I’ve been thinking about this scenario for over a decade, and authored a book, War at the Top of the World, that warned of the dangers of a future Sino-Indian conflict.

Just thinking about this topic staggers the imagination. China and India account for 2.3 billion people, a third of the world’s total population.

My book was directly inspired by meeting the Dalai Lama in the mid-1990’s. I heard him give a long, very interesting speech on the Indian-Chinese border conflict, which I had studied in depth as a result of my deep interest in the Himalayan region.

The audience that came to hear His Holiness expected to hear a warm, fuzzy talk about the meaning of life. Instead, they were totally bemused by the Dalai Lama’s discussion of South Asian grand strategy and the Tibetan-Indian border that had been drawn by Imperial Britain with no regard to China. People often forget the Dalai Lama is the temporal leader of Tibet as well as its spiritual guide.

I was the only person in the audience who understood the subject or who asked questions about the talk. After, His Holiness took me aside and we conversed at length about the contested border, from Ladakh and Kashmir in the West to India’s Assam and Northeast Frontier Agency (today Arunachal Pradesh), and Tibet’s future.

We also talked for a long time about cats, but that’s another story that will be in my next book.

So from my encounter with the Dalai Lama came my first book, War at the Top of the World (now in its fourth, revised edition), which also covered then little-known Afghanistan and the endless conflict over Kashmir between India and Pakistan.

In War, I predicted that the first major crisis of the 21st Century would occur in Afghanistan.

9/11 happened soon after War came out. I was swamped by calls from the media to talk about Afghanistan and a certain Osama bin Laden.

“How did you know?” everyone asked me in amazement.

“Because I was watching that part of the world when few others were doing so,” came my reply.

In 1962, India moved troops into remote valleys high on the eastern Himalayas claimed by China. Beijing proclaimed it would “teach India a lesson.”

It certainly did. Marching over the high mountains, Chinese troops quickly outflanked static Indian forces – as they did with American troops in Korea in 1950. The Indians were routed. The People’s Liberation Army took much of Arunachal Pradesh, and stood before tea-producing Assam, only a relatively short distance to Calcutta.

Satisfied by his “lesson,” Chairman Mao ordered his troops to withdraw.

Proud India was humiliated and deeply shocked. Since then, India has built up its forces in the region to over three army corps of 100,000 mountain troops, backed by high-altitude air bases and a network of new roads and supply depots.

The long, poorly demarcated border has been tense ever since. India claims two large chunks of territory in the west held by China: Aksai Chin and a slice of Kashmir given by Pakistan to China to allow a military road connecting Tibet with Chinese Xinjiang. I have explored both frozen wastelands, both over 15,000 vertiginous feet.

China claims most of Indian-held Arunachal Pradesh on the eastern end of the Himalayan border, known as the McMahon line,

India has only grudgingly accepted China’s 1950 takeover of Tibet and has harbored anti-Chinese groups dedicated to liberating the mountain kingdom. At the same time, India quietly asserted control of two other Himalayan mountain kingdoms, Bhutan and Sikkim.

India sees the growing array of Chinese bases in Tibet as an extreme danger. China’s air, missile and intelligence bases in Tibet look down on the vast plains of India.

India’s leader, Jawaharlal Nehru, once complained of this danger to China’s Premier Chou Enlai. Chou laughed and retorted, “If I wanted to destroy India, I would march 100 million Chinese to the edge of the Tibetan plateau and order them to piss downhill. We would wash you into the Indian Ocean.”

Tibet controls most of the headwaters of India’s great rivers. Delhi has long feared that China may one day dam and divert their waters to China’s dry western provinces.

Other serious potential flashpoints exist. India’s old foe, Pakistan, with whom it has fought four wars, is China’s closet ally. Beijing arms Pakistan and has built up its nuclear arms program. An Indian-Pakistan war over divided Kashmir, or an Indian intervention in a fragmenting Pakistan or Afghanistan, could draw China into the fray. A new port in western Pakistan at Gwadar will give China port rights on the Arabian Sea.

Burma (today Myanmar), on India’s troubled eastern flank, which is rent by tribal uprisings, deeply worries Delhi. Strategic Burma is rapidly becoming an important forward Chinese base. A new road links China with Burma, and provides China’s navy a badly needed port on the Andaman Sea, and thus access to the Indian Ocean.

India believes China is trying to strategically encircle it. To the west, Pakistan; to the north, Tibet; to the east, Burma. To the south, China is busy cultivating Sri Lanka.

In spite of million-man armed forces and nuclear weapons, India feels increasingly threatened by China’s rise. The Indians know full well that China expects obedience from its neighbors. Even a small border clash between these two assertive giants could light the fuse of a broad and very frightening conflict. The scramble for oil and gas offers ample causes of yet more conflict in Central Asia and even the Gulf, where today America rules supreme.
August 31, 2010

Eric Margolis [send him mail] is the author of War at the Top of the World and the new book, American Raj: Liberation or Domination?: Resolving the Conflict Between the West and the Muslim World. China and India: A War of Giants by Eric Margolis
Recently by Eric Margolis: Drowning Pakistan Worries Washington

Spokesman P.J. Crowley told reporters Wednesday that Clinton will announce the new assistance while attending meetings at the United Nations in New York. The United States has provided more than 90 million dollars in aid since the flooding hit earlier this month.

