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COVER STORY

MARCH 2019

MCG the place to be on International Women's Day for the T20 World Cup 2020

BY SAT Sports Desk

M

ELBOURNE, 8 March: Today marks one-yearto-go to the final of the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup 2020, when the two best women’s teams will compete to be crowned champions at the biggest cricket stadium in the world, the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG), on International Women’s Day. The International Woman’s Day this year marks one-year-to-go to the final of the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup 2020. The final will be held at the biggest cricket stadium in the world, the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG), on Sunday 8 March 2020, International Women’s Day. The final at the MCG, to be played under lights on Sunday 8 March 2020, presents a groundbreaking opportunity to set a new world record for attendance at a women’s sporting fixture.

Fans are urged to ‘save the date’ and be part of this historic opportunity for cricket and women’s sport, with tickets to the final on sale now at t20worldcup. com from A$20 for adults

Nick Hockley, CEO at ICC T20 World Cup 2020, speaks to media ICC T20 World Cup 2020 morning tea to celebrate one-year-to-go to the women's final at Melbourne Cricket Ground on March 08, 2019 in Melbourne. Photo: Michael Dodge/Getty Images.

and all kids’ tickets are A$5.

The ICC Women’s T20 World Cup 2020 is being played as a standalone event across Australia from 21 February – 8 March 2020. Ten teams will contest 23 matches in eight venues across six host cities, giving it a truly national footprint befitting a major global sporting event, and meaning as many fans as possible will have the opportunity to be part of it.

In order to reach the final, teams will have to finish top two in either Group A or Group B, comprising five teams each. Teams will then need to win one of the blockbuster double-header semi-finals at the iconic Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG) on Thursday 5 March 2020.

Hosts and four-time champions Australia will be out to defend their title, after defeating England in the final of the sixth and most recent edition of the global showpiece event for women’s T20 cricket, held in the West Indies in late 2018.

ICC T20 World Cup Australia 2020 Local

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A general view is seen of the ICC T20 World Cup 2020 morning tea to celebrate one-year-to-go to the women's final at at the MCG on March 08, 2019 in Melbourne, Australia. Photo: Michael Dodge/Getty Images. www.southasiatimes.com.au - (03) 9884 8096, 0421 677 082

MARCH 2019

cover story

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MCG the place to be on International...

Organising Committee CEO Nick Hockley said: “The final of the Women’s T20 World Cup 2020 will be the culmination of a threeweek festival taking place across Australia.

"The MCG on International Women’s Day is the perfect stage to celebrate the best teams in the world and presents an opportunity to set a new benchmark. We’re calling on everyone to save the date, gather your friends and family and help set a new record for the highest attendance at a women’s sporting event in history.”

ICC CEO David Richardson said: “I am particularly excited by the prospect of the final being held at the MCG in front of 92,000 fans and I know the Australian public, with their love of cricket will turn out in force to see the world’s best players battle it out for the title and break a world record in the process.”

Sports Minister Martin Pakula poses with Australia women's captain Meg Lanning in front a giant ICC T20 World Cup 2020 shirt that achieved a world record for the most signatures on it during ICC T20 World Cup 2020 morning tea to celebrate oneyear-to-go to the women's final at the MCG on March 08, 2019 in Melbourne. Photo : Michael Dodge/Getty Images Hopefully when we will feature in the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup, we will be a force to be reckoned with.”

Chloe Tryon – South Africa vice-captain: “I think it’s a master stroke by the ICC to have the final of the Women’s T20 World Cup on International Women’s Day. It’s such a significant day for every single woman across the world and to have an event of this magnitude come to an end on that day is brilliant.

“On a personal note, it would be a dream come true firstly playing in a World Cup final and second, in front of 90,000 cricket lovers at the MCG. This is the stuff every cricketer dreams of and it would be even more meaningful for Team South Africa to make history on such a big day.

“International Women’s Day in itself is so important and of great significance to women worldwide.

It serves as a reminder for women to be commemorated and celebrated for their loving and nurturing contribution to society. The same society that at times forgets these all-important leaders and pillars. It’s also a reminder that there is still a long way to go and a lot of work still needs to be done to create a more equitable society that is completely inclusive of women.

“We all come from different backgrounds and have different struggles. We need to put a voice to these so that as players, administrators and fans, we can find a way forward and support one another through them. This

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International women players speak: Meg Lanning – Australia captain: “It would be amazing to break the record. I’ve been a spectator when there’s 95,000 people there at the MCG and the atmosphere is incredible and it would be amazing to be the ones walking out on the middle of the ground with people there to watch and cheer you on.

The picture of it in my mind is incredible and hopefully it pans out so that Australia can get in to the final.”

Amy Satterthwaite – New Zealand captain: “It's a huge ambition but it’s a really exciting one as well. If they can achieve that (filling the MCG) it's going to be a pretty phenomenal World Cup. We've seen at the last few World Cups that it's just getting bigger and bigger and the public support has been incredible. It would be really exciting to be a part of.”

Bismah Maroof – Pakistan captain: “The ICC couldn’t have planned the final of the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup 2020 better. Playing on the International Women’s Day and at the MCG gives out a strong message to the sporting world on the importance and significance the ICC and its Members are giving to women’s cricket.

“The PCB has been focusing extremely hard on women’s cricket and generating opportunities for the emerging and interested girls to take up this great sport. I am sure this initiative will not only create more awareness of women’s cricket in Pakistan but will also inspire young girls to follow in the footsteps of some of the biggest names in women’s cricket.

“The Pakistan women’s cricket team is shaping up well and improving with each match. Our recent performance against the Windies women’s cricket team is a testament to the potential we have.

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COVER STORY

is also how we will create a welcoming environment which will, in turn, entice young girls into choosing our beloved game as a viable career path.

"As a South African, diversity is one of the many things that binds us a nation. International Women’s Day serves as a reminder to us to keep fighting the good fight and to raise our voices on behalf of those whose own continues to go unheard.”

Shakera Selman – Windies bowler: “A women’s World Cup final being played on International Women’s Day is already a coincidence of sorts. I’d be honoured to play in front of 90,000 supporters of women’s cricket and women in general. This will definitely be one of the

most memorable World Cup finals, no matter who gets crowned champions, simply because it is being played on the day when women are celebrated.”

Danni Wyatt – England all-rounder: “It’s always fantastic to see a large crowd and the idea of playing in front of a full MCG in the T20 World Cup final on International Women’s Day is so exciting.

I know from playing for the Renegades in the WBBL that the people of Melbourne love their cricket, so I hope they can turn up and help fill it out. Obviously from our point of view we’ll be doing everything we can to make sure we’re there as well.”

All fixtures information for women and men at icc-cricket.com Tickets are on sale now at t20worldcup.com

MCG the place to be on International...

MARCH 2019

Sports Minister Martin Pakula joins women cricketers to mark one year until the ICC T20 World Cup 2020 Woman’s final

By SAT Sports Desk

M

ELBOURNE, 8 March: Victorians are in for spectacular cricket with the state aiming to set the world record for the biggest ever crowd at a women’s sporting match, when the MCG hosts the Women’s Final of the ICC T20 World Cup one year from 8 March, 2019.

Minister for Tourism, Sport and Major Events Martin Pakula was joined by the stars of Australian women’s cricket at the MCG today to mark one year until the women’s final.

For the first time in its history, the ICC World T20 will feature two standalone events. The women’s competition will be held in February and March, before the men play in October and November.

Minister for Tourism, Sport and Major Events Martin Pakula said, “Victoria is one of the world’s great sporting cities and the MCG is one

Sports Minister Martin Pakula speaks to media during ICC T20 World Cup 2020 morning tea to celebrate one-year-to-go to the women's final at Melbourne Cricket Ground on March 08, 2019 in Melbourne.. Photo: Michael Dodge/Getty Images of the world’s greatest venues – there’s nowhere better to set the record for the biggest ever crowd for a women’s sporting match.”

“It’s an ambitious task, but imagine the atmosphere of a sold out MCG cheering on

superstars like Meg Lanning and Ellyse Perry in the final of the ICC T20 World Cup on International Women’s Day in 2020,” the Minister said.

A sell-out crowd for the Women’s Final on International Women’s Day would make history

– breaking the world record attendance for any women’s sport fixture.

Melbourne is Australia’s sporting capital and with the eyes of the world focusing their attention on the MCG for the Women’s Final, our state is set to embrace women’s sport

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like no other location has before.

Group games for the women’s tournament will be played at Junction Oval in St Kilda thanks to a $40 million investment from the Labor Government, Cricket Australia and Cricket Victoria towards the redevelopment of the iconic ground.

The Government’s $25 million contribution has given our top male and female cricketers the ground and facilities they deserve.

The Victorian Cricket and Community Centre features the new headquarters for Cricket Victoria, female-friendly facilities for our elite women’s cricket team VicSpirit, and stateof-the-art medical and rehabilitation areas.

The Melbourne Cricket Ground, Junction Oval and Kardinia will be hosting more matches than any other state during the tournament, confirming Victoria’s status as the sporting capital.

MARCH 2019

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community

MARCH 2019

Record road investment in Melbourne’s West picks up pace

By SAT News Desk

M

ELBOURNE: Drivers can look forward to better journeys in Melbourne’s west as work ramps up on key road upgrades and bridge improvement work as part of the Andrews Labor Government’s Suburban Roads Upgrade.

Minister for Transport Infrastructure Jacinta Allan last month visited the site of the first bridge upgrade at Hyde Street in Spotswood, which is part of the $1.8 billion Western Roads Upgrade.

Piling work, new safety barriers and corrosion protection upgrades are underway to strengthen and protect the bridge for the more than 14,000 drivers and hundreds of trucks which travel over it each day.

The Ballarat Road Bridge spanning the Maribyrnong River will be upgraded next month – adding new safety barriers and strengthening the bridge to better cater

for heavy vehicles. Works to improve crossings at Altona, and Brooklyn and Geelong Road, will also begin later this year.

Drivers will also see construction work getting underway at the Forsyth Road interchange and along Palmers Road duplication, with all eight major road upgrades now underway from Altona North to Tarneit.

New lanes will be added

to Palmers Road between the Princes Freeway and the Western Freeway, 16 intersections will be upgraded, and the Sayers Road intersection will be smoothed out to improve journeys for 11,000 drivers.

Minister for Transport Infrastructure Jacinta Allan said, “Whether it’s building more lanes to slash congestion, improving key intersections or carrying out vital upgrades or rehab

work – we’re delivering for drivers and communities in Melbourne’s west” “The Western Roads Upgrade is delivering major road upgrades and leaving a legacy for communities through Melbourne’s west – including an iconic new sculpture at Duncans Road in Werriee,” she said.

The Forsyth Road intersection upgrade will also see new lanes added, improved access to the

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Princes Freeway and better north-south traffic flow for 28,000 drivers every day.

More than 1,100 workers are helping deliver the Western Roads Upgrade with major construction due for completion by 2021.

In addition, more than 260 kilometres of arterial roads are being improved, resurfaced and rehabilitated from Footscray to Werribee ahead of a 20-year maintenance program.

As part of the works, an iconic sculpture – which could be up to 15 metres high – will be built at the upgraded Duncans Road interchange. McClelland Sculpture Park+Gallery will drive the selection of the new sculpture, and artists with a connection to the western suburbs are encouraged to apply to create it.

Member for Williamstown Melissa Horne said, “This massive amount of works make local roads smoother, safer and more reliable for commuters -- because only Labor delivers for the west.”

MARCH 2019

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community

Ayush Information Cell setup in Melbourne

By SAT News Desk

M

ELBOURNE, 13 February: The world’s most liveable city now has a Ayush Information cell to cater for the Ayurvedic and related needs of the community.

HE Dr. Ajay M Gondane, The High Commissioner of India, Canberra, Mr. Rakesh Malhotra Consul General of India in Melbourne was present on the occasion.

Dr Santosh Yadav, Ayurvedic practitioner and President of Australian Association of Ayurveda told about Ayush and said this is the 30th Ayush cell setup worldwide.

The Ayush Information Cells promote traditional Indian Medicine on global level. The main Objective of this Cell is to increase the awareness Ayurvedic medicines in the Community.

The Ayush Information Cell will work in the following areas: 1. Organise lectures, seminars related to Ayurveda, Yoga, Unani, Siddha and homeopathy (AYUSH); 2. Facilitate associations of stakeholders for networking, conducting meetings, develop awareness among public; 3. Maintain a register of practioners; 4. Generate data about local regulations related to trade and practice of traditional medicine; 5. Celebrate Ayurveda day and Yoga day; Dr A.M.Gondane who inaugurated the cell

has supported the step thoroughly to promote Ayurveda in Australia. He has been of great help to the Australasian Association of Ayurveda, assisting in the organisation of “First Ayush International conference and Exhibition” in Australia in 2018, “ Dr. Yadav said.

The Cell is situated at 125 Stud Road, Dandenong, Victoria. Ph :9794 8546 Mob 0410914987.

—Supplied.

New Indian Consul General in Melbourne soon

By Neeraj Nanda

M

ELBOURNE, 7 March: MR. RAJ KUMAR will be the next Indian ConsulGeneral at the Indian Consulate, Melbourne, a reliable source says. At present, he is India's Consul General in Jalalabad, Afghanistan.

