No solution in sight

The Centre for Science and Environment, under the leadership and guidance of Sunita Narain, has moved the ?controversy? from the recommendations of the task force intended to create a blueprint to save the great Indian Tiger in the wild, to the fight against adulterated aerated drinks, Coca-Cola and Pepsi, supposedly infected with unacceptable levels of pesticides. Both these issues have been in the public space for some time and neither have been led into a corrective. The tiger continues to be severely threatened as do the forests of India and suspicions are periodically raised and aggravated about colas being poisonous.

No watertight and foolproof system of scientific verification acceptable to all parties is brought into play and no methodology to protect the Bengal tiger is in place, let alone operational. These serious issues seem to have become theme songs for rowdy television programmes, diffused and all over the place, trying to be sensational rather than constructive, gradually replacing prime-time soaps. All a trifle mindless.

The tiger situation is rapidly deteriorating as poaching goes on silently, now that the ?press? has ceased to be as interested as it was when the tiger had become extinct in Sariska. Poachers move stealthily, do their business and the ?authority? looks the other way since they are no longer in the line of fire. The ?expert? task force has not been able to institute any alternatives or make any change mandatory, and if they have done so, it is invisible. To confuse the issue, tigers and tribals were linked instead of being segregated which compelled the delay of the Tribal Rights Bill in order to allow time for clearer thinking. In all of this, government agencies and government-initiated task forces, advisors, call them what you may, are squabbling and stalling every move and decision. It is so typical of an anarchic bureaucracy playing administrator in an indecisive political environment and therefore running amuck.

Why is it so difficult for opposing factions to be civilised in their battle for what is right? Why have arguments descended to the level of a slinging match, much like the obscenities and abuse that politicians hurl at each other when they are unable to get the argument right? Has the television screen become the stage for crude and untoward behaviour as all the ?players? vie with each other for space and social status in their quest for ?upward? mobility? Do the producers of such rabble-ridden, loud shows not see what they are presenting to the public and what traits they are projecting and endorsing?

Television should be the arbiter of good sense and intelligent and cogent discussion, debate and discourse. When ?guests? on shows behave in strange ways, undisciplined and hysterical, it is for the anchor to control the show, take it back to the issue at hand and return the viewer to sanity. Great anchors do it the world over.

The aerated drinks issue is referred to as the ?cola wars?. This in itself describes the attitudinal approach to a problem that could cause some kind of ailment for those who regularly consume adulterated drinks if, in fact, they are adulterated. All the concerned agencies should be fighting the problem together and not against one another.

But before that, surely the CSE and other such bodies should be looking at the unhygienic water we are forced to drink, the filthy environment we live in, the unclean open drains that nurture disease and spread potential death. Why are they not out there, bringing the government to its knees on all those obvious truths as well? And, why do they not take their battle to its logical conclusion? When the issue of using CNG was raised, Sheila Dikshit bought into the idea and implemented it. Kudos to her. The response to adulterated colas is likely to go into a temporary coma and reappear some months down the road because the methodology used in the fight is faulty.

When will experts, in the true definition of the word, create the parameters within which the tiger population can revive and restore itself and be conserved thereafter? For now, there is a complete lack of clarity that spells an absence of commitment to do, to change, to rectify and restore.