tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-58250931792490468412024-02-19T18:20:30.225-08:00JayEnAar's TakeAn alternative and rational view on matters ranging from the trivial to the weighty and all things in between.JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.comBlogger32125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-77786169418591988692014-02-28T06:49:00.001-08:002014-02-28T10:58:01.092-08:00Reunion revisited - in pictures<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Here are some pictures of my recent travel to Bilaspur to see my old school. I joined a reunion party organised by the Class of 1977 - they left the school 9 years after I did, but amazing and talented bunch that they are, have managed to keep up contact with each other across the globe and kindly let me join them for their third reunion in the last few years. <br />
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The School from what used to be the main entrance. Now it is in fact the back, the official entrance being on the other side where the extension has been built<br />
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This used to be the main entrance into the school courtyard<br />
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The library used to be in the main building. Its now part of the extension. No idea how well stocked it is.</div>
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The staircase has not changed at all. I was surprised how narrow it is. My memory of it is rather different.<br />
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With the present care taker, Mr Santosh Prasad<br />
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One of many finger print scanners. This was the machine that, like a child speaking the truth, told me I did not belong.<br />
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Inside a classroom, with the white screen pulled down. To the right of the blackboard is the computer point<br />
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The overhead projector, all connected up to receive input from a laptop plugged into the network.<br />
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A busy day of lessons spread across 2 shifts<br />
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In conversation with a very youthful HeadMaster (to my right)<br />
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The road from the school towards the Railway colony<br />
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Bharat Mata School is actually a Church run school with a pretty good reputation, hardly a kilomteer away from the Railway School<br />
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The Bungalow once occupied by the Jammi family. Looks rather grander now. Back then it had a small plate on the gate that said J Ranga Rao, Divl Personnel Officer.<br />
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I was wowed by the gardens and the landscaping.<br />
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I don't rememebr that the house had this plaque giving it a name- Amar Bilas, and a vintage, 1911. Unless my memory totally fails me.<br />
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<br />
The badminton court in the officers club<br />
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<br />
Obvious! - the tennis court, only now it has a professional looking surface.<br />
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JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-54937252027778851012014-02-18T19:53:00.001-08:002017-10-18T03:04:16.498-07:00Reunion Revisted<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="color: #4c1130; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swami_Vivekananda_Airport">They decided to
name it the Swami Vivekananda Airport in Raipur</a>. I’m not sure that great
man of peace and spiritual enlightenment
would have felt honoured, but at least the airport is a peaceful, quiet,
sleepy place, even if the only reason
for that is the relative lack of economic development and the consequent lack of demand for services to and from it. But Raipur’s new
airport was my first glimpse of Chattisgarh since I left Bilaspur in 1968. Then it was an ill-served region of the state,
ruled from Bhopal, now it is a full fledged state with Raipur for its capital.</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The road from Raipur to Bilaspur is a single lane black top
for most of the 110 kilometers. I don’t believe I ever travelled this road when
I was at school in the 1960s. But take out the traffic and it must have looked
little different then as now, except for the sections at either end that had
recently been converted to a two lane road.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="color: #4c1130; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Bilaspur is now a busy thriving city. It has all the look
and feel of a city on the move, impatient for anything new and glitzy – bill boards
selling the latest in cell phones, motor bikes, cars, skin whitening products and
fashion. There’s even an Apollo Hospital, someone said proudly. All the old
cinema halls have gone I was told – I wouldn’t have known, I never went to one
when I was in school. The road that I
cycled down every Sunday from the Railway colony to the Girls Degree College to
visit my sister is unrecognisable. It used to be a tree lined route with fields
on either side beyond the trees. It is now a busy thoroughfare with houses, shops and apartment blocks on either side,
but, curiously there are still two rows of trees almost in the middle of the road. Could it be that they kept the trees that
used to be there and simply widened the road on either side? </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Driving along in an auto-rickshaw the transition from the
city to the railway colony is abrupt and
palpably obvious. The houses are neater, more regularly spaced out and the
narrow tarmac roads with relatively sparse traffic cannot have changed much
over the last 50 years. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="color: #4c1130; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>There is a 5 foot wall now all along the playing ground and as the auto drove alongside I had no inkling where we were, and so I came upon my old school rather suddenly; inexplicably, it was an emotional moment. The same red brick building
still stands, the heavy gate padlocked; a large sign proclaiming 'South East
Central Railway Mixed Higher Secondary (English Medium) School' looked like it could
do with a fresh coat of paint. A smaller sign warned of CCTV surveillance – the first indication that some things had changed. An event to mark the departure
of the graduating class of 2014 was in progress, allowing us to wander round
the school building and grounds, thanks
to the caretaker, Mr Santosh Prasad.</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="color: #4c1130; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><br /></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The School has been extended considerably; it now runs two shifts a day to cope with rising demand, and the average class size has grown to 40. But there’s
still a backlog of 200 kids of railway staff who cannot be accommodated. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="color: #4c1130; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>The look and feel of the building and class rooms does not
prepare me for what came next: this school now has modern IT knitted into its DNA. No more daily attendance
sheets and roll calls. Staff and pupils alike sign in using finger print
scanners. Minutes after the start time the head master has his day’s attendance
figures. An SMS message goes out to the parents of any absent child. CCTV cameras are in every classroom and corridor. I put my right thumb into the scanner just to see what happens; the machine beeped and flashed a message rejecting my input. I may well entertain a misplaced notion of it being 'my old school', but the machine was clear: I did not belong. I thought I had moved on and the school was the same. But the school had moved on too; recognisable, yes; but not recognising its own past. </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">No more chalk and blackboard – though they are still there.
Every class room has a roll-down white screen and a projector suspended from
the ceiling. The teacher plugs his or her laptop into the school network to access all the teaching
material she needs. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="color: #4c1130;"><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Head Master Mr KK Mishra is very obviously proud of his
school. He reels off statistics of his school kids’ achievements, including one
girl who represented India at an international sports event. No, the school did
not focus solely on cramming, as so many Indian schools do; yes, the emphasis
was on all round development; and yes there were adequate
toilet facilities, separate for boys and girls, and they were subject to a
regular cleaning and inspection regime; and of course clean filtered drinking was
available from numerous water points
dotted round the school. </span><a href="http://scholar.google.co.in/scholar?hl=en&q=jean+dreze+indian+schools&btnG=" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Amartya
Sen and Jen Dreze</a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> would be proud. If half of all schools had these
facilities then India would be sure to collect the promised demographic dividend.</span></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I walked from the School through the Railway colony. The
roads looked and felt the same but I couldn’t be sure of the way. Unexpectedly
and rather abruptly I came upon the old bungalow. It’s now the official home of
the Divisional Railway Manager, that probably explained the presence of a
Railway Protection Force guard at the gates. Structurally its the same,
somewhat spruced up and refurbished with air conditioning units slung from the bedroom
windows. But the big surprise was the grounds: immaculately maintained lawns
with luxuriantly stocked flower beds, a small
central pond, a swing, scores of flower
pots lining the drive way and a floral archway. What an amazing change! Who
keeps it all going? I asked. No less than 10 full time staff, they said, some
contract workers and some railway staff. </span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="color: #4c1130;"><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I walked out of the front gate and across the road into the
Officers Club. The
badminton court has been extended, the tennis court now has flood lights and a new high quality playing surface. There was a flight of steps that I have no memory of, that took you up on to the flat roof of the club house. The club house itself was closed and so I
shall never know whether the old gramophone player still exists (probably not)
but, peering through the glass window I could see something I would never have
predicted in 1968 – a row of exercise machines.</span> </b></span></div>
</div>
JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-55769344781612853732014-02-11T01:51:00.000-08:002014-02-11T05:42:03.632-08:00Reunion<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #4c1130;"><b>It is a good dictum, probably borne out by experience, that says: ‘Never return to a place in your personal history that you
have fond memories of.’</b></span> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Human memory is selective. We remember the good bits that
happened to us. We filter out the not-so-good or the downright bad parts.
