SPEAKS YOUR MIND A House of CARDS - India First e … YOUR MIND NAVEEN REMAINS UNTOUCHABLE ... Akhilesh Yadav removed Ompal Nehra, a senior official who enjoyed the status of a minister,

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RNI REGD NO. ORIENG/2004/13647VOLUME 11, ISSUE 21 | FORTNIGHTLY

INDIAFIRSTS P E A K S Y O U R M I N D

NAVEEN REMAINSUNTOUCHABLE

The scams and farmer suicidesthat hit Odisha last year did

precious little to hurt the long-time chief minister’s

popularity

IF20160101

A House ofCARDSThe sickening Winter Session of the Parliament was asymptom of a disease that is hampering the nation’s

health – partisan politics

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1 JANUARY 2016 INDIA FIRST 3

In his recently published opinion piece in TheTimes of India newspaper, popular writer ChetanBhagat noted that the key ingredients – the three

D’s – of successful politicking inthis country are drama, dramaand development.

While some may find such asceptical observation to be inpoor taste, there seems to be anundeniable ring of truth to it – es-pecially upon flashing back tolast year’s political scene (andscenes, many of which have beendetailed in the cover story).

Take, for instance, the WinterSession of the Parliament lastmonth.

There was already a long line-up of pending legislation to bepassed this time – as the previousParliamentary session had beena near washout, thanks to thedisruptions in both houses overthe Lalit Modi and Vyapam con-troversies, with only four billspassed in the Lok Sabha and nota single one being passed in theRajya Sabha.

When the Monsoon Session ended in August lastyear, many political and economic experts hadlamented that the Goods and Services Tax bill hadbeen left pending to the detriment of the country. Theyhad pointed out that the implementation of the GSTbill would lead to not only a broadening of tax base butalso transparent administration and enforcement oftax laws – both of which would translate into moremoney in government coffers and a 1.5 percent in-crease in the country’s economic growth. Even the av-erage Indian consumer would stand to gain directlyfrom this reform, they had explained, in the form ofsavings made from a reduction in the overall taxes ongoods.

Therefore, it was hoped that our elected legislatorswould have the good sense to pass at least this crucialbill, proposed to be in effect from April this year, in thesubsequent Parliamentary session.

However, those hopes were shaken up when the firsttwo days of the Winter Session, which were supposedto be dedicated to discussions on “Commitment to theConstitution as part of the 125th Birth AnniversaryCelebrations of Dr B.R. Ambedkar” ended up in a warof words between the BJP and the Congress over intol-erance, secularism, and constitutional legacy.

As days went by and Parliament saw disruptions fol-lowing developments in the National Herald case andallegations of corruption in the Delhi District Cricket

Association, it was clear that therewas not a hope in hell of the GSTbill being passed during the WinterSession.

Rajya Sabha Chairman HamidAnsari was right in pointing outfrustratedly that disrupting a func-tioning legislature amounted tobeing in breach of constitutionalprinciples. So was Prime MinisterNarendra Modi in expressing con-cern over several measures for thepoor pending in the Parliament asa result of the ruckus in the Parlia-ment.

Mr Bhagat may also be right insaying that the masses cravedrama from their political leaders– but do they really want it morethan, or at the cost of, develop-ment? That is a question that thisnation should seriously mull overif partisan politics is to be eventu-ally stopped from taking prece-dence over public welfare. n

FROM

THE E

DITOR

’S DE

SK

MUCH TO MULL OVERFROM THE YEAR PAST

“The masses crave drama from theirpolitical leaders – but do they really wantit more than, or at the cost of,development?”

By SUNJOY HANSEditor-in-Chief

4 INDIA FIRST 1 JANUARY 2016

CONTENTS

23BUSINESS

PATCHY RIDE Last year saw theautomobile industry gothrough many ups anddowns in India

08COVERSTORY

The sickening Winter Session of the Parliament wasa symptom of a disease that is hampering thenation’s health – partisan politics

KEEPING PACEAMID HURDLESIndia became thefastest growing bigeconomy of the worldlast year, but manyexperts reckon it is notout of the woods yet

26ECONOMY

A SPRINKLING OFPARADISEThe Maldives could bethe best bet for Indiansseeking the perfectisland holiday

UNQUIET STATEMilitancy and strikescontinued to disruptnormal life in Manipurlast year

19MANIPUR

INDIAFIRSTEditor-in-Chief Sunjoy Hans[email : [email protected]]

Consulting Editor Pankaj Kumar

Associate Editor Siddhartha Tripathy

Senior Special Correspondent Kabita Dash

General Manager Bimal Ku. Bhanjdeo

Legal Advisors Yasobant Das, M.R. Mohanty

Orissa Correspondent H.K. Rath

Delhi Correspondent Samita Chaudhary

Special Correspondents Tarun Khanduja,Ashok Mehta

Production Head Debabrata Mishra

Assistant Art Director Prabhakar Hota

General Manager Finance Niranjan Das

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RNI Regd No. ORIENG/2004/13647Volume 11, Issue21, 1 January 2016, Fortnightly

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S P E A K S Y O U R M I N D

36TRAVEL

A HOUSE OF CARDS


In a nutshell

Not WorkingThe Lok Sabha had over 100 per-

cent productivity in the wintersession of parliament, while the RajyaSabha could not even reach the halfwaymark, working only 46 percent of itstime, Parliamentary Affairs Minister M.Venkaiah Naidu said recently. Briefingreporters as the winter session came toan end, the minister blamed the Con-gress for the repeated disruptions. "Thissession has been a victim of a strategyconceived before the commencement ofthis session which was to see that par-liament was paralysed, come whatmay," Naidu said. While the Lok Sabhapassed 14 bills, the Rajya Sabha passednine bills, most of them without discus-sion. "Broadly, this session has beenmarred by inventions of excuses to stallthe parliament on daily basis by our op-ponents," he said. On the GST bill, theminister said the meeting betweenPrime Minister Narendra Modi andCongress president Sonia Gandhi raisedhopes, and blamed the Congress for notbeing able to pass it. "But such hopeswere belied since Congress party re-fused to budge from its pre-sessionstrategy of not allowing the passage ofthis important legislation," he said,adding that the government has not"given up" on the GST bill. n

A Symbolic GestureAcar belonging to underworld don

Dawood Ibrahim, which was auc-tioned recently in Mumbai, was set afireby a Hindu Mahasabha leader in Indira-puram in Ghaziabad district of UttarPradesh. "The burning of the car was asymbolic destruction of terrorism," saidSwami Chakrapani, the national presi-dent of the All India Hindu Mahasabhawho set the car on fire in the presence ofaround 200 supporters in Kinaoni local-ity. Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind presidentMaulana Suhaib Qasmi along withabout a dozen supporters was also pres-ent. Dawood is wanted in India for the1993 serial bomb blasts in Mumbai thatkilled 257 people and injured nearly a1,000 others. The green Hyundai Accentcar forfeited under the Smugglers andForeign Exchange Manipulators (Forfei-ture of Property) Act was purchased byChakrapani at the auction for Rs.32,000on December 9. Chakrapani told re-porters that he earlier planned to mod-ify the car into an ambulance. "It is asymbol of terrorism and all patriotic

people, including Hindus and Muslims,have assembled here to destroy terror-ism symbolically and pave the way forpeace in the country," he said. Qasmisaid Indian Muslims were as patriotic asthe Hindus in the country. "Islam neverteaches terrorism and violence. Thoseinvolved in terrorist activities are not thetrue followers of Islam. Jamiat membersare therefore participating in the sym-bolic destruction of terrorism throughburning of Dawood's car," he said. n

Getting the BootUttar Pradesh Chief Minister

Akhilesh Yadav removed OmpalNehra, a senior official who enjoyed thestatus of a minister, for saying that Mus-lims should help in building a Ram tem-ple at the site of the razed Babri mosquein Ayodhya. Nehra, advisor to the enter-tainment tax department, said in Bi-jnore that he felt that Muslims should

facilitate the construction of a grandRam temple in Ayodhya and a Krishnatemple in Mathura. The chief ministerhas taken a dim view of Nehra's com-ments. Despite his sacking, Nehramaintained that what he said was in na-tional interest and that the move wouldhave brought together Hindus and Mus-lims like never before. Said to be closeto Samajwadi Party chief MulayamSingh Yadav, Nehra also said he did notregret losing his ministerial status.Nehra's comments have come at a timeof renewed tensions over the Ram tem-ple. The Vishwa Hindu Parishad hasbeen gathering stones for constructingthe temple at the spot where the 16thcentury Babri Masjid stood until it wasrazed in December 1992. n

HomestretchStating that Hyderabad is for Hyder-

abadis, MIM chief Asaduddin

Game OnChief Minister Arvind Kejriwal sought to know why Prime Minister

Narendra Modi and Finance Minister Arun Jaitley were "afraid" of aprobe into the affairs of Delhi's cricket body. Referring to the CBI raid onDelhi Secretariat on December 15, Kejriwal said: "We [AAP] cooperatedwith your raid, you also cooperate with the enquiry commission [set up byour government]," Kejriwal tweeted. "We did not fear your raid, why areyou afraid of the enquiry commission?" The Delhi government has set upan enquiry commission to probe the allegations of corruption in the Delhiand District Cricket Association (DDCA) which Jaitley headed for 13 yearsuntil 2013. Kejriwal said many TV channels were claiming the commissionof enquiry he had ordered was "illegal". He asked: "Was the CBI raid legal?"Jaitley has sued Kejriwal and other leaders of the Aam Aadmi Party for link-ing him with the alleged corruption in the DDCA. The BJP has suspendedits MP Kirti Azad for campaigning against Jaitley on the same issue. n


Owaisi called upon people to reject out-siders in the ensuing elections toGreater Hyderabad Municipal Corpora-tion (GHMC). He said Majlis-e-IttehadulMuslimeen (MIM) will contest 70-75 outof 150 seats. Addressing a public meet-ing in the capital, the Hyderabad MPsaid he was confident that a MIM leaderwill again become Hyderabad's mayor.In the outgoing GHMC, MIM had sharedpower with Congress. Majid Hussain ofMIM was mayor for three years. At thepublic meeting, Owaisi took a dig atCongress party's Telangana unit chiefUttam Kumar Reddy for his remarksagainst MIM and for meeting people in-volved in the bid on the life of hisbrother Akbaruddin Owaisi. TermingCongress leader an outsider, helaunched a bitter attack on the party.The MP also trained guns on the TeluguDesam Party and the Bharatiya JanataParty. Owaisi, however, spared Telan-gana Rashtra Samithi (TRS), triggeringspeculations that MIM will have an elec-toral understanding with the rulingparty. n

Greens see RedThe Delhi government unveiled its

ambitious traffic rationing plan tocombat rising pollution, but greens wereunhappy over the exemption given to 25categories of motorists includingwomen drivers, bikers, emergency vehi-cles and a host of VIPs. The odd-evenformula will be tried out for 15 daysfrom January 1 between 8 a.m. and 8p.m. except on Sundays, Chief MinisterArvind Kejriwal said. It will also apply tovehicles entering Delhi from otherstates. Environmentalists expressed dis-may over the large number of exemp-tions, saying this will derail the scheme.But others lauded the initiative whileadmitting it will cause inconvenience tomotorists. Officials said the scheme willbe applicable only to cars, which formalmost a third of the capital's nearlynine million vehicles -- a situation thathas taken Delhi's air pollution to alarm-ing levels. Cars with odd registrationnumbers will be allowed to ply only onodd dates (January 1, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13 and15) and those with even registrationnumbers on even dates (January 2, 4, 6,8, 12, 14). Sundays (January 3 and 10)will be restriction free. Kejriwal said thepolicy incorporated suggestions fromthe judiciary and the union home min-istry as well as experts. "We appeal toresidents of Delhi to make this odd-evenplan a success so as to reduce air pollu-tion which has assumed alarming pro-portions," he said. n

Click to Clean If unattended mounds of garbage

and littered streets with flies, ratsand dogs feasting on the trash botheryou, don't get upset anymore at the in-action of the civic authorities. Just clickthe picture of the garbage on your mo-bile and upload it on the Click2Cleanpage on Facebook. Click2Clean supple-ments Delhi government's SwachhDelhi mobile application that works onsimilar lines. Click2Clean ensures that aclick from your camera or your mobilephone does the magic. The garbage willbe removed without knocking at thedoors of unresponsive civic body clean-ers. Launched by Charities Aid Founda-tion (CAF) India in October, the

Click2Clean campaign has already at-tracted over 8,500 people to endorse iton Facebook, with many uploading theimages of littered sites onfacebook.com/clicktoclean. Accordingto CAF India Chief Executive MeenakshiBatra, there is an urgent need to cleanup Indian cities as the number of peoplemigrating from rural to urban areas con-tinues to surge. "This exerts an ever-in-creasing pressure on civic agencies toensure cleanliness and maintain sanita-tion standards. Keeping this in mind, wehave launched the Click2Clean cam-paign in Delhi NCR to start with and ap-peal to corporates and individuals toparticipate in this movement to cleanour cities,’’ Batra said. n

‘Silence Deafening’Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi once again trained his guns at

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying his silence on many issues,including corruption, was "deafening". Gandhi also demanded that theprime minister order a probe into the affairs of the Delhi and DistrictCricket Association (DDCA). "During campaigning in the 2014 Lok Sabhaelections, Modi-ji said na khaunga na khaane doonga [neither will I in-dulge in corruption, nor allow anyone else to indulge in it]. But now peoplefrom his own party are shown the door when they raise corruption issues,"the Congress leader remarked. "Ab Modi-ji jawaab dein ... [Let Modi replyto the issue now]," the Amethi MP said. Referring to the suspension ofBJP's Darbhanga MP Kirti Azad after he alleged corruption in the DDCAwhen it was headed by present Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, RahulGandhi said the prime minister should order a probe into DDCA affairsand take necessary action. The Congress vice president, who arrived inAmethi for a two-day visit from December 23, later flew back to New Delhi.He met party workers, office-bearers of district Congress units and inter-acted with over 200 newly elected village heads during his visit. n


POLITICALLY INCORRECT

A fortnightly update on the faux pas of the movers and shakers of Indian politics

“Modi is a coward and apsychopath ... CBI raids my office ...When Modi cudn't handle mepolitically, he resorts to thiscowardice”

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwaltook to Twitter to vent his angerafter his office was raided by the CBI. When criticised for his words, he saidhe would apologise if the PrimeMinister were to apologise for his“deeds”.

