The Great Indian Democracy

Painful journey of Lokpal in 2011

2011-12-30T01:37:00.000-08:00

The year 2011 ends and what a what a way it ends for the Indian democracy. If there are a few words to describe this year, they would be corruption, anger, arrogance etc. But entire thing can be summed up in one or two words as Lokpal Bill. Never possibly in history of India would a bill would have seen such a wide variety of reactions (with possible exception of Hindu Code Bill). Let’s look at the journey this year to understand what went wrong and who the real culprit is.
Act 1 – Indulging Anna team
Early this year when Team Anna sat protesting at Jantar Mantar, Congress tried to indulge him to erase public memory and reduce anger over 2G and CWG. Hence they hurriedly formed a drafting committee with govt and Team Anna. They completely ignored the political class. No members of other parties were part of this drafting committee. What better way to show your utter contempt of Parliamentary Democracy?

Act 2 - Games with Anna
After side lining the Parliament and other political parties, Congress started the process of taking team Anna for a ride. The drafting committee could not come to a common draft as government was non-committal on many fronts. This was the stage where Team Anna saw through the Government's lack of intention on Lokpal Bill.

Act 3 - Abuse and misuse
When the drafting committee failed to conjure a proper bill, Congress tried its old games of abuse and misuse. Congress spokesperson Manish Tewari fired the first salvo by questioning Anna Hazare's personal integrity. Digvijay Singh as usual joined the slander game with his trademark effectiveness. Post the abuse came misuse. Anna Hazare was arrested and ironically taken to same jail as Kalmadi, Raja. If this was a joke, it was so cruel it backfired. But Congress wasn't listening. Having curbed Baba Ramdev's protest with an iron hand, Congress was sure of repeating it with Anna Hazare. It misjudged the people's mood completely.

Act 4 - Pitching Parliament vs Anna
After it was forced to release Anna from Tihar, Congress tried to use speeches of some supporters of Team Anna. They tried to change the contour of the movement as being Team Anna vs Parliament. While Congress was right that many Anna supporters were undermining the Parliament, they forgot that they had started the process of undermining of Parliament. Congress in a bid to provide a 'halo' to its Yuvraj Rahul Gandhi, allowed the Anna protest to carry on for few days. Finally it allowed a discussion on Lokpal only after providing a chance to Rahul to try for a 'game changer'. Sadly the game changer was as much a damp squib as the player. The Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha then got Anna to break his fast after making some commitments.

Act 5 - Farce at Standing Committee
Once Anna's fast was over with commitments from the Parliament, it became necessary for the Standing Committee to provide a strong Lokpal Bill. But Congress members had different thoughts. They went back on issues such as CBI, inclusion of PM, inclusion of Type C and D employees. Most of non-Congress members and few Congress members gave their dissent note. The height of cheating was when Standing Committee called an emergency meeting with extremely less notice after telling members that the sessions were over. They pushed their side of contentious argument in the bill and presented a half baked, weak Lokpal to cabinet.

Act 6 - Playing the Religion card
Now that the world knew about Congress's fraud at the Standing Committee, Anna decided to fast again from 27th Dec followed by a Jail Bharo stir. Congress compromised a bit on contentious issues and got cabinet approval. But it had already made a plan to scuttle the bill by using friends like Laloo Prasad Yadav and Mulayam Singh Yadav. They started the dangerous divisive game of reservations on religious basis. Everyone knew this was unconstitutional but Congress just played along. BP protested that reservations in a constitutional body (as wished by all) would be dangerous for the country.

Act 7 - The internal sabotage
Once the bill was brought to the Lok Sabha, Congress used it's friends in RJD, SP to create chaos. While the bill was passed, it did not get constitutional status as government fell short of 2\3rd mark. 12 Congress MPs were absent including some loyalists of Ahmed Patel. Yet Congress wanted to blame only BJP, which had consistently said that while it was all for Lokpal being a constitutional body, it was against the constitutional status for such a weak bill. All indications showed internal sabotage of Rahul's wish.

Act 8 - Assault on democracy
Now that the Congress had egg on it's face in LS, it faced the uphill task of passing it in RS where numbers went against them. Though LS had passed the bill on 27th, Congress wasted whole of 28th on procedural issues and made no attempt to bring the bill for discussion and vote. It used the time to negotiate with allies and other parties but failed as TMC hardened its stand. Finally when the bill came up for discussion on 29th, the house was delayed due to absence of the PM. Later at night, when S S Ahluwalia and Sitaram Yechury asked the Speaker what happens if voting does not happer till 12 midnight, the speaker brushed their concerns aside. Meanwhile most channels were talking of a disruption plan being worked out between Congress, SP and RJD. Exactly the same thing happened. Government now buoyed by failure and hasty end of Anna's fast in Mumbai, was ready to do anything to either stop the bill or shove its own preferred version. First disruption as RJD MP Rajneeti Prasad who tore papers (as Congress MPs tried their best to act as shocked. Instead of tackling one rogue MP, RS speaker adjourned the house for sometime inspite of knowing that midnight was approaching. BJP MPs sat quitely without getting provoked by barbs of various Congress ministers and MPs. When the clock neared 12, BJP leader Arun Jaitley expressed BJP's willingness to sit all night for the bill to be passed. But by then the Vice President and Speaker of RS had made up his mind to act like a Congress slave . Amidst the matchfixing, the bill was deffered indefinitely.

The entire sequence of this journey shows complete shamelessness, arrogance, penchant for cheating all and a disdain for democracy that Congress always had.

The Land of Elite

2011-09-29T23:11:00.000-07:00

Last few days there have been a series of articles saying how and why Narendra Modi cannot be and should not be made the PM. I wondered if this was just ideological disdain for Modi. If it was just disdain in terms of ideology, I am sure the writers, thinktanks, media barons (all now called The Elite in this post) cannot ignore the good he brings to the table. So naturally it is more than just ideological disdain. Then I looked at history, from 80s till today. Realised that there is a blanket dislike for any politician who was born and brought up in an average family in any far-off village or town. Such a person was an outside for these elites till the time he or she does not use his mass appeal and charishma to break into it like Atal Bihari Vajpayee did. Others like Advani, George Fernandes, Sushma Swaraj and many others have not been so lucky. Smallest of their error was magnified to manifold and achivements underestimated. The phrase 'benefit of doubt' is reserved only for the Gandhi family or the politicians who owe complete loyalty to Gandhi family or those from the charmed circles of the metros or from an established political family. Let's take some examples to expose the prejudice of the elite.

1. Just around the time, Mayawati was taken to the cleaners for the mega money garland, similar thing had happened in Maharashtra. President of Maharashtra Congress Manikrao Thakre was openly caught saying how much money he demanded from the CM and other ministers for a rally of Sonia Gandhi. Later at the rally in Wardha, Sonia Gandhi congratulated Thakre for 'arrangements' and patted his back. The same set of 'elite' who cried as if hell had broken loose in Mayawati's case did not utter a word against Sonia Gandhi though both Mayawati and Sonia were guilty of same crime. Just because Mayawati was a Dalit woman not born or married to a royalty? Or because she dared to dream of a place supposedly reserved for the Gandhi Family?

2. This has been long debated hence will be brief. The amount of flak Narendra Modi received for 2002 is multiple times more than what Rajiv Gandhi got for 1984. I have seen people like Vir Sanghvi defending Rajiv but absuing Modi.Again question is why? Just because Modi was a tea-stall boy who made it big and now threatens the Gandhi monopoly? Or because he is an OBC who has scored over all other administrators in terms of good governance?

3. The uproar that we heard when Yeddiyurappa was named in a scam and the relentless pressure that brought his downfall is completely missing when it comes to the far more corrupt deeds of Sheila Dikshit or Naveen Patnaik. Just because he was a rank outsider, a typical rural man with no pretensions to be a city slicker?

4. The set of elites who who sniggered at anyone who questioned the secrecy over Sonia Gandhi's health had no qualms about cracking jokes on Nitin Gadkari's surgery because here was an unknown man (for them) who has taken over a national party and is proving a credible opposition today. Just that fact that he came from a small city in Maharashtra and never hid his discomfort with the air kissing and hypocritical ways of the metro circles, meant he was an outsider and hence can be mocked.

5. R R Patil at the worst can be called an inefficient Home Minister. At no point can he be called a corrupt one. Yet he has drawn more criticism and ridicule from the elites than Prithviraj Chavan, Vilasrao Deshmukh who are equally inefficient and definitely corrupt in latter's case. R R Patil is a small village boy who made it good. His kids study in a public school in his village and RR can barely speak decent Hindi or English. And hence the mockery?

6. Let's see the list of CMs who are currently darlings of the elite (no pun intened). Prithviraj Chavan, Omar Abdullah, Sheila Dikshit are some names that come to mind. But a look at their performance and you will see they don't stand a patch compared to Narendra Modi, Nitish Kumar, Raman Singh when it comes to governance. Yet, you will rarely see articles or shows critical of the darling CMs while others are either bashed or ignored

There are many such examples. The point is why such disdain for people from ordinary backgrounds, unknown families and not the so-called higher castes.

India is growing and with that aspirations of people are also growing. And aspirations do not discriminate on basis of family, caste, religion, region or language. We can no longer have a mentality that only some family., some people and some caste can rule India. It is an absolute insult of democracy to have that mindset.

I do not know if any elite would read this post. But if you do, I would be glad to see you prove me wrong with your counter views or atleast you can introspect on whether you are strengthening democracy or weakening it.

Let Gujarat be

2011-09-12T06:35:00.000-07:00

For long I have resisted the temptation of writing on this subject because a lot has been spoken and written about it. But today as the SC puts the wheels of justice back in place, I might as well pen down by thoughts gathered over these years.

Godhra 2002 and the riots after that were a blot on society just as Sikh Genocide of 1984 or Mumbai riots or Neyveli, Meerut, Bhiwandi, Bhagalpur riots or ethnic cleansing of Pandits in Kashmir. But the fact also remains that this incident has drawn more attention that all other cases of violence in India put together. The skewed attention matrix does draw suspicion to the political and social interests' behind keeping the wounds open.

No discussion of a riot can be complete without understanding the social dynamics at work behing it. Gujarat has seen the maximum number of riots in post independence India. Right from 1967 till late 80s, Ahmedabad, Baroda, Surat were waylaid by bloody riots every year. Ahmedabad in particular used to witness riots on every Jagannath Rath Yatra. The underworld of Gujarat for long was controlled by gangsters like Latif who enjoyed open political patronage from then Congress governments. This changed in the period post 1990. Congress lost power to JD and BJP alliance. Contrary to the popular belief that Advani's Rath Yatra was divisive, in Gujarat it actually united the otherwise highly fragmented Hindu community. It started the period of Hindus asserting their religious identities. First glimpse of this aggressiveness and anger against local Muslim community (mainly because of the belief that Latif and gangs troubled Hindus the most) was seen in 92 riots. In a way, Gujarat for long was on a tinterbox of Hindu anger and that exploded in 2002. It was also the period when anti-Islamic sentiments were at the peak due to 9/11 and other local reasons mentioned below.

India was out of a bloody war with Pakistan. Kandahar hijack was fresh in public memories and the Parliament attack had happened just a few months ago. The subsequent deployment of the forces on the India-Pakistan border meant there were not much forces to be used within the country at times of an emergency.

After the incident at Godhra happened, it is well-known that Gujarat did ask Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra for additional forces and those states refused the plea. Is it sheer coincidence that all the 3 states were then ruled by Congress? The delay in deploying police and other forces led to the riots spreading across the state except for some parts of Kutch and Saurashtra. Though this can't be a justification, it also means that administration or the ruling class was not hand in glove with the rioters. At the worst, it shows administrative inefficiency and nothing more. But to call these riots a genocide is unfair. 11,000 rounds were fired and most of those killed were Hindus. So in no way was the administration trying to shield the majority community. Also one can rioting happened from both the communities and hence high number of deaths on each side. Figures have no emotion nor any bias and they just tell you the sad story as it was.

Once the riots were over, the long road to recovery meant 3 things - Legal Justice, Political Justice and Reconcilliation. Narendra Modi did the right thing by dissolving the assembly and calling for fresh elections. Only the people of Gujarat had the right to say then if they believed their leader was a murderer or not. Once that was done, he set on to the path of rebuilding Gujarat and confidence of its people. Today that is showing results. Muslims in Gujarat as far more in the mainstream (socially, economically) than most other states. The inclusive development of the state has ensured that the community which languishes in despair in other states is living a life of dignity and prosperity in Gujarat.

Coming to the critical issue of legal justice. Of all riot cases in Indian history, Gujarat riot cases have seen the fastest trials anc convictions. Many of it even before activists like Teesta came to fore. Compare this to 84 where no chargesheet too was filed and hardly anybody has been convicted. Or with Bhagalpur where justice took nearly 2 decades. Congress-NCP government in power for nearly 15 yrs after Mumbai riots have not pushed for legal closure to the cases. More than 4000 cases registered and nearly 25000 people were arrested and brought to trial. More than 40 cases have already seen convictions. This cannot happen if the state is trying to prevent justice. Also point to note is that those arrested and facing trials include politicians both from the BJP and the Congress. Process of Justiceujarat riots cases has been the most unbiased and the faster in the country till date.

For long Narendra Modi has been suffering at the hands of those who believed that justice has to be subservient to their instints and beliefs only. By readily co-operaitng with the probe agencies he has shown his willingness to confront the blot and come out clean. And by ensuring the smooth reconcilliation process he has ensured that hurt feelings of a community are healed.

Now it's only good for India if the vested interests let Gujarat be.

Anna Protest and more

2011-08-17T23:34:00.001-07:00

Since most people do not like to read entire blogs and love to quickly pass judgements. Here is quick one on my stand. I do not support Lok Pal Bill presented by the govt, neither do I support Anna Hazare teams draft of Jan Lok Pal (and yes I have read both). I do agree corruption has to be killed and feel there are other ways of doing it alongwith a Lokpal which is neither lame nor draconian. I completely support Anna's right to protest and fast. But I do not support the self righteousness and holier than thou attitude of many of the protestors. Hamam mein sab nange hain.

If the nation has come to a standstill it is mainly because of the events in last one year where India has seen monumental corruption and absolute breakdown of governance. The government has been criminally arrogant and remarkably stupid in its handling of the crisis. To start with they indulged Anna to such a level that they decided to ignore Parliament and other political parties in the drafting process. They undermined the authority of the Parliament and today they accuse Anna Hazare of same. Well, Anna Hazare is not answerable to the Parliament and nation but this government is. After the indulgence came the show of utter ruthlessness and arrogance in form of midnight crackdown on Ramlila Maidan injuring women, children and old. They took it to the highest level by resorting to undemocratic methods to prevent Anna Hazare from fasting. They muddied the waters further by personal attacks, insults and namecalling. If there is a case study on stupid governance, this has to be it. Add double standards to that and you get an unmanageable crisis. Govt needs to stop treating NAC as a holy cow while reasing other civil society as commodities. It needs to ensure that henceforth Parliament is the supreme law making agency in the country and no Anna or NAC will be allowed to change that.

Coming to the Lokpal Bills. There is no denying that India needs a strong Lokpal Bill. But as the name says it has to be a Pal of the Lok (people). Which means the Lokpal can neither be draconian nor it can be a lame duck to be misused. Both the drafts, Govt and Anna Hazare team, have many loopholes in them. While Govt draft is completely useless in terms of its jurisdiction, it also has all probabilities of misuse due to the nature of formation process. On other hand, the Jan Lokpal is so rigid that it can suffocate governance and development. One has seen the negatives of activism overreach. So what needs to be done? Well to start with, there is a need to bring in the PM, Ministers, Bureaucrats, MPs under the bill but keep Judiciary out as it can hamper justice deliverance. On the other hand, care has to be taken to keep strategic decisions like security, defence out of the ambit for obvious reasons. The formation of the Lokpal has to be done taking executive, judicial class in confidence. Govt cannot have singular right to dictate the members of Lokpal. CJI, Leader of Opposition have to be a part of the selection process.

But will the Lokpal Bill in itself solve all the problems? Answer is a resounding a NO. What is needed is a series of reforms in form of police reforms, judicial reforms, elecoral reforms and citizen reforms to end the menace of corruption, These are needed to remove the red tape, the delays in decisions, corruption in courts, delays in justice delivery system, criminals in Parliament and overall systemic changes needed. While the first three are debated, I will speak about the last one and that is reforms in citizen behavior. No longer can people be allowed to be morally and financially unethical or unbothered about corruption and just abuse political class. Citizens have to exercise their voting rights sensibly and also ensure clean behvior themselves which means no giving bribes, being whistleblowers, no faking bills to save taxes and abiding by law of the country.

India is at the crossroad. How each pillar of democracy behaves will decide which path we take.

Is Jaitapur Congress's Nandigram in Maharashtra?

