Night World : Secret Vampire Chapter 4

Poppy was staring without appetite at a dinner tray of chicken nuggets and french fries when Dr. Franklin came in the room. The tests were over. The CAT scan had been all right, if claustrophobic, but the ERCP had been awful. Poppy could still feel the ghost of the tube in her throat every time she swallowed. â€Å"You're leaving all this great hospital food,† Dr. Franklin said with gentle humor. Poppy managed a smile for him. He went on talking about innocuous things. He didn't say anything about the test results, and Poppy had no idea when they were supposed to come in. She was suspicious of Dr. Franklin, though. Something about him, the gentle way he patted her foot under the blanket or the shadows around his eyes . . . When he casually suggested that Poppy's mother might want to â€Å"come for a little walk down the hall,† Poppy's suspicion crystallized. He's going to tell her. He's got the results, but he doesn't want me to know. Her plan was made in the same instant. She yawned and said, â€Å"Go on, Mom; I'm a little bit sleepy.† Then she lay back and shut her eyes. As soon as they were gone, she got off the bed. She watched their retreating backs as they went down the hall into another doorway. Then, in her stocking feet, she quietly followed them. She was delayed for several minutes at the nursing station. â€Å"Just stretching my legs,† she said to a nurse who looked inquiringly at her, and she pretended to be walking at random. When the nurse picked up a clipboard and went into one of the patients' rooms, Poppy hurried on down the corridor. The room at the end was the waiting room – she'd seen it earlier. It had a TV and a complete kitchen setup so relatives could hang out in comfort. The door was ajar and Poppy approached it stealthily. She could hear the low rumble of Dr. Franklin's voice, but she couldn't hear what he was saying. Very cautiously Poppy edged closer. She chanced one look around the door.She saw at once that there was no need for caution. Everyone in that room was completely occupied. Dr. Franklin was sitting on one of the couches. Beside him was an African-American woman with glasses on a chain around her neck. She was wearing the white coat of a doctor. On the other couch was Poppy's stepfather, Cliff. His normally perfect dark hair was slightly mussed, his rock-steady jaw was working. He had his arm around her mother. Dr. Franklin was talking to both of them, his hand on her mother's shoulder. And Poppy's mother was sobbing. Poppy pulled back from the doorway. Oh, my God. I've got it. She'd never seen her mother cry before. Not when Poppy's grandmother had died, not during the divorce from Poppy's father. Her mother's specialty was coping with things; she was the best coper Poppy had ever known. But now . . . I've got it. I've definitely got it. Still, maybe it wasn't so bad. Her mom was shocked, okay, that was natural. But it didn't mean that Poppy was going to die or anything. Poppy had all of modern medicine on her side. She kept telling herself this as she edged away from the waiting room. She didn't edge fast enough, though. Before she got out of earshot, she heard her mother's voice, raised in something like anguish. â€Å"My baby. Oh, my little girl.† Poppy froze. And then Cliff, loud and angry: â€Å"You're trying to tell me there's nothing?† Poppy couldn't feel her own breathing. Against her will, she moved back to the door. â€Å"Dr. Loftus is an oncologist; an expert on this sort of cancer. She can explain better than I can,† Dr. Franklin was saying. Then a new voice came – the other doctor. At first Poppy could only catch scattered phrases that didn't seem to mean anything: adenocarcinoma, splenic venous occlusion, Stage Three. Medical jargon. Then Dr. Loftus said, â€Å"To put it simply, the problem is that the tumor has spread. It's spread to the liver and the lymph nodes around the pancreas. That means it's unresectable – we can't operate.† Cliff said, â€Å"But chemotherapy . . .† â€Å"We might try a combination of radiation and chemotherapy with something called 5-fluorouracil. We've had some results with that. But I won't mislead you. At best it may improve her survival time by a few weeks. At this point, we're looking at palliative measures – ways to reduce her pain and improve the qualityof the time she has left. Do you understand?† Poppy could hear choking sobs from her mother, but she couldn't seem to move. She felt as if she were listening to some play on the radio. As if it had nothing to do with her. Dr. Franklin said, â€Å"There are some research protocols right here in southern California. They're experimenting with immunotherapy and cryogenic surgery. Again, we're talking about palliation rather than a cure – â€Å" â€Å"Damn it!† Cliff's voice was explosive. â€Å"You're talking about a little girl! How did this get to – to Stage Three – without anybody noticing? This kid was dancing all night two days ago.† â€Å"Mr. Hilgard, I'm sorry,† Dr. Loftus said so softly that Poppy could barely pick up the words. â€Å"This kind of cancer is called a silent disease, because there are very few symptoms until it's very far advanced. That's why the survival rate is so low. And I have to tell you that Poppy is only the second teenager I've seen with this kind of tumor. Dr. Franklin made an extremely acute diagnosis when he decided to send her in for testing.† â€Å"I should have known,† Poppy's mother said in a thick voice. â€Å"I should have made her come in sooner. I should have – I should have – â€Å" There was a banging sound. Poppy looked around the door, forgetting to be inconspicuous. Her mother was hitting the Formica table over and over. Cliff was trying to stop her. Poppy reeled back. Oh, God, I've got to get out of here. I can't see this. I can't look at this. She turned and walked back down the hall. Her legs moved. Just like always. Amazing that they still worked. And everything around her was just like always. The nursing station was still decorated for the Fourth of July. Her suitcase was still on the padded window seat in her room. The hardwood floor was still solid underneath her. Everything was the same – but how could it be? How could the walls be still standing? How could the TV be blaring in the next room? I'm going to die, Poppy thought. Strangely enough, she didn't feel frightened. What she felt was vastly surprised. And the surprise kept coming, over and over, with every thought being interrupted by those four words. It's my fault because (I'm going to die) I didn't go to the doctor's sooner. Cliff said â€Å"damn† for me (I'm going to die). I didn't know he liked me enough to swear. Her mind was racing wildly. Something in me, she thought. I'm going to die because of something that's inside me, like that alien in the movie. It's in me right now. Right now. She put both hands to her stomach, then pulled up her T-shirt to stare at her abdomen. The skin was smooth, unblemished. She didn't feel any pain. But it's in there and I'm going to die because of it. Die soon. I wonder how soon? I didn't hear them talk about that. I need James. Poppy reached for the phone with a feeling that her hand was detached from her body. She dialed, thinking, Please be there. But this time it didn't work. The phone rang and rang. When the answering machine came on, Poppy said, â€Å"Call me at the hospital.† Then she hung up and stared at the plastic pitcher of ice water by her bedside. He'll get in later, she thought. And then he'll call me. I just have to hang on until then. Poppy wasn't sure why she thought this, but suddenly it was her goal. To hang on until she could talk to James. She didn't need to think about anything until then; she just had to survive. Once she talked to James, she could figure out what she was supposed to be feeling, what she was supposed to do now. There was a light knock at the door. Startled, Poppy looked up to see her mother and Cliff. For a moment all she could focus on was their faces, which gave her the strange illusion that the faces were floating in midair. Her mother had red and swollen eyes. Cliff was pale, like a piece of crumpled white paper, and his jaw looked stubbly and dark in contrast. Oh, my God, are they going to tell me? They can't; they can't make me listen to it. Poppy had the wild impulse to run. She was on the verge of panic. But her mother said, â€Å"Sweetie, some of your friends are here to see you. Phil called them this afternoon to let them know you were in the hospital, and they just arrived.† James, Poppy thought, something springing free in her chest. But James wasn't part of the group that came crowding through the doorway. It was mostly girls from school. It doesn't matter. He'll call later. I don't have to think now. As a matter of fact, it was impossible to think with so many visitors in the room. And that was good. It was incredible that Poppy could sit there and talk to them when part of her was farther away than Neptune, but she did talk and that kept her brain turned off. None of them had any idea that something serious was wrong with her. Not even Phil, who was at his brotherly best, very kind and considerate. They talked about ordinary things, about parties and Rollerblading and music and books. Things from Poppy's old life, which suddenly seemed to have been a hundred years ago. Cliff talked, too, nicer than he had been since the days when he was courting Poppy's mother. But finally the visitors left, and Poppy's mother stayed. She touched Poppy every so often with hands that shook slightly. If I didn't know, I'd know, Poppy thought. She isn't acting like Mom at all. â€Å"I think I'll stay here tonight,† her mother said. Not quite managing to sound offhand. â€Å"The nurse said I can sleep on the window seat; it's really a couch for parents. I'm just trying to decide whether I should run back to the house and get some things.† â€Å"Yes, go,† Poppy said. There was nothing else she could say and still pretend that she didn't know. Besides, her mom undoubtedly needed some time by herself, away from this. Just as her mother left, a nurse in a flowered blouse and green scrub pants came in to take Poppy's temperature and blood pressure. And then Poppy was alone. It was late. She could still hear a TV, but it was far away. The door was ajar, but the hallway outside was dim. A hush seemed to have fallen over the ward. She felt very alone, and the pain was gnawing deep inside her. Beneath the smooth skin of her abdomen, the tumor was making itself known. Worst of all, James hadn't called. How could he not call? Didn't he know she needed him? She wasn't sure how long she could go on not thinking about It. Maybe the best thing would be to try to sleep. Get unconscious. Then she couldn't think. But as soon as she turned out the light and closed her eyes, phantoms swirled around her. Not images of pretty bald girls; skeletons. Coffins. And worst of all, an endless darkness. If I die, I won't be here. Will I be anywhere? Or will I just Not Be at all? It was the scariest thing she'd ever imagined, Not-Being. And she was definitely thinking now, she couldn't help it. She'd lost control. A galloping fear consumed her, made her shiver under the rough sheet and thin blankets. I'm going to die, I'm going to die, I'm going to – â€Å"Poppy.† Her eyes flew open. For a second she couldn't identify the black silhouette in the darkened room. She had a wild idea that it was Death itself coming to get her. Then she said, â€Å"James?† â€Å"I wasn't sure if you were asleep.† Poppy reached for the bedside button that turned on the light, but James said, â€Å"No, leave it off. I had to sneak past the nurses, and I don't want them to throw me out.† Poppy swallowed, her hands clenched on a fold of blanket. â€Å"I'm glad you came,† she said. â€Å"I thought you weren't going to come.† What she really wanted was to throw herself into his arms and sob and scream. But she didn't. It wasn't just that she'd never done anything like that with him before; it was something about him that stopped her. Something she couldn't put her finger on, but that made her feel almost . . . frightened. The way he was standing? The fact that she couldn't see his face? All she knew was that James suddenly seemed like a stranger. He turned around and very slowly closed the heavy door. Darkness. Now the only light came in through the window. Poppy felt curiously isolated from the rest of the hospital, from the rest of the world. And that should have been good, to be alone with James, protected from everything else. If only she weren't having this weird feeling of not recognizing him. â€Å"You know the test results,† he said quietly. It wasn't a question. â€Å"My mom doesn't know I know,† Poppy said. How could she be talking coherently when all she wanted to do was scream? â€Å"I overheard the doctors telling her. . . . James, I've got it. And . . . it's bad; it's a bad kind of cancer. They said it's already spread. They said I'm going to . . .† She couldn't get the last word out, even though it was shrieking through her mind. â€Å"You're going to die,† James said. He still seemed quiet and centered. Detached. â€Å"I read up on it,† James went on, walking over to the window and looking out. â€Å"I know how bad it is. The articles said there was a lot of pain. Serious pain.† â€Å"James,† Poppy gasped. â€Å"Sometimes they have to do surgery just to try to stop the pain. But whatever they do, it won't save you. They can fill you full of chemicals and irradiate you, and you'll still die. Probably before the end of summer.† â€Å"James – â€Å" â€Å"It will be your last summer – â€Å" â€Å"James, for God's sake!† It was almost a scream. Poppy was breathing in great shaking gulps, clinging to the blankets. â€Å"Why are you doing this to me?† He turned and in one movement seized her wrist, his fingers closing over the plastic hospital bracelet. â€Å"I want you to understand that they can't help you,† he said, ragged and intense. â€Å"Do you understand that?† â€Å"Yes, I understand,† Poppy said. She could hear the mounting hysteria in her own voice. â€Å"But is that what you came here to say? Do you want to kill me?† His fingers tightened painfully. â€Å"No! I want to save you.† Then he let out a breath and repeated it more quietly, but with no less intensity. â€Å"I want to save you, Poppy.† Poppy spent a few moments just getting air in and out of her lungs. It was hard to do it without dissolving into sobs. â€Å"Well, you can't,† she said at last. â€Å"Nobody can.† â€Å"That's where you're wrong.† Slowly he released her wrist and gripped the bed rail instead. â€Å"Poppy, there's something I've got to tell you. Something about me.† â€Å"James . . .† Poppy could breathe now, but she didn't know what to say. As far as she could tell, James had gone crazy. In a way, if everything else hadn't been so awful, she might have been flattered. James had lost his consummate cool – over her. He was upset enough about her situation to go completely nonlinear. â€Å"You really do care,† she said softly, with a laugh that was half a sob. She put a hand on his where it rested on the bed rail. He laughed shortly in turn. His hand flipped over to grasp hers roughly; then he pulled away. â€Å"You have no idea,† he said in a terse, strained voice. Looking out the window, he added, â€Å"You think you know everything about me, but you don't. There's something very important that you don't know.† By now Poppy just felt numb. She couldn't understand why James kept harping on himself, when she was the one about to die. But she tried to conjure up some sort of gentleness for him as she said, â€Å"You can tell me anything. You know that.† â€Å"But this is something you won't believe. Not to mention that it's breaking the laws.† â€Å"The law?† â€Å"The laws. I go by different laws than you. Human laws don't mean much to us, but our own are supposed to be unbreakable.† â€Å"James,† Poppy said, with blank terror. He really was losing his mind. â€Å"I don't know the right way to say it. I feel like somebody in a bad horror movie.† He shrugged, and said without turning, â€Å"I know how this sounds, but . . . Poppy, I'm a vampire.† Poppy sat still on the bed for a moment. Then she groped out wildly toward the bedside table. Her fingers closed on a stack of little crescent-shaped plastic basins and she threw the whole stack at him. â€Å"You bastard !† she screamed, and reached for something else to throw.