“Incidents of rapesused to occur duringearlier regimes aswell ... Rapes werecommitted evenduring the RamRajya”

Uttar Pradesh Policechief Jagmohan Yadavwhile responding to aquestion on the risingincidents of rapes.

“I don’t think booze is anintoxicant. You cannot call alcoholan intoxicant. It is consumed onlyin the army, parties … Thegovernment gives licences formanufacturing liquor, we auctionliquor vends. As long as it is done,alcohol cannot be calledintoxicant”

Punjab’s Health Minister SurjitKumar Jyani made this startlingstatement after inaugurating a de-addiction centre in Muktsar district.


Cover Story

A House of CardsThe sickening Winter Session of theParliament was a symptom of a diseasethat is hampering the nation’s health –partisan politics



The intense political fireworkslast month served as an apteven if unfortunate climax tothe year that was.

It was a year in which the deathly Vya-pam scam from Madhya Pradesh andthe Lalit Modi controversy (linked to thecorridors of power in New Delhi) pro-vided an electorally destroyed and de-moralised Congress party with muchneeded ammo to leave the rulingBharatiya Janata Party red-faced andPrime Minister Narendra Modi tight-lipped for some days.

It was year that saw the BJP burn itshands with the Land Acquisition Bill.

It was a year in which the political dis-course (and possibly shenanigans) byboth of the two major national parties ofthe country, saw the public speculate,introspect and debate about rising intol-erance in a secular, democratic India.

It was a year that saw the BJP lose theplot midway through its Bihar electioncampaign (replacing the developmentcard with the communal one) and fallflat, much to the Congress party’s pleas-ure as a minor player of Nitish Kumarand Lalu Prasad Yadav’s Grand Alliance.

What was worse – much worse – wasthe paralysis of the Parliament and leg-islative proceedings key to national de-velopment on account of such issuesover much of the year.

Yet as the year was drawing to a close,it was hoped that the two parties wouldspare each other the sparring during theWinter Session of the Parliament andpass at least the reforms-oriented bills,such as the Goods and Services Tax billand the Real Estate bill, that had beenwidely considered crucial to improvingthe nation’s economic health.

After all, with the last Parliamentarysession scheduled to run for a full fourweeks, from November 26 to December23, the legislators had enough time onhand to thrash out their views and ironout their differences.

But that was not to be.The Winter Session did not start off

well. Even in the first two days – whichwere dedicated to discussions on theConstitution, to mark the 125th birthanniversary of its chief architect B.R.Ambedkar – BJP and the Congress wereseen at loggerheads over their notions ofsecularism, “growing intolerance” aswell as constitutional values and princi-ples.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi hadeven made efforts to reach out to theOpposition, the most widely reportedbeing his invitation to Congress Presi-dent Sonia Gandhi and former primeminister Dr Manmohan Singh for a dis-

cussion on the GST bill over tea, but itdid not seem to have the desired effectinside the House.

A couple of other developments overthe following few days would virtuallyseal the fate of the GST bill among manyother important ones.

On December 7, the Delhi High Courtdismissed the pleas of Mrs Gandhi andher son, Congress vice president RahulGandhi, to quash a trial court’s sum-mons sent to them in June. Those sum-mons were in response to senior BJPleader Subramanian Swamy’s complaintabout fraudulent acquisition of a com-pany called Associated Journals Ltd.(AJL, publisher of the now non-opera-tional National Herald newspaper) by afirm called Young India Ltd (YIL) ofwhich the Gandhi mother-son duo to-gether owned 76 percent shares.

Senior advocate and Congress leaderKapil Sibal, contending that the takeoverwas in line with the Companies Act andthat there was no illegality in thetakeover, had sought before the HighCourt that the lower court’s proceedingsbe quashed on account of the lack of“supporting proof” pertaining to the al-legations. Besides, Sibal had pointed outthat Swamy was a political opponentand the BJP leader’s complaints had anulterior political objective.

But Sibal’s advocacy had little effecton Justice Sunil Gaur, whose ruling read:"This court is of the considered viewthat the gravity of the allegations lev-elled against petitioners has a fraudu-lent flavour involving a national politicalparty and so, serious imputationssmacking of criminality levelled againstpetitioners need to be properly lookedinto.”

The High Court went on to suggestthat there were indeed sufficientgrounds to summon the Gandhis: "Afterhaving considered the entire case in itsproper perspective, this court finds nohesitation to put it on record that themodus operandi adopted by petitionersin taking control of AJL via Special Pur-pose Vehicle i.e. YIL, particularly, whenthe main persons in Congress Party, AJLand YIL are the same, evidences a crim-inal intent."

"Whether it is cheating, criminal mis-appropriation or criminal breach oftrust is not required to be spelt out atthis nascent stage. In any case, by nostretch of imagination, it can be saidthat no case for summoning petitionersas accused in the complaint in questionis made out … Questionable conduct ofpetitioners needs to be properly exam-ined at the charge stage to find out thetruth and so, these criminal proceedings

cannot be thwarted at this initial stage."Most importantly, the ruling meant

that there was no way the Gandhis weregoing to avoid appearing before the trialcourt.

After all, Swamy’s accusations hadbeen serious. Detailing how the AJL hadreceived a whopping interest-free loanof Rs.90.25 crore from the Congress andthe party later transferred the debt to YILfor a measly Rs.50 lakh, his complaintclaimed that the Gandhis, as majorityshareholders of YIL, personally bene-fited from the acquisition of AJL.

However, it was the High Court rulingthat marked the exacerbation of tensionbetween Congress and BJP and theywere at daggers drawn well and truly inno time.

Stating that Congress had faced manysimilar cases “sponsored” by its politicalrivals, party spokesperson RandeepSingh Surjewala said the party “shallpursue the matter at an appropriatelegal forum so that lies of BJP and itsdirty tricks department are exposed inthe public domain”.

"As part of the BJP's petty vendettapolitics, a completely misconceived pri-vate complaint was instituted by Subra-manian Swamy, who is a member of the


BJP's central committee. Even the factsof the complaint disclose no ingredientsof any offence committed under the In-dian law. The whole purpose is sensa-tionalism, political revenge and ashoddy attempt to malign the Congressleadership," Surjewala pointed out, be-fore adding that "no attempts to malignthe Congress leadership through doc-tored cases will deter us from fightingand exposing the anti-people policies ofthe present government.”

In response, the BJP added insult toinjury through its spokesperson Shah-nawaz Hussain who was quoted by thepress as saying: "This is what happenswhen you buy such a huge property fora pittance.”

The very next day, as a trial court inthe national capital asked the Gandhisto appear before it on December 19 inconnection with the National Heraldnewspaper case, Congress parliamen-tarians created a ruckus in Rajya Sabhaover the issue sloganeering and troopingnear the Upper House chairman HamidAnsari’s podium, which eventually led torepeated adjournment of the house.

Later in the day, Sibal said at a pressconference at the Parliament Housecomplex that the National Herald news-

paper was a part of the Congress party’slegacy and that there was “nothingwrong” with its taking loans from theparty.

Taking a swipe at the BJP, the veteranlawyer-cum-politician said: "Filing suchcases show that government's fear thatit cannot defeat the Congress, and peo-ple like Subramanian Swamy have beenkept in the BJP for such acts.”

Meanwhile, the government ex-pressed disappointment with Congressmembers’ protests inside both houses ofthe Parliament over the National Heraldcase and accused the Opposition ofpoliticising a legal issue.

Even as Lok Sabha was adjourned forthe day, Congress party supporters, in-cluding Members of the Indian YouthCongress (IYC) and the National Stu-dents Union of India, marched towardsthe Prime Minister’s official residence inprotest over the National Herald case.

One of the representatives of the pro-testers, Congress leader Amrita Dhawansaid: “We'll protest on the streets be-cause this is an attack on our leaders …There are so many important judicialproceedings pending in the courts. Whyisn't (BJP leader) Subramanian Swamytaking them up? Why is he only after the

Congress? It is a vendetta of theBharatiya Janata Party."

The BJP further stoked the flames bytaking the line that the Congress wasprotesting only to deflect corruptioncharges. "Congress is only trying tocover up its corruption. Let Congressparty explain this: Was 2G case avendetta, or was CommonwealthGames case, Coal scam case avendetta?" asked Ravi Shankar Prasad,the union Minister for Communicationsand Information.

Also, in response Mrs Gandhi's com-ment that she was not scared of anyoneas she is Indira Gandhi's daughter-in-law, Prasad added: "Law is not con-cerned with who is whosedaughter-in-law, or who is whose son-in-law … India of 2015 is not India of1967. Sonia Gandhi is not IndiraGandhi.”

Not very surprisingly, the same storyplayed out at the Parliament the nexttwo days as the verbal slugfest becamebitter by the day with Rahul Gandhiopenly accusing Prime Minister’s Officeof driving the party’s revenge politicsand the BJP challenging the Gandhiscion to prove it while counter-accusingCongress of making a national issue out

YSR Congress MPs stage a demonstration to press for special status for Andhra Pradesh at the Parliament in New Delhi.


of a family problem.Leader of the House in Rajya Sabha,

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, also tooka dig at Mrs Gandhi, by posting on hisFacebook account that the country had“never accepted the diktat that thequeen is not answerable to law”.

The senior BJP stalwart, known for hisrhetoric and articulate speaking, alsosaid Congress leaders must find a wayout of the chakravyuh (phalanx) of theirown creation.

"They (Congress leadership) have ac-quired properties worth a huge amountwithout spending anything. They haveused tax-exempted income for a non-exempted purpose. They have trans-ferred the income of a political party toanother company. They have createdhuge taxable income in favour of thesecond company," Jaitley continued.

"The answer to the Congress leader-ship landing up in a 'chakravyuh' is tofight their battle legally and not disruptparliament. By disrupting democracy,the financial web created by the Con-gress leaders cannot be undone," headded.

But Jaitley had little inkling that hewould himself be in the centre of a con-troversy within a week’s time.

The bomb fell on December 16 whenthe Aam Aadmi Party sought his resigna-tion, claiming that the CBI raided theDelhi Secretariat to scuttle a probe intoalleged corruption at the Delhi and Dis-trict Cricket Association (DDCA) whichJaitley had headed for a long time.

Many former cricketers had hurledmajor corruption charges at the officebearers of DDCA, but the matter had notgotten politicised until then.

Sensing a golden opportunity to hurtBJP where it would hurt more, the Con-gress also joined the AAP in calling forJaitley’s resignation as it demanded aJoint Parliamentary Committee (JPC)investigation into the “DDCA chief andhis team's gross financial irregularitiesin the cricket body”.

Congress senior spokesperson AjayMaken stated that the report that fol-lowed from the corporate affairs min-istry’s orders on inspection of books ofaccount and other records of DDCA in2012 revealed that the Registrar of Com-panies (RoC) had named four officials as"officers in default", all of were “knownfor their proximity” to Jaitley.

Maken pointed out that the DDCAhad admitted to the Serious Fraud In-vestigation Office (SFIO), which was in-vestigating its affairs, that theconstruction cost of Ferozshah Kotlaground had gone up from Rs.24 crore toRs.114 crore.

Alleging that the probe revealed therewas no record of tender for most con-tracts and many companies whichbagged the construction contracts werein fact owned by office-bearers ofDDCA, Maken said the DDCA had "ille-gally constructed" 10 corporate boxes inthe stadium and sub-leased these for 10years for about Rs.36 crore.

During Jaitley's tenure, Maken added,there was neither any disclosure of an-nual accounts nor any maintenance ofaccounts of expenditure and income.

