Why a ‘Black Act’ Needs To Go

By Patricia Mukhim
The debate on the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act has always been trapped in a binary of “for and against”. Army generals are pitted against those who live under the shadow of the Act in the Northeast and Jammu and Kashmir. Other Indians do not seem to want to engage in this problematic discourse. Those who believe the Act should be repealed and make their views public are termed “over-ground sympathisers of militant outfits”.

This is akin to the post-9/11 war cry from George Bush – those who are not with us (meaning, in attacking Iraq) are against us. Bleeding heart patriots like Arun Jaitley believe the Act should remain in all “disturbed” areas because to withdraw it would be “political ingratitude”. Jaitley has not lost any family to the Act. He does not know the humiliation of a body search, or of his home being violated and members of his family being subjected to rough treatment “on mere suspicion”.

Army honchos argue till they are blue in the face that the AF(SP)A is meant to be used with responsibility. Was that not how the Prevention of Terrorism Act was meant to be used, too? But wasn’t it misused and abused?

Until it was thought fit to be reviewed? So why is the AF(SP)A sacrosanct? Let’s get real here. How can a force trained to be absolutely ruthless and unforgiving with the enemy be asked to tone down its muscle because they are fighting their own people?

This simply does not work! Let us also remind ourselves that the Act was first used in 1958 to quell what was at the time coined “Naga secessionism”. But today the Nagas are engaging with the government of India and have gradually toned down their demands for “sovereignty”.

Things on the ground have changed but our rulers desire to hang on to a colonial Act because they can’t think of a better way of tackling internal dissensions. Indeed, it is a national shame that a country with a 5,000-year-old civilisation, a country that has experienced the pangs of repressive foreign rule, a country that has produced a Gandhi for the world, should adopt a draconian colonial law to suppress its own people long after the colonial masters have left this soil. That its Army generals and the country’s defence minister should continue to defend the Act is, indeed, pathetic.

The AF(SP)A draws its lifeblood from the Rowlatt Act enacted by the Rowlatt Commission on 10 March 1919 to curb the seditious tendency of Indians. It allowed the then British government absolute power and authority to arrest people and keep them in prison without any trial if they were suspected of being terrorists. As can be expected, all movements aimed at ousting the British from India were termed “seditious” and freedom fighters were equated with terrorists despite Gandhi’s avowed path of non-violence. Naturally, this vicious piece of legislation earned the infamous nomenclature of a “Black Act” even while Indians across the country revolted in protest against it.

While the protests in Delhi were more subdued, in Amritsar the protesters became agitated because two front-ranking Congress leaders, Dr Satya Pal and Dr Saifuddin Kitchlew, were arrested and taken to an unknown destination (in the same way many Kashmiris are made to disappear). A public meeting at Jallianwala Bagh on 13 April 1919 was where the Rowlatt Act bared its fangs. A peaceful meeting attended by women and children was construed to be a conspiracy against the British. The infamous Brigadier-General Dyer entered the park, shut the gates to prevent people from exiting, and then ordered his troops to fire at the crowd. This lasted 10 minutes. Sixteen hundred rounds were fired indiscriminately. This horrific crime was committed on the plea that Indians had no right to protest, not even non-violently. The Jallianwala Bagh massacre claimed more than 1,000 lives and left at least 2,000 people injured.

In 1935, the Rowlatt Act and other repressive laws were sought to be diluted following largescale protests. But the Indian Freedom Movement had begun to gain momentum and the British sense of desperation was evident. To crush the 1942 Quit India Movement, the British enacted the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Ordinance, 1942.

British records reveal that this Ordinance was intended to be used as an instrument for furthering British imperialism. The AF(SP)A is simply a carbon copy of the 1942 British law and is as draconian and potent as the law enacted by an alien power. If the Act were effective, insurgency would have been contained only within the Naga Hills. The fact that it has replicated itself in nearly all the seven states tells us that the Act is a failure and needs to be reviewed immediately. State terror unleashed on the people of Nagaland in the late ’50s and early ’60s is, to the people of that state, no less traumatic than Hitler’s Auschwitz agenda. The largescale burning of Naga villages and crops and the brutality with which the men were handled and women raped is a saga that India should be ashamed of. The Nagas, after all, are as Indian as the soldiers who wreaked the utmost cruelty upon them.

This is where the AF(SP)A becomes indefensible. How can you have a law that allows an Indian Army NCO the right to shoot to kill based on mere suspicion and to claim that it is necessary to do so to “maintain public order”.

What makes the Act so offensive is that it gives such overriding powers to Armymen to shoot, arrest, search individuals and homes on mere suspicion and on the plea of “aiding the civil administration”. Over the years the AF(SP)A has been identified with arbitrary detention, torture, rape, looting by security personnel and, in the case of Jammu and Kashmir and Manipur, the unexplained disappearances of alleged terrorists or their relatives. Can an enlightened democracy such as ours continue to have such cruel laws in place without allowing for a review?

The standard argument trotted out by Army bigwigs is that extraordinary circumstances demand extraordinary laws. But insurgency in this country is old enough to have brought forth more creative ways of dealing with the issue and without the need to use the Army on a continued basis. The Army, as has been oft argued, is best left to deal with an external enemy. Let the soldiers reserve their brutality and sheer might to tackle India’s enemies, not other Indians.

The latest debate on the Act vis-à-vis Kashmir appears to be posited not so much on its repressive facets but on the political expediency to bail out Omar Abdullah. Why do so many hearts in Delhi beat with empathy for Kashmir while the voices in a region that has faced the worst brunt of the AF(SP)A are completely blacked out? And mind you, the North-east has shown by example that it has the strength of character to raise a non-violent protest against the Act in the person of Irom Sharmila, who completes her 10th year of fasting this November.
Does this count for nothing in the average Indian psyche? Do we want people in some parts of the country to live without some of the rights enshrined in the Constitution? Which is more sacrosanct – the AF(SP)A or the Constitution? Let us also not forget that there are other parts of this country that are as violence prone as the North-east and Jammu and Kashmir. So the Act truly has no legs to stand on!

The writer is editor, The Shillong Times, and can be contacted at patricia17@rediffmail.com
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Read full history - Why a ‘Black Act’ Needs To Go

Delhi Meet Backs Repeal of a ‘Holy Book’

By Yambem Laba

Organised under the banner of the North East India Women’s Initiative for Peace, it was slated as a “high profile meet on the AF(SP)A” and it took place on 8 September 2010 at the India International Centre, New Delhi. According to Binalakshmi Nepram, conference organiser, “the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act has entered its 52nd year of implementation. Government panels, the United Nations and hundreds of civil society organisations across India have called for its repeal, but the issue continues to remain deadlocked”. Activists, scholars, soldiers and policemen attended and drew parallels between the North-east experience and that of Kashmir.

It all began on a very solemn note, with Sinam Chandrajini Devi lighting the inaugural lamp. Tears rolling down her cheeks, she recollected how two of her sons were shot dead by the Assam Rifles on the afternoon of 1 November 2000 at Malom along with eight others. The screen behind her, showing her younger son receiving the National Child’s Bravery Award from Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and being feted by President R Venkataraman, added to the poignancy. In fact, it was the Malom massacre that prompted human rights crusader Irom Chanu Sharmila to embark on her fast to death, calling for the Act’s repealment. Her protest has entered the 10th year.

Thokchom Meinya Singh, Congress Lok Sabha member from Manipur, minced no words when he said the Act must go in its totality. He said that in spite of it being enforced in Manipur for nearly 50 years now, the number of insurgent groups had increased from one in 1958 to more than 40 now, rendering the Act redundant. He also cited how the Administrative Reforms Commission headed by current Union law minister Veerapa Moily, the Hamid Ansari-led Working Group on Kashmir and the Justice Jeevan Reddy Commission initiated by the Prime Minister had all recommended the Act’s repeal. He also reiterated that “this is a colonial act and we do not require it” and lamented the fact that although Parliament repealed Pota, it retained the AF(SP)A.

This writer, in his address, spoke of the history of the Act beginning from 1942 when then India Viceroy Lord Linlithgow signed the Armed Forces Special Powers Ordinance whereby officers of the rank of captain and above, of the then British Indian Army, were given powers to shoot to kill with no questions asked. It had taken the British some 84 years of misrule to employ such draconian measures whereas the Indian Republic had taken only eight years to do the same, with Parliament enacting the AF(SP)A 1958 and the powers hitherto given to captains and above were now given to havildars and above. Such powers were not given to personnel of the white regime in apartheid South Africa or even in neigbouring Pakistan during its days of military rule, he added. He also recalled how he was arrested by the Assam Rifles despite being a member of the Manipur Human Rights Commission, with an Army officer telling him that “he does not recognise the Governor of Manipur” when shown the Warrant of Appointment confirming the membership. He also related how he and a group of other activists had, for the first time in 1980, challenged the AF(SP)A in the Supreme Court and had to wait 17 years for the apex court to pass its verdict.

Sanjoy Hazarika, who was also a member of the Justice Jeevan Reddy Committee, said that “there is nothing afresh that we can say about the AF(SP)A, the story is unending and the tragedy is still going on”. He added that the daily killings in Srinagar was a dilemma between civil liberties and the right of the state. He told the gathering of a Union home ministry “cabinet note” that had not been put up to the cabinet because of pressure from the Army. “Who runs the place in these parts of the country – is it the Army or the civil authorities?” he asked.

