PM AND THE MEDIA

 

B.RAMAN

 

I can’t claim to know Mr.Simon Denyer, the New Delhi correspondent of  the “Washington Post”. I had met him and his headquarters-based News Editor during a long off-the-record discussion at New Delhi in April.

2. His News Editor had come to India for doing a story and he and  Simon went around meeting people in important positions for a discussion on the state of India.

3. I found them to be pleasant and friendly. They were both very well-informed on India. They came well-prepared for the discussions. On the whole, I had an impression that they were professionals to their finger-tips, well disposed towards India.

4.A despatch of Simon on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh carried by his paper on September 5,2012, has received mixed comments in New Delhi. It has been very critical of the Prime Minister’s style of leadership. Official circles in the entourage of the Prime Minister are reported to have been unhappy about the way the despatch has projected the Prime Minister in negative colours.

5. There is ill-concealed glee among the Prime Minister’s critics and political adversaries over the despatch. Their attitude seems to be: “:It serves the Prime minister right.”

6. For over a year now, the Prime Minister has come under severe criticism even from non-political persons in India over what is seen as his ineffective leadership style, marked by an inability to formulate and articulate policies and to interact with confidence with the people and the media.

7. In recent weeks, this criticism is being increasingly reflected in foreign media. As a result, the halo that he had acquired in his first term as one of the economic wizards of the world whose views are sought even by the developed countries of the world is slowly disappearing.

8. In all international summits on the state of the global economy during his first term, he had the pride of place in the head table as the Prime Minister of India taking the country forward with wisdom and determination. He  still has a place in the head table, but minus the aura. There is an  anxiety  in official circles in Delhi that the “Washington Post” despatch could add to the attrition of the aura.

9.From a perusal of some tweets sent to his followers by Simon, one could see that his despatch was based on his assessment and insights. He did not have the benefit of a discussion with the Prime Minister or any of the senior officials in the Prime Minister’s Office. According to his tweets, he did seek a meeting  with them before sending his despatch, but there was no response. He had no other option but to send his despatch without the views of the Prime Minister or his entourage.

10. The case brings out in bold relief the defective media strategy of the PMO in his second term as the Prime Minister. During his first term, he had in Dr.Sanjaya Baru, an activist and always-on-the-go media advisor, who compensated for the Prime Minister’s reticence to interact with the media.

11. Dr. Baru did manage to organise two Press conferences during which the Prime Minister gave a charming assessment of his own performance since he assumed charge. He hardly gave any one-to-one interview, either on or off the record, but Dr. Baru sought to make up for this by actively interacting off-the-record with senior journalists to explain the Prime Minister’s thinking and policies. The senior journalists were not able to get the Prime Minister’s version from the horse’s mouth, but got it indirectly through Dr.Baru.

12. In 2008, Dr. Baru joined a Singapore think tank. The media advisors, who succeeded him in the PMO, were not proactive as Dr. Baru was. They were unduly defensive and protective and did not realise the importance of perception projection and correction through regular interactions with the media. Instead of encouraging the Prime Minister to give up his propensity for silence and reticence, they tended to strengthen it by failing to adopt a proactive media interaction policy.

13. The only occasion journalists had for interacting with him was on board his aircraft during his foreign travels, Since foreign correspondents did not accompany him on his foreign travels, they had no opportunity of interacting with the Prime Minister and picking his brains.

14. During the last one year, there has been an increasingly negative projection of the Prime Minister partly due to his bad style of leadership at a time of cascading crises and partly due to the lack of interactions between the media and the Prime Minister or senior officials of his office.

15.The Prime Minister and his officials do not seem to realise the importance of such interactions in order to let the media and the people in India and abroad have a clear perception of the state of the nation and what the Prime Minister intends doing to deal with the various issues confronting the Government.

16. The lack of a corrective due to the unwillingness of the Prime Minister or his senior officials to meet Simon has resulted in a one-sided despatch, which reflects the views of people outside the PMO without projecting the views of the PMO.

17. Many of us have been repeatedly stressing the importance of a new and more open media strategy to prevent wrong perceptions of the state of the nation and the Prime Minister’s ability to overcome the crises confronting the nation.

18. Unfortunately, the Prime Minister and his officials have been continuing in their old ways, hoping that somehow these negative perceptions will dissipate on their own. It is hoped that the discomfiture caused by Simon’s despatch will lead to the adoption of a proactive media strategy.

