Articles by G P D

Uses of the Treaty G P D DELHI has been in a festive mood over the last week or so. The tenth anniversary of the famous Indo-Soviet Treaty of Friendship and Co-operation was being celebrated. The festivities, of course, happened to be at different levels and exhibited differing degrees of enthusiasm. To begin with, Indira Gandhi did not appear, to be particularly jubilant over the anniversary. She and her colleague Venkataraman were perhaps more busy gloating over the favourable response from the IMF. The Soviets sent a delegation, organised film shows and contributed articles to the special supplements brought out by some leading newspapers. Generally it appeared that the Soviets were far more enthusiastic about the anniversary than the Indians.

councils." Thus the main difference between the clergy and the liberals is of orientation (Western or medieval) rather than of class interests. Rani Sadr himself wants to organise Iranian economy on the basis of Western capitalism. With this in view he had appointed a young cconoinist Ali Reza Nobari as the governor of the Central Rank of Iran. The Prime Minister resented his appointment and ultimately forced him to resign. The power struggle between the clergy and the liberals is a struggle between feudal and modernising forces in Iran. The clergy may find it difficult to retain feudal relations of production (the current social turmoil helps generate heightened political consciousness among the masses) although its feudal outlook represented by its medieval oriented religious teachings finds acceptance in the backward social ethos of Iran.


the same technocratic-elitist background of President Giscard d'Estaing and Jacques Chirac, is currently considered one of France's most promising politicians. With an attractive electoral personality and a hard-driving, two-fisted style, Rocard, who prefers a more dynamic and centrist concept of Socialism, is also less beholden to the union of the Left with the Communists. He had initially announced his intention to contest but drew only a fraction of support from the Party. lie later withdrew in favour of Mitterand.

Waking Up to Realities G P D WIT H Reagan's election to the presidency of the United States, the Taiwan issue seems, to be moving to the centre of Sino-West relations. Senior Taiwanese1 officials visited Washington for Reagan's inauguration, On January 17, the New China News Agency made a curious comment on the invitation. It said that the invitation was "an important step toward resumption of official relations with Taiwan in violation of the principles contained in the Sino-Us communique". As if this comment was not mild enough the Xinhua went on to inform readers that "it is learned that the Chinese government has expressed to the American side firm opposition to this step''. The sobriety and the coolness of this comment is indeed unprecedented in Chinese diplomatic language. Is there a hope in Beijing that President Reagan may not complicate Sino-West relations further and therefore a little token accommodation of the American satellites ruling in Taibei can be ignored?

What Brezhnev Did Not Get G P D IN spite of the tremendous publicity built up Brezhnev's pilgrimage to Ja- waharlal Nehru's and Indira Gandhi's India was a rather tame affair. He does not seem to have persuaded the lady to believe what he had to say on most matters except of course of them Soviet Union's "particular liking for Shreemati Indira Gandhi, that out standing political and state figure of contemporary Asia". One does not know if he made any impact on Indira Gandhi by saying this; perhaps not because literally thousands of sychop- hants are telling this truth to her anyway. It would make some difference naturally that this assessment has come from a man who is head of the first socialist state in history. Beyond giving this certificate of outstanding behaviour he achieved very little of consequence on this trip to Delhi, Brezhnev was here seven years after his last trip. Those were different times. Indira Gandhi was a confident political leader, all sure of herself. The Bangladesh affair was not yet forgotten. India appeared to be supreme in South Asia. The domestic front was reasonably quiet. The pic- ture has changed. The lady seems to have lost her magic touch. Every new day brings a new story, indeed scores of them, which underline the basic fact of our politics today, namely, the ruling elite talks nonsense and presides over new chaos. Repression is the only answer to problems this government knows of. It was an American privilege, one would have thought, to compliment generously leaders who have nothing more than anti-people policies to show as their achievement. The Soviets seem to have learnt the game. They have, in fact, outdone their teachers! It is not known what Brezhnev advised the CPI delegation which met him in Delhi. The socialist countries are given to recommending their foreign policy line as the ideal revolutionary line to other communist parties. In this particular case the Soviets have done it once before. It is not known if Brezhnev's realisation of the outstanding qualities of Indira Gandhi was also passed on to Rajeshwar Rao and Bhupesh Gupta who met him. Availa-