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HIMALAYAN MIRROR

Soldier of steel

ENGLISH DAILY PUBLISHED FROM GANGTOK

HIMALAYAN MIRROR
SEPTEMBER 12 2015 VOL 10 NO. 08

By Amma, for women

By Arjun
Subramaniam

By all accounts, the Amma Baby Care Kit

launched by Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J.
Jayalalithaa on Monday could make every amma
in the state happier. The kit, which has 16 items
ranging from a mosquito net and an infant mattress
to a dress, toy and a hand sanitiser, will be distributed to mothers of new-borns through government
hospitals. The Rs 67-crore initiative is aimed at
improving hygiene and sanitation among the poor,
which in turn could help reduce ailments among
newborns. Women and children have always been
seen to occupy a place in Jayalalithaas projected
development narrative. Prior to the kit, she had
announced setting up exclusive enclosures in bus
stations for lactating mothers. Her previous
tenures as CM saw targeted welfare measures such
as the cradle baby scheme to curb female infanticide. Many of these have been successful and have
since been adopted by other states.
It is often asked whether governments should
spend precious resources on subsidies and socalled freebies. States like Tamil Nadu offer a slew
of free or subsidised goods that range from television sets and mixie-grinders to seeds and cement.
Over the years, the state has expanded the ambit of
public services from running schools, hospitals
and transport utilities to managing canteens, sellling subsidised drinking water and medicines.
Competitive populism has led to every successive
government adding to the list of free or subsidised
goods and services. The fiscal cost of such extravagance has weighed on the state finances and crippled public investment in infrastructure. That said,
however, a sweeping critique of subsidies and welfare misses the point.
The experience from the southern states is that
well-designed welfare initiatives targeted at vulnerable sections, primarily women, girl children
and the poor, deliver results. The achievements of
Tamil Nadu and Kerala in areas like public health
and literacy are the outcome of targeted subsidies.
Welfare works in the southern states mainly
because the delivery mechanisms are in place.
With the deepening of democracy and the electoral
space becoming more and more competitive, this
should happen in the rest of India too.

t surely is a daunting
task for a modern
military historian to
choose Indias most
accomplished and illustrious
contemporary
war-time
general
between
K.S.
Thimayya, Harbaksh
Singh and Sagat Singh.
However, on the 50th
anniversary of the
India-Pakistan war of
1965, the exploits of
Indias steely Western
Army commander during the 1965 war,
Lieutenant
General
Harbaksh Singh, merit
reflection. Blooded in
combat as a captain in
the steamy jungles of
Southeast Asia against
the relentless Japanese
during World War II,
Harbakshs early military personality was
shaped by a contempt
for the manner in which
the Allied forces wilted
in the face of the
Japanese
offensive,
physical toughness and
a steely determination
as a PoW in Malaya,
and
circumspection
about the military capabilities of the Indian
National Army to defeat
the
battle-hardened
British Indian army.
Much of the Indian
armys early aggression
during
the
IndiaPakistan conflict of
1947-48 could be attributed to Harbaksh, who,
as a colonel and the second-in-command
to
Brigadier L.P. Sen in
161 Brigade, orchestrated a number of battles,
including the Battle of
Shalateng that had the
Pakistani raiders retreating along the SrinagarBaramula-Domel high-

A shared failure
Back in July, in his convocation address at the Indian
Institute of Science in Bangalore, N.R. Narayana
Murthy threw down the gauntlet to the Indian scientific establishment. What, he asked, were the contributions of the products of such institutions? Had India
produced a single invention in the past 60-odd years
that could be said to be indispensable to lives across
the world? C.N.R. Rao, distinguished scientist and
chairman of the scientific advisory council to the
prime minister, has responded to Murthy in Current
Science, pointing out that though the government has
hobbled scientific research for its own sake with its
insistence that engineers and scientists focus on solving specific problems or building on existing technology, private enterprise has failed to step into the space
vacated by government.
Murthy was right, but so is Rao. Several of the truly
groundbreaking inventions from the last half-century
or so, such as the internet, cellphone or the global
positioning system, originated from research subsidised by the United States military. But besides
Darpa, the US defence research agency, the common
thread running through many of these technological
innovations is private partners. The US government
played entrepreneur, taking risks to support such
future successes as Tesla Motors and Apple. And
Google Maps, for instance, owes its existence to an
MIT project funded by Darpa. The Indian government, on the other hand, has chosen to apply its energies to reinventing the wheel with the doomed Akash
tablet, for instance.
Certainly, much of the blame for the lack of similar
stories coming out of India lies in the states wearying
paranoia and lack of vision when it comes to allowing
private players a role in defence research. But corporations have also failed to put their money where their
mouth is. Murthy name-checked MIT in his speech at
IISc, to which he unfavourably compared the IITs.
But, as Rao noted, Indian billionaires have not, separately or together, founded institutions like MIT or
Stanford both of which have trained and nurtured
the best minds to enable scientific advancement.
Separate reports by Bain and McKinsey this year find
that philanthropy levels in India remain low by global standards. According to Bain, in the UK, 74 per
cent of people made charitable donations in 2013,
compared with 28 per cent in India. And McKinsey
notes that Indian donors tended to prefer direct interventions to help beneficiaries immediately, rather
than indirect interventions that seek to build organisational capacity at scale. As the American example
makes clear, it is the willingness and ability of both
public and private economic agents to take risks that
produces new, gamechanging advances.