The disaster has claimed more than 1,600 lives. The United Nations estimates that 6-8 million people are in desperate need of help.

Keywords: Pakistan flood, US aid

The Indian Army has received confirmation that China deployed an infantry battalion of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) at the 15,397-feet Khunjerab Pass on the Karakoram highway this month for the security of its workers engaged in building a railroad. This railroad will eventually connect Xinjiang to the port of Gwadar in Balochistan, Pakistan.

The Khunjerab Pass straddles the border between China and PoK and is 272 km from Gilgit in the Northern Areas. This PLA deployment is expected to be raised to brigade strength (3,000 troops) as work on the railroad progresses in the Northern Areas.

Writing in The New York Times — the article was carried by The Indian Express — Selig S Harrison, director of the Asia Program at the Center for International Policy, reported that 7,000-11,000 PLA troops are already in the Gilgit-Baltistan region.

The Indian Army brass has taken note of the deployment of 1,000 troops at Khunjerab Pass but is not unduly alarmed about the build-up.

Syed Ali Gilani, in a statement issued in Srinagar, termed the restrictions as frustration on part of the occupation authorities. “The puppet administration is using brute force to quell the Kashmiris’ peaceful movement against Indian oppression,” he added.

He said that India had fielded its regular army in addition to the police and Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) personnel to counter the innocent Kashmiri people.

“In villages, Indian army and Rashtriya Rifles have started to brutalize the youth who stage peaceful protests against India. They are called to military camps and harassed every day,” he deplored.

Syed Ali Gilani denounced the arbitrary raids on Hurriyet leaders including Pir Saifullah and Raja Mehraj-ud-Din. He appealed the Kashmiri people to follow the programmes announced in connection with the Quit Kashmir campaign.

The veteran Hurriyet leader also flayed the arrest of the Pro-Pakistani Chairperson of Dukhtaran-e-Millat, Aasiya Andrabi by Indian police.

“She is not an armed woman but only leads women. On one side, the administration is describing Kashmir as political issue and advocating its political solution, and on the other, arresting leaders one after the other,” he said demanding the release of all arrested persons including Aasiya before Eid. Restrictions depict authorities’ frustration: Syed Ali Gilani. ‘Pakistan Times’ Jammu & Kashmir Desk

The Acting Chairperson of Dukhtaran-e-Millat, Riffat Fatima, in a statement issued in Srinagar, termed the illegal detention of Aasiya as the frustration of the puppet administration. “The authorities are trying to suppress the ongoing freedom movement through use of brute force,” she added.

She said that the administration was subjecting Aasiya Andrabi to political vendetta and had been detaining her husband for the last seventeen years. Riffat condemned the illegal detention of DeM Chairperson during Ramadan in past three years.

The spokesman of Jamaat-e-Islami Jammu and Kashmir, in a statement issued in Srinagar, condemned the unlawful arrest of Aasiya. He urged India to settle the Kashmir dispute in accordance with the aspirations of Kashmiri people by implementing the relevant United Nations resolutions.

Meanwhile, Hurriyet leader and the Vice Chairman of Jammu and Kashmir Muslim League Masarrat Alam Butt, has reiterated to continue the freedom struggle till its logical conclusion, despite all odds.

Masarrat Alam Butt in a media interview condemned the imposition of curfew and restrictions by the occupation authorities in the territory. “Indian troops have unleashed a reign of terror in the occupied territory. They open fire straight at unarmed and innocent Kashmiris,” he added.

He said that New Delhi wanted to suppress the ongoing freedom movement through use of brute force. “India can not deter Kashmiris’ resolve to get freedom from its illegal occupation through use of brute force,” he maintained.

He said that as many as sixty-four innocent Kashmiri youth, most of them students and children, had been martyred by the occupation forces so far during the current agitation. He maintained that the Sikh community was fully safe in the occupied Valley.

And, the spokesman of Press Guild of Kashmir in a statement flayed Indian police for torturing a scribe, working with a local daily. He warned of worst consequences if the police did not stop subjecting the reporters and photojournalists to torture. Illegal detention of Aasiya Andrabi condemned ‘Pakistan Times’ Jammu & Kashmir Desk

Syed Ali Gilani, in a media interview in Srinagar, said that puppet administration was resorting to autocratic tactics to crush the ongoing movement. “It was high time for India to accept the ground realities. People of Kashmir are struggling for their inalienable right to self-determination,” he added.

The veteran leader said that the struggle of Kashmiri people had entered into a decisive phase. He said that the ongoing movement would continue till India accepted Kashmir as a dispute, withdrew its troopers from the occupied territory and released all the illegally detained Pro-Pakistani Hurriyet leaders and activists.