Meenakshi Ganguly, South Asia director of Human Rights Watch, countered the theory that repealment of this Act would enhance anti-national elements and the Army would then have to be deployed to meet a political situation. The Act, she said, could not be amended but had to be repealed. “There is a woman who has been on a hunger-strike for 10 years and there are kids screaming in Kashmir because their parents have been killed.”

Yaruigam, a Naga academician from Manipur who teaches at Delhi University, spoke of the collusion of three entities behind the continued existence of the Disturbed Area status — politicians, bureaucrats and the underground. It was the interplay of these three elements that was behind the mess, and not the Army, per se, he said.

Ram Mohon, former BSF Director-General and advisor to the Manipur governor in 2001, said the Act in itself was not draconian but it was the leadership at the ground level that mattered most. He cited the case of Lt-General VK Nayar (retd) who later became one of Manipur’s most popular governors, who, during his earlier stint as GOC of the 8-Mountain Division, while combating the PLA and Prepak in the Manipur Valley, did not experience single complaint of human rights abuse being levelled against his troops. He then mentioned the Tonsem Lamkhai massacre in 2002 when a CRPF patrol was ambushed and seven personnel and a militant were killed. Half an hour later, the CRPF fired at a bus carrying polling personnel who had arrived on the scene and seven civilians were killed. It was the lack of leadership amongst the CRPF troops that made them resort to killing, and not the Act, Ram Mohon said.

General BS Malik, president of the Control Arms Foundation of India, said that “if you have been just at war or insurgency — then no harm can come to you”, and added that the “Tughlaqs of Kashmir and the Northeast sitting in the airconditioned comforts of Delhi would lead to the collapse of the Indian Republic in those regions”.

General-secretary of the People’s Union for Civil Liberties Pushkar Raj said that history proved that draconian laws could not quell public-based insurgency and cited how the success in Punjab, which was a pseudo insurgency, gave a kind of confidence to the Indian state. The same could be applied to the rest of the country.

On the question of Kashmir, Raj said New Delhi could have solved the problem in 1953, ’54 and ’55 but did not and now, in 2010, the situation was different. The AF(SP)A was a trigger-happy law, he added. How else could one explain children between 14-18 years taking to the streets to defy the Indian state, he asked. The question, he added, was now of national security versus human security; the latter was real while the former was illusionary.

Iftikar Gilani, editor of the Kashmir Times, presented the Kashmiri perspective of the AF(SP)A. He said that under the Act anyone with a uniform was an angel who could do no wrong. He recollected how the BSF had, in 1993, “roasted” 62 people alive in Sopore, and though a judicial commission inquiry followed, nothing came of it. He also cited the case of a Major Avtar Singh of 35 Rashtriya Rifles who, after killing a fellow officer, had fled to Canada and although the CBI had been requested to put out a “red corner” notice for him, this had not been done as yet. Gilani also said that “national security” was a much-abused term and likened it to a holy cow, citing how, in 2002, he had been arrested in the “national interest” and later released in the “public interest”. This gap between national and public interest was widening by the day, he said.

Siddharath Varadaranjan, chief of the national bureau of The Hindu, recalled how he had to leak the Justice Jeevan Reddy Committee report after it lay rotting in the Union home ministry after it had been submitted because the defence ministry and the military top brass had objected to it. He also spoke of how, in the post-Jammu and Kashmir scenario, both the Prime Minister and the home minister needed to take another look into the Act. He also noted how the Army chief had said the entire move against the AF(SP)A was political and how Lt-General Jaiswal had spoked of the Act as the Army’s “holy book”. Other speakers included Anjuman Ara Begum, who spoke on the Assamese experience; Zothanpari, who recalled the Mizoram experience; Ravinder Pal Singh, defence analyst; Lourenbam Ngangbi; and KS Subramanian, a retired IPS officer.

The meeting adopted the resolution that the Act should be repealed in its entirety.

The writer is a former Imphal-based Special Correspondent of The Statesman

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Hams & Scams And Dubious Deals

By JB Lama

A recent report says corrupt Indian politicians and corporate officers have siphoned off public money worth $12.3 billion between 2000-08.

According to Kordy Cuscio, a junior economist with Global Financial Integrity (Washington), “corruption is rampant in India as in almost all developing countries... as the economy grows so do illicit flows.

This positive correlation exhibits the increasing incentive to conduct illicit flows mostly because money is flowing within the system to steal away…”

This rings true particularly for the Northeast, where the Centre has been generously pumping in funds for its development in the absence of commensurate results.

Politicians and bureaucrats of the region have long ceased to be the paragons of simplicity and honesty they were before the creation of new states, beginning with Nagaland in 1963.

Scams were unheard of then, but since the ’80s there has been any amount of diddling, with that all-too-familiar ring of ministers and officials being involved. Needless to say, they must have had good tutors from outside.

In Assam, it was the veterinary Letter of Credit scandal in which Rs 175 crore was fraudulently drawn from the state treasury between 1989-93. In Manipur, fraud in the power department came to light when Rishang Keishing was chief minister.

Earlier, a “chota Harshad Mehta”, as our Imphal correspondent described him, tried to swindle a cooperative bank of  Rs 2 crore. Former Arunachal Pradesh chief minister Gegong Apang was allegedly involved in a Rs 124-crore power department scam. Meghalaya was rocked by a Rs 50-crore rural electrification scandal. There was yet another Rs 294-crore forest racket.

The Meghalaya Forest Corporation  allegedly sold  1,777 teak and sal trees for just Rs 67.85 lakh when the market value was more than Rs 2 crore. About 120,000 valuable trees reportedly disappeared from the Chimabangnshi reserved forest in the Garo Hills, the explanation being that these were “uprooted by storms”.

The disease has also percolated to autonomous bodies run by tribals. There are reports of some of them openly cultivating insurgency with the help of funds allocated for economic development. Last year, the newly-formed National Investigation Agency brought to light politicians being hand in glove with the Jewel Garlosa faction of the Dima Halam Daoga in Assam’s North Cachar Hills district. It has allegedly been procuring arms with money supplied by the council. Its chief executive is under arrest.

In 2008, the Justice RK Manisana Commission that probed the alleged misappropriation of funds by the North Cachar Hills Autonomous District Council said there was an understanding among politicians before the 2007 council elections to pay a certain amount to a rebel group. There are allegations that one of the ministers in the Tarun Gogoi government is involved in the Rs 1,000-crore scam. An NGO, Krishak Mukti Sangram Samity, has called for a  CBI probe and the Centre, too, is said to be in favour of this inquiry. Hopefully Dispur will act.

In October last year, Niranjan Hojai, commander-in-chief of the Jewel Garlosa faction, formally surrendered to the authorities with 460 others in the aftermath of their chief’s arrest in June last year from Bangalore. But after a month, he disappeared from the designated camp and was arrested in July this year from near the Indo-Nepalese border. How he escaped from the designated camp was puzzling. Could it have been a deliberate act, given that he is said to be in the know about the extent of the politician-rebel nexus in the council? Last year when the Army went into action in the North Cachar Hills, the intelligence  network did not even know that Jewel Garlosa was holidaying in Kathmandu.

Chief minister Tarun Gogoi has promised to not only resign but even quit politics if the charges against his minister is proved correct. Hopefully, the truth will be not be a long time coming.

Read full history - Hams & Scams And Dubious Deals

'Power is Needed, But at What Cost?'

By Kunal Majumder

On one hand I constantly need to mobilise power in the face of a demand growth explosion in my State - on the other hand I cannot turn blind eyes to the other side of development problems.

With around 160 hydel power projects planned on Brahmaputra, there is a need for a holistic environment assessment by Pradyut Bordoloi, Power Minister, Assam As a power minister in the state of Assam - I probably have practically understood the meaning of a bipolar syndrome.

On one hand I constantly need to mobilize power in the face of a demand growth explosion in my State - on the other hand I cannot turn blind eyes to the other side of development problems. How does one not get worried knowing that nobody is seriously studying the ramification of allowing reckless construction of river dams in the upper reaches of the Brahmaputra water system.

The Central Electricity Authority (CEA) has apparently identified as many as 160 assorted hydal power projects to be put up in the highlands of Arunachal Pradesh without carrying out a holistic study. Hydel power projects like the one on Lower Subansiri River will enable us to get 600 megawatt power from 2012. At the moment, Assam has a deficit of 300 megawatt, which will grow every year.

But when you look at the gamut of sanctioning projects in totality, you realize that there are several lacunas in the system of allotting power projects in a remote area. Environment and Forest ministry carries out an Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) study for every single project. Usually a small group of experts would fly down from Delhi, Mumbai or Kolkata to a location in the North East for EIA study.

They stay for a night in a hotel in Gauhati, or in a nearest urban centre. Maybe the entity, which is going to promote this power project, would have a helicopter commissioned for such a study. They will fly around the zone; they will have an aerial view of the proposed site.