2011-04-20T00:46:00.000-07:00

As they say history repeats itself if you don’t learn from it. Maharashtra government and specially Congress seems to be learning it the hard way in Jaitapur. Maybe because they did not learn from the mistakes Left Front made in Nandigram and Singur. Whatever the mistakes they have committed, it surely has put Coastal Maharashtra on a volcano ready to erupt. And sadly one family has lost its young son.
Jaitapur Nuclear Power Plant was touted as one of the biggest achievement of the state. JNPL is a new proposed 9900 MW power project of Nuclear Power Corporation of India (NPCIL) at Madban village of Ratnagiri district in Maharashtra. It will be the largest nuclear power generating station in the world by net electrical power rating once completed.
On December 6, 2010 agreement was signed for the construction of first set of two third-generation European Pressurized Reactors/Evolutionary Power Reactors (EPR) and the supply of nuclear fuel for 25 years in the presence of French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. French nuclear engineering firm Areva S.A. and Indian state-owned nuclear operator Nuclear Power Corporation of India signed this multi billion valued agreement of about $9.3 billion. The supporters of the project point out to the growing needs of the country in terms of power. They also point out at the economics and environmental safety of nuclear power generation. The local support for the project mainly came from Narayan Rane, Ex-CM of Maharashtra and currently a minister in state cabinet. The local residents of the region were promised employment opportunities as well as increased market value of land. The land acquisition saw the landowners being paid amount much more than the market price,
With everything seemingly in place for a smooth start of the project, what has happened in last few months that the region is seeing a popular upsurge? Why are the local residents up in arms against the project and refusing the economic temptations doled out to them? The answers can be found out in the arrogant manner in which the whole project is being pushed.
When the first signs of trouble and revolt were seen, the government tried to tone down their anger by increasing the compensation amount. The government could not understand that the opposition was because of various reasons like impact on the marine ecosystem which will impact the main occupation – fishing, of the region. The concerns were more on environment and livelihood than on compensation. The government completely failed to read the situation. In the entire period, government and Congress thought it was prudent to rely on the judgment and ground reports from Narayan Rane. They relied too heavily on his long standing political career in the region. This is where the government faltered majorly. Not only was he reading the concerns wrong but he was also resorting to arrogant strong arm tactics which further infuriated the locals. In Jan 2011 when the CM Prithviraj Chavan visited Jaitapur, the local residents were prevented from voicing their grievances. People opposing the project were kept away from the meeting venue by force. So the CM had no clue about the anger in the local communities.
The Fukushima disaster in Japan acted as a catalyst in increasing the opposition to the project. The coastal belt of Maharashtra falls in Seismic Zone 3 which is Moderate Risk Zone. Post Fukushima the concerns of similar accidents in the JNPL and its impact on people and area around too had to be considered. While the environmental studies conducted so far have showed that no danger is expected, the local anger is over the manner in which studies were conducted and the institutes doing the study. NEERI (National Environment Engineering Research Institute) is one of the main organisations doing the study. The reputation of this agency was badly hit during an oil spill at Mumbai coast in 2010. Neither were they able to control the after affects of the spill but for a long period they were in dark about the hazards of the spill and ways to control it. Also the public hearing of the environmental concerns done in April 2010 was found flawed because the report was not shared with most of the local residents around. Though Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh immediately after Fukushima agreed to reconsider the power plant at Jaitapur, very soon he did a u-turn.
There are few more questions which need to be answered by the Government of India and Government of Maharashtra
The approval for this project was given a week before the visit of French President Nicolas Sarkozy. While giving the approval, Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh did mention that some of the environmental risks have been ignored while giving the nod from his ministry. He mentions strategic and economic reasons behind such a move. The question to be asked is what was the pressure or strategic impact of this project? Was the Indian Government under international pressure to give a go ahead? Is this a valid reason to take a confrontational approach with the local residents and not spend time in explaining the project?
The technology being used in the nuclear power plant has so far been untested in the world. The only place where it is under process of being built is in Finland. The project in Finland too has seen tremendous delay and has faced many technical and environmental hurdles. Is it wise on part of Indian Government to risk a region to a technology which is not yet proven?
The PM Manmohan Singh had put his personal prestige at stake for the Nuke deal. At that point he had mentioned about India needed additional 45,000 MW of nuclear energy to meet the demand. Many scientists like Dr Gopalkrishnan, ex- Chairman of Atomic Energy Regulatory Board have raised questions on the PM’s assessment. Also why has the government tried to strangle all other traditional means of power generation? Why is there a blanker ban on coal generated power plants? Is the PM under pressure from the US and other vendor countries to buy technology? Instead of a few high impact plants, why is government not looking at plants with smaller capacities distributed across India?
If we see the chain of events, we can see that the government in the state has tried to subvert the process of explanation and been blind to people’s doubts. They have tried to shove the project down people’s throat. If Dr Anil Kakodkar could explain the project to Maharashtra Assembly and Council (where the main supporters of the project including the CM were caught sleeping), what was stopping them from a similar engagement with the local residents.
Does India in general and Maharashtra in particular need some power project to overcome the power crisis? The answer is a resounding yes. Being a layman who does not understand atomic energy in great detail, I will excuse myself from commenting on the merits of nuclear power and JNPL. But being a resident of the state, I will surely say that if government had been less arrogant in it’s behavior and been more accommodating to dissent, we might not seen the loss of life in the police firing 2 days back.

Why am I not rejoicing today

2011-04-09T03:06:00.000-07:00

Some are calling it 15th August revisited and some are clling it awakening of new India. Congratulatory messages and smses from people who suddenly have found their ‘conscience’. But as an aspiring young leader, am I rejoicing? No, I am not. And I have my reasons not to rejoice.

To start with, let’s look at the entire movement against corruption. Today Anna Hazare is the face of India against Corruption and treated as if he has already won the war against corruption. One question to ask is was this a fast against corruption or was it a fast just to push himself and his team on the Jan Lokpal Bill Draft Committee? If it was a fight against corruption, why was no action demanded on people already accused yet free like Sheila Dikshit, Kalmadi, Pawar, Vilasrao, Kanimozhi etc? Why did Anna agree only when the government gave him a commitment to pass the bill in June and allowed him to nominate people from the so-called ‘civil society’. I will not get into details of the people nominated or their ideologies or even their dirty acts at some times. But I am forced to ask if only the people nominated make a ‘civil lot’. Where is the inclusivity that these ‘civil society; members love to ask for every time? Why no woman in the committee, why is the committee feudal with a father – son duo in it? Do these 5 represent the voice and wish of entire India? Why is no attempt made to take views of all those common people who joined the movement?

There is also a larger constitutional question. How are we in last few years allowing unconstitutional bodies to frame policies and laws? It started with the National Advisory Council. NAC’s regular turf war with Manmohan Singh and his ministers has ensured that governance goes into a cold storage. The state of inertia hurting Indian economy today is because of this turf war. Now do we want to create one more entity made up of similar activists and put further brakes on development? This is not to say that India does not need a law which will allow complaints against PM and his group of ministers. We need a law which is strong enough to punish wrong doers at higher levels. The Lokpal Bill passed in LS during Vajpayee’s time ensures the above. The new demand is to let the social activists be a part of this entire process. It also creates a Frankenstein. The porposed Jan Lokpal Bill can be extremely draconian if used used with an agenda. This is fraught with dangers as ‘civil society’ in India is still at best a bunch of politically motivated good speakers who push their masters and funders agenda. Also there is a tendency seen in this group and that is to take a view which does not agree with the majority class or caste. Not that majoratism is the way democracy should function but to always act as if majority is wrong is also dangerous. So while the Lokpal Bill as per what NDA had passed should be the starting point along with necessary steps to keep it out of government pressure and control. The immediate need of the hour is to strengthen the existing institutions and bring it out of government pressures. A movement is needed to ensure sanctity of the CVC, CEC, CBI etc. It’s the undermining of these institutions that has led to rampant corruption and corrupt going scot free. On its own passing Lokpal Bill will not solve the problem. It will need comprehensive set of reforms at all levels to ensure that agencies create work efficiently and in an unbiased form.

So while I would thank Anna Hazare for a couple of things. One is to bring the fight against from a political domain to the social domain. So far only the opposition parties were leading this fight against the corrupt UPA. For the first time, the society also joined in. Another aspect to thank Anna for is that his movement ensured that Congress does not escape under the fog cover of WC win and Indo-Pak thaw. It ensured that post WC, the focus is back on corruption and the government’s inaction on it. But at the same time I am not rejoicing because no major breakthrough has been made yet. What Swami Agnivesh and Arving Kejriwal are showing off as victory is nothing few unconstitutional, unimportant crumbs. As long as the process of punishing the guilty of CWG, 2G, Dewas-Antrix, Cash for Votes, Wheat Scam does not move towars logical finish, the India against Corruption is just a nice dream to have.

Nation at the crossroads

2011-04-08T01:52:00.000-07:00

“Tu idhar udhar ki baat na kar, yeh bata kafila kyun loota”. This is the question Sushma Swawaj asked PM Manmohan Singh in the Parliament recently. And when she asked it, she was echoing the sentiments of millions of Indians who are pained at where we are. When the team of Manmohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi took over the reins of the country from Atal Bihari Vajpayee, the nation was on the threshold of marching into an era of prosperity, happiness and positivity. And its just country misfortune and UPA’s abysmal governance that we need a World Cup victory to rejoice over as something positive in an otherwise negative period. If the nation introspects, it will find the answers. There are many reasons but the biggest reason is the apathy of the great Indian middle class which has brought us to this stage. It’s denial to be a part of the political solution (intentional or stage managed) made it blind and deaf to continuous reminders from likes of L K Advani since 2007 that things are going worse. Starting with mismanagement of anti-terror policy to withering away of the economic growth and now to the menace of corruption, warning signs were always there but both the government and the public ignored those. The result is UPA back in power with higher degree of incompetence, graft, arrogance and unaccountability. So when the second part of the above couplet says “Mujhe rahjaano se gila nahin, teri rahbaari ka sawaal hain”. Here the question is asked not only of Sonia Gandhi, Manmohan Singh, Congress, UPA but to all those who ignored the warning signals in 2009 and brought the country to these crossroads.

Anna Hazare, the grand old man of Maharashtra, is now in Delhi replicating his Maharashtra model. He has successfully fought corruption at all levels in Maharashtra. Now he is on a hunger strike at Jantat Mantar in Delhi against the rampant corruption in the government. He is supported by a number of activists, celebrities, professionals and people from all walks of life. It’s a welcome movement and one has to support it. The anger against the non-stop spate of graft issues is building up the anger of the nation. But there are some dangerous signals coming out of this movement. One of the dangers is people with dubious credentials joining this crusade. One already saw likes of Om Prakash Chautala and Pappu Yadav trying to hog llimelight in this fight. Next is the presence and support from the so-called ‘civil society’. When you have people like Swami Agnivesh, Aruna Roy, Harsh Mander support Anna Hazare, you wonder if this all is becoming a setup. These people are the ones running the government by proxy. If Sonia Gandhi is the remote control, they are the batteries. If they cannot fight corruption inspite of being in the system, nation should think twice before trusting them. They have the power, mandate and support of NAC chief Sonia Gandhi to formulate policies to stop graft. Why haven’t they been able to do so till now? If Harsh Mander and Aruna Roy were so concerned about probity in life, why have they not objected or resigned against the shameless corruption of the PM, the cabinet and his allies? Under no circumstances should they be allowed to hijack the movement. If it happens, it will be a repeat of anti-terror movement after 26/11. Instead of making government answerable their aim is to tar every party with same brush. Nation must distinguish that in BJP, a Bangaru Laxman or Yeddiyurappa is an exception but for Congress Sheila Dixit, Vilasrao, Ashok Chavan, Tarun Gogoi, Jaipal Reddy, Suresh Kalmadi are the rules and not just exceptions. So how much ever, the civil society tries to turn the movement to “sab chor hain”, the national agenda should be to remove the corrupt systems put in place by the Congress part y and make it pay for all the corruption of its own and its allies.

One of the main demands of Anna Hazare is Jan Lokpal Bill. Before we say that Jan Lokpal will be the solution to all the corruption problems, there is a need to understand the pros and cons of it. There is no denying that this country needs systemic changes mainly in form of political reforms, judicial reforms and police reforms. But we also need social reforms and corporate reforms. The corruption is so deeply etched in the soul of the society that just countering political corruption won’t be enough. Society too has to introspect and answers some bitter questions. Hating politicians is dangerous since it creates a political vacuum which is always filled by someone who we don’t like. There are institutions like CVC, CBI, and CAG which act as watchdogs against corruption but if they have failed, it is due to political interference as we saw in the case of appointment of CVC Thomas. The current government has systematically corrupted or destroyed institutions like CVC, CEC. Imagine that an ex-CJI faces serious charges of graft and government still relies on him to become National Human Rights Commission chief against all opposition. So even if Jan Lokpal is accepted, there is no guarantee that Congress will let that institution remain pure. So need of the hour is not another institution but a strong resounding punishment to Congress for its rape of the existing institutions. One more thing worrisome about Jan Lokpal is the demand to include members of ‘civil society’. Now this is fraught with dangers mainly because such ‘civil society’ is nothing but a brigade of arrogant charlatans who just push their master’s agenda. One has to find the right checks and balances before finalizing the Lokpal Bill. And this needs a through discussion not just outside Parliament with the jholawalas but also with the members of the Parliament.

As the nation tries to find its way out of the current situation, there is a tendency to create apathy at various levels against anything political. This is a danger to the democracy. The middleclass is already so apathetic that any increase in it would be the death knell of the democracy. The only way to bring change is by increased participation in the political process. Not all is negative. If one looks at the clean governance Gujarat has provided. Recently a study done by an IAS office for WB showed up Gujarat as being the place where corporate did not have to bribe the government. Look at the new laws in Bihar and MP where they have passed laws to act against erring babus. For all its negatives, Karnataka remains the only state where Lok Ayukta is free and fair and same time has been given powers and is not a toothless wonder. All is not lost and all that we as citizens needs to do is to forget diversions like caste, secularism and vote for clean governance.

.. for Manmohan is an honest man

2011-03-22T02:55:00.000-07:00

Friends, Indians, countrymen, lend me your ear (or should I say eye)

I come to bury Democracy, not to cry over it
Not all men have the courage to live and die with conviction
Manmohan Singh rules sitting on the corpse of the Democracy,
So let it be with Democracy ... The noble Dr. Manmohan Singh
Hath told you he has never done anything wrong:
That he did not appoint the tained CVC,
And I wish we had questioned Manmohan Singh years ago ...
Here, under leave of Manmohan and the Congress,
For they are an honorable lot
So are they all; all non-corruptible people

Come I to speak when integrity of head of nation has been questioned...
Multiple times on 2G and CWG:
But Manmohan Singh says that he has done no wrong;
And he is an honest man….

He hath brought many ministers like Raja, Vilasrao, Kamalnath, Pawar,
To gather monies, his party and allies have filled their coffers with
Does this Dr Manmohan Singh look so clean?
When the people needed answers, Manmohan Singh gave helplessness:
A Prime Minister has to be made of sterner stuff
Yet Manmohan Singh says he is no to be blamed;
And Manmohan Singh is an honest man.

You all did see that on the sacred floor of Parliament
Manmohan Singh and his men bought and sold MPs like cattle
They bought votes and subverted media to stay in power
Yet Manmohan Singh says he is not to be blamed;
And, sure, Manmohan Singh is an honest man.

I speak not to disprove of whatever Manmohan Singh had done in past,
But here I am to speak what I do know now.
You all did love him once, not without cause:
But now what makes you mourn that love for him?
O my mother nation! You are held ransom by vested interests,
Manmohan Singh and his men have lost their reason…. Bear with me;
My heart is in the coffin there with Democracy,
And I must pause till it come back to me.

Note - For the uninitiated, this is a remake or a rehash of the original "Friends, Romans, Countrymen" speech by Mark Antony from Julius Caesar. Tried to adapt it to the current act of treason from a so-called clean, honest, gentleman PM. Its time nation asks Manmohan Singh "Et Tu, Dr Singh"

Unaccountable Governance

2011-03-18T05:56:00.000-07:00

Today India faces a trust deficit and the person who comes to mind is an extraordinary gentleman called Morarji Desai. When Morarji Desai government went into minority, someone in his cabinet prepared a list to be given to the Speaker and the President. The list contained some names who had not yet declared support. Morarji Desai immediately took responsibility for this and said he would retire from public life. Such is the character needed to lead in a democracy. Does this not make Manmohan Singh look like a pygmy? Anything comes up and he says he does not know. Be it 2G scam or CWG or CVC appointment or the latest re-release on cash for vote scandal. He and Sonia Gandhi have hid behind a media created halo and escaped any kind of accountability.

Like never before India has a weird form of governance today. The person who is the PM has no authority and shies away from taking accountability on anything. He has a super PM who enjoys all the power but is never questioned. Then his cabinet is full of members who he hasn’t himself chosen as he had to practice ‘coalition dharma and so his cabinet colleagues are answerable to their respective leaders and fight amongst themselves. Then there is super kitchen cabinet which forms the policies for the government but has no constitutional authority. The NAC as the kitchen cabinet is called is a group of Super PM Sonia Gandhi’s ‘Kitty Party Friends’ and they have been given the power by her to overrule the PM while drafting the policies. Does this in any way sound like a democracy to you? Where does the accountability here lie and who will take the whip if anything goes wrong? No answers whatsoever from the ruling dispensation. Look at this funny irony. While NAC credits itself for bringing in Right to Information to improve transparency, NAC and Sonia Gandhi both are out of the purview of the RTI.

Accountability of the various institutions is the strong base on which a democracy thrives. And being accountable is a trait that is generally held by individuals or a group of such individuals. It is not a trait which can be thrust upon any person. So if accountability is not a value which an individual or an organization possesses, there is no way that it will take responsibility for any action or inaction. If this is someone who proves this in recent times, it is Indian PM Manmohan Singh. But it would be unfair to blame him alone for this because lack of accountability is an organizational disease in Congress. Except a few exceptions like Lal Bahadur Shastri, Madhavrao Scindia, rarely has one seen Congress leaders taking responsibility until and unless it is thumped on them from the High Command which is the Gandhi family.

If we go into history and see the early years after India’s partition, one can see how Jawaharlal Nehru ran the government like a dictator and surrounded by his coterie. Hardly anyone in modern India would have messed up on various policies as Krishna Menon but never was he questioned nor was he removed. Even after China debacle, when opposition asked for him resignation, Nehru used the old trick of ‘I would resign too’ to blunt the resignation demand. It’s just sad that India never got to learn the lessons from Nehru and Menon’s mistakes as they thwarted attempts for facts to be brought up. Jawaharlal Nehru in his entire tenure was averse to taking blame for any mistakes. Infact as one of his biographer Walter Crocker’s said in his books – Nehru was averse to answering questions from colleagues and subordinates as he thought they could not match up to his intellectual levels and he had no time for fools. What Nehru did not realize was that such feudal arrogance in initial days of Indian democracy would set a bad precedent.

The precedent that Nehru set was followed by Congress at times with more stubborn and arrogant behavior. Indira never apologized to the nation for the murder of democracy and the excesses the countrymen faced during the emergency. She went about her PMship with a total disdain for counter questions or oppositions. She went on creating Frankensteins like Bindranwale, illegal Bangladeshis and corruption but she never felt the need to tell why was she doing what she was doing. When confronted her answer was always “Foreign hand trying to destabilize India”. Stalwarts like Jayaprakash Narayan, Morarji Desai, Charan Singh, Atal Bihari Vajpayee all were at some or the other point in time called Foreign Agents by the Congress just to silence opposition.

Then came her son Rajiv Gandhi who possibly broke all the records in Parliamentary democracy by lying blatantly in Parliament. When confronted by the corruption over Bofors, Rajiv Gandhi lied in the Parliament that any kickback was paid. His bluff was soon called by brave journalists’ like Arun Shourie. But the man never felt remorse for lying to the Parliament. Nor did he ever feel remorse for presiding over the largest genocide this country has seen post partition. He infact justified it in his famous words about the tree and earth shake. Rajiv Gandhi carried on his activity of subverting constitution with a dangerous mix of communal politics. Be it Shah Bano case or the elections in Assam and Meghalaya. He tried to alter the Indian constitution on basis of religious vote banks. And he did that by riding on a brute majority. Who can forget his actions of IPKF or the dreaded rigged elections of Jammu and Kashmir? There was a scope for course correction or introspection in his politics and policies.

The curse continues today with Sonia Gandhi ruling India but without any form of accountability to either people of India, parliament or to constitution. The indications are that her son Rahul Gandhi is keen to continue the same trend by his continuous refusal to take up ministerial post but by constant meddling in important affairs of the ministry. How long will India have to play slave to such feudal mindset. When will the patience get over and tough questions asked of the Nehru Gandhi parivaar? Will we continue to remain a colony even after 6 decades of independence? The choice is with the people. Raise your voice and ask uncomfortable questions, answers for which have never been given to you so far.

Weakening Social Democracy

2011-02-17T21:49:00.000-08:00

Woodrow Wilson, the 28th President of USA once famously said “Democracy is not so much a form of government as a set of principles”. So true and when the same principles come under strain, there is no governance and finally no democracy. While India proudly calls itself the 2nd largest democracy (or the largest in terms of populace) in the world, India has had to face many such threats to its principles. If in 70s the threat came in form of corruption, lack of accountability, nepotism and dictatorship, the threat in later decades came from rise of separatist sentiments and rise of religious and casteist fundamentalism. The latest threats have been on principles of social harmony and concept of India as a nation and all Indians as citizens.

