Lokpal Bill tabled, to come up on Monday
Bid to take Bill forward fails amid ruckus
With just five working days to go for the winter session of Parliament to end, prospects of forward movement on pending legislative work appeared increasingly slim on Friday, with the Congress-led UPA government and the Opposition remaining deadlocked on key issues. The pending work ranges from the Lok Pal Bill to creation of Telangana.
Sloganeering and fractious exchanges marred proceedings in the Lok Sabha and in the Rajya Sabha on Friday. Meanwhile, Samajwadi Party (SP) leaders told journalists they would back a no-confidence motion by MPs opposed to the division of Telangana.
Though the government managed to table the Lokpal Bill in the Rajya Sabha, incorporating 13 amendments, discussion on it could not be held as the House was adjourned during the post-lunch session.
Government sources said the UPA was keen on pushing the Bill through, ignoring protests. However, Chairman Hamid Ansari, the sources said, told the government managers he could not allow the Bill to be approved amid pandemonium.
Pressure on the government to pass the Bill has mounted since the good show by the Aam Aadmi Party in the Delhi Assembly elections. The Bill was the centrepiece of the mobilisation that preceded the AAP’s formation.
On Friday, the adjournment was forced by SP members at 3.30 p.m., when the House reassembled after three adjournments. Led by Naresh Agarwal, SP MPs demanded a discussion on rising prices. Deputy Chairman P.J. Kurien first warned the agitating members and later adjourned the House till Monday.
SP leader Ram Gopal Yadav told journalists that his party was opposed to the Lokpal Bill as it would lead to “police raj”. He said: “For us, the issue of price rise is more important than Lokpal.”
Earlier, adjournments were forced by SP MPs, who raised slogans against rising prices. Two members from the Telugu Desam Party trooped into the well opposing bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh. The Lok Sabha witnessed noisy scenes with TDP and YSR Congress members rushing into the well in support of their demand for a united Andhra Pradesh.
Debris and sludge: new building material
With a nation-wide restriction on sand extraction owing to directions of the National Green Tribunal, the construction industry should look for effective alternatives in waste, including processed debris, quarry dust, ash and sludge, said Vaman Acharya, Chairman of the Karnataka State Pollution Control Board (KSPCB) on Friday.
By using the voluminously available waste, the construction industry will find “huge assets” along with solving the problem of pollution and environmental degradation, Dr. Acharya said at a seminar on “Alternatives to river sand” organised by the KSPCB and the Indian Concrete Institute (ICI).
Cement firms
“We find that cement companies are open to buying ash from thermal power plants. Thermal power plants such as the Udupi Power Corporation Ltd. (UPCL) and Raichur Thermal Power Station have much of the ash lifted by cement industries,” he said.
Sand extraction
However, the highly environmentally destructive riverbed sand extraction remains the predominant source of sand, which is used extensively in the construction industry to make mortar and concrete, Dr. Acharya said.
Alternative sand such as manufactured sand (crushed stone) pond ash (a by-product of thermal power plants) or construction demolition waste have several advantages, said C.S. Vishwanatha, chairman of Civil-Aid Technoclinic Pvt. Ltd.
Sand import
States such as Kerala are facing a crisis over construction material, said V. Ramachandran, vice-president of ICI. “Kerala imports sand from places such as Vietnam, and is also looking to use marine sand for construction,” he said.
Custodial death a travesty of justice: CM
Chief Minister Jayalalithaa on Friday termed custodial deaths as “travesty of justice.”
Addressing a conference of police officers at the Secretariat, she said: “When the police are expected to protect the lives of citizens in their homes, work places and in public, it would be a travesty of justice if a citizen dies within the precincts of a police station.”
She also told the police officers “an odd death in custody here and there” might appear to be “statistically negligible.” But “a dead man is not a mere statistic for his loved ones.”
At the same time, she also spoke of how the police force had to perform three roles – as guardian of society, an instrument of law and a public servant, besides undergoing hardships. She commended the police for the recent arrest of Fakruddin and his associates following an operation in Puthur without any loss of life.
On the new challenges for the police, she said that once police officials were concerned about inter-district criminals but, now, “inter-State and even inter-national criminals tend to take centre stage.” It was not enough if offenders in heinous crimes were arrested. Their bail applications must be strongly opposed; accused charge-sheeted quickly and expeditious trial conducted, she added.
Police commended for arresting Fakruddin
Jayalalithaa lists priorities and challenges police were facing
Cabinet okays disabilities Bill
The Union Cabinet on Thursday approved the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Bill, a comprehensive measure that covers a whole spectrum of problems from physical disabilities to mental illness and multiple disabilities. It will replace the Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunity Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Act of 1995.
The Bill provides for five per cent reservation in public sector jobs and makes the private sector more accountable for creating a disabled-friendly environment.
It provides incentives for the private sector to take such measures.
On political participation, the proposed law says every person with disability who fulfils eligibility requirements is entitled to be registered as a voter.
He/she should not be disqualified from exercising the voting right on the grounds of disability, irrespective of any stipulation to the contrary in any law for the time being in force.
Any person who is unable to vote in person due to disability or because of admission to hospital for treatment is entitled to opt for postal ballot, says the Bill.
It requires the Election Commission to ensure that all polling stations are accessible to persons with disabilities.
The proposed law also allows mentally unsound women the right to fertility and prescribes punishment for forced abortion or hysterectomy on them.
It provides for
job quota,
postal ballot
Plan to meet fiscal deficit target without affecting flagship schemes
The Finance Ministry has found a way to meet the fiscal deficit target for 2013-14 without suffocating the UPA government’s flagship “aam aadmi” schemes or the defence budget.
Highly placed officials told The Hindu that the Ministry had more or less completed the process of deciding the cuts in 2013-14 budget allocations to ministries and schemes for keeping the fiscal deficit within the target of 4.8 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product. These Revised Estimates would be tabled in Parliament as part of the Vote-On-Account in February 2014, the officials said.
To the ministries that were protesting that the funds squeeze could adversely impact the implementation of development schemes on the ground level, the Ministry had decided to provide additional funds through a “seldom-used provision of Vote-On-Account,” the officials said.
Additional funds would be allocated to these ministries for April and May that technically fall in 2014-15, the officials said. “This way, the allocations will not disturb the fiscal deficit for 2013-14.”
The Ministry has written to the complaining ministries seeking their estimates of additional funds. These include the Ministries of Health, Roads, Rural Development and Defence.
A Vote-On-Account is the provision by which a government obtains the vote of Parliament for incurring expenditure through withdrawal from the Consolidated Fund of India.
Normally, the Vote-On-Account is taken for two months only. But during election year or when it is anticipated that the main Demands and Appropriation Bill will take longer time than two months, the Vote-On-Account may be for a period extending two months.
