NDIA EGAL

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STORIES THAT COUNT
CHIDAMBARAMS GOLDENOMICS 13
April 30, 2014 ` 100
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* AAP in UP: Love Without Votes?
* De Votah Sez NOTAH!
* Soldiers Ballot Battle
ELECTIONS 2014 46
A BATTING
JUDGE
Justice Mudgal, head of the panel probing
match fixing and betting, opens up on BCCI
presidents, IPL, and what ails global cricket
KILLER TOWERS
the legal battle
against cellphone
companies
PAID NEWS
buying the piper
KASHMIRI
PRISONERS
trail of torture
26
22
71
AIRBORNE
GOONS
passenger
misbehavior 64
3
April 30, 2014
D
uring a recent brainstorming ses-
sion, eminent lawyers who advise
the India Legal editorial team
suggested that we should plan a
cover story on the impact of judi-
cial activism on Indias society.
Does a proactive judiciary retard or enhance the
process of social, economic and political evolution?
This is, indeed, a worthy subject, and will, in time,
occupy the cover page of our fortnightly magazine.
But it needs immense research, a variety of voices and
international comparisons for it to become a compre-
hensive statement and analysis on what will surely
define future political and juridical debate in this
nationthankfully still a nation of laws rather than
just men acting on whims and superstition.
Nonetheless, as we prepare for this and even at the
risk of having our competitors steal the idea (Let
them! Our belief at India Legal is that no matter who
does it, we do it better), it is timely that we open up
the discussion on this editorial page.
Election 2014 is upon us. No matter who wins, this
country is going to change in ways yet unfathomable.
But who will drive this change? The politicians?
Media? Student activists? Protesters? Judiciary?
Maoist revolutionaries? Or NOTA?
The easy answer is, all of the above. Because thats
what happens in a democracy. But my immediate
answer is that India has been politically, economical-
ly, socially asleep for the last decade. In this somno-
lent state, democracy usually takes a beating. And
when democracy is seen to retreat in the face of cor-
ruption, a megalomaniacal political culture of
impunity takes centre stage. And when this happens,
the judiciary steps in to correct the imbalance and
reflect the peoples will, where politicians are failing.
This happened in the US in Judge Earl Warrens
time. Decisions such as the Miranda Warning and
New York Times vs Sullivan, which enhanced the
rights of the accused and the press, were later con-
demned as judicial excesses by conservative US lead-
ers, who then brought strict constructionist judges
to the benches. But these rulings had been necessary
in order to correct historical racial injustices and soci-
etal imbalances.
In India, judges have stepped in where angels fear
to tread. Nothing is sacrosanct: live-in relationships;
L e t t e r f r o m t h e E d i t o r
I n d e r j i t B a d h w a r
editor@indialegalonline.com
personal laws; gay rights; dowry demand; rape laws;
khap panchayats; euthanasia; cricket betting; mercy
petitions; and telecom spectrum allocation. Critics
call the Supreme Court Indias new super cop often
meting out vigilante justice. Supporters say the fight
against long-standing injustice needs bitter medicine,
even if it kills some innocent bystanders.
Theres no gainsaying that the judiciary, with all its
warts, seems to be the only option when the political
system turns effete. Suffice it to say that what keeps
the people of Pakistan relatively free is the judiciary,
which politicians can defy at their own peril.
But here are some words of caution from Eric
Posner, a professor of law at the University of
Chicago: There doubtless has been a bubble in cer-
tain kinds of rights to legal recovery, one that (like
other bubbles) is perpetuated by delusion and self-
interest. But this bubble in rights has also created
enormous benefits for society. Indeed, it has eliminat-
ed abuses so basic that it is hard now to imagine how
our society could so recently have accepted them.
He writes that those who try to improve the law
have two choices. The first option uses analysisit
describes not just what a proposed reform will gain
but also what it will sacrifice. The second option uses
rhetoricit emphasizes a proposals upside, but
obscures its costs. Reformers frequently choose the
second option, because they would otherwise risk
failing to inspire their audience to take action, he
adds. But it is risky to try to motivate people to
change the law, he warns, by downplaying what they
will sacrifice in doing sothis tends to start a process
that eventually recreates in new forms the worst
things... about the problems one is trying to solve.
The overall result may be only to change the iden-
tities of the people or institutions that get hurt, and
not to reduce our net exposure to legal error. The
change agents now driving this countrys political
machines and judiciary would do well to mull over
Posners thoughts.
4
April 30, 2014
Editor-in-Chief
Inderjit Badhwar
Managing Editor
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FOCUS
Killer rays
Jaipur resident SUDHIR KASLIWALs struggle to have cellphone towers
removed from the vicinity of his home following a cancer death in the family
pitted him against powerful telecom firms
VOLUME. VII ISSUE. 16
13
26
Perverted midas
Chidambarams tenure as FM will be remembered for the black money it
ushered in. ALAM SRINIVAS examines what compelled him to take such decisions
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CFO
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APRIL 30, 2014
A BATTING JUDGE
Justice Mukul Mudgal, head of the panel probing cricket fixing, opens
up on BCCI presidents failure to clean up IPL, why Dhoni should give
up test captaincy, police apathy to investigate match fixing, pros and
cons of T20, and racism in global cricket. A report by
INDERJIT BADHWAR and ALAM SRINIVAS 38
LEAD
5
April 30, 2014
Gate No 420A
Its swanky, but the revamped Mumbai Airport is a
showcase of crony capitalism. NARESH MINOCHA
points out the norms that were flouted to modernize it
32
Opening up
a new front
Theyve safeguarded the nations interests for
over six decades. But for the first time the armed
forces will be able to vote from their posting
stations, reports SHIVANI DASMAHAPATRA
AVIATION
Hooligans in the air
Trail of torture
Unruly passengers cause menace on flights but get
away scot-free because of legal loopholes. But their
misbehavior will cost them dear, if an international
law is amended, writes SHOBHA JOHN
Prisoners from Kashmir in the capitals Tihar Jail
are in constant fear of attacks from other
inmates, who perceive them as anti-national.
A report by SHEIKH SAALIQ
71
R E G U L A R S
Letters.....................6
Ringside..................8
Supreme Court .........10
Consumer Watch......78
Is That Legal? ...........81
Wordly-wise...............82
A L S O
Need for indigenized
arms production.....18
Perils of paid news.22
Pleasing private sector
in highway projects36
Non-performing
assets of banks..........42
Guest column: The
need for a high court
bench in western UP...45
Money siphoning by
by Oshos close
disciples.....................60
Cyber threat to
sensitive websites......68
HUMAN RIGHTS
The way nature
ordained
Farmers in North America fight a highly regulated
food distribution system to give unprocessed farm
produce to neighbors and friends.
DAVID E GUMPERT narrates the 20-year struggle
74
GLOBAL TRENDS
THE NATION
ELECTIONS 2014
Love minus votes
Arvind Kejriwal has endeared himself to rural
electorate in UP too, but INDERJIT BADHWAR
finds that lack of organization and funds will prove
to be his undoing
46
52
Andolan against
votes
Communities, villages and middle class localities
decide to boycott polls, angered at their demands
not being met, says BHAVDEEP KANG
55
64
INFRA
Cover Design: ANTHONY LAWRENCE
Photographs: ANIL SHAKYA
US has em too
In response to your cover story on political
lawyers (Political Liars, April 15, 2014), this
smooth transition from the legal profession into
politics is a pretty universal phenomenon, as will
emerge from a study of the men in the US house
and senate, as well as the British parliament.
Kishore Mirchandani,
New York
Stunning range
The moment you come across the word legal,
it may give you cold sweat down the spine. I did
not even want to open India Legal, but then
curiosity got the better of me and Oh Boy! You
have come out with a magazine that really
LETTERS
April 30, 2014
6
My father was a politically inclined man
and it was because of him that the whole
family took an interest in politics. In the
1984 elections, as a result of the untimely
death of Indira Gandhi, there was a huge
sympathy wave, which resulted in Rajiv
Gandhi getting unprecedented majority in
the elections (its another matter that he
failed to meet peoples expectations). The
vivid memories from that era are those of
Vinod Dua and Prannoy Roy conducting
post-poll analysis in a 24-hour
non-stop broadcast on Doordarshan,
which gave breaks of 3-4 Hindi films to
keep audiences hooked to it.
In the year 1999, a leading magazine
predicted a landslide victory for the
BJP-led NDA, with up to 336 seats, and
around 140 seats for the Congress and its
allies. The BJP and its allies won with 299
seats, whereas the Congress and its allies
managed 144 seats. The margin of error
was around 10 percent (37 out of 336).
In 2004, the same magazine predicted
an NDA sweep, with the alliance expected
to get around 330 seats and another
Congress rout. The results were shocking;
NDA got 181 and UPA managed 218
seats. The pollsters tried to play safe in
2009, showing NDA as the largest party in
an expected hung parliament. The publi-
cation expected UPA to be marginally
ahead of NDA and gave the former
around 200 and the latter around 180. The
UPA got 234 seats and NDA 184, with the
BJP only managing 134 seats.
In 2009, the margin of error in the sci-
ence or art of predicting election results
went up to 17 percent (34 out of 200) -
Predicting or forecasting any result isnt an
easy task. Some people might not tell the
truth during surveys. Also, the data can be
doctored. With such anomalies in the
results, the questions regarding the validi-
ty of these polls are obvious.
During the days of Prannoy Roy and
Vinod Dua, this was serious business.
The same cant be said for the present
day polls.
The worst exit polls were conducted
during the 2013 Delhi elections, when a
company called C-voter predicted just 6
seats for AAP. In the 2012 UP elections,
Akhilesh Yadav stumped all the polls with
totally unexpected results. Looking at all
these aberrations, one needs to question
if there is any relevance of these polls or if
these have just become another tool of
marketing a party.
Gaurav Pandey via email
Predictions off the mark
LETTER OF THE FORTNIGHT
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April 30, 2014
impressed me with its range and quality.
Congratulations and keep it up.
Ashok Patel,
via email
In defence of British English
a completely new genre of journalismbut
impressive, brilliant, too gaudy, lavish, and
simply excellent. extremely user-friendly
magazine that one can use forsolving personal
problems, and helpingpeople affected by legal
issues. but please follow british english, not
american english. defense is defence in
british english.
mr dua,
former professor, indian institute of mass
communication, new delhi
Editors Note: Thanks for responding in
lower case.
A breather for lawyers
I am a Colombo-based lawyer. I find your journal
fascinating because it widens a lawyers vision
beyond the reach of law that ordinarily confines
lawyers to the attraction of filthy lucre.
Gomin Dayasri,
Colombo
Bizarre Qs, cool As
India Legal made for a fascinating read. I
particularly enjoyed the tongue-in-cheek,
textured narrative you wove, while successfully
responding to some trulybizarrequestions.
Subi Chaturvedi,
via email
Whats in a name? Everything
I read the first three issues of your magazine with
great interest. The design is attractive and
articles well-researched and well-written. The
regular sections were the surprise package.
Even for a non-legal person like me, these were
easy reading. But despite your providing the
rationale for the title of your magazine, my doubt
persists. When I read the full-length articles in
the political domain, I wonder what is it that you
provide that other mainstream magazines
dont. Why shouldnt I go for any other political
magazine?
Pawan Sehgal,
Dubai
Be general please
I found the magazine interesting, with a mix of
stories and illustrations. The
story, Subrata-dum & Raju-
dee in the April 15, 2014
issue was arresting. I feel
the content of India Legal
should appeal to general
readers. Try and desist from
keeping the focus only on
legal issues. Looking for-
ward to more exciting stories
in future.
BK Chaudhuri
Noida
Course correction
India Legal comes as a whiff of fresh air in
journalism at a time when most of the
frontline magazines believe in towing the line
of one political party or the other. The
stories are hard-hitting, with lot of gravitas,
and prise open the truth on a host of issues
plaguing the nation. The regulars, especially Is
That Legal, are informative.
Kumar Ritwik,
Gurgaon
Please email your letters to:
editor@indialegalonline.com
Or write to us at:
India Legal, ENC Network,
A-9, Sector 68, Gautam Buddh
Nagar, Noida (UP) - 201309
In brief
The Sudhir Choudhrie story (Arms and the
Murky Man, April 15, 2014) is a knockout.
Perfect journalistic instincts. Congratulations.
NV Subramanian,
via email
I have just read the April 15, 2014 issue of
India Legal cover to cover. Its an outstanding
effort, with great articles carrying a lot of infor-
mation other than editorial content.
Arun Singh,
via email
A wonderful idea and a well-planned maga-
zine. Congratulations to the entire team.
Anil Tyagi,
via email
I compliment you for a very well done
magazine.
Thomas Abraham
Founder President, Federation of Indian
Association, New York, and Global
Organization for People of Indian Origin
Stamford, CT, US
8
April 30, 2014
For there is but one essential justice which cements society, and one law which
establishes this justice. This law is right reason, which is the true rule of all
commandments and prohibitions. Whoever neglects this law, whether written or
unwritten, is necessarily unjust and wicked.
Cicero, On the laws
VERDICT
Raag Darbari
10
April 30, 2014
PEOPLE/
worlds costliest bails
SWINDLERS LIST
At $1.6 billion bail bond, Sahara chief tops the global chart
SUBRATA ROY
chairman Sahara Group:
$1.6 billion
Globally, it is the highest-ever bail fixed
for any individual by any court.
However, the
Supreme Court fixed
the high amount
because it wanted
Sahara to return
almost $4 billion to
three million investors.
MICHAEL MILKEN
rogue bond
trader:
$250 million
Americas junk bond
specialist was
indicted on 98 counts
of racketeering and
securities fraud in
1989. He ended up
serving less than two
years in prison.
JULIUS MEINL
British billionaire:
$133 million
He was suspected of a secretive
share buyback that was linked to
his European land company; he
was arrested in 2009.
VK SHARMA
CMD. JVG Group:
$20 million
In the late 1990s, he duped
investors, was arrested, got bail
and absconded. He re-emerged
and raised over $150 million
between 2005 and 2012. He
was rearrested in 2013.
BERNIE MADOFF
Ponzi scamster: $10 million
He was indicted for involvement in a $50
billion scandal. He agreed to a nightly
curfew as no one co-signed his bail bond.
BERNARD EBBERS
CEO, WorldCom: $10 million
In 2005, he was charged with conspiracy, filing
a false statement with the US market regulator
and securities fraud, as WorldCom inflated its
assets by $11 billion.
DENNIS KOZLOWSKI
CEO, Tyco International:
$10 million
He was accused of stealing $600
million from his firm, larceny and
enterprise corruption, along with a
senior employee.
Sentenced in
2005, he may
stay in jail for
24 years.
KENING MA
automobile trader: $100 million
Based in southern California, he
sold all-terrain vehicles without a
smog certificate.
OJ Simpson
American football
player: $250,000
Randy Quaid
American actor,
$100,000
Ryan ONeal
TV and movie
actor: $50,000
Sean Avery
Canadian ice hockey
player: $20,000
Compiled by Shailendra Singh
Lindsay Lohan
Hollywood
actress:
$300,000
Most expensive celebrity bail bonds
Getty Images
11
April 30, 2014
SUPREME COURT
Illustrations: Aruna
D
elhiites must have heaved another sigh of relief after the Supreme Court
directed state-owned National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) to
desist from cutting power supply to Anil Ambani-controlled BSES firms that
provide power to the capital.
This is the second time that the apex court has thwarted NTPC from plung-
ing Delhi into darkness. It had, in February 2014, restrained Indias largest
power generating utility from shut-
ting off power.
The BSES firms need to pay out-
standing dues to NTPC, but claimed
they have no money to do so, espe-
cially when the tariff is low in the
capital and as a result they continue
to lose revenue.
The court ordered BSES firms to
pay the dues since January 1, 2014 to
NTPC. It also asked the commission
to make sure that there is no unnec-
essary delay in payment of dues. The
court will seek a long-lasting solu-
tion to the crisis from the Delhi
Electricity Regulatory Commission
and BSES companies.
I
f a youngster who is 18 years or below commits a heinous
crime, should he/she still be tried by the juvenile court?
Well, the answer is yes if one goes by the decision of the
Supreme Court.
A three-judge bench of Chief Justice P Sathasivam and
Justices Ranjan Gogoi and Shiva Kirti Singh refused to
entertain two petitions filed by BJP leader Subramanian
Swamy and Nirbhayas parents that sought a relook into
the meaning of the term juvenile in legal parlance
while questioning the constitutional validity of the
Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children)
Act, 2000. It rejected the plea of Nirbhayas
parents to send the juvenile convict for a reg-
ular trial. The accused was sentenced to a
maximum of three years in a reformation
home by the Juvenile Justice Board.
There was nothing wrong with the act, the
bench clarified, and left it to the criminal courts
to figure out the juvenality of an offender in a
heinous crime.
A
fter the death row convicts in
the Rajiv Gandhi assassina-
tion case, it was the turn of 1993
Delhi blast convict Devenderpal
Singh Bhullar to get relief from
the Supreme Court. A bench of
Chief Justice P Sathasivam and
Justices RM Lodha, SL Dattu
and SJ Mukhopadhaya commut-
ed his death sentence to life
imprisonment. The verdict was
based on two counts: One,
Bhullar was mentally ill. Second
was the inordinate delay by the
president in deciding his mercy
plea. It was a report by the
Institute of Human Behaviour
and Allied Sciences that con-
vinced the court that Bhullar was
indeed insane. Bhullar developed
mental illness in prison, after he
was sentenced to death by a
TADA court in 2011.
Classifying criminals
A lease
of life
Delhis high-voltage drama
Reality
check
A
fter asking BJP and Cong-
ress in early March to clarify
their stand on government for-
mation in Delhi, the apex court
ordered them to file a response
within two weeks on whether
they will form the government. It
said the issue cant be left in
limbo. The parties wanted the
court to defer the matter till Lok
Sabha elections. The hearing was
related to AAPs petition against
presidents rule and suspended
animation of assembly.
12
April 30, 2014
B
ringing black money tucked away in foreign banks by
Indians is an issue which governments of the day have
time and again skirted. But not any longer after the recent ver-
dict of the Supreme Court, which had earlier taken the lead in
addressing the issue in 2011 by ordering the setting up of a
Special Investigation Team (SIT) to find out ways to bring
back black money to the country.
The center recently appealed to a three-judge bench headed
by Justice HL Dattu to dissolve the SIT, contending that it was
not workable and sans any jurisdiction.
The apex court gave a dressing down to the Solicitor General
Mohan Parasaran while rejecting the appeal. It also did not
consider Parasarans assurance that the government was tak-
ing concrete action and a mechanism was already in place to
deal with the issue.
While pointing out that it had to order the formation of SIT
as successive governments had abdicated responsibility on a
critical issue, the court declared that it will help SIT in any
roadblock faced by the latter.
Black money blues
T
he coal block allocation probe took a curious turn
recently when the Supreme Court ordered the Central
Vigilance Commission (CVC) to find out whether the CBI
was justified in closing investigations in 20 cases after pre-
liminary enquiries. The doubt arose because according to
investigation officers the cases were fit for registering FIRs,
but were overruled by senior CBI officials.
A bench of Justices RM Lodha, Madan B Lokur and
Kurian Joseph gave the judgment after allegations were
made by NGO Common Cause that top officials in the CBI
were wrapping up cases. It took into account a recent
instance where the CBI had filed a closure report in two
such cases despite differences of opinion among its officials.
Pointing out that it was crucial to get divergent views
examined by an independent body, the court asked the CBI
to submit all documents on 20 cases before the CVC.
CBI hauled
over coals
SUPREME COURT
C
ompensating rape victims by giving them
half the property of rapists maybe an appre-
ciable way to rehabilitate them, but the idea did not
find favour with the highest court in India.
Although a bench of Chief Justice P Sathasivam and
Justices SA Bobde and NV Ramana examined the verdict
of the Bangladesh SC that had ruled in 2001 that a rapist
must give away half his property to the victim, it averred
that the verdict was too liberal to be followed in every
Making a case
for rape victims
rape case. Amicus curiae Sidharth Luthra had drawn
the attention of the court to the verdict.
However, the judiciary should be able to offer
substantial compensation to the survivors of
rape victims, observed Sathasivam while deliv-
ering the judgment in the gang rape of a
tribal girl in West Bengal. The bench
asked the state government to pay `5
lakh as compensation within a
month, in addition to the `50,000
sanctioned for rehabilitation. It
pointed out that the state gov-
ernment had failed to provide
details of measures taken for the
security of the girl and her family.
13
April 30, 2014
CORPORATE/
black economy/ palaniappan chidambaram
PERVERTED
MIDAS
PERVERTED
MIDAS
for years to come, the fm
will be known as the man
who helped to generate
black money and
legally convert it into white
By Alam Srinivas
Getty Images
for years to come, the fm
will be known as the man
who helped to generate
black money and
legally convert it into white
By Alam Srinivas
F
OR two decades, he hated to be in the
shadows of Prime Minister Man-
mohan Singh, who is hailed as Indias
first reformer. Finance minister (FM)
P Chidambaram still thinks he has
done more than Singh to push India
on to the path of liberalization. In private conversa-
tions, he can go on for hours on how his moves as FM
(comprising three stints and nine full budgets) made
the economy more market-oriented and forced the
black economy to change its color to white.
Ironically, and shockingly, in the past 20 months,
the FM has almost singlehandedly given a boost to
black money. Many of these decisions were compelled
by an attempt to reverse the growth slowdown, but
they helped increase corruption. They had nothing to
do with the dozens of scandals and scamslike 2G
and coal blocks allocationthat plagued UPA-II. The
end result: the transformation of Chidambaram into
the gray reformer.
Each time, he imposed curbs on gold imports,
delayed the decision to renegotiate tax agreement
with Mauritius, and went slow on how to tax cross-
border mergers, the FM merely encouraged smug-
gling and generation of black wealth. His aggression
to tax the taxpayers more, and not seek new sources
and recover unpaid taxes, to rev up governments rev-
enues forced individuals and firms to evade and avoid
taxes of all kinds.
