Dork in chief

With ministers like these....

2004-09-11T04:52:00.000-07:00

"Patil does explaining to Sonia, quite a bit," says Pradeep Kaushal in The Indian Express (September 11, 2004 at 0205 hours). Shivraj Patil is colorless even as lacklustre politicians go. His earlier stints as MoS Science and Tech, and then Speaker were consistently devoid of any highlights whatsoever. He is as close you can get to a real life Major Major Major (the Catch 22 character). His appointment as Home Minister after his defeat in the LS polls has the hard to miss stamp of the Congress khichdi cabinet - one which is drawn up by people who have never been out of Lutyens Delhi, with an undistinguished understanding of India, economics, politics and everything else, who prize personal loyalty and servitude over everything else. Not surprisingly his tenure as Home Minister has been disastrous and promises to only get worse. It is true that during LKA's time the Northeast wasn't exactly settled. The borders continued to be soft admitting all sorts of vermin. But whatever their faults, NDA accepted the reality of neglect and tried their best to make new friends and build new relationships with the people at large. This government hasn't gotten used to the fact that the days of the Northeast politicians paying obeisance to New Delhi is over. They may be Congressmen in name but intend to do everything to fight for their share of the federal pie, dissidence be damned. In all this you have an incompetent like Shivraj Patil? Need we say more?

The real fundamentalists

2004-09-10T16:38:00.000-07:00

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1040910/asp/opinion/story_3737539.asp

A fine piece once again from Swapan. Dr.Singh's credentials are beyond reproach. He is a socialist of sorts having been influenced by the Fabians. Back home he surely must have imbibed the deeply uncompromising welfarist ideals of ourt own socialists, JP, Achyut Patwardhan, Lohia and many others. These socialists to a person had nothing but contempt for the commies aka Lal Langotis. During the Quit India movement the socialists went underground while the commies functioned as stooges and informers of the colonial administration. while many Congressmen being non-violent types were treated with some softness, the socialists being more active types suffered badly. The socialists never forgave the commies for their betrayal. JP himself was no fawning admirer of Stalin and Mao unlike some of the deranged "peoples' leaders" of the commies cheered and applauded while 10s of millions perished and were put to death in "workers' paradises". HKS Surjeet that comedian after a visit to Romania a few months before the fall of Ceausescu returned singing the praises of the socialist paradise of Europe. This when the dictator on his last legs was still forciblyrelocating entire villages.
Dr.Man Mohan Singh is not some cheapjack like Irfan Habib who churns out ideology dressed up as history. This is a courageous man who despite some hardened beliefs dared to change India for the better. The words of a true intellectual like Dr.Singh are worth listening to any day over the protestations of a commissar like Irfan Habib. Shame on The Hindu (what's new?) for ducking the issue entirely.

Gondogol ache! Felu-babu!

2004-09-07T18:30:00.000-07:00

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1040908/asp/opinion/story_3728222.asp

Omkar-da good work on this one. The Census data on West Bengal on closer examination paints a depressing picture of the state better known as Waste Bengal. That clown Ashok Mitra must pay attention to matters closer to home rather than fool around with things he knows not (which is just about everything other than those things he was trained to do many years ago). A detailed examination of the stats are called for.

Vijai Bhava! Vijayasimha!

2004-09-07T18:18:00.000-07:00

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1040908/asp/frontpage/story_3731230.asp

Vijai Singh has made it to the No.1 slot. Congrats! How far the UP/Bihar Bhaiyya has come. Shipped to the PAcific, Indian Ocean, Africa, Southeast Asia and the Caribbean to work as indentured labor, the community has put its past aside and risen to make the best of what it has. I know little about Vijai's family or his early days. But this seems to be a story of pure grit. Making it to the No.1 slot without the many advantages Americans, Europeans, South Africans enjoy - talent farming, sports scholarships (Stanford), the value of their currency, the superior training system, the remunerative nature of sport etc., is outstanding. Vijai thanks for remebering your roots in India. But also remember what President Kalam told NRIs earlier this year. You are welcome to visit India always but your first loyalties must lie with the country whose passport you carry.

Now I hope the press will not rake Vijai once more over the coals for his views on mixed golf championships, while they keep silent over "no-women allowed" golf courses.

