Literacy rate doubles in 40 years in Punjab

From 34.1% in 1971, it rose to 76.7% in 2011

Ludhiana, June 24
In a positive step, the literacy rate in Punjab has almost doubled in the past about 40 years. Though four decades seem to be a long time to make improvements in the education system, the latest data with the Census Department show that the literacy rate in the state has increased to 76.7 per cent from 34.1 per cent in 1971.

The previous survey on literacy was conducted in 1971. Almost 75 per cent of the total population of Punjab is now literate. The literacy rate among men is 81.5 per cent while it is 71.3 per cent among women.

Hoshiarpur district with 85.4 per cent has the highest literacy rate. The district having least literacy rate is Mansa with just 62.8 per cent literate population.

In Hoshiarpur, maximum urban women (85.4 per cent) are literate while the most literate urban men are in Mohali district (92.2 per cent), reveals the survey report.

US paying price of backing Islamic militants: Pak Prof

The role of the US in “fanning Islamic militancy” has been highlighted by a visiting Pakistani professor who was the star performer at a seminar sponsored by The Democracy Forum in London.

Nuclear physicist Dr Pervez Hoodbhoy, from Quaid-e-Azam University in Islamabad, was a keynote speaker at the seminar entitled ‘The role of education in combating terrorism’. In his view, the US has played a major role in contributing to the Islamic radicalisation that currently prevails in both Afghanistan and Pakistan.

His views were spelt out at the well attended function, chaired by Dr William Crawley of the Institute of Commonwealth Studies and addressed by The Democracy Forum head and British Conservative MP Stephen Hammond. Other participants included Professor Jack Spence from King’s

College, London, Shiraz Maher from the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation, Mushtak Parker, Editor of Islamic Banker magazine and retired ambassador and visiting professor at the Centre for Policy Research in New Delhi G Parthasarathy. The seminar was brought to a close by retired British Crown Court Judge Sir Mota Singh.

In his speech, Hoodbhoy started by commenting on the changes to the education curriculum in Pakistani schools, quoting from a 1995 primary education document published by Pakistan’s Ministry of Education.

The document states that after the completion of Class V, all children should be able to “understand Hindu Muslim differences and the resultant need for Pakistan”. “Children should be also able to understand India’s evil design against Pakistan,” it further says.

Other requirements for Class V graduates are to “acknowledge and identify forces that may be working against Pakistan” and to “make speeches on Jehad and Shahidat”.

At least as important, according to Hoodbhoy, was the earlier meddling of US government agencies like USAID and the CIA, encouraging Islamic radicalisation which shaped the world view of both young Pakistanis and their Afghan counterparts.

The US role in this process is especially relevant today as the Taliban stage a comeback in parts of Afghanistan in anticipation of the American pullback from the country in 2014. Squads of Taliban-backed morality police are active in provinces like Nuristan where they mete out Draconian punishments to anyone who watches television, listens to music or participates in any other types of activity deemed to be un-Islamic.

Back in the 1980s, the US government spent millions of dollars to produce educational textbooks for Afghan refugee children that were filled with violent images and militant teachings from the Koran.

Published by the University of Nebraska in the US, these textbooks were subsequently exported to the madrassas (schools) operating along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

“They distributed millions of Korans to madrassas with the aim of fanning radicalism,” Hoodbhoy explained. “It was viewed as the most efficient way of fighting the Soviet Union by putting this across as a religious war. The policy was evolved between the US and Pakistan and Saudi Arabia was the funder. But it was very close consultation between General Zia (Pakistan’s late president) and the CIA which conducted the biggest covert war in history (against the Soviet Union.)”

At the time, President Bush explained that some 10 million US-supplied books intended for Afghan school children would teach “respect for human dignity, instead of indoctrinating students with fanaticism and bigotry.”

Yet, the content in one of the mathematics textbooks written in Dari and Pushtu, read out by Hoodbhoy, included the following:

“One group of Mujahed attacks 50 Russian soldiers. In that attack, 20 Russians were killed. How many Russians fled?"

Another mathematics problem states: “A Kalashnikov bullet travels at 800 metres per second. A Mujahed has the forehead of a Russian in his sights 3,200 metres away. How many seconds will it take the bullet to hit the Russian’s forehead?”