During the span of over 33 years’ of service in the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), Government of India, Mr. Raj Kumar served in different capacities at the MEA in New Delhi as well as

in Indian diplomatic missions in Libya, Malaysia, Kenya, United Kingdom, Nigeria, Panama and Sri Lanka.

Mr. Raj Kumar's diplomatic assignments include administrative and diplomatic work covering political, commercial, consular and cultural desks in Indian missions. He also worked as Head of Office at the Office of the High Commission of India, Lagos (Nigeria), Charge d’Affairs in Embassy of India, Panama and Consul General at Consulate General of India, Hambantota

(Sri Lanka).

The new Consul General will take over his post in a few months.

Source of photo & profile: Indian Consulate, Jalalabad, Afghanistan.

During the span of over 33 years’ of service in the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), Government of India, Mr. Raj Kumar served in different capacities at the MEA in New Delhi as well as in Indian diplomatic missions in Libya, Malaysia, Kenya, United Kingdom, Nigeria, Panama and Sri Lanka.

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MARCH 2019

MARCH 2019

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community

MARCH 2019

Record $967 m commitment to expand residential aged care

M

ELBOURNE, 5 March: The Morrison Government is providing Australians with more choices for longer lives, with a record 13,500 new residential aged care places across Australia, worth $907 million a year, along with a $60 million capital works investment to finance construction of new and extended aged care homes.

The $967 million expansion is part of our Government’s $5 billion aged care boost and is Australia’s largest ever allocation of residential aged care places.

It represents an increase of more than 36 per cent on the 9,911 Aged Care Approvals Round (ACAR) places announced in 2016– 17.

Metropolitan allocations are at record levels but rural, regional and remote areas are significant winners because of a focus on improving aged care access and services in country communities.

The number of new places allocated outside major cities has almost doubled from the previous round, with over 5,000 allocated to regional areas.

Allocating these new places to regional areas is part of our strategy to combat the challenges faced by these communities.

I am passionate about ensuring all Australians have access to quality aged care services regardless of where they live.

Every one of these new places will mean senior Australians can age with more confidence, knowing they have future care options in locations as close as possible to their families and communities, whether in the city of the country.

Older Australians who are financially or socially challenged, who are from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander or LGBTI communities or who are veterans, are among those who will have priority access to more than 23 per cent of the new places.

The $60 million capital works investment will provide 28 grants to establish, extend and

refurbish new and existing homes in priority areas of rural and regional Australia.

Projects will include renovations, extensions, improved kitchens, gardens and recreation facilities, solar power additions and better security and fire protection systems.

Our Government is also focused on supporting senior Australians with special or complex needs.

Projects funded include: More than $4.7 million to be invested in Shepparton, Victoria, to build a 20bed residential aged care facility exclusively for disadvantaged older

Australians who are homeless or at risk of homelessness.

More than $5.9 million to extend and upgrade two facilities in Queensland to better support Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander seniors in need of dedicated, culturally appropriate aged care.

The Aged Care Approvals Round is a highly competitive process.

I thank every organisation that submitted applications and look forward to seeing the benefits of this funding for our aged care services, senior Australians and communities throughout Australia.

Tanya Spisbah new Director of Australia India Institute, Delhi

By SAT News Desk

M

ELBOURNE, 1 March: Tanya Spisbah, Head of International Strategic Engagement at UNSW, is the next Director of the Aii@Delhi, says the Australia India Institute (AII) website.

The website says, “Tanya is a renowned and influential expert on Australia-India relations, particularly with respect to health and sustainable development.

A career diplomat with the Australian Department of Foreign

Affairs and Trade for more than a decade, Tanya served from 201417 at the Australian High Commission in New Delhi, specialising in health and technology diplomacy for inclusive, sustainable growth. She notably led the health agenda resulting in the Australian and Indian Prime Ministers exchanging an MoU for Health and Medicine, paving the way for cooperation on digital health.”

“I am absolutely delighted that Tanya will be leading the Australia India Institute in Delhi”,

said AII Melbourne Director and CEO Craig Jeffrey.

I am absolutely delighted that Tanya will be leading the Australia India Institute in Delhi”, said AII Melbourne Director and CEO Craig Jeffrey

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The Morrison Government is investing record funding in aged care, with annual funding to grow by $5 billion over four years.

Under our Government, aged care places are up and home care packages are up, demonstrating our absolute commitment to the wellbeing of senior Australians.

Information about the 2018–19 Aged Care Approvals Round outcomes, including details of the successful providers, is available at www.agedcare. health.gov.au/funding/ aged-care-approvals-roundacar/2018-19-aged-careapprovals-round Source: Medianet

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MARCH 2019

smART Small Works Art Exhibition

By SAT News Desk

M

ELBOURNE, 13 March: A few artists with different styles under the banner of Preekriti run by Prathiba Madan, made this art exhibition an exciting initiative to showcase and promote local community artists.

The organiser calls it an exhibition of small works (30x30cm) in different mediums. Basically, it is bringing out the creative best in the small format.

Pratibha, brings together about 20 artists (including herself) with their seventy plus works, enhancing talent at the local level. Michael Gidley MP, State Member of Parliament for Mt. Waverley opened the exhibition.

Those whose art is displayed include Beata Wacek, Myra Carter, Peta Tranquille, Rebecca Liz Sanchez, Sahar Kashef, Kathy Best and Alicia Cornwell.

Art has been described as the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination, typically in a

visual form such as painting or sculpture, producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power.

This creativity is visually well expressed in the different mediums which the artists have used here to express themselves through their paintings.

It’s like philosophy in different visual formats which Preekriti has brought to us through this exhibition. It’s good to see Madhubani style rubbing shoulders with the most modern art styles and creations in Acrylic.

This effort needs to be commended as it brings smoothness and calmness in an otherwise tough world. smArt – Small Works Exhibition,13-24 March 2019 (Wed-Sun, 10 am – 4 pm) at THE TRACK GALLERY. 47 Millers Cres, Mt. Waverley, Vic 3149. Enquiries – preekriti@gmail.com

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COMMUNITY

MARCH 2019

Airport Rail Link closer to take off as joint agreement signed

By SAT News Desk

M

ELBOURNE, 13 March: Melbourne Airport Rail Link (MARL) is set to become a reality, with the Victorian and Commonwealth Governments formally signing off on the project.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews announced the signing of the Heads of Agreement today, which sets out the strategic objectives, governance arrangements and information sharing processes for the $10 billion joint commitment.

Mr Morrison said the people of Melbourne and Victoria had been waiting far too long for the rail link to become a reality.

“For decades Victorians have talked about a train line to the airport. We are delivering it. In last year’s Budget we made a $5 billion investment in the Melbourne Airport Rail Link, it was the biggest infrastructure commitment in the Budget.

“Melbourne is truly a global city that deserves world class infrastructure.

The Rail Link is part of our plan to bust congestion across the city and get people home faster and safer.

“I’d like to thank the Premier and Minister Tudge who have worked constructively with me to land this agreement and bring the project closer to fruition.”

A project team will be established to drive the development of a full Business Case for the

project, which will not only connect Melbourne Airport to the rail network for the first time – but also integrate it with the Metro Tunnel and the future Suburban Rail Loop, and pave the way for fast-rail to the regions.

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews said the Victorian Government is not wasting a minute leading the planning work for an Airport Rail Link that delivers for all Victorians.

“The Melbourne Airport Rail Link has been talked about for far too long – we’re doing the detailed planning and development work to make it a reality,” Mr Andrews said.

“By choosing the Sunshine route, we are ensuring all Victorians can benefit from the rail link, including people living in Geelong, Ballarat and Bendigo. As we complete the business case, we’re

also doing the work needed to deliver fast rail to the regions.”

Melbourne Airport is a key part of Victoria and Australia’s economic growth. In 2016-17, it handled more than 35 million passenger movements and by 2038, it is expected to almost double to more than 67 million, as Victoria’s population continues to grow and demand increases.

Melbourne Airport Rail Link will alleviate congestion on the main road connection to the airport, the Tullamarine Freeway, and unlock capacity for the growing population in Melbourne’s north-west.

Minister for Cities, Urban Infrastructure and Population Alan Tudge said following the successful widening of the Tullamarine Freeway, the airport link would bust congestion for

generations to come.

“This is a critical project for Melbourne. It will make it easier for residents and make our city more attractive to visitors,” Mr Tudge said.

“When complete, someone in Pakenham, Frankston or Ringwood will be able to get onto the train, and be at the airport in the time it would have taken to drive, but without having to worry about parking.”

Victorian Minister for Transport Infrastructure Jacinta Allan said this is part of the Victorian Government’s unprecedented pipeline of major transport projects.

“We’re building the Metro Tunnel, removing dangerous level crossings and getting on with the Melbourne Airport Rail Link.”

“This is not just about getting from the airport to the city – it’s about better

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connecting our suburbs and regions, so people have better services wherever they live.”

Planning and development of the MARL Business Case is already well underway. Rail Projects Victoria has engaged expert technical and commercial advisers for the project, and ecological, traffic and geotechnical investigations have begun.

Early market engagement on the MARL attracted submissions from more than 100 local and global organisations. Further market sounding will be undertaken to assess equity partners, private sector involvement, financing arrangements and other matters.

A reference group including community, industry and local government representatives will be established to provide guidance and feedback to the project team as the Business Case is developed.

The State and Federal Governments have committed up to $5 billion each to deliver MARL. The total cost of the project is estimated to be in the range of $8-13 billion, with construction to take up to nine years and due to commence in 2022.

The Business Case will be delivered by 2020 and will assess station and procurement options, value capture and creation opportunities, and economic analysis of the recommended solution.

Source: Joint media release

by Australian PM & Vic Premier through AAP.

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technology

MARCH 2019

The internet is now an arena for conflict, and we’re all caught up in it

By Tom Sear*

M

ost people think the internet operates as a kind of global public square. In reality, it’s become a divided arena where conflict between nation states plays out.

Nation states run covert operations on the same platforms we use to post cat videos and exchange gossip.

And if we’re not aware of it, we could be unwittingly used as pawns for the wrong side.

How did we get here? It’s complicated, but let’s walk through some of the main elements.

The age of entanglement On the one hand, we have an information landscape dominated by Western culture and huge multi-national internet platforms run by private companies, such as Google and Facebook. On the other, there are authoritarian regimes such as China, Iran, Turkey and Russia exercising tight control over the internet traffic flowing in and out of their countries.

We are seeing more cyber intrusions into nation state networks, such as the recent hack of the Australian parliamentary network. At the same time, information and influence operations conducted by countries such as Russia and China are flowing through social media into our increasingly shared digital societies.

The result is a global ecosystem perpetually close to the threshold of war.

Because nations use the internet both to assert power and to conduct trade, there are incentives for authoritarian powers to keep their internet traffic open.

You can’t maintain rigid digital borders and assert cyberpower influence at the same time, so nations have to “cooperate to compete”.

This is becoming known as “entanglement” – and it affects us all.

Read more: A state actor has targeted Australian political parties – but that shouldn't surprise us Data flows in one direction Authoritarian societies such as China, Russia and Iran aim to create their own separate digital ecosystems where the government can control internet traffic

that flows in and out of the country.

The Chinese Communist Party is well known for maintaining a supposedly secure Chinese internet via what is known in the West as the “Great Firewall”.

This is a system that can block international internet traffic from entering China according to the whim of the government.

For the majority of the 802 million people online in China, many of the apps we use to produce and share information are not accessible. Google, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter are blocked. Instead, people in China use apps created

by Chinese technology companies, such as Tencent, Alibaba and Baidu.

Traffic within this ecosystem is monitored and censored in the most sophisticated and comprehensive surveillance state in the world. In 2018, for example, Peppa Pig was banned and the People’s Daily referred to her as a “gangster” after she became iconic of rebelliousness in Chinese youth culture.

Complete blocking of data is impossible A key objective of this firewall is to to shield Chinese society and politics from external influence, while enabling internal surveillance of the Chinese population.

But the firewall is not technologically independent of the West – its development has been reliant upon US corporations to supply the software, hardware innovation and training to ensure the system functions.

And since the internet is an arena where nations compete for economic advantage, it’s not in the interest of either side to destroy cyberspace entirely.

As cyber security expert Greg Austin has observed, the foundations of China’s cyber defences remain weak. There are technical ways to get around the firewall, and Chinese internet users exploit Mandarin homophones and emoji to evade internal censors.

Chinese economic and financial entanglement with the West means complete blocking of data is impossible. Consistent incentives to openness remain. China and the United States are therefore engaged in what Canadian scholar of digital media and global affairs Jon R Lindsay describes as: chronic and ambiguous intelligence-counter intelligence contests across their networks, even as the internet facilitates productive exchange between them.

That is, a tension exists because they are covertly working against each other on exactly the same digital

platforms necessary to promote their individual and mutual interests in areas such as trade, manufacturing, communications and regulation.

Since Russia is less dependent upon the information technology services of the United States and is therefore less entangled than China, it is more able to engage in bilateral negotiation and aggression.

Read more: How digital media blur the border between Australia and China Different styles of influence If the internet has become a contest between nation states, one way of winning is to appear to comply with the letter of the law, while abusing its spirit.

In the West, a network of private corporations, including Twitter, Google and Facebook, facilitate an internet system where information and commerce flow freely. Since the West remains open, while powers such as Russia and China exercise control over internet traffic, this creates an imbalance that can be exploited.

