In My View

Iranian jigsaw and Indian confusion

Minister for External Affairs, Pranab Mukherjee’s ongoing visit to Teheran would as much be for extending bilateral relations, as for gauging the mood of the town. Though he would not be privy to the famous bazaar talk of the city, his aim would be to try and figure out what the Iranian leaders are planning for West Asia.

Because, indeed it is no longer a question of Iran’s supposed dereliction in the nuclear realm. Increasingly, the question being asked: is Iran ready to replace the USA as a predominant power in West Asia? Official Washington believes that the gainer of the Iraq bloodbath is neither the USA nor naturally, the Iraqis, but ironically, Iran. Not surprisingly, the USA has taken a twin track approach to deal with the problem. One, it has begun military operations against those they claim to be Iranian provocateurs operating in Iraq. And two, it has trumped up an intra-Shi’i feud in Iraq, that was conspicuously absent for the past three years in the lexicon of security punditry in the USA.

All this while one had been aware of a sectarian battle – many call it a civil war, including a recent National Intelligence Estimate of the American intelligence community – between the Shi’is and Sunnis. It had been triggered by the Al Qaeda, then led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi to sabotage the nascent Iraqi nationalist movement. But now the apparent seed he had sown has been further embellished by the equally resourceful American strategic community and taken the form of intra-Shi’I bloodletting.

Clearly the attempt is to create an environment by which a Shi’i-run Iraq is not beholden to Iran for its sustenance, spiritually and materially. Yet, the USA is failing. In Lebanon the emboldened Hezbollah has moved front and centre after staving off an Israeli incursion. In Iraq, Moqtada al-Sadr maintains 60 Parliamentarians in the country’s showpiece legislature, and a few ministers in the Nuri al-Maliki cabinet. In Palestine, Hamas has links to the same Iran, who had reportedly been bankrolling it for a long time.

Increasingly, it is appearing that West Asia is becoming a dangerous place for the Americans. In that light, Pranab Mukherjee’s visit is significant. For it gives India a peek into the Iranian leadership’s mind and keeps the conversation channels open. The message Mukherjee delivers in Teheran would be less relevant at this stage, than the manner in which it is delivered. For, in the mind of many, India is now a strategic ally of the USA even though the final pact for nuclear cooperation is still in the works. Which side does India choose? Or can India choose both?

Meanwhile, Iran’s pilot plant at Natanz, for industrial scale enrichment of Uranium, is set to go critical in the next few days. The US establishment seems unable to make up its mind whether that would push Teheran across the threshold the USA has demarcated, calling for it to act. According to a recent New York Times report, “After weeks of limited access inside Iran, inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency have reported that Tehran has succeeded in manufacturing parts for about 3,000 centrifuges, the devices that can spin uranium into reactor fuel — or bomb fuel. In recent days, the Iranians have begun installing the machines and supporting gear in a cavernous plant at Natanz, which would be a potential target if the United States or one of its allies decided that diplomacy would never keep Iran from getting the bomb.”

Already last week, Robert Gates, the new US Defense Secretary, who has a bit of experience in handling nuclearised stand-offs, has ruled out an attack on Iran. The NYT’s report has signs of a rather touching oversimplification on nuclear technology. For the technological capability required for Uranium enrichment meant for power plants is a fraction of that is required for weapons. Weapons grade Uranium needs to be enriched to the extent of 98 per cent of purity, while nuclear power Uranium needs to be enriched to the extent of two per cent.

The same report also mentions how the Iranians have been woefully short of their self-imposed deadlines in terms of installing centrifuges that would enrich the Uranium, by separating its impurities. Apparently, it says the Iranians are still stuck with P-1 design variety, the ones Pakistan produced and then Abdul Qader Khan sold in the black market.

