May

31

Nations that live in glass houses…

May 31, 2009 posted by indiatime | 7 Comments

Increasing incidents of violence against Indian students in Australia are prompting widespread condemnation and outrage in India. Some have even called for UN intervention (come on now), and others have temporarily protested by turning down stupid honors by Australian universities (I promise you they all will eventually accept those honors).

While such outrages seem to temporarily unite fractious populations, they seldom work towards removing the divisions and fractures that divide those fractious populations in the first place. e.g. amidst all the outcries about discrimination in Australia, India’s newly elected government chose the speaker of the parliament based on, you guessed it, caste. In a few weeks, a new batch of Indian students will begin their educational curriculum in India for the academic year 2010, and the most important criteria all those students had to go through was, yet again, caste and religion. Even the so-called elite institutions in India routinely practice a caste-based entrance system, which has now become a fixture in India, and about to get only worse. Most government jobs and placements, too, go through similar caste-based filters, and the most important and the most critical line on the resume is one that describes the caste or the religion.

So my question is this. If India’s own laws and India’s own government and India’s own educational institutions happily and merrily practice racism and casteism, why blame other countries when elements from those countries behave on the same lines? And what about attacks on foreign tourists in India?

And what about rapes and murders of German and Russian and British women in Goa? What about the incessant invisible muggings that outsiders routinely go through at the hands of beggars?

And forget the outsiders, for a moment. What about our own babies getting killed by our own mothers? What about our own women getting attacked and killed by greedy in-laws and abusive husbands? What about our own public getting duped and tricked by our own politicians? What about our own schoolchildren getting mauled over by city buses in our own capital? What about criminals routinely getting elected despite active pending cases? Man, I can give a thousand examples of racist crimes happening within India, perpetrated by Indians against Indians, just within the first 5 months of 2009.

So stop the hypocrisy, folks. India is a glass house and a huge one at that. Let’s not pretend that racism is just an Australian issue. Are some Australians racist? I’m sure, they are. Do the Indian students need some protection? Of course there needs to be a way to deal with such hate crimes. But long before all that, India needs to clean its own house and get real about race and caste issues. Nations that live in glass houses cannot and should not throw stones at others.

May

29

“…The chief of the ATS died like a dog on the street, but nobody wants to take the responsibility….”
- Kavita Karkare (wife of anti-terrorism chief Hemant Karkare)

The wives of Mumbai’s top cops who laid their lives down on 26/11 last year, are slamming a sham report written by a government-appointed bureaucrat. The so-called investigative report has absolved all the governmental bodies and officials including those responsible for key decisions on the fateful night 26/11. Joked a senior minister from the Maharashtra government,

“….It appears that we are encouraged by the report submitted by veteran bureaucrat Ram Pradhan on the terror attack. He has unexpectedly given a clean chit to all. The moot question is that if every one in the police force performed his duty, then why did the attack take place and why did we not react to the alerts sent by the Centre? After Pradhan’s report, every one in the government is in a relaxed mood. If there is delay in procurement of weapons, no one will be held responsible…”

While the wife of the former anti-terrorism chief is complaining that her husband died like a dog on the street, Vinita Kamte, wife of Mumbai’s late additional commissioner of police, is no less bitter in alleging that her right to information petition request has prompted the authorities to blank out 10 minutes of calls from the records.

And what does the newly elected prime minister have to say to the martyrs who died for their country? While the government’s cronies cleared every one of those in the chain of command that night, the prime minister himself was celebrating his new victory, rewarding the then chief minister of Maharashtra with an important portfolio in the cabinet and promising the then sacked home minister that he would be taken care of. “we’ll take care of everyone…”, promised the prime minister.

Thank you, sir. We truly appreciate your vision and thank you for helping us forget the tragedy of 26/11. It is better that such bitter memories are quickly forgotten and erased. These martyrs’ wives are just bitter and upset and do not understand how nations conduct their business. Good governance means you have to take along those, and shield all who are cronies and phonies, and make them look good, no matter how badly they screw up or what havocs their incompetence wreaks.

And Hemant, my friend, I know you’re in heaven somewhere reaping the rewards for your sacrifice as a soldier and a good life as an honest man. Just in case you choose to be reborn in this country (not too sure you will), make sure you choose to be the son of some current politician. That is the only way to reap rewards in a land that continues to spit on its great soldiers and martyrs, and still garlands and idolizes rajahs and kings and ministers.

May

28

Fresh new young faces?