Then they will get back to Delhi and they will file their EIA, which may not see all dimensions of an environmental impact. An individual EIA will cover only 20-25 km radius of that project site. But has anybody imagined what would be the cumulative effect of 160 hydel power projects in the region? Twenty years from now when 160 power projects in various capacities are ready, what will be the combined adverse effects on a downstream state like Assam? This is one point that gets us worried.

That's why the government of Assam, despite my being a power minister, we have raised this issue again and again in different forums. What we keep saying is that before the CEA (the Central Electricity Authority) allows anybody whether it is a government or a private entity to put up any hydel project in the highlands, a comprehensive EIA should be carried out to see dimensions of the cumulative effects in the entire area.

Once you carry out the comprehensive study, you should identify which part of the highlands would be safe, where probably the downstream adverse affect will be minimal and where probably you can take some redressal measures. Arunachal Pradesh government is apparently signing MoUs with all sorts of fly-by-night operators. Prospectors are pouring in, paying upfront value and sign MoUs. All these private players may not have any accountability; they do not care about the environmental affect in the downstream areas. It is very dangerous to allow reckless construction of river dams in the upper reaches of Brahmaputra, without having a roadmap determined by the appropriate authorities - be it the power ministry or central water commission or central electricity authority. And the problem is, when a power project is allowed, multiple agencies are involved.

The left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing. There is hardly any coordination. Everybody is doing his or her own job, but hardly any cohesive approach is taken to monitor in a holistic manner. Because of our objection, an inter-ministerial group on this issue was formed. The group has recommended that a study on Brahmaputra basin be carried out. But unfortunately they are not doing anything.

Arunachal Pradesh thinks if these projects come up, they would become the richest state in the country. They might not have any concern for the people of Assam who live in the downstream areas. If you ignore all these environment issues, it will bring catastrophe in the future. At the same time I have seen there are certain groups who are totally against dams or any kind of developmental activities.

All these groups have converged in Assam and are spreading lot of disinformation while the Central government puts everything in a cold storage. I think there should be a generated condition for an informed rational decision. We should not let anti-developmental people spread all sorts of misinformation and corrupt the minds of the people of Assam. We are not against river projects, but we have to know for sure that the places where the dams will be put up are safe and that adverse downstream effects can be properly addressed.

There is also concern about dams being built in highly seismic region around the foothills of Himalayas. In 1950, great earthquake of Assam actually changed the entire topography of the area. Brahmaputra changed its course; it's been flooding the plains of Assam every year since then. Coincidently the very dam of Lower Subansiri project currently being developed by NHPC is located on the fault line of the great earthquake of 1950. God forbids if there is an earthquake of 8.5 Richter scale again, it would be a disaster - at least that is what the people of Assam shudder to think. I

'm not guided by any kind of biased views, but if somebody's raising an issue that has to be addressed by appropriate authority. In today's world there is technology to take care of structure even in earthquake prone areas. You have to tell the people of Assam that an appropriate technology is being used and the dam is going to be safe.

That has to be told to people or else they are becoming victims of frightening misinformation. They are being constantly told that river dams are like huge 'water bombs'. Unfortunately even the main opposition Asom Gana Parishad has changed its tune. Consistently, the party had demanded big dams in the state for long 25 years.

With the elections approaching, they are now making a U Turn on dams on one up-manship contest against dams. We have to create condition for debate and discussion on river dams. Let people be told that appropriate technology is being used and that Central Government is very sensitive to these issues - that we are in safe hands. Before that the question that will continue to haunt us in Assam is 'hydal power at what cost'?

**kunal@tehelka.com

Read full history - 'Power is Needed, But at What Cost?'

Dilemma of a Seminarist

By Patricia Mukhim

A seminar in Guwahati: Mumbo jumbo?

Northeast India was introduced to the seminar culture in the early eighties. At the time, seminars were the preserve of the academia and intellectual circuits. Today, all colleges are expected to hold regular seminars if they are to be accredited grades by the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC).

NAAC is an autonomous body funded by the University Grants Commission (UGC) to — A, B or C. The NAAC uses seven criteria as their measurement tools. Seminars perhaps fall under the category of research, consultancy and extension. For colleges and universities, seminars are also part of a continuous learning process without which existing views are not critiqued and new ones do not germinate.

Interestingly, seminars have spilt over into other non-academic domains and have now almost a cult following among NGOs, governments and quasi-government institutions.

A quick research reveals that the word “seminar” has its basis in the Latin word for “seed”. It was originally a meeting of scholars for sharing and nurturing the kernel of ideas and then challenging the human intellect to find out better ideas. In a seminar all participants are meant to be on an equal footing.

Everyone’s opinion counts. It is a process of interaction where people learn from one another and where even the most simplistic of views is treated with equal respect as the mumbo-jumbo spouted by so-called scholars.

No one comes to a seminar to simply “listen”, but to engage with the topic under discussion. Hence, it is important to read up the concept note before one agrees to participate in a seminar, rather than be a blank slate where everyone leaves cruel verbal and verbose footprints. As somebody has rightly remarked, the point of a seminar is less to teach and more to share views. In India, we have the ugly habit of inviting some (un)worthy (politician or celebrity) to inaugurate a seminar. This officious ceremony is boring and unnecessary.

It often cuts into the time of the real seminar. Sometimes you wonder why the seminarists even have to listen to people who are themselves the cause of all problems and who after mumbling words of wisdom leave the hall and also the attendees totally flummoxed.

Fact & fiction

There are types and types of seminars. In half a century of existence on this earth one has had occasion to attend all types. Seminars come under various names and guises. Some are so convoluted that you do not even know whether you understand what you are being asked to speak. I have noticed that at such times, the truly learned come up with the most basic points intelligible to all (laypersons, non-academic types) except perhaps to the author of the mind-boggling theme.

Some themes are pretty much like recycled plastic. If you are in the Northeast then the regular topics are peace, conflict, governance, ethnicity, the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, influx from Bangladesh and the like.

But there are other themes which are flagged by international donors which also have to be taken up. They include gender, women and land rights, women’s access to natural resources, child labour, trafficking of women and children, culture and self-governance, among others.

The problem with being an NGO is that you have to have a problem to survive in a cut-throat world. If you do not pose a societal problem, you do not get funds. So as far as NGOs are concerned, problems are never meant to be solved. This basically means continued employment for the project staff. Hence, the issue of HIV/AIDS seems to exacerbate after every intervention. Similarly, the number of trafficked women and children appears to grow exponentially every year. The more the theme is beaten to death the more people seem to want to be trafficked.

Recently, a Shillong-based NGO came up with a fantastic figure of 70,000 child labourers working in the coal mines of Jaintia Hills alone. The NGO claimed to have studied working conditions in 900 out of the 5,000 or more mines in the district and since they found four or five children working in each mine, they extrapolated the figures. Now none of us would really have the time to double-check on the facts and figures presented to an international audience which is ready to lap up such problems because they need to spend the money they have within a particular period. That is how NGOs survive their lies and turn fiction into fact so glibly.

Tehelka picked up the child labour story and raised a stink. Meghalaya is now notorious for child labour and trafficking. Obviously, the NGO that brought out the figure will be wooed by child rights activists across the world. Funnily, the Meghalaya government did a similar survey and found only 270 child labourers in the same area. So who is lying here? We will need a heavily funded seminar to arrive at the truth, I guess.

Waste of money

Recently, the government of Manipur organised a seminar on Peace Dividends — The Way Forward. This is the second seminar on the theme this year, maybe with a slight tilt towards governance and development gaps.

The seminar held in Imphal saw some leading Naga intellectuals and peace workers in attendance. To the serious minded, the fact that the Nagas deigned to attend and engage with an issue that has been baffling the two states for a quarter of a century should count for something. But as usual, chief minister Ibobi Singh — who inaugurated the meet — shamelessly encroached into the real seminar time.

Paper presenters were told to quickly condense a 20-minute presentation to 10 minutes. If only it was so easy to encapsulate a 63-year-old problem into a countdown of 10 minutes, then all the problems of the world would have been solved.

But such seminars are probably just talking shops. They only help the organisers get a good annual confidential report (ACR). There is no serious follow-up and no consolidation of ideas for forward and backward linkages.

The next seminar will also predictably start from scratch. The same people who attended the first seminar will reshuffle their ideas and recast a few points and make a presentation to a disinterested audience. I have noticed that few people have any interest in what others do. They are engrossed in their own presentation and consider that the only gem of wisdom.

Hence, seminars are a waste of public money that could be better utilised to make a difference to some lives somewhere. Contrast this to seminars organised by groups abroad (this is not to certify that everything foreign is good, but some things are).

There are no pre-seminar ceremonies. The organisers just outline the theme and the expected objectives. Time is managed to the dot. Following the seminar there are repeated emails to discuss, debate and mull over the issues raised. Countrywise groups are formed to address problems at the country or state level to finally arrive at a point where we can push for policy changes. This is the real purpose of a seminar.

But who cares? After all, as some wit remarked, the NGO and seminar circuit is itself one big racket. Few will disagree with this acerbic, tongue-in-cheek comment.