Agriculture in India

TYPES OF FARMING IN INDIA Primitive Subsistence Farming This type of farming is still practised in few pockets of India. Primitive subsistence agriculture is practised on small patches of land with the help of primitive tools like hoe, dao and digging sticks, and family/community labour. This type of farming depends upon monsoon, natural fertility of the soil and suitability of other environmental conditions to the crops grown. It is a ‘slash and burn’ agriculture. Farmers clear a patch of land and produce cereals and other food crops to sustain their family.When the soil fertility decreases, the farmers shift and clear a fresh patch of land for cultivation. This type of shifting allows Nature to replenish the fertility of the soil through natural processes; land productivity in this type of agriculture is low as the farmer does not use fertilisers or other modern inputs. It is known by different names in different parts of the country. It is known as jhumming in north-e astern states like Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Nagaland; Pamlou in Manipur, Dipa in Bastar district of Chattishgarh, and in Andaman and Nicobar Islands.This primitive form of cultivation is called ‘Bewar’ or ‘Dahiya’ in Madhya Pradesh, ‘Podu’ or ‘Penda’ in Andhra Pradesh, ‘Pama Dabi’ or ‘Koman’ or Bringa’ in Orissa, ‘Kumari’ in Western Ghats, ‘Valre’ or ‘Waltre’ in South-eastern Rajasthan, ‘Khil’ in the Himalayan belt, ‘Kuruwa’ in Jharkhand, and ‘Jhumming’ in the North-eastern region. Intensive Subsistence Farming This type of farming is practised in areas of high population pressure on land. It is labour intensive farming, where high doses of biochemical inputs and irrigation are used for obtaining higher production.Though the ‘right of inheritance’ leading to the division of land among successive generatio ns has rendered land-holding size uneconomical, the farmers continue to take maximum output from the limited land in the absence of alternative source of livelihood. Thus, there is enormous pressure on agricultural land. Commercial Farming The main characteristic of this type of farming is the use of higher doses of modern inputs, e. g. high yielding variety (HYV) seeds, chemical fertilisers, insecticides and pesticides in order to obtain higher productivity.The degree of commercialisation of agriculture varies from one region to another. For example, rice is a commercial crop in Haryana and Punjab, but in Orissa, it is a subsistence crop. Plantation Plantation is also a type of commercial farming. In this type of farming, a single crop is grown on a large area. The plantation has an interface of agriculture and industry. Plantations cover large tracts of land, using capital intensive inputs, with the help of migrant labourers. All the produce is used as raw material in respective i ndustries. In India, tea, coffee, rubber, sugarcane, banana, etc.. are important plantation crops.Tea in Assam and North Bengal coffee in Karnataka are some of the important plantation crops grown in these states. Since the production is mainly for market, a well developed network of transport and communication connecting the plantation areas, processing industries and markets plays an important role in the development of plantations. CROPPING PATTERN India has three cropping seasons — rabi, kharif and zaid. www. excellup. com  © 2009 Send your queries and suggestions to [email  protected] com Rabi: Rabi crops are sown in winter from October to December and harvested in summer from April to June.Some of the important rabi crops are wheat, barley, peas, gram and mustard. Though, these crops are grown in large parts of India, states from the north and northwestern parts such as Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Uttaranchal and Uttar Pradesh are important for the production of wheat and other rabi crops. Availability of precipitation during winter months due to the western temperate cyclones helps in the success of these crops. However, the success of the green revolution in Punjab, Haryana, western Uttar Pradesh and parts of Rajasthan has also been an important factor in the growth of the above mentioned rabi crops.Kharif: Kharif crops are grown with the onset of monsoon in different parts of the country and these are harvested in September-October. Important crops grown during this season are paddy, maize, jowar, bajra, tur (arhar), moong, urad, cotton, jute, groundnut and soyabean. Some of the most important rice-growing regions are Assam, West Bengal, coastal regions of Orissa, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Maharashtra, particularly the (Konkan coast) along with Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. Recently, paddy has also become an important crop of Punjab and Haryana.In states like Assam, West Bengal and Orissa, three crops of pa ddy are grown in a year. These are Aus, Aman and Boro. Zaid: In between the rabi and the kharif seasons, there is a short season during the summer months known as the Zaid season. Some of the crops produced during ‘zaid’ are watermelon, muskmelon, cucumber, vegetables and fodder crops. Sugarcane takes almost a year to grow. Major Crops Rice: It is the staple food crop of a majority of the people in India. Our country is the second largest producer of rice in the world after China.It is a kharif crop which requires high temperature, (above 25 °C) and high humidity with annual rainfall above 100 cm. In the areas of less rainfall, it grows with the help of irrigation. Rice is grown in the plains of north and north-eastern India, coastal areas and the deltaic regions. Development of dense network of canal irrigation and tubewells have made it possible to grow rice in areas of less rainfall such as Punjab, Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh and parts of Rajasthan. Wheat: Th is is the second most important cereal crop. It is the main food crop, in north and north-western part of the country.This rabi crop requires a cool growing season and a bright sunshine at the time of ripening. It requires 50 to 75 cm of annual rainfall evenly distributed over the growing season. There are two important wheat-growing zones in the country – the Ganga-Satluj plains in the northwest and black soil region of the Deccan. The major wheatproducing states are Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan and parts of Madhya Pradesh. Millets: Jowar, bajra and ragi are the important millets grown in India. Though, these are known as coarse grains, they have very high nutritional value.For example, ragi is very rich in iron, calcium, other micro nutrients and roughage. Jowar is the third most important food crop with respect to area and production. It is a rain-fed crop mostly grown in the moist areas which hardly needs irrigation. Maharashtra is the largest producer of jowar followed by Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh. Bajra grows well on sandy soils and shallow black soil. Rajasthan is the largest producer of bajra followed by Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Gujarat and Haryana. Ragi is a crop of dry regions and grows well on red, black, sandy, loamy and shallow black soils.Karnataka is the largest producer of ragi followed by Tamil Nadu. Apart from these states, www. excellup. com  © 2009 Send your queries and suggestions to [email  protected] com Himachal Pradesh, Uttaranchal, Sikkim, Jharkhand and Arunachal Pradesh are also important for the production of ragi. Maize: It is a crop which is used both as food and fodder. It is a kharif crop which requires temperature between 21 °C to 27 °C and grows well in old alluvial soil. In some states like Bihar maize is grown in rabi season also. Use of modern inputs such as HYV seeds, fertilisers and irrigation have contributed to the increasing production of maize.Major maize-produc ing states are Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Andhra Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh. Pulses: India is the largest producer as well as the consumer of pulses in the world. These are the major source of protein in a vegetarian diet. Arhar, urad, moong, masur, chana and peas are major pulses of India. Pulses help in restoring soil fertility. That is why they are produce in rotation with other crops. UP, MP, Rajasthan and Karnataka are major pulse producing states in India. Sugarcane: Sugarcane grows in hot and humid climate. It requires temperature range of 21 ° to 27 ° c and rainfall of 75 cm to 100 cm.Sugar can grow on variety of soils. After Brazil, India is the second largest producer of sugarcane in the world. It is the main source of sugar, gur (jaggary), khandsari and molasses. The major sugarcane-producing states are Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Punjab and Haryana. Oil Seeds: India is the largest producer of oilseeds in the world. Different oil seeds are grown covering approximately 12 per cent of the total cropped area of the country. Main oil-seeds produced in India are groundnut, mustard, coconut, sesamum (til), soyabean, castor seeds, cotton seeds, linseed and sunflower.Most of these are edible and used as cooking mediums. However, some of these are also used as raw material in the production of soap, cosmetics and ointments. Groundnut is a kharif crop and accounts for about half of the major oilseeds produced in the country. Andhra Pradesh is the largest producer of groundnut followed by Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Gujarat and Maharashtra – linseed and mustard are rabi crops. Sesamum is a kharif crop in north and rabi crop in south India. Castor seed is grown both as rabi and kharif crop. Tea: Tea cultivation is an example of plantation agriculture.It is also an important beverage crop introduced in India initially by the British. Today, most of the tea plantations are owned by Indians. The tea plant g rows well in tropical and sub-tropical climates endowed with deep and fertile well-drained soil, rich in humus and organic matter. Tea bushes require warm and moist frost-free climate all through the year. Frequent showers evenly distributed over the year ensure continuous growth of tender leaves. Tea is a labourintensive industry. It requires abundant, cheap and skilled labour. Tea is processed within the tea garden to restore its freshness.Major tea producing states are Assam, hills of Darjeeling and Jalpaiguri districts, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Kerala. Apart from these, Himachal Pradesh, Uttaranchal, Meghalaya, Andhra Pradesh and Tripura are also tea-producing states in the country. India is the leading producer as well as exporter of tea in the world. Coffee: India produces about four per cent of the world’s coffee production. Indian coffee is known in the world for its good quality. The Arabica variety initially brought from Yemen is produced in the country. This var iety is in great demand all over the world.Intially its cultivation was introduced on the Baba Budan Hills. Others: India is a producer of tropical as well as temperate fruits. Mangoes of Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal, oranges of Nagpur and Cherrapunjee www. excellup. com  © 2009 Send your queries and suggestions to [email  protected] com (Meghalaya), bananas of Kerala, Mizoram, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu, lichi and guava of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, pineapples of Meghalaya, grapes of Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra, apples, pears, apricots and walnuts of Jammu and Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh are in great demand the world over.Horticulture Crops: India is the largest producer of fruits and vegetables in the world. India produces about 13 per cent of the world’s vegetables. It is an important producer of pea, cauliflower, onion, cabbage, tomato, brinjal and potato. Non-Food Crops Rubber: It is an equatorial crop, but under special conditions, it is also grown tropical areas. It requires moist and humid climate with rainfall of more temperature above 25 °C. Rubber is an important industrial raw material. It Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Andaman and Nicabar islands and Garo India ranks fifth among the world’s natural rubber producers.in tropical and subthan 200 cm. and is mainly grown in hills of Meghalaya. Cotton: India is believed to be the original home of the cotton plant. Cotton is one of the main raw materials for cotton textile industry. India is the third-largest producer of cotton in the world. Cotton grows well in drier parts of the black cotton soil of the Deccan plateau. It requires high temperature, light rainfall orirrigation, 210 frost-free days and bright sunshine for its growth. It is a kharif crop and requires 6 to 8 months to mature.Major cotton-producing states are – Maharashtra, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh. Jute: It is known as the golden fibre. Jute grows well on well-drained fertile soils in the flood plains where soils are renewed every year. High temperature is required during the time of growth. West Bengal, Bihar, Assam, Orissa and Meghalaya are the major jute producing states. It is used in making gunny bags, mats, ropes, yarn, carpets and other artefacts. Due to its high cost, it is losing market to synthetic fibres and packing materials, particularly the nylon.Bhoodan – Gramdan & Land Reforms Vinoba Bhave spread the awareness about donating surplus land to the landless. This was a precursor of abolition of Zamindari system. ‘Land reform’ was the main focus of our First Five Year Plan. The right of inheritance had already lead to fragmentation of land holdings necessitating consolidation of holdings. The laws of land reforms were enacted but the laws of implementation was lacking or lukewarm. The Government of India embarked upon introducing agricultural reforms to improve Indian agriculture in the 1960s and 1970s.The Green Revolution based on the use of package technology and the White Revolution (Operation Flood) were some of the strategies initiated to improve the lot of Indian agriculture. But, this too led to the concentration of development in few selected areas. In states like Punjab, UP, proper implementation fo land reform has led viable size of plot. The right size leads to scale economy and better crop management leading to optimum production. Therefore, in the 1980s and 1990s, a comprehensive land development programme was initiated, which included both institutional and technical reforms.Provision for crop insurance against drought, flood, cyclone, fire and disease, establishment of Grameen banks, cooperative societies and banks for providing loan facilities to the farmers at lower rates of interest were some important steps in this direction. Kissan Credit Card (KCC), Personal Accident Insurance Scheme (PAIS) are some other schem es introduced by the Government of India for the benefit of the farmers. Moreover, special weather bulletins and www. excellup. com  © 2009 Send your queries and suggestions to [email  protected] comagricultural programmes for farmers were introduced on the radio and television. The government also announces minimum support price, remunerative and procurement prices for important crops to check the exploitation of farmers by speculators and middlemen. Current Scenario: The growth rate in agriculture is decelerating which is an alarming situation. Today, Indian farmers are facing a big challenge from international competition and our government is going ahead with reduction in the public investment in agriculture sector particularly in irrigation, power, rural roads, market and mechanisation.Subsidy on fertilisers is decreased leading to increase in the cost of production. Moreover, reduction in import duties on agricultural products have proved detrimental to agriculture in the country. Farmers are withdrawing their investment from agriculture causing a downfall in the employment in agriculture. Agriculture has been the backbone of the Indian economy though its share in the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has registered a declining trend from 1951 onwards; yet its share in providing employment and livelihood to the population continues to be as high as 63 per cent in 2001.The declining share of agriculture in the GDP is a matter of serious concern because any decline and stagnation in agriculture will lead to a decline in other spheres of the economy having wider implications for society. Considering the importance of agriculture in India, the Government of India made concerted efforts to modernise agriculture. Establishment of Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), agricultural universities, veterinary services and animal breeding centres, horticulture development, research and development in the field of meteorology and weather forecast, etc. were given priority for improving Indian agriculture.Apart from this, improving the rural infrastructure was also considered essential for the same. FOOD SECURITY If any segment of our population does not have this access, that segment suffers from lack of food security. The number of people who do not have food security is disproportionately large in some regions of our country, particularly in economically less developed states with higher incidence of poverty. The remote areas of the country are more prone to natural disasters and uncertain food supply. In order to ensure availability of food to all sections of society our government carefully designed a national food security system.It consists of two components (a)buffer stock and (b) public distribution system (PDS). Public Distribution System: PDS is a programme which provides food grains and other essential commodities at subsidised prices in rural and urban areas. India’s food security policy has a primary objective to en sure availability of foodgrains to the common people at an affordable price. It has enabled the poor to have access to food. The focus of the policy is on growth in agriculture production and on fixing the support price for procurement of wheat and rice, to maintain their stocks.Food Corporation of India (FCI) is responsible for procuring and stocking foodgrains, whereas distribution is ensured by public distribution system (PDS). The FCI procures foodgrains from the farmers at the government announced minimum support price (MSP). The government used to provide subsidies on agriculture inputs such as fertilizers, power and water. These subsidies have now reached unsustainable levels and have also led to large scale inefficiencies in the use of these scarce inputs. Excessive and imprudent use of fertilizers and water has led to waterlogging, salinity and depletion of essential micronutrients in www.excellup. com  © 2009 Send your queries and suggestions to [email  protected] com the soil. The high MSP, subsidies in input and committed FCI purchases have distorted the cropping pattern. Wheat and paddy crops are being grown more for the MSP they get. Punjab and Haryana are foremost examples. This has also created a serious imbalance in inter-crop parities. In PDS consumers are divided into two categories : †¢ Below poverty line(BPL) and †¢ Above poverty line (APL), with the issue price being different for each category.However, this categorisation is not perfect and a number of deserving poor have been excluded from the BPL category. Moreover, some of the so called APL slip back to BPL, because of the failure of even one crop and it is administratively difficult to accommodate such shifts. Suggestion for Future: Each district and block can be made self sufficient in foodgrain production if government provides proper agricultural infrastructure, credit linkages and also encourages the use of latest techniques.Instead of concentrating only on rice or wheat, the food crop with a better growth potential in that particular area must be encouraged. Creation of necessary infrastructure like irrigation facilities, availability of electricity etc. may also attract private investments in agriculture. The focus on increasing foodgrain production which should be on a sustainable basis and also free trade in grains will create massive employment and reduce poverty in rural areas. Shifting Agricultural Pattern: There has been a gradual shift from cultivation of food crops to cultivation of fruits, vegetables, oil-seeds and industrial crops.This has led to the reduction in net sown area under cereals and pulses. With the growing population of India, the declining food production puts a big question mark over the country’s future food security. The competition for land between non-agricultural uses such as housing etc. and agriculture has resulted in reduction in the net sown area. The productivity of land has started showing a declini ng trend. Fertilisers, pesticides and insecticides, which once showed dramatic results, are now being held responsible for degrading the soils.Periodic scarcity of water has led to reduction in area under irrigation. Inefficient water management has led to water logging and salinity. Impact of Globalisation on Agriculture Under globalisation, particularly after 1990, the farmers in India have been exposed to new challenges. Despite being an important producer of rice, cotton, rubber, tea, coffee, jute and spices our agricultural products are not able to compete with the developed countries because of the highly subsidised agriculture in those countries.Change in cropping pattern for example from cereals to high-value crops will mean that India will have to import food. During 1960’s this would have been seen as a disaster. But if India imports cereals while exporting high-value commodities, it will be following successful economies like Italy, Israel and Chile. These countrie s exports farm products (fruits, olives, speciality seeds and wine) and import cereals. www. excellup. com  © 2009 Send your queries and suggestions to [email  protected] com

