Month: May 2020

Weather Reports: The New Frontier Of Indo-Pak war

By Dr. Krishnendra Meena

People listen to weather reports to plan their days or weeks for chores such as when to put out clothes to dry, go out etc. Perhaps the weather man never thought that weather reports can be weaponized. It is India which lobbed the first weather report bomb starting the weather report wars with Pakistan.

The strategy thought out in the secret meeting rooms of the Indian strategic defence cabals is to make a virtual claim on Pakistan Occupied Kashmir as called in India, or Azad Kashmir as named by Pakistan. ‘Doordarshan’ is under instruction to pretend that POK is Indian. It is to give the daily weather reports for all of Kashmir including POK but call it simply Kashmir.

Not to be outwitted, Pakistan retaliated with the same. They are now giving weather reports for all of Kashmir, including Jammu and Ladakh, as if they were all part of Pakistan. It is all about visual representation of territory.

Visual representations of territory have played a significant role in the national imagination of people. Nations and states have reinforced such representations through school textbooks, maps, documents, decrees and legal instruments. In the age of mass media, internet and related proliferation of information, any news can become a source of confrontation between states.

ALSO READ: Trump’s India Visit: Geopolitics & Strategy

The Indian official television broadcaster, Doordarshan, has adopted a new media offensive now for over a week. Weather bulletins on Doordarshan and All India Radio have started featuring weather forecasts of Mirpur, Muzaffarabad and Gilgit-Baltistan area of Kashmir over which Pakistan has territorial control and India claims the territory. In a reaction to this, Pakistan has carried weather reports of the Indian side of Kashmir on its official television channels.

Notably, Indian broadcasts follow the bifurcation of the state of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) into two Union Territories (Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh) under the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganization Act, 2019 in August 2019.  In the same month, India had already revoked Article 370 of Indian Constitution which accorded special status to the state of Jammu and Kashmir, and involved special provisions for the residents of J&K. Pakistan at that point had raised the issue at the United Nations without much success. India is now unravelling its grand design and making people imagine POK as if it is part of India.

Geopolitically, this is a well-known strategy of claiming territory with the approach of place-naming and place-making and establishing a norm through repeated usage of suitable nomenclature that the place belongs to us. Examples abound of creation of a sense of belonging by such means by India’s erstwhile colonizers, the British. Historically the British were an important factor in the current territorial dispute at India’s northern expanse as to who the territory belongs to.

ALSO READ: India Must Remain Involved In Taliban Deal

An important task of the state is to invoke a territorial image of the state and familiarize the larger population with it. School textbooks and official maps play this role effectively to make its territory and places legible for the state population. Place-making often involves creation of new activities, economic or otherwise at a particular location. In this case, the weather forecasts is one such activity, with which not only the Indian State but the people can also identify.

As critical geographical as it may sound today to investigate the British colonialist and imperial exercises, it is instructive that such methods of place-naming and place-making have existed even in ancient Indian texts like Puranas, the Epics and related texts. The geographical references to seven dwipas, including Jambu Dwipa cover the whole Eurasian expanse in detail with Mount Meru (The Pamir) as the centre of the Eurasian continent. The description stretches to as far as the Mediterranean and the Eastern coast of Africa.

Furthermore, there is astonishing detail about the orientation of the Himalayas and the adjacent mountain ranges. The river systems originating from the present-day Tibet are explained in detail with the directions of the flow of rivers. The “Puranas” include, the origin of the universe and the earth, the oceans and continents, mountain systems of the world, regions and their people and astronomical geography” (Ali, 1966). However such detailed descriptions were never laden with the ideas of capture or control of territory but only for the sake of geographical knowledge.

Within this literature, the expanse of Bharatvarsa is mentioned in detail on numerous occasions. This fact of geographical unity of the subcontinent remained unchanged and unchallenged until the moment of partition in 1947. The partition in 1947 essentially created a rupture in the regional, human and physical geography of the Indian sub-continent into two separate states of India and Pakistan. Perhaps, it is this longer geo-historical imagination that takes precedence over recent history since partition when the weather reports are broadcast on the national television channels.

ALSO READ: Pakistan’s Contradictions: Kashmir And Kartarpur

The territorial claims in Kashmir are now becoming more visible and perhaps a beginning of a new geopolitical imagination of post 1947 India is being given shape and root.

