THE HINDU – CURRENT NOTE 18 February
Project Loon can now predict weather systems
Researchers at
Google have moved a step closer to rolling out a network of huge balloons to
provide Internet connectivity to billions of people around the world,
particularly those in difficult-to-reach rural areas.
The Project Loon
team, part of the company’s X research lab, said it can now use machine
learning to predict weather systems.
The advance
means Google has much more control over where its balloons reach, making it
possible to focus on a specific region, rather than circumnavigating the globe.
“We can now run
an experiment and try to give service in a particular place in the world with
ten, twenty or thirty balloons,” rather than the hundreds needed previously,
the company said.
“Real users”
will be able to make use of the system in the “coming months”, however, the
company did not specify where the initial roll-out would take place.
The company has
experimented with beaming down connectivity from a network of huge,
tennis-court sized balloons rather than undertaking huge construction projects
to replicate connectivity networks in the developed world.
The balloons
float in the stratosphere around 18 kilometres high. By raising or lowering
altitude, the balloons can be caught in different weather streams, changing
direction.
By using
machine-learning algorithms, Google thinks it has found a way to predict
weather with enough accuracy to make it possible to hover balloons over a
relatively small area for a long period of time.
The firm was
last year able to keep a cluster of balloons over Peru for three months.
Russia reset still on: Trump
President defends
Michael Flynn who quit as NSA over Russia contacts; says he would ‘love to get
along’ with Moscow despite political setback
President Donald
Trump on Thursday reiterated that his push to reset the U.S. relations with
Russia would continue regardless of the political blowback.
The new
administration’s efforts to start afresh with Russia, which is considered an
irreconcilable adversary by the U.S. security apparatus, has prompted a media
outcry leading to the ouster of Michale Flynn as the National Security Adviser.
“I know
politically it’s probably not good for me... I would love to be able to get
along with Russia,” Mr. Trump said even as the Secretary of State Rex Tillerson
was about to meet Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrvov in Germany on the sidelines
of the G20 foreign ministers’ meet. After his first meeting with the Russian
counterpart, Mr. Tillerson said he would work with Russia in areas of common
interest but will stand up for the values of the U.S. and its allies. Mr.
Tillerson also called on Russia to honour the Minsk agreement to end the
fighting in Ukraine.
Mr. Trump’s
impromptu press conference at the White House that lasted for 75 minutes was
dominated by questions regarding alleged links of his advisers to Russia. The
President defended his track record in office and accused the media and leaks
from intelligence agencies of trying to undermine his policy initiatives.
“Those are
criminal leaks. They’re put out by people... in agencies. I think you’ll see it
stopping because now we have our people in,” Mr. Trump said, reiterating that
the real scandal is that his conversations with foreign leaders were getting
reported in the press. The President said he didn’t mind when details of his
conversations with the leaders of Australia and Mexico found their way into
media, but it would be tricky when he deals with more sensitive foreign policy
issues such as North Korea. “All of a sudden, people are finding out exactly
what took place,” the President said.
President
defends Flynn
Mr. Trump said
his former NSA Flynn was merely doing his duty by talking to the Russian envoy
to the U.S., as he did with officials of 30 other countries. The President said
he asked Mr. Flynn to quit because his recollection of the conversation to the
Vice-President was inadequate. Mr. Trump also made light of the allegations
that Russia has deployed cruise missiles in violation of an arms control
treaty.
“It happened
when — if you were Putin right now, you would say, hey, we’re back to the old
games with the United States... I think Putin probably assumes that he can’t
make a deal with me any more because politically it would be unpopular for a
politician to make a deal... it would be much easier for me to be tough on
Russia, but then we’re not going to make a deal,” said Mr. Trump. Russia has
denied reports about the missiles.
Meanwhile, a
National Public Radio report said Mr. Flynn did not make any promise on
sanctions when he spoke to the Russian envoy.
“Flynn talked
about sanctions, but no specific promises were made. Flynn was speaking more in
general ‘maybe we’ll take a look at this going forward’ terms,” the report
quoted an unnamed intelligence official as saying.