Finance Ministry to provide additional funds through
Vote-On-Account provision
‘No compromise on Kudankulam plant safety’
AERB will give its nod for the production of another 500 MW power
The Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) will give clearance to the authority of Kudunkulam Nuclear Power Project (KKNPP) in Tirunelveli district to go ahead with the production of another 500 MW power to attain the full capacity of the first unit in near future, if they complied with the rules and regulations in all aspects formulated by the Board, said its chairman, S.S.Bajaj.
Speaking to media persons on the concluding day of the three-day meeting of the Voda Voda Energy Reactor (VVER) Regulators Forum — the first to be conducted in India — at Kanyakumari on Friday, he said AERB had given clearance to KKNPP after satisfying with the 15 directives put forth to the authority before going ahead with the power production in phased manner.
It had given permission after giving clearance right from the site selection to the unit attaining criticality.
Regarding the safety of KKNPP, Mr. Bajaj said the AERB won’t compromise with the safety of the plant and the 14 foreign delegates who visited the site were impressed with the special safety arrangements made in and around the plant after the Fukushima accident.
“As there was fluctuation in power production, the KKNPP authorities had to shut down the plant often on a couple of occasions and it would happen in future also till the power plant attained the constancy in production in order to synchronise it to the central grid properly,” he said.
VVER regulators forum comprised nuclear regulatory organisations from Armenia, Bulgaria, China, Czech Republic, Finland, Hungary, Iran, Russian Federation, Slovakia, Ukraine and India.
In the three-day meeting, the delegates shared the experiences of global nuclear regulators and harmonising the regulatory practices.
This was the 20th annual meeting of the Forum, which was established in 1993, said Mr. Bajaj.
State’s position in educational development index sees a fall
EDI in District Information System for Education released
The State stands fifth in the Composite Educational Development Index (EDI) contained in the recent District Information System for Education (DISE) 2012-2013 provisional report. Last year, the State had secured three ranks higherthan this.
This year, the EDI is 0.661. EDI is calculated using a set of 24 indicators under four sub-groups such as access, infrastructure, teachers and outcome indicators. The data is based on information collected from 1.43 million schools spread over 662 districts across 35 States and Union territories, as on September 30, 2012.
According to DISE 2012-2013, Lakshadweep has retained the top spot from last with an index of 0.712, followed by Puducherry, Tamil Nadu and Sikkim.
Karnataka’s Educational Development Index ranking had fallen both at the primary level as well as the upper primary level last year. The State has secured the fifth rank in the primary level, two spots lower than the previous year’s ranking of three. In the upper primary level, the State is ranked at six, four spots lower than the previous year’s ranking.
The State has fared well in infrastructure index which is determined by the percentage of schools with toilets for boys, without toilets for girls, ramps and kitchen shed. It has maintained its second ranking in the primary level as well as the top spot in the upper primary level.
It has also maintained its outcome indicators which include ratio of girls’ enrolment with boys’ enrolment, gross enrolment ratio, among others, at the primary level. But there is a steep drop in the upper primary level as the ranking has slipped by 11 places.
In the access index, which is measured by availability of schools per 1,000 children, density of schools per 10 sq km, among others, the State’s ranking has fallen by one place at the primary level, but there is a decline in score and ranking at the upper primary level by eight places.
Responding to the finding of the report, Rajkumar Khatri, Principal Secretary of Primary and Secondary Education, said that some of the indicators were newly introduced, deleted or modified which may have resulted as an advantage for the union territories and Puducherry and Sikkim.
Teacher index
Indicators that have been removed this year are percentage of habitations not served and percentage of schools with less than three teachers.
Newly introduced indicators are percentage of schools with kitchen shed and average working hours for teachers.
The State has fared poorly compared to last year in primary as well as upper primary level in the teacher index. The teacher indicator takes into account the pupil-teacher ratio, single-teacher schools and teachers with professional qualification, among others.
Sources in the department pointed out that as there was no permanent teacher recruitment during the survey period, the index could have seen a decline in score and ranking.
A worrying indicator is the percentage of single-teacher schools which stands at 7.09, up from the previous year’s 6.29.
Asked if the State government would step up measures to improve the teacher index indicator, Mr. Khatri said that the Cabinet had approved recruitment of 9,405 primary school teachers which would be done once the employment reservation for Hyderabad-Karnataka under Article 371 J comes into force.
‘Some indicators were new, others deleted or modified’
‘Cabinet has approved recruitment of 9,405 primary school teachers’
Code of conduct revised
Now, Ministers can’t force officials to take decisions in conflict with their duties
In a bid to insulate the bureaucracy from political interference, the Union Cabinet on Thursday revised the Code of Conduct for Ministers (both Union and States) by adding a new provision as per whic Ministers cannot force civil servants to take decisions that may be in conflict with their duties and responsibilities.
A new paragraph has been added to Section 2 of the Code of Conduct, which states that the “Minister shall uphold the political impartiality of the civil services and not ask the civil servants to act in any way which would conflict with the duties and responsibilities of the civil servants.”
The revised code will take immediate effect in the case of the Union Council of Ministers. In the case of the States and the Union Territories, the revised code will be forwarded to the Chief Ministers for adoption.
A legacy of activism
Ifthikar Chaudhary, who stepped down as Chief Justice of Pakistan on Wednesday, will go down in history as the first judge to challenge a military ruler successfully, and then to have spoilt it all by his relentless onslaught against a fledgling democratic government, its President and Prime Minister.
Mr. Chaudhary’s epic term in office, which included more than a year under house arrest (a total of 60 judges were similarly detained at the same time) during the Musharraf regime, and saw the Supreme Court make a comeback to assert its independence in unprecedented but controversial ways, embodies both the achievements and failures of Pakistan in this period.
If his refusal to resign on a demand by the military ruler Pervez Musharraf in 2007 reflected the political aspirations of a nation and triggered a popular movement that heralded the return to democracy, the Supreme Court was also a willing instrument in a dubious move to ensnare President Asif Ali Zardari in a case that pitted him directly against the military. Taking on politicians may have won Mr. Chaudhary much popular approval, but it shone unflattering light on all of Pakistan’s systemic flaws and on how entrenched these are in the national psyche.
Those who believed that the “black coat movement” — the long agitation by the country’s lawyers for the restoration of Mr. Chaudhary — would lead to positive systemic changes in Pakistan were disappointed. Indeed, sections of lawyers who participated in the movement were also among those who cheered the killer of Punjab Governor Salman Taseer in 2011 — he was shot down by his police bodyguard, who accused him of committing blasphemy — when he was produced in court. The more progressive among the Chief Justice’s supporters in the bar gradually distanced themselves from him.
Mr. Chaudhary leaves behind the complex legacy of an apex court that is more mindful of its role in upholding the Constitution than at any other time in its history, but continues to rely on jurisprudence flowing out of the infamous “doctrine of necessity” used by previous Supreme Courts to validate military rule.
