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VOLUME 12, ISSUE 4 | FORTNIGHTLY
16 APRIL 2016
` 30
INDIA
FIRST
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FROM THE EDITOR’S DESK
“While it makes much sense to crack down
on firms such as Mossack Fonseca and put
pressure on countries like Panama to
embrace global best practices on tax
information exchange and enforcement of
anti-money-laundering laws, the sinking of
offshore tax havens per se will not ensure
the end of corruption”
LEAKY
LESSONS
By SUNJOY HANS
Editor-in-Chief
A
mid the far-reaching fallout of the Panama
Papers leak (detailed in the cover story) many
financial gurus across the globe, including
our very own Reserve Bank of
India governor, Raghuram Rajan,
have painstakingly sought to remind the public and media that
not every offshore company is illegitimate.
They cite many legitimate reasons for individuals and companies to use offshore firms and
companies. For instance, if two
companies from different countries decide to set up a joint venture company, it might be a
perfectly prudent and not remotely unethical for them to incorporate that company on a
neutral jurisdiction. Similarly, it
is only fair for residents of unstable nations to be able to have accounts in calmer lands where
they do not run the risk of losing
their hard-earned dough to
despotic administrations, draconian laws, or marauding mobs.
Had these been the only rea16 APRIL 2016
sons why all offshore accounts were opened in the
world, the Panama Papers leak would never have happened.
Unfortunately, many of the schemes that the
Panama Papers detailed involved shell companies and
trusts which were anonymous, highly opaque, and effectively concealed the identity of the real owners behind the masks of hired nominees. Such entities are
more often than not vehicles that tax evaders, money
launderers and corrupt politicians and public officials
use to give their governments and people the slip.
Data released by the International Consortium of
Investigative Journalists have comprehensively illustrated how rich close friends, relatives and associates
of some powerful politicians and high-flying public officials have become over the past years.
Nepotism and corruption go hand in hand. They always have. And that ultimately widens the gap between the rich and the poor.
When politicians and public servants steal from government coffers they only steal the taxpayers’ money,
leaving the state treasury with as much less to spend
on necessary amenities, facilities and infrastructure.
When work contracts and projects are awarded on the
basis of kinship and friendship instead of merit, then
honest and capable firms become incapable of and
discouraged from contributing to the national growth.
Hence, while it makes much sense to crack down on
firms such as Mossack Fonseca and put pressure on
countries like Panama to embrace global best practices on tax information exchange and enforcement of
anti-money-laundering laws, the sinking of offshore
tax havens per se will not ensure the end of corruption;
it will ultimately be up to the national governments to
make their finances and administration as transparent
as possible.
However, leaving kleptocrats with fewer options to hide
away their loots in offshore dens will go a long way in
boosting global efforts to put an end
to corporate anonymity and financial
secrecy. Creating a global platform
where details about ownership of offshore entities are openly available to
tax officials, law-enforcers and the
public will do the world a world of
good. So will putting in place stiff
penalties for flouters of these rules. All
governments must ensure that global
banks adhere to anti-money-laundering protocols and all law firms
that set up offshore companies are
regulated.
Going back to what our RBI governor also advised recently, the
Panama Papers leak should not
serve to delegitimise wealth by fuelling dismay about the global financial world among the less
well-off; it should serve as an alarm
bell for governments across the
globe to better (read more fairly
and equitably) manage their peoples’ wealth. n
INDIA FIRST 3
INDIA
FIRST
S P E A K S
Y O U R
CONTENTS
M I N D
Editor-in-Chief Sunjoy Hans
[email : [email protected]]
Consulting Editor Pankaj Kumar
Associate Editor Siddhartha Tripathy
Senior Special Correspondent Kabita Dash
General Manager Bimal Ku. Bhanjdeo
Legal Advisors Yasobant Das, M.R. Mohanty
Orissa Correspondent H.K. Rath (Bapun)
Delhi Correspondent Samita Chaudhary
Special Correspondents Tarun Khanduja,
Ashok Mehta
Production Head Debabrata Mishra
Assistant Art Director Prabhakar Hota
General Manager Finance Niranjan Das
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08 A WATERSHED DISCLOSURE
COVER
STORY
19
The Panama Papers have marked the beginning of tough times
for secret offshore tax havens and those invested in them
UP AGAINST THE
GRAIN
A traditionally Left-
POLITICS leaning West Bengal
remains a tough nut to
crack for an essentially
rightist BJP
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RNI Regd No. ORIENG/2004/13647
Volume 12, Issue 4, 16 April 2016, Fortnightly
email : [email protected]
28
MOVE OVER
DIESEL BUSES
Electric buses make
ENERGY better sense not only for
the environment but
also for the
government’s purse
strings
4 INDIA FIRST
30
HEALTH
A TRUE-BLUE
ALTERNATIVE
Ozone therapy offers
many advantages over
mainstream treatment
16 APRIL 2016
In
a
nutshell
In the Dock
D
ubbing West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee as the head
of "syndicate", the Congress said that
was the prime reason she could not take
action against party leaders and MPs accused of indulging in corruption. The
Trinamool Congress hit back, wondering whether the words of Congress leaders carry any weight after they have sold
their flags to those (read the CPI-M) who
accused then prime minister Rajiv
Gandhi of accepting kickbacks in the
Bofors gun deal. Addressing the media,
Congress spokesman Anand Sharma
said the multi-crore-rupee Saradha chit
fund scam was a reality, and a minister
belonging to the Trinamool has landed
in jail. Referring to the purported sting
operation by the Narada News portal,
Sharma said: "Their MPs have been seen
... They have been caught on camera.
"But Mamata has taken no action
against that. That's because she is the
head of the syndicate. How can she then
take action against her corrupt ministers and members of parliament?" he
asked. "The offer of having an internal
probe is an insult to the wisdom of the
voters of Bengal. It is a joke perpetrated
on the people." Trinamool secretary
general Partha Chatterjee said: "The socalled syndicate head Mamata Banerjee
lives in a 6-feet by 6-feet room. What is
the use of saying all these?" n
Daring the PM
A
day after Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched a no-holdsbarred attack on her, West Bengal Chief
Minister Mamata Banerjee said his comments do not behove the office he holds
and termed his BJP "Bhayanak Jali Party
(Dangerously Fraud Party)" while daring
him to arrest her. "I fight with my head
held high. I never bow my head before
anyone. The prime minister can arrest
me if he so wishes, I don't care," she said
addressing an election rally in the same
area where Modi held one of his three
meetings earlier. Banerjee told the
prime minister that she was not his "domestic help" and alleged he spoke like
an RSS volunteer. n
Kolkata Crusaders
O
nce unknown beyond their immediate circles of family, friends
and colleagues, they became crusaders
due to difficulties and sorrow they expe16 APRIL 2016
Detained & Deported
B
ollywood actor Anupam Kher was recently detained at the Srinagar
airport to prevent him from visiting the troubled NIT campus in the
capital. He was later put on a Delhi-bound flight. Kher had intended to
visit NIT Srinagar to express solidarity with non-local students who have
been on protest following clashes with local students after an India-West
Indies cricket match on March 31. Deputy Inspector General of Police
Ghulam Hassan Bhat and a Senior Superintendent of Police met Kher at
the VIP lounge of the airport on his arrival and told him that he cannot visit
the NIT campus. "Kher was later asked to take a fight back to Delhi. He
went back by an IndiGo flight," a police officer said. Some Kashmiri students had celebrated India's loss to the West Indies. This was opposed by
some non-local students, triggering unrest and clashes. The non-local students allege they were beaten up by the Jammu and Kashmir Police. They
want the college to be shifted out of the Kashmir Valley. In the morning,
Anupam Kher expressed unhappiness on being stopped at the airport. "I
have been told by police that I cannot enter Srinagar city at all. I have asked
them to show me the orders," he tweeted. n
rienced at a personal level. They all are
now busy plotting the downfall of West
Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee,
who in the very first place is "responsible" for their 'celebrity' status. Among
these fighters working against the Trinamool Congress chief and her party in
the West Bengal assembly elections is a
Jadhavpur University professor, a widow
of a green activist, two housewives, and
a farmer. Dubbed as Maoists or arrested
for circulating an innocuous spoof, they
all faced Banerjee's wrath at one or the
other point of time. Now, they say, they
are fighting to "reclaim democracy
snatched away by the despotic Trinamool regime". n
Nonagenarian
Candidate
T
he Congress' Gyan Singh Sohanpal is the oldest candidate in the
West Bengal assembly polls, seeking his
11th term as a legislator at the ripe age
of 91. Fondly called "Chacha" (uncle) by
one and all, Sohanpal is contesting from
Kharagpur Sadar constituency in West
Midnapore district, which has been
sending him to the assembly since 1982.
He served as a West Bengal minister and
briefly as the assembly speaker in the
past. Sohanpal's family belonged to
Punjab but migrated to Bengal in early
1900s. He joined the Congress party durINDIA FIRST 5
ing the Quit India movement for the
overthrow of British rule in the country.
He won his first election in 1969 in independent India. Since then, Sohanpal
has kept the Congress flag high in all
electoral contests, except in 1977 when
the Left Front swept to power in the
state. This time he is pitted against BJP
state president Dilip Ghosh and the ruling Trinamool Congress' Ramaprasad
Tiwari, but has the backing of the Left
Front which has an electoral understanding with the Congress in West Bengal. n
High and Dry
O
nce a favourite summer retreat of
the erstwhile British rulers,
Shimla is now so much in the grip of
water scarcity that its hotels as well as
guests have to fork out handsome
amounts for every bucket they need.
"There is no water at all in the hotel
we're staying at. I was charged Rs.100 for
a bucket of water," Deepti Bhatnagar, a
tourist from Lucknow, said. Her husband Pragya said: "This is probably the
only tourist destination in the country
that expects the tourists to carry their
water with them." In most of Shimla,
taps stay dry -- water supply is restricted
to once in two or three days. Some
neighbourhoods receive tap water once
a week. The owners and managers of
Shimla's 450 hotels, restaurants and
guest-houses are a worried lot. "We are
buying a 3,000-litre water tanker for
Rs.5,000 from a private supplier to meet
our daily needs," D.P. Bhatia, the general
manager of the Oberoi Group's Clarkes
Hotel, said. Private suppliers bring water
from natural sources located on the outskirts of Shimla to sell to the hotels, he
said. Civic authorities say water shortage has become more acute since January 2 when supply from Ashwani Khud
was stopped following a recent outbreak
of jaundice. n
Prohibition in Phases
T
amil Nadu Chief Minister J.Jayalalithaa promised introduction
of liquor prohibition in the state in
phases if her AIADMK is voted back to
power. Kick-starting her election campaign, Jayalalithaa, also the AIADMK
general secretary, said it is not possible
to prohibit liquor sales in the state with
one single signature and has to be done
step by step. She charged DMK president M.Karunanidhi with lifting prohibition in 1971 and introducing liquor to
a generation that did not know about
drinking. Noting all parties in the state
6 INDIA FIRST
When Sonia Laughed
C
ongress president Sonia Gandhi is seldom known for expressing her
emotions in a lighter vein in public. But recently, a cryptic comment
on President Pranab Mukherjee by a compere at the Arjun Singh memorial
lecture could not but make Gandhi break into peals of laughter. At the end
of the president's address, as the compere said, "Khuda ne bhi khushi
manaya hoga, jab unhone Pranab Mukherjee ko banaya" (God must have
blessed himself the moment he made Pranab Mukherjee), the entire audience at the Teen Murti auditorium burst out in laughter. Gandhi was certainly one of them. Earlier, with two of the top Congress leaders -- former
prime minister Manmohan Singh and Gandhi -- sharing the centrestage
with Mukherjee, it all appeared a sombre and serious show. Even the courtesy gestures between the Congress leaders were minimum with hardly
any whispering or interactions. Late Arjun Singh's wife Saroj Kumari also
sat in a corner occasionally chatting with Gandhi. Among the audience,
there were prominent Congress leaders sitting in the first row -- M.L.
Fotedar, A.K. Antony, Digvijaya Singh, Jyotiraditya Scinda, Ahmed Patel,
Suresh Pachury, P.J. Kurien, while among non-Congress personalities were
Farooq Abdullah and Amar Singh. n
are talking about prohibition, she said
while all others can talk about prohibition, DMK president Karunanidhi cannot and does not have any right to speak
about it. In Tamil Nadu, liquor is retailed
by state owned outlets and is the major
revenue earner. All parties have been
demanding ban on liquor sales in the
state and it is one of the major poll
planks. n
Historic Win
for Women
A
group of women created history
when they prayed at the wellknown Shani Shingnapur temple by
pouring oil on the five-feet tall idol of
Lord Shanidev. The development took
place shortly after the Shani Shingnapur Temple Trust declared that women
would be allowed to enter and pray at
the open-to-sky platform from now
on. Trustee Shalini Lande pointed out
that the Bombay High Court had ruled
that there was no law to prevent
women from entering any place of
worship. "Yes, we have taken this decision. We shall now finalise other details like how and when women can go
and worship there," Trust chairperson
Anita Shetye said. For over four centuries, women have been barred from
stepping onto the high platform on
which stands a black stone -- symbolising Lord Shanidev, the personification of planet Saturn. Shani
Shingnapur is known as the only village where houses do not have doors
and locks, and yet it remains theftfree. Even the UCO Bank's branch in
the village does not have locks on its
doors. Belief has it that thieves cannot
steal or burgle in the village which is
protected by Lord Shani and misfortune would befall anyone who steals. n
16 APRIL 2016
POLITICALLY
INCORRECT
A fortnightly update on the faux pas of the movers and shakers of Indian politics
“Come to Maharashtra,
I will put a knife to your
throat”
Maharashtra Navnirman
Sena chief Raj
Thackeray to Asaduddin
Owaisi after the latter’s
remark that he would
not chant ‘Bharat Mata
Ki Jai’ even if a knife is
put to his throat.
“Do we have a ISI agent
as PM now?? Its very
serious the way PM is
surrendering to anti
India forces? [sic]”
Delhi Water Minister
Minister and Aam Aadmi
Party leader Kapil Mishra
compares Prime Minister
Narendra Modi to an ISI
agent.
“After the elections, we will
take account of all murderers
and executioners ... We will
take account of every drop of
blood of our men who have
embraced martyrdom”
CPI-M leader Mohammed Salim
landed in a controversy by
warning that the Left Front will
take account of all "murderers
and executioners" who ran
amok during the Trinamool
Congress regime after it comes
to power following the
assembly polls.
16 APRIL 2016
INDIA FIRST 7
Cover
Story
A WATERSHED
DISCLOSURE
As the Panama Papers leak takes the world by storm, with India being
no exception, it heralds harder times for offshore tax havens and all
those invested in them
8 INDIA FIRST
16 APRIL 2016
S
ipping on their morning cuppa
coffee at their luxurious homes
and opulent surroundings,
many of the world’s mighty and wealthy
might have fallen off their chairs after
flipping open their dailies early this
month. The dose of news that ormally
helps keep them abreast of the times,
sharp for the day, must have served as a
rude awakening, completely rendering
that shot of caffeine redundant.