That’s probably the explanation for the oft repeated view most people have of
the songs and movies ‘in our days’; they are always ‘the best’. Never mind that
on any objective and unbiased view there were many things that made us unhappy
or left us dissatisfied.</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">
</span></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="color: #4c1130; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></b>
<b style="color: #4c1130; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But returning to a place many years later carries the risk
of disenchantment. Our memory of it is static, frozen at a time of our selective
choosing, while in reality the place we romanticize about has moved on,
changed as much as we have, kept up with the times, probably better than we have. The asymmetry between what we expect to see
and what we find can be baffling, unsettling, even disillusioning.</b></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">
</span></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">So should I return to my old school later this week when I
plan to travel to <b><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bilaspur,_Chhattisgarh" target="_blank">Bilaspur, the second city of the state of Chattisgarh</a>?</b> For better or worse I am committed and so I
thought it would be as well to capture my memories in words before reality
hits. </span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">
</span></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #4c1130; font-size: small;"><b>Railway ‘colonies’ in small towns in India were and still are set apart
from the rest of the country. Indian Railways is a remarkable organisation; a
state run monolith, it not only knits the country together physically and
geographically, but also brings together people from all backgrounds,
languages, and cultures into a workforce ’family’. And like a family it
provides for its own: doctors and nurses
to work in its hospitals, teachers to run the schools it maintains for the
children of railway workers, and cultural clubs and institutes for staff and
their families. </b></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">
</span></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">In most railway towns you could set off on foot from from the railway station, pass
the railway school, drop in at the railway hospital, have a cup of tea in the
official canteen in the railway management offices, play a game of badminton or
tennis in the railway officer’s club, take in a film at the railway institute.
Without breaking sweat. All the while you would walk on narrow single lane black top roads, pass neat
rows of terraced houses with curtained windows, and large officers’ bungalows with neat lawns set in
expansive grounds. </span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">
</span></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b style="color: #4c1130;">If you’ve read</b><span style="color: #660000;"><b> </b><a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bhowani-Junction-Story-Tellers-John-Masters/dp/0285636049" target="_blank"><b style="background-color: #eeeeee;">John Masters’ <i>Bhowani Junction</i></b></a><b> </b></span><b style="color: #4c1130;">or seen the 1956 film of the same name you would
know what a railway township looked like.</b></span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">
</span></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Bilaspur was such a
town when I was in school in the 1950s and 60s in what was then the South Eastern Railway
– one of 9 zonal Railways. It was a small school and it grew along with me. It
was only a middle school at one time but when I was in the senior most year the
authorities decided to expand it into a high school by adding on a further
year. So for the next 3 years, I remained in the senior year. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #4c1130; font-size: small;"><b>In the graduating
class there were only 11 of us. We
effectively worked alongside the teachers; I remember in the final year we
spent the first few weeks practically setting up the chemistry and physics
labs: We prepared bottles of 0.1 normal solutions hydrochloric acid and sodium
hydroxide, unpacked Bunsen burners, variable rheostats, and vernier calipers, set up weighing balances. It was fun, more a sense of adventure and involvement and enterprise than
of dull and uninteresting lessons. </b></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">And after school we’d play volleyball with the teachers since neither they nor we had the numbers to make
2 teams. My memory of the library is that it was small but totally accessible
and unstaffed. There were no rules; it ran on of trust. I remember reading both the volumes of Conan
Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes short stories and books. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #4c1130;"><b>Sport was not my thing. Did I make a contribution to the
school? Not much, I think but I did at least set up a nascent debating society
and recall organising at least one debate. I don’t remember that it was a success.</b></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">
</span></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Evenings were spent in the Railway Officers Club, playing
endless table tennis and badminton. I also read every week, cover to
cover, Time, and Life magazines; the regular newspapers were from Calcutta (now
Kolkata - where South-Eastern Railway had its head quarters); The Statesman,
and Ananda Bazar Patrika. It was the mid-sixties and even in small town
Bilaspur our sheltered life in school
and club was not immune from the major news events of the times: Nehru dying in 1964; the
brief war with Pakistan in 1965, and the sudden, unexpected death of the diminutive Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri in
Tashkent in 1966, and the killing of
Martin Luther King in 1968. But
if there was one story that dominated the international news at the time it was
Vietnam. I am ashamed to admit that at the time, no doubt owing to what I read,
I was suckered into believing that the American GIs were the heroes saving the
world from the communist inspired Vietcong.
Not even the <span style="color: #20124d;"><b><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/forty-years-later-photographer-reflects-on-missing-the-napalm-girl-image/2012/06/12/gJQAMORmeV_gallery.html#photo=2" target="_blank">now iconic picture of the little naked girl running towards the camera</a>,</b></span> her back burned with napalm, terror twisting her face into a contortion of pain, awoke me to the real horror and
tragedy and injustice of a war unleashed on a small poor country by the richest, most powerful military-industrial nation; such is the power of slanted news coverage,
such is the gullibility of a young reader with the more immediate
preoccupations of life in a small railway township. Somethings at least don't change: half a century on and America is still at war, the terror and the tragedy and the injustice is, if anything, greater.</span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">
</span></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #4c1130; font-size: small;"><b>I remember too being fascinated by the record player they had in the club; it had an automatic mechanical record changer, so you could place a stack of vinyl records and each would
slide into place in turn. Doris Day’s Que Sera Sera, and Connie Francis’ Never on a Sunday were two songs that played almost continuously. Maybe they
were popular at the time, maybe they were the only two records they had; more likely the selective filter of my memory has blotted out all the other songs we heard on that record player.</b></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #4c1130; font-size: small;"><b><br /></b></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #4c1130; font-size: small;"><b>It is with this mental imagery that, in a couple of days, I shall venture forth into the past; not under any illusions about expecting to see what I remember, but it would be nice at least to find, however improbably, the library where I last left it, or the record player still standing. But then perhaps I should have asked someone at the time to explain to me what Doris Day meant when she sang Que sera sera. </b></span></span></div>
</div>
JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-18118729908891925502014-01-22T08:04:00.000-08:002014-01-22T15:17:02.596-08:00Protests, progress and polemic <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #4c1130;"><b>Protest is the means by which we progress.
