A mismatch of nuclear doctrines

VITAL QUESTIONS: The massive retaliation promised in the Indian nuclear doctrine is being increasingly questioned by scholars and analysts. This handout photograph released by the Defence Research and Development Organisation shows the launch of Agni V intercontinental ballistic missile at Wheeler Island, Odisha, on September 15, 2013.

India intends to deter nuclear use by Pakistan while Pakistans nuclear weapons are meant to compensate for conventional arms asymmetry.
Manufacturing a nuclear weapon does not, as a senior Indian Minister in 1998 claimed, create credible deterrence. Deterrence is entirely a matter of perceptions, a mental effect that is created on the adversary that nuclear use will entail assured retaliatory holocaust. The possibility of nuclear use is thereby pre-empted. The Indian nuclear doctrine, in that sense, is well articulated on paper. Since 1998, more than 15 years have passed and in the Indian sub-continent, nuclear arsenals have grown far beyond the small nuclear ambitions that were articulated then. Yet there is an increasing fund of world literature being published, pointing to structural and operational weaknesses in the Indian nuclear arsenal. The question is not whether India has built enough nuclear bombs. Hardly anyone questions this basic fact, but the ideational systems that will ensure the massive retaliation promised in the doctrine are being increasingly questioned by scholars and analysts worldwide. Pakistani observers cannot help but be swayed and dangerously influenced by such literature, thereby inducing them to think the unthinkable. What does not help in encouraging sober thinking is the fact that since the end of the Second World War, South Asia has seen the largest number of shooting wars in the world. So the questions of nuclear use will not arise in the quiet peace of neighbourly relations, but in the stress of combat over the Line of Control or the international border. The 1998 test Critics of the credibility of Indias nuclear arsenal begin with their doubts on the success of the thermo-nuclear test of 1998, which they claim was a fizzle. There has been much toing-and-froing in technical journals, of the veracity, accuracy and interpretation of seismic readings. There has also been an occasional closed door briefing by select bomb makers but surprisingly there has not been, to date, a clear unambiguous public statement from the right source about the countrys thermo-nuclear capacity being fielded in Indias nuclear arsenal. This is a matter of some negligence, considering that the only members of the scientific community who have spoken on this issue are deeply sceptical of the success of the thermo-nuclear test.

The command and control of nuclear forces are another area of criticism, and not surprisingly so, since India is the only nuclear weapon country without a Chief of Defence Staff to act as the interface between the Prime Minister, the National Command Authority and the military who own the weapons at least most of it. In the guise of safety, Indias nuclear weapons are not only de-mated and the core and ignition device separated from the warhead, but the separate components are under different departmental control. The actual reason for this bizarre arrangement is quite obvious. There is a petty turf war, and neither the Department of Atomic Energy nor the DRDO is willing to let go of the controlling part of the bomb, even if it means a cumbersome and unnecessary loss of control. Needless to say, between the military, the DAE and the DRDO, none of them has any hierarchical control over the other two. Other critics have written to say that having opted for road or rail mobile launching arrangements, India does not have the robust transport, road and rail infrastructure to move the missiles, warheads and cores from safe storage to launch hideouts and dispersal points with confidence and alacrity. These weaknesses have led to critics stating that Indias nuclear capability is disaggregated and with weak institutional features. In the case of China, it is conceded that India feels more threatened by Chinese nuclear delivery than vice-versa. Yet, in the absence of the Agni long-range missiles, it is vaguely surmised that the Indian retaliatory capacity is based on air delivery weapons, which could mean anything Mirages, Jaguars, Su 30s. The absence of the CDS results in even knowledgeable Indians conjecturing that the Strategic Forces Command (SFC) will completely bypass the military chain of command and operate directly under the PMO. This, of course, raises other more serious problems. In the case of deterrence with Pakistan, it is accepted that the doctrines of the two countries are mismatched. India intends to deter nuclear use by Pakistan while Pakistans nuclear weapons are meant to compensate for conventional arms asymmetry. At the same time, Pakistan relies on 20,000 LeT cadres as an extension of its armed forces to create terror strikes, to which the Indian answer is to punish the Pakistani state with conventional war. Thus arises the vague and elastic concept of a nuclear threshold. Yet, the Indian National Command Authority is ill designed to manage the inevitable South Asian transition from conventional war to a possible nuclear exchange or the frantic strategic signalling that is bound to occur as the threshold approaches. If, for instance, the threshold was to materialise as a result of an armoured incursion, the Indian NCA by its location, composition and infrastructure would be entirely unaware of the impending catastrophe. Hanging untethered to any commanding authority, civilian or military, would be the Integrated Defence Staff, a well-staffed organisation designed for the civilian-military interface, but currently without a head, nor with any links to the SFC. After much persuasion, there now exists a skeleton nuclear staff under the NSA, normally headed by the retired SFC. But while its Pakistani

counterpart, the Strategic Plans Division (SPD), is highly active both on the domestic and international conference circuit, its Indian counterpart seems to be totally tongue tied, non-participatory and holed up at its desk. Foreign critics have noted the introduction of battlefield nuclear weapons in Pakistans arsenal and raised doubts of the likelihood of massive retaliation in response to a small warning shot by Islamabad. This is what the Indian doctrine promises. Life for the leaders of the strategic community would be easy if a doctrine, once written on paper, could be left unchanged for decades without reinforcement, to prove its validity. That unfortunately is not the case in a dynamic field where the stakes are the survival of nations. Even K. Subramanyam had warned that massive retaliation was an outmoded concept and difficult to enforce without periodic reinforcement. So this article is inspired not because India is not continuing to arm itself with bombs and missiles. This piece is inspired by the increasing clamour in international literature that Indias penchant for secrecy is illsuited to conveying the stabilising threat of nuclear deterrence. Against China where our capabilities are undeveloped, a certain amount of ambiguity is sensible, but against a country which is openly wedded to first use, and is introducing battlefield weapons, an untended 10-year-old piece of paper is inadequate. Signalling, overdue Something needs to be done to reassure both the domestic and international audience that with high pressure terrorism lurking across the border, it is not just Indias strategic restraint that will keep the peace as it did after Mumbai and the attack on Parliament. Nuclear signalling from the Indian government is hugely overdue, so much so that it will take some effort to restore stability to South Asian deterrence. The first target should be the Indian strategic community and there are enough discussions and conferences where officers from the SFC and nuclear staff could provide discrete assurances that things are not anarchic with Indias nuclear command and control. The strategic community in turn will carry the message abroad or to foreign observers that in the face of Indian official silence, they need not imagine the worst. The establishment needs to do more than arrogantly refer to the doctrine as being the sole answer to all questions. In deterrence, only perceptions matter and there is a disturbing build-up of literature indicating that the disbelief of others in our nuclear command and control is in urgent need of correction. (Raja Menon is a strategic analyst)

Arihant all set for sea trials

Gaurav Vivek Bhatnagar

Indias first indigenously built nuclear-powered submarine, INS Arihant, will undergo sea trials in a few weeks or months as its preliminary harbour acceptance trials were over, Assistant Chief of the Naval Staff Rear Admiral L.V.S. Babu said here on Tuesday. During the trials, all systems, including its ballistic missiles, will be tested before the submarine is finally commissioned into the Navy. The submarine would be indigenously designed, built, operationalised and maintained, said Rear Admiral Babu

Hybrid cloud is the way forward in India: Microsoft

Yuthika Bhargava Microsoft, which is seeing a good traction for its cloud platform Windows Azure, is betting big on growth of the hybrid cloud environment in the Indian market for increasing its customer base as it feels the solution allows organisations to derive maximum benefit from the cloud infrastructure. According to Srikanth Karnakota, Director (Server and Cloud Business), Microsoft, cloud computing has already become mainstream in India. It is no longer in nascent stageadoption of cloud started with private cloud model and growth has been phenomenal. If you look at the overall cloud market, 70 per cent of it is private cloud today, while 30 per cent is public cloud, he said. Explaining the concept of a private and a public cloud in an interview with The Hindu , he said, Private cloud is like you have a large mansion you have and it is all yours. A public cloud is like a massive apartment not just yours. He said security concerns mainly drove companies to opt for private cloud model rather than going for a public cloud. However, now that these concerns had been dealt with, organisations were moving to public cloud, giving rise to increasing use of hybrid cloud environment, he added. Companies opted for private cloud because of security concerns. But that is changing. No longer are people worried about security on public cloud. Companies are adopting it and they are looking at what applications can be put on public cloud. The savings there are phenomenal, he said. Talking about the change in trends, he said, Today conversation has shifted from security but to how can companies shift more apps to public cloud. Can an end user log into an app in-house (private cloud) and need not log in again into an app running on public cloudso single sign on for both, that is hybrid cloud. Talking about the adoption of the cloud model, he said, Companies are not entirely moving to public cloud. They still want some apps running

in-house. But private cloud alone will not grow. That is why the trend is hybrid. In the next two years every thing will be on hybrid. Windows Azure is seeing a 300 per cent growth rate, and has over 15,000 customers in India, adding over 2,000 new India customers every month. The companys Azure platform has over 15,000 customers in India

Two countries, two elections

The 2014 elections need to be watched in both India and Indonesia for their potential to change the tried-tested-and-failed politics of the entrenched political elite.
India is not the only populous and diverse Asian country to be gearing up for elections later this year. Its maritime neighbour, Indonesia, will also hold parliamentary elections in April, followed by presidential polls in July. Compared to India, Indonesia is a young democracy. The election this year will be the countrys fourth since the downfall of military dictator, Suharto, in 1998. Democracy has nonetheless taken firm root in this sprawling archipelago and elections here have the same chaotic and exuberant timbre that characterises polls in India. The parallels between the two countries do not end here. Elections in both nations look set to feature a political googly in the form of Arvind Kejriwal in India, and Joko Widodo in Indonesia. Both these leaders have stirred up the electoral pot, and represent a break from the standard establishmentpolitician, whom the public has grown increasingly disenchanted with. Both Mr. Kejriwal and Jokowi (as Mr. Widodo is universally called) are political outsiders, known for their personal integrity, and anti-corruption crusading zeal. They both represent a newly engaged electorate that senses in them the possibility of political renewal and a break from the tired, venal, dynastic politics of the past. Like Mr. Kejriwal, Jokowi is an aam aadmi . Son of a carpenter, Mr. Widodo is slightly-built and humble, and wildly popular as the Governor of Jakarta. He burst upon the political scene in 2005, when he was elected mayor of the mid-sized Javanese city of Solo. Formerly a furniture businessman, Jokowi successfully transformed what was then a crime-ridden city into a regional centre for arts and culture. He campaigned against corruption and went as far as to refuse a government salary for his job as mayor. He enacted several pro-poor policies, including ones that helped rehabilitate the citys street vendors, and earned a reputation

for mediation. In 2009, Jokowi was re-elected as Solos mayor with an unprecedented 90 per cent vote share. His second tenure in Solo was cut short when he was asked by his party leader to stand for Jakarta Governor in 2012, a post he won easily. Although Jokowi is yet to hold any national office, all major polls show him as the frontrunner in the elections, were he to stand. And it is here that one of the crucial differences with Mr. Kejriwal becomes clear. Unlike Mr. Kejriwal, Jokowi does not front his own political party, and is beholden to Indonesias grand-old nationalist party, the PDI-P (Partai Demokrasi IndonesiaPerjuangan). The PDI-P is embodied in its leader, Megawati Sukarnoputri, the daughter of nationalist leader Sukarno, the first President of independent Indonesia. The PDI-P has essentially functioned as the vessel for the Sukarno familys political ambitions. The identification between the family and the party is akin to the Gandhi/Nehru-Congress nexus. Therefore, despite the polls indicating that Ms. Megawati has virtually no hope of winning the upcoming elections (she lost in both 2004 and 2009), she remains loath to give up control and hand over the Presidential ticket to Jokowi. Her final decision is expected to be announced after the parliamentary elections in April, but it is widely reported that she might try and stand herself, again, with Jokowi on the vice-presidential ticket to boost her electability. While Mr. Kejriwal might also come to depend on outside support from the Congress, as he currently does in Delhi, the AAP leader is not subject in the same way to the whims and fancies of the Congresss leading family. But, on the other hand, unlike Jokowi, Mr. Kejriwal has no track record at all in politics. Nor has he shown the Indonesians ability to mediate and strike compromises between different political stakeholders, yet. Mr. Kejriwal and Jokowi are both potential party poopers for rival candidates who would have been clear frontrunners in their absence: Narendra Modi in the Indian case and Prabowo Subianto in the Indonesian. Mr. Modi and Mr. Prabowo have some commonalities as well. They stand accused of human rights abuses in the past. They are strongmen who appeal to voters desirous of the steady hand of authority at the centre, believing decisive leadership to hold the answers to the myriad woes faced by their nations. Until the Jokowi wild card cropped up, Mr. Prabowo, who leads his own political party, Gerindra, had been the favourite for President.

This is despite the allegations levelled against him of human rights violations during his years, in the late 1990s, as the general in charge of the Indonesian militarys elite special forces unit, Kopassus, which is known to have kidnapped and tortured political dissidents at the time. Although never charged with wrongdoing, a military commission dismissed him from the army on the grounds of his having exceeded orders. And like Mr. Modi, Mr. Prabowo continues to face a travel ban to the United States. Asked last year how he would handle the travel restrictions if elected President, Mr. Prabowo wryly answered: I will send my Vice-President to Washington. I can always visit Beijing. One major difference between Mr. Modi and Mr. Prabowo lies in the latters overt commitment to religious and cultural plurality. He has been carefully cultivating the powerful Indonesian-Chinese vote, a diaspora that has been the subject of pogroms in the past. He is also avowedly anti-Islamist, and has argued that only he has the ability to keep Islamic fundamentalists, in this Muslim majority country, in check. But, in fact, political parties with an explicit Islamic agenda have consistently underperformed in Indonesian politics. The combined vote share of all Islamist parties in Indonesia dropped to 29.2 per cent in the 2009 elections, down from 41 per cent in 2004. Most analysts do not see the Islamist parties improving their electoral fortunes this year, regardless of the outcome of the presidential race. Whats clear is that the 2014 elections need to be closely watched in both India and Indonesia for their potential to change the tried-tested-and-failed politics of the entrenched political elite. If Mr. Kejriwal pulls off a coup in India, it will signal to Indonesia the real possibility of an aam aadmi -led change from below; a phenomenon most Indonesians are hungry for. On the other hand, if Jokowi emerges the next Indonesian President, it should serve as a wake-up call to the Congress party about how to effect a transition from a dynastic fiefdom to a relatively democratic and egalitarian organisation. For the Congress, as for the PDI-P, this may well turn out to be an existential imperative. The AAP leader and the Jakarta Governor represent a break with the standard establishment- politician

On a wing and a prayer

At the crossroads:Although a military operation against militants is the last option for Pakistan, it has resorted to targeted strikes in North Waziristan

against the Taliban. The picture shows people fleeing the military offensive and entering Bannu, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, on Wednesday. Photo: Reuters The Pakistan government finds itself between a rock and a hard place. The spate of bombings targeting the security forces and the police, and the blast near the military General Headquarters in Rawalpindi, a day after the suicide attack in the Bannu cantonment, are too close for comfort. Every attack has been claimed by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), with which the government was mandated to have a dialogue for peace by the All Parties Conference (APC), at its meeting on September 9, 2013. Within two months of the APC, on November 1, 2013, TTP chief Hakimullah Mehsud was killed by a drone strike and the Minister for Interior, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, slammed the United States for sabotaging the peace process. He said at a well attended press conference the next day that ties with the U.S. would be reviewed. Some interlocutors had been about to fly to meet Mehsud with a formal invite for talks with the government, he said. Even before that, a week after the APC , militants killed two army officers in Upper Dir, and followed it up with week-long bomb attacks in Peshawar, including an attack on a church that killed over 80 people. The TTPs new leader Mullah Fazlullah has refused to talk to the government, if the militant outfits publicists are to be believed. The outfits recent attacks have not spared even the media. Last week, the TTP brazenly called up a television channel whose staffers it killed in an attack in Karachi to claim responsibility. Air strikes Blasts are occurring with unfailing regularity and the government which is putting together a draft National Security Policy can only react in shock and condemnation. The policy envisages a military operation against militants as the last option. At the APC, outgoing army chief, General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, was also on the same page as the government on the need for a dialogue. The government keeps saying the army is on the same page even now, despite the constant targeting of security forces. However, there are targeted operations as in December when the security forces killed over 20 militants in North Waziristan after an army checkpost was bombed. After the Bannu attack, the army used air strikes to hit suspected militant hideouts in North Waziristan, which killed 40 terrorists, including top Taliban leaders. The TTP is putting out conflicting statements, calling for a ceasefire first from the government side and clearly not favouring a dialogue on its avowed aim of spreading the Sharia law across Pakistan. Mr. Chaudhry Nisar, responding to the Bannu Cantonment bombing which claimed the lives of over 20 Frontier Corps men, said the government was in favour of a dialogue with those who believed in peace but it could take action against those who believed in bloodshed.