Mr. Trump said
he has “inherited a mess” globally and domestically, but his administration has
done more than any other President in the past to set things right in the first
few weeks. “I didn’t come along and divide this country. This country was
seriously divided before I got here,” he said, adding that “to be fair to
Obama” the division started before his presidency.
SEBI may allow MFs to trade in commodities
To deepen the
nascent commodity market, SEBI is likely to give mutual funds the go-ahead to
trade in commodity markets in a month. The regulator is also in talks with the
RBI to allow institutional investors like banks and FPIs to trade in the
segment. “Mutual funds’ participation in commodities derivatives would be the
first one to happen among institutional investors,” Securities and Exchange
Board of India (SEBI) Chairman U.K. Sinha today said, and hinted that the move
could be implemented in a month. Mr. Sinha, whose term ends on March 1, was
speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the regulator’s international
conference on commodity derivatives. On allowing participation of banks, AIFs
and FPIs in commodities, he said SEBI is in active consultation with the
Reserve Bank over the issue.PTI
The groundwater beneath their feet
In 1995, a chromium
factory in Tamil Nadu’s Vellore district shut shop leaving behind a legacy of
contaminated soil and water. Two decades later, agriculture remains unviable
and people continue to flock to hospitals with health issues. Serena Josephine
M. reports
It is 7 a.m. in
the morning. In Puliyankannu in Ranipet, in Vellore district in Tamil Nadu,
Valliamma is busy preparing steaming cups of coffee and tea while a man sits
next to her making masala vadai for the people milling around. When asked about
the distinct chemical odour that surrounds the village, the 80-year-old woman
shrugs nonchalantly. “It comes and goes,” she says. All the people in the
village seem equally resigned to the polluted air they breathe even as they
yearn for cleaner air and fresh groundwater, both of which are in short supply
in this bustling industrial belt.
The factory’s
tainted legacy
Across the
village, on the side of the 730-acre State Industries Promotion Corporation of
Tamil Nadu (SIPCOT) Industrial Complex (phase I), lies what has changed the
lives of hundreds of villagers in the last two decades. It is the abandoned
compound of the Tamil Nadu Chromates and Chemicals Limited (TCCL). In its
backyard is the source of the problem and it reaches out to the sky: 2.27 lakh
tonnes of chromium-bearing solid waste from an area of two hectares. TCCL,
before it shut operations in 1995, used to manufacture sodium dichromate, basic
chromium sulphate and sodium sulphate.
All this
chromium was dumped two decades ago when the factory closed for reasons that
are not clear. The huge heap of yellow-coloured chromium, about three to five
metres high, is so toxic that it finds place in the List
of Hazardous Waste Contaminated Dump Sites in the Country, compiled by the
Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB).
With its
tanneries and chemical units, Ranipet in 2006 earned the dubious distinction of
being one of the 10 cities/districts/villages on New York-based Blacksmith
Institute’s list of worst polluted places in the world. Sadly, not much has
changed in the decade since. Even now, during rains, leachate containing
hexavalent chromium, a form of the metal that is more toxic to humans as it is
carcinogenic, has been steadily flowing on the ground, with devastating
effects. Widespread contamination of soil and groundwater, since 1995, is the
factory’s legacy.
The abandoned
factory is proof of the intensity of the contamination, as stagnant pools of
rainwater have turned a dirty yellow. “When I was young, the water in the
Puliyankannu Eri used to be so clean and clear that I could see my face in it,”
Valliamma recalls. “In the last 20 to 30 years, industrial pollution,
especially from TCCL, has polluted the lake water and it has become unusable.
Water in many wells is also contaminated. Nobody constructs borewells here as
the groundwater is polluted.”
Scanning through
the pages of a regional newspaper, Dhanalakshmi, another resident, remembers
how she used to take clothes to the lake 30 years ago to wash them. “Luckily,
we get potable water from Thengal where the Ponnai and Palar rivers converge,”
she says. “If water is one of the problems, air pollution is another. When
there is wind, the smell of chemicals fills the air and we end up inhaling the
polluted air. Many residents complain of frequent cold and respiratory
illnesses.”
