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EDITORIAL
Wicket
Wicket Ways
Acknowledging Musharraf
is less of a terror than his cricketers
 If
people get the government they deserve, it follows that cricket gets the
administrators it justifies. India, the eternal contrarian, is a happy
exception to both rules. It is blessed with a government that swings from
wanting to ostracise Pakistan to writing a supplicatory letter to its
dictator. To compound a regime of flawed priorities, Foreign Minister
Jaswant Singh promises General Pervez Musharraf-evil "Mr Kargil"
till the previous week-a grand welcome but declines to clear cricket matches
with Pakistan arguing they are "gladiatorial" contests. The
NDA Government is presumably the Circus of Rome. India can talk to the
man sponsoring terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir but not play cricket with
his country unless the tournament involves at least three teams. It can,
however, play any other sport with Pakistan in any circumstances. If this
is consistency, Indians need new dictionaries.
The immediate cricket encounter that
has been prohibited is the Asian Cricket Championship match between India
and Pakistan scheduled for September. The tournament is an extremely silly
idea but, to be fair, it does involve four teams-Sri Lanka and Bangladesh
making up the numbers. So excited was the Board of Control for Cricket
in India (BCCI) at the prospect of playing in Pakistan that it reneged
on a promise to tour Australia and rushed to the media. The BCCI is guilty
on two counts. First, there is an unseemly desire to resume lucrative
subcontinental cricket matches. Second, it did not do what was diplomatic-consult
the Government before agreeing to the Asian championship. Yet, in perspective,
these are minor sins compared to the Government's position. With his ersatz
love for all things English, the foreign minister may know of the suggestion
that "the Battle of Waterloo was won on the playing fields of Eton".
The Duke of Wellington was only coining a one-liner; it took a Jaswant
Singh to pervert it into a whole doctrine.
Right
Of Passage
Give the 'president of Khalistan'
the Indian passport he deserves
 On
Tuesday, May 29, the Punjab and Haryana High Court directed the government
of India to issue a passport to Jagjit Singh Chauhan and allow him to
come home. As "president of Khalistan", Chauhan was the principal
ideological proponent of the separatist movement that mangled Punjab in
the 1980s and early 1990s. Declared a secessionist, his passport was revoked
in 1981 while he was in London. Much has changed since then. The Khalistan
slogan is a dead letter. Didar Singh Bains-the millionaire Californian
peach farmer who spearheaded the divisive cause in the United States-returned
to India in 1997. Despite being temporarily detained at Delhi airport,
he promised to bring investment to Punjab. Only a few weeks ago Wassan
Singh Zaffarwal, once chief of the dreaded Khalistan Commando Force, "surrendered"
to the Punjab Police. True, allegations of a "deal" with the
ruling Akali Dal were heard. The larger point is that Zaffarwal has returned
from Zurich confident the courts will exonerate him and he will embark
on a political career.
Against this backdrop it is churlish-and, as
the high court said, a violation of Fundamental Rights-to deny Chauhan
entry into India. Legally, despite his controversial past, Chauhan is
a citizen of this country. The Government cannot simply shut the gates
on him and push him into limbo. Politically, Chauhan now wants to wage
a "new battle for Khalsa raj" but "in a democratic and
peaceful manner, under the Indian Constitution". While his aspirations
are open to question, the rhetoric is probably no more than a means of
seeking honourable rehabilitation in Indian public life. In the long run,
this will help Punjab get over its decade of terror-one in which it the
extremists played a dirty game but, it must be accepted, the Congress
government didn't do much better.
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