Influence operations conducted by China and Russia in countries such as Australia exist within this larger context. And they are being carried out in the digital arena on a scale

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never before experienced.

In the words of the latest US Intelligence Community Worldwide Threat Assessment: Our adversaries and strategic competitors […] are now becoming more adept at using social media to alter how we think, behave and decide.

The internet is a vast infrastructure of tools that can be used to strategically manipulate behaviour for specific tactical gain, and each nation has its own style of influence.

I have previously written about attempts by China and Russia to influence Australian politics via social media, showing how each nation state utilises different tactics.

China takes a subtle approach, reflecting a long term strategy. It seeks to connect with the Chinese diaspora in a target country, and shape opinion in a manner favourable to the Chinese Communist Party.

This is often as much as about ensuring some things aren’t said as it is about shaping what is.

Russia, on the other hand, has used more obvious tactics to infiltrate and disrupt Australian political discourse on social media, exploiting Islamophobia – and the divide between left and right – to undermine social cohesion.

Contd. on pg 15

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community

MARCH 2019

The internet is now an...

Contd. from pg 14

This reflects Russia’s primary aim to destabilise the civic culture of the target population.

But there are some similarities between the two approaches, reflecting a growing cooperation between them. As the US Intelligence Community points out: China and Russia are more aligned than at any point since the mid-1950s.

Read more: We've been hacked – so will the data be weaponised to influence election 2019? Here’s what to look for A strategic alliance between Russia and China The strategic origins of these shared approaches go back to the early internet itself. The Russian idea of hybrid warfare – also known as the Gerasimov Doctrine – uses information campaigns to undermine a society as part of a wider strategy.

But this concept first originated in the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA). In 1999, Chinese PLA colonels penned a strategy

titled Unrestricted Warfare, which outlined how to use media, government, pretty much everything, in the target country not as a tool, but as a weapon.

It recommended not just cyber attacks, but also fake news campaigns – and was the basis for information campaigns that became famous during the 2016 US presidential election.

In June 2016, Russia and China signed a joint declaration on the internet, affirming their shared objectives. In December 2016, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed off on a new Doctrine of Information Security, which establishes how Russia will defend its own population against influence operations.

Observers noted the striking similarity between the Russian document and Chinese internet law.

Russia and China also share a view of the global management of the internet, pursued via the United Nations: […] more regulations to clarify how international law applies to cyberspace, with the aim of exercising more

sovereignty – and state control – over the internet.

The recent “sovereign internet” bill introduced to the Russian Parliament proposes a Domain Name System (DNS) independent of the wider internet infrastructure.

If the internet is now a site of proxy war, such so-called “balkanization” challenges the dominance of the United States.

Nations are competing for influence, leverage and advantage to secure their own interests. Russia and China don’t want to risk an all out war, and so competition is pursued at a level just below armed conflict.

Technology, especially the internet, has brought this competition to us all.

Read more: Russian trolls targeted Australian voters on Twitter via #auspol and #MH17 We’re entering turbulent waters Despite its best efforts, China’s leaders remain concerned that the digital border between it and the rest of the world is too porous.

In June 2009, Google was blocked in China. In 2011, Fang Binxing, one of the main designers of the Great Firewall expressed concern Google was still potentially accessible in China, saying: It’s like the relationship between riverbed and water. Water has no nationality, but riverbeds are sovereign territories, we cannot allow polluted water from other nation states to enter our country.

The water metaphor was deliberate. Water flows and maritime domains define sovereign borders.

And water flows are a good analogy for data flows. The internet has pitched democratic politics into the fluid dynamics of turbulence, where algorithms shape attention, tiny clicks measure participation, and personal data is valuable and apt to be manipulated.

While other nations grapple with the best mix of containment, control and openness, ensuring Australia’s democracy remains robust is the best defence. We need to keep an eye on the nature of the political discussion

online, which requires a coordinated approach between the government and private sector, defence and security agencies, and an educated public.

The strategies of information warfare we hear so much about these days were conceived in the 1990s – an era when “surfing the web” seemed as refreshing as a dip at your favourite beach. Our immersion in the subsequent waves of the web seem more threatening, but perhaps we can draw upon our cultural traditions to influence Australian security.

As the rip currents of global internet influence operations grow more prevalent, making web surfing more dangerous, Australia would be wise to mark out a safe place to swim between the flags.

Successful protection from influence will need many eyes watching from the beach. * Industry Fellow, UNSW Canberra Cyber, Australian Defence Force Academy, UNSW. Source: The Conversation, 12 March 2019. (Under Creative Commons Licence)

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south asia 16 LETTER FROM SYDNEY South Asia Timestimes

MARCH 2019

The visa trap and blackmail for more dowry

By Ashok Kumar

S

YDNEY: In 1661, in the marriage between King Charles II of England and Catherine of Braganza, daughter of King John IV of Portugal, who placed Bombay in India in the possession of British Empire, as part of Catherine’s dowry to Charles. Even the kings and the queens are not spared the wrath of dowry.

Rich people might have escaped the dowry abuse dragnet,however, it soon assumed the proportions of a curse as the time progressed.

Dr. Manjula O’Connor of the Melbourne based Australasian Centre for Human Rights and Health together with University of New South Wales, School of Psychiatry And Gender Violence Research Network (UNSW) organised the Second National Dowry Abuse Summit where it deliberations focused on dowry abuse against women of migrant background. Looking at the number of cases, this practice has engulfed the various countries around the globe. Now, we see dowry as a status symbol and parents spend a fortune on weddings so their daughters could live happily ever after. But the demand for larger gifts or increased cash payments threaten the fairy tales of the brides.

But, in Africa, the situation is reverse. The man intending to get married has to pay to the bride’s parents and is one of the most essential items normally required in most traditional marriages in Africa, is the Dowry. This dowry can also be termed as the bride price. The amount usually paid differs from one country to the other and from one tribe to the other. Some tribes in Nigeria for example do not collect cash as dowry, but insist on cowries or herds of cow as the bride price. Charles from South Sudan said Summit that he had to give herds of goats and sheep to the bride’s parents as part of dowry or bride price. The African society is patriarchal and men have to pay the bride price. In Ghana, there is no practice of Dowry.

In the Muslim traditions, the groom has to pay ‘meher’ to the bride and that is registered with the ‘ Kazi’ (priest).

There are many reasons adduced to the payment of dowry in the contemporary African society.

Traditionally speaking, the payment of a bride price whenever marriages are contracted in African societies has long been recognized in its entirety.

It is a practice which has long been accepted by clan heads and traditional rulers alike. The amount to be paid is usually fixed by each community and it may vary sparingly depending on individual family.

Across the globe, dowry has become a social issue that keeps on having an impact on the young generations. So far there’s no legal instrument that is binding. It is a common sight to see brides running away from their marital homes due to pressures from within and without.

The payment of dowry however helps to creates a stability within traditional marriages and hence prevents the lady from running away from her new home. It is generally assumed the payment of the bride price is a sign of the capability of the man who is coming for the hand of the lady. The payment of this important item during traditional marriage ceremonies is a serious test of the man’s financial capability and strength.

At the summit, it was revealed that a new tradition is being framed among the Non-resident Indians and that of visa threat as part of dowry.

A general refrain from the groom’s side is that you bring enough dowry or we’ll get your visa cancelled and you will be deported. There were three Indian women who came to Australia on a tourist visa after getting married to an NRI (Non-resident Indian) but when the time came up for permanent residency, the demand for more dowry started pouring in leading to the threats of visa cancellation.

In India, under the Dowry Prohibition Act of 1961, both giving and accepting dowry in India is an offence.

The punishment for violating the law is 5 years imprisonment + Rs 15,000 ($ 300 AUD) fine or the value of the dowry given, whichever is more.

Victoria is the only state in Australia that has framed laws that categorises dowry abuse as form of family violence.

There is no such definition in the Federal Family law Act of financial abuse.

In India, in 1983, Sections 304B and 498A of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) were enacted to make it easier for an Indian

wife to seek redressal for harassment by the husband’s family.

-Section 304B of the IPC relates to dowry deaths, or the death of a woman in the initial seven years of marriage as a result of a dowry demand by her husband or his family/ relatives.

The three ladies who are yet to finish their fight against such grooms participated in a panel discussion. Tulika Mehra (name changed), was happily married till the demon of dowry gripped her soon after she came to Australia. She said dowry demands of her husband’s family resulted in her being severely physically assaulted. Now she runs an NGO to help the other affected women. Pragati Sharma’s (name changed) case was worst. Pragati was forced to abort as she was carrying a daughter but her woes didn’t end even after the birth of a son that her in-laws failed to acknowledge. She also couldn’t fulfill the dowry demands. She then filed a case in India and got her in-laws and husband’s passport revoked. But still no respite for the lady, who is fighting a legal battle and her son. The third victim, Lata (name changed), said her parents gave away every single cent in dowry

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but the never-ending demands have ruined her married life. Needless to say that 76% of women face domestic violence and that are not reported.

Recently, the Indian Government is bringing in a law to rein in men who live abroad and have abandoned their wives.This law would help women who have been abandoned by their Non-Residential Indian (NRI) husbands after the government received hundreds of complaints last year.

The participants at the summit argued,”if we are to achieve a transformative change, we must have specific comprehensive and holistic legally-binding instrument. We need to fix accountability of various actors responsible for dowry related abuse from prevention to protection and to rehabilitation of women and children affected by dowry abuse.”

A global consultation and re-examination of issue of dowry abuse, including sharing of information on legally-binding instrument on dowry abuse would help ameliorate the dowry victim’s life. A resolution is being proposed for the organisers to forward to the United Nations.

Source: The Indian SubContinent Times, Feb 27 2019.

MARCH 2019

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south asia 18 South Asia Timestimes

MUSINGS

MARCH 2019

Questions Galore, Phew, But, No Answers!!!

By Rashid Sultan

Let’s start at the beginning.

M

ore than 40 jawans of CRPF are killed when a suicide bomber smashes his vehicle into one of the trucks, in the convoy of 2500 persons, at Pulwama in J-K on one of the most protected roads in the country.

The incident happens at 3.10 PM. The Prime Minister is away at a video shooting in James Corbett National Park and is not accessible by phone. It is reported he comes to know about this terrorist attack 4 hours later. Reason? The inclement weather. In the 21st century-digital India we are unable to contact our P.M. after such serious incident. Whatever happened to satellite phones of the bodyguards?

And, we thought India was aiming to be a super power in coming decades. Can it be a lie?

We are very good at detecting 2 kgs of beef and lynching innocent people but closed our eyes on the 300 kgs of RDX transported to attack the CRPF. It is reported that Jammu and Kashmir police did inform the higher ups in the intelligence hierarchy about some imminent incident. No action taken.

It is also reported before the transfer of 2500 jawans the CRPF did ask for the airlift instead of transporting such huge numbers by road. The

request was denied.

The nation has stood as one in anger and demands retribution against Pakistan which harbours Jaish-eMuhammad which has claimed responsibility.

The P.M declares that he has given free reign to the army to take whatever action necessary. I always thought the defence has been having a free reign for last 30 years in Kashmir and the North East under the protection of AFPSA. No national mourning is declared because it will conflict with the BJP’s electioneering. No wonder the P.M. leaves the allparty- meeting to condole deaths of CRPF personnel a few minutes after as he has to go to Maharashtra to address an election rally when opposition parties have deferred or postponed their political activities.

As was very much expected, some Indian Air Force aircraft cross the border, one night, and claim to have bombarded the training camps of Jaishe-e-Mohammad and thus eliminate the terrorist organisation. But, do these organisations get eliminated? Have we not heard that the US is going to extreme lengths to persuade the Taliban to integrate and join the Afghanistan polity after 18 years of war on terror?

And as was also expected the Pakistan Air Force crosses into our borders and also shoots an Indian Mig which crashes on their side of the Loc and arrests the Wing Commander Abhinandan. Thank God,

wisdom prevails and Imran Khan releases the pilot as a gesture of goodwill.

The question which strikes like a bull’s eye is why Jaish-e- Muhammad which is a staunch enemy of India chose this particular time to attack when elections in India are two months away? To aid the Hindu Nationalist Party?

Now the battle ensues how many people we killed in our strikes across the border. The embedded media and Amit Shah boast figures of 250 to 300 people.

Reuters and the BBC report there was hardly any casualty on the Pak side.

The P.M is silent and the Air Marshall says we do not count the casualties. Who to believe?

The embedded media, as usual to increase their TRPs are bent upon to lit fires of hatred against Pakistan haranguing 24 hours to attack Pakistan. In other words, ‘war’ while the world is nervous because both these neighbours have scores of nuclear arsenals.

In the past we have fought at least three wars on Kashmir, losing thousands of soldiers on both sides.

To what result?

Without going to the genesis of the Kashmir problem, the last 30 years have been volatile and murderous for civilians, terrorists and Indian armed forces (one estimate puts the figure of 5 lakh including paramilitary forces) which means a soldier for every eight or ten civilians. The world has never known a worse militarised zone than Kashmir. Naturally, this

gives rise to distrust and hatred among the citizenry.

According to estimates 30,000 to 70,000 people have been killed in the last 30 years. Unfortunately, the situation has become grimmer in the last five years due to the BJP’s socalled ‘masculine politics’.

In the ongoing Operation All Out, 150 terrorists and many many more civilians were killed in the last one year. This has seen radicalisation, particularly among the youth to reach unimaginable heights.