The DDCA’s internal fact-findingteam, which inquired into its accountsfor 2013-14, found there was huge finan-cial irregularity and plenty of "spuriousand illegitimate payments" made tosome so-called companies in 2013-14."Substantial payments were made to 9companies which, on investigation,turned out to have the same registeredoffice, same e-mail IDs as well as com-mon directors. Duplicate bills were is-sued and the reasons for paymentsfalsified by ledger entries," Maken said.

The next day, Jaitley brushed asidethese claims "untruth and only false-hood".

Denying the corruption charges lev-elled against him, he said: "It is a part ofpropaganda technique to deflect atten-tion when you yourselves are in thedock. Finding himself acting as a shieldto cover an officer under investigation,the Delhi chief minister has attemptedto focus attention on me,” Jaitley contin-ued.

Jaitley added: "I left cricket adminis-tration in 2013. By referring to somefacts of 2014 and 2015, he AAP leaderand Delhi chief minister Kejriwal) can'tdrag me in."

However, things started getting a littlemore complicated for the BJP whenparty MP Kirti Azad, a former cricketerand a Lok Sabha member from Bihar,came to the fore urging the enforcementdirectorate to probe into DDCA’s finan-cial irregularities.

Speaking to the press in New Delhi,Azad even showed a video produced byWikiLeaks4India which claimed that theDDCA had given out contracts to vari-ous companies whose addresses werelater found to be false.

It was also alleged in the video thatthe DDCA hired office and other equip-ment at extremely inflated prices, in-cluding hiring of laptops at Rs.16,000per day and printers at Rs.3,000 per day."If the companies were fake, surely thebank accounts into which the moneywas paid must also be fake … I just wantto expose corruption, the accounts of itwill be explained later. I repeat, this is

not personal or against one person. It isagainst corruption," Azad explained.

Soon after Azad detailed his under-standing of the financial wrongdoing inthe DDCA, the AAP asked Modi to sackJaitley. "Jaitley is the Suresh Kalmadi ofBJP," AAP leader Ashutosh told themedia, referring to the former CongressMP who was linked to the alleged cor-ruption in the 2010 CommonwealthGames.

"Kirti Azad has made it clear that Jait-ley is the head of the (DDCA) scam. Heshould be removed," said Sanjay Singh,another AAP leader.

On December 21, Jaitley filed adefamation suit against Kejriwal claim-ing 10 crore in damages.

However, when Jaitley was fiercely re-futing the corruption accusations lev-elled against him, Azad made an alreadystrange situation stranger for the BJP bydemanding to know why Jaitley had notsued him as well.

"I have been raising the issue of cor-ruption in DDCA since long. This wasmy issue which was hijacked by the AamAadmi Party and the Congress for polit-


ical gains. In fact, they have raised thisissue on the basis of my letters. So thedefamation case should have been filedagainst me. It is unfortunate that thedefamation case was not filed againstme,” he said.

The BJP took a united stand behindJaitley amid loudening calls by Congressand AAP to sack Jaitley from the govern-ment and launch a Special InvestigationTeam (SIT) probe into alleged corrup-tion in the DDCA.

Later in the day, BJP president AmitShah released a statement on behalf ofhis party, saying: “All allegations on ArunJaitley are baseless and away from truth.The entire BJP is standing by his side asa unit. Arun Jaitley ji has led his entirepublic life based on high standards andprinciples.”

Saying that the Congress was unableto digest its electoral defeats since the2014 Lok Sabha elections due to whichit was manufacturing allegations to de-fame his government, Prime MinisterModi expressed confidence the next daythat Jaitley would come out from anysuch probe with “flying colours”.

But Azad’s suspension on December23 for “anti-party activities” set tongueswagging even inside certain factions ofthe BJP, particularly senior leaders suchas L.K. Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi,Yashwant Sinha and Shanta Kumar who– according to party sources – felt theBJP had sent a wrong message.

Even Subramaniam Swamy expresseddisagreement with the action takenagainst Azad, saying he "did not thinkthe party should lose an honest personlike him (Azad)".

"I will assist Azad in drafting a reply tothe BJP notice. He is still a BJP member.I have every right to assist him," Swamysaid.

It was no surprise that the move alsoprovided the Opposition with a freshround of ammunition to blast the Modigovernment and its supposedly auto-cratic modus operandi.

As the working hours of the Parlia-ment were coming to a close, along withthe Winter Session, it was found that amajority of the bills that needed to bepassed by the Rajya Sabha had not evenbeen discussed. (Only the Juvenile Jus-

tice Bill had been passed the day beforein the wake of widespread publicprotests after the release of the youngestconvict in the Delhi gang-rape case.) Sothe legislators of the Upper House hur-riedly passed a few bills – without evena brief discussion. The irony was no loston political observers across the coun-try, who questioned the commitment oflegislators to the nation’s well-being.

At the end of the day it was found thatthe Rajya Sabha, the running of which re-quires tens of crores of taxpayers’ money,had clocked a productivity of less than 50percent. With the chances of Goods andServices Tax bill coming into effect thisyear appearing to be slimming by everyfailed Parliamentary Session, the taxpay-ers’ hopes of recovering some of their lostmoney are also dimming.

As the New Year begins, partisan poli-tics seems to have emerged as thebiggest threat to national development.If politicians are not ready to right thiswrong in the system, may be it is timefor the taxpayers to rise up and effect thenecessary changes that they rightly de-serve. n

Left MPs led by CPI-M GS Sitaram Yechury stage a demonstration at the Parliament in New Delhi.


2015 was a year of political upsand downs for Odisha chief min-ister Naveen Patnaik and his Biju

Janata Dal. While the aftershocks of themulti-crore money deposit collectionscam continued to be felt almostthroughout the year, many other contro-versies erupted.

However, none of these posed any realthreat to him. His public image, by andlarge, remained intact. No wonder, aconfident chief minister rounded off theyear with the announcement of his vi-sion plan—2036, the underlying mes-sage being that his party was not goingto be dislodged from power at least forthe next 20 years.

The year also saw the government ex-ploring the possibility of turning thestate legislature bi-cameral by setting upa legislative council, a contentious issue.Opposition alleged that it was the chiefminister’s bid to strengthen his holdover the state.

On the other hand, Naveen kept uphis war of words against the Centre,though both Prime Minister NarendraModi and BJP president Amit Shah shiedaway from attacking him directly. WhileModi during his April 1 visit to Rourkeladescribed the chief minister as his friendand spoke of cooperative federalism,Shah, who addressed a rally in the statecapital, blazed away at the Congress in-stead of targeting Naveen.

Both the leaders, keenly aware of BJP’srather weak position in the Rajya Sabha,tried their best to keep Naveen in goodhumour but the latter kept blowing hotand cold towards the Modi government.If his party supported the passage ofMMDR Amendment Act in the parlia-ment, it took to the streets over con-tentious issues like the Polavaramproject.

The year had its fair share of contro-versies. While the after-effects of themoney deposit collection scam contin-ued to nag the ruling Biju Janata Dalwith some of its senior leaders includinga sitting MP still in jail, veterans like lateKalpataru Das, a former Rajya Sabhamember, came under a shadow in con-nection with the discretionary quota al-lotment scandal that had several otherleaders in hot waters.

2015 was a bad year for self-styledgodmen and their political patrons. It allbegan with the arrest of Santosh Raulaaka Sarathi Baba who ran a plushashram on the outskirts of Kendraparatown. The arrest was preceded by mobviolence and allegedly excessive policeaction that led to the suspension of thendistrict superintendent of police, SatishGajbhiye who is still cooling his heels at

State

NAVEEN REMAINSUNTOUCHABLEThe scams and farmer suicides that hit Odisha last yeardid precious little to hurt the long-time chief minister’spopularity


home.The incident led to a flurry of allega-

tions about Sarathi Baba having enjoyedthe patronage of several powerful politi-cians including a former minister whohails from Kendrapara district. Theleader admitted to having knownSarathi but denied having bestowed anyspecial favours on him.

Sarathi’s arrest opened the floodgatesof allegations against Babas in otherparts of the state with Surendra Mishraalias Sura Baba, the most prominentamong them being arrested later fromhis sprawling ashram on the outskirts ofBhubaneswar that, ironically enough,had been declared a tourist spot by thestate government.

However, in sheer political terms thecontroversy that rattled the governmentmost was sparked off by a string offarmer suicides across the state in thewake of a severe drought. With morethan 100 deaths taking place, oppositionparties hit the streets accusing the gov-ernment of being indifferent to theplight of farmers who were taking theirown lives following crop failure and in-

ability to repay their debts.Pushed on the back-foot the govern-

ment sought to absolve itself by citingthe report of district collectors that con-cluded that none of the deaths were onaccount of crop loss or debt burden. Butprotests over the issue continued withministers visiting districts having to faceangry demonstrations. The protestorstargeted agriculture minister PradeepMaharathy in particular with eggs beinghurled at his carcade in one of the dis-tricts.

As the opposition, enthused by Con-gress vice-president Rahul Gandhi’s suc-cessful padayatra in drought-hitBargarh, upped the ante, the rulingparty organised a farmers’ convention inthe district with chief minister, NaveenPatnaik announcing a special droughtpackage for farmers. Significantly, threesenior ministers including agricultureminister, Pradeep Maharathy were notinvited to the convention.

While it was a year of mixed fortunesfor the BJD, the Congress, the main op-position party, suffered some major set-backs during 2015. The first blow was

the decision of the party’s tribal face,Giridhar Gamang to change sides aftermore than three decades following seri-ous differences with the leadership. Heleft many red faces in the Congress byjoining the BJP which, bereft of bignames, welcomed him with open arms.

The passing away of former chiefminister and Assam governor, J.B. Pat-naik, widely acclaimed as the “BhismaPitamaha” of state politics, was anothercrippling blow to the party. His deathnot only marked the end of an era butalso left a large number of Congressmenin the state feeling rudderless.

For the state BJP it is a period of strug-gle during which it tried its best to re-gain some of its lost base in the state.However, riven by factions, the partycontinued to face a crisis. It was unableto reach a consensus even on electing itsnew state president.

The debilitation of both Congress andthe BJP suited chief minister NaveenPatnaik’s game plan. His popularity, de-spite occasional hiccups, continued togrow making him the undisputed leaderof not only his party but also the state. n


To a casual visitor, this provinceof Brussels may look like anyother – a bit run-down in parts,

but largely having the glass-frontedstores, cafes and bars visible in mostother places across Europe. The distinc-tion though is the dress of choice amongmany women. Everywhere, you see thehijab, not unlike in an Arab nation. Butthis is Brussels, the capital of Belgium,the headquarters of the EuropeanUnion, in the heart of Europe.

Molenbeek Saint-Jean, a province ormunicipality of the capital with about100,000 residents and an area of 5.9 sqkm, has earned the notorious epithet of"terrorist hub" as three of the attackerswho killed 130 people in Paris a monthago came from here.

Several other terrorist attacks havebeen traced to this area, including theone in Madrid, Spain, where bombs in atrain killed 181 commuters. The bombswere planted by Al Qaeda-inspired mil-itants who had lived in Molenbeek.Ahmed Shah Masood, the leader ofNorthern Alliance in Afghanistan, waskilled by a Taliban supporter who hadlived here. Several smaller attacks werefound to be led by persons who lived inMolenbeek.

So why has the province producedmore than its fair share of jihadists?

"The youth in the area do not havemuch work and some of them may seemto be attracted to jihadist thinking," saidJohan de Becker, Police Chief of BrusselsWest, which has jurisdiction overMolenbeek and five other provinces.

He said the local police knew some ofthe men who were involved in the attackin Paris, but only as "petty thieves", notas major criminals.

The police chief said that the Paris at-tack had made them realise the need forgreater police presence, especially thosewith an Arabic background. Becker saidthat police recruitment at present isdone nationally and Arab-origin peoplein Molenbeek find it difficult to join, es-pecially since education levels amongthem are low. "We are asking that re-cruitment rules be changed and moremoney allocated for police," he said.

Molenbeek has almost 40 per centpopulation of Moroccan origin. In thefifties and sixties, when Belgium neededworkers for its coal mines, it looked atMorocco to bring in young, hardworkingpeople. They came in their hundreds forthe mines and later for subway con-struction. Their families followed. Mostof them lived in small apartments in thearea.

In the last two decades, the economyof the area turned for the worse and

Saad Benaissa.

International

Brussels’BurdenAlthough purging Jihadist elements from theMolenbeek suburb of Belgium’s capital has becomenecessary and desirable post-Paris attacks – yet it onlyamounts to treatment of the symptom, not the diseasethat creates them


there have hardly been any employmentopportunities.

"For several years, the political leadersignored the need for measures to pre-vent jihadist thinking from taking hold.We did not give enough support to Mus-lims from Morocco which I think is im-portant," said Francoise Schepmans,Mayor of Molenbeek, at the City Hall.

She said that lack of education amongyoung Moroccans reduces their chancesof finding a job and many were on wel-fare support which often led to frustra-tion. Some of the informal mosques, inresidential areas, may be centres of ji-hadism, she said, although the mainmosques – there are 25 of them – are nota problem. But she objects to the wholeof Molenbeek being called a "terroristhub".