May 28, 2009 posted by indiatime | 7 Comments

India’s prime minister expanded his cabinet today, showing once again the significance of loyalty and family dynasty and the insignificance of accountability.

- While pretending to add fresh young faces to his cabinet, the prime minister promised to award important positions to all those who have been dropped from the cabinet for reasons of poor performance or voter rejection. Shivraj Patil, the former home minister dropped for non-performance after the 26/11 terror attacks, has gotten a special promise, too. And the Maharashtra chief minister dropped after the same 26/11 attacks has now gotten his reward as a cabinet minister. Anybody who thought that accountability meant anything in India should be sorely mistaken with these signals from India’s highest political authority.

- Virtually all of the young faces that have made it to his cabinet of ministers, are sons and daughters of former party elite. Let’s see who they are.

1. Krishna Tirath, a new face, is really the daughter-in-law representing her father-in-law Sohan Lal’s Delhi’s constituency.

2. Jyotiraditya Scindia is the son of former minister Madhavrao Scindia and represents his father’s old constituency in Madhya Pradesh.

3. Pratik Patil from Maharashtra is the grandson of Vasantdada Patil, a former chief minister of that state, and represents his grandfather’s old constituenc which was later held buy his father.

4. Delhi’s Ajay Maken is the nephew of Lalit Maken who was the son-in-law of former Indian president Shnkar Dayal Sharma.

5. Agatha Sangma, the youngest minister, is taking over her old father’s constituency in Meghalaya. Father PM Sangma was formerly the speaker of India’s parliament.

6. Sachin Pilot, another young face, is the son of former minister and party loyalist Rajesh Pilot who was also a close friend of former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi. Sachin Pilot’s father-in-law is Farooq Abdullah, the ex-chief minister of Jammu & Kashmir and himself the son of Sheikh Abdullah, a former politician and a former chief minister of Jammu & kashmir.

7. Salman Khursheed, representing the state of Uttar Pradesh, is the grandson of former president Zakir Hussain.

8. Daggubati Purandeswari, representing Andhra Pradesh, is the daughter of N. T. Rama Rao, former chief minister of that state.

9. Jitin Prasada, representing the state of Uttar Pradesh, is the son of Jitendra Prasad, a former vice-president of the congress party and an advisor to two prime ministers.

10. Preneet Kaur, representing Punjab, is the wife of former Punjab chief minister Amarinder Singh and also the daughter of former chief minister Gyan Singh Kahlon of that state.

11. M M Pallam Raju, representing Andhra Pradesh, is the son of former minister M S Sanjeevi Rao.

12. Ranjit Pratap Narayan Singh, representing Uttar Pradesh is the son of CPN Singh, a former Rajah and a former minister in the central cabinet.

One can go on and on until practically every so-called fresh new face is shown to be closely blood-related and a direct descendant of some royal family or a political dynasty. The world’s largest democracy, let’s be clear, still rejoices in former kings and royalties and political dynasties. And we have not even said a word about the 5th generation freshest face who is not in this cabinet of ministers but will soon assume the leadership of them all, becoming the next leader of this country.

May

27

May 27 - only in India

May 27, 2009 posted by indiatime | 3 Comments

1. Marriage breaks over priest’s religion
Yesterday in Likhwad, near Vadodara, a groom left without marrying the bride and his folks walked out of the wedding ceremony, when the two sides failed to reach a compromise on the religion of the priest. The groom’s family brought Christian priest while the bride’s family brought a Hindu one. The bride’s family lodged a complaint at the local police station, contending that they were ’shocked and awed’ and that the Christian priest was unacceptable. While at the police station, they also charged the groom of demanding a motorbike as a dowry. Also yesterday, a Muslim woman married her adopted Hindu daughter off in a Hindu wedding ceremony.

2. Massage parlor girls allege deception
Working girls rescued from a Goa massage parlor have alleged that they were lured by cash and promises of promotion. The girls accused the parlor owner of entering into a two-year contract with them with the promise of an eventual promotion. Asked about what they had imagined the promotions in their working line would be, the girls said they thought they would get to work on beauty treatments of the clients.

3. Tigress enters family’s home during the cyclone
A family in Gosaba, West Bengal found an adult tigress taking refuge in their home during the recent cyclone. The adult humans locked the adult tigress into the room and brought in the forest department to escort the animal back into the animal reserve that she had escaped from. The forest officials are said to have rescued the tigress and the family and later released the tigress into the forest and the family into the family home. A few deers were also said to have entered a different family’s home, and were also rescued and released into the same forest (No, the forest officials were not bribed by the tigress).