Not that Chidambaram was unaware of the
impact of his policies. So did he deliberately allow the
manipulators to thrive in the hope that a sizeable por-
tion of the tainted money will find its way into the
Congress coffers to fight elections? Or were his prior-
ities different? Logically, he knew the economy was in
a mess, and his task was to stem the rot a bit so that
Indias sovereign rating did not plummet to junk sta-
tus. What if it helped the robbers too!
One is never sure with Chidambaram, who consis-
tently plays the dual role of Dr Jekyl and Mr Hyde.
One day, he will rail against black money; the next
day, he will announce a voluntary disclosure scheme
for offenders to allow them to convert their black
money into white. One week, he will go out of his way
to woo local and global investors with sops; the next
week, he will anger them with `60,000 crore loan
waiver scheme for small and marginal farmers.
YELLOW METAL, BLACK GOLD
Back in the 1980s, before reforms kicked in, gold
smuggling was at its peak. Controlled by the under-
world and financed through the illegal hawala chan-
nels, it boosted the illegal economy. Liberalization put
a stop to illegal imports of the yellow metal. For the
next two decades, gold came in only through official
channels. Chidambaram changed the scenario when
he imposed customs duty on imports, which contin-
ued to rise through 2012 and 2013.
The FMs reason to do so was valid. Indians spent
$50 billion in 2012-13 to buy gold abroad. The pas-
sion to own bullion pushed the countrys current
account deficit (CAD)foreign outflows minus for-
eign inflowsto record levels. Global rating agencies
threatened to downgrade India to a junk status, or the
same as in 1990, when the economy was in a mess.
Chidambaram had no option but to restrict gold
imports, at least in the short run.
Despite the duty and other curbs, World Gold
Council estimated that Indias gold demand rose 13
percent to 975 tons in 2013, compared to the previous
year. The bulk of it was through imports, although
higher quantities of recycled gold found its way into
the market. However, as per official figures, the value
of imports in the 11 months (April 2013 to February
2014) of 2013-14 was around $23 billion or less than
half the figure for 2012-13. How was that possible?
The black rabbit that the FM pulled out of his hat
was in the form of illegal gold imports, or smuggling.
Over the past several months, black marketers have
made hay and hawala premiums on gold shot up
to 5-15 percent. The Department of Revenue
Intelligence said that the seizures of smuggled gold in
2013-14 were higher than the combined figure for
the past 10 years. In several months during the last
fiscal, the seizures by Indian authorities jumped by
300-400 percent.
Most of the illegitimate gold came across the
porous borders with Pakistan, Nepal and Bangladesh,
through the smuggling routes for narcotics. In fact,
Pakistan witnessed a huge jump of duty-free imports
of gold which, instead of being exported as jewelry,
was allegedly sent to India. During 2012 and 2013,
such imports by Pakistans exporters zoomed by
80-100 percent. Pakistan banned imports for a
month and later imposed stringent curbs on them.
14
April 30, 2014
CORPORATE/
black economy/ palaniappan chidambaram
Curbs on gold imports gave a boost to
smuggling, and hawala premiums shot
up to 5-15 percent. Gold seizures
zoomed by 300-400 percent.
have to cut TDS, and the Indian seller does not have
to pay tax. For holders of black money, it makes sense
to re-route their illegal money through Mauritius,
show it as an investment to acquire a firm or buy
shares in it, and instantly convert the black money
into whiteand that too tax-free.
In the past 15 years, only one former finance min-
ister, Pranab Mukherjee, had the guts to roadblock
the Mauritius route. In his 2012 budget speech, he
removed the zero-tax status that any tax haven,
including Mauritius, enjoyed. To be fair to the other
finance ministers, Mukherjee was forced to act. The
reason: The Supreme Court ruled that the
Netherlands-based Vodafone, which purchased a
majority share in Hutchison Essars mobile assets in
India for over $11 billion in 2007 through the
tax haven route, did not have to pay any tax on the
cross-border deal.
Thanks to smuggling, Chidambaram could claim that
official gold imports slumped, but as the World Gold
Council hinted domestic consumption still went up.
ALL FDI ROADS LEAD TO MAURITIUS
Since April 2000, cumulative FDI (foreign direct
investment) inflows from Mauritius to India totaled
almost $80 billion, or almost 40 percent of total
inflows from all the nations. A portion of the
Mauritius investments is alleged to be globally tainted
moneyearned through narcotics, gun-running and
smuggling. The second component of it is black
money generated by Indians, which is taken overseas
and brought back to the country as white money.
Indian agencies dub the latter trend as round-trip-
ping or treaty shopping. The Income Tax Department
pleaded and screamed for changes in the India-
Mauritius Double-Taxation Treaty. Mauritius impos-
es no tax and, under the treaty, India cannot impose
tax on acquisitions of Indian firms, which are funded
through Mauritius. Normally, a foreign entity, which
buys an Indian company, has to cut TDS (tax deduct-
ed at source) on capital gains that may accrue to the
seller. However, if the money comes through
Mauritius, a tax haven, the foreign buyer does not
15
April 30, 2014
Many of decisions taken by the finance
minister were compelled by an attempt
to reverse the growth slowdown, but
they only helped increase corruption.
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
2011-12
2012-13 2013-14*
Share of Mauritius
Total FDI inflows
35.12
35.12
9.94
9.94
9.48
9.48
15.46
15.46
22.42
22.42
3.42
3.42
Mauritian moneybags
Source: Planning Commission All figures in $ billions *April-November
16
April 30, 2014
terranean as a notified jurisdiction, which meant
that deals through Cyprus would be scrutinized care-
fully by the income tax authorities.
Cyprus swung into action because Indias decision
would scare away legitimate foreign investors, who
route their investments through the island to benefit
from its favorable tax regime. In less than three
months, Cyprus agreed to share investment informa-
tion more readily with India and renegotiate the bilat-
eral tax treaty to plug loopholes related to treaty shop-
ping. India said it would remove the notification on
Cyprus, only after a new treaty was signed.
ROBBING PETER, WHO PAYS TAXES
One of the biggest challenges that Chidambaram
faced in the past two years was how to raise govern-
ments revenues, even as the economy slowed down.
It became a huge headache because he could not
expand the tax base due to political reasons. For
example, he dared not tax farmers. Thanks to crony
capitalism and nexus between big business and poli-
tics, he did not initiate action against errant compa-
nies, which had huge unpaid taxes.
His only option was to impose a higher burden on
individuals and firms that already paid taxes. This
obviously prompted the existing taxpayers to find
ways to reduce their outgo. Many resorted to options
that helped them avoid and evade taxes. Some of
In effect, the apex court opened the doors and
windows for future transactions to remain tax free. In
addition, the court gave the option to other buyers,
who had indeed paid capital gains tax on similar deals
in the past, to ask for refunds from the government.
What did Chidambaram do during his second
stint as FM in UPA-II, that is after Mukherjee
became the president? The FM postponed the 2012
decision to April 2016. He started an out-of-court
arbitration with Vodafone, which, however, broke
down later. Most importantly, he kept the Mauritius
route wide open. Publicly, Chidambaram said that the
India-Mauritius taxation treaty was being renegotiat-
ed, but the new clauses that he proposed wont curb
the flow of black money.
The fact that Mauritius was being given special
treatment could be gauged from the manner in which
India dealt with Cyprus, another tax haven and a less-
er-known route for tainted money. On November 1,
2013, India declared the island nation in the Medi-
The tax on cross-border M&A deals was
postponed. Despite allegations that it
was used to re-route black money, the
Mauritius route remains open.
2012-13 2013-14
Seizures of smuggled gold Seizures of smuggled gold
Lure of gold
(April-January)
Lure of gold
CORPORATE/
black economy/ palaniappan chidambaram
17
April 30, 2014
tax on royalties since 2006.
Nokia Indias immovable
assets, including its factory
in Chennai, were frozen.
This derailed the parent
companys decision to sell
its global factories to Micro-
soft. Nokia, which has now
approached the Supreme
Court, agreed to pay an
interim amount of `4,000
crore to the Indian tax department.
The finance ministers response to this was to hike
the tax on royalty payments to 25 percent in Budget
2014. The small investors, who were enraged with the
fees, cheered as they felt more profits would be avail-
able as dividends to them. There was a catch. The FM
said that MNC subsidiaries will pay either 25 percent,
or the maximum rate mentioned in the bilateral tax
treaties that India has signed with the respective
nations, whichever is lower. It transpired that the
majority of these treaties listed the maximum rate at
either 10 or 15 percent.
Several taxpayers that India Legal spoke to agreed
they were saddled with many taxeson income
(income tax), profession (services tax), consumption
(excise and customs duties), entertainment and even
on basic necessities like education and health (cess).
They admitted that they avoided a few, either through
consumption without bills, or non-payment of servic-
es tax. This is why the finance ministry launched a
campaign against evaders of services tax.
For years to come, UPA-II will be known as the
regime that launched a number of scams. But its
Chief Financial Officer Chidambaram will become
synonymous with Indias modern Midas. The finance
minister will be known as the man who helped gener-
ate black money and paved the way to legally convert
it into white.
these initiatives turned out to be completely legal. For
example, consider the royalty payments made by
Indian subsidiaries of foreign multinational compa-
nies (MNCs). In the recent past, such fees have been
hiked several times.
Between 2009 and 2012, the combined royalty
payments by 50 listed Indian subsidiaries to their
parent MNCs went up by over 30 percent per year. In
the same period, the combined annual sales and prof-
its of these subsidiaries rose by 17 percent and 7 per-
cent, respectively. The era coincided with the removal
of governments ceiling on royalty fees in 2009.
Apart from the economic slowdown, which
reduced the profits of MNCs subsidiaries, the two
other reasons for regular hikes in royalty were high
taxes on their profits and dividends that they paid to
their shareholders, including the MNC parents. Until
April 2014, royalty was taxed at 10 percent, which was
much lower than the other two taxes. It was the best
way to avoid taxes and still enrich the MNC parents
coffers. Thus, Maruti Suzuki has lately become the
cash cow for Suzuki.
Some subsidiaries went a step further and did
cough up even the 10 percent tax on royalty paid to
their parents. This was the reason why the tax author-
ities slapped a case of over `21,000 crore on Finnish
firm, Nokia, and its Indian arm. The charge was that
the mobile handset manufacturer had not paid any
TAX HAVEN ROUTE
Vodafone CEO Vittorio
Colao (right) with
commerce minister
Anand Sharma. Income tax
authorities have imposed a
huge liability on
Vodafones purchase of
Hutchison Essar
IL
PIB
18
April 30, 2014
LECTIONtime in India is an interesting period
when one sees politicians of all hues conjuring
up support from the masses. The promises are
generally on issues of the basic needs of the
common manabout roti, kapada aur makaan.
These are the topics that concern the daily lives
of the average Indian in a country that, at inde-
pendence, was predominantly rural, industrial-
ly backward and could not feed itself. The Green
Revolution ushered in a modicum of respectability away from the
sobriquet of being a basket case, wherein it was once said that food
aid from America went directly from ship to mouth to feed the
INDIA?
ensuring stability, both internal and external, will be a major
challenge for the next government. the leadership needs to
ensure that reliance in defense is a priority
By Manmohan Bahadur
E
FOCUS/
national security
WHY NOT MADE IN
WHY NOT MADE IN
P
r
a
m
o
d

P
u
s
h
k
a
r
n
a
19
April 30, 2014
hungry. National security was never an issue,
for that was an ethereal subject meant only
for the experts.
Seven decades later, the situation is differ-
ent. As the heat of May approaches, the elec-
tion fever has raised temperatures to a differ-
ent level. Luckily, one sees stirrings of inter-
est on the subject of national security and the
odd statement made on it by some (just two
or three) political parties. That, however,
does no justice to the power ambitions of
India, for what is required upfront is their
vision for the country.
Vision is defined as an acute sense of the
possible. It is the setting of the agenda by the
leader. Ben Gurion, the founder of Israel,
envisioned greening of the Negev desert.
Today, due his vision and the thrust to attain
it, Israel is selling water technology to the
world, including India. And this, in a country
where on seeing the flow in the Brahma-
putra, an Israeli expert remarked that the
amount of water that flows in the river in one
day is equal to what his country gets in a full
year! Another telling example was the vision
of John F Kennedy, who declared in the early
1960s that to demonstrate its superiority
over the Soviet Union in space exploration,
America should put a man on the moon
before the decade endedand it did.
FOR A CORRECT POSTURE
Indias challenging security environment is in
dire need of a vision to confront the problem
headlong. With two inimical neighbors and
an internal security milieu that is a threat to
its stability, the country can ill afford to plod
from crisis to crisis. Red lines need to be
drawn and deterrent capability to enforce
punishment that would follow any transgres-
sion, needs to be acquired. Our posture
should inspire confidence in our allies and
dissuade detractors, so that India never again
gets depicted as a cat seeing itself as a tiger in
its reflection in a mirror, as was done by the
influential magazine, The Economist, on its
cover page a year back.
The makeover can happen only if there is
a vision (and a plan) of grandeur, not just a
delusion of greatness, as is our national
character; our rich cultural heritage cannot
be a substitute for our backwardness in most
indices of human progress. The vision has to
come from a leader who himself, or herself,
believes in and has the self-belief to achieve
it. In a book, The Challenge of Command,
which is a compulsory read in military
colleges, its author Robert Nye
says that the followers
should see the picture
(destination) through
the eyes of the leader. Its
only then that the synchro-
nization of the leaders aim and
that of the masses would occur and
generate an effect greater than the sum
of the individual efforts.
THE THREATS
Western leaders go to great lengths to spell
out their vision, which becomes the yardstick
for the citizens to make up their mind whom
to vote for. Do we in India know the vision of
our leadership so as to elect him or her?
Leaders like Mahatma Gandhi, Winston
Churchill and George Smith Patton had a
charisma that was worth dying for. Modern
India needs such leadership desperately if it
has to get its act together to address the chal-
lenges. Questions must be posed in the
run-up to the elections and answers demand-
ed from each political party to know their
plan of addressing the security issues staring
us in the face.
Heading the list of threats is the impend-
ing American withdrawal from Afghanistan
in end 2014, an event that portends a major
challenge to India. Many scenarios have been
painted, starting from the most optimistic,
wherein the present Hamid Karzai govern-
ment will acquire stability, to the most
pessimistic one in which Afghanistan breaks
up into areas of tribal dominance of various
clans. Analysts talk about a move of battle-
hardened insurgents moving to Jammu
India needs more indigenously-made
arms. For this to happen, the local
private sector has to be seen as a
nationalistic asset.
20
April 30, 2014
FOCUS/
national security
and Kashmir resulting in a new thrust to the
insurgency, which has been kept under lid.
How does the new Indian leadership plan to
interact with the Afghan government which
may be under pressure from the Taliban,
aided by Pakistan? China has huge invest-
ments there and could it, or would it, join
hands with India to bring in stability? Would
India agree to play second fiddle to China?
Chinas feverish militarization with a
budget three times that of India, and its
structured and calculated encircling of India
through its String of Pearls strategy, por-
tends an unsettling environment. Once its
road link from Sittwe in Myanmar to
Kunming gets completed next year, it would
get access to the Bay of Bengal, negating the
threat of closing of the Malacca Straits posed
to its shipping.
The defense industries of India and China
complemented each other in their archaic
legacy in the mid 1970s, after which the
Chinese graph just took-off. Can we do a
China with our indigenous defense indus-
try and achieve a reversal of the 70/30 ratio
which is heavily biased towards imports?
Political parties must educate the public on
how they plan to get back the strategic auton-
omy that is slipping away as a consequence.
HOSTAGE TO ARMS SUPPLIERS
Strategic autonomy is the freedom available
to a nation to do what is best in its interest.
India is presently hostage to foreign vendors
due to the absence of an indigenous military
industrial complex. When the Soviet Union
collapsed in 1991, the three services were
running from pillar to post for spare parts for
their inventory of weapons which were of
USSR origin.
When India exploded the nuclear bomb at
Pokharan in 1998, the ensuing American
embargo crippled the Indian navys Sea King
helicopter fleet. Recently, India was coerced
into accepting a three-fold price increase
from around $800 million to $2.33 billion
for the aircraft carrier INS Vikramaditya
because there is no home grown industry to
fall back on.
The armys artillery arm is in poor shape
because of the procrastination of the
procurement system to import desperately-
The new Indian leadership will have to
deal with an Afghan regime under Taliban
pressure, and counter Chinas calculated
string of pearls encircling of India.
CASE FOR SELF-RELIANCE
(L-R) Defense equipment by Mahindra on display;
The chief of the air staff, Air Chief Marshal NAK
Browne (left), after a one-hour sortie in the Rafale
aircraft at St Dizier airbase
PIB
21
April 30, 2014
needed numbers, despite the Bofors gun. The
navys depleting submarine arm has come
into sharp focus after the INS Sindhurakshak
and INS Sindhuratna tragedies.
The knee-jerk reaction of blacklisting for-
eign vendors, like putting on hold all deals
with Rolls Royce after CBI inquiry, has
harmed our defense preparedness. The IAF
is on a sticky wicket with its squadron
strength down to 34, as per a parliamentary
standing committee report on defense. The
delay in the induction of 126 Rafale medium
multi-role combat aircraft (MMRCA) has
added to its woes.
SYNCHRONIZED EFFORT
India is in this predicament because the
Made in India tag is conspicuous by its
absence. This tag can only make an appear-
ance with a visionary plan and missionary
zeal to galvanize the private industry. This
would not be possible in isolation or by just
tinkering with the defense procurement
procedure (DPP). The requirement is a radi-
cal overhaul of the DPP and, more impor-
tantly, the mindset of the government. The
private industry has to be viewed as an asset
that is as nationalistic as the Defense Public
Sector Undertakings.
A close coupling and synchronization of
the defense and foreign policies is an imper-
ative in this endeavor, overriding turf consid-
erations and petty politics.
The mantra of the IAF, People First,
Mission Always, conveys the importance of
the human resource in any organization,
especially the armed forces. Unfortunately,
joining the forces has slipped down the prior-
ity of choices for young Indians in the last
decade. The vision of our political hopefuls
must include their plan to incentivize the
youth to join the armed forces. Social values
having changed over the past decades, cogent
thoughts need to be devoted to this vital
aspect of national security.
Finally, political leaders need to be
reminded of an Oscar Wilde quip, now-a-
days, people know the price of everything,
but the value of nothing. Politicians must
know the value of izzat, which is what armed
forces personnel want. The well-being of the
veterans, as they fade away from active serv-
ice, must be a sincere duty accepted by the
political classit has to be a solemn part of
their vision for India.
The author, a retired air vice marshal, is
a distinguished fellow at the Centre for Air
Power Studies. The views expressed in
this column are personal.
FOREVER READY
(L) A Rafale aircraft
as part of navy
exercises; (R)
armymen in action at
the Kargil heights
IL
SPOTLIGHT
COMES
ON AT A
PRICE
as tv channels and print
publications pretend to
present insightful political
analyses and profiles during
election campaigns, its time
to question many of these
articles, which are only
advertisements
masquerading as news
By Paranjoy Guha Thakurta
22
April 30, 2014
NDIAS media is dominated by corporate con-
glomerates, which seek to maximize their profits.
The independence of the media and its ability to
bring about transparency in society gets compro-
mised because of corruption within itself. Paid
news in any form, but more importantly in the
run-up to elections, is dangerous. The latter sub-
verts the fundamental tenet of democratic ideals:
purity of a citizens vote. The difficulty is that paid
news is difficult to identify. The deception involved in passing
off advertisements as news entails a clandestine activity.
Its occurrence, thus, can be established only by its partici-
pants by acknowledging their guilt. In addition, paid news is
organized through cozy relationships between lawmakers,
politicians cutting across party lines and representatives of
corporate media. This nexus cannot be weakened easily.
News is supposed to be fair, neutral, independent, and
distinguishable from opinions or commentaries, as well as
MEDIA/
paid news
23
April 30, 2014
advertisements. The first problem with paid
news is that consumers are unable to distin-
guish between paid editorial content and
unpaid one. This distinction is required for
TV channels under the advertisement code,
formulated under the Cable Television
Networks (Regulation) Act, 1995.
Consumers of news content are provided
with false representations (or advertise-
ments) that masquerade as news content.
This is a violation of a citizens right to
know, which is protected under Article
19(1)(a) of the constitution as a fundamental
right; it was affirmed in Union of India vs
Association for Democratic Reforms case by
the Supreme Court.
The candidates in the fray do not account
for the payments made to media firms for
favorable coverage. Thus, some of them get
away spending money over and above the
ceiling allowed on their campaigns by the
Election Commission. These are corrupt
practices as per Section 123(6) of the
Representation of the People Act, 1951. The
media, which indulges in paid news, does
not account for the revenues and violates the
Companies Act, 1956 and 2013, and Income
Tax Act, 1961.
I
n the absence of powers with the Press
Council of India (PCI), including powers
to conduct search and seizure opera-
tions, it is difficult (and often impossible) to
track these illegal transactions. Several pro-
posals to curb paid news exist, but none
offers a satisfactory answer. Among them are
those for the setting up of ombudsmen in
media firms to address paid news and the
regulation of cross-media ownership hold-
ings. These are, in a sense, long-term solu-
tions. More direct suggestions, such as crim-
inalizing the practice of paid news, have also
been proposed.
The calls to criminalize paid news, and
make it a cognizable and non-bailable
offense, are attractive proposals. However, it
would be akin to placing the cart before the
horse if one were to agonize over the minuti-
ae of the offense. The question arises as to
how can a debate on prosecution help if the
practice is difficult to establish.
There are other causes for circumspec-
tion. Standards of proof tend to be higher in
cases of criminal offenses because they could
involve sentences. The rationale for paid
news to be a criminal offense is clear: these
are seen as more egregious than civil wrongs.
Whereas civil wrongs injure particular peo-
ple or parties in a case, criminal wrongs are
those against society.
However, given the higher burden of proof,
it may prove to be counter-productive.
Criminalizing paid news would
be meaningless, as the illegal
practice by media and politicians is
difficult to establish.
Illustration : Anthony Lawrence
24
April 30, 2014
Another seemingly attractive option that
has found currency is the amendment of
Section 123 of the Representation of the
People Act, 1951 to make instances of paid
news actionable by the Election Commission.