Thanks Telegraph

2004-09-05T03:48:00.000-07:00

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1040905/asp/opinion/story_3714392.asp

This Weblog is fast becoming a washing board for The Telegraph. V.v. interesting article on the September 1 tamasha organised by the Bham Phront of Waste Bengal. From earlier reports it seems that this "peoples' rally" was not entirely trouble as usual for the people. Good work by Buddha-da. He seems to be able to keep the CPI-M thugs at bay quite effectively. His predecessor that mimic Marx and thugmeister was well known for his carefully honed expertise at managing goon squads, all acquired thru his days as a "labor lawyer" and then "labor leader". Respectable people do very often rely upon goons to enforce authority in political parties. The history of this sorry process in WB is waiting to be written. In 1989 when a bandh was organised to protest against the "anti people policies" of the government (of Rajiv Gandhi), some public sector firms thought of hosting their employees at work overnight to save them the trouble of walking miles and miles from home the next day (this was on August 31st). That night CPI(M) goons systematically fanned across Dalhousie Square walked up into offices and thrashed 100s of people. The Telegraph of course reported it. The Hindu that sanctimonious rag never heard of it!

Another one who doesn't get it

2004-09-04T04:17:00.000-07:00

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1040901/asp/opinion/story_3692590.asp

The Telegraph is unputdownable (a word coined by MJ Akbar) for a number of reasons. One of them has to do with the shoddy quality of some of its writers. Nivedita Menon a "professor of Political Science" in Delhi University is one of its worst. In this article she starts talking about Chandra Bhan's book - compilation of his articles of the last few years. She starts there. The rest of the article is about Nivedita's views on this and Nivedita's wisdom about that. What does the book contain? We are not any wiser at the end of it. Telegraph could have invited Chandra Bhan to write about his book or got somebody to review it. Why did it have to call a 2-bit hack who hasn't grown out of her "when I went to Shimla last summer" composition days? Nivedita does inform us a little. We learn that she is "anti-capitalist" - wonder what she is doing about it? And she expresses surprise at Chandra Bhan's proposed Dalit-Brahmin alliance and his dismissal of Kancha Illiah's Dalit-Bahujan proposed alliance. Kancha of course is that charlatan who makes an appearance at every hack meet. Chandra Bhan has no time for wannabe Dalit defenders considering Kancha is running the "Dalit flag" only because he it affords him a foot in the door given his mediocre and below par intellectual accomplishments. Kancha is certainly not in the same league as Drs. Radhakrishnan and Pandian of MIDS (not unless you are willing to suspend all rational evaluation).

But Nivedita wouldn't know all this would she. Because Chandra Bhan works with The Pioneer, New Delhi - and is the only Dalit journalist to be employed as an editor in any capacity by an English newspaper.

Here and there

2004-09-04T03:53:00.000-07:00

http://www.telegraphindia.com/archives/archive.html

Ashok Mitra a communist crank and crackpot never fails to amuse. This man's views were so far off the line that his own party the CPI(M) was constrained to throw his out of the government. Here is gassing away as usual. In what surely marks him out as a race-baiter, ignoramus, liar, fool and what have you he alleges that the US Olympic team owes its spectacular performance in the 2004 Olympics - as usual - to the performance of black atheltes - who unfortunately (according to him) continue to receive the short end of the stick. I don't know what planet this man lives on (or maybe he has already been committed?) The days when Jesse Owens labored in obscurity after his historic triumph at Berlin 1936 are long gone. The black salute at Mexico 1968 is far behind us. Surely Ashok Mitra did not miss out on those numerous US athletes black, white, brown, yellow etc (yes Anjana Bharadwaj) who joyously celebrated their medal victories draped in the Stars and Stripes? The idioy needs a reality check or maybe a lobotomy or lobal transplant would do?

Talking of China the man as usual waxes on about the great accomplishments and as always conveniently forgetting the Great Leap (Back)Forward, Let a 100 Flowers Bloom (Wither), The Cultural Revolution, each of which was accompanied by the extermination of millions and millions - about 30-60 million a record. The Chinese of course have no time for numbskulls like Mitra anymore. Ramadorai of TCS is an IT advisor to a Chinese provincial government and Suresh Krishna of TVS is busy setting up auto ancillary supply chains in the remote provinces of China. And yes China remembers those who have helped her in times of need. When Dr.Kotnis's family (Dr. Kotnis ki Amar Kahani by V. Shantaram) visited China a few years ago they were feted and treated like VIPs.

