Water and Gas

A very pertinent article pointing out how the priorities of developed and developing countries differ and why they should work together to save mother earth

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Opinion/Editorial/LEADER_ARTICLE_Death_By_Water/articleshow/2041744.cms

LEADER ARTICLE: Death By Water
14 May, 2007 l 0009 hrs ISTlARUN MAIRA

The hottest issue on the planet this summer is climate change by global warming. Several reports have put the issue on the front burner - Al Gore's documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, Nick Stern's assessment of the economic impacts of climate change, and the IPCC's exhaustive analysis of its causes and potential solutions. Leaders must act with haste because they may already be too late. Indian Parliament took up the issue on May 8.

The heightened pressure for action is creating political fissures. The industrial nations acknowledge they have created the problem. While they enhanced their economic might, they overused and misused resources, building a huge stack of green-houses in the earth's atmosphere.

To which, these nations say, the developing nations dare not add any more and therefore must now find new technologies and new ways to develop their economies. "The truth about climate change policy", writes Lawrence Summers, "is that deve- loping countries are where most of the action must be". Their economies are growing and using more energy and natural resources (albeit more frugally than the rich nations when they grew) and in the process many millions are rising out of poverty. In fact, faster economic growth rather than direct assistance to the poor is the mantra that economists like Summers preach. So what is the way out now?

The reality is that climate change is everybody's problem, whosoever caused it. Both rich countries and developing ones will have to change policies and adopt new technologies. While asking their citizens for support to stop further damage to the environment, western leaders ask them, 'What is the world you want to bequeath your grandchildren'? Such an appeal is too far out for India's masses.

They are anxious about their conditions here and now - their jobs, their incomes, and inflation in prices (especially of food). They are also concerned about nutrition, health, and education of the children they already have - not their grandchildren to come. For Indians, in cities and villages, the urgent environmental issue is not the dwindling of polar ice and Himalayan glaciers. It is the water that is no longer flowing in their taps (if they have them), their dwindling rivers and ponds, and the falling water table. For them, water for drinking, cooking, sanitation, and growing food, and not greenhouse gases, is the urgent environmental issue.

The environment (and climate) is a global system. Like God (for the believers), it touches people everywhere. As with God, we must make our connections to the environment and climate in our own ways. Therefore, if we want the issue of climate change to unite and not divide us, we must be free to approach it in ways that matter to each of us, so long as the solutions we find do not prevent others from obtaining theirs.

Delhi's government is struggling to find water for its citizens. It is appealing to neighbouring states that are also strained to find water for their own towns and farmers. Many other Indian states are quarrelling with each other for dwindling water sources which they share. Even in Florida, southern Australia, and western USA - all rich regions of the world - access to water has become a divisive issue between communities and states.

India must take a lead in finding solutions to the global environmental crisis. Indian leaders will need the support of the country's people to make the policy changes required. Issues must be framed appropriately to make the right emotional connections when support is required for tough decisions. For many in India and elsewhere in the developing world, the environmental crisis is immediately and mostly about water. It is not so much about energy and emissions - which form the core of the climate change agenda in western minds.

Therefore, while 'climate change' may be the right way to represent the environmental crisis to people in developed countries, water must take centre stage to win more support from India's masses. Climate change may sound a bit up in the air to people struggling to have water here and now. In fact, the problem of global governance, according to political scientist Robert Dahl, is that decisions about issues like global trade and global warming are being taken by clubs of global elites who are not sufficiently connected with the masses in their own countries.

No doubt, India and China will have to address issues of energy and emissions. Solutions to these problems along with solutions to the water crisis will require innovations and investments. Capital to fund these innovations must flow to developing countries from the developed countries that have accumulated the capital as they grew their economies by processes which, they admit, have damaged the environment.