You don’t have to go far.

Just see a few videos of youth pelting stones in the Srinagar streets. Why are we antagonising the whole valley as our foe? The father of Adil Daar, aged 22, the suicide bomber, says the turning point in his son’s life came when he was fiercely beaten and tortured by the police, while innocent. And thus he defected to terrorists.

Look at the recent so called after effects of the Pulwama attack. Two colleges in Dehradun expelled Kashmiri students.

Bajrang Dal and VHP activists beat unarmed Kashmiri traders and students in Uttaranchal, Haryana, Jammu and Uttar Pradesh (Lucknow) shouting at them ‘ go back’. Even the governor of Meghalaya, Tathagat Roy was invoking people to boycott Kashmiri petty traders who come every winter to sell their wares – woollen shawls and dry fruits. In any civilised country this governor should have been kicked out

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by now but he is laughing all the way as other BJP ministers spreading hatred against Muslims and Dalits and instigating violence against them all along 5 years in office.

We call Kashmir indisputable part of our country but innocent Kashmiris are beaten and made to go back to Kashmir right under the nose of the government- both central and state.

And, lo and behold Narendra Modi is invited to South Korea to receive ‘Peace Prize’. This is the man who is claimed to have overseen the Gujarat massacre of 2002, who has been a mute spectator of mob lynching (mainly minorities) and now engulfing the whole Kashmir Valley into a breeding ground against India under ‘masculine politics’. Don’t know if it is a government award or by some private organisation.

Goes to show that North Korea must have had a valid ground to separate from the South.

The Kashmir Times newspaper has been blacklisted by the government. Meaning no government advertising for this paper. RJD leader Tejasvi Yadav, Lalu Yadav’s son, has appealed to all opposition parties not to participate in debates on the television shows which are blatantly pro BJP, most of the mainstream media with few exceptions.

God save the Indian Democracy.

-These are author’s personal views

MARCH 2019

southSouth asia times 19 Asia Times

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south asia 20 South Asia Timestimes

BOOK REVIEW

MARCH 2019

From Bradman to Kohli, another treasure trove from Kesri A

By Ashok Kumar

t the SCG, we share some story ideas, stories and on one such occasion, Kersi presented his latest book “From Bradman to Kohli” that I lost and found again and I promised him that I’ll review the book.

As all of his other books, “From Bradman to Kohli” published by St. George Instant Print makes an interesting reading with his history of cricket tours between Australia and India.

The book has been rightfully entitled “Bradman to Kohli” as the inbetweens have been rightly chronicled and in such a way as if we are watching those matches.

Such is Kersi’s passion for recordkeeping that no event of any test could be missed.

For example, as described

by Vijay Hazare after he bowled Bradman. Hazare wrote in “A Long Innings: “I started with getting the all-important wicket of Bradman. The giant appeared fallible on a wet wicket. Later, I got Hasset, Lindwall and Tallon.” But more interesting was when Hazare scored a century in both innings but went on to lose the match by an innings and 16 runs in difficult conditions.

Arthur Mailey, the former Australian spinner turned writer paid him the ultimate tribute by saying that even Bradman could not have achieved Hazare did under those circumstances. Kersi confessed Vijay Hazare is his idol.

So we can rightfully say that Vijay Hazare was the real Hero of India’s first outing to Australia aptly titled “The Pioneers” despite centuries by Dattu Phadkar in Adelaide and Amarnath, though in State matches. Having been born in Bombay, the young Kersi is still nostalgic about the Test Australia played that involved centuries by India Captain G S Ramchand and

by Australia’s Jim Burke and Harvey. The Test match also saw good knocks

by Pankaj Roy and Poly Umrigar. The tour proved to be haven for Richie Benaud in the Madras Test where he claimed 7 for 72.

The book can’t be complete without the chapter on Alan Border and

Sunil Gavaskar on whose name the trophy is named between Australia and India.

Rightfully, Both Border and Gavaskar have written forewords for the book.

These and many such a fact will often lead us to a cricket Library but Kersi has cut our journey and efforts short by producing this book. Kersi reminiscences all other Tests of the Australian tour that commenced 9 years after India’s first tour of Australia.

In the Calcutta Test of that tour Kersi writes about the 39 wickets that tumbled for 638 runs with off spinner Ghulam Ahmed scalping 7 for 49 and Benaud capturing 6 wickets for 52. Kersi rues the fact that there were no Man of the Match or Man of the series awards or else both would have gone to Benaud for his 11 wickets.

The book is spread into 29 chapters and each chapter from White pants and shirts to white track pyjamas is a gem as most of which we have either

forgotten or don’t care to remember. This book is an encyclopaedia or a handbook for the cricket lovers and those learning to play cricket.

An interesting chapter on India’s rising team under Nawab of Pataudi that was emerged as name with Nawab himself, Chandu Borde and Ajit Wadekar excelling to show their mettle in Australia. The chapter titled Pataudi’s mission impossible aptly describes the triumphs and travails of the team. The team saw good knocks by FM Engineer, Rusi Surti, M.L Jaisimha (who was flown in as a replacement). The team had Bishen Bedi and EAS Prasana to display their spinning talent. Though the team came close to winning Test but showed enough emerging talent. Kersi informs us that Russi Surti and Subramanium stayed back in Australia with the former in Brisbane and the latter settled in Sydney.

The 1967 series would be

remembered not because India was win-less bu India showed its resolve to fight.

Kersi again takes us to Bombay where in the 1969 Kersi was witness to riots erupting over the decision going against Srinivas Venkataraghvan.

Australia won the burning Test. The series would be remembered because of century on Debut by GR Vishwanath. India won the third Test in Delhi that helped the spinners, Prasanna, Venkataraghvan and Bedi. For the first time in the Australia India series we could witness the emergence of Indian spinning power.

In between the chapters, Kersi gives small anecdotes that we don’t find anywhere in the libraries, like the note on Frank Tarrant who was born in Melbourne but has Indian links and served the Indian cricket.

He was the umpire in Bombay and Calcutta Tests against England. And, his own experience of bowling

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his slow off spinners to Surrinder Amarnath (son of Lala Amarnath)and Ashok Mankad (son of Vinoo Mankad) at the insistence of Bedi.

With ‘Thommo and Simmo’ being household names another Indian juggernaut led by Bishen Singh Bedi hit the Australian shores. The quartet of Bedi, Prasanna, Venkat and Chandra mesmerised the Australian players and spectators alike. Specially, when Bedi in the Brisbane Test took wicket on the first ball he bowled in the Test, he became a favourite so much so the moment he touched the ball, there used to be chants of “Baidi, Baidi”. This series was followed by a team led

by Kapil Dev in 1985-86 in which Kapil who by now had emerged as India’s fast bowler was among wickets and excelled with bat but lacked the killer instinct.

The series elevated Sunil Gavaskar to Badman’s average. The series bore no results but the series in 1991-92 brought young Sachin Tendulkar into limelight despite Australia winning 4-0 the 5 match series.

Among the best of India Australia Test matches we cannot miss the Calcutta Test as it will go down in cricket history as one of the greatest. Following on Australia’s 445. VVS Laxman combined with Rahul Dravid to set up partnership of 335 runs in a total of 7 for 657, a lead of 383 and the spinners Harbhajan (6 for 73 and Tendulkar 3 for 31) turned the tables on Australia a and won the Test by 171 runs.

Steve Waugh described VVS’s performance as ‘some of the best batting I’ve ever seen.’

Virat Kohli sparkled in the 2014-15 series when he scored 692 runs, including three centuries (two in one test). However, lost the Border- Gavaskar trophy It was always enriching experience sitting with Kersi in SCG and learning about the game and his experiences. The book is a reflection of all his experiences and store of the record books that we normally don’t see. It won’t be understatement if it’s said that Kersi is a treasure of information on cricket.

environment

MARCH 2019

By Disha Shetty

V

aranasi: It’s 6.30 pm in the northern Indian city of Varanasi on a cool January evening.

Darkness is yet to fall but visibility already has. The cars on its teeming streets are hard to see from just metres away. But your tongue registers the dust obscuring the view.

Soon, your skin feels the coarse particles that make up this dust. There is enough of it here, according to 2018 World Health Organization (WHO) data, to classify Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s parliamentary constituency as one of the cities with the most polluted air on the planet.

Home to 1.2 million people, Varanasi, sprawled along the banks of India’s holiest river, the Ganga, has since 2016 frequently overtaken India’s national capital New Delhi in terms of air pollution, according to WHO data.

Varanasi is not alone.

Home to over 600 million, the Gangetic plain hosts four other cities--Kanpur, Faridabad, Gaya and Patna-that occupy the top five slots in the 2018 WHO list of the world’s most polluted cities, measured for particles that are 2.5 micron in diameter (PM 2.5) or less.

These particles are 1/25th the diameter of a human hair. They are known to cause cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, even cancers. India’s cities also occupy 11 of 15 of the slots in WHO’s list of most polluted cities in the world when a larger pollutant--PM 10--is considered.

The impact of this air pollution doesn’t just stop at human health. Several of the gases that cause air pollution also have greenhouse properties--they trap the sun’s heat and push up the earth’s temperature, and the latest research implicates these pollutants as changing local and global climate by means still being studied. It does seem, experts said, that temperatures are rising on the Gangetic plain, and the monsoon is becoming more uncertain.

“Air pollutants, a lot of them, also have an effect on the climate,” said Erika von Schneidemesser who studies the links between air pollution and climate change at Institute of Advanced Sustainability Studies (IASS) Potsdam, a German research institute. “If the particulate matter released in the air has a high amount of black carbon (or soot), then it will absorb more sunlight and contribute to warming and thereby climate change.”

While several gases-such as carbon dioxide (CO2), methane and nitrous oxide--were known to cause warming, it was earlier believed that particulate matter in the air reflects sunlight, causing a cooling effect.

Emerging research now indicates otherwise. While some particulates have a cooling effect, others cause an increase in temperature, studies suggest.

The year 2018 was the warmest on record for the planet since record keeping began in 1880, according to an assessment by US National Oceanic and Atmospheric

Administration (NOAA), the largest repository of climate data in the world.

As temperature fluctuations become the new normal, people are paying less attention to weather, said a 2019 February study based on twitter interactions.

People tend to remember weather events only for as long as two to eight years, and if unusual weather continues for longer, they will no longer find it unusual or be able to tell the difference, the study said.

This is the fifth story in our series on India’s climatechange hotspots (you can read the first story here, the second here, the third here and the fourth here).

The series combines ground reporting with the latest scientific research and explores how people are adapting--or trying--to the changing climate.

The human cost of air pollution Boatman Ravi Sahani, 24, scans the Assi ghat, or steps-one of the most popular in Varanasi along the Ganga--for tourists, whom he will offer a 30-minute ride. It is 2 pm.

He has been here since 4 am and will remain here till 8 pm, pleading with tourists to take a ride in the boat.

But few are interested.

The river water is dark and the air smoggy. Tourists complain that the polluted air makes them cough and causes their skin to itch. For Sahani this means reduced income.

“We have done this work for generations. The money I make is barely enough to survive,” he said. “If I had

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money to start something else, I would, but I don’t have it.”

Varanasi had no good air day in all of 2015, according to a 2016 report called Varanasi Chokes by the Centre for Environment and Energy Development (CEED), IndiaSpend and Care4Air. “One of the reasons why we chose to study Varanasi was to make a point that the problem of air pollution is not limited to Delhi alone. The need was to take it beyond the national capital,” said Aishwarya Madineni, Bengaluru-based researcher and report’s author.

While air quality in high-income countries is improving, nearly 97% of those living in cities--with a population of more than 100,000--in low and middleincome countries are now breathing polluted air.

In 2016, the WHO attributed 7 million deaths-comparable to the population of Hyderabad--to indoor and outdoor pollution. Of these, the highest number of deaths, 2.4 million, were in south-east Asia alone. As air quality declines, more people will be at risk of stroke, heart disease, lung cancer as well as chronic and acute respiratory disease, according to the WHO. These cities will also be drivers of climate change, experts said.

Air pollution is affecting temperature, rainfall Air pollution can cause a net rise or fall in temperatures and change rainfall patterns, experts said.

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When something burns, the chemical process of combustion leads to the release of either a gas or particulate matter like soot.

In most instances, gases and particulate matter are released together. Scientists said they have a “fair understanding” of the nature of both most gases and particulate matter.

“But there are blind spots in our knowledge,” said Schneidemesser of IASSPotsdam, and it is difficult to say how these chemicals will interact with each other.

If the particles and gases causing warming dominate the mix, the net result would be a rise in temperature.

Particles such as those of dust, sea salt and ash suspended in the air are known as an aerosol. Some aerosols absorb more heat from the sun, others have reflective properties, causing temperatures to drop.

“Aerosols can make significant changes to cloud properties,” said Sachchida Nand Tripathi, professor and head, department of civil engineering, Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kanpur.

He has, for years, studied how air pollution caused changes in local and regional environment.

In the clouds, water condenses around particulate matter to form droplets, which then come down as rainfall. Aerosols can weaken rainfall. Here’s how it works: while the water available in the clouds is the same, it is now redistributed among the large number of particles available.

As a result, two patterns are emerging. “One, it shows the increasing aerosols in the atmosphere are slightly weakening the Indian monsoon,” said Tripathi. “And two, over a short time scale, it can redistribute the rainfall.”

