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Articles 25121 through 25220 of 25647:
- Time to correct India’s West Asia policy (Tribune, M.S.N. Menon, Mar 02, 2001)
THE horse is the only animal dearer to Allah, says the Prophet of Islam. Now that we have been gifted a horse by no less a person than Prince Abdullah, we should hope that it has brought with it the goodwill of its masters.
- Musharraf desperate to talk with India (Hindustan Times, Prem Shankar Jha, Mar 02, 2001)
ATAL BIHARI Vajpayee’s decision to extend the ceasefire by three months instead of one, simultaneously allowing the security forces to counter terrorism in the Valley, signals a shift in the government’s goal. From trying to get Pakistan to the negotiatin
- FLOTSAM & JETSAM: Walking through Delhi Golf Club (Hindustan Times, Bhaichand Patel, Mar 02, 2001)
ONE OF the best secrets of Delhi is the magnificent Lodi and Mughal-period monuments on the grounds of the Delhi Golf Club. If you are properly dressed and walk in full stride you will have no difficulty getting past the club’s gatekeepers in order to see
- DISINVESTMENT BLUES (Daily Excelsior, Editorial, Daily Excelsior, Mar 01, 2001)
This time disinvestment in BALCO and the policy as a whole being pursued by NDA Government has rocked both Houses of Parliament. Not that opposition onslaught lacks merit. It is to be seen that the targeted disinvestment in Public Sector Undertakings to t
- Command Performance (Times of India, Editorial, The Times of India, Mar 01, 2001)
Breaking a 53-year-old taboo and marking a milestone in administrative reform comparable to the initiation of the economic reforms, the Group of Four Ministers (GOM) and the National Security Adviser have submitted their recommendations on revamping the n
- ALPHA FOR THE ATTEMPT (Telegraph, Editorial, The Telegraph, Mar 01, 2001)
There were reasons for scepticism. Last year’s budget did not augur well, nor did the railway budget. Elections are due in several states and populist pressure exists from the National Democratic Alliance allies. To cap this, several key officials in the
- Scripting his best Budget yet (Business Line, B. S. Raghavan , Mar 01, 2001)
THE first spontaneous reaction of the corporate chieftains at the conclusion of the two-hour long Budget speech of the Finance Minister, Mr Yashwant Sinha, was to burst out clapping.
- Bangladesh High Court judgement will it help change obscurantist norms in India ? (Daily Excelsior, Fazal Mehmoo, Mar 01, 2001)
In the second week of January, a historic judgment was pronounced by the Bangladesh High Court. It was the case of a woman, Shahida Atiqa, of village Athia in Naugaon district, whose husband Saifullah had pronounced triple talaq after an argument. Not onl
- DISINVESTMENT BLUES (Daily Excelsior, Editorial, Daily Excelsior, Mar 01, 2001)
This time disinvestment in BALCO and the policy as a whole being pursued by NDA Government has rocked both Houses of Parliament. Not that opposition onslaught lacks merit. It is to be seen that the targeted disinvestment in Public Sector Undertakings to t
- DISPUTED TERRITORY (Daily Excelsior, Editorial, Daily Excelsior, Mar 01, 2001)
Home Minister L K Advani has done the right thing in setting the record straight by stating that J&K State is an integral part of India. To that extent there is simply no question of declaring it as a disputed territory. He also reiterates Government's co
- Simply vintage stuff (Business Line, Sarvadaman, Mar 01, 2001)
THANK you, Finance Minister, sir. It was not old wine in new bottle, it was simply vintage Bourdeaux with the optimum maturity that we all have been patiently waiting for a decade. After Dr Manmohan Singh's eye-opener in 1991, we Indians had to wait for a
- A market-oriented exercise (Business Line, Ravi Narain, Mar 01, 2001)
THIS is the fourth Budget presented by the Finance Minister and has smoothly moved the reform process forward from the steps initiated earlier. This Budget is significant, particularly in the context of the difficult circumstances in which it has been pre
- LTTE on the run in Sri Lanka (Pioneer, Ashok K Mehta, Mar 01, 2001)
A happier, though minus one eye, President Chandrika Kumaratunga was in Delhi last week to brief Indian leaders about developments in Sri Lanka and also to push SAARC forward. Her last visit was two years ago. At that time, the Sri Lankan Army (SLA) was b
- Way of all flesh (Hindustan Times, Soumya Bhattacharya, Mar 01, 2001)
SUSHMA SWARAJ and her band of nudity policemen must have been busy. Or else they wouldn’t have (shouldn’t have) missed out on this one. But it is a shame because in any case, the Information and Broadcasting Minister — who thinks that FTV is leading the c
- Culture mirror reflects inequality (Pioneer, Suhit Sen, Mar 01, 2001)
It is tempting to read social and economic disparity in cultural terms. That's more or less what the academic, social theory establishment-loosely read post-modernists-have been doing for more than a decade.