Syed Ali Gilani said that the mass participation of people in Quit Kashmir Movement had frustrated the occupation authorities. “Indian troopers and police have been given unbridled powers to kill and harass the unarmed Kashmiris,” he maintained.

Emphasising that the sacrifices rendered by over one-lakh martyrs should serve as a glaring example of Kashmiris’ resolve, he said India could not muzzle the just voice of Kashmiri people through use of brute force.

The veteran Pro-Pakistani Hurriyet leader said that India was delaying the resolution of Kashmir dispute by projecting it as an economic issue just to hoodwink the international community.

On the other hand, the Pro-Pakistani Jammu and Kashmir Tehreek-e-Hurriyet, headed by Syed Ali Gilani, has hailed China for disallowing the Chief of India’s Northern military command based in the territory to enter the country.

A spokesman of Tehreek-e-Hurriyet, in a statement issued in Srinagar, appealed the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) to adopt the same policy and make India realize that its occupation of Kashmir was illegal.

Another report says; Indian police have arrested eleven Pro-Pakistani people including Hurriyet leader and the Acting President of Jammu and Kashmir Democratic Political Movement, advocate Muhammad Shafi Reshi, from different places.

The police arrested Muhammad Shafi Reshi along with four other people from Baba Demb area of Srinagar. Reshi is a member of the Jammu and Kashmir High Court Bar Association.

The police arrested two students for raising anti-India and pro-liberation slogans at the gate of Jammu University. A police team conducted raid at Khatianka Talab area of Jammu city and arrested the students identified as Qamran and Shafiq. The police also arrested five persons in Handwara for participating in anti-India demonstrations.

On the other hand, people took to streets in Habba Kadal, Chota Bazar, Shaheed Gunj, Karfali Mohalla, Kani Kadal, Islamabad, Bijbehara, Sangam, Qaimoh, Kulgam, Pulwama, Kakapora, Pampore, Awantipora, Tral, Kupwara, Handwara and Baramulla areas and staged pro-freedom demonstrations. Indian troops and police personnel resorted to heavy baton charge and excessive teargas shelling to disperse the protestors at many places, injuring several people.

Locals said that the troops and policemen broke windowpanes of many houses and damaged the vehicles passing through the areas. Residents of Islamabad said that the troops smashed windowpanes of several houses and a Mosque at Ghaziabad. In Tahab area of Pulwama, a hawaldar of 8th battalion Armed Police was beaten to pulp by CRPF troopers after he objected their chasing away an eight-year-old boy.Detentions cannot deter Kashmiris’ resolve: Gilani
‘Pakistan Times’ Jammu & Kashmir Desk

NEW DELHI: The Manmohan Singh government on Monday said that it was making “independent verification” of reports that hint a Pakistan handing over de-facto control of the strategic Gilgit-Baltistan region in Pakistan. The government said it would be a matter of serious concern if the reports turn out to be true.

“We have seen media reports and are seeking an independent verification of these reports. If true, it would be a matter of serious concern and we would do all that is necessary to ensure safety and security of the nation,” MEA spokesman Vishnu Prakash told reporters on Monday.

He was asked about the reports in The New York Times about the influx of an estimated 7,000 to 11,000 soldiers of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army in the Gilgit-Baltistan region in the PoK, which is closed to the world.

According to the US newspaper, “China wants a grip on the strategic area to assure unfettered road and rail access to the Gulf through Pakistan”, and for this purpose it is building high-speed rail and road link. The link up would enable Beijing to transport cargo and oil tankers from eastern China to the new Chinese-built Pakistani Naval base at Gawadar, Pasni and Ormara in Balochistan, just east of the Gulf in 48 hours.

“Many of the PLA soldiers entering Gilgit-Baltistan are expected to work on the railroad. Some are extending the Karakoram Highway, built to link China’s Xinjiang province with Pakistan. Others are working on dams, expressways and other project,” the paper said.

The report reinforces the view in the strategic community that China will once again use the Kashmir issue as a bargainic chip. India’s response to China’s involvement in construction and water management

While the above is steeped in Indian paranoia, the article by Verma takes the cake.

Ironically, instead of consolidating and integrating Kashmir, pacifist New Delhi is permitting the birth of a similar pocket of influence with extreme philosophy in the valley that will come back to haunt India in the near future.

THE THREAT FROM NORTH

Second, to add to the woes of New Delhi, a bigger threat in addition to the existing one is posed by communist China. While too much ‘god’ motivates Pakistan, China pretends to be a ‘godless’ state. Unlike nations that boast of an army, in Pakistan the army owns the state. On the other hand, in China the People’s Liberation Army is loyal to the Chinese Communist Party and not the state. Dissent in both is a ‘no-no’ in varying degrees. Both, Pakistan and China, unlike India are paranoid about open societies. Thus, Beijing and Islamabad share commonality of purpose and together direct their energies to upstage India in international forums, on the borders and by fomenting internal dissent. In a unique ‘jointmanship,’ Islamabad clandestinely transfers sensitive defence technology it receives from the west to Beijing on ‘barter basis’ as there is ban on transfer to China!