Still another textbook publishes a verse from the Koran, followed by a tribute to the Mujahideen who are described as obedient to Allah and willing to sacrifice their wealth and life to impose Islamic law on the government.

From Rio to Rio, the world hasn’t taken a stride

A lot of high-flown rhetoric ushered in last week's UN Conference on Sustainable Development. Rio+20 was the biggest summit the UN had ever organised. Some 40,000 environmentalists and 10,000 government officials gathered with politicians from 190 nations for a meeting which the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said was "too important to fail".

But the reality at Rio was little different. A 50-page document, titled 'the future we want', had been negotiated and graveled upon, all before the arrival of the heads of states. The text was predictable. The document said it all, but nothing consequential.

The gathering, which has attracted more than a hundred world leaders, had promised to tackle poverty and damage to the natural world. But campaigners say few tangible measures have been agreed. And they have denounced the final text.

So does Rio+20 signal the end of global consensus and action on environmental issues?

I remember June of 1992 in Rio de Janeiro vividly. The occasion was the world conference on environment and development. A large number of people had come out on the streets. They were protesting the arrival of George Bush senior, the then president of the US. Just before coming to the conference, Bush had visited a local shopping centre urging people to buy more so that the increased worldwide consumption could rescue his country from the prevailing financial crisis. Protesters were angered by his statement that "the American lifestyle is not negotiable". People wanted change in the way the world did business with the environment. They demanded that George Bush signed the climate convention and agreed to take on tough emission reductions. The mood was expectant, upbeat and pushy.

In June of 2012, the mood in Rio de Janeiro was markedly different. This time, as well, top leaders had come from the grand shopping market of G-20, where they stopped to discuss ways to spend more to get the world economic engines going. In fact many - from Barack Obama to Angela Merkel and David Cameron -- did not even bother to show up. Their countries are in the grips of elections and economic meltdowns and priorities have changed. They clearly have no time for issues like a melting and self-destructing Planet.

So, this time, in Rio the effort was to conclude business and do this as efficiently and painlessly as possible. This time as well civil society groups marched on the streets and gathered to furiously discuss a brave new world. Their venue was the people's summit - located some one hour away from where the officials were gathered. But they found that their voice, however loud, did not reach the negotiators. Instead, this time, civil society was conveniently mainstreamed into the process as representatives of major groups were given space to speak inside the negotiating rooms. This time, there was no need to shout it would seem. So, it would seem.

But the fact is that the final document has left the world cold and hungry. It will do little to solve the world's urgent interlinked crisis of economy and ecology. We know that the world has run out of time and certainly of ideas to dead with its current paradigm of growth, which is based on an unsustainable consumption pattern and lifestyle of a few. Rio+20 does nothing to move the world towards a fairer and greener world.

The only gain in Rio 2012 was that the world stopped itself, just in time, to go backwards. The final document is a victory for the developing world, in particular, India, because it reiterates the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and respected capabilities. This guiding principle, hammered out with much acrimony in 1992, establishes the differentiation of action of different parts of the world. It is clearly not negotiable. So, 20 years later, the only gain we can celebrate is that the world did not dismantle the framework of justice and equity in global negotiations. This should never have been allowed to happen in the first place. But the reason is clear: the world has done little to follow up on the promises of Rio 1992. It is now looking for every excuse to get out of its commitment to change.

Air India pilots go on hunger strike

New Delhi, June 24
The agitating Air India pilots sat on indefinite hunger strike today to put pressure on the authorities concerned to accept their demands for reinstalling their 101 sacked colleagues and recognition of the Indian Pilots Guild as a trade union. Eleven AI pilots, who are at loggerheads with AI management over the move to train pilots from the erstwhile Indian Airlines in the merged entity on Boeing-787 Dreamliner, began their hunger strike at Jantar Mantar this morning. The strike is being led by Captain Aditya Singh Dhillon.

The AI pilots have been protesting for the last 48 days to mount pressure on the Civil Aviation Ministry to accept their demands. “Instead of accepting our demands, the ministry has sacked the 101 agitating pilots,” said Dhillon.

“Keeping aside all other issues, we are just demanding that the government should reinstate the 101 sacked pilots and restore recognition of the IPG,” he said.