Never was this threat as obvious as in the month of January 2011. The last ten days of Jan 2011 showed such events unfold that one wondered if they are just aberrations or slowly becoming the rule in this country that preaches social harmony and worships Motherland.
When Maulana Ghulam Vastanvi became the VC of Deoband, there was a sense of happiness not only in Muslim community but outside it too. Maulana Vastanvi is seen to be the moderate and progressive face of the Muslim community and this was highlighted across the spectrum when his appointment became public. His work in field of education, especially in modernising education, was seen to be a revolutionary. So when he took over charge at Deoband, one felt this might bring change the largest educational institution for Muslim students, which has been mired in controversies over fatwas and at times outdated views. But suddenly Maulana Vastanvi has to face music from Deoband, other Muslim clerics and also the media and so-called civil society. What did he do to warrant a complete negative reaction and calls for his removal? Why did media treat him like a culprit inspite of his achievements and wish to take the Muslim community forward? Well, Maulana Vastanvi in an interview after his appointment said that “while law should take it’s own course in case of Gujarat riots, it’s time Muslim community moves on and sees the development made in Gujarat which has benefitted the Muslim community in a large way.” What was wrong with this statement that everyone suddenly started gunning for Maulana Vastanvi? To a rank outsider, this statement is a mature statement which augurs well for the community and the country. Well, it seems disappointing that a section of the country is not ready to move on though the people of Gujarat specially the Muslims have moved on and reconciled with Narendra Modi and Gujarat government. Is it not pure bias to ignore the fact that Gujarat Muslims are the most progressive, prosperous and educated than their community brethren from other states. Is it a crime if someone states this obvious fact? While the fate of Maulana Vastanvi’s resignation will be known only after the Shura meeting on 22nd Feb 2011, just the fact that his statements have generated so much anger in the community is disturbing. It seems a section of the Muslim community, clerics and leadership aided by the pseudo-secular elements do not want the Muslim community to come out of it’s ghetto identity. They might as well have a radical, dyed in the past Maulana lead their students rather than a person who has shown how progressive education benefits the cothe mmunity. This is a danger sign to the democracy and social fabric. When you have one section of the society which has not progressed at a speed comparable to other sections, anger will grow and hurt the country very badly.

Another event which took place the same time was one concerning judiciary. Recently Supreme Court upheld the life sentence given to Dara Singh for the murder of Graham Staines and his two minor sons. The murder was a gruesome act and it got the punishment that it deserved. While upholding the earlier sentence given by the High Court, Supreme Court also went into the circumstances and the background of the dastardly act. As an observation the court also said "It is undisputed that there is no justification for interfering in someone's belief by way of 'use of force', provocation, conversion, and incitement or upon a flawed premise that one religion is better than the other." In no way does this remark condone the act done by Dara Singh and others. All it says is that conversion is a stigma and a problem one has to identify. Immediately the Christian communities and the civil society were up in arms. Noise was generated about how SC was justifying Staines’ murders when the fact was far from it. A few days after the judgment, the SC expunged the observations. Brings us to the question – Is it communal to question the act of conversion? Isn’t it a fact that conversions are causing tremendous strain to the society especially in tribal India? If questioning and opposing conversion is communal, then Swami Dayanand Saraswati, Swami Vivekanand and Mahatma Gandhi all stand guilty as communal. Why is the Christian community not stopping their evangelists, their clerics from indulging in this heinous crime? Conversions and opposition to it has seen a lot of bloodshed in the past and double standards in addressing the root causes will only increase the violence. We cannot have a society wherein Swami Paramanand’s gruesome murder has to be ignored and at times even welcomed (A Christian cleric Father Emmanuel of Delhi on Times Now actually stated that Swami Paramanand was murdered because of his ‘communal activities’). Lack of tolerance towards the views of judiciary from a community is not a great sign for the democracy.

As the proverbial last straw on a camel’s back, the final act of endangering our democratic principles came in form of the high-handedness with which Central Govt and State Govt of Jammu and Kashmir behaved with fellow Indians and patriots to stop the Ekta Yatra and hoisting of tricolor at Lal Chowk. When was the last we heard, trains being stopped and made to return under cover of darkness? When was the last your bags were checked and were having Tiranga was an objectionable act? When was the last young men and women had to face lathis for having tricolor in their hands? Ever heard of a country where Leaders of Opposition are under arrest on a National Day? Sounds like emergency? And all this use of force and preventive measures for what? To stop hoisting of Tiranga at Lal Chowk in Srinagar. Constitution allows anyone to hoist the national flag anywhere as long as it is not infringing on someone’s private property. And Lal Chowk is as much a part of India as Chandni Chowk in Delhi or Nana Chowk in Mumbai is. But under pressure from separatists like Yasin Malik, the Omar Abdullah government not only buckled but went one step ahead in playing appeasement politics. And appeasement of whom? The group of people who take pride in showing Pakistani flags and hoist them at Lal Chowk at every possible opportunity. Many were injured and arrested as the Central and State government resorted to extra-constitutional methods.

When seen alone, the above three incidents look like small incidents in overall picture of democracy and governance. While the episode on Dara Singh judgement is about lack of tolerance and contempt of judiciary, the Vastanvi episode is a clear case of someone’s right to speech being questioned and the Tiranga episode is an infringement on right to national identity and right to visit any part of India lawfully. But when you put all the three together, we get a picture where radicals in minority communities are encouraged by government, so-called civil society and media to violate the spirit of our constitution and insult the basic tenets of democracy. This is a danger in the longer run and can destabilize the country if steps aren’t taken to stop it right now.

The age of digital intolerance

2011-01-28T23:31:00.000-08:00

A storm has been brewing on the digital world specially the twitter for a long time. What would have started as a one-off case is now being seen more as a pattern. Actually not even a pattern but a methodical madness. It's been seen increasingly that people from the so-called 'right wing' have been getting into ugly scraps with media people, analysts and others. Some call this group as Internet Hindus and others call them RSS Storm Troopers. I object to both because both are highly biased and grossly generalised. So let's call them Right Wing Twitterati for simplicity.

B Raman, ex-civil servant and one of the leading analysts in the country, recently wrote this piece after his showdowns with the RWT - ramanstrategicanalysis.blogspot.com/2011/01/hindutva-storm-troopers.html . Why has the digital world come to a point where a senior person has to write such an article. Let me make it clear that one ideological grounds, I have nothing common with him. I disagree with most of his analysis and am sure he too would never be comfortable with the ideological spectrum I represent.

It;s not only about B Raman but Sagarika Ghose, Barkha Dutt, Ranvir Shorey, Nikhil Wagle and many others have had their fights in the past. To be honest many of them actually enjoy provoking and then crying 'victim'. If you actually see the tweets from some of the people mentioned above, you will realise they have indulged in greater intolerance and provoked people. And when people have responded, they have gone on to brand the reaction as right wing attack. While I have no love lost for any of the people mentioned, I do feel that the RWTs are giving them a chance to brand them. If one stops for a minute and thinks, one will realise that Manish Tewari has been one of the most abusive people on the twitter. But his language was never questioned and nor was it called the Slave Brigade Crusade. Why the double standards on same problem? The people who are the Crybabies have to introspect and answer that. People like Sagarika, Wagle, Barkha, Nidhi should also respect the digital medium. On TV they were the kings and the queens, people had to lap up whatever they offered. But on digital world, they are nothing more than commoners. So when Sagarika calls someone a right wing jerk, she sould be ready to be called a media concubine. Similarly if Barkha questions someones integrity, she has to take the Radia potshots and Barkha should remember that the first case of online intolerance is creditted to her. No guerilla warfare please. Its the crazy internet jungle.

Coming to the RWTs, I have always maintained that RSS suffers the most from its fringe elements because already biased media loves to potray the loonies are the rule rather than exceptions. In one twitter exchange with Nikhil Wagle I asked him if he thinks RSS is all fanatics or would he also recall people like Atalji, Nanaji Deshmukh, Bhideji, Rambhau Mhalgi.. all great thinkers and people with extraordinary integrity. When RSS has lakhs of such noteworthy people, why should we give our opponents the chance to strengthen their biases and remember us only for anarchy? RWTs have to understand that you never win an argument by shouting, you win it by sheer strength of your content. Arun Jaitleyji famously says if your message is powerful, no one will ignore it. So rather than getting personal or abusive, letshave the right amount of ideological conviction and reason in our tweets. As far as frustrations and anger over biases goes, I will use one of the lines I like in life - Gussa badi kameeni cheez hain, sahi waqt pe istemaal hua to kamaal nahin to sirf bawaal.

And what do I tell to people like Mr. Raman or Sagarika or Barkha or Nikhil Wagle? Well, just one thing, the RWTs are not some aliens. They are a passionate, patriotic bunch of our own people. We talk about Aman ki Asha and Global Village but if we cant co-exist with our own people inspite of ideological differences, then we all are equally intolerant. And it wont be long bfore this intolerance reaches the real world too.

Yes for Tiranga

2011-01-24T01:08:00.000-08:00

Very rarely has a 26th January been watched with the such anticipation. And why not? This year the Republic Day is watched not for the show, the pomp and the dazzle in New Delhi but the action in far -off Lal Chowk in Srinagar. Isn't it a tragedy that the day when India celebrates it constitution, some youth will be facing police and their water canons, tear gas shells, lathis, maybe bululets too, just to exercise a right which Republic of India gives them. And the right is to hoist Indian Tricolour at any place on Indian soil as long as it is clean and respectable towards the flag.

Media has ,as always, gone ahead with its own biases in lambasting BJP and its youth wing for the Ekta Yatra. But no body so far has questioned why has BJYM taken out the yatra. The answers are not too far to find out. In last few years, Kashmir valley has been held hostage by an unholy nexus of seperatists, media and social activists. They at no point of time have lost an opportunity to spit at India or anything remotely Indian. Syed Ali Shah Geelani, Yasin Malik, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, Arundhati Roy, Gautam Navlakha, Barkha Dutt, Nidhi Razdan are some of the people who seem to be running a campaign against Indian interests in the state. And in each occasions, the government of India has been surrendering. Be it during Amarnath Land Row or the action against stone pelters or troop reduction or the removal of AFSPA. The continous kid glove treatment to the seperatists in valley has not gone well with the other population of the state. That's why you saw unprecedented crowd at the Kashmir conclaves organised by BJP. More and more nationalists forces are slowly realising the dangers of seperatism. They have been wanting to enter the mainstream but have been held back by a handful of seperatists. This yatra is to connect the rest of India with this nationalist part of the state.

And this is precisely why the J n K government as well as Central Government and the seperatists are afraid of this yatra. Imagine a CM who sat silent when Srinagar burnt or was under stone fire, now spewing fire and wanting to stop the yatra. The yatra is to tell him , not to take the nationalist side too lightly.

Looking at the slew of steps taken in recent past, one thing is obvious, you will face no fire if you are a seperatist and want to spread anti-India venom. This and recent statements by Pak diplomats on how Pakistan was close to a deal with the UPA government, one can imagine Government at both central n state giving major concessions to the seperatists. This yatra is also to warn the government from any such surrender. This is precisely the reason, first voice against the yatra came from seperatists leader Yasin Malk. After he protested, NC, PDP and Congress joined the fracas to further their bogus secularism.

In current scenario, it would be prudent if the governments do not indulge in competetive seperatism and allow the youth to hoist national flag at Lal Chowk, the same place where seperatists furled Pakistani flag during recent strife.

Corruption, Institutions and Congress

2011-01-09T22:57:00.000-08:00

31st December 2010, Income Tax tribunal passed a long pending order nailing the people (including Sonia and Rajiv Gandhi's close friend O Quattrochi) who allegedly received kickbacks in more than 2 decade old Bofors case. This was the apt end to the year 2010 which for India could easily be called the Year of Scams and Inflation. And ironically the institutions who should be the guard and the watchdogs against corruption are turning out to be the failed pillars of democracy.

Corruption has always been an issue in India since independence. Old timers do talk about how then Finance Minister was forced to resign when allegations of corruption were made against Krishnamurti in 1950s. Then PM Nehru had to face pressure and criticism from leaders across political spectrum including his son in law Firoze Ghandy. Then came the era where Nehru's daughter Indira Gandhi made corruption a part of routine life in Indian society. Aided by the license raj and the brute majority that Congress enjoyed, corruption found its way right from the corridors of governance to the common officials on the ground. It took a massive movement by Jayaprakash Narayan alongwith RSS to awaken the entire nation to the dangers of corruption and nepotism. For the first time, Congress looked beatable in Indian politics.

But lot has changed since then 9including method and scales of corruption). In later years, Indian democracy found a few new institutions to work with existing institutions for a clean governance. Alongwith the courts, now we had CVC to keep a vigil on various departments. Media which played a stellar role in the Bofors corruption campaign gained more teeth with infusion of 24 x 7 TV channels. Common sense would have said that with this corruption should have come down.

But the year 2010 has clearly showed how corruption instead of reducing has taken epic proportions. Adarsh scam, CWG scam, 2G scam, the daylight wheat robbery, the sugar scam, Lavasa and many more were unearthed in the year. While involvement of ruling politicians was a given thing, these scams brought in new players right from media Tzars (and Tzarinas) to corporate head honchos to lobbyists to bureaucrats to defence forces to judges to vigilance office. For a moment it seemed, this was a well-oiled unit given protection at the highest level.

If one looks at it closely, it seems Congress has learnt a lesson or two from its Bofors and Narsimha Rao days. While it was as corrupt then, it also used to be regularly caught on the wrong foot because of the various institutions mentioned above. So one guesses that when it came back to power in 2004 as UPA 1, it made a systematic process to weaken the institutions. A case in point is the misuse of CBI in last 6 years. The only case where CBI was seen to be swift was in the Amit Shah where it acted as if it was under pressure to treat a state Home Minister like a petty pickpocket. Compare that to the lethargy shown in CWG or 2G scam. One has been hearing daily since 2 months on how Kalmadi, Raja, Radia etc will be caught in a day or two but nothing has happened. The slow pace has helped the accused to ensure papers are not found easily. Same CBI has been periodically used against Mayawati, Laloo, Mulayam for political benefits at time of crisis. While no one had any doubts about CBI being a Congress pawn, recent IT Tribunal notings make this fact known universally. If an institution is facing a crediblity crisis, the government in a normal circumstances would ensure a person with impeccable credentials is brought to lead it and that means the person is selected by those who have set high standards or integrity. But this is not what Congress did. They brought in Thomas as the Chief Vigilance Commisioner. Thomas faces charges in a graft case in Kerala and is also under scanner for his tenure in Telecom Ministry when 2G Scam happened. his appointment was against the wish of Leader of Opposition Sushma Swaraj. Why this departure from a regular practice where CVC has to be selected with approvals from PM, Home Minsiter and Leader of Opposition? Now the same tainted CVC was given the task to select the new CBI Director. The entire episode shows that Congress is keen to kill the neutrality of investigating and vigilance agencies for fear of being caught red handed.

If there have 2 institutions on whom Indians have place greatest faith, it is the court and the media. But Congress has ensured that these two are made an integral part of their Loot India campaign. Ex CJI Balakrishnan is one person who sat over some of the most controversial economic and business decisions in his tenure. The doubts raised by his colleagues and ex- CJIs on his behaviour and integrity are serious. The fact that his kins have increased their wealth manifold during his tenure is enough to make any person smell a scam. Add to his kin's involvement with a political party and it clearly raises questions over his political neutralilty too. Rather than making such a person leave public life and enquire against him, the Congress in centre has gone ahead to make him the chairperson of National Human Rights Commission. And media is silent in all these acts of ommision and commision. Similarly Congress has ensured many retired and tainted bureaucrats are given such positions after their tenure is over. Ramamnand Tiwari and Subhash Lalla in Maharashtra are similar examples of tainted babus getting plum posts after retirement. Its like asking a thief to keep a vigil on his theft and others wrong doings too.

So far there were a few whispers about the mainstream media being a party in crime with the Congress but the leaked Radia tapes proved that they are a part and parcel of the government and the party. How else can one explain renowned journalists like Vir Sanghavi and Barkha Dutt lobbying for the man who is said to have been the kingpin of the 2G scam? If media is not doing its job of being a watchdog, where can a common Indian look to.

Many skeptics will ask "but how will this affect a common man". Well, this affects the common man the most. Imagine the money Indian economy lost due to 2G and CWG scams. The same money could have been used for schemes for those below poverty line or to reduce the pressures of inflation. The food inflation which is making 2 meals a luxury for a poor man could have been avoided had the government and its institutions not allowed the wheat, the sugar and now the onion scam to happen. Every paisa that is taken away in an act of corruption is a paise on which the aam aadmi has the first right. But this has gone missing to PM Manmohan Singh, Congress President Sonia Gandhi or the "PM in waiting" Rahul Gandhi.

But all is not lost. The fact that, inspite of most institutions not playing their part fairly, so many scams were unearthed and the government was pushed to the corner to explain, is heartening. This means that there are elements in media, bureaucracy and judiciary which are not ready to be the slaves of the Gandhi dynasty and care for the country. It is time where people of this country have to revolt against the tenure of corruption which has made life impossible for a common man.

Is there a shift in BJP-Muslim community relationship?

2010-12-03T22:41:00.000-08:00

Last 3 months, there were a few elections which took place. While one was the Bihar elections which was prominent and known to all. The other was the civic elections and elections to local bodies in Gujarat. Though both these elections differed in issues, players and even agendas, some notable commonalities were:

Both the states voted overwhelmingly in favour of the ruling party and decimated the opposition
Both the states voted on the plank of development
For the first time in its history, the percentage of Muslim vote for BJP rose above 15pc.

While the first two points have been debated many a times specially with regards to Gujarat, one has to take the thrid point very seriously since this has national resonance. What has changed that Muslims and even other minorities have voted in large numbers for the man so far villified by the media and others as a "merchant of death" and "enemy of the minority".

Muslims in Gujarat have clearly demonstrated that they do not agree with what the media and other activists say about BJP in general and Modi in particular. After years of systematic villification and demonising campaign, Muslim community and BJP showed clear signs of reconcilliation and the results were for all to see.

To start with BJP won the Kathlal bye-election. Interestingly BJP had never won this assembly and Congress had lost it only twice (and both times to a third party). This assembly segment has a large number of Muslim voters and these votes decide the winner and the loser. The margin by which BJP won the seat clearly showed that Muslims voted wholeheartedly for the BJP candidate. Then in the civic body elections, BJP swept all the 6 main city civic bodies. Out of these 6 atleast 3 (Ahmedabad, Vadodra, Surat) had sizeable Muslim population. Not only did BJP sweep across the non-Muslim dominated seats, but also swept the seats in Muslim dominated areas. The victory of Muslim candidates on BJP tickets proved that there is a churning happening both at the voter and the local leadership level. The third and final proof of the change occured during the elections to zilla parishads, nagar palikas and the panchayats. The events in Godhra gave a clear signal that no more can Muslims be used a vote bank by just raising fears of BJP. 17 Muslim councillors who were elected, ensured that a BJP Mayor was elected. Apart from this, there were a number of minority candidates (both Muslim and Christians) who contested as BJP candidates were elected. That was the reason BJP swept the local polls including in minority dominated areas.