(The writer can be contacted at patricia17@rediffmail.com)

Read full history - Dilemma of a Seminarist

The Dubious Korean Connection

By Prasenjit Biswas

The Northeast’s extant form of globalization can be gauged from the forest of antennae and new satellite hook-ups that are exemplified by cable agents who popularize a channel such as Arirang TV.

What sets it apart from, say, Australian TV, Animal Planet or AXN, lies in the “cool” stuff it carries that affects both high and popular cultures in the region, especially Nagaland, Manipur valley and parts of Mizoram.

Even DD-I (the national channel) for the first time aired a Korean drama called Emperor of the Sea and then the MBC hit drama A Jewel in the Palace that had viewers glued to the screen.

DVD and CD shops in Nagaland and Manipur are priding themselves on their collections of Korean films, songs, information about everything Korea, starting from hairdos to Ginseng to cooking styles in mainland Korean households and restaurants.

Often the distinction between North and South is blurred in this craze for everything Korean. At the high table of tribal cultures in the Northeast, some recognize a kind of cultural and racial similarity between Korean and regional lifestyles as projected in some of the TV dramas and serials.

The archetypal Korean film or drama hero, who undergoes emotional ups and downs in the course of life-changing experiences and ends up in severe tragic flaws, fascinates the North-eastern psyche and generates instant identification.

One sees here a distinct and emergent pattern in accepting the Korean life-style which, going by Seoul standards, is in reality far too distant.

Yet in phantasmic and heroic performances, Korean small screen actors, the simplicity and soundness of Korean life, provides a catharsis to the drudgery of existence in the region.

The contrast of worldviews between Hindi pop and Korean sop lies in the latter’s instant appeal in developing experiential connections between producers and audiences across local and diasporic themes.

For example, a theme of the Korean TV show Men of the Bath House, written by Kim Soo Hyun, deals with very ordinary people who struggle in togetherness to keep alive the Confuscian value of sharing both joy and suffering in a common place, a bath house. It also recreates and reproduces the largely Asian cultural symbol of the “bath-house” prevalent from China to Japan that finds its echo in youth dormitories in Nagaland and Mizoram.

The culture of in-group decision-making and reverence for the most intelligent and diligent in a North-eastern tribal village find its more colorful parallel in the work of Lee Joo Hyun, Kim Hee Sun and others in Korean TV drama.

Like the story of how a rich grandmother drives out her granddaughter-in-law and ruins the life of her grandson, who, in turn, wrecks the lives of the women with whom he falls in love with. It evokes empathy for the “victim” as there is a submission of masculinity to the values of fidelity that still rules family life in Korea.

Apart from such TV shows, video parlors in Nagaland and Manipur find many takers for hit Korean films like My Sassy Girl, A Moment to Remember, Windstruck, My Wife is a Gangster, Silmido, Joint Security Area, Sex is Zero (a Korean version of American Pie), etc. Posters of Korean actors and actresses like Gweon Sang-woo, Cha Tae-hyun, Jeon Ji Hyun, Jung Da Bin and Song Seung Hun and many others adorn hostel rooms in colleges and universities. Even phraseology determined by Korean dialogue is frequently exchanged on the street and the youth often greet each other with anna saiyo (hello), sarange (I love you), watuke (what to do) and waju waju (yes, yes).

If this symbolizes South Korean up market stuff, North Korean imagery does not lag behind. In Kohima and Imphal, one comes across T-shirts embossed with portraits of President Kim Il Sung underscored by anti-American messages. One even hears talks of the Korean style of baking cakes during Christmas and how mouth-watering Korean bamboo shoots are.

Of course, one also knows the Koreans are not too fond of what the Nagas cherish – red chillis. But however much the Korean kitsch for satisfying a transnational palate is not really included in the North-east context, it has managed to evoke a taste for a decidedly curious reason in the region.

This rapid advance of Korean television might be enough to incense homegrown media circles – after all, how have Korean products acquired such popularity even without any direct cultural, linguistic or ethnic connections – but then there is the undoubted emergence of a “virtual neighborhood” between the Northeast and fellow Asian countries because of spaces having been electronically intervened.

These virtual neighborhoods bring home the taste of other cultures and promote an electronic reproduction of local cultures that purport to make survival possible. They surpass the spatial realm and sustain themselves by flooding the lived-in spaces of North-east tribes to exemplify the concept of connecting “distant shores”.

In analysis, the Koreanisation of the Northeast serves to point a finger at the forces that are at work in Nagaland and Manipur.

**The writer is associate professor, department of philosophy, North East Hill University, Shillong

Read full history - The Dubious Korean Connection

The Dubious Korean Connection

By Prasenjit Biswas

The Northeast’s extant form of globalization can be gauged from the forest of antennae and new satellite hook-ups that are exemplified by cable agents who popularize a channel such as Arirang TV.

What sets it apart from, say, Australian TV, Animal Planet or AXN, lies in the “cool” stuff it carries that affects both high and popular cultures in the region, especially Nagaland, Manipur valley and parts of Mizoram.

Even DD-I (the national channel) for the first time aired a Korean drama called Emperor of the Sea and then the MBC hit drama A Jewel in the Palace that had viewers glued to the screen.

DVD and CD shops in Nagaland and Manipur are priding themselves on their collections of Korean films, songs, information about everything Korea, starting from hairdos to Ginseng to cooking styles in mainland Korean households and restaurants.

Often the distinction between North and South is blurred in this craze for everything Korean. At the high table of tribal cultures in the Northeast, some recognize a kind of cultural and racial similarity between Korean and regional lifestyles as projected in some of the TV dramas and serials.

The archetypal Korean film or drama hero, who undergoes emotional ups and downs in the course of life-changing experiences and ends up in severe tragic flaws, fascinates the North-eastern psyche and generates instant identification.

One sees here a distinct and emergent pattern in accepting the Korean life-style which, going by Seoul standards, is in reality far too distant.

Yet in phantasmic and heroic performances, Korean small screen actors, the simplicity and soundness of Korean life, provides a catharsis to the drudgery of existence in the region.

The contrast of worldviews between Hindi pop and Korean sop lies in the latter’s instant appeal in developing experiential connections between producers and audiences across local and diasporic themes.

For example, a theme of the Korean TV show Men of the Bath House, written by Kim Soo Hyun, deals with very ordinary people who struggle in togetherness to keep alive the Confuscian value of sharing both joy and suffering in a common place, a bath house. It also recreates and reproduces the largely Asian cultural symbol of the “bath-house” prevalent from China to Japan that finds its echo in youth dormitories in Nagaland and Mizoram.

The culture of in-group decision-making and reverence for the most intelligent and diligent in a North-eastern tribal village find its more colorful parallel in the work of Lee Joo Hyun, Kim Hee Sun and others in Korean TV drama.

Like the story of how a rich grandmother drives out her granddaughter-in-law and ruins the life of her grandson, who, in turn, wrecks the lives of the women with whom he falls in love with. It evokes empathy for the “victim” as there is a submission of masculinity to the values of fidelity that still rules family life in Korea.

Apart from such TV shows, video parlors in Nagaland and Manipur find many takers for hit Korean films like My Sassy Girl, A Moment to Remember, Windstruck, My Wife is a Gangster, Silmido, Joint Security Area, Sex is Zero (a Korean version of American Pie), etc. Posters of Korean actors and actresses like Gweon Sang-woo, Cha Tae-hyun, Jeon Ji Hyun, Jung Da Bin and Song Seung Hun and many others adorn hostel rooms in colleges and universities. Even phraseology determined by Korean dialogue is frequently exchanged on the street and the youth often greet each other with anna saiyo (hello), sarange (I love you), watuke (what to do) and waju waju (yes, yes).

If this symbolizes South Korean up market stuff, North Korean imagery does not lag behind. In Kohima and Imphal, one comes across T-shirts embossed with portraits of President Kim Il Sung underscored by anti-American messages. One even hears talks of the Korean style of baking cakes during Christmas and how mouth-watering Korean bamboo shoots are.

Of course, one also knows the Koreans are not too fond of what the Nagas cherish – red chillis. But however much the Korean kitsch for satisfying a transnational palate is not really included in the North-east context, it has managed to evoke a taste for a decidedly curious reason in the region.

This rapid advance of Korean television might be enough to incense homegrown media circles – after all, how have Korean products acquired such popularity even without any direct cultural, linguistic or ethnic connections – but then there is the undoubted emergence of a “virtual neighborhood” between the Northeast and fellow Asian countries because of spaces having been electronically intervened.

These virtual neighborhoods bring home the taste of other cultures and promote an electronic reproduction of local cultures that purport to make survival possible. They surpass the spatial realm and sustain themselves by flooding the lived-in spaces of North-east tribes to exemplify the concept of connecting “distant shores”.

In analysis, the Koreanisation of the Northeast serves to point a finger at the forces that are at work in Nagaland and Manipur.

**The writer is associate professor, department of philosophy, North East Hill University, Shillong

Read full history - The Dubious Korean Connection

Time of The Essence For Naga Peace

By JB Lama

Into his second term in office, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is bent on finding a solution to the lingering Naga problem.