- Costly gamble (Deccan Herald, Editorial, The Deccan Herald, Mar 01, 2001)
The budget proposals tabled in Parliament on Wednesday make it clear that the government has decided to play all its trumps at one go in favour of the stock markets in a last desperate hope that the economic growth rate will pick up. The critical factors
- MR SINHA GETS A HIGH SECOND (Telegraph, SHUBHASHIS GANGOPADHYAY, Mar 01, 2001)
When P. Chidambaram presented his “dream budget” (1997), my colleague and I had predicted a high growth rate for the economy. So had many others, but later faced a serious dilemma when the government growth figures started being revised down, then up, the
- Filling of Indians (Pioneer, Sidharth Bhatia, Mar 01, 2001)
We are like the filling in a sandwich and the blacks and the whites are two slices of bread," is how a South African Indian wryly expressed the dilemma of the 1.3 million strong community, which is now pondering its own position in a democratic dispensati
- Bengal escape into magical realism (Daily Excelsior, Sondip Bhattacharya, Mar 01, 2001)
I have seen the future and it works," is the remark attributed to an enthusiastic visitor to the Soviet Union in the 1920s. A few years later, Sydney and Beatrice Webb described the USSR as a "new civilisation". In a way it was. None of the old civilisati
- Taliban to open Kabul Museum to show destruction (Times of India, Correspondent or Reporter, Mar 01, 2001)
KABUL: The bullet-scarred doors to the Kabul Museum are to be opened on Thursday for the first time since the reclusive leader of Afghanistan's hardline Taliban rulers ordered priceless pre-Islamic relics destroyed as offensive to Islam.
- Big Pluses, Small Minuses (Times of India, Editorial, The Times of India, Mar 01, 2001)
The buck stops - and starts - with us. This was the central message of New Deal Sinha's Budget 2001 for the new millennium which enjoined fiscal responsibility on both the individual citizen and the government. For years, the current FM has talked the tal
- ALPHA FOR THE ATTEMPT (Telegraph, Editorial, The Telegraph, Mar 01, 2001)
There were reasons for scepticism. Last year’s budget did not augur well, nor did the railway budget. Elections are due in several states and populist pressure exists from the National Democratic Alliance allies. To cap this, several key officials in the
- Where positives dominate (Hindu, Editorial, The Hindu, Mar 01, 2001)
IT WAS NOT exactly a facile exercise in balancing the books. What the Union Finance Minister, Mr. Yashwant Sinha, had on hand was a constellation of challenges in framing his fourth budget. A creeping sense of disquiet about the slowing down of the moment
- New security set-up (Tribune, Editorial, The Tribune, Feb 28, 2001)
IT is not celebration time yet for the armed forces, although the Group of Ministers (GoM) has nudged the decision-making power closer to them. The proposed Chief of Defence Staff, the seniormost of the three service chiefs, will report directly to the Pr
- Safety first for Mamata (Hindustan Times, Editorial, The Hindustan Times, Feb 28, 2001)
FOR ALL her talk about the railways not being only a commercial enterprise but a public utility which is a “dependable friend of the Indian people”, Mamata Banerjee has managed to turn a national institution into a well-oiled vote-garnering machine. As is
- Sushma as "Bharat Didi" (Tribune, Editorial, The Tribune, Feb 28, 2001)
WHEN Mrs Sushma Swaraj became Information and Broadcasting Minister for 13 days, during the first spell of BJP rule, she made Doordarshan women newsreaders follow a dress code which matched her strict puritan tastes. Now she has close to four years for ma
- N-fuel for Tarapur power plant India’s search for self-reliance (Tribune, G Parthasarathy, Feb 28, 2001)
BARELY 20 years ago, in April 1981, the then Chairman of India’s Atomic Energy Commission, Dr Homi Sethna, met American negotiators led by Assistant Secretary James Malone in Washington. Sethna was at the State Department along with the Secretary, Externa
- God of the willow (Pioneer, Editorial, The Pioneer, Feb 28, 2001)
In a game of idols and icons, there will always be only one god: Don Bradman. There will never be another cricketer like him because both the times and the game have changed.