Grief and Loss Essay

Losing someone or something we love is very painful. We may experience all kinds of difficult emotions and it may feel like the sadness will never let up. These are normal reactions to a significant loss. But while there is no right or wrong way to grieve —there are healthy ways to cope with the pain. Grief is a natural response to loss. It’s the emotional suffering we feel when something or someone we love is taken away. We may associate grief with the death of a loved one – and this type of loss does often cause the most intense grief. But any loss can cause grief, including: * A relationship breakup * Loss of health * Losing a job * Loss of financial stability * A miscarriage * Death of a pet * Loss of a cherished dream * A loved one’s serious illness * Loss of a friendship * Loss of safety after a trauma The more signifcant the loss, the more intense the grief. However, even subtle losses can lead to grief. For example, we might experience grief after moving away from home, graduating from college, changing jobs, selling our family home, or retiring from a career we loved. Grieving is a personal and highly individual experience. How we grieve depends on many factors, including personality and coping style, life experience, faith, and the nature of the loss. The grieving process takes time. Healing happens gradually; it can’t be forced or hurried – and there is no â€Å"normal† timetable for grieving. Some people start to feel better in weeks or months. For others, the grieving process is measured in years. Whatever grief experience, it’s important to be patient and allow the process to naturally unfold. (Bowlby 1977) In 1969, psychiatrist Elisabeth Kà ¼bler-Ross introduced what became known as the â€Å"five stages of grief.† These stages of grief were based on her studies of the feelings of patients facing terminal illness, but many people have generalized them to other types of negative life changes and losses, such as the death of a loved one or a break-up. The five stages of grief: * Denial: â€Å"This can’t be happening to me.† * Anger: â€Å"Why is this happening? Who is to blame?† * Bargaining: â€Å"Make this not happen, and in return I will ____.† * Depression: â€Å"I’m too sad to do anything.† * Acceptance: â€Å"I’m at peace with what happened.† If we are experiencing any of these emotions following a loss, it may help to know that our reaction is natural and that we’ll heal in time. However, not everyone who is grieving goes through all of these stages – and that’s okay. In fact, some people resolve their grief without going through any of these stages. And if we do go through these stages of grief, we probably won’t experience them in a neat, sequential order.(Parkes 1972) Kà ¼bler-Ross herself never intended for these stages to be a rigid framework that applies to everyone who mourns. In her last book before her death in 2004, she said of the five stages of grief, â€Å"They were never meant to help tuck messy emotions into neat packages. They are responses to loss that many people have, but there is not a typical response to loss, as there is no typical loss. Our grieving is as individual as our lives.† Instead of a series of stages, we might also think of the grieving process as a rol ler coaster, full of ups and downs, highs and lows. Like many roller coasters, the ride tends to be rougher in the beginning, the lows may be deeper and longer. The difficult periods should become less intense and shorter as time goes by, but it takes time to work through a loss. Even years after a loss, especially at special events such as a family wedding or the birth of a child, we may still experience a strong sense of grief. While loss affects people in different ways, many people experience the following symptoms when they’re grieving. Important thing to remember that almost anything that we experience in the early stages of grief is normal – including feeling like we’re going crazy, feeling like we’re in a bad dream, or questioning our religious beliefs. * Shock and disbelief – Right after a loss, it can be hard to accept what happened. Feeling numb, have trouble believing that the loss really happened, or even deny the truth. If someone we love has died, we may keep expecting them to show up, even though we know they’re gone. * Sadness – Profound sadness is probably the most universall y experienced symptom of grief. We may have feelings of emptiness, despair, yearning, or deep loneliness. We may also cry a lot or feel emotionally unstable. * Guilt – We may regret or feel guilty about things you did or didn’t say or  do. We may also feel guilty about certain feelings (e.g. feeling relieved when the person died after a long, difficult illness). After a death, we may even feel guilty for not doing something to prevent the death, even if there was nothing more we could have done. * Anger – Even if the loss was nobody’s fault, we may feel angry and resentful. If we lost a loved one, we may be angry at our self, God, the doctors, or even the person who died for abandoning us. We may feel the need to blame someone for the injustice that was done. * Fear – A significant loss can trigger a host of worries and fears. We may feel anxious, helpless, or insecure. We may even have panic attacks. The death of a loved one can trigger fears about own mortality, of facing life without that person, or the responsibilities we now face alone. * Physical symptoms – We often think of grief as a str ictly emotional process, but grief often involves physical problems, including fatigue, nausea, lowered immunity, weight loss or weight gain, aches and pains, and insomnia. The single most important factor in healing from loss is having the support of other people. People aren’t quite often comfortable talking about their feelings under normal circumstances, it’s important to express them when grieving. Sharing loss makes the load of grief easier to carry. Wherever the support comes from, it is important to accept it and do not grieve alone. It’s normal to feel sad, numb, or angry following a loss. But as time passes, these emotions should become less intense as we accept the loss and start to move forward. If we aren’t feeling better over time, or grief is getting worse, it may be a sign that grief has developed into a more serious problem, such as complicated grief or major depression. The sadness of losing someone we love never goes away completely, but it shouldn’t remain centre stage. If the pain of the loss is so constant and severe that it keeps us from resuming our life, we may be suffering from a condition known as complicated grief. Complicated grief is like being stuck in an intense state of mourning. We may have trouble accepting the death long after it has occurred or be so preoccupied with the person who died that it disrupting daily routine and undermines other relationships. (Simons 1979) Symptoms of complicated grief include: * Intense longing and yearning for the deceased * Intrusive thoughts or images of your loved one * Denial of the death or sense of disbelief * Imagining that your loved one is alive * Searching for the person in familiar places * Avoiding things that remind you of your loved one * Extreme anger or bitterness over the loss * Feeling that life is empty or meaningless Every person is individual and deal with grieving process differently ,however some people experience high level of distress which brings them to see the counsellor. (Stroebe,Schut & Stroebe,2005)People seeking counselling would quite often come for help with thoughts, behaviours, feelings or ability to coop. Sometimes grieving person realizes that counselling is the way to go sometimes family or friends would recognize the symptoms and recommend counselling to the grieving person. In both cases it’s counsellors responsibility to help the survivor to adapt to the change. There are certain principles and procedures than counsellor should follow to help client work through grieving process and come to a good outcome. 1, Actualize the loss Talking about loss may be very difficult for client. This can be encouraged by counsellor by asking appropriate questions: when this happened, how this happened, who told you about it, where were you†¦ some clients would need to go over and over it in their minds before they can be fully aware that it has happened. There is not a time scale for this and counsellor will have to follow clients own pace. Counsellor is in this stage clients listener and can facilitate the growing awareness of the loss and its impact by encouraging to verbalize current and past memories of the deceased. 2, Identify and experience feelings Many clients come to counselling as the are worried about what they are feeling. Some feelings can be very confusing and problematic such as anger ,guilt ,helplessness, loneliness, anxiety. Counsellor’s role is to ensure client that all these feelings are natural and are part of grieving process and help them to acknowledge these sometimes negative feelings. It is important not to leave client with negative feelings but to help them find balance between the negative and positive feelings as focusing on negativity may put client in the risk of complications in the bereavement and make them  suitable for medical treatment(Neimeyer 2000) 3, Assist adapt to the loss To achieve this counsellor may use problem solving approach. What are the problems that client is facing and how can this be solved? Counsellor can help to learn effective coping skills help with self esteem if needed .Good judgement of situation is necessary as during acute grief there is an increased risk of maladaptive response. 4, Help find meaning in the loss The specific ways in which people find meaning-strategies such as â€Å"there’s a spiritual order to the universe†,†she drank too much†,I needed to learn something†-may be less sailent than the process itself .In other words,the ability to reascribe meaning to a change world may be more significant than the specific content by which that need is fulfilled.(Schwartzberg and Halgin 1991,p.245) Finding meaning in loss is one of the goals of counselling. The process can be as important as the meaning. 5, Facilitate emotional relocation By this counsellor can help client find a new place in their own life which will help them to move forward with life. Some people don’t need any encouragement but there are many who do. Especially with loss of loved ones people are tended to feel that if they will move on it will dishonour the memory of the deceased or no one will ever fill the place of lost one. Counsellor can help client to realize that this is true to certain extend but it is all right to live and enjoy their own life. 6, Provide time to grieve Grieving requires time and every person deal with loss differently. Client may be going backward and forward in grieving process and counsellor is there to allow as much time as client needs. Sometimes family and friends seem to the grieving person as â€Å"they don’t understand† â€Å"they keep telling me what to do† etc. Counsellor can help interpret to family members that grieving person needs to accommodate to the loss. There is also a critical time periods which for grieving person is more likely to be difficult to coop with. This would be anniversaries, birthdays ,Christmas and holidays. It is advised to make a note of this dates as grieving person would often  need extra support .If these critical dates come after counselling treatment has finished it is advised to make an arrangements to contact client. 7, Allow for individual differences Grieving process has a wide range of behavioural responses and has strong individual differences in the intensity of reactions, pain ,length of time (Schvartzberg&Halgin,1991) Counsellor can help to explain these differences to the family as sometimes they expect everyone to grieve the same way. Of course client’s ethnicity, religion, upbringing and beliefs play major role in the process and counsellor has to be familiar with these factors. 8, Examine defences and coping styles When rapport between client and counsellor has developed clients are more willing to discuss their behaviour. Some of the coping styles can be dangerous( alcohol and drug abuse) and not making adjustment to the loss. Counsellor has to be alert and inquire about this as heavy drug or alcohol use can intensify the grief and depression. As a general rule, normal grief does not warrant the use of antidepressants. While medication may relieve some of the symptoms of grief, it cannot treat the cause, which is the loss itself. Furthermore, by numbing the pain that must be worked through eventually, antidepressants delay the mourning process. Counsellor can help with active emotional coping which seems to be most effective way to deal with bereavement. This techniques includes using humour ,reframing and redefining difficult situation. 9, Identify Pathology and refer In some cases counsellor may recognize a pathological difficulties in client’s behaviour .Some people will not be able to coop and will continue to struggle. This can develop to some type of complicated grief. .In this case counsellor will have to refer client for different type of psychotherapy. Left untreated, complicated grief and depression can lead to significant emotional damage, life-threatening health problems, and even suicide. To summarize grieving process is natural reaction to the loss It is personal highly individual experience. There is impossible to set a time scale or ask when grieving process is finished. Bowlby(1980) and Parkes (1972) both say that grieving is finished when a person completes the final  phase of restitution. There is a sense in which grieving can be finished when people regain an interest in life, feel more hopeful and adapt to the change. In lots of cases grief counselling is helpful but as a therapists we have to accept that not every grieving person needs counselling and for those who do need it counselling has to be customized as grief is unique to each individual ( Neimeyer,2000) References: Bowlby,J.(1980) Attachment and loss ,New York:Basic Books Kubler-Ross,E.(1969) On death and dying. New York:Macmillan Neimeyer,R.(Ed).(2001) Meaning reconstruction and experience of loss. Washington D.C :American Psychological Association Parkes,C.M.(1972).Bereavement:Studies of grief in adult life.New York:International University Press. Sanders,C. (1989 ) Grief:the mourning after.New York Wiley Worden,W.J.(2009) Grief counselling and grief therapy.A handbook for the Mental Health Practitioner New York: Springer Publishing Company