19. This may please be read in continuation of my article of January 27,2012, suggesting the appointment of a Task Force on a new media strategy available at  http://ramanstrategicanalysis.blogspot.in/2012/01/need-for-task-force-on-pms-media.html ( 5-9-12)

(The  writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate of the Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com  Twitter @SORBONNE75)

CAN HISTORY REPEAT ITSELF IN TIBET?

 

 

B.RAMAN

The rumblings from the Tibetan areas of China continue. The more the Chinese suppress, the more the Tibetans protest. The more the Chinese demonise His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the more the Tibetans respect him. The more the Chinese flaunt the economic progress made by the Tibetan areas under the leadership of the Communist Party of China (CPC), the more the Tibetans long for His Holiness.

2. The Chinese recently took the CPC appointed Panchen Lama, who normally lives in Beijing under heavy security, on his annual one month, CPC-sponsored exposure to the Tibetan people. He camped in Lhasa under the protection of the PLA and was taken round the various monasteries where the influence of His Holiness the Dalai Lama continues to be strong.

3. The Chinese hopes that the Tibetan people would start venerating the CPC-sponsored Panchen Lama were belied. His presence in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) and his visits to the monasteries were tom-tomed by the Party and Government-controlled media. There was hardly any excitement in the Tibetan areas.

4. News of the sermons and travels of His Holiness the Dalai Lama outside Tibet in his political and religious exile evoke greater interest and greater excitement among the Tibetans in the TAR, Qinghai, Gansu, Sichuan and Yunnan than the sermons and activities of the Panchen Lama.

5. In desperation, the Chinese have been trying to prevent news of the sermons and activities of His Holiness from reaching the Tibetans in China. They have stopped allowing the re-entry of Tibetans who go to Nepal and India to attend the religious meetings of His Holiness. They are trying to find out how news about the happenings in the Tibetan areas travel to the outside world almost the same day and is broadcast by Radio Free Asia, the radio station funded by the US State Department.

6.The Internet has been censored and blocked. Mobile telephone services have been vigorously controlled. The Tibetans have been denied access to social media networks. Despite this, news continues to trickle out and trickle in. There is a two-way trickle which the Chinese intelligence agencies have not been able to identify and stop.

7. The chain of self-immolations continues---mostly in the Tibetan areas of Sichuan, but increasingly in Qinghai and Gansu too. The total number of fatal self-immolations since March of last year crossed 50 last week.The Chinese do not know how to stop it. Their intelligence agencies have not been able to profile Tibetans who are likely to commit self-immolation.

8. There has been no flow of intelligence from the Tibetan community about plans for self-immolation. Arrests and severe punishments to Tibetan bystanders who do not stop the self-immolation attempts have not worked.

9. There have been more raids and more arrests. The Kirti monastery of Sichuan, where the self-immolations started last year, was raided once again last week and the monk inmates subjected to intimidatory  questioning. The Zilkar monastery in the Qinghai province was raided on September 1 and four of the monks there were taken away for custodial interrogation.

10. Reliable sources report that one question the Chinese security officials have been posing to every Tibetan interrogated by them is: How does the news travel to the Dalai Lama? How does the news travel from the Dalai Lama?

11. The Chinese are confused. Despite their denying the Tibetans easy access to modern means of communication, news continues to travel and travel fast. There have been reports of large-scale preventive arrests in the Lhasa region. The trouble has till now been confined to the Tibetan areas of Sichuan, Qinghai and Gansu. The Tibetan areas of Sichuan continue to be the epicentre of the wave of self-immolations.

12. Though the TAR has not yet been affected in a big way by the self-immolation movement, it is becoming the epi-centre of the Gandhian type satyagraha practised by the Lakhar movement, which is a Tibetan self-identity movement which tells the people: Be Tibetan, Eat Tibetan, Dress Tibetan, Speak Tibetan, Live Tibetan, venerate His Holiness the Dalai Lama.

13. The recent arrests in the Lhasa region were meant to stifle the Lhakar movement. The Chinese have not succeeded.

14. There is a protest chakra going on in the Tibetan areas of China. The more the protests, the more the suppression. The more the suppression, the more the protests.

15. It is a new type of protest movement, the like of which Tibet has not seen before. Self-motivated, self-induced, self-driven with no identifiable leaders and organisational structure behind it. It is kept sustained not by anger but by the pride of the Tibetans in themselves, their culture, their religion, their traditions, their heritage, their guru.