A few metres
away from Puliyankannu is Karai, another village that has been experiencing the
impact of groundwater pollution. Sipping his morning coffee, Selvan recalls how
Karai Eri used to be in his younger days: “I used to drink water from the lake
then. Now, the colour of the water scares me. Nobody uses it.”
Contaminated
soil and water
If there is one
livelihood that has borne the brunt of this haphazard dumping of toxic metal,
it is agriculture. Villagers say agricultural production has dwindled over the
years, particularly in Puliyankannu and Karai, due to polluted groundwater.
“Nobody raises crops in this part of the region,” says Sekar, a resident.
“Where is the source of good water to raise the crops?”
K. M. Balu, a
farmer in Ranipet and coordinator of the Palar Paathukappu Kootiyakkam (Federation
for Palar Protection), says the chromium dump site has destroyed the livelihood
of hundreds of farmers: “Ten villages in and around the dump site, such as
Avarankari, Puliyankannu, Karai, Puliyanthangal and SIPCOT, have been badly
hit. There is no scope for agriculture here.”
The matter has
been brought up with officials at various levels, repeatedly, but their pleas
have gone unheard, Balu says. “Letters, protests... nothing has succeeded in
drawing the attention of the authorities,” he says. A petition sent to the
Collector and to the Chief Minister’s Special Cell three years ago has also led
to nothing. Apart from his organisation, the Tamil Nadu Vivasayigal Sangam,
affiliated to the All India Kisan Sabha, has also been unrelenting in its
efforts to draw the attention of officials. “The Palar river, nearly 2 km from
the site, is also contaminated. Three water bodies — the Kodathappu Eri, the
Karai Eri and the Puliyankannu Eri — have been contaminated. Villagers stopped
using the groundwater several years ago, and they do not allow their cattle to
graze near these water bodies,” says L.C. Mani, the association’s district
assistant secretary.
Mani estimates
that at least 1,000 acres of agricultural land around TCCL have been rendered
unfit for cultivation. “What will farmers do when water even in farm wells has
not been spared from this contamination?” he asks. Crops such as paddy, ragi,
maize and sugar cane were raised in this part of the region three decades ago
but no longer, he says.
“Chromium is a
heavy metal and so affects crops to a great extent,” says M. Pandiyan,
professor and head at the Krishi Vigyan Kendra and Agricultural Research
Station, Virinjipuram. “First, it does not allow the crops to grow as it
prevents absorption of water and nutrients from the soil. Second, some crops
that are tolerant, such as ragi, can withstand chromium and grow. But they
end up absorbing it. Consuming them is dangerous as they can cause cancer.”
The Union
Ministry of Environment and Forests, in its ‘Inventory and Mapping of Probably
Contaminated Sites in India’, says the “Supreme Court Monitoring Committee had
expressed serious concern over the extremely hazardous wastes dumped by Tamil
Nadu Chromates and Chemicals in the open environment in violation of the
hazardous waste rules.”
On its part, the
CPCB, through the National Clean Energy Fund (NCEF), identified 12 contaminated
sites in the country that included TCCL in Ranipet. It came up with a project,
the ‘Remediation of hazardous waste contaminated dumpsites under NCEF project’.
According to the CPCB’s online project documents, during its 20 years of
operation from 1975 to 1995, TCCL generated and disposed huge quantities of
hexavalent chromium-bearing waste on open land.
A natural
outcome of this are concerns over the health of the villagers. Mani and another
resident of Puliankannu, A. Babu, say villagers are facing several health
hazards due to the pollution of both air and water. “We have been receiving
many patients with asthma, both acute and chronic cases; chronic obstructive
pulmonary disease; even lung cancer,” says Anbu Suresh, medical superintendent
at the Scudder Memorial Hospital at Ranipet. “We also see persons with allergic
reactions to skin and eyes. These are mainly due to air pollution and water
pollution.” Of about 100 in-patients at the hospital, at least 30 to 40 of them
were admitted for respiratory illnesses, he says.
Shutting shop
When it was
established, TCCL functioned as a joint sector company. However, it operated
under various private managements from 1989 before it shut down in 1995. An
official of the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board (TNPCB) says it was shut
down for causing pollution.
