Who Killed Benazir Bhutto?

The audacity of politicians, especially Pakistani rulers, to think rest of the people as dumb and ignorant baffles me beyond any limit. I mean, agreed, we are mere mortals who live and breath towards bright and preferably, comfortable future. And they (Pakistani rulers) are more of, well, Darth Vader. So, yes, there are itsy-bitsy differences. But in no way we are this dumb. Yes, we like to believe in ‘Slam Dunks’ or ‘Mission Accomplishments’. Hell, we are even ready to believe that Mr. Musharaff is a peace dove (worthy of Peace Nobel!) and working incessantly towards eradicating Al-Quaida. But we ain’t going to believe that Al Qaida killed Benazir Bhutto.

I am ready to believe some unknown extra-terrestrial, traveled thousands of light years just to kill a horse look alike political leader of a failed state on the Earth. But for the love of all that is sweet in on the mother earth, don’t tell me that Musharaff didn’t kill Bhutto. Please. Please have some mercy on my common sense.

After all this verbatim the question remains, who killed Benazir Bhutto? Indians? They have vested interest in keeping Pakistan in turmoil. They could kill her and keep Pakistan away from stable democracy. Americans? May be. There is no ulterior motive here in killing her. But then Americans ain’t exactly known for taking pragmatic steps. Al-Quida? Possibly. They left the paid membership of Pakistan Fan Club some time ago. By keeping Pakistan in turmoil their Terrorist Universities will certainly have bigger freshman class this year.

But in all these above ‘line-up’ characters we are assuming that Benazir’s killers want Pakistan in turmoil. Isn’t it possible that the Killer(s) may actually want to eliminate possible choices of powers in Pakistan’s politics (notice that I am not mentioning Democracy anywhere)? Apart from Pakistani elite class and Army there is no one in this whole universe (including E.T’s!) who wants to rule Pakistan. First, it is an Islamic state. Second, it’s a failed state. Repeat these two sentences again and again and you will have Pakistan in making. Yes, people would like to control them. But that’s just to make sure that they don’t send home-grown Terrorist talent as a Christmas gift but that’s about it. This logic takes out India and Americans out of equation.

It is hard to comment anything on Al-Qaida. The demarcation lines between reality and myth, reality and what Americans wants world to believe is so thin and blurred that to comment on Al-Qaida is throwing darts in the dark. (I miss them all even in broad day light. But that’s beside the point!) More ever it is next to impossible to pin-point where Al-Qaida stops and Taliban begins or where both stop and ISI (Pakistan’s CIA) begins. But even under these circumstances we can safely say that Al-Qaida will be least interested in Benazir Bhutto. More pressing concern for them at this point of time (Apart from Americans burning their tails) is Musharaff. However half hearted attempt it might be but Musharaff and Pakistani army – the only patron saint of Talibans, under pressure from US, is definitely not making these terrorists life easier. If anything then this blatant betrayal makes Musharaff as numero-uno target of Al-Qaida & Co. So, this takes them out of line-up too.

And, it leaves us in a weird situation where there are no killers in this murder investigation. Hmm….perhaps, she is still alive and plotting to take over Pakistan! All righty, let’s come back to the three dimensional world.

Musharaff ran Pakistan for straight 8 years. Unhindered power makes people crave for more power. I mean, this isn’t a revelation. But lately Bush government in order to show something to their home voters started pressing Musharaff to transition power to the democracy. Now, Musharaff already listened to US once and sent guns towards Taliban, the same organization that his Army nurtured for years. His grand plan was to take over Afghanistan and keep India in check by maintaining large resource of militants. All these plans came down tumbling in post-September 11 geo-political scenario. But he stuck with pragmatic note and sided with powerful master. But it is too much for him now that US is forcing him from his power. He could take care of Nawaz Sharif but Benazir was getting out of hand. She first stuck secret deal with Musharaff in order to gain entry into the country. But after getting support from US, she conveniently tried to back-stab Musharaff. Of course, this guy is not only a seasoned dictator but he still has strong backing of Army and he had enough. Ka-boom!!!

Of course, all this is too obvious. Yet, media and political class across the nations are refusing to see the reality. It is not easy to accuse anyone even in normal criminal cases, lest that includes political figures. In any case, who cares of justice anyways. There is only one option left in Pakistan and everyone has to cling to him

Modi Vs. Reality

In one of the most stupid electoral analysis of BJP’s stronghold in Gujrat, author summed BJP’s successes in Gujrat as ‘in 1995 they won on Ram Temple aftermath, in 2002 they won by killing Muslims and now, they will probably win because of Sonia Gandhi’s statement that generated communal fervor’ I mean, we ain’t talking about, Bihar – the corrupt state in India, or Orissa – the most backward state in India or not U.P. – most casteist or communal state in India but about Gujrat – the most industrialized state with one of highest literacy rate and state with best infrastructure in India. This may sound funny but it ain’t so. More ever, this analysis wasn’t published by mock journalists like Barkha Dutta or Rajdeep Sardesai or by leftist TV channel like NDTV but in Indian Express, supposedly premier name in Indian political journalism. And, if you read other electoral analysis in any newspaper, similar theme is hard to miss. By making such dumb analysis they effectively labeled Gujratis as dumb, communal and Hindu Talibani. And, electoral victories of BJP are surmised merely on the basis of communal Hindu frenzy generated by RSS and Co.

Just in case if reader hasn’t read the newspaper lately (and it’s quite possible considering the news quality in Indian media) then BJP won handsomely in Gujrat. They won seats in Rural as well as Urban areas. They won votes among literate as well as illiterate people. They won across the caste lines and all this, with the campaign plank of development and slogans of ‘Vaibhav-shali Gujrat’. (Prosperous Gujrat) The election was fare and peaceful by best standard practices. No vote booth grabing, no liquor distribution in poor areas and no forceful vote stamping by party hooligans, which usually happens in U.P, Bihar and yes, our beloved West Bengal.

Then the obvious question that arises is that why Indian media is so resolutely against Mr. Modi or for that matter, against BJP? Having bias towards other political parties is one thing but in order to prove non-existing reality, generating false reports is all together different. Because, in that case there is certain agenda that Media lab wants to impose on people. I don’t want to go into conspiracy theories here but it boggles my mind to see India media so far removed from the reality, so much immersed into self-gratification and sensationalism and worst, being judgmental in publishing news.

The reality is that Mr. Modi was bound to win the election from the day one. He is non-corrupt as well as progressive. His schemes for primary education as well as woman’s education are worth laudable. His zeal to build infrastructure is stupendous and his ability to fight pinko-leftist and psudo- human right activist are legendry. But I guess, these are the precise reasons Media hates him. But as I said earlier, it’s ok if he is not a darling of Media but that doesn’t mean they will paint him as a villain.

I think Mr. Modi doesn’t play by the rules, usually written and ‘enforced’ by Nehruvian Media. He don’t’ talk bull shit. He doesn’t harp on caste politics. More ever, he doesn’t worry about minority appeasement. I mean, not doing minority appeasement is usually equated as treason by ‘secular’ media. (It’s a different matter that in recently published government survey about Muslim community, Muslims in Gujrat are better off than most of the other part of the country.) He is tough on terrorist. He doesn’t mind killing terrorists in fake encounters. And, in a country where expressing Hinduism is a taboo, he is unabashedly, Hindu.

It is pity that the reality that Media is trying to portray is in fact, work of their imagination. This is how they would love to see in reality but sadly it ain’t so. But in this game of ‘communalism’ that media loves to play, the ultimate looser is a common man. Because, he (not in gender way) doesn’t want anyone else to decide what is good and what is bad for him but merely needs information, pure information, and unbiased, non-partisan information from the media. Isn’t that what media is supposed to do anyway?

Gandhi

Gandhi ji baffles me. I always find him very intriguing. His life moves effortlessly from one end of spectrum to other. He believed in peace. But his zealotry in handling any situation with peaceful manner often caused India and Indian independence movement major setbacks. He wanted all voices to be heard but at the same time, he was quite autocratic in his decisions. He created fierce followings as well as fierce opposition. Anything and everything related to him were extremities. And, as always, extremities always meet. In Gandhi ji's case, his actions and his personalities were the reason behind such extremities. His audacity to challenge the might of British empire with seemingly innocuous method of Satyagraha was outlandish by all accounts but it worked. It did wonders. At the same time his timidity in taking necessary and stern actions right before partition cause untold misery.

Contradiction ran amok in his personal life as well public.It seems his personality was in constant turmoil. Reading his autobiography gives us valuable insight into his philosophy, which was imposed on Indian people and changed the course of independence struggle.