Under Mr. Chaudhary’s unapologetic activism, it also allowed itself to be turned into a court of both first and last resort. On any given day, Court Room 1 in the marble-and-granite Supreme Court building would be packed with petitioners ranging from widows fighting off land sharks, people wronged by bureaucrats, rape victims, transgenders, orphans, jailed children, even a Hindu father who wanted the court to restore to him his daughter who had eloped with a Muslim man.
Theatrical proceedings
The proceedings were never less than theatrical. Only some of these cases would reach conclusion, but Mr. Chaudhary never failed to assure the petitioners that justice would be done, calming the sobbing widow with consoling words and sending off the land shark with a stern warning.
His tendency to take up cases suo motu based on newspaper or television reports, or on the basis of letters sent by petitioners, made him popular on the street, but saw the court pronounce on matters such as the fixing of prices of petrol and other essential commodities, or the appointment of officials.
Some cases taken up by the court under Article 184 (3) of Pakistan’s Constitution, which permits the use of suo motu , did have a positive effect. It ensured punishment to paramilitary personnel who were caught on camera as they shot and killed an innocent civilian in Karachi in broad daylight. At the other extreme was the court’s decision to take action against a popular television host and actress who was caught at Islamabad airport with bottles of liquor but had talked her way out of being booked by the police.
A people’s judge
No intellectual, Mr. Chaudhary was a conservative at heart but surprisingly progressive at times, as when the court ruled to give transgenders recognition as a third sex. His unpredictability and brinkmanship, combined with the desire to be seen as a “people’s judge” rather than as a jurist, stand out in the cases by which he will be most remembered.
Until his last day in office, Mr. Chaudhary pro-actively pursued the high-voltage “missing persons case”, on behalf of the families of people who had disappeared after being picked up and detained by Pakistani intelligence for suspected links to terrorists. His dramatic summons to top-ranking military officials heading the secret services, and his threats to slap contempt on them if they did not produce the missing persons, jolted the security establishment out of its comfort zone. Indeed, this is one of the reasons cited for President Musharraf’s decision to remove him in 2007. Largely due to Mr. Chaudhary’s efforts, some of the missing persons were restored to their families, though critics would argue that he took up with less vigour the cause of hundreds of Baloch youth who went missing in the last decade.
In 2012, he also pronounced on a long-dormant case on the money power that Pakistan’s powerful intelligence agencies brought to bear on elections and against elected governments, ruling that the 1990 polls were tainted by the ISI’s distribution of millions of rupees to select politicians. The judgment underlined that the military must not involve itself in politics.
Dubious case
But only a year before that, the Supreme Court was seen bending to please the Army in what came to be known as “memogate”, a dubious case brought against the government alleging that in the aftermath of the U.S operation in Abbottabad against Osama bin Laden, President Asif Ali Zardari had made approaches for American help to prevent a military coup that he feared was in the offing. Some Pakistani commentators asked why the hyper-activist Mr. Chaudhary had not taken suo motunotice of Osama bin Laden’s long and illegal presence in Pakistani territory, wondering if he would question the security establishment for failing to detect him.
Mr. Chaudhary also showed extraordinary zeal in reviving corruption cases against Mr. Zardari, holding that the immunity granted to him as the country’s President was not automatic. Controversially, the court convicted and ordered the arrest of Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani on contempt charges for ignoring its order to write to Swiss authorities asking them to reopen specific cases against Mr. Zardari that had been closed under an amnesty ordered by President Musharraf. Earlier, in 2009, Mr. Chaudhary had set aside as unconstitutional the amnesty agreement reached between President Musharraf and Mr. Zardari’s wife and then leader of the Pakistan People’s Party Benazir Bhutto, months before her assassination in 2007.
The man on the street saw him cracking down on corruption at the highest levels, but impartial observers saw overreach that was pitting the judiciary dangerously against the executive and Parliament. The episode raised fears of another intervention by the Army but despite the professed love for democracy, most sections of Pakistan, including its influential electronic media, cheered him on.
Larger-than-life figure
During his tumultuous term, Mr. Chaudhary, who was Pakistan’s longest serving Chief Justice, became a larger-than-life figure, and a historic era has ended with his departure. Few now remember that he was among the judges who validated General Musharraf’s coup against Nawaz Sharif. Though some of the sheen came off after revelations that his son took favours from a property tycoon facing proceedings in the Supreme Court, Mr. Chaudhary has certainly left the judiciary stronger than when he took up office.
In an environment fraught at the best of times, the challenge for Chief Justice Tassaduq Jillani, who stepped into his predecessor’s big shoes on Thursday, will be to safeguard the Supreme Court’s independence, while bringing sobriety and judicial sophistication to its working to enable it to play its proper role in a democracy that is still taking root.
Ifthikar Chaudhary leaves behind a Supreme Court that is more mindful of its role in upholding the Constitution than at any other time in its history, but continues to rely on jurisprudence previously used to validate military rule
A dream on the theme of civil justice
The best results of the Woolf reforms seem to have been in cases involving smaller sums of money
At first sight, it could be a dream, perhaps even a fantasy — a civil justice system in which lawyers exchange full information in advance and give their clients prior estimates of time and cost; the parties are expected to try and settle without litigating, and either of them can offer to settle at any time. If a court does take a case, it hears only the key points at issue; cases are allocated to fast-track or multi-track courts according to the complexity or size of the claims. If expert evidence is needed, only single experts are appointed and serve neither one party nor the other. Judges, for their part, act as trial managers who set tight timetables and levy penalties for deadlines missed, all with the aid of the latest IT systems.
Yet that was what Lord Woolf, the then head of the English civil judiciary or Master of the Rolls, envisaged in his government-commissioned report, Access to Justice , which was published in 1996. The first major proposal for reform in the English and Welsh civil system for 50 years, the report got immediate attention throughout the judicial Anglosphere.
Woolf clearly meant his proposals to improve access to civil justice, to cut costs, and to put the parties on an equal footing. There was widespread agreement at the time that civil litigation in England was unpredictably, excessively, and disproportionately expensive; costs varied between 41 and 96 per cent of claim values. The time cases took was equally problematic; four years was not unusual, and according to Woolf the main agents in complicating and prolonging cases were lawyers themselves.
Supported by a lot of favourable publicity, the proposals were widely welcomed, not least for proposing pre-action protocols whereby lawyers would get to know their case and put it to their opponents before launching proceedings. In February 1997, the then government passed the Civil Procedure Act, and in 1999 the new Civil Procedure Rules (CPR) took effect.
