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TheIndian EXPRESS
www.indianexpress.com

l THURSDAY l SEPTEMBER 20 l 2012

The Indian EXPRESS

BECAUSE THE TRUTH INVOLVES US ALL

The opposition scatter gives the UPA an opportunity to explain why reforms are crucial
sions to raise diesel prices, cap the cooking gas subsidy and bring in FDI in retail and aviation are not lightbulb ideas. They are not even likely to result in tangible gains soon. However, they are a crucial statement of intent. It must abide by these decisions at all cost, and follow up with more substantial financial reforms to revive investor confidence. It can afford to do so, given that its political opposition, for all the noise, is incoherent and unlikely to unseat it. This is also the perfect opportunity for the Congress to make a rational argument for its economic strategy. Unlike the nuclear deal standoff in its last term, which was too abstract to mobilise opinion either way, this is clearly a matter with wide resonance. The government simply needs to make the better argument. The TMC has pitched its decision as a stand for the common people whose interests are being grievously shortchanged by FDI in retail, for instance. The UPA must aggressively counter such myths, and explain the consolidation and efficiency gains of the decision, how it will profit consumers, farmers and small businesses as well as upgrade infrastructure and supply chains. It must not allow the poor to be used as a rhetorical device. It should point out the ways in which welfare is inextricably linked with economic revival.

Gift of a crisis

VEN as the Trinamool Congress dramatically withdrew its support to the UPA, other parties have also been making a show of their own unhappiness with this government. Nearly all the major non-Congress parties will register their protest in todays bandh. But they have no common charter, and each of them is visibly making their own calculations. It is a collection of several small movements, not a unified resistance that threatens the UPA. The BJP has demanded a special session of Parliament to discuss FDI in retail and test the governments strength. This was shot down by its own ally, the JD(U), and Nitish Kumar has indicated his willingness, presumably in the next election, to team up with anyone who offers Bihar special status. Even the Congresss ally DMK has joined the protest, and the Samajwadi Party, without denying its tacit support to the UPA, has planned coordinated agitations against the slew of reforms it has announced. This is essentially a scatter of political reactions, each party making its own individual statement, with nothing uniting them, apart from a desire to signal distance from the Congress. Now that the government has changed the subject and made the first modest moves towards a growth-oriented economic environment, it must persevere. Its deci-

FDI is welcome in aviation, but first there must be a clean-up in the sector
pockets too. This week, Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh made the startling disclosure that a cabal of officials in the Airports Authority of India allegedly forged numbers in a tender file to award the contract for ground handling at five international airports to just one firm, raising questions about the extent of the regulatory oversight in this sector. Having publicly flagged the problem, the ministry must now undertake a thorough examination of the issue, it must go beyond the suspension of the concerned officers. This is the backdrop against which the government has liberalised the foreign investment regime, allowing foreign airlines to pick up a 49 per cent stake in domestic airlines. But as airlines like Emirates and Etihad are showing, it may make more sense for them to fly under their own flag to more Indian cities. While Air India, for instance, has cut back on its services to connect only 62 Indian cities, the two airlines now already reach 21 destinations within India.

Air pockets

AISING the pitch of her dissent, Mamata Banerjee has announced her decision to pull out of the UPA government, in which the Trinamool Congress (TMC) participated for three years. Doing so might have consolidated her image as a crusader, but the TMC chief also proves that her DNA of populism triumphs over pragmatism in most crucial decisions. Besides, with her withdrawal of support to UPA 2, Banerjee seems to have reached a place where she limits her political and economic options instead of widening them. What she gains is a political turf in which she is at once crusader and ruler a unique space in which to manipulate her unpredictable politics. When she announced her decision on Tuesday, Banerjee made two crucial points. First, her ministers will submit their resignations on Friday, after offering prayers. Second, the Trinamool Congress will not be party to the Left- and BJP- sponsored bandhs on September 20, even though they plan to raise the same issues on which she wants to walk out of the government. The implication is clear Banerjee does not want to be bracketed with either the Left or the BJP. Also, by referring to Friday prayers, she addressed her biggest electoral constituency the Muslims, most of whom had moved away from the Congress. In the context of 2014, the TMC certainly cannot afford to have any truck with the BJP and its allies. Neither can it be part of any combination in a possible UPA 3, given the present showdown and deep-rooted differences in policy. In a scenario in which the Trinamool Congress expects to notch up 30-35 MPs from West Bengal in the next Lok Sabha