This was not one of those April Fool
jokes. Newspapers crack those on the
first day of the month, not the third. The
first lot of headline-hugging news stories on what has now been popularly
dubbed as “Panama Papers” – a titantic
trove of 11.5 million leaked confidential
documents detailing information over a
span of four decades about 214,000 offshore companies (including their directors and shareholders) listed by
Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca
– meant business.
This was as serious as investigative
journalism can possibly get in these
tech-savvy times. And as big, being well
over a year in the making.
After an anonymous soul, answering
to some higher calling for global good,
made these documents freely available
in instalments to German newspaper
Süddeutsche Zeitung early last year, the
Munich-based daily realised the enormity of the job at hand – there was 2.6
terabytes (2600 gigabytes) of data to be
examined – and enlisted the assistance
of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, a body created by
an American charity called the Centre
for Public Integrity.
The ICIJ then shared these documents with more than a 100 news organisations across the world for
investigation and analysis. It took some
400 journalists beavering away at these
documents in 25 languages, many working way beyond office hours and
Iceland Prime Minister Sigmundur David Gunnlaugsson
16 APRIL 2016
through the weekend, for over 12
months to unveil how some 140 politicians (including 12 current and former
presidents, prime ministers and monarchs), highly placed public officials and
celebrities – along with or through their
close friends, relatives and associates –
from around 200 countries might have
hidden a considerable part of their considerable assets from public and government scrutiny, and especially from their
respective taxmen.
GLOBAL IMPACT
Given the sheer scale of the Panama
Papers leak, which was manifold bigger
than all other similar major documentry
leaks – WikiLeaks (1.7GB, in 2010), Offshore Secrets (260GB, 2013), LuxLeaks
(4.4GB, 2014) and HSBC files (3.3GB,
2015) – put together, Project
Prometheus, as the ICIJ had named the
operation internally, called for nothing
less than an unprecedented Herculean
level of concerted and coordinated effort by the journalists from almost all
over in order to be the explosive weapon
it needed to be in the battle against offshore financial secrecy and shenanigans.
And that is exactly what it turned out
to be.
When the blood, sweat and tears of
this army of journalists finally began
showing in the press and on-air as sensational scoops across the globe on April
3, they set tongues wagging and hackles
rising all the way from South America,
Africa and Australia to Europe, Middle
East and Asia. That very day, five heads
of state from Argentina, Iceland, Saudi
Arabia, Ukraine, and the United Arab
Emirates, along with close associates of
various government leaders of over 40
other countries, were identified as those
with links to shell companies they may
have used for illegal purposes, such as
tax evasion, fraud, and drug trafficking.
Within two days, a head rolled in the
Icelandic capital of Reykjavik as the first
major casualty of the Panama Papers
leaks. Iceland Prime Minister Sigmundur David Gunnlaugsson resigned
after it turned out that he had secretly
sold to his wife a stake in Wintris, an offshore company holding investments in
Icelandic banks.
The resignation was actually most
likely because of what happened a day
earlier, when some 20,0000 Icelanders
took to the streets to express their anger
against the government after the leaked
Panama Papers named Gunnlaugsson
as having possibly benefited from offshore investment accounts in tax
havens. Police had to erect barricades
around the parliament in Reykjavik to
protect lawmakers from protestors who
were beating drums and pounding the
makeshift wall surrounding the legislature. Opposition lawmakers had also
put forward a motion of no confidence
and called on the prime minister to resign, as reported by American newspaper Chicago Tribune.
Nearby United Kingdom saw Prime
Minister David Cameron embarrassingly bend over backwards to clarify before Britons his links to an offshore fund
that had been set up by his father, details of which had been revealed in the
leaks.
While there was no mention of Russian President Vladimir Putin in the
Panama Papers, many of his close associates – members of his so-called inner
circle – such as business billionaires
Arkady, Boris Rotenberg and Alisher Usmanov feature prominently in those
files. The most curious case, however,
was of Sergie Roldugin – one of Putin’s
closest friends and godfather to the
Russian President’s eldest daughter. A
cellist by profession, Roldugin was
found to have moved over US$2 billion
through a complex network of offshore
UK PM David Cameron
INDIA FIRST 9
Russia President Putin
entities. The musician was also found to
be holder of a 12.5% stake in Video International, Russia’s largest televisionadvertising agency whose ownership
remains a mystery, and a 3.2% stake in
Bank Rossia, which is often described by
US officials as Putin’s personal bank.
Kremlin has declared these files as
nothing more than attempts by a
“Putinophoebic” Washington to destabilise Russia. Nevertheless, these revelations by Panama Papers have served to
strengthen the perception that the Russian president is a stinking rich man who
hides much of his enormous wealth in
the coffers of those in his circle of trust.
FIRE IN
NEIGHBOURHOOD
Somewhat similar was the official narrative in Beijing where the Panama Papers were brushed aside as Western
propaganda against the Chinese establishment. After all, relatives of many former and current senior leaders of
Politburo of the Communist Party of
China – such as former Premier Li
Peng's daughter Li Xiaolin, former Communist Party General Secretary Hu
Yaobang's son Hu Dehua and Deng Jiagui, son and daughter-in-law of propaganda chief Liu Yunshan and the
son-in-law of Vice-Premier Zhang Gaoli
– presently or previously owned secret
offshore companies.
The most eyebrow-raising name that
cropped up in the files was of Deng Jiagui, a property tycoon and Chinese
Presient Xi Jinping’s brother-in-law who
owned two shell companies in the
British Virgin Islands while Xi was a
member of the Politburo Standing Committee. Although these companies had
reportedly become dormant or defunct
by the time Xi came to power, the news
that Deng and his wife, Xi’s elder sister,
ran businesses worth hundreds of mil10 INDIA FIRST
Chinese President Xi Jinping
lions of dollars through these offshore
entities, was deemed dangerous enough
for the Chinese President – currently
conducting an anti-corruption drive – to
be blocked by Chinese authorities
across the nation’s media.
Xi’s counterpart in Islamabad, Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, also
faced much scrutiny after some Panama
Papers offshore documents that his children Mariam, Hasan and Hussain were
owners or “had the right to authorise
transactions for” several offshore companies.
Mariam was described as "the owner
of British Virgin Islands-based firms
Nielsen Enterprises Limited and Nescoll
Limited, incorporated in 1994 and
1993". On one of the documents, the address listed for Nielsen Enterprises was
Saroor Palace in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
The document, dated June 2012, described Mariam Safdar as the “beneficial
owner”.
"Hussain and Mariam signed a document dated June 2007 that was part of a
series of transactions in which Deutsche
Bank Geneva lent up to $13.8 million to
Nescoll, Nielsen and another company,
with their London properties as collateral," the papers revealed.
In July 2014, the two companies were
transferred to another agent, it said.
Hasan Nawaz Sharif was described as
"the sole director of Hangon Property
Holdings Limited incorporated in the
British Virgin Islands in February 2007,
which acquired Liberia-based firm Cascon Holdings Establishment Limited for
about $11.2 million in August 2007.”
While those papers per se did not necessarily implicate the Sharif family in
any wrongdoing, they gave Pakistan
Tehreek-e-Insaf chairman Imran Khan
enough fodder to call for the National
Accountability Bureau (NAB) to initiate
a thorough probe into the financial
holdings of the Pakistani prime minister
and his family members.
"Probes have already been initiated in
several countries -- including Australia,
New Zealand, Sweden and France -across the globe after their leaders and
office bearers were implicated," Imran
said. "If NAB wants to maintain its credibility, it should immediately begin a
probe into Sharif's family."
The former cricketer continued:
"Sharif should explain how his children
made all this money." He asked if
Sharif's family have "paid tax on this income".
Imran said the data leak was a defining moment for Pakistan, and added:
"How can those who launder money
from Pakistan to offshore accounts ask
others to invest in the country?"
He also noted that Maryam Nawaz
had given a statement two years ago that
her family did not have any assets
abroad. "But now Hussain Nawaz accepts that Maryam owns two offshore
companies," Imran pointed out.
In response, the Pakistan government
asserted that the Prime Minister Sharif
had no wealth stashed abroad while his
son Hussain Nawaz refuted allegations
that the Sharif family has hidden offshore assets.
Taking exception to Imran’s allegations, Information Minister Pervaiz
Rashid said that even the Panama Papers proved Khan's allegation was
wrong as Nawaz Sharif himself had no
assets in foreign countries.
"Both the children of Nawaz Sharif file
their tax returns in accordance with the
law, and do business abroad like children of common Pakistanis do," he said,
adding, “The documents do not mention that Nawaz Sharif and Shahbaz
Sharif have properties out of the country.”
Speaking to Geo TV, Hussain Nawaz
also offered a clarification: "Those
apartments are ours and those offshore
16 APRIL 2016
Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif
companies are also ours. There is nothing wrong with it and I have never concealed them, nor do I need to do that,"
he said, adding that all this was in accordance with British laws.
Hussain also said he had left Pakistan
in 1992, and being a non-resident for
more than 138 days he was not liable to
declare his assets, as per the country's
laws.
In his concluding line, Rashid said:
"We do not want to discuss things relating to Imran Khan. He could knock
doors of international courts or approach the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) over the Panama leaks.”
BACK HOME
In India, there were no such shocking
stories about this country’s president or
prime minister, fortunately, but the
Panama Papers did send shock waves all
the same, revealing offshore links of
some 500 Indians.
In India, The Indian Express – one of
the reporting partners of the ICIJ – ran
several pages of the investigation reports alleging among other names that
Bollywood
superstarts
Amitabh
Bachchan and Aishwarya Rai were directors in companies in Panama. The
two did not immediately respond despite efforts to contact them. Rai's
media adviser told the newspaper that
the information was false.
While there was no reaction from
those named in The Indian Express report, the spokesperson for Aishwarya
Rai said "no" when asked her if she intended to issue a statement.
In 2004, India legally allowed investments abroad by companies, and later
individuals, through the Liberalised Remittance Scheme.
Also named were Sameer Gehlaut of
India Bulls, for properties owned in Bahamas, Jersey and the United Kingdom,
and K.P. Singh of DLF about companies
16 APRIL 2016
Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi
registered in British Virgin Islands. Vinod
Adani, elder brother of Industrialist
Gautam Adani, and politican Shishir Bajoria from West Bengal and Anurag Kejriwal of Loksatta Party were also alleged
to have set up companies in tax havens.
Bajoria told the paper that that "erroneous beneficial owner information"
was given by mistake.
The Express said it had carried out the
investigations spread over eight months
with several global newspapers. Many of
the other persons named in the Express
reports responded, some denying while
others maintaining that they had
worked within the laws of the country.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi immediately ordered a multi-agency probe
team into the findings from the Panama
Papers.
“A multi-agency group is being
formed to monitor the black money
trail," Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said
in New Delhi after the expose was published. “Details of the assets worth
Rs.6,500 crore has already been found,"
he added.
As per a statement issued by his ministry, the probe team would comprise
officers from the Central Board of Direct
Taxes' Financial Intelligence Unit, its Tax
Research Unit as also officials from the
Reserve Bank of India.
"The group will monitor the flow of
information in each one of the case. The
government will take all the necessary
actions as required to get maximum information from all sources including
from foreign governments to help in the
investigation process," the statement
added.
The probe team ordered by Modi is
expected to look into the published details of Indians with offshore funds and
determine whether such funds existed
and were legal.
In the context of the commitment of
the central government to bring out
undisclosed money both from abroad
and from within the country, information brought out by any investigative
journalism was welcome, the finance
ministry said.
The ministry said in the past too,
based on the investigations by ICIJ in
2013 – that showed 700 Indians with
business connection with off-shore entities – the agencies of the government
were able to identify 434 persons as Indian residents. It also said 184 persons
admitted their relationship with such
off-shore entities/transactions.
"Although, in the previous report of
ICIJ, information relating to financial
transactions/bank accounts was not
available, the government authorities
have detected credit in the undisclosed
foreign accounts of such Indian persons
in excess of Rs.2,000 crores."
As a consequence, 52 prosecution
complaints have been filed against the
alleged offenders so far.
"The government is committed to detecting and preventing the generation of
black money. In this context the expose
of Panama Papers will further help the
government in meeting the objective,"
the finance ministry added.
The government expressed concern
that tax havens were making countries
like India suffer tax losses. "The recent
initiative of 'Base Erosion' and 'Profit
Shifting' (BEPS) will help India and
other countries in checking the practice
of tax-avoidance through such tax
havens. India is also fully committed to
the BEPS initiative."
However, the Aam Aadmi Party demanded a Supreme Court-monitored
probe against companies and people
named in the Panama Papers.
AAP spokesperson Raghav Chadha
said: "Prime Minister Narendra Modi
himself has availed of the hospitality of
industrialist Gautam Adani, whose
brother's company is named in the
INDIA FIRST 11
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley
Panama Papers investigation. Therefore,
we don't trust the government for a fair
probe into the matter."
"Therefore, a Supreme Court-monitored probe should be ordered in the
Panama Papers investigations at the earliest," he said.
The AAP leader also said the Centre
was planning to bring about "retrospective" amendments to the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act so that
political parties can receive foreign
fundings.
"The Delhi High Court ruled in 2014
that the Bharatiya Janata Party and the
Congress received foreign funding.
Therefore, the central government
wants to bring in retrospective amendments in the Act so that they could not
be charged with violation of the law in
the past and continue to receive foreign
fundings," Chadha said.
"If the government brings in the
amendments, foreign companies will
open their branches in India and fund
different political parties. Hence, they
will dictate policies to the government
(of the day) for their own benefit," the
AAP leader added.
The next day, a now-deceased underworld don, a politician, industrialists
and an ex-cricketer were found to be
among those with alleged off-shore
links, even as Mossak Fonseca
stonewalled New Delhi's probe efforts,
the Indian Express reported.
Amid these fresh reports, Reserve
Bank of India (RBI) Governor Raghuram
Rajan said not every off-shore company
opened by an Indian national need be illegitimate, and that this will be primary
task of the probe team in which the cen12 INDIA FIRST
Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal
tral bank has also been co-opted.
MORE REVELATIONS
In a series of articles under "Panama
Papers Part 2" the paper published its
second list of Indian names, along with
an article on how an aide of don Dawood Ibrahim used a set of 17 entities to
buy properties abroad.
Named in the second list, with some
repeats, were politician Anurag Kejriwal,
industrialists Gautam and Karan Thapar, businesspeople Ranjeev Dahuja
and Kapil Sain Goel, jeweller Ashwini
Kumar Mehra, former cricketer Ashok
Malhotra, and pharmaceuticals maker
Vinod Ramachandra Jadhav.
Also named in the list were IT consultant Gautam Seengal, agribusiness
owner Vivek Jain, retired government
employee Prabhash Sankhla, and garment exporters Satish Govind Samtani,
Vishal Bahadur and Harish Mohnani.
The paper also gave glimpses of their
alleged modus operandi.
Meanwhile,
megastar
Amitabh
Bachchan denied links with any of the
offshore shipping companies in which
he is supposed to be a director according to the Panama Papers.
"I do not know any of the companies
referred to by Indian Express - Sea Bulk
Shipping Company Ltd, Lady Shipping
Ltd, Treasure Shipping Ltd and Tramp
Shipping Ltd," the actor said in a statement.
