I FEEL sad that the rebels, world leaders and the United Nations failed to evolve a peaceful consensus in Libya as was done in Egypt and Tunisia (Cover Story, November 18).
France, the United Kingdom and their allies in NATO are responsible for instigating the violence in Libya through air strikes and for Muammar Qaddafi's death. He could have been taken into custody by the international forces and tried in the International Court of Justice. The U.N. needs to break its silence and answer how many more such countries have to be sacrificed in the name of democracy and change.
Syed Khaja New DelhiTHE Libyan strongman could hardly lay claim to having spotless human rights credentials. But the way in which NATO forces went about shelling Libya and hounding its charismatic leader makes his bad track record in human rights pale into insignificance.
With the invasion of Iraq under the pretext that it had amassed weapons of mass destruction and the extrajudicial killings of Osama bin Laden and Anwar al-Awlaki, the United States and its cohorts have been faithful to an expansionist logic of their own: to raise and support monsters who can cause havoc to the regimes and countries that are not willing to implicitly toe the U.S.' line and to eliminate them when either its ultimate interests are served or when the monsters end up threatening the U.S.' vital interests.
S. Balu MaduraiNATO leaders chose to attack Libya, leaving out countries like Syria when uprisings occurred there. Many innocent civilians, including children, were killed in the nearly eight months of fighting in Libya. Was this the price that had to be paid to oust a dictator?
Ritvik Chaturvedi New DelhiWITH the bloody and inhuman murder of Qaddafi, the Libyan crisis came to an end. But the whole episode raised more questions than it answered.
Western imperialism launched attacks in the guise of protecting democratic principles and human rights. Qaddafi's only fault was that he refused to follow the U.S.' diktats. Now the U.S. and other Western countries will surely get a huge share in the lucrative oil business.
Neeraj Kumar Jha Madhubani, BiharPEOPLE might be celebrating Qaddafi's death because they feel that they have finally got rid of a tyrant. It is unfortunate for Libya that he was not brought to trial in the manner of Hosni Mubarak.
A. Meghana Newcastle upon Tyne U.K.QADDAFI did not want to give up power, which led to civil war in the country. He ignored the U.N. and started killing his own citizens to stop the revolution. Only after the U.N.'s sanction did NATO and France directly get involved. Had they not intervened, the world would have been a mute spectator to bloodshed.
Should Libyan business contracts be given to countries that were mute spectators?
K. Stephen Daniel SecunderabadPERHAPS the greatest lesson to be learnt from the death of Qaddafi is that he was killed by his own people. In his lifetime, Qaddafi was mocked for his extravagant dress sense, retinue of all-female guards and the fancy titles he bestowed on himself. In death, he should be remembered only as an autocrat of the worst kind.
WHILE it was sad to see Qaddafi being dragged and brutally killed, it was not very surprising for he got what he deserved. After all, one must reap what one sows. The killing of Qaddafi by his own people should serve as a lesson to all those who misuse power.
Team AnnaTHE sheen is off Team Anna (Crusaders in the dock, 18). Some of its members are facing allegations of financial irregularities, and there is no transparency in the working of its core committee. Prashant Bhushan wanted the meetings with the government to be telecast live, but has any meeting of the core committee been telecast live? Why is the team shying away from an independent audit of its accounts?
Even without a Jan Lokpal Bill, the former Communications Minister and some prominent businessmen are now in jail in connection with the 2G scam.
This anti-corruption movement is building a personality cult around Anna Hazare. Also, why is the team's website silent on the court cases filed against Anna Hazare?
Deendayal M. Lulla MumbaiCAGTHIS is with reference to the article on the Comptroller and Auditor General (Reckless activism, November 18). A.G. Noorani has rightly analysed the powers and limits of a public servant. His words are valid for highly evolved societies where the majority of the citizens are aware of their rights.
Indians are still in cocoons of misinformation and illiteracy and they need someone to act beyond rulebooks.
By exhorting young men in the Civil Services to recapture lost space from the unscrupulous, he may have crossed the line. But let us not kill the CAG's exuberance. India needs many such outspoken officers.
S.V.L.N. Nageswara Rao Panchkula, HaryanaRamayanaTHE controversy over A.K. Ramanujan's essay on the Ramanyana is just another instance of intolerance of Hindutva elements and abject submission to their pressure by academicians (The rule of unreason, November 18).
Students should be trained to examine critically what is narrated. Otherwise, history will be drab and uninteresting.
Ramanujan's essay gives an enterprising teacher opportunities to engage students in discussion. Teachers who are afraid to think independently and express themselves will not be successful in their profession.
NO one in his right mind can question the erudition and the scholarly credentials of Ramanujan. The essay Three Hundred Ramayanas looks at different ways the great epic has been retold in various contexts. The different versions do not in any way diminish the importance of the epic. On the contrary, they enrich it.
But bigots who believe that there is only one version of the Ramayana fail to accept this. What is denied by them is the richness embedded in the plurality.
THE article is well argued and comprehensive but I have been grossly misquoted on page 128. For example, I did say that the politics of hurt religious or other sentiments is making critiques of religion or what is defined as religion increasingly untouchable in public discourse.
This is very different from the idea conveyed in the quote, why has religion become an untouchable in historical research?
Similarly, while I strongly feel that the Delhi University Academic Council should not have voted on the specific academic matter of the Ramanujan essay and that its decision is ironically anti-academic, anti-intellectual and anti-democratic, I never said that the Academic Council should only deal with administrative matters.
Death penaltyCAPITAL punishment is not the harshest punishment (Clear Confusion, November 18).
For terrorists and hardened criminals, the death sentence is not an adequate punishment. In fact, it is a relief for them from the hellish solitary life in high security prison.
They should be awarded sentences that last their natural life, not imprisonment for just 14 years. A dead terrorist will be a martyr for other terrorists. A criminal languishing in jail will serve as a deterrent.
So all death sentences should be commuted to life-long imprisonment.
MarutiIT is heartening that the Maruti crisis ended following a tripartite agreement involving the workers, the management and the Haryana government (Truce for now, November 18).
It was an agitation that involved the country's leading car manufacturer. The government should view the developments seriously and do whatever is necessary for the development of the Maruti Suzuki venture.
PoliticsBHASKAR GHOSE laments that the strident note of the BJP does not change perhaps because many instances of corruption pop up from the UPA's cupboards (The basic structure, November 4). He says that the UPA's woes are mainly due to its allies such as the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam and the Nationalist Congress Party.
Here, one would like to ask whether it is not the duty of the chairperson of the UPA or the Prime Minister who heads the government to pull up the allies when they do things that by no stretch of imagination can be considered right or in the interest of the nation.
Besides, his contention that the scams involve mainly the Congress' allies is not correct because, as pointed out by L.K. Advani recently, the demands to probe the role of some senior Congress leaders in the scams have not been accepted.
Jnanpith awardsTHE write-up on Jnanpith Award winners Srilal Shukla and Amar Kant was quite informative (Moral historians, November 4).
However, the writer failed to mention the fact that Srilal Shukla, who was a postgraduate in English literature from Allahabad University, considered Charles Dickens his role model.
He once admitted that the kaleidoscopic texture of his magnum opus R aag Darbari and quite a few of the characters of the novel were profoundly inspired by Dickens' Pickwick Papers.
Anil Joshi2G scamTHE article Shifting spotlight (November 4) on the 2G scam makes out that Prashant Bhushan filed the P. Chidambaram application and that I was associated.
Not true. Prashant was asked by the court whether he supported me. He said he did. He brought no new facts on file.
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