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Electronics City. Call to book!www.bren.com/Palms Ads by Google P. VENUGOPAL SHARE PRINT T+ A woman walks down a deserted road in New Delhi. Sprawling urban zones such as Lutyens Delhi that transform into unqualified voids by night may be plugged at select locations with small shops and other points of activity. Photo: V.V. Krishnan As a city grows in population, sprawl and complexity, ensuring the safety of people using its public spaces needs to be given priority. Of the varied users of public spaces, women are the most vulnerable. The recent proposal to install closed circuit cameras at several places in Delhi brings to focus issues related to safety in a city, detection of crime and its prevention. While active monitoring measures such as installation of cameras and patrolling may be necessary in some places, the quality of natural supervision that a public space inherently offers through cues in its physical environment, can also act as a deterrent to crime. Public spaces devoid of adequate and appropriate activity and a sense of ownership invariably become vulnerable pockets for violence in a city. Many cities have their own set of such spaces and zones. Delhi, with its spread out habitat, listless intermediate void zones, and wide arterial roads and sprawling greens, many of which run out of activity and fall dead by night, is no exception. Streets tend to be safer, with active edges, be they shop fronts, hotels or residences, and with a generous dose of pedestrian movement. The absence of active edges indicates poor health of a street in terms of safety if offers to its users. As Jane Jacobs, the activist thinker on urban issues, pointed out long ago, spaces that lack natural guardianship promote crime. However, a citys design and construct is an amalgamation of many kinds of spaces. Large campuses, spacious enclaves, and grandiose urban spaces, such as Lutyenss Delhi, have their own role to play in a citys structure and design. Such sprawling zones, many of which transform into unqualified void s by night, may be plugged at select locations with internet cafes, coffee shops, small departmental stores, first aid centres and patrol booths, or a combination of these to establish points of activity and reference. Good design can ensure their unobtrusiveness. At another level, sprawling urban enclaves with sparse building density can be improved for safety through measured densification and sensitive urban design. Best use of land Land use plays a vital role in determining the safety quotient of an urban area. Those areas with mixed land use, usually a combination of office, retail, residential and other uses, offer persistent monitoring of their public spaces into late hours. Vendors and hawkers, often considered as unsightly encroachments, involuntarily attend to their immediate public realm. Zones in a city offering niches for diverse and wide range of activities also bring health and vibrancy to them. On the contrary exclusive zones with singular land use like financial districts, or a software district with extensive sprawl turn into desolate and unsafe islands by night, or even during peak working hours. As a policy, the idea of creating large exclusive zones needs to be revisited and creation of more mixed land use zones to be promoted, if needed through regulatory incentives. Other minor but important measures can significantly contribute to making urban environments safer through physical design features. For instance, regulations may stipulate a modest height for compound walls, and a certain degree of transparency through design. This can enhance spatial and visual permeability, simultaneously expanding the owners territory of vigilance. Blunt and long, continuous high walls, develop a negative zone along the edges with potential for abuse. Large urban parks, usually with thick peripheral plantation designed to ward off acoustic disturbance and to create a green oasis, involuntarily seclude themselves from the citys streets, becoming vulnerable to crime. Creating a view Wherever possible, creating transparent edges to urban greens and open spaces enhances natural involuntary overseeing, which can deter and mitigate criminal behaviour. Opening up of confined green spaces also contributes to visual relief and adds to aesthetic value of the surrounding environs. Good illumination is of course an indispensible element in creating safe zones. Large commercial buildings with active shop fronts close to grade, unlike the introverted malls, offer a positive edge and encourage pedestrian activity and fluent access. Urban elements like express ways, subways or under passes,

