Misgivings about123 Agreement

The nuclear deal between India and the USA as embodied in the so-called 123 Agreement is going to be signed soon between the two countries.

There have been a lot of misgivings in India about the deal. It is said by many politicians and analysts that the so-called 123 Agreement will be diluted by the Hyde Act or any other American law. This fear is baseless. Under customary international law and practice, any treaty between two sovereign countries is not subject to any domestic law of either country. The Vienna Convention of 1969 on the Laws of Treaty which has entered into force on 27 January 1980 also does not contain any allusion to the domestic laws of the signatory countries. Both India and the USA are signatories to the Convention.

However, should any dispute arise in future about the interpretation of a treaty of a part thereof, the dispute can be sorted out politically between the two countries. If the two countries are unable to sort it out, they can go to the International Court of Justice at the Hague or to a mutually agreed arbitrator. But in any of these processes, domestic laws of either country are irrelevant.

A Small Episode with Big Meaning

Sept 26, 2008



My wife and I were touring France in the fall of 1985. In Paris, we were staying in a small hotel on Boulevard de Strasbourg. It was near Gare de L'Est, and we could hear the rumbling sound of passing trains almost all the time.

However, we had a problem. We both were vegetarians and it was not easy to find vegetarian food easily at the hotel or in the neighborhood. Luckily, the concierge of the hotel proved helpful. He told us there was a joint called Jai Bharat which might be an Indian restaurant.

After walking for more than half an hour on the beautiful cobbled streets of Paris, we could locate it. And voila! It was a Pakistani restaurant. The restaurateur was a middle-aged, cultured gentleman from Lahore. He served us steaming hot vegetarian food prepared especially for us. Not only this, he refused to accept payment. He said most graciously, "Indians and Pakistanis are bhai-bhai. How can I take money from you for the food served for the first time?"

The Great Code of Hammurabi

Sept 27, 2008

During my visit to Paris in 1985, I dropped in at the Louvre. I asked the guide to show me only the most famous exhibits as I did not have much free time at that point. I saw Venus de Milo and Mona Lisa. After that I was led to the West Asian section of the museum where I was shown the 7-foot high stele (pronounced steelee) made of black diorite on which the Code of Hammurabi was inscribed in an inscrutable language. I was told it was the cuneiform language used in Iraq about 4000 years ago.

Who was this Hammurabi and what is his Code? Why is it famous? It is a fascinating story.

The story of Hammurabi and his code is linked up with the story of the two great Asian rivers. If you see the map of Iraq you will find the rivers Tigris and Euphrates flowing through the middle of Iraq. The land between these two rivers was called Mesopotamia. It has been irrigated by the water of these two rivers from the time immemorial. It was in Mesopotamia that the ancient Assyrian, Babylonian and Sumerian civilizations took birth, thrived and died.

Out of these three civilizations, the Babylonian was the greatest. It thrived from 18th century to 6th century before Christ. Hammurabi is believed to have lived during 18th century BC. He was possibly the first monarch of Babylonia. He was not a routine king. He was a visionary and a statesman. He gave his subjects a system of codified law, which is known in history as Hammurabi's Code or Code of Hammurabi.

Code of Hammurabi is considered by historians as the oldest piece of codified law. All the major systems of jurisprudence do partake many ideas implicit or explicit in the Code. To quote an example, Mose's code eye for an eye is taken from Hammurabi's Code. The only difference is that in Hammurabi's Code, unlike the law given by Moses, the principle of retribution is applicable only when the accuser and the accused belong to the same social and economic class. There are special provisions in the Code for the protection for the weaker sections of the Babylonians such as women, children and slaves.

The Hammurabi code lays downs the fundamental principles which cannot be tampered with even by the monarch. Thus, the modern concept of constitutional government has its origin in the Hammurabi Code.

The Code lays down legal procedures and penalties for frivolous indictments, perjury, and the erroneous judgements delivered by judges. The Code also gives laws relating to property, debts etc. The penalties were prescribed for the negligence of the physicians. I wonder how Hammurabi could foresee the American legal system so accurately?

The epilogue of the Code glorifies the mighty work of peace done by Hammurabi. He declares that he was called by gods to make justice prevail in the world, destroy the wicked and the evil. On the stele sitting in the Louvre he can be seen paying deference to one of the Babylonian gods and raising his hand to his face in a gesture of submission.

Hammurabi was a great politician even judged from the present day standards. He declares in his stele that he had inscribed his words on a pillar in order "that the strong may not oppress the weak, that justice may be dealt to the orphan and the widow." Hammurabi further adds:"Let any oppressed man who has a cause come into the presence of my statue as king of justice, and have the inscription on my stele read out, and hear my precious words, that my stele may make the case clear to him; may he understand his cause, and may his heart be set at ease!"

