LETTERS

The POTO debate

This refers to "The perils of POTO" (December 7). The provisions of the Prevention of Terrorism Ordinance (POTO) have spread fear among innocent citizens rather than bring an end to the feeling of alienation and injustice that has prevailed. The fact that more than 65,000 innocent people were harassed under TADA, POTO's predecessor, reveals the questionable character of the police.

The misuse of the draconian law by an unreliable political dispensation was perhaps best illustrated in Gujarat, where more than 18,000 innocent people suffered. Chapters three and five of POTO make the Ordinance more draconian than TADA. The ambiguous definition of a terrorist, the provision for prolonged imprisonment without trial, the absence of a time limit for the completion of trial and the powers to the police to intercept all kinds of communication, make searches without warrants and withhold the identity of witnesses from the accused, are some of the provisions that work against the interests of innocent citizens.

Provisions of the Indian Penal Code, such as Section 121A relating to conspiracy to overawe by criminal force, and laws such as the Explosive Substances Act have safeguards to prevent the prosecution of innocent people. These laws, if followed sincerely, are enough to deal with terrorists.

Sudhakar Prasad
Patna

Riots and politics

This refers to "Riots and politics" (December 7). You have rightly deduced that whatever be the reasons for the attacks, it is the common people who suffer. Politicians play games to promote their vested interest of coming to power. The country and the people are being divided by politicians in the name of caste, creed and religion. In this process, innocent people become their victims. At the global level, communal clashes have taken the form of terrorism. It is time the people realised its after-effects, especially in the light of the war in Afghanistan.

Akhilesh Kumar Sah
Faizabad

This refers to the article "The Battle over Islam", and the book review by A.G. Noorani titled "The West and Islam" (December 7). Today, Islam is the most talked about religion. The so-called progressive world considers it the epicentre of terrorism. Muslims all over the world are put to trial.

It is unacceptable that Muslims are considered terrorists; their religion teaches them to become intolerant. One cannot deny that Muslims taught Europe tolerance in the past. It is the West that is intolerant towards Islam and Muslims and the rest of the world. Arnold Toynbee rightly remarked: "It has not been the West that has been hit by the world; it is the world that has been hit - and hit hard - by the West... The West has been the arch-aggressor of modern times.... (The World and the West, 1953).

In the post-Cold War period, the United States thinks that Islam is the only hurdle in the way of the implementation of its authoritarian, imperialistic policy. Unfortunately, it is backed by Zionism. The fact is that the West cannot tolerate any Muslim country that follows the fundamental tenets of Islam. Though Islam is the law of the land in Saudi Arabia, an authoritarian country, the U.S. tolerated it and guards it because it does not pose any threat to U.S. imperialism.

It is a human tragedy that the United Nations, by remaining a mute spectator, is indirectly justifying the U.S. attack on Afghanistan.

The U.S., as a civilised and liberal nation, should change its imperialistic attitude and come forward to solve the long-standing problem of Palestine, which is the root cause of Muslim resentment.

Mehaboob Ali Balganur
Sindgi, Karnataka

Gender inequality

In his essay "Many faces of gender inequality" (November 9), Amartya Sen, noting a geographical divide in India between two largely contiguous parts (the southern and eastern States on one side and the northern and western States on the other) in terms of the female-male ratio among children, calls for further analysis. Unfortunately, when a deviation in Tamil Nadu does present itself, Sen misses the opportunity to pursue it. The reference is to the likely cause for such a deviation - female infanticide. Sadly, Sen dismisses in one stroke both the significance of the practice and the ground realities in that State.

Given the fact that a geographical divide has been observed for a long time with respect to demographic behaviour and women's status in India, the 'recent' deviation of Tamil Nadu from this pattern and not so much the pattern itself is astonishing, contrary to Sen's allusion. A recent scholarly inquiry, aptly titled 'Fertility decline and increasing gender imbalance, including a possible South Indian turnaround' (Basu, Development and Change, 1999), applies Tamil Nadu as "a particularly striking way of studying the countrywide trend" in rising gender imbalances.

The message from a variety of reliable sources is that female infanticide is not a sensation but a real problem that has occurred frequently in the last several years in Tamil Nadu. Tamil Nadu has 939 girls per 1,000 boys in the 0-6 age group, a drop of nine points from the 1991 figures. While States with worse declines than Tamil Nadu's take the limelight away from it, a disturbing trend can be seen in the district-level disaggregated data in Tamil Nadu. District-level child sex ratios from 1941 to 1991 reveal a sharp decline in some districts in recent years. A GIS mapping of the 1991 census data on child sex ratio for villages in Tamil Nadu by the South India Fertility Project presents a similar picture. Further, the infant (0-4) mortality rate for Tamil Nadu is exceptionally higher for females than males in some districts and is concentrated in the first week after birth (Athreya and Chunkath, Economic and Political Weekly, October 3, 1998), when female infanticide deaths are most likely to occur.