TMC (Marxist)
By walking out of the UPA, Mamata limits her options instead of widening them
SUBRATA NAGCHOUDHURY
polls, the partys role is likely to be restricted to a third alternative. Within West Bengal, Banerjees move takes the wind out of the CPMs sails whatever was left, that is. The communists in Bengal and elsewhere have been praying for and instigating a split between the Congress and the TMC to revive their fortunes. But the issues on which the TMC has quit the government are arguably down to earth and capable of swaying popular sentiments unlike the nuclear deal, which did not affect the common people. sorry plight. One senior leader of the CPM said: How can we not appreciate her stand? After all, she walked out of the UPA coalition on issues for which we are also fighting. May be the time has come when TMC and the communists may hit the streets, hand in hand, on a common agenda. No wonder Didis party has acquired, in certain quarters, the sobriquet of Trinamool Congress (Marxist). Smaller Left Front partners the CPI, RSP, FB publicly feel it is time they reevaluated the TMC.

LETTER OF THE WEEK AWARD

To encourage quality reader intervention The Indian Express offers the Letter of the Week Award. The letter adjudged the best for the week is published every Saturday. Letters may be e-mailed to editpage @expressindia.com or sent to The Indian Express, 9&10, Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg, New Delhi -110002. Letter writers should mention their postal address and phone number. The winner receives books worth Rs 1,000.

Within West Bengal, Banerjees move takes the wind out of the CPMs sail. The communists in Bengal and elsewhere have been praying for and instigating a split between the Congress and the TMC to revive their fortunes. But the issues on which the TMC has quit the government are arguably down to earth and capable of swaying popular sentiments unlike the nuclear deal, which did not affect the common people. This has the potential to severely shrink the political space of the Left.
This has the potential to severely shrink the political space of the Left. Even in her inconsistency, Didi has been consistent in eating into the support base of the Left in Bengal. Right from the days of the Singur land agitation, the TMC rank and file has gained and swelled from a tacit shift in support from the communists to Banerjee, not only in Bengal but from Delhi too. In the aftermath of her historic decision, the kind of responses that came from Left leaders highlighted their In pulling out of UPA 2, Mamata Banerjee has reiterated her partys commitment to its poll manifesto. But within the TMC, there is a growing sentiment that provisions in the manifesto are more suited to a party in opposition than one in government. In fact, a large number of issues found in the manifesto have virtually checkmated the Bengal government and prevented it from taking initiatives in many sectors. The existing land acquisition policy, for instance, has

been a major hurdle for industrial growth. Development projects in the infrastructure sector have also been stalled because of land acquisition bottlenecks. Financial aid from foreign funding agencies is also restricted as the TMC does not want user fees to be imposed. There has been a pressing demand from domestic industry to modify the Urban Land Ceiling Act, which puts a cap on land holdings in urban areas. Meanwhile, the rejection of special economic zones has come in the way of Infosys, for instance, pushing forward with its venture in Bengal, even though it had huge job-creating potential. Most of these problems have emanated from the contents of the TMCs manifesto. Many in the party share the view that the manifesto needs to be modified immediately but the top leadership sticks to what has been set down in black and white. Finally, there can be little doubt about Mamata Banerjees sincerity and her concern for the well being of the poor, but sometimes this seems to be pushed beyond plausible limits. Her resistance to the hike in railway fares is a case in point. The indefinite public transport strike in Kolkata has caused severe hardship to thousands of commuters. A large section of the commuters are ready to absorb a reasonable hike in fuel prices, which will push up fares, but the government has put its foot down, which has encouraged transport operators to go on strike. Banerjees pro-poor agenda prompts her to reach out to the people, often without realising that she does not have the means to implement the policies she wants. The writer is editor, Kolkata, The Indian Express
subrata.nagchoudhury@expressindia.com

Letters to the

EDITOR

Back on track

turns her back on UPA (IE, September 19). A weakened UPA, which does not have much time left before the general elections of 2014, must seize the opportunity thrown up by the Trinamool Congresss exit from the government. Apart from former railways minister Dinesh Trivedis unsuccessful attempts to introduce changes, the railways have been neglected for a long time. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has shown that he intends to revive the economy by announcing FDI in retail and aviation, increase in diesel prices and the sale of PSUs. Railways are also an important source of revenue for India and a critical part of basic infrastructure. Singh must take bold steps to improve them, now that they seem to have been rescued from the TMC. Bal Govind Noida