C.
Gnanaprakasam, 65, who worked as a production plant operator at TCCL from its
inception, recalls the time when all was well. “It began as a joint sector
company promoted by TIDCO [Tamil Nadu Industrial Development Corporation]. But
later the company’s major shares were sold and it shifted to private parties.
We manufactured chromium for use in leather industries. There were 500
employees, and about 100-200 casual labourers, but this number dwindled as
years passed. There were about 360 employees when it shut down,” he says.
TCCL started to
face issues due to poor management, Gnanaprakasam says. Untreated sludge began
to accumulate on its premises, forcing the TNPCB to issue a warning. “The
company shut down mainly due to polluting and mismanagement. We are yet to
receive settlement from the company,” the former employee says.
Impact of
chromium
There have been
numerous studies on the impact of the chromium in the site. According to the
CPCB, a study conducted by the Geological Survey of India in 1996 reported that
hexavalent chromium contamination spread south up to Karai village, which is
located 1.5 km from the factory. The TNPCB conducted studies through the
National Environmental Engineering Research Institute and National Geophysical
Research Institute to ascertain TCCL’s impact on the environment.
A few years ago,
Ligy Philip, professor, Department of Civil Engineering at the Indian Institute
of Technology, Madras, and her colleagues, started intensive studies on
bioremediation of chromium-contaminated soil and development of mathematical
models for clean-up of hexavalent chromium-contaminated aquifers using
bioremediation.
“One of the key
findings is that the chromium sludge at TCCL has trivalent and hexavalent
chromium. Hexavalent chromium is much more toxic compared to trivalent. We
found that hexavalent chromium was leaching in to groundwater and contamination
had spread for nearly two kilometres from the site,” says the report.
In fact, they
had undertaken research on bioremediation with funding from the CPCB and went
on to develop technology in the laboratory. “Some time during 2009-2010, we
demonstrated the technology at the Ranipet site on five tonnes of chromium sludge
and 10 sq. m of aquifer (groundwater). We demonstrated bioremediation using
bacterial strains that can reduce hexavalent chromium to trivalent chromium.
The latter is less toxic and paves the way for easy absorption. It will not
leach from the soil. Once hexavalent chromium in groundwater gets reduced, it
is easily absorbed into the soil. Thus the water gets cleared from hexavalent
and trivalent chromium,” Philip says.
Though the
technology was not adopted at the TCCL site, it went on to find takers in three
electro-plating industries, based in Gurgaon, Ghaziabad and North Chennai, that
use chromium for electroplating during the manufacturing of automobile spare
parts.
“It is in a
pathetic condition,” says L. Elango, professor in the Department of Geology,
Anna University, of the chromium site at Ranipet. A recent visit to the site
provided him an opportunity to take a closer look at the damage done by the
chromium sludge. “Chromium a highly toxic metal. Even the outer portion of the
compound wall at the factory has become discoloured over the years. One can
only imagine its effect on groundwater,” he says.
Elango points
out that during rains, leaching from the site would flow through the drains and
enter the Palar river, thereby contaminating it. The Palar river is the
drinking water source not only for parts of Vellore such as Vaniyambadi, but
also for parts of Chennai such as Tambaram. “However, the chromium concentration
in the water gets diluted following the rains and by the time it reaches
Chennai,” he says.
While
remediation in itself is a “tedious process”, he acknowledges the importance of
early measures that could have prevented this scale of damage. “One of the simplest
ways could have been excavation. We could have at least isolated the chromium
dumped here and covered it with tarpaulin sheet. We could have bundled it using
polythene bags. This could have stopped leaching during the rains. But this
should have been done at least 10 years ago,” he says.
However,
remediation of chromium-contaminated groundwater is difficult, and mandates
high technology intervention. One of the methods is to make use of “redox
reaction” facilitated by bacteria that converts hexvalent chromium to trivalent
chromium. This way, easily solvable hexavalent chromium can be converted to
less solvable chromium, thereby reducing its movement, he says. Another way out
is to pump the contaminated water and treat it by removing effluents.