Archaeology Home work Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Archaeology Home work - Essay Example Anthropology entails studying the life of man. Studying the life of man entails looking into man’s behavior and traits, also known as culture, and man’s physical characteristics. Anthropologists get answers ascribed to humans by living within communities and examining them. Archaeology, on the other hand, is about studying the history of man, which is the origin of humanity and the evolution of man through examining the physical remains of their existence. These remains include tools and buildings. One of the greatest challenges that archeologists face is acquiring knowledge on the interpretation of material culture in relation to humans (Renfrew & Bahn, 2012, 12). For instance, archaeologists may discover historical tools but fail to interpret with accuracy how man used them. To understand man’s use of specific material artefacts, ethnography has become a part of archaeology. Ethno archeology enables archeologists to live within communities so that they develop a better understanding of the use of material culture. Archaeology qualifies both as a science and as a humanity. Archaeology qualifies as a science through its involvement in the collection of evidence, performing experiments, the formulation of a working hypothesis and undertaking additional tests on this hypothesis against additional data, and finally coming up with a deduction. In addition to that, archeology employs scientific methods such as radiocarbon dating, which helps to estimate the date when an artifact existed, scientific analyses and experiments undertaken on residues found in pots. Archaeology has developed greatly in the recent past, expanding the field it covers from the earliest periods to the later times. Archeology serves to not only provide an insight into the life of man as it was more than 10, 000 years in the past, but also helps in explaining human civilization (Renfrew & Bahn, 2012, pg15). One of the most

Cont wk11 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Cont wk11 - Essay Example This constant threat creates challenges when they return to civilian life, and decreases their ability to function well. The major symptoms of PTSD include nightmares, irritability, flashbacks, feelings of detachment, trouble concentrating, and problems sleeping (Weiten, 2001). PTSD encompasses an individuals entire life. In trying to separate it into specific points of view, this researcher found that the literature on the topic did not categorize the problem in the ways that the textbook did. The reason for this is because PTSD has characteristics of many perspectives rolled into one. From the psychological point of view, PTSD is a mental health issue that also carries with it depression and anxiety. These issues create a need for obsessive behaviors or to drug and alcohol abuse. As an example, Tuerk, Graubaugh, Hamner and Foa (2009) studied veterans deployed in Iraq and found that many had developed an obsessive need for safety once they returned home. They also became hyper vigilant, over possessive of their families, and many kept a loaded gun under their pillow (Friedman, 2006). These behaviors are not isolated incidents. They generally happen as a result of a noise or situation that happens in the individuals normal environment. As an example, a barking dog or a car back firing can create a PTSD episode. Sometimes these behaviors can make the individual a danger to themselves and/or others. The soldier with PTSD due to combat stress also has common stressors that may add to their episodes of PTSD. As an example, when they rejoin civilian life, their home has changed, responsibilities have changed, and there can be more incidences of family discord. In looking at the psycho-social aspects of PTSD, many soldiers withdraw from friends and family because the family no longer recognizes the role of the deployed person in the family. This can bring about feelings of isolation and loss (National Center for PTSD). Memory plays a large

Talent Practices at the Home Depot Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Talent Practices at the Home Depot - Essay Example Therefore the only manner in which the company can truly differentiate itself is through its service standards. Employees are key to offering customers with the highest levels of service. Home Depot is aware of this fact and therefore uses its employees to gain competitive advantage over its rivals in all the different countries that it operates in. In order to gain competitive advantage through its employees, the company communicates the strategic importance of them to the company (Burke & Cooper, 2004). The performance levels that are expected of them are constantly communicated to them and they are provided with ongoing training to help them to update their knowledge and upgrade their skills, based on the area of the business the work in, whether it is on the shop floor or the office (Adamson, 2006). However since the company has to differentiate itself from its rivals in a highly competitive market, the company pays special attention to employees on the shop floor, who are the first line of contract with the customers and hence the most able to make a difference. Since this is the 'do it yourself' industry, the best employees are those who can help customers in their 'do it yourself' projects. ... refore when recruiting individuals to work on the floor in the retail outlets the company always looks for individuals who have an interest in 'do it yourself' projects (Clarke & Layman, 2004). The company gives priority to individuals who have specialist trades knowledge in areas such as plumbing, wood work, crafts, painting etc. Further individuals who are home owners themselves and have embarked on many different 'do it yourself' projects at home and have the necessary experience to help a customer are given priority. This is not to say that the company does not employ teenagers, high school and college kids. The company does recruit many such individuals but does so only if they have some interest in gardening or home maintenance or areas specific to electronics and home appliances. Therefore the company appeals to the above segments through various means such as trade schools for individuals who have specialist knowledge in such areas, these individuals not only work on the shop floor and as independent contractors for Home Depot but they also deliver work shops in areas such as gardening, wiring, tiling, etc. Next the company also uses the Internet through its website and also job sites such as Workopolis to recruit individuals. Another channel used by the store is in-store advertising for associates during high seasons, and walk in interviews. Discuss the critical programs used by Home Depot to keep talent in their pipeline. The company works with many different trade and vocational schools and builds relationships with these schools to gain access to their graduates, thus having a pipeline of qualified candidates to work for the company as independent contractors. Likewise all individuals who apply for positions within the company but are not successful at

Regulatory & Economic Environment Assignment Essay

Regulatory & Economic Environment Assignment - Essay Example This is also the same for the company to do in an effort to eliminate the competition threat by creating a rather precise marketing plan. The best way to do this is by carrying out a SWOT analysis of the competitors alongside the PEST analysis for a target market. Focusing on the Strengths of the competitor, one recognizes that the company has an already established base in the Asian market and that the deals they are offered are rather superior and worthy seeing as they are already acquainted with the suppliers in the region. A weakness that one can identify in terms of the manner through which business is run is acknowledging the fact that the competitor’s brand has not fully settled in the retailers market. The main reason as to why Brought Kitchens identified the company was the high amounts of sales that it had started making and this was due to a shift in the customers who go for cheaper products. However, accommodating this is one of the most effective strategies to car ry out. Opportunity comes in from the fact that the suppliers, unlike customers do not have a specific product of preference or rather do not have favorite retailers. This gives the company an opportunity of identifying itself with the Asian market. The threats however are in terms of the licensing and revoking of their earlier deal with their former European counterparts in case of anything. Part b Going through the political stature of the Asian market and target markets is important in understanding whether the country is trustworthy for investment and reliance in terms of business. Economic state is also vital in that one gets to understand and have prospects of the prices of the commodities. On the other hand, social factors come into play when attempting to understand the nature of people in the area and their attitude towards foreigners. Technology is also important to comprehend whether the people in the area accept changes in terms of technology which basically happens in c lose intervals. Putting all these factors into consideration assures the company of prosperity in its ventures. Question 2 Part a Dj Sports as stated has had its name in the market for a very long time and the fact that its policy, â€Å"Our name sells itself† is a rather confident one that it shows that there is no need of carrying out advertisements and signing labels just to get their products to the market. However, seeing as there are other companies that have come up in the contemporary environment, a challenge has been posed and the company must act in an effort to keep its product running, a market assessment has to be carried out. Engaging in the SWOT analysis of the company comes in as a key strategy. The fact that the company has been in the market for long in itself is a very large strength seeing as they have earned the reputation and trust of the customers. A weakness however is the fact that the company has decided to lay back and not take on any key advertisem ents as opposed to competitors. Advertisements ensure that the product reaches a wide range of customers and if they do not see the DJ line in advertisements, it is hard for them to choose a product that they know little or nothing about. An opportunity presents itself from the fact that customers believe that the company

If every physical event has a sufficient physical cause, how can a Essay

If every physical event has a sufficient physical cause, how can a functionalist account for mental causation - Essay Example The most important point to note about the functionalism is that it indicates that mental states which constitute beliefs, being in pain and desires are composed entirely by their functional roles. Being a theoretical; level existing between implementation and physical output, functionalism is different from Cartesian dualism which supports the physical substance and mental independency. The aim of this paper is to discuss how functionalist account for mental causation given that every physical event has a sufficient physical cause. One of the major worries that are experienced in functionalism is the problem of mental causation. This refers to facing a problem of accounting for the idea that intentional mental state and intentional thoughts are triggers of intentional actions1. Mental causation covers the mind’s interaction with the rest of the world and how it influences the behavior of individuals. One of the major sub-division of the problem of mental causation is problem of mental causal exclusion. Others are anomalism and externalism problems. A good example of the causal exclusion problem is indicated when pain is experienced and it is generally linked to a certain state, and the higher properties of that state occurs, then argument that it is pain can casually irrelevant. In dealing with the problem of mental causation, various responses have emerged. According to Antony and Levine 1997, the problem occurred due to highly restrictive causation whereby a cause has to produce its effect. Other phil osophers indicate that causation covers the relationships that exist between various events that must be invoked in order to produce a certain behavior. Recently, causal exclusion problem has been noted to relate with theories of mental states. Theorists such as Anthony and Levine indicated that even though mental states can be defined based on their

Bardens Bakery System Investigation Research Paper

Bardens Bakery System Investigation - Research Paper Example Question: Following on from any possible incorrect orders: If an order is received in the afternoon say, then the order would be raised manually, i.e. input by hand. Answer: There is a lot of paperwork associated with this process. Lots of problems with this current system, therefore there it is hoped that new information system can solve [there could be human errors in the 'manual order' process]. Question: How does the delivery process work Answer: Each delivery is dispatched the following day. Answer to Part 2 - SYNOPSIS AND EVALUATION Answer to section 1: The purpose of functional decomposition is to iteratively break down the description of the system into finer detail which creates a set of charts in which one process on a given chart is explained in greater detail on another chart. Each process may consist of several sub processes. Each sub processes may also be broken down into smaller units. Decomposition continues until you have reached the point where no sub process can logically be broken down any further. A good Functional Decomposition helps the analysis in several ways: The simplicity of the structure and representation aids in understanding the breakdown of functions and processes. Specifying the precise requirements and features for each function becomes easier because the functions and processes are broken down into smaller units. The partitioning and independence of the functions localizes errors and minimizes system faults. It allows the customer to view and discuss the organization in a form that can be dealt with, i.e., as a collection of functions, rather than as a continuous process. The process of decomposing the functional requirements is as follows: Decomposition Diagrams: A decomposition diagram or... Each process may consist of several sub processes. Each sub processes may also be broken down into smaller units. Decomposition continues until you have reached the point where no sub process can logically be broken down any further. A data flow diagram (DFD) of the scope of an organizational system that shows the system boundaries, external entities that interact with the system and the major information flows between the entities and the system The above process starts with the primary function of the company and breaks down to the services it provides and the granular level of decomposition is shown to give a picture of all the processes involved and sub processes that are carried on. The preparation for the interview demanded a lot of knowledge of the back ground of the company processes and it required a detailed study of the various processes which are carried on. The inflows, outflows and the various data structures, for example the databases involved. The overall conduct was good. Working within a team led to the identification of facts and better understanding the penetrations of the system and the decision as to how many data flows are involved.

Performance Measurement Systems of Organizations Essay

Performance Measurement Systems of Organizations - Essay Example The different types of performance measures are input measures, process measures, output measures, outcome measures and impact measures. The organizations can develop their own customised systems to meet their specific requirements and circumstances or utilize a number of performance management models and tools to develop their framework. The major performance measurement systems in use today are Balanced scorecard, Activity-based Costing and Management, Investors in People Standard, Quality Management, Charter Mark and Performance Prism. The frameworks are explained in the following sections. A Balanced scorecard defines what management means by "performance" and measures whether management is achieving desired results. Kaplan and Norton (1992) noted that it was designed to improve current performance measurement systems by providing alternatives to managing organizational performance exclusively through financial measures. According to them (1996), "the name reflected the balance between short- and long-term objectives, between financial and non-financial measures, between lagging and leading indicators, and between external and internal performance perspectives." According to CIMA (2005) official definition, the Balanced scorecard is "an approach to the provision of information to the management to assist strategic policy formulation and achievement". A Balanced scorecard is used to clarify or update a business's strategy, link strategic objectives to long-term targets and annual budgets, track the key elements of the business strategy, incorporate strategic objectives into resource allocation processes, facilitate organizational change, compare performance of geographically diverse business units and increase companywide understanding of the corporate vision and strategy. Evolution of the concept The concept was originated by Robert Kaplan and David Norton (1992) as a performance measurement framework that added strategic non-financial performance measures to traditional financial metrics to give managers and executives a more 'balanced' view of organizational performance.The developments in the concept are as follows: a. 1st generation- The Balanced scorecard designs feature a small number of performance measures typically spread across four perspectives, namely; financial, customer, internal processes and learning and growth, as proposed by Kaplan & Norton (1996). b. 2nd generation- New Balanced scorecard designs illustrate how the various objectives are related using a diagram called the 'strategic linkage model' or 'strategy map' (Kaplan & Norton, 2004). Using objectives and linkages helps to provide a stronger basis for choosing measures and for justifying these choices to others. c. 3rd generation- The third generation of Balanced scorecard designs were developed in 2000. These are easier to develop, implement and use than any earlier version. Balanced scorecard has become the focus of a wider strategic management process - a framework for strategic management and control rather than just a performance measurement device. Perspectives The Balanced scorecard sets out a framework of four key perspectives (Kaplan and Norton, 1996), as shown in the following figure. Figure 1 - Perspectives of Balanced