One might recall how, during Singh’s earlier tenure, the NSCN(IM) leadership had, in July 2004, told its cadres to be ready to leave their designated camps because it had refused to renew the ceasefire accord in protest against the UPA’s clause in its Common Minimum Programme ~ that boundaries of Northeast states would not be changed ~ that implied a rejection of the outfit’s demand for one administrative unit for Nagas. The UPA was then forced to drop the clause.

The Prime Minister started in earnest by inviting NSCN(IM) general secretary Thuingaleng Muivah to discuss the latter’s 30-point charter of demands submitted earlier that included sovereignty and a “Greater Nagaland”. In February this year Muivah met the Prime Minister and Union home minister P Chidambaram and later held talks with the Centre’s new interlocutor, RS Pandey, breaking a year’s silence.

The Centre submitted a comprehensive 29-point counter-proposal and both sides struck positive attitudes. Since then, talks have been held in fits and starts and whether there will be any breakthrough is anybody’s guess.

Some public utterances by Central leaders have been anything but conciliatory. At his first meeting with Muivah, Pandey reportedly told him there was little possibility of New Delhi ever agreeing to the “sovereignty” demand. Union home secretary GK Pillai has also made it known that “the territorial integrity of Manipur will not be disturbed under any circumstances”.

On 19 August 2010, Chidambaram told Parliament there was no question of  altering Manipur’s integrity and cited the pluralistic nature of Indian states. The Manipur-based United Naga Council, which enjoys NSCN(M) support, promptly asserted that Nagas in Manipur would decide their own future and Chidambaram had no say in this matter. Muivah, on his part, is not known to have reacted to this so far.

But last year when Chidambaram told the NSCN(IM) to present its proposals within the Constitution, that outfit described it as a total betrayal of the Nagas.

It recalled the commitments made by BJP Prime Minister AB Vajpayee, who took cognizance of the Nagas’ unique history and said this had to be taken into account while tackling the Indo-Naga political conflict.

The NSCN(IM) said Chidambaram’s utterances only reflected his immaturity and lack of understanding of the situation. What will follow is fairly obvious, with the outfit not ever likely to mellow.

This sticky point continues to be the drive behind the NSCN(IM)’s insistence on the integration of all Naga-inhabited areas. The Manipur government’s determination to not allow Muivah to visit his Somdal birthplace in Ukhrul district last May leaves no one in doubt that Manipuri's will never agree to losing any territory.

And last month when suspected NSCN(IM) cadres based in Arunachal Pradesh torched some huts in Assam’s Sivasagar district, the All Assam Students’ Union displayed exemplary unity with the state authorities to contain such mischief. This apart, a pro-talks Ulfa leader even offered the services of his cadres to fight the “border marauders”.

It is becoming increasingly clear that unless there is a serious quest for a compromise or face-saving formula, the cloud of uncertainty hanging over the 13-year-old Naga peace process is unlikely to dissipate. And the more time wasted, the more intractable the problem is likely to be.

Read full history - Time of The Essence For Naga Peace

Time of The Essence For Naga Peace

By JB Lama

Into his second term in office, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is bent on finding a solution to the lingering Naga problem.

One might recall how, during Singh’s earlier tenure, the NSCN(IM) leadership had, in July 2004, told its cadres to be ready to leave their designated camps because it had refused to renew the ceasefire accord in protest against the UPA’s clause in its Common Minimum Programme ~ that boundaries of Northeast states would not be changed ~ that implied a rejection of the outfit’s demand for one administrative unit for Nagas. The UPA was then forced to drop the clause.

The Prime Minister started in earnest by inviting NSCN(IM) general secretary Thuingaleng Muivah to discuss the latter’s 30-point charter of demands submitted earlier that included sovereignty and a “Greater Nagaland”. In February this year Muivah met the Prime Minister and Union home minister P Chidambaram and later held talks with the Centre’s new interlocutor, RS Pandey, breaking a year’s silence.

The Centre submitted a comprehensive 29-point counter-proposal and both sides struck positive attitudes. Since then, talks have been held in fits and starts and whether there will be any breakthrough is anybody’s guess.

Some public utterances by Central leaders have been anything but conciliatory. At his first meeting with Muivah, Pandey reportedly told him there was little possibility of New Delhi ever agreeing to the “sovereignty” demand. Union home secretary GK Pillai has also made it known that “the territorial integrity of Manipur will not be disturbed under any circumstances”.

On 19 August 2010, Chidambaram told Parliament there was no question of  altering Manipur’s integrity and cited the pluralistic nature of Indian states. The Manipur-based United Naga Council, which enjoys NSCN(M) support, promptly asserted that Nagas in Manipur would decide their own future and Chidambaram had no say in this matter. Muivah, on his part, is not known to have reacted to this so far.

But last year when Chidambaram told the NSCN(IM) to present its proposals within the Constitution, that outfit described it as a total betrayal of the Nagas.

It recalled the commitments made by BJP Prime Minister AB Vajpayee, who took cognizance of the Nagas’ unique history and said this had to be taken into account while tackling the Indo-Naga political conflict.

The NSCN(IM) said Chidambaram’s utterances only reflected his immaturity and lack of understanding of the situation. What will follow is fairly obvious, with the outfit not ever likely to mellow.

This sticky point continues to be the drive behind the NSCN(IM)’s insistence on the integration of all Naga-inhabited areas. The Manipur government’s determination to not allow Muivah to visit his Somdal birthplace in Ukhrul district last May leaves no one in doubt that Manipuri's will never agree to losing any territory.

And last month when suspected NSCN(IM) cadres based in Arunachal Pradesh torched some huts in Assam’s Sivasagar district, the All Assam Students’ Union displayed exemplary unity with the state authorities to contain such mischief. This apart, a pro-talks Ulfa leader even offered the services of his cadres to fight the “border marauders”.

It is becoming increasingly clear that unless there is a serious quest for a compromise or face-saving formula, the cloud of uncertainty hanging over the 13-year-old Naga peace process is unlikely to dissipate. And the more time wasted, the more intractable the problem is likely to be.

Read full history - Time of The Essence For Naga Peace

A Modest Proposal on AFSPA

By Siddharth Varadarajan

Change the blanket ban on trials without official sanction to one where the government has the power to bar prosecution in individual cases provided it satisfies the courts that its reasons for doing so are valid.

The Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act has come in for widespread criticism in Jammu and Kashmir, Manipur and other parts of the northeast because of the human rights abuses that have come to be associated with its operation. So strong is the sentiment against AFSPA in Kashmir that in recent months Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram and Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah have all spoken of the need to re-examine the law. The Army, on the other hand, says this is unnecessary.

The Army Chief, General V.K. Singh, has gone so far as to say that the demand for the dilution of AFSPA is being made for “narrow political gains.” On his part, Lt. Gen. B.S. Jaswal, GOC-in-C, Northern Command, has compared the Act to scripture. “I would like to say that the provisions of AFSPA are very pious to me and I think to the entire Indian Army. We have religious books, there are certain guidelines which are given there, but all the members of the religion do not follow it, they break it also … does it imply that you remove the religious book …?”

 Manipur Students of various organisations hold placards during a protest demonstration, demanding withdrawal of Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) from northeast and Kashmir, at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi on August 21, 2010. File Photo: S. Subramanium

On paper, AFSPA is a deceptively simple law. First passed in 1958, it comes into play when the government declares a particular part of the northeast (or Jammu and Kashmir under a parallel 1990 law) a “disturbed area.” Within that area, an officer of the armed forces has the power to “fire upon or otherwise use force, even to the causing of death, against any person who is acting in contravention of any law or order for the time being in force in the disturbed area prohibiting the assembly of five or more persons or the carrying of weapons or of things capable of being used as weapons or of fire-arms, ammunition or explosive substances.”

Even though activists have made this the focus of their criticism, giving soldiers the “right to kill” is not, in my opinion, AFSPA's principal flaw. After all, if a ‘law and order' situation has arisen which compels the government to deploy the Army, soldiers have to be allowed to use deadly force. Even a private citizen has the right to kill someone in self-defence, though the final word on the legality of her or his action belongs to the courts. Similarly, a civilised society expects that the use of deadly force by the Army must at all times be lawful, necessary and proportionate. Here, the Act suffers from two infirmities: the requirement of prior sanction for prosecution contained in Section 6 often comes in the way when questions arise about the lawfulness of particular actions. Second, AFSPA does not distinguish between a peaceful gathering of five or more persons (even if held in contravention of Section 144 of the Criminal Procedure Code) and a violent mob. Firing upon the latter may sometimes be justified by necessity; shooting into a peaceful assembly would surely fail any test of reasonableness.

Leaving this issue aside, however, it is important to recognise that AFSPA does not give an officer the unqualified right to fire upon and cause the death of any person in a Disturbed Area. At a minimum, that person should have been carrying weapons or explosives. The shooting of an unarmed individual, and the killing of a person in custody, are not acts that are permissible under AFSPA. Force is allowed in order to arrest a suspect but the fact that the Act authorises the use of “necessary” rather than “deadly” force in such a circumstance means the tests of necessity and proportionality must be met.