The concurrent rise of China and India pits them against each other, as they compete for the same resources, but one with an authoritarian regime that is scared of Dalai Lama and Google, and the other with a free society that revels in religion, Dalai Lama and Google.

Threat from China was evident from its maps in 1946. Mao with the help of these maps described Tibet as the palm of a hand with its five fingers – Ladakh, Sikkim, Nepal, Bhutan and NEFA as Chinese territories that needed to be liberated. Tibet was liberated by force while New Delhi slept. Nepal found India’s refusal to defend Tibet as a sign of an unreliable ally and thought it prudent to open communications with Beijing.

Today India stands encircled by China.

THE THREAT PERCEPTION

To be supreme in Asia, and impelled by the necessity to divert the attention from the growing internal turmoil, Beijing is likely to design a limited but visible military victory in a joint strategy with Islamabad. Pakistan under severe threat of fragmentation would be more than a willing ally.

With Afghanistan being abandoned by the West, beginning July 2011, Islamabad will craft a strategy to take over Kabul with the help of Islamic fundamentalist groups. The irony is that in the aftermath of the exit of the West; Taliban will occupy the Parliament being built by India in Kabul and connive disruption from there of the Indian Union. These groups will not target the West immediately since the latter retains the ability to re-intervene once inaction is deemed as ’suicidal’. The Taliban will initially concentrate on unraveling a soft target like India in concert with Beijing -Islamabad -Kabul or Chinese Communists- Pakistan Army- Irregular Forces axis.

The physical threat to India will materialize in 2012, after the exit of the American forces from Afghanistan. Earlier India had to contend with a single threat from its West/Central Asia. Now another threat posed from the North under a joint strategy between China and Pakistan has emerged.

The developing scenario suggests that henceforth GHQ Rawalpindi will further orchestrate provocation against India to regain lost ground in J&K by way of rallies in PoK or Lahore and through military machinations on our borders. It will provide fillip to terrorist attacks, export of fake currency, inserting terrorists in India through Nepal, activation of sleeper cells, and raising controversy on non-issues like water. Beijing while talking ambiguously up to 2012 buildup will continue to support the Maoists in Nepal and step up training and funding to Maoist in India. The intensity of Cyber War will meanwhile increase.

In nutshell, the objective will be to keep India off balance.

THE STRATEGY

By 2012, to unravel India, Beijing is likely to para-drop a division of its Special Forces inside the Siliguri Corridor to sever the Northeast. There will be simultaneous attacks in other parts of the border and linkup with the Special Forces holding the Siliguri Corridor will be effected. All these will take place under the nuclear overhang. In concert Islamabad will activate the second front to unhook Kashmir by making offensive moves across the IB in the plains and the desert to divide Indian reaction capability. Meanwhile the fifth columnists supporting these external forces will unleash mayhem inside.

Two key question for New Delhi:
Will India go nuclear if its territorial integrity is threatened? France’s stated policy is that it will use the nuclear option, if Germany is attacked. Germany is not likely to face a nuclear adversary, yet France will use nuclear option if it is attacked. India faces threat from two nuclear powers in its vicinity. Will India shift its stated position of second strike to first strike, if the territorial integrity of the Union is under threat?
Will New Delhi have the gumption to order the Navy to retaliate and stop the flow of cargo in the Indian Ocean being freighted to China? Or will it order the Air Force to conduct offensive and decisive strategic strikes inside Tibet?

New Delhi requires to develop offensive orientation in its thinking for the answers to be in affirmative. India has produced more than its share of great thinkers in civil affairs. However, being a pacifist society, it does not boast of a single military thinker of repute. Therefore, we should not hesitate to import knowledge from the best military thinkers to create an assertive society, just in the same way, as we need to import the best defence technologies to set up the most modern defence industry hub that ensures expansion of democratic space in Asia.

The ideal opportunity for China to dismember India is between 2011 and 2014 on multiple counts. First, to divert attention from the growing dissent within. Second, beyond this period, Pakistan as a fragmented nation may not exist to support the Chinese. Third, the change of generation by 2015 will witness an assertive India. Fourth, the new Indian assertiveness will ensure rapid modernization of the Armed Forces with robust military capabilities. Last but not the least, given the fact it does not pose threat to any country, India will create strong international alliances. It is in a unique position and gets along well with the West, as well as countries like Russia and others. In

fact, the international opinion will decisively tilt in favour of India if it shrewdly deals the powerful geo-economic card held in the arsenal.

Popular Books on China

Tibet: The Lost Frontier
Dharamshala and Beijing: the negotiations that never were

Comment by Zoglul Husain

London 22 August 2010. Referring to the above article from Indian Defence Review Vol 25.2 Apr-Jun 2010. It is an important article to read. It reveals one of India’s game plans for a war in 2012 against what it calls the China-Pakistan axis. It has great implications for Bangladesh too.