"I have never been a director of any of
the above stated companies," he said. "It
is possible that my name has been misused."
Bachchan added: "I have paid all my
taxes, including on monies spent by me
overseas. Monies that I have remitted
overseas have been in compliance with
law, including remittances through LRS,
after paying Indian taxes.
"In any event the news report in Indian Express does not even suggest any
illegality on my part."
On April 6, Niira Radia, the founder of
Vaishnavi Communications whose
taped telephone chats with some
prominent people in India around eight
years ago, including ministers, journalists and business tycoons became the
matter of a probe, surfaced in the
Panama Papers expose.
Her name (appearing as Nira Radia, in
the documents investigated, minus the
extra 'i') was allegedly linked to a company in British Virgin Islands, which her
office denied, The Indian Express reported.
In the article, as Part 3 of the expose
on Indians having alleged offshore links,
Radia is said to have figured prominently as a director in the 232 documents pertaining to the company listed
in the tax haven, Crownmart International Group.
The list published by the newspaper
on the same day also had the names of
a top business tycoon in Bellary, a
prominent industrialist and a chartered
accountant – each of whom, which The
Indian Express said were contacted for
their responses, with many also sharing
their versions.
Another article sought to shows how
the world's largest currency note maker
De La Rue had contracted a New Delhi
businessman to help bag tenders in
India, in return for a 15-percent commission. The paper identified the com16 APRIL 2016
Bollywood Actress Aishwarya Rai Bachhan
pany as Aphra Consultants, linked to
Somendra Khosla of New Delhi.
On Radia, the paper said: "An investigation of these papers shows the existence of one offshore entity owned by
Radia, an International Business Company registered in the British Virgin Islands by Mossack Fonseka in 1994
named Crownmart International Group
Limited."
In response, her office said the said
entity was set up by her late father Iqbal
Narain Menon and that she was not a
beneficiary. Also that Radia had disclosed her assets to the authorities in UK
and India and that such information
was personal and confidential for third
parties.
In yet another article published that
day, the newspaper said the Indian diamond merchants, who were probed earlier for having overseas accounts in
Liechtenstein, British Virgin Islands and
HSCB, have also surfaced in "Panama
Papers".
Prominent among them are Rosy
Blue, one of the largest diamond traders
in the world, and Chetan Mehta of the
Belgium-based Gembel family.
The paper also reported that Harshad
Ramniklal Mehta of Rosy Blue did not
respond to its calls or queries, while
Chetan Mehta said he has been a nonresident Indian living in Belgium and
that the companies were shut longtime
ago.
A part of the list, Hyderabad-based
Moturi Srinivas Prasad said the off-shore
entities were started as one dollar companies with the hope of doing business,
but were closed. Satish Modi of Modi
Global was away from India, but an e16 APRIL 2016
Bollywood Actor Amitabh Bachhan
mail reply from his office said he was an
NRI and laws were followed.
The following day, the government reassured the nation that it would conduct
a thorough probe into illegal shell companies set up by alleged Indian tax
evaders as fresh skeletons tumbled out
of the “Panama Papers” cupboard, linking India's glamorous mix of sports and
entertainment to offshore tax havens.
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said
every bit of the expose that pointed toward offshore companies set up by more
than 500 Indians will be probed and that
people with illegal money stashed
abroad "won't get to sleep" at night now.
"In last three days we have formed a
group. We are analysing each and every
account to find out what is legal and
what is illegal," Jaitley said in an interview to ETV News Network. He was referring to the probe ordered by Prime
Minister Narendra Modi.
"Those who are having legal accounts,
they need not worry and those having illegal accounts won't get sleep at night,"
the finance minister said
"Those people who have kept it illegally, we will try to detect it fully. And I
think that soon every thing will be made
clear."
In the disclosure of the day, the Indian
Express reported that 10 members had
entered into a pact to form P-Vision
Sports to bid for IPL Pune franchise, in
which 15 percent was earmarked for the
offshore firm, Obdurate Ltd in British
Virgin Islands.
The bidder consortium included actors Saif Ali Khan, Kareena Kapoor and
Karisma Kapoor, industrialist Venugupal
Dhoot's firms and Pune-based realtors
Chordia family. It had investments by an
offshore company.
In the interview, the finance minister
also sought to clarify what Reserve Bank
of India Governor Raghuram Rajan said
on the legality of offshore companies
opened by Indians.
"So, I think he (Rajan) must have said
it in that reference -- that people who
have kept the money by taking permission from the RBI is legitimate and who
have kept the money by not taking permission of RBI is not legitimate."
Elsewhere, Rajan speaking over the
Panama Papers at a Confederation of Indian Industry-organised event in Mumbai said that it was important that
societies worked towards legitimizing
wealth because the phenomenon of rich
citizens spiriting money away in tax
havens may encourage dissatisfaction
among the less well-off.
"This is dangerous... the fact that
there are occasions where people are
found to be hiding their wealth as in the
Panama allegations, essentially it contributes to the process of de-legitimisation," he said.
Jaitley in the interview added a political twist to the black money issue and
said while some people were angry with
him because the government was strict,
some previous regimes kept silent on
the issue of illegal money parked
abroad.
But the Congress returned the allegation and said the government had ignored the ICIJ probe in the past. It also
demanded a Supreme Court-monitored
Special Investigation Team probe
against all those whose names have
cropped up in the Panama Papers case
INDIA FIRST 13
Indiabulls Founder Sameer Gehlaut
till date.
The Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) expressed doubt over
whether the Modi government was
ready to "touch the structure of tax
havens, money laundering and the generation of black money". In an editorial
in the CPI-M journal "People's Democracy", the party said the government
"should impose a blanket prohibition
on Indians acquiring shell companies
and operating secret accounts in tax
havens".
The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) ruling
Delhi demanded Jaitley's resignation,
saying one of those linked to the
Panama Papers was the BJP leader's
friend Lokesh Sharma.
Sharma is managing director of sports
management major Twenty First Century Media and has two companies of
his own registered in the tax haven of
British Virgin Islands. The third is a subsidiary of the sports company, according
to the expose.
AAP leader Ashutosh said Jaitley
should also reveal what kind of relations
he had with Sharma. He said a free and
fair probe into the Panama Papers was
doubtful as long as Jaitley was in the
union cabinet.
TOUGH OPPOSITION
On April 8, the AAP reiterated its demand for union Finance Minister Arun
Jaitley's resignation since, it said, an impartial probe into the Panama Papers
leaks was not possible under his supervision.
The party also warned of protests if a
free and fair probe was not conducted in
14 INDIA FIRST
DLF Chairman Kushal Pal Singh
the international leaks. "We have been
raising our voice against corruption
from time to time. We will take to the
streets if free and fair probe did not take
place in the Panama Papers leaks, in
which several influential names have
appeared," AAP leader Sanjay Singh told
reporters in New Delhi.
He said some names exposed in the
Panama Papers leaks were directly related to BJP leaders and thus an impartial probe was impossible under Jaitley.
"Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Raman
Singh's son Abhishek Singh, Prime Minister Narendra Modi's friend Vinod
Adani and, more importantly, Jaitley's
friend Lokesh Sharma – these are some
of the names revealed in the leaks. It is
impossible to investigate charges
against their friends. Hence, Jaitley
should step down until the probe is
completed," Singh added.
The next day the Congress party also
joined in, saying that any probe conducted by government agencies into the
Panama Papers expose would have no
credibility and reiterated its demand for
an apex-court monitored SIT. The party
was reacting to reports that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has proposed to
not refer the issue to a SIT.
"The Indian list of tax evaders who
have invested their ill-gotten wealth in
Panama are known to be friends and
well-wishers of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Finance Minister Arun
Jaitley. Hence, any probe conducted by
the government agencies will have no
credibility. Hence, we demanded a
Supreme Court-monitored Special Investigation Team (SIT) probe into the
Panama Papers leaks," Congress
spokesperson Manish Tewari said.
On April 10, the ruling regime finally
retaliated against the opposition’s aspersions over its credibility, when Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley stated that
the Congress "will not have many reasons to celebrate" after the details of the
multi-agency probe into the Panama Papers expose come out.
"There is a very impartial probe going
on and it is a multi-agency probe. When
the details of the probe come out, the
Congress will not have many reasons to
celebrate," Jaitley said.
At the time India First went to press,
police in Panama raided the headquarters of Mossack Fonseca even as Panamanian President Juan Carlos Varela
promised to work with other countries
to improve transparency in its offshore
financial industry.
It is extremely likely that there is lot
more to be revealed from the 2.6TB of
data from the Panama Papers leaks.
After breaking out a deluge of news stories early this month, the ICIJ has been
releasing new stories every day in a rationed manner. Hence, many experts
aver that what has been out so far is only
the tip of an iceberg. Besides, Mossack
Fonseca barely accounts for a tenth of
the global shell company market. A
chain reaction of similar leaks may very
much be in the offing, considering .
As the public attitude towards secretive offshore activities gets intolerant by
the day, the powerful and wealthy involved in such shenanigans really have
much to lose sleep over – let alone not
needing their morning cuppa. n
16 APRIL 2016
Nation
GIRL,
INTERRUPTED
Twenty-four-year-old actor Pratyusha Banerjee’s death highlights the dangerous
mix that toxic relationships and fame can become. But was it really a suicide?
16 APRIL 2016
INDIA FIRST 15
N
ews of India’s favourite bahu Pratyusha Bannerjee’s alleged suicide at her home in Mumbai came as a shock
to the country on April 1, but it is the lurid details of the
actress’s personal life turning into a TV soap of sorts on news
channels that is making her death even more heart-breaking.
While friends of the young actor and her parents have laid the
blame squarely on her boyfriend Rahul Raj Singh, talk of financial
worries and career insecurities is also doing the rounds. Hailing
from Jharkhand, Pratyusha catapulted to fame with her role in
"Balika Vadhu" between 2010-2013. She was later seen in the reality dance show "Jhalak Dikhla Jaa 5", "Bigg Boss 7" and hosted
some episodes of "Savdhan India". She recently appeared in
"Sasural Simar Ka".
Prior to dating Rahul, Pratyusha was linked to a businessman
named Makrand Malhotra, with whom she had a bitter break-up
and against whom she had lodged a complaint for abusive behaviour. Her legal troubles did not end with that relationship as just
earlier this year in January, she had filed an FIR against eight men,
including three policemen, claiming they tried to barge into her
residence in relation with a car loan that her boyfriend Rahul had
taken from a bank.
Her father Shankar Banerjee says that Rahul should be hanged
or imprisoned for the rest of his life for Pratyusha’s death. "Rahul
should be either hanged or kept in prison for the rest of his life.
He has ruined my daughter's life, she should get justice," he said.
The maid who worked for Pratyusha has also talked about friction
in the family because of Rahul. The young actor’s parents did not
approve of the relationship and the actress often fought with her
mother because of Rahul. Things got so bad, according to sources,
that Rahul had blocked her parents’ numbers from her mobile
phone. The maid also said that she had to quit working for the
troubled star because of the latter’s financial troubles and the
emotional stress surrounding the actor.
Rahul was known to control Pratyusha’s finances and there are
reports of him duping other women in the past too. His former
girlfriend who was recently in touch with him, much to
Pratyusha’s distress, claims that she did so in order to recover the
Rs 25 lakh that Rahul owed her. Pratyusha's mother, who was inconsolable, has also said that Rahul should be punished. Many
people have raised suspicions about Rahul’s intentions because
of his behaviour soon after the suicide. Upon discovering
Pratyusha’s body at the house they shared, he rushed to Kokilaben
Ambani Hospital instead of a hospital closest to the apartment.
He was also untraceable soon after the suicide. Friends of the
actor also say that she was a victim of physical abuse in the relationship.
Police soon charged Rahul with abetment of suicide, voluntarily
causing hurt, criminal intimidation and intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of peace under relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code. At least 10 of Pratyusha’s friends have come
forward to give statements pertaining to the tumultuous relationship between Pratyusha and Rahul, allegations of assault, unconfirmed financial issues between them and reported torture of
Pratyusha by a former girlfriend of Rahul.
Lawyer Falguni Brahmabhatt said that these 10 persons know
a lot of inside details owing to their closeness with Pratyusha and
are ready to share the information with police. "I have submitted
a list of 10 people to the Bangur Nagar Police Station and they are
likely to be called for giving their versions tomorrow," Brahmabhatt said.
However, she declined to reveal the names of the 10 friends on
grounds that attempts could be made to pressurize or influence
them.
At a recent press conference, a few of Pratyusha's friends, including Kamya Punjabi, Adah Khan and Vikas Gupta spoke about
the probable reasons driving Pratyusha to take the extreme step.
16 INDIA FIRST
Soma Banerjee mother of Pratyusha Banerjee at Siddharth Hospital in Mumbai.
16 APRIL 2016
Several television industry personalities
have however claimed on social media
networks that Pratyusha was a strongwilled personality and they could not digest she could abruptly end her life in
this manner.
Strangulation marks were detected on
the neck of the actor, indicating death
due to asphyxiation and hanging, according to a preliminary autopsy soon
after the death. A team of doctors conducted the post-mortem for over three
hours and the entire procedure has been
videographed. The viscera samples have
been sent for forensic analysis even as
the final autopsy report is expected later.
Many of Pratyusha’s friends say the
actor was strong and very lively as a person and could not have taken such an
extreme step. TV show producer Vikas
Gupta, who had recently offered a role
to Pratyusha, shared she was not at all in
depression. "She was doing very well
professionally. She had no shortage of
work she had earned a lot of money and
her money was taken care of by Rahul.
She was not in depression at all. The
only problem was she was in a disturbed
relationship," Gupta said at a press
meet.
Gupta also stressed that Singh "physically assaulted" the 24-year-old actress
in "public". "He had raised his hand on
her and we have proof of it. It was not a
great relationship. Unfortunately, we
have not been called by the police to
record our statements," he added.
One of Pratyusha’s close friends Leena
too was present at the meet, and said
the 24-year-old actress had called her
the night before the day she took the
drastic step. Leena disclosed that
Pratyusha was disturbed by Singh's former girlfriend.
"Prior to the day she committed suicide, she called me at 3 a.m., and she
was crying very badly. She said, 'I can't
live my life like this, and I want to come
out of it'. She said she wants to fight
back and wanted to come out of it. She
just wanted to get married to Rahul and
have a child, this was her plan," Leena
said.
Leena also mentioned that Singh's
former girlfriend "used to torture her
(Pratyusha)".
The "Balika Vadhu" star's closest
friend and actress Kamya Punjabi asserted that Singh was cheating on her.
"Pratyusha had told me, 'Rahul is cheating on me, what should I do?' She didn't
want to give up on this relationship and
wanted this to work," Kamya said.
It has been reported that Pratyusha's
post-mortem report has hinted at signs
of early pregnancy. But nothing has
16 APRIL 2016
Many women in the glamour industry have taken their lives
after a failed relationship or depression due to a flagging
career. Some Indian celebrities who took the drastic step:
Pratyusha Banerjee: Famous for
her portrayal as Anandi in the TV
show "Balika Vadhu", Pratyusha allegedly committed suicide in Mumbai on April 1. The actress hanged
herself from a fan at her Goregaon
residence. Her boyfriend, Rahul Raj
Singh, took her to the hospital where
she succumbed.