Since 2014, the Indian government’s approach under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been quite assertive on the issue of Kashmir and related terrorism emanating from Pakistan. The response to acts of terrorism has been more in terms of military action at the Line of Control, But for the first time a nuanced approach to visually construct that represents the whole Kashmir as Indian, has been adopted.

Reports indicate that Mr. Ajit Doval, the National Security Advisor who is also an intelligence expert on Pakistan, has been instrumental in developing and implementing this strategy of weather forecasting of the larger territory of Kashmir and thereby indicating that it is Indian. On the other hand, reactions of the international community may only become evident when real world diplomacy resumes after the end of the global shutdown due to the CoVID19 pandemic. Until then, the otherwise innocuous weather report, produced by non-political meteorologists, has become the new political battle ground between India and Pakistan.

Dr Krishnendra Meena is Assistant Professor and teaches at School of International studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi

Navy On High Alert As Cyclone Hits Bengal, Orissa

By LokMarg

In the wake of Cyclone Amphan, the Eastern Naval Command (ENC) is monitoring the developments in the Bay of Bengal closely and ships at Visakhapatnam have been kept on standby to proceed to affected areas to undertake humanitarian aid, distress relief, evacuation, and logistic support.

According to the India Meteorological Department (IMD), Cyclone Amphan is likely to make landfall between Digha (West Bengal) and Hatiya Islands (Bangladesh) close to Sundarbans near afternoon today and is likely to cause havoc in parts of Odisha and West Bengal.

According to the Indian Navy, these ships are embarked with additional divers, doctors, inflatable rubber boats and relief material including food, tentage, clothes, medicines, blankets in sufficient quantities.

Additionally, 20 rescue teams with Gemini boats and medical teams are also kept ready for augmenting rescue and relief efforts in Odisha and West Bengal. Naval aircraft are also standing by at the Naval Air Stations INS Dega at Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh and INS Rajali at Arakkonam, Tamilnadu to undertake reconnaissance, rescue, and casualty evacuation if required.

The ENC is also coordinating with the state administrations in Odisha and West Bengal to augment rescue and relief operations as needed.

The IMD has issued a warning for heavy to very heavy rainfall at isolated places over north coastal Odisha (Balasore, Bhadrak, Mayurbhanj, Jajpur, Kendrapara and Keonjhargarh Districts) and isolated heavy falls over Jagatsinghpur district for today. It has also predicted heavy falls at isolated places in the Gangetic West Bengal (east and west Medinipur, south and north 24 Parganas, Howrah, Hoogli, Kolkata and adjoining districts). (ANI)

Domestic Flight Ops To Restart From May 25: Govt

By LokMarg

Union Minister Hardeep Singh Puri on Wednesday announced that domestic civil aviation operations will resume in a calibrated manner from May 25 onwards. The minister said that all airports and air carriers are being informed to be ready for operations from May 25.

“Domestic civil aviation operations will recommence in a calibrated manner from Monday 25th May 2020. All airports and air carriers are being informed to be ready for operations from 25th May,” Civil Aviation Minister Puri wrote on Twitter.

He also said that Standard operating procedure (SOPs) for passenger movement is also being separately issued by the Ministry of Civil Aviation.

Earlier, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) had issued a statement and said “All scheduled commercial passenger flights have been suspended till May 31 midnight. Foreign and domestic airlines shall be suitably informed about the opening of their operations whether international to or from India or domestic, respectively, in due course.”

This decision came after the government extended the lockdown till May 31.

Domestic flights in the country have been prohibited since March 25 when the first lockdown was enforced to contain the spread of coronavirus.

(ANI)

‘Priyanka’s Targeting Of UP Govt Shows Cong Hypocrisy’

By LokMarg

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday hit out Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra over her barbs at the UP government on the issue of migrant workers, saying that states, where Congress was in power, had seen few trains arriving with migrant workers and it shows ‘hypocrisy of Congress.’

In an interview with ANI Editor Smita Prakash, Sitharaman said that if Priyanka Gandhi was really focused about UP government, she should see why 300 trains arrived in the state when not even five to seven trains arrived in Chhattisgarh.

The minister said that she does not want to politicise the issue and everyone should work together in the extraordinary situation created by the coronavirus crisis.