Nearly 15 years after the Woolf reforms were introduced, the main conclusion is that they are a partial success. The best results seem to have been in cases involving smaller sums of money, with at least an initial decline in the number of claims reaching certain courts; the Queen’s Bench Division of the High Court saw its caseload fall by nearly a fifth in the first year. Many lawyers also think that the duty on parties to cooperate has worked well, as settlements are often reached during the pre-action protocol period; the so-called Part 36, which enables either party to propose settlement at any stage, has also received much praise.
The problems, however, show the difficulty of making public policy both in technical respects and as an attempt to change a working or even wider culture. In particular, costs have gone up, with lawyers preparing cases in detail irrespective of whether or not pre-trial settlement is reached; costs are now front-loaded. Secondly, the time taken for cases involving smaller claims is on average about 13 months, and according to several analysts Woolf’s conclusion that lawyers were the main cause of delays and complications was somewhat hasty. Under the earlier system, lawyers would often settle without having to prepare detailed documents, but now even the initial letters have become something of an industry in themselves. Further delays are caused by the time it takes to identify suitable experts and obtain appropriate information from them, and lawyers accustomed to the adversarial legal system have not taken readily to the idea of single experts. On top of that, outside London the need for suitably experienced judges has sometimes caused additional delays.
One area where the reforms have made little difference is the volume of higher-level financial litigation, even if some large businesses now find the process so expensive that they settle almost every dispute outside the courts. Some corporates have taken to what one lawyer calls “blackmailing” opponents with threats of litigation, so that the other parties settle.
Some of the problems can be addressed without apparent difficulty. For example, the Judicial College, formerly the Judicial Studies Board, holds training days for judges; with many of the senior judiciary making a point of being accessible to their colleagues in the lower courts whether at such events or elsewhere, information and advice can flow freely.
More intractable problems, however, have to do with political will and the wider public culture. None of the five British governments which have held office since the Woolf report appeared has even attempted to fund the up-to-date IT system which is essential for the system to work; Woolf himself says that in the current economic climate new funding for that is unlikely to be approved. Thirdly, civil legal aid was effectively ended in 1995, when conditional fee (also called “no win no fee”) arrangements were finalised. The Access to Justice Act 1999 abolished legal aid for personal injury cases; although the move was not connected with Woolf’s proposals, it has created an incentive for lawyers to cherry-pick cases which they are sure of winning. That restricts ordinary people’s access to justice and could also mean that difficult cases which could set precedents or otherwise develop the law may not reach the courts at all.
Conditional fees, nevertheless, are now widely used in other Commonwealth jurisdictions, such as South Africa, and parts of Canada; they also figure in the United States. In the English system, fixed-cost procedures, for their part, hit poorer claimants hardest; in fact they do not even include lawyers’ fees. Poor claimants also face a large proportion of repossession and debt orders, and there is evidence that certain courts have even recovered more than they cost.
Even non-court proceedings, however desirable, can raise awkward issues. Arbitration seems to have become a relatively standard element in various types of business contracts, but in other types of cases mediation is so strongly expected before litigation is considered that the term “mediation coercion” has emerged. In addition, non-court settlements tend not to address genuine and possibly justified feelings of injustice or wrong. Moreover, the contending parties themselves are frequently responsible for delays, and they often undertake mediation not with a view to reaching early settlement but so as to avoid the costs of litigation. As for civil trials themselves, the transformation of judges into trial managers could connote the beginnings of a move away from the adversarial judicial system and towards the beginnings of an inquisitorial one, at least in civil matters.
Irrespective of the problems though, a return to the old ways is not foreseeable, and the reforms have been at least partly copied in several civil systems. In April 2009, Hong Kong introduced a version without pre-action protocols and front-loading. Woolf himself has called on English judges to enforce the procedures more strictly, and has cited a Singapore judge who sentenced a time-wasting lawyer to three months in prison. As one commentator says, this revolution has only just begun. In addition, India is some way ahead of various other jurisdictions in that almost all High Courts have had mediation centres annexed to them, where litigants can receive mediation services free of charge; this addition to the civil process was first introduced in 2005. As for other aspects of India’s civil system, it could be that somewhere in the upper reaches of the Indian judiciary India’s own Woolf stalks yet unseen.
(Email: arvind.sivaramakrishnan@thehindu.co.in)
India is ahead of others in that almost all its High Courts have mediation centres annexed to them
Some corporates resort
to blackmailing to force other parties to settle
Premium on continuity
Much of what Finance Minister P. Chidambaram and RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan said at the Economic Conclave 2013 is not new. There is, however, a special contextual significance. It is for the first time after the recent State Assembly elections that top policymakers of the UPA government are seen reiterating the broad contours of the government’s economic agenda and policy goals. Considering that the Congress party heading the UPA lost heavily in the elections and faces an equally grim challenge in the general elections barely six months away, the purpose of such reiteration is not quite clear. At one level, it could be an appeal to the next government to maintain continuity in certain core areas of economic policy. That, however, assumes a certain degree of consensus among the leading political parties on key economic areas — which is not evident even now and is even less likely to be so after the elections. Mr. Chidambaram’s focus on achieving fiscal consolidation within a specified time-frame involves a number of difficult steps to cut expenditure and boost revenue. The former involves, among others, pruning subsidies and freeing controlled prices in the energy sector. These have always been politically difficult decisions and it is facile to assume that the next Finance Minister will find it any easier to undertake a course- correction. The level of economic growth is a crucial determinant of revenue collection. Unfortunately, GDP growth has been at a low ebb, struggling to reach a modest 5 per cent annual level.
Inflation has remained a big worry over a long period. The governments of the day have paid a heavy political price on account of inflation — a point so very evident from the recent election results. Both the Centre and the States need to act in unison to check negative trends. The UPA government’s track record in these crucial areas has not been particularly striking. The reason for articulating policy measures now is to reassure financial markets and overseas investors, who over the past few weeks have given their own verdicts on the Indian political situation. At least three major brokerages and a rating agency have given out the assessment that the present government will press ahead with populist policies. The stock markets zoomed to record highs after the election results were announced. Although the benchmark indices have since come down, the feeling in the markets remains to be that a BJP-led coalition will be good for them. Never mind that as on date the situation is very fluid and, equally relevant, the BJP’s economic agenda is still fuzzy.
India’s trade deficit with China nears record $30 b
India’s trade deficit with China after 11 months of this year has reached a record $29.5 billion, exceeding last year’s annual figure, according to newly released trade data.
The numbers underline the sharp decline in once-burgeoning trade, which reached $74 billion in 2011 when China became India’s biggest trading partner.
The following year, a 20 per cent slump in India’s exports, largely on account of iron ore mining bans, coupled with the global slowdown, resulted in a 10 per cent decline as trade fell to $66.50 billion, even as both countries announced an ambitious $100 billion target for 2015.
