For View form the Right

From the front page The weekly carries an interview with former Petroleum Minister Ram Naik who says Saddam Hussein8217;s regime had offere...

From the front page

The weekly carries an interview with former Petroleum Minister Ram Naik who says Saddam Hussein8217;s regime had offered cheap oil in return for kickbacks to the NDA government. 8220;They offered us crude at a rate which was about 2 less per barrel than the international price. But in lieu of it we were asked to pay about 0.5 commission per barrel. And this commission was to be paid in cash, which means that it cannot be accounted for. This is absolutely immoral,8221; Naik says in the interview. While conceding that Iraq did support India on the issue of Kashmir, the BJP leader says it was also Iraq8217;s 8220;bounden duty8221; to follow the UN approved scheme to fend for itself. But Saddam, he said, instead chose to sell crude at a discount, expecting kickbacks in return 8212; and those who fell for the bait 8220;have all been exposed8221;.

Editorial

8220;The cover up has a Bofors ring8221; draws a parallel between the UPA government8217;s handling of the Volcker committee report and the Bofors scandal. 8220;Then also the entire exercise was to save the top leader of the party, whom many believed as the chief beneficiary,8221; the editorial says. At another place it says, 8220;It is unlikely that the present probe will also yield any credible result unless the political system extends unscrupulous loyalty to truth and fair-play.8221; According to the editorial, the Volcker report, unlike The Mitrokhin Archives cannot be easily dismissed as fictional and has therefore proved to be embarrassing to both Natwar Singh and the Congress. And while it took the PM two weeks to act on the report, 8220;the Congress has not atoned yet.8221;

Swamy8217;s agenda

Subramanian Swamy returns to the Organiser with a monthly column, and this week starts with a column that searches for the way ahead for India. Swamy had written earlier for the Organiser in the 70s, raising issues like the Swadeshi Plan, growth rate and nuclear issues that he says 8220;angered Mrs Indira Gandhi and her KGB benefactors8221;. But, he says, while the radical ideas of the 70s have become mainstream, the mission is yet incomplete and 8220;we need a new agenda for change to weld the Indian into one corporate mind and entity8221;. One danger, says Swamy, is the subtle fragmentation of national consciousness, and a state of affairs that could be attributed to one wrong decision after another. One such, he says, is Nehru8217;s decision to go to the UN Security Council on Kashmir. 8220;What Nehru did for his personal image in the West, or perhaps to please Edwina Mountbatten, was to weaken the national resolve to cherish the hoary concept of Bharatvarsh, the geographical integrity of Hindustan from Kashmir to Kanyakumari8221;.

Tailpiece

In 8220;Don8217;t sell out India8217;s nuclear defence8221;, M.D. Nalapat says: India can cooperate with the US only if New Delhi is given the same status and rights as Paris or London, not relegated to tenth-class status the way a small clique of officials reporting to the UPA leadership are attempting to concede.

Compiled by Ananda Majumdar