“If she’s really focused about UP government, she should see why 300 trains arrived in UP when not even five-seven arrived in Chhattisgarh. Don’t want to politicise this as migrants are Indians and all of us in this extraordinary situation should concentrate and work together,” she said.

“Three hundred trains as opposed to 7. I’m not saying the size of the populations is comparable but the migrants probably are comparable. Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand – the numbers may be comparable to entire UP put together. This is unfair, dirty and clearly shows the hypocrisy of Congress,” she added.

Congress had on Wednesday slammed the Yogi Adityanath government over 1,000 buses arranged by the party “not being allowed” to enter the State to carry migrant workers to their homes. Priyanka Gandhi also spoke on the issue on Wednesday through the party’s social media platforms.

(ANI)

5,611 New Cases In 24 Hours, Covid-19 Tally At 1,06,750

By LokMarg

With 5,611 new cases reported in the last 24 hours, India’s COVID-19 tally reached 1,06,750 on Wednesday, according to the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.

As many as 140 deaths have been reported in the last 24 hours, taking the total number of deaths to 3,303.

Out of the total cases, 61,149 are actives cases and 42,298 patients have been cured/discharged/migrated.

Maharashtra continues to remain the worst-affected state with 37,136 cases, followed by Tamil Nadu (12,448 cases), Gujarat (12,140 cases), and Delhi (10,554 cases).

The nationwide lockdown imposed as a precautionary measure to contain the spread of coronavirus has been extended till May 31.

(ANI)

Teenager

‘Online Classes, PUBG, Web Series… Lockdown Is Cool’

By LokMarg

Vaibhav, a Class 9 student in Delhi-NCR, says teenagers have adapted to digital mediums better than grown-ups. Other than not being able to indulge in outdoor sports, his life hasn’t changed much during lockdown.

I am a student of Class 9 and we are deep in the middle of changes brought about by Coronavirus. Schools have been closed for really long now and we are getting used to online classes.  Earlier, mobile phones were an important part of our lives, but now they have overtaken every aspect of our lives. Due to lockdown, we aren’t able to go out anywhere. So the phone is the real go-to place now:  to attend lectures, to play PUBG games with friends and catching up with new web series on online apps.

As teenagers, our understanding and comfort levels with digital mediums is better than adults. That is why we have adapted to the lockdown better than most other grown-ups. Digital mediums make you feel part of a wider world.

ALSO READ: ‘Lockdown Made My Kids Prospective Chefs’

I was a huge PUBG fan before lockdown too, but my friends and I would also play basketball, go cycling and swimming. Ours is a huge society and I have nearly 50 friends here with whom I could interact on a regular basis. The physical interaction now has stopped; now it happens through Zoom calls. From morning to 2 pm, I attend online classes. Then I play PUBG for some time and again between 7-8 pm.

I do miss physical interaction with my friends at our housing society and school. Nothing can replace the fun that friends can have together. Thus, our school has ensured that everyday the first period online will be an interactive session and we will start studying our various subjects only after the second period.

ALSO READ: ‘Lockdown Hasn’t Changed Much, But I Miss Eating Out’

I don’t what’s going to happen in the future but for right now I am happy that our teachers have made the transition from traditional classroom to online classroom quite easily. We are having some difficulties with uploading heavy files but overall things are going smoothly.

If the lockdown is further extended beyond May 31, it would affect us, but not as much as others. It has been too long that we have been in lockdown now. At the same time we understand the seriousness of the matter and are ready to follow all government guidelines to keep ourselves and our countrymen safe.

No Lockdown For Liquor

By Mahendra Ved

One change the Coronavirus pandemic has unleashed in India’s private and public lives that was unimaginable only a few weeks ago, is of the state conducting home deliveries of alcohol.

It is dictated by stampedes at many places across the country when the liquor vends re-opened after 40 days’ lockdown, burying physical distancing in the dust. They got even the Supreme Court to nudge state governments to consider online sales and home delivery.

This is a radical departure in a tradition-bound country with a diverse population that practices faiths many of which, per se, disapprove of alcohol consumption.

Add to this, the cultural mores. Although history is replete with evidence of soma, sure and shiraz and mythological narratives talk of ancient Indians drinking, there is no reference to it in Ramayan and Mahabharat, two of the mythology-backed TV serials currently being re-run to keep the Corona-hit locked-in people entertained and home. 

ALSO READ: Will DD Re-Run Sustain Epic Magic?