May

26

The payoff of stability

May 26, 2009 posted by indiatime | 4 Comments

With Indians electing to elect the same government, the word about India’s political stability is out in the international investor community who now believe India to be one of the few bright spots to make a fast buck. It’s not that there aren’t any other bright spots at the end of the recession tunnel elsewhere. But with an impressive 28% registered returns for the month of May so far, India has made an impressive showing which was almost 4 times that of China and about 50 times some of developed markets around the world.

Some analysts are calling it the beginning of the super bull market for India. Most global fund managers who have put in their trust in the upswing of the world markets for later this year, are betting on India’s recent upsurge that began a few weeks before the national elections and has continued in the wake of the political stability following it.

Also helping India are the numbers showing its continuing leadership in the offshore arena, with the competing countries only managing to cut a very tiny slice of India’s share. And although some investors continue to worry about of the uncertainty over currency exchange rates, India’s upswing is expected to drive large chunks of investments towards the Indian market, at least until some of the other major markets do not start showing healthier returns.

So make hay while the sun shines folks. Barring an unforeseen crisis, the next few months promise to make the India investor a lot of money. And knowing that the global funds are impatient for some solid returns, this window of time, at least the next few months, might mean real happy days for India Inc.

May

25

Australia’s ABC News is reporting about the case of Paul Dean, an Australian fugitive who has, for last 3 decades, moved around in India disguising as a priest, surgeon, and a charity worker.

Paul Dean disappeared from Australia back in 1976, stealing a hundred thousand dollars, and resurfaced as a missionary in India, eventually performing eye and general surgery among the poor populations on India’s east coast. He claimed to be an agriculture expert, a missionary, and a doctor. But over a period of 30 years, Paul Dean aka brother Alan left a trail of victims who he sexually abused. Caught a few times and arrested, he managed to convince the authorities to let him free, and that included the Indian as well as the Australian law.

So far neither the Australian nor the Indian authorities have shown the inclination to go after this child molester who has also abused and maligned the charitable organizations that he apparently worked with. As for the patients who the fake doctor operated upon and whose limbs he has cut so far, they seemed to be happy with his limb-cutting skills. And many locals called the running fugitive a ‘walking god’.

One of these days, we may see the Australian in doc India (walking God Dr. Paul Dean) and the Indian doc in Australia (Dr. Death - Jayant Patel)) go into a partnership that would be the first Indo-Australian medical tourism venture. An apt cultural and academic exchange, one would think.

May

24

Mumbai’s underworld still rides high

May 24, 2009 posted by indiatime | 5 Comments

It was almost two years ago that a journalist wrote about Mumbai’s mafia riding high. It’s two years later, and Mumbai’s mafia is riding even higher, proving once again how inept and ineffective the Mumbai law enforcement is. And this in spite of all the known cross-connections among the Mumbai underworld and the Karachi underworld and the ISI and the terrorists.

1. This Friday, a speeding truck rammed into a police informer and his wife riding their bicycle, instantly killing the woman and injuring the informer. Another underworld informer was killed exactly the same way abut two years ago.

2. Yesterday, another police informer was attacked by unknown goons but survived. The police deemed his story a publicity stunt, but failed to account for the strange accident from the day before that killed an informer’s wife.

3. Abdul Merchant, the convicted murderer of Gulshan Kumar, one of India’s most famous music personalities, has escaped. Merchant was out on a 14-day furlough, but failed to turn himself in afterward. For the two weeks that he was on furlough, Merchant was supposed to report to the local police station every day, but requested a 4-day break from the daily reporting, and escaped thereafter. Merchant’s lawyer Farhana Shah has washed her hands off the escape, contending she doesn;t know what happened.

4. Mumbai police are reporting that one of the trusted aides of underworld don Chhota Rajan, has now branched out forming his own gang. Bharat Nepali has become the newest entrepreneur on Mumbai’s underworld scene. His main area of activity is said to be Mumbai’s Tilak Nagar-Chembur-Govandi belt.

5. Mumbai police recently arrested 4 men of the Chhota Shakeel gang preparing to murder a lawyer representing the Ravi Poojari gang. The police contended that the men were trying to avenge the killing of Naushad Kahimji (which happened in Mangalore on April 19) who used to be a lawyer for the Chhota Shakeel gang.

6. Apparently the Mumbai police didn’t arrest everyone who was preparing to avenge the April 19 killing. Because the Mangalore police claimed that someone did avenge the Shakeel gang lawyer’s murder by killing Pandu Pai who was supposedly involved in the lwyer’s murder (Mangalore is said to be becoming a hub on the underworld scene).