For some time now, Islamabad has been trying to make a distinction between those elements in Pakistan Taliban that favour a dialogue and those that are unrelenting in their violent quest. It brackets the two late TTP leaders, Wali ur Rehman and Hakimullah Mehsud, as those who favoured a dialogue which couldnt take off due to their deaths. The government is under tremendous pressure to initiate action but can it negotiate for peace from a position of strength? What are the issues it will take to the table for the talks? The TTP, as the government says, has over 50 factions, making a dialogue difficult. The unseen enemy which operates from the shadows, as the Interior Minister described the TTP, is clearly calling the shots for now. The Opposition parties, including a vociferous Imran Khan, leader of the Pakistan Tehreek e Insaf (PTI), have been questioning the dialogue process. How can talks fail when they didnt take off to begin with, Mr. Khan asked. In Parliament, politicians have repeatedly demanded updates on the talks from the government and the response has left them far from satisfied. Externally too, Pakistan is under fire for not clamping down on cross-border terrorism, and not curbing the Haqqani network which is engaged in fighting in Afghanistan, something the U.S. has pointed out time and again. It did not help matters that a senior financier of the Haqqani network, Naseeruddin Haqqani, was shot dead in the capital city some time ago. U.S. funding President Barack Obama signed a bill last week which clearly linked funding to Pakistans actions on terrorism and the release of Dr. Shakil Afridi who is in jail for helping the CIA track down Osama bin Laden in 2011. There are provisions to withhold $33 million unless Dr. Afridi is released and cleared of all charges. Another provision can block aid until Secretary of State John Kerry certifies that Pakistan is not supporting terrorist activities against the U.S. or the coalition forces in Afghanistan. A key element of the bill is Pakistans cooperation with the U.S. to deal with counter terrorism efforts against the Haqqani network and other terror groups, and preventing them from operating from Pakistan. Pakistan has already reacted with disappointment to the withholding of funds over Dr. Afridis release. But the other issues related to preventing crossborder terrorism are equally vital. It is significant that the Prime Ministers advisor on National Security and Foreign Affairs, Sartaj Aziz, is scheduled to meet Mr. Kerry on January 27 as part of the strategic dialogue ministerial to discuss a range of issues. The PTIs blockade of NATO supply lines to protest U.S. drone strikes invited the ire of the U.S., and Secretary of Defence Chuck Hagel, during his

visit to Pakistan in December, requested the government to ensure that land routes were kept open. He reviewed shared concerns regarding the activities of terrorist groups, including the Haqqani network, on Pakistani territory. While Pakistans protests against drone strikes as a violation of its sovereignty have been raised at the United Nations, they cannot overshadow the real threat of terrorism that the country has faced for several years. With the coalition forces set to leave in a few months and the general elections in Afghanistan, it is not a moment too soon for Pakistan to weigh its options and develop a measured response to the ruthless militancy which had its beginnings even before the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan after 9/11. The government is aware that fire-fighting may not be the best option but in the absence of a focussed and timely strategy, it could continue to be on the back-foot in the war against terror if it doesnt get its act together soon. Pakistan should develop a measured response to the ruthless militancy which started even before the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan

Oil exploration and security

First it was telecom a couple of years ago and now it is oil and gas exploration. It looks like the Chinese ghost will not go away. The Union Home Ministry has advised the Petroleum Ministry against considering Chinese firms for the award of exploration rights in oil and gas blocks due to security reasons. The on-land blocks in Rajasthan, Gujarat and Punjab proposed for auction are located close to the border with Pakistan where apparently China is engaged in different projects. The blocks in the northeast and offshore ones in the Mahanadi basin, says the Home Ministry, are close to sensitive defence installations and strategic assets. In its view, these blocks should therefore be given only to Indian public sector companies for exploration. The Home Ministry also wants its advice to be kept in mind while finalising sub-contracts for services such as equipment procurement, consultancy and maintenance. Truth to tell, it is not as if too many foreign companies are lining up to invest in the countrys oil and gas exploration sector, not to talk of Chinese ones. The auctioning of oil exploration blocks under the New Exploration Licensing Policy has attracted but tepid attention from foreign bidders in the last couple of rounds, and the story is likely to be the same in the upcoming one as well. Yet, the bogey of threat from Chinese companies needs to be busted. For all its exertions in recent years, the government has not provided concrete evidence of any wrongdoing by Chinese companies in the telecom and IT sectors. Its warnings have been based on mere suspicion which is not enough grounds to keep out a foreign investor, especially in these difficult times for the economy. On the other hand, it was Facebook, Google and

Twitter, companies that are headquartered in what is supposed to be a friendly country, which were in the eye of a storm over sharing data from their servers, including that of Indians, with the U.S. National Security Agency. This proves companies from friendly countries are as capable of aiding espionage as those from not-so-friendly ones. And the answer is not to ban or show the door to all multinationals but to put in place protective systems to safeguard the countrys interests and assets. In the case of the oil blocks there is indeed a problem as these are located in strategic or sensitive parts of the country. Instead of trying to keep out companies from one country or the other, the government would do well to create a reporting and monitoring system that will enable security agencies to keep an eye on the activities of these companies, especially when it comes to blocks located close to defence installations. That is the way to handle security threats.

Nagaland: descent into chaos

R.N. Ravi The reckless ceasefire between the Government of India and the National Socialist Council of Nagalim (NSCN-IM), a militia predominantly of the Tangkhul tribe of Manipur, for the last 17 years is pushing the Nagas into a state of civil war. While the protagonists of the ceasefire, New Delhi and the NSCN (I-M), are in mutual comfort capering about the mulberry bush without a stopwatch, the process has landed the Nagas in an orbit of selfdestruction. They are far more fragmented and fractious than before. The Naga society is seething with multiple tensions intermittently erupting into morbid fratricidal violence. The wars in Zunheboto between the local Sema Nagas and the NSCN (I-M) that left several dead and scores injured on both sides, the discovery of mass graves in and around Dimapur, and the closing of ranks by six tribes of eastern Nagaland Chang, Konyak, Phom, Khaimniungan, Yimchunger and Sangtan for a protracted fight for political and administrative separation from other tribes of Nagaland are some of the latest grim portents of their fraught predicament. Over 1,800 Nagas have been killed in some 3,000 fratricidal clashes since the beginning of the ceasefire (1997-2013). Contrast it with the violence during the 17 years preceding the ceasefire (1980-96) that took a toll of some 940 Naga lives in 1,125 clashes mostly with the security forces. The irony is underscored by the fact that while the security forces and the NSCN (I-M) have been at mutual peace during the ceasefire, twice as many Nagas have died, killing one another in some 300 per cent escalation in fratricidal violence. The vector of violence has turned inward with a vengeance, from between the security forces and the Naga militias to the one among the Nagas themselves. Some in New Delhi gleefully chuckle at their remarkable feat of trapping the belligerent Nagas in this vicious cycle of fratricidal killings.

The term Naga is a rubric for a host of over 25 distinct tribes inhabiting the Nagaland State and adjoining areas of north-eastern India and Myanmar. Their mutual differences far outnumber their commonness. Each tribe is culturally distinct and linguistically unintelligible to the others. In the not so distant past, contacts between two tribes were, more often than not, marred by bloodshed. Modern state, modern education and the Gospel have had a somewhat sobering influence on their world view. Secession bid The Naga National Council, the first credible political entity of the Nagas with pan-Naga political ambitions, born just before the British left India, sought to engender a shared political consciousness among the disparate tribes. Under the stewardship of A.Z. Phizo, an Angami Naga, it launched an armed campaign to secede the Nagas from India. The NNCs campaign for secession and the counter-campaign of the Indian state were much too violent. The NNCs enterprise to forge a politically conscious and socially united Naga society was largely anchored in its projection of a common enemy post-British India. It challenged the Indian state with the gun. The conflict was grossly asymmetric. The Indian state had far superior guns in far superior numbers. A gun-inspired political enterprise to forge a collective political identity on a disparate sociological base merely on the fiction of a common enemy was fraught and foredoomed. The Nagaland State created in December 1963 with enhanced autonomy on matters, including the customary laws of the tribes, administration of civil and criminal justice and ownership and transfer of land and its resources, offered unprecedented democratic space to the Nagas of Nagaland to fulfil their aspirations and allay their apprehensions. The Nagaland State as a democratic polity took the wind out of the NNCs sails and unleashed forces and interests that were incompatible with and antithetical to the kind of politics being prosecuted by the militant Nagas. The NNC got splintered and eventually faded into political irrelevance although, thanks to the failure of the Nagaland State to deliver on its promises, its motto still tugs at the Nagas hearts and minds. The dynamic of democratic politics within the special framework, howsoever imperfect in the eyes of the Nagas, guaranteed by the Constitution of India, created imperatives for peaceful co-existence and co-mingling of the Naga tribes. Several ultra radical Naga nationalists joined the new constitutional order and helped in weakening the centrifugal politics of their erstwhile colleagues. Although the weakened ultra radical strain did not die and sporadically asserted itself with a vengeance marked by mayhem and bloodshed, it increasingly ceased to be the mainstream politics. By the 1980s, ultra-radical nationalists were pushed to the margins of the Naga political space. Their capability to influence Naga politics was grossly

eroded. Violence 105 killed in 10 years (1981-90) was the lowest in Nagalands history. The Naga issue began inching towards a sort of Chekhovian resolution. Unlike a Shakespearean tragedy where, at the end, the stage is splashed with blood and strewn with corpses, a tragedy by Anton Chekhov ends with the characters unhappy, disillusioned, even bitter but alive, bracing themselves for a new beginning. The process of a slow yet steady political reconciliation and social assimilation of the Nagas got perverted with New Delhis cynical engagement with the NSCN (I-M) since August 1, 1997. The ceasefire with the outfit was in utter disregard for the logic of the prevailing situation. The crucial stakeholders the popularly elected State government, the traditional Naga bodies that wield wide and deep influence on their respective tribes and other active militias in the fray were excluded from the process. New Delhi missed the vital fact that the NSCN (I-M), notwithstanding its panNaga pretensions, is essentially a militia of the Tangkhul tribe of Manipur with little resonance with the broad Naga family. A deal cut with it would not be acceptable to the Naga society. Not only the deal itself was a nostrum ab initio , New Delhis emasculation of the institutions of the state such as stripping the police of their statutory obligations to enforce the laws and maintain the public order against unlawful activities of the NSCN (I-M) further worsened the situation. The NSCN (I-M) has been unrestrained in demonstrative use of brutal force. Dressed in battle fatigues and armed with sophisticated combat weapons, its cadres freely roam the streets of towns and villages. In the teeth of popular opposition, New Delhi allowed it to set up multiple garrisons, almost in every district to help expand its reach in the State. In the guise of giving the NSCN (I-M) a secure political space for building a workable consensus on the fractious Naga issues, New Delhi has given the militia a free military run of the Naga inhabited areas. Fragmented society The NSCN (I-M) leadership has, however, failed to grasp the fragility of the fiction of a Naga nation imagined on the base of an ethnically fragmented society riddled with historical contradictions. Instead of building a workable resonance with the Naga society, it used the ceasefire, under the tacit patronage of New Delhi, to augment its weapons inventories, its promiscuous killing-machine to terrorise people into submission and establish its military hegemony over all tribes. However, true to their martial character, the Naga tribes have refused to be subdued and they often strike back with a vengeance. The violent clashes in Zunheboto during the last Christmas week in which some 10,000 Sema Nagas from over 100 villages armed with traditional weapons attacked a local NSCN (I-M) garrison in a fight that lasted three days and claimed over a dozen lives are a pointer to the popular resistance to the outfit. The Semas, who were resentful of the NSCN (I-M)s garrison in their land, were

provoked by molestation of their women by the armed cadres of the outfit some days earlier. They dismantled the garrison and chased away, at least temporarily, the armed NSCN (I-M) cadres. The ceasefire with the NSCN (I-M) has resulted in the retreat of the state from the crucial areas of governance and subversion of democratic politics. It is undoing the political and social gains achieved since the creation of the Nagaland State that has been rendered tentative in its aftermath. The absence of a credible state has created a power vacuum that is being filled in by chaotic sub-nationalist forces often at war with one another. The powerful traditional tribal bodies are alienated and, in their eagerness to flout New Delhis dalliance with the NSCN (I-M), are fostering the other Naga militias. The secessionist politics that was profoundly circumscribed by the politics of expanded democracy is seeking to regain centre stage. Thanks to New Delhis cavalier policies, the Nagas are in a dystopia and the grapes of wrath against India are ripening for the vintage. (The writer is a retired Special Director, Intelligence Bureau.) The absence of a credible state in Nagaland has created a power vacuum that is being filled by chaotic sub-nationalist forces often at war with one another

Contact lens as a diagnostic tool

The tear fluid between lens and cornea has hundreds of proteins and metabolite molecules, an indicator of the health of the body
Contact lens can be used to diagnose glaucoma, blood pressure and diabetes. photo: R. Ragu Advances in mini and microcomputers are turning science fiction into reality. A couple of months ago, we had a visitor from MIT to our lab who was wearing a strange kind of spectacles. When I asked him about it, he said it was actually a wearable computer called Google Glasses, made by Google. And of course we now know of a wrist watch computer made by Samsung. Last week Google announced the introduction of a wearable contact lens which would monitor the sugar levels in your tears and let you know if you are a diabetic or not. With this, you no longer need to invade or prick your finger to draw blood and wet it on a litmus-type paper to read your sugar levels. And we all thought that a contact lens is worn to correct your eye sight to normal.

So, with the Google contact lens, there is literally more than what meets the eye! We have come a long way since 1508 when the great Italian Leonardo da Vinci thought up the idea of slipping a glass piece over the eye to correct vision, and 1823 when the British physicist John Herschel thought up a practical design. Fifty years later, such a glass was made, though it covered the entire eye. With the advent of plastics, the first lightweight contact lens was made in the year I was born, 1939, and was made to cover not the whole eye but the corneal surface. But it was Drs. Otto Wichterle and Drahoslav Lim in 1959 who introduced the hydrophilic soft contact lens. Currently we have contact lenses that you can wear and sleep, lenses that are disposable after each use, and those meant for fashionistas. A typical contact lens is lighter than feather, has a diameter of about 14 mm, curvature of about 8.7 mm, fitting smug over the cornea and held in place thanks to the surface tension of the tear fluid that wets it. And it is this tear fluid that holds the key for the diagnostics. Produced by the tear glands on the outer surface of the eye, it contains hundreds of proteins and metabolite molecules, and thus an indicator of the health of the body. Non-invasive And since one does not have to pierce the body to collect blood but simply collect it or study it as it is held between the cornea and the contact lens, it becomes an attractive diagnostic fluid. All that one needs to do is to fit the contact lens with an appropriate sensor which measures chosen properties or levels of any component in it. This last sentence is easier said than done; and it is here that innovation has played a role. Early enough, in the 1990s and 2000s, Drs Matteo Leonardi and Rene Goedkoop from Switzerland, supported by Sensimed, used the contact lens to measure the pressure within the eyeball, also called the intraocular pressure (IOP), which is an indication of the pressure that the optic nerve feels. If the IOP becomes higher than normal, the optic nerve can become inefficient over time, thanks to this higher than normal pressure and can eventually lose its activity, leading to loss of vision. This condition is termed glaucoma, a silent stealer of vision. What the duo did was to put together a circular strain gauge on the edges of the contact lens in order to measure the changes in the circumference of the outer surface of the eye due to IOP, and read out as electrical signals. This

was an alternative to the conventional method of using a pressure sensor (tonometer) with which the eye doctor would contact and slightly press the curved corneal surface (applanation) and measure the intraocular pressure. Any change beyond the accepted normal range of IOP would be diagnosed as possible glaucoma. The Leonardi-Goedkoop machine, termed Triggerfish, does this in a more convenient way. Likewise, Drs Stodtmeister and Jonas Jost of Germany devised a method to measure the systolic and diastolic pressures of the ophthalmic artery, and have used it as a method to make blood pressure measurements. And in all this the main function of the contact lens (to correct the refractive power) was not affected so that it does double duty. What Drs Brian Otis and Babak Parviz of Google have done is to put in a sensor on the edges of the contact lens, which measures the level of glucose in the tear fluid which bathes the contact lens, and thus monitors diabetic status in a continuous manner. Currently it has been tried out on a series of subjects, and awaits FDA clearance for marketing and widespread use. Dr Parviz, who was earlier at the University of Washington, Seattle, had already used the contact lens as a GPS device to let the wearer know where he/she is going. This was done by putting in a tiny integrated circuit, powered by a cell phone in the pocket, and which contains a GPS set up and can voice- announce directions. This bionic lens has wireless communication system, rf power, and transmission capability. The use of this to the visually handicapped is obvious. Such use of the contact lens as a multifunctional device would certainly have pleased da Vinci. D. BALASUBRAMANIAN

Minuscule device that powers body organs developed

Thin, flexible mechanical energy harvester, with rectifier and microbattery, mounted on the bovine heart. photo: University of Illinois and University of Arizona Researchers from universities in the U.S. and China have developed a microscopic device capable of producing power from the bodys organs.