THIS refers to Mamata

Need of the hour

against reform (IE, September 18) outlines how various political parties are opposed to the idea of bringing in FDI in retail. This is inexplicable in the era of globalisation. The UPA governments decision to introduce FDI in retail and aviation is the need of the hour. Shailesh Pawar Durg FDI in retail will affect agriculture and cooperatives badly. Once we promoted initiatives like Operation Flood, led by Verghese Kurien, where the poor dairy farmer was made part of a dream project and the profits percolated down to the grassroots. Today, we want to let in foreign bidders and could lose the chance to repeat that success. It would seem that our political masters are merely eager to farm out their own work to corporate firms. The need today is to support expert Indians who can deliver profitable long-term results. Hemant A. Sant Vadodara
THE UPAs decision to let in THE editorial United

HE civil aviation sector in India has gone long past the point of being a growth story, but the declining numbers of air traffic passengers warn that the sector could face more troubled times. Since the global meltdown of 2008-09, the first five months of this fiscal threaten to be the first period that the number of air passengers in India will come down. The 6 per cent year-on-year drop looks more precipitous if one compares the data month-on-month. In a slowing economy, this is not surprising but the airline companies seem to have dug a larger hole for themselves as they had banked on an ambitious growth in passenger numbers. The immediate response of the aviation companies has been to raise fares and, wherever possible, cut back the number of seats on offer. But unless there is a turnaround in the economy in the next two quarters, these measures could further cripple the sector. At the same time, the sector has run up against regulatory air

SREENIVAS JANYALA
HE Telangana agitation is stirring again. Pro-Telangana parties and groups are preparing for the Telangana March on September 30, when more than one lakh people are supposed to join rallies in Hyderabad and lay siege to the state secretariat. A similar event last year resulted in mindless violence; protestors desecrated and vandalised the statues of cultural icons on Necklace Road. After a series of general strikes, with even government employees hailing from Telangana refusing to work for 45 days, the Telangana statehood issue was put on the backburner as the Centre refused to budge. Now, after eight months of peace, renewed investor confidence, and real estate picking up, the Telangana issue is coming into play again. Sonia Gandhi held talks with senior leaders on Monday to discuss an all-party meeting on Telangana, but nothing was decided and the issue continues to simmer and gather momentum. In the run-up to the Telangana March, students of Osmania University and the police clashed on campus this Monday, after they were refused permission to lead a procession to the state assembly, which was in session. This time, Telangana leaders say, it will be a fight to the finish. The resolve is reflected in a letter written to Sonia Gandhi by 13 cabinet ministers from Telangana. They have requested her to announce the separate

Eight months after it last flared up, the issue rearranges the political chessboard
state of Telangana immediately, before the situation goes out of control. Congress ministers have so far shied away from direct involvement. To attract international attention, the Telangana Joint Action Committee (TJAC), which has been steering the protests, has warned that it will disrupt the international bio-diversity meet in Hyderabad, scheduled to begin on October 1, in which delegates from 180 countries are expected to participate. The positions of political parties have also changed in the last few months, giving a fillip to the Telangana demand. The Telugu state again. The Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS), which has spearheaded the movement since 2001, has offered to merge with the Congress if a separate Telangana state is declared. It could be a chance for the Congress to lay claim to power in the proposed state and make up for the losses in the rest of Andhra Pradesh, where it is expected to perform badly in the 2014 elections. In by-elections held in June this year for 18 assembly segments, the Congress managed to win only two while 16 were won by YSR Congress. For the ruling Congress, it is a catch-22 situation. Legislators and MPs from diversity meet. They point to the bickering between TJAC and TRS, both keen to gain the upper hand. In the process, the Telangana movement has lost steam and direction. The TRS wants total control over the agitation while TJAC is chalking out its own course. TRS President K. Chandrasekhar Rao is apparently unhappy with the TJAC for cornering all the credit for leading the Telangana agitation last year. So when the TJAC announced that it would relaunch the agitation with the Telangana March, KCR reportedly tried to scuttle such plans by announcing in public that he had been assured by the Centre that a separate Telangana state would be declared very soon, and if that did not happen then there would be total anarchy in Telangana. The TJAC was supposed to restart the agitation from August 15 with a chalo Hyderabad call but after KCRs confident statements, it was forced to postpone plans to September 30. The TJACs convenor, M. Kodandaram, a political science professor at Osmania University and a mentor for the thousands of Telangana students, and KCR do not see eye to eye anymore. The demise of Telangana ideologue K. Jayashankar last June and the decline of balladeer G. Vittal Rao, popularly known as Gaddar, as well as last years agitation fatigue have slowed down the movement.
janyala.srinivas@expressindia.com

Telangana reloaded

A damaging new video is the latest blight on the Republican candidates campaign
haveabettershotatwinningifhisfatherhadbeenbornofMexicanparents, suggesting that he believes identity, rather than policies, wins elections in the US. At the same time, Romney also insulted Palestinians, who he thinks have no interest... in establishing peace. These remarks come soon after Romneys ill-considered statement accusing Obama of sympathising with those who attacked US embassies in the Middle East and his gaffe-strewn three-nation tour in July. Now, as in the past, he doubled down on his comments: he said they were not elegantly stated, but that he says the same thing in public. Romneys campaign may recover from this serious misstep the election is still six weeks away. But the torrid September Romney has had in some ways reveals who he is. His repeated gaffes and refusal to take them back suggest a tone-deafness and lack of agility that ought to concern his party and its voters.

