| May 24, 2006 | Wednesday | Rabi-us-Sani 25, 1427 |
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‘A mini-civil war in India’
Nehru’s double standards
Karzai’s allegation
Dental college hardships
‘Power and politics’
KG’s car parking dilemma
Searching for friends
The whole truth
Grievances of pensioners
DISCUSSIONS following the letter “Inefficient power plants” (May 14) have highlighted our serious energy challenge. We seem to be doing nothing to solve the basic problem, yet we just do not have enough resources to continue with our present wasteful ways.
The main culprits of enormous waste are possibly the following:
1. Industrial power plants and boilers: Low efficiency power plants and conventional boilers really take the cake. It is now generally agreed even by sceptics that the industries cannot afford inefficient processes due to the high (and rising) costs of natural gas. A change of directives will not solve this serious issue as witnessed in instances in which special approval for cogeneration was taken for gas sanction and then all commitment of energy efficiency was forgotten.
2. Utility power plants: When the government ‘sanctioned’ use of our precious natural gas to the most inefficient KESC power plant at Bin Qasim, without asking for timetable to convert these atrocious power plants to combined cycle high efficiency type, we could only look on helplessly. It is unfortunate that not even the Electric Power Regulating Authority intervenes in such suicidal acts. But then, what can we expect from our regulating authority if they approve the most inefficient combined cycle power plant in Karachi (only 44 per cent efficient versus standard design with 30 per cent higher efficiency) or approve a new power plant at nearly 10 cent per kWH (wind power)?
3. Large commercial buildings: We are now facing an ‘avalanche’ of centrally airconditioned buildings which we simply cannot afford to operate and maintain. Most of these buildings are built with no energy efficiency code into consideration and with most inefficient electrical and mechanical (airconditioning) systems and, obviously, no building approval authority has any knowledge of, or concern for, actual energy usage.
The whole world has been ensuring ‘greening’ of buildings, specially for the last 10 or so years and we are actually encouraging inefficient buildings which consume enormous energy (both electrical and natural gas for airconditioning).
Even if we had ensured action on the Pakistan building code (finalised by the ministry of housing and works some 18 years back), we would have now conserved considerable amount of energy, being wasted at the cost of national progress and prosperity.
It is unfortunate that in the present energy challenge, one just does not hear of any attempt to conserve energy. Whether it is transportation or industrial processes or personal comfort, we are totally lost. Big cars, buses and trucks move at high speeds (most inefficient modes), we witness wasteful industrial processes (specially for production of steam and hot water) and set the most ludicrous low-temperature for airconditioners.
A sensible energy policy is urgently needed, similar to the one promoted in the US by President Carter many years ago. His policy limited high speeds on highways, enforced cogeneration for industrial steam generation and airconditioning and room temperature setting not below 24 degrees centigrade.
It is time we took action to save the country from the oncoming energy crisis. Conservation is the only option and it must be ensured at the highest level.
AINUL ABEDIN
Karachi
SAYEED Hasan Khan ended his well-written article, ‘A mini- civil war in India’ (May 4), with the words of a former chief secretary of East Pakistan about the Tebhaga movement: “... the peasants, after all, ‘wanted only a third share of the crop they toiled to product.”
Jyoti Basu had first-hand experience of the movement, and wrote in his Memoirs (1999) that the Tebhaga movement was one of the proudest moments in the history of farmers’ movement in undivided Bengal. Our own senior historians would know that a lot of work has been done on agrarian structure and peasants’ struggle in Bengal during the first half of the last century by historians like Sunil Sen, Adrien Cooper and Sugata Bose.
The Communist Party of India organised this movement through Bengal Provincial Kisan Sabha. The demand of the Bengali farmer was that instead of sharing his crop with the zamindar on a 50-50 basis he should get two-thirds, and the zamindar one-third. The other demand was that the harvested paddy should, first, be stored in the farmer’s godown, and not in the zamindar’s godown from where the zamindar got ‘higher’ 50 per cent, and the farmer a ‘lower’ 50 per cent.
The movement was launched in September 1946, and covered most of the districts of the province. At that time, the Land and Revenue Commission (constituted in 1940 and commonly known as the Floud Commission) agreed with the farmer’s demand, and recommended that he should get two-thirds of the produce, which meant that he would not pay a half share of his crop to the zamindar. He would pay only one-third.
To implement this recommendation, Suhrawardy’s Muslim League government introduced Bengal Bargadars Bill in January 1947 in the provincial assembly, but it was not processed because of opposition from within the Muslim League and the Congress; and, according to Jyoti Basu, “Suhrawardy said that he did not know that he had ‘so many landlords’ in his party.”
Severe clashes between farmers and zamindars continued. The police were more ruthless and brutal in suppressing the peasants — according to Sunil Sen, 49 farmers were killed; Jyoti Basu estimated 70. Surprisingly, the conservative Statesman carried pro-movement stories and articles.