Over the years that AFSPA has been in operation, the Army has opened fire countless times and killed hundreds, if not thousands, of people. Whenever those killed have been armed insurgents or terrorists, there has been little or no public clamour against the Act. It is only when the armed forces violate the provisions of the law and indulge in the unlawful killing of persons — especially unarmed civilians — that voices get raised against AFSPA. The protests in Manipur in 2004 reached a crescendo because of the death in custody of Th. Manorama and scores of others like her. In Kashmir, sentiments against the Armed Forces Act got inflamed because of fake encounter incidents like Pathribal and Macchhil.

If today people are questioning General Jaswal's “religious book,” it is not so much because of its provisions as because of the failure of its custodians to act when the law is flouted. The Lord's Word threatens sinners with fire and brimstone, eternal damnation or the endless cycle of births and deaths. But AFSPA holds out no such horrors for the soldiers who violate its provisions. Section 6 says “no prosecution … shall be instituted, except with the previous sanction of the Central government, against any person in respect of anything done or purported to be done in exercise of the powers conferred by this Act.” This requirement confers de facto impunity on all transgressors. Thus the CBI may have indicted army officers for the murder of innocent civilians at Pathribal in 2000 but their trial cannot take place because the Central government refuses to give sanction. What is worse, the Minister concerned does not even have to give any reasons.

The ostensible logic behind this Section, a variant of which can be found in Section 197 of the CrPC and in many Indian laws, is to protect public servants from frivolous or vexatious law suits. But though it has not ruled on the ambit of AFSPA's Section 6, the Supreme Court has often declared that the object of Section 197-type protection is not to set an official above the common law. “If he commits an offence not connected with his official duty he has no privilege.”

In the Pathribal case, the CBI took the view that abducting and killing unarmed civilians in cold blood could not be considered part of “official duty.” Not only did the MoD reject this logic, it moved the Supreme Court for quashing of the case on the ground that it has not granted sanction to prosecute. At no time has it been asked to furnish reasons for denying sanction.

A government which has faith in the actions of its officers and the robustness of its judicial system ought never to shy away from allowing the courts to step in when doubts arise. And yet, in case after case, legal proceedings get stymied by the denial of official sanction.

In a democracy, this requirement of previous sanction should have no place. But given the balance of political and institutional forces in India today, it is utopian to believe it can simply be done away with. What I am proposing, therefore, is a modest remedy. Let us not tamper with the government's ability to protect officers from criminal proceedings. But instead of the default setting being ‘no prosecution without official sanction,' let the blocking of a prosecution require official action.

Section 6 could thus be amended to read: “No prosecution … shall be instituted against any person in respect of anything done or purported to be done in exercise of the powers conferred by this Act where the Central government provides reasons in writing and the competent court upholds the legal validity of these reasons.”

Such a provision would prevent good officers from being prosecuted for killings which result from acts of good faith while allowing the bad apples to be prosecuted for their crimes. The government would still have the right to intervene on behalf of a soldier who has committed an illegal act. But this would require a Minister to take personal responsibility for a decision that would, after all, be tantamount to denying justice to the victim's family. In the Pathribal case, for example, Defence Minister A.K. Antony would be compelled to inform the trial court of his reasons for opposing the prosecution of soldiers indicted by the CBI for murder. And the court would get to rule on whether Mr. Antony's reasons were valid or not.

There is no reason why this inversion of the “previous sanction” provision cannot be replicated across the board in all Indian laws to cover situations where human rights abuses are alleged. Such a provision would not disturb the basic provisions of AFSPA. But it would bring that “religious book” in closer conformity with an even holier tome, the Constitution of India.

Read full history - A Modest Proposal on AFSPA

A Modest Proposal on AFSPA

By Siddharth Varadarajan

Change the blanket ban on trials without official sanction to one where the government has the power to bar prosecution in individual cases provided it satisfies the courts that its reasons for doing so are valid.

The Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act has come in for widespread criticism in Jammu and Kashmir, Manipur and other parts of the northeast because of the human rights abuses that have come to be associated with its operation. So strong is the sentiment against AFSPA in Kashmir that in recent months Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram and Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah have all spoken of the need to re-examine the law. The Army, on the other hand, says this is unnecessary.

The Army Chief, General V.K. Singh, has gone so far as to say that the demand for the dilution of AFSPA is being made for “narrow political gains.” On his part, Lt. Gen. B.S. Jaswal, GOC-in-C, Northern Command, has compared the Act to scripture. “I would like to say that the provisions of AFSPA are very pious to me and I think to the entire Indian Army. We have religious books, there are certain guidelines which are given there, but all the members of the religion do not follow it, they break it also … does it imply that you remove the religious book …?”

 Manipur Students of various organisations hold placards during a protest demonstration, demanding withdrawal of Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) from northeast and Kashmir, at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi on August 21, 2010. File Photo: S. Subramanium

On paper, AFSPA is a deceptively simple law. First passed in 1958, it comes into play when the government declares a particular part of the northeast (or Jammu and Kashmir under a parallel 1990 law) a “disturbed area.” Within that area, an officer of the armed forces has the power to “fire upon or otherwise use force, even to the causing of death, against any person who is acting in contravention of any law or order for the time being in force in the disturbed area prohibiting the assembly of five or more persons or the carrying of weapons or of things capable of being used as weapons or of fire-arms, ammunition or explosive substances.”

Even though activists have made this the focus of their criticism, giving soldiers the “right to kill” is not, in my opinion, AFSPA's principal flaw. After all, if a ‘law and order' situation has arisen which compels the government to deploy the Army, soldiers have to be allowed to use deadly force. Even a private citizen has the right to kill someone in self-defence, though the final word on the legality of her or his action belongs to the courts. Similarly, a civilised society expects that the use of deadly force by the Army must at all times be lawful, necessary and proportionate. Here, the Act suffers from two infirmities: the requirement of prior sanction for prosecution contained in Section 6 often comes in the way when questions arise about the lawfulness of particular actions. Second, AFSPA does not distinguish between a peaceful gathering of five or more persons (even if held in contravention of Section 144 of the Criminal Procedure Code) and a violent mob. Firing upon the latter may sometimes be justified by necessity; shooting into a peaceful assembly would surely fail any test of reasonableness.

Leaving this issue aside, however, it is important to recognise that AFSPA does not give an officer the unqualified right to fire upon and cause the death of any person in a Disturbed Area. At a minimum, that person should have been carrying weapons or explosives. The shooting of an unarmed individual, and the killing of a person in custody, are not acts that are permissible under AFSPA. Force is allowed in order to arrest a suspect but the fact that the Act authorises the use of “necessary” rather than “deadly” force in such a circumstance means the tests of necessity and proportionality must be met.

Over the years that AFSPA has been in operation, the Army has opened fire countless times and killed hundreds, if not thousands, of people. Whenever those killed have been armed insurgents or terrorists, there has been little or no public clamour against the Act. It is only when the armed forces violate the provisions of the law and indulge in the unlawful killing of persons — especially unarmed civilians — that voices get raised against AFSPA. The protests in Manipur in 2004 reached a crescendo because of the death in custody of Th. Manorama and scores of others like her. In Kashmir, sentiments against the Armed Forces Act got inflamed because of fake encounter incidents like Pathribal and Macchhil.

If today people are questioning General Jaswal's “religious book,” it is not so much because of its provisions as because of the failure of its custodians to act when the law is flouted. The Lord's Word threatens sinners with fire and brimstone, eternal damnation or the endless cycle of births and deaths. But AFSPA holds out no such horrors for the soldiers who violate its provisions. Section 6 says “no prosecution … shall be instituted, except with the previous sanction of the Central government, against any person in respect of anything done or purported to be done in exercise of the powers conferred by this Act.” This requirement confers de facto impunity on all transgressors. Thus the CBI may have indicted army officers for the murder of innocent civilians at Pathribal in 2000 but their trial cannot take place because the Central government refuses to give sanction. What is worse, the Minister concerned does not even have to give any reasons.

The ostensible logic behind this Section, a variant of which can be found in Section 197 of the CrPC and in many Indian laws, is to protect public servants from frivolous or vexatious law suits. But though it has not ruled on the ambit of AFSPA's Section 6, the Supreme Court has often declared that the object of Section 197-type protection is not to set an official above the common law. “If he commits an offence not connected with his official duty he has no privilege.”

In the Pathribal case, the CBI took the view that abducting and killing unarmed civilians in cold blood could not be considered part of “official duty.” Not only did the MoD reject this logic, it moved the Supreme Court for quashing of the case on the ground that it has not granted sanction to prosecute. At no time has it been asked to furnish reasons for denying sanction.

A government which has faith in the actions of its officers and the robustness of its judicial system ought never to shy away from allowing the courts to step in when doubts arise. And yet, in case after case, legal proceedings get stymied by the denial of official sanction.

In a democracy, this requirement of previous sanction should have no place. But given the balance of political and institutional forces in India today, it is utopian to believe it can simply be done away with. What I am proposing, therefore, is a modest remedy. Let us not tamper with the government's ability to protect officers from criminal proceedings. But instead of the default setting being ‘no prosecution without official sanction,' let the blocking of a prosecution require official action.

Section 6 could thus be amended to read: “No prosecution … shall be instituted against any person in respect of anything done or purported to be done in exercise of the powers conferred by this Act where the Central government provides reasons in writing and the competent court upholds the legal validity of these reasons.”