They say such devices could in turn be used to power other implanted biomedical devices, like pacemakers, heart-rate monitors and neural stimulators, eliminating the need for invasive surgeries to replace their batteries. This device mounts onto the surface of the organ of interest, to produce and store power associated with mechanical motions, wrote Dr. John Rogers, Director of the Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, in an email. He was a part of this research which involved scientists from four universities. The device relies on the piezoelectric effect, where electricity is generated when some pressure is applied on a specific crystal. In the researchers system, they are lead zirconate titanate (PZT) crystals, which are one of the highest-performance piezoelectric crystals known. The PZT is mounted on a thin sheet of plastic, with a chip for a rectifier and a small chip-scale battery. The pacemaker, or other implantable device, connects to the device through the battery component. Our harvester provides about enough power, on average, to operate a pacemaker, Dr. Rogers added. The battery acts as a buffer between the PZT harvester and the pacemaker, evenly spacing out the power to be fed. The testing The researchers tested their device with both experiments and computer simulations. During experiments, they implanted the device on the hearts of cows and sheep, the size of whose hearts, lungs and diaphragm are close to those of humans. They found that the device operated at an efficiency of 2 per cent. Implanted devices like cardiac pacemakers need about 1 microwatt to function, and last for some 10 years. Currently, such devices come with a built-in cell that produces this power, and requires replacement after the lifetime period. Dr. Rogerss team observed that stacking five of the PZT harvesters on an organ resulted in a power-density of 1.2 microwatt/cm{+2}, sufficient to operate a pacemaker. Animal models Conversely, although computer simulations have shown that the device can survive over 20 million bending-unbending cycles in a moist environment, Dr. Rogers wrote that longer term survivability tests are needed in animal models.

This direction represents an area of current work, he wrote, adding that it will be at least two more years until they can progress to human tests. Protection Simulations proved that the silicone encasement of the crystal protects it from deformation when implanted on an organs surface. The team also notes in their paper, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on January 20 , that silicones pliant mechanical properties meant their device could be used to measure other bodily functions by attaching on the skin or around fingers.

Fish contain genetic blueprint for limbs

Nandita Jayaraj Think of a world populated only by giant insects on land, and fishes in water. According to Joost Woltering of University of Geneva, that is what Earth would look like if the transition from fins to limbs had not happened. In a study published this week in PLoS Biology , Woltering and colleagues have found some definitive clues about this transition. By studying a group of architect genes present in both fish and mammals the Hox genes the scientists were able to find out that the DNA structure and regulatory mechanism for limb and digit formation were present in fish even before the transition happened, but the enhancements required to activate digit formation evolved only in tetrapods (ie. four-legged land animals). The role of Hox genes in limb and fin formation is crucial. Malfunctioning Hox genes result in animals missing large segments of their limbs. Mammalian Hox genes have an interesting feature. In the forming limbs the HoxA and HoxD genes are switched on in two independent waves the first making the proximal limb (arm/leg) and the second making the digits (toes/fingers), said Woltering in an email to this correspondent. Limb formation in tetrapods is usually attributed to this bimodal behaviour of Hox genes. So the scientists were surprised to observe the same mechanism in Hox genes in zebrafish fin radials (the bony part at the end of fins), too. So are the two structures ancestrally the same or homologous structures? To test this, the team inserted fish Hox genes into mouse embryos and found that in the resulting mice, Hox genes were active only in the proximal part of the limbs, not in the digits. This showed that the fish counterpart of the mouse digit domain cannot yet make digits, said Woltering. Therefore

fish fin radials and tetrapod digits are not homologous in the classical sense. However, keeping in mind the shared regulatory mechanism in Hox genes of fish and those of mice, the team propose the re-definition of homology. For instance, there are genes that are expressed in the hand and in hair follicles, this fact doesnt make them homologous structures, he said. Only if the underlying switches that determine where a gene is expressed are homologous, the structures are homologous. Dr. Arkhat Abzhanov, an evolutionary biologist from Harvard University who was not involved in the study, agrees. Identical expression patterns of the same gene(s) could in principle be established by non-homologous regulatory mechanisms so it might be very helpful to look at the regulatory details, he said in an email.

Coming full circle: Shinzo Abe in India

Ananth Krishnan

A normal Japan that takes on greater security responsibilities in Asia, coupled with its newfound confidence under Mr. Abe, bodes well for India and the region.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. PHOTO: AP When former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi travelled to New Delhi in 2005, he was the first Japanese leader to visit India in more than half a decade. His visit took place at a time when Tokyo appeared somewhat wary towards Indias overtures for building closer defence ties. Fast forward a decade, and the relationship has appeared to have come full circle. It is now Tokyo that appears eager to broaden the security relationship with India, even pushing to sell its home-grown amphibious aircraft. Mr. Koizumis visit has since come to be seen as a turning point. The past decade has seen an unprecedented level of engagement between both countries, underlined by regular annual summit meetings between their Prime Ministers, a rare occurrence in Indias diplomacy with most countries. This intensive engagement has persisted despite the many changes of government in Tokyo over the past nine years as many as four different Prime Ministers have visited India during this time.

While this has reflected the consensus across the political spectrum in Japan for pursuing closer ties with India, no leader has perhaps been as vocal an advocate for the relationship as current Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Mr. Abes ties with India stretch back over two generations. His grandfather, Nobusuke Kishi, who visited India as Prime Minister in 1957, had deeply personal reasons to be grateful to India, particularly for its support to Japan during its traumatic and isolated post-war years. During the Second World War, Kishi served as a senior official in the puppet Manchukuo government established in northeastern China following the Japanese occupation. In charge of its industrial development, he presided over a regime that oversaw widespread and notorious exploitation and abuse of the local labour force. Charged with war crimes he is still regarded in China as a Class-A War Criminal Kishi was subsequently cleared of the charges and went on to become Prime Minister. India extended a warm welcome to Kishi in 1957 at a time when the country was still largely isolated by its neighbours. Kishi made clear his gratitude by making India the first recipient of Japanese Official Development Assistance (ODA). Mr. Abe will certainly be mindful of this history when he arrives in New Delhi this weekend on a visit which will also see him preside over the Republic Day parade as chief guest. When he visited India as Prime Minister in 2007, Mr. Abe met with the son of Indian jurist Justice Radhabinod Pal, the only member of the post-war International Military Tribunal for the Far East, who cast a dissenting vote against punishing Japanese officials for war crimes. Among the 50 suspects charged with war crimes was Mr. Abes grandfather, Kishi. Pal presented a lengthy dissenting opinion questioning the highly politicised tribunals legitimacy and motivations, although he acknowledged the atrocities committed by Japanese forces. Mr. Abe has made clear that his government is looking to reinvigorate the relationship with India, which has been framed by his aides as a central pillar to his governments foreign policy objectives for the region. His first term as Prime Minister, in 2007, ended in just one year after a series of missteps left him a widely unpopular leader. Mr. Abe was given a second chance in December 2012, when his Liberal Democratic Party won a resounding victory amid public dissatisfaction with a series of governments that failed to revive a stagnating economy. Mr. Abe, in his second innings, wisely made the economy his first priority, shelving, at least for much of his first year in office, his more controversial political agenda. Mr. Abe turned to Koichi Hamada, a professor at Yale University, in crafting a bold and ambitious revival plan, announcing three arrows to save the economy. Dubbed Abenomics, the three arrows involved massive monetary easing, an expansionary fiscal policy and a plan for long-term growth. The first two arrows had largely succeeded in hitting their target, Mr. Hamada wrote in a recent essay, evinced by a soaring stock market which has recorded a 40 per

cent gain over the past year. The Japanese currency has also fallen 20 per cent against the dollar, boosting Japanese businesses by making their exports competitive again. There is an unmistakeable return in confidence for beleaguered Japanese industry and enterprise, a resurgence that is good news for India. Japanese investments have continued to play a crucial role in building Indias infrastructure, including the Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor. Japanese assistance towards a Chennai-Bangalore high-speed rail project is expected to figure during Mr. Abes visit. Trade between both countries reached $ 18.6 billion last year. According to the Japanese governments figures, investment into India grew from 15 billion Yen ($ 145 million) in 2004 to 543 billion ($ 5.25 billion) in 2008. In 2011, the figure stood at 181 billion ($ 1.75 billion). Cumulative development assistance committed to India, according to government figures, has reached 3800 billion Yen ($ 36.7 billion). On the foreign policy front, however, Mr. Abes record has been mixed so far. Mr. Abe has for long stated his ambition of making Japan a normal country and turning the page on elements of the post-war imposed pacifist Constitution that limits the development of the military. His project has taken on all the more urgency in the wake of renewed tensions with China over the disputed Senkaku or Diaoyu East China Sea islands and the rapidly growing strength of the Chinese military. A normal Japan that takes on greater security responsibilities in Asia, coupled with its new-found resurgence and confidence under Mr. Abe, no doubt bodes well for India and the region. Only this month, both sides agreed to enhance defence consultations, particularly on the issue of maritime security, when Japanese Defence Minister Itsunori Onodera visited New Delhi. Mr. Abes government has, on the other hand, risked undermining its regional promise as tensions with China and South Korea have worsened on the sensitive question of wartime history. Mr. Abe became the first Japanese leader in seven years to visit the Yasukuni Shrine, a memorial for the civilians who lost their lives in the war that also enshrines 14 Class-A war criminals. The visit understandably angered China and South Korea, who view the shrine as glorifying the brutalities of Japanese militarism. The Yasukuni visit even brought criticism for Mr. Abe at home. Mr. Abe will be the fourth Asian leader to be received as the Chief Guest at the Republic Day parade in the last five years, following leaders from South Korea, Indonesia and Thailand. The trend albeit partly a result of scheduling highlights Indias increased attention towards deepening its engagement with the region. It does, however, remain to be seen how India navigates the increasingly complex tensions that have cast a cloud on East

Asia, and left unclear what impact a resurgent Japan under Shinzo Abe will ultimately leave on the region. He will be the fourth Asian leader to be received as the Chief Guest at the Republic Day parade in five years

A law that raises more questions than it answers

K. Chandru

In order to inquire into complaints of sexual harassment of women at any place, a law must be enacted to deal with offences, delinking them from employment rules
Rare instance:The Supreme Court used its extraordinary powers under Article 142 of the Constitution to formulate the Vishaka guidelines. PHOTO: R.V. Moorthy Complaints by two law interns against two retired judges of the Supreme Court have created several controversies, which include the mechanism required for conducting enquiries against members of the higher judiciary. They have also thrown up the question of the application of Vishaka principles which set up a mechanism to enquire into such complaints. The aborted action pursuant to the report of the three-judge committee, nominated by the Chief Justice of India, also received flak from different quarters. While the Supreme Court washed its hands of the report, which found a prima facie case, the judge himself questioned the wisdom of constituting a committee knowing full well that he had already retired from service and the law intern was not an employee of the Supreme Court. He also lamented that he was unjustly dealt with by the court at the cost of his honour. In the midst of this debate, pursuant to the direction issued by the Supreme Court in Binu Tamta s case (2013), it notified The Gender Sensitisation and Sexual Harassment of Women at the Supreme Court of India (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Regulations, 2013. Many high courts notified such regulations and formed their complaints committees. However, the full court of the Supreme Court hurriedly decided that no more complaints of sexual harassment would be entertained by the court against its retired judges. Subsequently, when a complaint against another retired judge was not entertained, the aggrieved intern challenged the decision and notice has been ordered. It was observed that a mechanism would have to be found

to deal with complaints against even retired judges. The mechanism to be evolved and its source of power were not explained. When Chief Justice J.S. Verma embarked on a law to deal with complaints of Sexual Harassment at the Workplace (SHW), he drew support from the Convention on Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) in Vishakas case. It defined sexual harassment and directed the formation of Complaints Committees consisting predominantly of women and including an NGO. They were made applicable to private work establishments. It was a rare instance where in the absence of a parliamentary enactment, the court itself enacted a law with its extraordinary power under Article 142 of the Constitution. Conscious of its limitation in making such a law, the court said its directions would be binding and enforceable in law until suitable legislation is enacted to occupy the field. Ten years later, although a bill was introduced in 2007, for unexplained reasons it was not made into an Act. Following Vishaka, in Medha Kotewal Lele s case (2013), all governments were directed to amend the relevant service rules, and incorporate a provision by which the enquiry report given by a complaints committee would replace the enquiry by an employer, and they were to initiate action based on the report alone. Under this process, an aggrieved woman employee need not depose more than once first before the Vishaka Committee and again during a departmental enquiry. Though the Central government amended its Discipline and Appeal Rules, it was reported that many State governments were yet to amend their rules under Article 309 of the Constitution. The Central government amended only the model standing orders in the Industrial Employment (Standing Order) Rules. At this stage, Parliament enacted The Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013 (SHW Act) and got assent from the President (April 2013). It came into effect from December 9, 2013. Curiously, the Act nowhere referred to the Vishaka judgment. Its Objects and Reasons only referred to Articles 15 & 51A of the Constitution. The SHW Act borrowed the definition of the term Sexual Harassment from Vishaka. It mandates all the employers to constitute an Internal Complaints Committee and requires that at least 50 per cent membership should be women. Contrary to the earlier direction of the Supreme Court, the SHW Act put in place a two-tier mechanism for enquiring into complaints. When the ICC arrives at a conclusion on an allegation, it can recommend to the employer action against the person concerned in terms of service rules (in such an enquiry the employer will nominate his own enquiry officer who need not be a female). The SHW Act also provides for a settlement procedure, appeal to a court/tribunal against the decision of the ICC. It provides for the prosecution of the person concerned. In case of malicious intent of a complainant, retributory action is contemplated.