How effective is the strategy of nuclear deterrence Essay

How effective is the strategy of nuclear deterrence - Essay Example The use of weapons of mass destruction may not be a realistic option to solve issues because it goes against the principle of life (Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, 2013). Some countries use nuclear deterrence to impose sanctions on their enemies and prevent them from using their nuclear weapons. This is because they inflict fear on their adversaries such that if the adversary used their nuclear weapons in an unacceptable way, the threatening state will react by using it supposedly superior, nuclear weapons against the adversary, and the damage will be devastating for both countries. Therefore, nuclear deterrence is an attempt to create risks that may make the opponent not to engage in a certain policy or action (Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, 2013). This essay discusses the merits and demerits of the strategy of nuclear deterrence to evaluate its efficacy. As mentioned earlier, nuclear deterrence is the act that involves the prevention of using nuclear weapons (Nuclear Age Peace Foundat ion, 2013). This means that the threatening nation prevents its adversary from using Nuclear weapons against it or its allies, lest the threatening nation will attack its adversary, using nuclear weapons. Therefore, nuclear deterrence is the threat to strike back with nuclear weapons (Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, 2013). ... A threatening nation must be capable and willing to use its nuclear weapon, as well as, effectively communicate this to the nation that is to be deterred to ensure the success of nuclear deterrence (Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, 2013). This means that a deterrent force inflicts unacceptable damage on the nation to be deterred. Secondly, the threatening nation must have the ability to exact payments by disallowing the opponent to accomplish its objectives of using nuclear weapons or by charging the opponent a disproportionate price for achieving the objectives to use nuclear weapons (Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, 2013). Alternatively, the threatening nation can combine the two aforementioned strategies. Further, the threatening nation must ensure that the safety of its nuclear arsenal is guaranteed. Additionally, the opponent must not access a way or method of eliminating the deterring capability of the threatening nation. Therefore, the threatening nation must ensure that technical a nd policy means do not allow the opponent to access a way or method of eliminating the deterring capability of the threatening nation (Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, 2013). Finally, the threatening nation should ensure that it is always ready to demonstrate to its adversary that it can deliver on its message. Therefore, the threatening nation must show that it is willing to engage in a nuclear war that it tries to deter or prevent, if circumstances dictate so (Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, 2013). Having known the preconditions that should be met to ensure the success of nuclear deterrence, it is worthy to analyse the benefits that may accrue from nuclear deterrence, when it is carried out successfully. First, it has been argued by Waltz (1994, p,

Two new species of Chelus from the late tertiary of Northern South America Essay Example for Free

Two new species of Chelus from the late tertiary of Northern South America Essay Testudines Introduction            This is a group of animals widely known as the turtles. The order testudines has over 250 known species of turtles. Testudines are a very unique group of animals due to their shells. The shell is a modified ribcage and vertebral column. All testudines are placed in the order chelonia. (Keith p.5). They can be divided into different categories depending on where they live. Sea turtles and terrestrial turtles. Terrestrial turtles are mostly termed as tortoises while aquatic turtles are known as terrapins. Those that live in salty water oceans are referred to as sea turtles. Apart from Antarctica, testudines can be found in all other continents of the world. They are characterized by a shell. The upper side of the shell is known as the carapace while the lower side is known as plastrone. The shell is normally part of the skin. Evolution history            The first testudines are believed to have lived in the late Triassic periods. This is about two hundred and twenty million years ago. Over two hundred species represented by thirteen group exist today. Since Triassic period, turtles have evolved little by little though it is likely that the modern turtle could resemble the ancient ones with remarkably stable body plan. Testudines are believed to have evolved from body extensions of their back bones and broad ribs that enlarged and grew together to form the protective shell that offered protection at every stage of its evolution even when the components of the bones were not complete( Rieppel 1996 pg453). This is proved by the fossils of freshwater turtles; the odontochelys semitestacea dated back at Triassic period. This species display a complete bony plastrone and an incomplete shell which resembles that of a turtle at embryonic development.            There is no study that shows an exact ancestor for turtles. A molecular analysis of about two hundred and forty eight genes of sixteen vertebrate taxa suggests that testudines could be a sister to birds and crocodiles. (The Achosauria pg35). The separation dates of birds, crocodiles and a turtle is estimated to be two hundred and fifty five million years. The recent common ancestor of the modern turtle is estimated to have occurred about one hundred and fifty seven years ago and corresponds to the separation between cryptodira and preurodira.            Proganochelys is the earliest known fully shelled turtle of the late Triassic period. This genus had so many undisputed traits of the modern turtle. However it lacked the ability to pull its head back into the shell and had a long spiked tail ending in a club. This body form resembles that of ankylosaurs is believed to have resulted from convergent evolution.            Testudines have two extant suborders; pleurodira and cryptodira. Cryptodira is the larger of the two and include all terrestrial turtles, marine turtles and most of the freshwater turtles. Pleurodira is the smaller suborder and consists most of the freshwater species. Taxonomy            Testudines are commonly referred to as tortoises, turtles or terrapins. . There are fourteen extant families of this order. The order has more than three hundred known species though others may have been extinct with time. Ninety seven genera of testudines are also known. These genera are split into two suborders which are cryptodirans and pleurodirans in which the distinguishing factor is how the animals fold their neck to pull their head back into the shell. Pleurodirans have long necks and which they fold sideways while cryptodirans have short ones and they fold them straight back to pull their heads back into the shell. Pelomedusidae and cheidae are the only known extant families of the pleurodires.            The cryptodirans the following known families: carettochelydae, cheloniidae, Testudinae, Dermochelyidae, Chelydridae, kinosternidae, Emydidae and Trionychidae. (Romer 1933 pg 5)            Testudines are placed in a subclass known as Anapsida. Generally, testudines are placed in the following scientific classification.            Kingdom- AnimaliaPhylum- ChordataClass- SauropsidaOrder- Testudines (Linnaeus, 1758 pg 40) Diet            The diet of the testudines varies with the environment as well as the age. Adult turtles’ main diet is aquatic plants, invertebrates such as warms, insects and snails but sometimes they can eat dead marine animals. Some freshwater turtles are carnivals and are reported to feed on small fish and other aquatic small creatures. Young turtles are purely carnivores and feed on crab and snails. This is because proteins are essential for the formation of the carapace and other body features.            Sea turtles feed on sponge, jellyfish and other and other soft bodied sea creatures. Turtles that have stronger jaws have been reported to feed on jellyfish. Some turtles such as green sea turtles are purely herbivores and feed on mainly algae. Behavior            Turtles are extant reptiles and therefore are all of their species endotherms. With this they are seen basking in the sun especially in morning either on rocks or bare soil for terrestrial ones or floating on water for sea turtles. Turtles breathe through the lung and lay their egg on dry ground and not in water. A turtle will fold its neck and pull its head in the shell if it notices any form of danger. Turtles have good night vision due to large number of rod cells in their retina therefore most of them prey at night. They have a great color vision with sensitivities ranging from the near ultraviolet to red. Testudines have poor pursuit movement especially the terrestrial ones. However, carnivores ones can move their necks very fast to catch their prey.            All turtles have rigid beaks and use their jaws to catch, cut and chew their food. Testudines are social creatures and sometimes switch between promiscuity and monogamy in their sexual behavior. The rigid carapace of the turtle is dome-shaped which is difficult for any prey to crush and it is also used for camouflaging in case of danger or when preying. (Laurin 1999 pg65)            Turtles live for long and take long before they reach breeding age. They do not have any parental care so ones they lay their eggs, they leave them to hatch on their own and the young ones are left to find their way to their natural habitat. Habitat            Testudines resides in different environments ranging from freshwater, salt water, coastline and tropical reefs. They inhabit almost all non-arctic terrestrial region which include deserts, mountains, prairie and mountains. (Alderton, 2012 pg15) Interactions of turtles with human beings Some turtles such as red-eared sliders are considered pests where they are not native. The flesh of turtle’s calipii is used for food in some cultures. In the Island of Grand Cayman, turtles are a traditional diet. Fat from turtles is used in cosmetic industry in Mexico and Caribbean. Chinese use turtle plastrons as traditional medicine. Small sized Testudines are mostly used as pets in most parts of the world. References Alderton, David, and Susan Barraclough. Amazing snakes and reptiles. New York: Sandy Creek, 2012. Print.Fogel, David. Matamatas: the natural history, captive care, and breeding of Chelus fimbriatus. Ada: Living Art Publishing, 2011. Print. Wood, Roger Conant. Two new species of Chelus (Testudines: pleurodira): from the late tertiary of Northern South America. Cambridge, Mass.: Museum of Comparative Zoology, 1976. Print. Source document