No liberty has been gained, no right secured, nor freedom won, without protest
of some sort. All protest starts with an awakening, a sense of injustice, grows
into a demand that is more often than not denied because those in power would
much rather conserve and consolidate their own position. All protest therefore
sooner or later grows into a struggle that seeks to calibrate the degree of
vigour in the protest movement with the resistance put up by the status quo. Some protests fizzle out, some succeed. If we enjoy any freedoms and rights at all it is because of past protests that have won through. </b></span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The sight of an elected leader of Delhi
demostrating on the streets of his own city against a police force run and
controlled by the federal government in the Centre must indeed seem odd. The
protestors, usually, are the dispossessed; their target, usually, is the
established state or institutional power. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #4c1130;"><b>So by sitting down on the street and
holding a cabinet meeting in his car was Arvind Kejriwal behaving like an
elected Chief Minister of Delhi or, as the press and many commentators called
him, like an anarchist?</b></span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white;"><span data-reactid=".r[26].[1][3][1]{comment10151905543862253_28896267}[0].[0].{right}.[0].{left}.[0].[0].[0][3].[0].{end}[0]{0}[0]" style="color: #20124d;"><b>Is
it anarchy for an elected leader to take to the streets? </b></span><br data-reactid=".r[26].[1][3][1]{comment10151905543862253_28896267}[0].[0].{right}.[0].{left}.[0].[0].[0][3].[0].{end}[0]{1}[0]" />
<!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--><br />
<!--[endif]--></span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white;"><span data-reactid=".r[26].[1][3][1]{comment10151905543862253_28896267}[0].[0].{right}.[0].{left}.[0].[0].[0][3].[0].{end}[0]{4}[0]"><b><span style="color: #4c1130;">That
depends on who you are and how much power and privilege and comfort you derive
from the status quo ante.</span></b></span></span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;">
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span data-reactid=".r[26].[1][3][1]{comment10151905543862253_28896267}[0].[0].{right}.[0].{left}.[0].[0].[0][3].[0].{end}[0]{4}[0]"> </span><br data-reactid=".r[26].[1][3][1]{comment10151905543862253_28896267}[0].[0].{right}.[0].{left}.[0].[0].[0][3].[0].{end}[0]{7}[0]" />
<span data-reactid=".r[26].[1][3][1]{comment10151905543862253_28896267}[0].[0].{right}.[0].{left}.[0].[0].[0][3].[0].{end}[0]{8}[0]">Chetan
Bhagat (an author with some mediocre literary talent, but enough to gain him a right to pop up on television with his views) decries the
tactics of street protest used by the Aam Aadmi Party. But that is because he
and the people who move in his circles would rather the prevailing
situation continued. <span style="color: #20124d;"><b>They would, wouldn't they?</b></span></span><br data-reactid=".r[26].[1][3][1]{comment10151905543862253_28896267}[0].[0].{right}.[0].{left}.[0].[0].[0][3].[0].{end}[0]{11}[0]" /><br />
<!--[endif]--><span data-reactid=".r[26].[1][3][1]{comment10151905543862253_28896267}[0].[0].{right}.[0].{left}.[0].[0].[0][3].[0].{end}[0]{12}[0]"></span><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white;"><span data-reactid=".r[26].[1][3][1]{comment10151905543862253_28896267}[0].[0].{right}.[0].{left}.[0].[0].[0][3].[0].{end}[0]{12}[0]"><b><span style="color: #4c1130;">But
if you're a slum dweller in the city or a street worker at the mercy of the
police, you would see this as a legitimate<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><i>aandolan<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></i>for your rights. What we are
witnessing in India is the result of years of lopsided economic and social
development in which the majority has been left behind, carried along only by
false promises made every 5 years by a conniving kleptocratic class of
politician; denied their due, instead offered tidbits: a quota here and a handout there.</span></b></span></span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;">
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br data-reactid=".r[26].[1][3][1]{comment10151905543862253_28896267}[0].[0].{right}.[0].{left}.[0].[0].[0][3].[0].{end}[0]{15}[0]" />
<span data-reactid=".r[26].[1][3][1]{comment10151905543862253_28896267}[0].[0].{right}.[0].{left}.[0].[0].[0][3].[0].{end}[0]{16}[0]">These
politicians have built and run a system of civil administration that functions
only to keep the masses in their place. As a result, education, public health,
infrastructure for transport, travel, electricity, water and sanitation serve, to the extent they function at all, only the minority; police and and the criminal justice system work only in the service of their political masters. </span><br data-reactid=".r[26].[1][3][1]{comment10151905543862253_28896267}[0].[0].{right}.[0].{left}.[0].[0].[0][3].[0].{end}[0]{19}[0]" /><br />
<!--[endif]--><span data-reactid=".r[26].[1][3][1]{comment10151905543862253_28896267}[0].[0].{right}.[0].{left}.[0].[0].[0][3].[0].{end}[0]{20}[0]"></span><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<b style="background-color: white; color: #4c1130; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Suddenly
this arrangement - cosy for the elite, burdensome for many, and desperate for
the mass at the bottom of the heap - is coming under challenge. For those on the lower rungs this is not
anarchy. It is a revolt against the oppressive regime that prevailed. It is an on-going protest. It may yet fizzle out but that would be the bigger tragedy. </b></div>
JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-16802575242292830012014-01-17T07:17:00.001-08:002014-01-17T07:36:58.698-08:00Suchitra Sen <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span style="color: #4c1130;"><b>Suchitra Sen, 82, died 17 Jan 2013. </b></span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">Remember Aandhi? </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">The 1975 Gulzar movie? </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span style="color: #4c1130;"><b>I had just finished my internship, perhaps a house job or two. I remember the film made an impression on me. It was not the usual boy-meets-girl run-around. It had a grown up theme, love unsanctioned by social mores; separation under societal pressure; a strong woman determined to make her way in a man's dirty world of ruthless politics; no room for personal life, much less for the consummation of love and romance. I thought Sen was a complete and mature actor. Sanjeev Kumar was good but without question she was the star; she stormed Aandhi.</b></span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">Now, when reading about her illness, her stay in a Kolkata hospital's intensive care unit, with the news reporting each development - 'stable but critical' what the hell does that phrase mean? - and amplifying the false hope of a new team of medical experts, I think not like a movie-goer but like a health policy commentator. Was it all necessary? </span><br />
<br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span style="color: #4c1130;"><b>For ultimately she endured the futility of the sort of critical intensive care that old and infirm people with fatal illnesses are subjected to in India especially if they are well off and get into the clutches of private hospitals; doctors scurrying round pretending she would recover and go home; experts called in to advise even more invasive interventions than those that failed. </b></span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #37404e; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span style="color: #20124d;"><b>In Aandhi the film, Aarti, once she had become a successful politician could not embrace the man she had separated from - the man who was the father of her daughter - for fear of public and electoral rejection. In life, Sen could not reject a medical care system that took away her dignity. In death, we can all embrace her memory. </b></span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span style="color: #20124d;"><b><br /></b></span></span>
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span style="color: #20124d;"><b>RIP.</b></span></span></div>
JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-68910172389099044742013-12-27T06:57:00.004-08:002013-12-27T07:11:25.419-08:00Aam Aadmi Arvind Kejriwal<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">In a decade or two from now, if he does not make a serious
mistake, and given a fair wind of good luck,<span style="color: blue;"> <span style="background-color: yellow;"><a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-19796991">Arvind Kejriwal may
well come to be seen as the man who put India on the path to greatness</a>. </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>A year after formally launching his Aam Aadmi Party he has
won an unprecedented victory in the Delhi State Elections. With 28 out of 70
seats he may not have a majority but the upset caused to India’s usual
vote-bank based electoral calculations is justification enough to kindle
genuine expectations ( rather than mere hope) of sustainable change in the
decrepit state of governance in India’s body politic. </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Is it a flash in the pan? Is it just a protest vote? Time
will tell but for now a lot will depend on delivery of electoral promises. No
doubt the mainstream parties will do their best and their worst to discredit an
AAP led Government in Delhi.</span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">If hope is not to be snuffed out even before it has begun
then AAP will have to learn a few simple lessons in the art of survival while
delivering policies based on the simple but intractable idea of good clean
honest and open governance.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>1. Running a government is very different from mounting a
campaign. In a campaign you speak to people who want you to win and as long as
you can attract supporters your job is done. In government you have to deliver,
and if that involves changing the existing system then you’be better take heed
of what Machiaveli said: </b></span><br />
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b><br /></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b><i><span style="color: #990000;">there is nothing more difficult to plan, more doubtful of
success, nor more dangerous to manage than a new system. For the initiator has
the enmity of all who would profit by the preservation of the old institution
and merely lukewarm defenders in those who gain by the new ones. </span></i></b><span style="color: #181818;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #181818;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Delivering policy objectives when
in power means making choices, and there will always be someone who feels hard
done by. Doing the right thing and then explaining to the disgruntled why they
can’t see the benefits is the best you can do.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background: white; color: #181818; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b><span style="color: #660000;">2. It is better to under-promise and over
deliver. Two or 3 years from now it may
well be the case that you’ve delivered 7
out of 10 campaign promises. But if your detractors can argue that the 3 you’ve
failed to deliver are the ones that matter most, then your term in office can
come to be seen as a failure. In the new system of transparency of information
that AAP is promoting there will be no hiding place. So its as well to manage
expectations, even as you prepare to deliver promises.</span></b><span style="color: #181818;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background: white; color: #181818; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white;">3.There is nothing Aam or common
about being in power. It’s a privilege and the office is both high and important. So I don’t understand </span><a href="http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Kejriwal-refuses-to-take-Z-security-cover-from-Delhi-Police/articleshow/27800673.cms"><span style="background-color: yellow; color: blue;">Arvind’s
Kejriwal’s apparent refusal of an official residence, car and security</span><span style="background-color: white;">.</span></a><span style="background-color: white;">
Think ahead, what will happen when the Mayor of Shanghai, say, comes calling on
an official visit. Besides, an emphasis on being a humble commoner can come to
be seen as mere posturing. The office is more than the individual occupying it
and so long as you can keep the two separate its not only okay but even
essential that the symbols of power are wielded to good effect.</span><b style="background-color: white; color: #660000;"> </b><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background: white; color: #181818; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b><span style="background-color: white; color: #660000;">4.