7. Recently, Karimullah Khan, a close aide of India’s most wanted criminal Dawood, was acquitted of murdering an informer. Karimullah remains behind bars however, facing trial for killing hundreds of Mumbai citizens during the 1993 bombings in the city.

8. Also recently, two other underworld shooters were acquitted of all charges in a case where two people were shot to death in broad daylight a few years ago.

9. Ashwin Naik, the dreaded underworld don who was recently acquitted by a Pune court of yet another murder charge, is now a free man. Naik said he will now live a normal life.

10. Also free last week, were four accused alleged to have killed Ajit Dewani, the secretary of Bollywood actress Manisha Koirala. They were employed by Abu Salem whose girlfriend is now herself a television celebrity.

May

23

Top 10 challenges for the new Indian government

May 23, 2009 posted by indiatime | 4 Comments

Somini Sengupta’s piece in today’s New York Times mentions lifting up the economy and delivering public services to the poor as the two most important challenges for the new Indian government. It must strike as a strange thing when the party that has been in power for most of independent India’s 6 decades, wins a decisive majority and everyone’s still worried about delivering public services to the poor. Here is my list of the top 10 challenges before this same-old set of incumbents.

1. Improving infrastructure - India has one of the most poorly developed infrastructure and facilities on the planet, and that is because none of the governments have ever taken it upon themselves to dedicate their time to this noble deed. India does not have a single world class highway, period. Even the most developed of Indian cities have electrical power issues and sections of these cities are shut down every day, cities like Mumbai have severe water issues and transportation is a mess.

2. Improving living conditions - When the Nehru-Gandhi family won a thumping majority in 1971 elections, they won it with a promise to eliminate poverty from India. That was 40 years ago. Things have actually gotten much worse for those who don’t make enough money and things have actually gotten much better for those who make more than their 7 generations would ever need. e.g. Food rations, although available on paper, are not accessible to those who badly need them, and people who need them can now hardly afford the prices in the open market.

3. Improving sanitation and public health - Building toilets and urinals should be the first priority of any government in India. This alone would improve public health since most of India’s health issues relate to poor hygiene and unsanitary conditions. Not a single Indian city has a universally acceptable garbage collection facility.

4. Eliminating corruption - Every aspect of Indian society is riddled with corruption inside and out. The political corridors, the judiciary, the law enforcement, public services - there is no area that can be truly said to be free of corruption.

5. Eliminating reservations and quotas - Most of India’s educational institutes and most of the public jobs reserve huge sections for the underprivileged. Although this looks like a good deed on paper, the reality is far more sinister and has to do with election politics, vote banks and perpetuates the ills in the society by continuing the beliefs and practices of the old caste system instead of eliminating thos from the public conscience.

6. Dealing with separatists - Separatists have been winning the battle over India’s paramilitary and local police in most of the northeast and almost everywhere else. This is because the government has never really stood behind and supported the brave police officers who were willing to go in and root out this ill. In most of these places, the separatists, sometimes with the help of foreign governments, have created sleeper cells and built relations with the local population which alerts them about police/paramilitary movements. The Sri Lankan government has recently set a precedent in quelling armed separatist movements. India should quickly do the same to be able to equate India’s own separatist troubles with Sri Lanka’s, since the world sentiment at this time seems to favor such governmental actions.

7. Dealing with terrorists - The current government did nothing the last time terrorists entered and terrorized an Indian city. I think India’s public will not allow a repeat of that type of inaction the next time the terrorists enter another or the same Indian city. They can begin with carrying out the sentences received by convicted terrorists on India’s death rows, now that the elections are over and the vote banks aren’t an issue for another 5 years.

8. Improving education - India’s education system creates public servants and not scientists or innovators. That has to change. Indians have neither invented nor innovated much during the last hundred years. Science and basic research is totally neglected. And our most prestigious institutes do little more than produce the next batch of worker bees for American companies.

9. Watching out for bad apples in the stock market - India cannot let another Satyam scandal ruin the stock market that now promises to make some deserving gains by later this year. The right signal to send to those who are still thinking of faking their accounts is to let them know of the severe punishments and zero tolerance policies for such behavior. Like most countries, we too, treat our rich criminals with kid gloves. Furthermore, our rich criminals are usually in bed with our rich politicians, complicating matters for everyone involved.

