The ‘Under-Nourished’ Future of India

Ishaal Zehra

A 27 year-old Russian man, Sergei Gavrilov, killed his mother because she refused to give him her pension money so he could go for gambling and partying. He was so infuriated that he smashed her head with a brick and then strangled her. He put her out on the balcony, spent the next 2 weeks blowing through her money, and then when he discovered her body had frozen, he cannibalized her dead body, making soup and pasta from parts of her legs for over a month.

‘She was frozen, like meat in the freezer,’ he told police.
Apparently he was driven to eat his own mother’s flesh because he was starving. Or at least that’s what he claimed.

The whole story flashed in my mind while reading the latest United Nation’s Children’s Fund report that said India has the largest number of stunted children below the age of 5 in the world.

More than 90 percent of the developing world's children facing stunted growth live in Africa and Asia, the report said. One third of them -- roughly 60.8 million -- are in India alone. Out of a total of 19 million newborns per year in the developing world that are born with low birth-weight, India avow the 7.4 million low birth-weight babies per year -- the highest in the world.

The report said that "more than half of the world's chronically undernourished children under the age of 5 live in South Asia. The rates were highest in Bangladesh, India, Timor-Leste and Yemen, comprising more than 40 per cent of underweight children. India has one of the highest numbers of underweight children, below the age of five-- in the world in addition to one third of 'wasted children' (those facing a greater chance of death). Undernourished children often have poor physical health and slower mental development. When the problem is widespread, as in India and Afghanistan, it undermines those countries' ability to improve their economies and eradicate poverty.

In developing countries, almost 200 million children under the age of 5 suffer from stunted growth and health problems due to poor nutrition in their early years. Those who survive under-nutrition often suffer poorer physical health throughout their lives, and damaged cognitive abilities that limit their capacity to learn and to earn a decent income," the UNICEF chief said. "They become trapped in an intergenerational cycle of ill-health and poverty," she added.

Leaving aside the future of India, the present of India is even in the worse condition. According to another report, India is fast emerging as the Hunger Capital of the world.

As per the report released by Navdanya Trust, India is fast emerging as the hunger capital of the world with one in every four Indians going hungry. If this is any indication of an impending food crisis, the report said that 57 million children in India, the largest in the world, are underweight due to malnutrition. Although the Indian central government spends more than Rs. 32,600 crores in food subsidies, per capita food consumption has reduced from 186 kg per person annually in 1991 to 152 kg in 2001 and is gradually on the decrease.

The report said, “The food prices have doubled since 2003 and if the food prices continue to rise, the situation is not going to get any better. The report also criticized the quality of food provided at ration shops and cited genetically modified seeds and chemicals as the reason for the high cost of food production, forcing farmers to debt and ultimately suicide. The report further said that the proposed Food Security Act, based on a failed policy was only adding insult to the injury.

Most people in New Delhi are concerned about poverty situation in India and general discriminatory behaviour amongst Indians, where, a number of them were of the view that India has adopted a policy to focus and develop select group of Indian high society and bring it at par with the developed world and then take on the next segment of society for its development. As most military diplomats believed that even if India attempts to take the entire population along, still it will not be able to match the pace of progress and will be thus left behind. They have taken a sharp decision indeed as why to carry the deadlock with one. But this is not a deadlock rather a huge portion of their own population.

Many congratulations to the Indian cream of the crop on the successful launch of Dhanush, the 350 km range ship based anti-surface missile from INS Subhadra in the Bay of Bengal on December 14. This was probably the consolation after the failure of its nuclear-capable IRBM (Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile) Agni-III in May and November 2009 test firings. Furthermore the nuclear deals with the West are on the surge already, what if it’s on the cost of India’s inopportune poor masses.