So what has changed since those distrubing days of March 2002. The biggest change is that Muslims have stopped believing the fictional works of media and other activisits be it social or political. They are seeing the development of the state. Earlier their leaders used to just lament about lack of development in Muslim areas e.g. in Juhapura or Kalupur in Ahmedabad. Narendra Modi has changed that. He has taken development right to the doorstep of the common man, be it Hindu or Muslim. This has affected the Muslim phyche the most and in a very positive manner. While cynics and critics never give him credit, one has to see and believe how the growth in Gujarat is inclusive and does not discriminate on basis of religion, caste or creed. A welcome change for the masses specially the minorities from the days of just appeasement and no development practised by the Congress. Skeptics still are not ready to accept this reconcilliation. But they don't get the fact that such a sweeping victory is possible only if all sections of the society vote for you.

Just around the same time, Bihar elections also proved the same. BJP won most of the Muslim dominated seats in there. While people give credit to Nitish Kumar for this, they tend overlook the contribution of BJP state unit specially the Deputy CM and Finance Minister Sushil Kumar Modi. As FM, Sushil Kumar Modi ensured that the development work is spread across various regions and cuts across the traditional caste and religion lines. And the result is for everyone to see.

The silent performer that he is, BJP President Nitin Gadkari deserves a lot of credit for this change. His diktat that HC Verdict on Ayodhya be taken calmly without any extremes ensured that the chest beating loonies in the party did not do anything that could make the Muslim community feel insecure about. The calm and mature reaction to the verdict ensured that. To many who are not completely aware of Nitin Gadkari's track record, he as Party President of Maharashtra had worked hard to expose the government on Waqf property scam. He was in forefront of the opposition to the shameless loot of Waqf properties by the Congress-NCP government. At a time like Ayodhya verdict India and specially BJP needed a man who could ensure that tempers or excitement do not go out of control and Nitin Gadkari ensured that.

Now what do these election results mean to national politics in general and BJP in particular? In general, this will ensure that no party can take Muslim votes for granted and continue to appease it while keeping them away from development benefits. This will also ensure a dirty fight amongst the 'secular' parties to stake claim to Muslim votes and that could result in some of them playing right into the hands of the radicals. For the BJP, this is a clear statement that development politics pays handsome reward if it is inclusive. It brings BJP closer to the minorities. In the past while BJP would just discount the votes of minorities, now it knows it can get a good part of it. And this will ensure that radical right loonies are kept on tight leash and not allowed to vitiate the relationship between the two community. Last but not the least, if this process of reconcilliation continues the way it is, there would be a time soon that BJP will no longer be a political untouchable and will be able to dream of coming to power on their own.

Verdict and beyond

2010-09-30T23:34:00.000-07:00

Finally the most awaited verdict is out. The decades old case of Ramjanmabhoomi- Babri Masjid has ended in the HC. While there are many different views about the verdict, some welcoming it and some slamming it, the verdict has atleast given a chance for people to move on. Let me not get into what the verdict is or how does one intepret it. I will focus on how can this verdict usher in genuine reconcilliation between the different communities.

The verdict has more or been very clear about the issue of a temple being there and it being the birthplace of Lord Ram. Now that aspect of the controversy is clear, it is time both the parties forget the bitterness of the past and work towards the final settlement. Being the majority community, so far the onus of upholding the values of secularism has been on the HIndu community. And in most cases, the community has shown magnamity. Thats why India never saw a Hindu vote bank or Hindu radicalism sweeping across the country. This verdict now puts the onus on the Muslim community to uphold this tradition. Am sure the common Muslim man or woman on the street will be willing. The only hinderance I see would come from radicals or the psuedo seculars. This time the country has to shut its ears and doors to these kind of vested interests and let the two communities join hands.

A tale of 2 school boycotts

2010-09-27T23:54:00.000-07:00

This mornign newspapers welcomed me to two news seemingly similar but when one goes below the surface, it tells you about the clash of 2 cultures. The news items were about the school boycott called by many parents in Navi Mumbai in Maharashtra and the school boycott call in Kashmir by Islamic radical seperatist Geelani.

The Navi Mumbai school boycott was prompted on issue of school fees hike by private schools and the government's failure to control or even regularise the hikes which are very frequent, most of times unjustified and also extremely tough for the middle class. When it went beyond the tolerance of the parents, they took an extraordinary step of calling for a one day boycott. This call was taken out of concern for the future. It had the feel of concerned citizens worrying for the well-being of the kids.

The Kashmir boycott was called by Geelani and his cronies. They have asked the parents not to send their children to school. There is absolute no concern for the future here. All they want is to prepare an army of uneducated, radicalised terrorists who will be pawns at their hands. Sadly some parents heeded the call. And for those who bravely sent their kids to schools, they had to fear attacks as Geelani's men attacked school buses. It was a shameless act of Talibanising an entire population.

The two episodes show you how 2 cultures are fighting for space in Indian democracy. The one in Navi Mumbai was the culture of tolerance, non violence and had its vision set on a better tomorrow. The one in Kashmir was of hatred and had no concern for the future generation.

Sadly while the parents in Navi Mumbai had no authority or minsiter coming to meet them, one saw a galaxy of so-called secular Indian political class and media clamouring to meet the man who wants to Talibanise Kashmir. Who wins in the end will be decided by what we the people think is good for the nation.

Statesman v/s the pretender

2010-09-20T02:05:00.000-07:00

In continuation with my last blog and the state that we find ourselves in today, I decided to do a flashback and see how did the NDA regime do and what's the biggest difference between then PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee and current PM Manmohan Singh. While comparing their actions or even inaction on various issues, one thing becomes very clear - Manmohan Singh can go down as a great economist but can never be called a statesman. At the best he can be called a pretender. Whereas Vajpayee had statesmanship written all over him even before he became the PM. Remember how he put his hand up and led Indian delegation to UN on a crucial Kashmir debate inspite of being in the opposition. A statesman has to be judged on various counts as below

Authority in the government - We live in a strong democracy and there is always room for dissent. On an issue once all the opinions are heard, it boils down to the person in the hotseat to raise his hand and make the right decision. It's always his or her duty to defend that decision, whatever his personal opinion be. Atal Bihari Vajpayee was a master of this art. He ensured that every issue was debated well and then a decision taken. One a decision was taken, there was no looking back. That's why you never saw the squabbling between cabinet members like you see in Manmohan Singh's time (Even on Kandahar, no dissent was heard at the time of the crisis or the decision). This ensured that government never fell prey to inaction and also the cabinet decisions were respected by the bureaucracy. This is seriously missing in Manmohan Singh.

Pressure from external forces - If Manmohan Singh had Left, Laloo, Karunanidhi, Mamata etc to contend with in his 2 tenures, Atal Bihari Vajpayee had George, Mamata, Karunanidhi, Patnaik and others to deal with. But one can hardly see any decision that was taken then under pressure from the allies (except a couple of fuel price rollbacks). No major policy decision was cancelled or postponed because of allies. Manmohan Singh during his first tenure stopped the economic liberisation process under pressure from the Left. And today due to that we can see the slackening economy. Inspite of socialists in his cabinet and as allies, Atal Bihari Vajpayee allowed Jaswant Singh, Yashwant Sinha and Arun Shourie to do what was needed for economy. Similarily the frictions with the party or Sangh Parivar were kept under control and never allowed to become a hinderance to governance. Inspite of Sangh pressure, Atal Bihari Vajpayee entertained no adventurism on Ramjanmabhoomi and continued his effort at out of court settlement. Whereas Manmohan Singh has always buckled under pressure from Congress party or the Gandhis. That's why today inspite of a well experienced cabinet, the policy decisions are taken by the Gandhis and the National Advisory Council.

First amongst equal - Manmohan Singh though the PM is not the tallest leader within the allies, the parliamentary board and the party. This means everytime he has to demand respect rather than commanding it. Compared to this, Atal Bihari Vajpayee though in company of stalwarts like L K Advani, George Fernandes, Jaswant Singh etc, was still the tallest leader and everyone knew the buck stopped there. This helped when it came to complex issue. Take for instance Kashmir. Atal Bihari Vajpayee used his famous lines of talks within the ambit of insaaniyat and allowed talks with moderate seperatists. He allowed them to go to Pakistan. This bore fruits when Kashmir saw a heavy turnout in 2002 state elections. Many Kashmir analaysts also laud it as the fairest elections Kashmir ever saw. Even today he is loved for his moves on Kashmir. Compare this to Manmohan Singh. He and his cabinet and his party and his high command can not agree on the solution. To start with they stopped the talks started by NDA. Then they allowed situation to go out of control during 2008 Amarnath crisis and now their mishandling of the situation has given Kashmir another long bout of struggle. Why has Manmohan Singh failed to take a decision? Why can't he overule everyone else and do what is needed as the PM? Answer is that he does not have the political stature of a statesman that one needs for such a complex issue.

Country first, party later - One of the aftermath of NDA rule was that BJP lost a lot of its traditional constituency. This to me was not the failure of Atal Bihari Vajpayee but his victory as a statesman. Nowhere did he allow party considerations to rule his actions. He did what was important for the country be it Indo Pak thaw or the N bomb testing or the economic policies or tightening of tax rules. He did what was needed at that time for the country and did not let political gains govern his decisions. Compare this with Manmohan Singh. For years they did not do anything about farmer suicide and suddenly before elections they decided to announce a package , The UPA fuel prices change is dictated by the state assembly elections calendar. The export or import controls over sugar have been changed based on elections in Maharashtra or UP. Even projects like dam, mining, roads etc been held hostage to considerations like opposition ruled state or Congress and allies ruled states. While the Vedanta project which has been dealt a body blow in Orissa, the Povaralam dam project in AP has been allowed to go ahead inspite of similar conditions and impact on tribes and environment. Political bias does not befit a statesman. Manmohan Singh fares extemely poor on this when compared to Atal Bihari Vakpayee.

Sense of fairplay- One of the biggest strength of a statesman is how he or she behaves with an opponent. In entire NDA rule, there was no case of any opposition leader being targetted. Also tainted ministers like Muthaiah, Buta Singh were asked to quit (NDA 1 lost power due to this). Compare this with the phone tapping actions of UPA or their misuse of CBI in Gujarat. Corruption tainted ministers like Raja, Kanimozhi, Pawar etc are all still in the government. The sense of justice is clearly missing with Manmohan Singh as the PM. Party is allowed to go ahead with it's vendetta politics when it comes to opposition leaders and opposition ruled states.

Vision for future - What is the PM's vision for future? How does he intend to build the infrastructure which has been left neglected so far in his regime? What is the long term economic policy? In his years as PM, Manmohan Singh has concentrated so much on keeping all his allies, party and high command happy that he seems to have lost his touch which endeared him to the country in 90s as the FM. All one hears from him are lofty words or predictions like inflation will come down at _______. Atal Bihari Vajpayee with his years of experience in the villages and small towns of the country knew what was needed in India. That's why he unveiled his vision where infrastructure was to drive the development of India and fuel the economy. Roads, Power, Railway, Telecom and other sectores were given a boost to enable a good platform for the economy to take off. His vision on interlinking of rivers has to be fulfilled to solve woes fo agricultural sector.

Respected outside - While nobody doubts that PM Manmohan Singh has endeared himself to the world leaders, one does not certainly know if it is just appreciation or genuine respect for him. Can he take a decision which is good for India but which US does not like and still get away with it? Like Atal Bihari Vajpayee did when he went ahead with the Nuclear plan. Atal Bihari Vajpayee took bold foreign policy initiatives and at the same time did not blink when national interest was at stake. He allowed Jaswant Singh to mend post-sanctions relations with US and other superpowers but not at the cost of national respect. India sailed through the sanctions and other countries had to acknowledge India as a growing power.

One can go on long about how Atal Bihari Vajpayee as PM was the statesman while Manmohan Singh is the pretender, I will end with just one point. NDA regime will be remembered for N Testing, Road Infrastructure, Education for all programme, Port development, Power reforms, Kashmir peace process and subsequent elections, peace initiatives with Pakistan and Kargil war when needed, corruption free governance, midday meal scheme, relations with other countries, economic progress and many more. Will UPA be able to better this?

Perils of a dysfunctional government

2010-09-16T00:11:00.000-07:00

So finally the PM spoke on matters troubling the country. And when he finished speaking (to a select group of editors) the confusion increased rather than decreasing. While the media focused on his statements about retirement, Rahul and young cabinet, the things which he did not speak about clearly missed a mention.

The country today wants to know what is the PM planning to do about Kashmir? What is his solution for the Naxal issue? How does the economist PM plan to revive a slowing economy and control the rising inflation? Pakistan and China are getting aggressive by the day and what's India's view on that? The corruption and inefficiency continues unabated in this regime. What's the PM's view on that? What about rotten grains and lack of storage? What about Commonwealth Games? How does PM plan to stop the squabbling within the cabinet? Many questions left unanswered and as one suspects, it's a problem of "I can put my foot in the mouth if I answer"

What is leading to this state of motionless inertia? How did a government elected with a larger mandate fall prey to such a situation? Answer is loud and clear. The government is torn apart by internal divisions thereby rendering it dysfunctional. The divisions are many - between various ministers, between allies, between govt and Congress party but one which is most hurting the nation is increasing differences between Sonia Gandhi and the PM.

Take an example. Food is allowed to rot in absence of a good PDS just because Soniaji wants to bring in Food Security Bill and they have not agreed on final draft. Whenever such situations arise, anarchy takes over and ambiguity increases. Vested interests start taking over and twist things to their benefit. This is easily explained by inaction on Pawar, Raja or increasing violence in Kashmir valley or even Mamata's open support to Naxals.

Can India afford such a situation at this time? China's designs vis-a-vis India are getting aggressive by the day be it military, land grabbing, economy or interference on Kashmir. India is facing a war both internally and externally. Economy has shown signs of lethargy and inflation is making life worse. India needs a leadership which can strong decisions quickly. India needs a leader who can raise his \ her hand and be counted to see us through the testing times. Alas, we are faced with a lack of choice. We have 3 options thrown at us - a PM who cannot take decisions, a super PM who has no accountablity but has a say in all decisions and a wannabe PM who is not only ill-equipped but also unsure of his readiness to take on the accountablity.

There is only solution and that is that one of the 3 people in this situation has to make a move. Either PM puts his foot down and runs the government with authority or Sonia /Rahul remove the PM and take over. If no one is ready to do this and the state continues, one can just imagine the implications on the country. It would get on to a road of no recovery.

Rahul's dangerous left turn

2010-09-01T23:15:00.000-07:00

Manmohan Singh would have never imagined in his wildest dreams that the shackles he broke as a Finance Minister would return to haunt him as a PM. As FM in his first budget speech, he came down heavily on Nehruvian socialism which according to him resulted in the lack of growth in the country. But he would have to eat crow today as Nehru's great grandson revisits his agenda and makes it his political vehicle to the seat of power.

The signs were obvious for a long time. People close to Rahul were all mouthing words which are generally found in dictionairy of a Left Liberal. Digvijay Singh coming down heavily on Chidambaram on Naxal policy, Jairam Ramesh playing traunt to many development projects. But the government's intervention in Vedanta case and Rahul's subsequent visit was the point where it was declared openly that Rahul wants to follow his great grandfather, grandmother and father. While Rahul applauded the tribals for their fight and vowed to work as their soldier, he forgot to give them a solution to their economic woes. The tribals in Orissa are amongst the most impoverished in the country and Kandhs are reported to be living on mango kernels. Vedanta was both a boon and a bane to them. Now that the project is scrapped, what option does Rahul give them to improve their lot? Rahul will possibly say NREGS and the proposed Food Security Bill. What are these two bills and how will they improve the conditions? Well, these two schemes will give the poor guaranteed work (for a limited number of days) and food from PDS. But what about overall welfare? What about health, education, sanitation, infrastructure? No answers on that front because they aren't important. He is following the same theory which impoverished India for a long time - Give a fish everyday to the fisherman but don't teach him to fish. Because an independent and affluent India will have no place for sound good slogans or poverty toursim that Rahul likes to indulge in just like his late elders.

Rahul surely needs to read and understand economic and political history of post independence India .All spheres of our life were ruined by Nehruvian brand of socialism. License Raj gave brith to corruption, populist policies gave way to laziness and apathy, lack of competition gave birth to mediocrity being the accepted standard. If Nehru started it, Indira promoted it to her benefits. Garibi Hatao was the biggest sham in history of this country. She ensured that the poor remain poor and never question her. Rajiv was the naive one who did not try to change the situation and had no choices either. So when India got it's first non Gandhi Congress PM, it broke out of that evil grip (and it also had no choice either). Manmohan Singh spoke out against the policies of yesteryears. When India got it's first PM who had no Congressism in his blood, Atalji, he ensured that India accelerates on it's journey to prosperity. He overame all pressures from the Left leaning allies (Left Libs like George, Mamata were not allowed to hijack the development agenda). His vision and pet projects like the Golden Quadrilateral, Antodaya or Sarva Siksha Abhiyaan not only ensured welfare, created jobs but also improved other aspects of rural India. One thought Manmohan Singh on becoming the PM will accelerate this growth but the hopes were dashed. UPA 1 faced pressure from the Left and the UPA2 is facing pressure from the Ultra Left Libs in form of National Advisory Council, Sonia, Rahul and their advisors.

Today this government is under seige from it's own party. Every important minsiter seems to be stalked by a member of Sonia-Rahul coterie. If P Chidambaram is being shadowed by Digvijay Singh, Pranab Mukherjee has Mani Shankar Aiyar on his heels. Ministers like Kapil Sibal are heckled by Keshava Rao who is known for his Leftist leanings. Jairam Ramesh is allowed to play anti-development policies under the garb of environment. NAC advisor list and their introductions will clearly show their leanings and ideology. To give an example, N C Saxena who played a vital role in the cancellation of Vedanta project is a member of NAC, Advisor to Environment Ministry and also a number of other important decision making bodies. So we are currently governed not by Manmohan and his cabinet but a shadow cabinet which owes no accountablity to the country. This makes one think if in near future, Manmohan Singh, Pranabda, Chidambaram and other will be replaced by Rahul, Mani Shankar, Digvijay Singh and their likes.

This will be the beginning of another nightmare. The first one lasted nearly 45 years and cost us heavily. The next one even if it last 5 yrs will bleed us even worse. So don't fall for the 'Avatar' and know your politics and economics before you herald Rahul as 'The man India needs'

The dangers of appeasement

2010-08-01T00:22:00.000-07:00

3 events recently took place in 3 different zones of India. Though not very widely reported by the media, the events are some indicators of dangers of vote bank politics and time to come. In first event, a lecturer's hands were chopped of in Kerala by radical Muslim group for 'defaming' Mohammad, in another event Kashmir valley started following Friday as the weekly holiday for schools and banks rather than Sunday as in rest of India. Third event took place in West Bengal where radicals students of a government funded university forced teachers to wear a burqa and those who did not comply had to resign. Do I hear a 'Thank God for Modi in West Zone'?