Jiah Khan (2013): She was just
three films old in Bollywood and
starred alongside A-listers like
Amitabh Bachchan, Akshay Kumar
and Aamir Khan. Jiah was found
dead, hanging from her ceiling fan in
June, 2013 at her residence in Juhu,
Mumbai. She left behind a suicide
note in which she mentioned her
"abusive relationship" with actor
Aditya Pancholi's son Sooraj. Jiah was
only 25 when she ended her life.
Viveka Babajee (2010): Sultry
Mauritian model and actress Viveka
Babajee was best known for her KamaSutra condom advertisements.
Viveka was found hanging from the
ceiling fan of her Mumbai apartment
in 2010. She blamed boyfriend Gautam Vohra for her death in a dairy
entry. Police said that she committed
suicide due to depression.
Kuljeet Randhawa (2006): An actress and a model Kuljeet Randhawa,
who was seen in the TV show
"C.A.T.S", an Indian version of "Charlie's Angels", hanged herself in her
apartment in Juhu, Mumbai in 2006.
She even left behind a suicide note
stating that she was ending her life as
she was unable to cope with life's
pressures.
Nafisa Joseph (2004): The modelturned-video jockey, who acted in the
TV series "C.A.T.S" along with Kuljeet,
reportedly hanged herself in her flat
in Versova, Mumbai in July 2004.
Silk Smitha (1996): Renowned as
the Southen sex siren, Silk Smitha,
whose performances garnered whistles and hooting from front benchers,
was found dead at the age of 36 under
mysterious circumstances. Her body
was found hanging by a rope near her
home in Chennai in 1996. n
INDIA FIRST 17
Rahul Raj Singh boyfriend of Pratyusha Banerjee at Siddharth Hospital in Mumbai.
been confirmed. To this, Gupta stressed:
"If she was pregnant, she would have
been alive today. She wanted to be a
mother. Let the medical report come,
then let's see."
Veteran actress Surekha Sikri, who
played 'Dadisa' to Pratyusha's character
in "Balika Vadhu", said: "I am absolutely
shocked. I knew her, she was very sweet.
She was a sensitive person, she must
have taken something to heart and must
have got really emotional."
According to Tanuj Garg, former CEO
of Balaji Motion Pictures, she had plans
to marry her beau Rahul Singh.
"Terrible, terrible news about
Pratyusha Banerjee. Met her once at a
party. How extreme must pressures be to
drive one to take one's own life. Friends
met Pratyusha Banerjee and her
boyfriend Rahul (who owns a production house) on Holi and they seemed
happy. They were to get married," Garg
shared on Twitter.
Bollywood actress and item girl Rakhi
Sawant, a close friend of TV actress
Pratyusha Banerjee who allegedly committed suicide on Friday, says the "Balika Vadhu" star was "tensed" about her
relationship with her boyfriend Rahul
Raj Singh.
"I still can't believe that she is no
more. She was so lively and full of life.
She had such big dreams. I had met her
few days back and she was little upset.
She looked tensed about Rahul's ex-girlfriend Saloni. She was tensed about her
relationship," Rakhi said.
"She was such an emotional girl that
the moment we ask what happened she
used to have tears in her eyes," she
added.
Rakhi also said that Pratyusha was not
depressed about her work, but she was
only tensed about her relationship.
18 INDIA FIRST
"She was doing very well
professionally. She had no
shortage of work she had
earned a lot of money and her
money was taken care of by
Rahul. She was not in
depression at all. The only
problem was she was in a
disturbed relationship”
– TV show producer Vikas
Gupta, who had recently
offered a role to Pratyusha
"She was madly in love with Rahul
and used to say that she can't live without him. Let the Mumbai police investigate on this," she added.
Soon after details about the abusive
relationship started coming out, the
lawyer Neeraj Gupta who was representing actor-director Rahul Raj Singh after
formal charges were filed against him
exited from the case on April 6. Gupta
has claimed Singh concealed certain
crucial details of the case, and this
prompted him to listen to his conscience and leave the case.
Singh has contended that he had no
role to play in Pratyusha's suicide. He
filed an application for an anticipatory
bail before the Dindoshi court On
Wednesday, a day after Bangur Nagar
police slapped him with abetment to
suicide and other counts.
The police action followed a complaint and a fresh statement by
Pratyusha's mother Soma Banerjee that
Singh used to assault her daughter.
Meanwhile, a court rejected the anticipatory bail plea of Rahul. Opposing the
plea, the Banerjee family's lawyer Falguni Brahmabhatt said investigations
were still at a preliminary stage and it
could be a case of abetment to suicide
or even murder.
Arguing for bail, Singh's lawyer Ashok
Saraogi said Pratyusha may have committed suicide since she had certain financial issues but Brahmabhatt said this
could not be the reason for her to end
her life.
Accordingly, Dindoshi Court Sessions
Judge K.F. Ahmed rejected Singh's bail
plea.
Saraogi plans to move the Bombay
High Court against the ruling soon while
Singh continues to be under treatment
at a suburban hospital for the past four
days. Brahmabhatt said that right from
the beginning, Singh's behaviour had
been suspicious.
The lawyer wanted to know why he
did he not inform the police after he saw
Pratyusha's body hanging and took her
straight to the hospital.
“He tried to revive her in front of a
CCTV camera. But first aid is always
given at the spot. Why did he come outside and then try? Was there a suicide
note or other evidence which he may
have destroyed?" she asked.
For now Rahul remains a prime suspect in the case. If one looks at precious
high-profile cases of suicides over failed
relationships like in the case of Jiah
Khan, Viveka Babaji, Nafisa Joseph etc,
one sees a pattern of abuse and control.
So far no boyfriend has been convicted
for abetment to suicide. A few months
before her death, Pratyusha had given
an interview where she had talked about
how upset she was with all the controversies surrounding her life. It is indeed
sad that controversy haunts her, even in
death. n
16 APRIL 2016
T
he Left Front may be huffing
and puffing but the BJP, desperate to make a mark in West Bengal, is realising that Bengali votes may
be culturally and intellectually “essentially pro-Left”.
West Bengal, where staggered assembly elections began on April 4, offers
more than a Herculean challenge and
jigsaw puzzle to the BJP and its politics
of neo-nationalism, liberal economic
policies and Hindutva slant, say those in
the know of things.
Even as the saffron party's electoral
fortune surged in the 2014 Lok Sabha
polls in Bengal, party leaders acknowledge that they are up against "basic ideological
barriers"
more
than
organisational weaknesses.
"The fact that Bengali voters and even
others in the state remain pro-Left ideologically, culturally and intellectually
makes things difficult for the BJP in West
Bengal, unlike in Assam where the proHindutva slant always had acceptance
among upper caste Assamese," said a
Bharatiya Janata Party leader who did
not want to be identified.
Thus, BJP managers believe that while
the party is near striking distance in
Assam, the going would be tough in
West Bengal despite an aggressive campaign against a limping Left and the ruling Trinamool Congress.
In Assam, upper caste Hindus relate
to the Brahminical appeal of the RSS
and the BJP unlike in West Bengal
where, ironically, the upper caste Bengali ‘Bhadrolok’ has for decades been associated with Marxist politics.
One reason why Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee cornered what was once
a solid Left vote bank and why she remains popular is that she never portrayed herself as anti-Left – despite
being the biggest political foe of the
Marxists.
Trinamool MP and former union minister Sishir Adhikari explained: “During
Marxist misrule when Singur and
Nandigram happened, the people of
Bengal saw us as genuine followers of
Communist ideology. That was the turning point of Bengal politics.”
This was when, he pointed out, Trinamool leaders started mocking CPI-M
leaders as “pseudo followers” of Karl
Marx.
"This actually helped the Trinamool
to get votes. Slowly people in Maoist-hit
areas developed courage and faith in
democracy," he said.
Thus, when Mamata Banerjee played
to the hilt her pro-farmers card against
the failed industrialisation attempts of
the Left, she appeared to the people as a
16 APRIL 2016
Politics
Up Against
the Grain
A traditionally Left-leaning West Bengal remains a
tough nut to crack for an essentially rightist BJP
more genuine political leader than the
Marxists.
This also made easier the task of those
Left cadres who decided to opt for 'Didi'
– Mamata Banerjee – and her Trinamool
Congress and abandon old-style Marxist
politics.
The BJP's Asansol MP and union minister Babul Supriyo admitted that Didi's
persona too helped defeat the Left.
"Didi's image as a pro-poor leader
who wore rubber chappals (slippers)
and a cotton sari actually challenged the
Leftists’ proletarian claims. But today,
while Didi still moves in chappals, her
party colleagues are no less than
‘crorepatis’,” he said.
In sharp contrast, both in economic
and social contexts, the BJP lacks the
Left slant. So, despite campaigning aggressively, the apprehension in the BJP
camp is that the party may not win
many seats in West Bengal.
Indeed, there is acceptance that a
higher vote share for the BJP in the 2014
Lok Sabha polls actually helped the CPIM.
For instance, in Raiganj seat, CPI-M's
Mohammed Salim defeated Deepa Dasmunshi of the Congress by just 1,634
votes even as BJP candidate Nimu
Bhowmick polled over two lakh votes.
Sudip Bandyopadhyay, a long-time
associate of Mamata Banerjee, has repeatedly underscored the importance of
'being Left' in West Bengal – if one has to
make a decisive mark.
“We understood from the very beginning that the Left Front could not be defeated in Bengal from a rightist
platform. So despite the best attempts
personally from Atal Bihari Vajpayee and
strong opposition from the likes of the
late Ajit Panja, the Trinamool quit the
BJP-led NDA,” he said.
The rest, as they say, is history – or
Didi's story. The BJP is beginning to understand this. n
INDIA FIRST 19
A
s of today, there are more than
20 million cases pending in the
Indian district courts; twothirds are criminal cases and one in 10
have been pending for more than 10
years, a recent analysis of National Judicial Data Grid (NJDG) data has revealed.
More revelations: There is one judge
for every 73,000 people in India, seven
times worse than the United States; on
an average, 1,350 cases are pending with
each judge, who clears 43 cases per
month; at the rate cases are handled at
the district courts, civil cases will never
get cleared, and it will take more than 30
years to clear criminal cases.
This is a looming crisis, and understanding where the problem lies is key
to finding a solution.
Delhi stands out for having the worst
population-to-judge ratio. While the national average is 73,000 people to a
judge, Delhi is almost seven times worse
with about 500,000 people to a judge. At
the other end, smaller states and union
territories such as Chandigarh, Goa, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Sikkim,
Haryana and Himachal Pradesh have at
least twice as many judges per person,
compared to the national average.
Taking a look at the case burden on
judges in each state: As expected,
smaller states which have a better population-per-judge ratio perform better
and the bigger states are worse off.
Uttar Pradesh stands out as the state
with the maximum case burden on each
judge, with about 2,500 cases pending
per judge. That is almost twice the national average of 1,350 cases per judge.
Sikkim and Mizoram are the best performing states with 71 and 118 pending
cases per judge, respectively.
States with fewer judges and higher
burdens have most cases pending for
more than a decade
Does the burden on judges translate
to judicial delays?
The results are mixed. Smaller states
and UTs such as Haryana, Sikkim,
Chandigarh, Punjab, Mizoram and Himachal Pradesh have less than one of
cases pending more than 10 years.
Among states with the worst ratio, Gujarat heads the list with about one in 4
cases delayed more than 10 years.
There is a correlation between the
case burden on judges and population
per judge. Uttar Pradesh, Orissa, Bihar
and West Bengal, which have a higher
burden and higher population per
judge, also have a higher ratio of cases
pending more than 10 years.
Next, taking a look at the rate at which
states are able to dispose the cases each
month – this is the number of cases dis20 INDIA FIRST
Nation
To Decode
a Legal
Time Bomb
India’s district courts have been sitting on
ever-rising millions of cases over the past few
years, with those in Delhi and Odisha being the
worst performers. What exactly has been leading
to this looming crisis?
16 APRIL 2016
posed minus the cases filed in that
month. A positive number implies that
more cases are disposed than filed each
month. This will result in eventual clearance of pending cases. A negative number means that the state is adding to its
pending cases each month.
Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh stand
out at either extreme. Maharashtra
builds a backlog of more than 100,000
cases each month, while UP clears more
than 44,500 pending cases each month.
Karnataka clears about 34,000 pending
cases each month.
Uttar Pradesh, which has 2,513 pending cases per judge and a total of 631,290
cases pending for more than 10 years, is
clearing 44,571 cases each month, five
times faster than the national average.
Gujarat and Bihar, which have a high
ratio of cases pending for more than 10
years, continue to pile on more cases
each month. And here is why some
states will never be able to clear pending
cases, at current disposal rates.
States that build a backlog will never
be able to clear their pending cases at
the current rate of clearance. The 10
states with the fastest-growing backlog:
Maharashtra, Gujarat, Bihar, Delhi, Goa,
Himachal Pradesh, Chandigarh, Meghalaya, Sikkim and Orissa.
Among the states clearing the case
backlog, the southern states of Karnataka, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Telan16 APRIL 2016
“There is a correlation
between the case burden on
judges and population per
judge. Uttar Pradesh, Orissa,
Bihar and West Bengal, which
have a higher burden and
higher population per judge,
also have a higher ratio of
cases pending more than 10
years”
gana and Tamil Nadu are the best. They
will clear all pending cases within six
years. Uttar Pradesh, which has the
highest number of pending cases per
judge, will also clear pending cases
within 10 years due to its high case-disposal rate.
TWO IS TO ONE
The NJDG shows the criminal and
civil cases pending in each state. This
helps us understand the rate at which
justice is delivered to criminal cases relative to civil cases.
The national average is two pending
criminal cases for each pending civil
case. Bihar, Uttarakhand and Jharkhand
have almost five times as many pending
criminal cases to civil cases. At the other
extreme, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh,
Manipur, Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka
and Punjab have a very low ratio.
Summing it up: Delhi and Orissa have
the worst rating. Bihar, Gujarat, Uttar
Pradesh and West Bengal are the next
states with a poor rating. Of these, West
Bengal and Uttar Pradesh may get better
in coming years because they are clearing pending cases faster.
Himachal Pradesh and Sikkim score
high. The district judicial systems of
these states need to be studied and best
practices replicated in other states.
However, they are piling pending cases
each month.
Some states that may soon face a crisis are Delhi, Himachal Pradesh, Goa
and Maharashtra, which are accumulating pending cases each month and will
soon be in the red on parameters of
pending cases per judge and cases
pending for more than 10 years.
On the positive side, states such as
Karnataka and Kerala, which are clearing pending cases every month, will
soon reduce the number of pending
cases per judge.
It is well known that India's judicial
infrastructure is crippled. This analysis
helps understand where the problems
lie. This analysis also reveals where to
invest on judicial infrastructure, fill vacancies for judges and provides the evidence needed for urgent reforms and
target the reforms at the right areas. n
INDIA FIRST 21
I
ndia faces major challenges in the
water sector with the per capita
availability going down and demand growing due to urbanisation and
industrialisation.