A 60.8 million of Indian children with stunted growth with one in every four Indians going to death due to hunger is not easy to digest. It is a big figure to ignore. Probably, most people are very much right to believe that India has a gigantic task to lift the masses out of poverty which seems very unlikely under the prevailing corrupt and inefficient Indian society as a whole. Don’t you think it would be better to snub that farce slogan of shining India and accept the reality with facts? The money been wasted on expanding nuclear arsenals and guns and missiles budget rather be spend on helping the massive rock bottom poverty. Or else, am afraid many of “Sergei Gavrilov” would be forced to turn cannibal with no other option left for survival. It is a serious snag, provided someone pay any heed to it.

Indian Nuclear Assets Danger to the World

While the western media and the western governments keep shouting about vulnerability of Pakistans nuclear arsenal and keep expressing the fears that these are likely to fall in the hands of extremists like Taliban, they have kept their eyes wide shut regarding the state of affairs of the nuclear weapons and nuclear capable missiles of neighbouring India where the situation is highly alarming, reveal the findings of The Daily Mails investigations into the matter.

According to The Daily Mails investigations, the Indian government, in bid to keep it maximum possible away from the striking capabilities of Pakistan that lies across Indias northern borders, decades back decided to install all its nuclear and missile facilities in the Eastern zone of the country. However, with the passage of time, the eastern region of India emerged as the most disturbed, fragile and ungovernable region of the country with a variety of insurgency movements including that of Naxal rebels, emerging in that very part of the country.

According to a map, graphed by Indias own security agencies, the eastern region and some other parts of the country have been declared as The Red Corridor of India due to being unstable,ungovernable and being highly fragile, security wise. According this Red Corridor map, there are some 51 districts that are very badly hit by the rebels while the total number of rebel struck districts remains around 164, ranging from Dehradhun to Kerala.

The Daily Mails investigations indicate that most of India’s top nuclear and missile facilities are located in the extremely Nexal terrorists struck districts of India, located deep down in the Red Corridor. According to The Daily Mails investigations, in the direction of Indian nuclear facilities, Uranium processing plant by the name of Uranium Corporation Of India Limited (UCIL) is located in adversely insurgency and terror struck region of Jharkhand where Nexal guerrillas are dominating and are on the rampage, Talcher Heavy Water Plant again in the same area, Institute of Physics(IOP) again in the same area while Atomic Minerals Directorate for Exploration and Research(AMD), Ceramatic Fuel Fabrication Facility(CFFF), Electronics Corporation of India Limited(ECIL), Mishra Dhalu Nigam Limited(MIDHANI), National Centre for Compositional Characterization of Materials(NCCCM), New Zirconium Sponge Plant(New ZSP), Nuclear Fuel Complex(NFC), Special Materials Plant, Uranium Fuel Assembly Plant and Zirconium Fabrication Plant, Seha Institute of Nuclear Physics and Variable Energy Cyclotron Centre(VECC) are located in the most Nexal warriors hit areas of Orissa, Andhra Pradesh and West Bengal. Similarly, Fast Breeder Test Reactor(FBTR), Fast Reactor Fuel Reprocessing Plant (FRFRP) General Services Organization(GSO), Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research(IGCAR), Kalpakkam Atomic Reprocessing Plant(KARP), Kamini Research Reactor, Madres Atomic Power Station (MAPS), Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor(PFBR), Manuguru Heavy Water Plant, Institute of Mathematical Sciences(MSc), Southern Petrochemical Industries Corporation Limited(SPIC), Tuticorin Heavy Water Plant, Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited(BHEL), HMT Machine Tools Limited(HMT-MTL), Indian Institutes of Sciences(IISc) and Super Computer Education and Research Centre(SERC) are located in the areas, Indian government has included in the most disturbed Red Corridor while Apsra Research Reactor, Bhabha Atomic Research Centre(BARC), Boron Enrichment Plant(BEP), Central Workshops, Plutonium Reprocessing Plant, Purnima 1,II & III Research Reactors, Uranium Conversion Plant, Uranium Enrichment Plant, CIRUS Research Reactor, Dhruva Research Reactor, Hazira heavy Water Plant, Larson and Toubro, Hazira Water Works, Advanced Fuel Fabrication Facility(AFFF), Tarapur Atomic Power Station(TAPS), Power Reactor Fuel Reprocessing Plant(PREFRE), Beryllium Matching Facility(BMF), Construction Service and Estate Management Group(CSEMG), Directorate of Purchase and Stores(DPS), Heavy Water Board, Tata Institute of Fundamental search(TIFR), Rshtrya Chemicals & Fertilizers (RCF), Thal-Vaishet Heavy Water Plant, Centre for Development of Advanced Computing(C-DAC), Kiroskar Brothers Limited and Walchandnagar Industries Limited(WIL) are located in State of Maharashtra, which, though, is not included in the Red Corridor map of India, yet the whole world knows that Maharashtra is the hub of Extremist Hindu Militant Groups where Hindutva Brotherhood, Shiv Sena, Bajrang Dal, Durga Vahini and Sangh Parivar like terrorist organizations are on the rampage for past many years, without any check from authorities and all these Hindu militant organizations are very well known for their extreme anti-Pakistan policies and are full capable of getting hold of any of the Indian nuclear facility that exists in their respective state and region.