Such a provision would prevent good officers from being prosecuted for killings which result from acts of good faith while allowing the bad apples to be prosecuted for their crimes. The government would still have the right to intervene on behalf of a soldier who has committed an illegal act. But this would require a Minister to take personal responsibility for a decision that would, after all, be tantamount to denying justice to the victim's family. In the Pathribal case, for example, Defence Minister A.K. Antony would be compelled to inform the trial court of his reasons for opposing the prosecution of soldiers indicted by the CBI for murder. And the court would get to rule on whether Mr. Antony's reasons were valid or not.

There is no reason why this inversion of the “previous sanction” provision cannot be replicated across the board in all Indian laws to cover situations where human rights abuses are alleged. Such a provision would not disturb the basic provisions of AFSPA. But it would bring that “religious book” in closer conformity with an even holier tome, the Constitution of India.

Read full history - A Modest Proposal on AFSPA

Kashmir & The 7 States

BJP activists take out a peace rally in Guwahati.

By Patricia Mukhim

Comparisons are odious but they are the only way in which human beings and institutions can progress. Unless there is something better to compare with, how can we measure our successes or failures? How do we know that we have made some headway in our human endeavour?

The seven states of the Northeast which have been tagged together as homogenous entities have always felt that Kashmir is the apple of India’s eye while they are orphans.

The damage control exercise launched by an obliging Centre during the recent crisis in the Valley was illustrative of the concern for that troubled paradise, once the beautiful kingdom of Maharaja Hari Singh. People in the Northeast have nursed their hurt and pain at this obvious display of favouritism.

Normally this should not happen in a country whose rulers possess a depth of knowledge, political acumen and social discernment about governing a nation of disparate voices and ethnicities. Unfortunately, this nation does not have people of that calibre.

The social apathy and political insouciance was evident during the 68-day blockade of National Highway 39, called by a section of Naga organisations to express their grievances against the government of Manipur

This blockade resulted in an economic crisis of unspeakable dimensions which also affected the Naga-inhabited areas.

It was like cutting the nose to spite the face. The Nagas of Manipur knew this but had claimed they had no other way to bring the Manipur government to its knees. After the 68-day period, the Centre began talking tough because the media had made it uncomfortable for the government in New Delhi to remain unconcerned.

The blockade was lifted on condition that it would be re-imposed if the government failed to respond to the demands of the Nagas of Manipur. And indeed the Nagas made good their word. The blockade was re-imposed on National Highways 39 and 53 since August 3 and continues.

The Centre made a feeble attempt to create some sort of forum where things between the parties in conflict would be thrashed out with Delhi acting as the referee. But this failed to pacify the Nagas. They had taken a decision to opt out of Manipur and have stuck to their guns. These are political battles that are expected to last for as long as Naga peace talks are on track.

We are talking here of a 63-year-old problem which seems to defy solution. The Nagas have been hewing at a humungous boulder bit by bit for all of 50 years.

Whether they have made a dent is not the issue here. But it has been 13 years since they officially agreed to talk peace.

Compared to the Naga insurgency, the Kashmir assertion is of fairly recent origin. At least the insurgency bit is.

Perhaps the situation in Kashmir has taken a nosedive after Omar Abdullah assumed charge as chief minister. He is accused of remaining aloof from the people, a characteristic that is typical of a high caste, high-class ruler who lords it over his subjects.

That someone was so piqued as to throw a shoe at the crotchety Omar who seems to be saying all the wrong things could not have done his sagging image a lot of good. And that by a cop!

Kashmir scene

Recently a national media news channel aired a programme that provided the microphone to several young Kashmiris to say what they felt about the present problems of Kashmir and the way forward. Each one who spoke said they wanted a Kashmir that enjoyed its autonomy and was allowed to rule itself. They spoke of political sovereignty without blinking an eyelid. It sounded very much like what the Nagas had been saying for half a century and the Manipuri Meiteis for over two decades. The young Kashmiris who spoke up cannot be accused of being spokespersons of the hardliners who are alleged to be fomenting trouble in Kashmir. They seemed like educated, independent young people with a mind of their own. They all detested the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958, and wondered why the Centre continued with this draconian law against its own people.

What they were trying to convey very subtly was that it was easy for “India” to use such draconian laws because the Kashmiris are never really considered “Indians”. Clearly, the Centre’s appeasement policy does not wash with the average Kashmiri because it is seen as a purely political ploy to keep Omar Abdullah in his chair. There is also an obvious disdain by the present generation for politicians across the political spectrum

Fear of what?

Indeed, come to think of it, seldom if ever would a nation once enslaved, use a law enacted by a colonial power and apply that law on its own people after it became a sovereign country and long after that colonial power had left this its soil. Since no part of India is today safer than the Northeast or Kashmir, would the army act be applied so readily anywhere else? What then are the compulsions of India when it comes to Kashmir and the seven states of the Northeast?

Pakistan’s penchant for Kashmir and the issues around that state certainly are trigger points that make India react, often with uneducated responses. But what are India’s fears in the eastern sector? Is China still a threat? Have the ghosts of the past not been exorcised yet? Can any part of the country be kept under a tight leash merely because of the fear of invasion? A fear that is perhaps ill-founded, given the present geo-politico-economic compulsions and the interdependence of nations? If the fear is founded on some well-founded arguments then is it not premature of India to be speaking of the Look East Policy unless it is some kind of red herring intended to befool the people of the seven states.

Maoist threat

Comparisons indeed are odious but there is no doubt that Kashmir not the periphery that the Northeast is. Kashmir is the core of India’s existence as a sovereign country. In this so-called Indian state, the assertions for secessionism are no longer covert.

Every other day, hardened groups owing loyalty either to Pakistan or to a different idea of sovereignty make that call and whip up anti-India sentiments without being held to account.

The only similarity is that Kashmir like the Northeast is also a highly-militarised zone and military brutality is felt there on a daily basis as much as it was in Nagaland and Mizoram in the fifties and sixties.

While Kashmir is always in the eye of the storm, the Northeast has to jolt the Centre every once in while with bomb blasts. The sense of real and perceived neglect is gradually sending the region into a sort of delinquency which could become a fertile ground for Maoism. In the long run this could further dent the image of India. If Maoist violence spreads to the Northeast it will catch on like wildfire. India does not have a policy that is tried and tested and can be applied in the Northeast or Kashmir. Those ruling the roost in Delhi are obsessed with the politics of instant gains. They have no stamina to think of long-term strategies that will yield more sustainable, long-term results.

(The writer can be contacted at patricia17@rediffmail.com)

Read full history - Kashmir & The 7 States

Kashmir & The 7 States

BJP activists take out a peace rally in Guwahati.

By Patricia Mukhim

Comparisons are odious but they are the only way in which human beings and institutions can progress. Unless there is something better to compare with, how can we measure our successes or failures? How do we know that we have made some headway in our human endeavour?

The seven states of the Northeast which have been tagged together as homogenous entities have always felt that Kashmir is the apple of India’s eye while they are orphans.

The damage control exercise launched by an obliging Centre during the recent crisis in the Valley was illustrative of the concern for that troubled paradise, once the beautiful kingdom of Maharaja Hari Singh. People in the Northeast have nursed their hurt and pain at this obvious display of favouritism.

Normally this should not happen in a country whose rulers possess a depth of knowledge, political acumen and social discernment about governing a nation of disparate voices and ethnicities. Unfortunately, this nation does not have people of that calibre.

The social apathy and political insouciance was evident during the 68-day blockade of National Highway 39, called by a section of Naga organisations to express their grievances against the government of Manipur

This blockade resulted in an economic crisis of unspeakable dimensions which also affected the Naga-inhabited areas.

It was like cutting the nose to spite the face. The Nagas of Manipur knew this but had claimed they had no other way to bring the Manipur government to its knees. After the 68-day period, the Centre began talking tough because the media had made it uncomfortable for the government in New Delhi to remain unconcerned.

The blockade was lifted on condition that it would be re-imposed if the government failed to respond to the demands of the Nagas of Manipur. And indeed the Nagas made good their word. The blockade was re-imposed on National Highways 39 and 53 since August 3 and continues.

The Centre made a feeble attempt to create some sort of forum where things between the parties in conflict would be thrashed out with Delhi acting as the referee. But this failed to pacify the Nagas. They had taken a decision to opt out of Manipur and have stuck to their guns. These are political battles that are expected to last for as long as Naga peace talks are on track.

We are talking here of a 63-year-old problem which seems to defy solution. The Nagas have been hewing at a humungous boulder bit by bit for all of 50 years.

Whether they have made a dent is not the issue here. But it has been 13 years since they officially agreed to talk peace.

Compared to the Naga insurgency, the Kashmir assertion is of fairly recent origin. At least the insurgency bit is.

Perhaps the situation in Kashmir has taken a nosedive after Omar Abdullah assumed charge as chief minister. He is accused of remaining aloof from the people, a characteristic that is typical of a high caste, high-class ruler who lords it over his subjects.

That someone was so piqued as to throw a shoe at the crotchety Omar who seems to be saying all the wrong things could not have done his sagging image a lot of good. And that by a cop!