Since his childhood, knowingly or unknowingly, he always carried certain notion about what is right and what is wrong, who is good and who is not. But these principals proved elusive to him. And, he was absolutely self-absorbed in his quest of achieving this mirage. He was married happily and had a nice family. But then he wanted to live austere life. So, in the midst of his family life he decided to take a vow of celibacy. Such efforts weren't exactly logical. More ever, he never fully understood that someone is going to face repercussions of his abnormal actions. Or perhaps, it never occurred to him that his ideals, his quests might be contrary to some one else's beliefs. This pattern of kept recurring even in his public policy decision. For better, for worst.

He was a politician. Leading a political movement of freeing a country from clutches of colonial superpower was always going to be a treacherous journey. It wasn't any Saint's job or perhaps, person doing this shouldn't be called as a Saint. But then, Gandhi ji wanted to be a saint as well as a politician. This contradiction was obvious to create trouble. For example, he was successful in stirring up Indian society to stand up against British power in 1921 but then with one violent incidence and he decided to call off raging movement. Reason, he wanted a strictly non-violent movement, that is, Saintly way. Now, no one was questioning his leadership, his motives or perhaps, his methods. But his zealotry in forcing 'peaceful' movement on Indian people was quite contrary to vary philosophy he was trying to espouse. Similar thing happened during the riots of Mophala in Kerala, a precursor to his actions during partition.

When India needed a stern leader during the bloody days of partition, instead of using his towering stature Gandhi ji not only failed in his basic duty but he impeded efforts of others who were taking necessary decisions. Razakar's were creating havoc in central India, Punjab and Bengal was literally flooded with blood and here, our esteemed leader wanted peace by asking only one community to stop retaliating. This was beyond redemption.

Contrary to popular culture he was not sole reason behind independence but he was one of the very few important reasons behind independence. Lokmanya Tilak set up stage, a perfect political launching pad for independence movement and Gandhi ji used that pad to take movement to next stage. His efforts to mobilize people for the cause are unparalleled in Indian history. Irrespective of casts, clans, gender, region and to certain extent religion, masses readily stood besides him. Trusting him with their lives. At best Indian society at that time can be described as fragmented, timid and non-confident. Gandhi ji successfully stirred flames of independence amongst these lost souls. It was truly a superhuman effort.

Thus he understood what is needed to be done to unite people for political struggle i.e. he was a perfect political leader but then at critical junctures his inner urge to become a Saint would take hold of him. To say his inner conflicts caused untold misery would be an understatement.

In the heat of partition his limitations came into fore. The visage of invincibility suddenly started looking more like showmanship and his ideals listless. Contradiction followed him to his end, his followers, sensing the imminent fall of this grand sire, rushed to commodities his principals in the market of petty politics. All this was too much for him to bear. Instead of being more attentive, Gandhi ji retired into his world of Maun-Vrat and Upavaas. The irony is not that monsters his indecisions created ended up consuming him but these monsters made cruel joke of his principals by elevating him to the Godly status.

He was a mortal human being who did superhuman things. Some of his principals were outdated and ill-informed but then some where bang on the target. In any case he shouldn't be an object of loath. We need to take what suits our time and move on. It is better than making mockery of this great person and hurting our own generation.

Stock Market and the Economy

Discussing Stock Market always excites people. Tell people that you are a trader and people will start asking you for ‘tips’ immediately. Some people are nuts about stock market and some people just hate the idea of investing directly into stock market. The irony is both are right. Risk to invest money for short term usually outweighs the returns while investing for long term is probably a better idea. Still, stories of traders walking off with Corvette as a bonus or people jumping out of windows because huge losses are permanently imbibed on the psychic of modern societies. But why stock market is so important for economies?

Stock markets are hallmark of capitalistic economies. It is one of the most important system in Capitlism to raise money. Now, they can raise capital either by borrowing money from banks or floating bonds in the market or taking company public. When a company goes public, stock market comes into the picture. A company divides its worth into stocks. They sell those stocks on Stock Market to general public and raise capital. A stock holder owns part of the company, though, he/she doesn’t have any say in day-to-day running of the company. Later, those stocks get traded over and over according to news, rumors and performance of that perticular firm. But capital that, company raised initially remains the same.

Now as returns of stock market – over the period of time – are usually greater than interest rate of bank, more and more people invest money in the stock market. In developed economies percentage of population involved in stock market is quite high. For example, in US, more than 50% of people have their money in stock market while in China it’s mere 7%. So, it is quite clear that when stock market crashes lot of public equity vanishes. But this usually happens when market is floating high on the cloud nine of speculations. For example, the tech bubble of 2000.

Another factor that is related to above point is that as stock market lures people with higher results, greater part of household savings or pension plans is invested to stock market. Obviously, when market tanks, household savings and pension plans goes down the drain too!

The second factor to gauge importance of stock market is the value of tradable stocks. These tradable stocks doesn’t include equity held by government. As this value increases it affects economy more and more. In China, for example, value of stocks traded is only 25% of GDP. But in US, value is 150%. (In India this percentage is more than 100%)

Third, if stock market is on roll then it becomes easier for companies to raise money through the market and there by invest more. But when stock market crashes the investment decreases affecting economic growth on longer term.

Thus stock market is quite important to economy but without these above factors, it doesn’t affect economy as much as it is believed. That is, stock market melt down in China won’t be as detrimental to Chinese economy as it is predicted. But swings in stock market have puissant effect on public psyche. So, it is understandable that when stock market dives everyone is talking about economy going down but it doesn’t have to be so.

Hindu Renaissance

It seems Hindus are destined to take fault for every possible ill in our society. Now, considering more than 85% of our population is Hindu so,it is quite obvious that Hinduism or at least, Hindus are responsible for social problems. But what bothers me is that Hindus are the victims here. Victims of bloody and torcherous history. The situation that they are facing today is the result of constant warfare and invasion for last thousand years. How come Hinduism that bore the brunt of Islamic genocides and plunders and lost 1/3 of its population to Abrahmic religions, stands on trial for everything that is bad in India? Isn't there a tiny possibility that the ills we are facing are caused because our society cocooned itself in order to survive from continuous invasion?

Worst thing is that modern day politics dictates Hindu sects like Sikhs, Jains and neo-buddhists to consider Hinduism as main threat to their existance. One reason is our political system since independence (thanks to Mr. Nehru) made joke out of Hinduism. Hindus are compartmentalized and marginalised in their own land. The imprints of extrimely biased education system are quite evident on Hindu mind as we don't know our history. We don't know meaning of our traditions and our heritage. That's why we are usually on the backfoot when sects like Sikkhism, Jains and Buddhists attack Hinduism with blatent lies.

Still worst, our insecurity oozes out whenever faced with Islamic terrorists and Christian. We suddenly start parroting alien concepts like secularism and conveneantly misinterprit the spirit of sarva-dharma samabhaav.

With such a non-confidense and lack of knowledge, are we going to survive in next century?

I agree that we should embrace these enstranged children of ours more tightly. They are slinging mud at us only because they gain political profits out of it. But most of believe that that somehow someone will take care of problem and that ain't going to happen for sure. As more and more Hindus make economic progress as their priority numaro uno and rightly so, I think we are going to witness further dip in Hindu traditions, Hindu population and awareness for Hinduism before we see possible resurgence. Swami Vivekananda said that unless a person is sure about his/her two meals every day, he/she ain't going to think about Hinduism. (Of course, Muslim people are opposite but that's why Hinduism and Islam is two opposite ends of spectrum.)

Coming back to economics, right now majority of Hindus are worried about their income. They are working really really hard for making more and more money and then spending as much as possible on luxuries. It is understandable. This is probably the first time that Indians, in general, are seeing so many opportunities to progress. But the flip side is that either they ignore their religious traditions or young generation grow ignorant of their religious background. But as they grow economically stable, I hope that 'Hindu gene' will kick in and they will start working towards betterment of Hindu society. One can see similar thing happening withNRI's. They are econmically stable and financially rich. That's why we see more awareness amongs them about problems faced by Hinduism and more probability of NRI's working towards betterment of Hindu society. It's going to take at least half of a century for economic progress to encompas all most billion Hindu people, but do we have that much time? We are going to face another onslaught of Islamic and Christian terrorism within next 20 years. In the mean time our political system will be more minority appeasing, more corrupt and will be admantly anti-Hindu. How are we suppose to face this?

