Vedas and the Dantas

Vedas prescribe the philosophies and

I am a person who wants peace and hence it is often difficult for me to be a litigant. However when the local communities or people who are directly affected and rarely I myself ( taking care of the constitution and particularly protecting the environment are, not only mine, every citizen's duty) put on a wrench have to take to litigation and it must be considered fair in the current context of varied `vested' interests'.

Veda: Since it was the first it is "Veda Vakhyam"

The first real litigation on public purpose where I was involved was a convincing visit to Borra Caves, an unique geological monument made of the Karst topography in the Eastern Ghats Visakhapatnam district accidentally happening in our lives and furiously I wrote on the ruled sheets that I in the midst of about 300 people sitting in a marriage hall, the real concerns of people.

Samatha for whom I made the visit, thanks to a visionary driver, fought `tooth and nail' ( there is an incident of a graet activist losing teeth during this period and how not only nails but lives were later taken - subject for along blog) and a verdict was delivered in the favour of the tribals first time in the history of colonial and independent India. Wonderful it was that the client Samatha and the eminent advocate Dr Rajiv Dhawan never met face-to-face during the four year struggle. Wonderful because it is only a great pleader who can know the pain of his plaintiff without having to meet him. (In restrospect many believe that it was possible only that way.) No wonder that a major victory had been won for the adivasis of India. That was circa 1997! It was hailed later by the honourable advocate himself that this verdict was as historic as the Mabo judgement in Australia, another common wealth.

Just a decade later, the famous lawyer had to counter his own erudite and illustrious arguments and plead for the Orissa Government to allow mining in the tribal tracts. Was it due to the shabby treatment meted in the sale of Balco where pro bono he pleaded and was grossly undersupported by his clients and the clients had perhaps catapulted! Is there a reason to believe that advocates have also catapulted - and that is my serious concern- as some of these insightful and visonary lawyers are needed to be pro bono!

The lawyer pleads in an article in down to earth that institutions like CEC is micro-managing the affair. It was conducive to Veda-anta (sic) for the Supreme Court to micro-prescribe, that despite the fact that their activities were derogatory of the laws and their investors had condemned them for vioation of Human Rights and Environmental Safeguards, to ask for a joint venture to enable them destroy the land and deity of the Dongaria Kondh - the NIyamgiri hills for `just a few dollars more". Where does collusion end in India - (there is market for public office and sometime I wonder if I would rake in moneys if I start and Exchange for Public Office) and there is the market for selling of the land - in the name of SEZs or Mining leases or for mere industrial estates which periodically haunt local communities - and today the specific logic of the CEC which has been a body actually created for this micro-prescription by the Hon Supreme Court hurts!

I have nothing to say except that windfall profits must be shared with communities and that we need not pock-mark our country with numerous mining pits but seek a rational way of using our resources and at a time and context that will be appropriate for our future and the future of the globe- but who will listen to sane voices if Environment Day is also to be an event marketed and made use of by the channels to add to their advertisement revenues and Vedantas have to plead through citizens magazines a license to loot this Earth and the citizens therein!

Verdicts and Justice

My continuing encounters with the Judiciary in India makes me realise the absolutely short term memory that our dispensers of justice have. Most often the judges forget the core issue and seek some peripheral question on the spur of the moment. Most of these questions too are not very bright either. At the end of the long drawn hearings the judges pass a verdict. Perhaps the fundamental problem is in their training itself - for there are no Colleges for Justice and Jurisprudence but only Law Colleges! Today the courts reflect more of the global economic policies than even what the constitution of India would perhaps permit and where several political parties might fear to tread. But engaging the Court is as necessary as building the grassroot consciousness - and one must get along with the rigmarole!

Killer Buses or Careless Blokes

A body was seen stuck to the chasis of a Delhi city bus and on the discovery of it the driver fled. The body apparently was charred and unrecognisable. The callousness of Delhi bus drivers have become a legend and notice board in the the city's prominent ITO crossing lists number of deaths on Delhi's roads which beats mortality rates of all the killer diseases. The Delhi bus drivers are what they are, but my driving around the city and watching the way pedestrians walk, motorcyclists rush and cyclists cleave their way, I feel the bus drivers are not to blamed for everything.