But the impact of aerosol pollution on rainfall is a complex mechanism, which depends on moisture availability, amount of pollution and altitude, among other factors.

At the local level, this could mean that rainfall might vary greatly within a city. For instance, a highly polluted city centre might receive a sudden, short burst of rainfall that can even lead to flash floods, as Nagpur reported in August 2016. Aerosol pollution can interfere with cloud formation and cause hailstorms, similar to the one reported from Delhi in February 2019.

In 2017, nearly 7% of global carbon emissions came from India, up from 6% in 2016 according to a December 2018 report from the Global Carbon Project, a collaborative effort between several research institutes to quantify global greenhousegas emissions.

Contd. on pg 22

south asia 22 South Asia Timestimes Contd. from pg 22 Currently, India is the world’s fourth largest emitter of CO2, behind China, US and the European Union (EU).

While US and EU emissions are falling, Indian and Chinese are rising. The US continues to have the highest per capita carbon emissions in the world.

These emissions come from the burning of fossil fuels or even changes in landuse patterns. Large scale deforestation could lead to a net rise in carbon emissions from a country.

A majority of Indian cities in the top 20 most polluted cities in the world are in the IndoGangetic plain.

What makes this region, that stretches from Pakistan in the west to Bangladesh in the east, so polluted?

“Apart from being densely populated the region also has a unique topography,” said Tripathi. “To the north of the Indo-Gangetic plain are the Himalayas, and to the south is the Deccan plateau. This creates a valley effect and causes the air to stagnate.”

Northwesterly winds that blow across the region spread polluted air across the IndoGangetic plain. Winds can also spread pollution from Central Asia and Pakistan all the way to parts of Punjab, said Tripathi.

The Indo-Gangetic plain is a “global aerosol hotspot”, causing the ice in the Himalayas to melt faster, said a 2011 NASA study. The aerosol is also causing rainfall variability during the summer monsoon, another 2015 study said.

environment Back in the Indo-Gangetic plain, the effects of India’s inaction are plainly evident.

But it is not just cities in the Indo-Gangetic plain that are polluted.

“There is high pollution around both Mumbai and Hyderabad as well. In the case of Mumbai, due to the topography, the pollution gets carried by the winds to the oceans,” said Sagnik Dey, associate professor at the Centre for Atmospheric Sciences, IIT-Delhi. Dey has studied the distribution of aerosols over India using satellite imagery and found that the distribution changes every season, varying even between neighbourhoods.

Dey highlights another gap: the lack of air-quality sensors.

“We have just over 130 continuous automatic air monitoring systems, of which 40 are in the NCR [National Capital Region],” said Dey. “Nearly 500 districts in India don’t have a single monitoring system, whether automatic or manual. To put it simply, we have no idea how polluted many of India’s tier-2 and -3 cities are because we are not measuring the pollution levels there at all.”

A lifetime of changes Baijnath Majhi is 87. He has never gone to school.

Like his father, he is a boatman, as are his children and grandchildren. Over his lifetime, Majhi has watched the Ganga’s water get visibly polluted and the air quality in Varanasi deteriorate.

“We can earn money only when people come,” said Majhi, “I have been sitting here since morning but there hasn’t been a single customer yet.”

For those like Majhi, the polluted air means a worsening quality of life and a cycle of poverty he hasn’t been able to escape. Majhi accepts whatever a tourist is willing to pay. The alternative is day long idleness.

Many changes that Majhi has seen over his lifetime tend to play out over a timescale of hundreds of years, said experts. But the sheer quantity of air pollution has meant that those like Majhi are able to notice a perceptible difference.

The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere has almost doubled since the preindustrial age till now, according to the Global Carbon Budget report released in December 2018.

Between 1960 and 2017 alone, the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere has gone from 310 ppm (parts per million) to 410 ppm--a rise of over 32%.

A lot of this pollution does not come from vehicles in India. “Household pollution in rural India is a big contributor mostly caused when solid

MARCH 2019

fuels like coal or wood is used for cooking,” said Dey. This is a feature common to most developing countries, he added.

Improving monitoring In Delhi in January 2019, unprecedented air pollution and public pressure led the government to launch the National Clean Air Programme (NCAP)--a five-year plan that focused on improving air quality across 102 cities in India.

A key component of this plan is increasing the monitoring of data using lowcost air monitoring devices.

“For real change, different departments have to work together; the pollution control board alone will not be able to make much of an impact,” said a senior official at the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change (MoEFCC), speaking on condition of anonymity since he was not authorised to talk to the media.

The NCAP has its flaws: it lacks legal mandate, does not have clear timelines for its action plan, and does not fix accountability. It also ignores air quality in rural India, as IndiaSpend reported in February 2019.

Solutions to tackle air pollution exist, but state government officials must lead the way, said the MoEFCC official. “An increase in public pressure is needed to drive change,” he added.

Coordination between government departments to address air pollution is another requirement. In Varanasi, for instance, the

civic body in charge of making regulations rarely consults the pollution control board.

Dey of IIT-Delhi believes that while the NCAP is “heading in the right direction”, it is not enough. “We need to invest a lot more in measuring the data,” he said.

Measuring air pollution and climate-change impacts is difficult, said IASSPotsdam’s Schneidemesser, because “there are so many interactions and feedback mechanisms” between air, land and ocean systems.

But on the bright side, “if regulations are put in place, it is possible to see improvements in air quality on the timescale of weeks and at times even days”, she said, citing the example of Beijing-a city where the minimum temperature falls to -8 deg C-- where air pollution was brought down by 35% over five years to 2017.

Beijing’s transformation was possible because the government had a plan, various departments enforced the plan and the laws and helped millions of households switch from coal to natural gas for winter indoor heating. In Varanasi, it would be a start if government officials started talking to their colleagues.

This is the fifth of a series on India’s climate change hotspots. You can read the first part here, the second here, the third here and the fourth here.

(Disha Shetty is a Columbia Journalism School-IndiaSpend reporting fellow covering climate change.)

Source: India Spend/Sabrang India (Heading changed)

AUSTRALIAN TILES WORLD Opens in Truganina

'AUSTRALIAN TILES WORLD’ at the 9 Network Drive, Truganina opened on 9 March 2019. Sanjay Patel, family, and friends assembled for the start of the new business. In one section of the place beautiful times imported from Morbi, Gujarat, India are displayed. One has many colours and natural looking times to choose. Contact- www.tilesworld.com.au

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south asia MARCH 2019

South Asia Times

SOUTH ASIA

southSouth asia times 23 Asia Times

Women’s Feature Service: Mapping the struggles of feminism in India N

By Shiwani Neupane

EW DELHI, Mar 5 2019 (IPS) Pamela Phillipose was editor of the Women’s Feature Service, the only syndicated news service in India with a gender perspective, for nearly six years, until she stepped down this year as editor in chief and director.

She wore other hats for the publication as well, writing and photographing.

The service began operating in India when Anita Anand, the manager, moved its headquarters to New Delhi in 1991 to ensure that its focus stay on the developing world and that it become autonomous.

The service had gotten its start in 1978 as a UNESCO initiative in reporting on development issues and written by women journalists, based with the Inter Press Service (IPS) global news agency in Rome. www.ipsnews.net Once it moved to India, it opened several bureaus around the world, publishing articles by Indian journalists and others for syndication about women’s issues on social, economic, political and health developments, but the bureaus eventually shut down because they could not raise enough money to keep going.

The service (www. wfsnews.org) now syndicates 250 to 300 articles a year and offers programs like international conferences on womenrelated topics to be selfsustaining. (Anand left in 2000.)

Phillipose started her journalism career in Bombay (now Mumbai) with The Times of India in the 1970s and later was associate editor for The Indian Express. She was awarded the Chameli Devi Jain prize for outstanding woman journalist in 1999 and the Zee-Astitva Award for Constructive Journalism in 2007.

She was an editor of a book, “Across the Crossfire: Women and Conflict in India” and has contributed to various anthologies,

Pamela Phillipose, who edited the Women’s Feature Service in New Delhi for almost six years. She stepped down in 2014. including “Memoirs From the Women’s Movement in India: Making a Difference.”

This interview, which touches on Phillipose’s career as a journalist and advocate as well as the increasingly precarious state of many women in India, was held last year by email and

by Skype from New York to Phillipose in Delhi.

Q. Why did you leave mainstream media to join the Women’s Feature Service in 2008?

A. The Indian media had increasingly moved away from issues concerning a large section of population, which did not have a presence in the market, after the country began to liberalize its economy — a process that began in the mid-1980s but which peaked in the early ’90s.

Dictated by the market, and the advertising sector in particular, the mainstream media began to shift their focus to consumers during the liberalization years.

This meant that many important tropes fell off the media map, including that of gender. This was one of

the major reasons for me to consider making the move from The Indian Express, where I was in charge of the editorial pages, to the Women’s Feature Service, a features agency mandated to highlight gender concerns.

Q. You moved from The Times of India to The Indian Express and then to Women’s Feature Service, or WFS. How has the life of Indian women changed during your career?

A. I began my career in the mid-1970s with The Times of India in Bombay.

In those days, newspapers were driven largely by politics. The Mathura rape case of the late 1970s and the mobilizations around it helped to make visible the larger theme of violence against women.

This, in turn, impacted positively on media coverage of women’s concerns, and the trend continued into the 1980s, which saw many legislative changes taking place.

After the economic restructuring of the 1990s,

there was an unprecedented burgeoning of media presence and institutions — first within the print, then within television and over the last decade or so within the ICT [information and communications technology] and social media space.

All of this has impacted both the representation of women in the media and their presence within the media. In the 1990s, for instance, because women were the prime audiences for television, television serials attempted to consciously link women with the models of hyperconsumption and a neo-conservatism being promoted on television.

However, through it all, larger issues like societal biases — reflected in skewed sex ratios — and sexual violence, remained deeply entrenched within society.

The extent to which such violence, for instance, existed at the subterranean level was evident in the regular recurrence of violence, as evidenced in the murder and rape of Thangjam Manorama in

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Manipur [2004] or in the Delhi gang rape [2012].

So, while many positive changes, vis-à-vis women, did take place, including universal primary education, rising legal literacy and reservations for women at the level of local government, women in India continue to face serious challenges, including those determined by their caste and religious backgrounds.

Q. India has received a lot of news coverage in at least the last year for the occurrence of multiple gang rapes in the country. This has led to multifaceted conversations worldwide about the state of women in India. Have these conversations helped shed light on women’s rights and concerns, a mission of the Women’s Feature Service, or have the rapes complicated the situation for women further?

Contd. on pg 24

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MARCH 2019

Women’s Feature Service: Mapping the struggles of feminism in India

Contd. from pg 23

A. These are complex issues that require comprehensive answers.

Quickly, though, I would like to point out that the Justice Verma Committee Report was a positive outcome of the mobilizations around the Delhi gang rape of December 2012 because it put on the table many issues like marital rape and assaults on women in conflict situations.

Those mobilizations also saw the enactment of the Criminal Law (Amendment) Act 2013, which mandated the compulsory filing of First Information Reports in police stations, something that was neglected earlier, and the criminalization of various kinds of attacks on women, including stalking, acid attacks and stripping.

Q. How do you balance your advocacy work on women’s rights in India with journalism?

A. I believe an important part of journalism is advocacy. In a country like India, where the wellbeing of an increasing number of people is being threatened, directly and indirectly, by reversals of all kinds, ranging from the food and environmental crises to global recessions, there is space for a more people-centric definition of journalism.

We need more than ever media practitioners who travel beyond the confines of privileged enclaves, leaving behind the “big spenders” of metropolitan India, to tell their stories.

We need media practitioners who have the knowledge, capacity and technological ability to communicate on the real issues of our times and speak truth to power in compelling ways.

It is important for journalists to use their abilities of description, their sense of empathy, their

access to information and their understanding of the power of words, to tell their stories.

Q. What advice would you give to the prime minister of India, Narendra Modi, about effective legislation to protect women’s rights? Do you think, for example, that a separate coach for women in a train is necessary?

A. It is imperative that the Modi government ensures that the rising tide of intolerance and communalism in the country is addressed urgently. Communalism and communal violence adversely affects women disproportionately, as we saw in the Gujarat riots of 2002.

One piece of legislation — the Women’s Reservation Bill, providing for a 33 percent quota for women

in Parliament and the state legislatures — has been pending since 1996 because of opposition from male Parliamentarians.

The Modi government would do well to pass that law urgently. We also need other laws presently considered too radical for Indian society — like a matrimonial law and a law to outlaw marital rape.

Q. The Women’s Feature Service has reported on women in conflict zones.

You also co-edited a book reporting on conflict, titled “Across the Crossfire: Women and Conflict in India.” What is it about women in conflict zones interests you?

Why is it important to focus on women in these circumstances?

A. Women and children, as we know, are the worst affected when conflict-driven

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violence breaks out, since the responsibility of keeping families going falls on them.

However, they hardly matter in peace negotiations and their concerns are not adequately reflected in the drawing up of the architecture of the postconflict scenario.

Another major concern is that they are extremely vulnerable to sexual attack and assault in times of conflict. This is why I would also advocate the striking down of a repressive law like the Armed Forces Special Powers Act, presently in the statute books, which gives the military sweeping powers to treat citizens in disturbed areas with complete impunity. * Founded in 2011, PassBlue is a project of the New School’s Graduate Program in International Affairs in New York and not tied financially or otherwise to the UN. PassBlue is a member of the Institute for Nonprofit News.