Following the special law enacted by Parliament, the Vishaka guidelines will no longer apply since the Supreme Court itself had ruled that its guidelines would be followed only till a law was made by Parliament. A number of State governments, public sector and private employers have not amended their service rule/statutory orders switching over to one-time trial and the binding nature of the report of the complaint committee. Hence, in future, an aggrieved woman will have to depose before the ICC and, in case the ICC agrees with her complaint, once again before the employer under disciplinary rules. The future application of regulations framed by the Supreme Court and other courts drawing their power only from Vishaka is in doubt since the power to frame rules under the new Act vests solely with the Centre. Parliament, no doubt, had ignored the earlier directions issued by the Supreme Court but it attempts to safeguard the interest of persons who are accused of harassment in workplace by providing for conciliation, appeal and retributory action in case of complaints with malicious intent. The SHW Act has thrown up more questions than what it seeks to achieve. It is because Vishaka limited its operation till the time a new law was made. In future, a person charged with sexual harassment is likely to demand that he should be tried only under the SHW Act and not under the earlier rules or directions by courts. It is not clear under which authority the Supreme Court constituted a threemember committee to go into the allegations against Justice A.K. Ganguly. Further, after resolving not to entertain future complaints against retired judges, entertaining a writ petition so as to explore the possibility of evolving a mechanism to deal with complaints against persons who ceased to be in employment. If a person is not in the employ of an employer, the SHW Act has no mechanism to deal with complaints. The Act contemplates only disciplinary action against a person accused of committing SHW and no action can be initiated after anyones retirement. The law also does not deal with conduct outside the workplace unless it is connected to the employment. In order to inquire into complaints of sexual harassment of women at any place by anyone, a special criminal law must be put in place to deal with SHW offences delinking them from employment rules as was done in Tamil Nadu which enacted the Tamil Nadu Prohibition of Harassment of Women Act, 1998 to deal with such type of cases. (Justice K. Chandru is retired judge, High Court, Madras) The law has put in place a two-tier mechanism to enquire into complaints of harassment

National communal harmony award for CSSS

Special Correspondent The Centre for Study of Society and Secularism, Mumbai, has been selected for the National Communal Harmony Award 2013 in the organisation category. Mohinder Singh of Delhi and N. Radhakrishnan of Kerala have been selected for the award in the individual category. Established in 1996, CSSS is a Mumbai-based organisation working to promote peace, secularism and communal harmony in the country. It has also been working on human rights issues and for the cause of the marginalised and deprived sections of society. Dr. Singh, 72, is a scholar and member of the National Commission for Minority Educational Institutions. He was a Member of the National Commission for Religious and Linguistic Minorities from 2005 to 2007. In 1984, he, along with other social activists, organised relief camps at Delhi and restored friendship between the Hindu and Sikh communities in the wake of the anti-Sikh riots. Dr. Radhakrishnan, 69, is a well-known academic, Gandhian scholar and peace worker. He initiated the Shanti Sena programme at the Gandhigram University and extended the work to other parts of the country. He has been actively working to restore peace in communally tense areas of Tamil Nadu and Kerala.

Largest domino kidney transplant in India conducted

Sukhada Tatke

12 patients operated on
A father donated his kidney to his son. Two husbands did the same for their wives. Three wives gave a lease of life to their husbands in the same way. These transplants happened simultaneously on Saturday morning across three hospitals here. The medical exercise became the second and largest domino kidney transplant in India so far. While this procedure is routine in North America and Europe, Indias first domino kidney transplant comprising five surgeries happened only in June, 2013. It took two years to execute.

The patients from Maharashtra, aged between 24 and 55 years, were registered with the city-based Apex Swap Transplant Registry (ASTRA) which facilitated the swap transplants. Currently, nearly 150 patients are registered with the registry. The surgeries (both on donors and recipients) happened at Bombay, Hinduja and Hiranandani Hospitals. If the domino kidney transplant had not been carried out, some of them would have had to wait indefinitely and the others, for a long time, said coordinator of the transplants, Shrirang Bichu, a nephrologist with Bombay Hospital. The exercise saw the participation of 12 patients, 12 urologists, 12 anaesthetists, five nephrologists, six vascular surgeons, 24 assistant surgeons, six assistant nephrologists and 24 nursing staff. For a transplant, it is necessary that the blood and tissue of a donor and recipient match. If there is a donor but the blood group is incompatible, swap transplants make the procedure possible. The transplant is carried out in a series where the donor of one pair gives a kidney to the recipient of another pair. It continues till the last donor in the chain donates to the first recipient in the line. ASTRA runs periodical checks of the database to see potential transplants and compatibility between donors and patients. Vishwanath Billa, nephrologist and transplant physician attached to Bombay Hospital and part of ASTRA, said inherently incompatible blood groups were made compatible using swap transplants. So far, we have carried out 30 binary swaps. The domino kidney transplant is an extension of the binary swap, which is done on two people, he said.

Sulabh founder felicitated

Social reformer and founder of Sulabh sanitation movement Bindeshwar Pathak was on Saturday awarded the prestigious Banga Moni award here by the Michael Madhusudan Academy. Dr. Pathak, also a Padma Bhushan awardee, was chosen for spearheading the Sulabh sanitation movement and for his efforts to uplift the downtrodden sections of society, besides paying attention to the improvement of condition of the widows from Bengal who have been languishing in the ashrams of Vrindavan. The award, which consists of a gold-plated medal and a memento, was given to Dr. Pathak at a function here. PTI

Parveen Sultana, Ruskin Bond, J.S. Verma, Vairamuthu, Paes to get Padma Bhushan
Top row:(From left) Padma Bhushan awardees Ruskin Bond, Parveen Sultana, J.S. Verma, Leander Paes, Vairamuthu and Pullela Gopichand.Second row:(From left) Padma Shri awardees Vidya Balan, Mallika Srinivasan, H. Boniface Prabhu, Dipika Pallikal, Paresh Rawal and Parveen Talha.

Padma Shri for Vidya Balan, Boniface Prabhu, Mallika Srinivasan, Santosh Sivan, Yuvraj
Classical singer Begum Parveen Sultana, Justice Dalvir Bhandari, author Ruskin Bond, the former Chief Justice of India J.S. Verma, former Comptroller and Auditor General V.N. Kaul and Tamil lyricist Vairamuthu are among the 25 people selected for this years Padma Bhushan. Lyricist Vairamuthu, who holds the unique honour of receiving the Presidents award for lyricist six times, said he was happy about receiving the Padma Bhushan. Cine stars Paresh Rawal and Vidya Balan, sand artist Sudarsan Pattnaik, theatre artist Bansi Kaul, Chairperson of the Chennai-based Tractors and Farm Equipment (TAFE) Mallika Srinivasan, P. Kilemsungla, Union Minister Sharad Pawars brother Pratap Govindrao Pawar, owner of Sakal newspaper group, have been chosen for the Padma Shri. It is a matter of pride for the team [in TAFE], said Ms. Srinivasan. We accept this with pride and humility. The award would inspire us to build the company into a global one with the focus on improving the lot of the farming community. Our thrust will be on developing rural India, she said. Ms Kilemsungla, the first woman from Nagaland to be appointed as member of the Union Public Service Commission, has been awarded Padma Shri for her contribution to the field of literature and education. Ms. Vidya Balan, 36, has portrayed strong female protagonists in Paa , Ishqiya , The Dirty Picture and Kahaani. Among the other Padma Shri awardees are tabla player Vijay Ghate, filmmaker and cinematographer Santosh Sivan, theatre personality Mohammad Ali Baig, TV actress Nayana Apte Joshi, musician Musafir Ram Bhardwaj, Manipuri dancer Elam Endira Devi, Kathak dancer from Bengal Rani Karnaa, film animator Ram Mohan, dancer Kalamandalam Sathyabhama and former UPSC member Parveen Talha. Ms Talha was the first ever Muslim woman to enter any Class-I civil service through the Civil Services examination. In sports, tennis star Leander Paes and badminton player-turned-coach Pullela Gopichand have been selected for the Padma

Bhushan, while cricketer Yuvraj Singh is among the seven sportspersons chosen for the Padma Shri. Gopichand, one of the finest badminton players in the country, is the second renowned sportsperson to be conferred the Padma Bhushan this year. Squash player Dipika Pallikal, former Indian womens cricket captain Anjum Chopra, Sunil Dabas (kabaddi), Love Raj Singh Dharmshaktu and Mamta Sodha (mountaineering), and H. Boniface Prabhu (wheelchair tennis) are the other sportspersons selected for the Padma Shri. PTI

Emerging economies need to unleash structural reforms: IMF chief

With the global economy on the path to recovery, emerging nations would need to put in place various structural reforms to unleash their growth potential, IMF chief Christine Lagarde said on Saturday. ... structural reforms are needed in emerging market economies also. They would have to do away with bottlenecks and protective barriers to unleash the potential they have, Ms. Lagarde said here while listing out potential risks before the global economy. In a session on global economic outlook on the last day of the WEF annual meeting, the IMF Managing Director said the key news today was that advanced economies were growing at rates slightly better than expected while growth of emerging economies had been slower than what was previously thought. New risks More interestingly, the debate has begun on new risks, such as how tapering takes place, at what speed and how it is communicated and what would be the spillover effects especially on emerging economies. This is a new risk on the horizon and needs to be watched, she said. Deflation Noting that another emerging risk is deflation, Ms. Lagarde said monetary policies have to be re-formulated after some time. Debating what should be on top of the agenda for global economy in the year ahead, other panelists said that nearly seven years after the crisis surfaced in 2007, the mood was generally positive today. PTI

The case for a land value tax

Navin Singh

The real estate bubble will not burst anytime soon, but capital is being hit as nothing new is created
In a feudal society like India, land ownership has always been a source of wealth and power. While the traditional feudal class has largely faded out, post-Independence, especially in the last decade, real estate prices have soared to vertiginous heights, bringing realty back to the centre stage of the Indian economy. The fall in property prices in 11 out of 15 major Indian cities in 2013 as compared to 2012, has created a feeling that the overheated real estate sector is showing signs of correction. Some have gone on to speculate that this might be the sign of an impending real estate bubble- burst. But bankers see no reason to be worried as the Indian realty sector differs from that of developed world in many ways. First, the mortgaged propertys market value is more than its book value as up to 50 per cent of the value of a property is paid by the buyer in black, and banks lend only by book value. So the sector can absorb considerable downward correction. Secondly, a major share of the investment in real estate is in undeveloped land, which is not financed by banks. Finally, money is parked in this sector usually to evade taxes, and this flow of unaccounted funds is not likely to slow down anytime soon. It is a tragedy that the same factors which make this sector immune to a meltdown, are bleeding our economy. Black money, whether earned legitimately or siphoned off from government-spending, is getting sucked into a vortex of shady land deals, which provide not only anonymity but assured returns. It creates artificial scarcity, jacking up land prices for endusers. Moreover, it creates an incentive for the builder-politician nexus to delay clearances to residential or commercial building projects of individuals or communities without political patronage, leading to a mushrooming of irregular colonies, with non-existent infrastructure such as water lines and sewerage. It has created a new feudal class of landowners which extracts a rentiers income from the economy without adding any value. The overdeveloped real estate sector is worthless for Indias balance of trade, as construction projects, even if world-class, cannot be exported. Even if the real estate bubble does not burst, capital is still being destroyed and nothing new is created.

This is the neo-liberal blind spot which fails to see the Physiocrats wisdom of recognising that productive work is the only source of national wealth. However, the productive work, the value added to the economy, is all that most modern economies tax. Real estate, on the other hand, gets its value from location, mostly a result of public utilities like transportation, water, electricity and drainage tending it, and jobs, schools and hospitals in its vicinity. All of this is financed by the community, either as taxes if built by the state, or as user-fees if built privately. So modern taxation is a clear case of taxing private wealth while doling out public wealth to a select few those who are first-comers, inheritors, cronies or plain lucky. The logical solution to this aberration would be to tax land at its value. The so-called land value tax was an idea considered by Adam Smith in The Wealth of Nations , but most famously and fervently advocated by George Smith. Ever since the 1868 Meiji restoration in Japan, it has been used in many parts of the world, as in the U.S., Australia and Hong Kong. It has been dubbed the least bad tax by Milton Friedman as it does not lead to allocative inefficiency. From Paul Samuelson to Joseph Stiglitz, it has many supporters in the economists fraternity. Michael Hudson is a vocal proponent and he has suggested it for China as a way to avoid the fate of debt-ridden Western economies. Land value tax, when applied to non-agricutural land, might turn out to be the game-changer. It will end speculative land hoarding and bring down prices for the end-user. The money saved thus will be spent on other commodities, increasing consumption and give the economy a boost. It will free a lot of undeveloped land close to cities, which can be developed by state or private players. These developed colonies will be affordable to lower income families which have been spending considerable sums for unapproved land till now. This will provide the government revenues to develop urban infrastructure. Mining companies, which find it more profitable to squat on natural reserves sensing a rise in mineral prices, will not do that once they have to pay annual tax on the value of the mines. They will have to mine it to earn revenue to pay tax, or choose to return it to the government. Unused prime urban land, of closed mills for example, will be promptly returned to the government for the same reason. This tax may not replace all other taxes, as Paul Krugman concedes, but may be a one-stop solution to all that ails realty sectors. drnavinsingh@gmail.com

China is largest FDI source for Nepal, overtakes India

Ananth Krishnan China has overtaken India to become the largest contributor of Foreign Direct Investment to Nepal over the first six months of the current fiscal year, underlining the rising Chinese economic presence and strategic influence in the country, according to new figures. Investment from China reached $174 million between July and December, accounting for over 60 per cent of the total FDI commitment, the Chinese State-run Xinhua news agency said, citing a new report released by Nepals Department of Industry. Three-fold increase This marked a three-fold rise from the same period in the previous 2011-12 fiscal year, where Chinese investment reached $55 million. The Xinhua report noted that since last year, China has begun to surpass the investment from India into Nepal. While India was the biggest source of FDI during the 2011-12 fiscal year, investment from China rose the following year to account for 31 per cent of total foreign investment. The Chinese investors had always desired to expand their investment in Nepal. However the political scenario in the past discouraged them, Dhruba Lal Rajbanshi, an official at the Nepali Department of Industry, told Xinhua. As the political course took positive shape following the Constituent Assembly election, the Chinese investors have introduced huge amount of FDI, he said.

Maharashtra students create record for largest lezim dance

Students, numbering 7,338, of the schools run by Sangli Shikshan Sanstha set the world record of forming the largest lezim dance here on Sunday. Their feat was registered in the Guinness Book of World Records and a certificate was given to the organisers at the venue. The event had been organised by Sangli Shikshan Sanstha at the Chhatrapati Shivaji stadium, here on Sunday morning on the occasion of the Republic Day. The students dressed in their school uniform , composed of boys and girls aged 10-16 years. Nikhil Shukla, a representative of the Guinness Book of World Records awarded the certificate of achievement, organiser of the event Vijay Bhide said.