Analysis of the Armed Special Forces Act 1943 in India

Analysis of the Armed Special Forces Act 1943 in India Civil society is a term oft-repeated in democratic contexts today. Seen as an essential component of the liberal framework of political structures, it is essentially the space of free association for the masses. India, a multicultural democratic country, boasts of a vibrant civil society. At the same time, it also has accusations of being one of the worst offenders of human and civil liberties of some of its people, in the form of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act. This chapter seeks to introduce the motivation, hypothesis, methodology and key concepts of this paper. Introduction The spotlight of global affairs and the ‘march to democracy has been on the Middle East in 2011. Mass rebellions against autocratic, unjust and oppressive regimes have swept the region in a sort of domino-effect swarming hordes of people rose up to replace what seemed no more applicable or tolerable in Tunisia to Tahrir Square in Egypt, in a bid to in-state the only form of governance that allowed ‘power to the people i.e. democracy. This phenomenon has come to the West as a pleasant surprise, that have viewed the Islamic world as essentially subject to notions of conservatism, violence and religion all seen as harbingers of a pre-modern past that the West feels it has left behind for good. â€Å"What is happening in Tunisia and Egypt is the completion of the 1989 revolutions the Egyptians are reclaiming the values of the Solidarnosc and the Civic Forum from the neo-liberals who usurped them The people in Tahrir Square and elsewhere are giving us back the meaning of c ivil society a place where people can talk, discuss and act freely,† says Mary Kaldor , examining the notion of civil society and how it has changed since the last time it was picked up from the annals of a rejected history and reinvented to bring monumental political change in Eastern European states. Closer home, the beginning of summer this year has seen a heated campaign against corruption being driven by a single mans Satyagraha Anna Hazare would definitely qualify as a ‘non-entity even by the modest standards of celebration that Indian civil society activists enjoy. Yet, this army truck driver of the 1960s is today the poster-boy of ‘publicness, coming to symbolise the space for mediation and political interference to bring out moral dividends that is the hallmark of a vibrant democracy. Some have called his actions ‘Gandhian, one of the few attempts at reform emerging from among the non-political that post-independence India has seen, otherwise witnessed only in Irom Sharmilas consistent campaign from Manipur against the travails of militarisation of the north-east region and abuse of power that the Armed Forces Special Powers Act 1958 has become synonymous with. The Armed Forces Special Powers Act, which the Indian government has thought fit to implement in two contexts all the North Eastern states and Jammu Kashmir is arguably among the most contentious legislations of post-Independence India. Said to be based on a 1942 British ordinance intended to contain the Indian independence movement (Quit India movement) during World War II, it was enacted as a short-term measure to allow the deployment of the army in Indias north-eastern Naga Hills but since has been in existence for five decades. It has, since then, also been implemented in Jammu Kashmir which has shown violent separatist aspirations since the late 1980s. The Act has been controversial because of the fact that it gives to the armed forces extended powers of action without accountability, which has led to abuse of power and gross violation of human and civil rights, building around it a sense of impunity. In a democratic framework, this move to retain the sovereign integrity of the Indian state has been vociferously derided by people both within and outside these regions. Even though justifications for the laws existence abound from freedom of operation to existence of provisions for accountability and redress within the armed forces set up, the Act in itself has become a symbol of oppression at the hands of the Indian state and therefore a part of the problem, not the solution. Hypothesis This paper attempts to therefore study civil society in India its role and scope with specific focus on this nugget of legislation that has a strong reference to the case of maintaining or violating civil liberty in a democracy. It seeks to analyse the effectiveness of the Indian democracy in this respect, considering whether ‘power to the people is just another catchphrase or if it goes deeper than that. This researcher is of the view that even though the definition of a modern civil society in a multicultural context as India needs to be revisited, and even though largely (as in the case of the AFSPA) political, military, judicial and legislative action has a will of its own, there is scope for activism and there are voices that get heard. The necessity of such a space of negotiation in a democracy cannot be stressed hard enough. The arbitrariness of power, possible marginalisation of the ‘have-nots and the dilemma of national unity versus individual rights need to be examined in the light of modern liberal rhetoric of freedom and equality that are foundational aspects of the Indian constitution. Methodology The study has used both primary and secondary sources of data along with analysis using both the deductive and inductive methods. I have analyzed government records, media reports, library sources, existing literature on the subject, archival data, think-tank reports as well as spoken / interviewed a few primary sources within the civil society. The study has also use information and experience gathered at symposiums, lectures and workshops related to the topic. It has been largely qualitative in approach, since the issue required an exploration of theory and potential policy-making role of civil society in situations of conflict and civil unrest. Chapterisation The paper shall follow this sequence: the first chapter will examine the trajectory of conceptualisation of civil society in the corpus of philosophy and political studies and its relevance globally as well as in India. The second chapter will elaborate upon the Act, the controversy and the issues surrounding it. In the third chapter, I will look at civil society initiatives regarding this aspect, both in terms of humanitarian redressal and rehabilitation and attempts at political negotiation and policy amendment. It will also look critically at the degree to which these initiatives have worked in mitigating the more negative consequences of the law. The last chapter, in conclusion, will critically analyse the role that civil society has played so far in the dynamics of the Indian democracy and the scope for positive change it contains. The rest of this chapter is dedicated to elaborating on the key concepts of this paper: civil society and the Armed Forces Special Powers Act. Key Concepts Civil Society: It is crucial to understand what civil society in a changed global context means. Historically, it has been understood to mean the public space that exists between the family and the state that seeks to mitigate the preponderance of individualism as well as the ‘tyranny of the majority. Based on principles of voluntarism, association and pluralism and tolerance, this was an imagination that sought to negotiate with power structures in every context it arose in, whether during industrialisation of England where a new bourgeois class of powerful traders emerged that sought to bargain with the state and the Church for power, or in Eastern Europe of the 1980s where a bid to parlay Communism resulted in associational uprising that stemmed out of sports clubs, trade unions, bars and basements. After 1989, civil society got the rejuvenation that had been missing for the past couple of centuries since Marx and Gramsci had derided it as yet another excuse for state/power domination and co-option of the masses. It has since been taken much more seriously, both academically and in its practical application, although consensus on what it constitutes is hard to come by. However, with democracy becoming the chosen form of ‘correct government, where representation and election to power is ‘by the people, for the people and of the people, civil society assumes new meaning as the arena of civilised battle. There is more to a democracy than public participation through ballot-box approval. This, in a nutshell, could be the motive for a functional civil society.   However, the proprietorship of the West over the concept of civil society is often criticised. By linking it with modernity, it is seen to be a concept both inherently Western and also as the Wests boon to the world. Ernest Gellner paints civil society as the space of the profane that gives freedom to the baser aspects of human beings and their relationships. Having associated it with capitalist liberalism, he posits many upcoming rivals to it such as Islam, Asiatic capitalism, fierce nationalism- leading one to believe that this essentially Western notion is one under threat from more preponderant forces in different parts of the world that do not essentially derive from rationality. Mary Kaldor finds in this a patronising approach of the entire West, evident also in US and Europes response to the upheaval in the Middle East. She observes that there already exists a term for civil society in Arabic Almujtamaa Almadani and therefore finds that the concept has more antiquated roots than otherwise presumed. To offset this overlordism, she says, â€Å"Instead of imposing yet another neo-liberal formula, western countries and institutions should consult the people of the Middle East about how they can help to construct a fairer, more sustainable economy. Instead of giving governments money to buy western weapons, they could discuss with civil society how they could help to restructure the armed forces to provide human security, to establish civilian control over the military, and to convert the substantial military industries to peaceful uses.† Ruminating on the changed idea of civil society, she says disappointedly, â€Å"After 1989, everyone celebrated the idea of civil society. But it was rapidly reduced within the framework of neo-liberal thinking to mean western-supported NGOs who would help to smooth the path of neo-liberal transition.† In the post-Cold War phase, since the world has gone more global, the meaning of civil society has veered towards international-level cooperation and institutionalism, through NGOs, forums, transnational networks of activities to work on a ‘global humanitarian regime. It has now become a buzzword relating to democracies, liberalism, neo-liberalism, anti-war movements, global justice and so on, and thereby is seen as a platform inhabited by activists of all sorts. In the normative sense, civil society is and always has been seen as the arena where consent is generated for and in opposition to concentrated authority. In the descriptive sense, or in considering what all should be included in this realm, lies the tensions should regulatory bodies such as the UN and the World Bank be considered part of civil society? Should one include international NGOs that depend on government funding? Does civil society include religious or ethnic organisations? Does it include militant or sece ssionist organisations that are fighting against an oppressive state or for some defined nationalism? As the concerns that occupy minds in a global world change (such as todays preoccupations include AIDS, landmines, terrorism, nuclear disarmament/disaster, receding water levels etc), the definitions of all realms of society would change too. This paper, taking insights from the corpus of philosophy on the subject, defines civil society as the associational space, lying between the family, state and market, where autonomous individuals voluntarily come together to define and pursue common goals to reap collective benefits. Schmitters definition of civil society, as a set or system of self-organised intermediary groups that: (1) are relatively independent of both public authorities and private units of production and reproduction, that is, of firms and families; (2) are capable of deliberating about and taking collective actions in defence or promotion of their interests or passions; (3) do not seek to replace either state agents or private (re)producers or to accept responsibility fo r governing the polity as a whole; and (4) agree to act within pre-established rules of a civil, i.e. mutually respectful, nature. It is civil society based on the four characteristics of dual autonomy, collective action, nonusurpation and civility that this paper will refer to. The Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act (AFSPA): The Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act is a law, enacted by the Parliament of India, to meet violent internal situations created by underground militant outfits to further their illegal and ‘unconstitutional causes. The law was enacted to provide necessary powers and legal support to the Armed forces for carrying out proactive operations against the militants in a highly hostile environment that was threatening the integrity and sovereignty of the Indian nation-state. The Act dates back to September 11, 1958, when the Parliament of India passed the act bestowing more power on the armed forces in â€Å"disturbed areas†. First introduced in the states of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura, the Act was later extended to Jammu and Kashmir as the Armed Forces (Jammu and Kashmir) Special Powers Act, 1990 in July 1990. The Act allows an officer of the armed forces to fire upon or otherwise use force, even to the causing of death, against any person who is acting in contravention of any law against assembly of five or more persons or possession of deadly weapons, to arrest without a warrant and with the use of necessary force anyone who has committed certain offenses or is suspected of having done so, to enter and search any premise in order to make such arrests. The act also bestows legal immunity to the officials, which means that they cannot be sued or prosecuted. While the law was enacted to mitigate militant action, violence and to quell secessionist tendencies that violated the essence of the Indian union, it has since inception over half a century ago turned into a controversial aspect of governance in the country. An increasing militarisation of areas branded as ‘disturbed and a consequent violation of human rights and civil liberties has resulted in a worsening of conditions in both the regions it has been applied to. Instead of bringing about greater cohesion, or of managing to bring the north-east and Jammu Kashmir peacefully into the fold of the Indian union, the law has become just another reason for the strengthening of secessionist demands. This is in contradiction with the reasoning given for consistent political will to keep the Act in place in the two regions: in a response to the United Nations Human Rights Committee questioning the validity of the AFSPA under the Indian law and in light of Article 4 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, ICCPR, the Attorney General of India responded that the AFSPA is a necessary measure to prevent the secession of the North Eastern states. He said that a response to this agitation for secession in the North East had to be done on a war footing. He argued that the Indian Constitution, in Article 355, made it the duty of the Central Government to protect the states from internal disturbance and that there is no duty under international law to allow secession.â€Å"The shrill rhetoric demanding that the Armed Forces Special Powers Act be repealed, if allowed to hold sway, may drive us deeper into the dark world of both Islamist terror and the Maoist insurgency, † Brigadier S K Chatterji (retd) has warned more recently. The primary issue of controversy here is the violation of human and civil rights. According to a Human Rights Watch report, the act is in violation in the following respects: The right to life is violated by section 4(a) of the AFSPA, which grants the armed forces power to shoot to kill in law enforcement situations without regard to international human rights law restrictions on the use of lethal force. The right to liberty and security of person is violated by section 4(c) of the AFSPA, which fails to protect against arbitrary arrest by allowing soldiers to arrest anyone merely on suspicion that a â€Å"cognizable offence† has already taken place or is likely to take place in the future. Further, the AFSPA provides no specific time limit for handing arrested persons to the nearest police station. The right to remedy is violated by section 6 of the AFSPA, which provides officers who abuse their powers under the AFSPA with immunity from legal accountability. This section of th e AFSPA prohibits even state governments from initiating legal proceedings against the armed forces on behalf of their population without central government approval. Since such a sanction is seldom granted, it has in effect provided a shield of immunity for armed forces personnel implicated in serious abuses. In practice the AFSPA also facilitates violation of the right to be free from torture, and from cruel or degrading treatment. Since the AFSPA provides powers to arrest without warrant and then detain arrested persons for unspecified amounts of time, the armed forces routinely engage in torture and other ill-treatment during interrogation in army barracks. However, the support from within the armed forces and certain other sections of the political and academic circles is strong for the continuance of this act. Northern Army Commander General Jaswal in Jammu Kashmir gave the following reasoning: I would like to say that the provisions of the Armed Forces Special Power Act are very pious to me and I think to entire Indian ArmyWe have religious books, there are certain guidelines which are given there, but all the members of the religion do not follow it, they break it also, does it imply that you remove the religious book or you remove this chap. My take on it is to find someone guilty, take him to task, but dont touch this pious document or provision of the Armed Forces Special Power Act giving the similarity to religious book.† In the past couple of months Army has argued that without the Act it will not be able to launch proactive operations. The Army will also not be able to use force except in self-defence and not have powers to destroy ammunition dumps and IEDs. The army also says that a majority of human rights abuse cases are found to be false and those found true have been severely dealt with. Human rights activists have however contended time and again that the Act gives excessive powers to the soldiers. Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah has said in recent past that there is a need to revoke the Act since it is prone to abuse. One of the grounds that the citizens have stated is that the people arrested or otherwise detained should be allowed to plead their case under section 130 and 131 of the Criminal Code. The Article 21 of the Constitution also gets violated in the process. In spite of the various cases filed and protests initiated there has been no revocation or dialogue towards the same. The issue revolving the AFSPA is that the principle of national integrity and sovereignty is in direct conflict with the liberal democratic frameworks of human rights and the civil society has the potential to the site for this negotiation. This is the premise under which the rest of this paper seeks to examine how the civil society and the Indian state have sought to deal with the AFSPA. CIVIL SOCIETY This Chapter seeks to chart the history of philosophy on civil society, in political sciences and social sciences. It will then look at civil society in India specifically, in todays context, and some of the major criticisms levelled against the concept and its real-time manifestation. Civil Society: The Concept At the abstract level, civil society has historically been conceptualised as a mediating space between the family, state and recently, also separate from the market. It is the site of association, voluntariness and community engagement, set apart from the politics and compulsions of the state as well as the individuality and liberty of the family. Bruce Sievers identifies seven strands that go into the making of civil society: nonprofit and voluntary institutions, individual rights, rule of law, the common good, philanthropy, freedom of expression and tolerance. Emerging in the context of the 18th century industrialisation rampant in Europe that gave rise to a new class of bourgeoisie and the new ideas of utilitarianism and capitalism, civil society gets inextricably linked with libertarian ideals that seek to carve out spaces for autonomous action in every individual and societal aspect.   