Use the power of the market to deliver your policy promises. This is always better than trying to employ
and directly control the staff you need to deliver services. And spend the time
to develop intelligent solutions that achieve more than one policy objective. A
case in point is electricity tariffs. AAP’s promise </span><a href="http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2013-12-24/news/45540144_1_delhi-discoms-power-tariff-three-discoms"><span style="background-color: yellow; color: blue;">to
cut the electricity tariff by 50% is flawed</span></a><span style="background-color: white; color: #660000;"> because it tries to do what
markets do best. It would have been much better to have promised a policy goal
of ‘affordability’ by the bottom 25% of the population. To achieve this AAP
would not have needed to either blame the distribution companies or do an
expensive audit of their accounts. Simply
make it a condition that the first few
essential units of power must be charged at a price that the bottom 5 or
10% can afford. After that let the market decide the price. By having a graded
tariff that allows companies to charge more from more prolific consumers, AAP
could have at once placated the environment lobby, met its real objective of
making power affordable, and achieved the progressive goal of the rich subsidising
the poor. </span></b><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background: white; color: #181818; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">5. Resist the superficial attractions
of political vendetta. It may be appropriate to try and right past wrongs by
the erstwhile regime, but investigating leaders of the last regime sets the
wrong precedent. Commissions of
enquiries and probes by judges or the CBI have never delivered justice. If anything they lead to litigation,
acrimony and counter accusation and counter probes. The previous regime has
been judged by the electorate and kicked out. That is verdict enough. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Start as you mean to go on and make
a clean break with the past and announce a set of measures to ensure all future
spending decisions are free of the taint of corruption. Publish details of expenditures
incurred and of contracts awarded. Better still insist on all cabinet members
and senior officials declaring their assets to an independent body in advance
of the new government taking charge. It is better to prepare for the next election battle than to refight the last one.<span style="color: #181818;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #660000;"><b>6. Finally, coalition is not a
dirty word. Politics is the art of the possible, and sometimes nothing is
possible without allies. The key is openness and transparency even when deals
are struck that you would rather have done without. It is important for Arvind Kejriwal to keep in mind that the real change he has wrought thus far lies in the hope he has kindled that a better cleaner, more responsive form of politics is possible. To set that hope firmly on the path to realisation he doesn't have to do everything at once. How he governs and the value systems he embeds is every bit as important as the results he achieves on the ground.</b></span></span></span></div>
</div>
JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-15876011196961029012013-12-14T09:29:00.000-08:002013-12-16T07:14:10.614-08:00The criminalisation of homosexuality<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The decision
by the <a href="http://judis.nic.in/supremecourt/imgs1.aspx?filename=41070"><span style="color: #20124d;"><b style="background-color: yellow;">Indian
Supreme Court on 11 Dec 2013</b></span></a><span style="font-size: small;"> to uphold the constitutional validity of Sec
377 of the Indian Penal Code – and thus once again criminalise consensual
homosexual acts - has reopened the
debate</span><span style="color: #20124d;"><u><span style="background-color: yellow;"> </span><a href="http://www.dnaindia.com/mumbai/report-no-going-back-gathering-against-supreme-court-s-verdict-on-section-377-in-mumbai-on-sunday-1935168"><span style="color: #20124d;"><b><span style="background-color: yellow;">in
India</span></b></span></a></u></span><span style="font-size: small;"> and</span><span style="background-color: yellow;"><span style="color: #20124d;"><b> </b></span><span style="color: #20124d;"><a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-25329065"><span style="color: #20124d;"><b>elsewhere</b></span></a>.
</span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>The judgement
overturned a 2009 decision of the Delhi High Court that Sec. 377 of the Indian
Penal Code was discriminatory against the gay community. It was for Parliament
to decide, the country's highest court said, not for judges to make the law. Surprisingly for a Court that has taken an activist position on many other issues, on this question it decided to go conservative. </b><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sec 377 of
the IPC violates an important liberal principle of law making and for that
reason alone it needs urgently to be repealed. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Law making<o:p></o:p></span></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #660000;"><b>We need laws in order to regulate society and the economy. These laws are broadly
of two sorts, they are either restrictive in some way, i.e they proscribe
certain acts and activities that we might want to do; or they place a duty on
us to act in a certain way under a given set of circumstances. All restrictive
laws – don’t drink and drive, don’t assault someone and so on – inherently
interfere with our personal liberties - our freedom to go about our lives as we see fit. Two
essential criteria for a restrictive law therefore are: 1) We must be satisfied
that any personal liberty that it constrains is justified by the protection it
affords to someone else’s rights. As a corollary, no individual liberty should be infringed by a law unless the exercise of that liberty hurts or harms someone else or infringes another's legitimate right. 2) that by making the law and by the process
of implementing it there is not likely to be more harm than good. Personal
prejudice has no place in deciding which laws to enact</b></span>. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Does Sec 377 measure up?<o:p></o:p></span></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sec 377
fails on both counts. It infringes the rights of homosexuals in a dramatic
manner by making it a criminal act to have consensual sex. But
does it meet the first criterion? Does it protect someone else’s rights? Clearly
so long as same sex relationships are both consensual and confined to the
privacy of the bedroom, it is hard to see how anyone’s rights are infringed. Right
wing religious groups that appealed to the Supreme Court would argue that they
are offended by what they regard as unnatural sex. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>This is a
fundamentally flawed argument: there is no such thing as the right not to be offended. So long as the act that offends takes place
in the privacy of someone’s bedroom then any offence taken is entirely in the
mind of those outside it. There is good reason why it would be dangerous to
accept a right not to be offended by someone else’s private behaviour as a
basis of state enforced legislative or executive action. Each of us has his or her
own set of prejudices and while we are free to hold those views we have no
right to impose them on others. If this
principle was held firmly then we wouldn’t have to give in to illiberal demands
to ban books or films just because some group or other decided to take offence
when they had both the choice and the right to ignore whatever it was that so
offended them</b>. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The second
criterion is more nuanced. If there were public benefit or some societal good
to emerge from a law that restricts individual rights and freedoms then there
is an argument to be made for such a law. Legislation aimed at curbing smoking
for example, or a tax that discourages alcohol or fatty food consumption fall
into this category. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #660000; font-weight: bold;">But in the
case of Sec 377, the<u> </u></span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naz_Foundation_v._Govt._of_NCT_of_Delhi"><span style="color: #20124d;"><b style="background-color: yellow;">overwhelming
evidence</b></span></a><span style="color: #660000; font-weight: bold;"> is that a law that criminalises consensual homosexual acts actually
causes a great deal of harm to society as a whole. Across India some 50 million
people will be denied the opportunity to live their lives as they wish. Their
sexual lives will be driven underground. They will have to pretend to be
something they are not, subject to arbitrary persecution and exploitation by the
police, marry against their will an innocent person of the opposite gender
simply to keep up the pretense, and lead a life a fear, denial and despair. </span><o:p></o:p></span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #660000; font-weight: bold;"><br /></span></span></span>
<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And there is a further twist that is peculiar to the Indian context. The fact that our police and criminal justice system are both inept and corrupt, the law is often used to threaten, harass, persecute and exploit the people. Such malafide action is helped by the fact that an allegation of engaging in 'unnatural sexual acts' is difficult to disprove.<span style="color: #660000; font-weight: bold;"> </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #660000;"><b>Simply put
Sec. 377 infringes personal liberties and causes harm to wider society. The activity that Sec 377 proscribes - consensual homosexual acts in no way harms or hurts any third party, not does it impinge upon any right of any other person. Any offense taken by unconnected people is based on a personal prejudice that they should deal with without recourse to the law. Denying freedom to some people because of a baseless prejudice held by a vocal