This section defines corrupt electoral prac-
tices, including bribes and inducements to
influence voters. The concern here is that it
would only penalize the candidates, and leave
the errant media firms alone. Nevertheless, if
paid news is recognized as a corrupt electoral
practice under act, it would be a deterrent.
T
he PCI is a quasi-judicial authority set
up by an act of Parliament but it has
no statutory powers to punish. Its writ
does not extend beyond print. The majority of
its 30 members represent the industry. The
PCI has no real teeth to enforce its findings or
to penalize any individual or organization. It
has no mandate by which to enforce the
observation of its own code of ethics, as there
is no legally binding quality to them which
could justify a courts intervention.
In an ideal situation, self-regulation by
the media would be the best solution. But the
question arises as to what needs to be done to
contain and curbif not, stop altogether
the corrupt practices of the blackest of the
black sheep within the fraternity.
This is what the Delhi High Court stated
on April 19, 2013, in the Indraprastha People
versus Union of India case: ...the absence of
P
ALAGUMMI Sainath, rural
affairs editor at The Hindu,
reported on the paid news
problem as it manifested itself on the
eve of October 2009 assembly elec-
tions in Maharashtra. He highlighted
a series of complimentary reports on
the then chief minister of the state,
Ashok Chavan.
A total of 15 editions of three large
newspapers carried identical content,
and each newspaper attached a dif-
ferent byline. The three newspapers,
Lokmat, Pudhari and Maharashtra
Times, were competitors.
Contemplating the outcome of a legal suit between the correspon-
dents of these articles to determine who owns the copyright of the con-
tent may be hilarious, had it not been for the sheer scale and audacity
of the fraud that was perpetrated by the Marathi language media.
Chavan won from the Bhokar assembly seat in Maharashtras
Nanded district by a margin of over one lakh votes. The official expens-
es incurred on advertising during his election campaign worked out to
`5,379 on newspaper ads and `6,000 on cable TV ads.
To use Sainaths words, these covered at least 47 full newspaper
pages, many of them in colour, focussing exclusively on Mr Chavan,
his leadership, his party and government. These appeared in large
newspapers, including one ranking amongst Indias highest
circulation dailies....
The Election Commissions (ECs) attempts to inquire into the verac-
ity of Chavans election accounts were opposed by the politicians legal
team. His lawyers, including Abhishek Manu Singhvi, member of the
Rajya Sabha and spokesperson of Congress, challenged ECs jurisdic-
tion before a two-judge bench of the Delhi High Court but failed. The
matter is now before the Supreme Court.
The government filed an affidavit in the Ashok Chavan versus
Madavrao Kinhalkar case in support of Chavan. The affidavit, submitted
by the law ministry, effectively seeks to whittle down ECs powers to
question the veracity of the expenditure statements of a candidate by
claiming that the commission has no powers to act in a hypothetical
situation where a candidate knowingly submits a record of his overall
expenditure, but leaves the relevant particulars blank.
Curious case
of Ashok Chavan
MEDIA/
paid news
25
April 30, 2014
state intervention on its own is no guarantee
of a rich media environment. On the contrary,
to promote a media environment character-
ized by pluralism and diversity, state interven-
tion is necessary. Freedom of expression is
not an absolute right and it can be restricted
to protect the rights of others.
It added: Under self-regulation the media
voluntarily commits to uphold a code of ethics
that it itself drafts but ethics itself is a com-
plex and controversial subject due to society
not being homogeneous.
The issues related to the kind of regula-
tory authority that is required for the media in
India have been discussed and debated with-
out any resolution as of now. At the end of the
day, it comes down to the practitioners. In
order to curb corruption in the media, jour-
nalists have to preserve the ideals and act in
an ethical manner.
The author is an eminent journalist and
educator. As part of a sub-committee of the
PCI, he has co-authored a report titled Paid
News: How Corruption in the Indian Media
Undermines Democracy. This article is
adapted from a chapter in his book titled
Journalism: Ethics and Responsibilities,
co-authored by Ujwala Uppaluri
T
HE Election Commission (EC)
has highlighted the deception
and propaganda that was
related to paid news in its October
2011 order on Umlesh Yadav, the first
ever sitting member of a legislative
assembly to be disqualified for her
failure to record expenditure incurred
on advertising during her campaign.
She was disqualified under section
10A of the Representation of the
People Act, 1951. Yadav, mother of
Vikas Yadav, convicted in Nitish Katara
murder case, was elected from
Bisauli, Uttar Pradesh, in 2007 on a ticket of the Rashtriya Parivartan
Dal. She was unable to complete her term and was banned for three
years from seeking re-election as well.
This case has set a precedent and represents a major breakthrough
in solving the paid news problem. It also sets the right precedent of the
PCI and EC working together; the former forwarded its findings to the
latter. The EC articulated the full extent of the damage paid news did,
and held Yadav accountable. But it let the errant media go scot free.
On 20 October 2011, the EC opined that by suppressing expendi-
ture on paid news and filing an incorrect or false account, the candi-
date... is guilty of not merely circumventing the law relating to election
expenses but also of resorting to false propaganda by projecting a
wrong picture and defrauding the electorate.
On May 3, 2013, the Allahabad High Court upheld the commissions
finding as fully consistent with the law and has cited clear precedent
laid down by the Supreme Court in LR Shivaramagowda vs
TM Chandrasekhar. The latter case saw the SC rule that, in addition to
checking whether accounts had been duly lodged, it was within the
ECs powers to check to see if true and correct accounts of expendi-
ture incurred or authorized were provided by candidates. The Yadavs
have challenged the high court ruling in Supreme Court.
The case did not result in any indictment of the newspapers that
printed ads about her (Dainik Jagran and Amar Ujala). The PCI was
able to identify the content as paid one because the format of the
impugned material was such that it would appear as a news report to
the layman and the word ADVT printed at the lowest end rather
appeared to accompany a small boxed appeal by the candidate.
How Umlesh Yadav was
disqualified as an MLA
IN JEOPARDY, GENUINE REPORTAGE
Election coverage and analyses in full swing on
some of the news channels. This is just a
representational photograph
Anil Shakya
IL
KILLER
RAYS
his singular goal is to get these structures
removed from crowded residential areas
after harmful emissions killed his brother
while another had a brush with death.
Sudhir Kasliwal is determined to keep
fighting despite official apathy. a first person
account of his crusade
FOCUS/
cellphone radiation / transmission towers
he ubiquitous cellphone has taken over our lives. Be it at a
marketplace, metro, railway station, cinema hall or air-
port, one can see people with mobiles glued to their ears,
laughing, looking grim or gesticulating. But how many are
aware of the health hazards caused by radiation emanating
from mobiles as well as telecom towers that boost mobile
signals? While mobile companies are quick to debunk it,
asserting that there is no definitive research on it, I have personally been
affected by it and fought to remove cellphone towers from residential colonies.
Perhaps, this will be a lesson for youngsters who use their mobiles for pro-
longed periods or sleep with it tucked under their pillows. Residential colonies
also often welcome cellphone companies to install towers on the rooftops of
T
A TRIBUTE: Nothing could thwart Sudhir
Kasliwals (left) fight against mobile towers. He
had already lost his brother Pramod to fatal
radiation effects.
houses, so that it can bring them additional
revenues, thus cutting down on their month-
ly maintenance payments.
I too would have ignored all the warnings
associated with cellphone towers if I hadnt
faced the serious consequences of electro
magnetic radiation (EMR) emitting from
mobile towers.
PERSONAL LOSS
It all began in 2011. My youngest brother,
Pramod Kasliwal, was diagnosed with brain
cancer. The family naturally panicked. We
rushed him to New York Presbyterian
Hospital where Dr Jeffrey N Bruce, a neuro-
surgeon, operated on him to remove a brain
tumor. We hung on to hope. But after a few
months, he passed away.
When I told Dr Bruce that another broth-
er too had been diagnosed with a brain
tumor a few months back he was surprized
that two siblings had simultaneously fallen
prey to the same disease. Some doctors said it
could be caused by radiation. It was then that
I started thinking along this line.
It then occurred to me that we had three
mobile phone towers with the antennae of
about seven cellphone companies, barely 15
feet from our house in Jaipur. The height of
the antennae was almost at the same level as
the first floor of our house, where my broth-
ers lived. Were these towers responsible for
the cancer, I wondered.
I immediately recalled how in November
2011, Bollywood actress Juhi Chawla had
successfully launched a campaign to get 14
towers near her residence removed. She and
residents of four buildings in plush Malabar
Hill in south Mumbai had demanded that
the government remove these towers. After
an independent audit, the residents had dis-
covered, to their horror, that radiation levels
were very high due to the towers being just
40 meters from their houses.
HIGH RADIATION
They wrote to their MP, Milind Deora that
radiation through mobile tower boosters
should only be at the rate of 1 milliwatt per
square meter. But according to experts, the
exposure limits to radio frequency fields pre-
scribed by India are 9.2 watts per square
meter. This is much higher than other coun-
tries3 in Canada, 2 in Australia, 1.2 in
Belgium, 0.1 in China and Italy, 0.095 in
Switzerland and 0.02 in Russia.
Unfortunately, in India, regulation of
mobile towers has not kept pace with the
growth of the cellphone industry. Chawla
stressed during her campaign that towers
installed on buildings in residential areas,
hospitals and schools should be regulated.
Studies have indicated significant long-
term impact of electromagnetic fields on
some species, affecting genes. This could lead
to health complications like tumors, reduc-
tion in sperm count and congenital deformi-
ties. In 2007, Bioinitiative Working Anil Shakya
27
April 30, 2014
FOCUS/
cellphone radiation / transmission towers
28
April 30, 2014
Group, a collaboration of scientists and pub-
lic health policy experts from the US,
Sweden, Denmark, Austria and China
released a 650-page report, which cited more
than 2,000 studies on the toxic effects of
EMRs from all sources.
Suspected health hazards due to it are
blurred vision, headache, nausea, fatigue,
memory loss, hearing problems and so on.
However, chronic exposure to even low-level
radiation, they found, could cause cancer,
impair immunity and even contribute to
Alzheimers disease, dementia, heart disease
among other ailments.
However, according to a government
panel instituted to study the effects of mobile
tower radiation, there is no long-term data
on the environmental impact of mobile tow-
ers. This ambiguity has helped cellphone
companies skirt the issue.
Inspired by Chawla, I too decided to take
the initiative to remove the towers near my
house. But it was easier said than done.
A LONG DRAWN BATTLE
I first engaged a professional team from
Mumbai to measure the EMR around my
house. In the meantime, five more cases of
cancer surfaced in our neighborhood. When
the results of EMR came out, we were
shocked. Radiation levels in our first floor
house, where the windows faced the towers,
were extremely high. So was the case in other
houses in the neighborhood.
When this team visited Jaipur in
December 2011, word spread and the news
was flashed in local newspapers. Rajasthan
Patrika, a popular Hindi newspaper, took the
lead and dispatched reporters to various
places in Jaipur, where the towers were
installed, to conduct a survey. We were again
shocked to know that there were more than
100 cancer cases in parts of the city where
there were clusters of towers.
This was the turning point for me. I deci-
ded to take up the issue with government
authorities. To begin with, I wrote several let-
ters to the then Rajasthan Chief Minister
Ashok Gehlot, Chief Secretary S Ahmed and
his successor, CK Mathew. I also met Jaipurs
mayor, Jyoti Khandelwal, municipal authori-
ties and others.
As expected, there was no reply, and of
course, no action. But, I wasnt going to give
up easily. I used RTI to ask municipal
authorities about the rules governing instal-
lation of towers, whether those next to my
house were granted permission to be set up
and if the requisite fee was deposited by cell-
phone companies.
My query got shunted from one depart-
ment to another, and finally, they said that no
permission was granted, nor any fee deposit-
When the towers were active, peacocks,
sparrows and other birds vanished from
our garden in Jaipur. But they all returned
after the towers were disconnected.
STROKE OF LUCK
Sanjiv Kasliwal (above),
another brother of Sudhir,
is under treatment after
mobile tower radiation led
to brain cancer
29
April 30, 2014
ed by the companies. Armed with this reply, I
again made the rounds of various authorities,
the chief secretary and the chief minister.
The mayor went to the extent of saying that if
she ordered the removal of the towers next to
my house, the whole city would want other
towers removed. Cellphone companies fur-
ther said that if the three towers were
removed, around 30,000 phones would be
disrupted, including those of the chief secre-
tary and the DGP. Plus, there would be no
mobile coverage in the Vidhan Sabha,
Secretariat and SMS Hospital, all of which
were close to my house. But that was hardly
going to stop me in my crusade.
Meanwhile, the chief minister directed
the chief secretary to take action, but nothing
was done. I then went to Delhi to knock on
the doors of Telecom Minister Milind Deora
and showed him the answers to my RTI.
Deora sent a fax to the collector of Jaipur,
CEO of the municipality and the chief secre-
tary, saying that if the towers were installed
without proper sanction, they should be
removed. I felt lighter at heart.
But my happiness was short-lived as no
action was taken. A high official in the
Rajasthan government said I was trying to
fight a powerful lobby and wouldnt succeed.
But I was not going to give up as my fam-
ily had paid a heavy price. Another brother,
Sanjay Kasliwal, was being treated for brain
cancer. Even my six-year-old dog had died of
a stomach tumor. However, it was no more a
personal battle.
With no redressal in sight, I served a legal
notice to Jaipur municipality. At one level, it
was a lonely battle. But at another level, I had
got support from the media. Rajasthan
Patrika had joined the campaign to remove
towers from crowded residential localities.
Finally, the municipality disconnected the
three towers next to my house. And yes, the
30,000 phones still continued working!
FINAL JUDGMENT
As a result of Rajasthan Patrikas campaign,
the state issued orders that all towers located
in schools, hospitals and playgrounds be
removed. The matter went to the Jaipur High
Court, where the cellphone operators lost the
case. They have now appealed to the Sup-
reme Court.
A PIL in the high court stated that there
were about 30 crore cellphone users and
nearly 4.4 lakh cellphone towers in India. It
further said the towers were a source of vari-
ous harmful and hazardous radiations.
The judgment, delivered on November 27,
2012, directed the authorities to:
Remove towers from hospitals and col-
leges within two months.
Remove towers within 500 meters vicinity
of jail premises within six months.
Examine whether towers near ancient
monuments dotting the city need to be
removed within two months.
Strictly enforce DoT guidelines with
respect to mobile handsets and clearance for
installation of mobile towers.
Educate the public about different mobile
sets and their ill-effects.
The state government and local authorities
should decide on a case-by-case basis about
installation of towers in densely populated
areas in accordance with law.
When the towers were active, birds had
disappeared from our garden. Now they
returned to generate a joyous babel, and also
started building nests on defunct towers.
As told to Ramesh Menon
Service providers
should ensure that all
public areas around
the site are within safe
EMR exposure limits.
Radio frequency
radiations from Base
Transceiver Station
should be audited for
compliance with
prescribed norms.
In case of both
ground-based and
roof-top towers, there
shall be no building in
front of the antenna(e).
If the antenna is
mounted on the wall of
a building or a pole
along the road, its
height should be at
least be five meters
above the ground or
road level.
Safety first
Guidelines for mobile
tower installation:
Safe distance
Number of antenna(e)
pointed in the same
direction
Safe distance a building should
be from antenna(e) at the same
height (in meters)
1
2
4
6
20
35
45
55
1
2
4
6
2
0
3
5
4
5
5
5
IL
30
April 30, 2014
DEADLY
DAMAGE
F you can use your mobile phone,
you have cell connectivity. This
means that you are within the range
of a nearby mobile tower. Mobile
technology uses radio frequency
radiation (RFR), which is part of the
spectrum of electromagnetic waves. This
electromagnetic radiation (EMR) causes
both thermal and non-thermal effects.
In the last two decades, questions have
arisen about the adverse impact of EMR on
humans. Most nations have prescribed stan-
dards for permissible radiation levels in
mobile phones and towers. They observe
these standards and do not face problems of
thermal damage.
Over the last decade, these radiations
have increased by almost 100 times in India.
According to Dr Girish Kumar, head,
Department of Electrical Engineering, IIT,
Mumbai: If a person stands within a meter
of a tower for six hours, his temperature can
go up by 6 degrees Fahrenheitenough to
cause death. While most people do not do so,
many towers are still dangerously close to
residential areas, including building clusters.
The constant signal from the mobile
technology can disrupt the humans bioelec-
tric systems, which control and regulate
functions like the heart and brain. The con-
stant onslaught of radiations stresses the
body, which responds by going into a fight or
flight mode.
This under-threat mode exhausts the
cellular repair system, which is unable to heal
damaged cells. Over time, accumulation of
rays from mobile towers around you can
cause cancer, and even death
By Harsaran Bir Kaur Pandey
I
Anil Shakya
FOCUS/
cellphone radiation / transmission towers
31
April 30, 2014
damaged cells could well become the under-
lying cause for major diseases like cancer,
Alzheimers disease, Parkinsons disease,
heart problems, hearing and memory loss
and infertility. Children and infants are the
most vulnerable to EMR, which easily pene-
trates their thinner skull. EMRs can also
cause a permanent damage to foetus.
The largest retrospective adult case-con-
trol study titled Interphone was coordinat-
ed by the International Agency for Research
on Cancer (IARC), a specialized agency of
World Health Organisation (WHO). It stud-
ied links between use of mobiles and head
and neck cancers in adults. The data gath-
ered from 13 countries found indications of
an increased risk of glioma, a malignant
brain cancer, in those with the highest (10
percent) cumulative hours of mobile use over
10 years. For the first time, WHO acknowl-
edged the possibility of a carcinogenic impact
on humans.
Incidentally, another study of users till
2004 shows a 40 percent higher risk of
glioma in the highest category of heavy
users. Heavy means an average 30 minutes
use per day over a 10-year period. WHO has
promoted further research on this group.
India has set norms to limit the harmful
effects of EMR exposure from mobile towers.
(See main story) While some states have leg-
islated strict laws on this, others lag behind.
Many RWAs and individuals have taken
tower companies to court to force compli-
ance of the government norms. In Gurgaons
phase III, residential complexes have existed
since the mid-1990s. In the last five years, a
swathe of land was converted for commercial
and office use; the latest being the Rapid
Metro to connect office complexes. Over-
night two towers surreptitiously appeared on
top of the rapid metro buildings. On either
side are thousands of residential premises.
No one from these complexes was consulted;
the towers radiate microwaves 24x7. The res-
idents now plan to take legal action.
The stakes are high. Most of us cannot do
without mobile phones. The technology
needs a network of towers to ensure connec-
tivity. The government has begun to put
health over technology but it will take strict
monitoring and enforcement to ensure that
mobile tower companies readily comply with
the norms.
The urban development ministry wants
to find solutions and has set up a committee
of experts. Some of the initial recommenda-
tions include that towers must be placed on
the tallest building in residential areas to
reduce the impact on people, and they should
be situated on a six-foot concrete platform to
protect the top two floors from direct radia-
tion. Ultimately, people need to be more vig-
ilant to safeguard their health.
Harsaran Bir Kaur Pandey is the
author of The Radiation Threat: An
Emergency in the Making
We are enveloped by electromagnetic smog in
the age of technology and electronic gadgets.
EMRs from mobiles, computers, Wi-Fi routers,
mobile transmission towers, etc are affecting
human health. Syenergy Environics Limited, a
New Delhi-based organization, has developed a
chip to neutralize radiation. Extensive trials have
been conducted in collaboration with Max
Healthcare, and the results were published in
international scientific and medical journals. The
chip when fixed on mobiles, laptops, PCs,
tablets and Wi-Fi Routers protects users against
radiation. A strip wrapped around a mobile
transmission tower can achieve the same result.
Chips and strips
IL
LIFE SAVER
The new chip (above)
neutralizes radiation
effects. It can also
be fixed to mobile
phone towers
32
April 30, 2014
INFRA/
ppp model/mumbai airport
GATENO
420A
manmohan singh exalts the success of
mega schemes under the business
arrangement, but the new project is also
a showcase of crony capitalism
By Naresh Minocha
was struck recently by a comment in the media that most of the billionaires
among Indias top business leaders operate in oligopolistic markets and in sec-
tors where the government has conferred special privileges on a few. This
sounds like crony capitalism. Are we encouraging crony capitalism? Is this a
necessary but transient phase in the development of modern capitalism in
India? Are we doing enough to protect consumers and small businesses from
the consequences of crony capitalism? These were the questions posed by
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on May 1, 2007.
Seven years later, as he inaugurated the new integrated terminal, T2, of
Mumbais international airport in January 2014, he indirectly answered them. As he cut the
red ribbon, the prime minister said: I compliment Mumbai International Airport Limited
(MIAL) for building this state-of-the art facility. The entrepreneurial skills of Shri GVK Reddy
and his colleagues are truly first-class.
Exuding confidence in the Public-Private Partnership (PPP) model, Singh added: The
construction of the new terminal is yet another shining example of successful execution of
large infrastructure projects under the PPP model which our government has encouraged in
recent years. I am very happy that the PPP model has worked particularly well in the civil
aviation sector.
Ironically, and shockingly, the PPP model that Singh raved about has fattened the pockets
I

33
April 30, 2014
of dozens of crony capitalists in the past few
years. It has drained the national exchequer due
to incentives to the private sector, and broken
the back of the consumers, because of high tar-
iffs paid by them to use these infrastructural
facilities. Even private sector players have
alleged that PPP has become a cozy cartel of
crony capitalists, bureaucrats and politicians, in
which huge sops are openly and grandly handed
over the platter.
PPP FAULTLINES
In 2013, a Parliament Standing Committee crit-
icized the Planning Commission for designing a
flawed PPP model. One, the various clauses
were borrowed from western contracts, and had
no relation to unique local conditions. Two, the
commission interfered in engineering and tech-
nical aspects of the projects, although it had no
experience in them. Three, the PPP allowed
bidders to quote huge premiums to be paid to
the government to bag lucrative projects. They
took on a gamble, and hoped that they could
cite reasons like GDP slowdown, policy bottle-
necks and poor market as fig leaf to wriggle
out of their commitments. In fact, several pri-
vate players did exactly that. And threatened to
abandon the projects if their demands to pay
lower premiums, and get higher financial
incentives, were not met.