Doubts over achieving target
The latest figures have cast doubt on whether that target may be achieved. During the period under reference, even as China’s trade with the rest of Asia as well as with its major Western trading partners has picked up, trade with India has remained in a slump, suggesting that causes were more structural rather than a reflection of global trends.
After 11 months of this year, India’s exports to China reached only $14.87 billion out of total bilateral trade of $59.24 billion, according to data released this week by the China’s General Administration of Customs.
Trade between the two countries was down by 2.7 per cent year-on-year, even as China’s overall global trade rose 7.7 per cent. This was driven by an export sector that has continued to show signs of revival, growing 12.7 per cent and marking the second straight month of rising exports.
Among China’s biggest trading partners, trade with the U.S. was up by 7.6 per cent. China’s trade with Southeast Asian countries showed the biggest growth, growing 10.9 per cent.
Border trade up 23 per cent, still minuscule India’s border trade with China, while still at a minuscule $14 million, grew 23.3 per cent last year, local authorities in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) were quoted as saying by the official Xinhua news agency this week.
Trade has grown more than 50 times since 2006, when the Nathu La pass, between Sikkim and the Shigatse prefecture in Tibet, was reopened. Most of the trade is made up of imports of Indian goods into Tibet, which reached $12 million last year. Authorities said the border market is open for only six months of the year — opening on May 1 and closing on November 30.
Government studying options to decriminalise gay sex
Congress supports individual rights; BJP skirts issue
Coming out in support of gay rights, Congress president Sonia Gandhi and vice-president Rahul Gandhi have expressed their disappointment with Wednesday’s Supreme Court verdict that held homosexual acts between consenting adults illegal.
Echoing the view, a number of Union Ministers meanwhile said the government was considering all options to restore the 2009 Delhi High Court order on Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code that had held otherwise.
“The High Court had wisely removed an archaic, repressive and unjust law that infringed on the basic human rights enshrined in our Constitution,” Ms. Gandhi said in a statement. “This Constitution has given us a… legacy of liberalism and openness, that enjoin us to combat prejudice and discrimination of any kind.”
Mr. Rahul Gandhi said he agreed with the High Court’s view on decriminalising gay sex, stressing that his “personal view” was that it was a matter of “personal freedom” that should be left to the individuals concerned.
The Aam Aadmi Party, too, said the Supreme Court’s verdict violated human rights, went against the liberal values of the Constitution, and the spirit of the times.
But the principal Opposition, the BJP, remained silent on whether homosexuality should be decriminalised. Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Sushma Swaraj said that if the government wanted to amend Section 377, it should first draft a proposal and call an all-party meeting. The BJP would then examine the issue and make its stand known.
Earlier in the day, Law Minister Kapil Sibal said: “The Government is considering all options to restore the High Court verdict on [Section] 377. We must decriminalise adult consensual relationships.”
The Supreme Court should have applied “current social and moral values,” Finance Minister P. Chidambaram said.
Link your Aadhaar number by January 31 to get LPG subsidy
Confusion persists about the system and the process of subsidy transfer
Domestic LPG users in Tiruchirapalli, Pudukottai and Nagapattinam districts should get their Aadhaar numbers linked with their bank accounts and distributors before January 31 to get subsidy under the Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) scheme
The DBT scheme was launched in the three districts from November 1. LPG users are given three months time to carry out the ‘seeding process’ from the date of the launch of the scheme.
Under the scheme, LPG users will have to buy the refills at market price and the difference between subsidised price and market price will be transferred to their bank accounts.
Consumers are required to submit the bank account-Aadhaar linkage application form at their bank branches and also register the Aadhaar numbers with their LPG distributors to complete the seeding process and become ‘cash transfer compliant.’
However, many LPG consumers in Tiruchi are yet to get their Aadhaar numbers linked with bank accounts and with the distributors.
For instance, just about 25 per cent of the 5.35-lakh LPG consumers in Tiruchi district have so far carried out the seeding process fully although nearly 70 per cent of the district population is said to have enrolled for Aadhaar cards, according to sources in the [in;oc sector oil marketing companies.
Although officials of the companies contend that the seeding process was progressing and could take some time, they concede that there was some confusion among consumers about the process and the system of transfer of subsidy.
After the Supreme Court’s order in the third week of September, directing the Centre not to tie provision of subsidies or benefits with “Aadhaar” numbers, many people did not show much interest in getting the Aadhaar cards.
However, there has been a rush at the Aadhaar enrolment centres after the launch of the DBT for LPG consumers in the districts.
As to the confusion over the transfer of subsidy, a senior officer of Indian Oil Corporation said an advance subsidy of Rs.435 (the average subsidy of the previous nine cylinders) will be transferred within two or three days after the consumer books the first refill on becoming cash transfer complaint by seeding the Aadhaar numbers with their bank accounts and distributors. This is only an advance subsidy which has to be surrendered when the consumer surrenders or transfers the gas connection.
The actual subsidy for the cylinders will be transferred to the consumers’ bank accounts within 10 days after the delivery of every refill (subject to a maximum of nine in a year).
Check portal
Consumers will not be compliant unless they carry out the linkage at both the bank and distributor. Consumers can check whether they are cash transfer compliant by visiting the transparency portals at the websites of the respective oil companies (Indane, Bharat or HP Gas).
Treasury Benches keen to use full 42 days for T-Bill
The Kiran Kumar Reddy government is determined to leverage the 42-day window for sending the views of the State Assembly as well as those of individual members to the Union Home Ministry on the A.P. Reorganisation Bill-2013.
The Centre lent an air of urgency to the process by air-dashing an officer with copies of the Bill but the same was not reflected in the Home Ministry’s covering letter asking the government to return the Bill by January 23. In fact, the actual time-frame available is till January 26.
The additional three days are now available as the Ministry wants not only the Assembly's view but those of individual members ‘clause by clause.’ Given the Chief Minister’s staunch opposition to bifurcation, his followers are planning discussion on each clause, pressing for division and getting it defeated. These plans, apparently aimed at delaying introduction of the Bill in Parliament, will depend upon when the discussion actually begins in the Assembly. As copies of the Bill have also been delivered to the Legislature Secretariat, what needs to be watched is timing of the next Business Advisory Committee (BAC) meeting, considering that formalities like translation of the Bill into Telugu and Urdu have to be completed.
TRS leaders has made it amply clear that they would allow the House to run on Friday only if the Bill is taken up after a meeting of the BAC. The Treasury Benches, however, claim that the Speaker can proceed with the BAC only with the consent of the Leader. Sources said Mr. Reddy was determined to comprehensively defeat the draft Bill as he believed that the Centre cannot carve out Telangana without the Assembly’s consent.
Women can’t get away with malicious complaint
Ministry notifies rules for prevention of harassment at workplace
Any malicious complaint of sexual harassment by a woman will attract the same punishment a man who has been found guilty of it at the workplace suffers.
The Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redress) Rules, 2013, notified by the Women and Child Development Ministry, recommend action for sexual harassment/malicious complaint including a written apology; warning; reprimand or censure; withholding of promotion, pay rise or increments; termination from service; or undergoing counselling or doing community service. These will apply in cases where service rules do not exist.
Anyone who discloses the name or identity of the aggrieved woman or witnesses will be liable to pay a penalty of Rs 5,000.
On the inquiry procedure, the Rules say the complaints committee — internal complaints committee or local complaints committee — can, on a written request, grant the complainant relief during the pendency of inquiry by restraining the accused from reporting on the work performance of the aggrieved woman or writing her confidential report, and, in case of an educational institution, by restraining the respondent from supervising any academic activity of the woman.
The complaints committee will have the right to terminate the inquiry proceedings or give an ex-parte decision, if the complainant or the respondent fails, without sufficient cause, to present herself or himself for three consecutive hearings. However, the ex-parte or termination order will not be passed without giving the complainant/respondent a 15- day notice in writing.
A complaint of sexual harassment can be filed by a relative or a friend, a co-worker or an officer of the National Commission for Women or the State Women’s Commission or any other person who has knowledge of the incident where the complainant is unable to do it herself beca-use of physical incapacity. But this has to be done with her written consent.
Health Ministry worried SC verdict will affect AIDS control
The Health and Family Welfare Ministry has expressed concern over the Supreme Court order that gay sex is illegal, saying the ruling will prevent vulnerable communities from accessing health facilities for fear of discrimination and stigma.
“We are concerned that this will discourage people from seeking health care, and consulting with doctors, counsellors and health workers,” Ministry Secretary Keshav Desiraju told The Hindu on Thursday.
The LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) is defined as a high-risk group by the National AIDS Control Organisation — now the Department of AIDS Control — with HIV infection prevalence among men having sex with men (MSM) being the highest, between 6.54 and 7.23 per cent. This is the second most vulnerable community after injection drug users.
According to the NACO 2010-11 annual report, India had an estimated 40 lakh persons in the MSM community, of whom 10 per cent were at risk of contracting HIV infection.
The Department of AIDS Control provides inclusive healthcare service for gay men and transgenders primarily for checking HIV infections, and the service was being accessed by a large number of the LGBT community following the 2009 Delhi High Court judgement that had struck down Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code which criminalised “unnatural sex.”
Now “we have gone back by many years. None of us can walk into a health care centre for fear of discrimination and blackmailing,” said transgender activist Lakshmi Tripathi.
The HIV Estimation of 2012 suggests an overall reduction of 57 per cent in the annual new HIV infections (among adult population) from 2.74 lakh in 2000 to 1.16 lakh in 2011, reflecting the impact of various interventions and scaled-up prevention strategies.
Based on these outcomes, the Department of AIDS Control designed the fourth phase of NACP (2012-17) to accelerate the process of reversal and further strengthen the epidemic response. The main objectives of NACP are reducing new infections and providing comprehensive care and support to all People Living with HIV and treatment services for all those who require them.
While HIV prevalence shows declining trends among female sex workers, MSM, injecting drug users and single male migrants are emerging as important risk groups.
Directive to govt. on compensation to farmer
He was dubbed a ‘Maoist’ by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee
The Calcutta High Court directed the State government here on Thursday to inform it by December 16 the steps that it has taken to implement the recommendations of the West Bengal Human Rights Commission in connection with the arrest of a farmer who was dubbed a ‘Maoist’ by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.
The farmer, Shiladitya Chowdhury, was arrested by the police after being described a ‘Maoist’ by Ms. Banerjee when she was addressing a public rally at Belpahari in the State’s Paschim Medinipur district in August 2012.
In its recommendation on July 15, the WBHRC had said the Chief Minister’s remark was tantamount to “serious adverse social and psychological effects, and affected the dignity of Shiladitya who is not a Maoist.” It had directed the government to pay him a compensation of Rs. 2 lakh within eight weeks.
When the State failed to comply with the recommendation, Mr. Chowdhury filed a writ petition in the High Court earlier this month.
During the court proceedings, Mr. Chowdhury’s advocate Partha Pratim Kanjilal said that ample time had been provided to the government to implement the recommendation but it had failed to do so.
“If the State government pays the compensation to Mr. Chowdhury by Monday [December 16] then the matter will come to an end; otherwise the case will continue,” Mr. Kanjilal told The Hindu.
Commenting on the developments, Mr. Chowdhury said he had full faith in the laws of the country.
He was dubbed a ‘Maoist’ by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee
Solar project inaugurated
Eminent nuclear scientist Anil Kakodkar visits the Solar Photovoltaic Hub after inauguration of a solar project at Bengal Engineering & Science University (BESU) at Shibpur in Howrah near Kolkata on Thursday.— Photo: PTI
Jharkhand CM says panchayats will have control over riverbed sand
RJD and Congress ministers had opposed auction policy
With coalition partners the Rashtriya Janta Dal (RJD) and the Congress stepping up opposition to the government’s policy to auction sand from riverbeds, Chief Minister Hemant Soren on Wednesday night announced that the government would restore access and control over the minor minerals to panchayats. A day earlier following public criticism from other Cabinet Ministers from the Congress and the RJD, the government had announced that the auctions have been suspended in 17 of 24 districts where the process was still under way.
On Wednesday, RJD leader and Minister for Social Welfare Annapurna Devi and Jharkhand State Congress president Sukhdeo Bhagat demanded the government withdraw the policy that would allow companies from outside the State to lift and trade in riverbed sand.
“We met the Chief Minister and have demanded that the government scrap this policy, and our support to the government will depend on this issue,” said Ms. Devi. Since last week, several Congress ministers have publicly criticised the decision which they said Mr. Soren had taken without consulting coalition partners.
In the 81-member Assembly, RJD’s six MLAs and 11 MLAs of the Congress are among the 43 who supported the government led by the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha. “The Congress cannot support a policy for control of minor minerals in a Schedule V Area where such rights must stay with panchayats,” said Mr. Bhagat.
Bandhu Tirkey of the Jharkhand Janadhikar Party had also criticised the auction policy.
Australia’s top court overrules gay marriage
Australia’s top court on Thursday struck down gay marriage in the nation’s capital, ruling that Parliament must decide on same-sex unions — to the anguish of dozens who have wed under a landmark law.
In a unanimous judgment scotching the Australian Capital Territory’s new same-sex marriage law, the High Court ruled that only Parliament — not state and territory authorities — had the power to decide who could wed.
The ruling dashed the hopes of same-sex couples and campaigners who had banked on the ACT legislation paving the way to a national law permitting gay marriage, a decade after the federal government defined wedlock as strictly between a man and a woman.
Australia continues to lag a growing number of countries on the reform.