"We, of course, need more control onwhat goes on in informal mosques," shesaid, adding they also needed moremoney for education, for communityservices, for outreach programmes andfor making youth part of society.

The Townhall where the mayor sits isjust across from where two of the terror-ists lived. Ibrahim Abdeslam, who blewhimself up in Paris, was heavily into re-ligion and was a regular mosque goer,said Nasih Atiq from Pakistan whoworks in his brother's shop La Maisondu Saree or House of Sarees nearby. Hesaid he used to see Ibrahim quite oftenbut did not talk to him.

Ibrahim's brother, Salah Abdeslam,who is absconding and who rented a carin Brussels that was said by police tohave been used for carrying the gunmenthat killed 89 persons in the Bataclanconcert hall, lived just next to the Houseof Sarees. According to Nasih, he sawhim almost on a daily basis before theattack. "He was like any other youngman in the area. He was not religious atall and used to love riding his motorcy-cle," Nasih said.

He said for the first few days policewere everywhere in the area and thehouses were sealed and neighboursquestioned. But a month later every-thing appears to have returned to nor-mal with no police personnel in sight.What has not come to normal is thebusiness. "It may be limping back, butcustomers are still not coming in fullforce," says Danish Atiq, Nasih's brotherand proprietor of the two saree shops inMolenbeek.

Most of his clients are Moroccans andjust because a few oddballs had turnedout to be terrorists, it does not meanpeople should condemn the wholeprovince, he said.

He found it to be a failure of federal

Danish Atique in his House of Sarees.

Johan De Becker.


police that the mastermind of Paris at-tacks like Abdelhamid Abaaoud, wholived in Molenbeek and who had gone toSyria and returned, was not tracked."When you have people coming backfrom Syria, what are your intelligenceservices doing?" he asked.

Hassan Rahali, a Molenbeek Councilmember, echoes sentiments that givingthe province a bad name would notsolve anything. "A very, very small groupof people are radicalised and the au-

thorities know about them. Why didthey not act earlier?" he asked.

Rahali, who is of Moroccan origin andis a second-generation Belgian, says thatthose who were involved in the Paris at-tacks were "radicals taking the name ofIslam, not Islamic radicals".

Noting that there were 40,000 or sopeople of Moroccan origin in Molen-beek, he asked: "Can you say they areradicals? Look around you, life is normalhere. This is not terrorist country."

"The radicals are the failures of thestate," he said, pointing out that theyhad very little help by way of educationor employment or even identity as Bel-gians. "They were hurt by the system, sothought of hurting it back." Rahali said,adding that some jihadist recruitersfrom Antwerp were trying to lure theyoung with money and weapons. "Somestupid people do get convinced."

Rahali said his biggest worry wasabout the impact on normal youth inMolenbeek. "European media haspainted the whole town black. Do youthink Muslim youths would get jobs forthe next 10 years after this?"

The heavy police presence and raidshave had an impact on ordinary peo-ple's attitude. Nerves are frayed, as onecan see during a walk through the run-down parts of Molenbeek, called theLower area. People object to being pho-tographed and refuse to be interviewed.

In the Mustaqbal Mosque, as devoteescongregate for evening prayers, they arenot very receptive to being pho-tographed. In fact, many young follow-ers sought deletion of pictures that were

taken earlier inside without objection.They also declined to allow a meetingwith the mosque head, who was leadingthe prayers.

The edginess is understandable. Forweeks, few would have seen a relaxedminute as federal and local police carriedout raid after raid. Even a month later, lifein some areas is yet to return to normal.

Saad Benaissa, of Moroccan origin,has been in Molenbeek for the past 15years and runs a small eatery near anarea called Place de la Duchesse whichwas earlier vibrant and full of life. Hisplace has suffered immensely. "Earlierbusiness was very good. Now, it hasgone down steeply. I don't know what todo. I can't go anywhere else," he said.

That is true for most residents inMolenbeek who have to lower theirheads and let the storm pass. Paris wasa wake-up call for the authorities, whoare trying to purge the jihadist elementsfrom the area which has unfortunatelybecome a synonym for terrorism in Eu-rope. n

Mayor Francoise Schepmans.

Hijab is dress of choice.

"The radicals are the failures ofthe state … They were hurt bythe system, so thought ofhurting it back”– Hassan Rahali, a MolenbeekCouncil member


The year just ended was anotherof violence and more violencein Manipur, one of the most

troubled states in India's northeast.In a place where militancy never

seems to abate, there was little to cheer,with Naga insurgents massacring 20 sol-diers in Chandel district in June, invitinga rare but deadly Indian Army retalia-tion in Myanmar.

Manipur

Unquiet StateMilitancy and strikes continued to disrupt

normal life in Manipur last year

The violence has only been com-pounded by the never ending strikesthat have made life very tough for themass of people all across the landlockedstate.

The violence and unrest resulted inthe extension of the Disturbed State sta-tus till October this year, preventing thecentral government from repealing theArmed Forces Special Powers Act(AFSPA).

The AFSPA is probably the most hatedlegislation in Manipur, where many sayit gives security forces sweeping powers– without any accountability.

Amid the persisting unrest, the 595-km India-Mandalay bus service waskick-started to boost the northeast'strade with neighbouring countries andSoutheast Asia.

At the start of 2015, Chief MinisterIbobi Singh drew flak after human rightsactivist Irom Sharmila, who has beenfasting for 15 years demanding the re-peal of AFSPA, was released from judi-cial custody but rearrested forcontinuing her hunger strike.

Sharmila, better known as the IronLady, completed 15 years of hunger

strike on November 1, with no hopes ofher demand being met.

On June 4, a deadly ambush by mili-tants left 20 soldiers of the Dogra Regi-ment dead in an attack blamed on theNational Socialist Council of Nagaland(NSCN) led by S.S. Khaplang, which hasrefused to accept a peace pact signed bythe government and the dominantNSCN-IM faction.

(Interestingly, in the past few months,the other Manipur based armed groups,including the Kanglei Yawol Kanna Lup(KYKL), the Peoples Liberation Army(PLA) and the Kangleipak CommunistParty (KCP) have become dormant andhave been taken over by the NSCN-K.These groups have also witnessed a lotof their cadres quitting and joining civil-ian life.)

The attack led to a sneaking surgicalstrike by the Indian Army in Myanmarterritory, an operation that threatenedto sour ties between the two countries.

Then came massive protests by theImphal Valley-based Meitei communitydemanding Inner Line Permit (ILP) forthe state on the lines of ILPs inArunachal Pradesh, Mizoram and Naga-

land. The government was compelled topass a bill after the agitation and thedeath of a teenager, Saipam Robinhood.

But this only caused outrage and re-volt among the tribals, who said theMeiteis are trying to destabilize the al-ready marginalized tribal population.

The tribal belts of Manipur spreadover five districts – Ukhrul, Senapati,Tamenglong, Chandel and Churachand-pur – constitute 75 percent of the statearea with a population of 500,000 to600,000 while more than 1.4 millionMeiteis are packed in an area of 5.5 sqkm.

Tribal Lok Sabha member TangsoBaite's house was burnt after he was ac-cused of not taking up the tribal issue.The turmoil in Churachandpur districtleft nine tribals dead.

Amid the tumult, the India-Myanmar-Thailand (IMT) trilateral highway be-came operational. And theImphal-Mandalay bus service wasflagged off on December 10. The busjourney between Imphal and Mandalaywill be covered in 14 hours. It is the firstbus link to provide direct connectivitybetween India and Myanmar. n


The proof of the pudding lies inits eating, but the problem withthe PDP-BJP ruling coalition in

Jammu and Kashmir, according to manypolitical observers, is that its pudding isnot ready to be tasted despite beingcooked for 10 months.

The ideologically apart parties tookthree months to work out the terms oftheir alliance after the state assemblyelections threw up a fractured mandatein December 2014.

The Valley-centric PDP got 28 seatsand the Jammu-centric BJP got 25 seats,including those of its allies in the 87-member assembly.

The regional National Conference(NC) dropped to 15 seats from its 2008election tally of 28 in the 87-memberstate assembly.

The wily old PDP patron, MuftiMuhammad Sayeed, remained double-minded about whether or not he shouldcast his lot with a right-wing politicalparty.

Rising above regional considerations,Sayeed said since the electoral mandatehad been overwhelmingly in favour ofthe BJP in the Jammu region, the onlyway to move forward and preserve theunity in diversity of the state was toshake hands with the BJP.

It was a bitter bill Sayeed had to swal-low to come to power and the BJP hap-pily obliged by conceding him the chiefminister's chair for the full six-year termof the assembly (Against five years inother states, the J&K assembly has a six-year tenure).

Equitable development for the state'sthree regions – Valley, Jammu, Ladakh –employment for the youth, uninter-rupted electric power supply, relief andrehabilitation of flood victims of lastyear and political space for differentviewpoints are the hallmarks of whatSayeed calls the "battle of ideas".

As for the separatists, they have raisedthe ante against Sayeed for aligning with"anti-Muslim BJP" since he came topower on March 1 but despite their bestefforts, have not been able to move be-yond shutdown calls to galvanize peoplein their support.

For the failure of any of their masscampaign to take ground in 2015, theseparatist leaders have blamed the gov-ernment for keeping them under con-tinuous house arrest and detention.

Bruised and battered by its electoraldefeat, the NC was licking its wounds tillthe people starting talking against thePDP in the Valley and the BJP in theJammu region.

Sayeed's political adversary, formerchief minister Omar Abdullah, has

Kashmir

The Clockis TickingAfter almost a year of non-performance the coalitiongovernment in Jammu and Kashmir will not have theearly-days excuse for long as public patience wears thin


started rebuilding his image by high-lighting the “failures and disenchant-ment of the people with the PDP-BJPcoalition".

The PDP-BJP alliance depended heav-ily on Prime Minister Narendra Modi'sgovernment at the centre for financialsupport for almost everything fromroads, flood relief, employment, infra-structure, power projects and evensalaries to its employees.

Modi announced a financial packageof Rs.80,000 crores ($12 billion) when hevisited the state on October 6 this year.

The benefits of this economic pack-age will take time to become visible onthe ground, but the impatience of thepeople with the PDP-BJP government isfast running out.

There have been daily protests in Sri-nagar city and other places in the Valleyagainst electric power shortages, badroads, inadequate rations, unemploy-ment and human rights violations.

The other big problem for the statethis year has been that J&K’s secondbiggest industry after horticulture,

tourism, has not done well in 2015.The fear of another flood due to inces-

sant untimely rains kept the tourist in-flow to the Valley at a low ebb this year.

The promise made by the PDP-BJPgovernment to get back the ownershipof hydro-based electric power from theNHPC made little headway in 2015.

"The state government's cofferswere completely emptied by the previ-ous government because they knewthey were on their way out. Whateverdamage has been done by the NC dur-ing decades cannot be undone by us injust 10 months," a senior minister andclose confidante of the chief ministersaid, speaking on condition ofanonymity.

"We don't have a magic wand and ex-pecting that we came to power with amagic wand or Alladin's Lamp is beingunfair to us.

"We still have full five years to deliverand a call on our performance cannotbe taken just because we are unable toset right the wrongs in just 10 monthsthose were done in decades by the NC

headed governments in the past," theminister added.

He said the PDP's opponents haveeven been spreading rumours aboutSayeed's health.

"That is being callous and mischie-vous. The chief minister is working over-time and nobody in a failing state ofhealth can do that," the minister said.

News reports that Sayeed would behanding over the reins of power to hisdaughter and PDP president, MehboobaMufti, continue to make rounds al-though she recently said she was not in-terested in becoming the chief minister.

The lives of ordinary citizens and thebusiness community started graduallyreturning to normal last year after theunprecedented floods of 2014.

So, will Sayeed be able to clear theAegean Stables and rise to people's ex-pectations?

This will largely depend on whetherSayeed has the wisdom and energy ofHercules or chooses to soft-paddle as apeddler of dreams in the sunset of hispolitical career. n


Last year was one of both war andpeace in Nagaland. Even asPrime Minister Narendra Modi's

government signed a historic peace pactwith the most powerful of the Naga un-derground outfits, another set of Nagaguerrillas massacred 20 Indian soldiersin Manipur.

The year was then a year when twosets of ideas were in the race for su-premacy in the Christian-majority state:a desire to end the country's mother ofall insurgencies or to keep it going.

The Naga Peace Accord was signed onAugust 3 between the government andthe National Socialist Council of Naga-land-Isak-Muivah (NSCN-IM) which isled by Isak Chisi Swu and ThuingalengMuivah. It followed 17 years of peacetalks.

The development sent a message toall other factions of the Naga under-ground that New Delhi would only ne-gotiate with the NSCN-IM and that theonly choice the other five factions of theNSCN had was to embrace the accord orbe eliminated militarily.

The NSCN-K led by S.S. Khaplang,which had abrogated the 14-year-oldtruce on March 27, responded by killingeight Assam Rifles troopers in Mon dis-trict of Nagaland.

And with bases in Myanmar, it am-bushed a Dogra Regiment unit in Chan-del district of neighbouring Manipur,killing 20 soldiers.