UPA's first 100 days

2004-08-29T07:02:00.000-07:00

http://us.rediff.com/money/2004/aug/28guest.htm

TCA Srinvasa Raghavan has this take on the UPA's pro(re)gress in its 1st 100 days. Hard to disagree. We seem to be back to the days of tokenism best typified by the Nehruvian embrace of medicrity embellished with large doses of style, platitude, puffery and pomposity. With one shadow PM - who talks of her "inner voice" - remember what Ambedkar used to say of Gandhi's "inner voice"? - an upright scholar PM who is too nice to be tough - a capable rail mantri who if he desires can achieve much but has decided to spend his lifetime as a public entertainer, a senile external affairs minister, who's best accomplishment is that of being the Nehru khaandan's sincerest court jester, an Oxford commie now wallowing in oil, a finance minister who for the second time has inherited an 8% pa GDP and is doing his best to return it to a sedate 4% pa as he did six years before. I will stop there. That's enough woe for a day.

PayyoLi Express - PT Usha

2004-08-29T06:58:00.000-07:00

http://us.rediff.com/sports/2004/aug/29oly-ath6.htm

Here'e Usha's take on Anju's leap. Ain't it sad that we Indians have learnt absolutely nothing after Kawaljit Sandhu, Usha and now Anju? How long will we have raw talent that is ignored or highlighted to embellish some moronic minister's ego? Sunil Dutt who is otherwise an honorable man every which way you look at it - said the most idiotic thing possible to India's Olympians at their send-off to Athens, "PErform well with the spirit of sacrifice towards the nation, remember the spirit of Sonia!"

India's finest President ever

2004-08-28T07:26:00.000-07:00

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1040828/asp/nation/story_3685559.asp

Kakkan, Rafi Ahmed Kidwai, Nath Pai, Gita Mukherjee, JP, Sucheta Kriplani, Muthulakshmi Reddy, Kamaraj - are all gone. If you want to know what it must have been like when they were around look at President Kalam. A rational, liberal, Indian traditional rooted in India's chaal, chalan and charitra, with an eye on the future fully understanding that while we can forget history we cannot ignore geography. Regardless of what has happened we must live together. That is what Gandhi understood and that is what Ambedkar too recognised.

Gandhi wanted the politician to be a public servant a person who wsa capable of making a living through a skill or profession, who would serve the people for free. Kalam is one such person. He has made a living as an ordinary lower middle class Madhavan and built up our only successful technological supply chain. He has won the affection, trust regard of 1000s of small town and large town boys and girls who has moulded into furture oriented engineers and scientists. He has made the best use of our indigenous institutions of learning and opened up opportunities to innumerable small technology shops. He earned his honours the hard way by being a successful technocrat who learnt to work the political system fairly, without sucking up or putting on pseudo-liberal airs as one of his predecessors has done. He is not a pompous ass who talks of social justice in the afternoon and is sipping his scotch and soda without fail that evening. He is not a made up man of the masses who after a lifetime of high living in the capitals of the world and India's finest residences wants to continue living the high life at sarkar expense in New Delhi and bilks the exchequer as usual.

If only we could have more Kalams and less of the other despicable variety.

So near yet so far

2004-08-28T07:12:00.000-07:00

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1040828/asp/frontpage/story_3687446.asp

Anju Bobby George gave her best - but it wasn't good enough. But our hearts are with you Anju. Yours has been a lone battle for glory. While the aam janata has been with you all the while the neta and babus have as usual have shafted you. Given that you started late and had to make the brave choice of a career in track and field knowing fully well that the GoI and a cricket crazed public don't give a damn you persisted. You persisted even after you found that the facilities the government afforded you were behind the times. Still you kept at it. You got to see Mike Powell toward the tail end of the performance arc and have done the best possible. The former Sports Minister Uma Bharati made a vain boast of India making a pitch to host the Olympics! The citizenry held their laughter in check as they didn't want to choke in their guffaws. Now Uma Bharati has discovered a new passion - the Tiranga - and is now a guest of the Karnataka government. Does she remember that it was once her duty as Minister of Sports to see that you and otehr athletes got the best that India could give you? Does she remember you now or has she already forgotten you? Thru all this the only person from the political establishment who has seen fit to remember our athletes is as always President Kalam. In his I-Day speech he remembered you and your fellow athletes and offered you our best wishes. Anju if you can come close to a souped up Marion Jones it's great work. Marion comes from the US athletic system an awesome machine that is geared towards excellence from the grade-school level.

There's more happy news of our making it to the finals of the womens 4x400 m relay. Good work! Keep it up ladies. For a cricket crazy nation that doesn't even bother i you win or lose you are giving everything and more. Let's hope that you are the nucleus around which a future mass of talent develops.

