Year 2105 and Hitler

Year 2105 –

Hitler - a great orator and fierce nationalist. He is credited with single handedly brining Germany out of their misery in post WW-II scenario. His militaristic foresight and diplomatic acumen can be compared with very few people of 20^th century. Though his racial supremacist policies were partly responsible for WW-II, nevertheless his devotion towards his own people and ‘fatherland’ was widely seen as model for patriotism in contemporary era. He is accused of orchestrating holocaust, where almost 60 millions Jewish people allegedly were murdered. But there is no substantial evidence that he was direct in charge of such genocide. His associates like Goebbles, Goring etc may be responsible for Holocaust.

Don’t be alarmed, this eulogy was not printed anywhere. I wrote it just to understand how I felt when I read about Genghis Khan, listed as one of the most prominent person of last millennium in Time magazine. Not only Genghis Khan, I was astonished to see Muhammad Ghuri as a ‘king who brought numerous artisans, nobles etc’ along with him in India. Bought, give me a break! He was a fucking maniac, a religious zealot who killed millions just because they were not of his religion. Interestingly Hitler failed to get mentioned as one of the prominent person who shaped the world in last millennium. The explanation given by Nancy Gibbs, one of the Time magazines writers is as follows.

if all Hitler had done was kill people in vast numbers more efficiently than anyone else ever did, the debate over his lasting importance might end there. But Hitler's impact went beyond his willingness to kill without mercy. He did something civilization had not seen before. Genghis Khan operated in the context of the nomadic steppe, where pillaging villages was the norm. Hitler came out of the most civilized society on Earth, the land of Beethoven and Goethe and Schiller. He set out to kill people not for what they did but for who they were. Even Mao and Stalin were killing their "class enemies." Hitler killed a million Jewish babies just for existing.

Now, there is a differentiation among the killers on the basis of, well, what fits the current political scenario. This is ridiculous. Genghis Khan, Hitler, Muhammad Ghuri or all of their kinds were genociders, killers, and murderers. They killed people simply because ‘not for what they did but for what they were’.

All the people that came to North America as ‘pilgrimage’ or went to south America or Australia were genociders because they effectively obliterated Red Indians, Aboriginals of Australia and native dwellers of South and Central America. But, shhh! We can’t write about that, we can’t say that loudly. People who did that were whites, peaceful Christians and they were on their mission to educate the world. Ultimately, they succeeded in their efforts and price was too low even to mention. Couple of hundred million people lost their lives. But that’s ok! That is why we have Thomas Jefferson, George Washington as luminaries who lit the flame of freedom as democracy. (It is a different issue that they didn’t know that Red Indians were killed by their countryman ‘not for what they did but for what they were’. )

If Genghis Khan became a worlds prominent figure within 800 of his genocidal acts (almost 750 years of that 800 years wasn’t a media age per se!) then there is no stopping from someone writing eulogy for Hitler within next 100 years. And, as long as there is differentiation among the people who killed people insanely just because what they stood for, there will another genocider in making.

Don’t worry Mr. Pol Pot, Mr. Mao, Mr. Stalin you guys are next in line for eulogy.

Changed Face of Terrorist

Attack in London was not a surprise at all. It was long expected and according to New York Times London “had been on the cross roads of terrorism for long”. Plus, who can forget Mohammad Gaddafi saying on the eve of Afghanistan bombing that “US should bomb London rather than Kabul”. The growing population of Islamic community in Britain had been headache for most of the government around the world, now; it is going to be big headache for British government too. I was reading an interesting column about the attacks in NY Times and the points raised by author definitely needs attention.

Looking at the terrorist profiles in London or New York attacks, we can see that majority of those terrorist are from educated, middle class or upper class families and had decent childhood. Thus, the standard picture of terrorist being poor, uneducated and hailing from isolated and fanatic community is wanting in current terrorists’ profile. Another important feature is bulk of the terrorists comes from Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Pakistan. Two of the above mentioned countries have per capita income very high, 12,000 and 4,500 respectively. And about Pakistan, well, it is hub for terrorist, one stop shopping mall for all terrorist, so it hardly surprising that we find Pakistani nationals regularly on terrorist list. Good example would be in last four months, in Iraq, 46 of the 55 suicide bombers were Saudi nationals.

