Jagmohan

Jan 27, 2011

Jagmohan is a former governor of J&K and a former Union minister

On India’s darkling plain

The conflicts and controversies over the institution of Lokpal remind me of the lines of poet Mathew Arnold: “And we are here as on a darkling plain/Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight/W

The 9/11 mind field

Why did American policymakers fail to anticipate and prevent the calamitous event of 9/11? How is it that they lacked understanding of the forces that were building up the monster that felled the towering symbol of American might? How come the prestigious think tanks of the country, which were envisioning “the end of history” and laying down a roadmap for a New American Century, took no notice of the conspiratorial baggage of those who were going all over the globe and setting up terror nests?

India rises but falters

On August 15, 1947, two great visions were entertained by two of the most powerful minds of modern India. One was by statesman Jawaharlal Nehru and the other by savant Sri Aurobindo.

365 days of freedom

Last year, on August 15, The Asian Age published an article written by me, titled Did India Awake? In the article, I had referred to Jawaharlal Nehru’s historic speech, delivered at mid-night of August 14-15, 1947,

Media on a Fai ride

If one goes through the 44-page criminal complaint, filed by the FBI, against Ghulam Nabi Fai, executive director of the Kashmiri American Council, one would find a plethora of clinching evidence to conclude that since mid-1989, Mr Fai had been virtually functioning in America as head of a branch of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI).

Look beyond LoC

While we routinely claim that the erstwhile princely state of Jammu and Kashmir acceded to India on October 26, 1947, and is now an integral part of the Indian Union, both in terms of national and int

1953: A Kashmir story

It was 58 years ago, on June 23, that Syama Prasad Mookerjee died as a detainee of the state government in the Srinagar Camp Jail at the relatively young age of 51. He had gone there to protest against a system under which even Indian citizens, including the President of India, could not enter, without a permit, the state of Jammu and Kashmir, despite it being a part of the Union.

Taking the green pulse 40 years on

The Himalayan glaciers are melting at an alarming rate; the Ganga is changing its course at Varanasi, threatening agricultural land on the banks. Last year Moscow witnessed an unprecedented heat wave, and Pakistan was hit by a flash flood. Ever since the Stockholm Conference in 1972, a number of international conventions have been held

Power equations

As regards the composition of the Lokpal, there is little justification for restricting the appointment to judges. Nor would it be wise to make the area of eligibility too wide, as has been suggested by the group associated with Anna Hazare. The soundest course to follow would be to open the field of selection to retired judges of the Supreme Court

Checks & balances

The attempt to establish the institution of Lokpal commenced long ago on the recommendation of the Administrative Reform Commission. The Lokpal and Lokayukta Bill, 1968, was introduced in the fourth Lok Sabha and since then there have been eight attempts to secure Parliament’s approval. At the initial stage, the main objective of bill was to deal with the “problem of redress of citizens’ grievances”.

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