Thank you Congressman Pallone

2004-08-25T19:17:00.000-07:00

http://us.rediff.com/news/2004/aug/26jk.htm

If any parliamentarian/politician has even a thuLi aLavu of sudu, soraNai, vekkam-maanam he/she should hang their heads in shame. A politician has no responsibility save the welfare of the constituents. Congressman Pallone deserves praise for having used every opportunity available to highlight the plight of the Kashmiri Pandits. Indian politicians across parties deserve condemnation for having ignored the Pandits at every turn. Their only fault? They are not even half-a-million. You see that's not a very big vote bank. The real tragedy of the Pandits is the silent ostracisation and marginalisation over the last fifty years. From a peak when they formed over 20% of the population of the Valley at the turn of India's Independence, their share of the population (in percent) went down to single digits by the time the latest troubles started. Abdul Kalam in a first of sorts visited a Pandit refugee camp in the first year of his Presidency. Maybe it takes a true multiculturalist like him to recognise that misery is misery regardless of whom it chooses to inflict itself upon..

I am reminded of Congressman Gary Ackerman who when the Taliban in their heyday decreed that all Hindus in Afghanistan should wear yellow armbands (like the Nazis made the Jews wear a Yellow Star of David), himself went around wearing a yellow armband. http://www.house.gov/ackerman/press/taliban.htm
Here is his statement.

Thank you! More visibility maybe?

2004-08-23T17:00:00.000-07:00

I have my first references.

Dr. Amardeep Singh who teaches English at Lehigh University
http://www.lehigh.edu/%7Eamsp/blog.html

And the Scientific Indian - named by me as - Thalaiva - Thiru Selvakumar AvargaL
http://www.thescian.com/blog/index.php

Selva - it means wealth - shows a progressive and practical face with his concentration on matters scientific. He is in the big league of webloggers having made it to the pages of www.Pharyngula.org

KaLari payattu

2004-08-22T04:27:00.000-07:00

http://in.rediff.com/news/2004/aug/22kalari.htm

Interesting news from China. If only India had nurtured its traditional arts and crafts as the Chinese have done. And of course if only India had done away and extinguished a number of cruel and regressive customs and traditions as the Chinese have done. And both after Independence. Unfortunately there is little by way of inventory or record about the great martial art forms of India. KaLari interestingly is one of few (only?) martial art forms where unarmed combat is taught last - after all armed combat methods have been taught. Only the best students the most balanced ones, the most compassionate ones get to learn unarmed combat. Tamizh Naadu has its own KaLari and Varmakkalai. The Tamizh and Kerala styles are closely related. TN of course has the beautiful Silambam (staff-fighting) and Maan Kombu Kalai (fighting with metal tipped deer horns). This is a vanishing art. There are innumerable other forms in every corner of India and if the Congress-Jhola-Lal Langoti gang has its way there will be nothing left of these forms in another ten years.

Few movies have showcased the speed and grace of KaLari. There are a few Malayalam movies that have featured KaLari - Oru Vadakkan Veerakatha, HH Abdullah, ThachoLi Marumagan.... Shankar's Indian charmed us with its Indian thaatha - Kamal's - adroit use of varmmakkalai - attacking the weak points - atemi waaza in bu-jitsu. I don't know how much of this is authentic. Interesting it shd be.

A few Chinese friends of mine at school were keen to learn Yoga. Being the deracinated sort thanks to 50 years of faux socialistic and mediocre McCaulay schalaticism in India I was embarassed to say I knew little of Yoga save what my father taught me. The Chinese students of course know to paint, know quite a bit of their ideographic script, know a little Tai-Chi - so beautiful. They are also taught about the ancient links between China and India all in grade school. The Indonesians learn about the Mahabharata and Ramayana in grade school - and this happesn even in Sumatra. The Pancha Pandavas are taught to be a comparable parallel to the five pillars of Islam. And we in India have to make do with ignoramuses and "eminent historians" who know no Sanskrit or any other Indian language sitting in New Delhi or NYU holding forth on matters they have no idea of.

Last week we saw Greece shocase its heritage - Socrates, Homer, Iliad and all as it lauched its opening ceremony. The classicists will be full of civilization and democracy and the glories of Western Civilization. True I agree. The last three places I want to see before I die are Egypt, Greece and Rome. Being from India I have an ancient tradtion running in my veins. And China too would be great bt it will take a long time for the Chinese to undo to the great uprootings of the pre-Deng era.

But then aren't there other ancient traditions? It has been estimated that the traditional literature of India in philosophy, spiritulism, religion, science, aesthetics, medicine, the arts etc. is about many times as voluminous as all the "Classics" that are studied today. In Sanskrit I studied about 40 parts of speech (all taught in English of course in my undergrad years) and was told that this is a tiny part of the topic!