There are three kinds of people, one who blessed with absolute ignorance. Second who think someone will take care of problems and that 'someone' doesn't include them. And, third who believe that Sanatan Dharma faced with such problems before and came out triumph. True, we faced with similar kind of problems before. For the sake of convenience, I will divide Hindu history into three broad parts. First one, before Islamic invasion, second one, from Islamic invasion till independence and third time period is since independence. During first part the greatest threat we faced was from Buddhism. This closest relative of ours literally gobbled us from inside out. All though, Buddhism emerged as more refined version of Hinduism sans rituals, later on it tried to disown Hinduism and stumbled badly. Things never looked bright for Buddhism since then. But Buddhism held mirror to Hinduism and unwittingly, end up strengthening roots of Sanatan Dharma. Islamic invasion was absolutely brutal and bloody. This kind of religious ferocity and unprecedented violence was something Hinduism never witnessed in its a-historical past. Though it took few hundred years for Hinduism to regroup and fight back. These efforts weren't exactly coordinated and missed quite a few golden opportunity(we lost one third of our population and one third of our land to Islam) but Hinduism still survived. We are still majority in Indian subcontinent.

That was that. It all happened in past. All this was result of sacrifices made by innumerable souls. Some we know like Shivaji or Maharan Pratap and some we don’t know like Khokars of Afghanistan or Raja Harpal Dev of Devgiri or Ahoms of Assam. But the most important thing that was common among all these people was they were ready to sacrifices their life for the cause. And, they knew who their enemies were. Not only this ‘sacrifice for cause’ thing is missing in present generation, we have absolutely no clue about our enemies either.

Let me finish this blog by giving an example -: Christian missionaries put together a study in which they figured out how much money it takes to convert a Hindu? They divided that part according to regions, castes, education and language. And, with this study (I am not saying this study is statistically correct) they know where to push for further prosyletization. So, they using their capitalistic mindset to ‘harvest’ more souls.

How’s that? How are we supposed to counter this with stupid caste and regional politics?

Complexities of Debt and Securities Market I

With housing market crashing down, market is behaving quite cautiously. The effects of housing crash took two of Bear Sterns hedge funds to cleaners. Failures of these two respected hedge funds, which has more than $20 billion of investments, bares the inner world of extremely complex debt and securities market of Wall Street. I will try to shed some light on these intricacies.

Since last few years US housing market was going through housing boom. This was possible because loans were given to the people with bad or not-so-good credit history. These home loans are known as sub-prime lending. But institutions who loaned money to these people didn’t wanted to carry this risk entirely. So, they packaged those loans into bonds and sold them to investors further. Thus, if they are lending money with 10% interest rate, they packaged this loan into bond and sold them to the market by promising say 5% interest rates. Since 2000, more than $1.8 trillion of such bonds back by home loans are sold in the market. Now value of these bonds are affected adversely as number of defaulters or late payments are increasing. But the underlying concept behind this procedure is simply to spread the risk by repackaging and selling an already sold financial product.

The next step of this chain is to pool these bonds, that in derive their value from some other entity, into one product. They are known as Collateralized Debt Obligations (or CDO’s) So, some CDO’s contain less risky bonds and some contain high risk (and obviously high return ) bonds. But the funny thing is institutions and hedge funds that invest in these CDO try to further stretch the risk potential of their investments. So, for example, if a Hedge Fund decides to invest a grand in CDO’s, they will invest only 100 bucks of their own money and they will borrow rest from some other institution. Thus, it is clear if a particular set of CDO went down, it sends shivers through out the market. Because directly or indirectly lot of investors are involved in it.

Is Indian economy running out of gas?

The recent sudden increase in dollar value of rupee ruffled quite a few feathers. At least, my roomies who regularly send money to India have lost their sleep. In last month or so, the Rupee value of Dollars decreased from around Rs. 44 to Rs. 40. It means, Rupee is getting costly. There are bunch of reasons behind it. Most of the people believe that monetary policy is solely responsible for this hike but it is much more complex. And, getting perceptive on this issue will help us to understand the rising inflation in India too. If Government Of India failed to act on either inflation or on rising rupee, the over heated Indian economy will come to screeching stop. Of course, the effects won’t be too pleasing !

India became a service sector giant in last few years. More than 50% of India’s GDP is contributed by service sector. Instead of making standard transition from agricultural based economy to industrial and then to service sector, India jumped straight from agriculture to service sector. Thus Rupee is in heavy demand in international market as India’s exports of services are rising. Also, Indian expatriates are sending unprecedented amount of money back to their home land. That’s why Rupee is getting costlier i.e. it is taking less Rupees to buy a dollar. But if Rupee becomes costlier then we will loose our export advantage. For example, it will be expensive for American software companies to outsource to India and they will scale back on outsourcing if Rupee continues to gain strength. But populist policies is forcing Government of India to making Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to put more money in the market and dilute the Rupee value. It was doing that for all most an year but such forced treatment on an all ready sick patient is surely going to have awful side effect. So, we have rising inflation as there is more supply of money than demand.

In short - : As India’s exports are rising (service sector) Rupee value increasing in international market and to keep it artificially down RBI is printing more money which in turn is increasing inflation.

But recent increase inflation can’t be attributed solely to the lax monetary policy. Sustained GDP growth of last 25 years or so is more related to internal consumption than export based economy. There are various reasons for continuing increase in internal consumption. Of course, easiest of them is huge population. But other reasons are quite subtle India’s middle class is burgeoning and their apatite for luxurious goods is increasing rapidly. In the mean time, India is slowly catching up industrialization too. All though, government is waking up slowly to the realities of shabby infrastructure, the projects such as golden quadrangle road is consuming lots and lots raw material. But sadly, the supply side is unable to keep up with this rapidly rising demand. The second step of green revolution never took place. Hence, rising population is straining food supplies. Rigid labor laws and strict government control stunted the manufacturing industries. And now they can’t provide enough of cement, steel or tar. Thus inflation has more to do with demand than monetary policy.

All these signs are pointing towards over heating of the economy. Instead of loosening the bottle necks of the economy, government, admittedly because of useless leftist parties, is forcing more and more populist policies down economies throat. We need more fuel to keep economy running at this pace otherwise it is fast hurtling towards some serious trouble.

Bharat and Indian Government II

I am continuing my argument regarding to Mr. Prime Minister’s recent comments about conspicuous spending of rich Indians. I am throwing some facts that I got from recently published article of Mr. Guru Charan Das in Foreign Affairs. The facts and last Italic paragraph are of Mr. Guru Charan Das. The first three facts proves how much India has progressed in last 25 or so years. And, then how much of that progress is done in spite of Government of India rather than vice versa.

• The country's economy grew at 6 percent a year from 1980 to 2002 and at 7.5 percent a year from 2002 to 2006

• In the past two decades, the size of the middle class has quadrupled (to almost 250 million people), and 1 percent of the country's poor have crossed the poverty line every year.

• As a result, inequality has increased much less in India than in other developing nations. (Its Gini index, a measure of income inequality on a scale of zero to 100, is 33, compared to 41 for the United States, 45 for China, and 59 for Brazil.)

• For now, growth is being driven by services and domestic consumption.

• Consumption accounts for 64 percent of India's GDP, compared to 58 percent for Europe, 55 percent for Japan, and 42 percent for China.

• Only 10 percent of credit goes to the private sector in China, even though the private sector employs 40 percent of the Chinese work force. In India, entrepreneurs get more than 80 percent of all loans.

• Software and business-process outsourcing exports have grown from practically nothing
  to $20 billion and are expected to reach $35 billion by 2008.

• A recent national study led by Pratham, an Indian nongovernmental organization,
  found that even in small villages, 16 percent of children are now in private primary schools. These kids scored 10 percent higher on verbal and math exams than their peers in public schools.

• At government health centers, meanwhile, 40 percent of doctors and a third of nurses are absent at any given time. According to a study by Jishnu Das and Jeffrey Hammer, of the World Bank, there is a 50 percent chance that a doctor at such a center will recommend a positively harmful therapy.

Thus it is clear that privatization - one way or other - has helped the middle class carrying burden of growth. And sadly, Indian government failed in doing basic duties.

After India's independence, Nehru attempted a state-directed industrial revolution. Since he did not trust the private sector, he tried to replace the entrepreneur with the government -- and predictably failed. He shackled private enterprise with byzantine controls and denied autonomy to the public sector. Perhaps the most egregious policy was reserving around 800 industries, designated "small-scale industries" (SSI), for tiny companies that were unable to compete against the large firms of competitor nations. Large firms were barred from making products such as pencils, boot polish, candles, shoes, garments, and toys -- all the products that helped East Asia create millions of jobs. Even since 1991, Indian governments have been afraid to touch this "SSI holy cow" for fear of a backlash from the SSI lobby.