segment of society is a step nearer to the state pandering to bigotry.</b></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="color: #660000; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>India’s
Parliament should act to free its people from a law that has been overturned in
the country that introduced it 152 years ago when it ruled India as its colony. </b></span><span style="font-size: small;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-91497826065569923592013-06-02T06:55:00.000-07:002013-06-02T06:58:13.788-07:00Growing skills<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="color: #660000;">No close friend or casual acquaintance of mine would describe me as a gardener, never mind a keen one. I like to have a nice tidy garden and am perfectly capable of admiring a beautiful well-stocked garden. But I would rather work extra at what I know I can do reasonably well to earn the money to pay the gardener to do the work. But this year I decided to do something in the line of growing things. Beans, tomatoes, and a few flowers should be within any thinking man's reach, I reckoned.</span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><br /><span style="color: #444444;">Its taught me a few things. Not that I had any illusions, but you feel it more when you've had the personal experience. Its hard work even when the scale of the operation is limited. I can understand the worry farmers must feel when the weather turns. Too cold, too dry, too hot, its all a worry. Nature seldom provides circumstances Goldilocks favoured for her porridge - neither too hot nor too cold. And when it does appear balmy there's usually a catch somewhere</span>. </span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #660000;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I worried about the slugs eating the bean plants (WD40 - a lubricant - works well I was told; I sprayed it liberally; not on the plants, even I know better than that - but on the outside of the containers. I am concerned at the small white spots that have appeared on the young leaves of my two tomato plants. I know nothing about fungal or viral diseases of plants and how to fight them. I'm letting nature take its course. I can afford to since there isn't a lot riding on my success at growing things. I am thankful that I don't have to depend on my farming skills to feed myself. I have renewed respect for farmers and growers everywhere especially in poorer countries with scarce resources, neck deep in debt, everything invested in the crop, no insurance to cover unforeseen events, and all too exposed to the vagaries of nature. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">They may not know it but they must be naturally gifted risk managers.</span></span></div>
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<span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /><span style="color: #444444;">But these plants have come up nicely. </span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRB-tkkkFX-gV6plJpOGOFPT9H6Y3QzCsgO-ltFY31ipeekBqmU6uDE6RYUlNV8IEzxuGeRqDqU4eXa_sVBN6Vqrc8L_11kSHom0EG5tiUwR1HbPofzULbMscHoZfcP6s7oi_VZtOGJvCl/s1600/Jun2013my_flower1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRB-tkkkFX-gV6plJpOGOFPT9H6Y3QzCsgO-ltFY31ipeekBqmU6uDE6RYUlNV8IEzxuGeRqDqU4eXa_sVBN6Vqrc8L_11kSHom0EG5tiUwR1HbPofzULbMscHoZfcP6s7oi_VZtOGJvCl/s200/Jun2013my_flower1.JPG" width="200" /></span></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWhaUbKCMivvbP4Z-jhdt1qkSYEX35CB_tYNhJ5bIncusJOR4pb2cubtfK3F5Nb_sAdhBBIfse3e9JMoIF_TpcRZXqXJjPu5_8QOVp6ofuJZRzTquqznrZqYHa-pcns6Q2Ynb2Di2pVfsA/s1600/My_flower2Jun2013.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWhaUbKCMivvbP4Z-jhdt1qkSYEX35CB_tYNhJ5bIncusJOR4pb2cubtfK3F5Nb_sAdhBBIfse3e9JMoIF_TpcRZXqXJjPu5_8QOVp6ofuJZRzTquqznrZqYHa-pcns6Q2Ynb2Di2pVfsA/s200/My_flower2Jun2013.JPG" width="200" /></span></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmEsSL88L3wGFpiZXxFCVBpZjHlmaldjW-pyN-9yy_KYjgWr68DiIQMfdEikzzjkKPshbfkINqUgJ1nEyYjJ9eEPWtTnA8sDav868OG7S7fazuv7SCMpWIRfw2eUJJZrlSOEWDDF1jReg5/s1600/hangingbasket+2013Jun.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmEsSL88L3wGFpiZXxFCVBpZjHlmaldjW-pyN-9yy_KYjgWr68DiIQMfdEikzzjkKPshbfkINqUgJ1nEyYjJ9eEPWtTnA8sDav868OG7S7fazuv7SCMpWIRfw2eUJJZrlSOEWDDF1jReg5/s200/hangingbasket+2013Jun.JPG" width="200" /></span></a></div>
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<span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I<span style="color: #660000;">'d like to think I can take some credit for them.. at the very least I didn't do them any harm when they were merely bedding plants that I bought in the local market. </span></span></div>
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<span class="text_exposed_show" style="color: #444444; display: inline; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Its like having children - hard work, worry, concern, disappointment when things go wrong but joy when they turn out okay.</span></div>
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JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-32088165744002377142013-04-27T10:58:00.004-07:002013-12-16T07:18:48.031-08:00Quotas and reservations - again<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><a href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=5825093179249046841#editor/target=post;postID=3140435930652036834;onPublishedMenu=overview;onClosedMenu=overview;postNum=21;src=postname" target="_blank">One of my earliest blogs</a> <span style="color: #660000;"><b>was on the subject of reservations and quotas for groups defined in some arbitrary way - colour race or in India's case by caste or the lack of it. </b></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I argued then that any such policy of preferential treatment of people from special interest groups lead to a corrupt regime where establishing entitlement takes precedence over striving for excellence. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21576662-governments-should-be-colour-blind-time-scrap-affirmative-action" target="_blank">In this week's Economist</a> <span style="color: #660000;"><b>the harm done by 'affirmative action' as it is called in America is reviewed once again. Much better put than my own blog post but essentially the same argument. I feel vindicated. </b></span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">But I also know that the political imperative to continue with a system that provides so much opportunity for patronage is not likely to diminish. That India's corrupt and debased system of caste-based reservations does nothing to help those whom it is intended to benefit is not a strong enough argument, so long as there are enough voices to convince the majority of the downtrodden that their turn will come if only they fight for an even bigger quota. The desperate will buy any promise however debased, and the charlatan politician will make any promise howsoever false.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>But that should be no reason for India's reformers and thinkers not to lead a quiet revolution in thinking that accepts the manifest impossibility of guaranteeing jobs and prosperity not by better education, infrastructure, respect for law, and protection of property, but by offering access to a percentage quota of the same grossly inadequate opportunity</b>. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;">To paraphrase the Economist editorial's concluding paragraph:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b>Selection on the basis of caste is neither a fair nor an efficient way of identifying and helping people who suffer social and economic disadvantage. Caste-based reservations replace old injustices with new ones: it divides society rather than unites it; it creates an incentive to establish entitlement rather than to work hard and excel; it blunts enterprise and dulls effort while encouraging complacency. Governments should tackle disadvantage directly, without reference to caste. If a school is bad, fix it. If there are barriers to opportunity, knock them down. And if the sons and daughters of people like the late ex-President KR Narayanan and Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar apply to a university or for a job, judge them on their academic prowess, not their caste.</b></span></div>
JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-74970148586139311592013-03-12T08:31:00.002-07:002013-04-27T11:02:29.085-07:00Be careful what you wish for<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #660000;"><b>In the days following the Delhi gangrape in December last year, a
justifiably outraged public rightly demanded swift action by the police. When
5 men were arrested and charged with the crime there were calls for a swift
trial followed by the death penalty. Some commentators even called for summary
execution.</b></span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Yesterday the news broke that Ram Singh, one of the 5 accused, was found hanging in his Tihar cell. Job done and justice delivered? Or was it
another example of the failings of India's crumbling, corrupt and decrepit
system for administering criminal justice?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #660000;"><b>No one, least of all those who had called for the death penalty, should rejoice at this turn of events. Ram Singh's death in custody is
as much a tragedy for India's justice system as the original crime was a
brutally grim reminder of how we as a society treat our women. Before we
condemn him with loose comments to the effect that he got what was deservedly
coming to him anyway, lets not forget that he was accused of a major and
horrific crime, not yet convicted by a proper court of law after due process.</b></span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This matters to each and every citizen of India. When the police
investigate a crime they often arrest a suspect. Just as any of us could become
the victim of crime so too can any one of us be picked up as a suspect. A
suspect - potentially one of us, remember – has a right to his day in court, to
answer to the charge and to test the prosecution's case that he is guilty.