Lets consider how the Mumbai airport, like
the Delhi one and capitals airport metro line,
became one of the biggest examples of corrup-
tion. Once the government decided to rebuild
the airport by inviting private sector, MIAL was
formed in 2006. The Hyderabad-based GVK
Reddy Group owned 74 percent and the state-
owned Airports Authority of India (AAI), the
COZY CARTEL
The government allowed
MIAL to levy
development fees on
passengers using Mumbai
airport, when the original
contract didnt
mandate it
34
April 30, 2014
remaining stake. The latter leased out the air-
port to GVK for 30 years so that the private
partner could recover investments and earn
robust profits.
ADVANTAGE GVK
When the agreement was signed in 2006, it did
not mention that MIAL could charge develop-
ment fees from domestic and international pas-
sengers in addition to the passenger services
fees, levied for facilitation and security services
at the airports. However, in May 2009, the
government allowed the company to charge
`100 per embarking domestic passenger and
`600 per embarking international passenger
for 48 months. This translated into additional
revenues of over `1,500 crore for the Reddys.
This was before the government had formed
the airport regulator, Airport Economic
Regulatory Authority of India. The reason to
allow development fees was MIALs argument
that its costs escalated sharply from over `6,800
crore in 2009. Once the regulator was put in
place, it allowed the airport operator to collect
the fee from each passenger not just for two
years, but for eight years (April 1, 2013, to April
1, 2021). The total amount that could now be
mopped by MIAL over this period jumped to
almost `4,000 crore.
According to the regulator, the operators
costs had ballooned to over `12,000 crore. In
addition, MIAL had to pay an interest of over
`1,300 crore on the extra loans it had to borrow
from its original lenders to finance the higher
investments. The regulators decision seemed
bizarre and was at loggerheads with the think-
ing in the ministry of civil aviation and other
stakeholders in the Mumbai airport project.
For example, the stakeholders said that the
development levy may be pooled as equity con-
tribution by the passengers to MIAL. At least, it
will make the users as shareholders and prevent
the company from boosting revenues and P&L
account. Once they become investors, the pas-
sengers will happily pay extra charges.
In October 2012, the ministry decided that
the extra funds required for the completion of
Mumbai airport should be through equity con-
tribution by the two promoters, GVK Group
and AAI. In fact, the latter agreed to pump in an
additional `293 crore as equity, but MIAL
refused. The latter insisted there was no scope
to infuse more equity. The regulator sided with
MIAL and allowed development charges for
eight years.
Why did the regulator show such generosity
to the GVK Group? It is due to the extra charges
that GVK Reddy heaved a sigh of relief; he took
out full-page advertisements in newspapers
which read: My dream has been to create icons
which will last for generations.
The promoter should definitely thank the
MIAL got several post-bid sops. These
included huge development fee, sovereign
guarantees, and securitization of future
revenues to raise fresh loans.
NAIVE FAITH
(L-R) The majority partner in
MIAL, GVK Reddy, and Prime
Minister Manmohan Singh. The
economist PM seems blissfully
ignorant of the arm-twisting
ways of PPP partners.
INFRA/
ppp model / mumbai airport
PIB
Worse, this agreement is totally silent on
securitization of future revenues from whatever
source, including development levy. In this case,
how did the government allow it; the decision
helped MIAL to raise the second loan of over
`2,600 crore. If other bidders had known this
was possible, GVK may not have bagged the
project in the first place!
In addition, the contract provided for only
one tri-partite agreement between MIAL, AAI
and a consortium of lenders in case the operator
needed to raise funds. This was signed when the
operator borrowed almost `4,300 crore from
an IDBI-led consortium. Therefore, there was
no scope for MIAL to raise fresh loans. This
implied that the operator had no legal justifica-
tion to securitize future earnings from develop-
ment fee, which, in itself, was not allowed under
the bi-partite contract with the AAI.
To help MIAL get out of this contractual
mess, the arms of the authority are being twist-
ed to amend the relevant contracts to allow
MIAL to raise the second loan of over `2,600
crore. The changes will incorporate clauses to
allow the operator to put earnings from devel-
opment fee into an escrow account, whose
charge would be created in favor of the lenders.
In a bid to force AAIs hands, the GVK
Group has threatened the former with dire con-
sequences. According to official sources, both in
the authority and ministry, the private player
has warned them that if it is not allowed to
securitize the development levy, the moderniza-
tion project of the Mumbai international air-
port will come to a standstill. MIAL told us
that the lenders may even recall the loans, says
one of them.
This twisting of arms is a classic tactic in the
art of crony capitalism. First, get the incentives.
Then ask for more sops; if they are not given,
say the project is in trouble. Maybe, it is time for
prime minister to answer his 2007 questions.
Maybe, he has known the answers all along.
35
April 30, 2014
airport regulator for the Mumbai project.
High development fees was not the only
advantage that GVK enjoyed. In 2007, the same
year when Singh raised those questions on
crony capitalism, UPA-I extended sovereign
guarantee to MIAL for the repayment of the lat-
ters almost `4,300 crore debt.
The government had no transparent guide-
lines on how such guarantees could be given to
private players, who would use them to raise
cheap loans, both domestically and globally.
In September 2010, the ministry of finance
banned sovereign guarantees for private sector
projects. Despite these curbs, MIAL has again
asked the government for a similar guarantee
for the over `2,600 crore loan it raised from its
earlier lenders through the securitization of the
future earnings through development fee. As
mentioned earlier, the regulator allowed MIAL
to even finance the interest component of this
loan through development fee.
There are other technicalities involved in
how MIAL gained from the Mumbai project. As
mentioned earlier, the original agreement
between the operator and AAI does not men-
tion development fee. If other bidders had
known that they could do so, they would have
quoted a higher price. This is akin to giving an
unfair advantage to a specific bidder.
The twisting of arms is a classic tactic in
the art of crony capitalism. First, get the
incentives. Then ask for more sops; if they
dont come, say the project is in trouble.
IN response to the queries posed by
Singh in 2007, we would like to ask him
a few of our own. Does the post-bid
permission to levy development fee,
which was not even mentioned in the
contract, amount to crony capitalism?
Does the permission to borrow against
future earnings from the extra levy
amount to crony capitalism? Does the
grant of a sovereign guarantee in a non-
transparent manner to a private player
amount to crony capitalism? Is it not
crony capitalism if the government
resists a probe into allegations of gold
plating, or a deliberate increase in
investment costs?
QUESTIONS FOR PM
IL
INFRA/
ppp model/highways
36
April 30, 2014
t is possibly the last nail in the coffin
of the ambitious private-public
partnership (PPP) model in the
highways sector. Forced, cajoled
and even threatened by private
players, the National Highways
Authority of India (NHAI) is keen to renego-
tiate 23 such projects. This is despite allega-
tions of favoritism, cartelization, and corrup-
tion in the award of many highways, and sops
given to the private builder after the bids
were finalized.
The comptroller and auditor general
(CAG) and the courts have criticized the offi-
cial agencies and private firms such as Enron,
GMR Group, GVK Group and Reliance
Power for the unusual concessions given to
the latters infrastructure projects. Highway
developers bid aggressively to bag contracts
in 2011-12, and hoped that banks would will-
ingly extend huge loans. The economic slow-
down made the lenders wary. Hence, the pri-
vate sectors clamor for bailouts!
For example, the NHAI approved cost of
Bangalore-based GMRs six-lane, 555-km
highway from Kishangarh to Ahmedabad
was `5,500 crore. GMR believed the figure
was underestimated by `2,300 crore. With
banks backing off, the private partner wants
to renegotiate the terms. It wants to pay 58
percent less premium than was originally
envisaged in the contract. It wants the repay-
ment of its `8,000 crore loans and interest
deferred by several years. If NHAI accepts
GMRs conditions, other bidders will object
and initiate legal action.
Gold plating is the rule in the highways
sector. According to one estimate, the
padding, or deliberate hike in investment
costs, in the case of 14 projects was over
`10,000 crore, or 124 percent of the costs
approved by NHAI. If this is true, why is
NHAI not keen to go for re-bidding of the
projects, instead of doling out more incen-
tives to the existing private developers?
The problem lies with NHAIs past expe-
riences. More often than not, when an infra-
structure project undergoes a re-bid, the eco-
nomics goes against the interests of the gov-
ernment, and in favor of the private develop-
er. For instance, when Satyam Computer
almost collapsed due to cooking of its
accounts and finances by promoter
Ramalinga Raju, his construction firms con-
JOURNEY
TO NOWHERE
several projects in the highways
sector have failed due to graft
and manipulation of bids
By Vivian Fernandes
I
37
April 30, 2014
tract for Hyderabad Metro failed. Larsen &
Toubro won the re-bid. However, the state
had to offer it a subsidy of `1,250 crore,
instead of the `30,000 crore premium that
Raju agreed to pay originally. From a money
spinner for the state, the metro turned into a
financial burden.
But giving more concessions to the bid-
ders, who have got into trouble because of
aggressive premiums they offered to the gov-
ernment, cost escalations, or lenders apathy,
may be fraught with different issues. If NHAI
extends them to one highway developer, oth-
ers will obviously join the queue. In addition,
future bids will get distorted as bidders real-
ize that they can get additional sops later.
I
ndias highway development program
was initiated by former Prime Minister
Atal Behari Vajpayee. The foundation
stone for converting the Bangalore-
Hyderabad highway to six lanes was laid on
January 6, 1999. The Golden Quadrilateral
connecting the major metros was meant to
counter the effect of global sanctions follow-
ing Indias nuclear tests in 1998.
The projects were entirely financed by the
government, and built by private contractors.
Over time, PPP became the preferred route.
Private developers were awarded projects on
the basis of minimum subsidy sought or the
highest premium offered. The investment
was to be recovered from tolls. So far, 239
PPPs have been awarded for 21,600 kilome-
ters at ` 1.87 lakh crore. However, the PPPs
were mired in corruption charges. The
Planning Commission blamed NHAI for fix-
ing bids. The highway authority blamed the
commission for draft agreements largely
based on western experiences. The World
Bank, which financed some of the highways,
blamed both NHAI and commission.
A few years ago, a leading business maga-
zine detailed out the modus operandi used to
manipulate bids. In some cases, BOT (build,
operate, transfer) schemes were changed to
BOT-annuity ones. Under the former, the
developer had to earn his revenues from toll;
in the latter, the government paid fixed half-
yearly payments to the developer, whose risks
vanished. NHAI extended additional loans,
over and above the contracted figure to com-
plete projects. This de-risked the developer,
but put extra burden on NHAI.
Over-engineering was always a problem
area. If a two-lane highway was required in
an area, the potential bidders would coax the
authority to opt for four- or six-lane one.
More flyovers, underpasses and side lanes
were added to inflate project costs. There was
also a cartelization of sorts. Either the tender
was designed to favor specific bidders, or the
winner was pre-fixed. In the latter case, com-
petitors were dissuaded to bid, and promised
another project later. Thus, although there
were dozens of pre-qualified bidders for a
project, only one or two submitted the final
bids. It was a cozy relationship between gov-
ernment, NHAI and private firms.
No one accepts the blame for the PPP
mess. NHAI and planning commission
attack each other. The World Bank, which
financed a few projects, criticizes both.
IL
Anil Shakya
38
April 30, 2014
T
WO former presidents of the Board of Control for Cricket in India
(BCCI) made a bombshell of a statement to the three-member
committee. They told the panel, formed by the Supreme Court to
ferret out facts about match fixing and betting in the Indian
Premier League (IPL) that matches involving CSK (Chennai
Super Kings) and other IPL teams were fixed. Nilay Dutta, one
of the three members of the panel, who submitted a separate report, wrote that
IS Bindra, former BCCI president, said that he knew another former prominent
Indian player was involved in match fixing along with a former reputed
Indian player.
In early April, a newspaper reported that the secret envelope, submitted by the
panel to the apex court, contained unsubstantiated allegations against 12-13 crick-
eters from five of the eight IPL teams, and three BCCI office-bearers involved with
the league. In addition, the article said that the envelope had names of team owners,
apart from CSKs Gurunath Meiyappan, the son-in-law of the ousted BCCI presi-
dent, N Srinivasan, and Raj Kundra, part-owner of Rajasthan Royals (RR).
Who are these IPL officials? Who are the former presidents referred to earlier?
Who are the former cricketers? Who are the 12-13 current cricketers? And, which of
the eight team owners were involved in match fixing and illegal betting?
Justice Mudgal was reticent to reveal too much before the final Supreme Court
order. But he still put several cats among dozens of pigeons. The article was only
partially correct. If the former BCCI presidents knew about match fixing, why didnt
they take action during their tenures? When asked if the presidents were Shashank
the former punjab and haryana high
court chief justice whose three-member
panel submitted its report on match
fixing and illegal betting in ipl to the
supreme court spoke exclusively to
INDERJIT BADHWAR and
ALAM SRINIVAS. Their report:
FOURTH
UMPIRE
Anil Shakya
LEAD/
cricket/justice mukul mudgal
39
April 30, 2014
Manohar and Bindra, he made no comment.
When queried if the envelope included names
of six cricketers, like skipper MS Dhoni and
batsman Suresh Raina, he insisted that there
were too many unsubstantiated allegations and
it was imperative to protect the privacy and
honor of anybody who may have been implicat-
ed wrongly or because of a vendetta.
However, the one name he discussed was
that of Sundar Raman, IPLs COO, who worked
with past IPL commissioners like Lalit Modi,
Chirayu Amin, Rajiv Shukla, and Ranjib
Biswal. Justice Mudgal opened up when told
that Sunil Gavaskar, Indias opening batsman
appointed by the apex court to manage IPL 7
(2014), wanted to investigate charges against
Raman, and that the latter was hand-in-glove
with Gurunath and a few bookies.
Ramans name figured in a conversation
that involved Vindoo Dara Singh (a bookie and
son of wrestler and movie star Dara Singh). It is
mentioned in one of the annexures in our
report. There are several allegations that were
not verified. We felt it was our duty to tell the
court, but such charges could be made due to
jealousy, spite, and exaggeration. We did not
wish to sully reputations and make such
names public.
J
ustice Mudgal, who played cricket as a
batsman in Modern School and has
watched most tests in India since 1955,
is passionate about the game. During the
110-minute conversation, he laughed, joked, got
angry, and became serious. He felt that IPL has
helped and harmed cricket; recommended that
Dhoni be removed as test captain; was angry
about racial bias in cricket; and said that police
did not investigate IPL charges properly.
During the lighter and less-serious moments,
he reminisced about former cricketers, and why
Ranji and Duleep trophies should be renamed.
IPL has been good for young cricketers; it
has given them money. Many 18-year-olds, who
hail from small townsand I am happy about it
because most players earlier were confined to
the elite, and cities like Mumbai, Chennai,
Kolkata and Bangaloreare flooded with
money. The cricket-loving judge pointed out:
In an IPL, a young player, who hasnt played
Ranji Trophy, can bowl a good over to a bats-
man like Kevin Pietersen (England). It gives
him confidence. He rubs shoulders with the
greats and sits in the dugouts with them and
asks questions. It gives him immense knowl-
edge and learning.
However, there is the flip side. The young-
ster has to be cautious about the money. This is
where the BCCI should have stepped in, and
urged him to mandatorily invest 50 percent of
his earnings in a three-year fixed deposit. The
teenager finds himself engulfed in glamor, as he
mixes with stars and celebrities he has seen only
on TV or in newspapers.
The biggest drawback of the league is that
most Indian players cannot play a single session
in a test. The ability to play long innings, as
Rahul Dravid and VVS Laxman did on Day four
of the second test against Australia at Kolkatas
Eden Gardens in March 2001, is missing.
Forced to follow on, the Indian batsmen script-
ed a dream 376-run partnership that turned the
match on its head. Against all odds, India
romped to a 171-run victory against the Aussies,
He opined that although Dhoni is gifted
as a T20 captain, he has failed as a test
skipper. He is too defensive, favours
some players. Mudgal said he wouldnt
choose him to lead the test team.
Courtesy BCCI
40
April 30, 2014
LEAD/
cricket/justice mukul mudgal
who had won their previous 15 tests.
Today, bowlers can get away with four good
overs (maximum allowed in T20), but cannot
do a good 10-over stint. They are players, who
are excellent in T20, above-average in one-day
games, but unfit for tests. The prime example is
that of Ravichandran Ashwin, the off-spinner.
He is outstanding in a 20-over match, passable
in ODI, but I would not pick him up in a test.
But that is my opinion; as you know, there are
one billion cricket experts in India.
O
ne can say the same about Dhoni, who
is an excellent T20 captain. He has
great intuitions and backs his hunches.
But this is not so in tests, where he becomes too
defensive. His obsession with some players
becomes a disadvantage in a test. There were
instances, when players became tourists on a
tour. Dhoni wont give them a chance. Going by
his recent performances, I would not choose
him as a skipper in the longer format.
Justice Mudgal was livid about what he
dubbed as incidents that smacked of racial
bias in global cricket. Certain players and offi-
cials (match referees) are singled out for harsh
treatment. There are double standards in the
way situations are judged. I have seen it time
and again how players from India, Pakistan, Sri
Lanka and West Indies are singled out for pun-
ishments. I have seen it in other sports as I am
a member of the Court of Arbitration for Sport
(a global body to facilitate the settlement of
sports-related disputes).
He gave examples of such biases. Chris
Broad, the former England pacer, played 25
tests and 34 ODIs, but was appointed as an
international match referee in 60 tests and 244
ODIs. Compare this with Indian pacer Javagal
Srinath, who played 67 tests and 229 ODIs. His
match referee record: 32 tests and 132 ODIs, or
almost half of Broads. Sachin Tendulkar was
banned for a game for ball tampering; South
African Faf du Plessis was fined 50 per-
Apex court said Sunil Gavaskar should manage IPL 7; but the
former opener is a huge beneficiary of BCCI and IPL. He has
rarely criticized the board except in recent times. There were other
accusations against him; in 2000, lakhs of rupees, including
foreign exchange and travelers cheques, were found in his locker
room at Bombay Gymkhana Club. A few newspapers said that
commentators like Gavaskar hired by BCCI, deliberately did not
criticize any of the latters actions and decisions.
Shivlal Yadav takes over Srinivasan's other roles in BCCI.
But Yadav is the latters biggest supporter, even when there
was pressure on Srinivasan to step aside. Yadav refused to
ask for Srinivasans resignation and, in fact, supported his
candidature for the presidents post in 2013
Srinivasan is allowed to represent BCCI at ICC. If he
was not fit to run the board because of conflicts of
interest and match-fixing charges against his son-in-law,
Gurunath Meiyappan, how could he represent the
country at a global forum? However, SCs interim
order is silent on this issue. Srinivasans supporters
contend that BCCI can appoint any person as its
nominee at the ICC, and it does not have to be the
president himself.
Apex court allowed CSK and RR to participate in IPL 7; this
was despite the Justice Mudgal Committee having found
Meiyappan guilty of illegal betting, and recommending further
investigations against RRs part-owner, Raj Kundra.
Niggling questions
Getty Images
41
April 30, 2014
cent of the match fee for the same offense.
Sadly, such prejudices turn into reverse ones.
Why should the national tournament, Ranji
Trophy, be named after Maharaja Ranjit Sinhji,
who played for England, but never for India?
Why should Duleep Trophy be named after
Duleep Sinhji, who did the same? Why cant we
name them after CK Nayudu, Polly Umrigar,
Mushtaq Ali, Vinoo Mankad, and senior Nawab
of Pataudi? Justice Mudgal seemed disgusted
and appalled when he raised these questions.
The mention of these former greats took
him back down the memory lane. He remem-
bered the West Indian pair of fast bowlers,
Wesley Hall and Charlie Griffith. Hall would
start his 50-yard run-up almost from the
sightscreen at Delhis Ferozeshah Kotla, but
Griffith is the fastest bowler I have seen. Each
time he bowled, I never saw the ball unless it
was in the keepers gloves or hit off the bat.
He then recounted a story about Richie
Benaud, the legendary Australian captain, who
first stationed himself at silly mid-off and then
silly mid-on to catch Indias opening batsman,
Pankaj Roy, on 99 runs. He described how
Bishan Singh Bedi shocked Australian Dougie
Walters, when he bowled him with the arm ball
that whipped in as Walters shouldered it.
A
s the conversation veered back to match
fixing and betting, he talked about the
role of police in IPL investigations. The
Delhi Police forwarded information about Raj
Kundra and Umesh Goenka (bookie) to the
Rajasthan Police, but the latter stopped the
investigations. The Rajasthan Police said it had
no jurisdiction as Kundra did not reside in the
state but in London.
Justice Mudgals report indicted Chennai
police for not pursuing information about the
involvement of a senior CSK cricketer in match
fixing. Other leads got by Delhi Police and
Mumbai Policelike names from Vindoos
iPad, two Indian players mentioned by bookies,
Chandresh Jain and Ashwani Aggrawal, and
players named by fast bowler S Sreesanth, who
was arrestedwere forgotten.
Laxity of the police, BCCIs smugness, lower
ethics of players, and involvement of boards
officials and IPL team owners contributed to
the mess in IPL. But the overriding issue in
Indian cricket is about conflicts of interest. It is
about the conflict of interest between
Srinivasan and his ownership of an IPL team
(CSK), the conflict of interest between senior
players and their agents, and the conflict of
interest between cricket and commercial inter-
ests of all the stakeholders.
Unfortunately, conflict of interest was not a
part of Justice Mudgal committees terms of ref-
erence. Hopefully, the Supreme Court will still
grapple with it. And, as Justice Mudgal pointed
out there needed to be a detailed investigation
into the IPL game between CSK and RR, played
on May 12, 2013, in which Gurunath and
Vindoo fixed, betted and exchanged informa-
tion about CSKs score and how it would lose
the game.
LOSING BALANCE
IPL is a boon for younger
Indian players in terms of
exposure and learning,
but some of them are too
enamoured by glamour
and money
IL
Justice Mudgal says a
detailed probe into the
May 12, 2013 IPL
game between CSK
and RR is needed to
find out the truth
behind allegations of
match fixing against
Gurunath Meiyappan.