- Fear of being afraid (Tribune, Abu Abraham, Feb 28, 2001)
LOOKING at the aerial photographs of Bhuj in the newspapers, I couldn’t help thinking of Hiroshima. Those pictures also showed a similar devastation, of a city flattened to rubble with just the odd tall building standing, though mutilated beyond recogniti
- Don't alleviate poverty, remove it (Pioneer, Bharat Jhunjhunwala, Feb 28, 2001)
The World Bank refuses to recognise that there is a fundamental conflict between capital and labour. Cheap capital, if left free, will necessarily displace labour and create poverty.
- The learning curve (Pioneer, Sidharth Bhatia, Feb 28, 2001)
Depending on where one stands, South African President Thabo Mbeki is either a die-hard Stalinist of the old school and a ruthless dictatorial leader who brooks no opposition, or he is a man with a vision for his country and continent, and who is trying h
- Death and the filmmaker (Pioneer, Chiranjib Haldar, Feb 28, 2001)
Ritwik Ghatak wanted to use theatre to further the cause of revolution, but opted for cinema to express his tortured being. He was the only Indian director for whom creativity was almost a suicidal obsession.
- Self-reliance and self-respect go together (Pioneer, G Parthasarathy, Feb 28, 2001)
Barely twenty years ago, in April 1981, the then Chairman of India's Atomic Energy Commission Dr Homi Sethna met American negotiators led by Assistant Secretary of State James Malone in Washington.
- Choosing the Chief (Pioneer, Editorial, The Pioneer, Feb 28, 2001)
The recommendation of the Group of Ministers to create a new post of Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) is undoubtedly a momentous step in India's military history. If, and when, implemented, the move will catapult a traditionally conventional armed force into
- Opening up the road to Mandalay (Tribune, V GANGADHAR, Feb 28, 2001)
I wonder if the famous Hollywood duo of the 1940s, Bing Crosby and Bob Hope made a film called “Road to Mandalay” in their unforgettable “Road” series of Zany Comedies. Bing and Bob starred in “Road” movies which took them to Bali, Morocco, Singapore and
- Mum’s the word (Hindustan Times, Editorial, The Hindustan Times, Feb 28, 2001)
A COUPLE of days ago, Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha excused himself from answering a query about reducing the age of retirement for central government servants from 60 to 58 in the Rajya Sabha. His reason for keeping mum was that the answer would be pro
- Wait for a catch (Hindustan Times, Editorial, The Hindustan Times, Feb 27, 2001)
EVER SINCE his contract with Marc ‘World Tel’ Mascarenhas expired on December 31, Sachin Tendulkar has been a free man. In the last five years, Sachin has not only matured as the world’s leading batsman, but also developed the right business instincts.
- Medical miracle offers hope of perfect health (Tribune, Editorial, The Tribune, Feb 27, 2001)
FOR about $ 900 parents can protect their new-borns by storing umbilicalblood which contains stem cells, the holy grail of surgeons.
