Isn’t it shocking that despite many spurious drug rackets having been unearthed in various parts of the country in the last few years, these merchants of death walk free to build their empires on blood money (Pills that Kill, Sept 22). Not only that, they have for company the "milk sheikhs" who think nothing of mixing urea or shampoo in milk, those who adulterate oil and foodstuff, or mncs who think nothing of pesticides in their colas. The saddest thing is that existing laws are either too ineffective to be deterrents or are not implemented effectively. There should be a public trial of these mercenaries and the death penalty awarded for their wilful, cold-blooded genocide.
Vivek Khanna, Panchkula
These days everything seems unsafe. A crime blitz has hit the country. On one side, innocent people are caught in the merciless radar of terrorism, on the other, companies lace their products with toxic material. Sushma Swaraj’s decision to inject changes in the Drug Act is welcome. Hope it’s implemented soon, as is csir director R.A. Mashelkar’s prescription to cure the disease. Any delay will lead to a pathological society with the amorality of cannibals.
Philip Verghese ‘Ariel’, Secunderabad
I fully agree with Sushma Swaraj that drastic changes are necessary in the Drugs and Cosmetics Act. Offenders should be given the death penalty.
Pradeep Arora, Delhi
I am confused. At the beginning of your story, you have this unqualified statement: "...One in every four medicinal drugs that you buy in the country is spurious or fake or substandard. The size of the fake pharma industry is anything between Rs 2,000-6,000 crore, or 10-30 per cent the size of the legitimate one." On the last page, you say, "Some senior officials...feel the scare is highly exaggerated. ‘The fear of spurious drugs is more of a perception created through hype by some quarters’.... Mashelkar (csir director) admits that while the industry claims the spurious medicine trade is 20-30 per cent of the legal industry, the evidence collected by state authorities indicates the problem is smaller." Who should I believe?
Om Damani, New York
The existence of fake drugs itself was not surprising, the extent was. The impetus for this sordid business comes from certain purchasing procedures and systems followed by hospitals. Both the central and state governments must declare that drugs sold to such approved hospitals will be exempt from sales tax if purchased from the manufacturer. This will eliminate the middleman and the manufacturer will be directly responsible if the drug’s found to be substandard. There’s some 22 per cent mark-up over the prices at which drugs are sold to chemists and the mrp. Almost all drugs have 16 per cent sales tax. The hapless consumer is caught between the fake drug maker and the government which wants to tax patients and profit from their misery.
M.M. Gurbaxani, Bangalore
There is a subtle, subliminal message in the two stories that Outlook has done on the sordid fantasy of the spurious Indian drug industry and the "persecuted" American cola mncs in India. While the foreign cola companies are given all the benefit of the doubt, the aggressive and competitive Indian pharma industry is discredited and tarred with a broad brush as corrupt and dishonest. It’s high time Indians learnt to think critically, read between the lines and not take all the garbage the English news media dishes out.
Raj Purohit, on e-mail
Is the educated terrorist really a surprise (Next-Door Kamikaze, Sept 22)? You have a region where generations of youngsters have grown up without much hope. As in the Middle East, some among these inevitably pick sides and engage in violence to vent frustration. Here, they play into Pakistan’s hands by agreeing to do its dirty work. It’s a warning to the Indian government: only the political process, along with education and investment, will stabilise Kashmir.
Rustom Roy, London, UK
Fruits of Collective Dreaming and Oh, What a Racket! were two excellent studies in contrast in your Sept 22 issue. While on the one hand, illiterate quarry workers have done Rajnandgaon proud by dint of their stony resolve, in Uttaranchal, bureaucrats’ wives are running some of its money-grubbing ngos. The Outlook story is astounding enough to make one squirm: of the 20 lakh registered ngos in the country, only 30,000 or so are doing developmental work.
Rajpal Bharadwaj, Mumbai
We perceive our rural sisters as pallu-clad, silent beings. There have been various measures for their empowerment but it’s Rajnandgaon’s women who’ve shown what it really is. All it took was a constructive idea on collector Shrivastava’s part.
Sumitra Balakrishnan, on e-mail
V. Sudarshan has to be complimented on the directness of his questions to US Asst Secy of State Christina B. Rocca, who didn’t seem to mind them (Interview, Sept 22). But whether Rocca (or India) admits it or not, there is no choice for India but to form a "trilateral axis" with Israel and the US to combat terrorism. For, trade may or may not have become globalised, terrorism has, aided by the very gizmos and tools of globalisation such as cell/satphones, the Internet and international banking networks. And though there may have been no terrorist attacks in the US post-9/11, terrorist networks are still intact. The war in Iraq has given them a rallying point besides other perpetual areas of conflict like Kashmir, Chechnya, Palestine.