16. Despite their most brutal suppression, the Chinese have not been able to destroy the pride and hopes that continue to drive the movement. Today, the odds seem heavily against the Tibetans.

17. So they did against Mahatma Gandhi in the 1920s and against Nelson Mandela in the 1970s and the early 1980s. And then the odds turned in their favour. Brutal suppression failed to prevail.

18. Can history repeat itself in the Tibetan areas of China? ( 5-9-12)

(The  writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate of the Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com  Twitter @SORBONNE75)

SRI LANKA AND TAMIL NADU: A MESSY SITUATION

 

B.RAMAN

If the political parties in Tamil Nadu do not conduct themselves with a sense of balance and responsibility and indulge in competitive exploitation of the discontent in certain sections of the population over Sri Lanka-related issues, they may end up by creating passions beyond control in both countries.

2. All right-thinking Tamils should be concerned over the acts of anger directed against two football teams of Sri Lankan students in Chennai and against Sri Lankan Christian pilgrims in southern Tamil Nadu in recent days. This resulted in the football teams having to go back to Sri Lanka and in anxieties over physical security among the pilgrims. There is a reason to suspect that some of these incidents were more politically-orchestrated than spontaneous expression of anger by the local people against the Sri Lankans.

3. There is a genuine anger among sections of the people of Tamil Nadu against the Sri Lankan Government over the following aspects of its policies towards the Sri Lankan Tamils:

( a ).The lack of progress in finding a political solution to the aspirations of the Tamils.

( b ).The   lack of a sincere enquiry into the death of a disproportionate number of Tamils during the last hours of the Sri Lankan Army’s assault to kill Prabhakaran, the leader of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), and capture  the LTTE headquarters thereby defeating the LTTE’s insurgency.

( c ). The perceived use of disproportionate force by the Sri Lankan Navy against Indian Tamil fishermen who mistakenly fish in Sri Lankan waters, leading to frequent deaths of our fishermen.

4. This anger has been turned by the local political parties against the Government of India also for the following reasons:

( a ). The perceived reluctance of New Delhi to exercise adequate pressure on President Mahinda Rajapaksa to make him fulfil his commitments to the Tamils and the Government of India on their political future and  protect our fishermen.

( b ). The unwillingness of the Government of India to take any punitive action against the Sri Lankan Government by way of suspending the military-military relationship between the Armed Forces of the two countries. Under this relationship, officers of the Sri Lankan Armed forces are permitted to join training courses in different training institutions of our Armed Forces.

5.In view of the forthcoming elections to the Lok Sabha in 2014, there has been a competitive exploitation of all these  issues by  many of the political parties including the ruling AIDMK and the opposition DMK in the hope of winning poll dividends.

6. The anger, which was initially against the Sri Lankan Government, has been turned into anger against the Sri Lankan people, mainly Sinhalese, coming to Tamil Nadu for private reasons such as pilgrimage, tourism, sports etc. Fortunately, till now, the exploited anger has not led to any untoward  incident of violence against the Sinhalese. If the temptation to politically exploit this anger by different parties is not resisted, there is a danger of a backlash by the Sinhalese against the Indian nationals ( not necessarily only against the Sri Lankan Tamils) working in Sri Lanka.

7. In recent years, India’s economic relations with Sri Lanka have considerably improved and a number of Indian companies have established their branches in Sri Lanka. There has also been an increase in the number of Indian Tamil tourists visiting Sri Lanka. If there is a backlash against  them, we might be faced with a vicious circle of ethnic violence in the two countries.

8. There never was much popular support for the LTTE in Tamil Nadu. Nor were there strong feelings of solidarity between the people of Tamil Nadu and the Sri Lankan Tamils living in refugee camps in Tamil Nadu. When the LTTE was defeated by the Sri Lankan Army and Prabhakaran killed in May,2009, the reactions among the people of Tamil Nadu were fortunately low.

9. If a politically-motivated attempt is made now to rouse the feelings of the people of Tamil Nadu over the attitude of the Sri Lankan Government towards the Sri Lankan Tamils, the resulting passions may take unpredictable shape.