The Kerala event is a natural culmination of the process of appeasement followed by both Left and Congress. Muslim votes are in sizeable numbers in North and Central Kerala. They ensure the victory and defeat of the parties. This prompted both the so-called secular parties from turning a blind eye to activities of the Muslim radicals. The radical leader Madani was convicted in the Coimbatore blast case but after a few years, in an unprecendented move, the Kerala and TN legislatures in a rare show of unity asked for his release. Since his release he claims to have shunned violence but his name figures in list of cases including the riot cases in a fishing village outside Calicut (Kozhikode), Bangalore blast case and the recently seen Love Jihad. Both Congress and Left clamoured to ensure that Madani was on their dias during last elections. Things have now reached such a level that Kerala is slowly becoming a hotbed of Wahabi terror. Kerala HC and later the CM had to comment on Love Jihad which is a sick attempt at conversions using heart as a weapon. Number of Hindu and Christian girls have either been converted or shunned after Nikah by Muslim youth in North Kerala. This menace has been admitted by all sections in Kerala. If the rising radicalism is not countered by peace or force today, it will result in insurgency in Gods own country.

The other incident of Kashmir is again symptomatic of politics of appeasement. The radicals in Kashmir valley have been courted , helped and encouraged by Congress at every stage of history. The death of Kashmiriyat and rise of Wahabi influence can now be seen from the fact that banks and schools in Kashmir valley have started following Friday as a holiday, which is different from rest of India. The hesitation of the ruling establishment from scrapping Article 370 for minority votes is now bearing dangerous fruits. After ethnic cleansing of Hindus from the valley, attempt is being made to convert the valley to another theocratic Islamic region.

The West Bengal issue of students forcing teachers to follow a dress code is a sign of times to come. Aliah University is a Madarasa which is converted to a university and runs on tax payers money. Here students have taken a radical stand and are not even apologetic about it. If we take this as a one off case and ignore it, we will face the same situation in all of India. Indoctrination since childhood and the reluctance to oppose radical thinking in Madarasa will slowly result in an army of educated but radicalised Muslim youth, which is a danger this country cannot afford.

This brings us to the larger question. Who will bell the cat? Recently Bangladesh SC took a bold decision and banned fatwas against women. If an Islamic state can do it why can't a secular state like India take on the radicals.

If we look at indications right now, Congress is very interested in playing the minority card since it sees this as a sure path to ruling India on its own. Also Congress is playing footsie with other radical institutions like KHAP Panchayats, Sambhaji Brigade, MNS. Other parties like Left, NCP, JD, TC, DMK, RJD, SP etc are all dependent on the minority votes. So that leaves only the BJP. It can do this by engaging with the moderates in the Muslim community and simultanesly ensuring that Hindu radical groups do not vitiate a process of harmony for a few minutes of fame. Modi is the best example of how radical influence in a state can be controlled by both tough action and empowerment. In his state, if needed for infra development, both temples and mosques were removed without any groups creating tensions. He has ensured safe and peaceful celebrations of both Moharram and Rath Yatra which was never the case in 'secular' Congress govts earlier. Today Muslims in Gujarat have the best per capita income compared to the Muslims in other states and they are better off in all other development index than Muslims from so-called secular states. In last 5 years, the fruits of development have reached all sections of the society in Gujarat and this has benefitted Muslims too. Slowly, the locals are moving on from 2002 (though the central govt, media and limousine liberals do not wish that the community moves ahead). The faster this process and faster it is accepted by those outside the state, easier it will be for BJP and Modi to build the bridge with the moderate section of Muslim community. Only this can ensure that genuine secularism prevails in the society and the Damocles sword of radical threat over our heads removed forever.

Politics of encounters

2010-07-24T00:03:00.001-07:00

So the CBI is gunning and so is the media. Not to forget the Congress and the so-called activists. And what is the target? 2 (or rather 3) encounters in Gujarat a few year s ago. The first one is one a known criminal Sohrabuddin and his wife, the other one is of his accomplice and fellow criminal Tulsi Prajapati, the third one of a LeT terrorist Isharat Jehan. So these 3 have given enough reason for others to hunt for the most efficient CM of India, Narendra Modi. Lets look at some statistics of encounters

Nearly 120 encounters have taken place in Maharashtra since 2000. Most of them under Chagan Bhujbal as the Home Minister. Interesting fact is that more than 70% of those killed belonged to anti-Dawood gangs. Gang affiliations aside, the fact thot most of those killed were gangsters meant that no tear was spent over the encounters. Lets come to another Congress ruled state Andhra Pradesh. Nearly 80 encounters have taken place over last 5 years. Most under Naxal operations or again st the mafia. Similar story repeated in UP where encounters of dacoits and criminals is a regular feature. Compareid to this Gujarat has witnessed less than 15 encounters in Modi regime.

But still we are made to believe that everything is wrong about the Gujarat Home Ministry and the police and administrators need to be punished. What sort of message are we sending? As long as you are a criminal troubling people in opposition ruled states, you will be provided protection and after your death 'justice'. If you are a terrorist like Isharat and wish to blow up opposition leaders, you will have support from the media, 'civil society' and 'secular' establishment. Is that the message one has to get?

Look at statistics again. Gujarat has amonst the lowest crime ratio in India but still the Home Department of Gujarat is being hunted like it is a pack of trigger happy mercenaries.

End of Federalism?

2010-07-14T23:47:00.000-07:00

Ever heard a Governor and Election Commissioner (both of them tainted individuals in their respective tenures) tell a democratically elected state government on which ministers to remove from the ministry? Both the positions, Governor and EC report to the President and so come under the Central Govt influence. This is a serious departure from the set democratic norms. We can debate and even agree on the point of Reddy brothers mining activities and their presence in Karnataka Cabinet. But to be adviced on corruption by Governor H R ,Bhardwaj whose claim to fame is the clean chit to accussed in Bofors case or his shielding of tainted ministers like Laloo as Law Minister in UPA1, is like Baba Nithyananda teaching celibacy.

This is just one off case in a larger picture. Central Govt's refusal to sign the anti-terror bill passed by Gujarat govt, interference of National Advisory Council in state matters like law and order, the step motherly treatmeant to states ruled by opposition, Union Minister Mamata Banerjee dictating anti Maoist policy in WB, the support to the Maoists in Lalgarh, CBI hounding Gujarat Police and Home Minister on encounters of anti-nationals (inspite of the fact that Gujarat has seen far lesser encounters than Maharashtra or AP), scuttling National Highway projects in opposition ruled states, opposing construction of a dam in MP on environment reason while same has been cleared elsewhere, many more such examples to show how central government is trying to interfere in working of state governments.

One of the most important pillar of democracy is the federal rights that states enjoy and to cut those rights is a first step to dictatorship. Indira Gandhi in 70s followed the same path. She first interfered in state subjects and got duly elected governments dismissed. Then she clamped down on political rights and finally on individual rights. History is repeating itself after 3 decades. The federal character of India is being tried to change using all democratic and undemocratic tools. Today it is the right of some opposing states that are infringed upon. Tomorrow it will be me and you to suffer if we decide to be against the government on any issue. Also one of the other flip side is that whenever states rights have been threatened, regional sentiments have risen and so have the regional parties.

NREGS and inflation

2010-07-06T07:05:00.000-07:00

While there can't be much debate on good intent of NREGS, one certainly is forced to think about it's implementation at a time when a few states have shown signs of failure. To start with lets just look at one aspect of how it fuels inflation.

The scheme guarantees the rural populace a fixed minimum amount of labour work within its area at a better daily wage. The problem here is that the dependence is completely on infrasturcture projects, be it state or centre sponsored. Now this can work well in a state where infrastructure projects are being undertaken thick and fast. And also where infrasturcture development does not just mean building of roads. But come to states where the infrastructure projects are far and few and those which are running show no signs of ending. This is where the imbalance starts. The labourers get their wages for miniscule amount of work. And landowners find labour at much higher cost since the minimum rates have been pegged. This means while the cost of foodgrains increases, the supply decreases due to lack of labour and lower productivity. The same time, the demand for the grains increases because you have more people with money to buy. This entire cycle pushes the start cost of foodgrains higher but still both the players in agri economy are left dissatisfied. The landowner is not satisfied because of higher wages, lack of labour and less productivity. And the labourer now finds the rising prices of foodgrains a burden and also has to live with Damocles sword on his head of losing the wages if no new infrasturcture projects are undertaken in the area. This is a dangerous cycle and has far greater impact than just inflation.

So if NREGS has to work well, a balance has to be found between labour for infrasturcture and labour for agriculture. The implementation has to be different. Infrastructure project need to be undertaken at a faster speed so that more work can be taken in an amount of time and this ensures the labourers have enough work for long. More spheres like agricultural labour, rural enterpreneurship, private corporate involvement etc have to be covered else NREGS will remain just a free sop>

why I support this bandh

2010-07-04T22:58:00.000-07:00

These are the few reasons why I support the Bharat Bandh:

This bandh has not been called for trivial issue like desecration of statue or some cartoons or paintings. The reason for the bandh is something which is far more serious and is affecting a common man very badly. The inflation was one wound and the fuel price hike is like salt on it. In such extraordinary situation, an extraordinary method of protest it needed.
This bandh has come after all other means failed. Opposition parties recommended changes in budget, asked for debate, ran a signature campaign and moved a cut motion. But all this was met with either an arrogant no or misuse of power. This left the opposition with no other choice.
Media has been silent on price rise and is saving the government. Atleast now media is now talking about the issue.
If the bandh works the government will be forced to look into the steps to reduce the pain and act less arrogant.

Year 1 of UPA 2

2010-05-17T02:13:00.000-07:00

Watching the PM address a press conference where answers have been smaller than those on Twitter, one wonders if the PM really means what he is saying because one year performance actually shows something else.

UPA2 started with a lot of expectations since Congress had won sizeable seats and there was no dependence on Left, Laloo, Mulayam etc. It was claimed in media that now Manmohan Singh will be allowed to implement his economic reforms, Sonia Gandhi her social ideas and Rahul Gandhi his vision for the future. Also one felt that this tenure around, PM will ensure clean cabinet. But has it really happened? Today we have a PM and his senior colleagues battling their own partymen, allies fighting other ministers, some allies making pots of loads of money, an ally working more as a regional satrap that national minister. So what has been done well and what has failed in last one year?

Highs

Right to Education - One of the positive steps one has seen government take is on education with right to education bill. Kapil Sibal has put a lot of effort on this reform which if implemented well can ensure a greater future.
Women's Reservation Bill - The Women's Reservation Bill giving women 33% reservations was passed by the Rajya Sabha. One hopes the passage of the bill allows political empowerment of women. Though one has to credit the BJP and Left Parties without whose support this would not have been possible as some allies if the UPA looked certain to stop this bill. They did succeed in preventing the final passage of this bill by bartering their support in cut motions in lieu of postponement of the Bill in Lok Sabha

Apart from this, the government has made some right noises in Food Security Bill but that has been shelved for the time being due to differences between Sonia Gandhi and Manmohan Singh.

Lows

Naxal Violence- When P Chidambaram took over as the Home Minister, there was lot of expectation. Partly because the man he replaced was a total disaster and PC too showed quick learning abilities. So when post election, we moved into a phase where he started acting swift against naxals, he was supported by opposition too. But then came the big betrayal. First Mamata and her party played spoilsport when it came to taking on Maoists in WB and then the 10, Janpath ganang led by Digvijay Singh and backed by Gandhi loyalists. It is a shame that today on a crucial issue like Naxal violence, while opposition is standing strong with the Home Minister, his hands and legs too are being tied by his own people. And it only makes the matter worse that both PM and UPA Chairperson are silent over this sensitive issue.
International Affairs - Pakistan still keeps poking us in the eye because it knows we dont have a will to hit back hard.The Mumbai attack masterminds are roaming freely in Pakistan, India continues it dossier diplomacy. At Sharm al Sheikh, while we absolved Pakistan govt of promoting terror, we threw our interests away with the acceptance on Baluchistan. One summit did not teach us a lesson and so we allowed them to delink terror from talks.A price to pay for PM's single minded obsession to come across as a statesman in Vajpayee mode. With China continuing it aggressive postures on the borders, we saw our union ministers like jairam Ramesh throw away national interests and lobby for Chinese telecom equipment companies. US on one hand makes allright noises with the show of mutual respect between Obama and Manmohan, and on other hand provides military aid to Pakistan as usual. The same US admin does not allow India to further its national interests and play a role in redevelopment of Afghanistan.
Economy- The PM last during the elections last year promised to curb price rise within 100 days of coming to power. It is end of year one and prices have just increased. Specially sugar, pulses and other essential commodities. Agri Minsiter Pawar said prices to be controlled by June, then Finance Minister Pranabda said inflation will be controlled by Sept and in his press conference, PM said prices to come down by December. The governemtn seems to be playing a game of procastination while the poor man suffers and fights for 2 full meals. utOn commerce and growth many say India did not fare as badly in recession as others but what they forget is that India is an emerging power and so in that state, the systems are still strong to take punches. What surprises one is that the government in last six years has been silent on divestment of PSUs and on FDI. While one can blame Left for this not happening earlier, PM now has no excuse. Due to this the growth has been more subdued than it should be. This is the worst one could have expected from an economist minister.
Corruption - If there is one point where this government seems to be totally in control, it is on corruption. They have allowed their ministers to go scotfree and almost institunionalised corruption. Telecom Minister Raja has broken all records when it comes to corruption. His multi-million crore telecom scam has hit the nation real hard but no one in UPA is complaining and even the 'oh so decent' PM is speechless. Add to this the IPL scam and the fingers pointed at Shashi Tharoor, Praful Patel, Sharad Pawar. While Tharoor being a lightweight had to go, the others are making merry. The pulses scam, the BT scam are all out in open but no action taken.
Infrastructure - When NDA government was in powe under Atal Bihari Vajpayee, the amount of road development that used to take place was more than 15kms a day on an average and today, this is lower than 10lkms a day at the best. Now with Congress govts like Maharashtra, AP and others like UP showing no signs of ingrastructre developement, the road project seems to be heading nowhere. Very interestingly when it comes to infrasturcture like roads, ports, power etc, the states doing the best are all NDA ruled states like Gujarat (all over infrastructure), MP (Roads), Karnataka (Ports), Bihar (Roads, Power). All this while Sonia and Rahul go around the country lamenting lack of development.
Other lows -The list of other lows would be Non-implementation of NREGS due to corruption and lack of infra projects. Telengana issue being mishandled completely leading to virtual shut down of a state for weeks. North East is reeling with violence and Manipur is on verge of being cutoff from the country due to blockade. The divisive voices have gathered momentum after government has spoken about implementing Sachar and Mishra committee reports. Only in the 70s and 80s, that CBI, IB, IT Dept etc were used to blackmail and pressure political allies and opponents to support the government. This is a throwback to the draconian days.

Many channels have done their ratings and most of it has been average with some of it saying that the PM has not delivered on his promise yet. This one year has been a year of broken promises and more mess. UPA 2 so far is lucky because opposition is still finging its feet.

Nanaji Deshmukh - RIP

2010-03-02T02:26:00.000-08:00

Ex-President Kalam lavished praise on this person's model of development calling it "the most apt model for rural India". Kalam also mentioned this model in his books and talks.
This person refused cabinet berth at a ti me when he was one of the tallest leaders and could have taken a very rewarding ministry. Reason - he wanted to implement his model of development in Chitrakoot on UP and MP border and take it elsewhere.
He gave the nation a litigation free district where all disputes are settled amicably
Highly influenced by Vinoba Bhave and Jayaprakash Narayan, he is supposed to have taken the lathis on him to save JP.
He spent a long time in jail in this fight against emergency and for democracy in the country.

In short, the man has done everything that makes him a Mahatma as JP used to call him fondly. The person is or rather was, Shri Nanaji Deshmukh. He passed away on 27th Feb 2010 amidst the same rural people with whom he had been staying for last 3 decades. The tallest leader Jan Sangh (now BJP) alongwith Vajpayee and Advani, Nanaji felt the call of his service much more tempting that trappings of power. He worked tirelessly and died working. Here's a tribut to the great man for whom Kalam said "What he does at his age, should be an eye opener for rest of the country"

To know more about him, visit - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanaji_Deshmukh

Same news for 50 yrs?

2010-02-10T20:56:00.001-08:00

India faces a year of drought and the crisis is deepened due to lack of food storage facilities and hoarders
Terrible inflation seen in urban cities and lack of employment in rural areas pushing people to migrate
China continues it;s evil designs on India border and there are reports of Chinese incursions in Ladakh and Arunachal Pradesh while Pakistan refuses to give up it's claim on Kashmir
Linguistic passions run high is some states of India as states fight on basis of language
Indian politics has become a tool in hands of feudal lords and has no grassroot infusion

Well, if you thought these were the news of 2010, you are just partly correct. Because these are the same things which troubled India in late 50s and early 60s. I was reading a book on Nehru by Walter Cocker on my way back from Delhi. While the author talks highly about Nehru as an individual, the questions he raised about the problem he faced as the PM shows that nothing has changed in 50 years. The same set of problem Nehru faced are faced by current government. Is it a lack of long-term vision or is it that whenever the GOP rules India, it brings with it the same set of problems? Whatver be it, the fact is that this is no India of 50s and 60s where people took it lying down (till 1975 when people finally revolted). This is the New India with it's new found confidence and strength to change regimes if they fail to perform.

Lack of accountablity - a throw back to draconian days

2010-02-08T20:51:00.000-08:00

While UPA government has been doing flip flops on various issues like naxalism, Indo-Pak talks, price rise, fuel prices etc, there is place where it is extremely consistent. That is it's dictatorial opposition to being accountable.

In the recent CMs meet, when Gujarat CM Narendra Modi asked the government what it was doing to fulfill it's election promise of providing the poorest of poor with wheat and rice at extreme low prices, he was accussed by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee of politicising the price issue. Excuse me Mr FM, every citizen in this country has a right to question unfulfilled promises and it's government's duty to respond. But one can pardon Pranabda for his regular outbursts because he is the proverbial best man, one who wished to be the groom (PM) but never got the chance.

In same vein, Home Minister Chidambaram refused to pass the anti-terror bill of Gujarat government accusing it of playing politics with terror. The proposed law is actually a complete copy of one used in Maharashtra by COngress government. But since the states are different, so is the government's stand on it. And this has been done with a criminal mind of bleeding Gujarat just because Narendra Modi is the tallest leader of the state,

While Congress questions Sharad Pawar of going and meeting Bal Thackeray, it itself goes on its knees for Indo-Pak talks. When asked if this is under US pressure, the reply is that those quesitoning don't want peace in the region. DOuble Standards, eh?

The only thing angelic about Sant Chatwal is the use of wor 'Sant' in his name. His earlier claims to fame were the numerous cases against him and his relaiton with the Clintons. But that iself made him worthy of winning the esteem Padma Bhushan. His notorious past and his dubious financial deals were ignored just because of his proximity with Manmohan Singh and his 'enormous effort' for Indo-US deal (which obviously means a money trail somewhere). Again no clarification either from Home Ministry or PMO. The poor President anyways is just a rubber stamp who can quesiton the master.