Mukherjee would do well to keep in mind these perspectives, if he hears the rhetoric that Iran is normally delivering to anyone who is listening. Though it remains to be seen whether New Delhi still retains its influences in Teheran; the same impact it had when it had helped the country break out of its isolation in the 1990s. If it does, at this stage, India could temper the Iranian intransigence about the concerns of the international community vis-à-vis its nuclear programme and its rising dominance in West Asia. Or, India could be another cog in the back channel wheel being spun by Washington. A public indication about which way the wind is blowing would be found in the way the two countries, India and Iran, play the tango on the Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline issue. The world will be watching.

Pinaki Bhattacharya, currently located in Kolkata, is a Special Correspondent with the Mathrubhumi, Kerala. He writes on Strategic Security issues. He can be contacted at pinaki63@dataone.in.

A Letter From A Brother To A Journalist

By the time you guys read this news, the body of Major Manish Pitambare, who was shot dead at Anantnag, would have been cremated with full military honors.On Tuesday, this news swept across all the news channels, ‘Sanjay Dutt relieved by court;’ ‘Sirf Munna, not a bhai;’ ‘13 saal ka vanvaas khatam’(!3 year exile over); ‘Although found guilty for possession of an armory, Sanjay can breath sigh of relief as all the TADA charges against him are withdrawn,' the marquees screamed.Then many personalities like Salman Khan said 'He is a good person. We knewhe will come out clean'. Mr Big B said "Dutt's family and our family have relations for years he's a good kid. He is like elder brother to Abhishek." His (Sanjay Dutt’s) sister Priya Dutt said "We can sleep well tonight. It’s a great relief."

In other news, Parliament was mad at Indian team for performing bad; Greg Chappell said something; Shah Rukh Khan replaces Amitabh in KBC and other such stuff. But most of the emphasis was given on Sanjay Dutt's "phoenixlike" comeback from the ashes of terrorist charges. Surfing through the channels, a news-item on BBC startled me. It read "Hizbul Mujahidin's most wanted terrorist 'Sohel Faisal' killed in Anantnag, India. Indian Majorleading the operation lost his life in the process. Four others are injured.”

It was past midnight, I started visiting the stupid Indian channels, but Sanjay Dutt was still ruling. They were telling how Sanjay pleaded to thecourt saying ‘I'm the sole bread earner for my family,’ ‘I have a daughter who is studying in US’ and so on. Then they showed how Sanjay was not wearing his lucky blue shirt while he was hearing the verdict and also howhe went to every temple and prayed for the last few months. A suspect in Mumbai bomb blasts, convicted under armory act...was being transformed into a hero.Sure Sanjay Dutt has a daughter; Sure he did not do any terrorist activity.Possessing an AK47 is considered too elementary in terrorist community and also one who possesses an AK47 has a right to possess a pistol so that again is not such a big crime; Sure Sanjay Dutt went to all the temples;Sure he did a lot of Gandhigiri but then...........

Major Manish H Pitambare got the information from his sources about the terrorists' whereabouts. Wasting no time he attacked the camp, killedHizbul Mujahidin's supremo and in the process lost his life to the bullets fired from an AK47. He is survived by a wife and daughter (just like Sanjay Dutt) who's only 18 months old.Major Manish never said 'I have a daughter' before he took the decision to attack the terrorists in the darkest of nights. He never thought abouthaving a family and he being the bread earner. No news channel covered thissince they were too busy hyping a former drug addict, a suspect who's linked to bomb blasts which killed hundreds. Their aim was to show how he defied the TADA charges and they were so successful that his conviction inpossession of armory had no meaning. They also concluded that his parents in heaven must be happy and proud of him.

Parents of Major Manish are still living and they have to live rest oftheir lives without their beloved son. His daughter won't ever see herdaddy again. Finally Major Manish, to my generation is a greater hero, someone who laid his life in the name of this great nation.So guys, please forward this message around so that the media knows which news to give importance, as it is a shame for us since this Army Major's death news was given by a foreign TV channel!!!

Times Achanging!

The Journalist Responds

Dear Tukai,

I will not forward this to anyone, least of all, to a newsperson.