Inefficiency of water use in agriculture, over-exploitation of underground
water and contamination are other issues associated with water management
in the country.
India receives average rainfall of
about 1,170 mm which corresponds to
an annual precipitation of about 4,000
BCM (billion cubic metres) including
snowfall. However, there is considerable
variation in rainfall both temporally and
spatially.
Nearly 75 percent of the annual precipitation occurs during the monsoon
season between June and September.
After accounting for evaporation, the average annual water availability in the
country has been assessed as 1,869
BCM. It has been estimated that owing
to topographic, hydrological and other
constraints, the utilisable water is 1,123
BCM which includes 690 BCM of surface
water and 433 BCM of replenishable
groundwater.
Since the amount of water available is
more or less constant, rising demands
due to increasing population and economic growth are expected to strain the
demand-supply balance.
According to a report by the 2030
Water Resources Group, India's water
requirement will be about 1,498 BCM in
2030, which is double of the estimated
aggregate water demand at present. But
water balances for the country as a
whole are of limited value since they
hide the existence of areas of acute
water shortage and do not reflect problems of quality.
The twin indicators of water scarcity
are per capita availability and storage.
India's population has increased from
361 million in 1951 to 1.21 billion in
2011 and the per capita availability of
water for the country as a whole has decreased from 5,177 cubic metres per
annum in 1951 to 1,545 cubic metres per
annum in 2011, a reduction of about 70
percent.
This meets the definition of a waterstressed condition - per capita availability of less than 1,700 cubic metres. The
average per capita availability was 1,816
cubic metres according to 2001 census.
Nine out of 20 river basins, with an estimated population of 200 milllion, are
estimated to be facing water scarcity
conditions.
The per capita water storage capacity
in India has been assessed at 209 cubic
metres while it has been estimated at
22 INDIA FIRST
Nation
Looming Crisis
While demand for water is on the rise in India,
supply is on the wane
5,686 cubic metres in Russia, 3,223 cubic
metres in Australia, 416 cubic metres in
China and 2,192 cubic metres in the
United States.
The annual extraction of groundwater
in the country is by far the highest in the
world and the growing dependence on
this has led to over-extraction, which is
lowering the water table in many parts
of the country.
The annual groundwater withdrawal
for domestic and industrial purpose is
estimated at 9.27 percent while it is estimated at 90.73 percent for irrigation.
According to official data, around 84
per cent of the total addition to the net
irrigated area has come from groundwater over the past four decades. With an
estimated 30 million groundwater structures in play, groundwater is being exploited beyond sustainable levels.
A NASA assessment showed that between 2002 and 2008, India recorded a
decline in the water table to the extent
of 0.33 metres per annum.
The groundwater monitoring data of
Central Groundwater Board (CGWB) for
pre-monsoon 2014, compared with
decadal mean of pre-monsoon (20042013), showed that out of total wells analyzed, around 39 percent showed a
decline in the groundwater level. According to an assessment done in 2011,
nearly a sixth of the 6,607 assessment
units (blocks/ mandals/ talukas/ dis-
tricts) across 15 states and two union
territories have been categorised as
"over-exploited".
Also, water use efficiency in agriculture, which consumes around 80 percent of water resources, is estimated at
around 38 percent, which compares
poorly with 45 percent in Malaysia and
Morocco and 50-60 percent in Israel,
Japan, China and Taiwan.
Groundwater quality data monitored
by the CGWB shows that the groundwater in parts of 20 states is contaminated
by fluoride and in 21 states by nitrate in
excess of World Health Organization
(WHO) guidelines.
Organic pollution has been identified
as a predominant cause of water pollution. The Central Pollution Control
Board has assessed the total volume of
municipal waste water generated in the
country at 61,948 MLD (million litres
per day) against the installed sewage
treatment capacity of 23,277 MLD leaving a gap of more than 38,671 MLD.
India's urban population has grown
from 27.8 percent, according to 2001
census, to 32.16 percent, as per the 2011
census.
The National Water Policy, released in
2012, calls for planning and management of water resources through common integrated perspective considering
regional and national context and on an
environmentally sound basis. n
16 APRIL 2016
Bihar
Now, for the Difficult Part
Having put the liquor ban in place, the Bihar government must now
focus on the de-addiction of alcoholics
F
or the Bihar government, enforcing a liquor ban that came
into effect recently is not the
only challenge. De-addiction of hundreds of thousands of alcoholics is going
to pose a tough task for the state government.
After a partial liquor ban came into
force in Bihar from the beginning of this
month, the state government has decided to take on the responsibility of deaddiction of alcoholics.
In the past, de-addiction of alcoholics
was mainly given to NGOs and voluntary organizations that run rehab centres to help people kick the habit.
The Bihar government has set up 39
de-addiction centres across the state for
treatment and counselling of alcoholics.
"Around 150 highly trained doctors
will be deployed at de-addiction centres
in all 38 districts in the state for treatment and counselling of alcoholics,"
said N.K. Sinha, state programme officer
of de-addiction centres.
Doctors have been trained at the Bengaluru-based National Institute of Mental
Health
and
Neurosciences
(NIMHANS) and New Delhi and Patnabased All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS). "The state government
sent these doctors for special training in
February and March for de-addiction of
alcoholics," he said.
According to officials of the state
health society, these doctors have been
trained to carry out various methods of
de-addiction, including counselling and
treatment, to help overcome the mental
and health problems of patients.
In Patna, the government has set up a
25-bed de-addiction centre at the Nalanda Medical College and Hospital and
a 10 bed de-addiction centre in all sadar
hospitals in the districts.
Doctors will also provide free counselling to families, particularly the
women, of alcoholics to deal with the
stress at home.
Health experts pointed out that alcoholics are prone to withdrawal symptoms, including body pain, anxiety and
irritability after they leave alcohol.
Bihar Excise and Prohibition Minister
Abdul Jalil Mastan said that other than
16 APRIL 2016
"With the liquor ban, alcoholics will now have to live without
alcohol or they have to quit the habit. In such a situation, all of
them would develop some health-related problems; counselling
and treatment would be provided to them by doctors at
de-addiction centres”
– Abdul Jalil Mastan, Bihar Excise and Prohibition Minister
enforcing liquor ban in the state, the
state government's focus will be de-addiction.
"With the liquor ban, alcoholics will
now have to live without alcohol or they
have to quit the habit. In such a situation, all of them would develop some
health-related problems; counselling
and treatment would be provided to
them by doctors at de-addiction centres," Mastan said.
He said de-addiction of the poorest of
poor in rural areas will be the focus,
adding that it was not “an easy thing in
view of the big number of alcoholics in
the state”.
Mastan said in the first phase, manufacture and sale of country and spiced
liquor would be banned, followed by Indian-made foreign liquor later this year.
Last year, during campaigning for the
2015 Bihar assembly elections, Chief
Minister Nitish Kumar announced that
an alcohol ban would be implemented
from April 1.
Bihar police chief P.K. Thakur has announced that prohibition and its 100 per
cent implementation is a priority of
state police.
"We have decided to set up a helpline
number and control room to register
country liquor related complaints,"
Thakur said. The state minister said the
poorest of the poor were consuming
liquor, leading to family problems and
domestic violence which was affecting
their children's education. "Women are
suffering more than anyone else due to
increasing liquor consumption."
According to officials, the ban decision is expected to impact the government's financial health. Bihar earns an
annual revenue of around Rs.3,650 crore
from liquor sale.
To provide livelihood to those involved in the liquor business, the government has offered them to sell
products of the state-run Bihar State
Milk Cooperative Federation Ltd. under
the brand name "Sudha Dairy". n
INDIA FIRST 23
F
ood and power supply are the
two major issues the Naveen
Patnaik government seems to be
preoccupied with as both have a direct
impact on people and, thus, also its
public image. The government’s image
is of significance with all the three major
parties including the ruling Biju Janata
Dal beginning preparations for panchayat polls to be held early next year.
The food issue is on focus with public
distribution system being subsumed
under the National Food Security Act
(NFSA). As the war of words between
the state and the Centre continues on
NFSA, the state government is now accusing the government of India of forcing Odisha to lift more wheat instead of
rice which is the staple food of the
Odias.
Food supplies and consumer welfare
minister Sanjay Dasburma said that
Odisha requires more rice as it is a rice
consuming state. “It’s unfortunate that
the Centre is trying to oblige the wheat
lobby and is compelling us to accept
more wheat. The chief minister has
raised the issue with the central government. But our concerns are yet to be addressed,” the minister said.
Sources said that Centre has reportedly threatened to cut down the subsidy
if the state does not lift the rice and continues to demand more rice. In a recent
letter to chief minister Naveen Patnaik,
Union Minister of Consumer Affairs and
Food and Public Distribution, Ram Vilas
Paswan said, “If higher quantity of rice
is allocated to the states and union territories, it will not only increase the subsidy burden of government of India but
also create an imbalance in wheat rice
stock in the central pool. Therefore, it is
regretted that your request for increasing the ratio of rice and wheat to
85.12:14.18 cannot be agreed to.”
Under the new ratio, the state had
sought 27,904 MT of rice in excess of allocation made under NFSA. The Centre
has been providing 99.66 thousand
tonnes of rice and 45.40 tonnes of wheat
against the state's requirement of 1.48
lakh tonnes of rice.
The state government is worried at
the response of the central government
as its populist cheap rice scheme under
threat. Much before the NFSA came into
existence, the Naveen Patnaik government had introduced the scheme providing 25kgs of rice to a family at Rs 2
per kg. The scheme had paid rich dividends for the BJD which had swept the
2009 assembly polls winning 104 of the
147 seats at stake.
Later the state government brought
down the price of this rice to Re 1 in Jan24 INDIA FIRST
State
DOUBLE
FOCUS
The BJD administration is preparing for panchayat polls
on the planks of rice and power supply
Saroj Mishra
uary 2013 to improve its image ahead of
the 2014 elections. The tactics clicked.
The BJD romped home with 117 seats in
the Assembly and 20 seats in the Lok
Sabha.
The state government had to restructure the scheme after the NFSA came
into existence. Odisha is one of the last
states to implement the Act. The problem has arisen because the Centre is trying to push more wheat than rice into
the state.
The issue of rice and distribution of
ration cards also rocked the state assem16 APRIL 2016
bly with BJP accusing the state of trying
to turn NFSA into Biju Food Security
scheme.
The Congress alleged that many poor
people have not received ration cards as
the survey had not been done in a fair
manner. “Those who are influential and
rich have been able to get the ration
cards,” said congress chief whip, Tara
Prasad Bahinipati.
The issue of power shortage, on the
other hand, has assumed importance
with the state reeling under a heat wave
and temperature even in cities like
Bhubaneswar soaring to unbearable levels. The government has been importing
power from Delhi and Punjab to meet
the shortfall through power banking system. Under this a state borrows power
from surplus states at the time of need
and gives it back to them when they run
short of power.
While the state’s average demand is
3300 mw of power, the requirement
touches around 4100 mw power during
the peak period. The state manages to
procure 2700 mw of power from different sources.
“As we are committed to providing
uninterrupted power to consumers, we
are procuring it from different sources.
16 APRIL 2016
There is no power cut now. During the
peak summer in June, we are planning
to get more power from Himachal
Pradesh,” said a senior official of the energy department.
The state government is worried that
the situation might become alarming if
the government does not raise its own
installed capacity by 2019 as the power
requirement may jump to 5100 MW by
that time.
Underscoring the need for setting up
power plants to meet the requirement of
the consumers, chief minister Naveen
Patnaik has written to Prime Minister
Narendra Modi about the need for setting up an ultra mega power plant
(UMPP) in the state. “The state government and government of India have
launched the joint initiative of providing
24X7 power for all, which will not only
drive economic development, but also
enhance the quality of the life of common man. In order to achieve this objective, generation of power also needs to
be increased commensurately,” the
chief minister said.
Patnaik argued in favour of setting up
the Ultra mega power plant (UMPP) at
Bedabahal in Sundergarh districts on an
urgent basis. The UMPP in Odisha is to
be developed through two Special Purpose Vehicles (SPVs), Odisha Integrated
Power Limited (OIPL) and Odisha Infra
Power Limited (OINPL), which are subsidiaries of Power Finance Corporation
Limited.
“The state has already contributed Rs
350 crore as sought by the project proponents of UMPP. However, the progress
for development of UMPP is rather slow
even when all the requisite support is
being provided by the state government,” the chief minister said, adding
that instructions should be issued to
concerned authorities for early initiation of the bidding process and implementation of the Power project. Once
the proposed UMPP comes up, the state
will be surplus in power as it is expected
to get 1300 MW of power as its share
from the 4000 MW UMPP.
Currently, the state depends heavily
on generation of hydel power from the
reservoirs. “As most of the hydel power
stations have become old, power production from these units has fallen
drastically. Though the installed capacity of the seven hydel units is 2000
MW, they are actually producing just
294 MW power at the moment,” officials said. n
INDIA FIRST 25
International
‘The Lady’
Warrior of
Democracy
Aung Suu Kyi spent the best part of her life
fighting against the military junta for democracy
in Burma. Now holding a high position in the
current regime, can she make the best of her
mission?
A
ung San Suu Kyi's journey in
the battle for democracy, much
of which was spent in detention, has culminated into her appointment as Myanmar's new foreign
minister, though she had made it clear
that she will wield more effective power
than the country's president.
Suu Kyi was sworn in on March 30 and
will concurrently hold three other portfolios in the government led by her confidant and handpicked President U Htin
Kyaw. She will also be the minister in the
president's office, minister of education
and minister of electricity and energy.
An international icon for democracy,
Suu Kyi peacefully fought the country's
oppressive military regime that put her
under house arrest for 15 years, in a bid
to quell her efforts to make the people of
the Southeast Asian nation the real
fountainhead of power.
But "The Lady" – as she came to be
known as – never succumbed to the ruling junta and continued her battle even
when she was held incommunicado in
Rangoon, now called Yangon.
Suu Kyi, inspired by Martin Luther
King and Mahatma Gandhi, was in detention in some or the other form during much of her time between 1989 and
2010. But she battled on earning herself
an iconic status that made her an international symbol of peaceful resistance
in the face of oppression.
She won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991
when the committee chairman for the
26 INDIA FIRST
award called her "an outstanding example of the power of the powerless".
And when finally power came to her,
she was barred from becoming president
because the country's constitution, written by the military, prevents anyone with
close family ties to someone who "owe allegiance to a foreign power". Suu Kyi's two
sons are British passport holders.
Nevertheless, the 70-year-old leader
has vowed to take up a role "above the
president". How that would be practiced
is not clear. But, with her lifelong friend
and confidant sworn in as the new president, Suu Kyi may not be too far from
calling the shots – even though remotely.
Suu Kyi, the daughter of Myanmar's
independence hero, General Aung San,
was born in 1945. Her father was assassinated during the transition period in
July 1947, just six months before independence, when she was only two.
She went to an elite English medium
school in Burma until 1960. In that year,
her mother was appointed ambassador
to India and the young Suu Kyi further
studied at Delhi University before she
went to Oxford, where she met her future husband, the British scholar
Michael Aris.