Certainly not to say that mine is bestest and greatestest. Others are nothing. How much richer our education would be if we could study different strands of classicism, the Greek, the Roman, the Chinese, the Indic and the many others that surely are there. I am going to trawl thru the collected works of Ambedkar to see what he has to say on the subject. Readers who are experts on Ambedkar are welcome to contribute.

Swarnavardhan Rathore?

2004-08-21T07:38:00.000-07:00

http://us.rediff.com/sports/2004/aug/21oly-shoot1.htm

Cheers to Raj Rathore for winning the what is by now surely the only medal for India at the 2004 Olympics. 1.3 billion people and one silver medal? We have tolerated this level of performance for so many years now that it has stopped to matter. Getting into any sport at a respectable level of technology and competition in India is a big-big problem. And the Indian Army with 1000s of marksmen couldcome up with only silver medallist? I am sure that there are great marksmen in the Army. May be they could train people up? And thenm what about other sports? Tennis? I had no hopes. Hockey - this team is out of steam and as always peaks 90 degrees out of phase from the Olympics. Poor talent pool, lousy promotions and sponsorship inside India and an apathetic sporting community. I am not disappointed with Sachin for his Ferrari swindle only. The guy never opens his gob about other sports. He is an excellent athlete and would probably do well at any ball game as Gavaskar and Kapil have proven themselves to be (As did the great Vinoo Mankad).

Today's IE

2004-08-20T19:38:00.000-07:00

http://iecolumnists.expressindia.com/full_column.php?content_id=53424 Saeed Naqvi. What can I say about this man? He is India's finest reporter and without doubt is the world's finest international reporter today. He's travelled round the world a 1000 times, met two Popes, over a 100 heads of state, Presidents, PMs, Sheikhs, prelates, acharyas, bhikkus, the Dalai Lama, generals, admirals, marshals, tin-pot dictators, lotawalas, jholawalas, carpet baggers and who else have you. His reports are often the only true ones ever filed. A few years ago in Sierra Leone, the Indian and Brit peacekeepers were surroneded by a huge group of rebels. A few years Op Khukri happened and the troops were rescued by a brilliant armed action. The "international press" as is their wont reported a "briiliant action" by the "elite" SAS or some such thing. Naqvi happened to be at hand right there having ridden with the Indian contingent that broke thru the rebel lines and filed the only true report on the action. The Brits had provided pretty little by way of either brawn or brain. It was an Indian show all along.

Today's article by Naqvi is about upward mobility in India and how this is reflected in its cricketers. He says that Kaif, Zaheer and Irfan are the only team members who are not articulate and well educated. I am not so sure Saeed saab. Kaif has played for the counties in England and Irfan is the smartest cricketer around these days. There was a time when Abid Ali and MAK Pat were the true princes of cricket, while GR Vishy, Chandra, etc were the partially schooled galli cricket types. Those days are long gone.

http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=53528

A disappointing story on the Golden Quadrilateral. Gen BC Khanduri was doing a great job with the project, and got re-elected in May 2004. The usual problems - land acquisition and probably there will be more meddling by TR Baalu. Why can't we have an exit here and an exit there? How about not having Hindi inside TN? The DMK and CPI-M together? OK let's hope for the best.

2004-08-20T19:07:00.000-07:00

After a long break...OK not so long break

Anil Ambani. What is right about the speech? It is realistic. That's true. Years and years of socialist rhetoric - idle chatter at that - has banaoed us into thinking that all we need to do is to have a semblance of the objects, structures, processes that other countries have. It doesn't matter how good it is. I don't say that we haven't achieved anything. We have achieved much since 1947 given that 200+ years of colonial rule courtesy the Brits saw us living thru stagnant GDP, declining health standards, decline of knowhow generation, immiseration of the peasantry, five famines the last of which occured during 1942 - so much for the benefits of colonialism. But whom do we have to blame after Independence? Ourselves and only ourselves. Did the light escape every PM from Nehru to Rajiv? Did no one ever understand the utility of a freer economic regime? Did no one ever realise the need to grow and hit the high notes? To be the best at something?

That's what Anil Ambani is asking today. In the 80s Dhirubhai once asked if he was happy about doing well said something to the effect that when India had 10 companies with a paid up capital >$100 million, he would smile.