Whether drink-at-doorstep is progress or if Indians have turned ‘modern’ is debatable. The age-old squeamishness about alcohol consumption has been given a go-bye for the greed to generate revenue, by even adding a hefty “Corona Cess”.  Necessity has become the virtue for central and all state governments except Gujarat, Bihar and Nagaland and the Lakshadweep union territory. It’s supposedly temporary, but one can’t be too sure of the future.

Two very apt lines have gone viral on the social media: “When a drunken man falls, nobody lifts him. But when the economy falls, all the drinking men gather to lift it.”   

Significantly, there is no objection from the politico-cultural czars who dictate what people should wear, eat and drink. They don’t seem to mind their governments profiting from selling liquor. Eschewing beef and bovine urine talk and dress diktats for now, they have shut their eyes to the ill-clad families of daily-wage workers, left hungry and unpaid by their contractors, walking back, shoe-less, from big cities to their villages hundreds of kilometer away.

This tragically contrasts with opening of the liquor vends, especially when the same Supreme Court says it “can’t stop them from walking.”

ALSO READ: The Invisible Indian In Pandemics

This modern-day Marie Antoinettes’ culture is omnipresent. With Gandhi and those who worked with the Mahatma long gone, the original ‘nashabandi’ adherents, now down-and-on-the-political- periphery, are also silent. They never took Prohibition seriously when they ruled and made money, conveniently ignoring Article 47 of India’s Constitution. Also a Directive Principle of State Policy, it prescribes: “….the State shall endeavor to bring about prohibition of the consumption except for medicinal purposes of intoxicating drinks and of drugs which are injurious to health”.

All are guilty of shedding principle for practical reasons. Truth be told, Prohibition does not win votes and drains the exchequer. The law, whenever and wherever applied, has been impossible to enforce given the porous international and inter-state borders. Past experiments that failed were by C. Rajagopalachari (old Madras State) and N T Ramarao (old Andhra Pradesh).

Nitish Kumar’s Bihar is the current example. Prohibition is non-debatable in Gujarat, although liquor flows in from nearby states. Erstwhile Bombay state developed ‘bevda’ (double-distilled hooch) culture till as Maharashtra, influenced by its powerful sugar lobby, it gradually went wet.

Alcohol has definitely ruined millions of families. Men resort to domestic violence, incur debt and take to crime. In segments of society where women, too, drink, damage is compounded, without giving women any social or economic advantage.  

Besides some committed NGOs, women where organized in groups, perhaps, remain the sole Prohibition supporters. Liquor bans have often spared them from penury and domestic violence. Sadly, Coronavirus has weakened these womenfolk, seemingly ending the debate if Prohibition delivers medically, socially and/or morally.

The ground has been laid over long years by going easy on collective conscience. Late Jayalalithaa financed her ‘Amma’ welfare schemes for the poor from excise revenue. Things were not different earlier, and not just in Tamil Nadu. They gain momentum before each election when freebies are distributed to the electorate.

If alcohol quenches thirst or kills, it also sanitizes. Thus sanitizers, direly needed to combat Caronavirus has alcoholic content, were consumes by many in Karnataka as a substitute to alcohol. Taking the cue as it were, some liquor manufacturers have used their expertise to make satinizers and donate them. Surely, they also serve who rinse their hands with sanitizer – before lifting the peg.

ALSO READ: Coronavirus, Nemesis Of The Age Of Reason

Money remains the mantra. Alcohol sale delivered over 15 percent of tax revenues for 21 states in 2018-19. Earnings range from Punjab (Rs 5,000 crores) to Tamil Nadu (Rs 30,000 crores). Going by the booze-boom, the 2020-21 fiscal should witness a whopping rise for all.

These official figures, however, conceal inter-state smuggling and hooch produced and sold through the unorganized sector, statistics for which are seldom available.

India consumed 2.4 litres of alcohol per capita in 2005, which increased to 4.3 litres in 2010 and scaled up to 5.7 litres in 2016, a doubling in 11 years, as per a WHO report. Hence, the estimate to reach about 6.5 billion liters by the end of this year may be upwardly revised.  

“The big picture is that this is the right approach even if Covid were not wreaking havoc,” declares a Times of India editorial in support of home delivery. It seeks to draw a global picture of Covid-driven liquor policies adopted by different countries, confidently adding that “none have reported a conversion to teetotalerism.”