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MARCH 2019

southSouth asia times 25 Asia Times

Break the menstrual taboo

By Tharanga Yakupitiyage

U

NITED NATIONS, Mar 8 2019 (IPS) - It is time to rise up and fight a long neglected taboo: menstruation.

Marking International Women’s Day, United Nations human rights experts called on the international community to break taboos around menstruation, noting its impacts on women and girls’ human rights.

“Persistent harmful socio-cultural norms, stigma, misconceptions and taboos around menstruation, continue to lead to exclusion and discrimination of women and girls,” the experts from various mandates from cultural rights to violence against women said in a joint statement.

Among the experts is the Chair of the Working Group on discrimination against women in law and in practice Ivana Radai who told IPS of the need to challenge the taboo.

“Even in the human rights community, it is either thought of as not so important or people did not understand how much discrimination exists still,” she said.

“We really feel that it is time to challenge the taboos and shame and to address the human rights issues that arise in respect to discrimination and stigma,” Radacic added.

Period-Shaming Around the world, millions of women still lack access basic sanitary products to manage menstrual bleeding.

In India, less than 10 percent of women have access to sanitary products.

Many are forced to seek alternatives, from old rags to newspapers.

The use of unsanitary materials often have health implications, including reproductive tract infections and cervical cancer.

The lack of adequate gender-sensitive facilities is another challenge, preventing women and girls from maintaining menstrual hygiene in a private, safe, and dignified manner.

According to the World Bank, at least 500 million women and girls lack such facilities, which severely impact girls’ attendance and participation in school.

In Nepal, 30 percent of girls’ report missing school during their periods.

This all stems from the

In India, less than 10 percent of women and girls have access to sanitary products. Many are forced to seek alternatives, from old rags to newspapers. Credit: Stella Paul/IPS idea that menstruation is “impure” and even often treated as an illness, resulting in the exclusion of women and girls in societies around the world.

“When combined with the stigma and shame that women and girls are made to feel during that time, it is truly disempowering,” the joint statement said.

When on their periods, many women and girls are not allowed to touch water or food and are restricted from entering religious or culture sites.

Chhaupadi, a practice still common in Nepal, restrict women and girls from entering her home, touching her parents, or going to school or temple. Instead, they are banished to a hut outside the main house for the duration of their period.

The U.N. has found reports of pneumonia, attacks from wild animals, and rape when women and girls are banished to a shed.

However, if a woman doesn’t follow the rules, she is told that she will bring destruction and misfortune to their family.

Though the Indian Supreme Court lifted the ban on women and girls of menstruating age from entering Sabarimala temple in Kerala, the move has sparked protests and violence by opponents, many of whom blocked women from entering the

temple.

“This idea of women being contaminated and impure— that then has an effect on how they feel and see themselves and how they see their own womanhood,” Radacic said.

Changing the Cycle Many have already been working to shine a spotlight on the issue, including Plan International UK which has launched a period emoji, represented by a red droplet, as a way to overcome the silence around the natural monthly reality for billions of women worldwide.

A new documentary, ‘Period. End of Sentence.’ which revealed the stigma of menstruation in rural communities in India, even won an Oscar.

Radacic noted that the documentary was “timely” and a good way to raise awareness to people in Western countries who may be unaware of the inaccessibility of hygienic and sanitary pads for many girls and women.

The documentary, directed by Rayka Zehtabchi, follows the installation and impacts of a low-cost sanitary napkin machine made by notorious “Pad Man” Arunachalam Muruganantham.

“The daughter never talks to the mother, the wife never talks to the

husband, friends don’t talk to each other. Menstruation is the biggest taboo in my country,” he says in the documentary.

Inspired after seeing his wife use a rag for her menstrual bleedings, Muruganantham now provides pad machines to communities across the South Asian nation and trains women on how to use them, allowing them to establish their own business and sell affordable pads.

“The strong creation created by god in the world is not the lion, not the elephant, not the tiger—the girl,” Muruganantham said.

In the documentary, a group of women branded their sanitary products “Fly,” and with good reason.

“We have installed this machine for women. So now we want women to rise and fly,” one woman said.

Radacic also pointed to situations of conflict and crises, leaving many displaced and refugee women without access to sanitary products or even basic, private facilities.

Organisations such as WoMena and CARE have started to address this gap, implementing a pilot project in the Rhino refugee camp in Northern Uganda which provided menstrual cups and reusable pads.

One girl who received a menstrual cup, which are reusable for up to 10 years,

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told CARE that she now feels more comfortable and has confidence as she plays sports and attends class during her period.

In fact, a study from University of London’s School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) found that providing free sanitary products and lessons about poverty increased girls’ attendance at school by 17 percent.

“There is more and more grassroots actions in certain communities and there is a celebration of the menstrual cycle, of the cyclical nature of a woman. I think it is a great time to really push this issue forward,” Radacic told IPS. However, it is not enough to just provide sanitary pads, she noted.

Radacic highlighted the need for countries to abolish laws where women are excluded or restricted on the basis of menstruation, ensure access to hygienic products and gendersensitive facilities, and teach comprehensive sexuality education to help break the taboo around periods.

“Much more has to be done to address the menstrual health needs of women and girls and to acknowledge that the failure to address them has a detrimental impact on all areas of women’s lives,” Radacic and others said.

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MARCH 2019

Neglect of education, death-squads, and the deep state syndrome in Bangladesh

By Taj Hashmi

intelligence agencies, police, bureaucrats, and big business, who operate independently of a nation’s political leadership, in pursuit of their own agenda and goals.

E

ducation has almost everything to do with changing, modifying, and improving the levels of people’s culture (although “improving the cultural level” is a loaded and controversial expression).

To remain politically correct, we may assert that education helps us broaden our world view, liberate ourselves from ageold, prejudicial ideas and practices promoted and nurtured by pre-modern feudalism, colonialism, and stagnating postcolonial states in the Third World, which are still clinging to many feudal and colonial values to the benefit of the postcolonial ruling elites.

However, the systemic neglect of education at every level by all the postLiberation governments in Bangladesh — the allocation for education being one of the lowest in the world, much lower than Sri Lanka’s — has not improved the cultural level of the bulk of the population.

There are three mediums of instruction in the country, Bengali, English, and Islamic or Madrasa, which respectively in general create underemployable, employable, and unemployable graduates. While the lower middle classes send their children to Bengali medium schools and colleges, the upper classes send their children to English medium institutions at home or abroad, and the poor can only afford Madrasa education for their children, who grow up as fatalist, unemployable, angry and frustrated adults.

Last but not least, the official policy of promoting only Bengali medium education by almost classifying English-medium education as anti-national and unpatriotic (albeit it is grossly hypocritical and dichotomous to what the elites do with regard to the education of their own children) is mainly responsible for massive unemployment among “educated” and unemployable graduates in the country, their number is in the neighbourhood of thirty to forty per cent. The consequential employment

of tens of thousands of English-educated Indians in the private sector costs the country very dearly, to the tune of almost three billion dollars per year, remitted to India by the Indians, mostly working illegally in Bangladesh.

The education system that produces semieducated, and even virtually illiterate people, cannot produce politically conscious citizens to question, let alone resist, autocracy, and extrajudicial killing, which are the building blocks of an overpowering Deep State.

Bad education is possibly worse than illiteracy as it destroys traditional values that nurture civility, honesty, mutual love, trust and respect among people without building any better alternatives.

Postcolonial states like Pakistan and Bangladesh — as studied by Hamza Alavi — are glaring examples in this regard. As Alavi has pointed out, in postcolonial Pakistan and Bangladesh over-developed military, bureaucracy, and police

run the state where the civil society being under-developed, remain dormant, ineffective, and irrelevant. In recent years, while the situation has substantially improved in Pakistan, Bangladesh has virtually become a police-state run by the over-developed military, bureaucracy, and police.

Since January 2007, the Deep State is actually running Bangladesh, where the so-called elected governments are virtually at its service. The Deep State is also known as a state within a state, a clandestine government runs the show. As David de Leon pointed out in 1903, private corporations had been running the United States to the detriment of the best interests of the people [ David de Leon, “Imperialism in Imperio”, Daily People (editorial) June 4, 1903], so do modern scholars point out several deep states, like the CIA in the US, the ISI in Pakistan (its military intelligence outfit) are examples in this regard. The deep state is made of covert networks of power, such as the military,

In Bangladesh today, the culture of the deep state is more powerful than the collective mass culture of compliance, apathy, and dejection. The slow and steady rise of the deep state was inevitable after the Government in 2004 had introduced the dreadful Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) or deathsquads à la Hitler’s Gestapo or secret police, and the Schutzstaffel, or SS troops, and the last Shah’s SAVAK in Iran, initially to get rid of hard-core criminals, which by early 2007 became the fearsome and unaccountable deathsquads. Initially, cross sections of Bangladeshis, including educated people, welcomed the RAB as their last hope for restoring order in Bangladesh. It is time to understand people’s unconditional support for extra-judicial killings by the dreadful RAB actually symbolizes people’s diminishing respect for the police and judiciary. This culture of lack of faith in lawenforcers and the judiciary is an age-old tradition of Bengal, developed out of pragmatic reasons, or people’s experience of living under brutal precolonial and colonial regimes for centuries, from the Palas to the Senas, and the Mughals to the British. This culture of admiration for the RAB, which is a powerful organ of the deep state is very pertinent to the study of the cultural dimension of underdevelopment, or the absence of democracy, freedom, and human rights in Bangladesh.

Again, thanks to the excesses of the RAB — in a killing spree since 2007 — which has forcibly made hundreds of dissidents and others disappear across the country, the vast majority of Bangladeshis want a way out of the state of fear. In sum, Bangladesh is not only a fractured polity today — which is roughly divided between the Awami Leaguers and Anti-Awami Leaguers — it is also in a

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state of confusion, fear, and uncertainties. How long the so-called myth of prosperity will keep the underdogs — at least 70 per cent of the population live below the poverty-line drawn at more than $1.90 per capita income per day — is an embarrassingly loaded question. Nobody wants to answer it, economists, development practitioners, human rights activists, let alone the Government!

I end this submission with an old Urdu story, which goes like this: One poor widow invited four maulvis to pray for her dead husband. She prepared a good meal for them as well. Incidentally, all the four so-called maulvis were illiterate, even did not know any prayers. The first one came and while eating halwa and paratha, started murmuring in subdued voice,” Mai kutch nahi janta” (I don’t know anything). Then came the second maulvi and sat next to the first one. He wanted to follow the first. He was shocked, and started chanting in low voice, “Jaisa tu, waysa mai” (I am like yourself).

Then came the third one, and after discovering what was going on there, was very worried and started chanting in low voice,”Yeh kab tak chalega? (How long will this last?). Then came the fourth one, who was illiterate but smart. After listening to all the three maulvis, he just grabbed the bowl of halwa and parathas, and started gulping the food and started chanting, also in low voice: “Jab tak chale chala jaye, halwa-paratha khaya jaye” (Let us all eat halwa-paratha as long as we can!). I think the situation in Bangladesh is very similar to what was going on at the old lady’s house that day, ignorant but powerful people are busy ruining the country with their crude culture, ignorance, and brute force!

Dr. Hashmi is a historian, analyst, and author of several books. He is an Adjunct Professor of Criminal Justice at Austin Peay State University, Tennessee.

Source: Counter Currents, 7 March, 2019.

COUNTERVIEW

MARCH 2019

southSouth asia times 27 Asia Times

CIC threat of penalty compels RBI to share under RTI minutes that rubberstamped DeMon exercise

By Venkatesh Nayak*

I

am placing in the public domain a copy of the meeting minutes of the Board of Governors of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) which legitimised the Central Government’s initiative to withdraw the legal tender nature of currency notes of Rs. 500 and Rs. 1,000 denominations (also known as demonetisation or DeMon for short) on 08 November, 2016. Readers might remember my earlier despatches about RBI’s stubborn refusal to part with any information about the preparatory stages of this exercise. Readers might also recall my brief analysis of the stark differences between the 2016-17 exercise and the previous such exercise conducted in 1978.

I salute the efforts made by the Indian Express and other media houses which have already reported the contents of RBI’s Board meeting minutes in November 2018- a worthy example of investigative reporting. However, I have not been able to locate a copy of the actual document on the Internet.

I am publicly sharing the document containing these minutes so that any citizen or institution may make use of it henceforth.

Click here for a copy of RBI’s DeMon-related meeting minutes.

Click here for the email communication received from RBI’s Central Public Information Officer (CPIO) which is proof that these documents were “neither stolen” nor photocopied without authorisation” but obtained legitimately under The Right to Information Act, 2005 (RTI Act) after a 28-month long wait.

Making this declaration at the outset is necessary because this is the season where wild accusations of theft of official documents are being flung at people who are working for greater transparency and accountability of certain very publicly conducted affairs.

Last month, RBI revealed its intention to disclose

these minutes at a hearing in my RTI case pending before the Central Information Commission (CIC). CIC issued a penalty show cause notice to the CPIO for the inordinate delay in making a decision in favour of disclosure. This order was widely reported.