Anil isn't the first person to be critical of our record. Some have made living out of spewing "India Stinking" articles for over 15 years now. A guy who won the Beam BcSride Prize is an expert at this sort of vacuous writing. Anil is different - way different. He is educated abroad and well travelled around the world. He has gone against the grain and fought his family in personal matters. He has put his money where his mouth his and done his bit to make Reliance the staggeringly successful company it continues to be. He has entered the political arena instead of staying behind the scene to pull strings for sundry political favors. He like his late father and his brother treats his company's shareholders and employees and other stakeholders with all due respect. He mayn't be self-made like his father was, but it's just one generation removed and a fame and fortune acquired through the market not thru dubious means - like smuggling antiques or earning commissions on big deals. If we need youth, freshness and competence at the helm, why not Anil Ambani? How about a Mulayam Singh mediated practical 3rd Front. It would be the confluence of economic right-headedness, rural touch, nationalistic fervor and genuine participation from the educated and up and coming Dalits - the sort that Ambedkar so powerfully sought to encourage - Educate, Organise and Agitate? Contrast this with the old time satraps and carpet baggers of the Congress who now with Rahul and Sonia around are looking forward to another 35 years of mediocrity?

The need to excel hasn't been nurtured by the Congress or the Bam Phront (Bengali Colloquial for Left Front). The Congress culture is built upon sycophancy and entitlement. The Left Front is so mired in reactionary ideology that any talk of doing something well is dismissed as a bourgeois/reactionary impulse.

I-Day speeches

2004-08-16T16:25:00.001-07:00

The President's speech and the PM's are like meandering rivers. They meet sometimes and don't a others. No actually the President's speech http://www.presidentofindia.nic.in/scripts/eventslatest1.jsp?id=645 is like a straight river curving only when points are to be emphasised. Kalam is not an ideological person - thankfully. His vision is rooted in reality and his own experiences. He is a very ordinary simple and homegrown achiever who has kept his eyes and ears open for matters far beyond his own shells. But he has tried to score 1s and 2s before hitting those sixers. There are others who can talk better and in greater detail about this man who is surely India's best President. But in this I-Day's speech he talked of his concerns regarding education and health. He is not talking of vast ideological chasms to be crossed - but simple steps that must be taken at the level of villages and mohallas. In keeping to form his I-Day dinner invitees included 20 Panchayat Sarpanches - men and women - the simple folk who keep our villages well run - here are pictures of the gathering - http://www.presidentofindia.nic.in/scripts/eventslatest1.jsp?id=644. When are we going to listen to him? And for that profound fool Prafool Bidwai who wrote a nasty smear piece on Kalam a couple of years ago when Kalam accepted the nomination to run for President there is yet another kick.
http://antiwar.com/bidwai/?articleid=592 In this hate-filled and moronic tirade Bidwai implies that Kalam advocates "Eugenics" for suggesting that bio-implants be used to improve the faculties of those who are mentally disadvantaged. Apart from the fact that Prafool shows himself to be a careless hack by mixing up eugenics - which is about breeding humans by selecting for superior abilities - with mental ability improvement in individuals - he displays an unpardonable ignorance of contemporary research into the methods for alleviating the problems of the mentally challenged. Bio-implants for a variety of ailments are among the many approaches - including embryonic stem cell transplant - in this exciting area. As if to show us what a prejudiced and idiotic hack he is Kalam's speeches since then on the matter of education have always included sugggestions and directions for taking better care of India's mentally and physically challenged folk. In this year's I-Day speech too Kalam has made an entreaty on their behalf. Some months back he adminitered a pledge to children that included a promise to treat mentally and phycially disadvanteaged folk with care and concern. Is Prafool going to apologise for his stridency and hatred?

Now for Dr.Singh's speech. It meets Kalam's speech on matters of practicality it divereges a little on matters of accountability, but wanders away very sharply in its references to Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi! Indira Gandhi's Garibi Hatao? For God's sake Doc, that was a campaign slogan that got IG into office and achieved nothing else. And Rajiv Gandhi and IT? Here was a man with a 400 seat majority in the Lok Sabha who could have done anything he wanted including commanding that sun rise from the West (As Tavleen Singh puts it) and what did he do? The Shah Bano retreat, soft-Hindutva, Bofors, holidaying in Andamans and Lakshadweep (>Rs. 30 crore for each outing) and a lot of other forgettable things. As for IT this man did not have the vision to lift capacity restrictions on manufacture of computers or throw open telecom infrastructure to competition. Dr. Singh if not for your bold moves in 1991 with Rao-garu we would have been looking at the wrong end of the abyss by now and all you can do is to pay words of praise to Rajiv and his Mummy? I do admire IG for many things. But economics is not one of them. Must you talk of them? You would win another term of office if you were to run on your achievements Doc. Spare us those days of stasis and mediocrity.

Anil Ambani's article in rediff.com "What Freedom Means to Me" http://web.mid-day.com/smd/play/2004/august/90025.htm read it at Mid-Day merits a special post all by itself.