A “non-prohibition” U.S. has seen $2 billion more spent on alcohol in stores since the start of March than last year. Mexico has kept its citizens dry but also kept tequila production going and tequila exports have soared. Sri Lankans have taken to home brewing in the face of their government’s ban on booze.”

Historically, Prohibition is a failed notion the world over. The idea of restrictions on the use and trade of alcohol has punctuated known human history; the earliest can be traced to the Code of Hammurabi, the Babylonian law of 1754 BC Mesopotamia. In the early 20th century, Protestants tried prohibition in North America, the Russians between 1914 and 1925, and the US between 1920 and 1933.

Having presented both sides of the picture within this space, as a social drinker, I must confess to tilting towards ending Prohibition, but with caveats and controls that should come from within. Drinking, after all, is a personal choice that should have family consent and of course, economic and medical ability.   

But one thing is sure: Coronavirus compulsions are unlikely to end this to-drink-or-not-to-drink debate.

The writer can be reached at mahendraved07@gmail.com

PM Reviews Preparations On Cyclone In Bay Of Bengal

By LokMarg

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday chaired a high-level meeting to review the response measures against cyclone ‘Amphan’ developing in the Bay of Bengal.

The Prime Minister took full stock of the situation and reviewed the response preparedness as well as the evacuation plan presented by the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF).

“During the presentation of the response plan, DG NDRF informed that 25 NDRF teams have been deployed on the ground while 12 others are ready in reserve. 24 other NDRF teams are also on standby in different parts of the country,” a PMO release said.

The meeting was attended by Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Principal Advisor to the Prime Minister PK Sinha, Cabinet Secretary Rajiv Gauba and some other senior officials.

The Ministry of Earth Sciences has said that super cyclonic storm ‘Amphan’ over west-central and adjoining central parts of south Bay of Bengal moved nearly northwards with a speed of seven kmph during past six hours and lay centred at 2.30 pm over westcentral and adjoining central parts of south Bay of Bengal, about 730 km nearly south of Paradip (Odisha), 890 km south-southwest of Digha (West Bengal) and 1010 km south-southwest of Khepupara (Bangladesh).

It said the storm is very likely to move nearly northwards for some more time and then north-northeastwards across northwest Bay of Bengal and cross West Bengal-Bangladesh coasts between Digha (West Bengal) and Hatiya Islands (Bangladesh) close to Sundarbans during the afternoon or evening of May 20 as an Extremely Severe Cyclonic Storm with maximum sustained wind speed of 165-175 kmph gusting to 185 kmph.

(ANI)

UP Accepts Priyanka Request For 1,000 Buses For Migrants

By LokMarg

Uttar Pradesh government on Monday agreed to Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra’s request to run 1,000 buses for migrant labourers.

Additional Chief Secretary (Home) Avnish Awasthi wrote to the personal secretary of Gandhi informing her in this regard and also sought details of the 1,000 buses.

Earlier, the Congress leader had requested Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath to allow the buses arranged by her party, to enter the State in order to take migrant labourers to their homes.

Gandhi took to Twitter and posted a video featuring buses queued up in a row.

“Our buses are standing at the border. Thousands of migrants and labourers are walking in the heat. Please give permission CM Yogi Adityanath ji, let us help our brothers and sisters,” Gandhi wrote.

In another tweet, she wrote, “Respected Chief Minister, I am requesting you, this is not the time for politics. Our buses are standing on the border. Thousands of labourers and migrants, without eating anything, are walking towards their homes. Let us help them, give permission to our buses.” (ANI)

Delhi Shops Can Open On Odd-Even Basis: Kejriwal

By LokMarg

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Monday announced that markets in the national capital can open but shops are allowed to operate only on an odd-even basis during the lockdown period till May 31.

The Chief Minister said that sports complexes and stadiums can open but without spectators.

“Markets can open but shops will open on odd-even basis. Sports complexes and stadiums can open but without spectators,” Kejriwal said here in a press conference.

The essential goods and neighbourhood shops will remain open during the lockdown.

Moreover, the shops that fail to maintain social distancing will be closed, he said.

The National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) on Sunday asked Ministries/Departments of the Government of India, State Governments and State Authorities to continue the lockdown measures up to May 31.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday had announced that the nationwide coronavirus lockdown will be extended to a fourth phase with “totally different” rules. (ANI)