World Affairs

The Greatest Show on Earth

Some Indians call it the ‘Greatest Show on Earth.’ Whether it be the greatest of all shows of shows or not it is certainly the biggest and greatest democratic election in the world, now on, with votes of 668 million voters of the one billion people spread out from the foothills of the Himalayas, through the deserts of Rajasthan right down to Cape Comorin  to sparsely populated Indian Ocean islands like the Andaman Islands being canvassed.

Voting will take place in more than 800,000 polling stations which will be held in five phases from April 16 to May 28 including in a polling station in the middle of Gir Forest put up for just one voter, Guru Shree Bharatdasjii Bapu, a priest in a Shiva temple located in the jungle.

That’s Indian democracy at work, unrivalled anywhere, Indians will say.

Who will emerge winner in this 14th election to the Indian Parliament since India’s independence? Opinion polls give a slight edge to the ruling Congress led coalition of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) of Sonia Gandhi but the formation of a government, even if the Congress alliance wins would be heavily dependent on regional parties that would be willing to join a coalition government.

Congress strategy

The Congress election strategy for this election has been to rid itself of allied parties in the northern states and go it alone to the polls. Congress must regain these seats which it once dominated, if it is to win an outright parliamentary majority which is discounted by one and all.

The strategy is described by Western political analysts as a ‘risky strategy’ where the expectation is to win enough seats to take a lead in the formation of a coalition with the allies it had rejected prior to the election.

The allies are expected to join in despite being spurned before the elections. It is also contended that fighting an election unencumbered by previous coalition allies will enable a wider choice of partners to be made after elections.

It is further contended that if the NDA comprising the Hindu nationalist BJP wins more seats that the Congress they would yet not be as successful in forming a coalition as the Congress because of its current unpopularity.

The BJP leader who would be the prime ministerial candidate for the NDA is considered ‘more divisive’ as his predecessor Atal Behari Vajpayee. The BJP in recent years has been attempting to rid itself of its hard core image of Hindutva to win votes of moderates and support of political parties as potential allies, particularly of those who need some degree of support of Muslims. But the BJP is dyed deep in saffron particularly after its role when in power in the destruction of the historic Babri Masjid Mosque.

Enter the Gandhis

While some leaders of the BJP have been attempting to rid itself of the saffron taint, 29-year-old Varun Gandhi, son of Maneka Gandhi and a scion of the Nehru dynasty has thrown back Hindutva into the imbroglio of communal Indian politics with a speech made recently. 

He had said that he would ‘cut the throats of Muslims’ after the election. There are 160 million Muslims in India which has the third biggest Muslim population in the world. Indian election laws prevent such provocative statements that could lead to communal violence being made and Varun Gandhi’s arrest was ordered by the Elections Commission and jailed.

This event has reinvigorated Indian communal politics and Gandhi who has been threatened by an Indian underworld leader was shifted to a jail in Uttar Pradesh (UP) whose chief minister is the charismatic and controversial Mayawathi, the leader of the ‘untouchables’ of India.

Mayawathi last week refused permission to Maneka Gandhi to visit her son in prison which led the volatile Maneka to accuse her of not being able to understand the anguish of a mother. The two ladies did exchange harsh words last week with Mayawathi telling Maneka that she should have done better in the upbringing of her son!

High pressure was being built up over the issue and on Thursday it was said that the UP authorities had permitted visits to Varun Gandhi.

Lalu Prasad

Meanwhile another charismatic leader, Union Railway Minister and leader of the Rashtriya Janata Dal, Lalu Prasad Yadav, has put his foot in to this flaming cauldron by declaring that he would run a road roller over Varun Gandhi for his anti-Muslim statements. With demands being made that Lalu Prasad be meted out the same treatment accorded to Gandhi, Lalu is now backtracking saying that his statement had been misinterpreted.

Varun Gandhi with his statement has landed himself in the eye of a storm and is being backed by L.K. Advani. What the BJP hopes to do with this Gandhi — out of favour with the mainstream Gandhis led by Sonia Gandhi — or what Gandhi wants to do to the BJP is not quite clear. But it does provide a young Hindu nationalist leader to the BJP plagued with a geroncratic leadership.

Meanwhile, in Tamil Nadu pneumatic former film idol and Chief Minister Jayalalitha Jeyaram is reported to have bounced back into Tamil Nadu politics having lost all seats in her state at the last general election. Eighty one year old Karunanidhi of the DMK is said to be losing support and he continues to ally himself with the Congress Party.

Both leaders have expressed serious concern about Sri Lanka Tamils, expressing concern about the fate of civilians caught in the cross-fire between Sri Lankan forces and the LTTE. Karunanidhi’s sentiments it is known are well in sympathy for the LTTE although he cannot openly call for support for the proscribed terrorist organisation. Reports last week said that both leaders have received death threats from LTTE front organisations.