Earlier record was set by 6,396 students of the Shikshan Prasarak Mandal Akluj and Sangramsinh Mitra Mandal (both India) in Akluj on November 30, 2009. Lezim is a folk dance form of Maharashtra, in which dancers carry a small musical instrument with jingling cymbals, which is called the lezim. PTI

Keeping India at bay

Ahilan Kadirgamar Fish move over the Indian Ocean knowing no borders, while marine resources including corals on the continental shelf are important for the seasonal migration and reproduction of fish. Similarly, for centuries past, fishers and traders travelled freely over the ocean, fishing and accumulating wealth needed to build coastal economies. Eventually, colonial empires and post-colonial states drew borders and boundaries across land and sea as capitalist forms of fishing and coastal industries steadily ravaged marine resources. The backdrop to the discussions and the upcoming India-Sri Lanka negotiations on the Palk Bay fishing conflict is the tension between a history of coexistence in the Indian Ocean and the contemporary predicament of exploitative fishing that destroys livelihoods and the environment. During the decades of war, the Northern fishers in Sri Lanka were restricted from the seas. Their livelihoods were devastated as they confronted repeated displacement. They lost many of their kith and kin to the unceasing firing and bombs, but struggled to keep their communities together through the years. Today they recall the decades before the war as a golden age of prosperity when the North contributed to over a third of the fish catch of the country. With such prosperity came social mobility and the consolidation of fishers cooperative unions. Although it was a herculean task for the fishers to keep their cooperatives running, these unions remained intact through the war. With the end of the war came hope that fishing would be revitalised in the North. There was an expectation of relief and return to sustenance on fishing, which about two hundred thousand people in the Northern Province depend on for livelihoods. Almost five years after the war, the reconstruction of the war-torn North and East has failed due to flawed neoliberal policies which banked on infrastructure development, financialisation and the market, with little serious attention given to local livelihoods. For the Northern fisherfolk, the problem is compounded by an armada of some two thousand Indian trawlers mercilessly poaching in their seas. On the three nights of a week when the Indian trawlers relentlessly invaded the seas, the local fishers smaller boats were run over and their costly nets destroyed. Having lost millions of rupees in damaged equipment, they now mostly stay at home on those three trawling days. Their catch is greatly reduced exacerbating their plight. With decreasing incomes, waning political and economic power and the

politicisation of rural development by the regime in Colombo, the cooperatives, which managed to survive the war, are weakening and face the danger of collapse. While the Sri Lankan fishers also compete with Indian small-scale fishers on non-trawling days, it is the more high-powered trawlers that are the cause for rage in the coastal North. The humming and the lights of the larger trawlers venturing close to the shores are the disquieting reality of the Sri Lankan fishers stolen future. With crippling indebtedness, some fishers are abandoning their way of life and resorting to day wage labour as masons or seeking work as migrants. Deep-sea trawling On the environmental front, years of trawling have led to the depletion of fish stocks. There is ample evidence of ecological damage by trawling, which scrapes the seabed, destroying biodiversity. Indeed, trawling is banned in many countries. In Sri Lanka, fishery policies in recent decades opposed trawling, which culminated in a ban in 2010. Research by marine scientists is now beginning to map the environmental damage due to Indian trawlers on the ocean bed. Why has this dire situation arisen? It is not that fishers in the past or elsewhere did not face such conflicts. When such conflicts did arise, there were struggles, negotiations and agreements reached. Indeed, that is how the trawling from the Tamil Nadu side came to be restricted to three days a week, as small-scale fishers hit back at trawlers. The problem with the Palk Bay fishing conflict is precisely its interstate character. Indian trawlers ravage Northern fishers livelihoods, but cannot be confronted and negotiated with on the shore as they live in two different countries. In this context, there have been two significant rounds of talks between Tamil Nadu and Northern fishers in 2004 and then again in 2010. The agreement reached in 2010 called for a complete end to trawling in Sri Lankan waters within a year, giving Indian trawl fishers time to shift to other forms of fishing. The agreement has not been implemented by either country across the Palk Straits, and three and a half years later, the situation has reached crisis proportions. The irony of the tragedy facing the Northern fishers is that the Tamil Nadu polity, which claims to champion the rights of the Sri Lankan Tamils, has been complicit in the dispossession of the Sri Lankan Tamil fishers. This hypocrisy also extends to the Sri Lankan Tamil middle class, the Sri Lankan Tamil media and the Tamil National Alliance. With the singular exception of the recently elected Chief Minister Wigneswaran, who recently called for a principled cessation of trawling, the Sri Lankan Tamil polity has been, for the most part, silent, reflecting its class and caste bias towards fishers. The Sri Lankan state, in turn, has used the issue as a leverage in a difficult relationship with its bigger neighbour on issues ranging from a constitutional

political settlement, continuing militarisation and the acrimonious human rights debates in UN forums. It is in this context that multi-level talks and negotiations seem to be the only way forward. It is critical that the affected fishers and their interests are placed at the centre, but the governments will have to arrive at agreements. While confidence building measures such as releasing Indian and Sri Lankan fishers arrested on both sides of the maritime boundary are welcome, there is specificity to those releases. The Sri Lankan fishers arrested in India are mainly from the South involved in deep-sea fishing and a different constituency from the war-affected small scale fishers of the North. It is therefore critical that the negotiations are inclusive of the representatives of Northern fishers cooperatives. Introspection needed For now, the vision and initiative has to come from the Indian side; New Delhi, the Tamil Nadu polity and the trawl fishing communities have to engage in some serious introspection. Otherwise, the mounting anger among the Northern fishers may place a wedge between the post-war North and India. Indeed, Indias support for devolution of power, substantive demilitarisation, the massive fifty thousand housing scheme for the waraffected and building of the Northern railroad are all now overshadowed by the Palk Bay fishing conflict. Addressing the Indian trawling problem is fast becoming the litmus test for Indian solidarity; not only towards the fisherfolk but the war affected North and East as a whole. Negotiations are not about demonising the Tamil Nadu trawlers, but rather about calling on them to take responsibility. On the Indian side, while a ban on trawling would be welcome given the ecological damage, it may, in reality require a process of buyback of trawlers by the government to reduce capacity and, over a period of time, complete decommissioning. On the Sri Lankan side, while an end to poaching by Indian trawlers will give some relief to the Northern fishers, their devastating past means there needs to be much support for their revival. There are calls by fishers for compensation for their loss of equipment and catch over the years. There is a need to rebuild fisheries infrastructure such as jetties and harbours. Next, training and investment in multi-day boats capable of deep-sea fishing for at least some sections of the Northern fishers are needed. It is such investment that can ensure that the fishers affected by the war for decades can catch up with fishers in Southern Sri Lanka. India can support such efforts to revitalise fisheries in the North and thus address the damage done by Indian trawlers and rebuild goodwill across the Palk Bay. The Government of Sri Lanka and the Northern Provincial Council must realise that the revitalisation of fisheries in the North is inextricably linked to credible reconstruction policies by an engaged civil administration and to democratisation that strengthens institutions such as the fisher co-operatives.

The vast Indian Ocean has both a history of coexistence and the resources to accommodate the peoples of the subcontinent. It is our modern predicament, shaped by muscular nation-states and avarice of capitalist institutions, that exploitation for profits and destruction of natural resources have created crises, be it be armed confrontations or fishing conflicts. It is now time to reclaim the Palk Bay to rebuild these fractured social relations. There is an urgent need for dialogue and cooperation between Northern and Tamil Nadu fishers to end destructive trawling. At the same time, we must imagine a future where Sri Lankan and Indian fishers collaborate and traverse the Indian Ocean on deep-sea vessels, while fishing for the sustenance of the subcontinent. And closer to the coast, the socially-excluded and dispossessed fisherfolk should be given respite to revive their livelihoods in their fishing villages and re-imagine a future that can be prosperous. (Ahilan Kadirgamar is a researcher and political economist based in Jaffna. This article draws on discussions at a recent conference on the Palk Bay fishing conflict held at the University of Colombo ) Indias support for devolution of power and substantive demilitarisation are all overshadowed by the Palk Bay fishing conflict between Tamil Nadu fishers and Northern Sri Lankan fishers

Nothing fishy about this genetically modified biofuel

Damian Carrington A genetically-modified plant that produces seeds packed with fish oils is set to be grown in open fields in the U.K. within months, scientists announced on Friday. The oils could provide feed for farmed fish, the researchers hope, but they could ultimately be used as a health supplement in human foods such as margarine. Fish oils specifically omega-3 long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids have been shown to cut the risk of cardiovascular disease and are a popular food supplement. But about 80% of the fish oil harvested from the oceans every year is actually fed to other fish being raised in aquaculture. With many fish stocks already over-exploited, the government-funded researchers from Rothamsted Research in Hertfordshire, southern England, have spent 15 years developing the new GM plant and hope to have permission for field trials by March, with planting to start shortly after if approval is given. Testy over trial Environment minister Owen Paterson, who will make the final decision after public consultations and advice from experts, said: The longer Europe continues to close its doors to GM, the greater the risk that the rest of the

world will bypass us altogether. Europe risks becoming the museum of world farming. But if the field trial is approved, as is likely, it could spur protests such as those that accompanied a field trial of GM wheat at Rothamsted Research in 2012, when hundreds of campaigners gathered at the site and threatened to destroy that crop. If fish are fed on the oil from GM plants in future, they might not need to be labelled as GM-derived, because cattle today are widely fed on GM soya, but are not required to reveal this on labels. Professor Jonathan Napier, who is leading the trial, said: The field trial is still an experiment. After that, if it is successful, you could grow plants either for animal feed or ultimately you could imagine a situation where it is used for human nutrition. If we can explain the benefits, maybe people will agree this is a good thing to do. It was possible, he added, the plant-produced oil might overcome one of the major downsides of edible fish oil: the strong taste. We have not tasted it, but we have smelled it and it did not smell fishy, he said. The particular fish oils that benefit the health of both fish and humans, called EPA and DHA, are not in fact produced by fish themselves but instead accumulated by eating marine microbes. Mr. Napiers team therefore took up to seven genes from algae that produce the fish oils and transplanted them into oil seed plants called camelina. It naturally produces short-chain oils and has been grown as a food crop for centuries in southern and eastern Europe and is used a biofuel crop in North America. The GM camelina has passed laboratory and greenhouse trials and about 25 per cent of the oil in the seeds is EPA and DHA, a similar proportion to that in fish oil. Mr. Napier said camelina cannot cross-pollinate with oilseed rape, a common U.K. crop, and that there are no wild relatives of camelina at the 300-hectare Rothampsted site, where 200 square metres of the GM crop would be planted for the next four years. Along with an independent group in Australia, who are using oilseed rape as the carrier plant, the field trials will be the first in the world to use plants to grow the special oils. Mr. Napier said harvesting the oil direct from algae would be much more expensive and require large amounts of water and energy. Guardian Newspapers Limited, 2014

Japan, India and the balance of power

K. Shankar Bajpai

India and Japan can honestly say that they are not building relations in hostility against China; but it is right for them to plan for the eventuality of Chinese hostility

Symbolic:The recent six-day India visit of Japans Imperial Majesties presages a relationship that can influence the global power structure. Photo: Kamal Narang Within two months, we have received from Japan, first that rare, and symbolically greatest, gesture, the visit of Their Imperial Majesties, then the Defence Ministers, and now, the Premiers. It is heartening that such an important country attaches such importance to us, despite our best efforts to prove ourselves unready, if not unable, to play the role clearly expected of us. Formally, we have so many strategic partners, the term has lost meaning, but Japan surely could give it solid contents. The economic component is obvious, limited largely by our own non-performance; the strictly strategic part is even more important but even less attended to. We could grow economically even without making the most of Japans cooperation, but to our national security interests, it is irreplaceably valuable. Moreover, the relationships significance is more than bilateral; it will influence others and the global power structure. The power-politics and balance-of-power calculations we denounce are facts of life, standard practice for all serious countries which plan for their national security interests with evaluations of the international distribution of power. Having multiple, often conflicting, interests to manage, all countries need some organising principle. During practically all of Indias first half-century, the Cold War furnished that principle for everyone, the pursuit of other interests being conditioned by this central fact of international life. Since its end, all countries have been at sea, casting around for some new sextant to guide them. We Indians, like all others who only took charge of their own destinies just before or during the Cold War, are dealing for the first time with the interplay of multiple powers, some rising and some weakening. They all act without the constraints, indeed the discipline, imposed by the Cold War, but one development provides a major sort of organising principle, for many states if not all: the enormous rise of China. No country has divined the ramifications of this for itself or globally not even China. How far it will prove an alarmingly assertive power, throwing its weight about aggressively, and how far a constructive, if self-centred, leader in shaping a new, equitable world order, is a question that has spawned quite an industry, but leaving everyone guessing. Great powers have, historically, been both, usually more the former. China should prove no exception, but in a very new setting. Most countries cop out with the banality that one must build on areas of cooperation with China while remaining wary of unwelcome possibilities. The first depends on Chinese attitudes, the latter on your own capabilities. Since no regional country comes anywhere near Chinas present capabilities, leave alone tomorrows, each must strengthen its own, which includes building partnerships. Each will strenuously and genuinely maintain these are not aimed at harming, or even containing, China, but that is what China will consider them. Is that a reason for eschewing them?

Territorial integrity paramount Perceptions are often more consequential than actualities, but that works both ways. China surely knows that how it appears to others inevitably shapes their policies. We should not fight shy of readying ourselves for unpleasant eventualities, nor imagine that these wont happen if we do not give China cause for misunderstanding. In this complex world, we must deal with many, varied concerns, but in regard to our national security there is surely a clear and imperative organising principle: do whatever you must to ensure territorial integrity. That imposes compulsions arising from one stark fact: two states already occupy substantial parts of our territory and claim more. Our differences certainly need not erupt in major violence; we should keep trying for a relationship, with both our neighbours, in which a realisation of the benefits of peaceful cooperation outweighs any calculations of gains from conflict. But the surest way to preclude conflict is to manifest capabilities which make it too costly. If miscalculation or mischance should nevertheless cause eruption, nobody will help us: we would have to cope alone. We are nowhere near equipped for that, on the ground or, even more importantly, in our thinking. Japans interest in us should at least be a stimulus for the thinking part, as well as leading potentially to improving our ground position. Uncertainty about the intentions and will power of the America so many criticise but rely upon to limit any Chinese hegemonism makes all affected countries rethink how to safeguard their interests. We Indians are often accused of not overcoming our neighbours animosities towards us, but Chinas are not exactly in love with it. Unlike us, however, China enjoys a respect that shapes its neighbours behaviour towards it. A distinguished ASEAN diplomat once remarked that, when deliberating some issue his Foreign Office no longer ask themselves first what Washington might be thinking, but what Beijing might. He added: we hope we can soon also ask what Delhi might think. That hope has kept fading, thanks entirely to us, but is still there; Japan has emerged as one country that looks actively to its realisation. Why our political leaders refuse to see such obvious reality is incomprehensible and self-damaging. That nobody is about to attack you tomorrow does not mean there is no clear and present danger demanding preparation for tomorrow. Enhancing our capacity to ensure our territorial integrity brooks no slacking. It has already suffered because our opposing parties would rather gather sticks to beat each other than agree not to play cheap politics on even a handful of issues of vital national importance. They have let our defence procurement become an inadequate patchwork, ignored both the essentiality of developing a strategic-thinking defence apparatus and the disturbingly unhappy civil-military relations and, not least, not allowed India to function as a serious player in the increasingly complex and demanding international arena.

One simple question can be a surprisingly useful pointer in working out our international relationships: which countries welcome a rise of India, and which dislike it? Most countries wouldnt care; two definitely do not wish us well; a few view a strong India as an asset to their own interests. Often, we dont recognise some of these, much less take advantage of the opportunities they offer. Japan is clearly wishing us well, as we wish it for them. There is no point in pretending that China does not drive us both more than our bilateral hopes might do otherwise, but there is no harm in that reality. We can both honestly say we are not building relations in hostility against China; but it is right and proper for us to examine what to do if China acts in hostility against us. Long dependent solely on its alliance with America for its national security, Japan is now looking for the best ways to rely more on itself, and play a greater role in the search for Asian stability. In our totally changed world, we ourselves have evolved to cooperate strategically with the U.S. Doing so with Japan is no less important. Just how reliable a partner Japan might consider us depends on our future functioning. That functioning is stifled by political bickering and the dysfunction of our instruments of state. Not one vote will be changed in elections by the issues affected, but with elections approaching no improvement is conceivable for who knows how long. Fortunately, most political parties can be expected to welcome cooperation with Japan. In translating into policies his striking devotion to his countrys greatness, Prime Minister Abe has somehow included a special liking for India. It is also to our governments especially our Prime Ministers credit that our relationship has reached such a promising stage. Once before, in the 1950s, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and Premier Nobusuke Kishi had similar hopes for a special relationship. The realities of todays strategic flux in Asia should encourage us to pick up the threads with Mr. Kishis grandson. (The writer is Chairman, Delhi Policy Group, former Ambassador to Pakistan, China and the U.S., and Secretary, External Affairs Ministry) Japans cooperation, not indispensable for Indias economic growth, is vital for its national security

CRPF brave heart bestowed Kirti Chakra

The Central Reserve Police Force won the most number of gallantry medals, including one Kirti Chakra, on Republic Day this year. The central armed police force bagged 15 gallantry medals, including two Presidents Police Medal for Gallantry (both posthumously) and 13 Police Medal for Gallantry (five posthumously).

Commando Bhrigunandan Chaudhary of 205 CoBRA unit, the recipient of the Kirti Chakra, exhibited exemplary courage and extraordinary grit and determination during an encounter with naxals in the Chakerbandha forest area of Gaya in Bihar. Both of his legs were mutilated in an improvised explosive device blast. However, he continued fighting against the naxals, gunning down six of them, before he succumbed to his injuries. Among the gallantry medal awardees are Constable Ugrasen Tripathi and Constable Santosh Kumar Singh (both posthumously). While Contable Tripathi was killed in an encounter with terrorists in Manipur, Constable Singh fought bravely with naxals in Jharkhand. The Police Medal for Gallantry has been conferred posthumously on Constables S. Prabhu, Parasmani Jha and Mukesh Kumar Bunkar, Head Constable Narender Singh and Sub-Inspector Pradeep Kumar. Among those who were awarded Police Medal for Gallantry are Constables Ali Hasan, Raj Kumar, Sanjay Yadav, Sibo Prasad Panigrahi and Assistant Commandant Anjani Kumar. Six officers and men, including four Inspectors General -- M.V. Rao, R. P. Meharda, S. N. Sabat and M. K. Sinha - have been awarded the Presidents Police Medal for Distinguished Service and fifty seven others have been conferred the Police Medal for Meritorious Service.