Kashmir scene

Recently a national media news channel aired a programme that provided the microphone to several young Kashmiris to say what they felt about the present problems of Kashmir and the way forward. Each one who spoke said they wanted a Kashmir that enjoyed its autonomy and was allowed to rule itself. They spoke of political sovereignty without blinking an eyelid. It sounded very much like what the Nagas had been saying for half a century and the Manipuri Meiteis for over two decades. The young Kashmiris who spoke up cannot be accused of being spokespersons of the hardliners who are alleged to be fomenting trouble in Kashmir. They seemed like educated, independent young people with a mind of their own. They all detested the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958, and wondered why the Centre continued with this draconian law against its own people.

What they were trying to convey very subtly was that it was easy for “India” to use such draconian laws because the Kashmiris are never really considered “Indians”. Clearly, the Centre’s appeasement policy does not wash with the average Kashmiri because it is seen as a purely political ploy to keep Omar Abdullah in his chair. There is also an obvious disdain by the present generation for politicians across the political spectrum

Fear of what?

Indeed, come to think of it, seldom if ever would a nation once enslaved, use a law enacted by a colonial power and apply that law on its own people after it became a sovereign country and long after that colonial power had left this its soil. Since no part of India is today safer than the Northeast or Kashmir, would the army act be applied so readily anywhere else? What then are the compulsions of India when it comes to Kashmir and the seven states of the Northeast?

Pakistan’s penchant for Kashmir and the issues around that state certainly are trigger points that make India react, often with uneducated responses. But what are India’s fears in the eastern sector? Is China still a threat? Have the ghosts of the past not been exorcised yet? Can any part of the country be kept under a tight leash merely because of the fear of invasion? A fear that is perhaps ill-founded, given the present geo-politico-economic compulsions and the interdependence of nations? If the fear is founded on some well-founded arguments then is it not premature of India to be speaking of the Look East Policy unless it is some kind of red herring intended to befool the people of the seven states.

Maoist threat

Comparisons indeed are odious but there is no doubt that Kashmir not the periphery that the Northeast is. Kashmir is the core of India’s existence as a sovereign country. In this so-called Indian state, the assertions for secessionism are no longer covert.

Every other day, hardened groups owing loyalty either to Pakistan or to a different idea of sovereignty make that call and whip up anti-India sentiments without being held to account.

The only similarity is that Kashmir like the Northeast is also a highly-militarised zone and military brutality is felt there on a daily basis as much as it was in Nagaland and Mizoram in the fifties and sixties.

While Kashmir is always in the eye of the storm, the Northeast has to jolt the Centre every once in while with bomb blasts. The sense of real and perceived neglect is gradually sending the region into a sort of delinquency which could become a fertile ground for Maoism. In the long run this could further dent the image of India. If Maoist violence spreads to the Northeast it will catch on like wildfire. India does not have a policy that is tried and tested and can be applied in the Northeast or Kashmir. Those ruling the roost in Delhi are obsessed with the politics of instant gains. They have no stamina to think of long-term strategies that will yield more sustainable, long-term results.

(The writer can be contacted at patricia17@rediffmail.com)

Read full history - Kashmir & The 7 States

A Different Accord

By Shekhar Gupta

As anniversaries go, Rajiv Gandhi’s 67th would not sound particularly extraordinary, in some sort of commemorative terms, not like a 25th, 50th, 60th, 75th or 100th. But it should remind us of another important anniversary connected with him this year, or rather a triple anniversary. This, 2010, is also the 25th anniversary of the peace accords he signed in Punjab, Assam and Mizoram (which was signed in1986 but sealed a year earlier). Each of these, even the accord with Sant Longowal in Punjab that seemed to falter within weeks of the signing, contributed ultimately to resolving one of the our most serious threats since the formation of the republic.

It is fascinating, therefore, that even when Rajiv Gandhi’s own partymen count his achievements and contributions today they talk about computers, telecom, his Bombay AICC speech, even Navodaya Vidyalayas. But they forget these three accords which deserve to be listed among the most important (and positive) turning points in any history of modern India. We can only guess why it is so. It could be because these came in the very early part of his tenure. But it could also be because of another complex reason: that all the people he settled these disputes with were political adversaries of his party and, remain so, to date. That is why each one of these was an even more remarkable achievement.

I was reminded of this earlier this afternoon while chatting with Assam opposition leader, and twice chief minister, Praful Mahanta (interview on NDTV’s Walk the Talk on Saturday, 9.30 pm). I knew Mahanta as an idealistic leader of the All Assam Students Union (AASU) and have followed him, mostly from distant Delhi, through his many ups and downs through his less idealistic political evolution. But it is only that I got an interesting, one-line answer to the question: so why did you sign that accord with Rajiv Gandhi after having fought his mother so bitterly? “Because he was young like us,” said Mahanta, whose English has improved over the years as my Assamese has, regrettably, declined and then added: “And also because he was the first Congress leader willing to go beyond his party’s line.”

If you study these three accords it is that one factor, Rajiv’s willingness to go beyond the party line, that underlines the refreshing new change he had brought to our politics and that fired the imagination of India so brilliantly in the early part of his prime ministership.

It’s ironical though that while the same honesty marked his Bombay AICC speech, it is his party that not only failed to respond to a leader with a message of change but closed ranks to throttle him. An eye-opener for me was the December 1985 election that followed the accord and installed a government of former rebels, led by Mahanta in power replacing the Congress’s Hiteswar Saikia. The most popular slogan in that campaign was: “Congress party murdabad, Rajiv Gandhi zindabad.”

Following each one of these accords, even as his party was losing, India was winning. If you go back to when Rajiv was elected, the assassination of his mother and the massacre of Sikhs was less than seven weeks old and Operation Bluestar less than six months. Nobody had then imagined that any Akali leader would bury the hatchet with the Congress, and even more importantly, with Indira’s son. How Rajiv managed to persuade Sant Longowal, then detained in a government guesthouse in Udaipur, must be a fascinating inside story that, I suspect, only Arjun Singh (who was appointed a very young governor of Punjab with the responsibility of implementing the peace) can tell. But I do know how angry Longowal had been till April of that year when I went for a “clandestine” interview, smuggled into his Udaipur detention home through the good offices of Delhi’s Sikh businessman-Akali leader Amarjit Singh Sarna. He said he would answer my questions only because he knew I had been “brave enough” to stay on in Amritsar during Operation Bluestar and had now taken the risk to come illegally to meet him. But he would only give me answers in writing so he couldn’t be misquoted. He scribbled his answers in Gurmukhi in the little notebook I had slipped in my hip-pocket. His answer to the question, on whether there could ever be peace between the Sikhs and “Delhi” was: “How can you even think about it, when bodies of innocent Sikhs are hanging on every tree along the GT Road between Delhi and Amritsar.” Just three months later, he had signed a peace settlement, knowing the risks. “Rajiv,” he said, “was very different. Very young, very sincere, not like other Congress people.” Rajiv worked with him on the tack of patriotism, convincing him that he and Longowal were patriotic Indians first. Their party politics came second.

But Rajiv picked Mizoram early enough for settlement as it was one of the two most active insurgencies, and unlike the other one in Nagaland, had a clear leadership. The price again was loss of power for his party. He embraced Laldenga, for two decades probably the most wanted man in India, and against whom his mother had unleashed IAF fighters in 1966, and while their parties fought each other in the election that followed, there was nothing but warmth between the two of them.

In the course of that election campaign, in the backyard of an MNF candidate’s home in Aizawl, I met an attractive young woman, Vanlalzari. She was a bit of a cult figure among the Mizos. As personal secretary of the IGP G.S. Arya, she had been sentenced to imprisonment for complicity in the most sensational rebel raid in the police headquarters (January 13, 1975) in which Arya, his DIG L.B Sewa and intelligence chief Panchapagesan were killed. From the prison, she wrote her own rebellious memoirs, The Zari Diary, which was like an illicit local bestseller and English translations of which all intelligence officers used to pore over. She had now been freed in the post-accord amnesty. She talked about her days in jail without remorse, while playing with her baby, counting posters of her candidate and stacking them in neat packets of a hundred apiece. Did she miss her cause of sovereignty? “Well, I will tell you what Pu Laldenga said to us. He said, Rajiv told him, what you Mizos want is power. You can’t get it no matter how many guns you have, how many Indians you kill. But come back to your people, and if they give you what they sometimes give my party, or Brig Sailo’s, it’s all yours. And that’s more than you can have while hiding in Burma. We trust our leader.”

Mizoram, in these 25 years, has become probably the most peaceful state in all of India and you see representatives of its brilliantly talented and very tiny population (less than a million) doing so well in the mainstream. One, a former cop, even won a Lok Sabha election in Bangalore on a BJP ticket. Punjab has buried the ghost of terror and anger a long time back. In Assam, Mahanta, now out of power, survived a near thing when ULFA tried to kill him for fighting them as no Congressman has done, and speaks so warmly of Rajiv. And in each one of these states, the AGP, MNF and the Akalis have lost and won power more than once since. What Rajiv taught us, in his very first year, therefore, is the generous power of Indian democracy, if you were willing to rise above narrow party interests. That, to someone like me who reported on that dangerous decade, is a contribution much greater than computerisation and the rest.

Read full history - A Different Accord