“The Marriage Act does not now provide for the formation or recognition of marriage between same-sex couples,” the court said.
“That Act is a comprehensive and exhaustive statement of the law of marriage,” it added. — AFP
No caste, no creed, no gender
To imagine, create and to touch the old world anew is what makes the magical journey of the artist. Artists neither belong to any special community, nor are they a unique set of people. To be an artist is in the essence of a human being. It is in every one of us to breathe life with the expanse of imagination, embrace it in our thoughts. We are all artists.
While all of us imagine, why is it that the imagination of everyone does not lead to creativity? Because if imagination has to be creative, it has to be accompanied by something else as well: deep understanding. This is essential for the spark of imagination to be more than fantasy. Essentially, the creative individual needs depth of perception. This depth is multilayered, with the past and present serving as a continuum as well as a stimulus to further evolution. Even the most radical and path-breaking ideas come from the same deep understanding within which acceptance and rejection play a part. I do not refer here to studied learning, but to a process of seriously comprehending the elements, their existence and various perceptions of them. The understanding I speak of is a result of observation and introspection.
Every individual imagines numerous possibilities around living one’s life in the normal course. But life is not just about living; it is also about the possibility of creating worlds that do not exist, sounds that have never been heard before or sights that seem improbable. These are real in the mind. In this imagination lies the courage to fight for today, to work and find the happiness of the day. Every possibility drives humans to push the boundaries of living. If not for this, there would be no tomorrow to look forward to and no reason for action in our daily existence.
Yet imagination arises from the present through human interaction with the world around. The possibilities generated by imagination are not pulled out of thin air, but born out of what exists, which in turn is the result of the past. When we link the past and present, we see a continuum, and within this change exists. In the spark of the imagination is born this constant environment of change.
In the arts, the words imagination and creativity are often used as synonyms and all artists are deemed to possess this quality. However, I see the two words as being different, even if they refer to the conjuring up of things that are fresh or not experienced before. While imagination is an activity that remains in the world of the mind, creativity is the result of it leading to a tangible creation in the temporal world. Therefore, great imagination need not result in creativity, but it is the source of creativity. The spark for imagination is experience, and the spirit of creativity is imagination. The act of creation is closely linked to the instinct of imagination. When humans ‘imagine’, they are experiencing their creations in the mind. These do not translate into creativity unless moved from the mind into the real world. Creativity involves the actual act of creation. This in a way is the translation of ‘that which is imagined’ into the reality of the present. Great artists are those who are able to make this move.
Contrasts in Shot-Silk
Subbulakshmi was born to a devadasi mother, Madurai Shanmukhavadivu (1889–1962), herself a vina artist. Subbulakshmi’s life changed with the move to Madras and her marriage to T. Sadasivam, a brahmin who was already married, a father of two daughters, freedom fighter and very well connected in political and business circles. In this new house, Subbulakshmi became ‘MS’, a divinity that lives until today. A dasi became Mira.
The bhakti music of MS was beautiful, uplifting, unforgettable, but the fact that there was another ‘MS music’ that was capable of being, and did indeed become, serious with all the rigour of art music has been lost to the legend of the ‘divine MS’. I regard this as a great loss. The Karnatik world that men had built denied her the musicianship that lesser men could aspire to. MS had to find her space within this order and manoeuvre within it. She and her husband may have been intensely committed to bhakti music, but the actual positioning of MS and her social transformation was the work of men in society, especially those constructing the modern Karnatik story.
D.K. Pattammal, on the other hand, was a brahmin from Kanchipuram.
Women from brahmin houses only sang devotional songs during religious occasions within the household. DKP, as she came to be known, showed great talent and learnt from numerous teachers and emerged as a champion of Karnatik music. She was the kutumba-penn (‘family girl’) Subrahmanya Bharati had spoken of, out in the public arena. The most common quotes about her are that she was ‘the first brahmin woman musician to perform in public’ and that she was ‘the woman first to render complex ragam–tanam–pallavis in kutcheris’.
There is a nuance to be noted here. By proclaiming that DKP was the first woman to render RTP, they were placing the capacity of the brahmin woman musician above that of the devadasi, a wholly inaccurate position.
RTPs were very much part of the repertoire of distinguished devadasis like Coimbatore Thayi and Bangalore Nagaratnammal. And therefore the compliment paid to Pattammal was less of a tribute to her than yet another expression of an attitude towards devadasis.
DKP’s music was called ‘man’s music’ and the brahmin woman was accommodated in the kutcheri world, but many male musicians would not accompany her. Only those who did not find a footing in the male world would do so. When Palghat Mani Iyer (1912-81) accompanied her and, much later, M.L. Vasanthakumari, on the mrdanga, it was a gracious personal gesture rather than a conceptual acceptance of women as important musicians. This meant that DKP’s kutcheris had to be attractive enough with just her name on the invitation. She could not depend on the names of her accompanists to attract more people. For instance, people attending a concert by Semmangudi Srinivasier (1908–2003) would also be interested in hearing him accompanied on the violin by Rajamanikkam Pillai (1898–1970) and on the mrdanga by Pazhani Subramania Pillai (1908–62).
An additional dimension of Pattammal lay in her identification with nationalist ardour. This was most powerfully expressed in her spirited renderings of Subrahmanya Bharati’s patriotic songs. And just as it used to be said of MS that she was Mira herself, people saw in Pattammal, none other than Bharati himself. All the masculinity of India’s svadeshi spirit shot through her patriotic songs. Nothing could have been more conducive to the patronising of Pattammal by male brahmins, many of whom were ardent nationalists and freedom fighters. Yet she was never accepted as an equal of male musicians. MS and DKP became two sides of the same coin minted in the foundry of male, brahmin domination.
Men manipulated the space for women in Karnatik music and saw to it that they remained a notch below their own kind.
Is Karnatik music
inherently religious?
To answer that, I must ask whether Karnatik music was intended to be religious. It is not possible to respond in ‘yes’ or ‘no’ terms to this. Karnatik music was not one single initiative that started like some association or a movement, but an aesthetic impulse that acquired shape and definition and then, through shared experiences and cognitive energies among master artists, developed a set of coda over a period of time.
But clearly its journey included a relationship with temples and their associated rituals. This is where we need to look beyond the function and the practice of the music. We need to recognise the brilliance of musicians whose genius was logistically linked to religious sites, but was aesthetically free to and did indeed travel beyond the precincts of the temple where they practised their art. In this complex formation lies the answer to the question about the intent of Karnatik music. My point of view on this subject is not atheistic but aesthetic.