Paulson's Bailout and the Tax Payer

Sept 23, 2008

There has been ear-splitting song, dance and noise about the bailout which the Treasury Secretary has proposed. It is not clear to me how the bailout is going to redeem the economy. It is estimated that the bailout will exceed 700 billion and may touch 1000 billion, the later figure being cutely referred to as a trillion.

For starters, most Americans are familiar with the concept of a million. It is one thousand thousand. In figures, it is the number 1 followed by by six zeros. I cannot have a physical concept of a billion, except that I can tell that it is one thousand million. That is the end of it. Ask a banker what a trillion is. Smartly he will answer it is one thousand billion, stupid! If you press him for further, he will gently clarify that it is a million times a million. You faintly pretend to understand, but well......

How many people can have a sensory understanding of a trillion except that it is a very very very big figure? How many people can visualize or have a physical idea of the speed of light? It is nice to impress a sophomore that it is 186,000 miles per second. But can you really understand it in the same way, as you understand a loaf of bread kept in your plate, or a mug of coffee sitting on your table?

Brutal fact is that a trillion can be described arithmetically, but it cannot be perceived by our eyes, ears or skin. You cannot even smell it. It is like the speed of light.If you don't agree with me try to imagine how much space one trillion 1-dollar bills will occupy without using your hematical skills. How the hell the clever Hank is going to distribute them? How is he going to count them, if at all he is going to count them? Surely, he must be a highly skilled man.

Another problem I feel uneasy about is this one. How the bailout is going to affect the the tax-payers, as a class. Surely, it will affect some tax-payers who do not have much money and whatever money they have they keep it either in cash or in a bank. But if you own a modest amount upward of $10,000, odds are that you are not keeping your money in a bank account, earning measly interest. You have perhaps invested your money in stock exchange, or a mutual fund, or maybe even in a sub-prime mortgage-based security. If you are rich or consider yourself to be so, you might have made investments in real estate or even a hedge fund. Only a naive guy will keep one million dollars in a checking account.

Now, because of the meltdown the value of all your investments has shrunk. If Hank does not bail you out by spending a trillion, the aggregate value of your invested wealth goes down, but you as a tax-payer are not affected. But if you allow him to spend a trillion the effect might well be that you don't lose on your investment as the market is bound to go up.

Choice before you is clear: (i) You save your investments from going under, and care a damn for tax you have paid or (ii) you allow your investment to go under and have the profound satisfaction of knowing that the tax you have paid was not be misused by the crafty Treasury Secretary!
If you go for the choice (i), you will support the Paulson bailout. If you go for the choice (ii), and oppose the bailout, you will allow the government to keep the taxes you have paid, or to misuse it differently.

A Sorry Tale, which CTBT is.

The brutal nuclear attack on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945 assaulted the conscience of humanity. An incredibly large number of people lost their lives. Self-esteem of the great Japanese nation was mortally wounded. A surge of colossal moral outrage overtook the world. The nightmare did not end there. Big powers cheerfully went on adding to their nuclear arsenal without any restraint.

In 1954, the Prime Minster of India, Jawaharlal Nehru, voiced the concern of international community on the proliferation of the nuclear weapons. He said that "fear would grow and grip nations and peoples and each would try frantically to get this new weapon or some adequate protection from it." Nehru maintained that "a dominating factor in the modern world is this prospect of these terrible weapons suddenly coming into use before which our normal weapons are completely useless."

Nehru proposed a ban on the nuclear test explosions as a first step towards total nuclear disarmament. It took the world more than four decades to understand the meaning his words. Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) did not become ready for signatures before Sept 24, 1996. That was exactly 12 years ago from today.

Story of CTBT is a intriguing story. It is a story without a happy ending. Nor there exists a tragic end to it. It is like a story told to a small girl who fell into sleep while her grandmother was telling it.

Let me begin the story.

Geneva is a beautiful Swiss city by the side of Lake Geneva. In a manner of speaking, it has been the capital of world conscience. Earlier, it had been the headquarters of the League of Nations. Presently, a large number of international organizations have their offices in Geneva, including many agencies of the United Nations. One such offshoot of the UN is the Conference on Disarmament (CD). It was set up in 1979 as the single multilateral disarmament negotiating forum of the international community.

An ad hoc committee of the CD began considering a draft in January 1994 for a treaty with an avowed aim of prohibiting and preventing nuclear test explosions. The operative provisions of the treaty were contained in the Article I of the treaty which runs as follows.