Courtsy to: Geo Tau Aisay

http://www.geotauaisay.com/2009/11/indian-nuclear-assets-danger-to-the-world/

New Iran – New Intentions

Ishaal Zehra

The attack which killed the national Deputy Commander of the ground forces of Iran's Revolutionary Guards (RG), General Noor Ali Shooshtari and the provincial commander for Sistan-Baluchistan, Rajab Ali Mohammadzadeh along with some senior officers and 42 others in a homicide bombing inflicted Iran's worst military casualties in years.

Quick after the mishap, an Iranian military official went as far as to raise the prospect of a possible military offensive into Pakistan against the group blamed for the attack. "There is even unanimity that these operations (could) take place in Pakistan territory," the ISNA news agency quoted MP Payman Forouzesh as saying. While the headquarters of Iran's armed forces blamed the bombing on "terrorists" backed by "the Great Satan America and its ally Britain," Fars News Agency said Sunday.

Islamabad strongly denied the allegations and said the attack was an attempt to "spoil ties" with Iran. "There are forces which are out to spoil our relations with Iran. But our ties are strong enough to counter these machinations," said the Pakistan's foreign ministry spokesman Abdul Basit while dismissing the allegations.

The point to ponder is that, how come Pakistan would be wishing to create unrest in some neighbour while its own house is burning. Pakistan has been the victim of worst type of terror since many years. The war which initially started in Afghanistan was purposely shifted to Balochistan province of ours as a part of the Great Game. Amid the GWOT the active involvement of many countries intelligence agencies in Balochistan was observed. These agencies, while playing with the internal conflicts of the center and the Baloch people, are subversively involved in provision of funds and arms to different armed groups. This has been proved many a times that the outlawed armed groups of Balochistan, BLA and BRA are funded and trained by Indian RAW. Even the websites of BLA and greater Balochistan are updated from India. The role of Indian consulate offices in Afghanistan is suspected since their origin.

Keeping in view the sensitivity of the problem, it is difficult for India to openly support the Baluch insurgency because it may harm her relations with Iran (never bother about Pakistan). If the Indians will come out openly in support of the BLA, anti-Indian elements in Pakistan will quickly bracket New Delhi with the alleged Great Game of the US against Iran.
Indian relation with Iran have generally been viewed by observers as a tightrope walking to balance out her interests in Iran as well with the US. India, knowingly, that sidestepping the international community’s efforts to thwart Iran’s so-called drive for nuclear weapons would only devalue her credibility in the eyes of global power, New Delhi is fast trying to convey an unambiguous message that a nuclear armed Iran is as unacceptable to India as it is to the US, the U.K. or France. Hence, India (a good time’s friend) seems to be all set to dump Tehran to seek new alliances and please her new friends.