Fortunately, that lobby has turned out to be mostly a phantom -- little more than the bureaucrats who kept scaring politicians by warning of a backlash. Over the past five years, the government has been pruning the list of protected industries incrementally with no adverse reaction.

The last paragraphs proves the moronic ways the Labor Laws are administered in India. Since 1991 successive governments tried to dismantle these ‘legacy’ industries. The results were mixed until our beloved Mr. Manmohan Singh came to the power. The first thing his government did is to scrap the disinvestment commission that used to overlook the process of disinvestment under Vajpeyee government.

Possible Fallouts Of Recent Caste Violence

The recent caste violence of Gujjar community in Rajasthan is quite unsettling. This situation can be analyzed in two ways and unfortunately for India, both of them are harbinger of dark times ahead. The infuriating thing is that this particular ‘caste’ is not fighting for social justice but rather to prove its ‘backwardness’.
The suspicious pattern that emerges from controversy of Dera Sacha in Punjab and then Gujjar violence in Rajasthan is that, both of these states are ruled by non-Congress governments. Congress party since the days of Indira Gandhi can’t stomach non-Congress political parties ruling at state level. In her draconian quest of power, Indira Gandhi fermented trouble in North-Eastern states, Kashmir, Punjab and in Tamilnadu. Fortunately, Tamilnadu remained peaceful (and Sri Lanka bore the brunt) but Punjab paid dear price. While North Eastern states and Kashmir are still burning.

It was not only unthinkable but all most blasphemous to imagine India being ruled by a non-Gandhi person. Luckily, P.V. Narsimharao, the first non-Gandhi prime-minister to complete five years of tenure, didn’t continued this old tactics of destabilizing non-congress state government. But the old ‘gang’ of Indira Gandhi is back in the power. First we have central governments faltering in Naxal hit areas only because these states are ruled by non-Congress government. Then as this ‘gang’ is feeling more cozy in the power, they started trouble in Punjab and now in Rajasthan. I suspect either Madhya Pradesh or Gujrat will be the next target. We will either see communal violence flaring in these two states or perhaps, continuation of caste violence.

The second conclusion is more dark and of course, is fall out of policies implemented by current government only. This caste violence is tight slap in the face of anyone who supports limitless affirmative policy. It is surely sowing seeds of deep distrust between various Hindu communities. The worst thing is that the government which is inciting violence for few extra votes, will judge who qualifies for ‘backward’ status. Of course, this backward status has nothing to do with being backward. And, in any case what is the definition of ‘backwardness’? If economical status is the criteria then half of India regardless of caste lines can be labeled as backward. If not, then Hindu caste system is way to complex to draw clear demarcation lines various communities.

With rapidly increasing education and host of social movements in last seventy years, Hindu society was realigning itself internally. Obviously, such progressive social movements are quite complex to describe but our ‘secular’ government deeply distrust anything that is genuinely Hindu. With rise of vote bank politics it was quite obvious that government will do its best to destabilize Hindu society. The tiny minority of so called ‘Dalit’ activists and communist dominated media have literally made it impossible to have any sensible dialogue over social justice. The strategy is just to muddle the water rather than to debate honestly. Thus, instead of caste lines getting blurred, they are vigorously getting drawn again. Though, the current motive of distinguishing ones’ caste is political, the differences will soon be stark enough for us to see recurring caste violence.

In nutshell, even if the recent rampage over castes is politically incited or perhaps, new trend in the society to reap the profits of affirmative policy, the ultimate looser is Indian society.

On the lighter side if everyone tried to become ‘backward’ then no one will really be ‘backward’ !

Bharat and Government of India

Yesterday prime minister of India, Mr. ManMohan Singh in his address to CII (Confederation of Indian Industries) emphasized on ‘inclusive’ nature of the growth. He said “India has made us. We must make Bharat...vulgar display (of wealth) insults the poverty of the less privileged” His assessed that rapidly rising income inequality in India is a source of concern and it may lead to social unrest in the future. I can’t agree with Mr. Singh on this point more. He further said that people with money should not flaunt their wealth and there is a need to limit the executive pay. But somehow I smell political motive and hypocrisy in his statements. He was the best finance minister India ever had and he is fast turning into the worst prime minister India will ever have.

There is no doubt income gap is rising at breath taking speed in India. People who are working in the IT sector are earning unprecedented amount of sum. Whether their pay is unnecessary is not a question here. It’s simple supply and demand graph and right now, Indian IT is in high demand. Secondly, people living in the cities are earning far more than people living in villages. With service sector rising rapidly, it is no brainier that there are more opportunities in the cities than in country side. But even in cities, people with education are earning far more than uneducated. And, uneducated in the cities are earning far more than uneducated people in countryside. But I don’t think we can change wealthy life style of middle class or rich class. Last time I checked India was still a democracy and more ever, with adaptation of western style capitalism it is next to impossible to keep check on people’s life style. I mean, increasing spending and lavish life style is the solid rock on which western style capitalism stands.

I strongly believe that we should adapt any foreign concept according to Indian life style, culture and ethos. So, what Mr. Singh fits well with me but the thing that I don’t understand is that his government failed to do basic stuff that government was supposed to do and now he is asking middle class to curb on their life style. That’s moronic. No wonder that the industry in its report card gave this government mere 30% . The infrastructure work has literally stopped. The road building is going no where. The SEZ’s have become political fire balls. Dismantling of legacy government industries has been stopped. The inflation is going up way more than government statistics suggests. We are heading towards electricity shortage chaos. The security of the country is in jeopardy with recurring bomb blasts across the country. His frivolous affirmative policy is surely going to wreck havoc in coming generations. The list just doesn’t stop.

Indian economy is emerging challenge to China and US. The Indian government should work in tandem with Indian industry and stop foreign domination of Indian markets. In case if Indian industry start using predatory tactics in order to make profits then yes, government should intervene. But right now they are still growing and instead of helping them grow, this government is sabotaging the future of Indian industries. More ever, there is lot of stuff that government is supposed to do and it’s not doing. For example, government should concentrate on providing better primary education, better roads connecting villages to cities and better health care to children. It should work towards betterment of higher education. To believe that five or six IIT’s and IIM’s is going to take India to next century is dumb. If anything, government can ask industries to work towards establishing some sort of business model that will stop constant flow of people from countryside to cities. Or should start something like Gramin Bank to make villages independent of city economies. Dang! This list doesn’t stop either.

Rather than blaming conspicuous consumption of middle class and asking executive to earn less, government should work more actively towards stemming inflation. If Mr. Singh is yapping to gain politically then I am ready to understand his logic but if not then someone needs to tell him that he is an economist!

Globalization and future conflicts

Globalization and capitalism usually work in tandem. In the tussle between communism and capitalism, capitalism was conclusively proved as a sole winner. But the effects of this rapid transformation of global financial scenario are still mixed. On one hand we have enviable growth rates of Asian economies and on the other hand we have plunder of African natural resources as well as seemingly perennial financial instability in South America. Obviously, we have fierce opposition to globalization through out the world. With dramatic improvement in the telecommunication and physical infrastructure, globalization is virtually unstoppable. But if we don't manage it well then the rapidly changing world order will soon result into conflicts between world powers.

Most of the world considers western countries as a benchmark of development. And, western economies, more specifically US economy, are based solidly on the base of higher consumption. In their quest to provide luxurious lifestyle (luxurious as compared to the lifestyle of non-western world) they are gobbling huge amounts of resources. Apart from the fuel based amenities, free trade economic model i.e. globalization, provides opportunity for each and every individual to have a life style that for all practical purposes was rich game few decades ago. Of course, such a lifestyle is still out of reach majority of the non-western population. It is not only impossible to provide such lifestyle to every one but attempt to do so will have disastrous environmental effects. For example, if all of the Chinese population is provided with standard US life style then earth will be empty of any resources in just three years.

Sadly, increasing pressure from western countries to open the markets of India and China and pursuit of these two behemoths to provide western life style to their citizens is straining world's natural resources to breaking point.

It’s a vicious cycle. Without consumption there is no capitalism and supposedly, no growth. But with more consumption we have rapid environmental degradation and conflicts over natural resources will follow.