Click here for the CIC’s interim order to RBI. Three days ago, CIC staff informed me telephonically about the cancellation of the next hearing in this case which was scheduled for 08 March, 2019. However, RBI’s CPIO emailed me these minutes the same day. He also shared RBI’s written submissions to the CIC against the grounds cited in my second appeal case.

As the CIC might not have examined it yet, I am not sharing those submissions publicly.

Preliminary observations on the contents of the DeMon minutes versus the CPIO’s justification for secrecy 1) The first two queries

in my RTI application were for copies of the minutes of the meeting of RBI’s Board of Governors and any recommendation that was submitted regarding the DeMon exercise to the Central Government. The CPIO sent a copy of the minutes of the 561st meeting of RBI’s Board which was held less than five hours before the Hon’ble Prime Minister announced the DeMon decision to the country on television. RBI sent its resolution approving the DeMon exercise to the Government only on 16th December a full 38 days after the Rs. 500 and Rs. 1,000 currency notes stopped being legal tender.

So essentially, RBI’s Board had only rubber stamped the Government’s initiative.

RBI’s CPIO has sent me this document also.

2) The remaining queries in my RTI application pertain to petitions, recommendations or communication submitted by any person, entity or organisation to RBI regarding demonetisation

and all replies that RBI sent to such entities. I had also sought copies of all file notings and correspondence conducted in this regard. RBI’s CPIO continues to deny access to all this information citing Section 7(9) of the RTI Act, without batting an eyelid.

Readers will recollect that an RTI application may be rejected only by invoking the exemptions listed under Sections 8 and 9 of the Act. Section 7(9) is meant to facilitate disclosure through some acceptable form if the form of access sought by an RTI applicant cannot be fulfilled. Nevertheless, the CPIO persisted with his line of reasoning at the last hearing before the CIC, held in February 2019.

3) In the first instance, RBI’s CPIO cursorily rejected the first two queries of my RTI application by citing Section 8(1)(a) of the RTI Act. Later, upon the advice of the First Appellate Authority (FAA), the CPIO gave some reasoning.

Click here for my RTI

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application, CPIO’s replies, my first appeal and the FAA’s order.

In his detailed reasoning as to why the DeMon minutes and recommendation sent to the Central Government cannot be disclosed, the CPIO had stated as follows: “The documents containing the information pressed for by the appellant in these queries have been examined. The documents reveal factors/modus operandi which preceded a highly sensitive decision of withdrawing the legal tender character of Rs. 500 and Rs. 1,000 bank notes by the Central Government having bearing on the economy of the state. It is reiterated that the information sought relates to vital economic interests of the country which takes in its expanse an array of economic, financial and security factors. data, exchange of opinions etc. of secret nature, disclosure of which would harm more the larger national interest as compared to the interest of an individual.

Contd. on pg 28

south asia 28 South Asia Timestimes Contd. from pg 27 Disclosure is also likely to impede the decisionmaking processes in the area of future economic and financial policies of the State. In effect it attracts the provisions of the Section 8(1)(a) of the Right to Information Act, 2005, (the Act) and the information sought qualifies for an exemption under this Section.

After careful consideration it is also observed that none of the information available can reasonably be severed from any part that contains exempt information as envisaged in Section 10 of the Act.” 4) A perusal of the DeMon minutes that the CPIO has furnished now, shows that there is hardly any information that can be called “sensitive” in them.

The only statistics cited in the DeMon minutes are reproduced below: a) The Central Government’s letter containing the draft DeMon Scheme drawn up in the Ministry of Finance stated that growth of the bank notes of Rs. 500 and Rs. 1,000 denomination was 76.38% and 108.98% during the period 2011-16 whereas the economy had grown

only by 30%. RBI’s Directors disagreed with this reasoning and responded that the growth rate of the economy was the real rate whereas growth in currency circulation was nominal and when adjusted for inflation did not constitute any stark difference. b) RBI disagreed with the Revenue Dept.’s finding that the shadow economy for India (where black money transactions do not leave an audit trail) was estimated at 20.7% of GDP in 1999 and had risen to 23.2% in 2007 (based on World bank estimates). It is interesting that the DeMon minutes do not mention the black money reports submitted by NIPFPand two other research institutions.

My formal request for copies of these reports was rejectedunder the RTI Act. The Union Finance Minister has recently made a curious statement in Parliament that black money study reports may be made available to MPs who sit on the Department-related Parliamentary Committee on Finance, but will not be placed in the public domain. The Government seems to have ignored the proviso underlying Section 8(1) of the RTI Act which contains the noble democratic principle that information which cannot

COUNTERVIEW be denied to Parliament or State Legislature cannot be denied to a citizen. To hold that information may be provided to certain MPs but not to the people who sent them to Parliament is perplexing to say the least. c) RBI’s Directors opined that most of the black money is not held as cash but in the form of real-sector assets such as gold or real estate and that DeMon would not have any material impact on those assets. d) RBI’s Directors rejected the Government’s concern that an estimated Rs. 400 crores of counterfeit currency in circulation was significant as a percentage of the total quantum of currency in circulation.

The Directors also noted that DeMon will impact negatively on the GDP in the short term.

5) What were the compelling factors that justified DeMon which took the lives of more than a hundred citizens who stood outside banks to exchange their currency notes and scores of bankers who collapsed counting them and have had well documented negative impact on various sectors of the economy which is still unravelling? RBI’s DeMon minutes are strangely silent on this matter.

6) At para #4.3(i), it

MARCH 2019

is mentioned that the Board found the measure commendable, but there is no reasoning provided for this commendation anywhere in the minutes.

At para #4.4 there is a vague mention that DeMon will help achieve financial inclusion. How will criminalising possession of the DeMon currency beyond the grace period, lead to financial inclusion is not explained anywhere.

7) What is interesting is that the DeMon minutes do not contain any sensitive information such as factors, data or exchange of opinion about financial and economic security. Nothing in the documents that I have received indicates that any portion of it has been severed under Section 10 of the RTI Act to remove sensitive information. So the CPIO’s reasoning which was bandied about between 2016-2017 as the basis for rejecting the RTI application is simply not borne out by the contents of the document.

8) The Board also stated that DeMon will help incentivise use of electronic modes for making payments instead of cash. Opinion on whether increased use of electronic modes of payment was due to DeMon is divided. RBI’s own recent reports present a

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contradictory picture.While e-transactions have grown manifold there is more cash circulating in the economy than there was on the date of demonetisation. So on what basis did RBI make its assumption on 08 November 2016, is not revealed in the DeMon minutes.

9) Interestingly, the DeMon minutes reveal that a Deputy Governor of RBI was working with the Central Government on the initiative to withdraw legal tender of the Rs. 500 and Rs. 1,000 currency notes, for six months. But his name is not mentioned anywhere in the minutes. The language of para #4.4 of the minutes seems to indicate that the Board was simply not aware of this planning prior to the tabling of the Deputy Governor’s memorandum on the subject at its meeting less than six hours before the Hon’ble Prime Minister announced the decision to the country.

Meanwhile, I am looking forward to the next date of hearing to battle it out for the remaining information I have sought in my RTI application. *Programme Head, Access to Information Programme, Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative, New Delhi Source: Counterview, 11 March, 2019.

finance

MARCH 2019

southSouth asia times 29 Asia Times

What is SMSF – Part II

BY Balki Balakrishnan

S

etting up and managing your Self-managed Superannuation Fund (referred to as SMSF or the Fund hereafter) is a major financial decision.

After all, you oversee the management of an important and significant asset of yours.

A badly managed Fund will not only invite penalties and other legislative remediation from the controlling authorities, it could also put the quality of your retirement phase in dire straits.

SMSFs can offer several features and benefits generally not available with other super options. Most of the people who commence SMSFs do so for various reasons such as better control on their super assets, intergenerational wealth transfer, borrow to make larger investments, own their business real property within their Fund etc.

Before you decide to commence SMSF you should consider whether you have the time, knowledge and the skill to manage your own super fund. You should be aware of the operational aspects of your Fund and your roles, responsibilities and obligations as a trustee of the fund.

In this article we will discover what structures are available to you and the advantages and disadvantages of those structures.

SMSF is a structure to maintain and manage your super money and getting the structure right at the beginning is very important.

When you set up your own Fund you take the role of either a trustee or a director of a company that acts as a trustee of your Fund (called a

Corporate Trustee). The trustee is responsible for holding the assets of the Fund and investing it for the benefit of the members of the Fund. You must also comply with super and tax laws while administering the Fund.

In the main there are two ways of structuring your fund – Individual trustees and Corporate trustee. Single member funds have some additional rules and are not in the scope of this article.

Individual trustee structure is an arrangement with four or fewer members and where all the members are trustees and no member is an employee of another member unless they are related.

Corporate trustee structure is where you have an incorporated company under the law that acts as the trustee for your super fund. In this structure all the members of the Fund must be the directors of the company and all the directors must be the members of the Fund.

You should be mindful that your choice of trustee structure will make a difference to the way you administer the

Fund and the types of benefits it can pay to the members.

You also should carefully consider the members you decide to have in your super fund such as their age, investment preferences and needs, their exit strategy from the Fund to name a few.

We will explore now the differences between the two structures.

While setting up the structure, the cost to establish is lower for individual trustee structure compared to corporate trustee structure. This cost is mainly due to the requirement to establish a company to act as trustee.

The governing rules of the Fund are determined by the super laws and the trust deed under both the structures.

However, under the corporate trustee structure the fund also must comply with the company’s constitution and the Corporations Act 2001 administered by ASIC. Individual trustee structure has fewer reporting obligations compared to corporate trustee structure.

However, since the assets of the fund are kept separate from any personal or

business assets it is easier to administer changes to ownership of the funds.

In an individual trustee structure, the assets of the Fund are held in the name of all individual trustees as trustees of the Fund. You need to change the name on the ownership documents (for example land title deed) and notify relevant authorities in case there is a change in trustees. This process can be onerous if the Fund holds many assets, such as a wide range of shares. In a corporate trustee structure environment such a requirement doesn’t arise because the company owns the assets.

The benefits of establishing a corporate trustee for your Fund has some compelling benefits even though the establishment and ongoing administrative costs, and reporting requirements are higher compared to organizing your Fund with individual trustees Most of the SMSFs have two members mainly the husband and wife. When one of them dies in an individual trustee structure the surviving member must

appoint another person to act as trustee of the fund for the Fund to be compliant. This could be impractical because the surviving member does not have anybody to appoint as member, or the surviving member is unwilling to relinquish control of the Fund. In a corporate trustee environment, the surviving member could simply continue as the sole member of the Fund and thus maintain full control of the super fund.

Another significant difference between the two structures is to do with the exposure to litigation of trustees of the Fund.

Individuals acting as trustees of the Fund are jointly and severally liable for any actions taken against the Fund. Should litigation against the Fund exceeds the Fund’s assets which is held in the names of the individuals, the personal assets of the individuals may become at risk. The companies on the other hand have limited liabilities. This ensures litigation against the Fund is limited to assets held in the name of the company and do not stretch to the directors of the company.

Many SMSFs are commenced to borrow and invest in direct property. Only an SMSF structured under a corporate trustee will be able to borrow money to invest in direct property or any other asset class.

While SMSFs are great for some people, they don’t suit all. You should carefully consider your objectives and have a financial plan for achieving them using this structure. You should also consider other options in achieving your financial goals.

You must speak to a Financial Advisor who is a SMSF specialist to discuss whether an SMSF is right for you.

Be wise, Be Prepared, Be Safe!

Opes Financial Solutions Pty Ltd trading as Opes Financial Planning ACN618 122 795 is an Authorised Representative of Merit Wealth Pty Ltd AFSL 409361.

Balki Balakrishnan

Director | Financial Advisor Authorised Representative Number: 409415 Merit Wealth Pty Ltd. AFSL No: 409361 M: 0419 506 560

This article contains information that is general in nature. It does not take into account the objectives, financial situation or needs of any particular person. You need to consider your financial situation and needs before making any decisions based on this information. Please contact us at 0419 506 560 if you want more information or need to review your insurance covers.

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southSouth asia times 33 Asia Times

quick community guide VIEW POINT

South Asia Times

MARCH 2019

contd from previous page Suite 536, No 1 Queens Road,

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south asia 34 South Asia Timestimes

australia

MARCH 2019

Oi! We’re not lazy yarners, so let’s kill the cringe and love our Aussie accent(s)

L

ast month, a US contestant on TV’s The Bachelor faked an Australian accent to stand out. It wasn’t a great accent. Yanks aren’t great at doing Australian English. But to be fair, when it comes to Americans and the Australian accent, we can, and do, draw on the words of “Australia’s nightingale” Dame Nellie Melba: “sing’em muck”.

A steady media diet of Paul Hogan and Steve Irwin types has left them with some funny ideas about how we Aussies talk. Stone the crows, Paul, you want me to throw another “what” on the barbie?

We say it’s time we educate our Yank mates.

First step, let’s stop spreading nonsense about how lazy our accents are and all these cultural cringetinged myths.

Flies, booze and linguistic turncoats: public figures and our ‘lazy’ accent In the opening years of the colony, it might surprise you to know that many saw the Aussie accent as a good thing — “pure” in the words of a few observers (and purity here doesn’t mean the absence of “foul language”, but rather the lack of regional characteristics). A Tasmanian correspondent, Sam McBurney, wrote in the Argus in April 1886: There were no peculiarities in the colonies, but a general tendency to speak a pure English.