Romney again

The Telangana Rashtra Samithi has offered to merge with the Congress if a separate state is declared. This could be the Congresss chance to lay claim to power in the proposed state and make up for the losses in rest of Andhra.
Desam Partys (TDPs) N. Chandrababu Naidu has finally decided to support the Telangana demand after numerous flipflops. It is a tricky decision for Naidu. If the Telangana state becomes a reality, the TDP stands no chance of winning in the separate state. Meanwhile, the partys base in coastal districts and Rayalaseema is eroding because of its support for Telangana. The YSR Congress Party, floated by Jaganmohan Reddy, had initially stood for a united Andhra but has now come around. The growing influence of BJP in parts of central Telangana is also working up the sentiment for a separate the coastal districts and Rayalaseema are threatening to resign if the state is bifurcated. On the first day of the state assemblys monsoon session, Chief Minister N. Kiran Kumar Reddy dismissed the TRS demand for passing a resolution on Telangana, saying that it would be defeated because all political parties were divided over the issue of a separate state. Political analysts, however, feel that Telangana sentiment has actually fizzled out and that the Telangana March on September 30 is a desperate bid to corner the ruling Congress on the eve of the international bio-

Show time

HOSE expecting a close US presidential election may yet be proven right, but so far, Republican candidate Mitt Romneys worst enemy this campaign has been Mitt Romney. With an economic recovery that can best be termed anaemic, Romney should, at the very least, be neckand-neck with President Barack Obama. Yet, as the campaigns head into home stretch, one gaffe after anotherhasgifted Democrats material to bombard voters with. The latest incident of Romney opening his mouth only to put his foot in it comes courtesy Mother Jones, which released a video recorded at a private, $50,000-aplate fundraiser where Romney dismissed 47 per cent of Americans as entitlement junkies who would never vote for him because he could never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives. In the same video, he also claimed that he would

John Kenneth Galbraith

WORDLY WISE

Politics is the art of choosing between the disastrous and the unpalatable.

LASSES have been suspended. Normal service will resume shortly. That is what we have been told in a series of mutually contradictory and rushed Isaf and Commons statements about the US decision to suspend joint operations with the Afghan army a decision no other coalition partner seems to have been warned about. One of those out of the loop, the defence secretary Philip Hammond, told MPs the decision was tactical, not strategic, and that its effect would be limited because the US did not routinely partner with the Afghans below the level of battalion. He is wrong on both counts. If this decision sticks, it strikes at the heart of the exit strategy, which is to leave an Afghan army strong and cohesive enough to stand on its own feet when foreign combat stops in 2014. If that were to happen now, the Hazaras and Tajiks would continue fighting, but the force

Suspending joint operations could damage the USs exit strategy

itself would crumble and civil war would return within a year. All the slick alliterative hype about Afghans standing up as we stand down has been exposed for the sham it really is by the current campaign of insider attacks which have killed 51 Nato soldiers this year. The longer the suspension of joint patrolling lasts, the deeper the damage in relations between Nato and Afghan forces will become... The transition is a process, not a handover. In north Helmand, the centre of this war, the lions share of the fighting is still done by US marines. The scale and speed of the training programme, which has left the Afghan army so vulnerable to infiltration, has been dictated by political imperatives as a war entering its 12th year drains of all meaning. From a leader in The Guardian, London

Leaving Afghanistan

started in the aftermath of the diesel and LPG price hike and the announcement of big bang economic reforms is likely to continue for a while. However, escape clauses are built into FDI in retail: states who do not want to implement it, need not do so. There is a danger that the dust will soon settle and everything will be forgotten. Controversies like the one on coal allocations will also be put to rest. S. Kamat Bardez

THE political circus that

Game changer

THIS refers to Hockey India

PRINTLINE

league: Four teams sold, Oz star Dwyer likely to be mascot of hockeys IPL (IE, September 18). A hockey league in demand with corporate buyers is good news. Aggressive marketing of the game will bring in viewers and drive away the apathy it suffers from. It will also attract more talented players and send out the message that cricket is not the only lucrative sport. Rahul Gaur Gurgaon