A third front has also come into being with the two Communist Parties, CPI (Marxist) and the CPI Communist Party of India joining hands with powerful regional parties such as the Biju Janata Dal, Telgu Desam Party, AIADMK of Jayalalitha and another Tamil Nadu party the Patali Makkam Katchi (PMK).

Some predict that this front could win as much as a hundred seats and could decide who would form a coalition government but this is considered far fetched. 

Terrorism reports say is the main national problem identified by Indians across the sub- continent but it would not be a decider at the elections with both Congress and BJP being strongly supportive of its crackdown.

Argumentative Indians

There are no predictions about an outright winner in this land known for predictions but it is indeed entertaining to watch the most argumentative nation in action on TV channels as I do on the one channel available to me.

A good example of the talkative nature of Indians I came across in the book, The Argumentative Indian by Oxford Economist and Nobel Prize laureate Amartya Sen. He quotes lines of a Bengali poet Ram Mohan Roy:  

‘Just consider how terrible the day of your death will be,

Others will go on speaking and you will not be able to argue back.’

Taliban vows to capture Islamabad

By Ahmed Qureshi A Quetta-based commentator

Having grabbed control over most parts of the tribal areas of the NWFP, the Taliban has now cast its sights on capturing Islamabad. Taliban Commander Mullah Nazeer Ahmed said in an interview to al Qaida’s Al Sahab on-line paper that militant factions have united and will take their war to the capital: “The day is not far when Islamabad will be in the hands of the Mujahideen.”

It is not an empty boasting. Taliban is already close enough to the capital.  On the night of April 4, six paramilitary soldiers died after a suicide bomber blew himself up in the heart of Islamabad. Baitullah Mehsud, the leader of the Pakistan Taliban, is allegedly behind the bombing. 

He had earlier claimed responsibility for the March 6 suicide bombing amidst celebrating lawyers in Islamabad and also for last week’s gun-and-grenade siege of a police training facility on the outskirts of Lahore and later vowed to carry out similar attacks in Pakistan “at least twice a week.”

People in the NWFP are left to the mercy of the Taliban. The government and the army are unmoved and it is left only to a handful of women sympathisers in Islamabad to protest against Taliban’s shariat system. 

Pakistan’s security apparatus did not seem to recognise that the fight against terrorism is theirs too.  Their statements convey that they are fighting an American war and not theirs.

Hussein Haqqani, Pakistan’s ambassador to the US, demanded an additional $ 30 billion in American military aid, besides the $ 7.5 and $ 3 billions that had already been promised to fight terrorism.

Talks

Obama Administration’s special representative to the Af-Pak region, Richard Holbrooke, and Admiral Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, had wide ranging consultations in Afghanistan and Pakistan on Tuesday and Wednesday.  Deep distrust and distinctly different approaches in dealing with terrorism became evident in their press meetings.  

Army Chief, General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani, and other senior officials reportedly made it clear to their American interlocutors that the US proposal of a joint Pak-US operation in the tribal areas was simply not acceptable, while drone attacks are counter-productive. Kayani also strongly warned against the US criticism of the ISI.

Holbrooke and Admiral Mullen were equally unrelenting. Washington believes that the Pakistani army, through its intelligence agency, ISI, is continuing to back its traditional clients in the jihadist underworld.

“There are challenges associated with the ISI’s support, historically, for some groups, and I think it’s important that that support ends,” Admiral Mike Mullen told reporters in Islamabad.

American and NATO commanders have accused Pakistan’s army of not targeting the al Qaida and Taliban militants, who attack U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan from their hide outs in tribal areas across the border.  Rather, they were facilitating their movements across the border.  The Pakistan army, however, says it has certain priorities and cannot risk opening up another front by attacking those groups.

Americans do not buy this argument.

Washington Post correspondent David E Sanger quoted in his latest book The Inheritance some top-level US intelligence officials who have telephonic intercepts of Pakistani Army chief in which he stated that Jalaluddin Haqqani is an “asset” for Pakistan.

What options do the Americans have to nudge the Pakistan army to act?  Apparently, not many.  This was proven during the talks that Holbrooke and Mullen had with Gen Kayani and Lt. Gen. Pasha, head of the ISI.

Clearly told

The latter had very clearly told them that they have to take the Pakistani word in all seriousness or leave it at that and refused any joint operations against terrorist groups.

The American administration has no luxury of pressuring the elected civilian government, led by President Zardari, as it has no major role in the matter of security and foreign policy.  The army calls the shots in Pakistan.

The Obama government’s new strategy of involving in the Afghan ‘contact group’ other neighbours, including Iran, Russia and India, has not gone well with Kayani’s Army.

It rolled out statistics that the Pakistan Army, the Frontier Constabulary and the police lost more than 2,100 lives in the tribal areas and the NWFP, and the country suffered a loss of more than US$34 billion while it received only US$11 billion as aid in the last seven years for participating in the war against terror. These figures have never been substantiated.