The terrorist who blew themselves along with 55 innocent people in London were born and brought up in England. They had far more opportunities to succeed in life than their ‘brethren’ in Iraq and Afghanistan. Yet, they chose to die for some flimsy reason. That shows that the Islamic community should start reforming themselves rather blaming the rest of the world for their social backwardness. I am not saying that everyone should advance according to western standard and it would be most welcome to set the standards of development according to their society. But harming no one and killing no one for some stupid reason is something, which is an unwritten rule.

Flow is a nature’s phenomenon. Defying that and sticking to something that happened almost 1400 years does not make sense. There are number of ways to reform the system without deviating from the central path and without loosing the crux. It will be most welcome effort for whole world.

B.S. II

There seems to be inverse relationship between number of books and columns I read and blogs I write. And, that actually scares me. It points out to few things. One, either I am extremely intelligent creature, whose mental strength increases in multiple proportion of number of books I read. And as I get nearer to the absolute infinity of knowledge, my pace of writing is increasing in order to enlighten the world the complexity of being a living being on this mother earth. Or, I am plainly bull shitting. The choice is yours. I will go for second option.

I uploaded a stat counter on my blog. It keeps the count of number of unique visitors, the time they spent on my blog, their location etc. almost 80% of people spends less than 5 seconds on my blog. (Though, this percentage is decreasing.)It again points few things again. Either people do not have time to read some of the interesting topics I write about or again, I am bull shitting. In this case I will go for first option.

I realized another interesting reason behind not reading my blog. I am benevolent enough to consider that majority of the people pay attention to the things happening around them. (I know they don’t!) But somehow they are bored to read, kind of things or issues I write on the blog. Or, they are read a lot, think a lot and they simply find no time in reading or listening to what other people say. I feel that this is the precise reason why we see so much bull shitting everywhere. CNN, FOX, MSNBC, BBC all these news channel with their biased views, instead of providing unpartisan news information to the viewers B.S. so much that, people like me have to rely on Jon Stewart and his The Daily show for reality. Sadly, there is no option here and I will rest my B.S. case here. Shalom!

(If I were you I won’t read this piece of s#*#t!)

World War - II

History channel is bombarding with programs celebrating the end of World War II for last whole week or so. The WW-II was certainly horrific. It was nadir for humanity. It consumed almost 5, 50, 00,000 lives and changed the future of the world drastically. NAZI power couldn’t become a superpower but it wounded British Empire so badly that Britain ceased to be a superpower. (And instantly attained the third world status, as the saying goes!) And, though the Cold war began, at least, the colonial era ended with the conclusion of world war.

The disturbing element of History channels WW-II programs is constant referral t the Allies member as torch bearers of freedom and democracy. Most of the allied members were definitely democratic, (barring, glaring example of Russia) I do not believe that Allied members were ‘freedom lovers’. The reason behind it is simple, the allied members had whole world shared among themselves and Germany challenged their supremacy or the delicate power balance among the powerful allies. And, the concomitant reason for waging war against Germany was to save their colonies and the ruse was the redemption and protection from the Nazi Satan.

I am in no way suggesting that Germany would have liberated the world from Colonial rule. Germany was itself a colonial power. And now looking back at NAZI doctrine, we can certainly say that colonial powers were benign compared to what Nazi’s would have been, had they won the war. Actually the conquered world had no choice or they had choice between rulers who were competing to plunder them. But the allied members were in no way fighting for the world. The horrific crime the allied members did near the end of world war were equally reprehensible as NAZI war crimes. Of course the Holocaust can not be compared with anything and at the same time I am not comparing Allied nations with Nazi Germany. Because, I think there can’t be any comparison among them as all of them were in same basket. Whether Nazi’s killed insanely under the spell of racial supremacy or Allied nations killed insanely under the spell of ‘liberating people’, ultimately it was the innocent bystander who was slaughtered.

I am not a peace activist andI believe that conflict is part of the nature. But at least in WW-II there was no liberator and victor but everyone was a victim.