Courtesy Indian Premier League
42
April 30, 2014
ECONOMY/
The missing
`
2.4 trillion
a few of the state-owned banks may fail in
the near future because of huge bad
loans. while the policy makers are in
hibernation, rbi has to walk its talk
By Shantanu Guha Ray
CLUELESS AGAINST
BAD DEBTS?
RBI Governor
Raghuram Rajan will have
to address the issue of
NPAs, which may drag
down the banking sector
banks/ non-performing assets
UNI
2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013
43
April 30, 2014
VER since he has landed in Tihar
jail, Sahara Groups top boss
Subrata Roy has written reams
and reams of notes. Jail officials
say they have no access to them
but presume he is writing about
his experiences in Delhis maxi-
mum security prison. They claim
there have been occasions when Roy has told
inmatessome of them notorious killersthat he
has been wronged by the UPA-II government.
Some nights, Roy, whose business has 4,799
establishments in its fold and `1.52 trillion in assets,
including 36,631 acres of land, would be awake for
hours. A Delhi newspaper reported that Roy, locked
in Jail 3 that once housed Indias tainted telecom
minister, A Raja, is suffering from high blood pres-
sure and sleeplessness.
The Supreme Courts decision to keep him in jail
till he pays a bail bond of `10,000 crore was prompt-
ed by zeal to protect the so-called three million
investors, who invested `24,000 crore in two of
Saharas deposits schemes. But nothing happened to
any of the senior managers, including Archana
Bhargava, former chairman of United Bank of India
(UBI), which is saddled with huge bad loans or non-
performing assets (NPAs). Bhargava resigned in
February 2014.
What is distressing is this is happening with UBI
for the second time, says Dhirendra Kumar, the
founder of Value Research. In 2009-10, UBIs NPAs
shot up by almost 35 percent, and some of its big
accounts went bad. The then chairman, Bhaskar Sen,
admitted that during the financial year we saw an
addition of `980 crore bad loans, of which a slippage
of `448 crore happened only in the last quarter. But
no lessons were learnt, claims Kumar.
Yashwant Sinha, former finance minister, said in
an interview that Indian bankers never admit that
they are under pressure from politicians and corpo-
rate captains. It is mainly for the fear of reprisal. In
India, a bunch of favored industrialist-politicians
routinely change the lenders rulebook and walk away
with the loans. Banks have to declare it as NPA, he
added in a reference to UBIs sanction of `100 crore
to a Delhi-based realtor.
As a result, the banks list of defaultersmost of
them with powerful connectionshave increased
manifold. In the case of the banks with high NPAs, no
one is answering as to how to recover the loans. The
banks must tell us why they sanctioned such loans,
Sinha said. Has anyone asked the Reserve Bank of
India (RBI) why state-owned banks have high NPAs,
mostly rising out of loans to dubious ventures?
London-based economist Lord Meghnad Desai
finds the RBIs silence disturbing. He says the coun-
trys central bank has hardly analyzed inspection
reports about the financial conditions of the banks.
He adds: Good health of banks is always critical to
the health of the economy. But it does not work that
way in India. The banks operate under tremendous
political pressures. With game-changing elections
around the corner, the onus, claims Lord Desai, is on
the political parties to clean these scandals. But noth-
ing will happen, he says.
GRIM SIGNAL
There is high stress in the Indian financial system,
where as many as 40 listed companies have reported
combined NPAs of `240,000 crore during the quar-
ter ended December 31, 2013. In the December quar-
ter, the State Bank of India (SBI), Indias largest bank,
reported the highest NPAsin terms of quantum
worth `67,799 crore. The Bank of Maharashtra and
UBI reported a 209 percent and 188 percent rise,
respectively, in NPAs.
Rising NPAs indicate the Indian corporate sector
is much on incubator, says Pronab Sen of the
Planning Commission. There are chances that bad
loans of Indian banks will rise further, hit by a slow-
down in business and slow economic recovery. Rating
agency ICRA, in which Moodys Investors Service
own a significant stake, has said the gross NPAs of
banks could rise to 4.2-4.4 percent of total loans by
March 2014, from 4.1 percent as on December 2012.
The figure could further go up to 4.8-5 percent.
E
5,000,000
6,000,000
4,000,000
3,000,000
2,000,000
1,000,000
20,000
0
40,000
60,000
0
Up, up & away
Total Gross Advances Gross NPAs
200,000
180,000
160,000
140,000
120,000
100,000
80,000
Source: RBI
All figures in ` crore
44
April 30, 2014
ECONOMY/
banks/ non-performing assets
This ponzi world
I
n the heart of the Indian Capital, judges hearing a case
in the countrys apex court asked lawyers representing
the West Bengal government: What is the status report
on the ponzi schemes (in your state)? The lawyers instantly
replied that some of the offenders had been sentenced and
efforts were on to repay investorsthe list included farmers,
fishermen and low income earnerswithin a year.
And what about the cash that is missing? the judges
asked again. The lawyers had no answer. It is important to
trace the missing cash; you should do it fast and let the court
know what you have managed, quipped one of the judges.
The lawyers, who claimed they knew the gravity of the situ-
ation, promised to revert.
In Siliguri, a town considered Indias
gateway to the north-eastern states, thou-
sands of duped investors took to the
streets late March to protest against chit
fund companies operating in West Bengal.
An estimated 25 people, including agents
of the Ponzi schemes, have committed sui-
cide in the state amidst report that more
investment firms will collapse.
Such dubious schemes have been dup-
ing millions of investors in the country.
These take the name of ponzi after Charles
Ponzi (1982-1949), an Italian businessman
who cheated several customers in the US
and Canada. Luring customers with the
promise of 50 percent profit in 45 days, he
would pay the earlier investors with the
money he collected from later investors.
The scheme finally collapsed, causing his investors a loss of
$20 million.
In India, the markets regulator, Securities and Exchange
Board of India (SEBI), says the scam in West Bengal alone
has resulted in at least `3.2 trillion in losses and has affected
3.3 million people.
The Serious Fraud Investigation Office is
investigating as many as 53 companies, the
largest of which is the Saradha Group, which
collapsed in April 2013. RBI says these com-
panies promised returns of 100 percent in
three years.
There are chances, claim officials of the
Enforcement Directorate, that half of the
cash collected by these companies has
been illegally channelled to tax havens. SEBI
says several operators confessed that they
used the cash to acquire villas in Jordan and
Dubai, oil businesses in Qatar and diamond
businesses in South Africa.
Finally, through an ordinance, SEBI has got back the
power to act against such ponzi schemes. As per the ordi-
nance, there would be a compulsory registration with SEBI
for pooling of over `100 crore. And the regulator has the
powers of search, seizure, attachment and recovery.
The rating agency believes the reasons for this
include business slowdown, stretched working capi-
tal cycles of companies and slow pace of recovery.
Gross NPAs of 40 listed Indian banks have grown to
a whopping `240,000 crore in value terms at the end
of December 2013, a rise of 36 percent from last year.
Government banks also face issues on capitalization,
given the advanced capital requirements under the
so-called Basel-III.
Although the public sector banks (PSBs) would
not need significant common equity capital in FY15,
in case they are unable to mobilize additional tier I
capital during that fiscal, their equity requirement
could go up from `20,000 crore to `45,000 crore,
ICRA said. This could prove a challenge, given the
governments current level of capital infusion, the fis-
cal constraints prevailing, and the limited investor
appetite for PSBs as reflected in the low valuation.
The trillion-dollar question remains: Will rising
NPAs further delay the recovery of India Inc? During
election time, no one is really thinking of the question
in Asias third largest economy.
RETRIBUTION TIME
Saradha Group chief, Sudipta Sen (above)
and his associate Debjani Mukherjee
(left) arrested for the ponzi fraud
IL
COLUMN/
judiciary/up
JUSTICE
FAR AWAY
though the state accounts for
nearly half of Indias pending
cases, its western region doesnt
have a high court
By Sanjeev Sirohi
I
n a decision on April 9, the Supreme
Court did not strike down the centers
decision to include the Jat communi-
ty in the OBC list. It posted the mat-
ter for further hearing on May 1.
Prima facie, we are satisfied with the
material submitted by the government for pro-
viding reservations to Jats, said Chief Justice
P Sathasivam delivering his verdict.
The government demonstrated its commit-
ment to the upliftment of Jats, a community to
which I also belong. But, it has a certain bias
against 26 other districts in western UP.
Despite being a Jat, I am against reservation of
any kind in the name of religion, caste or sex,
except on economic grounds.
UNFAIR TREATMENT
The main lacuna is that there is no high court in
western UP. Instead, people here have to travel
700-750 km just to reach Allahabad, where the
court is located. Ironically, the high courts of
Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Haryana,
Punjab, Delhi and even Lahore are nearer to
MISPLACED PRIORITIES
While the Jat community
successfully agitated for
reservations, the need for a
bench in western UP has
gone unnoticed
western UP than the one in Allahabad. Also,
there are benches in small places such as
Madurai in Tamil Nadu, Jalpaiguri in West
Bengal and Dharwad and Gulbarga in
Karnataka, with lesser population. Why is west-
ern UP getting a step-motherly treatment?
Take the number of cases in eastern and
western UP. According to the Justice Jaswant
Singh Commission, which was set up for set-
tling this bench issue, it is western UP that has
more pending cases. Almost 57 percent of cases
in UP are from here, and yet, while the high
court is at Allahabad, a lone bench is just 150
km away from Allahabad, in Lucknow. The
commission, therefore, in the 1980s, recom-
mended three benches of the high court for
western UP. But it was ignored. There are high
courts even in small states like Manipur.
Sikkim, which, at times, has just 50 pending
cases, too has its own high court.
MORE CRIMES
Considering that UP has the highest population
with the largest number of districts, towns and
villages, this is baffling. It also has the maxi-
mum number of judges and nearly half of all
pending cases in India. In 2011, 33.3 percent of
Indias crimes were reported from UP, which is
why UP desperately needs a bench.
In 1955, Dr Sampoornanand, the then UP
chief minister, recommended the creation of a
high court bench in western UP at Meerut but
it never happened. The present chairman of the
UP Bar Council, Ajay Shukla, many senior
lawyers of the Allahabad High Court and for-
mer judges too have lent support to this issue. If
the center can give statehood to 10 districts of
Telangana with a population of 3.52 crore, why
cant it concede one bench to a region with a
huge population?
Sanjeev Sirohi is an advocate based in
Meerut. Views expressed are personal
Getty Images
45
April 30, 2014
IL
46
April 30, 2014
THE NATION/
elections 2014/ up politics/ the aap factor
LOVE MINUS
Badaun
Bilsi
Bisauli
Gunnaur
Sahaswan
BADAUN
(Uttar Pradesh)
in a caste-dominated landscape,
kejriwals party has made a palpable
impact. but will the show of affection
for him translate into votes?
By Inderjit Badhwar
F
ighting an election in Badaunone of Uttar
Pradeshs most formidable 80 Lok Sabha con-
stituenciesis for the bravehearts. It has been
western UPs Muslim-Yadav Rock of Gibraltar,
where caste mathematics are the brick and mor-
tar of a virtually impenetrable electoral edifice
painstakingly constructed by Mulayam Singh
Yadav, whose nephew Dharmendra Yadav is the reigning MP-
monarch. Dharmendras development oriented approach has left
him relatively free of the corruption-tarnished image of Netaji
(Mulayam), his fathers elder brother.
Small wonder then that any party or candidate outside of the
charmed circle of the prevailing caste paradigm has to hear repeat-
edly that he is the proverbial fool rushing in where angels fear to
tread. Just consider the demographic and logistical dimensions of
this constituency, which has within its fold Gunnaur, Badaun,
47
April 30, 2014
VOTES?
HAS THE AAP IDEA FINALLY ARRIVED?
Photographs of the many faces of enthusiasm for Arvind
Kejriwal and his Aam Admi Party
THE NATION/
elections 2014 / up politics/ the aap factor
48
April 30, 2014
Bilsi, Sahaswan and Bisauli assembly seats,
an agglomeration of mufassil towns, half-
baked sewer-clogged cities, and large and
small electricity- and transport-starved vil-
lages, scattered at a one-way point to point
distance of about 120 kilometers over
spine-rattling, potholed roads winding
through dung- and slush-choked lanes or
fields ripening with another bumper crop of
wheat and sugarcane and mustard. And
mango orchards everywhere.
The voting population this time is about
18 lakhover 4 lakh Muslims, 4.25 lakh
Yadavs, 2 lakh Thakurs, over 4 lakh sched-
uled castes, and about 1.8 lakh brahmins,
the remainder being other backward
castes, banias, etc.
You can see how the electoral calculus
repeatedly plays into the hands of the polit-
ical-mathematicos juggling figures for
Mayawati and Mulayam Singh. Whenever
they are in power, their bureaucracies and
police rule with iron.
Although Badaun has been a pocket bor-
ough for the Samajwadi Party, it was a
Congress stronghold before VP Singh man-
dalized the area. It was the constituency of
Sharad Yadav from 1989 to 1991 until he lost
to BJPs Chinmayanand in 1991 following a
massive consolidation of the Hindu vote
during the Ram janmabhoomi movement.
There have been periods of opportunistic
alliances, but by and large political time in
Badaun has flowed as placidly as the Ganges
which skirts it. Runaway corruption, nepo-
tism, criminality, is a way of life.
And into this time and space Arvind
Kejriwals Aam Admi Party has made a sud-
den and unexpected entrance.
Huh! AAP in Badaun? Is there even a
hope in hell?
The daily newspapers, for reasons of their
own, confine AAPs Lok Sabha battles to a
few columns in the city pages. So to find out
what the real story is, I chose to burrow into
Badauns political belly, for several reasons.
One, I have been burning with curiosity
about whether AAP has made any impact on
voters in rural India and have found no
answers in the mainline media. Two, I was
born in Badaun (Ujhani town) and raised in
its grimly streets and flowering fields. Three,
my younger sister, Hema Mehra, an AAP
bhaktin, is the partys candidate.
I have strong political preferences like
you or anybody else but as a journalist I can-
not let personal biases override professional
concerns by doing a plug piece for Hema,
which, in any case wouldnt be possible,
because this issue of India Legal will hit the
stands after her campaign is over.
The main objective is to present an accu-
rate footslogging report, with a fly-on-the-
wall access to the candidate and to the
AT THE HUSTINGS
(clockwise from left) Sitting MP
Dharmendra Yadav; AAP
candidate Hema Mehra;
villagers donning AAP caps;
and the door-to-door campaign
of AAP candidate
49
April 30, 2014
familiar territory, on the impact of Kejriwal
and AAP in a place like Badaun.
As I trudged through the constituency, I
came to several remarkable conclusions:
1) AAP and Kejriwal have scored stunning
recognition and sympathy for their views
among both old and young voters in small
towns, as well as remote areas; 2) The AAP
factor has been a potent psychological and
perception game changer; 3) There is a sub-
tle but palpable goalpost shift from caste
issues to performance and corruption; 4)
The AAP perception wave will not turn into
votes because the party has virtually zero
ground level organization and volunteers
are thinly spread; 5) AAPs election coffers
are virtually empty as compared to other
parties with bulging pockets; 6) In many
remote areas Kejriwal is a hero but there is
a raging debate on why he quit the Delhi
government; AAPs campaigners are frus-
trated at the lack of support from the center
but are resigned to see this campaign as an
andolan to spread the word and prepare the
groundwork for future elections.
Hemas main electoral pitch: Win or lose,
I will not quit the battle against corruption,
which has made a mockery of your lives.
Hum nayee kheti bo rahe hain. Isski sinchaii
keejiye mere saath jur kar. Mujhe vote do ya
na do magar bhrashtachar ke khilaaf to
awaaz uthao! (We are sowing a new har-
vest. Join me in irrigating it. Regardless of
whether you vote for me or not, at least raise
your voice against corruption.)
I recorded my observations in a series of
tweets, which are modified and reproduced
on the next page as a travelogue-diary in
order to give you an as-I-felt-it account of
what I observed. There were so many
villages and so many people that I no longer
remember them all, but what is important is
that my reporting is based on a represen-
tative section of people and places. IL
THE NATION/
50
April 30, 2014
A catchy slogan composed by a Muslim pro-
AAP supporter: Bolo bolo har har Gange, sab
beimaan ab honge nange! (Mother Ganges,
hail to thee, strip the crooks to make us corrup-
tion free). And: Jhadoo chalega zoron se,
hoshiyaar in choron se. (Wield the broom
with all your might, sweep the crooks
gainst whom we fight.)
Looks like this election will be won by the party
that is better at manipulating system thru mus-
cle n poll fraud. But people seem to admire
Kejriwal as a fighter. Surprising.
A passing remark: If you really believe in
the AAP vision then stand out as a whistle-
blower 2 xpose all trojan horses n frauds
without fear or favor.
Overheard remark about AAPs UP convener
Sanjay Singh: Sanjay babu learned his politics
from Mulayam. Both venomous seat warmers
with self-interest.
Hema Mehra is repeatedly saying dat dis elec-
tion is andolan rather than vote grabbing.

Badly organized campaign. Strong local
candidate, but AAP office clueless re com-
plex EC rules and no help frm on top. And,
hah! Sanjay Singh and Yogendra Yadav 2
visit Badaun but local org clueless re
time/route.
Kejriwal announces restructuring campaign
org. But does he realize it may be 2 little 2 late
2 restructure? A shame that a visible pro-AAP
upsurge is being squandered coz of absence of
organization.
AAP local offices in UP either a sham or non
existent. No help frm central office. Candidates
cobbling up own organizations.
AAP doubtlessly made huge perception
impact n shaken de major parties in this
remote area, but no money, no skilled
organizers.
Wow! Cant believe it. Rural UP issues r solidly
performance n anti-corruption. AAP ahead on
2nd issue, but supporters admit to damage
caused by Kejris Delhi resignation drama.
After second day of tour, I dont think senior
AAP leadership realizes what kind of grassroots
enthusiasm party has generated. But vote?
Mebbe next time
The AAP campaign in Badaun is a day-night-
footslogging, often lonely door-to-door cam-
paign, but reward seems 2 come when vil-
lagers faces light up when u mention Kejriwal.
Not everywhere, but in places u least expect
him even to be heard of!
Badaun rural campaign, UP, no electricity,
no roads. But awareness and admiration
for Kejriwal surprisingly high.
Hema Mehras AAP campaign from Badaun. In
according with party principles she turned
down armed security protection tho she is only
woman among 16 candidates.
Visited cop station in Badaun city where AAP
candidate told to file a daily advance route map
with local thana for each campaign vehicle or
face seizure! Is dis possible in any campaign
where plans change minute to minute. Seems
like harassment.
AAP Muslim supporter sez Muslim kids denied
admission to primary schools, they have no
alternative to fundamentalist madrasas. Hindus,
pls wake up 2 need 4 secular education.
Another Muslim AAP campaigner sez post-
Independence India and AAP recognize that
despite some religious extremism Indian
Muslims are most liberal, law abiding, patriotic.
Subdivisional magistrates are supposed to be
working under Election Commission, but seems
they are working in tandem with Mulayam Raj
to harass AAP and other challengers.
First AAP 5-hour Pad Yatra through Badaun
town through markets under blazing sun, and
shortage of bottled water produced a huuuge
response. Shopkeepers, vendors, rickshaw-
wallahs were screaming support, grabbing and
reading pamphlets, grabbing and wearing AAP
caps. Cd be just a tamasha or novelty but it
appeared absolutely genuine.
Politically captive bureaucracy and cops
harassing and imponding AAP vehicles carrying
campaign broomsthe election symbol. Cops
say it is illegal to carry brooms in campaign
vehicles. By that token should they not ban
cyclesthe SP symbol? Why isnt Kejriwal
screaming?
Caps and pamphlets are in huge demand in
remote villages and whistlestop chai shop
meetings. More than what must have been
1,000 AAP caps grabbed from campaign cars.
And people are actually wearing them.
I have done round de clock questioning on
Modi effect/wave. There appears to be recogni-
tion, certainly, but I dont see a wave. BJP is
certainly lagging behind SP. BSP campaign very
silent and invisible but Mayawatis Jatav vote
bank still looks intact. Cd this turn out to be an
AAP vs SP contest? That itself would upset the
political applecart of Badaun.
Sez one AAP street volunteer: Because of
lack of grassroots organization AAP shd c
dis election as a great curtain raiser for
next assembly election.
Baramaikkera village, populated by Kurmis and
Jatavs, showing electrifying Kejriwal awareness.
I thought Kejriwal was goofy until I
stepped out of Delhi. May lose horribly, but
he has certainly set the future agenda for
political style and debate.
elections 2014 / up politics/ the aap factor
52
April 30, 2014
after years of legal battle, indias
soldiers win the right to vote
from their posting stations
By Shivani Dasmahapatra
THE NATION /
elections 2014/ armed forces/ ballot rights
FRONT
OPENING
A NEW
53
April 30, 2014
T was a battle of a different
kind fought not by, but for men
and women in uniform. After
years of struggle by armed
forces veterans, ordinary citi-
zens and one parliamentarian,
the Supreme Court, in an inter-
im order, directed the Election
Commission (EC) in March
this year to allow defense personnel to vote
while posted at peace stations. The order put
soldiers on a par with other citizens in the
voting field after a long time.
The victory was a long time coming. Until
1969, servicemen could register as voters at
their place of posting, but things changed
after the Nagaland assembly elections in
1969, when Wopansao, the losing candidate,
went to court saying the results were skewed
because of a large number of Assam Rifles
voters. Both the Guwahati High Court and
the Supreme Court rejected his appeal in
1971. Despite the verdict, the government
issued a special order in 1972, saying soldiers
could vote only through postal ballots and
proxy voting in their original constituencies.
Even the EC, which had initially defended
the right of soldiers to vote at their places of
posting then, later reversed its stand. In
2008, the EC passed an order that service-
men should have resided in their place of
posting for three years with their families to
register as voters there. These rules made it
almost impossible for any soldier to vote in
his posting station. For years, veterans
who had lost out on their right to exercise
their franchise had complained about the
ECs apathy towards the countrys 23 lakh
soldiers while it went out of its way to regis-
ter voters in far-flung areas.