A furious government announced abounty of Rs.17 lakh on informationleading to the capture of Khaplang andits military wing chief Niki Sumi.

In the meantime, a new faction of theNSCN – NSCN-Reformation – was born.It followed the expulsion of P. Tikhak andWangtin Naga, formerly senior leadersof the NSCN-K.

The NSCN-Reformation is the onlyfaction to support the Naga accord. Theothers – NSCN-Unification, NSCN-Khole Kitovi and NSCN-K – remain wed-ded to violence.

Nagaland witnessed trouble on Feb-ruary 5 after a mob of 5,000 stormedthe Dimapur Central Jail, dragged outa 35-year-old alleged Bangladeshi ac-cused of raping a Naga woman,dragged him for over seven kilometres,and lynched him.

Houses and shops belonging toBangladeshi immigrants also cameunder attack. The case was handed overto the CBI. More than anything, itshowed the Naga distate for "outsiders",particularly Bangladeshis.

Also in February, nine Congress legis-lators voted in favour of Chief MinisterT.R. Zeliang of the Naga People's Front

Nagaland

Testing TimesNagaland saw its fair share of violence last

year despite a historic peace pact between theCentre and the Naga insurgents

(NPF), which counts the BJP as an ally.The move left the assembly with no op-position.

The central government also recog-nised the role of Rani Gaidilu, a freedomfighter who played a significant role dur-ing the independence era.

Nagaland was back in news in Sep-tember as its lone Rajya Sabha member,Khekiho Zhimomi, who died on Novem-

ber 26, outspokenly suggested the cre-ation of two union territories in Ma-nipur, adding to the already simmeringtensions on the issue of Greater Naga-land. The MP apologised.

As the year was set to end, Chief Min-ister Zeliang got into trouble. A districtcourt told him to appear before it onJanuary 17, 2016, on charges of allegedlyfaking his graduation degree. n


Indian passenger car makers wereunder legal and regulatory spot-lights last year, while for the auto-

mobile industry, in general, it was a yearof mixed fortunes in terms of sales withgrowth rates ranging from double digitsto the negative, according to experts.

The apex court ordering ban on regis-tration of diesel passenger vehicles ofover 2,000 cc engines in the nationalcapital region till March 2016 and theDelhi government's proposal to allowodd and even number cars to ply on al-ternate dates, shocked the car makers.

But the Volkswagen emission scandalis probably the strongest jolt to have hitthe automotive industry worldwidewhich had its impact in India as well.

The central government on its part in-troduced new crash test norms for carsfrom 2017 onwards.

"The year 2015 saw a spill-over of thesafety concerns in Indian manufacturedcars that were raised in early 2014. Mostof the severe car crashes around thecountry were in the spotlight as hard re-minders of the substandard safetynorms that cars in India need to adhereto," said Collin Noronha, senior researchanalyst, Automotive & TransportationPractice at Frost & Sullivan.

According to Noronha, the govern-ment stipulating stringent crash testnorms for all new cars from October2017 is a giant leap for the Indian auto-motive industry.

For upgrades of existing models, thedeadline will be from October 2018, hesaid.

"Despite the relatively weaker emis-sion norms in India as compared tothose in markets like the United Statesof America and the United Kingdom, ac-tion initiated by the Automotive Re-search Association of India (ARAI) haseventually led to Volkswagen GroupIndia recalling approximately 323,700cars fitted with 1.2-litre, 1.5- litre, 1.6-litre, and 2.0-litre EA 189 diesel enginesthat were manufactured and sold be-tween 2008 and November 2015,"Noronha said.

Terming 2015 as a volatile year for thepassenger vehicle segment Noronhasaid some segments showed stronggains in two to three months since Jan-uary 2015.

The market is generally evolving inpreference from small hatchbacks to thepremium ones. Queried about the trendin the car segment, he pointed out theincreasing electronics content in thecompact segment.

"For the two wheelers segment 2015was a mixed year growing by just twopercent ending November 2015," said

n Minority shareholders of MarutiSuzuki India gave green signal forsourcing cars from Suzuki Motor Gu-jarat Pvt. Ltd. (SMG).

n Jan Dhan Yojana to make many peo-ple loan worthy to buy two wheelers.

n Higher pension for ex-service-men, implementation of 7th PayCommission expected to drive vehicle

sales in 2016.

nHero MotoCorp unveiled two 110cc scooters completely developed in-house.

n Hero MotoCorp starts manufac-turing operations in Colombia.

n TVS Motor Company to expandits Tamil Nadu's Hosur at an outlay ofRs.350 crore.

Business

Patchy Ride Last year saw the automobile industry go through

many ups and downs in India

Yadvinder Singh Guleria, senior vicepresident-sales & marketing, HondaMotorcycle & Scooter India.

The automatic scooter segmentlogged 12 percent growth.

The overall motorcycle segment con-tinued its downward trend with the twopercent de-growth, he added.

"We expect the industry to grow by 3-5 percent subject to variables like mon-soon, introduction of GST (Goods andServices Tax) and its timing. Scooterswill continue to lead this growth," Gule-ria said.

As for the commercial vehicles sector,Muralidharan R., director, corporate rat-ings with Fitch: "The MHCV (medium &heavy commercial vehicles) sales regis-tered a strong year-on-year growth of31.9 percent during January-October2015, reversing falling sales over the lasttwo years. However, sales volumes of the

light commercial vehicles (LCV) fell by6.1 percent."

He said the resumption of mining ac-tivity along with green shoots in themanufacturing sector growth in secondhalf of 2015, though erratic, has beenpositive for the sector.

Also the new regulations which makeanti-lock braking system (ABS) and aspeed-control devices mandatory fortrucks (produced after October 2015 andsold after March 2016) is also likely tohave contributed to additional saleswith some truck/ fleet operators ad-vancing their purchases," Muralidharansaid.

"Fitch expects MHCV to continue topost strong growth (around 10 percent)in 2016. We, however, expect LCV de-mand to remain weak during first half of2016 before improving in second half of2016," he remarked. n

HIGHLIGHTS OF 2015


China, the world's most popu-lous country, scrapped its one-child policy last year, a year

that also saw an upswing in ties withIndia with Prime Minister NarendraModi visiting the country. The yuan wasdevalued, sending shock waves in stockmarkets across the world.

The country also witnessed two majortragedies when over 450 people werekilled in a ship capsize in June and over170 died in massive explosions in Tian-jin city in August.

China came down heavily on the cor-rupt, with its crackdown seeing over 100high-ranking officials being tried.

In a dramatic move, President Xi Jin-ping announced military reforms. Astaggering 300,000 troops are to be cut,a move that was described as getting astep closer to China's commitment to-wards peaceful development.

Parts of China and capital Beijingwere left gasping as smog enveloped theregion, leaving residents worried.

As the year comes to an end, China,one of the world's biggest economies,saw an array of events.

One of the biggest developments forthe country of 1.3 billion was allowingthe two-child policy in an attempt tobalance population development andoffset the burden of an aging popula-tion.

It scrapped the one-child policy, apart of the family planning policy, intro-duced in the late 1970s. However, theplan will come into effect only fromMarch this year. It has been estimatedthat it would help raise the populationto an estimated 1.45 billion by 2030.

On the diplomatic front, Chinareached out to its South Asian neigh-bours, including India. In February, In-dian External Affairs Minister SushmaSwaraj visited China, paving the way forPrime Minister Narendra Modi's visit.

Modi visited China in May. He startedhis three-day trip from Xi'an where heheld summit-level talks during whichthe border issue, the widening trade im-balance, connectivity issues and"strengthening trust" were high on theagenda.

While in Beijing, Modi held talks withhis Chinese counterpart Li Keqiang. Ajoint statement called for an early settle-ment of the boundary issue whichshould be pursued as a strategic objec-tive and said that both countries weredetermined to actively seek a politicalsettlement.

With India's neighbour Pakistan,China's relationship took a new turnwith President Xi Jinping's visit to Islam-abad where he envisaged investments

Neighbours

Ringing theChangesLast year saw China finally take some drastic butprogressive steps


worth $45 billion and signed 51 agree-ments.

An important meeting was arrangedbetween President Xi and his Taiwanesecounterpart Ma Ying-jeou, a first of itskind since the end of a civil war in 1949.The meeting took place in Singapore inNovember.

President Xi also made a state visit tothe US in September where he alongwith his counterpart, Barack Obama,reached a consensus on cyber-security.He also visited Britain in October.

China's strength, its economy, took abeating when the yuan was devalued onAugust 11.

The next day, it faced its second deval-uation. These resulted in Chinese ex-ports getting cheaper and imports intoChina more expensive. Stock marketsaround the world, including India, werehit.

Last year, China has dealt sternlywhen it came to corruption as part of acampaign launched by President Xi

when he came to power in 2013.The low points were tragedies. The

year began with a stampede at a NewYear's Eve celebration in Shanghaiwhere 35 people were killed and over 40injured.

On June 1, a ship with 456 people onboard capsized in the Yangtze river fol-lowing a tornado. A total of 442 werekilled while only 12 survived. Two arestill missing and presumed dead.

On August 12, a series of explosionsripped through a container storage sta-tion at Tianjin port. Fires caused by theinitial explosions continued to spreaduncontrollably throughout the next fewdays, causing eight additional explo-sions. It killed 173 people including fire-fighters, eight still remain missing andover 750 were injured.

In September, President Xi an-nounced a cut of 300,000 troops. Around of military reshuffle in August sawthe inclusion of younger officers. Thesechanges were parallel with the military's

anti-graft campaign, which has so far re-moved 40 senior officers, as well asChina's increased efforts to moderniseits forces.

Last year, China also made giantstrides in science and technology. In No-vember, the construction of the world'slargest ever radio telescope entered thefinal stage. China also manufactured theworld's first electric plane, started build-ing its largest solar plant and built theworld's largest amphibious aircraft.

The Beijing residents coughed andrasped as the Chinese capital wasshrouded in smog.

On the flip side, since late January lastyear, smog levels have increased at analarming rate, prompting the govern-ment to adopt the world's strictest emis-sions standards.

And, China's campaign of islandbuilding in the South China Sea hascaused concern among other regionalplayers. China claims most of the SouthChina and East China seas. n


Notwithstanding a sharp cut inthe government's growth fore-cast at the fag end, the year

2015 will go down as a year when Indiaemerged as the fastest-growing largeeconomy. This happened also despitesetbacks such as 12 months of negativeexport growth, another bad monsoonand roadblocks to the far-reachinggoods and services tax regime.

In addition to growth, the economyalso saw some positives. Global crude oilprices fell to the lowest levels in over adecade, checking the balance of pay-ments from going awry, inflation rate re-mained more-or-less under control,despite spikes in food prices, and eco-nomic reforms got a big push, notably in

Economy

Keeping Paceamid HurdlesIndia became the fastest growing big economy of theworld last year, but many experts reckon it is not out ofthe woods yet

the form of further opening up of a hostof industries to foreign equity.

India's real GDP in the first half of thecurrent fiscal grew at 7.2 percent as perofficial data, which was slightly lower incomparison to the GDP growth of 7.5percent in the previous fiscal.

India's external position improved atthe same time. Forex reserves are a littleabove $350 billion in November 2015 ascompared to a little over $270 billion inJuly 2013. Net foreign direct investment(FDI) inflows have increased to $17 bil-lion in the first half of 2015-16 in com-parison to $15.8 in the same period lastyear. The second quarter's current ac-count deficit logged at a level of 1.6 per-cent of GDP.

However, the global slowdown con-tinued to weigh on exports, which havedeclined for 12 straight months. Thegovernment said this was also pullingdown growth but felt the situationwould improve in the coming months.

On the fall in the value of the Indian

rupee, the finance ministry's mid-termeconomic review attributed it consider-ably to the major devaluation of the Chi-nese yuan.

The changes overall, however, ledmany global institutions such as theWorld Bank, International MonetaryFund, Asian Development Bank andsome UN institutions to upgrade India'sgrowth forecast to some 7.5-8 percent,calling it the fastest expanding globally,surpassing China.

The year also began with India chang-ing the way it calculated its gross do-mestic product under a new series,though the controversy over thechanged methodology employed re-fuses to die down with economists even

terming it obscure.Changing the base year to 2011-12

from 2004-05 in January, the Central Sta-tistics Office said India's real GDP, thatis adjusted for inflation, grew by sevenpercent in the first quarter of this fiscal,slower than the 7.5 percent expansion inthe quarter before – but much higherthan 6.7 percent registered in the firstquarter of the last fiscal.

Arun Kumar, till recently a professorat Jawaharlal Nehru University, said thatin view of negligible industrial growth,drought-like conditions in past yearsand no substantial increase in profitsand wages, the new numbers fall flatfrom the point of credibility.

"Even input costs, that are now lowwith falling oil prices, were not low inthe period 2011-12. Let the statistics of-fice show the growth figures for up to 10years prior to the base year for us to con-sider the new series seriously," Kumarsaid.