10. The Government of India finds itself in a dilemma. The protection of the people of Sri Lanka visiting Tamil Nadu is the responsibility of the Government of Tamil Nadu. The Government of India cannot act unilaterally in the matter. In view of the 2014 elections, no party is prepared to adopt a reasonable attitude. Even the DMK, which supports the Dr.Manmohan Singh Government in the Centre, has joined the anti-Sri Lanka campaign in Tamil Nadu unmindful of the difficulties of New Delhi.

11. The Government of India is not in a position to exercise adequate pressure on the Rajapaksa Government either on the issue of the political future of the Sri Lankan Tamils or for the protection of our fishermen. Nor is it in a position to force the Government of Sri Lanka to hold an enquiry into the violation of the human rights of the Sri Lankan Tamils.

12. In view of the strong political and economic support for Sri Lanka from China and Sri Lanka’s developing relations with Pakistan, we do not have much of a card for coercive diplomacy against Colombo. The Government of India has to do  the best of a bad bargain.

13. The dilemma  faced by the Government of India  is partly the result of its failure to foresee and pre-empt the politically caused emotions with an eye on the 2014 elections. Unless it persuades the ruling ADMK to tone down any politicisation of the problem, the DMK, its ally, is unlikely to co-operate with it. It would not like to be projected by the ADMK as not being supportive enough of the Sri Lankan Tamils and our fishermen.

14. The only way of dealing with this issue is through a possible  quid  pro quo by conceding the demands of the Tamil Nadu Government in other matters not having an impact on our foreign policy in return for its giving up its present policies relating to Sri Lankans.

15. To address the sensitivities of the Tamil Nadu Government, the Government of India could also modify its policy in relation to the training of Sri Lankan Armed Forces officers in our training Institutions. In future, training slots could be offered to the Sri Lankan Armed Forces only in respect of those courses where the training is imparted in institutions outside Tamil Nadu.

16. This is a tricky political matter to which a solution based on an all-party consensus with the political parties of Tamil Nadu has to be found by our Prime Minister asserting his authority and taking the necessary initiative. His  reluctance or inability to exercise authority could make the situation messier. ( 4-9-12)

(The  writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate of the Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com  Twitter @SORBONNE75)

BENGALURU ARRESTS OF TERRORISM SUSPECTS

 

INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM MONITOR: PAPER NO. 761

B.RAMAN

According to media reports, the Bengaluru Police are presently interrogating 13 persons who have been taken into custody on suspicion of their involvement in a conspiracy to carry out assassinations of some targeted individuals in Karnataka and Hyderabad. The media reports have stated that the suspects under interrogation, all of them Indian nationals, are alleged to have had links with the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET), a Pakistani terrorist organisation, and the Bangladesh branch of the Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HUJI), which is generally referred to as HUJI (B). Both these organisations had operated in Hyderabad and Bengaluru in the past.

2. Eleven of the arrests were made on August 29,2012----six in Bengaluru and five in Hubli in Karnataka. The 12^th arrest was made in Hyderabad on August 31 and the 13^th in Bengaluru on September 1,2012. The 11 suspects arrested on August 29 included a journalist, a doctor and a Junior Research Fellow with the  Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO).

3.Shri Jyoti Prakash Mirji, the Police Commissioner of Bengaluru City, was reported to have told the media on September  1 that the suspects were self- motivated and had no direct links with any other group. Their  plan was to kill high profile personalities and cause communal tension in the country.

4.It is not clear what the Commissioner of Police meant when he said that the suspects had no link with any other group, since other reports quoting the police had said that the suspects had links with the LET and the HUJI (B). Did he mean that the suspects had no links with any other indigenous organisation such as the Indian Mujahideen, which had in the past operated in Bengaluru or the Students’ Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) or Al Umma of Tamil Nadu, which had also in the past operated in Bengaluru?

5.On March 30,2006, the Karnataka Police had arrested at Jelenabad in Gulbarga District one Shamim Ahmed, a suspected activist of the LET, who was reportedly residing in Goa. An AK-47, two hand-grenades, a mobile phone, maps of dams and some power grids of Andhra Pradesh, some audio-visual cassettes and Urdu literature were allegedly found in his possession. It was not known what happened to him subsequently, whether he was prosecuted, on what charges and what was the outcome.

6. In January 2008, the Karnataka Police arrested Riazuddin Nasir alias Mohammad Ghouse of Hyderabad and Asadullah Abubaker of Hospet. Nasir was a drop-out from an engineering college and Asadullah was a student of the Karnataka Institute of Medical Sciences in Hubli. Subsequently, the Police also arrested one Mohammad Asif of the same Institute. During interrogation, Nasir was reported to have admitted that he had undergone training in an LET camp in Pakistan in 2006.