Article I
1. Each State Party undertakes not to carry out any nuclear weapon test explosion or any other nuclear explosion, and to prohibit and prevent any such nuclear explosion at any place under its jurisdiction or control. "

"2. Each State Party undertakes, furthermore, to refrain from causing, encouraging, or in any way participating in the carrying out of any nuclear weapon test explosion or any other nuclear explosion."

All the parties agreed to these core provisions but the discussions dragged for a long time on the other provisions of the treaty.

However, India did not support in the treaty because (i) the provisions about entry-in-force of the treaty were unprecedented in a multi-national treaty and were against the customary International Law, and (ii) the treaty did not contain a commitment by the nuclear-capable states to eliminate nuclear weapons within a time-bound frame.

In spite of the Indian misgivings, a final draft of the treaty was put up to CD in June 1996. A majority of Member States of the CD supported the draft. The draft was then submitted by the CD to the General Assembly of the United Nations. On Sept 10, 1996, the General Assembly approved the draft and requested the Secretary-General to open it for signatures at the earliest possible date. The treaty was opened for signature on September 24, 1996.

The treaty was signed by 71 countries including the five nuclear-capable states. India, Pakistan and Israel kept themselves away from it. That was the position in 1996.

Treaty has not come into force till today. What are the reasons of its lying in a coma for 12 long years. The answer lies in the death wish of the treaty planted like a Trojan horse in its article XIV.

ARTICLE XIV
ENTRY INTO FORCE
"1. This Treaty shall enter into force 180 days after the date of deposit of the instruments of ratification by all States listed in Annex 2 to this Treaty, but in no case earlier than two years after its opening for signature."

Now, the Annex 2 cited above contains a set of 44 States, including all the five recognised nuclear-capable States, India, Pakistan and Israel. Present status is that the CTBT has been signed by 178 countries and ratified by 144.

Question of India and Pakistan ratifying the treaty does not arise because they are not signatories to the treaty. Israel, a late signatory, has also withheld the ratification. Other States who have not ratified the treaty are the USA, China, Egypt, North Korea, and Indonesia. The pride of place goes to the USA, who not only had withheld the ratification, but also had it unambiguously decided not to ratify the CTBT by a resolution of its Senate on October 13, 1999.

Situation would have been laughable, if the matter was not serious. By implication of the Article XIV of the treaty, any single country mentioned in the Annex 2 of the treaty can veto the entry into force of the treaty. India was justified in pointing out that this procedure was perverse and an absurdity in the eye of customary International Law.

So, the CTBT's is a story which does not have a visible end in the foreseeable future. To call it a Treaty is a misnomer. At best we can say, with apologies to the Bard, that "....it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."

Andrew Marvell and T S Eliot

September 21, 2008

My brother recently sent me a beautiful poem To his Coy Mistress by Andrew Marvell. Marvell was arguably the most perceptive metaphysical English poet of the 17th century. Unfortunately, I never had an occasion to read any of his works till I saw this poem.

I read the poem over and over again till its magic completely overwhelmed me. It was delightfully sensuous to the point of being transcendental.

It evoked memories of the good old days when I was a student of the NREC College. Professor Bannerji was lecturing us on T S Eliot's Wasteland. During the lecture he remarked that Eliot was hugely influenced by Andrew Marvell. He observed that the line, "But at my back from time to time I hear..." in T S Eliot's Wasteland was almost literally picked up from Marvell's famous poem To his Coy Mistress.

My brain retained that line, as it did large portions of Wasteland. I do not know why. Possibly because T S Eliot was my favorite poet, or maybe because it was fashionable in those days to quote from Eliot and Ezra Pound.

Now, when I saw Marvell's beautiful poem, I was reminded of those days when some of us in the English class honestly believed that we alone represented the intellectual and literary life in that little, sleepy provincial town. It was a kind of conceit which comes easily if you do not know much and understand still less.

Read the first two lines of the second stanza of Marvell's poem:

But at my back I always hear
Time's winged chariot hurrying near

Then see Eliot's line from Wasteland:

But at my back from time to time I hear...

The similarity between Eliot's line and Marvell's is obvious. Too striking to be coincidental. I can now see clearly what our professor meant when he said that Eliot's Wasteland was influenced by Andrew Marvell.

The poem To his Coy Mistress by Andrew Marvell is reproduced below:

Had we but world enough, and time,
This coyness, lady, were no crime.
We would sit down and think which way
To walk, and pass our long love's day;
Thou by the Indian Ganges' side
Shouldst rubies find;
I by the tide Of Humber would complain.
I would Love you ten years before the Flood;
And you should, if you please, refuse
Till the conversion of the Jews.
My vegetable love should grow
Vaster than empires, and more slow.
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze;
Two hundred to adore each breast,
But thirty thousand to the rest;
An age at least to every part,
And the last age should show your heart.
For, lady, you deserve this state,
Nor would I love at lower rate.