Though no
pro-active steps have been taken to implement a remediation at the earliest,
there have been many fora where the subject has been discussed. R. Natarajan
recalls how the TNPCB had organised a meeting in 1995-1996 on chromium
contamination in Ranipet and Ambur when he was consultant-cum-resident engineer
of TIFAC at the Department of Science and Technology. He says scientists had
presented papers for bringing about solutions to chromium contamination. One
such paper had looked into electrochemical reactions to convert chromium salt
into chromium metal. “By that time, the groundwater had turned yellow or dark
yellow, or brown due to concentration of chromium. Drinking this water could
cause cancer. Converting it into trivalent chromium, which is non-toxic and
non-carcinogenic, might prevent cancer, but is not the solution,” he says.
He adds: “What
should be looked into is how to convert it into a useful product. It can be
converted into salt that is used for leather tanning as chrome is used for
softening leather or into chromium metal. A pilot plant to implement this
should be set up. The question is who will put up the plant?”
A solution in
sight?
If something did
take off on a positive note, it was CPCB’s move to engage a private consultancy
to prepare a Detailed Project Report (DPR) under the NCEF project. A private
consultancy, ERM India Private Limited, was selected to prepare a DPR and
provide consultancy services for remediation of eight identified contaminated
sites.
“The consultancy
has been studying the Ranipet chromium dump site for two years now. They have
completed the field study and are in the process of finalising the DPR. Based
on the results of the field study, they are drawing remedial options. We are
expecting them to submit the DPR by the end of March this year,” an official of
the CPCB says.
Once the DPR is
submitted, the TNPCB and other stakeholders will be called in to finalise the
remedial option depending on its feasibility and suitability, the official
says. The CPCB would also call for global tenders to implement the selected
remedial option.
While the
technical procedures are under way, what matters for the villagers is better
living conditions. “If these industries did not come up, we would still be
drinking water from Puliyankannu Eri. Life would have been different. But the
damage has been done,” says Valliamma. All she can do now is hope that there is
a solution after all.
“At least, the
future generation should live in a less polluted environment in which they can
easily access clean drinking water and breathe clean air,” she dreams.
The fight Pakistan must wage within
The suicide
bombing at the Sufi shrine of Lal Shahbaz Qalandar at Sehwan is not
the first terrorist attack on a place of worship in Pakistan, and is unlikely
to be the last. Imbued with their extremist ideology, jihadis have targeted
several Sufi shrines all over Pakistan for several years. As the shrine is a
major attraction for devotees, the Sehwan attack resulted in a very high number
of fatalities, just like the attacks on the popular shrine of Data Ganj Bakhsh
in Lahore in 2010 and that of Hazrat Shah Noorani in Balochistan last November.
Unfortunately, Pakistan’s ruling elite still sees terrorism through a
geo-strategic lens, not as the consequence of its appeasement and sponsorship
of Islamist extremism.
Jihadi
justification
The jihadis
justify their violence against Sufi shrines as attacks against ‘impure’
manifestations of the Islamic faith. Killing ‘unbelievers,’ ‘heretics’ and
‘deviants’ is an integral part of their plan to create a purer Islamic state.
The same justification has been used in the past to attack Shias and Ahmadis as
well as Pakistan’s Christians and Hindus. Although jihadi groups were
originally nurtured by Pakistan for proxy wars in Afghanistan and against
India, at least some jihadi groups consider Pakistanis as legitimate targets.
To them Pakistan is as much their religious battlefield as Afghanistan or
India. Pakistan would have to delegitimate the jihadi ideology in its entirety
to ensure that more extreme offshoots of its protégés do not kill its people.
Despite periodic
noises about making no distinctions among good and bad jihadis, Pakistan’s
leaders have shown no interest in defining all jihadis as a threat to Pakistan.
The country’s military still sees terrorism in the context of its geo-strategic
vision. The jihadis responsible for attacks within Pakistan are deemed ‘agents’
of Indian intelligence or the Afghanistan National Directorate of Security
(NDS).