With all most 2.4 billion people i.e. one third of world population in the world embracing rapid capitalization, we should brace ourselves for drastically new world in every possible way. None of the western countries even in their hey-days of growth managed more than 3% economic growth consistently. On the other hand China is clocking all most 9% for last thirty years and India on an average managed 6 to 7% in last fifteen years or so. As more and more people enter in the class bracket of income, the consumption of every thing is going to go up. If their consumption doesn’t go up then the capitalistic model won’t work and that will result into immediate chaos. In order to sustain consumption level, it will be imperative for the two countries to capture more and more of the world resources. The problem doesn't just stop there. We still have Europe and US as kings of consumption and more ever they most of the world resource under their belt. And, yes, they have technologically advanced armies to protect those resource. For example, if US end up stabilizing Iraq then they will have the second highest Oil reserve under their thumb. Thus it will not only safeguard their oil interest but they will control over the growth of India and China.

So, it seems that future conflicts will be over world resources than terrorism. We don't need Oracle to figure this out. But the point is that time is fast running out for stopping such conflicts. China and India are rapidly advancing their armies. Though, it will be years before they can compete with US army, but then we don't need 'equal' forces for wholesome destruction. Few nuclear missiles sprinkled around the globe and we are back to the stone age.

Bush's Legacy

“Mr. Gonzales, do you remember the events of 29^th September 2006?” Asked one of the Senator. “No” replayed Mr. Gonzales. “You don’t remember that you had a meeting in your office about the possible firings of the District Attorneys on that day?” another shot at Mr. Gonzales. “My schedule says that I had that meeting 8 of that morning but I don’t recall the happenings of that meeting” replied out beloved attorney general. And, here I thought that general of the country is supposed to be an honest and intelligent lawyer !

All though I was aghast to see clips of Gonzales’s testimony to the congress, if we take a look at the larger picture of the Bush administration, it is not at all surprising to see such a high level of incompetence. Each and every step that Bush administration took, at least with respect to foreign relation, is full of blunders, inanity and absolute arrogance in both. Of course, that’s what is expected from an administration whose chief (i.e. the President) is as dumb as our George W. Bush. I have tried to see a bit of wisdom or a bit of sense in his eyes but naada. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. He doesn’t know what he is talking about nor does he have any clue of what he is doing. And the worst thing is he doesn’t know that he doesn’t know. Of course, his administrative staff is to be blamed equally for all the ills. But the scariest part is that his subordinates are extremely shrewd and they know what they are doing. These rats are going to leave the ship soon but Mr. Bush's legacy will go down with this Titanic for ever.

Post September 11, it was obvious to attack Afghanistan but it was soon clear that bombing Afghanistan was by popular demand and the real target was Iraq. Now, every known living organism on the earth (except for the some in US) knew that Iraq has nothing to do with September 11 attacks. But bush administration first tried to connect the non existing dots on the map and later when their leitmotif of fighting against terrorism failed they changed their tune to planting democracy in the middle east. Even if we accept the new found mission as a noble one, the administration is doing miserably in that. The terrorism never emanated from Iraq (ahem, Pakistan and Saudi. Anyone?) and democracy can’t be forced on any society.

Thinking strictly from geo-political point of view, I am ready to admit that it makes sense in sitting near to the terrorist hot-spots. By having solid base in the middle east it will be easier to keep tabs on Iran, Saudi and on Pakistan. But by sheer arrogance Bush administration failed to subdue an already battered nation and mess up the whole logic of invading that country. They let the Bathist forces dissolve in the Iraq society. The problem is, these Bathist forces are heavily armed and posses technological know-how of bombings. Gosh ! now that was stupid. Thus each and every Iraqi in Baghdad and ‘bloody’ triangle around it became a suspect, a potential suicide bomber. Without any active support from the Iraqi society, it is impossible to contain the Shia and Sunni violence. Though a spectator of this gory violence between two warring sects, the US with it’s gaucherie public relation is taking the blame.

In the mean time, Iran is dangerously close in acquiring nuclear weapons and North Korea already posses some. Pakistan is double timing both US and Taliban. Russia is growing belligerent. South American nations are increasingly getting engulfed into rabid Chavezesque anti-Americanism.

Increasingly getting isolated by failures in foreign affairs, even Mr. Bush’s internal policies are seriously questioned by his peers. True he is not running for the Presidential election but it seems that his legacy is going to haunt US as well as rest of the world for quite a sometime to come.

The Real Hero.

How do you define greatness of a person? Who do we think is worth enough to be called a Hero? Is it that he – as a leader - survived toughest time of the history ? If that’s the case, what is the definition of ‘toughest time’? Is it that he lead the nation to the dizzying height of the success? Then, in that case, what is the definition of the ‘success’?. Or is it that he – as a leader - astutely lead an already established empire and succeeded in maintaining the hegemony? Of course, the definition tough times or success will vary drastically according to the time and situation. More ever, the society that person belongs to also play important role in shaping the nature of greatness of a person. Apart from being brave, intelligent and inspiring, that person not only needs to be on the winning side in order for the world to understand his greatness, but also the nation that he commanded and voiced needs to understand the consequence of his deeds for it be immortalized. There are number of examples where the extremely gifted people failed to grab the attention and ended up surrendering meekly to the unresponsive, pathetic and regressive society.

Thus it is quite hard to pinpoint exact reason behind greatness of a particular personality as time, situation and society plays great role in shaping a personality. Having said that, there are some common traits in great people – whether he is a political leaders, military general, ideologues or philosopher - who change the course of the history and future of the lackadaisical society drastically. That person is a rebel at the core because the ability to question the contemporary practices is a necessary first step towards revolutionizing the society. But Revolution doesn’t mean complete destruction of reigning social structure and forceful imposition of ‘new’ ideas because such a charade always fails. The genius of a great person becomes evident at the way he seamlessly institutionalizes his revolutionary ideas with contemporary social structure. The process of social change is usually very slow. And a leader understands this shortcoming of the society and yet manages to inject the vigor and confidence in the society. It is not that he is undefeated in all the contests. But he understands the nature of the defeat better than other looser. He learns from his mistakes and make sure that he doesn’t repeat the same mistake. At the end of the day – by hook or crook - he emerges victorious because of tremendous confidence and unflinching conviction in the cause.

To certain extent, heroes of the one society can be villains for the other. But then there are some deeds that transcendence the political and cultural boundaries. Such examples are quite rare. These people make cause more important than their persona. The rallying cry is the necessity to take action rather than personal whim. The result is counted on the basis of its effect on the cause rather than personal success. And, that’s precisely make them stand out among the other leading minds of the history. These great people attain higher degree of success even after their death. Because during their life time they rear such high quality of talent and imbibe the next generation with quintessential philosophy, that the next generation not only further the cause but take the success to the next level. Their legacy continue to live for hundreds of years and when ever society finds itself confused and under siege, these great people act like a bacon of hope the lost generations.

Such heroes are quite rare. And, in the last thousand years of Indian history, only Shivaji fits all the criteria described above.

Iraq : Now What?

The recent reports about U.S. pulling out the troops from the Iraq all together or at least, not increasing the troop level is depressing as well as sickening. The common arguments in pulling out troops goes like this - One, US has no business of being in the Iraq at first place and we need to pull out of Iraq as soon as possible. Second, US is the rallying point for the Jihadist in the middle-east and if US disappears from the scene then the budding jihadist movement will fizzle out. And, third one - the most inane one amongst the others - is that Iraq war is hurting US economy and war expenditure is burdening the US budget.

So, let's deal with each of these three points one by one.

I partially agree with the first point. US should have never invaded Iraq. They should have attacked Iran or Pakistan (or better Saudi Arabia). Iran is soon going to emerge as te spokesperson for all the terrorist attack around the world, whether the jihadist like it or not. And Iran with its huge oil reservior is going to hold world economy at the ransom. If they get the nuclear weapons then the scenario is going to be worst than expected. So, it would have been prudent to root out the evil in its childhood. Of course, Iran would have provided the stiff resistance but defeating them would have been worth every penny spent and every life lost. About Pakistan - to say anything against this cancerous country would be an understatement.

Second, US was a rallying point for the Jihadist for long time. Way before the Iraq war. Remember the September 11 attack ? It happened before Iraq war ! In any case it makes sense to engage enemy in their own backyard. And, even if US did leave Iraq, the Jihadist movement will gain strength because they will project US exit as their victory. Also, the current violence in Iraq is the result of infighting between Shia’s and Sunnis rather between US army and Muslims. It may sound preposterous but US seems to more like a bystander in the gory play between Iraqi Shia’s and Sunnis.