Alas, it was also around this time that the commentary started to change — enter those fanciful tales that link our accent to our half-open mouths, the flies, the climate, the pollen, our dental hygiene, alcohol consumption, and even our day-to-day conversations with Chinese migrants.

Sadly, Australian public figures are often the purveyors of these furphies. In the early 20thcentury, Dame Nellie Melba lambasted the accent, referring to our “twisted vowels” and “distortions”, and claimed the …general tendency to dawdle and slouch along … lies at the heart of the Australian accent.

In his 1939 contribution to the book Some Australians Take Stock,

T.S. Dorsch suggested the Australian accent might arise from “a species of national sloth”. And at the end of last year, Australian New York Times columnist Julia Baird joined the public chorus lamenting the “laziness” of the accent.

“Lazy” and “slovenly” have long been the go-to adjectives for haters of the Australian accent. Language researcher Janice Reeve found them to be the two most common adjectives used in letters to the ABC Weekly from 1939-1959.

Public figures aren’t helping our image by spreading this nonsense about the Aussie accent overseas. The ideas don’t stand up to scrutiny.

What does it even mean to have a ‘lazy’ accent?

Our views of accents are arbitrary social evaluations rather than intrinsic facts, and we base them on our knowledge and experience of the people who lie behind the accents. So, when you call an accent lazy, what you’re really saying is that someone is lazy. But who?

The answer is often racist, classist, sexist, and, well, lazy.

Want proof?

Britons asked to evaluate British accents rated the posh accents (those closer to the Queen’s English) as the most prestigious, and the urban accents as least prestigious. When Americans rated the same accents, the results got confusing.

Among other things, urban dialects no longer came in at the bottom of the list, and Americans in these studies even suggested that a Glasgow English speaker was from Mexico, and a Welsh English speaker was Norwegian.

And what about these sounds often cited as “lazy”?

Baird (among others) mentions “t” becoming “d” (“impordant”) and the disappearance of “l” in the iconic “Straya”.

The first thing to point out is that the modification and disappearance of these sounds aren’t distinctively Australian. They’re not even just an English thing but make up the potpourri of linguistic changes that have been going on for centuries — in all languages.

Next, to be technical, the “t” isn’t becoming a “d” but rather a short, rapid touching of the tongue against the bump behind

the teeth, known as a “tap”.

It’s rather like an “r” sound.

This change is widespread in global English, including British and American varieties. If you condemn it, you must also condemn those early English speakers who turned “pottage” into “poddash” and finally into modern English “porridge”.

And don’t these “disappearing” sounds like the “l” get up people’s noses?

They certainly did in the 17th century, when “l” dropped from words like “walk” and “talk”.

“Negligentius” is how Wallis described the modern pronunciations “wawk” and “tawk”. He would have written “slovenly” but he chose to write his 1653 book on the grammar of English in Latin because English wasn’t up to the task.

Are such sound deletions “lazy”?

A more honest approach to such “laziness” might see us reinsert the “k” in words like “knight”, “knee” and “knot” (lost sometime during the 17th-century).

But why stop there?

We might reinstate “r” throughout Australian

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English in “word”, “part” and “far”. But then we’d be opening ourselves up to complaints about the Americanisation of Australian English. After all, the Americans maintained the “r” in these words where the British and Australian varieties lost them in the 17th and 18th centuries.

Learning to love the Aussie accent If you’d like to “improve” the pronunciation of others, research shows this is the wrong way to do it.

In the first instance, it implies people aren’t aware that some accents are more valued than others in different contexts. And it downplays our dynamic ability to change our accents to suit our circumstances and goals. For instance, much gets made of Bob Hawke’s “broad” Australian accent, whereas a closer examination of his accent sees him speaking “general” or even “cultivated” in formal contexts (his Boyer lectures).

In the US, Barack Obama is also a dynamic accent shifter, but his standard English accent has been met with snide observations that he is “well-spoken” (leaving one to wonder, well, why shouldn’t he be?).

In the second instance, openly negative attitudes toward less socially valued accents in the classroom often lead to shame, resentment, and even hostility toward language activities. The outcomes can be catastrophic, with consequences well beyond poor school performance. In fact, this led the Norwegian Ministry of Education to ban classroom attempts to change accents in 1878.

So, there’s no substance to the view the Australian accent is “lazy”. If you’re promoting it, then in the wise words of American “philosopher” Jeffrey Lebowski, “that’s just, like, your opinion, man”.

And it’s an opinion that is neither helping the view of Aussies overseas nor is it helping the people it proposes to help. So let’s learn to love our Aussie accents in 2019 in all forms, posh, broad, ethnic, Aboriginal — and by this we mean love the people who use them.

Source: The Conversation, 12 March, 2019 (Under Creative Commons licence)

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MARCH 2019

Sangeet Sandhya Open forum for music lovers – classical, semi-classical & film music

Saturday 2.2.19 -

Gia Pndit (vocal)

Saturday 6.4.19 Saturday 1.6.19 Saturday 3.8.19 -

TBA Shraddhanand Reddy (vocal) Hashmat (vocal)

Saturday 5.10.19 - Radhey Shyam Gupta (sitar) Saturday 7.12.19 - Shubhangi Pandey (vocal)

Swar Sandhya Open forum for music lovers; Karaoke – Popular Indian Music Bring your own music, perform and enjoy

Saturday 5.1.19 Saturday 4.5.19 Saturday 7.9.19

Saturday 2.3.19 Saturday 6.7.19 Saturday 2.11.19

Venue: Brandon Park Primary School,

Time: 8.00pm

1-5 Ninevah Cr Wheelers Hill Free Entry, with ample parking, Free tea, coffee and biscuits Contact: Phone- 0402 074 208 or 0407 559 113 email- sangeetswarsandhya@gmail.com www.facebook.com/sangeetsandhya

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south asia 36 South Asia Timestimes

media

MARCH 2019

Twenty-seven women journalists held in appalling conditions

By Neeraj Nanda

A

s more and more women take up journalism, so too have women journalists increasingly been the victims of ruthless persecution by authoritarian regimes. According to RSF’s tally, of the 334 journalists in prison at the end of February, 27 of them – or 8% – were women. Five years ago, only 3% of imprisoned journalists were women.

These women journalists are being held by nine countries. Iran and China are the two largest jailers of women journalists, with seven held in each country.

They are followed by Turkey which – despite freeing the famous Kurdish journalist and artist Zehra Dogan two weeks ago – continues to detain four other women journalists.

Saudi Arabia is holding three women journalists, Vietnam two and Egypt, Bahrain, Syria, and Nicaragua are each holding one.

Targeted for what they write, charged with the worst crimes Although targeted by the authorities because of their articles or social network posts, these women are usually held on charges of “terrorist propaganda” or “membership of a terrorist group,” as in Turkey and Egypt, or for “suspicious contacts with foreign entities,” as in Saudi Arabia. Although vague and unsubstantiated, allegations of this kind are used to impose long jail terms.

In Iran, journalist and human rights defender Narges Mohammadi and Paineveste blog editor Hengameh Shahidi

were sentenced to 10 and 12 years in prison respectively on charges of “conspiring against national security and the Islamic Republic” and “insulting” the head of the judicial system. Roya Saberi Negad Nobakht, who has British and Iranian dual citizenship, initially received a 20-year prison sentence in 2014 for her Facebook posts.

It was later reduced to five years.

Life sentences Some countries have no reservations about imposing the longest possible prison terms in order to silence outspoken voices. This is the case in China. Gulmira Imin, a member of the Uyghur Muslim community and editor of the news website Salkin, was sentenced to life imprisonment in 2010 on charges of “separatism” and “divulging state secrets.”

A well-known 74-yearold journalist, Nazlı Ilıcak, received the same sentence in Turkey for taking part in a TV broadcast critical of the government on the eve of an abortive coup attempt in July 2016. She and two male colleagues, the Altan brothers, were sentenced to “aggravated” imprisonment for life, the harshest form of isolation, with no furloughs and no possibility of a pardon.

“Twenty-seven woman journalists are currently deprived of their freedom because of what they wrote or because they spoke out courageously,” RSF secretarygeneral Christophe Deloire said. “They are spared nothing. They are often the victims of disproportionate and iniquitous sentences.

They are subjected to the most appalling prison

conditions, like their male colleagues, and they are sometimes also tortured and harassed sexually. We call for their immediate release and we urge the United Nations to take up these cases.”

“Inhumane” conditions Women, like their male colleagues, are liable to be subjected to extremely harsh prison conditions.

Lucía Pineda Ubau, the news director of the Nicaraguan TV news channel 100% Noticias, spent 41 days in Managua’s El Chipote high-security prison before being transferred to a women’s prison at the end of December. The conditions in El Chipote, where the former Somoza family dictatorship used to torture its political prisoners, are “inhumane,” according to José Inácio Faria, a Portuguese MEP who visited Pineda there.

Tran Thi Nga, a Vietnamese blogger who defended migrant workers, was held incommunicado for more than six months after her arrest, until finally sentenced to nine years in prison on a charge of “anti-state propaganda” in a one-day trial on July 25, 2017. She was denied phone calls and visits for nearly a year because she “refused to admit her guilt.” Her lawyer, who was only able to meet her once before the trial, voiced alarm about her state of health, which he said was worsening steadily.

In Iran detainees are constantly denied proper medical care, whether in Gerchak, one of the country’s worst prisons, where three women who worked for the Sufi website Majzooban Noor - Sepideh Moradi, Avisha Jalaledin and Shima Entesari

– are serving five-year jail sentences, or in Tehran’s notorious Evin prison. Women journalists detained in Iran often stage dangerous hunger strikes in protest against prison conditions, including the lack of adequate medical attention.

Several UN reports have confirmed that Iranian female detainees fall sick more often than male detainees.

The situation of female detainees is aggravated by the segregation of men and women imposed by Iran’s ultra-conservative society and the traditional hatred towards intellectuals and the Islamic regime’s critics.

“Health conditions are bad enough for the men but the lack of hygiene in prison is even more terrible and problematic for the women," said Narges Mohammadi’s husband, Taghi Rahmani.

Tortured, humiliated and sexually harassed They are spared none of the worst forms of mistreatment.

In China, Gulmira Imin was tortured and forced to sign documents without being able to see her lawyer. For women, physical torture is compounded by the threat of rape and sexual harassment.

According to the family of Shorouq Amjad Ahmed al Sayed, a young photojournalist arrested in Egypt on April 25, 2018, she was beaten unconscious, insulted, and threatened with rape until the she made the confession sought by her interrogators -- namely that she had created a website with the aim of endangering public order and belonged to the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood.

There is a great deal of

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concern about two Saudi women citizen-journalists, Eman al Nafjan, who blogged as Saudiwoman, and Nouf Abdulaziz Al Jerawi, who wrote for The Arab Noon and other websites. According to the Saudi human rights NGO Al-Qst, they were among several women’s rights activists who were tortured following arrest in the spring of 2018, some of whom were also harassed sexually, made to undress, and photographed naked while forced to embrace other female detainees.

Disappeared in detention The Saudi authorities have not yet said what charges are being brought against Nafjan and Jerawi. Six other women journalists are currently being held without trial in other parts of the world. In some cases, their families have lost all contact with them. In China, no one knows what has become of three women citizen-journalists, Zhang Jixin, Qin Chao and Li Zhaoxiu, who were arrested in 2015, 2016, and 2017 respectively.

The Syrian blogger Tal alMallouhi has also disappeared in detention. As she was sentenced to five years in prison in 2011, she should have been released a long time ago. She was last seen alive in 2016 when she was transferred to the state security prison in Damascus.

The world’s youngest detained women journalist at the time of her arrest in December 2009, when she was still 18, she is now one of the longest held behind bars.

Source: Reporters Without Borders (RWB), March 6, 2019.

MARCH 2019

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BUSINESS

MARCH 2019

Adani Renewables Australia is striving to be a leading supplier of renewable energy in Australia

A

dani Renewables Australia’s vision is to generate renewable energy as part of an energy mix that is reliable, secure and affordable, for all customers with a particular focus on industry, as we transition to generate low emissions.

Putting words into action, the business currently has 300MW of solar power projects under development: Rugby Run Solar Farm, located near Moranbah in Queensland, and a second solar project 10km from Whyalla in South Australia.

Rugby Run Solar Farm Adani’s first solar project, Rugby Run, is located near the town of Moranbah reached mechanical completion in October 2018. In phase one, Rugby Run Solar Farm will supply 65MW of renewable power and has the capacity to expand up to 170MW. More than 247,000 solar panels will be installed at the farm (in phase one). The farm will

be fully operational early 2019.

The farm will generate 185,000 MWh of power each year or the equivalent to power about 23,000 homes each year (from phase one), says the Adani Australia website.

Whyalla Solar Project The Whyalla Solar Project is located approximately 10km from Whyalla, in South Australia, at a vacant site more than 300 hectares in size. It’s development approval was granted in September 2017, with preconstruction approval granted in August 2018.

Adani Renewables Australia is currently in commercial negotiations for power purchase agreements.

Whyalla Solar Farm will deliver up to 140MW of renewable power and generate up to 300,000MWh of power each year and is likely to generate 200 jobs at peak construction, says the Adani Australia website.

Source: Adani Australia.

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MARCH 2019

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www.southasiatimes.com.au - (03) 9884 8096, 0421 677 082

MARCH 2019