The mid-year review released this

month lowered the economic growthforecast for the current fiscal to the 7-7.5percent range, from the previously pro-jected 8.1-8.5 percent, mainly becauseof lower agricultural output due to


Highlights

n Real GDP in first half of fiscalgrew at 7.2 percent

n India emerges as fastest-grow-ing large economy

n Forex reserves of over $352 bil-lion as on the first week of De-cember.

n FDI inflows increased to $17 bil-lion in the first half of 2015-16

n Indian basket of crude oils fellbelow $40 a barrel

n Foreign investment limits raisedin defence, real estate and insur-ance, foreign equity in railways

n Retail and wholesale inflationrates rose in November to 5.41percent and (-)1.9 percent re-spectively, largely due to an in-crease in food prices

n Infrastructure sectors grew at2.3 percent in the first half of fis-cal

n Government lowers GDP growthestimate for fiscal by one per-cent to 7-7.5 percent

deficit rainfall. It also said there may bea need to reconsider next year's fiscaldeficit target of 3.5 percent.

"GDP growth has been powered onlyby private consumption and public in-

vestment is a concern. The proposedwage hike for government workers mayimpact plan for next fiscal." The econ-omy continues to send "mixed signals"over growth, while all economic indica-

tors were not yet aligned in pointing toa higher trajectory of growth, it said.

India's eight core industries, repre-senting major infrastructure sectors,grew at 2.3 percent in the April-Septem-ber period of the current fiscal, com-pared to a rate of 5.3 percent in the sameperiod of the previous fiscal – the fall ingrowth rate caused by lower expansionin electricity, coal and cement sectorsand negative growth in steel and naturalgas sectors.

Jaitley's first full union budget alsoannounced an agreement earlier in theyear with the Reserve Bank of India(RBI) that it constitute a Monetary Pol-icy Committee to determine by majorityvote on the policy rate required toachieve the inflation target.

Meanwhile, RBI Governor RaghuramRajan cut the interest rate in January forthe first time in nearly two years and fol-lowed up with two other reductions tobring down the central bank lendingrate to 6.75 percent.

Politics intervened during the year toprevent the enactment of India's mostimportant reform of its indirect taxregime by way of the pan-India Goodsand Services Tax (GST) that the govern-ment has targeted for implementingfrom April next year, because the rulingNDA does not have the numbers to passthe constitution amendment bill in theupper house. n


When 36-year-old Latha couldnot any more take the em-barrassment of daily

episodes of forgetfulness – recallingwhere she kept her money or forgot topick up children from school – she fi-nally decided to visit a good neurologist.

Blamed by her family for being irrita-ble and short-tempered at times, shewas later diagnosed with early signs ofdementia – a chronic syndrome charac-terised by a slow decline in memory,personality and overall functioning ofan individual and on the rise amongyoung Indians.

"There is a definitive surge in thenumber of young Indians diagnosedwith dementia at an early age. Depres-sion is setting at a young age in Indianswhich results in less interest in work anddisturbance in the food and sleep pat-terns leading to memory decline," saidDr. Mohinish Bhatjiwale, director (neu-rosurgery and neurosciences) at Nana-vati Super Specialty Hospital inMumbai, in an email.

Dr. Atul Prasad, director and seniorconsultant (neurology) at BLK SuperSpecialty Hospital in New Delhi, agreed:"Yes there is a surge in young patients –both men and women with memory-re-lated problems."

Latha, who often complained aboutfatigue, poor memory and feeling low,was prescribed a small mood stabiliserdose by Dr Prasad along with somelifestyle changes.

Within weeks, her mood swings im-proved and in a span of six months,there were no further complaints ofmemory disturbances.

According to Dr. Sunil Mittal, directorat Cosmos Institute of Mental Healthand Behavioural Sciences (CIMBS), inNew Delhi, many factors contribute to-wards dementia, some being genetic,others environmental.

"While we have little control over ourgenetic predisposition, what we cer-tainly can do is to make the best of whatwe have in our hands," Mittal explained.

A recent US study found that womenwho reported problems with their mem-ory were 70 percent more likely to be di-agnosed with mild cognitiveimpairment or dementia decades later.

Normal memory problems includetaking several minutes to recall wherethe car is parked, forgetting to call afriend back, putting things down andbeing unable to find them soon after orforgetting the name of someone youhave just met.

"Stress, grief and lack of sleep can alsoaffect memory, as can trying to do toomany things at once," said the authors

Health

Mind theMemoryDementia is affecting a rising number of young peopleacross the country. Can it be checked?


in the journal Neurology.Dementia, however, is not a specific

disease. It is an overall term that de-scribes a wide range of symptoms asso-ciated with a decline in memory orother thinking skills severe enough to re-duce a person's ability to perform every-day activities. Alzheimer's diseaseaccounts for 60 to 80 percent of suchcases.

If you have symptoms like findingmulti-tasking increasingly difficult,problems negotiating familiar places,such as you regularly can't find your ve-hicle in the car park, forgetting thenames of close relatives and friends orproblem in recognising faces, colours,shapes and the like, it needs to be at-tended.

It is important to detect early signs ofmild cognitive impairment which canbe a red flag for onset of dementia. Oncedetected, to prevent progression of de-mentia is also important," Mittal noted.

Keeping the mind active with atten-tion enhancing tasks and cognitive tasks

goes a long way in preventing dementia.Leading a healthy lifestyle with bal-

anced diet, moderate exercise andhealthy coping with stress can go a longway in preventing dementia.

"Certain other medical conditions likeobesity, high blood pressure, high cho-lesterol, heart disease and stroke canalso be risk factors for dementia," Mittalstressed, adding: "Therefore, it is ex-tremely important to keep them undercheck with regular follow-up and propertreatment."

"After all, a healthy mind and healthybody go hand-in-hand," he said.

"Children are affected more owing toparental conflict at home and emotionaldisturbance which renders them emo-tionally dry. It is extremely important tohave a mix of positive environment,emotions and lifestyle to develop astrong and long-lasting memory,"Bhatjiwale suggested.

Can singing improve memory inyoungsters already diagnosed with earlystages of dementia?

"Participating in musical activitiescan help individuals with dementiaboost their self esteem and prevent so-cial isolation. Musical tasks can be ahealthy exercise for the mind whilebeing a pleasant and enjoyable experi-ence at the same time," explained Dr.Shobhana Mittal, a consultant psychia-trist at CIMBS.

The mind is like your body and it is upto you how much you make it work."Playing Sudoku, Bridge and other suchmind-related games helps sharpen yourmind and memory," advised Dr. Ra-jshekhar Reddi, a leading neurologistfrom Max Hospitals.

Dementia can be avoided by having apositive attitude towards life, living in anatural environment with less pollutionand more exposure to oxygen.

"A well-balanced lifestyle with regularpractice of yoga and proper hydrationcan also go a long way in avoiding de-mentia. Happier people have a bettermemory, after all," Bhatjiwale con-cluded. n


While "net neutrality" and itsensuing debate kept Indianpolicymakers and the social

media busy for most part of the year,what took the country to the centrestage was a statement from social net-working giant Facebook's founder MarkZuckerberg that if the world needs to beconnected then it is very important toconnect the billion-plus people in India.

"It is central to our plans of connect-ing the next billion people and then thewhole world," Zuckerberg said duringthe town hall meeting held at the IndianInstitute of Technology (IIT) in NewDelhi in October during his maiden visitto India.

Facebook rechristened its free inter-net platform internet.org – which it de-veloped in conjunction with RelianceCommunications Network – as "FreeBasics by Facebook" in September.Today, nearly 15 million people in 24 na-tions have access to internet as a resultof Facebook's free internet efforts.

Although India has no regulations yeton "net neutrality" a draft report on thisfrom the department of telecommuni-cations (DoT) is with the governmentfor clearance.

"Net neutrality" means that govern-ments and internet service providerstreat all data on the internet equally and,therefore, not differentially charge users,content, platforms, sites, applications ormode of communication.

Amid the debate, Satya Nadella, theIndian-born chief executive of US-basedtechnology major Microsoft, visitedIndia in November and announced astring of partnerships, programmes andproducts to help Indian organisationsand governments explore uncharteredbusiness areas and enrich customer andcitizen experiences.

Referring to the newly launched localMicrosoft Cloud, Nadella said during aconference in Mumbai: "With MicrosoftCloud and Surface Pro 4, our customershere in India have the digital technologythey need to seize incredible newgrowth and opportunity on a globalscale."

Just a month back in San Francisco,top Oracle executive Thomas Kurian an-nounced that the leading cloud servicesprovider fully supports the latest digitalinitiatives launched by the Indian gov-ernment.

"Oracle is committed towards PrimeMinister Narendra Modi's ambitious'Digital India' initiative. In the days tocome, the world will see Oracle invest-ing in more Indian cities to open newproduct development centres," Indian-born Kurian, Oracle's president of prod-

uct development, announced.Oracle has already hired 2,300 engi-

neers in product development in Indiathis year. The company has 12 develop-ment centres in India, including facili-ties in many emerging cities likeVijayawada, Thiruvananthapuram,Noida and Ahmedabad.

Cloud computing is a general term forthe delivery of hosted services over theInternet. It enables companies to con-sume compute resources as a utility –

just like electricity – rather than havingto build and maintain computing infra-structures in-house.

When it came to wearable technologyin India, the year saw some tough com-petition to the leader Apple. While Applesmartwatch was finally launched inIndia this year, at around Rs.30,000, itstill burnt a hole in people's pocket.

Later this year, Lenovo-owned Mo-torola introduced five new variants of itsandroid wear Moto 360 (2nd Gen) col-

Technology

Taking toNew Tech From smart watches to Mobile Wallet to drones, Indiaincreasingly adopted and adapted to the cutting edgeof the digital age over the course of past year


lection for the Indian consumers.The Rs.19,999 Moto 360 smartwatch

gives users complete control right fromthe wrist so you can stay in the momentwithout constantly grabbing your phonefrom your pocket or purse.

The new Gear 2 smartwatch fromSamsung was also billed as an evolvedsmartwatch that can be used to answercalls while driving.

Titan, India's largest watchmaker, alsoannounced a "smartwatch" jointly de-signed and built with global computingmajor HP Inc in India and select inter-national markets by December.

Although Apple launched twoiPhones with new touch technology, a13-inch iPad and an enhanced Apple TVthis year, its smartwatch – especiallyWatch OS 2.0 – is still an ultimate wear-able experience.

Not just smartwatches, Panasoniclaunched a wearable, ultra-compact,lightweight and tough camera for the In-dian market in November.

Next tech trend that took the countryby storm this year was the launch of"Mobile Wallet" or "credit card killer" assome referred it to.

Although still in a nascent stage, theconcept of "Mobile Wallet" took rapidlyon the psyche of the Indian consumers– making it one of the most lucrativestart-up avenue this year.

While the mobile payment solutionsprovider Paytm alone claims to have 20million active users, MobiKwik has 12million users. Other key "Mobile Wallet"players are Citrus Pay, Oxigen, mRupeeand Snapdeal's Freecharge and the listis growing.

According to the research firmRNCOS, the current Indian market sizefor m-wallet stands at about Rs.350crore and is estimated to rise to Rs.1,210crore by 2019.

While drones or Unmanned Aerial Ve-hicles (UAVs) took to new skies theworld over this year – not just for deliv-ering pizzas but to perform some keytasks from the battlefield to assessingclimate change – India too appearedready to utilise the technology.

According to media reports, India isset to launch an ambitious project called"Project Ghatak" to develop its ownstealth combat drones or UCAVs (un-manned combat aerial vehicles).

Initiated by the Aeronautical Develop-ment Agency-DRDO combine in con-sultation with the Indian Air Force (IAF),these drones will be capable of firingmissiles and precision-guided muni-tions at enemy targets and then return-ing to home bases to re-arm for furthermissions.

GAIL (India) Ltd is set to use dronesand satellite imagery to map and moni-

tor its pipeline network while expandingits partner scheme to detect/prevent en-croachment and terror attack threats.

Two emerging international trendswill be worth mentioning here: "Internetof Things" and "Virtual Reality" that willsure catch up with the Indian massessoon.

For a layman, "Internet of Things" isbasically connecting any device with anon and off switch to the internet –smartphones, headphones, coffee mak-ers, air-conditioner, television, washingmachines, lamps, wearable devices andalmost anything else you can think of.

According to the global analyst firmGartner, there will be over 26 billionconnected devices by 2020 across theworld. Move over video games as theyear has already been heralded as theyear of Virtual Reality (VR) – a technol-ogy that uses a computer to create asimulated three-dimensional (3D)world.

Technology bigwigs such as Samsung,Facebook and Sony are set to launchtheir VR headsets. Facebook – that ac-quired VR giant Oculus – will launch"Rift" early next year, followed by theHTC Vive and Sony's PlayStation VR inApril. Not just the workplace, the VRsoftware can also help such sectors ashealth, education, architecture and de-fence. n


Skrillex, Afrojack, Slash, MichaelLearns to Rock, Mogwai andMegadeth. The live music calen-

dar for 2015 was long and diverse with aplethora of artists from across the globe,who mesmerised sold-out crowds atgigs, festivals and events in India thisyear. Some of the best – David Guettaand Fatboy Slim – of course, had beenkept for the last.