It was in 1950 that the West Bengal government passed an Act incorporating the provision that the farmer’s share of the harvested crop would be two-thirds. To put it briefly, in the Tebhaga movement, the peasants did not want “only a third share of the crop they toiled to produce,” as claimed by the chief secretary (who had also served in the Tebhaga-affected district of Mymensingh). They wanted two-thirds, and they got it, though belatedly.
MAH
Islamabad
THE double standards applied to various issues by the first Indian prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, were revealed by a number of incidents. One of them, which was quite amusing, pertains to an Indian dispute with Ceylon (Sri Lanka).
According to the ‘50 Years Ago Today’ column of Dawn, the then prime minister of Ceylon, Mr Bandaranaike, rejected Pandit Nehru’s suggestion that differences in the interpretation of Indo-Ceylon agreement on citizenship of Bharatis (Indians) in Ceylon be referred to arbitration. Mr Bandaranaike said he expected Pandit Nehru to appreciate the refusal in the light of his own attitude towards Kashmir (Dawn, May 11).
In 1956 diplomatic circles in New Delhi pointed out that Pakistan’s suggestion that differences in interpretation of UNCIP resolutions regarding the preliminaries to holding of a plebiscite in Kashmir be referred to arbitration was rejected by Pandit Nehru. However, when it came to differences in Bharat-Ceylon agreement, he wanted an arbitration, which was analogous to the other case.
Those circles considered it a fitting rebuke that his suggestion was turned down by the Ceylon premier and the rejection was accompanied by a reminder to the Indian prime minister that he had done the same with regard to Pakistan’s proposition about Kashmir.
Apart from that, India had annexed the state of Hyderabad during Nehru’s reign under the pretext that the majority of its population was Hindu, even though its ruler, the Nizam, was a Muslim. However, when it came to Kashmir that had a Muslim majority but a Hindu ruler, the premier did not apply the same principle.
The noted British philosopher and peace activist Bertrand Russell had also accused India of using double standards with respect to the Kashmir and Nagaland problems. Our rulers who appear to be bending backwards and making unilateral concessions to India, in the hope it would start negotiating seriously about resolving the Kashmir issue, should learn a lesson from the attitude of Mr Nehru.
SALAHUDDIN KARIM
Karachi
FOLLOWING the Taliban’s storming of a town, Afghan President Hamid Karzai pointed the finger, as usual, at Pakistan. This time he crossed previous limits by explicitly saying: “Pakistani intelligence gives military training to people and then sends (them) to Afghanistan with logistics” (May 19).
This is ludicrous. Mr Karzai must be well aware that Pakistan is itself fighting Al Qaeda operatives and Taliban in Waziristan and other areas adjoining Afghanistan. Does he mean to say that the Pakistani forces are first training these militants and then fighting them, during the course of which more of our troops have lost their lives than the western and Afghan forces combating them across the border? They have been attacking our military posts and convoys and have also killed many pro- government tribal leaders, which proves Pakistan is not patronising them.
He must realise that even the US, given its vast financial and technological resources is unable to seal its borders with Mexico to prevent illegal immigration. As a result of this, millions of undocumented migrants have flooded America. Similarly, India, with its 700,000 troops in held Kashmir and a high-tech fence on the LoC, claims traffic of militants across it.
Peace in Afghanistan is in that country’s own interest because of the planned TAP gas pipeline, transmission of electricity from Central Asian Republics and for many other projects.
Given the bonds of kinship present across the Durand Line and the forbidding mountainous terrain, it is unreasonable for the Afghans or anybody else to expect Pakistan to completely prevent the Taliban (or the local populace) from moving across.
ADIL ABDULLAH
Karachi
MY son is currently a dental student at Fatima Jinnah College. I am writing to express my disgust with the college administration for demanding an extra allotment of Rs100,000 as they feel “burdened with unforeseen costs and hidden expenses”. This is in addition to Rs700,000 which has been paid since July last year, although he still has a full year to graduate.
This litany of concern is not meant to be discouraging, but rather to remind us that we continue to face difficult choices among competing priorities. We shall not bend over the private educational institution’s voracious financial requirements to extract our hard-earned money.
As a concerned parent, I urge the education commission to take appropriate action to help students against such potentially devastating tuition increases that could undermine the credibility and mission of the college.
AN AFFECTED FATHER
Karachi
THIS has reference to Mr Irfan Husain’s article ‘Power and politics’ (May 13). Growing up in Pakistan you hear about the excesses of our politicians on a daily basis and you somehow get used to it and sadly immune to it. As a common citizen trying to make end’s meet, you really don’t have time to waste on getting frustrated about something you have so little control over.
I suppose, as a result of such frustrations, you feel the need to leave the country so that you can try to make your life a little better and also help your family in the process, even though leaving your friends and family for a strange land thousands of miles away is not totally desirable but the extent of your frustration is such that you are somehow compelled to leave all that you are familiar and comfortable with in the hope that the unknown shores somewhere in the West will improve your life and that of your loved ones.
Sadly, as with everything else, in life your dreams rarely match reality. So you leave Pakistan, you’re a stranger in a strange land, totally overwhelmed by your new situation and miserably homesick. Those things that irritated you about your brother or sister seem so endearing and make your heart break even more. The land that you left because you thought you could’nt make anything of yourself there starts to feel not so bad anymore. And all this while you’re still getting up every day trying to find some work that will help you get by till you can find something that is halfway decent, something that you don’t feel ashamed of telling your family back home about.