The rich should consider it their moral responsibility to provide financial support to developing countries on issues concerning global warming - and not adopt a typical financier's approach. Finally, because India, the world's largest democracy, must take the lead in finding practical solutions, its leaders (and the global elite) must consider that sustainable livelihoods and water (along with energy) matter as much or more to its people than abstractions of climate change and economics.

The writer is a management consultant.

Some logic at last

Much has been said in the past few months about the flaws in the Mandal Commission’s conclusion that 52% of India’s population is OBC. For the first time someone has made an attempt to defend it. The writer is SS Gill, member-secretary, Mandal Commission. Read the article at

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Opinion/Editorial/Counting_caste/articleshow/2019868.cms

SS Gill takes pains to elucidate how the Mandal Commission identified indicators of social backwardness, most of which were economic indicators. He claims the sample was adequate and representative and hence correctly identified the Backward Castes. He then justifies using the 1931 census data to identify their percentage in the population by arguing that the proportion of various groups in the Indian population should have more or less remained the same. So once OBCs have been identified on the basis of ‘objective’ criteria their proportion can then be extrapolated from the 1931 census. Simple!!! But flawed!!

The Mandal survey was carried out in 1978. 30 years have gone by since then and Indians’ average income and standard of living has risen. Many of the castes would no longer qualify as OBC on the basis of the same criteria used by the Mandal Commission.

The second objection of anti-quota protestors is that quota, if any, should be for backward people and not backward castes. The creamy layer of the backward castes should be excluded and by the same logic backward people of the ‘forward’ castes should be eligible for the quota. Neither Mandal Commission nor the Govt. has an answer to this

Now this is news!!!!

A French bulldog feeds a 2-week old baby Bengal tiger, which was rejected by its mother at Shirotori zoo in Japan. The dog is nursing the baby tiger as if it were his biological mother


2 brothers


2 roosters play with a rubber ball in Shenyang, China. They regularly play with the ball ever since the owner found it 3 months ago

Nimra, a one year old cat, sits with her kittens and seven chicks in Amman. Nimra has been taking care of the chicks after their mother's death a month ago

US Hypocricy

"With two carrier strike groups in the Gulf, we're sending clear messages to friends and adversaries alike," – Dick Cheney says in an apparent warning to Iran.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2007/05/11/cheney-warns-iran-with-_n_48248.html

These kinds of statements will just give more ammo to the hardliners in Iran. Cheney is a fool if he thinks this will intimidate Iran into backing off on the nuclear stand-off.

Which brings me to the issue of who is right on the nuclear weapons issue? As much as I admire so many aspects of American society today and abhor the regressive Arab society, I am very uncomfortable with the US foreign policy and its self-arrogated role of policeman of the world.

When the US and other nuclear powers continue to hold their nuclear weapons it is downright unfair of them to expect others not to pursue the same. Every country, no matter what kind of regime is there, has the right to defend itself and pursue all means for the same. The US has no right to ask Iran or North Korea to abandon their weapons programs, leave alone India and Pakistan. And why is it quiet about Israel’s weapons. Just because it is an ally?

A related issue is the US’s doublespeak on freedom, human rights and democracy. No one should be fooled into believing that the US believes in upholding these. The only thing US foreign policy strives for is US interests which, frankly speaking, is what every country should strive for. And in keeping with this policy the US has ignored human rights violations by allies (Israel being the prime example) and has plotted against democratically elected governments which were anti-US (lots of examples here incl. many South American leftist govts.). It has also propped up and tolerated autocratic regimes friendly to itself. Don’t forget that the US supported Saddam and Iraq up to the Gulf War just because he was anti-Iran. The irony is that Saddam was a dictator and in Iran there was a popular regime which, though not elected, had the people’s support. What was Iran’s crime? That it had thrown out an unpopular ruler who was friendly to the US and put in place a dispensation which was anti-US (what else can you expect if you were the biggest supporter of the unpopular ruler). And we can’t forget it’s misadventure in Afghanistan which has fuelled Islamic terrorists and its continued support for autocratic Pakistan (incl. threatening democratic India with a warship in the 1971 war. Thank God the Russians thwarted them)

The US can say whatever it wants but it doesn’t care a fig about others, it only cares for its self interest. Unfortunately it takes a short-term view on securing its interests and those actions return to haunt it later.