Now to pose another related question: what happens when the thought in the musician’s mind is the music’s religious content? This is not an academic question, but is about a very real situation. Most Karnatik musicians in the past and many in the present hail from conservative families, more often than not of brahmin descent. They believe strongly in religion and ritual. This automatically makes their relationship with Karnatik music religious. In this situation, the lyrics rendered further entrench their already conditioned minds in religious belief, leading many musicians to feel, believe and then propound the belief that they are conveying the philosophical and religious meaning of the vaggeyakara to the audience. Many kirtanas are rendered with deep feeling and focus on the names of the deities and the vaggeyakara’s yearning for these gods.
In doing so, is the kirtana’s aesthetic make-up influenced? As much as the musicians are engrossed in the music, the focus is driven by textual meaning as they understand it and their own associations with the words being sung. Lines in the compositions are rendered with a clear emphasis on those words that create a religious – if not devotional – emotion both for the musician and the listener. These lines are even repeated to constantly emphasise the same emotion. In the process, the musician’s thoughts veer away from the musical structuring.
Within the modern world, the Hindu religious content raises an important question. Can an atheist or a non-Hindu be a Karnatik musician?
The environment that pervades Karnatik music makes it very difficult for an atheist to function within its world. There may be a few, but they will find it very difficult to come out in the open and articulate an atheistic narrative for Karnatik music. They will silently pamper the religious responses to their music and encourage devotional and philosophical expressions. I am not finding fault, but highlighting the difficulty for them to be who they are within this world. The musical fraternity at large does not feel it necessary to give Karnatik music, especially its compositional forms, a purely aesthetic thought.
What about practitioners of other religions? Among the nagasvara community there were not a few Muslim families that mastered this art form. Most of them flourished in what is now Andhra Pradesh and a few still live alongside the most conservative Hindu communities of Srirangam in Tamil Nadu. My admiration for these people is immense, as they have been able to negotiate two very opposing ideas, but there is a nuance. They have had to, perhaps willingly, accept the Hindu pantheon within their world. You will find their homes adorned with pictures of Hindu deities and their immense respect for Hindu gods and goddesses even when their religious practices are Islamic. This is a credit to their ability to straddle two worlds. But they cannot display apathy for Hinduism and be accepted as musicians by the Karnatik world.
Voicing the note
The human voice is a beautiful contrivance. As with the eyes, it expresses the innermost emotions and thoughts of the human being. The very tone of a person’s voice can tell you a lot about him. You do not need to see the person and he need not be near you, yet you understand from his voice more than just the linguistic meaning of his words or the sound that you hear. Sound as music, by its nature, can only be experienced, not seen or held – it is an intangible. In this intangible, almost mystic nature of the voice’s beautiful progeny, music, lies its capacity to abstract its own meaning from life. This is very different from visual abstraction.
You can stand in front of a painting or sculpture for a long time and let your eyes constantly receive the painting. Music, and the perception of abstraction in it, does not work that way. A line of music once sung is gone, but is still alive in your mind. The faculty of hearing completes its work very quickly. The voice is both a natural instrument and the vehicle of this abstraction. There is no external transfer of the mind’s abstraction, neither does the music emanate from an external source. This gives the voice a personal nature that makes it different from any instrument. This may be the reason why, in India’s artistic traditions, the voice has been regarded as music’s prime vehicle. The musician or the listener never sees the physical seat of this instrument, the voice box. All one sees is the movement of the lips, mouth and tongue. Yet, the music that is born from it conveys an emotion that rings true in the listener’s or musician’s own being. While music from the voice is very intimate, it does not speak automatically to everyone.
One has to become aware of the voice, not only in a technical sense, but intimately — the sort of intimacy we have with a plant that we nurture.
We do not just water the plant and watch the flowers bloom. There is something more: an emotional relationship, even if the reciprocity, which that expression implies, is not evident. What is it that gives us this feeling?
It is a deep sense of awareness of the plant and, through that, ourselves. This awareness makes us spend that extra second with the plant, to watch and experience. This is the kind of relationship that we need with the voice. We don’t just train it, we actually listen to it: the sounds, movements, emotions that it conveys. This awareness is about knowing oneself through the voice.
In music, awareness comes with listening; it is something we need to develop. I would like to differentiate the act of hearing from listening. Listening contains the awareness of what is being conveyed. Meaning lies not only in the words. As we listen to our voice, like with the plant, we become aware of the meaning behind every musical sound, every movement, every pause and every breath. This opens us to the world of pure music. This music is in every person and we understand it only if we understand our voice, the ‘first messenger’. Music and the voice are inseparable. The voice is Karnatik music. This intrinsic relationship is why every musician – not just the vocalist – must learn to sing. In singing, the musician discovers music, voice and, with utter clarity, the person within.
( A Southern Music: The Karnatik Story, published by HarperCollins, is being launched by Professor Amartya Sen on December 16, 2013, in Chennai)
Excerpts from A Southern Music: The Karnatik Story by acclaimed vocalist T.M. Krishna
A good start in Bali
The trade agreement reached in Bali last weekend has provided much-needed oxygen to a moribund World Trade Organisation. The WTO, founded in 1995, was fast fading into irrelevance what with countries forging bilateral trade pacts and powerful regional trade agreements, especially in the developed world. In the event, the first-ever trade agreement between the 159 member-countries of the WTO is a shot in the arm for multilateralism even as it keeps the agenda of the Doha Round alive. “We have put the world back into the WTO,” declared Roberto Azevedo, Director-General, and he could not have put it more eloquently. The agreement is designed to simplify customs procedures and lower trade barriers between countries. The International Chamber of Commerce has estimated that the Bali deal will cut trade costs by 10-15 per cent even as it adds an estimated $1 trillion to global trade. How realistic these numbers are will only be proved in the years ahead, but there is little doubt that global trade will get a significant boost from the Bali agreement. In a sense, the emergence of regional trade blocs which was seen as a threat to the WTO eventually proved to be its saviour as those countries left out from them, mainly emerging economies such as India, Brazil, South Africa and Russia, realised the WTO was critical to their interests.
The unyielding stance of India on protecting its farm subsidies which are set to increase following the enactment of the Food Security Act did cause some disquiet amongst the member-countries and at one stage seemed set to hold up an eventual agreement. The interim mechanism devised as a via media will allow India to continue with its agricultural support price programme undisturbed until a final solution is negotiated. A phase of tough and tricky negotiations is ahead for the country as it seeks to get its farm subsidy programme into the WTO framework; support from other developing countries with similar programmes is crucial here. Indeed, from a larger perspective, the agreement at Bali is just the beginning. A lot of hard work lies ahead for the WTO, and Mr. Azevedo has acknowledged this. Trade negotiators need to carry forward the positive momentum built up at Bali as they seek to push through the Doha Round agenda. This will not be easy though, as negotiators will have to contend with regional groupings such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which involves the U.S., Japan and ten other Pacific Rim countries, and the powerful trans-Atlantic alliance between the U.S. and the European Union, negotiations for which are now on. Bali may have infused life into the WTO but its biggest battles lie ahead.