â€Å"A ‘civil society was civilized and ordered by the rule of law. Unlike tribal so ciety, it was also large-scale and held together by impersonal bonds of interest rather than ties of kin and blood. It was also, to a degree some found frightening, a self-correcting mechanism in which the selfish actions of myriad individuals, brought together only by the rule of law, managed to produce an orderly and dynamic accumulation of prosperity unprecedented in human history,† observes Michael Ignatieff The importance of social engagement and principle of tolerance have only gained more importance in a globalised world that is characterised by multi-cultural, multi-ethnic nations. Robert Putnam identifies civic engagement, dense networks of interaction, political equality, solidarity, trust and tolerance and a strong associational life as crucial to the generation of ‘social capital the resource that could help to facilitate coordination and cooperation for mutual benefit in societies. He says that networks of civic engagement foster norms of generalised reciprocity, encourage the emergence of social trust, facilitate communication, collaboration and therefore collective action on common dilemmas and endorse the idea of collective benefits. Through its history, a number of philosophers have vouched for and expanded upon this realm of an advanced society. Alexis de Tocqueville , in Democracy in America, says that Americas answer to the problem of limiting the absolutist state was to have a constitution defined in law and protected by a counterbalancing force of independent bodies. These were the local associations of citizens acting together in the affairs of daily life. This was a civil society engaged in politics, voluntary by nature. His idea of civil society was based in the observation of an absolute sovereignty of the majority, but this principle, which could just as well turn into a tyranny of the majority, was also mitigated through a non-centralised frame of governance that set importance to localised chains of command and responsibility. Civicness emerged in America, he observed, through the relentless formation of associations: â€Å"Americans of all ages, all stations in life, and all types of disposition ar e forever forming associations. There are not only commercial and industrial associations in which all take part, but others of a thousand different typesreligious, moral, serious, futile, very general and very limited, immensely large and very minute. . . . Nothing, in my view, deserves more attention than the intellectual and moral associations in America.† Civil Society, for Hegel , is the site that lies between the Family and the State in the Ethical Life, as described in his Philosophy of Right. It is the site where the ‘determination of particularity as per individual rights is given free rein, but which has to acquire a mantle of universality for the rights to become acquirable or even legitimate, so to speak. Here, therefore, are two elements: the concrete person who is out to pursue self-interest and personal motive, and the form of universality, or the generation of common motive, through forming bonds and finding over-lapping areas of interest. A particular end, therefore, assumes the form of universality through this relation to other people, and it is attained in the simultaneous attainment of the welfare of others. It has three dimensions: the system of needs, the administration of justice and the police and the corporation. The system of needs refers to the generation of ‘universal human capital through human beings exceptional capacity to generate needs and spot commonness with others and then to satisfy those needs through work and labour. A single persons particularity of interest can be recognised if he manages to associate himself with one sphere of the needs. The administration of justice is the principle of rightness that becomes universally known through a public legal code. Not only does this embed within the principle of freedom in both subjective individual and universal platforms, it also makes wrongdoing an infringement on the people that live within such an ethical life. The polizei, then, is the bearer and the guardian of this publicly generated and accepted principles of right, the public authority that also looks after public utilities and regulation activities as well. The corporation, on the other hand, is the arrangement whereby common interests are brought to fore through voluntary association as in sports or religious clubs etc. All these aspects together form the civil society for Hegel, the space where freedom of self-interest is allowed to reign but within the limits of the principle of universality.   Antonio Gramsci, however, had a more critical view of civil society, from a Marxist vantage point. He saw civil society not as the benign space that afforded a voice and power to the masses, but as an instrument of domination linked in an unholy alliance with the bourgeois elements in the civil society seeking to protect propertied interests . He was also convinced that the intricate, organic relationships between civil society and political society enable certain strata of society not only to gain dominance within the state but also, and more importantly, to maintain it, perpetuating the subalternity of other strata. In other words, the site of hegemony was civil society it was the arena wherein the ruling class extends and reinforces its power by non-violent means through components such as the press, the libraries, schools, associations and clubs that could all become media for propaganda and homogenisation of the masses. The state and the civil society in his purview are inextri cably linked, which only facilitates subordination by the state without coercion, focussing instead on ‘manufacturing consent. However, he does acknowledge the potential of civil society as a site for breeding revolutions and for newer ‘conceptions of the world to take place. However, the manifestation of this fairly utopian concept is fraught with tensions and dichotomies. Ernest Gellner, in Conditions of Liberty, analyses the role of civil society in the Marxist, socialist and capitalist frameworks and has also assessed post-modern rivals to it that have emerged, such as Islam. The Eastern European states found the concept of civil society useful in gaining independence from a Communist stronghold precisely because of the possibility here for mobilisation of the masses in opposition to totalitarian militarist regimes. Through meetings of trade unions, religious groups, bars etc, the emphasis was on autonomy, self-organisation and withdrawal from the state to create islands of civic engagement for the emergence of a ‘parallel polis. For Gellner, a civil society was â€Å"a profane society, a society that explicitly sought to put the lowest of human desires to productive uses. Mandevilles paradox private vices make public virtues naturalized the profane by demonstrating that â€Å"capitalist individuals were more likely to promote the public good when they looked exclusively to their private interest.† He found the Marxist, and therefore the socialist strain of civil society, that stressed on driving religion out of life and also investing the economic with the ultimate sacredness, as faulty for it denied space to the profane, the self-interest and avarice of human nature that could be harnessed and channelled into collective action. With the ‘disenchantment of the world that comes with modernity and its powerful agencies of science and capitalism came the advent of ‘the modular man    who associates voluntarily with other prototypes, giving rise to a Gesellschaft, the inorganic form of social bonding, through fostered ties, rather than a Gemeinschaft, the organic community based on ties of blood and kin. â€Å"The genius of capitalist civil society is that it not only harnesses our profane energies, b ut relieves us of the moral burden of thinking of them as profane. In so doing, it relieves us of the strain of constant longing for unattainable self-transcendence in desperate simulations of paradise,† says Ignatieff. He also observes that liberty in civil society is essentially negative because there cannot be, in principle, agreement among human beings about the positive ends of political communities, beyond the protection of the liberties of the individuals who compose it. If people seek to overcome their own alienation and separateness, they can do so only as individuals or in voluntary groups. Civil society, then, becomes crucial for maintaining checks and balances, says Ignatieff. The realms of politics, economics and culture are neatly segregated, and power in any one domain does not endow power in another. The society is free, acting through a vibrant media and elected representatives, all functioning within the ambit of law. â€Å"Needless to say, no civil society has ever lived up to this goalyet the formal promise is more than hypocrisy: it remains the standard against which civil society judges itself and from which it finds renewed impetus to reform.† In this sense, civil society, albeit being a flawed ideal, also has the potential for redeeming itself simply by virtue of being embedded in the notion of reform, of itself as well as of society, simply by virtue of allowing private trajectories of interest being followed.   Despite changing meanings, civil societys core rests in a rule-governed society based on the consent of individuals. The ‘social contract that Hobbes defined is another way of understanding the liberal ideas behind the conception of civil society through different phases, civil society can be seen as the process or the space through which different individuals negotiate, argue, struggle against or agree with each other and with the centres of political and economic authority. The element of autonomy, voluntariness and collective action through association remain hallmarks through all definitions of the term. Civil Society in India: It would seem natural that civil society, as has been described and conceptualised above is an integral part of a democracy, with its accompanying notions of equality, public participation, and masses-oriented governance. Robert Post and Nancy Rosenblum describe a consensus among contemporary theorists â€Å"that democracy depends on the particularist, self-determining associations of civil society, where independent commitments, interests, and voices, are developed . Civil society is the precondition for democratic decision making, whether democracy is conceived as deliberation or as interest group pluralism, and this is true even if the goal of democracy is to transcend particularism and arrive at uncoerced agreement or a common will.† According to Joerg Forbrig, a vibrant and functional civil society can contribute to strengthening a democracy in five ways: control of state power through the incorporation of a body of laws, individual rights and thereby becoming a space that overlooks the relationship between the pr Analysis of the Armed Special Forces Act 1943 in India Analysis of the Armed Special Forces Act 1943 in India Civil society is a term oft-repeated in democratic contexts today. Seen as an essential component of the liberal framework of political structures, it is essentially the space of free association for the masses. India, a multicultural democratic country, boasts of a vibrant civil society. At the same time, it also has accusations of being one of the worst offenders of human and civil liberties of some of its people, in the form of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act. This chapter seeks to introduce the motivation, hypothesis, methodology and key concepts of this paper. Introduction The spotlight of global affairs and the ‘march to democracy has been on the Middle East in 2011. Mass rebellions against autocratic, unjust and oppressive regimes have swept the region in a sort of domino-effect swarming hordes of people rose up to replace what seemed no more applicable or tolerable in Tunisia to Tahrir Square in Egypt, in a bid to in-state the only form of governance that allowed ‘power to the people i.e. democracy. This phenomenon has come to the West as a pleasant surprise, that have viewed the Islamic world as essentially subject to notions of conservatism, violence and religion all seen as harbingers of a pre-modern past that the West feels it has left behind for good. â€Å"What is happening in Tunisia and Egypt is the completion of the 1989 revolutions the Egyptians are reclaiming the values of the Solidarnosc and the Civic Forum from the neo-liberals who usurped them The people in Tahrir Square and elsewhere are giving us back the meaning of c ivil society a place where people can talk, discuss and act freely,† says Mary Kaldor , examining the notion of civil society and how it has changed since the last time it was picked up from the annals of a rejected history and reinvented to bring monumental political change in Eastern European states. Closer home, the beginning of summer this year has seen a heated campaign against corruption being driven by a single mans Satyagraha Anna Hazare would definitely qualify as a ‘non-entity even by the modest standards of celebration that Indian civil society activists enjoy. Yet, this army truck driver of the 1960s is today the poster-boy of ‘publicness, coming to symbolise the space for mediation and political interference to bring out moral dividends that is the hallmark of a vibrant democracy. Some have called his actions ‘Gandhian, one of the few attempts at reform emerging from among the non-political that post-independence India has seen, otherwise witnessed only in Irom Sharmilas consistent campaign from Manipur against the travails of militarisation of the north-east region and abuse of power that the Armed Forces Special Powers Act 1958 has become synonymous with. The Armed Forces Special Powers Act, which the Indian government has thought fit to implement in two contexts all the North Eastern states and Jammu Kashmir is arguably among the most contentious legislations of post-Independence India. Said to be based on a 1942 British ordinance intended to contain the Indian independence movement (Quit India movement) during World War II, it was enacted as a short-term measure to allow the deployment of the army in Indias north-eastern Naga Hills but since has been in existence for five decades. It has, since then, also been implemented in Jammu Kashmir which has shown violent separatist aspirations since the late 1980s. The Act has been controversial because of the fact that it gives to the armed forces extended powers of action without accountability, which has led to abuse of power and gross violation of human and civil rights, building around it a sense of impunity. In a democratic framework, this move to retain the sovereign integrity of the Indian state has been vociferously derided by people both within and outside these regions. Even though justifications for the laws existence abound from freedom of operation to existence of provisions for accountability and redress within the armed forces set up, the Act in itself has become a symbol of oppression at the hands of the Indian state and therefore a part of the problem, not the solution. Hypothesis This paper attempts to therefore study civil society in India its role and scope with specific focus on this nugget of legislation that has a strong reference to the case of maintaining or violating civil liberty in a democracy. It seeks to analyse the effectiveness of the Indian democracy in this respect, considering whether ‘power to the people is just another catchphrase or if it goes deeper than that. This researcher is of the view that even though the definition of a modern civil society in a multicultural context as India needs to be revisited, and even though largely (as in the case of the AFSPA) political, military, judicial and legislative action has a will of its own, there is scope for activism and there are voices that get heard. The necessity of such a space of negotiation in a democracy cannot be stressed hard enough. The arbitrariness of power, possible marginalisation of the ‘have-nots and the dilemma of national unity versus individual rights need to be examined in the light of modern liberal rhetoric of freedom and equality that are foundational aspects of the Indian constitution. Methodology The study has used both primary and secondary sources of data along with analysis using both the deductive and inductive methods. I have analyzed government records, media reports, library sources, existing literature on the subject, archival data, think-tank reports as well as spoken / interviewed a few primary sources within the civil society. The study has also use information and experience gathered at symposiums, lectures and workshops related to the topic. It has been largely qualitative in approach, since the issue required an exploration of theory and potential policy-making role of civil society in situations of conflict and civil unrest. Chapterisation The paper shall follow this sequence: the first chapter will examine the trajectory of conceptualisation of civil society in the corpus of philosophy and political studies and its relevance globally as well as in India. The second chapter will elaborate upon the Act, the controversy and the issues surrounding it. In the third chapter, I will look at civil society initiatives regarding this aspect, both in terms of humanitarian redressal and rehabilitation and attempts at political negotiation and policy amendment. It will also look critically at the degree to which these initiatives have worked in mitigating the more negative consequences of the law. The last chapter, in conclusion, will critically analyse the role that civil society has played so far in the dynamics of the Indian democracy and the scope for positive change it contains. The rest of this chapter is dedicated to elaborating on the key concepts of this paper: civil society and the Armed Forces Special Powers Act. Key Concepts Civil Society: It is crucial to understand what civil society in a changed global context means. Historically, it has been understood to mean the public space that exists between the family and the state that seeks to mitigate the preponderance of individualism as well as the ‘tyranny of the majority. Based on principles of voluntarism, association and pluralism and tolerance, this was an imagination that sought to negotiate with power structures in every context it arose in, whether during industrialisation of England where a new bourgeois class of powerful traders emerged that sought to bargain with the state and the Church for power, or in Eastern Europe of the 1980s where a bid to parlay Communism resulted in associational uprising that stemmed out of sports clubs, trade unions, bars and basements. After 1989, civil society got the rejuvenation that had been missing for the past couple of centuries since Marx and Gramsci had derided it as yet another excuse for state/power domination and co-option of the masses. It has since been taken much more seriously, both academically and in its practical application, although consensus on what it constitutes is hard to come by. However, with democracy becoming the chosen form of ‘correct government, where representation and election to power is ‘by the people, for the people and of the people, civil society assumes new meaning as the arena of civilised battle. There is more to a democracy than public participation through ballot-box approval. This, in a nutshell, could be the motive for a functional civil society.   However, the proprietorship of the West over the concept of civil society is often criticised. By linking it with modernity, it is seen to be a concept both inherently Western and also as the Wests boon to the world. Ernest Gellner paints civil society as the space of the profane that gives freedom to the baser aspects of human beings and their relationships. Having associated it with capitalist liberalism, he posits many upcoming rivals to it such as Islam, Asiatic capitalism, fierce nationalism- leading one to believe that this essentially Western notion is one under threat from more preponderant forces in different parts of the world that do not essentially derive from rationality. Mary Kaldor finds in this a patronising approach of the entire West, evident also in US and Europes response to the upheaval in the Middle East. She observes that there already exists a term for civil society in Arabic Almujtamaa Almadani and therefore finds that the concept has more antiquated roots than otherwise presumed. To offset this overlordism, she says, â€Å"Instead of imposing yet another neo-liberal formula, western countries and institutions should consult the people of the Middle East about how they can help to construct a fairer, more sustainable economy. Instead of giving governments money to buy western weapons, they could discuss with civil society how they could help to restructure the armed forces to provide human security, to establish civilian control over the military, and to convert the substantial military industries to peaceful uses.† Ruminating on the changed idea of civil society, she says disappointedly, â€Å"After 1989, everyone celebrated the idea of civil society. But it was rapidly reduced within the framework of neo-liberal thinking to mean western-supported NGOs who would help to smooth the path of neo-liberal transition.