Pakistan army reiterated that the promised aid of $ 7.5 and $ 3 billion in civilian and military aid over next five years is not enough and demanded an additional $ 30 billion in military assistance, but not prepared for any American oversight of the spending or joint operations.

Emboldened by the conclusion that the Americans have no other option but to depend on the Pakistan Army, the latter appear to have lifted all Musharraf-era restrictions imposed on various jehadi groups.  These Pakistani-trained outfits, pricked by these restrictions, have started aligning closely with al Qaida and Taliban.  In order to maintain their leverage over these outfits, the army has loosened some of these controls. 

Not surprisingly, India accused the Pakistan army of giving cover for intensified infiltration in the recent days.  China too demanded Islamabad to rein in East Turkemenistan terrorist groups who are said to be training in tribal areas for a major terror attack in the coming days.

It is quite incomprehensible why the army is very oblivious of the impending dangers to Pakistan itself from the fast spreading Taliban groups. The silent majority of people seemed to have lost their voice as they preferred to buy peace with the Taliban as the security forces were reluctant to fight the Talibani elements.

When they reach Islamabad, as they have declared, it may be too late for the army. The phrase coined by the Americans, ‘Af-Pak’, may really become a reality.

Pilot of stolen Cessna wanted U.S. fighter jets to shoot him down

Man, now in custody, wanted U.S. military to kill him

The Canadian man who led fighter jets on a chase across six states Monday flew his stolen plane into the United States in hopes the military would shoot him down and kill him, according to a Missouri state trooper who apprehended the rogue pilot.

Yavuz Berke, who allegedly stole a Cessna plane from a Canadian flight school and was pursued for hours across the Midwest by fighter jets, was taken into custody after he landed on a Missouri highway late today and took off running.

Missouri state trooper Justin Watson told Good Morning America that 31-year-old Yavuz Berke, formerly known as Adam Leon, wanted to commit suicide, but didn’t have the courage to do it himself.

“His idea was to fly the aircraft into the United States  where he would be shot down,” Watson said. “He stated several times that at any time he thought he was going to be shot down.”

And he came close several times, Watson said.

Instead, Berke landed the single-engine Cessna 172 on U.S. Highway 60 in Ellsinore, Mo., at 9:50 p.m. ET. He made his way to a convenience store where a clerk noticed him and called police. He was found drinking Gatorade, seemingly relieved that his ordeal was over. 

“He actually seemed fairly happy that it came to a good end,” Watson said. “He didn’t seem to be down in spirits or anything like that.”

The U.S. military decided early on that Berke, a naturalized Canadian citizen who was born in Turkey, did not have any terroristic intentions, but was unclear at the time exactly what his plans were. As he flew over Madison, Wis., the state capitol building was evacuated as a precaution.

A North American Aerospace Defense Command spokesman has said that the pilot knew the F-16s were off his wing, but did not respond despite repeated attempts to reach him on every frequency possible.

“If the answer was no, then there wasn’t any reason to blow him out of the sky,” ABC News aviation analyst Jim Nance told Good Morning America, “although I’m sure they had the capability.”

Watson said Berke is now in a Missouri jail and has told police that he had been hospitalised for psychological problems.

Burke was apparently treated for depression Friday and left his girlfriend a goodbye note, Canadian officials told the U.S. government. Berke’s vehicle was left at the airport in Canada with the keys still in it.

The plane entered American airspace over Michigan’s Upper Peninsula at 4:23 p.m. ET Monday and was trailed by the military aircraft since 4:43 p.m. as it flew over Minnesota, south through Wisconsin, Illinois and Missouri.

The plane was stolen from Confederation College in Thunder Bay, Ontario, and was flown out of Thunder Bay International Airport at 2:55 p.m.

North American Aerospace Defense Command Spokesman Michael Kucharek said the F-16 pilots had made visual contact with the pilot and knew that the person flying the Cessna was aware that the F-16s were there. He was “unresponsive to their non-verbal directions and ... not in contact with the FAA controllers,” Kucharek said.

Kucharek said it costs roughly $50,000 per hour/per jet to scramble F-16s. From the time the plane was initially intercepted over Lake Superior near the Michigan upper peninsula until it landed on the Missouri highway, it was followed by two F-16s for more than five hours — a likely tab of $500,000.

According to the Federal Aviation Administration, the plane was flying for a while at 14,500 feet. Over 10,000 feet the air is quite thin and commercial planes would be pressurised, but the Cessna 172 is not. As a result, the pilot might have suffered from hypoxia, or lack of oxygen, which could have lead to confusion.

The plane later dropped its altitude to 3,700 feet, where there is more oxygen.

“It had opportunities to go into heavily populated areas,” a government official said, adding that It appeared to veer around, “not going to urban air space.”

— Lisa Stark, Pierre Thomas, Luis Martinez and Sarah Netter