UPA and Congress is getting in a phase where it is trying to subvert all sorts of democracy in the country and rule it with their own whims. They are not questioned by the media and if questioned, they claim it is politicising of issues. SLowly and steadily, the pillars of democracy are being broken apart and we should wait a return of 60s,70s and 80s when they took the country to disaster.

It is high time, one looks beyond the phot sessions and huge statements and sees the action else it will be too late.

Milking the aam aadmi, forgetting legends and forgiving terrorists

2010-01-23T04:21:00.000-08:00

So, what has been the activity in the political circles off late? While media continues to focus on every small thing Rahul Gandhi does, they seem to forget that Nitin Gadkari deserves much more of the limelight because he has already proved his credentials as an administrator while Rahul Gandhi still can't answer a simple question on price rise except with standard "I have spoken to the PM and he has assured me he till take steps". But anyways, the paid mediawallahs aside, the political scene this week was all about Pawar milking the aam aadmi (actually that been the consistent weekly news for more than a year or two now), ignoring legends like Netaji and attempts to forgive Nalini, the LTTE terrorist who was involved with killing of many people including former PM Rajiv Gandhi

Milking the economy - Sharad Pawar is one minsiter who skin can be used for making strong chappals because hardly anything or anyone can get under his skin or mind for that matter. I guess even Sonia and Manmohan have given up on him as they allow him to loot the common public while he ensures that the traders and hoarders get their money back after all the help he got from them in Maharashtra assembly elections. So after the prices of essential commodities and sugar, it is the turn of milk and milk products. Nice minister we have who makes milk costly while allowing more production and consumption of alocohol.

Forgetting Legends - Last year after UPA won elections, there were huge advertisements and programmes on birth anniversaries of Nehru, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi. So all tax payers paid for paying tribute to the family which is responsible for the 'lack of development' this ocuntry has seen. But that aside, it was surprising to see who Sardar Patel, Lokmanya Tilak and today Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose's anniversary has been completely forgotten. Is it an attempt to wipe of the legends of the history who did not belong to one family or did not share the family name ?

Forgiving terrorists - In the year 1991, at an election rally in Tamil Nadu, LTTE terrorists used a suicide bomber and killed scored of people including the former PM of India Rajiv Gandhi. While the main actors of the suicide bombing died on the spot, the police and intelligence agencies caught all those involved in the incident fairly quickly. This so-called involvement of DMK and it's sympathy for LTTE was used as an excuse to bring down I K Gujral's govt by Congress. Today the same Congress riding on DMK's support in the centre is ready to forgive those accused in the case. There have been high profile visits by Priyanka Gandhi to Nalini, one of the main accused and media announcments of how the Gandhi family has forgiven the accused. This brings to the table 2 main questions - Why was then a government brought down using DMK's sympathy for Nalini and LTTE as an excuse to push the nation into a midterm poll in mid-90s? Who gave the right to the Gandhi family to decide who the Indian law should punish or forgive? It's not about the death of their husband or father. This is about other people who were at the venue and who died in that incident. Why has no body asked their families on what they feel? Will law in India become a puppet in hands of one family just like other constitutional structures.

Price Rise - Steps to beat it

2010-01-13T01:11:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, I had a discussion turn into arguement with a friend. His view was that the price rise was a global phenomenon and that I was being unfair to the government. He challenged me if I could think of some steps which can help beat price rise currently and on a longer run as well. So here I take up the challenge. I will humbly say that I am no economist and I am no expert on these matters. So whatever I am writing is based on my reading and some common sense having been in business.

Take strict urgent action against hoarders - MP government on 11th Jan cracked down heavily on hoarders. This crackdown yeilded nearly 10,000 crore worth of sugar. Same has been the case with Gujarat government. Both these governments have cracked down hard on hoarders and brought out in market a huge supply of essential items. Just imagine if all state governments can follow this. It could result in a huge amount of foodgrains, sugar, pulses being recovered and for market consumption.

Put a gag on Commodity Trading for some time - The trading in commodity market specially the future trading results in traders holding on to the food stock without releasing it for consumption. This creates an artificial scarcity and pushes the price up. While commodity trading is here to stay, one can surely put a temporary stop to it.

Ask the ministers to shut up - Our Minsiters, specially Mr. Sharad Pawar needs to be told to shut his mouth when it comes to food stocks in India. He passed a comment about India facing sugar shortage and next day the price of sugar in international market zooms up. He has to understand that with China and India being 2 major consumers in the world, any shortage in any of the country can push international rates up.

Improve food logistics - Why is it so tough for the government to have an efficient food logistic system? A network of cold storages and other warehouses with a good network of transport is enough to ensure that no area in the country faces food shortage. It's a shame that even after 6 decades of independence, we can provide food security to our people. Since this is a long term plan, immediately what can be done is to involve private players with warehouses, cold storages, transport facilities to ensure faster time to market.

These are just four basic steps that came to mind. There surely will be more like a more conservative approach to food exports, strengthening of PDS, bringing labour balance to NREGS so that argriculture labour is not made costly and is available. But all these need just 2 things - One is the will to really ensure that India actually grows and has no pockets of underdevelopment and second is to ensure a clean, unbiased approach to food and agriculture without lobby pressure and temptations. As of now, the government seems to lack both.

Why Congress calls common public 'Aam' Aadmi

2010-01-12T02:05:00.000-08:00

If ones sees the way the current government is playing dirty over the price of essential commodities, one will know why Congress calls common public 'Aam' Aadmi. Well simple, suck the pulp out of the people the way it is done to Aam (mango)

Never in history has India seen such terrible price inflation. And what is government doing? Still dithering on what needs to be done and blaming everybody right from opposition ruled states to global warming maybe leaving ISI out this time or foreign hand out as in distant past.

If one looks at how the government itself is responsible for such a price rise, one can find variety of reasons. Why should government allow production of alcohol from foodgrains, knowing fully well that alcohol being more profitable business, the foodgrains needed for regular consumption will be pushed there. Many call it Thanksgiving for the money spent in elections. Same is the case with sugar. It follows the famous rule of "Scarcity, Scheme and Scam". You first export the sugar and create a scarcity, then try and bulldoze the farmers in selling for less, meantime the sugar industries have a field day, then you import raw sugar in emergency and God knows how many zeroes will be seen in this scam. Why is that while there is a shortage of foodgrains and vegetables outside, the FDI warehouses complain of essentials food items rotting there without anybody to move it out. If we look athe the time span, this has been going on for last 2 years with only respite coming during the General Elections. This should demand a quesiton as to when the government could bring prices under control then, why is it helpless now?

For all those who talk about Dr. Manmohan Singh being such a great economist, have you ever wondered why is he so helpless when economy is going for a toss and people can't make their ends meet. Also why has India seen most scams when he was the Finance Minister earlier and now the PM?

The much hyped up NREGA scheme can be called a brilliant plan badly implemented. It has changed the balance of labour in agriculture. What it has done is it has guaranteed employment to people at the base per day rate. This has now created a scarcity in labour available for agriculture in rural India. This has obviously led to increase in rates for the labour and thereby increasing the cost of essential items. This imbalance can be compensated by strict anti-hoarding law enforcement and efficient PDS systems. But that's where the government is failing miserably. So looking at just one side of the scheme has resulted in such an alarming increase of cost of daly lliving for everyone across India.

So while the Aam Aadmi struggles to stay afloat, the Congress sucks the juice out of 'Aam' because only if the common is needy, poor and helpless, Prince Rahul will get the opportunity for photo-ops.

3 crumbling pillars of Indian Democracy

2010-01-07T02:42:00.000-08:00

Democracy has 4 main pillars - Politicial System, Administators, Law Agencies (courts and police) and Media. No democracy can function properly if one of the four develops a crack. In India while all the focus has been on blaming the political system for every failure, the other 3 have by and large gone scotfree. Most of the times, attempts have been made to pinpoint the blame on just the political system without looking at how others performed. Here's a look at how the other three have developed serious cracks and need repairs.

Administrators - These are civil service officers and senior bureaucrats. Name one officer who has been caught and punished for any failure till date? The Intelligence Agencies are run by these bureaucrats and they have failed msierably at every level to prevent terror attacks but has any officer even been punished? The Public Distribution System is the key to control price rice and food shortage. The entire PDS is supposed to be driven by senior bureaucrats in Food Ministry but there has been total decay of this system over the years. Who is to blame? The ministers who change every year or the officers who are supposed to run it and have been in the system for a long time now. No corruption is possible without active involvement of the bureaucrats. Finally the ministers change every few years but the bureaucrats stay. They are the ones who run the system at the micro level. So nothing can be done or not be done without their knowledge and participation. But nowhere have they been blamed for the continuing failures.

Law Enforcement - Recently when some senior police officers were caught on camera grooving wiht underworld gangsters in Mumbai, media created a huge hue and cry. Was this something new? No, the nexus of police and underworld is wellknown and has been there for years now. But no top cop has ever tried to break it. 1993 Mumbai Blasts had seen involvement of so many customs and police officers which only proved how they were active members of D Gang and many still continue to be. 26/11 was a classic saga of faillure of top cops but has any cop been punished for it? Politicians did lose their ministries (though most of them got back or were promoted thanks to the Madam Sonia) but was any cop even demoted, leave alone removed? THough be fair to police they have taken the most abuses after the political class from the ignorant citizens. But what about the judiciary. The Dinakaran case has shook people's faith in judiciary. No one till nwo questioned him how did he amass such wealth. But he is still sitting pretty because the process to remove an errant judge is a long drawn process. No one knows how his impeachment go. Till recently the Chief Justice of India was vehemently oppsed to the judiciary coming under the bill which required them to declare their assets. Cases of judges getting involved in murky deals are increasing but still they are not sharing the blame for the weakening of the democracy.

Media - Ah, the co-called conscience keepers of the nation. My personal view is that media in India is the most corrupt pillar of the democracy. To compound that they are also arrogant and self-centred. they want everybody else to be accountable but they turn red when asked to be accountable. The way media behaved during Mumbai attacks was just not immature, it was also anti-national. So what did they do? They turned the anger of the public to politicians with their sponsored sms, candle lit vigils and other events. Media in India acts more like an event management company or a tabloid. They have not spared a single attempt to weaken the other pillars of democracy and the faith of people in the democracy. Starting right from Tehelka, which was nothing but a political pawn playing at the hand of the master. One thing to notice is why has media never tried to show or honestly admit to the corrupt practices within the media? Why has media always resisted the idea of being accountable. What was NDTV's reaction when it's coverage of Mumbai attacks questioned? They replied with criminal disdain and I am holier than thou so don't question attitude. Why is media shying away from declaring who their invesotrs are?

Repeating the same mistakes which casued partition and terror

2010-01-03T21:49:00.000-08:00

In early 1900s, the British unleashed the weapon of reservations for minorities and seperate electorates. This weapon sowed the seeds of a tree called Partition after 4 decades. Instead of learnign from this mistake, India looks like repeating it again for mere political gains. The Rangnath Mishra report which talks about 10% reservations for Muslims and a pie of reservations within the 27% already set aside of SC, ST and OBC for their counterparts in minorities. To start with the who argument of SC,ST and OBC in minorities sounds an antithesis because apart from Hindu religion, no other religion believes in caste system and so once converted how can peopel still be SC, ST and OBC surprises many a minds.

While no one is against reservations in principle to empower the poor class, the idea of reservations on religious grounds is as divisive as an idea can get. Slowly the pressure on the government will increase to implement it. It would be interesting to see how the government implements it because this government so far has shown a tendency to pander to minority radicalism on most cases be it Sachar committee report, Taslima Nasreen case or modernisation of Madarassas.

Another event which sows similar seeds is the recommendation by the PM's Committee on Jammu and Kashmir. The report (as reported by other members of the committee) was a unilateral report and recommended an autonomy for Jammu and Kashmir. The recommendations include J & K having it's PM, flag and Cabinet. The only control Indian government will have will be over Finance, Defence. Now this is a proper recipe for disaster. To start with, it's only some section of the Kashmir vallye which is asking for a seperation. This call has no takers in Jammu, Leh or Ladakh. Once J & K has it's autonomy, one can just imagine the plight of the Hindu, Sikh and Buddhist communities in the state as the state will be governed by hardline Muslim factions. Once the state is given autonomy, there won't be anything to stop other states from taking to arms asking for the same. So this entire recommendations by PM's man should be dumped into the dust bin without a thought. To borrow an old slogan - Ek desh mein do pradhan, do vidhan, nahin ho sakte (there can't be 2 PMs and 2 constitutions in one country)

One just hopes that in it's race to win over the minority votes, the current UPA government does not move ahead on the above 2 issues as they will only divide the country.

Jharkhand - elections and leter

2009-12-28T05:48:00.000-08:00

In early part of this decade, 3 new states were formed - Uttarakhand, Chhatishgarh and Jharkhand. All the 3 states carved from bigger states had natural resources in abundance but development had eluded them even after 5 decades of Independence. So when the NDA government carved these states, there was a lot of optimism in local population. While the former 2 went on their path of development thankfully due to stable governments, Jharkhand has been deteriorating due to instability. So all eyes were on this elections to see what mandate was thrown up.

The mandate that was thrown was even more fractured that the previous ones hinting at deeply divided thinking process at various regions and classes. Shibu Soren who was written off before the elections turned out to be the biggest winner, closely followed by Babulal Marandi. Both these leaders derive a lot of flak and disgust in urban living rooms but between them they acocunted for nearly 40% of the seats in the state, which hardly has any urban centre. What does this show? This shows that India and Bharat still think very different.

When Shibu Soren staked his claim to be the CM with BJP support, media and political observers went about questioning BJP. But what they forget is that Shibu Soren was given the higher pedestal first by Narsimha Rao and then Manmohan Singh. While Rao's government survived on his support, Soren was a cabinet minister in UPA1. Questions which weren't asked then are being asked now. The question one has to ask is was there a government possible without Soren? Answer is no. Any government that had to be formed needed JMM and that is the only way to bring some stability to the state. The last phase of unstable government of Madhu Koda and Congress has virtually stripped the state of it's resources and hope. Wish that this time's verdict though fractured, does soemthing for one of the most neglected places in the country.

BJP - Starting a new chapter

2009-12-20T21:51:00.000-08:00

Something that we all waited for has finally happened. The baton has been passed in BJP as the party has a new of leaders with Nitin Gadkari becoming the Party President and Sushma Swaraj taking over as Leader of Opposition. Arun Jaitley has already been the leader of the party in Rajya Sabha. This also means that the eternal yatri of Indian politics and the kartavya purush as I would like to remember him moves away from the limelight and becomes the mentor for the party as it weathers the toughest storm it has faced in it's history.

Many people I spoke with, asked about how does this team expect to be an alternative to Rahul Gandhi. Well, when people say that they forget that there is a basic difference between BJP and Congress. While Congress follows a top-down approach where in the Gandhi Family decides the party and government policies, BJP follows a grounds-up approach where the strength comes from the grassroots. This is infact the reason why there has been an organisation change in BJP. Like BJP, Congress too lost elections in 1996,98 and 99 but there was no change at any level. Even after 2 consecutive debacles, Sonia Gandhi ran the party. Whereas in BJP, electoral defeats results in introspection on leadership, ideology and approach. This is the more democratic manner of functioning and a healthy sign for a national party in a long run.

Taking a look at the choice of Nitin Gandkari are Party President, one get's a feeling that the idea is to get a person who is a doer and someone who have proven skills as a manager. Nitin Gadkari is long remembered in Maharashtra as the person who showed how infrastructure can be developed without bowing down to corporates or without burdening the common man. His work as PWD Minister and his vision for infrastructure during NDA regime proved to be the catalyst for the infra boom India saw. While Nitin Gadkari is a person who understands the concept of Hindutva, he also is not a hardliner. His concepts of Hindutva, secularism are very clear and one could see from his interview on NDTV that he is ready to take this debate beyond the television studios. He is unapologetic about his ideology which helps the grassroot workers to throw their weight behind him. Add to this the clean image he enjoys. All this makes his new inning one worth watching. The future of Indian democracy will depend heavily on how he delivers in next 3 years.

Division of states

2009-12-09T22:54:00.000-08:00

As India prepares for one more state in form of Telengana, there are voices of dissent about how India is getting broken into states and how dangerous it is for the country's unity having seen the lingustic jingoism in various states. While one can agree with this to some extent, there is no black and white when it comes to division of states.

To start with, the initial division of states was faulty since it was done only on lingustic grounds. That itself sowed the seeds of division. And who else but the 'great' Nehru to blame for this mistake in his already huge list of mistakes. No one can deny that a country as vast and populated as India needs smaller states for better administration. US for example with half the population of India has 51 states and so there is nothing wrong in having smaller states for better administration.

If one looks at the last 3 states formed out of bigger states during Vajpayee rule - Jharkhand, Chattishgarh, Uttarakhand, one can how they have performed better as seperate states and even better than the original states they were carved out from. So this also proves that neglect does lead to smaller states and once seperate they can become viable states as well. And they have not been formed on basis of language.

Most of the times, demand for a seperate states stems from decades of neglect. Uttarakhand was long neglected in UP and so the demand. Same is with the demand for seperate Vidarbha state in Maharashtra. In Telengana's case, while Telengana region acocunted for more than 50% population of the state, they were given only 40% representation in the state assemby. Their share of development fund was even lower since the leaders concentrated on the larger pie. This situation can be changed or saved only by having an administration which divides the development pie equally amongst the regions. This has been successfully proven in Gujarat where one used to hear cases for Kutch state. But in last few years, those have died down because the development was taken to those who so far were neglected.

Finally to the dirty politics played in Telengana case which lead to the situation becoming so volatile. Congress has played with the emotions of people in Telengana for long. To start with they merged the first Telengana party and agreed to its terms and made Chenna Reddy the CM of AP in 70s. But they did not nothing about the seperate state for years. In 2004, they got into an alliance with TRS on promise of seperate Telengana state but put it in cold storage after that only to bring it up again during no-confidence motion last year to save the government. Again they played the Telengana card during this year's assembly and general elections. But again put the demand in cold storage. This led to the violent reaction this time. More than 30 people have lost their lives over the politics played by the Congress and it was so distasteful to hear their MP Hanumantha Rao say on CNN IBN this morning how Telengana people should thank Sonia Gandhi for giving them a piece of pie like a mother as if India was an Italian Pizza to be divided.

Myths about terror, communcal divide and 6th Dec

2009-12-09T01:44:00.000-08:00

one of the most common statements one hears from political spectrum is that India faced terror only because of the incidents on 6th Dec 1992 when the disputed structure was brought down. Also commonly said is that Hindu Muslim divide is a result fo that day. Nothing can be farther from the truth than the above 2 statements.

Terror reigned in India even before 6th Dec 1992. One just needs to remember how Delhi was constantly ripped by bomb blasts in mid-80s. Indira Gandhi was assasinated much before the day in question. People need to think if Pandits were forced out of Kashmir after 6th Dec 1992? Answer is no, they were pushed out and terror ruled Kashmir even before that day. Mizo trouble, Assam rebels, Naxal violence - all were seen much before the day. Infact the fist act of terror seen in India was way back in time after partition when Nizam of Hyderabad and his Razakars terrorised not only Hyderabad but also states around the border. So to say that terror is result of that day is just a convenient political tool and gives justifcation to terrorists.