All eyes on Hamid Karzai

The fierce Kabul winter is still mild but the mood of the political elite, as I discerned during a recent visit to the Afghan capital, is cold, dark and grim, looking at 2014, the year of transitions with anxious apprehension. The sentiment in Kabuls bazaars, with the economy in a depressed state, is no different. The urban youth, more exposed to the world and taking increasingly to social media, are more hopeful and determined to avoid a return to the days of anarchy and civil strife. The Taliban insurgency and violence as well as its influence in the Pashtun areas is a threat but there is quiet conviction that the Afghan Security Forces will be able to meet their challenge if Western support continues and the Presidential election scheduled for April 5 next year is credible and leads to the formation of a coherent government. Afghanistans attention is currently focussed on the controversy relating to the Bilateral Security Agreement (BSA) with the United States, the internal peace process with the Taliban and the Presidential elections. In this discourse, there is also the thought unlikely as it may seem will President Hamid Karzai play one last card to continue beyond his constitutionally mandated term which ends in September 2014.

To be fair, President Karzai has, on his part, said all the right things about his retirement. More significantly, the Presidential election process has moved ahead. The Election Commission has cleared a final list of 11 Presidential candidatures and running mates for the election. If any doubts remain, it is because of the absence of a tradition of peaceful transfer of power and of constitutional practice. It is also because of Mr. Karzais record of brilliant political manoeuvre; hence the view that he wishes to continue but is not to be blamed for wanting to do so. Mr. Karzais position on the BSA has disappointed a majority of Afghans. The text was closed in mid-November after long and difficult negotiations. Mr. Karzai was required under the constitution to sign it and send it to Parliament for approval. He decided to summon a traditional Loya Jirgah (grand assembly) to endorse it before sending it to Parliament. The over 2,000 members of the Jirgah from all over Afghanistan were cleared by Mr. Karzai. It seems certain now that Mr. Karzai misread the mood of the country, reflected in the stand of the Loya Jirgah, on the BSA. There is no doubt that there is deep resentment, especially in the Pashtun areas of southern and eastern Afghanistan, against the Coalition forces for having entered Afghan homes during operations against the Taliban. There is also anger over the death of civilians resulting from the U.S. bombing. Above all, the Afghans are afraid of the country reverting to anarchy; an overwhelming majority of the people, including Pashtuns, feel that the residual presence of U.S. and NATO forces after 2014 is essential for the stability of the country. Mr. Karzai basically wanted the Loya Jirgah to give an equivocal endorsement to the BSA so that he would have space for further negotiation with the U.S. However, the Jirgah not only approved it but also demanded that he should sign it by the end of December. The chairman of the Jirgah, a veteran Jihadi leader and Islamic scholar, Hazrat Sibghattullah Mojededi was angered when Mr. Karzai imposed new conditions on the U.S. and said that he would sign the BSA only in April 2014. All this has never happened in a Loya Jirgah and has diminished Mr. Karzais image. Mr. Karzai is now hostile to the U.S. and openly says that there is lack of trust between them. It was not so to begin with. In this writers first meeting with Mr. Karzai, in 2002, he was deeply appreciative of the U.S. role in liberating Afghanistan from Taliban tyranny. Mr. Karzais relations with President Bush were close and warm but have been distant and frosty with President Obama. He is also not reconciled that Afghanistan is no longer a foreign policy priority for the U.S and that it merely wants an orderly exit from the country. Mr. Karzai will eventually sign the BSA, probably before the Presidential campaign begins in early February. He knows that the full Western support military and civilian which is vital for Afghanistans future, is linked to it. But the delay has added to uncertainties reflected in the fall of the Afghan

currency and the postponement of important investment decisions by overseas Afghans. Mr. Karzai has relentlessly pursued a quest for a rapprochement with the Taliban. The Doha initiative failed because of Taliban overreach, but at a more fundamental level the Taliban is simply not interested in negotiating with Mr. Karzai. The BSA will also be a major stumbling block for the Taliban is against the continuing presence of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan. Mr. Karzai has pinned his hopes on Mullah Baradar, who has been released by Pakistan to kick-start the process. His preferred venue for the talks is Afghanistan but he is willing to have them in Saudi Arabia or Turkey. Mullah Baradars standing among the Taliban is unclear. In any event, the Taliban core leadership is unwilling to give up its basic Islamist principles which are contrary in many respects to the old Afghan traditions and the constitution. Some senior Afghan political personalities suspect that one purpose of the reconciliation process for Mr. Karzai is to prolong his stay in office. If the process gathers traction, he may tell the country that his continuance is essential for its success and some Afghans may support this position though it will be opposed by those who want to see him go and will lead to turbulence. Fluid political scene The Presidential elections success is necessary to combat the insurgency. Fraud had vitiated the 2009 election and it may become an issue in the forthcoming election too. The principal candidates are former Foreign Ministers Dr. Abdullah and Zalmai Rasool, and former Finance Minister Ashraf Ghani. They are all Pashtuns (as are the rest) but Dr. Abdullah, whose mother was a Tajik and who was a close aide of Ahmed Shah Masood, is perceived to be a Panjsheri. The tickets the constitution provides for two Vice-Presidents indicate the fluidity of the Afghan political scene and the continuing importance of ethnic considerations and ethnic leaders. Mr. Karzai has said that he will not support any candidate, including his brother Qayyum Karzai, but many suspect he may quietly give his administrations support behind the scenes to a favourite (Zalmai Rasool perhaps) especially in the second round as the election is expected to go to. Currently, Dr. Abdullah is the frontrunner. President Karzai has a central role and responsibility to steer Afghanistan while adhering to the constitution to safety. He has to give up the propensity to play petulant games and, instead, prepare the country for the transition. The question is, does he have the vision to do so? (The writer is a former ambassador to Afghanistan and Myanmar)

President Karzai has to steer Afghanistan to safety while adhering to the constitution

When politics is determined by guns

Vijay Prashad

The rebellious spirit continues through protests across Syria against boththe Islamists and the Syrian government
Harsh conditions:Even as the flood of Syrian refugees continues into the snowy mountains in Lebanon, the UNHCR believes the makeshift shelters are substandard. Photo: Mohamed Azakir In the hillside town of Arsal in Lebanons Bekaa Valley, the mid-December storm named Alexa blanketed Syrian refugee camps in heavy snow. The normal population of Arsal is eighteen thousand. It has more than doubled since November 15 as fighting continues along the road that parallels the Syria-Lebanon border. The refugees have taken shelter in more than two hundred informal camps. The United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) has partnered with the Lebanese Army to assist the tens of thousands of Syrians who walked the 17 km that divides this town from Syria. Lisa Abou Khaled of the UNHCR said the refugees are in dire straits because the makeshift shelters are really substandard. The United Nations supplied many residents with thermal blankets, but these are insufficient. On December 2, UNHCR chief Antonio Guterres visited Arsal before the storm dispatched a foot of snow across the valley. Lets be honest. Were not doing enough, he said. Here in Arsal, we are seeing an emergency within an emergency. Were in a town that has more Syrians than Lebanese. Beyond that there is a gap of human capacity, clinics, schools that are not there. Over the course of the past month, the Syrian Army and its proxy forces have moved north from Damascus toward the town of Homs. They have largely cleared the strategic Qalamoun Mountains, shutting off many of the strategic access points for the resupply of the rebels. It is from these towns along the border that the Syrians have fled to Lebanon. The fighting has been lethal, with the Syrian government hitting the towns with airstrikes and artillery. The rebel forces have retaliated not only inside Syria, but, as on December 17, inside Lebanese territory too, with rockets and artillery striking Hezbollah targets in the town of Hermel. Syrians from Nabk and Yabroud attest to the peril of remaining behind. This is the reason why the flood of refugees into the snowy mountains of Lebanon has continued unabated. Their choices are unfathomable.

Those who remain behind in Syria are not only targets of violence, but are stalked by hunger. Two-and-a-half million Syrian civilians inside the country are out of the reach of humanitarian agencies (including the United Nations). Words, despite their ability to shock, cannot really paint a picture of the grim and gruesome reality of Syria today, said UN humanitarian chief Valerie Amos. Those who get away are the lucky ones. As the Syrian government forces a move to close off the Lebanon-Syria border, the Turkish authorities have already shut their crossing point at Azaz. Turkey, which had been one of the more vocal countries for the rebellion, has now held its tongue. Two factors have silenced the Turks. First, the growing independence of Syrias Kurdish population which announced the formation of Western Kurdistan on the Turkish border has threatened to reinvigorate the Kurdish resistance inside Turkey. Last year, the Turkeybased Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK)s field commander Murad Karayilan said, Let me state clearly: if the Turkish state intervenes against our people in western Kurdistan [in Syria], all of Kurdistan [including in western Turkey] will turn into a war zone. The message has been absorbed. Second, in-fighting between the various Islamist units along the border had spilled into Turkey something that the Turkish government does not want to encourage. They shut the Azaz border post when the Islamic state in Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS), Jabhat al-Nusra and Ahrar al-Sham fought pitched battles for its control. As the UNs Valerie Amos noted, clashes among the [two thousand armed] groups are increasingly common and key humanitarian routes have been cut off by the fighting. Jordans monarchy had already tightened its control over its long sprawling border with Syria. In December last year, the Al-Hayat reported: The Jordanian Kingdom fears the continued rise of Brotherhood groups in the Arab world and it dreads that once the current regime is overthrown, Syria would join this new Islamist alliance. The King had once called for the removal of the government of Bashar al-Assad, but he no longer makes such unequivocal statements. Over the summer, Jabhat al-Nusra and Ahrar alSham took a military post along the Damascus-Amman highway and threatened to use the Jordanian border as their main supply route. In November, Bashar al-Assad said the southern Syrian city of Daraa has become a Jordanian problem. Mohammed Shalabi (Abu Sayyaf), head of the Islamist fighters in Jordan, said that his men continue to cross the border, although Jordans Interior Minister Hussein al-Majali has denied this and has pushed back against Saudi pressure to open the border to the Islamists. These are decisions of sovereignty, he said. The weight of the refugee crisis, combined with the dangers of political violence, has stayed his hand, and has forced the Jordanian authorities to be stricter along the border. The Iraqi-Syrian border is by far the most porous, with the threats running between Baghdad and northern Syria. At a security conference in Bahrain in early December, Iraqs Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said that the ISIS fighters numbering over twelve thousand travel across the border with

impunity. Over the past month, ISIS has bombed four bridges that link the Iraqi city of Ramadi to the border town of al-Qaim. This prevents the already beleaguered Iraqi military from gaining easy access to the border. ISIS, meanwhile, has set itself up along the length of the Syrian-Iraqi desert. This is toxic, said Mr. Zebari, and the day will come, God forbid, when they will have another Islamic Emirate outside control. Iraq has been unable to contain the threats posed by ISIS, which are part of the legion of groups conducting as many as sixty bombings per month in the country. The enormity of the Islamist challenge within Syria and around it has alerted Western governments to be even less chary to support the rebels. As the Free Syrian Army (FSA) collapses, the rebellions military aspect is now clearly in the hands of the Islamists whether Jabhat al-Nusra, ISIS, or the newly created Islamic Front (among whom the most significant military force is the salafi Ahrar es-Sham). From the standpoint of Western intelligence, the distinctions between these groups such as whether they welcome foreign fighters are moot. In early December, the Islamic Front seized the Turkish border post of Bab al-Hawa (Gate of the Wind), west of Aleppo, from the FSA taking their cache of arms. The FSAs General Salim Idris fled Syria for Turkey. It is a major setback for the FSA, on whom the West pinned its thinning hopes. The creation of the Syrian Rebel Front out of detachments of the FSA and its allies to counter the Islamic Front is not impressive. Col. Abdel-Jabbar Ukaidi, a leading rebel commander, resigned his post out of frustration with the infighting. When we rose up in rebellion we had only one enemy, he notes. Now the enemies are legion. The United Kingdom and the United States hastened to announce that they had suspended all further deliveries of non-lethal assistance into northern Syria. Such supplies will continue to come through Jordan, but geography means that they will not reach the areas in northern Syria where the Western-backed FSA is being wiped out by the Islamists. With access to supply routes through Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey becoming closed off to the Islamic Front and the FSA, it is only the ISIS through Iraq that is able to bring in more material and men to the battlefield. It is the emergence of ISIS that has forced the hand of the West and Syrias neighbours to push for the restart of a political process. But when the main powers meet in Geneva on January 22, will they be able to make decisions on behalf of the rebels? The Islamists remain outside the process, having rejected not only Geneva II, but most significantly the Supreme Military Command of the FSA and the Syrian National Coalition, the political opposition. Neither the rebel armies on the ground nor the backers of the Syrian National Coalition mainly the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia are eager for the entente that might emerge out of Geneva II. It means that expectations for its outcome are not very high. The best that can emerge is a procedure by which the Syrian government acknowledges that it will constrain its hand once it takes back most of the country, avoiding revenge and building a political process. The deal around chemical weapons is an

indicator that the West is now eager to constrain the Assad government rather than to overthrow it. That was the precursor to the kind of political deal that is expected in Geneva. The rebellious spirit continues through protests, across Syria, against the siege-like conditions in which people are being forced to live, and against both the Islamists and the Syrian government. If the Syrian governments heavy-handed violence had turned sections of the population toward the rebellion, the cruel tactics of the Islamists, such as public beheadings, has repulsed ordinary people. Their hopes of a dignified future recede. When politics is determined by guns, the civil rebellion howsoever intense is no longer significant. It will have no role at Geneva. Neither will the Syrian refugees who are frozen in the hillside town of Arsal and in the Jordanian desert camp of Zaatari. (The writer is the Edward Said Chair at the American University of Beirut) The Islamist challenge has made Western governments even less chary to support the rebels

As cyber attacks rise, government sounds alert

Sandeep Joshi There has been a major increase in attacks on Indian websites in recent months, the most vulnerable being those of critical government organisations like banking and finance, oil and gas and emergency services, according to the latest report of the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERTIn) under the Department of Electronics and Information Technology. Asking all important agencies to instruct their website administrators to follow the best practices to secure web applications and web servers, CERT-In has said in an internal note that the most targeted websites included those having .in domain, which is mostly used by government ministries and departments, besides some major private organisations. Noting that there has been a constant rise in cyberattacks, which mainly include defacement of website, the note said that since mid-2013, there had been a major increase in the occurrence. A total of 1808, 2858, 2380 and 4191 Indian websites were defaced during May, June, July and August 2013 respectively, it said, pointing out that 6080 per cent of the websites targeted had .in domain.

Notably, in these four months alone, almost 40 websites belonging to some important government departments with .in domain were defaced. Indias country code domains that were targeted included .co.in, .net.in, .gov.in, .org.in, .nic.in, .ac.in, .edu.in and .res.in. Hackers, mostly from abroad, have also been targeting websites with .com, .org and .net domains. During its analysis, CERT-In, which has been tracking defacement of Indian websites, also found that top cyberattackers India faced included HuSsY, hasnain haxor, CouCouM, BLACKSMITH HACKERS, Romantic, ALFA TEAM 2012, Intruder and Team Patriot. Stating that defacing of a website was an act of cyber terrorism, particularly when the target belonged to critical government infrastructure, a senior official of the IT Ministry reasoned that hackers targeted these important websites to reduce public confidence in the security of a system and its trustworthiness for use for sensitive purposes. With rising defacements, CERT-In has circulated a list of security guidelines all critical departments need to follow. They have been asked to install a potent firewall and antispyware and anti-phishing controls, update their application software regularly and use the latest Internet browsers, capable of detecting phishing and malicious sites, besides exercising caution while opening unsolicited emails, the official said.