unkempt urban open spaces, derelict and run down zones of a city, all need attention and upgrade from the stand point of safety and crime deterrence. These suggestions are not exhaustive, and each city would need its own solutions. Formulated by C. Ray Jeffry in 1971, crime prevention through environment design, CPTED, is a comprehensive approach which aims at deterrence of crime through design of physical environment while allowing its use. With increasing urbanisation and densification of our cities, there should be national guidelines for crime prevention in urban areas, through environmental design and urban design. Think tanks need to draw on expertise from various disciplines including Urban Design, Landscape Design and Environmental Design, behavioural sciences, social sciences and others. What is urgently required is a national task force can oversee enforcement of these guide lines with focus on womens safety. (The writer is an architect and an urban designer based in Hyderabad. E-mail: tdc_architect@rediffmail.com) Vibrant public spaces in cities promote natural guardianship and deter crime, especially against women Losing the plot in the neighbourhood Travel Agent in Bangalore - Domestic-International Tour Package Best Travel Deals. Contact Now! Tours-Packages.co.in/Bangalore Ads by Google JYOTI MALHOTRA SHARE PRINT T+ BSF personnel patrol the India-Bangladesh border in Agartala, Tripura. The government has been unable to explain to the BJP and others that if the Land Boundary Agreement was not ratified, it would feed into the anti-Indian strain of Bangladesh politics. Photo: Ritu Raj Konwar A couple of weeks ago, former Maldivian President Mohamed Nasheed stopped in Delhi on his way to Saudi Arabia for umrah . He met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and other senior officials in the Indian establishment. No press releases were issued, but the signal was clear: without saying sorry, India was apologising to Mr. Nasheed and his Maldivian Democratic Party for having supported the coup against him in February 2012 and recognising his successor and current President Mohamed Waheed. At least in the Maldives, the Manmohan Singh government has sought to correct its botched analysis of the political situation. Across the rest of South Asia, Delhi has so clearly lost its nerve that it has failed to project the leadership that is expected of it. Worse, by taking the path of least resistance, the Congress-led government has often ended up siding with regressive and reactionary forces at home as well as in these countries. Bangladesh, for example. Finally, the Bill to ratify the Land Boundary Agreement (LBA) was introduced in the Rajya Sabha last week but had to be deferred again, because of opposition by the Bharatiya Janata Party nearly two years after it was signed by Dr. Singh and Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in Dhaka. Having failed to call Trinamool leader Mamata Banerjees bluff on the Tees ta waters agreement, the Prime Minister hid behind the compulsions of coalition-building and failed to explain to senior BJP leaders early enough the importance of ratifying the LBA by the necessary two-thirds majority in Parliament. Partisan politics The meeting between the PM and the BJP came only a few days ago, far too late for any serious bargaining. With the governments credibility falling by the day, the BJP, which hopes to win back power in 2014, failed to put national interest above partisan politics and strung Dr. Singh along. It insisted that Delhi first takes on board the views of States neighbouring Bangladesh knowing, very well, that West Bengal would refuse to toe the line and then put up the lone Asom Gana Parishad MP, Birendra Prsad Baishya, to opposing the Bill in the Rajya Sabha and bringing the House to a standstill. Certainly, the BJPs failure to take a statesmanlike view on improving ties with Bangladesh doesnt exonerate the Manmohan Singh government of lack of focus on this very important relationship. The Prime Minister was simply unable to explain to the BJP, the Trinamool Congress, the AGP and others that if the LBA was not ratified by India, it would feed into the anti-Indian strain of Bangladesh politics and boost the prospects of key opposition and pro-Jamaat-e-Islami leader Khaleda Zia, of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party leader (BNP). Dr. Singh failed to point out that if Awami League leader and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina lost the elections slated for January, the likelihood of Indias eastern frontier becoming much more troubled would significantly go up.