It depicts the scenario that in 2011 the West would leave Afghanistan, and then Pakistan would establish control over Afghanistan, and a Sino-Pak sabotage within India will follow in 2012 with the aim of dismembering India. It would be in 2012, as, according to the analysis, after that year Pakistan may not exist as a state.

India, as a habit, always vilifies China and Pakistan and glorifies itself. According to India, the states Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka are failed or failing states and so, according to them, India should rescue these states with the help of the West and India would do that out of magnanimity! India in reality is neither democratic, nor secular, nor socialist, as claimed by their constitution. Indeed, about 70% of Indian population are untouchables (Dalits) and semi-untouchables (Semi-Dalits), while majority of Muslims in there are very poor and are treated as semi-Dalits.

However, the Indian defence review is suggesting that, in the above scenario, it would be likely that China would “para-drop a division of its Special Forces inside the Siliguri Corridor (Chicken’s neck) to sever the Northeast”. In the event, India may use Nuke first and also may try to block Chinese ships in the Indian ocean. It has not analysed what China and Pakistan would do then, or before then.

Nor have they mentioned that it is because of the vulnerability of the Siliguri corridor that India has offered Bangladesh $1 bn loan to build road and rail transit corridor through Bangladesh. One of the conditions of carrying Indian cargos is that whenever Indian cargo would be carried on Bangladesh roads, no Bangladeshi vehicles would be allowed on those roads.

We need to analyse this transit-corridor project. As, according to reports, India is frantically preparing for war in two fronts against China and Pakistan, it is going to use the transit-corridor, road-links and train-links, for military transport and general military purposes, as their Siliguri corridor is very vulnerable. This means, India will establish territorial control over Bangladesh in their military preparation against two fronts, China and Pakistan, and also in their internal conflicts with the ULFA freedom fighters and the Maoists.

Mujib conceded to them river transit, Moeen U conceded air transit and Hasina conceded transit through road, rail, sea-ports, river-port, connectivity etc., which are programmed to be implemented soon. According to Hasina’s plan, our soil and our govt support would be used in favour of India and against China, Pakistan, Nepal, Tibet, Sikkim, Bhutan, ULFA freedom fighters, Maoists, etc. It would also mean that we would lose our independence and sovereignty to India. We must, therefore, oppose the transit-corridor project of $1 bn. There must be demos etc. on the proposed routes. People must build barricades and develop political resistance to stop the project. We must politically fight for the annulment of Hasina’s agreements with India. All patriots across the spectrum must unite and build political resistance.

Writer: Zoglul Husain
Email: zoglul@hotmail.co.uk

The answer to the outlined nightmare stares India on its face.

India simply needs to take out the cost-benefit ratio from the game plan of the opponent by rapidly acquiring the requisite military muscle that outguns and outclasses the adversary. War is akin to business. If there is no cost-benefit ratio, it cannot be imposed! Such assertive actions will also naturally propel India in Asia as the most influential player and arrest the slide of retreating democracies.

Bharat Verma, Editor Indian Defence Review and author of the book Fault Lines and Indian Armed Forces.

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — The aging man in mud-splattered, frayed clothes has barely lowered his body onto the sidewalk when the money starts piling up. Heeding his call for donations for flood victims, Pakistanis of all classes rush to hand over cash to Abdul Sattar Edhi, whose years of dedication to the poor have made him a national icon.

He thanks each donor, some of whom ask to have their photo taken next to him. Four hours later, the crowd remains — and the equivalent of $15,000 is overflowing from a pink basket in front of him.

Edhi has been helping the destitute and sick for more than 60 years, filling the hole left by a state that has largely neglected the welfare of its citizens. Part Mother Teresa, part Gandhi, with a touch of Marx, he is the face of humanitarianism in Pakistan.

Funded by donations from fellow citizens, his 250 centers across the country take in orphans, the mentally ill, unwanted newborns, drug addicts, the homeless, the sick and the aged. His fleet of ambulances picks up victims of terrorist bombings, gang shootings, car accidents and natural disasters.

Pakistan’s corruption-riddled government acknowledges Edhi and other charities do the work that in other nations the state performs. The country has no national health service, insurance program or welfare system, and few state-run orphanages or old people’s homes.

The foundation offers an alternative to charitable work performed by hardline Islamist groups in Pakistan, some with alleged links to terrorism. The spread of these organizations has triggered concerns in the West, including their work in the aftermath of this summer’s floods.

Edhi is a devout Muslim, but critical of Islamic clerics in general, not just extremists. He says they focus on ritual, preaching hellfire and defending the faith against imagined enemies, rather than helping the poor — which he says should be the cornerstone of all faiths.

The 80-something Edhi — he and his children disagree on his exact age — lives with his wife, herself a charity worker, in a tiny room in one of his welfare centers in Karachi, a bustling port city. His bed is a one-inch thick mattress on a piece of wood.

“I am a beggar for the poor,” he says, stained teeth showing in a wide smile, eyes sparkling after a week touring flood-hit areas. “Serving humanity is the biggest jihad. It is the real thing.”

___

Edhi deals with birth and death, and almost everything in between.