For Pakistan’s
military, Pakistan has only one enemy and all acts of violence against
Pakistanis must be attributed only to that enemy. At a recent event in
Washington DC, I was confronted by a fellow Pakistani who argued that terrorism
in South Asia would end if the Kashmir issue was resolved in accordance with
Pakistan’s wishes. He had no answer to my question how resolution of any
international dispute would diminish the fanaticism of those who kill Shias and
Sufis as part of an effort to purify Muslim society.
In all four
provinces
Over the last
week, jihadi offshoots claiming links to the Islamic State (IS) have
demonstrated their capacity to strike in each one of Pakistan’s four provinces.
Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, a faction of the Taliban, publicly claimed responsibility for
some of the attacks and threatened to attack further Shia, Ahmadi and Pakistan
military targets as part of its ‘Operation Ghazi’. Simple research on
Jamaat-ul-Ahrar and other similar groups reveals that their members are
homegrown Punjabi jihadis ideologically convinced of their narrow sectarian
worldview.
But Pakistan’s
reaction to the Sehwan attack was to blame groups ‘based in Afghanistan’. Some
were silly enough to suggest that the latest wave of attacks was aimed at
preventing the Pakistan Super League (which plays its cricket in Dubai due to
poor security in Pakistan) from having its final in Pakistan. There was no
attempt to answer the question how Afghanistan-based terrorists could travel
vast distances within Pakistan without being intercepted by Pakistan’s security
services. After all, the Inter-Services
Intelligence (ISI), which prides itself at being the ‘world’s best
intelligence’ service, shows a high degree of efficiency in dealing with
secular critics, ranging from little known bloggers to political activists, but
is remarkably incompetent at interdicting suicide bombers.
The only
reasonable explanation for why Pakistan is unable to intercept jihadi
terrorists targeting its own people is that the state apparatus does not
consider jihadis as the enemy in the same manner as they pursue secular Baloch
and Muhajir political activists or other critics of Pakistan’s policies.
For decades
Pakistan has seen jihadi groups as levers of its foreign and security policy
and periodic assertions that the policy has changed have proved wrong. Every
step against jihadis is followed by one in the opposite direction. Thus, the
much publicised ‘Operation Zarb-e-Azb’ targeted out-of-control Pakistani
Taliban in Waziristan but spared groups based in Punjab and Karachi. Hafiz
Saeed’s recent detention was accompanied by blocking action against him and
Masood Azhar at the U.N. with Chinese support. It is almost as if the Pakistani
state is continuously telling jihadis, “Those of you who do not attack inside
Pakistan will not get hurt.”
More about image
For Pakistan’s
civil and military elite, the priority is Pakistan’s international image and
its external relations, not the elimination of terrorism or confronting
extremist ideology. Pakistan’s publicly stated view of its terrorist problem is
that it is the victim of blowback from its involvement in the anti-Soviet
Afghan Jihad during the 1980s. Former military ruler, General Pervez Musharraf,
described Hafiz Saeed as Pakistan’s hero in a well-known interview on
Pakistan’s Dunya TV in October 2015 and argued that Pakistan had “brought
Mujahideen from around the world” and “trained the Taliban” at a time when
Afghan warlord Jalaluddin Haqqani and Osama bin Laden were heroes for both the
CIA and the Pakistanis.
In this version
of history, there is little acknowledgement of Pakistan’s role in allowing the
ideology of jihad to flourish and grow for two decades after the Soviets
withdrew from Afghanistan and the Americans started telling Pakistan to shut
down the jihadi enterprise. Pakistanis spend more energy defending themselves
against U.S. and Indian criticism over safe havens for the Afghan Taliban than
they do on figuring out how to rid Pakistan of the cancer of jihadi terrorism.
Twenty-five
years have elapsed since then Secretary of State James Baker threatened
Pakistan in 1992 that its support of jihadi groups could result in the U.S.
declaring Pakistan a State Sponsor of Terrorism.
Over a quarter
century, Pakistan has offered excuses and explanations as well as made promises
that have not been kept. It has itself faced terrorism, lost lives and fought
certain terrorist groups. But its essential policy of using jihadi groups for
strategic advantage in the region— in Afghanistan, Jammu and Kashmir and
against India — has not drastically changed.