Iran is a regional power and an aspiring nuclear state which poses a threat to Israeli expansionism in Middle East. There is no denying the fact that Iran’s nuclear programme has been a persistent worry for both, US and Israel. And the choice between new allies and old friend is getting tough on India. To understand India’s dilemma, it requires a critical view of her relation with both Israel and Iran. There has been a steady strengthening of the India’s relationship with Israel ever since India established full diplomatic relations with Israel in 1992. Ever since then, the flourishing Indo- Israel relationship has gained much potential to make a significant impact on the global politics, by altering the balance of power not only in South Asia but the Middle East as well. Today, India has become the biggest market for Israeli arms with their strategic, defence and intelligence cooperation growing at a rapid pace. Where as, on the other hand, the vast oil and gas reserves of Iran serve magnetic affiliation to the quenching India’s long term thirst for energy. And yet another attraction in Iran’s case is that she offers India access to Afghanistan and Central Asia, side-lining Pakistan.

Given the scenario, India is more likely to tilt towards Israel in future. As regardless of her important ties with Arab countries and Iran, her lure for intelligence consultations with Israel seems a durable one. Until now, India has veered between cooperation and altercation in case of Iran yet in the time to come we may expect India to go along with Israel and US in destroying Iran, one of the country in Bush’s war against his self-selected axis of evil. A nuclear Iran suspected of supporting Palestinians and organizations sympathetic to them, faces a great threat of attack on its nuclear installations. And India would support such an operation clandestinely, while opposing in front of the world, not to annoy Iran because of economic reasons. Amusingly, India’s interest in the proposed IPI gas line project diminished sharply from the time the US-India nuclear deal began to take shape. Probably, the US wants to undermine India-Iran economic relations to such an extent that New Delhi becomes a stakeholder in its plan against Iran.

The geopolitical implications of the collaborations between India, US and Israel are grave and manifold. Despite the denials, India is playing a secret role in US strategy against Iran for past many years. India regardless of having close ties with Iran stabbed her in the back by joining EU-3 on Iran’s nuclear issue. It is no more a secret that EU-3 is no longer acting independently, but as a surrogate of the US. How piteous that a democracy ended up as a deputy of a surrogate. History has witnessed how India once used the friendly ties with Tehran as a ladder to achieve US and European community’s support to secure permanent seat in Security Council. Thanks to her mean and wanton nature which made her vote twice against the same Iran in the IAEA governing board, thus endorsing the US agenda for confrontation with Iran. Nevertheless, the Indian vote against Iran has extensively lowered her global structure and credibility. Despite her close economic and political relations, if India could stab a friendly country like Iran in the back, then she could not be considered trustworthy by other developing countries.

The thriving indo-Israeli relations are posing a direct threat to Iran. Their trade has grown exceptionally over the years, especially after the launch of Israeli spy satellite from the Indian Space center, the tie got even stronger. The launch of TecSAR has considerably enhanced Israel’s intelligence-gathering capability. The satellite is clearly affecting the ongoing conflict in the Middle East, as its ability to produce image in adverse weather and even at night allowed Israel to obtain more information about the Iranian nuclear programme. Though India officially argues that she has commercially utilized her advanced technological capacity but the act brought to light India’s full cooperation to dissuade, isolate and if necessary sanction and contain Iran. Nevertheless, Iran should realize that a friend of your enemy can never be your friend and India has already established herself as Israel’s friend and Iran’s foe at many instances.

It is time that India’s credibility as a friendly democracy should be weighed by other developing countries of the world. The Indo-Israel nexus, under the US patronage, is posing a threat to the Muslim world. All their ambitions revolve around targeting particularly Muslim states that are energy rich and either nuclear or threshold nuclear states. It is high time that the Islamic countries take a unified and concrete step to cater this ghastly menace, or else it might become too late.

South Asian Fake Nuclear Power

India's nuclear tests shocked the world

Ishaal Zehra

Every now and then, in the democratic entity called India, something unusual happens which keeps one amused for so many days. The feeling is almost the same as some magician waves his wand and ‘woof’……. here comes a surprise (which eventually turns out to be a shock at the end of the day) and then another and another and the story goes on.