Forget not that the

earth delights to
feel your bare feet
and the winds long
to play with your
hair.
-K
Khalil Gibran

EDITORIAL

GANGTOK, SATURDAY 12 SEPTEMBER 2015

way. As a brigade commander during the

spring of 1948, it was
his brigade that gave
significant momentum
to Thimayyas offensive
that sought to push the

attacked in October
1962, Harbaksh was
flown in to replace him.
It was too late, however,
for him to influence the
course of battle and all
he could do was rally

August 1965 onwards,

as he crushed Pakistans
second attempt at infiltrating Kashmir with
thousands of proxy
raiders through multiple
ingress points. Having

revealed the offensive

mindset of Harbaksh.
Though the helicopters
only inflicted limited
attrition on the infiltrators, their mere presence in the skies,

Pakistanis all the way to

Muzaffarabad.
His
northern push in the
Tithwal
and
Kishenganga
sectors
saw significant territorial gains being made,
many of which were
returned to Pakistan
after the UN-sponsored
ceasefire of January
1949.
When
Lieutenant
General B.M. Kaul, the
controversial
corps
commander of the
newly formed and illfated 4 Corps, took suddenly ill with high altitude sickness days
before the Chinese

his troops to put up a

tough fight in the given
circumstances.
The
return of captured territory in 1947-48 and the
setbacks of 1962 troubled Harbaksh and he
vowed to set things right
whenever
presented
with an opportunity to
do so. He was to get his
chance as general officer commanding of the
Indian armys premier
Western Command as
war clouds loomed on
the horizon in 1965.
Tough, unyielding and
a demanding commander, Harbaksh was in the
thick of action July-

operated extensively in
the Kashmir Valley during the 1947-48 conflict, Harbaksh knew the
terrain like the back of
his hand and had regular
forces waiting at almost
all
entry
points.
Actively complementing his surface force
action were 10 Mi-4
helicopters operating
from Srinagar airfield
in armed helicopter and
casualty
evacuation
roles. Not many know
that this was the first
offensive action by the
IAFs helicopter fleet
and the story of their
induction into Srinagar

Harbaksh
acknowledged, acted as a
morale booster and
delivered the coercive
effect
he
wanted.
Success against the
infiltrators gave him
immense confidence to
tackle subsequent battles on the western front
with an aggressive
mindset.
Foremost
among these was the
recapture of Haji Pir
Pass on August 28,
1965
by
1
Para
Battalion under the
leadership of Major
Ranjit Singh Dayal.
When
the
guns
boomed in Chhamb on

September 1 and the

Indian armys forward
defences wilted under
the overwhelming firepower of Pakistani
Patton tanks, artillery
and
Sabre
jets,
Harbaksh held firm and
demanded that his
forces counter-attack
rather than hastily redeploy at Akhnur. It was
at his insistence that the
forward defensive line
rallied around Jaurian
and
blunted
the
Pakistani
offensive,
while the main divisional defences were
strengthened at Akhnur.
This rearguard action
allowed Harbaksh sufficient time to launch his
offensive in the Lahore
and Sialkot sectors and
deflect the immense
pressure building up in
Chhamb.
A strapping six-footer
with an intimidating
presence, he was neither as charismatic as
Thimayya, nor as innovative as Sagat Singh of
Bangladesh
fame.
Renowned
for
his
meticulous attention to
detail and staff checks,
and a relentless belief in
counter-attacks
and
offence as the best form
of defence, Harbaksh
was more in the mould
of the German generals
of the Wehrmacht like
Heinz Guderian and
Gerd von Rundstedt.
His operational account
of the 1965 war, War
Despatches, remains the
most detailed account
of the war from an
Indian army perspective. By every yardstick, he was the epitome of good soldiering
and leadership tough
as nails and strong as
steel.
(Courtesy:
Indian
Express)