The strike, which has led Air India to curtail its international long-haul flight schedule, has been declared illegal by the government and the Delhi High Court. The ailing national carrier has been operating 38 out of 45 services for over a month now.

When the pilots had refused to go on duty, the Air India a few days back advertised for hiring new pilots for long-haul operations. The agitating pilots said that ministry never approached them for discussing the demands and work out the problem. The pilots said that the ministry was trying to impose on the striking pilots the Dharmadhikari panel report which, he alleged, was completely biased.

The Dharmadhikari report deals with pay parity between Air India and Indian Airlines. 

India, EU to begin talks on free trade agreement

New Delhi, June 24
Their is still a big question mark on whether the much-anticipated Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between India and the European Union (EU) will fructify this year. India and the EU will hold talks on Tuesday in Brussels to resolve differences over the pact that is expected to give a major boost to bilateral trade between the two sides.
Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma will hold substantive discussions with EU Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht to explore the possibility of signing the accord as early as possible, according to Joao Cravinho, EU Ambassador to India. The two sides would also review the progress made in the talks under way since 2007. The India-EU summit in February this year had set a deadline of the year-end for concluding the pact.
Asked if the accord could come through this year, Cravinho was quite evasive, saying ''both sides will need to make a trade off...I think it is within grasp.''
Indications are that Sharma and Gucht would deliberate on issues like opening of services sector, which still remain unresolved.
Cravinho expressed his disappointment over what he called New Delhi increasing protectionism by raising already high tariff on car import, erratic cotton exports policy and insisting on higher domestic content by foreign telecom manufacture in India.
“The EU is committed as a whole to trade liberalisation. However, there are some protectionist measures like the rising car tariffs in India, the country’s back and forth policy on cotton exports and the domestic content requirement in manufacturing of telecom equipment which need to be resolved," he said.
As part of the bilateral investment and trade agreement, the EU has been pitching for opening up automobiles, wines and spirits as part of the free trade agreement that is being negotiated between India and EU. However, the two sides are yet to arrive at a consensus on these critical issues as Indian automobile industry feels that this would hurt the domestic manufacturers.
India has, traditionally, kept automobiles in the negative list under free trade agreements with other countries like Japan, Malaysia, Korea, ASEAN and Singapore. The EU, meanwhile, is reluctant to open up movement of professionals from India to the EU under Mode 4 to ensure job creation for its own people. Besides, the grouping has also been raising non-trade issues like human rights, child labour and environment during the ongoing negotiations for a broad based agreement.
According to Cravinho, the European Commission has also mandated that the objective of the negotiation should be to push for a single investor treaty with India, instead of several bilateral investor treaties that India currently has with some EU nations. The European Commission has already indicated to India that it was now looking at a single investor treaty.
"This was not part of the investment agreement when we started in 2007. However, the mandate for a single investor treaty has widened the investment negotiations," he said, adding that though this will take several years before it comes into practice. This seems to be the fallout of the Indian government's recent move to retrospectively tax overseas transactions involving Indian assets in the Vodafone tax case.

India and the EU have been negotiating the FTA for the past five years. It was initially expected to be concluded in 2011. But differences on the level of opening of the market have hampered the progress on the negotiations. However, the two partners are now working at concluding a deal by the end of 2012. The EU as an economic bloc is India’s largest trade partner.

The objectives India and European Union will resume talks in Brussels on Free Trade Agreement (FTA) to resolve differences over the pact that is expected to give a major boost to bilateral trade between the two sides  The two sides will review the progress made in the negotiations under way since 2007 They will explore the possibility of signing the accord as early as possible Will also deliberate on issues like opening of services sector, which still remain unresolved  The India-EU summit in February this year had set a deadline of the year-end for concluding the pact  Single investor treaty The European Commission has also mandated that the objective of the negotiation should be to push for a single investor treaty with India instead of several bilateral investor treaties that India currently has with some EU nations. The Commission has already indicated to India that it was now looking at a single investor treaty.

JD(U) is with NDA: Sharad Yadav

New Delhi, June 23
Days after it extended support to Pranab Mukherjee, the UPA-sponsored candidate for the presidential election, the Janata Dal (United) today sought to distance itself from embarrassing remarks by its spokesman suggesting altering political equations.