Science journals top 10 breakthroughs, 2013

In cancer immunotherapy, treatments targetthe body's immune system rather thantumours directly. PHOTO: AP Dolly, the world'sfirst cloned animal. Photo: Reuters The source of high-energy particles from outer space has been finally found. Reuters Structural biology has led to a powerful toolfor fighting disease. Photo: Reuters Brain cleans itself more efficiently during sleep.

Miniaturized human organs serve as better models of human disease. Photo: Reuters

Ultimately, we concluded, cancer immunotherapy passes the test. It does so because this year, clinical trials have cemented its potential in patients and swayed even the sceptics. The field of cancer immunotherapy hums with stories of lives extended the woman with a grapefruit-size tumour in her lung from melanoma, alive and healthy 13 years later; the 6-year-old near

death from leukaemia, now in third grade and in remission; the man with metastatic kidney cancer whose disease continued fading away even after treatment stopped, notes a paper published recently in the journal that ranked the top 10 science breakthroughs of 2013. The cancer research community experienced a sea change in 2013 as a strategy, decades in the making, finally cemented its potential. Promising results emerged from clinical trials of cancer immunotherapy, in which treatments target the body's immune system rather than tumours directly. The new treatments push T cells and other immune cells to combat cancer and the editors of believe that such approaches are now displaying enough promise to top their list of the year's most important scientific breakthroughs. Though the ultimate impact on the disease is not known, results so far have been highlighting its success. This annual list of groundbreaking scientific achievements, selected by and its international nonprofit publisher, AAAS, also includes major breakthroughs in solar cell technologies, genome-editing techniques and vaccine design strategies, to name a few. This year there was no mistaking the immense promise of cancer immunotherapy, Tim Appenzeller, chief news editor of the journal said in a press release by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). So far, this strategy of harnessing the immune system to attack tumours works only for some cancers and a few patients, so it's important not to overstate the immediate benefits. But many cancer specialists are convinced that they are seeing the birth of an important new paradigm for cancer treatment. Many of today's advances in cancer immunotherapy revolve around CTLA-4 (cytotoxic T-lymphocyte antigen 4) a receptor on T cells that was discovered in 1987. The early steps were taken by French cancer immunologist James Allison, now at the University of Texas, MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. CTLA-4 prevented the T cells from attacking invaders with their full force. In 1996, James Allison showed that blocking CTLA-4 in mice could unleash T cells against tumour cells in the animals that finally erased tumours in mice. In the meantime, Japanese researchers identified another brake on T cells known as PD-1. Clinical trials involving this receptor began in 2006, and preliminary results in small groups of patients appear to be promising. Another area of interest involves genetically modifying T cells to make them target tumours. In 2011, this strategy, which was known as chimeric antigen therapy, or CAR therapy, electrified the cancer research field, and it is now the subject of numerous clinical trials, particularly in blood cancers.

Accordingly, many pharmaceutical companies that wanted nothing to do with immunotherapy several years ago are now investing heavily, the release noted. There is still plenty of uncertainty regarding how many patients will benefit from these therapies, most of which remain experimental and for which forms of cancer they will work best, the release noted. Scientists are busy trying to identify biomarkers that might offer answers, and thinking of ways to make treatments more potent. But a new chapter in cancer research and treatment has begun. The journals list of nine other groundbreaking scientific achievements from the past year follows. CRISPR: Akin to the discovery of the microscope in the 1920 that touched off a revolution in surgical procedures, the discovery of a bacterial protein Cas9 gives researchers the equivalent of a molecular surgery kit for routinely disabling, activating, or changing genes, the paper notes. Though CRISPR, the gene-editing technique was discovered in bacteria, researchers use it as a scalpel for surgery on individual genes. Its popularity soared this year with over 50 publications in 10 months as more than a dozen teams of researchers used it to manipulate the genomes of various plant, animal and human cells. Cloning human embryos: After years of failure, researchers were able to derive stem cells from cloned human embryos this year. Scientists were able to clone sheep, mice, pigs, dogs and other animals, but human cells proved really tricky. But in 2007, researchers at the Oregon National Primate Research Center in Beaverton succeeded in cloning monkey embryos and extract embryonic stem cells. In the process they realised that caffeine plays an important role in the process, stabilizing key molecules in delicate human egg cells. CLARITY: This imaging technique, which renders brain tissue transparent by by removing the fatty, light-scattering lipid molecules that form cellular membranes. The lipids are replaced with molecules of clear gel but all neurons (as well as other brain cells) are left intact and on full display. This has changed the way researchers look at this intricate organ in 2013. According to the paper, researchers say the advance could speed up by 100fold tasks such as counting all the neurons in a given brain region and could make traditional methods of imaging post-mortem brain tissue irrelevant. Currently, the technique is limited to small amounts of tissue. Mini-organs: Researchers made remarkable progress growing mini humanlike organoids in vitro this year. These included liver buds, mini-kidneys and tiny brains. miniaturized human organs may prove to be much better models of human disease than animals.

If it is a challenge to coax stem cells to grow into specific tissues prodding pluripotent stem cells to develop into organized structures has been nearly impossible. Not any more. Researchers in spectacular style were able to grow a variety of organoids in the lab liver buds, mini-kidneys, and, most remarkably, rudimentary human brains. Cosmic rays traced to supernova remnants: Although originally detected 100 years ago, scientists have not been sure where the high-energy particles from outer space known as cosmic rays come from. This year, they finally tied the rays to debris clouds left by supernovae, or exploding stars. Perovskite solar cells: A new generation of solar-cell materials, cheaper and easier to produce than those in traditional silicon cells, garnered plenty of attention this past year. Perovskite cells are not as efficient as commercial solar cells yet, but they are improving very quickly. Structural biology guides vaccine design: This year, researchers used the structure of an antibody to design an immunogen the main ingredient of a vaccine for a childhood virus that hospitalizes millions each year. It was the first time that structural biology led to such a powerful tool for fighting disease. Our microbes, our health: Research on the trillions of bacterial cells that call the human body home made it clear how much these microbes do for us. "Personalized" medicine will need to take these microbial tenants into account in order to be effective. Why we sleep: Studies with mice showed that the brain cleans itself by expanding channels between neurons and allowing more cerebrospinal fluid to flow through much more efficiently during sleep. The finding suggests that restoration and repair are among the primary purposes of catching Z's.

One solution for two problems in fuel cells

Vasudevan Mukunth Today, two innovations lead the roster of answers in the search for pollutionfree sources of energy. The first, electric batteries, are already marketable but also plagued by concerns over high recharge-time and suboptimal performance in cold climes. Hydrogen fuel cells (HFCs), the other solution, face a different problem. Asian car-makers are ready with HFCs running at 60 per cent efficiency and already 50 per cent cheaper to make than in 2011. However, there is a conspicuous absence of hydrogen-refuelling stations owing to logistics issue.

Nonetheless, hydrogen fuel cells continue to receive upgrades. This week, researchers from the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT), Chicago, announced another one that increased their performance and lifetime by altering just one component. In a paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences , the researchers detail how an alternative support to disperse the cells catalyst is the key. An HFC works by consuming hydrogen that reacts with oxygen from the atmosphere over platinum nanoparticles as catalyst to produce water and electricity; the electricity powers a motor stationed in an external circuit between the anode and the cathode of the cell. The platinum is dispersed by high surface-area carbon (HSAC) supports. The HSAC supports have a tendency to corrode during vehicle start-up and shutdown because of electric potentials at the anode and cathode. As the carbon support is lost, more of the platinum nanoparticles are detached from the support surface and become inaccessible for reaction, Dr. Vijay Ramani, professor of chemical engineering at IIT and principal investigator in the project said in an email to this Correspondent. However, carbon has been the substance of choice because it is cheap, abundant, and has high electronic conductivity. Instead, Dr. Ramani and his colleagues synthesised a compound called titanium-ruthenium oxide (TRO) to support the platinum nanoparticles. Titanium oxide formed the rigid, corrosion-resistant support structure while a coating of ruthenium oxide allowed electrons to be conducted through the frame. Neither titanium- or ruthenium-oxide can be further oxidized, leaving them less harmed by corrosion. an oxidation reaction which commonly occurs during start-up and shutdown of the cell. In fact, after 5,000 startstop cycles during a test, the team found the loss in surface area due to corrosion was 16 per cent for TRO, against 39 per cent for HSAC. Also, with TRO, losses in catalyst activity were diminished by 70 per cent, increasing performance. Additionally, Dr. Ramani found that their compound was also able to prevent the platinum nanoparticles from oxidising. This happens when platinum gets exposed to potentials of 0.9-1 Vvalues reached when the HFC transitions between full- and no-load, 0.65-0.95 V. Due to beneficial electronic interactions between the nanoparticles and the TRO, called strong metal support interactions, platinum dissolution was far

lesser than it would have been with HSAC, with which the nanoparticles wouldnt have had such interactions, explained Dr. Ramani. Even though titanium and ruthenium are costlier than carbon, an analysis by the IIT team found that more than 90 per cent of the cells costs were incurred by the use of platinum as catalyst, irrespective of scale. By no means an incentive, Dr. Ramani feels this is not prohibitive, either. The distinction for that is taken by the absence of hydrogen-refuelling stations. Economy of scale in manufacturing will necessitate a market for fuel-cell vehicles, which in turn will require a hydrogen-fuelling station to be in place. This is a classic chicken-egg issue, quipped Dr. Ramani.

Malarial drug resistance marker identified

Mutations in a gene producing a protein called K13 are the markers. Photo: R. Eswarraj Scientists have uncovered mutations of a gene that make the most dangerous malarial parasite resistant to front line drug therapy. More than half a million children die each year from malaria caused by Plasmodium falciparum . Drugs with artemisinin have led the fight against this single-celled parasite's depredations and contributed to a decline in the world's burden of malaria. However, strains of P. falciparum that are resistant to artemisinin have been detected in Cambodia, Thailand, Myanmar and Vietnam, raising fears that these drug-resistant forms could spread to other parts of the world and put at risk the advances that have been made in combating malaria. An international team of scientists have identified a parasite gene whose mutations are associated with artemisinin resistance. Such mutations could be a useful molecular marker for tracking the emergence and spread of resistance, noted Frdric Ariey of the Institut Pasteur in France and his colleagues in a paper published last week in Nature . These scientists seem to have won the race to identify if not the gene, at the very least a key gene, responsible for artemisinin resistance, remarked Christopher V. Plowe of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute in the U.S. in a commentary published in the same issue of the journal. The team took a drug-sensitive P. falciparum parasite isolated from a malaria-sufferer in Tanzania and then cultured in it in the laboratory,

subjecting it to 125 cycles of escalating doses of artemisinin over five years. Genome sequences of the resistant forms that emerged were compared to that of a sensitive strain cultured in parallel without being exposed to the drug. The analysis revealed that the resistant parasites had eight mutations in seven genes that the sensitive ones lacked. With this information in hand, the scientists examined the genomes of 49 P. falciparum isolates from Cambodia with varying levels of artemisinin resistance. Mutations in a gene producing a protein called K13 stood out. Dr. Ariey and his colleagues then analysed the K13 gene sequence from over 900 parasites isolated from patients in various Cambodian provinces. The K13 mutations were widespread in provinces where artemisinin resistance had been reported and hardly found elsewhere. They also showed that these mutations were a good molecular marker to identify patients with drugresistant parasites.

Microsoft launches new safety application

Special Correspondent

Guardian can be used to alert friends and family during an emergency

Tech major Microsoft on Thursday launched Guardian, a new safety application (app), that enables friends and family of Windows Phone users to track them in real time. Available exclusively for Windows Phone users, Guardians track me feature allows friends and family to track them using Microsoft Windows Azure cloud services and Bing Map APIs, a statement issued by Microsoft here said. Guardian users can call for help through an SOS alert button and also connect to security agencies, police and hospitals easily via this app in times of distress, the statement said. Guardian was developed over six months by a group of enthusiastic Microsoft employees in India, within the Microsoft Garage, a global employee innovation initiative that gives the employees an outlet to explore ideas. Our employees wanted to do something to enable people to feel safer in our cities. So they used their spare time to develop Guardian, Managing Director of Microsoft IT India Raj Biyani said in a statement. Guardian is a robust personal security app with more safety features and capabilities than

any other comparable app available to Indian smartphone users today, he claimed. To use Guardian effectively, users need to add the names of friends, family members and security groups to the settings. In an emergency situation, the app can be used to alert them, via the SOS button. All the user has to do is tap the SOS button. The phone then sends a distress SMS to all buddy mobiles, notifying them of the emergency along with location details, Microsoft said. At the same time, the SOS button also sends emails to buddy email IDs and posts to private Facebook groups, if registered. Pointing out that Guardian uses Microsoft Windows Azure cloud services and Bing Map APIs extensively and can help the authorities and medical teams track the user, the statement said the phone can be traced even if it is broken. The application is capable of one touch video recording that can be used as evidence.

The inexplicable silence

Arun Mohan Sukumar

The Congress has steered clear of any debate on the AFSPA, leaving a politically untenable choice for the next government: repeal the Act or leave it untouched
Long-standing protest:Prospects of the AFSPA being amended now appear bleak as parties across the ideological spectrum have backed its continuance. In this file photo, Manipur students demonstrate in New Delhi, seeking the revocation of the Act. Photo: S. Subramanium With its recent decision to extend the implementation of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act in Manipur by another year, the United Progressive Alliances opportunistic posturing on the legislation has come full circle. The UPAs rendezvous with the AFSPA began months after it took charge in 2004, with the alleged rape and murder of Thangjam Manorama Devi, a 34year-old Manipuri, while in the custody of the Assam Rifles. Nine years have passed since the gruesome episode; three reports have been submitted to the Central government by judicial or quasi-judicial commissions constituted to examine the AFSPAs reign in Manipur; two of them are yet to see the light of day. The first commission set up by the Manipur government to investigate the custodial killing of Thangjam Manorama made it clear the Assam Rifles had offered little or no cooperation to its work. The Upendra Commissions summons to Army personnel went unanswered, and the impunity offered by

the AFSPA ensured none were brought to book for the act. Driven to the wall by popular State-wide protests, the Manipur government mulled repealing the AFSPA altogether. Then, New Delhi warned Chief Minister Okram Ibobi Singh against taking corrective action. The Damocles sword of Presidents Rule prompted Ibobi Singh to target civil society groups pushing for the AFSPAs repeal. Given that the prerogative to declare an area disturbed and thus invite the AFSPAs application to it rested with the recalcitrant Union government, the Manipuri agitation soon fizzled out. Subsequently, the UPA constituted the Jeevan Reddy Committee to review the working of the AFSPA. The Committees findings were submitted to the Union government in June 2005 but are yet to be made public. (A copy of the report was leaked to The Hindu and is accessible on the newspapers website http://www.hindu.com/nic/afa/). Whatever be the content of the Committee report, its quiet burial was a clear indication that New Delhi was simply not game for a public debate on the AFSPA. The report needed to be cleared by various nodal ministries, including the Defence and Law Ministries, went the official line. Meanwhile, the Assam Rifles had successfully requested the Gauhati High Court to strip the Upendra Commission of legality for want of jurisdiction over a paramilitary force. The High Court, nevertheless, referred the Upendra Commission report to the Union Home Ministry for speedy action. The ball was once again in the Union Cabinets court, but the government refused to engage in a debate on the AFSPAs merits. Silence on the AFSPA proved costly for the Centre in 2010, when State governments in Jammu & Kashmir and Manipur were compelled to take a stand against the law. That summer, a groundswell of protests in the Kashmir Valley forced Chief Minister Omar Abdullahs hand in coming out strongly against the AFSPA. He has since maintained the J&K government will endeavour to repeal the Act entirely from the State. Around the same time, a Division Bench of the Gauhati High Court overturned its previous verdict on the Upendra Commission report, declaring the Manipur government was free to act on its contents. Under enormous pressure from New Delhi, however, Ibobi Singhs Cabinet agreed in November that year to re-impose the AFSPA on some parts of the State. Panel confirms abuse of law Amid this turmoil, the Supreme Court acting on the basis of writ petitions before it constituted the Santosh Hegde Committee to investigate six separate cases of possible AFSPA abuse in Manipur. Five of these killings, the Committee found, were encounters fabricated by both the Assam Rifles and the Manipur Police. The Committee also held that security forces had used disproportionate force against persons with no known criminal antecedents. Most importantly, the Santosh Hegde Committee also unearthed evidence of the local police using

