Asia ready for kickoff

Asia is ready for one of its biggest sporting events. One month after the successfull Asian games,the continent is prepared for the coronation of its football Kings. Qatar is allset to host the 2011 AFC Asian Cup starting from 7th January. The joy of being selected as the host of 2022 world cup is still continuing in this small Arabian country. To that joy is the Asian cup arriving this winter. And this time to carry out a magic of the everlasting Arabian tales Indian football team is arriving after a gap of 26 years, to a place were millions of Indians had find their luck of life. A place were dreams came true for them. It is the right place to start a new era of Indian football.

After the arrival of Bob Houghton as the manager, Indian team has shown much progress comparing to the last few decades. Two Nehru cup winning and the winning of AFC Challenge cup which qualified the team for Asian cup had made the football fans of the country jubilant. Now they are eagerly waiting to see India at the biggest arena of Asian football. It is the dreams fulfilled for the players now. Baichung Bhutia, who is the face of Indian football for last 15 years is the most experienced player with the side. United States MLS team 'Kansas City Wizards' striker Sunil Chettri, is another attraction. Along with them is the best players of India lined up for the competition. They have being preparing for last one year at various places like Nou camp, Dubai, Portugal,etc., As Houghton said they are ready for a surprise among the giant opponents of 'C' group-Australia,South Korea and Bahrain.

Asian cup this time is aiming to showcase a worldclass performance. All the giants of Asian football are coming for an Arabian triumph. The thrilling performance of the continents teams at the South Africa world cup showed that the worth of Asian football had improved. This Asian cup is a step to many such great achievements. Even it dont have the best players of world football, Asian cup will feature all the best of the continent in Qatar. Manchester United player JS Park of S.Korea is the leading attraction. Along with him World cup star K.Honda,Nakamura(Japan), Tim cahill,Lukas Niel, Mark Schwarzer(Australia),Yazar Al Qatani(Saudi Arabia), Mehdi Mehdavikia(Iran),Last editions most valuable player Younus Mahmoud(Iraq) are the other leading stars of the event. Carrying over the dreams of decades, all 16 teams are well prepared for the battle. It raises the expectation of a close competition for the trophy and an everlasting memory filled tournament like the last edition.

Among the giants Indian team is like the Sindbads fleet in a vast ocean. They have to really show some magic for a good result. They dont carry big dreams like others since the teams standard is very low compared to the giants of Asia. Even diehard fans do not expect a second round. But the presence of the team at the event itself is a big victory. Whatever maybe the result in Qatar, it is a giant step to future. This is a path to bigger dreams for Indian team. After 12 years, when Qatar host the worldcup,India expect their team at event with the support from the millions of Indians there. This is only the first step,to recapture the crown of Asian football and to move to the world stage. Let it be. Come on Indiaa.....................

The war with hunger

The story of Shaheed Jetin Das is one of glorious moments of India’s freedom struggle. The great revolutionary sacrificed his life for the motherland in 1929 at the Lahore jail after 63 days of hunger strike. He is the only person who died in the pre-independence era by fasting against the colonial rule. Jetin Das's struggle was a golden episode which shocked India and inspired millions of freedom fighters.

In a country were great persons like Jetin Das had sacrificed their soles to live independent ,a woman has been fasting for 10 years-not against any foreign power, but against the terror created by the country's own rule. The epic of Irom Sharmila-"the iron lady of Manipur" is one of the biggest struggles independent India has witnessed. On November 2, 2010 she completed 10 years of fasting in Imphal, the capital of North-Eastern state of Manipur.

Irom Sharmila is on hunger strike since 2000 demanding the repeal of the Armed Forces (Special Power) Act, 1958 from Manipur. She started her strike after the Assam Rifles troops shot dead 10 innocent people in Mallom near Manipur on November 1, 2000. In that incident, in which the victims included an 18 year old National Bravery Award winner was shot for the reason of an IED explosion by the militants, which left no causality. But the troops target was all innocent civilians who were at their homes and some others who were waiting for bus. For Irom Chanu Sharmila, who was 28 at that time it was the incident which took her towards the fight against the notorious law, AFSPA which protested such actions of the Armed Forces. Her struggle was not for any publicity, but for the supreme goal of repeal of AFSPA.