With an unprecedented surge in in-ternational festivals and concerts, musicaficionados got the chance to witnesssome of the world's biggest names fromdiverse genres such as EDM (ElectronicDance Music), rock, jazz and heavymetal on the home turf in 2015. Andthere was also a surprise from Cold-play's Chris Martin.

EDM has definitely taken the cake, asfar as music genres are concerned. Sun-burn, India's premier electronic musicfestival, featured Grammy Award-win-ning DJ and music producer Afrojack atSunburn Arena, and had scheduled hostGuetta, Martin Garrix, KSHMR as head-lining acts in Goa at the end of thismonth.

The idea is to bring new sounds andfresh projects to consumers every year,said Harindra Singh, vice chairman andmanaging director, Percept Ltd.

"Each year our consumer research,marketing and production team re-search the artists, new production expe-riences and consumer experiences toensure that we give a truly global expe-rience to our fans. We are in constanttouch with the international artists andtheir agencies to experiment with newsounds and new projects and we bringto the country the absolute best," Singhexplained.

He said that while "dance music is awell-established concept worldwide,India is waking up to it only now andembracing it fully".

Even on the heavy metal front, anarray of artists such as Megadeth, Na-palm Death, Demilich, Anatomia, Car-cass, Inquisition, Hacktivist andCannibal Corpse among others madetheir appearances in the country at dif-ferent heavy metal festivals.

Kunal Choksi, owner of Mumbai-based heavy metal record label Tran-scending Obscurity, attributed thisgrowth to "awareness and promotion".

"The fact is that organisers here areactually making an effort to get in touchwith bands of their choice, and invitingthem to play shows in the country. In thepast, this remained a dream for most,"Choksi noted.

Devraj Sanyal, managing director andCEO, Universal Music Group South Asia,

Music

GoingGlobal Indian music lovers swayed tomore international live actslast year than ever before

says the surge of international acts tour-ing India has a lot to do with internet ex-posure to such bands.

"Our audiences are now exposed tomusic all over the globe at the very sametime as it's launched out there. Sec-ondly, unlike earlier, clubs and hangoutspots in metros now play internationalmusic much more than they ever usedto," Sanyal pointed out.

Post-rock too got a boost with bandslike Mogwai and Explosions in the Skyperforming for packed audiences thisyear.

"It is amazing for both of us to be herein such a short span of time. I think thisshows that the kind of music Mogwai, usand a couple of other bands from Japanhave been playing holds great interestand people are excited to see and hearthis kind of music," Explosions in the

Sky's guitarist Munaf Rayani stated.Jaideep Singh, senior vice president

and business head, LIVE Viacom18,credits "startup entrepreneurs" and"entry of big organised corporate play-

ers" for the growth of internationalmusic, especially dance music, in India.

"Initial five years were more of spo-radic events happening across the coun-try in a few major cities which set thebed rock of the explosive growth wit-nessed in the last few years," Singh said.

However, Sandesh Shenoy, organiserof Bangalore's Trendslaughter Fest andowner of Cyclopean Eye Records, ex-pressed belief that there is still quitesome work left to be done in the extrememetal sphere.

"Even though we have seen a surge inthe popularity of extreme metal in therecent years, the genre still largely re-mains underground. Barring a few com-mercial metal acts like Cannibal Corpsefor example, extreme metal seems tohave a rather limited and diminishingaudience," Shenoy concluded. n


"The fact is that organisershere are actually making aneffort to get in touch withbands of their choice, andinviting them to play shows inthe country. In the past, thisremained a dream for most" – Kunal Choksi, owner ofTranscending Obscurity, aMumbai-based heavy metalrecord label

In a nutshell:n Overall, a very positive year for

international music in India.

n A lot of big artists from acrossgenres performed this year, withspecial mention to Chris Martinfrom Coldplay, who gave an im-promptu performance in Delhi.

n Music festivals got a big boostwith great crowds. The Skrillexshow in Gurgaon, for example,reportedly had around 10,000people dancing to the DJ'stunes.

n Heavy metal music got a greatboost with the advent of musicfestivals like BIG69, CultFest,Trendslaughter Fest and Banga-lore Open Air, which broughtseveral big names from theglobal metal movement to Indiafor the first time.


Indian cricket went through another disheartening year both on andoff the field, starting with the national side failing to defend its WorldCup title to Indian Premier League (IPL) sides Chennai Super Kings

(CSK) and Rajasthan Royals (RR) being suspended by the Supreme Court-appointed Justice Lodha Committee in the spot fixing and betting scan-dal.

Co-hosts India who had won the World title after 28 years in 2011 underthe leadership of Mahendra Singh Dhoni, failed to defend it in March2015, as the visitors went down to Australia in the semi-finals by a bigmargin. Co-hosts Australia went on to clinch their fifth World title beatingNew Zealand.

More than the Cup loss that shook the sport in the country was whenthe cash-rich Twenty20 tournament saw a new low with its star-studdedteams being suspended for two years.

Both franchise's officials and co-owner Gurunath Meiyappan and RajKundra, both of whom were earlier found guilty of betting, were sus-pended for life from any cricketing activity undertaken by the Board ofControl for Cricket in India (BCCI).

Following the suspension, the game's governing body in the countryhad to bring in two new teams (Pune and Rajkot) for the tournament tomake it a competitive one.

Besides controversies surrounding the game off the field in the country,the national team's on-field performance too began on a wrong note atthe start of the year with India somehow managing a draw against hostsAustralia in fourth and final Test, eventually losing the series 0-2.

This was soon followed by a dismal show in the tri-series involving Eng-land and hosts Australia where the Dhoni-led side failed to win a singlematch.

The loss was followed by heartbreak for millions back home as two-time World Cup winners failed to defend their title on foreign soil.

Next up was the flamboyant T20 league in the country which paved theway for both fans and players to start afresh. Mumbai Indians clinchedtheir second IPL crown beating CSK at the iconic Eden Gardens.

But the Indian team's misery continued as they went down to well-or-ganised hosts Bangladesh 1-2 in the ODI series after drawing the loneTest.

Next it was a chance for the youngsters to prove a point as the teamflew to Zimbabwe for three-match ODI series where they won all threeand managed to win one and lost one in T20 encounter.

India then toured Sri Lanka for a three-match Test series where the vis-itors came out victories 2-1.

It was followed by over two-month-long South Africa tour of Indiawhich started on a disappointing note as the hosts lost both the T20 andODI series.

The longest format of the game was left to restore some pride and the

Sports

BatteredSeasonControversies and losses far outnumberedmoments of glory in Indian cricket last year


four-match Test series saw India make the best use of thehome conditions, by producing rank turners to outplaythe Proteas 3-0 in style.

The pitch in Nagpur was the centre of all controversies,as critics across the globe hit back at India for producingsuch unplayable conditions.

Swashbuckling batsman Yuvraj Singh made a come-back to the Indian team after more than a year when hewas named in the Indian T20 squad for the limited-oversseries in Australia next month.

The left-hander returned to national reckoning thanksto a series of impressive performances in the Vijay Hazaretrophy, including a scintillating 83-ball 98 against Serviceswhich helped Punjab qualify for the knockout stages ofthe tournament.

The country saw plenty of controversies off the fieldduring the year, with the acrimonious relationship be-tween India and Pakistan resulting in the proposed bilat-eral series being cancelled.

The BCCI and the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) hadsigned an MoU last year, agreeing to play a total of six bi-lateral series between 2015 and 2023. The first of thesewere to be hosted by the PCB in the United Arab Emirates(UAE) last month.

But with BCCI president Shashank Manohar reluctantto play in the UAE, the PCB agreed to host a limited-oversseries in Sri Lanka. The BCCI asked the Indian govern-ment to play the series.

But the government did not come up with a decision,which ultimately led to the series being cancelled.

Allegations of corruption within the Delhi and DistrictsCricket Association (DDCA) also created a storm with theDelhi government launching a probe into the body's fi-nancial affairs.

The ruling Aam Admi Party (AAP) accused formerDDCA president Arun Jaitley of overseeing massive finan-cial irregularities during his 13-year tenure which endedin 2013 and demanded his resignation as Union FinanceMinister.

Former India player Kirti Azad also held a press meetwhere he alleged that the DDCA gave contracts to fakecompanies, paying them crores of rupees in cash and hadfudged the audit of accounts.

He also played a video produced by WikiLeaks4Indiawhich claimed that some of the companies favoured bythe DDCA had given fictitious addresses.

Addressing the media with former India captain BishanSingh Bedi, Azad sought an investigation by the Enforce-ment Directorate into the working of the DDCA.

The row led Jaitley to file a defamation suit in the DelhiHigh Court against Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal andfive other AAP leaders, seeking Rs.10 crore in damages.

Above all, keeping aside all controversies surroundingthe game, history was made in the world of cricket whenfor the first time in the international level a day and nightTest match was played between hosts Australia and NewZealand with the help of pink ball in Adelaide in Novem-ber. Thousands turned up to witness the game take giantsteps to the next level.

The year also saw Australia speedster Mitchell Johnsonretire from the game after a successful 10-year-long ca-reer.

Johnson, the country's fourth highest Test wicket-takerfinished his career with 313 Test wickets behind only Den-nis Lillee (355), Glenn McGrath (563) and Shane Warne(708) on the list of Australia's greatest wicket-takers. n


The Maldives can take one’sbreath away. The gently sway-ing palm trees, the talcum

white sand beaches and an emerald seaon which the sunlight dances – all havequite a mesmerising effect on the eye ofthe beholder.

As the aircraft eases down at Male, thecapital of the Maldives, the view is pic-ture-postcard perfect. As much as theaircraft's small window permits, thewarm tropical paradise is alluring. Nowonder, the excitement among the pas-sengers, particularly the honeymooners,is palpable.

The sea colour is striking. Closer tothe island is a distinct green of light jade,which turns a deep blue a bit furtheraway.

The Maldives has some 1,200 islands,separated into a series of coral atolls.The country lies just north of the Equa-tor in the Indian Ocean. For Indians, it isone of those countries where visa isgranted on arrival. So, you just need tocarry your passport and catch a flight.

It has a tropical climate where theyear is separated into two main seasonsby the monsoons – hottest in April andcoolest in December. The best time tovisit is between December and Aprilwhen the weather is sunny, with clearskies, low humidity and excellent waterclarity.

A number of gorgeous private islandresorts, including two stunning proper-ties run by Club Med, dot this archipel-ago of the Maldives.

The sea is a few steps away from Maleairport as boats await to ferry passen-

Travel

A Sprinklingof ParadiseThe Maldives could be the best bet for Indiansseeking the perfect island holiday


gers to one of the resorts. The fresh,bracing air and the fine water spray asthe catamaran cuts through the sea athigh speeds, making a superb beginningto the holiday.

Holidaying in the Maldives is an en-chanting experience, exotic in all its as-pects. With abundant sea life, naturalbeauty, pleasant temperatures andsandy beaches, it is renowned as a trop-ical paradise. The memorable add-onsinclude swimming, fishing, water-ski-ing, snorkelling, scuba diving, kiteboarding and windsurfing.

Snorkelling is an experience in itselfwith the clear sea offering a high visibil-ity. Take a boat ride to one of the spots,wear your flippers and gear and jumpinto the inviting sea. A look down is likebeing in a giant aquarium, with multi-coloured fish gliding through the water.

Passing through a school of fish is an

exhilarating experience. One feels likestaying on and on in the water, but forthe gentle prodding from the diving ex-perts who accompany the group.

The corals here are straight out of sci-ence books. All shapes, sizes and coloursof these fragile marine invertebrates canbe spotted on the sea bed, with the sunrays illuminating them.

For the more adventurous type, para-sailing is another option. A high-speedboat will pull a bright coloured para-chute on which you are strapped andyou just go up and up with the wind. Inno time, you are looking at a wide ex-panse. To call the view stunning – wherethe sea meets the sky at the distant hori-zon – would be a major understatement.

The water villas, with plenty of oomphfactor, look like small huts. The beautifulresorts seem to be from la-la land.

There are hosts of other options – laze

around on a sun bed, gaze at the sea,soak in the bright sunshine and takelong walks on the beaches to feel thewhite sand that just cascades throughthe toes, taking away all your worries.

WHAT TO CARRY?The Maldives is characteristically

warm and sunny. It is best to pack light,airy cottons or linens in sober brightcolours. Sunscreen (SPF 15 or greater) isa must and so are swimming trunks,thanks to serene, inviting beaches andpools. Slippers or loafers and a hat orscarf should complete the summery en-semble.

A number of Indians are visiting theMaldives as it is just about two hours offlight time away from Bengaluru. Justpack your bags and head to this nationof islands. It will leave you refreshed,and rejuvenated – to the promised"sunny side of life". n


In the backdrop of the recentlyconcluded COP21 talks in Paris, asnations across the world discussed

ways to tackle the monster called cli-mate change, back home, India'sfavourite beverage, tea, is facing somemajor challenges as a result of it – fromlow yield to new pests.