India is no saint on these fronts but I will write about that some other time.

Media's Folly

Today's ET carries an article '166.5 MV - That's Centre's Generous Contribution to help state tide over 6000 MV shortfall'. It calls this an irony and the amount of electricity offered 'ridiculous'.

Hullo!!! Are other states supposed to cut their share of power just because Maharashtra has ignored power for years and according to reports it doesn't look like it is taking it seriously now either. The progress on new power plants in Maharashtra is very slow.

Sometimes the Media in trying to make an article 'sensational' ends up giving a completely wrong picture

Should industries be given free land?

An MLA in Karnataka has once again accused Infosys of being hungry for land. This is an issue which rears its head every once in a while but no one has a solution for it.

The rationale for giving land free or cheap to industries is that once they set up shop they will create employment in that area and also brings other benefits too. The project will not be feasible if they have to pay market prices for the land.

The main argument against this is that years later when the area has developed these companies can sell it off at exorbitant rates thus turning them into real estate companies!! Just look at the mills in Mumbai which got land for free. Today their promoters have shut shop and are selling the land for hundreds of crores. Is this fair? Certainly not.

The solution is to lease the land, not give it away. It can be a long term lease renewable at the option of the company as long as it operates there. No sub-lease rights allowed. Companies will argue that the money they put in to develop the land will go waste if they decide to shift out. To take care of that we can have a clause whereby the property will be sold and the company will get the development cost plus interest from the sale proceeds and the government keeps the rest. Fair enuff.

Another allegation by politicians is that some companies ask for more land than they think is required. Politicians say the state should not be giving land for recreational facilities et al which companies like Infosys provide to the employees. How come they forget all the facilities they have the state provide for them? Also the company may be asking for more land keeping in mind future expansion plans. What if the govt. doesn’t give more land then? It is better to take it all at once. In this case the company should reveal its future plans in advance. It can be given the extra land then with a provision that if it does not develop it as originally envisaged then it will revert back to the government.

Powerless Maharashtra

For years now Maharashtra has been facing a power crisis. The government (whichever party is in power) only makes noises about it but does precious little. They are still pinning their hopes on restarting the Dabhol project which has been a white elephant for long. Agreed an asset has been built and you should try to utilize it. But not if it is going to cost you more over the years than if you build a new plant with coal as the fuel.

But through all this Mumbai has been kept insulated. Though Mumbaikars like me rejoice at this it is blatantly unfair to the rest of Maharashtra. What sin has the rest of Maharashtra committed? I’m sure that if this goes on for some more time there will be major protests against it.

If this goes on it will further weaken Maharashtra attractiveness to industries. Already TN, Gujarat and others are either snapping at its heel or have overtaken it as far as new investments are concerned. It would be sad to see it go the way of West Bengal if things don’t improve.

The Day After Tomorrow

Every day we get news of further evidence of global warming and what its effects are likely to be. The events shown in the movie ‘The Day After Tomorrow’ now seems plausible.

By now majority of people in the US must also have accepted this fact (save a few people in the administration) But the big question is what are we going to do to slow it down? Whose responsibility should it be? Should developed countries bear the sole responsibility or should developing countries pitch in too?

Efforts are on throughout the world to develop greener technologies whether it be in car engines or in industrial processes. But there is large scale focused effort yet. Through the Kyoto Protocol the EU has taken some responsibility but it is not sufficient. At some time the US and developing countries like India and China will have to pitch in. Developing countries need to understand that they will be hardest hit by global warming and hence they must do their bit to prevent it. Developed countries may expect India and China to sacrifice some of their growth for the environment. But I don’t think this will be acceptable to them. Why should they not strive to raise their living standards to those of the West? It is the development of the West that has caused a lot of this damage and they have a right to cause as much. At best they can offer to implement the green technologies developed by the West to lessen the impact of their growth. But these technologies will have to come cheap.