If you’re one of the lucky ones who have come to the United States or Europe legally, then that’s a great plus but if you happen to be one of the countless thousands who’ve come to these distant shores by some desperate ‘illegal’ means only to improve your life, then all the above mentioned stresses are compounded by the constant fear of being picked up in some ‘security’ sweep or being told on by an employer who knows that you’ll work for slave wages only because if you were to demand something more you could be on your next flight out of the land of opportunity.
With all this going on, one fine morning you read a column in you friendly Dawn Internet edition about the excesses of the ruling class in Pakistan. The same old corruption, the same old abuse of power, the same old disregard for the poor and desperate millions, the same old decay of institutions of state, the same old rule of might is right, so on and so forth. And with that the desire to go back to Pakistan, to go back to your loved ones who you so desperately miss just dies down a bit since you are so painfully reminded of the reasons you left Pakistan in the first place.
As an expatriate in the US going through all this I ask myself: ”Will it ever change? Will the culture of total disregard for the people of our country by the ruling class ever change? Will the pathological desire to loot as much of the national wealth ever change? Will the propensity to abuse one’s power to enrich oneself at the expense of all others ever change?“
Unfortunately the answer to all the above is a disappointing ‘no’. And that being the case, people like myself who are strangers in a strange land will continue to hope that perhaps one day a column will be written that describes how things have changed in Pakistan. Perhaps that one done, long from now, this Pakistani will be able to go back to the land and family that I miss so dearly every day, of every week of every year.
Adnan Khan
Pensacola, Florida USA
WITH reference to the news item appearing on Dawn’s sports pages (May 11), I was pained to see Karachi Gymkhana Club affairs being debated in public. Having said that, neither the club’s cricket ground nor the club’s tennis courts are appropriate locations for the construction of an underground car park. The horrendous inconvenience this construction process will entail the neighbours and its own membership cannot be imagined.
It would make much more sense for the Sindh Governor to relinquish a strip of the Governor’s House land for the said purpose. After all, the Karachi Gymkhana is a primary neighbour of the Governor’s House, sharing a very long length of common boundary wall. All that is needed is for this boundary wall to be moved by about 100 feet in favour of the Karachi Gymkhana, and the entire issue of parking thrown up by the Club Road being declared a ‘no parking zone’ will be resolved.
The members of the Gymkhana number in the thousands, and each one is making an extremely valuable contribution to the progress and prosperity of Karachi, and indeed that of Pakistan. They deserve, indeed require, the rest and recreation provided by the club to continue as meaningful taxpayers. Such a gesture by the governor will truly establish an enabling environment for a sizable cross-section of the business community, and establish a positive perception of the government as being citizen-friendly.
Adil Ahmad
Karachi
I WOULD like to contact a Pakistani family we had befriended during our stay in Orlando, USA, between 1996 and 1998. Our friends are Javed Dangra and his wife Seema who have two young sons. We lost contact with them after they returned to Pakistan and we to our native South Africa.
IMTIAZ JAGOT
Durban, South Africa
Right about the time when the president was hovering above Karachi in his camouflage helicopter, the lights went out in my flat.
I wondered if I could shout out to him and tell him of our predicament. But then I realised he won’t be able to hear me, what with the noise of the rotors and the voices of his ministers who still have the audacity to say there is no loadshedding in Karachi. I hope the president reads this and realises that there is in fact loadshedding in Karachi.
RAVEZ JUNEJO
Karachi
IT will be recalled that in last year’s budget a meagre increase of 10 per cent was given to pensioners while the salary of government servants was increased by 15 to 20 per cent. It may be mentioned in this context that besides allowances/perks the government employees get a fixed and substantial amount as annual increment which to a reasonable extent helps ward off the effect of soaring prices.
But pensioners have to survive on paltry increases, which are sometimes as low as five per cent. The prices of daily necessities of life are constantly rising while the government machinery seems to have failed to control this monster. The repeated increase in POL is the sole contributory factor that radiates its negative effect as the prices of consumer goods and eatables automatically escalate. This chaotic economic situation badly affects the fixed salaried persons in general and pensioners in particular.
When talking about the woes of pensioners it is pertinent to point out that the specified period for restoration of the 50 per cent surrendered portion of pension, which was stretched from 10 years to 15 years, is another crucial blow to retired people. The early restoration of half pension at the age of 70 years was a source of relief and financial support to the pensioners in their old age but there are very few pensioners who attain the age of 75 years.
As we usher in the new budget, I request the ministry of finance to consider this aspect of disparity to pensioners with a positive approach to redress their genuine difficulties. The government should devise a set policy whereby pension can be increased by at least 20 to 25 per cent on a yearly basis on the same analogy the government servants get the fixed annual increment. This will serve as a helpful measure for the pensioner and offset the impact of price-hike and growing inflation.
Z.A. ANSARI
Karachi
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