Just above his bedroom, a maternity ward and an orphanage are home to 18 children, many of them abandoned by their mothers in cradles left outside his centers. They wear hand-me-downs from the city’s rich. Edhi’s wife, Bilquis, tries to get the children adopted, but few Pakistanis want to take girls or older children, she says.

On a recent afternoon, the kids shouted out English nursery rhymes and danced. They then sat cross-legged on the floor, drinking tea from plastic mugs and eating spicy pastries and sticky sweets that an anonymous benefactor had dropped off.

The home was clean and bright, with plenty of toys and loving staff. But there was no place to play outside, and the roar of motorbikes from the lanes below was a constant backdrop.

Across town, workers at the Edhi morgue were dealing with latest influx of bodies. They receive around 25 a day, half of which are never claimed — the city’s unloved and unknown.

Working quickly but carefully, they cut the clothes from the bodies, lather them with a bar of soap from head to toe, rinse them with water from a jug, then wrap them in a white sheet. The bodies are bussed across town, prayed over and buried in unmarked graves.

The body of American journalist Daniel Pearl, killed by al-Qaida terrorists in Karachi in 2002, was picked up by an Edhi ambulance and taken to the morgue, the largest in the city of 14 million people.

The morgue is attached to a hospital for the homeless, a dispensary, a shelter for boys and women and children, even a wedding hall for the marriages arranged for children who have been looked after by the foundation. The smell of baking bread from an oven that churns out 9,000 loaves a day fills the air.

“The poor can come here and get a solution to all their problems,” says Ejal Hassan Zaidi, who had accompanied a neighbor to the morgue to collect the body of his 3-year-old daughter, killed in a hit-and-run incident hours earlier. “From the cradle to the grave.”

___

Born in what is now India, Edhi and his parents moved to Pakistan in 1947 when that country was created as a Muslim state at the end of British colonial rule. The family was quite well off — his father was a traveling salesman — and socially progressive.

In his biography, Edhi credits his mother for setting him on a humanitarian path. She urged him to give half his pocket money to someone poor every day and rebuked him if he didn’t.

“‘You have a selfish heart, one that has nothing to give,’” he remembers her saying. “‘What kind of human being are you? Look at the greed in your eyes. Already you have started robbing the poor. How much more will you rob from them in your lifetime?”

When she was dying, he looked after her, bathing her emaciated body and washing and braiding her hair — experiences that would also shape his life.

“The first night she spent in the grave, I dedicated my life to the service of mankind,” he says.

Edhi started small. In 1951, he bought an eight-foot-square shop in a slum neighborhood in Karachi that he converted into a dispensary. Seven years later he bought a van that he used as an ambulance, writing “Poor Man’s Van” on both sides.

He became intimately involved in the business of caring for the sick and dying. He would drive the ambulance to the scene of an accident to pick up the bodies, administer injections during a flu outbreak and travel across the country to help after earthquakes and other natural disasters.

Edhi’s record of round-the-clock service and frugal lifestyle attracted donations, and he soon had a fleet of 14 ambulances. In the 1980s and 90s, he opened centers and ambulance services throughout the country. He donated $200,000 to releif efforts after Hurricane Katrina, and his workers have also helped out in disasters in Asia and the Middle East.

___

Pakistanis are a generous people, required by their Muslim faith to give away 2.5 percent of their wealth each year. The last nationwide survey done in 1998 showed that Pakistanis gave the then equivalent of $820 million to charity, around the same as the government’s health and education budget at the time. There are no numbers on how rising terrorism and a poor economy have affected this philanthropy.

Edhi does not accept donations from international organizations or governments, including Pakistan’s, saying he doesn’t need outside help and it is important for Pakistanis to help each other. He and his wife live simply of the interest from some savings.

The foundation does not produce detailed financial statements or annual reports. Edhi points to a wall of files in one office in which he says everything is accounted for. Donors do not seem to mind, such is their trust in him.

“You ask any Pakistani on the streets, Edhi is total credible with them,” says Anjum Haque, the executive director of the Pakistan Centre for Philanthropy. “The success of the trust is down to Edhi himself.”

Last year, donations to Edhi-run charities totaled around $5 million, according to Faisal Edhi, the founder’s son and trust member. A significant chunk of the funds comes from overseas Pakistanis, who want to donate to their homeland.

Edhi Village, a 65-acre complex in the undulating hills beyond the northern slums of Karachi, is home to 300 children, many picked up off the streets, and 900 adults, many elderly or suffering from mental disabilities.

Most wear clean, ironed clothes, and the food is fresh. Yet there are also signs of neglect. One naked youth dragged himself through a puddle. Some had no shoes and begged visitors to buy them a pair.

The adults live in rooms around the size of three tennis courts, bare except for raised sections for sleeping. They are locked inside for part of the day. There are two doctors, four nurses and two ward boys looking after them.

“We do the most we can do with our resources,” says Billal Mohammad, a regional Edhi manager. “They would be living on the pavement under the sky. We give them shelter, food and treatment. You must not see this place throughout Western eyes.”