Some time back Mr. P. K. Iyengar, former head of India's main nuclear body, told the BBC that he made it clear in 2002 that India's nuclear tests were inconclusive and ambiguous and that the 1998 nuclear test was not a deterrent against China, though it was against Pakistan. His comments came as atomic scientist K Santhanam, who was associated with India's 1998 nuclear tests, said they were not as successful as claimed. Meaning, the yield of the thermonuclear explosions was actually much below expectations and the tests were perhaps more a fizzle. Now if his statement is accurate then it points to a massive cover-up by India and also confirms what many in the West suspected at that time - that the nuclear devices India tested were not as powerful as had been thought. Revising history, Pakistan was forced to test her nuclear capability and declare itself a nuclear state after India made this dramatic presentation in front of the world boasting her fake strength in 1998 which actually disturbed the balance of power in the region.

Sometimes it is believed that countries exaggerate their achievements for political posturing against their enemies. Realistically, this is the part of the global game but this insanity of India in 98 unfortunately accelerated the arms race in the region and saying this would not be wrong that it is actually India who pushed the region towards an unending nuclear race.

This time the surprise came when the former US president Bill Clinton made it public that in the event of a nuclear war with Pakistan, Indian leaders had predicted a bizarre victory. Surprisingly the Indian officials had calculated that while 300 million to 500 million of their countrymen would die if Pakistani nukes hit India, all 120 million Pakistanis would be annihilated in a tit-for-tat Indian strike. What is more amazing is the Indian government’s willingness to play fast and loose with its citizens lives to notch up a bizarre win against Pakistan. Now this is actually called the height of enmity. In the heart of their hearts such is the hatred for Pakistan that they simply assumed their 500 million people dead just for the wish to see Pakistan dead and gone. Pulitzer Prize-winning author and historian Taylor Branch's new book, The Clinton Tapes: Wrestling History with the President, which goes on sale in early October, has an unguarded Clinton venting about Indian leaders' so-called willingness to threaten the death of millions in their standoff over nuclear arms.

India-Pakistan relations do not move at a comfortable pace. They zigzag from crisis to crisis. In the interregnum the two countries either engage in negotiations or struggle to revive an interrupted dialogue. And in such scenario keeping nuclear weapons free from risk is a mad fantasy. There is always a fatal risk that sooner or later, in a situation of political tension and panic, someone somewhere will err and millions may die.


Today many a brilliant writers including Mr. Iyengar himself stress upon conducting further tests to prove Indian nuclear capability. While talking to the BBC Mr. Iyengar said that If India wants to declare itself as a nuclear power and confirm to the military (read “Pakistan” instead) that it has all the means of designing a thermo-nuclear device which can go into a missile, which can be dropped from an aircraft or can be launched from a submarine, it needs many more tests. Humbly, for all such statements of conducting further nuclear tests just to establish India as a true nuclear power, I would suggest them to spend that money helping its gigantic rock bottom poverty rather then experiencing again a global embarrassment while raising their so-called ego by doing another fake test, provided someone cares to listen.

Pakistan - A Sleeping Superpower

Masood Sharif Khan Khatak

Way back in the 1960s Pakistan was truly on the move.

The early Ayub years gave us the “Green Revolution” because of the construction and commissioning of dams such as Mangla and Tarbela. Barrages were erected all the way down to the Guddu near Hyderabad.

These dams and barrages gave birth to an efficient network of canals and small distributaries which in the sixties not only made Pakistan self-sufficient but surplus in agricultural products.

In the 60s the building that we all know as Habib Bank Plaza in Karachi was the tallest building all the way from the Middle East down to Singapore. In the 1960s almost every army, navy and air force in the Middle East was manned by Pakistani officers and men. We literally raised those armed forces.

Many airlines that operate from the Gulf have actually been trained, organized and manned by PIA staff when they initially started operations. Today they are amongst the best in the world while PIA is in a total mess.

