Ignorance kills

8226; It is with heavy heart that I saw on TV the devastation caused by the kill...

8226; It is with heavy heart that I saw on TV the devastation caused by the killer tsunami. The earthquake struck at 6.30 am and the first tsunami waves struck the Indian coast at 8.30 am. During this invaluable 120 minutes, what was our Met department with its supercomputers doing? Where were the remote sensing satellites? What was the Institute of Oceanography doing? Where were the other scientific and geological agencies? It8217;s high time we decided whether we need these white elephants who predict disasters only after they have occurred. Will we ever learn from our mistakes? In my opinion, we should shut down all these agencies and spend the money in helping the affected people. Let8217;s leave weather predictions to international agencies.

8212; Sateesh Bhat Cochin

8226; This refers to the report, 8216;Deathwave8217; IE, Decemeber 27. With a large part of India being coastal, the nation needs to evolve precautionary measures to meet tragedies like Sunday8217;s killer waves. We need to ensure that we, in our greed for more land, do not allow buildings and hotels to come up near the beach front or on large stretches of reclaimed land.

8212; Subhash C. Agrawal Delhi

Gender equal laws

8226; Apropos of 8216;The global local way to go8217; by Pamela Philipose IE, December 27, it is well known that, like most laws, dowry laws and various other laws are being misused by some unscrupulous women and their relatives to harass hapless men. Both the Madras High Court and the Delhi High Court have in separate cases highlighted the misuse of the dowry law and Section 498A of the IPC so much so that even children and deceased in-laws are included in the FIR. Also, in many cases, the husbands are forced to shell out huge sums of money in the name of settlement. Notwithstanding the fact that innocent women need to be protected from unscrupulous men, the writer and women activists must acknowledge and accept the fact that not all women are innocent and genuine and that men can also become victims. There ought to be a social and ethical balance when making laws for special purposes so that innocent people both men and women are not victimised by unscrupulous and vengeful people again from both the sexes.

8212;Sriram Sundarrajan Chennai

Evaluate RAW

8226; This refers to your report and editorial on India8217;s premier intelligence agency, RAW IE, December 12 and 14. There never has been such flagrant waste of public money. Recruiting RAW personnel is done in an ad hoc manner. There is no limit to their expenses and anyone can defraud the public exchequer through bogus accounting. This agency could not even alert us on the Kargil intrusions and it misled the government over Sri Lanka. Yet it remains non-transparent and unaccountable to the people. It8217;s high time that Parliament goes into its working and assesses its utility to the nation.

8212; V.N. Rana On e-mail

The PM is right

8226; T.V.R. Shenoy in 8216;The talent principle8217; IE, December 16 argues against Prime Minister Manmohan Singh8217;s decision that no civil servant be granted extension. He took this decision so that no charge of 8220;favourtism8221; can be levelled and it certainly seems to be the right thing to do.

8212; Vinod Chowdhury Delhi