During the time that the suspect is in custody his - or her - safety and
welfare is the responsibility of the police, the courts and the rest of the
state apparatus that make up the criminal justice system. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #660000;"><b>And when the suspect dies under suspicious circumstances in jail
before his trial has concluded it is not summary justice. It is a tragedy for everyone involved: for the original victim’s family because they have been denied knowing
for certain that the right man has been convicted and punished; for the justice system because it has failed to deliver justice in
an open and transparent way; and it is a tragedy for all of us because our trust and faith in the ability of the police to do
their job properly is eroded.</b></span> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How Ram Singh came to meet his end is now the subject of another
investigation. But the fact of his death under suspicious circumstances when in custody, in theory at least the safest place possible, is unacceptable
and shocking. Any number of possibilities come to mind but it is difficult to believe
that the system that allowed this to happen will be capable of getting to the
truth of what happened in that jail cell. </span></div>
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JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-45619082694736533562013-02-09T03:23:00.003-08:002017-09-01T13:29:23.421-07:00Mr Modi's speech - misleading or harmless embellishment?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I saw and heard Mr Narendra Modi’s 6 Feb speech to students
in New Delhi – it was carried live on all the major news channels and I caught
it in Nagpur. It was widely billed as Mr Modi’s bid to be the BJP’s candidate
for Prime Minister should they win the next general election.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #660000; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>It was an impressive performance: using no notes he held the
attention of his young audience by focusing on his priorities and what he would
offer as a future prime minister. Development and good governance: he had
achieved that in Gujarat, he argued, and could repeat the performance for the country.
Development to him meant progress on 3 fronts, farm productivity and growth, industrial
sector reforms and service sector expansion.
Conscious of his audience he argued persuasively his belief that the
future belonged to the young people of India. (Note 1)</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">He did not once mention Hindutva or the Ram Mandir issue – clever move. Nor of course did he mention Godhra – again good move. Whatever the
rights and wrongs of that sorry episode, it is well behind us and some would argue time
to move on (I disagree but many in India have moved on). </span></div>
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<span style="color: #660000; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>I was getting increasingly convinced that India needed someone
like Mr Modi to provide strong leadership and push hard on development. Until that is, he narrated, towards the end
of his speech, a story that sounded so
positive and so heartening that I decided to look further into it. </b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Some years ago, Mr Modi said, a young man, diffident, a
Canadian of Gujaratai origin, not a gifted communicator, saw him in his office
with a somewhat rambling story of his plans for building a busisness. Mr Modi
soon felt that he was a bit of a time waster and so brought the meeting to a
close by referring him to the District Collector of some part of Gujarat. </span></div>
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<span style="color: #660000; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Some 40 months later ( later on in the story this became a
year later) this young man once again sought an audience with me, said Mr Modi. He almost tried to wriggle out of
another potentially pointless meeting when his PA told him that the young man
wished to invite Mr Modi to an inauguration of a new factory. The young entrepreneur also asked Mr Modi to
reserve a date in his diary for 6 months later when there would be a product
launch – the first output from this factory. </b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">By now of course everyone in the audience was agog to know more about this
young man and his impressive business acumen. Mr Modi never revealed the name
of the entrepreneur but told his audience with all the flourish of a stage performer that the
product of this factory in Gujarat was well known to his student audience –
they were the coaches of the Delhi Metro!</span></div>
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<span style="color: #660000; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Wow! That was some story. It captured at once the industrial
enterprise of Gujarat and the role of young people in economic development. But could it be too good to be true? I decided
to dig around a bit.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">A Google search tells you a great deal of the design and procurement
processes of the Delhi Metro. By and large it is a success story having
delivered the Metro ahead of the planned time table and within budget. The
main factor responsible for this remarkable achievement – esp given that it was
delivered in that cesspit of corruption known as New Delhi – witness the mess
that was the Commonwealth Games of 2010 – was Mr Sreedharan, the boss of Delhi
Metro Rail Corporation. He insisted on and won absolute freedom from political
interference and meddling in the
procurement process. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>The trains were sourced from more than one company. Those that
are manufactured in Gujarat are the MOVIA cars that the Canandian company Bombardier
Transportation was contracted to supply for 3 of the Metro’s Phase II lines. Bombardier set up a dedicated manufacturing facility in Savli, Vadodara
(Note 2) for this purpose. Bombardier
Transportation is of course not new to the rail transportation industry In
India. They have long had a presence in the manufacture of components for India’s
state owned railways. Other companies involved in the Delhi Metro are
Hyundai and Mistubishi for Phase I. The first 60 0f Hyundai’s trains were made
in their Korean plants but all the others are manufactured in BEML’s plant in
Bangalore.</b> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This is quite a different narrative from Mr Modi’s version
of a sole entrepreneur achieving something big. When a big international firm
wins a contract to set up a manufacturing unit for an infrastructure project of
the national profile of a brand new metro system in the nation’s capital, it is
unilkely the charismatic and business friendly chief minister of the state
lucky enough to host the factory will first hear of it through a young, wet-behind-the- ears, entrepreneur. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>So why the needless embellishment
of what would have been a success story even if more simply presented. The narrative that "Gujarat
was chosen as the site for a brand new manufacturing facility to make trains
for the Delhi metro – because we have the skilled manpower and the
infrastructure" - that in itself would have been some story to boast about </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">His speech was not scripted, of course – most Indian politicians
tend to speak extempore without notes, especially when making speeches at mass gatherings. It
could be he got carried away by his own rhetoric – he was after all emphasizing
the role of young entrepreneurs and wanted to use the example of Bombardier’s
investment in Gujarat. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="color: #660000;">I have no doubt that
Mr Modi did not intend to deceive, but in emebellishing a story that needed no spicing
up, he may have fallen prey to a temptation politicians find hard to resist - to
say whatever will please the crowd</span>. </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Notes</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
1. See <a href="http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/slideshows/people/10-punch-lines-from-narendra-modis-speech-at-srcc/slideshow/18370143.cms">http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/slideshows/people/10-punch-lines-from-narendra-modis-speech-at-srcc/slideshow/18370143.cms</a>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
2. See Projects
Monitor Press notice on Nov 17 2008. <a href="http://www.projectsmonitor.com/detailnews.asp?newsid=17375">http://www.projectsmonitor.com/detailnews.asp?newsid=17375</a>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
‘<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Bombardier Transportation India, the domestic
outfit of US-based Bombardier Inc, inaugurated its new railway coach
manufacturing plant on November 12. Located at Savli in Gujarat's Vadodara
district, the plant will be India's first fully foreign-owned railway coach
manufacturing unit.<br />
Initially, the unit will manufacture 340 Movia metro cars for the Delhi Metro
Rail Corporation. The cars, valued at Rs 2,360 crore ($590 million), were order
by DMRC in July last year. The cars will be delivered ahead of the Commonwealth
Games to be held at New Delhi in October 2010. Bombardier also won a follow-up
order in March this year for supplying 84 Movia cars, valued at Rs 548 crore.<br />
Bombardier already has a production site at Vadodara, Gujarat, which has been
in operation since 1996 for the manufacture of a range of converters,
electronic controls for trains, communications for three-phase propulsion
technology, as well as circuit breakers and tap-changers. Bombardier's
signalling office and software development centre are also located at Vadodara,
where it develops software for signalling and traction applications, catering
to the software requirements of Bombardier Transportation worldwide.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">
<span style="font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">For
information on Savli, Vadodara see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savli<o:p></o:p></span></div>
</div>
JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-51818971285235449622013-01-19T09:58:00.001-08:002013-04-27T11:04:41.065-07:00The wrong question <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Public anger following the December 2012 rape, assault and
murder of a young New Delhi woman focused attention on the scale and horror of
violence against women in India. The incident seemed to have awakened a new
struggle for the right of girls and women to be free from the fear of sexual harassment
and violence. The anger, while understandable and perhaps even desirable, must
not however lead to mistaken policies that might do harm without doing anything
for the cause of women’s safety.</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>The Government set up a<u> <a href="http://pib.nic.in/newsite/erelease.aspx?relid=91179">3 member committee
chaired by retired Supreme Court Chief Justice JS Verma</a></u> to consider ‘<i>amendments to the
criminal law so as to provide for quicker trial and enhanced punishment for
criminals, accused of committing sexual assault of extreme nature against women</i>’.</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">That is a pretty narrow remit, and even if a) the committe
comes up with sensible and practicable proposals to change the law; b) the
Goverment agrees and Parliament enacts the necessary legislation, and c) the
new law is implemented, it is unlikely that women will feel safer knowing that
should they be attacked there will be swift punishment for their attacker. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>I think this venture is destined to fail whatever suggestions
Justice Verma comes up with. </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The Committee’s seeks to suggest ‘changes to the criminal
law’ and its target is 'crimes of extreme nature against women’. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>The trouble is not with the law as such but with how the
police deal with and investigate criminal complaints, including allegations of rape
and sexual assault. There’s no point changing the penalty for a crime if the
victim can be dissuaded from making a complaint or withdrawing an allegation.