† In the post-Cold War phase, since the world has gone more global, the meaning of civil society has veered towards international-level cooperation and institutionalism, through NGOs, forums, transnational networks of activities to work on a ‘global humanitarian regime. It has now become a buzzword relating to democracies, liberalism, neo-liberalism, anti-war movements, global justice and so on, and thereby is seen as a platform inhabited by activists of all sorts. In the normative sense, civil society is and always has been seen as the arena where consent is generated for and in opposition to concentrated authority. In the descriptive sense, or in considering what all should be included in this realm, lies the tensions should regulatory bodies such as the UN and the World Bank be considered part of civil society? Should one include international NGOs that depend on government funding? Does civil society include religious or ethnic organisations? Does it include militant or sece ssionist organisations that are fighting against an oppressive state or for some defined nationalism? As the concerns that occupy minds in a global world change (such as todays preoccupations include AIDS, landmines, terrorism, nuclear disarmament/disaster, receding water levels etc), the definitions of all realms of society would change too. This paper, taking insights from the corpus of philosophy on the subject, defines civil society as the associational space, lying between the family, state and market, where autonomous individuals voluntarily come together to define and pursue common goals to reap collective benefits. Schmitters definition of civil society, as a set or system of self-organised intermediary groups that: (1) are relatively independent of both public authorities and private units of production and reproduction, that is, of firms and families; (2) are capable of deliberating about and taking collective actions in defence or promotion of their interests or passions; (3) do not seek to replace either state agents or private (re)producers or to accept responsibility fo r governing the polity as a whole; and (4) agree to act within pre-established rules of a civil, i.e. mutually respectful, nature. It is civil society based on the four characteristics of dual autonomy, collective action, nonusurpation and civility that this paper will refer to. The Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act (AFSPA): The Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act is a law, enacted by the Parliament of India, to meet violent internal situations created by underground militant outfits to further their illegal and ‘unconstitutional causes. The law was enacted to provide necessary powers and legal support to the Armed forces for carrying out proactive operations against the militants in a highly hostile environment that was threatening the integrity and sovereignty of the Indian nation-state. The Act dates back to September 11, 1958, when the Parliament of India passed the act bestowing more power on the armed forces in â€Å"disturbed areas†. First introduced in the states of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura, the Act was later extended to Jammu and Kashmir as the Armed Forces (Jammu and Kashmir) Special Powers Act, 1990 in July 1990. The Act allows an officer of the armed forces to fire upon or otherwise use force, even to the causing of death, against any person who is acting in contravention of any law against assembly of five or more persons or possession of deadly weapons, to arrest without a warrant and with the use of necessary force anyone who has committed certain offenses or is suspected of having done so, to enter and search any premise in order to make such arrests. The act also bestows legal immunity to the officials, which means that they cannot be sued or prosecuted. While the law was enacted to mitigate militant action, violence and to quell secessionist tendencies that violated the essence of the Indian union, it has since inception over half a century ago turned into a controversial aspect of governance in the country. An increasing militarisation of areas branded as ‘disturbed and a consequent violation of human rights and civil liberties has resulted in a worsening of conditions in both the regions it has been applied to. Instead of bringing about greater cohesion, or of managing to bring the north-east and Jammu Kashmir peacefully into the fold of the Indian union, the law has become just another reason for the strengthening of secessionist demands. This is in contradiction with the reasoning given for consistent political will to keep the Act in place in the two regions: in a response to the United Nations Human Rights Committee questioning the validity of the AFSPA under the Indian law and in light of Article 4 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, ICCPR, the Attorney General of India responded that the AFSPA is a necessary measure to prevent the secession of the North Eastern states. He said that a response to this agitation for secession in the North East had to be done on a war footing. He argued that the Indian Constitution, in Article 355, made it the duty of the Central Government to protect the states from internal disturbance and that there is no duty under international law to allow secession.â€Å"The shrill rhetoric demanding that the Armed Forces Special Powers Act be repealed, if allowed to hold sway, may drive us deeper into the dark world of both Islamist terror and the Maoist insurgency, † Brigadier S K Chatterji (retd) has warned more recently. The primary issue of controversy here is the violation of human and civil rights. According to a Human Rights Watch report, the act is in violation in the following respects: The right to life is violated by section 4(a) of the AFSPA, which grants the armed forces power to shoot to kill in law enforcement situations without regard to international human rights law restrictions on the use of lethal force. The right to liberty and security of person is violated by section 4(c) of the AFSPA, which fails to protect against arbitrary arrest by allowing soldiers to arrest anyone merely on suspicion that a â€Å"cognizable offence† has already taken place or is likely to take place in the future. Further, the AFSPA provides no specific time limit for handing arrested persons to the nearest police station. The right to remedy is violated by section 6 of the AFSPA, which provides officers who abuse their powers under the AFSPA with immunity from legal accountability. This section of th e AFSPA prohibits even state governments from initiating legal proceedings against the armed forces on behalf of their population without central government approval. Since such a sanction is seldom granted, it has in effect provided a shield of immunity for armed forces personnel implicated in serious abuses. In practice the AFSPA also facilitates violation of the right to be free from torture, and from cruel or degrading treatment. Since the AFSPA provides powers to arrest without warrant and then detain arrested persons for unspecified amounts of time, the armed forces routinely engage in torture and other ill-treatment during interrogation in army barracks. However, the support from within the armed forces and certain other sections of the political and academic circles is strong for the continuance of this act. Northern Army Commander General Jaswal in Jammu Kashmir gave the following reasoning: I would like to say that the provisions of the Armed Forces Special Power Act are very pious to me and I think to entire Indian ArmyWe have religious books, there are certain guidelines which are given there, but all the members of the religion do not follow it, they break it also, does it imply that you remove the religious book or you remove this chap. My take on it is to find someone guilty, take him to task, but dont touch this pious document or provision of the Armed Forces Special Power Act giving the similarity to religious book.† In the past couple of months Army has argued that without the Act it will not be able to launch proactive operations. The Army will also not be able to use force except in self-defence and not have powers to destroy ammunition dumps and IEDs. The army also says that a majority of human rights abuse cases are found to be false and those found true have been severely dealt with. Human rights activists have however contended time and again that the Act gives excessive powers to the soldiers. Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah has said in recent past that there is a need to revoke the Act since it is prone to abuse. One of the grounds that the citizens have stated is that the people arrested or otherwise detained should be allowed to plead their case under section 130 and 131 of the Criminal Code. The Article 21 of the Constitution also gets violated in the process. In spite of the various cases filed and protests initiated there has been no revocation or dialogue towards the same. The issue revolving the AFSPA is that the principle of national integrity and sovereignty is in direct conflict with the liberal democratic frameworks of human rights and the civil society has the potential to the site for this negotiation. This is the premise under which the rest of this paper seeks to examine how the civil society and the Indian state have sought to deal with the AFSPA. CIVIL SOCIETY This Chapter seeks to chart the history of philosophy on civil society, in political sciences and social sciences. It will then look at civil society in India specifically, in todays context, and some of the major criticisms levelled against the concept and its real-time manifestation. Civil Society: The Concept At the abstract level, civil society has historically been conceptualised as a mediating space between the family, state and recently, also separate from the market. It is the site of association, voluntariness and community engagement, set apart from the politics and compulsions of the state as well as the individuality and liberty of the family. Bruce Sievers identifies seven strands that go into the making of civil society: nonprofit and voluntary institutions, individual rights, rule of law, the common good, philanthropy, freedom of expression and tolerance. Emerging in the context of the 18th century industrialisation rampant in Europe that gave rise to a new class of bourgeoisie and the new ideas of utilitarianism and capitalism, civil society gets inextricably linked with libertarian ideals that seek to carve out spaces for autonomous action in every individual and societal aspect.   â€Å"A ‘civil society was civilized and ordered by the rule of law. Unlike tribal so ciety, it was also large-scale and held together by impersonal bonds of interest rather than ties of kin and blood. It was also, to a degree some found frightening, a self-correcting mechanism in which the selfish actions of myriad individuals, brought together only by the rule of law, managed to produce an orderly and dynamic accumulation of prosperity unprecedented in human history,† observes Michael Ignatieff The importance of social engagement and principle of tolerance have only gained more importance in a globalised world that is characterised by multi-cultural, multi-ethnic nations. Robert Putnam identifies civic engagement, dense networks of interaction, political equality, solidarity, trust and tolerance and a strong associational life as crucial to the generation of ‘social capital the resource that could help to facilitate coordination and cooperation for mutual benefit in societies. He says that networks of civic engagement foster norms of generalised reciprocity, encourage the emergence of social trust, facilitate communication, collaboration and therefore collective action on common dilemmas and endorse the idea of collective benefits. Through its history, a number of philosophers have vouched for and expanded upon this realm of an advanced society. Alexis de Tocqueville , in Democracy in America, says that Americas answer to the problem of limiting the absolutist state was to have a constitution defined in law and protected by a counterbalancing force of independent bodies. These were the local associations of citizens acting together in the affairs of daily life. This was a civil society engaged in politics, voluntary by nature. His idea of civil society was based in the observation of an absolute sovereignty of the majority, but this principle, which could just as well turn into a tyranny of the majority, was also mitigated through a non-centralised frame of governance that set importance to localised chains of command and responsibility. Civicness emerged in America, he observed, through the relentless formation of associations: â€Å"Americans of all ages, all stations in life, and all types of disposition ar e forever forming associations. There are not only commercial and industrial associations in which all take part, but others of a thousand different typesreligious, moral, serious, futile, very general and very limited, immensely large and very minute. . . . Nothing, in my view, deserves more attention than the intellectual and moral associations in America.† Civil Society, for Hegel , is the site that lies between the Family and the State in the Ethical Life, as described in his Philosophy of Right. It is the site where the ‘determination of particularity as per individual rights is given free rein, but which has to acquire a mantle of universality for the rights to become acquirable or even legitimate, so to speak. Here, therefore, are two elements: the concrete person who is out to pursue self-interest and personal motive, and the form of universality, or the generation of common motive, through forming bonds and finding over-lapping areas of interest. A particular end, therefore, assumes the form of universality through this relation to other people, and it is attained in the simultaneous attainment of the welfare of others. It has three dimensions: the system of needs, the administration of justice and the police and the corporation. The system of needs refers to the generation of ‘universal human capital through human beings exceptional capacity to generate needs and spot commonness with others and then to satisfy those needs through work and labour. A single persons particularity of interest can be recognised if he manages to associate himself with one sphere of the needs. The administration of justice is the principle of rightness that becomes universally known through a public legal code. Not only does this embed within the principle of freedom in both subjective individual and universal platforms, it also makes wrongdoing an infringement on the people that live within such an ethical life. The polizei, then, is the bearer and the guardian of this publicly generated and accepted principles of right, the public authority that also looks after public utilities and regulation activities as well. The corporation, on the other hand, is the arrangement whereby common interests are brought to fore through voluntary association as in sports or religious clubs etc. All these aspects together form the civil society for Hegel, the space where freedom of self-interest is allowed to reign but within the limits of the principle of universality.   Antonio Gramsci, however, had a more critical view of civil society, from a Marxist vantage point. He saw civil society not as the benign space that afforded a voice and power to the masses, but as an instrument of domination linked in an unholy alliance with the bourgeois elements in the civil society seeking to protect propertied interests . He was also convinced that the intricate, organic relationships between civil society and political society enable certain strata of society not only to gain dominance within the state but also, and more importantly, to maintain it, perpetuating the subalternity of other strata. In other words, the site of hegemony was civil society it was the arena wherein the ruling class extends and reinforces its power by non-violent means through components such as the press, the libraries, schools, associations and clubs that could all become media for propaganda and homogenisation of the masses. The state and the civil society in his purview are inextri cably linked, which only facilitates subordination by the state without coercion, focussing instead on ‘manufacturing consent. However, he does acknowledge the potential of civil society as a site for breeding revolutions and for newer ‘conceptions of the world to take place. However, the manifestation of this fairly utopian concept is fraught with tensions and dichotomies. Ernest Gellner, in Conditions of Liberty, analyses the role of civil society in the Marxist, socialist and capitalist frameworks and has also assessed post-modern rivals to it that have emerged, such as Islam. The Eastern European states found the concept of civil society useful in gaining independence from a Communist stronghold precisely because of the possibility here for mobilisation of the masses in opposition to totalitarian militarist regimes. Through meetings of trade unions, religious groups, bars etc, the emphasis was on autonomy, self-organisation and withdrawal from the state to create islands of civic engagement for the emergence of a ‘parallel polis. For Gellner, a civil society was â€Å"a profane society, a society that explicitly sought to put the lowest of human desires to productive uses. Mandevilles paradox private vices make public virtues naturalized the profane by demonstrating that â€Å"capitalist individuals were more likely to promote the public good when they looked exclusively to their private interest.† He found the Marxist, and therefore the socialist strain of civil society, that stressed on driving religion out of life and also investing the economic with the ultimate sacredness, as faulty for it denied space to the profane, the self-interest and avarice of human nature that could be harnessed and channelled into collective action. With the ‘disenchantment of the world that comes with modernity and its powerful agencies of science and capitalism came the advent of ‘the modular man    who associates voluntarily with other prototypes, giving rise to a Gesellschaft, the inorganic form of social bonding, through fostered ties, rather than a Gemeinschaft, the organic community based on ties of blood and kin. â€Å"The genius of capitalist civil society is that it not only harnesses our profane energies, b ut relieves us of the moral burden of thinking of them as profane. In so doing, it relieves us of the strain of constant longing for unattainable self-transcendence in desperate simulations of paradise,† says Ignatieff. He also observes that liberty in civil society is essentially negative because there cannot be, in principle, agreement among human beings about the positive ends of political communities, beyond the protection of the liberties of the individuals who compose it. If people seek to overcome their own alienation and separateness, they can do so only as individuals or in voluntary groups. Civil society, then, becomes crucial for maintaining checks and balances, says Ignatieff. The realms of politics, economics and culture are neatly segregated, and power in any one domain does not endow power in another. The society is free, acting through a vibrant media and elected representatives, all functioning within the ambit of law. â€Å"Needless to say, no civil society has ever lived up to this goalyet the formal promise is more than hypocrisy: it remains the standard against which civil society judges itself and from which it finds renewed impetus to reform.† In this sense, civil society, albeit being a flawed ideal, also has the potential for redeeming itself simply by virtue of being embedded in the notion of reform, of itself as well as of society, simply by virtue of allowing private trajectories of interest being followed.   Despite changing meanings, civil societys core rests in a rule-governed society based on the consent of individuals. The ‘social contract that Hobbes defined is another way of understanding the liberal ideas behind the conception of civil society through different phases, civil society can be seen as the process or the space through which different individuals negotiate, argue, struggle against or agree with each other and with the centres of political and economic authority. The element of autonomy, voluntariness and collective action through association remain hallmarks through all definitions of the term. Civil Society in India: It would seem natural that civil society, as has been described and conceptualised above is an integral part of a democracy, with its accompanying notions of equality, public participation, and masses-oriented governance. Robert Post and Nancy Rosenblum describe a consensus among contemporary theorists â€Å"that democracy depends on the particularist, self-determining associations of civil society, where independent commitments, interests, and voices, are developed . Civil society is the precondition for democratic decision making, whether democracy is conceived as deliberation or as interest group pluralism, and this is true even if the goal of democracy is to transcend particularism and arrive at uncoerced agreement or a common will.† According to Joerg Forbrig, a vibrant and functional civil society can contribute to strengthening a democracy in five ways: control of state power through the incorporation of a body of laws, individual rights and thereby becoming a space that overlooks the relationship between the pr