For ‘strategic
advantage’
In the process
of securing strategic advantage, Pakistan has unleashed ideologically motivated
groups on its soil that have morphed and mutated over time. While groups such
as Hafiz Saeed’s Jamaat-ud-Dawa speak of Pakistan’s national interest, other
groups such as Jamaat-ul-Ahrar have an ideological perspective that is not
limited by the concept of modern nation states. For them, Pakistan is as
dispensable as other states for the restoration of an Islamic caliphate and
they have a God-given right to kill those they consider un-Islamic.
In a recent
report co-authored by Lisa Curtis of the Heritage Foundation and myself, we
pointed out that Pakistan must focus on reversing the extremist trends in
Pakistani society. Pakistani authorities — specifically the country’s military
leaders, who control its foreign and security policies — need to take a
comprehensive approach to shutting down all Islamist militant groups that operate
from Pakistani territory, not just those that attack the Pakistani state.
As attacks like
the recent one in Sehwan demonstrate, Pakistan’s tolerance for terror groups
undermines the country. It corrodes stability and civilian governance, damages
the investment climate, and inflicts death and injury on thousands of innocent
Pakistani citizens.
Husain Haqqani,
Director for South and Central Asia at the Hudson Institute in Washington DC,
was Pakistan’s Ambassador to the United States from 2008 to 2011
Working on the ISRO principle
Its successes
demonstrate that it is possible to create high-performing public sector
organisations
Rarely is an
agency of the government of India associated with the development of
cutting-edge technology and global standards in execution. The Indian Space Research
Organisation (ISRO) is an exceptional case. In fact, by
launching 104 satellites from a single rocket on Wednesday, it has now set
the global standard in a field (or more accurately space) in which only a few
nations even dare to dabble. But what is it about ISRO that makes it stand for
excellence when a plethora of government agencies suffer from severe challenges
in terms of capacity and execution? What makes ISRO tick could help show us the
way to create other high-performing government organisations.
More autonomy
For a start,
ISRO is fortunate that it reports to the Prime Minister and his office rather
than a line ministry. This has been critical to its success. In line
ministries, ministers and bureaucrats have a tendency to micromanage their
turf, and this includes autonomous bodies, agencies and enterprises. More often
than not, there will be a senior official along with a set of junior officials
who have direct charge of supervising the affairs of an agency. The Prime
Minister’s Office (PMO) works differently given that its remit cuts across all
government departments. Its officials would certainly not have the time or the
mindspace to supervise the affairs of a single institution. ISRO, therefore,
has a real autonomy that most other government agencies do not.
Location matters
The geographical
location of the organisation also matters in terms of creating an appropriate
ecosystem to nurture excellence. A number of critical government-run
organisations and enterprises are either headquartered in Delhi (because it’s
the seat of the Union Government) or are in places that have had some political
salience to the ruling dispensation at the time they were set up. Neither
scenario may be optimal from the point of view of an agency. Being located in
Delhi will leave it particularly vulnerable to the diktats of the parent
ministry and the slow-moving, cautious culture of an omnipresent bureaucracy.
And a politically salient location outside Delhi may not have the ecosystem to
feed knowledge creation and build capabilities. ISRO, headquartered in
Bengaluru, is distant from Delhi and immune from the capital’s drawbacks. More
importantly, it is located in the appropriate geography in what is India’s
science and technology hub. It has the right ecosystem to attract talent and
build its knowledge capabilities more than most government agencies do.
Needless to say,
human capital is critical to the success of an organisation. Unlike many
government agencies which are staffed by generalists, ISRO is staffed by
specialists right from its technocratic top management. ISRO is also more
agnostic than most government agencies about cooperating with and working with
the best in the private sector. The building blocks of many of ISRO’s successes
come from outside the government system.
Learning the
right lessons from ISRO’s example is crucial for India. The conventional view
is that the government is poor in project execution and if one looks at the
state of infrastructure or of the quality of public services that is not an
unreasonable conclusion to reach. What ISRO shows is that it is possible,
indeed feasible, for the government to build high-performing
organisations/agencies. This is not an argument for a big government. Instead,
it is an argument for building top quality institutions in a limited number of
areas where the government’s role cannot be substituted by the private sector.