___

Edhi has made no secret of his dislike of Pakistan’s ruling class. So it was a surprise to see a gaggle of politicians using one of his orphanages in Karachi as a venue to mark the recent birthday of President Asif Ali Zardari.

The visitors spooned cake into the mouths of the children, shouted political slogans for television cameras and asked Edhi to be photographed next to them. He said he only let the politicians in so the children would have a party to enjoy.

“So what if the politicians are using me? They even use God,” said Edhi, who sat by himself for most of the event. “Landowners, clerics, politicians. They are all looters. There is no fear in telling the truth.”

Hardline Islamist groups have criticized Edhi for his progressive views on women and the secular nature of his work. Some have said that by accepting newly-born babies from unmarried mothers, he is promoting premarital sex.

“We meet them and we read their newspapers. They say we are non-Muslims, unbelievers and communists,” says Faisal Edhi. “The jihadi groups don’t like us. They don’t believe in humanity.”

There are questions about what will happen to the foundation when Edhi dies. He says his two sons and three daughters will take over, though without him at the helm, people may not give as generously.

For now, his children appear more concerned about their father’s health. Apart from an afternoon nap, he works just as hard as he did when he was in his 30s, they say.

“We tell him to take it easy, but he doesn’t listen,” says daughter Almas Edhi. “He wants to keep busy.”
On the Net:

http://www.edhifoundation.com/

http://www.pcp.org.pk/

Aging philanthropist is Pakistan’s Mother Teresa

By CHRIS BRUMMITT (AP)

While exemplary punishment has to be given to the players who throw no-balls on cue, the fact remains that cricket has to be purified from the curse of the bookies in Bharat. These bookies should be the responsibility of the Bharati government. Delhi is responsible for sending out “bookie ‘bombs’ ” that are destroying cricket in general. The IPL circus is the other curse on cricket. They can call IPL anything they want, they should not call it cricket.

LONDON: The man at the centre of an alleged betting scam involving the Pakistan cricket team was out on bail Monday as police, governments and authorities probed the scandal rocking the sport.

Mazhar Majeed, 35, was released from custody having been arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to defraud bookmakers, following a newspaper’s claim that he took money in return for exact details on no-balls in the Lord’s Test match between England and Pakistan.

The allegations have caused uproar in Pakistan and shaken a sport that prides itself on being considered synonymous with fair play.

British police bailed Majeed without charge late Sunday.

“A 35-year-old man has been bailed until a date in the future,” a Scotland Yard spokesman told AFP.

He said the police would not be discussing the date or his bail conditions.

Scotland Yard detectives have also grilled Pakistan captain Salman Butt and two of their star strike bowlers Mohammad Aamer and Mohammad Asif in their investigation.

Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani said the claims “have bowed our heads in shame”, as he launched an investigation.

The News of the World newspaper said it paid Majeed 150,000 pounds (230,000 dollars, 185,000 euros) in return for advance details about the timing of three no-balls in the fourth and final Test, which England won on Sunday to take the series 3-1.

The report said Aamer and Asif delivered blatant no-balls at the exact points in the match indicated by the alleged middleman.

Pakistan team manager Yawar Saeed said detectives had on Saturday visited the team’s hotel, where Butt and the bowlers had been interviewed about the allegations.

All three gave statements to the police, who took away their mobile phones.

Scotland Yard said they could not discuss persons interviewed as part of an inquiry.

The News of the World published a photograph, video and audio of its encounters with Majeed. He was pictured counting wads of banknotes given to him by a reporter posing as a front man for a betting syndicate.

The Lord’s Test was played to a finish Sunday, but unusually, the post-match presentation ceremony did not take place on the outfield but was moved inside the pavilion.

During the ceremony, England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) chairman Giles Clarke refused to shake Aamer’s hand when presenting the player with the Pakistan Man of the Series award and a cheque for 4,000 pounds.

Despite the allegations, Saeed denied that Pakistani cricket was “institutionally corrupt”.

“I would not like to say that,” he said. “Yes, one has heard and one has read (allegations), but I would not like to go that far.” A defiant Butt insisted he would not resign the Test team captaincy over the claims.

“Anybody can stand out and say anything about you, that doesn’t make them true,” he said.

In Pakistan, Gilani said a probe was under way.

“The latest fixing allegations have bowed our heads in shame,” the prime minister told reporters in his home town of Multan.

“I have ordered a thorough inquiry into these allegations so that action could be taken against those who are proven guilty.” President Asif Ali Zardari has expressed his disappointment at the claims and is being informed of developments.

The country’s federal sports minister Ijaz Jakhrani promised that any players found guilty would be severely punished.

If wrongdoing was proven, “all the players involved must forget to play for Pakistan in future,” he said.

The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) said they had requested access to the ongoing investigation.

The no-balls at the centre of the claims were bowled on Thursday and Friday.

Pakistan’s players now face an awkward time as they must remain in England for a series of one-day matches.