Marchs landmark ruling came after two
public interest litigations (PILs). The first
PIL was filed in December 2013 by Supreme
Court advocate Neela Gokhale, an army offi-
cers wife; the second was in March 2014 by
Rajya Sabha Member Rajeev Chandrasekhar,
an air force officers son.
There is an overall sentiment among vet-
erans and serving personnel that their con-
cerns and issues dont come to the fore. My
main effort is to highlight these issues, says
Chandrasekhar. He also started an online
petition on change.org to create awareness
about difficult regulations imposed on serv-
ice voters. As many as 77,000 people from all
over the country supported the campaign.
Its a beginning, says Gokhale, who had
experienced the difficulties as an army wife.
Only a few service personnel were registered
as voters and only a few were able to vote on
timely receipt of postal ballots. Now things
should change.
B
ut the legal battle isnt over yet. A con-
stitution bench is still to hear the mat-
ter of voting by soldiers in non-peace
stations. Chandigarh-based Brigadier (Retd)
HS Ghuman took up the issue in 2009 when
he filed a writ petition in the Punjab and
Haryana High Court, seeking the right of sol-
diers to register as ordinary voters in their
place of posting and deletion of rules in the
2008 order saying they violated the
Representation of the People Act, 1951.
The court dismissed his case in 2013, say-
ing armed forces personnel had not been
denied voting rights and that the move would
change the demographic character of con-
stituencies with small electorates. Brigadier
Ghuman is cautious about the latest
Supreme Court order: It is a part order; the
correct order should have been to register all
armed forces personnel as voters in their
place of posting anywhere in the country and
not just in peace stations.
Armymen defend the country in the most
inhospitable terrains, but their right to
vote was largely ignored. Some didnt cast
a ballot during their entire service life.
I
FIGHT FOR RIGHTS
(L-R) Lt Gen (Retd) SK
Bahri, Rajya Sabha MP
Rajeev Chandrasekhar and
Brig (Retd) VS Mahalingam
at the Election Commission
office during their struggle
to ensure voting rights for
the armed forces
personnel at their
duty stations
54
April 30, 2014
THE NATION/
Brigadier Ghuman is one of many veterans
angry at the voting hurdles faced by soldiers.
He says he never voted during his entire mil-
itary service, partly because the electoral reg-
istration officer never registered soldiers at
any station. The law has not changed since
1971 but the EC is acting like a political party
and bending laws on its own, he says.
Like him, Brigadier (Retd) VS Maha-
lingam was never able to cast his vote during
his 36 years of service. He says that every
place of posting has its set of local problems
and so it is only justified they vote from
there. He never received the postal ballots on
time; sometimes they reached weeks after
election results were declared. The Supreme
Court has sent a clear message to the estab-
lishment to uphold our democratic right, he
says. The vote of a soldier has had no worth,
but that must change now.
S
ome observers say the latest order
could lead to the politicization of the
armed forces. But Brigadier (Retd)
Vijay Raheja dismisses the fears. He says
troops are unlikely to be ignorant of the
countrys political scenario because every
barrack and mess has a television set. They
display no confidence in the very same men
who stand guard at the borders and lay down
their lives fighting for the nation, he says.
Parliamentarian Chandrasekhar, who
fought to implement the One Rank One
Pay policy for the armed forces, agrees. It is
every citizens right (to vote). But if there are
any concerns, then more the reason our sol-
diers should be made politically aware and
democratically empowered. Brigadier
Ghuman says there is a clear demarcation
between exercising your franchise and poli-
tics. What we want is for the services to be
part of the electoral process; that does not
mean we will be politicized, he says.
Veterans who lost out on the chance to
vote in past elections are not the only ones in
favor of the soldiers right to exercise his fran-
chise. Some young officers, who did not want
to be identified, told India Legal that the gov-
ernment took all decisions, from their uni-
forms to rations and artillery, but they were
kept away from participating in the exercise
to form and change the same government.
Some were upset that the interim order only
applied to peace stations. I have just
returned from Siachen. Does this mean I am
fit and capable enough to serve the nation
even at 18,000 feet but not capable to exer-
cise my right to vote? asked one officer.
Lt General (Retd) SK Bahri, who heads
the Indian Ex Servicemen Movement, says it
is discriminatory that soldiers posted in dif-
ferent states are excluded from the voting
process while politicians exploit the presence
of migrant workers from other states to gar-
ner votes in their constituencies.
He recalls how an election officer came to
his house during his four-year tenure in New
Delhi to register all civilians employed there
but did not register him and his family mem-
bers. The one time he received his postal bal-
lot in service was in 1975 when he was posted
in France, but it reached him after the elec-
tions were over.
The Supreme Court took into account the
fact that about 132,600 service personnel
have already registered as service voters and
directed the EC to make postal ballots for
them effective. According to Bahri, about
700,000 to 800,000 soldiers will be able to
vote at peace stations. While the Supreme
Court interim order is a definite step towards
recognizing the men and women in uniform
as citizens with equal voting rights, veterans
say the ideal outcome of this unfinished bat-
tle will be when every soldier posted even at
Siachen, the highest battlefield in the world,
takes his finger off the trigger to press the
button on a voting machine.
elections 2014 / armed forces / ballot rights
IL
SIGN IN TO CHANGE
Signatures of supporters
as part of a petition by
change.org being
taken to the EC
55
April 30, 2014
THE NATION/
elections 2014/ voters boycott
Vote against
hundreds of villages plan to shun
polls, as they are angered by lack of
water, health centers, land rights and
irrigation facilities. will this form of
nota make an impact?
By Bhavdeep Kang
TRIBAL TOURISM
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi met tribals in
Lanjigarh, Odisha, in 2010. The locals have
decided not to vote this elections.
Getty Images
56
April 30, 2014
THE NATION/
elections 2014/ voters boycott
I
n the biggest election in history,
with 814 million registered voters, a
few hundred thousand missing
ballots hardly matter.
Those who boycott the
elections in protest
against the political establish-
ments failure to deliver find their
angst reduced to a fourth or fifth place
decimal in polling percentages.
Yet, the calls for election
boycotts are heard down the
length and breadth of India, not just from
militants (Kashmir) and Maoists (eastern
belt), but elected panchayats as well. The rea-
sons are as varied as lack of potable water, pri-
mary health centers, roads, power and irrigation
facilities; insults on dalits; and leopard and wild
elephant attacks on locals. The protests come
from places as varied as Delhis prestigious
sub-city of Dwarka, verdant Niyamgiri hills of
Odishas Rayagada district and the lowlands of
Alappuzha city in Kerala.
In Uttar Pradeshs Akbarpur, six villages have
decided to stay away from polling on April 24 to
protest against lack of power and roads. To the
north, on the Indo-Nepal border, villages in
Shravasti and Balrampur will not venture forth to
booths, in terror of man-eating leopards that have
claimed a dozen lives in eight months.
Some of the grievances are long-standing. Over
90 villages in Jharkhands Dumka will boycott
the April 24 election to call attention to four
decades of injustice. Displaced in 1956 by the
Masanjor Dam on the Mayurakshi River, these vil-
lages still await compensation. Then theres
Pipraua village in Madhya Pradeshs Datia, where
people havent voted in 10 years because a prom-
ised all-weather road hasnt materialized. Their
silence was not heard in 2004 and 2009 also.
G
iven the sheer size of the electorate,
threats of poll boycotts are a poor tool for
protest movements. But they are still rel-
evant, says constitutional expert Subhash Kashyap,
who sees these pockets of protest as a wake-up call.
Theres a disconnect between people and politi-
cians, and tremendous erosion in the credibility of
the political class. People are fed up and disgusted
with politics. Political institutions have been de-
institutionalized, as it were.
Is there a substantive difference between the
Thirteen villages of Bailhongal Taluk
(Belgaum, Karnataka) took out a procession
with empty pots and threatened to boycott
polls because they dont have drinking water
Karadikal village (Madurai, Tamil Nadu)
has decided to boycott elections unless
jallikuttu, the traditional sport of
bull-taming, was allowed
Sultanpuriya village (Sirsa, Haryana) will
not vote in 2014 because officials havent
addressed the issue of high salinity of
underground water
Balakrishnampatti (Trichy, Tamil Nadu)
will protest against the shift of a primary health
center to another locale
Fifty villages in naxal-affected Gadchiroli,
Maharashtra, have announced a boycott to
protest against denial of land pattas under the
Forest Rights Act
Sikh families in Kupian Palt (Kurukshetra,
Haryana) have decided not to exercise their
franchise in protest against eviction from
their land
Villagers of Sakleshpur (Hassan,
Karnataka) will sit at home on voting day in
NOTA-worthy protests
calls for election boycott made by Kashmiri mili-
tants, or the naxals of Rayagada and the decision of
the panchayat of Budha Khera Lather in Haryanas
Jind district? For instance, Maoists have sent bulk
SMSes calling for a poll boycott in several districts
of Bihar. The state police tore down election boy-
cott posters, but dont know how to tackle this par-
ticular innovation. Or whether it should at all?
Technically there is no difference between the
two kinds of boycotts, according to constitutional
scholar and author A Surya Prakash, who has writ-
ten What Ails Indian Parliament. He says: Every
registered voter has the right to vote and so long as
voting is not mandatory, every elector has the right
not to exercise this right. However, if there is an
organized poll boycott by groups and entities, and
electors are prevented from exercising their fran-
chise through threats, protests and intimidation,
there is enough in the penal code and election laws
to take action against such persons.
But in effect, when the voters refuse to go to the
polling booths, they are exercising the none of the
above (NOTA) option, which will be introduced in
the ballot papers for the first time in the national
elections. If voters choose to stay away in
57
April 30, 2014
protest against wild elephant attacks
Dongria Kondh tribals (Niyamgiri hills,
Odisha) have decided to boycott polls because
theyve been denied basic services
In Alappuzha (Kerala), famous for its back-
waters tourism, villagers have decided not to
vote in protest against lack of potable water
Residents of 91 villages in Dumka
(Jharkhand) have resolved to shun elections to
protest against displacement
Piprau village (Datia, Madhya Pradesh)
will boycott yet another election to press
for an all-weather road
Six villages of Ghatampur tehsil
(Akbarpur, Uttar Pradesh) will refrain from
voting because they havent been provided
potable water and roads
Residents of Budha Khera Lather village
(Jind, Haryana) have decided to abstain in
protest against the governments failure
to expand an irrigation canal
Delhis Dwarka sub-city has announced
it would not vote and stop paying
property taxes to protest against the massive
shortage of water
REASONS, SMALL
AND BIG
(L-R) While Karadikal
village in Tamil Nadu will
stay away from polls unless
their bull-taming sport
jallikuttu is allowed, for
many villages in Dumka the
worrying issue is
displacement
Given the sheer size of the electorate, poll
boycotts or NOTA are more an expression
of anger. To become effective, these need
to be become the right to reject.
58
April 30, 2014
groups, it is a group exercise in NOTA, says Surya
Prakash. Its a right upheld by the Supreme Court
in a ruling on September27, 2013.
Directing the Election Commission to provide a
NOTA button on electronic voting machines, the
apex court held that the provisions of Rule 49-O,
under which an elector not wishing to vote for any
candidate had to inform the presiding officer about
his decision, are ultra vires (beyond the powers) of
Article 19 and Section 128 of the Representation of
the People Act (RPA), 1951. The order was in
response to a petition filed by the Peoples Union
for Civil Liberties.
The EC subsequently clarified that NOTA did
not amount to a right to reject. Clause 64(a) of
Conduct of Elections Rules, 1961, read with Section
65 of the RPA makes it clear that the candidate who
has polled the largest number of valid votes is to be
declared elected, even if the number of electors opt-
ing for NOTA is more than the number of votes
polled by any of the candidates.
A
s it stands, says Kashyap, NOTA is merely
an expression of anger and disgust. No
one is going to queue up at a polling booth
for two hours to exercise the NOTA option, unless
there is a right to reject, which would allow for re-
polling if the majority of votes are for NOTA.
With many people expressing their lack of faith
in the system, is there a case for the right to reject?
Social activist Anna Hazare seems to think so. In a
recent public meeting he said, The Jan Lokpal has
come, Right to Information has come and
Lokayukta would also be made. Now, we need the
right to reject in this election. All the miscreants
and corrupt people of this country are leading the
democracy these days.
As Shankkar Aiyer, the author of Accidental
India: A History of the Nations Passage Through
Crisis and Change, points out: The right of NOTA
must be accompanied by a provision that annuls
the poll when the NOTA votes cross a particular
percentage. Voters require a real right hereto
convey their point to political parties about the
quality of candidates. Supreme Court lawyer
Rajeev Dhawan agrees that NOTA, as it exists
today, amounts to a wasted vote.
The Aam Admi Party has included this right in
its to-do list. We know many candidates are
either corrupt or criminals. But our current voting
system forces us to choose one and waste our vote
on someone we know is unfit for the job. We, the
peoples party, plan to give the voter an alternate
choicea reject all button. If you dislike all candi-
dates, you will have an option to use this button.
If this button gets the majority of votes, the elec-
tions to that constituency will be cancelled, reads
its manifesto.
BJPs prime ministerial nominee, Narendra
Modi, is a long-standing advocate of the right-to-
reject option. He has twice piloted a bill on compul-
sory voting and the right to reject through the
Gujarat assembly, only to have it shot down by the
governor. Even before the SC ruling on NOTA, he
told a group of young professionals in Ahmedabad:
At present voters have to select a candidate put up
by the party irrespective of his background. But if
right to reject is given, they can reject all candi-
dates. Political parties, fearing the rejection, will be
forced to give tickets to good people.
Netizens across the country have launched a
campaign for the right to reject on social media.
At least a dozen FB pages canvass for legal amend-
ments to the RPA to give NOTA more teeth.
ISSUES GALORE
(L-R) While Budha Khera
Lather village residents in
Jind district of Haryana
want extension of an
irrigation canal, Sikh
families in Kupian Palt in
Kurukshetra district of the
state are upset about
eviction from their land.
IL
THE NATION/
elections 2014/ voters boycott
60
April 30, 2014
PROBE/
oshos followers/ money laundering
MONEY CHANGERS
DESECRATE
THE BHAGWAN
shell companies, trusts with similar names, forged
signatures and false documents were allegedly used
by some devotees of Rajneesh. in the process,
they channeled millions of dollars into their pockets
By Vishwas Kumar
61
April 30, 2014
about the heaven or hell after their deaths. They
aim to create an earthly heaven, where money,
power and personal ambitions are paramount.
Over the past two decades, dozens of shell
companies and trusts were set up, documents
were backdated through forged signatures or
false documentation, and the entities were per-
sonally controlled by select individuals.
Companies and trusts with the same or similar
names were registered globally to allegedly
confuse investigators, and genuine followers,
who could not spot the manipulations. Over
time, there were charges that huge amounts
were siphoned off from Oshos trusts to fill
personal coffers.
The creation of OMR and Zurich-based OIF,
and their getting hold of copyrights of Oshos
books and CDs, is a saga thats both complex
and frightening. During Rajneeshs lifetime, the
copyrights were held by Jeevan Jagriti Kendra,
which was registered in 1969. Six years later, it
was renamed Rajneesh Foundation. In 1991,
after Oshos death, a New Jersey-based Ame-
rican entity, Child Villas Rajneesh Meditation
Center, claimed that it had some of the rights,
which were transferred by Rajneesh Foun-
dations trustees back in 1980.
After the registration of these copyrights
and Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs) in its
name, the meditation center changed its name
to Rajneesh Foundation International in 1985.
A series of other renames took placeto
Rajneesh Friendship Foundation (1986),
I
F you are a follower of Bhagwan
Rajneesh, or Osho, and wish to
purchase a book or CD comprising
his teachings in India, remember
the money may go into the pockets
of those conspiring to grab the late
gurus global assets. The reason:
the copyright for these books and CDs are held
by Osho Multimedia and Resorts (OMR),
which was registered as a private limited firm in
Mumbai in 2001. Although the shareholders
and directors of OMR are Osho devotees, the
firms annual earnings of over `5 crore go into
the pockets of individuals. And since its cre-
ation, OMR has possibly earned a cumulative
amount of `180 crore.
In case, you wish to purchase Oshos books
and CDs overseas, the money may go to the
Zurich-based Osho International Foundation
(OIF). The foundation, which owns the global
copyrights, has nothing to do with the original
OIF, registered in Mumbai and based in Pune.
The Zurich entity is a namesake whose presi-
dent is Michael OByrne alias Swami Anand
Jayesh, a Canadian citizen. OByrne was presi-
dent of Oshos Inner Circle and whipped out
Rajneeshs will 23 years after his death. All these
years, his closest followers maintained that he
had left no will. (See the story: Controversial
Legacy, dated March 31, 2014).
COMPLICATE AND CONTROL
While he was alive, Osho said: The mind that
is full of greed, the mind that is constantly
obsessed with money, is already in hell. Sadly,
24 years after his death, his main devotees have
allegedly floated a maze of companies, regis-
tered in India and abroad, which are being used
to fulfill their voracious materialistic demands.
The spiritual leaders senior followers dont care
UNHOLY DRAGNET
The money from the
sale of Rajneeshs books
and CDs is deceptively
channelized into a private
firm, Osho Multimedia
and Resorts
Copyrights of Oshos books and speeches
were transferred from Jeevan Jagriti
Kendra to Rajneesh Foundation to
OIF (Zurich) and OMR (India).
Anil Shakya
62
April 30, 2014
Neo Sannyas Foundation (1989) and Zurich-
based OIF (1990). At some point in time, Neo
Sannyas transferred the copyrights to OIF
(Zurich), which transferred the Indian rights to
the privately-held OMR.
Consider the fact: While the Zurich-based
OIF was registered in 1990, or in the same year
that Rajneesh died, the Mumbai-based original
took birth in 1991. Many Osho followers
charged that the documents related to the
Zurich-based OIF were backdated in an attem-
pt to prove that Neo Sannyas transferred the
copyrights and IPRs to it even before the
Mumbai-based foundation came into existence.
Thus, the Mumbai-based OIF could not claim
ownership of the copyrights.
Two alleged masterminds behind these cor-
porate shenanigans seem to be OByrne and
Mukesh Kantilal Sarda alias Swami Mukesh
Bharti, the managing trustee of the real OIF.
The Pune-based OIF, unlike the Zurich-based
namesake, owns Oshos Pune ashram and its
properties in India, which are worth over
` 1,500 crore. The duo have collaborated, cali-
brated and complicated the linkages between
the various firms and trusts in a bid to take over
control of these properties in India and abroad.
OByrne was a former property developer.
He joined the Oregon commune in 1984, but
was accused for the non-payment of over $1.3
million to Bank of Montreal in 1987. After
Rajneeshs death, he dissolved his Inner Circle,
and floated a new trust, Osho International
Presidium, which was registered in Zurich and
headed by him.
Sarda, a milk delivery boy, became Oshos
devotee in the early 1970s. He became Byrnes
loyalist and the managing trustee of Neo
Sannyas Foundation and the Pune-based OIF.
Osho followers charged that the two con-
spired to benefit themselves and friends. A few
shareholders and directors of OMR, which
holds the India copyrights, are Sarda, Vidya
Khubchandani, Anand Kumar Awasthi, Lal
Pratap Singh and Devendra Singh Deval. They
are connected with the Pune-based OIF, Neo
Sannyas Foundation and the Delhi-based
Darshan Trust, which turned out to be a huge
beneficiary of Oshos properties.
For instance, Khubchandani is an ex-trustee
of OIF and the present trustee of both Neo
Sannyas and Darshan Trust. Awasthi alias
Swami Anand Satyarthi is an ex-trustee of both
OIF and Neo Sannyas, but an existing one of
the Darshan Trust. Singh alias Swami Yoga
Pratap, and Deval alias Swami Devendra Bharti
are trustees of OIF, but ex-trustees of Neo
Sannyas. Logically, they could be behind the
properties transferred to Darshan Trust or
copyrights to OMR.
Notably the trust (Neo Sannyas) and pri-
vate company (OMR) have same addresses and
same trustees, directors and shareholders. This
(OMR) has been created by the trustees (of Neo
Sannyas) as a special vehicle to siphon off funds
of the Trust, revealed documents submitted by
two of Oshos followers, Yogesh Thakkar and
Kishor Raval, in the Mumbai High Court.
OByrne made the most of
his links with Osho
Forfeiting legacy
Michael OByrne alias Swami Anand
Jayesh is a former property develop-
er and Canadian citizen. He joined
Osho in the mid-1980s, but vanished
in 1987 due to non-payment of over
$1.3 million to Bank of Montreal.
Later, he became one of the closest
followers of Osho and was a mem-
ber of the Inner Circle. After Osho
passed away in 1990, OByrne
formed the Osho International
Foundation in Zurich and became its
president. The foundation owns the
global copyrights for Oshos books
and speeches. Last year, he sur-
faced with Oshos disputed and con-
troversial will, which named him as
the executor.
Mukesh Kantilal Sarda alias Swami
Mukesh Bharti was a milk delivery boy
who became a devotee of Osho in the
early 1970s. In the early 1980s, he fol-
lowed the spiritual leader to the
United States, but returned to Pune in
1987. Sarda was always OByrnes
blue-eyed boy, and became the man-
aging trustee of Neo Sannyas
Foundation and Pune-based Osho
International Foundation. He is a
director in Osho Multimedia and
Resorts, which owns the Indian copy-
rights for Oshos books and speech-
es. He is also indirectly connected to
the Darshan Trust, which was gifted
several properties by the Osho Trust
based in Pune.
Sarda made his way up as
a close crony of OByrne
PROBE/
oshos followers/ money laundering
63
April 30, 2014
Sarda and OByrne contend that Neo
Sannyas Foundation doesnt exist anymore. It
was merged with OIF (in Zurich) and, logically,
the copyrights and IPRs held by the foundation
were legally transferred to the latter, which
transferred the Indian rights to OMR.
Information available on www.sannyas.org
states that Osho International New York is the
international publishing headquarters for all
Oshos works, which is managed on behalf of
Osho International Foundation, Zurich. It adds
that the New York-based company represents
all works by Osho as a literary agency and
administers the worldwide rights for the
Foundation. The copyright clause states that
Osho International Foundation is the sole and
registered owner of all the copyrights to all the
published and unpublished words and works of
Osho, as the Author in all mediums.