Selected writings of Dr. S. Radhakrishnan

It is now admitted that the Hindus at a very early time conceived and developed the two sciences of logic and grammar. Wilson Writes “ In medicine, as in astronomy and metaphysics, the Hindus once kept pace with the most enlightened nations of the world; and they attained as through a proficiency in medicine and surgery as any people whose acquisitions are recorded and as indeed was practicable, before anatomy was made known to us by discoveries of modern inquirers.” It is true that they did not invent any great mechanical appliances. For this a kind Heaven, which gave them the great water courses and abundant supplies of food is responsible. Let us also remember that these mechanical inventions belong after all, to the sixteenth century and after , by which time India had lost her independence and become parasitic. The day she lost her independence and become parasitic. The day she lost her freedom and began to flirt with other nations, a curse fell on her and she became petrified. Till then she could hold her own even ini arts, crafts and industries, not to speak of mathematics, astronomy, chemistry, medicine, surgery, and those branches of physical knowledge practiced in ancient times. She knew how to chisel stone, draw pictures, burnish gold and weave rich fabrics. She developed all arts , fine and industrial, which furnish the conditions of civilized existence. Her ships crossed the oceans and her wealth brimmed over to Judea, Egypt and Rome. Her conception of man and society, morals and religion were remarkable for the time. We can’t reasonably say that the Indian people reveled in poetry and mythology, and spurned science and philosophy, though it is true that they were intent on seeking the unity of things than emphasizing their sharpness and separation.

- Dr. S. Radhakrishnan
Indian Philosophy, Volume I

20th Century

The death toll in 20^th Century is listed below. Bulk of these casualties can be directly attributed to the ‘peace-loving’, ‘liberator’ and ‘democratic’ nations of western hemisphere.

1) First World War - (1914-18): 1,50,00,000

2) Russian Civil War – (1917-22): 90,00,000

3) Soviet Union, Stalin's regime (1924-53): 2,00,00,000

4) Second World War (1937-45): 5,50,00,000

5) Post-War Expulsion of Germans from East Europe (1945-47): 21,00,000

6) Chinese Civil War (1945-49): 25,00,000

7) People's Republic of China, Mao Zedong's regime (1949-1975):4,00,00,000

8) Tibet (1950 et seq.): 600 000

9) Mexican Revolution (1910-20): 1 000 000

10) Armenian Massacres (1915-23): 1 500 000

11) China War-lord era (1917-28): 800 000

12) China, Nationalist Era (1928-37): 3 100 000

13) Korean War (1950-53): 2 800 000

14) Rwanda and Burundi (1959-95): 1 350 000

15) Second Indochina War (1960-75): 3 500 000

(It includes Vietnam war, Vietnam Civil war, Cambodian war)

16) Ethiopia (1962-92): 1 400 000

17) Nigeria (1966-70): 1 000 000

18) Bangladesh (1971): 1 250 000

19) Cambodia, Khmer Rouge (1975-1978): 1 650 000

20) Afghanistan (1979-2001): 1 800 000

21) Iran Iraq War (1980-88): 1 000 000

22) Sudan (1983 et seq.): 1 900 000

23) Kinshasa Congo (1998 et seq.): 3 300 000

Source: http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/warstat1.htm

Mr. Manmohan Singh and Oxford

I had a very long discussion with my friend J.B. about the statement made by Mr. Manmohan Singh at Oxford. I wrote a blog denouncing him for making, what I considered as a brash statement. I thought he was indirectly eulogizing the British rule. But apparently he was not. I still stand by my statements in that particular blog, even I though I am ready apologies for misunderstanding Mr. Singhs’ statement. I agree with him (if he indeed said that! ) when he said that the infrastructure or bureaucracy British people created in India, for plundering country more systematically, helped in India in post-independence period.

British rule was worst in most of the sense than previous invaders India witnessed. Even though the damage was not visible as in case of previous invasions, the mentality that British people created is still hurting India.

Ram Janmabhumi

Less crudely, such questions are partly answered everyday by things like the city of Ayodhya, in Thailand. The Thai Ayodhya is not only sacred; it is unlikely to concede that Madurai is only a derivative of Mathura. Once however you historicize Rama, once you locate his birthplace at a particular Ayodhya at a particular point of time, either to territorialize his claim to a temple or to oppose it, you atutomatically deny or diminish the sacrednessof the other Ayodhya and, while you may serve the purpose of those who view Rama as a national leader, a historical figure and a cultural hero, you cannot sustain his stuuatus as a god who, as a god, has to exist today. If Rama is, only then is he Rama. If Rama was, he is no Rama. This is the paradox in which one gets caught when one accepts the language of either the Hindutva-hawkers or the secular fundamentalist.

- Ashis Nandy

Secularism

Whenever someone tries to write about the Islamic destruction in Medieval India, the secularists are up in arms. I really don’t care about the secularist because they are useless and they twisted the secularism in such a way that unity of different faiths, which they sought to do, is almost impossible to achieve now. But I don’t intend to write about secularism; that would be digression.