There are two types of us in India these days: those who say, either “Chalta hai, salary se matlab rakkho,” or worse still, who say, ‘come one old fucker, get modren;” the second group is like me who most often suffer tummy cramps, very often feel pukish, despite a perfect digestive system, and when drunk shriek and shout obscenities against the fellow scribes who are raping our country's moral (!) fabric. I do not see the point, when everything is TRP driven.

Why talk about the TV. Today's Hindustan Times had a bottom anchor piece, which shrieked how KBC 3 is infinitely lesser in TRP, according to TAM ratings over the past four days, the four days after its birth! Who the hell is bothered about some bloody sldier who killed the Hizb commander and died for that (or for his Country)?

Why talk about Kashmir and militancy? When the son of the India head of Adobe was kidnapped, the media sprang up and ran such a stink, but for the past two years, poor people, a lot of them Biswases and Haldars, lower caste, poor Bengalis, living in a hell now known as Nithari, had been complaining about children missing, and then the butchery is unveiled and the police chief of Noida says there has only been a marginal rise in heinous crimes year-on-year!

Are we taking about murders here? Or is this a marauding of the Indian conscience? Is there anything in IPC and CrPC that can deal with this? We are ruled by the lowest common denominator in cultural tastes. The slum-dwellers - or those from the middle and upper middle classes who have the same taste are turning the TRPs of Kyun Ki Saas Bhi Kabhie Bahu Thi. These are the serials where the advertisers are putting their money in.

It is also not a shame that the BBC gave the news on their channel. They too are driven by competition. They have devised a policy of going Indian and covering such an incident. I am not being cynical about BBC, for which I have a huge respect. But a year ago, they would not cover India if 20 people died in a train accident... it is another matter if a skier in the Swiss Alps got trapped and survived, that merited almost live coverage.

The BBC's country head, sales, gave me an interview in which she said they are giving more attention to India, because no fool can ignore India today (she did not mention, it though, but the fact is our leaders are best at the smart talk, our PMs and ministers mouth how great we are as a knowledge superpower, when all we do is menial work (BPOs) for US companies at 1 / 10the prices an American guy would take)

The credit for BBC is it does its work methodically, thoroughly and without any sensationalism, but the rest of it is all business and hardly altruism.

I am in the media business now, in the sense that my job with www.indiantelevision.com is about broadcasting and marketing etc. As jobs go, I find this very exciting, but I do get to see the innards of the damned media. It is an ulcerated intestine where gangrene is just about to set in.

Please brother, do me a favour. I am sick of being in the media, my wife wants to study abroad. Can you take me in for three months out there and see if I can set up a biryani selling shop or something. I truly love cooking and I want to do two things, make sufficient money to take holidays and write my books.

Of course, if you think that you want to start an internet campaign against what reviles you, I am all game, but then, we need to change tactic. I can find the respone email IDs of these crappy news channels in India and then we could garner all our strength to gather just 1,000 friends, who would spend a dedicated 45 minutes at watching the channels and then shaming them with letters on the net.

This is a Gandhian politics on the net. Some years ago, there was dispute between green NGOs and Lufthansa, and the NGO got people to bombard the airline’s email boxes. It hit the compnay so badly since those who were trying E-ticketing, could not because the mail boxes were jammed. The airlines lost a tonne of gold.

If you want to do it this way, and there is a dire need to do so, then I am seriously with you. Let me know.

Lots of love
Mithudada (Sujit Chakraborty)

Sujit will be contributing a media column from this Saturday.

In My View

India should make bold in SAARC

Come April, India would need to emerge out of its mien of injured innocence it had been adopting with some of its neighbours like Pakistan and Bangladesh. For the SAARC summit needs to be meaningfully hosted by New Delhi in the Association’s 23rd year. This has become more important with the USA and the world feting the country as an emerging great power, much to the relish of the Indian elite.

Not for long can the country even maintain its stoic silence and imperious neglect in dealings with other countries of the region like Sri Lanka or Bhutan. Nepal and the newest entrant to South Asian Association of Regional Cooperation (SAARC) could claim to have evinced some interest of the policymakers here lately.