The other day we saw over 10 kids hanging behind the bus and some alternating between the rear bumber of the bus and the footboard in busy Mehrauli-Badarpur Road. The bus was'nt that crowded and was definitely not the last bus home and it looked that the kids were just having such dangerous fun. A sudden brake would have had them into their last journey. It is amazing that people driving behind were so unconcerned. A small hint to the driver and they would have been reprimanded and potential accident could be avoided.

Road Dividers

Road dividers are the simplest device to keep local party workers busy with petty contracts. They have very little to do with traffic management and have lot to contribute to global warming. Look at any city in India you'll find road dividers and pavements are constantly on the dig and newer ones in place, just to be replaced when the next budget comes in. Some years ago, the city of Bangalore had excellent granite slabbed pavements and in the last decade alone several of its main streets have been redone with tiles, concrete slabs, tiles,concrete slab sequence that makes an interesting chronicle.
Not only do these road dividers call for greater vehicle-kilometers as often U-turns are one for a mile or more, they destroy in each round of relaying whatever trees or plants that are grown. They also are one of the greatest contributors to road accidents - matching the blue-line buses! In several small towns the cows act as road dividers and it has mutual benefits - the cows get the vehicles to wade off the fleas and the traffic behaves because there is some live creature there and that too revered!
I would vote for them, but the petty politicians and their backers will cry foul as it is their cash cow!

An Old Encounter Worth Constant Recall

Long years ago I went to conduct a survey of the impacts of Soapstone mining in a village called Pharsali in the then Almora District of Uttar Pradesh (now it is in the Bageshwar District of Uttarakhand). Perched at around 6000ft in the Himalayas, it is a woderful village close to the Pindari Glacier.

Close to the mine site lived an elderly lady whose cow, i was informed was wounded falling into the pit that the miners had dug. I went to interview her and know what she felt about the mine. She was forthright with her views on the mine and said it is for the benefit of one Mr Mangal Singh Aithani, a powerful person living in the nearby roadside settlement and it was not within her power to do anything but suffer the consequences of risk to cattle, pollution of the spring water, dust and rude behaviour of the miners. I said, I will faithfully report her concerns and do what was within my ability to restrict.

Having felt that my interview was inconclusive, I ventured to ask her what her other woes were. This was when she got into her moods and said she would answer me further only if I close my eyes. Not realising why she placed such a constraint and not wanting to stop her from her narration, I closed my eyes and she started with asking me as to what are my daily needs. Not knowing where to begin, I was grappling for words and she prompted me by saying - you'll need water to brush your teeth, is'nt it and go on from what you will need through the day. I said yes, I will first need water and she continued - so do I - and we have the Jal Nigam (Water Corporation) which lays the pipeline and Jal Sansthan (Water Society) which supplies water, both wings of the government who are there to provide for it - then on to breakfast - she said the Public Distribution System of the Civil Supplies Department is there to provide the rations and Kumaon Mandal Vikas Nigam (a regional development outfit) of the government was providing LPG cylinders for fuel to cook. Having completed the imaginary breakfast it was time to go to study and she pointed out that the Education Department has opened schools and colleges to attend and this went on till I could play with the help of the Sports Ministry in the evening and she advised that before I go to sleep, I should have some fruits which the Horticulture Department is promoting. Having now to go to sleep, I asked if I could open my eyes!
Yes, at your risk for if you open your eyes and look around for these they will vanish. Thats how Governments are - if you close your eyes and look for what the government is supposed to provide they are really not there, but when you close your eyes and think about their promises, there is hardly anything you want that is not provided by our welfare state.

That is why she said she encouraged people who can take on the government and also recalled how some of the people who came to her years ago have grown to prominent people and wished me to take on these causes.