10. Improving tourism - India exploits little of its tourism potential whereas there are countries on the planet that have made a living out of it. It is real short-sightedness to go after fast tourist money by going after druggists and addicts (e.g. in Goa) since that is keeping the family tourists away from some of or most beautiful tourist spots. Cocaine tourists do not bolster the rest of the economy and do little to help local businesses (They carry empty backpacks, sleep on the streets, and are no help to the local economies, but only to the drug barons). All we to show in tourism is what someone built 4 hundred years ago. That’s a pity.

May

22

Abusing Gods to win their affection

May 22, 2009 posted by indiatime | 19 Comments

kunde habba - courtesy Hindu.comAbusing and insulting someone to win their affection may seem like a bad idea to many. But tribals in south India have created an entire festival around the idea. ‘Kunde Habba’ or ‘Bodu Habba’ is an annual festival usually celebrated during the last week of May, in Kodagu district, amidst the southern hills of Karnataka state.

Apparently, once of the time, the people of the region were promised by Lord Ayyappa that He would take them hunting. And they say he did, but once in the forest, he left them on their own when he found the beautiful Goddess Bhadrakali. The tribals took this as a huge insult and decided to return the favor by an annual celebration around their moment of insult.

So they get drunk, dress in women’s attire, dance around tress for hours, and shower their otherwise revered Gods with choicest, filthiest and foulest abuses. They then ask the tourists for money (of course), and then sacrifice hundreds of chicken to honor the Gods. The tribals believe that if they don’t show the affection by insulting the Gods, the Gods will severely punish them.

Travelers to India have previously described India as a topsy-turvy world and a century-and-half old book on the people of the same region describes in detail the traditional ways of life in parts of India, where the past and the present and the future seem to be a happily seamless continuum. It’s more like a time machine that allows unrestricted travel back and forth, at your will and command and whims, and sometimes without your will, shoving you into the past or the future without your authorization.

Those of you who are not Indians, the next time you get abused or insulted by an Indian, all you need to know is that it is a way to show affection and an honest attempt to win your heart. For those of you who are Indians at heart, you already know quite well how to show your affection back, you @#$%.

May

21

While impassioned cases for increasing women’s involvement in politics continue being made on one side, it is also a fact of life in India that women doctors themselves are a party to female feticides, i.e. illegal abortions of newborn females.

One such case took an ugly turn yesterday when Dr. Laxmi Garg, owner of a private nursing home in Bathinda, Punjab, swallowed two poison tablets and ended her life. Dr. Garg’s troubles started back in September of 2006, when Ashok Kumar, a local resident, filed charges against her and a janitor working at her clinic, alleging that a murdered fetus was thrown or dumped by the clinic.

The police slapped the doctor with the Prenatal Diagnostics Techniques Act (PNDT) when they found two fetuses dumped in garbage behind her clinic. Earlier this year in February, a local sessions court found Dr. Garg guilty of the charges and sentenced her to two and a half years of rigorous imprisonment. The janitor who threw the fetuses in the garbage was however, acquitted.

But Dr. Laxmi Garg had no plans to go quietly. When first convicted in February, she tried to avoid her imminent arrest by getting herself hospitalized for chest pain symptoms. Her appeal against the guilty verdict failed, and so did the authorities attempt to make her pay for her crime. For Dr. Garg had carried a couple of poison tablets with her inside the court, and hearing the rejection of her appeal, she immediately swallowed the pills.

It is not known if charges were ever brought or filed against the parents of the murdered female babies. In the land of a woman president and a woman kingmaker and woman chief of the nation’s capital state and almost 10% women in the parliament, women seem to be a powerless bunch, happily or sadly allowing their lives to be run by their male chauvinist counterparts. This is what happens when you have your politics filled with kingmakers who are never accountable for anything they do, their pawns who are never aware of who does what in their names, and the vast ignorant audience who do not understand why accountability should ever be an issue in the first place.

As for little babies being dumped in the garbage, one must then attribute their misfortune to their being born in a wicked place where garbage-dumping of little babies of the female gender, has been around for ever. God, how I wish India’s politicians carried with them a poison pill for every social ill they cannot correct. And how I wish the members of the public carry a poison pill for every politician they cannot dump in garbage.

May

20

A family’s tryst with destiny

May 20, 2009 posted by indiatime | 3 Comments

Vikas Singh writes in the Times about why Rahul Gandhi will not become a cabinet minister this time around. I agree with Singh’s general conclusion, I disagree a little about the hows and the whys and the ifs. Here’s why.