And so it was left to Bangladeshs High Commissioner to India, Tariq Karim, to redeem the future for his country. Desperate to have the LBA ratified by India, and knowing that the BJP was a rising power, Mr. Karim met Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi in Ahmedabad a few weeks ago, perhaps the first sitting diplomat to do so. Puzzling activism If Delhi has been sleeping over Bangladesh, its over-activism in Bhutan has been puzzling. After its Prime Minister met the Chinese Premier in Rio de Janeiro last year, the Indians did a double-take. In Delhis black-and-white view of the world, how could a friend so openly consort with the enemy? But India forgot that South Asian realpolitik was not a Harry Potter movie and that China was not Voldemort; if anything, Delhi was reaching out to Beijing on several counts on its own steam. Indias decision to raise energy prices, passed off as a budgetary cut, caused a storm in Bhutan. Observers have wondered about the remarkable lack of grace in dealing with Bhutan and asked if the division of power between the Prime Ministers Office and the Ministry of External Affairs was the root of the problem. During Atal Behari Vajpayees tenure , then Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh and then National Security Adviser Brajesh Mishra had vied to be the most influential. The questions, whether there is a similar contest in the Manmohan Singh government and if so, who are its main protagonists, continue to loom large behind the scenes. With Pakistan, of course, much has been written and said since the August 6 incidents on the Line of Control, when five Indian soldiers were killed by Pakistanis. The irony here is unmistakable: In the early days of the Kargil war, Pakistani soldiers from the Northern Light Infantry wore civilian clothing to sneak into India. In 2013, Pakistani citizens soldiers, specialist troops or militants in army uniform needed to wear official army dress to signal the seriousness of their intent to destabilise India. When the BJP brought Parliament to a standstill demanding that Pakistan be declared Enemy Number One, Manmohan Singh & Co once again played right into their hands. Indias diplomats, famed the world over for their drafting skills, made such infantile errors on the wording of Defence Minister A.K. Antonys statement that even a menagerie of doves could not defend him. Last heard, the Prime Minister was holding firm to the line that he would definitely shake Nawaz Shari fs hand in New York, even as the BJP insisted he could have no substantive talks with a Pakistan Prime Minister who has suffered worse at the hands of his own Army than anyone alive in Pakistani politics. The party seemed so desperate to condemn the Congress that it was happy to abandon Mr. Vajpayees line on Pakistan which it had been unhappy about in the first place, anyway. The question is, can Prime Minister Manmohan Singh rediscover himself, or is it too late for that? With 10 months left to go for the general elections, it is time Delhi did a Maldives in the neighbourhood. That would mean pushing through the LBA as well as the Teesta waters agreement with Bangladesh, going back to its time-tested dual policy on Pakistan tough on terror but simultaneously opening up for trade, travel and visas as well as hand-holding Nepal on its November election. The first test will come on September 7 when Maldives votes for a new President. Can India bring to bear some moral authority that can ensure it will be a free and fair election? (Jyoti Malhotra is a Delhi-based journalist.) Having made amends on Maldives, there is hope that the Manmohan Singh government may yet salvage ties with Bangladesh, Bhutan and Pakistan The Mother Teresa her critics choose to ignore Meet Mickey & Friends - Watch World Class Broadway Shows & Visit New Mystic Point in HKDisneyPark.HongKongDisneyland.com Ads by Google NAVIN B. CHAWLA SHARE PRINT T+ There can be no better reply to muckrackers than her life and her work A few months ago, a couple of researchers in Canada produced a report entirely critical of Mother Teresa and her work, which predictably found its way into the media. Some of the issues they raised were her questionable contacts with dodgy characters such as the Haitian dictator, J ean-Claude Duvalier, her overly dogmatic views on contraception, abortion and divorce, and that she offered rudimentary medical care to the sick and dying in her hospices, instead of setting up a proper hospital in Kolkata. Here, there was a cruel twist to the tale that when she herself fell ill, she benefited from the best medical attention on offer.