Third, Is Iraq war really hurting the economy? I mean China and India are on the roll here And, all the economic indicators in the domestic US economy are positive with corporate profit are over the roof. (and so are the corporate pay checks ! ) And, If unemployment and poverty level is increasing in US in last few years then it has more to do with Bush governments domestic policies than foreign policies.

But the concerns that are raised against the war stems from the fact that most of their American citizens refuse to believe that their country is indeed a superpower. They have to understand that they are the sole superpower in the world and with characteristic traits like - tremendous military expenditure, insatiable consumer appetite for everything and insurmountable habit of the political class to meddle into the internal matters of other countries – they (America) for all practical purposes are an empire.

And, to maintain an empire i.e. to maintain the higher level of living standard and continuous growth, they have to invade – physically or financially - other countries in order to grab and secure the valuable and limited natural resources. I mean, that’s what empires do.

The Bush government media relations are quite pathetic. Bush is an extremely dumb person to begin with but more ever, they advertised, marketed and executed this war quite shabbily. If US government balking under the pressure from the opposition party, decides to bolt from the Iraq, not only Muslim terrorist wreck havoc across the globe but US will cease to be an empire.

In any case, given a choice between US and Saudi fuckers or knuckle head like Ahmadinejad, dominating the Oil resources, I will always choose the US.

My philosophical ramblings.

My apartment complex sits right at the T-junction of Route 18 and commercial avenue. Across the Route 18 and opposite to my complex, there used to be little garden and then flows the Raritan River. If you take the aerial view (Google Maps !!) then my apartment, Route 18 and garden is sitting comfortably in the Raritan river basin. When you take right turn on Route 18, from the commercial avenue, you could actually see the basin being blasted off to make the road. But for some 100 feet or so, the blasting of hard rocks formed an elaborate design akin to the grand canyon. Obviously, on the tiny level. But it's kind of ironic to see the natures beauty in human destruction. The elaborate way the caverns formed were quite fancy in design.

During the snow, the icy water would flow through the rock caverns. And, as the temperatures drops, the water would form icicles. It was an amazing picture. With old river valley being monstrously blasted off in the past to make a way for the traffic and in the midst vehicle conundrum, you see, nature's ability not only to rejuvenate but give a designers touch even to the destruction. I always thought about taking picture of that labyrinthine design, every time I pushed it for the next time. And that ‘next time’ never came.

Even though time never stops and things disappear as quickly as they appear, we humans have tendency to believe in immortality of the surrounding. It is as if we try to freeze our mind into a time wrap. We usually hate change, for good or for bad. All though, adaptability is absolutely required for the survival, we groan, we moan, we squirm and we whine, every time something change in our life or in our surrounding. We long for the past because we believe that it was better then than the present. But in the process of painting illusion about our past enjoyments, we totally miss out the rare moments of joy in the present.

The special moments in life seems to be the gift wrapped in the irony. We need to understand this irony. Unless, we discern the reality from the mirage of disappointment and contemplate for a fraction of second about the present - by firmly being in the present - we miss the real fun. And trust me the realization of missing out the real stuff is worst.
Worst than the moments you actually missed.

This doesn't mean we shouldn't contemplate about the past. We should definitely do that. It helps us gaining the perspective about the seemingly incoherent situations in the present. But we need to adapt by not getting burdened by the past. We need to live the moment by acting in the present - well enough - to actually enjoy.

As far as the fine design on the rock caverns are concerned, they are gone for good. Recent road widening construction lead them to be blasted off permanently. I ruined the chance of taking the photograph. And, I am missing that sorely.

Confused Hindus

We Hindus have very weird notions about our own way of life. I shall say we are more confused than we think we are. When people ask us about our religion, we say we are Hindus. It’s quite strange because Puran-Itihaas or Veda doesn’t have nomenclature called Hindu. What we follow is Sanatan Dharma. And, it’s more of way of life than religion. The definition of Dharma is way different than the myopic way the term religion is defined in English or in western world. The word religion is more related to Abrahamic religion and to define our way of lie as ‘religion’ is something like confining the vast and elaborately ornate nature of Sanatan Dharma into a narrow and fanatic mindset. But it seems that living in the world designed by westerners and for westerners, we have to define ourselves as Hindus.

Going into more deep self-defining traits, we can either say that we are more ‘spiritualistic’ Hindu in philosophy i.e. absolutely non-political and non-confrontational or otherwise, try to project the nature of Hinduism as cohesive political unit more akin to deal with the contemporary challenges faced by Hinduism.

Both of the above mentioned ways are correct in certain way. Sanatan Dharma is omnibus of host of the rituals, practices, festivals across the length and breadth of Indian subcontinent and South-East Asia.

But at the same time we are under attack from the Abrahamic religion for last thousand years. And, it doesn’t help much in the modern age as their expansion continue albeit in more sophisticated way. If we want to defend ourselves from getting extinct then we need to figure out who we are and what we stand for. Are we spiritualistic and don’t actually need to defend ourselves actively? Or we need to form cohesive political unit (which we failed to form in last thousand years !) and be more aggressive about defining out culture ?

General populace is wary to define themselves as a Hindu in political sense because to do so immediately put you in the comparison with Talibans. We in India follow extremely weird form of secularism. Actually, we as Sanatan Dharmis are secular by nature but in the contemporary period secularism stands more for minority appeasement and that too at the cost of weakening of our own culture.

People who say that they are spiritualistic know very little about Sanatan Dharma. What ever they know is mostly fed to them through communists and pseudo westerner’s beaks. Obviously, what is fed to us under the guise of modernism is totally crap and biased. It’s pity that we lost the touch to Sanskrit and there by, distanced ourselves from our literature. Without the proper knowledge, these people either out rightly reject and ridicule our heritage and traditions as too ‘conservative and as ‘out of time’ or be defensive about it. They basically like to cover their timidity and pitiable brains by bull shitting about the ‘liberal’ and ‘encompassing’ nature of Sanatan Dharma. The passivity with which they detach themselves from furthering the development of Dharma is surely recipe for degradation and decay

Unfortunately, the conservative Hindu nationalist suffer from the same dementia. Their gung-ho attitude towards solving the problems faced by Hinduism borderlines the day-dreaming. The root cause is lack of knowledge too. We don’t learn the real history in our class. We can’t read out classic texts. For that we depend on English interpretations penned by a foreigner. These people stick to the traditions with literal meaning without understanding the logic and scientific base behind it. When in doubt, rather than finding the truth, these people are content in exhorting the greatness of our ancestors. There by not only insulting the greatness of our heritage but they basically seal the doors for any necessary development. Their constant efforts to fit the current volatile situation in the historical format, makes it harder for them to rejuvenate themselves for the new challenges by shaking off the burden of illustrious past.

I guess, being spiritualistic or being combative can’t be different spectrums of Hinduism. It has to be two sides of the same coin. We need knowledge about our history as well as philosophy in order to gain the strength from within. We don’t need to echo our ancestors , rather, we need to understand, re-interpret and revise the traditions according to the contemporary period. If we are keeping up with the changing times then we don’t need to be defensive about it. Our ancestors were quite advanced and most of the traditions have strong logical base. We need to be innovators in every possible sense rather than imitators.

But without such cohesive efforts that is, by either showing cockiness in ridiculing our culture or being too stubborn in regards to our traditions, our culture is surely going to decay slowly. We were saved from Islamic as well as Christian conquest by the combination of Bhakti and Shakti movements in the medieval period. If we don’t further our struggle in the modern times then there is no second chance in the nature.

Hibernation

Lately, it seems that I am running out of ideas. I mean, I do have lot of ideas but they are not materializing into a blog of a page or tow. Is it a writers block? Naah.....that's funny. Because, I ain't a writer...may be...actually, Naaah !! All I wrote is few blogs and to say I am a writer is retarded. May be a bloggger but nothing more than that. Well, I don't know but I can't write anything any more.
Ok..tooo many useless and futile words to explain nothing. But again, that's precisely is my point. I need to read more stuff for further rumination. And, for that I am going to hibernate for some time. Hopefully I will be able to emergeafter two or three weeks. Let's see if I could come up with better and brighter subjects and able to put them succinctly.

Hope for the best and prepare for the worst.

p.s. - ok last sentence doesn't make much sense !! does it?

Endulkar ?

Indian cricket team was beaten convincingly by South African team in recent one day international tournament in South Africa. There is nothing new in India loosing in the foreign territory. In fact, India won extremely rarely in the bouncy pitches of South Africa, West Indies and Australia. So, I ain’t going to waste my time in talking about how India should have played and how they could win the last game. It’s pretty useless. Come next summer and we will be beaten again and the excuse will be the bouncy pitches again. I mean, for sweet mother of Moses, why can’t we make a one lousy bouncy pitch somewhere in India and let all the cricketers practice on it? But that’s too easy to do and plus, who is going to sponsor such a useful practice.