Communal divide has for long been attributed to that day. But communal divide was actually the cause and not the result of 6th Dec. Had there been no communal divide, Muslims would have gladly given the land to Hindu organisations for the temple (no namaz was offered for decades there). It would have been the most unifying gesture in modern history but this test was failed miserably. Shia Board was ready to negotiate and even gift the land for the temple. But the AIPMLB and Babri Masjid Action Committee (heavily represented by Sunni Muslims) was not ready to talk or even honour ASI findings on temple's existence. They were hell-bent on showing their political clout (aided by new found radicalism after Shah Bano case). Riots were not new to India. Meerut, Bhiwandi, Ahmedabad, Baroda, Bhagalpur and many more places had seen bloody riots in the period between partition and 6th Dec 1992.

So to say that the demolition was the cause of terror and communal divide is just a way of not letting truth .prevail

Indian leaders and books

2009-12-06T21:39:00.001-08:00

Few months back, at a book store, a thought came up in my mind. I started looking at how many Indian leaders have either written books or have books written on them by other authors compared to the leaders from the Western World. Since then I used to look at the histroy and biography section of every bookstore I entered. What surprised me was that from pre-freedom days, the only leaders who have books on them seemed to be Gandhi and Nehru family. I have seen just a couple of books on Subhash Chandra Bose and equal number on Sardar Patel, two of the talled leaders India ever produced. There is hardly anything on other leaders including Lokmanya Tilak, Gopal Krishna Gokhale, Bhagat Singh and others. Similarly in post Independence period, one sees books on Indira, Rajiv, Narsimha Rao and those written by L K Advani, Mani Shankar Aiyar, Jaswant Singh etc, one can hardly find any books on Jayprakash Narayan, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Chandrashekhar, Morarji Desai who have been the stalwarts of the anti-Congress front. Compare this with the tendency in the West where most of the leaders have either their memoirs or their biographies written and we find that amount of information that one gets about any leader outside the celebrated circle (read Nehru, Gandhi, Ambedkar) is extremely less. Only in recent years, one sees attempts by L K Advani, Jaswant Singh, Arun Shourie, P C Alexander to present a new and a fresh look at the history. One really wishes to know more about the leaders who like Lokmanya Tilak, Bhagat Singh, JP, Vajpayee who all came from extremely ordinary families and reached the high altar of Indian hearts and souls. It's time history remembers the ones who are languushing in deep corners of the forgotten.

Awaiting an Indian leader's Bicyle Diaries.

The political roundup

2009-12-02T02:09:00.000-08:00

Lot's happening as always in India. Right from price rise to a timid foreign policy, Government seems to be running out of answers and so senior ministers have resorted to either losing their temper in Parliament or using same old tune of "dont politicise the issue" which in pure terms means don't try and make us accountable, we aren't.

Price Rise - The price of essential commidities are shooting up the roof. Vegetables look a luxury for middle and lower middle class, while one wonders if the fruits soon will become a festive season item. Not to mention sugar which leaves a sour taste for most and there is no possiblity of that going down since Sharad Pawar has to repay his voters (sugar mill owners and big time farmers) for voting them back to power in Maharashtra. What an irony that while small farmers have to agitate for better price for sugarcane, the sugar prices seem to rise higher and higher. So wheres the money going, Mr. Pawar? And we have distinguished (or should it be extinguished) economist as our PM and he can't act against corruption and mismanagement by his own senior colleagues.

Naxal Violence - Naxals and Maoists are running amok in the many states in India and in response we have a central government response which is driven more by who is ruling the state. While Central government was quick to send enforcements to Eastern Maharashtra when Naxals attacked Gadchiroli, their own cabinet ministers have been doing business with Maoist in Communist ruled West Bengal. While Central government cannot make up it's mind in how to tackle the red menace, scores lose their lives and no one including media is bothered because ones who die are those who don't matter for the system.

Foreign Minister missing in action - Who is India's External Affairs Minister? Ah, did the question not stump you? When was the last you heard or saw him? He seems absent when China is armtwsiting India to abaondon projects along the border and he is nowhere to be seen when developed countries are putting pressure on India for emmision cuts. He is not to be found when Pakistan goes about it's drama of 26/11. S M Krishna is currently doing to External Affairs Ministry what Shivraj Patil did to Home Ministry for so many years.

We are not accountable brigade - Pranab Mukherjee, the seniormost and possibly the most able minister in current government has joined the "we are not accountable" arrogant brigade. He first lost his temper on Opposition Leader L K Advani on 26/11 victim compensation and later on Communist leader Brinda Karat on price rise. Both the issues were important but instead of answering the queries, Pranab Mukherjee lost his temper and accused leaders of politicising issues. Since when did asking questions becomes politicising? Isn't the government acocuntable? Does it not have the duty to answer for it's glaring mistakes? Atleast his government does not seem so.

26/11 Ram Pradhan report - So the nautanki is over. Media, sponsors, government all made hay at the cost of feelings of the victimes, their family and millions others who wanted to see some change. Ram Pradhan report has not been made public. The report did talk about how the system failed and how the police top brass mismanaged. Now the Maharashtra government talks about another committee to do a further investigation. All this at tax-payers cost.

They are dying here too

2009-11-26T10:42:00.000-08:00

Just saw a startched shirt and more starchted faced Home Minister Chidambaram proudly claim that his biggest achievement is that there has been no major terror attack in India after 26/11. Well, if that's the yardstick, then George Bush would be the greatest administrator in the world since US did not see even a small attack after 9/11. And anyways, if there has been no attack, it is only because terror groups are running helter skelter in Pakistan under US-Pak armed pressure.

But let's for a moment look at how terror is still killing people all over India. More than hundreds have died in last one year in Orissa, Chattisgarh, Jharkhand, West Bengal, Assam, Manipur, Nagaland and Kashmir. Scores of security officers and policement have died fighting the naxals, maoists, jehadis, ulfaites, naga militants in all these places. The Naxal and Maoist belt sees an attack every alternative day. Trains have been blown off, hijacked and much more. Blasts have ripped apart places and buildings. The poor tribals there keep on dying in a battle which the Central Government seems to keen to lose to discredit the local state governments, be it BJP, BJD or Communist governments. But no one notices since it's no Mumbai or Taj, it's just some undeveloped forest land of those forsaken states. Maybe the Home Minister needs to improve his geography to know that those places belong to India.

26/11 - Now and then

2009-11-25T02:49:00.001-08:00

It's nearly a year since 26/11. There will be ceremonies, events, media marches, sms polls, messages, all to get that penny out of our pocket by playing the "we care" drama tape. People spoke about wnating to change the system. Let's wait for a minute and see if things have really changed.

Kasab is still alive.
R R Patil and A N Roy are back in the control of our security
Vilasrao Deshmukh has been promoted.
There is no sign of any improvement in our police department as top cops fight each other
The police reforms and modernisation still looks a distant dream

So what changed? All the candles burnt, all the marches taken out and all the hands held. the reply is nothing has changed since the day 10 terrorists (though the then NSG Chief still claims there were more) raped our motherland. Hundrer more are doing it on everyday basis in forests of Chattishgarh, Jharkhand, Orissa, West Bengal. And thousands more waiting to enter through Kashmir. Nothing has changed since then till now. The government spoke about wanting to change things for people but it went back to making money in sugarcane prices and 2G Scams. Common public spoke about awakening and wanting to change the system but ran off to nearby hill stations when the time came for the change.

All we have to do is thank the Pakistan Army for keeping the jehadis busy else we would have seen many more 26/11 and then Indian History would read like a calendar - 13/12, 11/7, 26/11

So, while we sit on a volcano, let's forward stupid smses of 'we care', 'India strikes back', 'Mumbai Spirit rocks', 'Let's hold hands and march' to increase wealth of likes of Ambanis and Prannoy Roys.

Liberhan Commission report - just one sided view?

2009-11-24T03:34:00.000-08:00

So now that the report is 'officially' out, one can see how legal experts, constitutional experts are junking the report. And that is because it seems a large part of it was written while the honourable judge was 'daydreaming' (if I put down factual errors in a list, it would be a long one). While the political fraternity and the media are looking at the aspects of the report based on their affiliations, one can notice that while the report focusses heavily on what happened, it seems to suffer from selective amnesia on why it happened. Let me give you some examples:

The role of the Muslim leadership in build-up to the 6th Dec - The report says how the Muslim leadership was adamant on it's course and did not produce the settlement claim or any historical documents at the negotiation meeting where VHP produced the necessary historic and legal documents for the settlement. The fact that the leadership for 2 consecutive meetings did not bother to produce any legal or historcial documents slearly shows that all they wanted to do was to prolong the exercise and frustrate those leading the temple movement. Bukhari of Jama Masjid had gone to the level of saying that no judgement or negotiation where a Rama Idol is kept int he structure will be accepted and that there would be disintegration. It is surprising that everyone has so far been completely silent about how the inflexible attitude of these leaders played a major role in deepening the crisis. Also when VHP was doing Kar Seva on non disputed land, they put pressure on government to get it suspended too . They combined with the 'secular' leadeship to ensure that hardly any negotiation meetings took place between 1990-1992. And even when there was a talk of getting the courts to get an early judgement, these leaders played the game of delay.

The 'secular' leadership and their inaction / provocation - Was Narsimha Rao really so naive and foolish that he was day dreaming when the Kar Seva was allowed by SC and a huge mass had gathered? Wasn't he supposedly the father of Indian Economy boost as well as a shrewd politician who overstayed his tenure and luck? Did he really not think the situation was very volatile? Very surprising considering the fact that he was one of the chief negotiators earlier as the Home Minsiter of India under Rajiv Gandhi and had worked with leaders of both the communities. Also the fact that inspite of Hindu leaders meeting him regularly to get a settlement and urgng him to convince the Musllim leadership, he hardly did anything. He was inactive in the period that VHP suspended the kar seva to reach a negotiated settlement.Also the report is silent on the role of Late Rajiv Gandhi who as the Prime Minister ordered the locks of site to be opened to perform pooja. The way he played footsie with both the communities left him was nothing but pure communal politics. On the other hand, the so-called secuar leaders like Mulayam Singh and V P Singh continued their game of appeasement by indulging Bukhari inspite of his utterances. Though there is a very miniscule mention of how Mulayam administration fire callously furing the earlier Kar Seva in 1990, there has never been any doubt that Mulayam used his administration to kill scores of Kar Sevaks but got away with any rap just because he mouthed secular slogans. The fact that all these leaders continued to address the structure as a mosque (inspite of requests from a section fo the society to call it disputed structure till negotiations were complete) played a major role in incensing the already motivated kar sevaks.

So while the report, the media and the political class focusses only on one side of the story, it is high time, one looks at the other hand which was responsible for the clap else thse claps will someday become a slap on the Indian soul.

Princely Arrogance

2009-11-23T21:05:00.000-08:00

One thing that I like about Rahul Gandhi is his princely arrogance. The ignorance is so well concealed by the arrogance that even the most stupid remarks come across as gems. Read this "My UK MP friend knows more about rural India than NDA leaders". Hmm, so David Milband knows more about rural India that Atalji, who still has his family staying in a rural house in MP or Advaniji does not know rural India when his parents lived in a small village called Adipur in Kutch while the son was a star in Indian politics. Or maybe Milband knows mroe about rural India than Narendra Modi who spent more than 2 decades travelling across the country staying at party offices or party workers house like a common man and lived a spartan lives. Rural India and it's life is not new to RSS and BJP because that's where most of them come from. Maybe Rahul's friend David so much about India that he made the famous suggestion about how India should "give up" on Kashmir to save itself from Pak terror. Rahul, with friends like that you don't need enemies.

Now, he has come up with another gem. "India has two parts, one urban and another rural - one with facillities and one without facilities" He should be renamed Rahul Einstein for such a wonderful discovery. No body denies that there are 2 Indias but the questions why are there 2 Indias? Why haven't facilities still not gone to the villages and the poor? Who best to answer this other than Rahul himself considerignt he fact that his familly has ruled India most of the times after independence. So please don't reduce the burden of the blame just by accepting that their is mess. Own up for the mess generated by your family all these years.

Who else has the access to P Chidambaram's lock and key?

2009-11-23T20:46:00.000-08:00

Unanswered queries about 26/11, Telecom 2G scam, sugarcane crisis, rising prices, Madhu Koda corruption mess, US-China interference in Indian affairs, Chinese aggressive stance on eastern borders, Leftist terror and many more. One can count the number of issues where the government is in the docks and needs to answer. So what does the government do?

It just deflects the media and national attention to a Commission set up nearly 18 years ago. The question here is not about the contents of the Liberhan's report since one has to wait for whole report to be tabled. It is about who had the keys to Home Minister P Chidambaram's lock and key, where he claims he has the report? Or who did Justice Liberhan try to benefit some media houses or the government by leaking the report? If Justice Liberhan and Home Ministy are the only 2 entities in possesion of the report, who leaked it if not one of them? One interesting point to notice is that the report has been first leaked in Indian Express and NDTV, both media companies run by those who have close links with 10, Janpath - Shekhar Gupta and Prannoy Roy. So was it done to deflect attention from the faillures of the UPA or was it done to take the battle for Muslim votes to the next level? Some answers are so obvious that they do not require a question.

Tale of 2 congregations

2009-11-09T05:02:00.000-08:00

Nov 2009 saw an interesting set of opposites. The only thing common between the two was that both were huge assemblies. That's where similarities ended because both were organsied by 2 organisations which are on different ends of the ideologies and culture. Some glaring differences to be seen between the two were:

The one such meeting which was widely publicised was the Jamait Ulema's meeting which became famous for it's various resolutions like the fatwa against terror, against Vande Mataram, against insurance, women's reservations, television and much more. By the way before you think this was held in Afghanistan or Pakistan or Saudi, wait. It was held in India.

Another was organised by Vanvasi Kalyan Samiti in Delhi. Here more than 10,000 students and their families were brought from the North Eastern States, Orissa, Chattishgarh, Jharkhand. The students stayed with local families who support RSS and it's activities in tribal areas. The idea was to bring the bring the students to the mainstream and show them how similar the people are inspite of the diversity.

While one congregation was about division, the other was about uniting. One was bringing India to medival ages, another was bringing old India to meet a new one.

But still, one could not but help notice the media coverage the Jamait's congregaiton got and the lack of coverage for the tribal meet. And this neglect by the media and the ruling class only because of the vote bank politics and slavery of media to the ruling class (A rumour was that national media was warned against covering the tribal meet by a Union Minsiter who owes his position to missionaries).

For those who want to see the glimpse of how the tribals are being brought into mainstream, there is a similar event happening in Mumbai in December.

Home Minister goes a Ghajini

2009-11-03T02:49:00.000-08:00

Home Minister P C Chidambaram just did a Ghajini act. No, he did get tattoos on his body and neither did he bash up few goons. He had a lapse of memory and forgot that he was the Home Minsiter of India and not Home Minsiter for Muslims. He went to Deoband, which is one of the more fanatic forms of Islamic studies in India and with which Taliban also shares it roots. He spoke at length about Hindu fundamentalism. But he seems to have missed an important event which happened minutes before he went there. The clerics at the Deoband meet issued a fatwa banning Vande Mataram, our national song on grounds that it was anti-Islam. This was a clear strike at what can be called symbol of our identity and pride. Chidambaram maybe agrees that Vande Mataram is communal song and should be banned/ What next to be removed? The saffron from our flag?

Political Roundup

2009-11-01T21:43:00.000-08:00

Some things remain the same, more they appear to change. And Indian politics is one of them. A round up of all that happen (or did not happen) in the last few weeks

Maharashtra still awaits a government - Maharashtra Congress seems to have made up it's mind to ignore Madam and Yuvraj's calls for austerity. What else can explain the delay in swearing in which is costing the state more than 10 lakhs so far and not to forget the delay in projects which leads to more money being lost. The Congress fresh from a handsome win is more bothered about cabinet berths and portfolios than the aam aadmi.

RajThackeray's ideological washout - While the media and his partymen are busy showcasing MNS's seats as a major win, what they seem to miss are some of these details from Mumbai. Raj Thackeray fought on anti-migrant or pro-Marathi agenda but he also led to reduction of Marathi representation in current assembly. More than 50% of elected MLAs from Mumbai are non-Maharashtrians. Nearly one-third are from UP. This is substantially higher than previous assembly. So while Raj did his political bit by affecting BJP-SS, he lost on ideological grounds miserably.

31st Oct was Sardar's birthday too - Sardar Patel would possibly be sad up there when he realises that he made a mistake by not furthering his family into Indian politics. Because had he got a government which was run on strings by his grand daughter in law or daughter in law, maybe he too would have been remembered on 31st Oct. All efforts were made to show Indira as India and that included having 'paid' or 'loyal' stooges to even justify the emergency and Operation Blue Star be it in newspaper, magazines or television. Maybe this was one place where the governemnt and the Congress Party forgot to follow austerity.

Mother of scams - 2 corruption cases come out in open and who do they belong to? Well the incumbent UPA. One is Madhu Koda from Jhakkhand who was the UPA CM and another is D Raja from DMK and current Telecom Minister. While the sheer volume of money that Indian public has lost (Rs 50,000 crore) in telecome Specturm case makes it the largest scam in India, the minister D Raja is sitting pretty because the current government depends on DMK and there is no way our 'clean, non-corrupt' PM can remove an 'efficient' minister (or money arranger) like Raja. As far as Koda is concerned, he has no value anymore and so can be hounded.

BJP Blues in Karnataka - The first BJP government in south India faces a serious threat from the rebels led by the mine-kings and cash rich Reddy brothers. The situaiton underlines one main point and that is wherever BJP jas deviated from core RSS ideology and fallen prey to money-bags, it has had bad experience. It's high time BJP stops giving importance to those who are in the party only to further their business interests and gives some respect to those who are with the party based on ideology.

Centre-State Relations and Bias

2009-10-11T22:39:00.000-07:00

This morning, in Times of India, one saw an ad from Cong-NCP for elections tomorrow. The reason they wanted people to vote for them was mentioned "better centre-state relations" Now does this mean if anybody else comes to power, it will be treated untouchable or a pariah? This sounded more like a threat to vote than an incentive. Why should centre-state relationship depend on who is rulign the state? Such statements make the claims of partisanship in recent flood relief in South India very believeable. While one does not know the impact of the flood on both AP and Karnataka, from what one reads it clear that rain created nearly equal havoc on both the states. But still Karnataka ruled by BJP got nearly one third of what AP got, maybe because the Congress rules there.

This entire thing is against the spirit of federal and democratic policy. And ruling parties should dedist from using hreats to get them votes.

China Border - Deja Vu

2009-09-15T22:48:00.000-07:00

More some things look like changing, more they look similar at the foundation. Look at these coincidences - 1960-62, India had a 'humane' PM (keen for a place in history) advised by a man from Kerela called Krishna Menon. India had just started looking positive with the beginning of the Green Revolution. In 1950, Sardar Patel had warned Nehru about Chinese threat in long-term only to be brushed aside like always by the Alice who lived in Wonderland. 1962, General Thimayya warned Indian govt of Chinese intrusions only to be called 'alarmist' and 'Pro-West' by Nehru and Krishna Menon. The result was China invaded India in few months.