On the basis of a Statewide sample survey of vital events conducted by the Directorate of Public Health (DPH), primary health centre (PHC) records and Census data, Chunkath and Athreya (Economic and Political Weekly, April 26, 1997) show that far from being "occasional and relatively rare", female infanticide occurs along an "FI belt" with a core and a widening periphery. Cases of female infanticide were reported in 105 of the 386 blocks in the State. Twenty-three blocks accounted for about 70 per cent of all cases of female infanticide in Tamil Nadu in 1995. Between 1994 and 1999, over 18,900 such deaths were reported in the State. During this period, annually about one-sixth to one-fifth of all female infant deaths in the State were cases of female infanticide (Athreya and Chunkath, Economic and Political Weekly, December 2, 2000).

The situation with regard to female infanticide has come a long way since the spate of media reports in the mid-1980s. Tamil Nadu is the only State officially to acknowledge female infanticide as a problem. This acknowledgement has been accompanied by numerous initiatives in policy, grassroots action and research, which have limited the prevalence of female infanticide and, more important, helped attract attention to the issue of women's empowerment. Surely precious resources, commitment, time and efforts of hundreds of women and men have not been wasted in the pursuit of an exotic event, as Sen seems to imply.

But the concern is that despite these efforts, female infanticide remains an enigma. Not just that, non-governmental organisations have reported that female foeticide is rising at an alarming rate in the State, although a systematic assessment is yet to be undertaken.

Therefore, the conclusion to be drawn from the Census data is not that States like Tamil Nadu with marginal declines in child sex ratio do not matter. The 2001 Census confirms that there is absolutely no room for complacency. Tamil Nadu's experience with female infanticide demonstrates that the problem needs persistent policy-based action. Or else other southern States may soon follow Tamil Nadu and it will be a matter of time before this celebrated divide is blurred.

Sharada Srinivasan
Institute of Social Studies
The Hague

Amartya Sen does not address rape in the Indian context. With hundreds of thousands of women incorporated into the sex trade in Indian brothels, and thousands taken by sale, coercion or force from Nepal, Myanmar and other countries - among them are girls as young as 10 years old - Sen's omission is highly problematic. Indeed, in terms of some of India's gravest gender inequalities, Sen's scholarly article really says hardly anything.

The United States perhaps leads the world in various forms of gender inequality, discrimination and violence against women. As in Japan, the "glass ceiling" prevails in the work place and restricts women's access to pivotal career opportunities.

Rape as a social institution prevails, particularly in the burgeoning prison industry - and is an epidemic problem for men as well - where thousands of women in numerous U.S. state and federal prisons are constantly subject to egregious coercive sexual violence and rape by their male captors.

Keith Harmon Snow

(An investigative journalist,
photographer and African scholar)
Williamsburg, Massachusetts.

War in Afghanistan

This has reference to the statement by Aijaz Ahmad in his article "Re-mapping the globe" (November 9): "What is new in the United States' foreign policy is the declaration that it has the unique right to make war against any government that it considers inimical to its interests, and the notice that has been served upon the world to either support this policy or face retribution."

Such a right is neither "new" nor "unique". I suggest that Ahmad revisit world history for the past several millennia.

D.B. Chipp
Singapore

History textbooks

It was a clever move by the BJP's Human Resource Development Minister Murli Manohar Joshi, to delete objectionable portions from the NCERT's Class XI history textbooks in such a manner that any objection would have been resisted by Sikhs ("History and sensibilities", November 9). The move was also timely, with the Assembly elections due in Uttar Pradesh and Punjab where Sikh and Jat votes are of significance. The U-turn by the Congress, the main opposition party, came after it realised this fact.

Our distorted history books were authored by persons known for their pseudo-secular ideology for the sole purpose of gaining fame on international forums. These persons were patronised by the Congress Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, who once buried a time capsule with distorted facts.

It is regrettable that historians write history according to their own taste, suppressing facts. Now, since the opposition has diluted its objections, criminal action should be initiated against the erring historians, holding them responsible for misguiding students against Hinduism.

Subhash Chandra Agrawal
Delhi

Of para-teachers

Apropos of the article "The trouble with para-teachers" (November 9), we wish to make the following clarification.

Vidya Sahayakas employed in Gujarat are not para-teachers: they are full-time teachers appointed in all districts of the State, not just DPEP districts, to fill long-standing vacancies of primary teachers. There were more than 20,000 vacancies of teachers in 1997-98. In June 1998 the State government developed a scheme to appoint of Vidya Sahayakas. Under this scheme, a Vidya Sahayak is appointed on a contract basis for a period of five years and on a fixed honorarium of Rs.2,500 a month. The minimum qualifications for appointment as Vidya Sahayakas are the same as those of a primary school teacher, that is SSC plus a two-year programme in primary teachers' training.

All appointments are made at the district level by open advertisement and on merit, according to marks obtained in the SSC and in the training course. The State government has stopped the recruitment of fully paid teachers, and Vidya Sahayakas would be eligible for absorption as teachers on completion of two years of service, in the vacancies created by retirement. Vidya Sahayakas who are not absorbed thus will be absorbed at the end of five years of service as teachers. The State government has also adopted a transparent method of posting and transfer of Vidya Sahayakas and teachers, under which camps are organised where vacancies are displayed and postings decided in the presence of all concerned, on the basis of merit and the guidelines prescribed by the State government.

Also, they are given pre-service and in-service training like regular teachers. They are posted not in alternative schooling centres but in formal schools.

Varesh Sinha
Secretary, Education
Gandhinagar