1. The Nehru-Gandhi family has learnt the art and especially the timing of pushing their youngsters into politics. They have done this very successfully for last 3 generations, and now again for the 4th. For some reason, Indian public - young and old, rich and poor, north and south alike, have routinely allowed Gandhis’ newer inexperienced generation to piggyback on the parents’ experience, and the cycle goes on.

2. It’s not just the brand recognition, but the availability of the right launching platform, and the availability of unlimited money that successful PR campaigns are made of. Nehru-Gandhi family wrote the book on Indian political PR, when most opposition politicians were sucking their thumbs.

3. Every generation of Nehru-Gandhi family has initially portrayed itself as shy, reluctant, inexperienced politicians. This gives them a tremendous initial advantage in that they are seldom held accountable for mistakes and bloopers that would end most other political careers. Consider the case of GW Bush who used the inexperience and idiocy ruse to a great advantage, often getting a pass from his peers and the press. Jawahar Lal Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi, Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi all have followed exactly the same book. Each and every one of them was initially labeled shy, reluctant, wanting to have nothing with politics. Gradually and inconspicuously, their parents put them into leadership positions in youth organizations or party hierarchy.

4. Nehru-Gandhi family has had a stranglehold on a few chosen constituencies, where year after year, election after election, any member of the family can appear from nowhere, contest the election and win it, no matter what. In fairness to them, that is exactly what most political houses in India have done, where most politicians end up giving up their seats only to their sons or daughters.

5. So imagine when you have country’s best PR firms working since you’re in diapers to time your entry into politics. You have an unlimited supply of family money whereby you can fly helicopters and planes day and night, don’t have to do anything to earn a living, and are coached in political matters by some of the most experienced bureaucrats and statesmen this country has ever produced.

6. And when you are the right age, there is a party leadership position or a parliament seat waiting for you, with your name written on it for years. All you really have to do is smile and repeat the political messages from your family’s secret book on ‘How to win elections and influence the Indian public’.

7. The hardest thing to learn after winning such huge elections, is to show restraint and resist gloating and bragging. This is what the Nehru-Gandhi family does best. They know that the job is still not done and the destiny is still not fulfilled.

8. So as his mother did a few years ago, Rahul Gandhi will initially stay away from the speculations and will declare himself to be a party loyalist, promising to build a new India. This will him the hearts of all those who have so far resisted the temptation to give up on the idiotic opposition parties.

9. Man Mohan Singh will surely become India’s next prime minister in a few days, as promised by the party leaders before the elections. But Singh, who recently underwent a major cardiac bypass will somehow find a way to make way for India’s new prince-in-waiting. There will be some news leaked on Singh’s not keeping very good health and the need for him to relax and reduce his work burden.

10. Sometime later this year or early next spring, the Congress party leaders will convene a meeting and choose the new heartthrob of Indian politics and the new flag-bearer of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty as the undisputed leader of the world’s largest democracy. It will be a good day for the Nehru-Gandhi family and the forefathers will be hi-fiving one another for their incredible political skills and LTAOing over the stupid and foolish opposition that is just out of its league when it comes to politics in India.

May

19

Ruskin Bond turns 75

May 19, 2009 posted by indiatime | 6 Comments

ruskin bondRuskin Bond, the Indian writer, turns 75 today. A third generation British-Indian, Ruskin Bond has turned his childhood experiences as a British boy growing up in the last years of colonial India, into a lifetime of love for writing. “…I have loved India and it is very fascinating to be a part of its history of the last hundred years…”, he once told his interviewer. Ruskin went to England at the age of 17, but the memories of his father and his friends, and the sights and sounds and smells of India haunted him . So he came home to India, embracing his roots, reconnecting with his childhood memories and charming the readers all over with the fascinating and adventurous tales of a young British-Indian named Rusty.

For almost 50 years, Ruskin Bond has lived in the same place in picturesque Landour, the hometown of many Anglo-Indians and American missionaries (and the birthplace of John Birch). He has written much about Landour and Mussoorie and the Himalayan foothills and the local people -

…Three stray dogs are romping in the middle of the road. It is their road now, and they abandon themselves to a wild chase, almost knocking me down.

A jackal slinks across the road, looking to right and left, he knows his road-drill to make sure the dogs have gone.

Yes. this is an old bazaar. The bakers, tailors, silversmiths and wholesale merchants are the grandsons of those who followed the mad sahibs to this hilltop in the thirties and forties of the last century. Most of them are plainsmen, quite prosperous even though many of their houses are crooked and shaky…

Here’s Ruskin telling a tale about how he once almost became a Himalayan tiger’s breakfast.