In 1972 it was Pakistan that created history and paved the way for the world to move in the direction that it actually has moved by being instrumental in bringing about President Richard Nixon’s visit to Beijing (then Peking). That visit helped both China and USA equally and opened the world to be shaped as it is today. Not long after that, in 1979, if Pakistan had not taken on the USSR on its own initially, along with the Afghan Mujahideen, the world today would have been very different.

One can go on recounting many more aspects of Pakistan to show what a potently viable country it should have been today with an economy strong enough to stand it in good stead for exercising an independent foreign policy as well as in bringing about an environment in which the country would have had a content population which would, in turn, have excluded space to all sorts of disruptions.

What, then, went wrong and why do people now talk in terms of whether Pakistan will be able to outlast its present crisis?

Pakistan indeed lost its way in the years that followed the incidents I have quoted; military coups, the judicial murder of an elected prime minister, frequent derailing of the political process, an erratic foreign policy pursued by a bunch of minds that were driven by reasons other than prudent statecraft, importing of self-seeking bankers and making them prime ministers, denying of provincial autonomy to the federating units, allowing ethnic and other kinds of militancy to grow, letting fiefdoms be created right under the nose of the state, making talent become subservient to cronyism, treating education as if it was insignificant and so much more is all responsible for the dire straits we find ourselves in after having made a great start in the early years of our freedom.

It is said that South Korea laid its foundations for progress and prosperity on Pakistan’s First Five Year Plan. Pakistan never made a second five-year plan and in fact the First Five Year Plan was followed by unplanned improvisation. Who knows, had Pakistan followed its own First Five Year Plan like South Korea did, in the subsequent years Pakistan too may well have been one of the biggest economies of the world today. (South Korea is now the fourth-biggest of Asia and the world’s 15th.)

Most Pakistanis are known to have a strong faith in the country’s ability to bounce back from the wilderness. Pakistan is not a country that can be written off because a handful of insurgents have taken the state on frontally and because the state has not responded as responsibly as it ought to have ever since the crisis was evolving. Reacting to situations when crises explode in the face cannot be the best of situations for any state.

The present crisis should never have gotten to where it now stands. Now that it has and now that it has to be handled, let all Pakistanis take strength from the fact that this great country needs to be put back on the track from which it got derailed in the 1960s.

We Pakistanis have to once again regain our lost glory and win back our rightful, respectable and dignified place in the comity of nations. We can and must do it.

The writer- Mr. Masood Sharif Khan Khatak- is former Director General of the Intelligence Bureau and former Vice President of the PPP Parliamentarians.

Email: masoodsharifkhattak@gmail.com

Where is my Buddy – Hemant Karkarey?

Ishaal Zehra

It seems that investigation to the Mumbai tragedy is re-opened. And so are the queries in my mind. Some unanswered questions that still haunt the investigation authenticity are laying bared open with no one serious enough, or more preciously, daring enough to search for the answers. Death of Hemant Karkery who was about to expose the Hindu-Israeli terrorism in India and the long-forgotten lethal case of Colonol Prohit are two of those serious questions.

All this remembers me of a joke which was circulated widely condemning the absurdity of Iraq war. It went like this… On a campaign the (former) US President George Bush visits a school and explains his political actions. Afterwards he invites the children to ask him questions. One little boy raises his hand and say, “Mr. President my name is Joe and I have three questions from you. 1- How come you invaded Iraq without the support of the United Nations? 2- Where is Osama bin Laden actually hiding? And 3- Don't you think that the nuclear bomb on Hiroshima was the biggest terrorist attack of all times?”

Just as the President Bush begins to answer, the recess bell rings and he says they’ll continue afterward. 25 minutes later the kids come back to class.

“Where were we?” says Bush. “Oh, yes... do you kids have any questions?”
Another boy raises his hand and says, “sir my name is John and I have 5 questions: First, why did you invade Iraq without support from the U.N.? Second, where is Osama bin Laden actually hiding? Third, don’t you think that the nuclear bomb on Hiroshima was the biggest terrorist attack of all times? Fourth, how come the recess bell went off 30 minutes early? And last where is my buddy Joe?!!”