But at my back I always hear
Time's winged chariot hurrying near;
And yonder all before us lie
Deserts of vast eternity.
Thy beauty shall no more be found,
Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound
My echoing song; then worms shall try
That long preserv'd virginity,
And your quaint honour turn to dust,
And into ashes all my lust.
The grave's a fine and private place,
But none I think do there embrace.

Now therefore, while the youthful hue
Sits on thy skin like morning dew,
And while thy willing soul transpires
At every pore with instant fires,
Now let us sport us while we may;
And now, like am'rous birds of prey,
Rather at once our time devour,
Than languish in his slow-chapp'd power.
Let us roll all our strength, and all
Our sweetness, up into one ball;
And tear our pleasures with rough strife
Thorough the iron gates of life.
Thus, though we cannot make our sun
Stand still, yet we will make him run.

Electric Lamp and the Progress of Human Civilization

Sept 20, 2008



My older daughter is a biologist by profession. However, being a woman of lively intelligence, she is also interested in the evolution of human civilization.

She posed an intriguing question. To what extent human civilization owes its progress to the invention of electric lamp? The question set me thinking furiously.

Electric lamp was patented by Thomas Alva Edison in the year 1891 or so. That gave me a cutoff date, and the question was now reduced to the causative input of electric lamp to the progress of the civilization from the year 1900 onwards.

Well, vast human knowledge had been gathered before the beginning of the 20th century. The great ancient civilizations like Egyptian, Chinese, and Indian had thrived and made their invaluable contribution to the sum total of human knowledge and culture.

The philosophical doctrines posited by the great thinkers like Confucius, and Lao-Tse enriched human thinking. The great religions like Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, Buddhism, Jainism, Shintoism, and Judaism took root in different countries, spread widely, and gave humans a choice to live according to their own belief.

Also, the contribution by Greek and Roman thinkers had taken place much before our cut-off date. Skipping over the medieval ages, we saw in Europe, renaissance in the field of art, philosophy, literature, science and astronomy. Newton, Galileo, Leibnitz, Gauss, Riemann, Goethe, Shakespeare, Voltaire, Bach, Mozart, Beethoven were all intellectual giants born much before the dawn of 20th century. They had little opportunity to use an electric lamp.

However, if instead of electric lamp, we examine the historical value of a lighting device, the question assumes a different color. The primitive man was able to develop some sort of lamp, possibly as early 50,000 years ago. It consisted a hollow rock with filled with fat-soaked moss or some other such material. My understanding is that Eskimos still use a similar kind of lamp. Development of such devices transported man from Stone Age to later Ages. Somewhere in between man must have found how to make candles and torches.

The lighting devices of one kind or another increased the total working time for everybody. Night ceased to a forbidding factor for those who wanted to work. In enhanced the overall safety. It led to great works of art, science and literature over thousands of years.

We can perhaps say with reasonable confidence that although the electric lamp was not a critical factor in the evolution of human civilization, the lighting device of one kind or another most certainly was.

A Brief History of the Indo-US Nuclear Deal

Sept 18, 2008

The exciting news is round the corner. The bilateral nuclear deal popularly known as 123 agreement between the USA and India is likely to be okayed by the American Congress soon. The deal has passed through many hurdles.

The deal was conceived at Washington DC in a joint statement by the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and President George W. Bush on July 18, 2005. In it, the Indian Government agreed to consider putting its civilian nuclear facilities under the safeguards of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in exchange of the USA considering to extend full nuclear co-operation to India and by implication end the restrictive nuclear sanctions on India since 1974, when the first Indian atomic test took place.

As a follow-up, on July 26, 2006, the USA Congress amended the Section 123 of the Atomic Energy Act, 1954 to allow one-time exception to India to keep its nuclear weapons without signing the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). That incidentally explains why the nuclear agreement is known as 123 Agreement. The amendment is known popularly as Hyde Act.

After prolonged discussions at various levels between the USA and India, a 123 agreement was reached between the two parties on July 27, 2007. The agreement laid down the parameters of civilian nuclear cooperation between India and the United States. The agreement needed final approval by the US Congress and the Government of India. In case of India parliamentary approval was not necessary as the treaties with foreign countries are the sole prerogative of the executive.