- Doles and subsidies are also paid in the USA (Tribune, P. Raman , Feb 27, 2001)
AT 10.30 a.m., leaders of Techies gathered their employees into a conference room and told them to pick from a bunch of folders the one which had their names on it. Inside the folders was either a severance package along with instructions to be out of the
- Green Revolution in Haryana A boon or bane for farmers? (Tribune, Karan Singh Dalal, Feb 27, 2001)
FOOD deficit in the sixties prompted the government to adopt a new agriculture strategy which brought about the Green Revolution. As the immediate concern of the Government was food security, the thrust of the strategy was on increasing the production of
- Pulling the chain (Hindustan Times, Editorial, The Hindustan Times, Feb 27, 2001)
ONE GOOD indication of the health of a coalition is when its constituent members are allowed to do as they please regardless of the national interest or the cost to the government. By that reckoning, the Vajpayee government is beginning to look distinctly
- Bidder truths about disinvestment (Hindustan Times, Editorial, The Hindustan Times, Feb 27, 2001)
ALMOST FROM the time that the proposal to disinvest part of the government’s shareholding in Air-India was first mooted, aviation industry insiders have been muttering that the fix was in. The end winner, they declared, would be the Tata-Singapore consort
- Benazir exposes Pak judicial corruption (Hindustan Times, Benazir Bhutto, Feb 27, 2001)
A "MIRACLE" in the form of a conscientious Pakistani intelligence bureau officer saved her from being jailed on false accusations of corruption, writes Benazir Bhutto in an exclusive article for the Hindustan Times.
- Hang on a fine balance (Hindustan Times, B.B. Bhattacharya, Feb 27, 2001)
BUDGET 2001-02 will be the last one for the Ninth Five Year Plan. The Ninth Plan originally set an ambitious growth target of 7 per cent. After poor performance in the first two years, the growth target was revised downward to 6.5 per cent. The average gr
- Mamata defiant as ever (Tribune, Editorial, The Tribune, Feb 27, 2001)
GRANT it to Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee. She is comfortable as a short-term politician with her eyes fixed on West Bengal Assembly elections rather than on being a visionary administrator. Her budget says it all. She has ignored the advice of the Pri
- Bad news for Congress (Tribune, Editorial, The Tribune, Feb 26, 2001)
MRS Sonia Gandhi will survive the rout of the Congress in the assembly byelections in seven states. About that there should be no doubt. So what, if the Congress as a party disappears from the political horizon of the country, because of its obsession wit
- The doomed kiss (Hindustan Times, Editorial, The Hindustan Times, Feb 26, 2001)
EVER SINCE the Colgate Close-up advertisement was aired on television, chaos has reigned supreme. Instead of having the sudden urge to brush one’s teeth, viewers have either rushed off to kiss the closest pair of lips or angrily called in at the Ministry
- A peep into Chandrababu’s functioning His strategies and achievements (Tribune, C. Narendra Reddy, Feb 26, 2001)
MR Nara Chandrababu Naidu is one of the younger and upcoming leaders on the Indian political firmament. As the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh since September, 1995, he has emerged as a model. He has many achievements to his credit and is envied by his c
- Where do the poor live? (Tribune, Editorial, The Tribune, Feb 26, 2001)
THERE is a significant passage in the Economic Survey. It casts doubts on the National Sample Survey (NSS) assessment of a sharp fall in the percentage of the very poor. This despite the Planning Commission’s full-throated endorsement. The NSS says the pr
- The Security Counsel (Pioneer, Rahul Sagar, Feb 26, 2001)
To the casual observer one feature of India's strategic set-up is striking - namely, the seemingly identical composition of the various bodies that are concerned with national security.
- One billion and counting (Hindu, GARGI PARSAI, Feb 25, 2001)
The headcount of India's billion-plus population is on. GARGI PARSAI on the first census of the new millennium.
- Protect domestic producers, but not at the consumers’ cost (Tribune, Sarbjit Singh, Feb 25, 2001)
THE Union Government has announced that it will bring in a “suitable legislation” to safeguard the interests of domestic producers. Even the President in his Address to Parliament dealt with the issue of free imports at length and assured that the governm
- Pervez's perfidy (Pioneer, Editorial, The Pioneer, Feb 25, 2001)
Pakistan's bid to send two spy planes into Indian airspace at a time when its leader, General Pervez Musharraf, was making conciliatory noises towards this country, deserves some consideration in the aftermath of Thursday's ceasefire extension by India.