7. These three persons were reported to have told the police that they were planning to  carry out terrorist strikes against foreign tourists in Goa and against foreign IT companies in Bengaluru.

8. This is the first time many suspects have been arrested, who were reportedly planning to assassinate individual personalities with hand-held weapons. No explosive material appears to have been recovered from them. It is not clear why they chose the targeted persons for assassination.

9. Some media reports, quoting police sources, have claimed that the suspects were self-motivated by visiting Internet sites of Al Qaeda of the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). Whereas Al Qaeda based in North Waziristan of Pakistan has its web sites and propaganda material in the Arabic language, the AQAP has them in English, including its online motivational journal called “Inspire”. Anwar al-Awlaki, the Amir of the AQAP who was  a US citizen of Yemeni origin, and Samir Khan, a US citizen of Pakistani origin, who was an associate, were killed in a US Drone strike in Yemen on September 30,2011.

10.The investigation is likely to be difficult because the police have not been able to seize any evidence of forensic significance such as explosive material. The police may have to depend to a large extent on interrogation for ascertaining details. Cases based on interrogation and confessions do not often indulge in successful prosecutions, leading to allegations of mala fide from the Muslim community.

11. The police should keep an open mind in view of the inadequate forensic evidence and should resist any sensationalisation of the case, which could cause unnecessary tensions.

12. Since the arrests have been made in Karnataka as well as in AP and since the conspiracy for targeted assassinations reportedly involved targets in Karnataka as well as Hyderabad, it might be useful to have the case investigated by the National Investigation Agency (NIA).  (2-9-12)

(The  writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate of the Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com  Twitter @SORBONNE75)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

HAVE YOU COME ACROSS A MIND SICKER THAN  THIS?

B.RAMAN

During my long years with the Research & Analysis Wing (R&AW), I had , inter alia, handled the external aspects of the tribal insurgency in the North-East, the Khalistani terrorism, the Jihadi terrorism and the external aspects of the physical security of the Prime Minister of India.

2. In June 1985,Rajiv Gandhi undertook his first  travel abroad as the Prime Minister of India. He visited France, Algeria, the USA and Switzerland. He went back to India and came out again in October to visit the then USSR and Holland.

3.His June visits coincided with the first anniversary of Operation Blue Star in the Golden Temple in Amritsar. Khalistani elements based in Pakistan, West Europe and the US took a vow to have him assassinated before he returned to India. I was asked to help the SPG, which is responsible for the protection of the Prime Minister, during his visits to France, Switzerland and Holland.

4. That was the first time I came into contact with Rajiv, Sonia, Rahul and Priyanka. Rahul and Priyanka were young kids at that time. I had an opportunity of interacting with the kids, particularly in Paris. I have not met them after October,1985, but have maintained a distant interest in their welfare and progress in life.

5.I have been worried, like many of our fellow-citizens, over the declining and depressing state of affairs in the country. I have written a number of articles critical of the way Prime Minister Dr.Manmohan Singh has been handling the situation. Some of the articles were mildly critical, some very hard-hitting. I had also suggested that the time had come for the Congress to go for mid-term elections to remove the political gloom.

6. I believed that Shri Narendra Modi, the Chief Minister of Gujarat, was the man for the occasion and it was time for him to enter the political arena and take over as the PM after winning the elections. Between 2000 and till recently, I was a strong supporter of the BJP, the RSS and Modi.

7. Last year, I started visiting the Twitter site regularly  in the hope of keeping myself in touch with what was being discussed in the Twitter world. That was the beginning of my interactions with the online followers of Modi. I was shocked by their uncouth manners, foul language and extremist mind-set. Whenever I tweeted anything positive about Sonia, Rahul and Priyanka, the followers of Namo came down on me like a ton of bricks and subjected me to vile abuse.

8. I was called an old man who had become senile and developed Alzheimer’s disease. It was claimed that my cancer had spread to my brain etc. By nature, I am a pleasant and polite person. I was shocked by the kind of language used and threats uttered by the online followers of NaMo. Twice I quit Twitter in disgust and then I came back because of my curiosity.