The couple had two children. She was
living a quiet life with her family in the
United Kingdom until 1988. She returned to her homeland when her
mother fell ill, leaving behind her husband and sons to nurse her dying
mother.
But she found that her nation needed
her more when she saw the mass
slaughter of Burmese people who had
risen against the brutal rule of military
strongman U Ne Win. She raised her
voice and began a non-violent struggle
for democracy and human rights.
During her continuous detention, she
was offered permission to visit her family in the UK. She refused. She knew if
she left, she won't be allowed to return.
Her husband died in 1999 and she could
not even attend his last rites.
Restrictions were finally relaxed in
2011. She was allowed to travel outside
Yangon and hold political rallies for the
National League for Democracy (NLD).
16 APRIL 2016
She was allowed to contest elections for
the first time In January 2012. She won
easily in the elections and was sworn as
a parliamentarian.
That year Suu Kyi visited Thailand, her
first trip outside Myanmar since 1988.
She also travelled to Europe and China.
Her NLD won the landmark elections
in November 2015. The party secured
large enough majorities of seats in both
legislative chambers to allow the party
to form the new government.
Despite her iconic status of political
freedom, Suu Kyi has come under fire
from human rights advocates all over
the world for failing to defend Myanmar's Rohingya minority. Members of
16 APRIL 2016
“Suu Kyi, inspired by Martin
Luther King and Mahatma
Gandhi, was in detention in
some or the other form during
much of her time between 1989
and 2010. But she battled on
earning herself an iconic status
that made her an international
symbol of peaceful resistance
in the face of oppression”
the ethnic group – mostly Muslims – are
subjected to harsh and humiliating re-
strictions, including forced labour. They
do not have citizenship rights.
She was recently accused of Islamophobia when she was shown apparently
getting angry in a 2013 interview being
conducted by BBC presenter Mishal
Hussain. The interview appeared in
news last week when British media reported that she was so angered by the
interview's focus on Rohingya that she
was heard muttering, presumably to an
aide, "No one told me I was going to be
interviewed by a Muslim."
But those may be seen as minor blips
in the life of a woman who stood as a
bulwark against the all-encompassing
power of a military junta. n
INDIA FIRST 27
Energy
MOVE
OVER
DIESEL
BUSES
Electric buses make better sense not only for the environment
but also for the government’s purse strings
E
lectric buses generate 27 percent more revenue and 82 percent more profits than diesel
buses per day, according to an Indian
Institute of Science (IISc) study evaluating electric vehicles for urban transport.
The findings have special significance
because primary mass transit in Indian
cities is provided by 150,000 diesel
buses, held responsible for contributing
to urban smog and carbon emissions
that are warming the planet.
As much as 25 tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) emission can be cut every year
for every diesel bus replaced by an electric bus, said the IISC study, conducted
by Sheela Ramasesha and her group at
the Divecha Centre for Climate Change
in Bengaluru. Electric buses emit no
CO2, but the electricity needed for their
charging stations comes primarily from
coal-fired power plants, India’s primary
energy source.
However, if solar panels are set up at
the battery charging stations, the annual
25 tonnes of CO2 emission per bus can
be further reduced. Put another way, if
150,000 diesel buses were to be replaced
by electric buses, 3.7 million tonnes of
CO2 emissions could be saved.
Apart from reducing outdoor air pollution – which kills 670,000 people in India
28 INDIA FIRST
every year, according to an Indian Institute of Management-Ahmedabad paper –
a clean bus system would aid national carbon-reduction targets. Transport accounts for a tenth of India’s greenhouse
gas emissions, previously reported, with a
2009 study attributing 95 percent of these
emissions to road transport. India is now
the world’s fastest-growing major polluter,
as previously noted, contributing to almost a third of global emissions' growth
in 2014.
Using a Chinese-built electric bus
provided for a three-month free test run
to the Bangalore Metropolitan Transport
Corporation (BMTC) – India’s largest
and most-efficiently run bus fleet – Ramasesha and her colleagues ran their
tests on a pre-existing route with an average daily travel of less than 200 km
(the bus’ battery could run 215 km before recharge).
They compared economics and environmental impact of the electric bus
with a diesel bus on the same route over
a period of 93 days in 2015.
The electric bus was not just cleaner
for the environment but also made economic sense. The revenue generated by
both buses was almost the same while
profits, as we said, were 82 percent
higher. This is because the maintenance
and variable costs of an electric bus are
lower than its diesel cousin and its energy efficiency is higher.
The only downside of the electric bus
is its relatively high price – Rs.30,00,000
($45,000) vs Rs. 8,50,000 for a diesel bus
– which could reduce if electric buses
are manufactured in India. The bus used
for the tests was imported from China.
The electric bus was an easy winner,
emitting about 50 kg less CO2 per day
than the diesel bus. The diesel bus emitted 77 tonnes of CO2 every year.
Diesel-powered buses and trucks contribute higher CO2 than lighter motor
vehicles powered by petrol, a study in
the journal Atmospheric Environment
said in 2009.
In 2010, India and 21 other Asian
countries committed to more sustainable transport fuels and technologies,
“low-carbon transport initiatives to mitigate the causes of global climate
change and to fortify national energy security”.
Despite the high initial investment,
the absence of tailpipe exhaust fumes,
silent running, and lower idling motor
energy losses at bus stops or traffic signals could make the electric bus one of
those technological options for urban
India. n
16 APRIL 2016
A
fter 450 border pillars were
found missing along India’s
open border with Nepal near
Bihar’s east and west Champaran districts, the Sashastra Seema Bal (an
armed border force) is moving to plug
the gap.
New pillars would be erected soon.
The SSB, under the supervision and
monitoring of officials of the Survey of
India and Nepal Armed forces, are busy
constructing the new pillars along the
Defence
officially demarcated line.
“During our ongoing survey that
began last year, 450 border pillars were
found missing with few of them badly
damaged in the 'no-man's land' along
the border of two neighbouring countries,” said Manjul Mamgai, an official of
the Survey of India.
There is a 18.2 metre "no-man’s land"
between the two countries. But at several places, land grabbers have encroached on it. "After the survey, the SSB
will clear the encroachers from the area
along the border” he said.
Mamgai, who is heading a team of
surveyors from Dehradun, and is in
Champaran at present said over telephone that new pillars would be erected
soon.
In all, 1,870 border pillars were
erected stretching to 180 km from Gandak baraj in West Champaran to Ghorasan’s Jamunia in East Champaran
nearly 85 years ago.
“It is serious work with responsibility
because missing border pillars have al-
“Missing border pillars have
already caused anxiety for
concerned officials on both
sides of the border”
– Manjul Mamgai, a Survey of
India official
16 APRIL 2016
GAPING HOLES
The Indo-Nepal boundary has some 450 border pillars
missing, thanks in much part to land grabbers and
encroachers on both sides
ready caused anxiety for concerned officials on both side of the border. The
Survey of India is identifying the exact
location of the pillars,” Mamgai explained.
He also blamed nature’s fury, apart
from land grabbers and encroachers on
both sides for the plight. “Some border
pillars were washed away by heavy
floods and others became victim of the
changing route of rivers," Mamgai said.
He said officials of both countries are
meeting at Birganj in Nepal on March 21
to look at the issues arising out of the
missing pillars and the need to replace
them.
Last year it was agreed to install global
positioning system (GPS) in the pillars.
According to the agreement, the two
countries would set up 83 control points
in their vicinity across the 1,880-km border and install the GPS system in all the
8,553 boundary pillars along the border.
This will ensure timely replacement of
pillars if they are damaged by a natural
disaster or human intervention.
According to a confidential report
sent by the field formations of security
agencies to the Ministry of Home Affairs,
a total of 1,451 border pillars were
"missing" while 1,282 had been "damaged" along the Indo-Nepal border.
According to official reports of the
Survey of India, 1931 pillars were
erected after an agreement between the
two neighbours.
An SSB official said the pillars are the
only symbolic security structures along
the fence-less border of India and Nepal
which is notorious for smuggling.
Bihar shares a large part of its border
with Nepal, including 10 trade transit
points. n
INDIA FIRST 29
Health
A True-Blue Alternative
Ozone therapy offers many advantages over mainstream treatment
T
ired of conventional medicinal
treatments? Try ozone therapy,
used widely during World War I
to disinfect wounds and which has
proved to be useful in treating chronic
cases of asthma, chronic obstructive airway disease, diabetic foot ulcers, various
cancers and more.
The blue-coloured form of oxygen,
which nourishes healthy cells and destroys malfunctioning ones, rejuvenates
cells and helps in healing wounds and
repairing tissues.
"It is safe and is very effective because
it attacks and removes disease-causing
agents, including viruses, bacteria,
fungi, molds, yeast and toxic metals,"
said Dr. S.S. Sibia, director of Ludhiana's
Sibia Medical Centre.
Ozone is an element found naturally
in the atmosphere and a molecule consists of three atoms of oxygen. It quickly
combines with the blood, lymph and
other tissues of body and is more powerful than plain Oxygen.
When medical ozone enters the
bloodstream, it separates into O2 and O,
the healthy cells, armed with antioxidants, absorb the O2 and repel the O,
which zeroes in on the diseased cells
and neutralizes them, Sibia explained.
"We also use it as complementary
therapy in treatment of various types of
cancers and for general immune-activation for allergic diseases and improve
the body's inherent resistance," Sibia
added.
30 INDIA FIRST
"Ozone therapy works wonders
for most people. It's 100
percent natural with zero
chemicals, zero medication,
zero down time, zero
discomfort, and zero side
effects. It's relatively
affordable too"
– Dr. Chiranjiv Chabbra, a
dermatologist at Skin Alive
Clinic in New Delhi
The most commonly reported success
stories are of diabetic foot treatment
with Ozone.
Ozone therapy is administered in
many different ways in the human body
- drinking ozonated water, saunas, rectal
means, intravesical, ozonated saline,
soft tissue and joint injection and directly ozonating the patient's blood.
Ozone can be injected into and
around the joints for the treatment of inflamed and painful joints and is even effective for non-healing ulcers.
Ozonized oil is used as an ointment
for pain relief and is even used as antiseptic.
There is another aspect to ozone therapy.
"It involves injecting ozone into the
skin, which boosts oxygen levels and
helps to deeply cleanse impurities in the
skin. It is used for the treatment of both
oily and acne skin and also reduces inflammation," said Dr. Chiranjiv Chabbra, a dermatologist at the national
capital's Skin Alive Clinic.
"Ozone therapy works wonders for
most people. It's 100 percent natural
with zero chemicals, zero medication,
zero down time, zero discomfort, and
zero side effects. It's relatively affordable
too," Chabbra added.
To this end, Ozone can be used to balance the skin's ph level and lighten its
tone. It also works wonders for lines,
wrinkles and open pores.
"A large number of people are coming
to resolve issues of infected skin and we
recommend ozone therapy as it helps to
get rid of dry and infected layers," said
Dr. Priyanka Prakash, a dermatologist at
Gurgaon's Paras Hospital.
Many centres offer ozone therapy for
aesthetics and against dandruff, acne
and a host of other skin conditions.
"We use ozone therapy primarily to
treat problems of infected skin as it
helps in killing the bacterial activity that
causes acne or dandruff," Prakash
noted.
A word of caution, though.
"Ozone therapy should be avoided in
early pregnancy and care needs to be
taken in patients with hyperthyroidism,
bleeding problems, deficiency of Glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase (that
could lead to jaundice) and epilepsy,”
Sibia concluded. n
16 APRIL 2016
O
n a hot summer day 11 years
ago, 16-year-old Laxmi was
passing by the Khan Market
bus stand in central Delhi when a
spurned lover threw acid on her – leaving her in excruciating pain. After seven
surgeries – last one being the most critical – she is a self-reliant woman who
took on the pain and social enigma with
much grit in all those years.
Mother of a one-year-old daughter,
Laxmi is currently working as director of
a non-profit Chhanv Foundation. She is
also associated with "Stop Acid Attacks"
– a campaign that works against acid violence and reaches out to acid attack
survivors.
"I was 16 when a 32-year-old man
threw acid on me because I had refused
his proposal. This happened in 2005
while I went to Khan Market for book
shopping," Laxmi said.
"It was frightening and cannot be defined in words. I had to undergo seven
tough surgeries, including the most difficult one in 2009 which was never attempted before in India," Laxmi added.
For her, society plays a major role in
curbing social evils and she is disappointed at people’s attitudes for not raising enough voices against crime against
women.
“Society prepares and even nurtures
the conditions for a crime to happen
against women. Why should people remain silent until they themselves suffer
something odd to realise the agony that
others went through? We should all take
a stand against crime against women in
our society,” Laxmi stressed.
Overcoming the nightmare 11 years
ago was not easy for Laxmi. At a point of
time, it became very difficult for her to
even finish higher secondary education.
“But the incident could not stop my
spirit from fighting back,” she added.
The determination and support from
her family motivated her to enrol for
senior secondary certificate (SSC)
course as well as in advanced computer
education.
Against all the psychological and
physical torture she suffered, Laxmi says
she can not only stand up for her rights
but also raise her voice for others too.
Laxmi was honoured with the "International Women of Courage Award" by
the US First Lady Michelle Obama in
2014.
“You haven’t thrown acid on my face;
you threw it on my dreams. You didn’t
have love in your heart; you had acid in
it," she recited the poem in Hindi after
receiving the award.
Laxmi is now helping disseminate
awareness about acid attack and how to
16 APRIL 2016
Human
Interest
More than a Survivor
Laxmi did not let the acid splashed on her face over a
decade ago obliterate her life, and she is doing all she
can to prevent others from suffering what she went
through
Laxmi with her one-year-old daughter at her residence.
“Earlier there were no laws regarding the sale of acid but after
the public interest litigation (PIL) that I filed, the Supreme Court
ordered a ban on open sale and purchase of acid. Unfortunately,
acid is still available in the market”
– Laxmi, an acid attack survivor, social activist, and winner of
"International Women of Courage Award" in 2014
survive it. "We have several campaigns
running like 'Spot of Shame', 'Black
Rose Campaign' and have a cafe
'Sheroes Hangout' in Agra where five
acid attack survivors are working to fend
for their families," she informed.
"We are also happy to see people supporting us wholeheartedly through social networking platforms," Laxmi said.
Laxmi has made repeated attempts to
curb acid sales and gathered nearly
27,000 signatures for a petition to stop
the sales of acid in the market.
“Earlier there were no laws regarding
the sale of acid but after the public interest litigation (PIL) that I filed, the
Supreme Court ordered a ban on open
sale and purchase of acid. Unfortunately, acid is still available in the market,” she said.
Apart from being a social activist, she
also manages to endorse a clothing
brand "Viva & Diva".
“My family has always been the
source of inspiration for me. They have
supported me when I was low and motivated me to work for other acid attack
survivors as well,” she said. n
INDIA FIRST 31
N
o monkey business any more
– at least in tourist hotspot
Shimla. Declared vermin, the
marauding monkeys will be shot down
in areas outside forests to check their
menace.
The Ministry of Environment, Forests
and Climate Change, in a communication to the Himachal Pradesh government on March 14, declared the rhesus
monkey as vermin within Shimla's municipal limits, which legally allows their
elimination.