- The "official" voice of the Congress Party (Tribune, Harihar Swarup , Feb 25, 2001)
WHEN Jaipal Reddy rejoined the Congress 18 months back,one question posed everywhere was: would Sonia Gandhi appoint him the party spokesman? She was, apparently, not in a hurry even though the team of her spokespersons did a shoddy job. Her party had fac
- Whither the heat and dust? (Pioneer, Shobori Ganguli, Feb 25, 2001)
Too big, too hot, too loud, too many people. These are only a few of the infuriating stereotypes the West is consciously excluding from its assessment of India in the new millennium.
- 'Judyben’ helps in weaving threads of life (Tribune, Aditi De, Feb 25, 2001)
FLASHBACK to 1970. A young American exchange student of fine arts from Wisconsin arrives in India to study advanced batik techniques, but draws a blank. Soon, she chances upon a mirrored piece of embroidery in Baroda. Enchanted, she travels to Kutch in Gu
- Yet another spectacle (Tribune, Prem Kumar , Feb 25, 2001)
WE are fond of spectacles and at times can be very imaginative and original in thinking of new ones to add to the already long list of them. And then, this one was a grand spectacle indeed. Ships and planes, submarines and helicopters, bands and parades a
- Hot and cold winds blow over South Block (Tribune, Rakshat Puri, Feb 25, 2001)
THE Vajpayee Government seems suddenly under assault from two directions that common sense does not find easy to relate to each other. It is intriguing that the assault should come almost simultaneously from the two sides.
- Performance and promise (Tribune, Editorial, The Tribune, Feb 24, 2001)
The Economic Survey paints not-so-rosy a picture but makes up by promising to reshape the whole structure. In this respect the annual report card, which the document really is, admits that the government’s management is pretty messy but it will be better
- Ulterior agenda (Deccan Herald, Editorial, The Deccan Herald, Feb 24, 2001)
The United Nations War Crimes Tribunal’s conviction of three Bosnian Serb soldiers on charges of raping and torturing Muslim women and girls is an important verdict as it is for the first time that rape during wartime has been treated as a crime against h
- Relief mapped (Pioneer, Binoy Sharma, Feb 24, 2001)
Fifty-one-year-old Ahmed Patel is already a veteran in the Congress party. He is a member of the Congress Working Committee, the party's highest policy-making body, and was also in charge of the party's purse strings for several years. Now Rajya Sabha mem
- Rejecting the parliamentary system (Hindu, Era Sezhiyan, Feb 24, 2001)
THE NATIONAL Commission to Review the Working of the Constitution (NCRWC) has released a Consultation Paper on `Election Law, Processes and Reform Options', advocating ``a system of direct elections only at the grassroots of Indian democracy''. Regarding
- Will this Budget be any better? (Hindu, Subramanian Swamy , Feb 24, 2001)
JUST AS I had predicted in these columns last year, the 2000-01 Union Budget has flopped. The estimated 2000-01 growth rate, at 5.8 per cent, is far below the 1992-97 trend rate of 7 per cent, and much less than the Prime Minister's King Canute-like annou
- Not in poor health (Hindustan Times, Editorial, The Hindustan Times, Feb 24, 2001)
EVERY YEAR, the Economic Survey focuses on the health of the economy. This year’s survey has given a rosy report card because there is no doubt that the Indian economy is doing well in the world context if the GDP growth rate is an indicator. Few countrie
- More speculation,less information (Deccan Herald, G S Bhargava, Feb 24, 2001)
Acres of newsprint were being used by Delhi-based special correspondents to speculate whether the Vajpayee government would further extend the Jammu and Kashmir ceasefire. As L K Advani pointed out more than once, ceasefire is a misnomer for the security
- The genie that cannot be bottled (Pioneer, Harminder Kaur, Feb 24, 2001)
For over a decade now Pakistan has believed that the proxy war it has been waging in Jammu and Kashmir "is bleeding India white". Many of its generals and ISI chiefs have repeatedly argued that for every dollar Pakistan spends, India has to spend $ 33. Th
- Show some humility (Hindustan Times, Editorial, The Hindustan Times, Feb 24, 2001)
THE CONTINUING uproar in Parliament over the sale of Balco raises many questions. The first of these is an estimate of the true worth of the company. MPs and an ill-informed section of the press have been content to repeat the allegations made by the Balc