Thakkar and Raval counter that the Neo
Sannyas Foundation exists and dispute its
merger with OIF (Zurich). They claim the copy-
rights of Oshos books still rest with the founda-
tion. However, they will need to present docu-
ments, which may be decades old and may not
even exist to prove that the copyrights rest with
Neo Sannyas and not OIF (Zurich).
TRAIL OF DECEIT
There are other deals, which look suspicious.
For example, in 1988, the Pune-based OIF trust
signed a tripartite deal with two private firms,
Zen Properties and Godrej Properties and
Investment to construct a guesthouse and med-
itation hall in Pune. The construction was to be
on a plot owned by the trust, which was situated
next to Diamond Hotel (now Vivanta) at
Koregaon Road. The estimated cost: `16 crore.
Zen Properties was roped in only as a mid-
dleman, although the official reason was to
facilitate construction because the trust lacked
adequate funds. The work was done by Godrej
Properties, but Zen Properties earned a consul-
tancy fee of ` 1.19 crore without being involved
in the construction.
Three years later, Zen Properties vanished
from the scene. Thakkar and Raval believed
that this was Sardas way to siphon off money
since he controlled the Pune-based OIF trust.
And, this was done while Osho was still alive.
As revealed in India Legal s March 31, 2014,
issue, the Pune-based and Sarda-controlled
OIF decided to gift properties worth `90
crore to Darshan Trust, whose registered office
was in Delhis Defence Colony. The two trustees
of Darshan Trust were OIFs former trustees,
Khubchandani and Awasthi. The duo was con-
nected with Sardas OMR. Thakkar and Raval
contended that the properties could have been
used to make OIF financially stable.
In 2010, the Pune-based OIF mortgaged
properties to raise `3 crore from Corporation
Bank, Pune. Couldnt the ones gifted to
Darshan Trust be used in a similar manner to
help Oshos trust and his followers? Sarda
remained evasive when India Legal asked him
about his linkages with OMR and Darshan
trust. The matter is subjudice, he replied.
It is time for OByrne and Sarda to remem-
ber Oshos words: It (the mind) is already out
of paradisebecause paradise is there when
you are simply not clinging to anything whatso-
ever. An unclinging mind is paradise.
STEADFAST ON THE PATH
Despite allegations of
corruption surfacing against
some close followers of Osho,
his followers at large
continue to cling to his beliefs
IL
Uday Shankar Ganguly
64
April 30, 2014
unruly travellers cause forced landings or change
of flight route, but still go scot-free due to legal
loopholes. this could change if the 1963
tokyo convention is amended
By Shobha John
AVIATION/
misbehavior on flights
GOONS
IN THE AIR
foreign destination, the police of that coun-
try will not have the jurisdiction to take
action, explains Albert Tjoeng, assistant
director, corporate communications, Asia
Pacific, IATA. Unruly passengers are,
therefore, often not prosecuted and get
away. This is why IATA is advocating for
jurisdiction to be extended to state of opera-
tor, state of landing and state of aircraft
registration, he adds.
The aviation scenario too has changed.
Today, 40 percent of planes are leased, as
opposed to just 3 percent in 1980. Often, the
place where the aircraft is registered is nei-
ther the place where it lands nor the one
from where it took off. Therefore, without
extension of jurisdiction, the Tokyo
Convention will simply become outdated,
says Tjoeng.
IATA has, therefore, appealed to the
International Civil Aviation Organization
(ICAO) to review the Tokyo Convention.
Tony Tyler, IATAs director general and CEO
says: The Tokyo Convention was not origi-
nally designed to address unruly behavior
and there is a lot of uncertainty among
65
April 30, 2014
HEN Pratibha, a
young air hostess, was
called for the fifth time
by a passenger flying on
the Delhi-Hong Kong
route, she was in tears. The
passenger, a 23-year-old Indian, had been
drinking non-stop and was fast losing con-
trol over himself. He was harassing and
abusing her in the choicest of Hindi curses
and even tried pulling her hand. Finally, she
complained to the cabin-in-charge. When
the plane landed in Hong Kong, the inebri-
ated man was handed over to the no-non-
sense security. Pratibha says, I have never
felt so relieved.
Instances of unruly behavior among air
passengers are on the rise. Data from an
International Air Transport Association
(IATA) survey shows that between 2008
and 2011, 15,000 air hooliganism cases were
registered worldwide. Airline crew say that
it is rampant and especially so when the pas-
senger has had a drink too many.
According to IATA, a representative body
of some 240 airlines, such behavior could
cause a change of flight route and forced
landing, and cost airlines between $10,000
to $200,000. In addition, large aircraft may
have to dump fuel and pay landing fees,
accommodation costs, ground handling
charges and cost of new fuel if a plane is
diverted due to such a passenger. In many
cases, new crew will have to be assigned to
operate the onward flight, adding to time
and cost. Rarely are airlines able to recover
the cost, as the passenger doesnt have the
wherewithal to pay up.
BRING EM TO BOOK
Efforts are now being made to change legis-
lation so that action can be taken against
such passengers. The Tokyo Convention of
1963 deals with crimes on-board a plane,
but is in desperate need of amendment. The
convention gives jurisdiction over offenses
committed onboard an aircraft to the coun-
try where the plane is registered. So, for an
Indian-registered aircraft, only Indian
authorities have the authority to pursue
such cases. If an incident happens on an
Indian-registered aircraft which lands at a
Today, unruly passengers can be booked
in countries, where the plane is registered.
IATA wants this to be extended to
destination nations and state of operators.
W
BEARING THE BRUNT
Air hostesses of an Air India
flight; increasing cases of
hooliganism are not only
creating problems for
airlines crew in general but
have put a question mark on
air safety
66
April 30, 2014
November 22, 2012: A drunk passenger on an IndiGo Delhi-Nagpur-Pune
flight tried to enter the cockpit and created such a scene that the pilot
had to intervene. The passenger was remanded to seven-day magisteri-
al custody and charged under the Safety of Civil Aviation Act, 1982.
October 19, 2012: A hijack scare was triggered at Thiruvananthapuram by
a lady pilot, who was alarmed by some unruly passengers.
August 17, 2012: Three inebriated passengers onboard Air India Express
813 from Mangalore were handed over to Dubai security officials after
they misbehaved during the flight, demanding more liquor and using
abusive language.
January 8, 2014: American fashion designer Ralph Laurens niece Jennifer
was convicted for drunkenness, and threatening and abusive behavior
onboard a Barcelona-New York Delta flight. The flight was diverted to
Shannon in Ireland and cost the carrier more than $43,000.
June 3, 2013: A group of about 100 high school students, due to travel
from New York to Atlanta were kicked off an AirTran flight after they failed
to sit down and turn off mobile phones.
February 21, 2014: The Kerala Strikers team, participating in the Celebrity
Cricket League and representing Malyalam film actors, was off-loaded
from a private carrier on the flight from Kochi to Hyderabad, for alleged
misbehavior. The takeoff was aborted and the flight got delayed.
Law unto themselves
carriers as to what actions crew can take to
manage incidents in the air.
So serious has this issue become, says
D Sudhakara Reddy, president of the Air
Passengers Association of India, that most
of Indias domestic airlines, which fly inter-
national, have stopped serving alcohol to
economy class passengers. ICAOs step is a
welcome one and India being a member of
it, will be bound by the amendments made.
Statistics on unruly passengers from the
Safety Trend Evaluation, Analysis and Data
Exchange System (STEADES), a database of
IATA, show that there was a 14 percent
increase in unruly behavior from 2010 to
2011 (see box above).
Preliminary data for 2013 shows that
8,217 unruly passenger reports were
received, showing a substantial increase. Of
the incidents from 2007-2011, 20.9 percent
were serious enough to require the interven-
tion of the police at the place of landing.
While alcohol is a big source of nuisance,
other instances of unruliness are:
consumption of narcotics or cigarettes
AVIATION/
misbehavior on flights
TICKET TO MISBEHAVIOR?
More and more people are getting
the wherewithal for air travel, but
with access to comfort should
also come civic sense
Rajeev Tyagi
gers and I am glad IATA is doing something
about it.
Capt Shakti Lumba, aviation consultant
and ex-operations head of IndiGo, says that
on domestic flights in India, the commander
and crew are not empowered to restrain dis-
ruptive passengers, as there is no specific
national legislation in this regard. In the
past, cases of unruly passengers in domestic
airlines were handled by airlines under the
Indian Penal Code and the Aircraft Act.
Both legislations were inadequate to suc-
cessfully prosecute unruly passengers unless
an attempted hijacking case could be made.
There was a case in IndiGo, where a passen-
ger posing as a Directorate General of Civil
Aviation (DGCA) official was successfully
prosecuted for attempted hijack. There is a
crying need for such legislation, as incidents
of air rage are increasing, especially during
flight delays.
Unfortunately, though the DGCA is the
apex regulatory body for civil aviation, it is
powerless to prosecute. Even if it came out
with a circular, it would be dependent on the
police for that, explains Lumba.
The IATA move, he says, is a step in the
right direction. Future legislation to tackle
crimes onboard an aircraft should be exem-
plary. Better late than never, he adds
emphatically.
67
April 30, 2014
IL
refusal to comply with safety instructions
verbal/physical confrontation with crew
members or other passengers
interference with crew duties
making threats that could affect the safety
of the crew, passengers and aircraft
sexual abuse or harassment
LACKADAISICAL RESPONSE
While participating airlines in the IATA sur-
vey claimed that incidents were dealt with
properly when the place of landing was its
home jurisdiction, cabin crew said that was
often not the case in India.
A senior air hostess with a private airline
in Delhi says: There is no will among secu-
rity agencies in India to act on a complaint
regarding a passengers unruliness, no mat-
ter how serious it is. Once, a passenger
touched an air hostess inappropriately, but
when we complained, the security here kept
asking us again and again if the incident had
actually happened. Passengers too know
they can get away and act more aggressively
within the country.
However, the treatment abroad is vastly
different, she says. If a commander makes a
complaint about an unruly passenger
onboard, security gets cracking and is
already waiting when the plane lands there.
And the surprising thing is that an abusive
passenger, who is all fire and brimstone with
us on the flight, suddenly becomes a mouse
on seeing security men abroad with para-
phernalia such as guns, walkie-talkies,
baton, etc. We have no qualms in handing
him over to them.
PLIGHT OF THE CREW
Prabha Rani, a retired air hostess says: The
unruliness is usually onboard international
flights where drinks are served, especially on
those coming to India from the Middle East.
Its natural, I guess, considering that those
countries dont allow liquor. While we are all
taught to tackle such passengers, real-life
situations call for a lot of tact. If we reply
back, some louts shout and say: We have
paid for the service. It is humiliating. While
senior cabin crew can handle these situa-
tions, it unnerves the younger ones. Its high
time action is taken against these passen-
Soaring crimes
in the sky
Number of unruly incidents per 1,000
sectors increased from 0.736 in 2010 to
0.834 in 2011, a 14 percent increase
In 2011, 6,004 incidents of unruly
behavior were reported
In 2012, the number went down to 5,220
In 2013, it went up to 8,217
From 2007 to mid-2013, there was one
unruly passenger incident per 1,708
flights. Of these, 20.9 percent were
serious enough to require intervention
of the police
In 2012, every seventh unruly
passenger incident required police
or security service intervention
68
April 30, 2014
FTER he was sworn in as a
Rajya Sabha member in
June 2012, cricketer
Sachin Tendulkar abs-
tained from all crucial
proceedings of the
Upper House during
the last session of the
15th parliament. However, the master
blasters biggest contribution came as a
member of the standing committee on infor-
mation technology, which recently submitted
a report on cyber crime, cyber security and
right to privacy. The revelations are scary.
The committee found a 280 percent
increase in BOT infections in India. BOT is
a malicious software, which controls any
computer or laptop it infects from an exter-
nal source. The program can send emails to
the persons contacts, attack websites and
steal information. Almost 4,000 websites in
the country were defaced or hacked up to
June 2013; out of these 2,667 were owned by
government institutions and had .in
DEVIL
on your Screen
India is most prone to hackers attacks, but there is official
paralysis in dealing with issues, such as servers based
abroad and lack of indigenous internet technology
By Rakesh Bhatnagar
TECH/
cyber attacks
domain names with servers in India.
The fact is that the number of reported
incidents of website compromises has grown
5.5 times in the past five years, and India is
among the first five countries with respect to
spam mail. During 2007-12, phishing inci-
dents rose from 392 to 887.
This is true globally, too. Each day,
100,000 worms, viruses or variants are
released on the cyberspace; of these, 10 per-
cent are new and unique ones. US-based
Symantecs Internet Security Threat Report
(2013) found a 42 percent surge in global
targeted attacks during 2012 as compared to
2011, and 30 percent increase in web-based
attacks. India, with 134 internet service
providers, 10 million registered domain
names with 10 percent as .in ones and 260
data centers, is particularly at risk from pro-
fessional and amateur hackers. In fact, the
secretary of Department of Information
Technology admitted to the standing com-
mittee that the nature and size of the threat
in cyberspace in India is looming large and it
is very important to protect 11 critical sectors,
such as power, atomic energy, space, aviation,
transportation, etc., which are predominant-
ly using IT systems.
A key problem is that most of the Indian
websites are hosted by internet servers based
abroad. Why is it so? This is possibly because
A
All efforts should be made to
ensure that servers, which
host sensitive websites, are based
in India and owned by Indians.
The country
must protect
its 11 critical
sectors from
cyberspace
threat. During
2007-2012,
phishing
incidents went
up from 392
to 887.
69
April 30, 2014
of the penny-wise, pound-foolish mindset
among the government and website owners.
The committee found that the hosting issue
was largely on account of economical and
cost advantage reasons because the protec-
tion mechanism for securing websites
involves significant expenditure.
But logically, for sensitive areas costs
shouldnt be a factor at all. All efforts should
be made to ensure that servers, which host
such websites or are used for official purpos-
es, be based in India and owned by Indians.
The cost proposition sounds bizarre when
one considers that India is the land of techies
and rules the global software sector. The
country boasts of 100 million internet users
and almost 13 million broadband sub-
scribers. Why cant our engineers, based here
or located in US Silicon Valley, find low-cost
solutions to the server problem?
Given this scenario, the committee had
reasons to feel extremely disturbed as it
found out that even though crimes in cyber-
space have been on the rise, only 42,000
students have been trained or are undergoing
training in various long-term or short-term
courses to develop indigenous technology,
which is imported at a heavy cost.
Only 65,000 personnel are involved in
cyber security, against the estimated require-
ment of 500,000.
India is also totally dependent on foreign
know-how vis--vis internet technology
tools. However, the government hasnt put in
place an indigenous eco-system to check
attacks on the telecom infrastructure, partic-
ularly the routers.
Minister of State for Communications
and IT Milind Deoras response was that the
government had made it mandatory for tele-
com service providers to get their systems
verified by certified laboratories. This
stemmed from the perception that frequent
interruptions or derailment of IT systems are
propelled by foreign nations. But the govern-
ment is not geared to make its laboratories
free of suspected intrusive mouse traps.
No wonder, the government is smug
about cyber security and cyber threats. When
it was revealed that US National Security
Agency spied on 38 diplomatic missions of
foreign nations, including two Indian mis-
sions in Washington and New York, External
Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid seemed
unperturbed. His assurance was that various
agencies carry out security audits of IT and
communications systems in the missions on
a regular basis, and the government will
enhance its capacity to protect data and
information flows by building better cyber
and telephony infrastructure and evolving
new cyber and telecom security practices.
Anthony Lawrence
IL
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71
April 30, 2014
HUMAN RIGHTS/
kashmiri prisoners
E
HSAN Antoo, a Kashmiri, still remembers
with horror the day he was brought to
Tihar Jail after being charged under the
Official Secrets Act in 2004. After I
entered the jail, I was forced to remove my
clothes. The jail authorities said they want-
ed to see an identification mark on my body. Instead, they
made me turn around. What happened next was something
that still makes me tremble, Antoo recalls. Further indignity
was in store for him and other Kashmiri prisoners as jail
authorities used fingers and bamboo sticks to further
undertrials and convicts from
the valley in delhis tihar jail
are singled out for punishment
and humiliation by the jail staff
and other inmates, who
perceive them as terrorists
By Sheikh Saaliq
Trail of
TORTURE
TORTURE
Trail of
HUMAN RIGHTS/
kashmiri prisoners
traumatize them. When Antoo retaliated, he
was beaten up. I had other identification marks
on my body, but I was made to strip and brutal-
ized only because they wanted to humiliate me,
says Antoo.
While this is an extreme form of torture,
Kashmiri prisoners released after serving jail
terms in Tihar allege that they were singled out
for severe punishment and humiliation, not just
by the jail staff, but by other prisoners too, who
perceived them as terrorists. Many were beaten
up so brutally that they had to get their heads
stitched. According to a Hindustan Times
report, 18 cases of blade attacks were reported
inside Tihar in 2013. Most of them went unno-
ticed and unreported. Even the families of these
prisoners were unaware of the incidents. Most
of those, who are charged with terrorist activi-
ties, have been in Tihar for the last 20 years.
As they sit in dark cells, counting the days,
months and years to freedom, killing time is the
least of their problems. Whats more difficult to
bear is extreme hostility. Sudden, vicious attacks
by other prisoners have scared them out of their
wits. Gangs in Tihar, be it in the male or female
wards, have made life hell for these Kashmiri
prisoners. Danger lurks everywhere.
PAIN AND TORTURE
So bad has the situation become that many of
them went on a hunger strike last month,
protesting against an order by the director gen-
eral (prisons), restricting the rights of high risk
ward (HRW) prisoners. In a petition to the
Delhi High Court, they alleged that malprac-
tices and inhuman treatment were meted out
to them by jail authorities. In early February, a
team of lawyers from the Jammu and Kashmir
Bar Association visited Tihar on the orders of
the high court. A report was later released,
which highlighted the problems faced by
Kashmiri prisoners.
Antoo clearly remembers the day he was
attacked in a police van as he was being taken
for a court hearing. The van stopped and we
had to step out. Thats when a fellow prisoner
hit me on the face with his elbow and attacked
me with a razor. I was lucky the blade missed
me by a whisker, he says.
Khurram Parvez heads the Jammu and
Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society, and has been
following the cases of Kashmiri prisoners for a
long time. He says the ill-treatment of Kashmiri
prisoners inside Tihar Jail is an ongoing issue,
which needs to be addressed urgently. He feels
attacks on them are happening due to the
myopic thinking of other prisoners, who
consider Kashmiris as terrorists.
There is no way prisoners can be attacked
so systematically without the help of jail author-
ities. The attacks are mostly carried out with
weapons. In a high security jail like Tihar, it is
impossible to bring such weapons in. This clear-
ly indicates that jail authorities are helping the
attackers, Parvez says.
IN THE FEMALE WARD
Shockingly, even female Kashmiri prisoners are
not spared. Zamrooda Habib was a Kashmiri
prisoner in Tihar and kept a diary, which was
published into a book titled Prisoner No 100:
An Account of My Nights and Days in an Indian
Prison after she was released.
The book is full of incidents, anecdotes and
experiences about the dark world inside the jail.
One line from the book quotes Delhi police
telling her during interrogation, You are a sep-
72
April 30, 2014
Human rights activists say the attacks on
Kashmiri prisoners by inmates happen in
connivance with jail authorities. Otherwise
how can a prisoner get access to weapons?
aratist leader of Muslim Khawateen Markaz
(MKM). We would just strip you naked, take
your snaps and distribute them all over India,
thus defaming you forever.
Habib, who now heads the Association of
Families of Kashmiri Prisoners, says she was
charged under anti-terror law POTA and
lodged in Jail No 6, meant only for women.
But that hardly mattered, as what happened
to male prisoners also happened to me, recalls
Habib. She was the only Kashmiri woman
lodged in Tihar, and had to face the brunt of
blade gangs in her ward too. Most of them
attack prisoners who have been charged with
anti-national activities. When a group of pris-
oners came to know that I was a Kashmiri, they
caught me by my hair and dragged me all
around the ward. They beat me ruthlessly and
called me a terrorist, she says.
Habib remembers one Afghan woman, who
was charged with drug-smuggling. She was
beaten up so mercilessly that she died. The
cause of her death, she says, was extreme lower
abdominal bleeding. She was repeatedly
kicked on her abdomen, says Habib.
TERRORIST TAG
Syed Maqbool Shah, an accused in the Lajpat
Nagar blasts of 1996, who was acquitted after 13
years in Tihar, says that dangerous gangs inside
the jail pose a constant threat to prisoners lives.
Kashmiri prisoners, he alleges, are deliberately
kept with thieves, murderers and mafia, evok-
ing a sense of fear among them. I was lodged in
a ward with druggists, murderers and other
dangerous criminals. They would carry blades
and attack other prisoners. I was often called a
terrorist by other inmates, Maqbool says.
Gautam Navlakha, a prominent human
rights defender and a lawyer, says these attacks
are the worst kind of punishment.
Take the case of Rafiq Ahmad Shah, who
was attacked so severely inside Tihar that he
had to be referred to a hospital for treatment.
His father, Muhammad Yaseen Shah, learnt
about it through social media on March 24 this
year. Rafiq was arrested on October 29, 2005, in
connection with a series of blasts that rocked
Sarojini Nagar market, Paharganj and Kalkaji
in Delhi, killing 50 and injuring 104. The next
month, Rafiq was arrested from his home in
Alasteng in Srinagar and since then, Tihars
HRW No 5 has been his home.
The torture is particularly hard on families.
Rafiqs mother Mehmooda says with concern:
Our kids are being attacked in jails and we
dont even know. Whenever we go to visit them,
they prefer to remain silent. Even if they want to
tell us about these attacks, they arent allowed to
do so. We are forced not to speak in Kashmiri so
that jail authorities can follow our conver-
sation, she says.
FUTILE ATTEMPT
Javid Ahmad Khanwas, arrested in 1996 in con-
nection with the Lajpat Nagar blasts, is lodged
in HRW No 6. A few weeks back, his cousin
Farooq Ahmad came all the way from
Nawapora in Kashmir to meet him, but he was
not allowed. Disappointed, he returned home.