“As far as I am concerned the one-day series is on,” Saeed said.

Former Pakistan captain Imran Khan said cricket in Pakistan must not be allowed to be dragged down by corrupt players.

“Why should Pakistan cricket suffer if some players have indulged in a crime?” he told Britain’s ITV television.

“The people who are found guilty should be removed from the team and replaced and should be punished as an example.” Ramiz Raja, the former Pakistan captain and later PCB chief executive, wrote in The Daily Telegraph newspaper Monday: “It is a disaster for cricket…those players must now be dealt with severely.

“For them to do it at Lord’s, the Mecca of cricket, brings extreme shame and sadness.” The latest allegations are a further blow to cricket in Pakistan, already at a low ebb with home matches ruled out due to terrorism fears.

The team has been dogged by “fixing” allegations since the 1990s and also embroiled in ball-tampering. – AFP

Some analysts are investigating possible links between Bharati intelligence agencies and the bookies. After all the Bharati agencies have a stake in maligning their enemies and making them look bad in politics and in sports. It is pedagogical to note that RAW did help the LTTE attack the Lankan cricket players in Lahore. That event isolated Pakistani cricket to foreign tours. Many are raising their eyebrows on the antics of Bharati bookies who are playing a central role in all cricket scandals involving Pakistan. Of course this cannot be a coincidence. The Pakistani intelligence agencies should conduct a thorough investigation into the roots of this corruption.

http://www.rbi.org.in/scripts/BS_PressReleaseDisplay.aspx?prid=20940

India’s External Debt as at the end of March 2009
As per the standard practice, India’s external debt statistics for the quarters ending March and June are released by the Reserve Bank of India and those for the quarters ending September and December by the Ministry of Finance, Government of India. The external debt data are released with a lag of one quarter. A detailed account of external debt as compiled in the standard format as at end-March 2009 in rupee and US dollar terms and revised data for the earlier quarters are set out in Statement 1 and 2, respectively. The developments relating to India’s external debt as at end-March 2009 are discussed in the following paragraphs.

Major Highlights of External Debt

(i) India’s external debt, as at end-March 2009, was placed at US $ 229.9 billion (22.0 per cent of GDP) recording an increase of US $ 5.3 billion or 2.4 per cent over the level of the previous year mainly due to the increase in trade credits.

(ii) As per an international comparison of external debt of the twenty most indebted countries, India was the fifth most indebted country in 2007.

(iii) By way of composition of external debt, the share of commercial borrowings was the highest at 27.3 per cent as at end-March 2009 followed by short-term debt (21.5 per cent), NRI deposits (18.1 per cent) and multilateral debt (17.2 per cent).

(iv) The debt service ratio has declined steadily over the years, and stood at 4.6 per cent as at end-March 2009.

(v) Excluding the valuation effects due to appreciation of US dollar against other major currencies and Indian rupee, the stock of external debt would have increased by US$ 18.7 billion as compared with the stock as at end-March 2008.

(vi) The share of short-term debt in total debt increased to 21.5 per cent at end-March 2009 from 20.9 per cent at end-March 2008, primarily on account of rise in short-term trade credits.

(vii) Based on residual maturity, the short-term debt accounted for 40.6 per cent of the total external debt at end-March 2009

(viii) The ratio of short-term debt to foreign exchange reserves at 19.6 per cent in March 2009 was higher compared to 15.2 per cent in March 2008.

(ix) The US dollar continues to remain the dominant currency accounting for 57.1 per cent of the total external debt stock as at end-march 2009.

(x) India’s foreign exchange reserves provided a cover of 109.6 per cent to the external debt stock at the end of March 2009 as compared with 137.9 per cent as at end-March 2008.

Here is a report from HinduBusinessline:

India’s external debt rises by 8.1% at Sept-end

Our Bureau

New Delhi, Dec. 31

The country’s total external debt stock, at the end of September, recorded an increase of 8.1 per cent from the end-March 2009 estimates.

The external debt at the end of September stood $242.8 billion, an increase of $18.2 billion over end-March.

While the long-term debt showed an increase of $19.2 billion (10.6 per cent) and went up to $200.4 billion, the short-term debt came down by $985 million (-2.3 per cent) to $42.4 billion. The increase in external debt over the previous quarter stood at 5.7 per cent or $13 billion.

Valuation effect on account of depreciation of the dollar against international currencies accounted for $8.3 billion (45.6 per cent) of the total increase in the external debt. The increase in total external debt also reflected the impact of inclusion of cumulative SDR allocations to India by International Monetary Fund as a long-term debt liability in external debt statistics.

The debt-service ratio, i.e. the ratio of total debt service payments to current receipts worked out to 4.9 per cent during April-September 2009 as against 3.7 per cent for April-September 2008. The ratio of short-term external debt to foreign exchange reserves, which was 17.2 per cent at end-March 2009, came down 15.1 per cent at end-September 2009. The ratio of Government external debt to GDP has remained around 5.0 per cent in the last three years. http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/2010/01/01/stories/2010010151881500.htm