Forest Minister Thakur Singh Bharmouri said that the permission to cull
them will be valid for six months in the
municipal limits alone, excluding the
forest areas. Hailing the decision, which
followed several requests from the state,
he said the culling would go a long way
in mitigating the damage to human life,
crops and other state property.
The minister said 39 out of the 75
tehsils in 10 of the 12 districts have been
identified by the state forest department
as monkey hotspots.
A hotspot means a place of maximum
conflict with humans.
The maximum of seven monkey-affected tehsils are in Kangra district, followed by Una, Bilaspur and Sirmaur
districts (five each) and Shimla (four).
In a written reply during the ongoing
budget session, Bharmouri informed
the assembly that the attack on humans
in the state has increased since 2006.
In 2013-14, a record 513 attacks were
reported.
In the past three years, there were 674
attacks on humans by the monkeys and
the sufferers were compensated Rs.28
lakh during this period.
The minister said the state has been
conducting a monkey sterilization programme since 2006 and more than 51
percent of the monkeys in the state have
been neutered.
Quoting the agriculture department
report of 2014, Bharmouri said monkeys
and other wild animals damaged agricultural crops worth Rs.184 crore annually.
He said the loss to horticulture crops
was estimated at Rs.150 crore between
2006 and 2014.
On the high court order in January
2011 putting on hold permission to
farmers to shoot monkeys, Bharmouri
said the government would apprise the
court of the latest permission granted by
the centre.
"The case is listed for hearing on April
13 and we are hopeful we will convince
the court to provide immediate relief,"
the minister said.
He clarified that after being declared
32 INDIA FIRST
Wildlife
Apes in the
Cross Hairs
While the Himachal government has granted
permission to shoot down the rhesus monkeys
wreaking havoc in Shimla, animal protection groups
have taken umbrage at it
vermin, individuals who anticipate a
threat to their self or property were free
to kill monkeys.
Animal protection groups, however,
are outraged.
"Killing monkeys is not a solution,"
argued US-based Humane Society International campaign manager N.G.
Jayasimha.
He said that they would soon take
legal recourse to save the monkeys.
Himachal Pradesh is home to 207,614
monkeys as per last year's census
against 226,086 in 2013. Till March 31, a
total of 108,325 monkeys were sterilised
at eight centres.
Their number was the highest at
317,512 in the 2004 census.
The monkey census says there are
about 2,452 monkeys within the Shimla
municipal limits, which is higher than
their number registered in 2013.
Marauding monkeys, prowling in
gangs on Shimla's streets created panic
among residents and tourists. They have
been causing havoc by biting passersby
and snatching food.
Shimla Municipal Corporation deputy
mayor Takinder Panwar said on an average, more than 100 dog bite and over 60
monkey bite cases are being reported
every month in the Rippon Hospital
alone.
He said the monkey menace has
reached an alarming proportion and
needs to be tackled scientifically.
In localities such as Jakhu, Tutikandi,
Nabha, Phagli, Kaithu, Summer Hill,
Tutu, Boileauganj, Chotta Shimla and
Sanjauli, the residents have literally converted their houses into jails by erecting
iron grills on the doors and windows to
check the intrusion of monkeys.
Wildlife officials said around eight
years ago the monkeys were trapped
from Shimla and banished to the jungles
and that was the best technique to reduce their population.
"Now their population has grown
manifold and they need to be relocated
once again rather than going for
culling," an official said. n
16 APRIL 2016
W
ith assembly elections just a
year away and with the opposition Congress in disarray, the RSS has surprisingly emerged as
one of the most bitter critics of Goa's
BJP-led coalition government, especially
on the issue of Medium of Instruction
(MoI) in the state's private primary
schools, a large chunk of which are run
by the influential Roman Catholic
Church.
State Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh
(RSS) president Subhash Velingkar's repeated salvos targeting the BJP government as well as Defence Minister
Manohar Parrikar, accusing both of betraying the cause of Indian languages,
has not gone down well with the ruling
dispensation, although it has refused to
return the veteran RSS chief's barbs.
In a statement issued recently, Velingkar warned the BJP leadership that
the future of Goan students would be
harmed by pandering to the English language as a medium of instruction in private primary schools and accused it of
being double-faced.
“Don't ruin our future by giving grants
to English medium private primary
schools. The future will not pardon
you... Goans have been cheated once,
now they will not fall prey to their attitude of munh mein raam bagal mein
churi (double-face),” Velingkar said.
The genesis of the controversy goes
back to 1991, when the government of
the day decided to grant financial aid
only to primary schools whose medium
of instruction was either in regional languages like Konkani or Marathi, keeping
English medium schools out of the state
financial assistance list.
But a growing demand for education
in the English language at primary level
forced parents of students studying in
Church-run schools, with subtle patronage from Church officials, to agitate in
2010 and demand grants for primary
schools teaching in English medium
too.
In the lead-up to the 2012 state assembly elections, the BJP promised to
find a scientific solution to the vexing
problem, while also supporting a campaign led by the Bharatiya Bhasha
Suraksha Samiti (BBSM), a collective of
Indian language supporters including
academics, politicians and writers,
against allowing government grants to
English medium primary schools. Velingkar himself was at the forefront of the
Samiti’s activities.
After the BJP-led coalition government assumed power, then chief minister Manohar Parrikar, via an ad hoc
decision in 2012, decided to give grants
16 APRIL 2016
Education
FRIENDLY FIRE
The RSS has become the most vociferous critic of ruling
BJP over the issue of medium of instruction in
poll-bound Goa’s private primary schools
to only existing minority educational institutions that were using English as a
medium of instruction, with new
schools being denied the privilege.
While the RSS had criticised the decision at the time, its anger against what it
called the BJP's "shameful compromise"
is now reaching a crescendo, with assembly elections less than a year away.
"The BJP managed to beat the Congress in the last election because of the
campaigning and contribution done by
the BBSM. We will campaign against this
government if they ignore our demands," Velingakar thundered.
The BJP has, however, refused to get
drawn into a public debate with Velingkar, who has groomed generations of
state Sangh leaders and political activists – which include Parrikar and
Chief Minister Laxmikant Parsekar.
“Everyone has the right to an opinion.
We are doing best what we can for the
students of Goa,” a senior BJP leader
said, refusing to comment on the record
on Velingkar's comments.
The BJP has also drafted a bill on the
subject which is being discussed by a select committee of the Goa assembly. The
bill was expected to be tabled in the recently concluded budget session of the
assembly, but BJP sources said that such
a move would not be politically expedient, especially with elections round the
corner.
"If we officially allow grants to English
schools, we risk upsetting the RSS. If we
cancel grants we alienate the Catholic
vote," the BJP leader also said. The
Roman Catholic community accounts
for nearly a fourth of the state's population of 1.5 million.
According to Parsekar, who was also a
part of the agitation against English as a
medium of instruction before 2012, the
status quo should continue.
"I am personally of the opinion that
the grants continued to minority institutions should not be stopped,"
Parsekar has said. n
INDIA FIRST 33
T
here had always been a love-hate relationship between Ahom and Kangleipak kingdoms, the old names of
Assam and Manipur. They went to war numerous times.
But there were also tales of bonhomie. On one
occasion, after a Manipuri princess was married
to an Assamese prince, the king of Manipur decreed an entire village to emigrate to Assam so
that his daughter would not feel lonely in the
new land where language, culture and social
practices were different.
Villagers in Manipur also migrated to Assam
when marauding invaders from Burma (now
Myanmar) and China struck. Others often left
for economic and personal reasons.
One fallout of this migration was that Manipuris adopted the Assamese habit of eating
tamul (betel nut), which then seeped into the
society in Manipur. Now the society is grappling
with the changing habits of Manipuris, as far as
the nut and leaves are concerned.
Cut into six fine pieces the betel nuts are put
on betel leaves which in turn are placed on two
layers of plantain leaves. This offering became
indispensable for religious and social functions.
Apart from offering to the Gods and Goddesses,
shrines or temples, each guest coming for a
wedding, or even a death ceremony, is offered
the betel nuts and leaves.
In Assam, the nut is eaten raw. But the Manipuris, who call it kwa, often dump the areca
nut in pits for several days to soften it, known as
kom kwa.
To meet the widespread practice, several
truckloads of betel nuts and leaves used to arrive in Manipur from Assam. The climate in Manipur is not conducive to grow the plant, except
in a limited form in some areas bordering
Assam.
34 INDIA FIRST
Food
The Tastes,
They Changed
The Manipuri and Assamese folks still love their
paan, but they are no longer chewing at what
they had been traditionally
16 APRIL 2016
In Imphal, there are several wholesale
shops. Every market and every village
had kiosks with women vendors selling
skinned or unskinned betel nuts, leaves
and lime. Most of the elderly persons are
hooked on to the habit of chewing it
throughout the day.
As a result, traders in both the states
thrived and farmers in Assam got better
returns.
But the habit of consuming paan has
undergone a change.
Triggered by intervention of militants,
and attraction of tobacco-laced sweetened leaves (mitha-patti paan), the
practice of chewing has undergone a
transformation, which in turn has
brought about an upheaval in the market.
When truckloads of the areca nuts
and leaves from Assam used to travel
along NH37 to Manipur, the militants –
of whom there are groups galore – found
it lucrative to extract their pound of flesh
in the form of "taxes." To evade this illegal levy, the truckers would try to move
with army convoys. But then they found
many of their trucks torched or pushed
down deep gorges by the militants.
As a response, perhaps, the Manipur
market was practically invaded by the
tobacco-laced leaves, called "mitha
patti" brought by air freight from
Kolkata and other airports.
Ningthemjao, a wholesale trader, said
there was a drastic slashing of the demand of Assamese betel nuts and leaves
since the chewing habit was adopting
the other variety. "There is still some demand for religious and formal social
16 APRIL 2016
“Triggered by intervention of
militants, and attraction of
tobacco-laced sweetened
leaves (mitha-patti paan), the
practice of chewing has
undergone a transformation,
which in turn has brought
about an upheaval in the
market”
functions," he said.
Ibethoi, a woman who used to sell
betel nuts at the Keishamthong market
in Imphal, said: “I had closed down my
shed many years ago since nobody
bought it. People were after the mitha
patti paan”.
The business of the costlier "mitha
patti" is so lucrative that newspaper
packets and other luggages are sometimes offloaded at originating airports to
accommodate its consignments. The
'high quality' betel nuts that go with this
variety is brought in from Myanmar.
Because of a lack of demand for the
Assam betel nuts, most kiosks have either closed down or adopted the flownin variety.
Radhesyam, a social activist, said,
"Guests at functions like marriage ceremony or funeral gatherings had stopped
eating the offered betel nut. They just
ended up littering the venue."
He expressed wonder over why people still insist on offering it on special
occasions. Inao, an event manager, said:
"It (the offering) is made out of respect
for the guests for coming to the function
and this has to continue".
Some estimates put the habit of chewing the leaves at 90 percent of the adult
population. But it is not without its
darker side.
Health specialists say the incidence of
cancer, because of the tobacco-lacing, is
exceptionally high in Manipur.
"What is worrisome is that women are
not lagging behind men much," said
Prof Tomcha, former head of department of Radio Therapy at the Cancer
Centre, Regional Institute of Medical
Sciences, Imphal.
According to Lakpa Laishram, a retired teacher, some families had started
serving small packets of coconut pieces,
spices and sugar cubes in lieu of the
betel nuts and leaves in order to avoid
the health pitfalls. "It is high time others
follow the practice," she added.
As traders and farmers in Assam and
wholesalers and vendors in Manipur
suffered from the loss of a lucrative market, the militants too must have seen
their illegal income drying up. Some of
the insurgent groups called for a ban on
"mitha patti paan".
But since they could not intervene in
its supply, the flow was not hampered
much. Moreover, armed policemen
guard markets where wholesale trade in
the leaves takes places. Also, highly mobile traders, often from Bihar, have
fanned out across the state to sell their
product.
The business has really moved on. n
INDIA FIRST 35
Tourism
Hawaii
of the
East
Blessed with virgin
beaches, verdant
rainforests and volcanic
mountains, the island
province of Hainan has
been putting in place the
necessary infrastructure
to become a global
tourism hotspot
C
oconut and straws featured in
the opening speech by Chinese
Premier Li Keqiang which
largely revolved around the economic
travails of his country at the Boao
Forum.
Li, who did not mince words about
the difficult times ahead for the world's
second-largest economy, said how a
small piercing tool had made drinking
coconut water with straws more hygienic for tourists in Hainan, an island
province in southern China. The reference to coconut water and tourists in
Hainan was aptly made to underline
China's plan to develop this island into
a world-class tourist hub, which hosted
the four-day economic summit in Boao
city in March.
Having seen its economy slow down
36 INDIA FIRST
to a 25-year low of 6.9 percent last year,
China seems to be making a transition
from industry to service sector, which
grew by 8.3 percent as compared 6 percent manufacturing growth last year.
Described as Oriental Hawaii by the
Chinese media, Hainan, located in the
South China Sea, is blessed with pristine
beaches, volcanic mountains and tropical rainforests.
The place is a heaven for those who
have a fondness for seafood.
The island, which until 2010 was more
known for producing tropical fruits, is
vying to catch up with established international tourist destinations in neighbouring Thailand and Malaysia.
It was only in 2010 that the Chinese
government decided to turn the laidback island into a global tourist spot.
Over the years, Beijing seems to be
fiercely promoting tourism in Hainan
but it is yet to become popular with international tourists.
According to the World Travel and
Tourism Council, 97 percent of the
tourists who thronged Hainan in 2014
were Chinese.
"After agriculture, tourism is the next
big thing in Hainan. The goal is to make
this island as an international tourist
spot by 2020," said Zhao Hong, division
director of Hainan Tourism Commission.
Hainan generated over 57 billion yuan
as revenue from tourism last year, an increase of 13 percent from 2014.
In February, the provincial government doubled the cap for buying dutyfree products from 8,000 yuan to 16,000
16 APRIL 2016
per trip for domestic tourists.
The resort town of Sanya has one of
the world's largest duty-free shops.
Hainan has 82 five-star hotels, some
located on a 7.5-kilometre long Yalong
Bay in Sanya. A total of 23 international
hotel groups are operating in Hainan.
Besides scenic beauty, Sanya's infrastructure is developing rapidly. The treelined roads and magnificent high-rises
give a sense of infrastructure and environment going hand in hand.
Zhao says that heavy industries are
not allowed in Hainan.
The sail-shaped skyscrapers on the
man-made Phoenix Island in Sanya look
magnificent.
The government is planning to expand the Sanya Phoenix International
Airport. The Hainan Airlines is already in
16 APRIL 2016
"The number of tourists is
increasing from Italy, France,
Germany, Spain and Russia”
– Li Yongquan, a tour guide in
Hainan
the list of Fortune 500 companies.
The island also boasts of a 650-km
high-speed rail network which connects
all the major airports. China claims it to
be the world's first circular high-speed
railway line.
The train, which runs at a speed of 250
km per hour, takes a little over three
hours for a trip of the entire island.
Travelling on this train, which has a
cafeteria and other modern facilities, is
a real treat since it passes through tropical forests and man-made tunnels.