Cutting-edge research and development in spheres where there may not be ready
profits is one area the government should focus on building ISRO-like institutions.
Defence could be one such. A completely reformed Defence Research and
Development Organisation based out of Pune or Bengaluru (not Delhi) which
reports to the PMO and which actively collaborates with the private sector
would be worth considering. Or a central vaccine agency, based in Ahmedabad or
Pune, which focusses on solutions to under-researched diseases.
Of course, not
every government organisation will be engaged in cutting-edge technology
breakthroughs nor can every organisation report to the Prime Minister. Still,
independence from line ministries is important for a high performing
organisation.
The trouble is
that it is not easy to change the nature of institutions by tinkering with
them. There is a path dependency in the way institutions evolve. The creation
of high performing government bodies requires starting from scratch and
focussing on a few basics: real autonomy from ministries, right geographical
location/appropriate ecosystem, a team of specialists, partnership with the
private sector and operating only in spheres where there is no alternative to
government. The creation of a handful of such agencies could have a
transformative effect.
Dhiraj Nayyar is
Officer on Special Duty and Head, Economics, Finance and Commerce, NITI Aayog.
The views expressed are personal
Massacre in Sehwan
The shrine
attack is a reminder that Pakistan needs a composite plan against terror
The horrific
suicide attack at a Sufi shrine in Sehwan in Pakistan’s Sindh province that
killed at least 80 people, underscores fears about the Islamic State gaining
strength in the country. A suicide bomber blew himself up at the shrine of Lal
Shahbaz Qalandar, among the most venerated of Sufi saints. People of all faiths
in the subcontinent have flocked here over the centuries, making it a prominent
symbol of syncretism, and thereby a particularly potent target for the IS. The
terrorist group, which had announced its Pakistan branch more than two years
ago, has claimed a string of attacks in recent months, mostly on minority
Muslim sects. Initially, Pakistani authorities had denied that the IS has any
organisational presence in the country. However, attacks such as this, which
the IS promptly took responsibility for, suggest otherwise. In Iraq and Syria
the IS has methodically targeted Shias, Alawis, Kurds and Yazidis. In Pakistan
and Afghanistan, Shias, Hazaras and Sufis are being attacked. Pakistan,
particularly, has a rich Sufi tradition, a mystical and generally moderate form
of Islam that is loathed by fundamentalists. In 2010, Lahore’s Data Darbar
shrine had been brutally attacked. In June last year, the popular Sufi singer,
Amjad Sabri, was shot dead in Karachi. Three months ago, a Sufi shrine in
Balochistan was bombed by the IS, killing 45 people. The attack at the shrine
of Lal Shahbaz Qalandar came when it was full of devotees, to cause maximum
harm.
The IS is
clearly following a strategy that was successful in mobilising fighters and
gaining publicity in Iraq and Syria. The highly planned, well-publicised
attacks on Shias in these countries helped the IS whip up Sunni sectarian
sentiment and win recruits. There is still no evidence that the Pakistani
branch of the group is directed by the IS core in Mosul or Raqqah. But IS
fighters in eastern Afghanistan, where the group has established a province of
the ‘Caliphate’, and those in Pakistan seem to have aligned themselves with
local terror groups for organisational support. Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, a
ferociously anti-Shia group, and Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, a breakaway faction of the
Pakistani Taliban, are two such groups that reportedly have a tactical alliance
with the IS. Most of the major recent suicide attacks in Pakistan were carried
out by these three groups. This indicates a dangerous trend. After the massacre
in an army school in Peshawar in 2014 that left more than 140 dead,
the security forces had finally turned against the Pakistani Taliban and
dismantled parts of their terror network. But such operations did little to
minimise the threat Pakistan faces from terrorism as such. If the Pakistan Taliban
are on the back foot, others are coming forward with a more vicious, sectarian
worldview and firepower. Tragedies such as Thursday’s are a reminder that
Pakistan needs a more comprehensive action plan against terrorism.