K.R. Rangaswamy, Wisconsin, US
The introduction of Air Deccan is a dream come true (Plane Vanilla, Sept 22). Now even the common man can fly. But what about safety norms and flying comforts? What with a single air-hostess on board and free seating, will there be a stampede to get a window seat? Cost-consciousness is one thing, but hope it’s not at the cost of quality.
D.S. Shetty, Doha, Qatar
Irfan Habib is undoubtedly one of our finest historians, but it’s distressing to note that whatever he says about the asi report on Ayodhya is lapped up while the opinions of accomplished archaeologists like B.B. Lal and S.P. Gupta are dismissed simply because they do not toe the ‘secular’ line (Phantom of the Fossils, Sept 8). I’m not a votary of the Sangh parivar, yet I feel in your periscope an archaeologist is good or bad depending on which socio-political credo he’s affiliated to.
Anil K. Joshi, Ranikhet
Arvind Pandey’s crusade (Mera Bihar Mahaan, Sept 8) manifests the surfacing of a subnational Bihari identity. Fed on a regular diet of lampooning stereotypes of Bihar, the urban intelligentsia and the ill-informed people of the ‘developed’ parts of India fail to see that the state has emerged as India’s intellectual powerhouse; the supplier of first-rate intellectual capital, be it in government service, corporate sector, technology, medicine or academics. Yet, the quasi-racial attitude against the Biharis speaks volumes of the unidimensional predilections of a thankless nation.
Anand Vardhan, Patna
When Cottage Cheese Turns Sour (Aug 25) asks if hudco is becoming sick. If V. Suresh, a ‘hudco man’ for years before he became cmd, dismisses compelling evidence facilely as a "mischievous slant", the answer’s definitely yes. Witness the suspension of the research and training chief, the closure of the habitat polytech: all signs of techno-sickness becoming terminal. A techno-financial institution gone sick on its techno role is likely to go sick on its financial role too. One can only hope its new cmd is able to put hudco, drifted far from mandate, back on course and bridge the disconnect between disbursement and recovery and between quantum and worth of financing activity.
Gita Dewan Verma, Delhi
Only people who haven’t the foggiest about how brutal the Emergency was can appreciate Indira Gandhi’s politics (The Aandhi Rerun, Sept 22). Her administrative record too is as poor as Saurav Ganguly’s performances against genuine fast-bowlers. Till date, no historian or biographer—besides sycophants like K.A. Abbas and Khushwant Singh—has been able to list Mrs G’s tangible achievements. If she could rise so indubitably from the dustbin of history, it’s due to India’s flair for mocking itself so cheaply and meanly.
T.S. Pattabhi Raman, Coimbatore
I wonder why Indira’s such an icon for so many people. She owed her rise solely to the fact that she was Nehru’s daughter. She wasn’t very well-educated and did badly at school. Harold Laski, legendary professor of economics at the lse, described her as one of the dullest and most unimaginative students he had ever had! Even as PM, her list of failures was endless. She exacerbated the license-permit raj that well-nigh bled our economy to premature death, and was responsible for the Emergency. She could have saved us all the problems in Kashmir had she demanded the return of PoK in ’71, when we had Pakistan on its knees. She isolated Sanjay Gandhi, despite the fact that he was an astute politician and would’ve been a better leader than his brother.
Ganesh Natrajan, on e-mail
After reading your piece on Indira (The Aandhi Rerun, Sept 22), I had this dream. Sonia Gandhi replaces Vajpayee and promises better government. Soon after, she declares a state of Emergency and packs off the entire Opposition to Tihar. She then orders the army to invade Pakistan. Musharraf is brought to the Red Fort and peace is restored in Kashmir after a short but bloody conflict. Far-fetched? Not really. If, as you say, thousands of ordinary folk are flocking Indira’s museum, they could only be nostalgic about her rule, for strong, effective governance. I have heard many say that even another Emergency won’t be a bad thing when one sees the present confusion. One Congress MP told me in the Central Hall of Parliament, "Even if Soniaji imposes an Emergency, she won’t repeat Indiraji’s mistakes." Do the bjp leaders realise that if such a thing happens, history would hold them as the real culprits? They came to power on a fluke and have grossly bungled the opportunity. God save Bharat!
K.R. Sundar Rajan, New Delhi