Similarly, the number of times the Mumbai case will be re-opened, the questions will increase with the same magnitude. Who benefited from Mumbai carnage? How come Hemant Karkery died? Why his death is not being investigated properly specially from the point of view that he died just after unearthing rich and credible material about the involvement of a section of Hinduised army officers in the Malegaon and Modasa blasts? Why the case has not been investigated as a “False-Flag Operation” rather simply putting the blame on Pakistan? Why BJP Inclusion in the whole drama is being missed out? What has happened to the case of Col. Prohit, who is a Symbol of Hindu Terrorism? Why the findings are not being made public? The real motives behind this terror act and the actual beneficiaries are still not apprehended by the authorities. The case is being mishandled intentionally.

These dilly-dally tactics regarding the Mumbai incident investigations simply cannot hide the reality. Keeping own eyes shut doesn’t mean that every one else is blind as well. Some serious questions have to be investigated and answered if fair trail is to be done. How is it that ATS Chief Hemant Karkare, his associates Ashok Kamte, Vijay Salaskar and his entire team of about seven, who were tracking the case of Col Prohit, were gunned down in a narrow lane near Cama hospital about 12.5 miles away from the Taj Hotel? The Marathi papers in Mumbai have reported that the killers of Hemant Karkare and his associates spoke to them in Marathi before killing him and the others. The connection between Hemant Karkarey death and the Col Prohit case must be deeply probed, as there is much more underneath than what is present at the surface.

The death of ATS squad during the carnage has remained controversial as there are many loop ends in this regard. The wives of killed Policeman keep issuing statements suspecting hands of some vested interest Hindu organization in killing their husbands. Vinita Kamte, wife of slain police officer Ashok Kamte who was killed during the operation, wanted to depose some points before the Ram Pradhan committee panel but was not allowed to do so. She alleged that certain portions of the call records of the police control room on November 26 were deleted. "There are at least 10 minutes of conversation that has been deleted. I have sought call records of my husband, Ashok Kamte through RTI," Vinita said but was ignored completely.

Again, Quoting his captors’ conversation in his interview with Aaj Tak, a TV news channel, one of the hostages who escaped from room # 630 following his brief captivity said “One terrorist asks the other: How much amount of money these Indian politicians have?” The other terrorist answers, “You have received your payment isn’t it, then why are you worried?” why not this lead was taken forward? The election in India is over. The new government has taken the charge well and we all now expect fair trail of Mumbai carnage from them, evaluating all the leads which were left earlier. The loopholes must be probed properly.

One thing for sure, whether today or tomorrow, every time the case will be proceeded further the same question will haunt the court; where is our buddy Hemant Karkarey? And how was he and his whole team was cold bloodedly gunned down at a distant place from the main terror venue before he could proceed further the case of Col Prohit with some concrete proof about which he gave a hint in his interview to a TV channel before his tragic death? Surely, the case will only solve when this mystery will be cracked.

PAKISTAN’S NEED FOR NUCLEAR ENERGY

Amjed Jaaved

Our country is in throes of a full-fledged energy crisis. There is a discernible upsurge in enthusiasm for nuclear energy worldwide. Industrial production and household routines are being regularly disrupted by outages and planned power cuts (euphemistically called load shedding). The country’s backbone that is textile mills, steel smelting operations, shoe factories, small businesses and other key components operate on a limited schedule.

It is the poor who have to bear the brunt of power cuts. They do not have uninterrupted power supply units to beat load shedding. Besides, they lose jobs as the result of power-induced layoffs. Ordinary hospitals have no generators. As such, it is difficult for them to take care of the country’s ill.

At present, nuclear power accounts for only about one per cent of the country’s energy consumption. The country has two civilian-use nuclear reactors. Construction on a third one is underway. The country generates only about 450 MW of nuclear electricity. It has plans to increase the current capacity to about 8,800 MW by year 2020!