I-Day Speeches

2004-08-16T16:25:00.000-07:00

The President's speech and the PM's are like two meandering rivers. They meet sometimes and don't a others. No actually the President's speech http://www.presidentofindia.nic.in/scripts/eventslatest1.jsp?id=645 is like a straight river curving only when points are to be emphasised. Kalam is not an ideological person - thankfully. His vision is rooted in reality and his own experiences. He is a very ordinary simple and homegrown achiever who has kept his eyes and ears open for matters far beyond his own shells. But he has tried to score 1s and 2s before hitting those sixers. There are others who can talk better and in greater detail about this man who is surely India's best President. But in this I-Day's speech he talked of his concerns regarding education and health. He is not talking of vast ideological chasms to be crossed - but simple steps that must be taken at the level of villages and mohallas. In keeping to form his I-Day dinner invitees included 20 Panchayat Sarpanches - men and women - the simple folk who keep our villages well run - here are pictures of the gathering - http://www.presidentofindia.nic.in/scripts/eventslatest1.jsp?id=644. When are we going to listen to him? And for that profound fool Prafool Bidwai who wrote a nasty smear piece on Kalam a couple of years ago when Kalam accepted the nomination to run for President there is yet another kick.
http://antiwar.com/bidwai/?articleid=592 In this hate-filled and moronic tirade Bidwai implies that Kalam advocates "Eugenics" for suggesting that bio-implants be used to improve the faculties of those who are mentally disadvantaged. Apart from the fact that Prafool shows himself to be a careless hack by mixing up eugenics that contemptible inhuman and abominable quest - which is about breeding humans by selecting for superior abilities - with mental ability improvement in individuals - he displays an unpardonable ignorance of contemporary research into the methods for alleviating the problems of the mentally challenged. Bio-implants for a variety of ailments are among the many approaches - including embryonic stem cell transplant - in this exciting area. As if to show us what a prejudiced and idiotic hack he is Kalam's speeches since then on the matter of education have always included sugggestions and directions for taking better care of India's mentally and physically challenged folk. In this year's I-Day speech too Kalam has made an entreaty on their behalf. Some months back he adminitered a pledge to children that included a promise to treat mentally and phycially disadvanteaged folk with care and concern. Is Prafool going to apologise for his hate-filled rant?

Now for Dr.Singh's speech. It meets Kalam's speech on matters of practicality it divereges a little on matters of accountability, but wanders away very sharply in its references to Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi! Indira Gandhi's Garibi Hatao? For God's sake Doc, that was a campaign slogan that got IG into office and achieved nothing else. And Rajiv Gandhi and IT? Here was a man with a 400 seat majority in the Lok Sabha who could have done anything he wanted including commanding that sun rise from the West (As Tavleen Singh puts it) and what did he do? The Shah Bano retreat, soft-Hindutva, Bofors, holidaying in Andamans and Lakshadweep (>Rs. 30 crore for each outing) and a lot of other forgettable things. As for IT this man did not have the vision to lift capacity restrictions on manufacture of computers or throw open telecom infrastructure to competition. Dr. Singh if not for your bold moves in 1991 with Rao-garu we would have been looking at the wrong end of the abyss by now and all you can do is to pay words of praise to Rajiv and his Mummy? I do admire IG for many things. But economics is not one of them. Must you talk of them? You would win another term of office if you were to run on your achievements Doc. Spare us those days of stasis and mediocrity.

Anil Ambani's article in rediff.com "What Freedom Means to Me" http://web.mid-day.com/smd/play/2004/august/90025.htm read it at Mid-Day merits a special post all by itself.

More sloppiness from the Wash.Post

2004-08-16T16:23:00.000-07:00

BTW this is the same Wash.Post that printed a poorly written press-release for Wendy Doniger by Shankar Vedantam. Doniger's ill-written and unlettered write-up on Hinduism for the Microsoft Encarta was replaced with an excellent write-up by Arvind Sharma. Vedantam coyly asked why Doniger thought her paper was dropped in favor of Sharma's. Vedantam and Doniger without batting an eyelid (I assume) said something about her name being Doniger (foreign) and the other man's name being Sharma (Indian and Hindu). Vedantam of course printed it with little thought. Now how many readers know that Arvind Sharma is a Professor of Religious Studies at McGill, Montreal; has a PhD from Harvard Divinity School and is a former IAS officer and is widely published and was the first Visiting Professor of Indic Studies at Harvard recently? So Doniger is dropped because she is not Indian. So then why is Karl Potter editing the Encyclopedia of Indian Philosophy and why does Stephen Phillips at UT Austin command a great deal of respect for his work in Indian Philosophy?