Fed and the unknowns

By Bhaskar
Chakravorti

he global economic
policy elite have
been tuning in to
goings-on in an outpost
along the valley floor of
the majestic Teton mountains in the northwestern
United States. I speak, of
course, of the annual lateAugust confab of central
bankers and economists
hosted by the Federal
Reserve Bank of Kansas
City in Jackson Hole.
Picture-perfect Jackson
Hole, for one, is far from
anybodys conception of
a hole. It is also far from
Kansas City. Most importantly, it is far from the
dismal everyday realities
for the muckety-mucks
of the world monetary
order, who must make the
trip to step back and
challenge their assumptions, according to a
very pleasant history of
the confab put out by the
organisers. This year, try
as they might to step back
from it, the recent gyrations of stockmarkets
from Shanghai to Wall
Street could not have
been too far from any
attendees mind.
This year also happened to be the 10th
anniversary
of
a
University of Chicago
professor,
Raghuram
Rajan, taking the message of challenging
assumptions a little too
seriously and attracting
the scorn of the Jackson
Hole elite. He had badmouthed the most celebrated of financial innovations, the likes of credit-default swaps and
mortgage-backed securities, claiming that they
were creating conditions
for a full-blown financial crisis (in his words).
It didnt take more than
three years for him to be
proven right and for the

elite to have egg on their

faces.
In response to the crash
of 2008, the US Federal
Reserve had taken the
unprecedented step of
dropping its benchmark
interest rate to a level
close to zero and keeping
it there for almost seven
years. Now, Fed officials
are considering whether
it is time to raise the rate

global investors to park

more of their money in
the US, instead of in
EMs. This, in turn, could
affect their currencies,
exports
and
even
employment
levels.
India, too, has reason to
be following these issues
closely, though it is less
fragile than it was even a
year ago. Like other
EMs, India may have to

aback by the persistence

of low inflation in the
country. Inflation was
still running at just 1.2
per cent a year well
below the Feds target of
2 per cent. It is useful to
recall that the Fed has
been tasked by the US
Congress to maximise
employment and maintain stable prices. Despite
the steadiness of the post-

in Chinas economy, and

we can expect further
declines in commodity
prices. This means there
will be further risk that
the Fed will not make its
inflation target. In such
scenarios, an argument
can be made for a return
to further monetary easing, rather than a rate
hike.
A third uncertainty

to more normal levels;

this, in fact, was the talk
of Jackson Hole this year
and the reason why there
was so much worldwide
interest in the gathering.
In a recent interview,
now RBI Governor Rajan
cautioned: If you are not
careful about the volatility you are creating, the
others have to respond
and everybody is worse
off. It would be wise for
the Jackson Hole elite to
listen to the man.
To be clear, interest
rate increases by the Fed
profoundly affect the
emerging markets (EMs)
in particular. A rate hike
would likely lead to a
stronger dollar, causing

build up reserves as a
cushion against any
potential fallout from the
Feds actions. While
cheap oil helps, in topping up its reserves, India
will be decreasing its
demand for goods from
the US and elsewhere.
The Jackson Hole gathering ended without a
clear sign of the Feds
intent on next steps. The
debates at the confab do
point to some central
dilemmas for central
bankers. Three major
uncertainties will give the
Fed reason to take a deep
breath before making any
decisions.
For one, US policymakers have been taken

2008 recovery, wage

growth in the US has so
far been modest.
Couple this with the
disappointing
jobs
growth numbers from
September 4, and it is not
unreasonable to expect
that there is still room to
push towards the twin
goals
of
maximum
employment and price
stability. A premature rate
hike could run the risk of
halting that process.
In addition to the present, the future is shrouded in macroeconomic
and
geopolitical
unknowns. There is continued downward pressure on oil prices. Add to
that the sharp slowdown

source is, of course,

China, and, by extension,
other EMs. Chinas debt,
at $28 trillion in 2014, is
282 per cent of its GDP.
The Shanghai index
dropped dramatically, the
government devalued the
renminbi and cut interest
rates. With falling commodity demand from
China, the currencies of
the major commoditysuppliers to China
South Africa, Brazil,
Indonesia, Russia
have been simultaneously hit. These are also
countries with severe
institutional voids and
poor political stewardship. But with EMs producing close to 40 per

cent of the global output,

a further slowdown in
these economies, triggered by higher interest
rates in the US, risks
contaminating the entire
world economy. With the
EU and Japan struggling,
the last finger in the
global economic dike is
that of the US. Pulling
that finger out to see
which way the wind is
blowing could present
many perils.
In sum, there are still
rational arguments to be
made that the best the
Fed can do for its new
normal after its upcoming September meeting is
to preserve the old
abnormal keep the
rate low. Of course, it is
also reasonable to grumble about the free ride the
low-rate regime gives to
Wall Street and the fat
cats of the banking system.
My advice? It is time
for Indias policy elite to
get beyond Jackson Hole
and placing bets on the
next shoe dropping. With
oil and commodity prices
low, this is a rare window
for India to take bolder
measures. Stop fretting
about economists presenting papers in distant
mountain retreats and get
back to the ground level:
Long-sighted
policy
reform, investment in the
long-term, fixing the
track records of poor corporate profitability and
bad loans in the state
banking system, among
others. This is a rare
opportunity to build a
more solid framework
for Indias growth in the
real economy. It is time
to be the anti-Jackson
Hole: step forward and
take actions that are
resilient, no matter which
assumptions about the
Fed or China turn out
to be true in the end.
(Courtesy:
Indian
Express)