9. I wrote articles drawing attention to the Stormtrooper like methods of the online followers of NaMo and the kind of abuse and character assassination being directed at me. I sincerely believed NaMo was not aware of the obnoxious behaviour of his online followers. I wrote and tweeted a number of times suggesting that he should openly condemn their methods and dissociate himself from them. There was no response. I couldn’t help believing that his followers were indulging in such methods with his knowledge and approval. That was the beginning of my disillusionment with NaMo. My writings and Tweets became increasingly critical of of NaMo’s followers whom I started calling the NaMo Brigade and NaMo himself.

10. That was also the time when I started taking fresh interest in the personalities, policies and activities of the Congress. I did have hopes that Rahul could turn around matters, but my hopes were belied. I started thinking that the time had come for Priyanka to enter the political scene to set matters right with the support of the GenNext of the party. Rahul had not been able to enthuse the younger elements in the party and the country. It was important that Priyanka tried her hand at this.

11. In the beginning of June, I wrote my first article suggesting that Sonia should induct Priyanka into active politics. I was surprised by the initial condemnation of my articles by friends and foes alike. The NaMo Brigade stepped up its attacks on me. I was insulted. I was ridiculed. My sanity was called into question. I decided to go into a mode of watching silence.

12.To my surprise, after about three weeks, others too started discussing Priyanka as a possible political aspirant--- Shri Virendra Kapoor in Rediff, the Sunday Guardian and some other columnists and papers. Last week, NDTV had a series of political discussions on the likelihood of a mid-term poll. One of the questions polled and debated was the chances of Priyanka.

13. I drew the attention of my Twitter followers to this and tweeted once again why I had suggested the name of Priyanka.I tweeted in two consecutive tweets:  “As yesterday's developments in Gujarat show, NaMo will not be able to shake off his dark shadow. Namo is darkness at noon. Priyanka is brightness at night.” My reference was to the shadow over NaMo after the conviction of 31 of the accused in the  Naroda Patiya case of massacre of over 90 Muslims by a mob egged on by some Hindutva Top Guns. My allusion was  to Arthur Koestler’s novel of the last century based on life under Stalin. I was buried in an avalanche of abusive tweets from NaMo’s followers. Some of them even accused me of giving a powerful political slogan to the Congress for the next elections.

14.A couple of days later, one of my followers drew my attention to a defamatory, calumnious blog post twisting the meaning of my Tweets. The post deleted my reference to the conviction of the accused in the Naroda Pitiya massacre case and carried only my characterisations of NaMo as Darkness and Priyanka as Brightness. The post alleged that this old man used to send love Tweets to Barkha Dutt of NDTV, now he has started sending love Tweets to Priyanka.

15.His rage over my suggesting Priyanka as a possible future leader was obvious, but he was unable to counter me logically. So he indulged in character assassination.I have not come across a more sickening mind. It was the reaction of the lowliest of the lowlies.

16.Previously,whenever I used to protest online against the abuses and character assassination directed against me by NaMo’s supporters, my well-wishers in the BJP and the RSS used to ask me to ignore them. They used to claim these were not well-educated people capable of politeness.

17.But the man who has attacked my personal honour and projected me as a decrepit old man with a hunger for attractive women is not an uneducated person. I understand he is a graduate of one of the prestigious IITs of India. After having lived in Mumbai for some years, he is now reportedly based in the US and has allegedly been co-ordinating the online Blitzkrieg of NaMo from his safe sanctuary in the US.

18. If this is the kind of people who are the brains of the NaMo For PM campaign, would it be in the interest of the country for NaMo to become the PM? Everyman is known by the company he keeps. This is the kind of company NaMo keeps.( 2-9-12)

(The  writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate of the Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com  Twitter @SORBONNE75)

 

ACCEPTABILITY OF NAMO OUTSIDE GUJARAT WILL REMAIN UNCERTAIN

 

B.RAMAN

The conviction of 31 of the accused  in the Naroda Patiya massacre case of Gujarat by a special fast track court has to be welcomed for two reasons despite the fact that the case has not yet reached its logical conclusion with all avenues for appeal exhausted. Ninety-six people, mainly Muslims, were massacred by the accused during the communal conflagration of 2002 in Gujarat. The convicted have been sentenced to long terms of imprisonment.

2. The fact that some prominent Hindutva personalities of the Gujarat unit of the BJP were among those convicted would indicate the high-level of involvement of BJP personalities in the instigation, if not the commission of the massacre.