The technologically- advanced West has paid only lip service to Pakistan’s voracious need for nuclear power. They have extended the benefit of civilian nuclear energy to India, but not to Pakistan. During the former president Bush’s visit to Pakistan in March 2006, Pakistan’s prospective energy requirement was a topic of discussion. The communiqué issues at the end of the Bush trip committed the two countries to inaugurating `an energy working group, which will explore ways to meet Pakistan’s growing energy needs and strengthen its energy security’ and to working together `to develop public and private collaboration on a broad range of energy sources’. Unfortunately, there has been no tangible follow-up to the sanguine communiqué.

Ignoring Pakistan's dire need for energy, the USA has not signed a similar agreement with Pakistan. Stephen Cohen, Brooking Institution's South-Asia expert, echoed Pakistan's principled position on civilian-use of nuclear energy while addressing the United States’ Homeland Security Sub-committee. Key points of Cohen’s address are: (a) The 123 agreement should have been criteria-based instead of one-time India-specific bonanza.

The preferential benefits, envisioned in the deal, should have been extended to other eligible countries. Focusing, in particular on Pakistan, Cohen Called upon Washington to offer a similar deal, akin to European Union's criteria-based membership to the Union, to Pakistan. Cohen suggested that because of Washington's nonchalance to Pakistan's request, Pakistan has been forced to seek nuclear cooperation with China. In his view, Pakistan could be offered civilian nuclear cooperation in exchange for some reasonable nuclear restrictions.

There is worldwide enthusiasm for tapping the source of nuclear civil energy. This enthusiasm is outcome of over two decades of disappointing growth, coupled with economic recession. Industry leaders are forecasting a nuclear renaissance. The `nuclear renaissance' envisions a doubling or tripling of nuclear capacity by 2050. It is predicted that nuclear power would spread to new markets in the Middle East and Southeast Asia. A host of new fuel-reprocessing techniques and reactors would be developed.

The big push for nuclear power plants is expected in Asia, particularly from China, India, Japan and South Korea. In Europe, Italy is reconsidering nuclear energy. Besides, countries such as Germany and Sweden might delay or abandon phasing out nuclear power to meet climate change goals. Other countries (such as Canada, South Africa, and South Korea) have also planned to expand their programs to include uranium enrichment, plutonium reprocessing, or both.

Over two dozen additional states mostly in developing countries, including Jordan and the United Arab Emirates, have ardent interest in taping nuclear energy to meet their power deficiency. It is predicted that if the demand for nuclear energy continues to rise, the number of states with nuclear reactors could double.

A few more words about Pakistan’s current nuclear-power status. Pakistan has two pressurized-heavy-water reactors. One is the 125MWe Karachi Nuclear Power Plant. The other is Chashma Nuclear Power Plant with 325 MWe. Construction of Chashma-II is in progress with China’s assistance.

The project is expected to be completed in year 2,011. Because of political and feasibility constraints, it is not possible for Pakistan to tap new sources of hydel energy. As such, nuclear energy remains the only avenue to be tapped. The government is willing to design necessary policies and provide funds to implement nuclear-energy projects. The benefits of nuclear energy outweigh its costs. That's the reason the USA and India have signed the 123 agreement to benefit from cooperation in the field of civilian use of nuclear energy.

An energy-deficient Pakistan will be poor, politically unstable and environmentally-unsustainable. Impoverished Pakistanis would be an easy prey to the blandishments of preachers of religious bigotry or xenophobia. It is time the major powers shunned discriminatory policy towards Pakistan.

The World Bank, Asian Development Bank, members of international business community should see Pakistan as a potential investment target. The international financial institutions and the developed countries should extend cooperation in field of civil nuclear energy to speed up industrial activity in Pakistan. Faster economic growth will provide jobs to frustrated youth. As such, the unemployed youth would no longer find the extremist ideologies alluring.