Sloppy reporting

2004-08-16T15:38:00.000-07:00

The big worldwide news bureaus never cease to amaze with their lack of plain old competence. The same goes for some of the big time sheets of the US - and the biggest ones of them all - Wash.Post and NYT. There is a book waiting to be wtitten about the bloopers, biases, howlers etc. of these 'venerable institutions" when it comes to their reporting on India. Fat budgets, lavish expense accounts, training from the finest schools and now employing desis have all failed to make much of a difference.

Let's take yesterday's August 15 '04 atrocities in Assam and JK thanks to some "liberators" and "freedom fighters"

Associated Press has Ashok Sharma reporting on the Assam outrage where around 20 twenty people (lots of children) were dynamited while they were at school participating in the I-Day festivities. AP starts off by saying who it thinks committed this tragic(?) deed - you won't believe it - It turned out to be a time bomb! When it is pretty apparent that this atrocity is the handiwork of one of those many "liberation" outfits in the Northeast that have made this beautiful part of India into a charnel house, the AP is trying to be balanced! And Sharma and AP tell us that Dhemji in Assam where this foul deed occured is 1015 miles Northeast of New Delhi! Who is running the desk at AP? Victor Davis Hanson in the National Review rightly commented that 9/11 isn't a tragedy. Those 1000s weren't swallowed up by an earthquake or washed away by a tidal wave. They were incinerated in a calculated act of extreme violence.

They was a blooper by Rama Lakshmi of the Wash.Post who reports that that ULFA is one of the "....groups battling.....in the country's Northeastern Himalayan region"! Sure the Himalayas do stretch all the way to India's Eastern borders in Arunachal Pradesh. But that is way-way far away from Dhemji, Assam. WP desk folks need a lot of supervision maybe.

Contrast that with the editorial in the Hindustan Times. I wonder why more people can't read Indian newspapers to learn what is going on in India. The press is riotously vibrant and free and has a vast spectrum of opinion on offer. For those not familiar with the regional languages of India reading can be a little limited - as that's where the real reportage is to be found.

Christine Amanpour when she reported on St.Theresa's funeral service in Calcutta years ago was going around asking politicians and bureacrats on live TV how such a large public Christian religious service could be organised in a (rigidly or some such thing) Hindu country. I do not remember what she said exactly but I know I am not way off the mark. Jaws dropped! Now does she know that Dr. WC Mukherjee (a Protestant) and Fr.Jerome D'Souza SJ were members of India's Constituent Asssembly and piloted the move to abolish communal electrates. HAs she heard of Brig.Thomas Thiagaraj the tanker who screamed karo-ya-maro at Khem Karan in 1965 when the Indian Army launched a counterattack at Pakistani positions? Or about Adm. OS Dawson; Adm.G(eorge) Sushil Kumar? How many know among the fighting men of the Indian Army MMG does not just stand for medium machine gun. It also stands for Mandir-Masjid-Girja-Gurdwara. Temple-Mosque-Church-Gurdwara.

Dear Mr.Amardeep Cont'd

2004-08-13T18:38:00.000-07:00

Posting a quick repartee about anything written about India is difficult and bound to fail unless you are the side-splitting sort as Dr.NK is (who is an aerospace engineer) or are a matter-of-factly commentator as Dr.Ramesh Rao (Truman State U) or a fine fisker like Dr.SN Balagangadhara (who took apart Jeff Kripal on sulekha.com). I lack the talents of these three (who are but a few aming the many who can dash off a quick repartee) but one of those many dumb million Indians who has been reading tripe dressed up as "liberal critique".

Dear Mr.Amardeep

2004-08-13T15:45:00.000-07:00

Amardeep over at Amardeep Ka Blog http://www.lehigh.edu/~amsp/2004/08/opacity-of-indian-media-police-abuses.html points to a report by the Wash.Post on custodial deaths in India. I have posted a comment that makes clear what I think of that Page 3 rag "Times of India" and also about another gruesome incident - the lynching of Adikanta Daliya - A Dalit worker of the BJP - by the CPI-M thugs in West Bengal - that has gone unreported. There's plenty that happens in India that goes unreported for several reasons. One India is an under-reported subject within India and the world over. The English newspapers chiefly The Hindu are like banyan trees not letting anything grow underneath and largley determining what gets reported - with their ranks filled with members of the family. If one wants deep coverage one shd read the Indian language press. There's plenty of hard reporting from the streets and villages. As a rule English language journalists get their reportage from Indian language types as most of them cannot write in any Indian language.

Cont'd