3. The conviction and heavy sentencing have to be welcomed by all right-thinking persons because the case  clearly shows that the rule of law ultimately prevails in the country and that the courts will not tolerate massacres of members of the religious minorities by the religious majority.

4. The second reason for welcoming  it is that it will send a reassuring  message to the minorities that the law of the land makes no distinction between the religious majority and minorities while dealing with wrong-doings of a heinous nature.

5. I have pointed in many of my writings since the Indian Mujahideen (IM) made its appearance in 2007 that some of the Muslim youth belonging to the IM claimed to have been driven to jihadi terrorism by what they perceived as the unfair criminal justice system towards the Muslims. Hopefully, the Naroda Patiya judgement will transmit a clear message to the Muslim youth of the country that our criminal justice system is not prejudiced against them. More such judgements will help the Police in de-alienating the Muslim youth.

6. From what I have read in the media, there is no credible evidence to show any complicity of sections of the Shri Narendra Modi administration in the massacre. There might have been individual instances of  negligence and reluctance to act firmly because of the involvement of some Hindutva leaders, but from this, one cannot allege any complicity of the Modi administration.

7. Shri Modi continues to be immensely popular among the Hindus of Gujarat and the Gujarati youth because of his contribution to economic development without large-scale corruption and improvement of governance. One has to concede that Gujarat remain the best administered State in India today. Shri Modi is bound to reap the benefits of his record in the elections to the State Assembly due towards the end of this year.

8.But the details of the massacre of Muslims as they came out from the trial, the involvement of some Hindutva top-guns in the massacre and the fact that the massacre took place under Shri Modi’s watch are bound to add to the feelings of disquiet about Shri Modi’s acceptability as a pan-Indian and all-communities leader in other parts of India where emotional attachment to Shri Modi does not play the same role as in Gujarat. Many people in other parts of India admire his record as an administrator and concede his remarkable contribution to the economic progress of his State. At the same time, they are reluctant to accept him as a national leader. How uncertain will be his pan-Indian acceptability became evident from some of the reservations expressed recently by Shri Nitish Kumar, the Chief Minister of Bihar.

9.The style of the online blitzkrieg adopted by his die-hard followers in India and abroad reminiscent of the methods of the Nazi stormtroopers, continues to add to the disquiet. I have been drawing attention to these Storm-troopers and their obnoxious methods marked by abuse, invectives and intimidation since last year. I have been repeatedly pointing out that these Stormtroopers, claiming to act on behalf of Shri Modi, have been doing a tremendous disservice to his future and may come in the way of the wider acceptance sought by him. I have repeatedly urged that he should openly dissociate himself from them and condemn their methods. He has not done so thereby giving rise to an unfortunate suspicion that he may be politically benefitting from them.

10. The echoes of the court judgement and the reverberations of the intimidatory and grossly abusive methods of the Stormtroopers will be felt increasingly across the democratic societies of the West. Shri Modi might have been welcomed in South-East Asian societies, but in the western societies the question marks over his head will remain despite the recognition by sections of the Western media of his undoubted administrative acumen and economic management.

11. Shri Modi has every right to aspire to be the next Prime Minister of India, but his acceptability will not improve unless he rids himself of the support of the online Stormtrooper elements. Till he does so, he will remain quarantined in Gujarat. ( 1-9-12)

(The  writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate of the Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com  Twitter @SORBONNE75)

NAMO’S ONLINE BLITZKRIEG: WHAT I TWEETED ON AUGUST 11,2012

 

B.RAMAN

1.Rediff's interesting report on NaMo's online publicity blitzkrieg http://www.rediff.com/news/special/with-adspend-of-rs-200-500-cr-modis-election-pr-blitz-leaves-congress-dazed-special/20120810.htm …

2.I have been drawing attention to this for more than 18 months. I had also drawn attention last year to online blitzkrieg of Anna's team.

3. NaMo and Team Anna were helped by excellent IT brains---domestic in case of Anna and NRIs in case of NaMo. There has been online fatigue ..... contd

4. in case of Team Anna, but not in case of Team NaMo. If Team NaMo can moderate their language and use facts and figures and not abuses and .....  contd

5.invectives, one cannot object to their online blitzkrieg. Team NaMo has had a headstart online. Cong is waking up only now to  CONTD

6.online potential.A bit too late. At same time, online reach in India is limited. Team NaMo will have some advantage, but not crucial.FINI