No rift over backing Pranab The support of the JD(U) to UPA presidential candidate Pranab Mukherjee is no indication of any rift in the NDA. — Sharad Yadav, JD (U) chief Gag orders for partymen You (JD(U) leaders and spokesmen) should refrain from issuing statements or speaking to the media on contentious issues. — Nitish Kumar, Bihar CM

JD(U) general secretary Shivanand Tiwari’s remarks defending the UPA’s handling of economy and suggesting the BJP to reconsider its support to Purno A. Sangma in the presidential election created a piquant situation for the party and its relations with the BJP-led NDA.

While asserting that the party spokesperson should consult him or Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar before making statements, JD(U) Chief Sharad Yadav reiterated that what he said last week while backing Mukherjee, remains the authorised statement of the party.

“The support of the JD(U) to UPA presidential candidate Pranab Mukherjee is no indication of any rift in the NDA. The NDA is united and will remain so’’ the JD(U) Chief told correspondents here in an attempt to dispel doubts about developing cracks.

Top JD (U) leadership of Yadav and Nitish did not approve of the stinging remarks by a colleague as they do not want to precipitate matters. The JD (U) - BJP run a coalition government in Bihar which is yet some distance from completing its term.

Besides asking the BJP to reconsider the stand to back Sangma, Tiwari had also said the situation of the Indian economy would have been no different even if BJP leader Ravi Shankar Prasad had been the country's Finance Minister. Sharad Yadav countered it by emphasising that the JD (U) holds the Congress and the United Progressive Alliance responsible for “the mess the country is in today. Underscoring approach of different political parties during previous presidential elections, Yadav said even in 2007, Shiv Sena supported Congress-UPA candidate Pratibha Patil while the Akali Dal backed Zail Singh earlier.

Earlier, BJP spokesperson Tarun Vijay joined issue with JD (U) spokesperson for his pro-Mukherjee remarks saying: “Why is Shivanand Tiwari's confidence so low that he is advocating the cause of the UPA government by defending its misrule and bad governance’’.

The JD (U) top leadership does not want to precipitate matters beyond a point as the JD (U)-BJP run a coalition government in Bihar where elections are due only two years later.

In a related development, the CPI (Marxist) expelled Prasenjit Bose, a prominent young face of the party, for seeking to “malign the political line of the party’’. In his open letter of resignation from the CPI (M), Bose questioned the move of the party to support Mukherjee.

India strongly protests LoC firings at flag meet with Pak

Jammu, June 23
The much-awaited meeting between officials of the Indian and Pakistani Army was held today at Chakan-da-Bagh in Poonch district of J-K, with New Delhi, in strong words, conveying to Islamabad its concerns over recent truce violations in the KG Sector.
“We told them that border skirmishes were in nobody’s interest and such misadventures jeopardise peace initiatives between the two countries,” said an Army source.
“The Brigade Commander -level flag meeting commenced around 1100 hours at Chakan-da-Bagh and lasted till 1200 hours,” Jammu based Defence PRO, Col RK Palta said.
It has been reliably learnt that the meeting took place between 10 Brigade Commander, TS Sandhu and his Pakistani counterpart, 6 Sector Commander, Amir Sohail Ashraf. “We had been demanding a flag meeting with them, especially after June 13 when the Pakistani troops targeted out forward posts. It eventually happened today, providing us an opportunity to lodge our protest with them,” said a senior Army officer.
“With this meeting, we can now say that things will start moving in a positive direction,” he added.
The officer also hoped that once the differences were ironed out between the two armies, trans-LoC trade and travel would soon get back on rails.
The Pakistani troops had resorted to unprovoked firing on forward Indian posts in the KG Sector in Poonch on June 13. The heavy shelling continued till June 17. The firing forced the Army to deploy an artillery battalion in the KG Sector for the first time in the past one decade.
Army sources said the recent firing by the Pakistani troops was to facilitate infiltration of militants into J-K.
Cross-LoC trade and travel custodian, Abdul Hamid, said he was hopeful of resumption of trade and travel between the two sides after the flag meeting. “We hope that trade and travel via Chakan-da-Bagh will resume by July 2 and July 3,” he added.