Putting down roots Before I answer these accusations, let me encapsulate her life and her work. She was only 18 when she was convinced that her lifes vocation lay in her becoming a missionary in far-off India: Skopje, where she was born on August 26, 1910, was so far removed from Bengal that, barring a few Yugoslav Jesuits who fired her young imagination, no one in the small Catholic community would even have known where India lay. Yet, the early seeds of her faith, determination and compassion, nurtured by her widowed mother, impelled her to leave her close-knit family, first for Ireland to join the Loreto Order of teaching nuns, (and also to learn some English), and then by boat to faraway Calcutta, which she would grow to love so much that it would become indistinguishable with her own name. She lived and worked as a Loreto nun for close to 20 years before her true calling once again propelled her to find a way to the street, not as a lay woman but continuing to be an ordained nun. The Vatican itself gave her permission, fantastically for the first time in Church history, to step outside her secure convent into a huge and bewildering city. In 1948, Calcuttas pavements were swarming with teeming millions uprooted by Partition, who now joined the hapless sufferers of the Great Bengal Famine of 1942-43. Here stepped in a 38-year-old nun, now dressed not in the recognisable nuns habit, but a sari similar to what the municipal sweepresses wore, with no companion, no helper and no money. Confronted with disease, destitution and death all around her at a time (1948) when there was hardly any health-care service to speak of, she did what was to become her hallmark. Finding a man dying in the street, she took him to a public hospital, which refused to admit him, precisely on the grounds that since he was about to die, they would not waste a hospital bed on a life they said they could not save! It was only when she sat before the hospital in a dharna that they relented. The man died a few hours later. It was at this point that she began her search for a place where she could take those people whom hospitals refused; where she could nurse them she had some medical training and they could at least die being comforted and with some dignity. She begged various authorities and finally, an officer in the Calcutta Municipality gave her a pilgrims hall adjacent to the Kalighat temple, where she requested the police and municipal authorities to bring her all and any of those dying whom the hospitals refused. I have been so many times to this hospice at Kalighat, that I did not need to ask Mother Teresa why she had not set up a hospital instead, because I knew that a hospital would tie down all her Sisters to a single establishment, and then who would care for those who fell by the wayside? The infant abandoned on a street, the sick and elderly turned out of their homes, often enough by their own families, the leprosy sufferers or AIDS patients that no one wanted to even go near who would look after them? How many of us actually do anything about the desperately poor we see on the streets? We only have to look within us to know that those who are quick to criticise Mother Teresa and her mission, are unable or unwilling to do anything to help with their own hands. Although staunchly and devoutly Catholic, she reached out to people of all denominations irrespective of their faith, or even the lack of it. She did not believe that conversion was her work. That was gods work, she said. So while she lifted the abandoned baby off a street full of prowling dogs for the sanctuary of her Shishu Bhawan, she would never convert her, because that child would probably be adopted into a nice Hindu household, and such a conversion would then have been a cardinal sin which she would never commit. That is why people of all faiths were so accepting of this diminutive Catholic nun. In my 23 years of close association with her, she never once whispered that perhaps her religion was superior to mine, or through it lay a shorter route to the Divine. Which is also why, when I asked Jyoti Basu, that redoubtable leader of West Bengal, what he, an atheist and communist, could possibly have in common with Mother Teresa for whom god was everything, he replied simply that we both share a love for the poor. Her hospitalisation In the course of researching my biography on Mother Teresa, I asked her why she took money from dodgy characters like Duvalier. Her answer was concise. In charity, she said, everyone had a right to give. How was this different from thousands of people who each day feed the poor? I have no right to judge them, God alone has that right. And again, I accept no salary, no grant, no government or church funds, nothing. I do not ask for money. But people have a right to give. Meanwhile, I researched the Duvalier story. She had set up a small mission in Port-au-Prince, one of the worlds most desperately poor places. A day after Mother Teresa visited and left, Duvaliers da ughter-inlaw went to Mother Teresas mission and donated 1,000 dollars. It was not, as was reported, a million dollars, but Mother Teresas reply would still have been the same: if that gives peace to the giver, so be it. Let me now illustrate a true story of one of Mother Teresas actual hospitalisations. In 1994, Mother Teresa fell ill in Delhi when she had come to receive an award. She developed high fever and possibly gastro-enteritis. Against her will (I will be all right by tomorrow), I rushed her to a large, public hospital,