However, the agreement ran into stiff domestic opposition in India. The communist parties which were supporting the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government decided to withdraw support from the government in the hope that the government would fall and the bilateral agreement would collapse. National Democratic Alliance (NDA) also opposed the deal in the fond hope that the government might fall on the issue and the mid-term elections would bring them to power. The focus of the communist parties was on destroying the deal by pulling down the Manmohan Singh government. NDA focused on pulling down the government on the ground (pretext?) of being opposed to the deal. They calculated that a midterm election would bring them to power.

There was also some opposition to the pact within the constituent parties of UPA. Many constituent parties of the coalition were not keen to have mid-term elections. Why to have a midterm election and risk losing their parliamentary seats? It was a commonsense view. Even Congress was on the horns of dilemma. Who wants to lose power? All sort of arguments were advanced against the nuclear deal.

Dr Manmohan Singh, the Indian Prime Minister took a very strong and principled stand. It was rumored that he even contemplated resignation in the case of the political bigwigs of the UPA decided to give a go-bye to the deal. He staked the survival of his government on the approval of the deal. However, he could manage to convince his colleagues that the nuclear deal was absolutely essential in the national interest. He moved a confidence motion in the parliament on July 22, 2008. The Manmohan Singh Government won by 275 to 256 votes. That is called outstanding leadership. Not many Indian prime ministers in history have displayed such sterling qualities of leadership.

Next stage was to conclude an India-specific agreement between International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). It was done on August 1, 2008. It laid down terms and conditions for regulating the inspection and safeguards of the Indian civil nuclear establishment.

After the IAEA approval, the next step was to get an India-specific waiver from the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) for enabling India to trade in nuclear material and technology for its civilian reactors. NSG was a tough nut to crack. There was strong opposition from some countries who feared that such a waiver might help India to make nuclear weapons. Since all the decisions of the 45-members of the group are to be taken by consensus, it was an uphill task. It needed monumental effort by the US administration at its highest levels to maneuver the consensus. The NSG gave its final approval on Sept 6, 2008.

Now the ball is in the court of American Congress. There is strong bipartisan support to the Nuclear Deal. Not only the deal will bring huge commercial benefits to the American firms, it will also give tremendous uplift to the strategic bonding between the two countries. The 123 deal is bound to be ratified by the Congress. This Congress is going to be adjourned on 26 September this year. It is difficult to say at this point if they will be able to ratify the agreement before that date by waiving the mandatory one-month period needed for considering a bill.

Eerie World of Presidential Elections

Presidential elections in America are becoming eerier by the day. Reminds one of Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland.

Both parties are running their campaigns without much respect for sophistication. The Republican campaign is focusing on the pedigree of John McCain and the record of his sacrifices in Vietnam War. The Obama campaign is insisting that change is the only remedy to fix the mess in which the nation most decidedly is.

On September 14, 2008 John McCain made a statement of epic proportion which will reverberate in history for long time for its stark absurdity: "The fundamentals of the American economy are strong."

The veteran of Vietnam War is a man of few words and of impeccable lineage. Either the worthy Presidential hopeful was only vaguely aware of what the word fundamental means, or he was cheerfully out of touch with the reality of American economy. Sounds tragically hilarious against the backdrop of governmental seizing of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac! Forget the travails of the small fries like AIG, Lehman Brothers, and Merrill Lynch!

To be fair to him he perhaps realised his error and tried to correct it by saying that "the fundamentals are at great risk." Somebody is bound to ask him if the fundamentals of the economy are really strong how the economy is proving so vulnerable?

You can give a charitable interpretation and say that it was slip of tongue of an old man working under truly formidable stress of his campaign. However, if it was a mere slip of tongue and he did not really mean it, it is a more serious thing. Dangerous for a man who is aspiring to become the nuclear-button pusher!

He further observed: "We shall never put America in this position again. We will clean up Wall Street". Was he admitting that it was his party who had put America in this position? He was not specific on how he will clean up the Wall Street. Has he got some magical formula up his sleeves which he is shy to reveal for tactical or strategic reasons?

Sarah Palin, the maverick(?) Vice-Presidential hopeful, said in Golden, Colorado, "John McCain and I are going to put an end to the mismanagement and abuses in Washington and on Wall Street." A truly profound statement! Maybe fixing the mismanagement in Washington DC and Wall Street is as easy as pinning down a Viet Cong soldier or killing a moose in Alaska.

The brutal fact is that American economy has been under huge stress for quite some time. Fiscal imprudence by the Bush administration, bordering on irresponsibility, has brought the nation to this stage. To fix it will not prove easy for whosoever wins the White House. Neither candidate seems to have a plan to repair the damage to the economy. Maybe after the dust of election settles down, and the new administration is sworn-in, a miracle may happen. Amen!