Sanya also has tourist police – a first
of its kind. It was launched in December
last year to protect tourists.
It was set up after a tourist complained that he was charged 1,520 yuan
for a dish of prawns. The tourist was in
for a shock when he was told that the
price per prawn was 38 yuan.
"The number of tourists is increasing
from Italy, France, Germany, Spain and
Russia," said Li Yongquan, a tour guide
in Hainan.
Locals say more and more "whiteskinned" people can be seen smashing
volleyball on Sanya's beach over the
years. But the Chinese outnumber the
foreigners. n
INDIA FIRST 37
A
fter two successive years of
poor rains, farmers in India can
look forward to a favourable
monsoon this year, thanks to positive
weather patterns.
According to the India Meteorological
Department (IMD) and Skymet, India's
independent weather forecasting service, an overall good rainfall of around 89
cm is expected between June 1 and September 30 – the monsoon period in
India.
Last year, the country suffered mild
drought in parts of northern India, while
the year before large parts of north and
east India experienced full-scale
drought.
"It's still hard to predict the monsoon
as per geographical distribution, but it
would be much better than last year. It
would definitely have a positive effect
on the economy and bring good news
for farmers," said Mahesh Palawat, director Skymet.
The prediction of good rains is based
on the pattern changes evident with
drop in 'El Nino', a climatic phenomenon which is the warm phase of the
cycle of warm and cold temperatures in
the Pacific Ocean that also impacts the
monsoon.
A high El Nino has a negative effect in
terms of the weather, agriculture and
economics.
Palawat said that due to the vibrant
geographical distribution of India, even
during average normal rainfall there is
mild drought in some areas. However,
the situation this year would be better
than the past two years.
In India, 89 cm of rain is equivalent to
100 percent rainfall, which is called normal monsoon.
Experts predict between 100 to 102
percent rainfall this year.
In the past two years, the rainfall situation had been bleak, especially over the
regions of northern Karnataka, Maharashtra, Punjab, Haryana, Bihar, Jharkhand and eastern Uttar Pradesh – major
farming areas of the country.
The unseasonal rainfall last year –
hailstorm in late September, and heavy
rain in winter – and the drought situation in 2014 directly hit paddy farmers
of the major rice growing states, hurting
the country's agronomics.
The signs this year are promising. The
sea surface temperatures of the tropical
central and eastern Pacific Ocean are
predicting good rain days ahead.
"Though the tentative dates of monsoon prediction are between April 20-25,
the drop in El Nino pattern, which may
go below 0.5 by May end and become
neutral, projects an upbeat picture for
38 INDIA FIRST
Agriculture
A Promising Year
If the monsoon predictions for this year come true,
farmers have all reasons to expect a bumper harvest
"Though the tentative dates of monsoon prediction are between
April 20-25, the drop in El Nino pattern, which may go below 0.5
by May end and become neutral, projects an upbeat picture for
the monsoons ahead"
– An official of India Meteorological Department
the monsoons ahead," an IMD official
said, declining to be named.
According to the experts, 2015-16 saw
one of the strongest El Ninos of history,
causing below normal and close to
drought like situation in India and some
other developing countries.
"For six months since the last monsoon, El Nino was above 2 scale, which
is called severe El Nino. However, according to the last two weeks' data, it
has dropped to 1.8, and 1.0 last week,
which is moderate El Nino. We expect it
to reach 0.5 by May end, which is called
neutral El Nino," another expert at IMD
revealed.
The official said that if El Nino reaches
0.5, then it would not affect the monsoon in any way and rainfall would be
normal.
According to data compiled for 10
years, based on the El Nino situation, six
years showed low rainfall and four years
saw heavy rainfall – both results were
definitely not normal, he added.
"Even though as per our tests, El Nino
didn't show exact one-on-one relation
with the rainfall, but it does affect the
normal range of rainfall," the IMD official concluded. n
16 APRIL 2016
Movie
Review
'Love Games': More watchable
than other films of Bhatts
Subhash K. Jha
Director: Vikram Bhatt; Cast: Patralekha, Gaurav Arora, Tara Alisha Berry,
Rukhsar Rehman; Rating: ***
T
his is the land of the loathsome,
unplugged. The stench of selfindulgence among the stinking
rich is so all-pervasive in "Love Games",
we can almost smell the Chanel and the
expensive wine. Brand names are
dropped in conversations so casually
that you almost miss the point.
These are people who don’t know
what to do with their lives.
Vikram Bhatt’s last film "Hate Story 3"
gave us no clue what was to come next.
"Love Games" is somewhat redemptive.
The characters are despicably self-absorbed Page 3 types who have so much
money and free time on hand they plot
their own self-destruction with the same
level of enthusiasm as they point the
downfall of their adversaries.
Ramola( played by Patralekha) is a
newly-widowed heiress who pretends to
be grieving in public while she laughs
her head off in the privacy of her bedroom. Ramona needs a ‘f**k buddy’. And
who better equipped for the role than
the super-rich wayward adrift Cocaineaddict Sam (newcomer Gaurav Arora
).The two are the Bonnie and Clyde of
the bordello, shooting from their hips
like there is no tomorrow.
Their exploits are captured in lurid
details and a quirky background score
that gives the whole ritual of surreptitious mating a feeling of ruinous mis16 APRIL 2016
chief.
Then Sam meets his nemesis. Alisha
(Tara Alisha Berry) is a brutalized wife
and doctor who instantly heals Sam’s
scorched and drugged soul.
There is a sequence where Alisha
takes the besotted Sam into a secluded
room and shows him the injury marks
on her back perpetrated by her husband
( played by Hiten Tejwani). The empathy
that the sequence generates is in direct
opposition to the riot of hedonistic hijinks that Sam whips up with Ramona.
So far so watchable. And then midway the film falls apart. In his pursuit of
excitement and adventure(not unlike
his protagonist) Vikram turns what is
predominantly a psychological study of
excessive self-indulgence into a messy
crime misadventure with all three main
characters trying to finish of one another in a game that can only end in a
disaster and not the kind that augurs
well for the film.
This is not what I wanted to see and
know. "Love Games" plays the game defiantly by its own rules. And succeeds
until the point when the three characters bleed their inner-most insecurities
and cravings into a plot that absorbs
their auto-pleasuring non-judgementally. It then takes a firm grip of the three
characters hands and tells them, it’s
time to walk the talk.
With infuriating resolve the narrative
turns the characters into puppets of a
crime orgy, rendering their earlier selfindulgences into a nemesis that is the
equivalent of post-coital depression.
Nonetheless the film is gripping for a
large part. The principal characters are
unlike anything we’ve seen before. All
three actors perform confidently. Patralekha’s portrayal of a masked autoeroticism is one of its kind. Gaurav
Chopra provides some terrifying moments of insight into a mind that is so
far gone into self-indulgence,it doesn’t
feel anything any longer except perhaps
below the waist.
Tara Alisha Berry expresses the pain
and humiliation of spousal brutality
without making herself look like a
bleeding martyr. The fourth interesting
character of a shrink is played by Rukshar Rehman (the very beautiful actress
from Ram Gopal Varma’s "Sarkar").This
character is never allowed to develop in
the plot.
This is not film about growth. It is
about lives lived so close to the edge that
the only certainly is self-destruction.
Vikram Bhatt’s rips ruthlessly into ruined lives. He is not afraid to let his characters look vulgar in their cravings.
"Love Games" is a film about a selfgratification so complete, it destroys
everything it touches. n
INDIA FIRST 39
Bollywood
Singing with
Priyanka will
be wonderful:
Parineeti
Chopra
A
ctress Parineeti Chopra, who will go
behind the mic to sing for “Meri Pyaari
Bindu”, says it would be "wonderful" if there's
ever an opportunity to sing with her cousin
and actress Priyanka Chopra. Priyanka has
earlier crooned foot tapping numbers like “In
My City” ft. will.i.am, “Exotic” ft. Pitbull, and
even the title track of "Dil Dhadakne Do"
Asked if she plans to sing a number with
Priyanka, Parineeti told IANS: “ Wow! (Singing
with Priyanka) that would be wonderful. That
would be really wonderful, but I have to ask
her.” "That is a great idea, we should do it,"
she added in an ecstatic tone.
Priyanka, who has got global recognition
with her stint in the American TV series
“Quantico”, has now bagged a Hollywood film
“Baywatch” alongside actors Dwayne Johnson and Zac Efron. Parineeti says for crooning
a number together, they first “have to be in
the same country”.
For now, Parineeti is all set to play an aspiring actress in the upcoming film "Meri Pyaari
Bindu", which is set in Kolkata and also features actor Ayushmann Khurrana. The film is
directed by debutant Akshay Roy and is a Maneesh Sharma production. n
Tiger Shroff lauded for spreading Kung Fu awareness
A
ctor Tiger Shroff, who has claimed that Kung Fu has its
origin in India, is now earning kudos from masters
across India for bringing attention to the martial art.
Many of Indian Kung Fu trainers feel that Tiger, who will
be seen doing action scenes in his forthcoming film “Baaghi”,
can help raise a word around the marital art, says the film's
director Sabbir Khan. “Kung Fu masters from across India
have been reaching out to the team and are applauding Tiger.
They believe that Tiger's words will help create awareness
about the origin of Kung Fu and help promote the form of
martial arts," Sabbir Khan said in a statement.
Tiger has performed many Kung Fu moves in “Baaghi”,
under the supervision of Master Shifuji. “Baaghi", which also
features Shraddha Kapoor, is set to release on April 29. n
40 INDIA FIRST
16 APRIL 2016
Hollywood
Is Megan Fox
pregnant?
A
ctress Megan Fox is reportedly pregnant with her third
child. The actress showed off her tiny baby bump while
hitting the red carpet of the CinemaCon in Las Vegas on Monday.
Multiple sources claimed that the
29-year-old is expecting, reports eonline.com.
The "Transformers" actress stepped out on the
red carpet for CinemaCon dressed in a formfitting Versace dress
which showed a baby
bump. Her representative had no comment.
Fox's pregnancy
came as a bit of a
surprise since she
announced
her
separation from
husband Brian
Austin Green
last year. She
filed for divorce in
August
after five
years
of
marriage,
citing "irreconcila b l e
differences".
H o w e v e r,
the pair have
been spending plenty of
time together
lately. They're
frequently
seen on several occasions
around here
with
and
without their
two
kids,
three-yearold Noah
Green and
two-yearold Bodhi
Green. n
16 APRIL 2016
Jennifer Lopez
taught me how to
dance : Kerry
Washington
A
ctress Kerry Washington says she learned
to dance from singer-actress Jennifer
Lopez. “I had this very inspiring teacher named
Larry Maldonado. He had an awesome substitute
teacher named Jennifer, who would sometimes
step in and teach, but then she left to move to Los
Angeles and be on 'In Living Colour',” Washington said on “The Tonight Show”, reports femalefirst.co.uk.
“I learned to dance from Jennifer Lopez. It was
like meant to be that I would be famous,” she
added.
Meanwhile, the 39-year-old previously revealed she tries to "quit acting all the time".
She said: "I try to quit acting all the time! Not
necessarily the show, it's not that I would ever
walk away from 'Scandal,' but at times I am like,
'Eh, I'm done with this acting thing.' But being
able to tell the story brings me back." n
INDIA FIRST 41
Book
Review
Planning mayhem in Mumbai:
A new view of 26/11
Vikas Datta
Title: The Scout - The Definitive Account of David Headley and the
Mumbai Attacks; Authors: Shirish Thorat with Sachin Waze;
Publisher: Bloomsbury; Pages: 232 Price: Rs.399
W
hat kind of a person can coolly go
around a bustling metropolis with the
hidden objective of reconnoitering a series of high profile and bustling targets for a relentless, unconscionable carnage and strike up
acquaintanceship with those who might well figure
among the victims? Daood Sayeed Gilani alias David
Coleman Headley for one.
Many details are now known of the PakistaniAmerican Lashkar-e-Taiba operative with the mismatched eye pupils who laid the seeds of the 26/11
Mumbai attack, by providing the terror outfit with
detailed inputs and hours of footage of the iconic
and well-frequented targets, including the Taj Hotel,
the Leopold Cafe and even the hard-to-find Chabad
House.
But as the attack was being directed
by LeT commanders, why was Headley
not invited to the "command centre"
and his calls fobbed off. Finally arrested by the US authorities, he escaped the most serious punishment.
Indian access, once granted, was extremely limited. (Until recently, when
all sorts of disclosures are coming after
he became an approver).
Where did his primary allegiance, if
any, lie, and was there more he did that
we don't know about - yet?
This is what former police officers
Shirish Thorat and Sachin Waze try to
do deal with this in this book - a riveting account of
the preparations for the dastardly attack, their
bloody unfolding, and a tantalising bit of the aftermath - with the ominous tagline "26/11 was just the
beginning".
The real truth behind the planning and preparation of 26/11 may never be known, but the duo present a most plausible reconstruction of it, though
admitting that "at the end of it all, we knew what had
happened and in what sequence and like all events
there were some things which we could prove and
some things that we could not. This narrative is a
combination of verifiable facts and a professional's
estimate of what happened and how".
Thorat, an expert on terrorism and money-laundering, and Waze, who has experience of operating
on Mumbai's mean streets, has helped authors such
as Adrian Levy (co-writer of "The Siege: The Attack
42 INDIA FIRST
on the Taj"), Jason Burke and S. Hussain Zaidi, and
is himself author of a Marathi bestseller about 26/11,
succeed quite well.
Whether it is the meeting at LeT's sprawling headquarters at Muridke near Lahore when Hafeez Saeed
gives the go-ahead to Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi (here
strangely rendered Zakirur), their observations of
their relations with the ISI, the attackers' training in
Muzaffarabad, the planning sessions, they all seem
based on notes taken by an observant participant
and reads no less than an engrossing thriller.
Likewise is the appearance of Headley himself in
the third chapter, through his ISI handler 'Major
Iqbal' reading about his background from his file,
after having "poured two fingers of Jim Beam into a
gleaming crystal glass and followed it
up with soda and a splash of water"
and having lit a cigarette and taken a
"few meditative drags".
But it is the attack itself and the response of police force and some ordinary - and not so ordinary - citizens
that sets the book apart. Whether it is
junior officers and constables rushing
to confront heavily-armed terrorists
with their vintage - and unequal weapons, the CST announcer who
risked his life to warn away commuters, the beggar woman's selfless
act, countless hotel employees who escorted patrons to safety, the doctor
who worked overtime, and finally, the armed forces.
This has been gone over in newsreports and earlier
works but still remains the actual legacy.
This is however also the point when the plot is
lost. There are a few matters which are raised but not
adequately cleared up - like why the decision to put
Rakesh Maria in charge of the control room came in
for criticism later- but the vignettes of the aftermath,
tantalising as they are, end without any full closure,
while making a avoidable goof-up as to then union
minister P. Chidambaram's designation.
This may not yet be a definitive account, as
flagged, of Headley but gives an unforgettable view
of an "extraordinary maverick chameleon character
who only served himself despite professing multiple
allegiances (Levy)", and the attacks he helped
arrange. As such it is a valuable addition to the corpus on this watershed occurrence. n
16 APRIL 2016
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