Criminals are not deterred by the severity of the sentence that awaits them
should they be convicted. If at all they are deterred by the justice system it
is the likelihood of being caught and brought to trial (1). </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">It is hard to see how the police response to crimes against
women can change without a general change in the attitude of the police towards
citizens. There is still a widespread and justified distrust of the police. They
are generally poorly educated, <b><a href="http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/terror-strikes-ill-equipped-corrupt-police-force-india/1/151582.html">badly
trained, inadequately resourced</a>,</b> hardly if at all accountable to the
citizenry, in hock to politicians who in turn regard them as mere extensions of
the party in government, and <a href="http://www.svpnpa.gov.in/html/publications/OldJournals/uploadJournals/2004janjun.pdf"><b>widely
regarded (and with justification) as corrupt</b></a>. And worse they seem to have a
hangover from colonial days of being in some way not the guardians of citizens’
rights and liberties, but their masters (2). </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>The judiciary – with respect to Justice
Verma and his Committee - </b></span><b style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">is little better</b><b style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">. A judiciary that
presides over a criminal justice system that has tolerated - and indeed allowed
- delays of the kind that makes India unique, measured as it is in decades rather than years,
deserves no respect for its professionals standards and ethics. The legal profession is equally complicit in
what Bernard Shaw described as a ‘conspiracy against the laity’. The system appears to exist not to
dispense justice to aggrieved citizens but to exploit people’s ignorance while pretending to serve them.</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Justice Verma and his committee would be better employed
looking at the following questions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>A) How can the police service be reformed to make it responsive
to the needs of citizens, independent of political interference, and
accountable to the public? </b> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">B) How can the justice system and the courts (at all levels
and both criminal and civil) be reformed
to make it efficient, fair, responsive and timely? </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>C) Is it right for us to continue with an </b></span><b style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">adversarial system of
justice inherited from colonial times, with 2 sets of lawyers slugging it out in front of a judge, sitting
without a jury? Is there a case for moving to an <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inquisitorial_system">inquisitorial system</a>
with an independent and well resourced Magistrate Service that receives, records
and registers complaints from the public and where an investigating magistrate directs
the police investigation into (at least to start with, major) crimes? (3) </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">If India aspires to make this an Indian Century then we can
hardly carry on with the present decrepit system collapsing under its own
inefficiencies and corrupt practices. A fast track court for the trial of the
5 accused in the Delhi rape and murder case might well assuage public anger but
what about<b> <a href="http://ncrb.nic.in/">the other 24,206 rapes in 2011</a></b> alone
(page 83, Crime in India 2011, NCRB)? Or the other 256,329 violent crimes (page
50) reported in the same year? </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Here’s my prediction.
The Justice Verma Committee will achieve
little of substance. Let's look back at this in 5 years time and if I am proved
wrong I’ll happily donate INR 20,000 to charity. </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><u>Notes</u></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">1. There’s the additional factor of the balance between what
the criminal has to lose by being caught and punished versus what he stands to
gain from the crime should he escape detection. But that’s a subject for
another essay.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">2. <span style="line-height: 115%;">‘</span><i><span style="line-height: 115%;">A check of the complaints
register at any police station usually reveals hundreds of unregistered cases.
Nobody is punished for such lapses. Law and order gets priority over crime and
corruption thrives. Graft is so endemic to the force and the opportunities for
retail corruption so many, that bribes are paid for recruitment. Three months
ago, the Andhra Pradesh CID arrested five police sub inspectors for using
impersonators to clear their recruitment test. In 2008, nearly 40
sub-inspectors morphed photographs of post-graduate students onto their hall
tickets and paid each student<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></i><span class="rupee"><i><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="outline-style: none;">R<span style="outline-style: none;">s.</span></span></span></i></span><i><span style="line-height: 115%;">4 lakh to write their test.’</span></i><span style="line-height: 115%;"><br />
<br style="outline-style: none;" />
Read more at:<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/terror-strikes-ill-equipped-corrupt-police-force-india/1/151582.html" style="outline-style: none;" target="_blank_"><span style="color: #002f59;"><b><i>http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/terror-strikes-ill-equipped-corrupt-police-force-india/1/151582.html</i></b></span></a></span><span style="line-height: 115%;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">3. ‘<i><span style="background-color: white;">The main feature of the
inquisitorial system in<span class="apple-converted-space"><b> </b></span></span></i><b><i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_justice" style="text-decoration: initial;" title="Criminal justice"><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #0b0080;">criminal
justice</span></a></i><span class="apple-converted-space"><i><span style="background-color: white;"> </span></i></span></b><i><span style="background-color: white;"><b>in France</b> and other countries functioning along
the same lines is the function of the examining or investigating judge (</span>juge d'instruction). The examining judge
conducts investigations into serious crimes or complex enquiries. As members of
the judiciary, s/he is independent and outside the province of the executive
branch, and therefore separate from the Office of Public Prosecutions which is
supervised by the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></i><i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minister_of_Justice_(France)" style="text-decoration: initial;" title="Minister of Justice (France)"><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #0b0080;">Minister of Justice</span></a></i>’<span style="background-color: white;">.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Read more at<b><i><u> <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inquisitorial_system">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inquisitorial_system</a></u></i></b></span></span></div>
JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-19541111208492755382013-01-09T15:13:00.002-08:002013-01-11T00:15:47.926-08:00The silent bystander – why did no one help?<span style="color: #660000; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><b>Among the many question being asked after the horrific and
fatal rape and attack on a young woman and her survivor friend is this – why
did no one help?</b></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Many people have commented on the apparent lack of basic
humanity in urban India. The badly injured and barely clothed victims were not
dumped on some remote isolated spot. They were left on a flyover. Many people
passed by that road and yet, despite pleas for help from the man who survived, no
one stopped. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b><span style="color: #660000;">What has become of us? is the question many have asked</span> <a href="http://jammirao.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/societal-attitudes-need-to-change.html"><span style="color: #20124d;">as
in this blog post.</span></a></b> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Rupa Subramanya, co-author of <b><i>Indianomics – making sense of
modern India</i></b>, provides an <span style="color: #20124d;"><b><a href="http://blogs.wsj.com/indiarealtime/2013/01/05/delhi-rape-why-did-no-one-help/">interesting
take on the question</a>,</b></span> one that most of us will intuitively recognise as, at
least in part, true. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Essentially the argument goes something like this. To step
in and help someone in distress – a Good Samaritan act – is an act of altruism.