Scientists at Assam's Tocklai Tea Re-search Institute (TRI) say that erratic

Agriculture

Under StressClimate change is taking a toll on the quantity and

quality of tea produced in the country

rainfall over the years is a major concernfor the tea industry. The first flush – theearly leaves which are delicate and havea gentle aroma – which is harvestedmid-March, has been affected by thechanging rain patterns.

R.N. Bhagat, one of the scientists atTocklai, said: "In the last 100 years inAssam, we have lost around 22.1 cm ofrainfall. With this decrease and a shiftin rainfall distribution, the tea indus-try is losing the first flush that comesin March-April. Spraying of fertilizersis timed with the rainfall pattern, butwith no rain, the fertilizers have no im-pact."

Then again, with no rain, the relativehumidity in March-April is also lower-ing, further affecting the first flush. "Itused to be 80 percent, but in 2015 it wasrecorded around 52-54 percent," Bhagatnoted.

In a discussion organised by the Cen-tre for Environment Education and TheThird Pole under the Indian HimalayasClimate Adaptation Programme(IHCAP), Bhagat said that tea is a self-adapting plant and has been sustainingrising temperatures – the summer sawmore than 35 degrees Celsius, while teagrows ideally between 13-30 degrees C.

Even then, it cannot tackle all changes– like a spurt in new pests as a result ofchanging weather patterns.

N. Muraleedharan, director of Tocklai,said: "White flies is a new species of pestwhich has been reported mostly fromthe Assam belt. It is minute and travelsin hoards. There has also been increasein pests like thrips, tea mosquitoes, scaleinsects and green hoppers, as a result ofwhich the intensity of damage on tea ismore."

"As a result of change in weather pat-terns, there is a decrease in leaf qualitytoo," he went on to say.

What all of this translates into is pro-duction being affected. And to increaseproduction, the tea managements gen-erally use more chemicals, leading tomore biotic stress on the plant. Accord-ing to the scientists, there are two kindsof stress – abiotic (drought, flood) andbiotic (pests and the like caused by floodand drought).

"This also means that the total pro-duction cost of the tea estates is increas-ing. Earlier Rs.4,000-5,000 was used forpesticides, per hectare. Now it has goneup to Rs.20,000-25,000. Irrigation costshave also increased," Bhagat said.

With such multi-pronged challenges

being thrown at tea by changing envi-ronmental conditions, scientists arenow working on developing clones thatwould have the best chances of survivalin the future.

"We have simulated future scenariosof climatic conditions, like higher car-bon dioxide, and are looking at how teaplants behave. In one or one and a halfyears' time, we should be able to an-nounce future clones to the industry,"Bhagat said.

Scientists also developed a seed-stockthat is drought resistant and released itin September on an experimental basis,which got good results.

The changing climatic conditions andmore pests have also steered many gar-dens into adopting indigenous plantsthat are naturally repel tea-harming in-sects. "In this matter, organic tea ismuch more climate resilient than thechemical version. And its demand ishigh too. But it is more expensive," Mu-raleedharan said.

So, it is an uncertain future for thesteaming cup of 'chai' in your hands.But, as experts keep brainstorming tokeep the deluge of problems from thetea plants, the good news is that all hopeis not lost. Not yet. n


The much-hyped and antici-pated "The Force Awakens" isthe seventh chapter of the

Galactic epic "Star Wars" which is mag-nificently mounted. Filled with a widevariety of perfectly-paced set actionpieces, it simply dazzles. The saga be-gins on a familiar note, "Long time agoin a galaxy far, far away", followed by aninformational scroll which gives an in-sight into the Galactic War and the riseof the evil First Order from the remainsof the fallen Galactic Empire.

After the destruction of the secondDeath Star, Luke Skywalker, the last Jediwho vanished 30 years ago, is thought tobe a myth by the next generation.

This edition follows a Stormtrooper,FN-2187 (John Boyega) also known asFinn, whose conscience does not permithim to follow the diktats of the FirstOrder now commanded by Kylo Ren(Adam Driver).

His chance meeting with the Resist-ance Pilot Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac)on the planet Jakku, followed by help-ing him escape from Kylo's clutches,leads Finn on to fight against the evilforces and thereby search for the lastJedi.

With a thin derivative story that lacks

imagination, director J.J. Abrams'sscript, co-written by Lawrence Kasdanand Michael Arndt, is an action-packeddrama with a fair amount of humourthrown in. It feels like a rehash of theoriginal trilogy and is a bit disappoint-ing. But with unexpected twists and re-visiting some old characters makes, thenarration interesting.

The script suffers from heavy exposi-tion, as well as an overdose of long-drawn action sequences, that makesviewing a fatigued experience.

The performances of every characterare stereotypical and everyone has a de-cent amount of screen time to shine. Butit is the line-up of new individuals whoadd to the film's novelty factor.

John Boyega as Finn is earnestly con-vincing. He is enigmatic, as well ascharismatic as the disillusionedStormtrooper who must figure out whathe believes in and then choose to findthe strength to fight for it.

Daisy Ridley, as the scavenger who as-sists Finn in his endeavour, is energeticand lively. She, with a combination ofelectrifying looks and down-to-earth ac-cessibility, is swift and graceful in her ac-tion scenes. Her character gets a bouncewhen she realises that she is endowed

with some interesting powers, unfortu-nately, this mystery is not explained inthe narration.

The duo are ably supported by Harri-son Ford as Han Solo, Peter Mayhew ashis buddy Chewbacca, along with AdamDriver as Kylo Ren and Andy Serkis asthe Supreme Leader Snoke.

But it is the circular red and whiterobot, droit BB-8, voiced by variousmembers of the cast, who steals theshow with its anthropomorphised act.Also, it is the appealing character namedMaz Kanata wonderfully voiced byLupita Nyong'o, who is worth a men-tion.

Shuttling between vast sand dunesand elaborate spaceships, Dan Mindel'scinematography captures the dramawith flourish. His frames are picture per-fect and his camera movements aresmooth. They seamlessly merge withcomputer generated images which areadroitly lined up by the editors,Maryann Brandon and Mary Jo Markey.The 3D effects as well as John Williams'music naturally enhances the viewingexperience.

Overall, the film is not to be missed by"Star Wars" fans and lovers of adventureand sci-fiction. n

Movie Review

'Star Wars: The Force Awakens' -A visual magnum opus

Troy Ribeiro

Director: J.J. Abrams; Cast: Harrison Ford, Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, Adam Driver,Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, Oscar Isaac, Andy Serkis, Domhnall Gleeson, Anthony

Daniels, Peter Mayhew and Max Von Sydow; Rating: ***1/2


Bollywood

Ajay Devgn tries toovercome his 'fear of heights'Actor-filmmaker Ajay Devgn, who is returning to

the director's chair with “Shivaay”, got a chance totry and overcome his fear of heights while shooting forthe upcoming film.

Ajay, who has starred in action movies like “Singham”,“Singham Returns” and “Action Jackson”, took to Twitterrecently to share a photograph of himself hanging froma cliff in the picturesque locales of Landour, a small can-tonment town contiguous with Mussoorie.

“Trying to overcome my fear of heights, do you guysthink this will help?” Ajay captioned the image.

“Shivaay” is Ajay's second venture as a director, afterhis 2008 movie “U Me Aur Hum”. Sayesha Saigal, who isthe grand niece of legendary actor Dilip Kumar and SairaBanu, has been roped in to play the female lead in thefilm. British child actor Abigail Eames will essay the roleof Ajay's daughter in the film. "Shivaay", which beganfilming in Mussourie in November, will hit the screenson Diwali 2016. n

SunnyLeone isstunning:PriyankaActress Priyanka Chopra, who will next be

seen in Prakash Jha's forthcoming film "JaiGangaajal", says that standing next to the formerIndo-Canadian adult film star Sunny Leone makesher look "bad" as the latter is "stunning". "I lovehow things ar sensationalised out of context!Standing and taking pics with Sunny Leone makesme look bad cause she is stunning! Lol!" Priyankatweeted recently

Earlier this week it was reported that the "Quan-tico" star did not wish to be photographed with the"Jism 2" actress.

Sunny, who is prepping up for director Milap Za-veri's upcoming sex-comedy "Mastizaade", whereshe will perform a double role, said she "feels thesame" about Priyanka.

"I feel the same about you darling," Sunny toldPriyanka in a tweet. "Media can be mean some-times. They just wish it was them taking pics withyou. Lol xoxo." n


Hollywood

Kylie sparks rumoursof engagementReality TV star Kylie Jenner has sparked rumours that

she's engaged to her boyfriend and rapper Tyga after sheshared a photograph of a huge sparkler on her ring finger. The 18-year-old shared the photograph on Instagram, reportsaceshowbiz.com.

Kylie wore the new sparkler on her right hand while she held ontothe steering wheel of her car. She captioned the image with only aSanta emoji. While she didn't address the engagement rumour, Kylieposted a second image of the diamond ring on her Twitter later that day."Merry Christmas," she wrote alongside a heart emoji. n

Steve Harvey makes funof his Miss Universe gaffe

TV host and comedian Steve Harvey, who made head-lines after he mistakenly announced the wrong con-

testant as Miss Universe 2015 winner, made fun of hisembarrassing blunder, wishing his fans “merry Easter” onChristmas.

The message came with a photograph of the 58-year-old smoking a cigar while making a peace sign with hishand, reports aceshowbiz.com.

"Merry Easter y'all!" he wrote alongside decoratedChristmas tree emojis. Harvey made headlines lastweek after he mistakenly gave the Miss Universe crownto Miss Colombia Ariadna Gutierrez-Arevalo whileMiss Philippines Pia Alonzo Wurtzbach was the actualwinner.

Following the incident, he apologised multiple timesbut the internet seemingly still enjoys making fun ofthe "Family Feud" host in numerous memes that havelanded online in the past few days. Despite the gaffe,Harvey is expected to return to next year's Miss Uni-verse. n


Book Review

Was "familiarity" the only reason whyIndia adopted a parliamentary systemof governance? In his book "Why India

Needs the Presidential System", author BhanuDhamija, himself a publisher, seeks to answer thisquestion, while extending some radical thoughts onhow we should be governed.

"The Indian system began to break down almostimmediately after Independence, because the pow-ers of its two topmost officials were poorly defined,"says Dhamija, 56, a non-resident Himachali, whilecalling for a federal setup instead givenIndia's diversity, sizeand communal divi-sions.

"The truth is the In-dians adopted theBritish parliamentarysystem for poor andunsubstantiated rea-sons. Vallabbhai Patel,the first leader to at-tempt a justification ofthis system in India'sConstituent Assembly,could come up withonly one reason: Fa-miliarity."

Dhamija, who is analumunus of PunjabUniversity in Chandi-garh and the SternSchool of Business,New York University,and has lived half hislife in the US, says thatthe centralised, uni-tary control that theparliamentary systemoffers does not workfor India.

According to him,the architect of theConstitution of IndiaBhimrao Ramji Ambedkar alluded to two main ben-efits of the parliamentary system in the ConstituentAssembly -- one that it had the potential for “moreresponsible" governments and the other of a"strong centre".

He seeks to suggest how the benefits were not justunrealistic, but also impracticable. He also goes onto state that Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime min-

ister, almost single-handedly picked this system ofgovernment, but never really bothered to explainhis choice in the assembly.

"One of the astonishing stories about the makingof the Indian Constitution is in a joint meeting ofNehru's Union Constitution Committee and Patel'sProvincial Constitution Committee on 11 June 1947,Nehru was asked by a resolution to reconsider hisdecision."

While Ambedkar, he says, was the chief defenderof the parliamentary system, he came on the scene

only after the decisionto adopt this systemhad already beentaken. Prior to his ap-pointment as chair-man of the DraftingCommittee, he had al-ways opposed this sys-tem.

"Ambedkar wouldbecome the firstframer to disown thissystem. During a de-bate in the RajyaSabha in 1953 he said:'My friends tell me Ihave made the Consti-tution. But I am quiteprepared to say that Ishall be the first per-son to burn it out. I donot want it. It does notsuit anybody.'"

Even VallabhbhaiPatel, the first homeminister and deputyprime minister ofIndia, and Muham-mad Ali Jinnah, the fa-ther of Pakistan, alsorecommended a dif-ferent system of gover-nance, even asMahatma Gandhi

favoured a system based on village panchayats."How the concentration of power in a Central

government created a 'strong' government? Whatmade a national government 'strong' in a large di-verse nation, a union based on willing participationof units, or one based on force?" he queries.

"As India's constitution was being adopted, it wasquite evident that it had failed to inspire." n

Why India needs a presidential systemArvind Padmanabhan

Title: Why India Needs the Presidential System; Author: Bhanu Dhamija;Publisher: Harper Collins; Pages: 384; Price: Rs.550

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Documents

SPEAKS YOUR MIND A House of CARDS - India First e … YOUR MIND NAVEEN REMAINS UNTOUCHABLE ... Akhilesh Yadav removed Ompal Nehra, a senior official who enjoyed the status of a minister,