Javids father Mohammad Shafi Khan says:
My son is not treated well. Like all other pris-
oners, Javid is also bearing the brunt of being
a Kashmiri.
However, Tihar jail spokesperson Sunil
Gupta denies all allegations. He says jail author-
ities treat all prisoners equally, and minor inci-
dents are controlled. But the kith and kin of
these Kashmiri prisoners live in constant dread
and concern. Tihar Jail is no different from a
torture cell. Our kids are under constant threat
of getting killed there, laments Mehmooda.
How can these prisoners expect ingratiation,
given such a trail of torture?
73
April 30, 2014
SENSE OF LOSS
Family members of Rafiq
Ahmad Shah with their
loved ones photograph at
their residence in Srinagar
S
h
a
h
i
d

T
a
n
t
r
a
y
IL
74 April 30, 2014
farmers in north america are fighting big food
firms for their right to sell directly to the consumer. one of them,
michael schmidt, may finally win his case after 20 years. this is a
sign of global conflict that india will soon witness
By David E Gumpert
DARING TO DIFFER
Michael Schmidt answering
media queries during his
protracted legal battle for the
right to distribute raw milk
GLOBAL TRENDS/
alternative food distribution
WHOSE MILK IS IT,
ANYWAY?
75 April 30, 2014
sure to the residues of antibiotics fed to farm
animals en masse).
By the new century, Schmidt had re-built his
farm and re-married, and saw the private group
of devotees buying from his farm grow to more
than 200. Schmidt also committed himself to
nonviolent resistance against the intensifying
campaign against raw milk, which has come to
be known as food rights.
MIXED JUDICIAL RESPONSES
By the time Schmidt went on trial yet again in
2008 for illegally selling raw milk, the same
legal campaign that had unfolded against him
was unfolding against dairy farmers around
North America, most of them in the US. Nearly
90 percent of all US dairies had disappeared
since 1970, according to the US Department of
Agriculture, and the smaller ones that were left
were increasingly trying to capitalize on the
growing popularity of unprocessed foods,
including raw milk, and selling unpasteurized
milk privately as a way to bring in desperately
needed revenues to keep their farms afloat. The
legal results would be mixed.
In early 2006, federal, state, and local regu-
latory agents confronted a Kentucky farmer
delivering unpasteurized milk to members
t seemed an isolated incident
back in February 1994, on a cold
isolated piece of land about 150
miles north of Toronto, when
local public health authorities
descended on a small dairy farm
run by a German-born farmer,
Michael Schmidt. They seized
about $800 of milk and cheese,
and charged Schmidt with supplying unpas-
teurized milk to a group of several dozen friends
and neighbors who owned shares in his 30 or so
dairy cows, known as a cow share.
Schmidt would, within months of the raid,
be put on trial and his milk determined to be a
health hazard. Ontario had, years before, made
unpasteurized milk illegal, and evolved a cum-
bersome and expensive process for obtaining a
license to produce milk for pasteurization. Little
did Schmidt know that his legal difficulties were
just beginning, and would continue for 20
years, through two Ontario appeal courts,
culminating in a decision by a three-court panel
in early March, 2014.
All Schmidt knew back in the 1990s was
that he felt the need to follow through on his
commitment to supply unpasteurized, or raw,
milk to his cow share members. When he did,
though, there were more raids and undercover
investigations to try to suggest Schmidt wasnt
just selling his dairy products to a select group
of friends, but to the public as well.
Eventually, the legal pressures would force
Schmidt to divest himself of three-fourths of the
small farms land and many of its cows to pay for
legal bills. The pressures led to a divorce, and
more civil and criminal charges.
But as the son of Germans who had survived
the Hitler years, Schmidt saw in the official
crackdown on his small private arrangement an
unacceptable government intrusion against a
fundamental and universal rightthe right of
farmers to follow the timeless tradition of
privately distributing food to friends and neigh-
bors outside the highly regulated food distribu-
tion system that is centered on supermarkets
and box stores.
In Schmidts view it was a right that has
become ever more important now, as mass-
produced factory food has come to dominate
American and Canadian markets, and poses an
altogether new sets of health risks (like of expo-
I
THE COST OF A
CAUSE
Schmidt with his
second wife Elisa; the
hardship due to
clampdown on his farm
caused a turmoil in his
married life, leading to
divorce with his
first wife
76
April 30, 2014
of his cow share in a parking lot in nearby
Cincinnati, Ohio. They confiscated his milk and
questioned him so harshly he collapsed and had
to be hospitalized with symptoms of post-trau-
matic stress disorder (PTSD). Eventually he set-
tled the case by paying a fine of $500.
Later the same year, Ohio agriculture offi-
cials attempted to legally prevent another
farmer, Carol Schmitmeyer, from distributing
unpasteurized milk to a group of 150 cow share
members. She challenged the state in court, and
won a decision from a judge, who castigated the
Ohio Department of Agriculture over the fail-
ure of the department to articulate specific
problems with the cow share agreement. Ohio,
which had banned sale of raw milk in the state,
declined to appeal the decision, and so cow
shares are now legal in the state.
Also in 2006, regulators and police in
Michigan confronted a farmer, Richard
Hebron, on his way to deliver raw milk to a
group of cow share members in the university
town of Ann Arbor. They confiscated thousands
of dollars worth of milk and other foods, and
referred the case to a district attorney for possi-
ble criminal charges, since Michigan, didnt
allow the sale of raw milk. When the district
attorney decided against pursuing the case, the
Michigan attorney general agreed to allow cow
shares in the state.
However, other states werent as forthcom-
ing as Ohio and Michigan. Maryland in 2006
banned cow shares (and a related arrangement,
known as herd shares), and the ban withstood a
legal challenge by a farmer, all the way to the
Maryland Supreme Court.
In both Massachusetts and California, regu-
lators filed cease-and-desist orders against
farmers with cow share and herd share arrange-
ments, but no court cases have yet resulted, and
farmers continue to operate under the radar
DIRECT TO HOME
(L-R) The milch cattle on
Schmidts farm; and the dairy
farmer with bottles of
unpasteurized milk meant
for neighbors
The cases are about whether
farmers can sell unpasteurized milk
to friends and neighbors outside the
regulated food distribution system.
GLOBAL TRENDS/
alternative food distribution
77
April 30, 2014
(though legislation has been introduced in both
the states to legalize the private arrangements).
Michael Schmidt wound up representing
himself at a five-day trial in 2009, at which he
was charged with a number of violations of
Ontarios dairy laws. In early 2010, the judge in
the case decided in favor of Schmidt, ruling that
private food organizations are entitled to oper-
ate apart from the publicly regulated food sys-
tem. But because Canada doesnt prohibit dou-
ble jeopardy (being tried twice for the same
offense) as completely as the US, the Ontario
government appealed against Schmidts acquit-
tal, and won a reversal in late 2011.
UNDETERRED
Schmidt then went on a 37-day hunger strike
that attracted wide attention in Canada and the
US that ended only when the Ontario premier
agreed to Schmidts demand for a personal
meeting. He also gained a hearing on his case
from the Ontario Court of Appeal, which in
early March became the highest court in North
America to rule on a food rights case. It com-
pletely rejected Schmidts arguments. This
court has resisted schemes that purport to cre-
ate private enclaves immune to the reach of
public health legislation..., they said.
On the cow share arrangement, the justice
who wrote the opinion stated: In my view, the
cow-share arrangement is nothing more than a
marketing and distribution scheme that is
offered to the public at large.
The justice also suggested that Schmidts
cow share wasnt properly structured: The
cow-share member acquires a right of access to
the milk produced by (Schmidts) dairy farm, a
right that is not derived from an ownership
interest in any cow or cows. The implication
was clear: If the members had an ownership
interest in the dairy, things would be different.
It turns out the members do have an own-
ership interest. They each invested $2,000 a
few years back to acquire an actual ownership
interest in Schmidts farm. The reason why this
fact didnt come up as part of Schmidts argu-
ment in the case at hand is that the case preced-
ed the change in ownershipthis case has been
ongoing since 1994, when the province issued a
cease-and-desist order to prohibit Schmidt
from distributing milk. So, if further charges are
brought against Schmidt, he will use the new
ownership interest as part of his argument.
For his part, Schmidt remains philosophical,
and determined. He notes that over the 20
years Ontario has been prosecuting him, We
have had five premiers in Ontario, ten minsters
of agriculture, three popes, three presidents in
the US, and 260,000 deaths from smoking in
Ontario alone. Oh, and zero deaths from raw
milk. I have not counted the days in court, the
amount of court papers and the money spent on
defending our right for food of our choice.
He adds: Raw milk still keeps flowing from
Glencolton Farms, because the cows keep com-
ing home in the morning and in the evening.
The amazing reality of life.
David E Gumpert is author of Life, Liberty
and the Pursuit of Food Rights. He was a
reporter with The Wall Street Journal, editor
at Inc and Harvard Business Review. Davids
articles on food politics have appeared in
Bloomberg BusinessWeek, Boston Globe
Magazine, Food Safety News, Huffington Post,
The Nation, Alternet, Modern Farmer and
Grist. His previous book, The Raw Milk
Revolution: Behind Americas Emerging Battle
Over Food Rights, achieved wide acclaim.
Schmidt lost his case in the Ontario
court of appeal. But the court left a
window of opportunity, which he can
use in case of further charges.
IL
REFUSAL to own up for deficiency in services cost a mobile
phone dealer dear, with a consumer forum directing it to pay
`10,200 for selling a defective mobile handset worth `3,200.
Sai Mobiles & Electronics, operating in Sahibabad town of
Ghaziabad district, Uttar Pradesh, had sold a cellphone to
Naresh Kumar on October 25, 2012. But to the buyers dismay,
the handset stopped working within a week. The seller had
given a one-year warranty as a handwritten note on the retail
invoice, rather than issuing a warranty card.
The seller refused to take any responsibility for the dysfunc-
tional device. The complainant then sent a written complaint by
registered post to Sai Mobiles. The seller neither replied to the
notice, nor took any step to either rectify the defect or refund
the amount.
As a last recourse, Kumar approached the central district
consumer forum, which sent a notice to Sai Mobiles to appear
before the forum, but the shop owner failed to do so despite
several notices.
In its April 5, 2014 order, the forum held that the approach of
Sai Mobiles amounted to deficiency in services. It ordered the
dealer to refund `3,200 to Kumar, along with a compensation
of `7,000.
RIGHT SIGNAL
CONSUMER WATCH
LIGHT AT THE END
NAGPUR-based Avinash Prabhune has won a long-drawn con-
sumer battle against the Maharashtra State Electricity Distribution
Company Limited (MSEDCL). The National Consumer Disputes
Redressal Commission (NCDRC) censured MSEDCL for discon-
necting power supply without issuing notice under section 56 (1)
of the Indian Electricity Act (IEA) 2003.
Prabhune, a consumer rights activist, got a shock on August 19,
2004, when MSEDCL disconnected his power supply without any
notice, despite having paid the bill of `1,348.54 on August 2, one
day before the last date.
The NCDRC bench comprising judges DK Jain (president) and
Vinay Kumar (member) lashed out at MSEDCL for its the high-
handedness. It agreed with the petitioner that had MSEDCL
issued a notice under section 56 under IEA, Prabhune would
have provided the proof as regards payment of bill, well before
the respondents chose to disconnect the supply.
The NCDRC also directed MSEDCL to pay compensation of
`7,000 to Prabhune.
News capsules from the consumer
world to keep you well-informed
Illustrations: Aruna
April 30, 2014
78
Illustrations: Aruna
April 30, 2014
79
Searching
Google
IT was a dream honeymoon that went wrong. Sheena Kashyap and her hus-
band Shaman Sharma had booked for their honeymoon from New Delhi to
Amsterdam, en route to Detroit and Dallas. While Sharmas tickets with KLM
Royal Dutch Airlines were booked, Sheena took the help of a travel agent,
Airborne Travels, to book tickets provisionally with the same airlines.
On finding the rates of another agent, Business Travels, cheaper by `3,000,
she got the earlier booking cancelled. Business Travels telephonically informed
Sheena that her booking was confirmed and delivered the ticket at her resi-
dence upon payment of ` 27,126 in cash. The ticket was a consolidated price
for travel to all the three sectorsNew Delhi to Amsterdam, Amsterdam to
Detroit and Detroit to Dallas.
But after a few days when Sheena contacted the KLM Airlines office, she
came to know that there was no booking in her name. When she contacted
Business Travels, she was told that they had no intimation about the cancella-
tion of her booking. When a harried Sheena reached the airport, the airlines
advised her to buy a fresh ticket worth `59,391 for business class on the New
Delhi-Amsterdam flight.
Sheena was forced to fly business class as well as sit separately from her
husband, but upon returning from her trip, she filed a case in the district con-
sumer forum in Delhi.
The airlines claimed that since the booking was made first by Airborne Travels
and later by Business Travels, the computer automatically cancelled the first
booking on account of the double booking system in place. But the district
forum ruled in Sheenas favor, asking the airlines to refund her ticket money as
well as pay her `2 lakh as compensation.
The airlines approached the state consumer commission, which upheld the
order, observing that the airlines had connived with agent Business Travels
and cancelled Sheenas booking, forcing her to pay a higher sum
of `59,391.
Refuting the airlines defense, the commission pointed out that the booking
done through Airborne Travels was not a confirmed one and therefore, there
is no logic in cancelling a confirmed booking in preference of an unconfirmed
booking. Surprisingly, the travel agent was let off.
DELHI TO DALLAS, THE KLM WAY
INTERNET major Google has
been penalized by the
Competition Commission of
India (CCI) for non cooperation
in the pending investigation into
its alleged unfair trade practices
in India. The penalty is a hefty
`1 crore.
The probe was in response to a
complaint filed two years back
by matrimony.com and
Consumer Unity & Trust Society
alleging that Google was
abusing market power in the
online search and advertising
markets by favoring platforms it
wants to support.
The petitioners alleged there is
a tendency on the part of the
search engine to put the
platforms in a certain order,
which may not be done in fair
and non-discriminatory manner.
The fair trade watchdog CCI,
under the administrative control
of the Ministry of Corporate
Affairs, had sought to know the
software and the algorithmic
search adopted by Google in its
operations. It found fault with
Google for failure to provide rele-
vant information and documents.
80
April 30, 2014
IS THAT LEGAL?
An office employees email account is hacked by his colleague,
who then uses it to send objectionable mails to women in the
office. The employee is unable to prove his
innocence and loses his job. What legal
recourse does he have to get his
job back?
The employee should
file a complaint with
cyber cell of police
under Section 43,
66 and 67 of IT
ACT, 2000 &
Section 509 of
Indian Penal
Code. Thereafter,
police will inves-
tigate and trace
the colleague
who had hacked his email
account from the details of the IP
address and server address received from
the emails of the women in office. A
criminal case will be initiated against the colleague who
would have hacked and misused his account.
Thereafter, the employee should
try to reconcile the matter by
approaching the companys manage-
ment and providing them a copy of
the first information report (FIR)
and explaining to them the whole
episode. If the company still
refuses to reinstate him, the
employee can file a case against
the employer.
In the past, such cases have been
solved by the experts. One such case,
reported in the media was the arrest of
an HCL employee who wrote abusive
mails from his colleagues account to
the management to spoil his career,
but the cyber cell of CID
traced the mails to the inter-
net protocol address of the
employees laptop.
A couple gets divorced, and after a legal battle the mother gets
the custody of the children. But after a few years, the children,
still minors, dont want to stay with the mother but with the
father. What happens in such cases?
A childs preference is also taken into consideration. The court
first determines whether the child is capable of making an
informed choice, and if the child is, his/her opinion is sought.
A child of around nine or ten years is usually thought capable
of making an informed choice. If there are two children or
more and they want to live with different parents, the court
will try not to separate the children, and will then decide
which parent the children must live with. This will obviously
be emotionally devastating for the child who wants to live with
one parent and not the other, but it is a difficult choice the
court often makes.
If it can be shown that staying with one parent is harming the
child, custody can be given to the other parent.
Ignorance of law is no excuse. Here are answers to
some frequently-asked legal queries regarding
matters that affect us on day-to-day basis
Illustrations: Aruna
81
April 30, 2014
A young woman, whose
husband died of a heart
attack, leaves her in-laws
house in a huff, though
there were no
instances of any
kind of harass-
ment when the
husband was
alive. The
in-laws are
old and want
her to return,
but she wants
the family
property to be
divided. Can
she claim a
share in her deceased husbands property legally?
A woman is entitled to the share of her deceased husband in
the joint family property after his death and can claim the
same by filing a suit for partition of the property. Under the
Hindu Succession Act, she is entitled to a share as an heir
under Section 8 read with Schedule I. The Act defines
widow as a female who has been united in marriage recog-
nised by law and survives the husband without remarriage
In Muthammal (died) vs V Pavunambal case (2012), it was
held that on the death of her husband, the widowed woman
can claim a share in the joint family properties along with
her father-in-law, mother-in-law and brother-in-law. She
becomes one of the sharers along with other heirs and gets
her right for a share in the joint family properties.
A doctor, who is working in a government hospital, joins a
popular anti-corruption movement against the govern-
ment. To his dismay, he is suspended for his participation.
Is he on sound legal grounds if he moves the court?
Yes, the doctor can approach the court of law for seeking
appropriate compensation for being suspended in an
arbitrary manner.
In the matter of Delhi Transport Corporation vs DTC
Mazdoor Congress (1990), it was held that the manage-
ment cannot have unrestricted and unqualified power of
terminating the services of the employees. Although in the
interest of efficiency of the public bodies, they
should have the authority to terminate
the employment of undesirable, inef-
ficient, corrupt, indolent and dis-
obedient employees,
but this right must
be exercised fairly.
There should be
adequate reason for
the use of such a
power and arbi-
trariness should
be avoided.
A healthy youngster
becomes partially blind
after a brain surgery. He
has 40 percent vision. Is
he entitled to a govern-
ment job under the
handicap quota?
Yes, he is entitled to a govern-
ment job under the handicap
quota, if he can establish that
he has visual impairment even
after treatment or standard
refractive correction, and uses
or is potentially capable of using
vision for the planning or execu-
tion of a task with appropriate assis-
tive device. He will also come under the
category of persons with disability for suffering
from not less than 40 percent of any
disability as certified by a medical
authority. According to The
Persons with Disabilities
(Equal Opportunities,
Protection of Rights
and Full Participation)
Act, 1995, government
has reserved in every
establishment vacancies
not less than three per
cent for persons with dis-
ability, of which one per
cent each is reserved for
people suffering from blind-
ness or low vision; hearing
impairment; locomotor disability
or cerebral palsy.
have fun with
english. get the
right answers and
play better scrabble
WORDLY
WISE
1. Salman has made a
would
mean he has made
a mistake.
A: hara kiri
B: volte face
C: faux pas
D: modus operandi
2. Gita is an expert
judge of paintings
but is not sure which
of these spellings is
correct.
A: connoisseur
B: connoiseur
C: conoiseur
D: connoisure
3. WYSIWYG stands for
..
A: Whatever you say is
whatever you gain
B: Whatever you say is
what you get
C: What you see is
what you get
D: What you say is what
you get
4. PETA is an for
People for the
Ethical Treatment
of Animals.
A: eponym
B: anagram
C: antonym
D: acronym
5. What does captious
mean?
A: important
B: rich
C: miserly
D: fault-finding
6. Do you know the
plural of species?
A: specii
B: species
C: specieses
D: specae
7. Ravi just wrote
143 and Rekha
understood what he
was trying to say.
A: one for three
B: I for you
C: I love you
D: one for you
8. A mythomaniac is
one who has an
abnormal tendency
to .. .. .
A: study mythology
B: tell lies
C: explode myths
D: disprove facts
9. When Americans say
bling-bling, they
mean . . .
A: sexual assault
B: new dress
C: alarm bell
D: flashy jewelery
10. By IRL, IT profes-
sionals refer to ..
. .
A: in real life
B: in reverse line
C: in right length
D: inside reflecting light
11. Orthography is the
study of. .
A: bones
B: spelling
C: relics
D: bird
12. Which of these
expressions is right?
A: My wish is your
command
B: Your command is
my wish
C: My command is
your wish
D: Your wish is
my command
13. In the SMS lingo,
BRT will mean ...
... .
A: be right there
B: bring royal tiffin
C: bye, regret tomorrow
D: before reaching
there
14. Silver anniversary is
completion of 25
years. But comple-
tion of 15 years is
called ...anni-
versary.
A: steel
B: crystal
C: copper
D: wood
15. When collegian
Kumar yelled
vamoose!, he
wanted his friend to
.
A: eat fast
B: throw it
C: run away
D: be careful
16. The judge disposed
Asarams petition.
A: off
B: of
C: from
D: out
17. Hot dog! expresses
.
A: hunger
B: anger
C: joy
D: worry
18. A situation when
something good
seems to happen but
doesnt.
A. false dawn
B. fair game
C. night rainbow
D. black dream
19. He is hot-tempered
but his brother is as
cool as .
A: cucumber
B: stream
C: moon
D: ice
20. A behavior indicat-
ing reluctance to
spend money is .. .
A: couch potato
B: cold sweat
C: wool gathering
D: cheese paring
SCORES
0 to 7 correctYou need
to do this more often.
8 to 12 correctGood,
get the scrabble
board out.
Above 12Bravo!
Keep it up!
1 . c . f a u x p a s
2 . a . c o n n o i s s e u r
3 . c . W h a t y o u s e e i s
w h a t y o u g e t
4 . d . a c r o n y m
5 . d . f a u l t - f i n d i n g
6 . b . s p e c i e s
7 . c . I l o v e y o u
8 . b . t e l l l i e s
9 . d . f l a s h y j e w e l l e r y
1 0 . a . i n r e a l l i f e
1 1 . b . s p e l l i n g
1 2 . d . Y o u r w i s h i s m y
c o m m a n d
1 3 . a . b e r i g h t t h e r e
1 4 . b . c r y s t a l
1 5 . c . r u n a w a y
1 6 . b . o f
1 7 . c . j o y
1 8 . a . f a l s e d a w n
1 9 . a . c u c u m b e r
2 0 . d . c h e e s e p a r i n g
ANSWERS
textdoctor2@gmail.com
Aruna
82
April 30, 2014