Bond’s literary classics - Room On The Roof, Vagrants in the Valley, Rain In The Mountains, The CherryTree, The Blue Umbrella, (and many, many others), and his unforgettable short stories, have earned him more than a few famous awards and recognitions. One of these days, his name may even get the nod for the Nobel prize in literature, his profession’s most coveted prize bagged by Ruskin’s own favorite authors like Kipling and Tagore. For a British boy who made his room on the roof of the world in the Himalayan foothills, it would all suddenly fall in place. And quite deservingly so.

May

18

On the kutcha road again

May 18, 2009 posted by indiatime | 3 Comments

On the (kutcha) road again
Like a band of gypsies we go down the highway
We’re the best of friends
Insisting that the world be turnin’ our way
And our way
Is on the (kutcha) road again
Just can’t wait to get on the (kutcha) road again
- remade from Willie Nelson’s classic

Yesterday, three stories from India’s capital city got drowned amidst the election results, reflecting the alternate realities of world’s largest free country. In separate incidents, two children died, falling and drowning in New Delhi Water Board’s open manholes. Their voices drowned out by the roar of the victorious incumbent Sheila Dixit, the wonder lady of New Delhi’s local politics, the three children - Simran Thakur (7), Shahid (9), and Vikas Singh (14) became the newest victims of the insensitive local government.

Thousands of miles away, an American governor mourned the death of Anita Seeratan (13), an Indian-American teenager, who died of swine flu. The New Delhi authorities, in comparison, gave this idiotic response in their own defense of why their city’s little children died falling into open manholes:

…The manhole is not on the road but on a kutcha (dirt) road which is used by trucks and other heavy vehicles. Due to this, the manhole’s lid breaks frequently. Although we replace it periodically, we missed it this time. However, till morning there were no pending complaints about it. We have ordered a departmental inquiry and will appoint a senior official to look into the matter…

“…This wretched manhole has claimed my wonderful daughter…”, cried Simran’s father.

Little Shahid’s family was less luckier as there weren’t even any claims of investigation in his case. The local authorities told the press that they were not responsible for manholes deeper than 4 feet. In all the three cases including Shahid’s and the 14-year old Vikas Singh’s death, the Delhi police have registered cases of negligence, but they have little idea who to investigate.

Children unfailingly falling into manholes or routinely being run over by city’s local buses would normally raise hell in most cities of most countries. But most in India are pretty philosophical about such things. Many won’t even accept it as a sign of insensitivity, but would claim it as a sign of their spiritual maturity. Some would say that India needs to fall into a wormhole and time-travel a bit to make the connection between a democratic electoral process and its potential rewards. Until that happens, India must be said to be on a kutcha (dirt) road to progress.

May

17

Top 10 things that need to happen today

May 17, 2009 posted by indiatime | 2 Comments

Now that India is past the obligatory tamasha of democratic elections, here are the top 10 things that need to happen today, so things start moving in some direction.

1. Sonia Gandhi needs to step up to the plate and take charge and stop hiding behind as a kingmaker. Or she should just declare that her son will now become the leader of the ruling party and let him do his stuff. It is absolutely ridiculous for a giant democracy to have a stooge of a prime minister who has to run everything by his boss. If we want to have a stooge, then let us choose an impressive one while we’re at it. Maybe the great Mr. Khali or some Mr. Bollywood or some page 3 model or someone.

2. If Ms. Sonia can’t do it, then Mr. Singh should show some upright posture and stand aside. He will probably still make a great finance minister, but he just cuts a sorry figure as a leader when everyone knows he’s not one. Sorry, Singh Saheb, I’m a great fan, but I’m a much greater fan of the national pride.

3. Thackerays should call it a day. They seem to have little power left, and gone are the days it seems, when Bal Thackeray could influence the elections by a single Shivaji park speech. His successors are inept, uncharismatic, and sadly out of touch with reality.

4. L. K. Advani and Rajnath Singh should call it a day. They represent the old guard of India’s opposition party and they will keep hurting the party as long as they remain the faces of their party. If the BJP doesn’t wake up from this debacle and get its act together, it will never ever rise as the main opposition party again. For the BJP and its followers, that process must begin with the humbling understanding that the majority of India’s population does not give a hoot about their Hindutva politics. BJP must snap out of their definition of Hindutva and embrace the rest of the Hindus in India who far outnumber those within the BJP.