The Islamic invaders coming from Arabia were barbaric and religious fanatics. They wanted to spread their faith and kill who refuse to obey them. The destruction is real. The obliterated civilization of Zoroastrians in Iran is perfect example of annihilation and so is the Gandhar. (Present day Afghanistan)

But that was the way it used to happen in those times. Christians did the same thing in North and South America, as religious zealotry was a norm and secularism was rare, rather unacceptable. But that does not mean that we should not even talk about the destruction. Millions and millions of people lost their lives so at least we can do today is to evaluate the past and build the future in such a way that such genocides won’t happen again.

The Islamic marauders too were marauded; by Genghis Khan in 12^th century. And, even though both the victims and victors were of same religion, the genocide and annihilation done by Genghis Khan is unparallel in history. The genocide done by Hitler needed modern technologies but Genghis Khan did that with bare swords and hatchets. The sacking of Baghdad was so inhuman and barbaric that even today Baghdad grieves for its destruction.

Alas, that is not everybody thinks. Secularist made it impossible to discuss anything related to religion. We can not discuss the achievements of religion of majority nor can we discuss shortcomings of religion of minorities. Without open discussion society is increasingly becoming like stagnant water, full of dirt and mosquitoes. And, then everybody (media and “intellectuals”) show surprise at Gujrat riots, at Ayodhya riots. Where as the Ahamadabad riots in 1967 were worst than Ayodhya riots and Godhra was under curfew for six months in 1947.

Considering the media bias and intellectual blindness in India there is little chance that situation will change in near future. And, it will continue to affect the future growth of India adversely.

Invasion Theory II

Recently, Mr. Manmohan Singh babbled that British rule actually helped India. I thought I will be shocked to hear India’s prime minister saying that, but I wasn’t. It will be too naive to be shocked with this statement. The reason behind such a statement is not that Mr. Singh is Britain educated but the reason is total lack of historical perspective among the society. The problem is two pronged; first we do not take our history seriously, mostly brushing it of as ‘history’ and second, few people who take history seriously usually have no real sense of history.

As V. S. Naipaul correctly observed that, Indians need to face their wounds; the wounds of a defeated and plundered civilization. We say that we have ancient civilization. But if we ask ourselves what exactly do we know about our ancient civilization then very few people can actually answer the question. We no longer have our old universities, medicine, engineering and we are fast loosing our philosophy. We do not even speak, write or even understand Sanskrit anymore. (The way we are going, I doubt after fifty years we will be speaking even Hindi) There is no question that our civilization is old, already an antique when western civilization rose in Rome but it happened thousands of years ago. But this false sense of superiority seems to me like a poor attempt to conceal the deep wounds we had in last thousand years. The Islamic invaders followed by British crooks beheaded us so badly that we are still trying to find the logic explanation to our defeat. All of our values that lead us to dazzling heights proved completely useless against the marauding and barbaric invaders from west. Unfortunately we are still trying to pick up those values and boast the greatness of our civilization.

Out of this apathy towards our own history rose the attitude which is reflected in our Prime ministers statement. He is not to be blamed as he is mare reflection of our society. Lot of Indians do think that British rule was good. But was it really good or it was better than Islamic invaders we had for 500 years? Actually, both of them were equally bad. Both of them tried to destroy what we stand for and what we strive for. Our religion, tradition, custom, language, history, even geography is muddled because of them. They left us with no sense of direction and with no sense of ourselves..

Within 60 years of Independence if Indian prime minister states that British rule was good then I am scared of the future. I am just hoping that Mr. Singh statement was politically motivated and he did not meant that. But even in this hope lies a defeat which I am not ready to face.

Peshawe

The Peshawe dynasty is vastly misunderstood among other dynasties in India. Instead of counting them among the best administered and bravest (They are the one who officially overthrown Delhi sultanate and won area up to Attock in Pakistan.) they are blamed for numerous things. Particularly, Marathas sulked endlessly, as they had to fight under Peshawe’s (Brahmins) supervision in post-Shivaji period.

Strong navy was ultimate dream of Shivaji and he worked relentlessly for this dream and succeeded up to great extent. He halted British businessman from establishing strong base in Kokan area and stunted the growth of Portuguese outside Goa. His ships used to wreck havoc up to Arabian Peninsula. Among the other things, Peshawe’s are blamed for not building maintaining Navy in Arabian seas. Even if we accept this blame, we should consider the reasons behind it. It was almost impossible for them to keep eye on Navy’s growth because they were concentrating mainly on expanding empire on the west and northern front. They won area up to Gwalior, and virtually stopped further invasions from west and central Asia. Plus, they were fighting with their own brethren. Holkar, Shinde, Bhosle (Nagpur) were not co-operating with them at best and fighting against them at worst. .