where she was hospitalised for over a week. I stood vigil. She was known to have a cardiac history, and it was up to the cardiology department or the gastro department to take charge. The sad truth is that no one wanted to, frankly scared she might die on their hands. She sensed this too, pleading with me to take her back to her beloved Kolkata. But she could not possibly have been moved. In those days when there were no mobile phones, the switchboard at the hospital was jammed with enquiries. I not only took almost daily calls from Rashtrapati Bhavan and the Prime Ministers Office, but also from the White House, the Vatican, and chancelleries all over Europe. Ambassadors called frequently. Prime Minister Narasimha Rao offered her treatment anywhere in the world. Finally, not quite recovered in my view, her Sisters took her back to Kolkata. I have to say that the cardiac team was relieved to discharge her! There are other cases of her hospital treatments that I am aware of. If only the Canadian research team had known the reality about her hospitalisations, perhaps they would not have been so uncharitable. At the Vatican In her lifetime, Mother Teresa was sometimes described as a religious imperialist, a handmaiden of the Churchs doctrinaire policies on abortion and birth control. These were indeed her views and she was undeterred by such criticism. Yet, she gently but unmistakably left her imprint on the heart of the Vatican itself. Finding in Pope John Paul II a kindred spirit, she cajoled him into literally and metaphorically opening a small door to set up a tiny soup kitchen adjacent to the Popes grand audience chamber. At 6 p.m. each day, Romes homeless and hungry continue to be fed by Mother Teresas Sisters, just a few metres away from the grand Basilica of St. Peters. At a stroke, this frail nun, indisputably the worlds most decorated person, helped to demystify the Vaticans aura of wealth and privilege, serving a daily reminder to the Vatican where its true vocation lay. (Navin B. Chawla is a former chief election commissioner of India and biographer of Mother Teresas.) Getting the facts right 1947 MB data for 1 week - Freedom to endlessly surf, download with Tata Docomo at Rs 31. Buy nowtatadocomo.com/data-recharge Ads by Google SHARE PRINT T+ Free speech and dignified debate are an integral part of democratic functioning. Therefore we cannot but be concerned about the plummeting standards of intellectual debate as evidenced in Jagdish Bhagwatis personal attacks on Amartya Sen in the Indian media. Not only are Mr. Bhagwatis attacks offensive and abusive, they are also factually incorrect. We are indeed surprised by the misinformation in Mr. Bhagwatis recent articles on Mr. Sen. Mr. Bhagwati charges that Mr. Sen appointed himself Chancellor of Nalanda University. This is patently false, as Nalanda University is a cooperative initiative involving several Asian governments, an d Indias then President Pratibha Patil, as Visitor to Nalanda University, was the responsible authority for the appointment of the Chancellor. Amartya Sen was requested by President Patil to undertake the role as Chancellor without remuneration which he did because of his commitment to the vision of Nalanda University, an invaluable intellectual heritage for India, indeed for the world. Mr. Bhagwatis claim that Mr. Sen asked for and accepted a million dollars from BJP Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha for his new NGO, whereas I have not asked for a Rupee or received any financing from the BJP is false. When Mr. Sen got the Nobel Prize and used his prize money to set up a Trust to conduct policy research on education and health in India (he set up a similar charitable Trust in Bangladesh), the Government of India volunteered a matching contribution to the Trust, in appreciation of Mr. Sens achievement and commitment. Mr. Sen neither requested nor received a million dollars. Accepting a celebratory gesture in support of a charitable Trust from your own government (Mr. Sen remains an Indian citizen) is not the same as getting a grant from a political party. His commitment to advancing childrens health and education in India has continued, and indeed his royal ties from the book that Bhagwati attacks ( An Uncertain Glory: India and its Contradictions ) are going wholly to the same charitable Trust. Also, it is incorrect to say, as Mr. Bhagwati does, that Mr Sen gratuitously attacked Chief Minister Narendra Modi. Mr. Sen spoke about Mr. Modi in response only to pointed questions in a television interview. Surely in a democracy Mr. Sen has a right to his views and a right to reply truthfully in a media interview. Again, Mr. Sen has never denounced the provision by the private sector of arrangements for the delivery of food, education and health to the deprived. He has never said let alone insisted that the government alone must provide them, as Mr. Bhagwati claims.