But at this juncture it is imperative that Indian leadership should be able to emerge out of the neat little diplomatic box they have long spent their lives in, created by the issues of terrorism and militancy. Indeed, a great power needs to show its greatness first at home, then the near abroad and finally further afield. Chanakya might have had a thing or two tosay on such an issue. He did write in his Arthashastra, Book IV, that, “A king who is equal to his enemy in the matter of his sovereign elements shall, in virtue of his own righteous conduct or with the help of those who are hostile or conspiring against his enemy, endeavor to throw his enemy’s power into the shade; or if he thinks:-
‘That my enemy, possessed as he is of immense power, will yet in the near future, hurt the elements of his own sovereignty, by using contumelious language, by inflicting severe punishments, and by squandering his wealth; that though attaining success for a time yet he will blindly take himself to hunting, gambling, drinking and women; that as his subjects are disaffected, himself powerless and haughty, I can overthrow him; that when attacked, he will take shelter with all his paraphernalia into a fort or elsewhere; that possessed as he is of a strong army, he will yet fall into my hands, as he has neither a friend nor a fort to help him; that a distant king is desirous to put down his own enemy, and also inclined to help me to put down my own assailable enemy when my resources are poor; or that I may be invited as a Madhyama king,’
- for these reasons the conqueror may allow his enemy to grow in strength and to attain success for the time being.”

The Indian Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh had been urging all to think out-of-the-box solutions to problems. That will require courage in the South Asian context. And a truly brave decision would be for India to take an initiative in terms of economic migration to India from the proximate neighbours. This move would have to be based upon a domestic debate on the necessity for an immigration policy that recognises the realities on the ground. These realities are that India, being the largest economy of the region acts like a beacon to which the poor of the region flock in search of succour. These people work mostly in the unorganised sector of the economy; contribute to the growth of the gross domestic product of the country; but cannot enjoy the rights that a usual citizen can, nor respite to their itinerant status.

Considering that the nation has a population bulge in general terms and of young people, more specifically, New Delhi could begin by taking multi-sectoral look at the issue and devise a plan that acknowledges the reality of immigration with attendant issues of equitable treatment of guest workers; while balancing the employment needs of the country’s own. Of course, the trade unions of the country would have to sign up to any such proposal.

This proposal could well be meshed with a push for fuller implementation of South Asian Free Trade Agreement (SAFTA) that India hopes to achieve, but is facing various obstacles in the process from recalcitrant quarters. An acceptance by New Delhi of the region’s labour issues could create a fund of goodwill at the popular level that would ameliorate any reservations that the contending elites of the other countries might have about barrier free trade in the region.

A bold move of that kind could remove lingering doubts in some people’s minds that the great power being conferred upon India is more a case of default, than earned. It would also help to reclaim its largely lost relevance in the region, eroded over decades of neglect as New Delhi felt obligated to look at the segregated picture of the region, without noticing the wide vista.

Indeed, the choice for the country is clear. It has to decide whether it wants to live an existence of China in East Asia; at odds with most countries of the region that look at it with consternation. They fear its burgeoning economic power and feel increasingly insecure at the military muscle it affords Beijing as a result. This allows other powers to increase their influence in the region, at the cost of the Chinese strategic interests.
It is only fair that since this piece had begun by quoting Chanakya, it should end with the words of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. In his preface to Satyagraha in South Africa, Gandhi wrote“A dharma yudhha (just war), in which there are no secrets to be guarded, no scope for cunning and no place for untruth, comes unsought; and a man of religion is ever ready for it. A struggle which has to be planned is not a righteous struggle.”

Purity that Gandhi advocated was the badge of honour for the satyagrahi for whom religion could mean their way of life. Can the Indian strategists strive to reach that goal this SAARC summit?

Pinaki Bhattacharya, currently located in Kolkata, is a Special Correspondent with the Mathrubhumi, Kerala. He writes on Strategic Security issues. He can be contacted at pinaki63@dataone.in .