What disappointed me most was the way Tendulkar played against the south African fast bowlers. He is supposed to be the best thing that happened to cricket since Bradman retired. And, yet instead of leading by example and fulfilling his talents (and the prophecy!) he meekly surrendered himself to Pollack and Co. What is more infuriating was that none of the newspapers or cricket website minced a word against Tendulkar. He featured in none of the reason behind India’s debacle. Why? Are we biased for him? Is he still a little wunder-kid for us? Or is it is just that he is beyond the realm of mere mortals and hence, can’t be considered as reason for defeats. If that’s the case then forgive me for making such a blasphemous statement but we will be better off without Tendulkar. He ain’t making any difference as a batsman anyways, so, let’s give a chance to some talented kid and hope that he will score runs consistently or at least, when it’s needed.

He made a comeback in Malaysia tournament with a blazing a hundred. Everyone went ga-ga over his return and since then, nothing! We lost Malaysia cup. We lost mini-world cup. And we are kicked like a football in South Africa and I am yet to see a single necessary knock from Tendlukar. In the mean time, Lara is scoring runs as if there is no tomorrow and Ponting is on rampage against every bowler and Yousef Yohana, well, I hate that bastard. In all the debacles, Tendulkar is the most senior player in India team ( 17 years of experience.) and yet, he failed to lead by an example. Instead, Suresh Raina who is just 19 (i.e. two years more than Tendulkar’s international career.) is taking heat for the defeat. Comically dark ! Because, that kid lost his place in the team.

I am not against Tendulkar in any way. In fact, I am his greatest fan. His talent, his hunger for runs and his commitment to the cause definitely puts him in the rarified air of greatest cricketers. But cricket is a team game and we are talking about a team that represents India and we can’t get sentimental because it’s about India’s prestige we are talking about. But deification is just part and parcel of being famous in Indian public life. Usually, a person is deified when he is close to being a liability to the public. And it becomes hard for that person to bid adieu to his public persona. He not only hurts himself in this process but cause damage to the country in one way or other. We have numerous such examples, primarily in politics. Of course, Tendulkar was deified long ago and justifiably so. But, a century in ten or eleven matches is not something we expect from him. It’s probably adds up to his incredible statistics (I am sure he doesn’t care about statistics and is more concerned about winning) but if he doesn’t score valuable 50 or 60 in must win crunch matches then for me, his talent ain’t worth for place in India team.

He is great. No doubt about it. I still see the replays of his ferocious onslaught against Australia in 97-98. And, that’s why a lot more is expected from him. He definitely did justice to his talents and filled the vacuum in 1990’s. He surely is a real hero to the young generation. His hard work, his commitment to India, his clean image and middle class attitude is something that every one should try to emulate. But I would like to see him as hero for years to come. Even after his retirement I want to see him as an inspirational figure. But if he continued to play, even after ceasing to be a factor towards India’s victories then, it may sound too harsh, but that blemish won’t go away with all the hundreds he scored in his life.

Where is God?

What is god? I am not the first person, nor the last one to ask this question. I don’t know any persuasive answer either! Apart from the philosophical jargon, I intend to connect the very concept of higher power to the reality.

My point of view is strictly Hindu philosophical based. I don’t think Son of God needs to descent on earth to tell humans ‘thou shall not steal’ nor do I believe that messenger of god can ever marry and have a child from a nine year old girl. The best definition – succinctly postulated by Shri Dr. Radhakrishnan - is there is no exact definition because it’s a supreme energy that pervades everywhere and has ability to manifest through everything. We humans –bound by the three dimensional physical world and time bound mindset – can just try to comprehend the concept in idol form. But sticking to the philosophical definition raises one important question. With supreme Shakti encompassing whole universe, is it possible for that Shakti to take care of human affairs?

To read about Islamic conquest of India was one of the most depressing experience in 24 years of my existence on the earth. The sheer inhumanness of the conquest, the extreme barbarous nature of the Islamic invaders and Islam as a religion and mindless violence it unleashed is something beyond my belief. It is also sick to see Muslim people constantly mentioning their religion as a religion of peace. It is something beyond my comprehension.

But, the more I think of genocide carried by these Muslim invaders, it raises more question in my mind about the Hindu philosophy. If there is indeed justice in this world and if there is certain higher power that looks after us then why on earth it allowed such a primitive and hideous cult lto take over half of the known world and massacre and subjugate half of its population? Where was God at that time? Too busy ? Millions of people were slaughtered mercilessly, millions of people were dehumanized and sold in the market like commodities. Thousands of temples were leveled off and host of eminent academic institution were burnt. And it was not about imposing superior structure but it was pure hunger to destroy everything that is superior and replace it with extremely primordial belief system. How did it happen? Is it just part of the cycle that society work hard to build a civilization, which then destroyed by Huns ?

If we are to question the very existence of God, then such a bloody history is more than enough to answer it in negativity.

I tried to find answers in Gita but I couldn’t find solace. It seems that in larger scheme of time such incidences are blips. In one form or another they have occurred before and will continue to occur in the future. It’s basically like building house of cards. No matter how elaborate you build the house, it falls quickly and the game begins a new.

For me it seems more of lame excuse than answering the reality. The kind of religious ferocity that emitted from Arabia doesn’t even fit our standard defintion of ‘Asura’ or 'Rakshasa. The destruction they unleashed is on such a high scale that the Hindus seems to have cocooned themselves from discussing such massacres. The wounds are too deep to heal even after thousand years. But we have to face the reality. I know 'let bygons be bygons'. But the history is repeating, albeit in smaller scale and the actors are nations states like Pakistan and Bangladesh. And in order face them we have to comprehend the loss of heritage, loss of culture and massacre of our history.We have to refurbish our definition of God, we have to rediscover them.

Tresspassers will be recruited !

The recent issue of The Economist talks about the shortage of brain power around the globe. It was an interesting read, because there is so much competition in every possible sector that I was under impression that we have more brain power than needed. But the brain power they defined is not lower level clerical (read computer skills here!) but more of middle or upper level managerial skills. And, they argued that the universities (at least in US and in Europe) are not producing ‘talented’ people but more of literate people. The most interesting thing is they argued that the corporate world even in India and China is furiously trying to get hold of talent.

The argument seems to be contradictory to the situation in India. The companies are hiring people left and right. All they need is a graduation degree and they will be happy to recruit for all sorts of jobs. With over a billion people (and millions of useless Bangladeshis!) and almost 2.7 millions graduates every year, it seems that we are too many talented people in India. But reality always throws the perception off the balance.

Talent can be defined as knowledge necessary to succeed in the current world. Thus the number of students graduating from India may sound staggering but the percentage of graduating students with relevant set of skill is tiny 11%. According to the recent report of NASSCOM, only one out of four undergraduate in India is eligible for any kind of IT job. The unemployment rate among graduates is 17%. That means, India is producing staggering number of inept graduates. Who’s fault is it? It’s definitely not students fault but rather the government is extremely incompetent in providing any sort of useful education.

As far as outsourcing is concerned, we don’t have to worry about dollars inflow for at least another decade or so. The outsourcing expenditure is going increase from current $193 Billions to $260 billions by 2009. And that’s why we see so much desperation in grabbing anyone with a degree. As the firms that are on the forefront of outsourcing business start making forays into the first division product development, the talent deficit is going to be detrimental to their growth.

By the end of year 2000, the tech bubble went bust in US. There was greate pressure on American companies to save money in downturn economy. India was like a god given gift to the American multinational firms. With English speaking working class and passion for work, India poised itself correctly to tap the out-sourcing dollars. But if we don’t build the second floor i.e. knowledge, industrial and infrastructural base on this dollar flow then we will miss the bus of 21^st century.

Cursory glance on our education system and it’s clear that road to our dream of leading 21^st century is full of pot-holes. Though primary education is provided free by the government and it’s the constitutional right of every child, the system itself is in ramshackle. The teachers are underpaid and over-stretched. More ever, the students are missing too! We don’t have standardize testing or evaluation system for the whole country. Most of the school even in the cities lacks labs for computers or physics. We don’t encourage students to participate in extra-curricular activities. Rather than learning we focus more on getting grades in the exams. I haven’t even started talking about deficiencies on high-school and college level education. It will require separate blog.