- Pressure on Bengal Marxists (Business Line, Ranabir Ray Choudhury , Feb 24, 2001)
WITH the resignation of Samir Putatunda, the senior CPI(M) party functionary, as also that of his wife, a former party MLA, the stage in Bengal's Marxist politics appears to have been set for a churning the likes of which have not been seen for a long tim
- An elephantine challenge (Hindu, Editorial, The Hindu, Feb 24, 2001)
MAN'S BRUTALITY TOWARDS animals was recently demonstrated in the very forests where once Jim Corbett shed tears every time he had to shoot a maneater. But today's hunters, nay hardcore poachers, go about butchering a creature as mammoth and magnificent as
- This day, that year (Pioneer, Harish C Gaur, Feb 23, 2001)
To be born in a lower middle class family in a remote village in Haryana with limited access even to high school education, was a handicap but I did manage to sail through albeit with considerable difficulty to post-graduation and at age of 22+ and I had
- Poet and the city (Tribune, Narendra Kumar Oberoi, Feb 23, 2001)
So long as Kumar Vikal was alive, his persona was an inescapable part of his poetry. With his passing way (he breathed his last in Chandigarh on February 23, 1997), the persona and the poetry enter into a different relationship. Terms of relationship call
- Budget 2001-2002: Great expectations (Business Line, M. R. Sivaraman, Feb 23, 2001)
THE FINANCE Minister, Mr Yashwant Sinha, has a difficult task to perform in the 2001-2002 Budget. With a worldwide recession on the horizon, a massive natural calamity perceptibly affecting GDP growth, and a chronic drought gripping several parts of the c
- Realpolitik of economic reforms (Business Line, R. Sthanumoorthy, Feb 23, 2001)
ECONOMISTS and policy-makers, in general, treat economic policy-making as a purely `technical' problem. Their primary concern is to devise a policy proposal that ``maximises or improves social welfare''. And once a desirable policy is recommended, they ex
- Managing disasters (Business Line, B. S. Raghavan , Feb 23, 2001)
THE horrendous nature of the earthquake in Gujarat has stirred up a lot of interest in disaster management. Leaders of all the important political parties have laid aside their differences on policies and ideologies and are readily participating in the na
- Gujarat: Compounded by human failure (Business Line, D. S. Soman , Feb 23, 2001)
THE NATION has been going through traumatic times since the January 26 earthquake in Gujarat, a calamity that caused the worst havoc since Independence. The nation is familiar with tragedies, experiencing its fair share every year in the form of floods, h
- A peace vote for J & K (Tribune, Editorial, The Tribune, Feb 23, 2001)
FOR the third time the cease-combat operations drive is being extended in Jammu and Kashmir but it is no routine decision as in the past. One, the government thought it necessary to consult opposition parties before taking the plunge. That was not so much
- The last extension? (Hindustan Times, Editorial, The Hindustan Times, Feb 23, 2001)
It must have been a hard decision to take. Apart from the diplomatic gains, the last two extensions of the ceasefire in Kashmir haven’t achieved much. The sense of relief mixed with expectations of a dramatic improvement in the situation, which were antic
- Triumph of faith and spirit of service Beyond Chowk Mehta Punjab faces real challenges (Tribune, Hari Jaisingh, Feb 23, 2001)
THE 200-year-old Damdami Taksal at Chowk Mehta in Amritsar district is a premier centre for teaching Sikh tenets, prayers and ragas. It has kept up its sacred role in spreading the message of the great Gurus. Today, it inspires both reverence and awe.
- MEDIA`S FAILURE IN GUJARAT Not Going Beyond the Obvious (Deccan Herald, Ujjwal K Chowdhury, Feb 23, 2001)
Gujarat is currently the battle-ground of the warriors of peace and relief: the Indian Armed Forces, the rescue teams of 14 nations of the world, the NCC and BSF, and innumerable relief teams of citizens and voluntary organisations, many of whom are novic
- An opportunity in Afghanistan (Tribune, Syed Nooruzzaman, Feb 23, 2001)
THERE are interesting feelers from Afghanistan, a country with which India had traditionally friendly relations till a few years ago. The Taliban regime’s Ambassador in Islamabad, Mr Abdus Salam Zaeef, is reported to have expressed his country’s desire to
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