Today, we have a PM too keen to get his name in history books or a Nobel Peace Prize. India is riding high on economy. US has dealt a huge blow to Chinese trade vis-a-vis India by levying a huge anti-dumping duty on their products. And China has started making noises on the border - both verbal and in actions. Media and Armed Forces are both crying foul. But again comes a man from Kerala Shashi Tharoor and A K Antony who rubbish these claims as 'false alarms'.

One just hopes that like in the history India does not have to see coffins just because some people in New Delhi still live in fool's paradise as they lived in 1960s.

Miraj riots and Media

2009-09-11T04:31:00.000-07:00

Recently Miraj and Sangli witnessed riots during Ganesh Visarjan. This too was just the same kind of riots as one would have witnessed over the years. The Ganesh Pandals had erected some arches to which the Muslims of the town objected and riots broke out over this. What really stuck me while reading or watching the media reports was the way it was reported. All along the incident, the media line was - The riots broke out over an arch depicting Afzal Khan's death at the hands of Shivaji.

Now this is worth thinking. Is there any doubt about how Afzal Khan was killed? Was Afzal Khan a saint and Shivaji a murderer? Then how can there be a argument over a historically correct and proper action?

Then should the media have not said this - The riots broke out over objection of certain people over the arch? This looks a correct statement. But then if the media takes this line, it is secular incorrectness. And no media house in India wants to do that. And this just because of their prejudice against certain section of the social and political ecosystem.

100 days of failure - Price Rise and Inflation

2009-08-30T22:55:00.000-07:00

Hmm, so 100 days of the UPA government are over and let's just look around to see what's changed. PM Manmohan Singh had promised before elections on how he we will change the economy and reduce inflation within 100 days of coming to power. So this series this week will focus on all that was promised and delivered or not delivered, starting with what impacts the common man the most - Inflation, price rise and economy.

While economic growth seems to be moving in right direction to recovery, there seems to be no sign of the liberal policies one was promised. No divestments, no bold economic measures and all this inspite of no Left support needed. On the other hand, the inflation and price rise has zoomed to a new high breaking record each new day. Add to this the governement's silence on hoarders (payback time for election funds?) and our Agri Minister Sharad Pawar new methods to increase shortage and prices for sake of a fw wealthy farmers and industries. Walk into a shop and Tur Dal, Sugar, Moong Dal and in near future Rice too are all missing. Add to this the increase in fuel prices within one month of winning the elections (they had reduced the prices before elections for obvious reasons). Imgaine two of the seniormost ministers facing serious allegations from public, media and their alliance partners on how their nefarious ways are causing the price rise and making life tough for the common man.

Add to this the serious drought situation facing the country. And what has been the Central Government's reaction to it, to shift the blame to the State Governments. Either the governement's too busy printing full page ads on Rajiv Gandhi's birthday or they are waiting for the assembly elections in some state. Till then the farmers can wait and if they can't wait, they can die.

Angels and Demons

2009-08-16T23:31:00.000-07:00

So Jaswant Singh is at it again. He has just done what he does the best (apart from managing finances and external affairs of the country well) and that is to speak his mind, controversies notwithstanding. This time he has opened a Pandora's box by praising Jinnah and blaming Nehru for the country's partitiion.

One has to go beyond traditional prejudices to look at the role of Nehru and Jinnah in Indian Partition. Jinnah was senior to both Gandhi and Nehru in Congress and it was Jinnah who opposed the Khilafat Movement (started by Gandhi to protest against British removal of Caliphate in Istanbul). At that time Jinnah had warned Gandhi against bringing religion (Islam) into politics and thereby showed his secular credentials. What then spurred Jinnah to take a u-turn and ask for partition on religious grounds remains an unsolved mystery specially in India because J-Word has demonised by those who were responsible for the u-turn in Jinnah's thought process namely the Congress, Nehru and Nehruvian historians cum sychopants. The injustice done to Jinnah, the humiliation he was made to suffer at Congress Committee meeting in late 20s and early 30s and finally Congress's refusal to share power with Muslim League in Central Provinces and UP were amongst the few reasons that drove Jinnah to ask for Partition. It was the power lust of 2 egoists - Nehru and Jinnah that was the reaosn behind death of millions, sufferings of billions and the hatred amongst two communities and now countries. Had Nehru not been a greedy egoist that he was, Jinnah might have never gone on the path to partition.

Unfortunately history is always the story of the person who is in power and so we all were brought up to demonising Jinnah and worshipping Nehru when the truth was that both were equally guilty. But that's what Congress did post independence. They tried to remove references and history marks of all those who weren't in the Nehruvian sphere. While Sardar Patel's authority was slowly and steadily diminished after his sterling role in unificaiton of country, Shubash Chandra Bose's life and death were kept a mystery and even today Mukherjee Commission Report has not been made public. Many other doyens and leading lights of the freedom movement were pushed to comparatively lesser stature like Lokmanya Tilak, Bhagat Singh, Veer Savarkar to name a few. The idea was to make Nehru synonymous with Indian Freedom. Because of Gandhi's popularity and stature, they could not do the same to him and they conviniently appropriated Babasaheb Ambedkar as Congress symbol when the history clearly shows how Ambedkar till last moment was aligned with Muslim League and not Congress. It took last minute intervention from Gandhi to convince him but he was never aligned with Congress.

Similarly, Guru Golwalkar was always shown (inspite of being cleared by the courts) as someone behind Gandhi's murder, what was subsequently erased from history books was his and RSS' role in assisting army during 1948 Kashmir Invasion, 1965 Pakistan war or 1962 China War not to mention their services during various natural disasters which prompted the government to allow RSS be a part of the Republic Day Parade. But Guru Golwalkar was always demonised by the historians without presenting the true story.

While we all have been brought up to hate Hitler and as human beings, rightly so. But let's stop for a moment and think as Indians. Hitler was the only international leader (apart from US President Roosevelt) who supported India's freedom and was ready to help Bose (maybe for his own selfish reasons). The German army under Shubashbabu's request did not use Indian soldiers captured while fighting for Britian, as canon fodders for fighting. But then we as Indians have always forgetting this small symbol of German support. Instead we all were taught that Lord Mountbatten was a supporter of India's freedom while the fact was that he was responsible for the partition too. Simlarly though US President Roosevelt did his best to support India during partition (as seen from his letter to British empire in Mr. Singla's book), US offer as friend was ignored just because of Nehruvian love for Soviets and this resulted in long US-Pakistan frienship with started with 1948 General Assembly of UN on Kashmir. But then angels and demons are decided by those who yeild the power.

It's time for the new generation to break the prejudices and accept things for what they were and are. While we all will rightly hate Jinnah for the partition, it's time for the new generation to see Nehru in his rightful place in Indian History and that is of a greedy egoist who ruined the nation for his lust to become the PM. And some of his mistakes are troubling us even today in a bloody manner.

(Sources - Mr. Singla's book "Untold Story of India's Partition", Jinnah's biography which contains letters from Gandhi on Jinnah nationalist and secular credentials, Arun Shourie's book - Worshipping False Gods, Lost Hero by Mihir Bose, and many other similar books by Indian authors on Indian partition and leaders)

Remembering Atal Bihari Vajpayee

2009-08-10T23:27:00.000-07:00

Many a times, it takes small things to remember and aknowledge a great personality and his contributions to the world. Similarily it took a small road trip to remember Atal Bihari Vajpayee and acknowledge how he changed the state of the nation.

Zipping through Raigad, Ratnagiri, Sindhudurg on our way to Goa, me and my friend started talking about how difficult and back breaking journey it used to be for all when going from Mumbai to Goa and how pleasant it has become now. Then strikes a name - Atal Bihari Vajpayee. If Mahatma Gandhi is called the Father of the Nation, if Sardar Patel can be called the Integration Man and if Nehru can be called Man behind Agriculture Revolution, Atalji has all the right to be called the Father of Indian Infrasturcture.

It was in his rule of 6 years that the country broke it shackles in infrastructure and zipped ahead in port development, road and highway creation, power generation, telecom modernisation and much more. While one always used to tlak highly about Atalji political persona or his creative side and even his stint as the Foreign Minister in 1977, the face of a man with modern vision must have been a pleasant realisation to even his greatest critics. Not only did he put an emphasis on infrastructure, he ensured that infrastructure related ministries were given to those who would deliver. So we saw likes of Nitish Kumar, Maj Gen B C Khanduri, Suresh Prabhu, Late Rangrajan Kumaramangalam, Ananth Kumar Hegde be at the helm of the ministries whose growth was important for India growth story. He envisione and proposed, while his team delivered.

If today India is on it's way to becoming one of the economic superpowers, the credit for laying the foundation goes to Atalji.

Karnatka - TN Handshake, a welcome change

2009-08-10T23:06:00.000-07:00

Statues as I had mentioned in a earlier blog are European gift of art to India which we converted to the symbolism of power. But then this one statue unveiling is what I say is welcome as it helps the country.

The occassion was the unveiling of the statue of the great Tamil poet Thiruvalluvar in Karnataka. It took 18yrs and a lot of courage from the current Karnataka CM Yediyurappa to get this much needed honour for someone who is more a national hero. While one sees a tremendous growth of regional identity politics in India with the states trying to focus more on 'local pride and identity' than national integration, this move sees Karnataka and TN making some sort of departure. The fact that these 2 states have had conflicts on many issues right from border to water sharing and there are some hate sentiments by some populace at both sides makes this move even more welcome. Now TN CM Karunanidhi too has invited the Karnataka CM for unveiling of the statue of Kannada poet Sarvagnya in Chennai. If both the CMs could keep the regional hawks at bay and do the right thing, one can hope they can sort out the issues without much bloodshed or hatred .

This statue diplomacy can help stabilise intra-state relations get better which will just strengthen the country.

Years of effort washed in few minutes of 'emotion'?

2009-07-28T23:45:00.001-07:00

The Sharm Al Sheikh declaration between India and Pakistan has become a hot potato for the overnment to handle. India for the first time has been driven to the backfoot by Pak diplomacy. From being a victim of terror to formentor terror, India covered a long distance within 20 minutes of one to one between India PM and Pakistan PM. No one knows what transpired in the one to one meeting and no one will ever know because the RTI act does not include these discussions. But one thing is for sure, India gave temuch more than it got. Was it US pressure or was it the wish to go down in history books or was it the temptation of a Noble Peace Prize, one might never find out. What we find out on a daily basis is that while we have been stripped of our pposition to question Pakistan on terror attacks here, we see an accusation from the other side about Baluchistan on a daily basis.

This is when the statesman like Atal Bihari Vajpayee and cunning fox Late. Narsimha Rao score heavily over Manmohan Singh.

YUPA?

2009-07-20T22:29:00.000-07:00

One more deviation from the stand taken last year and during the election campaign. Now we have gone ahead with EUMA (End User Monitoring Agreement) with the US. One of the interesting points of this agreement is - US Administration has a right to monitor that the systems sold by them to India can't be used against US allies. This ties down India to the changing dimplomatic positions of US vis-a-vis allies. Plus that line combined with the flip flops on Pakistan being a US ally makes thione think if in a situation of battle, can India use systems against Pakistan without US coming down heavily on it. This plus many other terms which clearly show that India again bowed to US pressure and Govt has backtracked from the promises made to the Parliament and the nation..

In last 1 week, this is the third time that India succumbed to the US pressure. The Emission discussion in Italy, the Indo-Pak declaration under US pressure and now the EUMA. At this rate, this governemtn is slowly turning from UPA to YUPA - Yield Under Pressure Alliance.

Down but not out

2009-07-18T02:59:00.001-07:00

One of the most common statement we hear these days from media, common people, experts is about BJP in disarray. While mos tof the common public says this with some amount of curiousity, doubt and worry, the media and experts sound extremely glad. But then most of them forget a few things, which I am trying to point out.

While BJP lost the elections and came down to 116 seats, more than 80 seats were lost with a margin of less than 15,000 votes or less than 2%. This means that with some more effort in right direction, the tide can and will change.
In 1998 and 1999 elections, Congress was down to the same tally as BJP currently but then they did manage to bounce back in 2004. And plus BJP in 1989 bounced from 2 seast to 85 seats. So there is no reason why history cannot repeat itself. All we need is to have basic faith in our ideology.
If one looks at the Congress record over the years, it is clear that in absence of a strong opposition, Congress starts running this country like a personal kingdom and then starts the cycle of corruption, nepotism, sychopancy and violation of human rights. For this main reason, it is important that BJP stays strong. It's not only in BJP's interests but also in the interest of the country.
The glaring difference in BJP's post-lost actions and Congress's post-loss action in 1998 and 99 is that not only does BJP start thinking on ideological terms but the experts, the media and common man also expects it to think about its ideology one way or other. Compared to this, all Congress did was "we need Gandhis" after their earlier electoral losses. This is a redeeming feature in BJP and Left. They fight elections on ideological grounds. And that's why post losses, the discussion on ideology starts. It's always in national interests to have a mainstream national party which fights on ideology and not on individuals. And after a loss, one does not need to change the ideology but just the means to communicate it better and more clearly. This I am sure, BJP has already begun.

The battle's lost but the war's still on.

Arrogance of Power

2009-07-17T22:41:00.001-07:00

Something's can never change whatever be the time span. And Congress blue blood arrogance is back. After winning just over 200 seats in the elections, one is seeing a spate of activities in opposition rules states and a clamour for President's Rule. So far, the President's Rule has been demanded in West Bengal, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Chhatisgarh and now Uttar Pradesh. Congress is back to it's original thinking that nobody except they are destined to rule India. It seems very laughable when Rita Bahuguna Joshi targets Mayawati on rape cases in the most abusive language used in Indian Politics. She seems to forget the history wherein Congress leaders have been found guilty of the biggest sex scandals in India - Jalgaon, Srinagar, Indore and Delhi, in last 2 decades. And then comes the 'PM in waiting' or should one say Proxy PM, Rahul Gandhi on the infrastructure woes of UP. Can someone remind him that his party has been ruling that state for nearly 4 decades and if there is someone to blame for the lack of development in India, it has to be only and only Congress. But then, who will say that Emperor has no clothes?

It's surprising that this arrognace is kept aside only for India and Indians. Because the moment the PM steps out, he seems to bow down to everything, right from the stand on Pollution in Developing Countries to Terror and talks with Pakistan. It would help the country if rather than showing their bravado to Indians, the government shows some on the international circuit where it is fast replacing UK as US's paddle dog.

The 'Liberal' slip in showing

2009-07-03T04:27:00.000-07:00

While watching the landmark and welcome judgment on homosexuality, I enjoyed what I call the wicked pleasure. This pleasure was to see the so-called liberals like John Dayal, Father Emmanuel, Kamal Farooqi, Kalbe Javed etc show their real intolerant face. For long these 'gentlemen' have been the darling of media, activists and political parties who don't miss a chance to parade these liberals to take on the right-wing intolerant. But yesterday, they stood exposed as they went on their religious beliefs and how their beliefs were bigger than the judgement or the human rights of the homosexual community. It was sad the way these guys were turning a day of respect to a day of shame.

Next time, I hope I don't get mails of liberalism, tolerance and human rights coming out of a church flooding my mail box just because they were on receiving end.

What's in a name??

2009-07-01T23:01:00.000-07:00

Did someone say - What's in a name anyways? Well, if one goes by the Indian political standards, there is a lot more to name.

More than half the country is named after Nehru Gandhi family. It was possibly sheer luck that during the Emergency days of Indira and the brute majority days of Rajiv, they did not make an amendment to constitution that alteast one member of each family should be names after a Nehru or Gandhi and their future generations. That actually is the only thing left.

What Congress does at the centre is done by the regional parties in states. That's why you have roads, bridges, flyovers, highways, grounds, slums, schools named after the regional satraps and their families.

In late 90s, when Nitin Gadkari was the PWD minister in BJP-Shiv Sena government, he and MSRDC has made a decision not to name the infrastructure projects after any politician. That's why we still have the Mumbai Pune Express Highway being called that instead of Indira Gandhi Road or Sanjar Gandhi Marg. It is high time, a similar policy is followed and the country is spared from turning into a Gandhistan from Hindustan.

The politics of statues

2009-06-28T22:36:00.000-07:00

One of the finest memories of any trip to Europe are those fantastic statues complimenting the architecture of any town or city. What was supposed to represent art in Europe now represents power and greed in India. Statues surely have gone a long way.

In very recent past, we have seen how the bankrupt Maharashtra government had a 300 crore plan to install a statue of Shivaji Maharaj in the sea on the lines of Statue of Liberty. What they seem to havemissed is that US was not going through an economic crisis or facing farmer suicides when the statue was built there. But Maharashtra is and am sure Shivaji being such a great ruler would have himself used his coffers more for betterment of the people than such vote attracting misadventures.

So it comes across as sheer hypocrisy when Congress opposed Mayawati's plans to install her statues in UP. While Mayawati's plans to do it is sheer criticisable, Chidambaram's advice to her to use that money for development is like pot calling the kettle black. Congress is guilty of the statue culture in India and has not left a single city, town or village untouched by such symbols of their leaders in general and Gandhi Nehru family in particular. Had they thought of using that money for education and infrastructure, India would have been in a different level.

So while the culprits fight amongst themselves, few more farmers in UP and Maharashtra would be praying to get their next meal

Successful Diplomacy?

2009-06-01T01:33:00.001-07:00

One of the many things, media and the ruling party spoke as a UPA achievement was its diplomacy. Let's just have a look at what's happening around and see if this is really an achievement:

Pakistan
Pakistan has still not acted on 26/11 accussed and continues to play traunt on that.

US
While US has now conveniently reduced the 'pressure' on Pakistan for terror in India, it has started applying economic pressure on India with its anti-outsourcing policies. And the pressure to sign the NPT has restarted. So much for the hyped up Nuke Treaty

Sri Lanka
China has already made its inroads in SL with it's pro-government stand durign the LTTE crisis. India in turn was caught riding on two boats which meant that neither they have a say with Sri Lanka any more and neither they could do anything to prevent human rights violation.

Others
France has already shown its inclination to sign a Nuke Deal with Pakistan notwithstanding Pakistan's precarious position. Indian government has left Indian students in Australia to their own fate when faced with brutal racial attacks.

If this all is supposed to be an achievement, then God save the country from such regimes.

Post Elections - A new beginning

2009-05-28T22:13:00.002-07:00

Elections 2009 are over and results are out. Congress with it's few allies is back in power. And the first few things one notices is:

A much more stable government without allies pressure
A stronger Manmohan Singh which may mean more impetus on reforms
A return to dynasty with more than 20% of ministers so far sworn in kins of senior leaders
While merit has been the criteria for a few, more or less loyalty to the family has been given the importance. What else can justify inclusion / promotion of people like Veerapa Moily, Vilasrao Deshmukh, Ambika Soni.
More minority representation (than earlier governments) - While 5 ministers are Muslims, 3 are Sikhs (including PM) and Christians have the lion's share with 8 ministries, which means nearly 10% of the total cabinet.

Now that the ministers are in place, all eyes on PM's promise to turn aorund the economy in the furst 100 days.