5. The communists need to call it a day and understand that they are stupid and their politics is old and stale and stinky. They need to wake up and smell the fall of communism around the world. They need to realize that they are among the last handfuls who are still loyal to Mao and Lenin and Fidel. The people of West Bengal need to catch up to the rest of the world and shut down the communist party for good.

6. Sharad Pawar needs to call it a day. His opportunistic politics has worked wonders for him and his loyalists, but he needs to choose between Cricket and country and then focus on that one thing. India cannot afford a major cabinet minister who spends most of his time playing Cricket. Mayawati too, needs to call it a day. Her 15 minutes are up and her style of caste-politics stinks.

8. There is a serious war going on west of the border, and India needs to wake up from its election slumber and smell the explosive fumes. While India was sleeping, the Pakistani president made a trip to Washington and got some major discounts for his country and his military. India’s national security is intricately linked to the events that have been transpiring on the northwestern borders of Pakistan, and India needs to pay attention pretty damn quick.

9. The congress party, having won a thumping majority, needs to get behind India Inc and help accelerate infrastructure initiatives. Congress has gotten away without doing much for the last sixty years, and people still seem to be in forgiving mood. Sooner or later, there will come an opposition leader, who will be able to expose the habitual lies behind the congress party’s promises. The congress party better get its act straight before that happens.

10. India’s media needs to wake up from its Bollywood and Cricket fetish and begin some earnest exercises in journalism, long overdue for a country that wants to call itself a democracy. India’s media is third-rate and has made few contributions compared to media in much smaller countries that surpasses Indian journalism in quality, integrity and investigative efforts. The first decade of the new century is almost over, and we, the wannabe superpower, still suck.

May

16

India votes for change by voting for no change

May 16, 2009 posted by indiatime | 5 Comments

That India was not voting for a change this time, was clear several weeks ago. All such predictions came true today as the vote counts began coming in and the incumbent ruling party began preparations to reap the rewards of seeds long-sewn by the likes of Gandhi (Mahatma), Nehru, Gandhi (Indira), Gandhi (Rajiv), Gandhi (Sonia) and Gandhi (Rahul).

Although most news accounts would have you think that Man Mohan Singh is the winner of India’s long, arduous, often-excruciating democratic exercise, those who know will tell you that this win belongs to the emerging powerhouse of the ruling party, the man waiting in the wings to take his destined seat at the helm of power, the heir-certain and the uncrowned uncoronated king of his people - Rahul Gandhi.

That Rahul Gandhi would one day take his place on the family throne, was a given. It was one of those questions which wasn’t an if but a when. The friends and family and foes of India’s ruling family have known this for years. What is astonishing is that, once again, the coordinated machinery of India’s grand old party worked its wonders, putting the top family’s next generation on the party posters, making the dynastic democracy a palatable pill, yet another time for the nth time .

That the opposition would fall flat on their faces, was also a given. They shown incredible inability of making an issue out of the dynastic democracy, were never certain which ruling party leader they needed to target, and were really all over in their weak assault, divided as ever, focusing on nothing, offering nothing new at all. Their option for the main contender for the top spot was a man more than twice in age to the ruling party’s prince. Like what happened to John McCain six months ago, it became impossible for the older gentleman to speak about change when the man opposite him seemed to personify it for many. Plus the ruling party played its chess moves wisely, hiding its king well and castling time and again by confusing the opposition as to who they should target. Which of course sounds very stupid, because anyone could have seen these results coming.

Plus, the men who had given the opposition a distinct advantage the last time around, weren’t around any more. Pramod Mahajan, BJP’s star campaigner and coordinator who gave that party its win the last time, had died at his own brother’s bullet. Atal Bihari Bajpayee, their star candidate, had retired and taken a backseat to the next-in-lines. And those next-in-lines were just that - the next-in-lines without any personal charisma, hoping and hopping on the goodwill created by the party elders like Mr. Bajpayee.

But the opposition had squarely squandered its goodwill, taking people for granted and believing that they have invested in people’s stupidity enough to make them eat the religion pill. The ruling Congress party, has heavily invested in people’s stupidity, but they have become masters of that now, and no other party in Indian politics has the goods to overcome Congress party’s advantage. And no other party in Indian politics currently offered a fresh, new face that could offset the promise of the ruling party.

Most of those in the opposition who risked it all, probably lost it all. Most of those in the opposition who chose to remain true to their opportunist colors, chose well. And most of those who understood Indian public’s historic penchant for monarchies, understood well. Did the democratic process work? You bet it did. But democracy in the tropics, just like everything else, has a different flavor, a different taste and a different color.

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