As concerned citizens of India, we write this letter because erroneous charges should be corrected for the public record. We also appeal for a commitment to truth, a respect for facts, and the use of temperate language in anyone seeking to engage responsibly in a public debate. Presenting untrue statements in support of false accusations vitiates the practice of democracy. Signatories Somnath Chatterjee, N. Ram, Sudhir Anand and A.K. Shiva Kumar Attacking Syria is a bad idea Apply for Home Loans - Instant Approval with ICICI Bank & Save upto 3.5 Lakhs* on every EMI.ICICIBank.com/Home-Loans-Cashback Ads by Google SHARE PRINT T+ As allegations fly thick and fast that the Syrian Army attacked a Damascus suburb with chemical weapons last week, the West seems once again on the verge of committing itself to another disastrous military adventure. Though opinion is still divided within the United States, all indications are that Washington is thinking of aerial bombardment along the lines of Natos 1999 attack on Yugoslavia, once again citing humanitarian compulsions to justify what would be an act of aggression. Before the international community evaluates and debates its options, however, surely it is essential that there be an independent investigation of the incident. Though the Bashar al-Assad regime possesses stocks of chemical weapons, earlier allegations of their use by the government have never been conclusively verified. Ironically, U.N. investigators arrived in Syria right before the attack in which chemical munitions were allegedly used; only a government looking to discredit itself would have timed their deployment in this manner. Did hotheads within the regime act recklessly, disregarding the obvious international consequences? Or has the opposition staged a provocation to tarnish the regime, as the Assad government and its allies like Iran believe? Damascus has said it will allow U.N. experts to visit the site of the alleged attack, a counterintuitive offer if it really used chemical munitions there. The fact that Washington is not interested in onthe-ground forensics suggests the Obama administration has already made up its mind. Whatever the case, the alleged use of WMDs in Syria must not be made a pretext for illegal intervention. There is no basis in international law for drawing red lines as U.S. President Barack Obama has done the crossing of which would permit the unilateral use of force without U.N. Security Council authorisation. Even if law and morality were on its side, western military strikes would still be a bad idea. As it is, the expectation that some messianic solution to the civil war will come from outside Sy rias borders either from the Wests military might, or the money and arms pumped by regional powers has made the armed opposition consistently oppose any proposal for a political settlement. Syrias toxic environment, in which both the government and sections of the opposition have committed war crimes, cannot be cleaned up by the Wests firepower. Even if the U.S. and its allies were to succeed in destroying the Syrian state, as they did the Iraqi and Libyan ones before, an anarchic, partitioned Syria will radiate instability throughout West Asia. As he ponders his next move, Mr. Obama should be careful what he wishes for. Navy should have a DSRV for each coastal flank Read Free eBooks - Download From Our Free eReader & Get Six Great Classics for Free!www.TheReadingRoom.com Ads by Google VINAY KUMAR SHARE PRINT T+ The first 72 hours after a submarine accident are vital as trapped sailors will stand a good chance of survival, says Commodore (retd.) Satluri Govind, who has for three decades commanded and served on Russian submarines similar to INS Sindhurakshak, which was wrecked by explosions in Mumbai. All 18 sailors aboard the ship were killed. Sailors could survive on four to five days supply of food and oxygen in a submarine till a deep submergence rescue vessel (DSRV) reached them. He wanted the Navy to have one DSRV for each coastal flank. In the absence of a DSRV, 118 Russian personnel died after their nuclear-powered submarine Kursk sank in the Barents Sea in August 2000. A week before Sindhurakshak went down, the government took the first step towards purchasing a system to rescue submariners trapped underwater. The Defence Ministry issued an RFI, or request for

information, for a Submarine Rescue Bell System with LARS on August 6. The RFI a sked vendors to furnish the Navys Directorate of Special Operations and Diving with information by September 10. Responses were invited only from Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM)/authorised vendors and government-sponsored export agencies. Principal components of the equipment, sought to be procured, were submarine rescue bell for 12 men, launch and recovery system (LARS), associated life support systems and locator system. The system was to be fitted onboard the Navys submarine rescue vessel. If the DSRV was so badly needed, why did the Navy not get it till now? There are no easy answers as its purchase has so far remained undecided. Does it take a tragedy of INS Sindhurakshaks nature, in which we lost 18 of our highly skilled submariners, to shake up the bureaucratic machinery out of its slumber? asks Com. Uday Bhaskar. Sources say the cost of a DSRV should range from $40 million to $60 million, which is not at all a high price for procuring such specialised equipment to rescue personnel trapped in submarines which are very advanced technologically but can turn into iron coffins when crippled. After going through the RFI, the Navy will shortlist vendors for issue of the Request for Proposal (RFP) and only after that will qualitative requirements be framed. This process, even if speeded up, could take up to a year or more before the Navy finally gets the submarine rescue bell system, said a senior Navy officer. Incidentally, it was in November 2012 that the India-US exercise, Indiaex-2012, was held off Goa where the compatibility of the submarine rescue system of the U.S. Navy with Indian Navy submarines was tested for the first time. The exercise, meant to demonstrate the rescue of personnel from a disabled submarine, was significant for the Indian Navy, which not only operates an ageing fleet of submarines but also has no DSRV of its own.