An important thing to note is, British established their firm base in Calcutta first as they realized that it is impossible to expand their empire from Western Ghats. So, considering Peshawe’s did grave mistake by neglecting Navy, they were fairly successful in keeping sea enemies at bay as even Portuguese remained confined to Goa and there by serving the purpose of Navy.

It is a fashion to criticize the Peshawe’s because, first, there no more Peshwe’s left and second, Maratha’s still wield power in Maharashtra. But, I don’t think that Peshwe’s were Brahmins nor Shivaji was Maratha. They were great people who worked selflessly with grand aim in mind and they worked incessantly to achieve that goal. It’s because their bravery that we still boast name of our country as Bharat and still follow our religion and our tradition. Blaming someone because of caste politics is not only an attempt to trivialize their life but also an insult to their achievements.

Thomas L. Friedman

Apparently, Thomas Friedman, a New York Times columnist is increasingly becoming popular in India and among Indian Diaspora. His columns now appear regularly on Indian express website and he is getting quoted everywhere, particularly with respect to his views about India. But, I am increasingly getting frustrated with him, I mean with his views. Sure, he meets with all the important people, he travels around the world, but, instead he becoming rationalist and clear thinker, he is becoming naïve and his solutions to the problem, particularly about Islamic terrorism are childish.

He always carries a sense of superiority because he is American (though, he does criticizes America) and talks as if he stands on morally high ground. He sincerely believes that America is the only savior of the world and last hope for world redemption. He thinks America is beacon of democracy and believes that only hardcore capitalism is the only answer to all the world problems.

His solution for Islamic militancy is absolutely rubbish. He seems to believe that peaceful approach will do magic with militancy, at the same though, he thinks that Iraq invasion was necessary. In his talk about terrorism, he fails to mention Pakistan and that makes me wonder whether this person is biased or plainly stupid.

His views about India are definitely positive but he believes that India is lucky country, at least in terms of its software business. And, he thinks that it was America that helped India immensely. It is truth that Indian companies earn bulk of their money from U.S. but at the same time it is hard to discern whether India needs America or America needs India more. Mr. Friedman seems to see India as if a child growing under proper care and care is provided by America.

He try to simplify every problem and there nothing wrong in projecting a problem in simplified manner but that does not mean the problem itself is simple. He almost always fails to see the complexity behind most of the issues, be it Islamic terrorism or super power status of the America.

Capitalism II

Capitalism is defined as economic system based on private ownership of the means of production, in which personal profit can be acquired through investment of capital and employment of labor. Capitalism is grounded in the concept of free enterprise, which argues that government intervention in the economy should be restricted and that a free market, based on supply and demand, will ultimately maximize consumer welfare.

Basically, it is an economic system by people and for people. But increasingly, the word people is getting replaced by corporations. And, instead of satisfying the demands of the society these corporations are creating demand for their products, at the expense of community welfare. The strategies employed by fast food companies are fine example of demand generating tactics.

I do not claim to be a master economist and there is fair amount of
probability that I am completely wrong here. The tactics employed by
fast food companies (Americans spend $110 billions on fast food
annually, more than they spend on education!) that augmented their
sales to colossus level in comparison with their business in 1980's,
should be thoroughly scrutinized. These companies did not pay any
attention to the healthy diet, in the name of cost cutting; they pay
extremely low to their employees. They add artificial flavors for some
kind of addictive taste. Also, these companies focus themselves to
children. If a child is addicted to fast food then the fast food
company earns a life time customer. In the book Fast Food Nation, the
authors made a valid point; generally a child associates particular
taste of food to a particular incidence. That is the reason; we always
have nostalgic feeling about mom's food. So, with proper
advertisement, if a child is enticed to fast food outlet and if he
spends happy time there with his or her family then the child will
associate that particular taste with happy family time.

The scary part is, this research is done by fast food companies and not by
author. Manipulating communities demand is probably rampant in every
industry. I quoted fast food industry because I read the book about
it. But cosmetic industry is probably, another fine example of such
tactics. Such kind of capitalism is certainly harmful to the society. Ironically, the cure of this problem is hard to find as society is itself generating the perpetrator.