But instead of working on the development of primary and higher education, our government is busy in introducing reservation policy in every facet of civil life. The vote bank politics is turning draconian and it seems another generation of talented individuals will be gutted in its self-consuming fire.

I often get forwarded email of Mr. Manmohan Singh’s resume. There is no doubt about Mr. Singh’s brilliance or his accomplishments but sadly, he will be remembered as a Prime Minister who forced more reservation policies rather than developing our knowledge base. Last time I heard, he was setting up a committee to enforce the reservation policies in private sector.

A Hostage Nation

So, Mr. Afazal Guru, mastermind behind the attack on Parliament is very close to getting clemency. The game plan is pretty clear - he will get clemency and his death penalty will be converted into life imprisonment. He will have quite and luxurious life in the jail, proudly sponsored by Indian tax-payers. And, when he is bored, he will call his colleagues in Pakistan, they will do some hijacking and stuff and force Indian government to release him from the prison. He will then start working on his job of killing innocent Indian people again.

India is a reservation nation. Lower castes have reservation preference even for promotion in the government jobs. Minorities have separate civil code and separate education system. And, now we are going to have reservation policy for terrorists too. If you happen to kill more than five hundred people then Indian policy makers will think of prosecuting you. Anything less than that is a free ride. If you are a Muslim terrorist then no matter what you do, you will have complete support of Muslim community. Ok! May be not whole Muslim community but that terrorist can surely count on political class. The 93 bomb blasts prosecution is still dragging. In the mean time we suffered at least two major bomb blasts in Mumbai and Delhi and an attack on the Parliament. We had scores of small bomb blasts around the country but let’s just forget about them. I mean, isn’t it in-humane to scold terrorist and Pakistan so much? They are humans and they have rights too!

Mr. Afazal Guru was found guilty after four years of prosecution. All though, the attack on Parliament had Pakistan’s signature all over it, our politicians made every possible attempt to clamp on prosecution. And, now when the verdict is reached and that bastard mother-fucker is designated for hanging, the political hoopla began. It’s pretty systematic. First, the Muslim boards across the countries ‘expressed’ their concern for death penalty and set the vote bank politics set into the motion. Then the Muslim politicians in the congress party began to meet Sonia Gandhi to voice their opinion against the death penalty. But the nadir was to see the chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir saying that the death penalty is wrong. Recently, former chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir, Mr. Farokh Abudullha babbled that such a penalty will divide Hindu and Muslim community. And, I wonder the reason behind insurgency in Jammu and Kashmir.

I am pretty sure, had terrorist killed few Member of Parliament (I wish, they had done that!) then the situation would have been totally different. Because, politicians are extremely important specie in India. And they are the one who are holding our nation hostage. They are petty, weak, boorish, clownish, thuggish corrupt and inane. They are dividing our society in order to reap personal profit. And, they won’t mind selling our country to Pakistan. I don't see any way out of this situation, unless, voters start thinking hard.

I am not sure if Mr. Afzal guru will receive clemency or not. I sincerely trust our President. I hope, he stays on the course and do what is necessary.

Random Walk To Nowhere!

I am feeling like running in the vacuum right now. Without any external push you can’t run in the vacuum. No matter what you try to do, you ain’t going to move an inch. Similarly the more I try to do, the situation ain’t changing a bit in my life. Basically, actions without consequences. I don’t like to talk about my life. It’s not that worthy. At least not yet. In any case, there is very thin line between sharing experience and fantasizing one’s own beauty i.e. narcissism. And yet, I am trying to tread this line and catch the absolute abstractness of my life in words. From the outside, even to me, everything looks picture perfect. I graduated from prestigious university (at least, I think my university is prestigious!) and within a day or two of graduating I got the job offer in New York City. And that’s when then my seemingly attempts to swim in the thin air began.

When ever I see myself in my dreams, I find myself to be extremely slow in every motion. It is as if I want to do certain things like run but suddenly, someone is pausing my actions. Have you ever tried to play the movie before de-pausing it? The way words come out of actor’s mouth are hilarious. Now think you are actually inside the TV and someone playing you without de-pausing. And, you could speak three words per minute and trust me, it doesn’t feel good. Though, the rest of the world (I am still talking about the world in my dreams) seems to be within the laws of earthly physics, somehow I transcendent the three dimension realm of reality. I know, dreams are beyond three dimensional realm and no, I ain’t having any mystical experience. It’s just I feel frustrated and handicapped to do even mundane activities in my dream. And, this examples are to explain the way I am feeling right now. This sense of deja-vu is driving me insane because this is happening for real. Interestingly, the part of the dreams that are coming true are not the stuff I would like to experience. But irony is the essence of life.

College life provided me the structure. Exams, projects and home works etc. kept my mind focused on the objective, that, was for me, an unnecessary necessity. By the senior year, I was more than ready to enter into the working life style. But with me entering into work force it seems I am missing the college structure. The sense of desolateness caught me with surprise and I am desperately looking for the light at the end of this tunnel.

I know this is a passing phase. Perhaps, everyone goes through this ordeal and I really don’t want to sound pessimistic here. When this scenario will change, I probably won’t even remember this period. And, all these ‘sense of feelings’ will just be a space filler on my blog.

Lage Raho MunnaBhai !

Am I the only person who don’t want to see Lage Raho Munnabhai? By not watching this film, am I being dumb or by watching film, Indian society is fooling itself? The film is a box-office hit and though, I am not talking about film’s content, I am definitely enraged to see Sanjay Dutt getting kudos for the film. I am frustrated to see this guy still acting in the film industry. I am sad to see that people are actually watching his films.

The court drama related 1993 Bombay Blasts is ending in installments and looking at the verdicts so far, and Sanjay Dutt’s role in the blasts, I sincerely hope that Sanjay Dutt will be found guilty. But hope is mostly an illusion. So, let’s try to put some light on Mr. Dutt’s role in the blasts and then evaluate the probability of him actually being find guilty.

Mr. Dutt had stockpiles of AK-47 stored in his house right after Bombay riots of 1992 and just before Bombay blasts. He was a drug addict and had illicit contacts with Muslim underworld- Messer’s Dowd Ibrahim & Co. All though, Mr. Dutt wanted only one AK-47 – supposedly for his own protection - these underworld people dumped a lot more in his house. They were expecting more riots to break after the blasts and The arms and ammunition was the defense buildup by Muslim underworld to protect Muslims during the riots. The riots never happened but cops soon picked up the scent of large stockpiles of weapon in and around the Bombay. The Bombay Blast investigation was open and shut case as far as investigation is concerned, so, soon cops arrested Mr. Dutt’s. When cops showed up at his door, allegedly, he was trying to get rid of his weapons by melting them. (How ingenious!) Mr. Dutt had to spend 18 months in the custody before being bailed out by his father Mr. Sunil Dutt, Member of Parliament at that time. All these incidences are well documented. Usually, Mr. Dutt often argues that he had no clue of nefarious design of Muslim underworld. Nevertheless, the mere fact that he was in contact with traitor Muslim underworld makes him guilty of killing more than 300 innocent people. But the facts and logic is not enough for conviction, at least not according to Indian justice system. Extremely corrupt and inept, Indian justice not only lacks eyes, it lack brains too

As the prosecution of 93’ blasts dragged, Mr. Dutt got a second chance in life. His film carrier took off in late 1990’s and people soon forgot his murky past. He gave a blockbuster hit Vastav in 2000 and even won Filmfare award for his role in the film. Ironically, he played the role of an underworld don in that film. Obviously, the Indian film industry which is intrinsically connected to the Underworld, gave Mr. Dutt clean cheat. But the sad part is general populace also seems to have given him clean cheat. People are not only watching his films but also applauding for his so called acting talent. Frustratingly enough, even the city of Mumbai –which bore the brunt of Muslim terrorism – is gladly accepting Mr. Dutt as a returning Hero.

True to his real nature he continued to keep close ties with the Muslim underworld. His long conversations with Chhota Shakil were made public by cops and yet, he continued to sign films after films. His father who was member of parliament since 1980’s kept him safe from Law and cops. And when he died, Mr. Sanjay Dutt’s sister became member of parliament to save his ass. Indian press as usual biased, corrupt and inept always sided with Mr. Sanjay Dutt.

Given the extent of his influence on public mindset and his political influence through his father and now from his sister, it’s highly unlikely that he will actually be convicted for his crime. In the end of his blockbuster film Vaastav, the charected of an underworld don that Mr. Dutt played is killed by his mother. But unlike the movie, Mr. Dutt who is real life underworld lynchpin will definitely going to be Scot free.