lethal force in several instances, taking advantage of the immunity granted by the AFSPA. The Manipur Police was also conducting joint combing operations with the Assam Rifles in districts beyond those notified as disturbed areas. In the face of smoking gun evidence, the Centre duly informed the Supreme Court that the Cabinet Committee on Security would take a decision on the matter. That decision is still awaited. Over the last nine years, the Union government has relied on a strategy of obfuscation to pre-empt any debate on the AFSPA. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on various occasions has said his government follows a policy of zero tolerance against human rights abuses and custodial deaths. Yet, New Delhi has been unwilling to set the terms for a debate as to tweaking the AFSPA to prevent its abuse. P. Chidambaram, as Union Home Minister, has suggested that the government is for evolving a humane substitute to the AFSPA. Earlier this year, he also claimed that the Army had taken a strong stand against any dilution of the law. Opposition from the armed forces does not, however, preclude the Home Ministry clarifying its position on the law. Mr. Chidambaram has not indicated whether he favours a complete or partial withdrawal of the AFSPA from J&K and the north-east or amendments to dilute its provisions. The Cabinet Committee on Security could certainly have put out an official note highlighting the various points of disagreement within the government. Instead, the UPA has left its position deliberately ambiguous. Its attempts to build consensus and revisit AFSPA have merely clouded the debate and ensured that political parties and civil society activists have all but two options to choose from: either repeal the Act or leave it untouched. That the AFSPA lends itself to abuse is not contested. Several measures have been suggested by judicial commissions and commentators to tighten the legislation. Progressive recommendations The Justice Verma Committee constituted in the aftermath of the 2012 Delhi gang rape recommended that armed forces personnel accused of sexual offences should be stripped of AFSPA protection. The Jeevan Reddy Commission suggested there should be legislative prescriptions on powers, duties and procedures relevant to the deployment of paramilitary forces. Others have suggested that the government should provide its reasons for denying sanction to prosecute armed forces personnel in writing, which would then be subject to judicial review. These are progressive recommendations which occupy a middle ground those accustomed to grandstanding on AFSPA will not find it difficult to agree on such proposals. Yet, the UPA has made no effort to nudge the debate on the AFSPA in this direction. Its commitment to zero tolerance of human rights abuses flies in the face of encounter killings and riot-related excesses in Manipur and Jammu & Kashmir. Prospects for amending the AFSPA now appear bleak as

political parties across the ideological spectrum have backed its continuance. If the BJP joined hands with the Congress in supporting the AFSPAs extension in Manipur, the CPI(M) government in Tripura followed suit last week, extending the laws reign by another six months. In skirting the debate on the AFSPA, the UPA has hitched the law to an ill-informed discourse on national security and ensured its survival for the conceivable future. arun.mohan@thehindu.co.in The UPA's touted zero tolerance of human rights abuses is belied by encounter killings and riot violence in Manipur, J&K

Film on Kashmirs Hindu & Buddhist heritage

Madhur Tankha Filmmaker-historian Benoy K. Behl has explored the ancient Hindu and Buddhist heritage of Jammu and Kashmir in a new documentary which will be screened at the India Habitat Centre here on Sunday. Titled Legacy of Kashmir, the documentary gave the filmmaker an opportunity to travel across the Himalayan State to document the unique heritage of Kashmir. And the shooting experience in the verdant mountains of the State, blessed with bountiful nature as well as renowned heritage sites, was a mesmerising experience for Mr. Behl. Sharing details about filming the documentary, Mr. Behl said over the past three decades, he had travelled to quite a few interesting places in the subcontinent and the rest of the world. It has been a thoroughly enjoyable experience to travel to different destinations across the globe. I have been to the highest mountains and explored spectacular seas and rivers. But I have never come across a more beautiful place than Kashmir. It has another unique attribute as it has a rich heritage of Hindu and Buddhist philosophy and art, which needs to be preserved for the future generation. So this is the reason I have made this documentary. Since ancient temples in the Valley are located in remote and geographically unsafe regions, the film-maker sought assistance from agencies of the State. The Army and the State government were helpful and made sure that I and my team reached temples located in treacherous terrain. One of the magnificent sites was the temple of Wanghat, perched high on a mountain. When we reached the top, it became cloudy and we could not shoot. We had

to come down and when it became bright we started up again. However, by the time we reached the top, it started to rain. We had to come down again. Finally, when we went up in the late afternoon, we were able to shoot the beautiful temples. Pointing out that Kashmir had always been a renowned centre of Hindu and Buddhist philosophy, the filmmaker said in ancient times it was known as Sharada Peeth or the seat of the deity of learning. From the 1{+s}{+t}to the 12{+t}{+h}centuries, the Valley was one of the most important centres of Buddhist learning. It was in Kashmir that Shaivism rose to its fullest heights. The manifestation of Shiva in the beauty of the world around us was worshipped as Shakti. The Indian philosophy of aesthetics was most highly developed in this beautiful valley.

It is titled Legacy of Kashmir A mesmerising experience for filmmaker

2013, a year of surprises for aviation industry

Lalatendu Mishra

The year also marked the grant of nearly three times bilateral traffic rights to Abu Dhabi by the Indian Civil Aviation Ministry
Even as the year is drawing to a close, 2013 has been a year of surprises and excitement for an otherwise struggling Indian civil aviation sector. From a sense of gloom, the sentiment quickly changed to jubilation when foreign airlines lined up to throw a lifeline to troubled domestic carriers or applied for fresh applications to start new airline ventures with strong domestic partners. Since 2006, India has not seen the launch of a major airline. Rather, three airlines - Kingfisher Airlines, Air Deccan (Kingfisher Red) and Paramount Airways - have shut shop, in the meantime. The last major airline that was launched in India was IndiGo in 2006, which has now grown into be the largest domestic carrier by market share. Major highlights

The year saw the signing of the Jet Airways-Etihad Airways deal. Under the deal, the Abu Dhabi-based airline picked up 24 per cent stake in financiallystrained Jet Airways for Rs. 2,058 crore. Apart from this, Etihad also paid $70 million to buy Jets airport slots at London Heathrow Airport. And, it has committed to invest another $150 million to buy out Jets frequent flier programme. Etihad also agreed to procure funding worth $300 million to reduce Jets debt burden. This deal has come as a major saviour for Jets owner Naresh Goyal, who was always opposed to foreign airlines investing in Indian carriers. Though it was Vijay Mallya, the owner of the grounded Kingfisher, who had lobbied hard for foreign direct investment (FDI) from overseas airlines in Indian carriers, an arch opponent of this policy Mr. Naresh Goyal turned out to be the first major beneficiary. The year also marked the grant of nearly three times bilateral traffic rights to Abu Dhabi by the Indian civil aviation ministry. Tata Group The year also saw AirAsia and the Tata Group queuing up to start two new airlines in India. While AirAsia has expressed its willingness to launch a Channai-based low cost carrier called AirAsia India in association with Tata Group and Arun Bhatia of Telestra, the Tatas surprised everyone by announcing plans to start a full service airline in India with their erstwhile partner Singapore Airlines. The easing of FDI norms last year will prove to be a game-changer. We witnessed the creation of two start-ups - TataAir Asia joint venture and Tata-SIA joint venture - and also equity investment in Jet Airways by Etihad. Recently, SpiceJet announced an interline agreement with Tiger Airways, said Amber Dubey, Partner and Head-Aerospace and Defence at KPMG. The biggest event in 2014 will be the commencement or expansion of commercial operations by four global airlines Etihad, AirAsia, Singapore Airlines and Tiger Airways along with their Indian partners. We also expect one more FDI deal in an existing airline. All these will bring in global best practices, greater competition, better choices for passengers and lower fares, Mr. Dubey said. He said that the arrival of AirAsia India and Tata-SIA would shake the domestic market, bringing in more competition. The increased competition would boost regional and international connectivity, improve services and bring down fares. The Indian aviation industry has emerged as one of the top in the world with a massive movement not only in domestic and international sectors, but also the freight carriage. The sector has been going through a turbulence facing multiple headwinds which hindered its projected growth. Increase in oil

prices, decline in passenger traffic and liquidity constraints jeopardised the finances of some airlines and drained their limited financial resources, said Ankur Bhatia, Executive Director, Bird Group and Chairman of CIIs Core Committee on Growth Potential of Civil Aviation & Airports. IndiGo does well Most airlines continued to suffer losses but IndiGo announced a net profit of Rs. 700 crore, a record in its profitable growth. Air India also sharply improved its financial position following the restructuring of loans and fresh equity infusion from the Government of India. The national carrier improved its on-time performance and market share, a remarkable achievement from a team led by its Chairman Rohit Nandan. Air India The biggest achievement for Air India was the move of Star Alliance to reconsider its decision to allow the national carrier to join the grand alliance. This would further strengthen Air India. In 2013, Air India also decided to sell five of its fuel-guzzling Boeing 777s to Etihad for an unspecified amount. SpiceJet witnessed the exit of its high profile CEO Neil Mills, while Sanjiv Kapoor came on board as its new COO. Go Air inducted more planes into its fleet, and reported higher market share. The year also witnessed the launch of a new airline Air Costa. The rising cost of aviation fuel continued to pose challenges for the sector in 2013. Despite this, with FDI being allowed, Indian aviation sector could grow at the rate of 120-130 per cent as more international carriers would look at investing in domestic airlines. The year 2013 was significant in the sense that passenger throughput grew by around 6 to 8 per cent. This growth is commendable given various challenges such as slowdown in the economy, devaluation of the rupee, increase in ATF prices, austerity measures by corporate sector and subdued demand from the tourist sector, said experts. According to Mr. Dubey, the current times are definitely interesting but also highly challenging for the Indian aviation industry. Indian carriers have already lost about $ 1.6 billion in the financial year ended March 31, 2013. The year also witnessed Kingfisher reporting all time high losses, and reaching a stage of no return.

The industry emerges as one of the top in the world The easing of FDI norms will prove to be a game-changer

Peace, not war, on the Indus

John Briscoe

The balanced work of the Permanent Court of Arbitration means a new dawnfor water management in the Indus
The Indus Waters Treaty (IWT), signed by India and Pakistan in 1960, has recently been seen both as the one agreement that has worked between India and Pakistan and as an anachronism which should be dissolved or renegotiated. On December 20, 2013, the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) has issued a judgment which re-calibrates and modernises the IWT and, again makes it a critical and effective instrument in avoiding conflicts between India and Pakistan on use of the rivers of the Indus Basin. It is first useful to reiterate the central elements of the treaty and the longstanding areas of contention. The IWT assigns use of the eastern rivers (Ravi, Beas and Sutlej) to India and use of the western rivers (Chenab, Jhelum and Indus) to Pakistan. The biggest sticking point in negotiating the treaty in the 1950s was the conditions under which India could use the hydro-electric potential of the Chenab and the Jhelum before the rivers reached Pakistan. The principle incorporated into the IWT was that, indeed, India could develop this potential, but only under a set of well-defined limitations on the amount of manipulable storage which could be created by India in the process, thus assuring Pakistan that India would not have the ability to manipulate either the timing or the quantities of the flows reaching Pakistan. In the 1990s, a difference arose about the Baglihar Dam being built by India on the Chenab. Pakistan claimed that low gates installed for flushing sediments violated the specifications of the treaty and endangered Pakistans water security because it gave India a capacity to manipulate the timing of flows into Pakistan. Recipe for conflict In 2005, a Neutral Expert was appointed to hear the case. His finding essentially said that new knowledge of sediment management technology meant that India had to be allowed to install low gates. His finding ignored the central balance between Indias right to generate hydropower and Pakistans right to unmanipulated flows in the IWT. Since India plans to build many other projects on the Chenab and Jhelum, if the Baglihar ruling established new ground rules, this would, essentially, give India a free hand to do whatever it liked, leaving Pakistan vulnerable in both perception and

practice. This was a recipe for growing conflict and, eventually, even war over the Indus. In 2010, Pakistan took a new case, that of the Kishenganga hydro-electric project on the Jhelum river, to the International Court of Arbitration. On December 20, 2013, the court issued its final judgment. The Kishenganga case comprised two elements was India within its rights to build the project and was India able to insert low gates? On the first, limited and specific issue, the court interpreted the treaty literally and accurately and allowed India to proceed. This will somewhat limit the yield of a Pakistani hydropower project being built downstream, but it is not a systemic issue. The big and systemic issue was the second. Here, the court reinforced the hard constraints built into the IWT regarding the ability of India to embed manipulable storage into this and all future projects. Convenience vs water security The court pointed out that while it might be convenient for India to build low gates and practise sediment flushing, this was not the only way to manage sediments, and that convenience for India had to be balanced against the threat this would pose to Pakistans water security. The court explicitly stated that the Baglihar ruling did not constitute a precedent and implied that the Baglihar Neutral Expert had erred by not balancing engineering concerns with the diplomatic and security factors which were at the heart of the IWT. The decision by the PCA means that India can, as laid out by the IWT, continue to develop much-needed hydropower projects on the Chenab and the Jhelum, but it must strictly respect the IWT-defined limits on manipulable storage, and must use methods other than the construction of low gates to flush silt. The court also played close attention to an area which had been neglected in the original IWT, namely environmental flows (e-flows). The court mandated a small, constant release which was less than 10% of what Pakistan claimed to be necessary. Again, the court underlined the importance of balance. Although the court considered this approach (to defining the e-flow) to be somewhat severe in environmental terms, the court concluded that [.] such an approach represents an appropriate balance between the needs of the environment and Indias right to power generation. This principle of balance and reasonableness is particularly important because it is inevitable that Pakistan will ask that India release e-flows from the eastern rivers (especially the Ravi and the Sutlej) into areas of Pakistan which have suffered major environmental damage as India has diverted all flows to the east. The bottom line is that the brilliant and balanced work of the PCA means a new dawn for water management in the Indus. Rumblings over water wars on the Indus should now dissipate, and, once again, relationships between India and Pakistan on the Indus should become stable and perhaps have a positive ripple effect on relatioins between the two countries.

(The writer has served as Senior Water Adviser for the World Bank in New Delhi) The verdict may have a positive ripple effect on relations between India and Pakistan

Fresh Snowden papers show NSA pirated underwater cable

Vaiju Naravane

Agency hacked into computer networks of 16 firms

Even as a judge in the U.S. deemed the NSAs surveillance activities legal, documents released by the agencys whistleblower, Edward Snowden. to the German magazine Der Spiegel revealed that the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) had pirated an underwater digital transmission cable and hacked into the computer networks of 16 companies managing traffic between France, North Africa and Asia, it was revealed on Monday. Sources quoted by the magazine said the NSA managed to gain access to the cable SEA-ME-WE 4 linking Southeast Asia and Europe via West Asia, where it linked up with the Orange mobile telephone and data transmission network. Since a massive amount of traffic flows down this cable, such penetration by the NSA allows it to collect a huge amount of metadata. Such data, which appears to be benign because it does not give the conversation transcripts, nevertheless reveals a great deal about internet users and their habits, the French website Mediapart reported. An estimated 20 of the 250 underwater data transmission cables pass through France, and link Europe to the rest of the world. Some of these cables, like the ACE are of great strategic interest. The 17,000 km-long ACE cable, jointly owned by France Telecom Orange and its subsidiaries and 12 other companies and governments, terminates at Penmarch in Brittany on Frances Atlantic coast. Along its length, it branches off into a dozen or so West African nations, a patch of the continent that France considers to be of special interest. According to Mediapart, citing documents provided by Mr. Snowden, on February 13, 2013, the Office of Tailored Access Operation managed to collect information on the control systems of the SEA-ME-WE cable. The technique used to penetrate the cables security systems was baptised Quantum Insert and had already been used by Britains GCHQ to infiltrate the computers of Belgacom and OPEC. The technique consists of luring

employees of these companies and organisations towards fake internet sites to introduce Trojan horses into their systems.