AFSPA, a law which gives the power for the Armed Forces members, even non commissioned officers, to use force which can cause death for mere suspicion towards any person and can be punished only with the approval of the centre if find guilty, a case which never happened. This law which is enacted in various areas of the country, mainly in Kashmir valley and Manipur was meant to suppress militancy. But over the years it is widely misused and resulted in numerous cases of fake encounter killings. It also lead to widespread human rights violations, including murder, rape, torture, etc., Many of these incidents occurred in broad daylight with witnesses, but the responsible were protected by the notorious law. People who lived under this law have leaded a life of misery and sufferings as in an enemy occupied territory.

Justice J.B.Jeevan Reddy commission, appointed to the enquiry of the gang rape and murder case of Manorama Devi, a Manipuri girl, in 2004 by the troops of Assam Rifles which lead widespread protest across the country, had recommended scraping the AFSPA, but government refused saying it will increase militant activities. But the Act continued to be against the innocent in many occasions after that also, like the case in which an innocent youth, Samjith was shot in a busy market area in Imphal in broad daylight, which was explained being an encounter. This incident was video graphed which clearly proved the innocence of the victim. But neither centre nor state didn’t take any action against the responsible, which encouraged them to go ahead with their actions against the people.

Sharmila is the lead in the struggle against AFSPA now. She is under arrest charged with section 309 (attempt to commit suicide) of Indian Penal Code, IPC. As this section allow only one year’s custody, but each year she is arrested after release, since she continues the strike. For 10 years she has not eaten anything and is hospitalized and fed through nasogastric intubation with a deteriorating health in J.N.Hospital, Imphal, were her ward has been declared as a sub jail. She had taken her struggle once to Rajghat, Mahatma Gandhi's Tomb, escaping to Delhi after one release. All her letters to the Centre including Prime minister and President has turned down without any action and she continues her struggle.

Over these years she has become the face of Human rights struggle in India and won international attention. She had won numerous awards for her struggle, which she donated for the well being of the people and declared her only aim is the repeal of AFSPA. As government refuses it she continues her war with hunger until victory is achieved or being dead as like Shaheed Jetin Das.

Negative impacts of India-ASEAN FTA

The signing of ASEAN FTA has raised many objections from various parts of India. Through the tariff free trade, which comes into effect by the FTA will be a blow to the Indian agriculture and fisheries sector. This was the reason to argue upon the negative list by the two parties. The negotiations later led to the shortening of the negative list which place a number of India’s cash crops on normal track of import.

The FTA will be a blow to planters and farmers from South India since ASEAN countries has comparative advantage in the production of certain agricultural crops. ASEAN countries are featured with similar climate and geographical features with similar crops that of South Indian states, especially Kerala and Tamilnadu. Moreover ASEAN countries are having advantage in the production of crops like rubber, tea, coffee, pepper, etc. which are the main crops of these south Indian states. These products are characterized by high productivity and low cost of production in ASEAN countries. This can be improved in future with their current resources itself, due to low density of population and fertile land. Indian producers now itself face problem of high cost of production, low productivity, low prices and lack of cultivatable land due to high density of population. Tariff free trade help ASEAN products to enter Indian market, where domestic products will be unable to compete with. This will lead to a decline in agricultural production and dependence on imports.

Instead of protecting the key products by putting them on the negative list, India has agreed those to be on the special list of five products. The items on this list will have 50% tariff cut by 2018. The temporary protection will not be helpful for Indian products to recover from production disparities. 50% tariff cut is a very good advantage to ASEAN countries.

Palm oil is also not in protective list. Malaysia is having a high palm oil production and it is one of the major exporters of palm oil. Import of low cost palm oil will affect the market of sunflower oil and coconut oil and thereby coconut and sunflower market in India. These products constitute major part of crops in the southern states.

Fish and fish products are another major good which ASEAN has a good advantage. They are characterized by high availability of fish due to natural features. The involvement of fish and fish products in the trade pact is in complicated way in which they spread over normal track and negative list, leaving several loop holes. The import of such products may affect the domestic market featured with seasonal variations of availability.

Even though rubber is included in the negative list, several rubber products are on the normal track which will help the rubber industries of ASEAN countries to export to India.

The negative list items don’t guarantee any protection from tariff cut. Each year the items on the list will be reviewed. If in one year the production of an item in the list is reduced in one sector the product will go to normal list. This may affect products like fisheries which have natural variations in availability.

ASEAN’s import from India is only 2.1% of its total import, while 3.4% of their export is to India. In 2006-’07 total exports from India to ASEAN increased by 21 % only while import increased by 66% ,i.e., growth in import is three times larger than exports. Trade deficit has increased from 0.5 billion US$ in 2002-‘03 to 7 billion US$ by 2009 Aug. After tariff cut this deficit may increase.