The biggest source of global warming has been found to be methane emissions by cattle but there has been absolutely no effort yet to tackle this source of warming. Surely there will now be research on genetic modifications to reduce this.

Another big source of methane is paddy cultivation. Here again better quality seeds and improved cultivations methods can make a huge difference.

In both these cases India, China, Russia and other developing countries will have to play a major part in reducing emissions.

The time has come for a concerted global effort. We must act fast or we will see our cities drowning very soon

Uniploar cricket world

The world of cricket has become unipolar. There are the others and then there are the Aussies. World Cup 2007 was the most one sided world cup I have seen. While 15 other teams were able to match each other none of them came even close to challenging the Aussies. The Aussies didn’t lose a single match, they didn’t even come close to losing any!!

I don’t believe the other teams were short on talent. But what the others (especially India and Pakistan) lacked was confidence, determination, discipline and attitude.

When Matt Hayden or Ricky Ponting play they don’t have to worry about what will happen if they get out. They know the next guy is as capable as them. He will come out and hammer the opposition. They have confidence in each other’s abilities. Contrast that with India. I’m sure that when Sachin plays he would be thinking that if he gets out and another wicket also falls quickly it will be disaster.

Then there is the question of determination. For the Aussies nothing is impossible. They will keep trying. Other teams have been known to give up easily. I still remember that match where Prabhakar and Mongia faced a run-a-ball target but still played as if they had 50 more overs to bat.

When Aussies bowl they bowl with discipline. McGrath is a classic example. He’s not fast. But he gets it right each time. Bowlers like Sri Lanka’s Malinga are talented but unpredictable. They may bowl 5 good balls in a over but will stray on the 6^th and the batsman will happily punish him for that.

With all this comes an attitude, a belief that they are the best. Way to go Aussies.

Democracy killed in an encounter

The Sohrabuddin case takes a more ghastly turn every day. First we have news that he was killed in a fake encounter. Then we are told his wife and associate were also killed by the police to cover their tracks. And now comes the revelation that his widow might have been raped before being killed. Whether Sohrabuddin was a terrorist or not is irrelevant here. The manner in which all this took place is absolutely wrong. We are a democracy and he should have been caught and charged. We know that most criminals do get away because of our lax system but that is no excuse for this kind of goondaraj. Because here the power to decide is in the hands of a few individuals who may go about killing anyone they want without any fear of being punished.

Despite claims by the accused (and the VHP, Bajrang Dal, etc which I think should be banned outright along with their fundamentalist counterparts in the Mumbai community) that it was a patriotic act the court should go ahead and give the strictest punishment so that it sets a deterrent to future misadventures by overzealous policemen.

This case has also made other states think about the encounter that have taken place within their borders which is a welcome sign. It is no wonder today the people are afraid of the police rather than seeing them as protectors. It is high time steps are taken to correct this.

Truth goes up in smoke

The Slum Rehailitation Scheme (SRS) has been policy which politicians of all hues have endorsed with enthusiasm. And it is not difficult to see why. It had potential to generate huge revenues, for them ofcourse. There have been numerous allegations of irregularities in the scheme to benefit certain builders. I would say any builder who is ready to pay a good price.

Now that a PIL was filed to unearth the alleged corruption and its hearing was due in 3 days we get the news that a major fire broke out in the SRA office and the records destroyed. What a coincidence L And some employees say they were actually told not to come to the office on that day. The SRA CEO even had the temerity to say that suspicions of sabotage were bounds to crop up. Yet bet. With names of top politicians having cropped up and the SRA having been most unhelpful in the case so far what else are we supposed to deduce?

Sadly with the evidence already destroyed this scam will go on merrily

And today they say only some files have been destroyed....Bet those r the files with corruption written all over them