Benefits in kind accrue to the Good Samaritan; the gratitude of the person
helped, the innate sense of well-being that comes with having done a good
deed. But that has to be balanced against the costs of intervening. Time,
expense may be and the uncertainty of when the Good Samaritan act can be
regarded as finished, allowing the helper to move on with his own life. </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">In most cases the costs are minimal and most of us would likely help someone in trouble. In the specific case of the New Delhi incident there was
the added complication of the criminal nature of the attack that led directly
to the need for help. Whoever stepped in to help would have had to contend with
the police. And the police in India are known not for their humanity, kindness
and intelligence. On the contrary, they have a justified reputation for venality. (In the movie <i>No one killed Jessica, </i>the investigating poilce officer admits receiving a bribe of 1.5 lakhs just for not beating the suspect during interrogation.) </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>So if you buy this argument, we don’t need to beat ourselves
up over our apparent insensitivity to a fellow human being in distress. People
who do not intervene to help a victim of crime may be acting under the
compulsion that to do anything else would be irrational. </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Despite that we need a huge change of attitude among
ordinary people so that more of them act out their innate altruism. But more
importantly we need an even bigger change in the mindset of petty officialdom
and especially the police – a change that that would lower or hopefully even
eliminate the costs associated with being a good Samaritan. </span></div>
JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-8682748639021349452013-01-05T13:24:00.000-08:002013-01-10T15:13:28.938-08:00Unintended consequences<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<b style="color: #660000;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I have a serious issue with how public anger at recent
events in India is being channelled.</span></b><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Take for instance the demands for a quick and speedy trial
of the 5 men accused of the rape and murder of the 23 year old student whose
tragic case has become the focal point for understandable anger and widespread protests
at women’s lack of security and of freedom from violence and fear. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Calls for a quick trial are understandable but the cause of
natural justice is far more important. Unless we are prepared to live under a
system of rough justice at the hands of a baying mob, we need to tarry a bit
and do it right. If justice for ‘Amanat’ is what we wish to see then we have to
ensure the system is robust enough to deliver it. A quick trial and a speedy
execution may satisfy the immediate demand that ‘something must be done’, but
it will not solve the wider issue of the decrepit state of the criminal justice
system in India. Indeed it would be in the interest of the politicians in
charge to appear to give in to the public demand for quick justice in the hope
that the protests die down and they can get back to ‘business as usual’. </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.firstpost.com/india/who-will-defend-the-delhi-gang-rape-accused-578306.html" target="_blank">The lawyers association in New Delhi</a> has said that none of
their members will represent the 5 accused. Their spokesman told NDTV that this
was their way of showing support for the public anger at what happened. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>But this is unprofessional and unacceptable behaviour. Justice
must not only be done but must also be seen to be done. How do we know that the 5 men currently in
custody are indeed the men who carried out the rape and assault? How can we be
sure that the real culprits have not got away? The police have lots of forensic
evidence we are told but the evidence chain has to be established clearly
before an open court and must stand up to scrutiny and challenge by the defence
team. We are told that the accused men have confessed. That maybe so, but
convicting on the basis of uncorroborated confession is dangerous. How do we
know that in response to public anger, the police picked up 5 men and coerced
or beat them into a confession? A proper
trial may take time but it will be better than a trial that leaves doubt as to
the safety of a conviction. </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The public are angry at the inordinate delays in rape and
other criminal cases, especially where politically powerful men are in the
dock. They may well look upon a lawyer acting for the accused as contributing
to these delays. But consider this: the extraordinary delays that so bedevil
criminal cases in India’s courts have nothing to do with the defence team doing
a proper job, and everything to do with corruption, inadequate training, lack
of resources and poor case management by judges. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>In any case the potential for delay must not be an excuse to
compromise the quality of justice. If speed is all important then why not
dispense with a trial altogether and take the police at their word. They say
they’ve got the men who did it, they have the evidence of guilt, and what’s more
they have a confession. Hang them now and be done with it!</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">But that is precisely a system that corrupt and powerful
people can exploit; they can commit whatever crime they like – and many
powerful people have been accused of rape, let’s not forget - and then fix the system so that some poor
hapless guy takes the rap for it. The perfect crime is not when the criminal avoids
detection but when someone else is convicted.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>And that is precisely why we need a robust system that
allows the defence team to examine and probe the evidence so that there is a much
better chance of not convicting in error. </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">We talk of the accused ‘being on trial’ but in reality it is
the prosecution case that is being tried. Does it stand up to scrutiny? Does
the evidence consistently and beyond reasonable doubt persuade us that the
person accused is indeed guilty? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>To do anything less would be to place too heavy a reliance
on the integrity and intelligence of the police and the criminal justice
system. </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">If we could afford to do that
then we might not be where we are and Amanat might have remained an anonymous
student safely and securely using New Delhi’s buses however late the hour.</span></div>
</div>
JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-14604261930957598682012-12-30T04:08:00.004-08:002013-01-21T07:26:50.223-08:00Amanat's obituary<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Amanat, 23, an ordinary Delhi girl who would ordinarily have
remained unknown beyond her family and friends died on 29 Dec 2012 probably of septicaemia
and multiple organ failure. She underwent major abdominal surgery in New Delhi,
probably a total ileectomy and colectomy, followed by a spell of intensive care before transfer to a tertiary unit for a last
ditch attempt to save her life.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b> In her last
moments she was surrounded by all the high tech gadgetry of a world-class
hospital in Singapore known for its track record in multi-organ transplant
surgery. The hospital itself was surrounded by the usual media pack tracking
and reporting, even sometimes making it up, every heart beat of the girl and
every sob of her family. Back home in Delhi and elsewhere in India the news
coverage of her plight, ever since she was found on a flyover beaten (we now know,
to death) and raped, rose to a new crescendo.</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">In life she was content with the anonymity of an ordinary
citizen. In death her coffin was met at the airport by the country’s prime
minister and the leader of the ruling party. A surreal fame that she did not
seek and could not possibly have desired but a status that the media pinned on
her like a bravery medal on an unwilling conscript. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<b><span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Amanat was of course
not the first victim of violence against women nor sadly will she be the last.
In a country known for its poor record of equal rights for women, why her case
rose to such prominence remains a question that many will ponder and few will
adequately explain. But the fact is she did become a focal point for protests in
New Delhi and across the country. </span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">What would she have wanted to come out of all this? For her
it was a personal tragedy of unimaginable horror, for her family the anguish has
become deeper, for the country this was a crime that aroused a whole generation
of young Indians demanding change. They would all have wanted a safer, fairer
society where such crimes are rare, hopefully even unknown, and where, when they do occur, justice is swift but
fair with regard for the due process of law. And yet the portents are not bright that
meaningful change will emerge. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Her alleged attackers have already been identified, tried
and found guilty by the High Court of Television and Newspaper. Crowds of
protesters were baying for a swift trial followed by capital punishment.
Politicians too weighed in with their own demands for and promises of tougher laws
and fast track courts. (They probably failed to spot the irony that many among
them had more in common with Amanat’s attackers than the girl they appeared
to be mourning). The country is a democracy and people usually get what
they wish for if they ask loudly enough. </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">As a future doctor, Amanat would have recognised that prevention
is better than cure, that prevention is hard work, takes longer, is less immediately gratifying but ultimately more satisfying since it delivers better results than the quick fix of swift and seemingly
decisive action after the event. She of all people would have known this because she
experienced firsthand the ultimate futility of high-tech medicine to fix the frailty of torn intestines
and mangled viscera. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Applying these principles, she would have asked some
searching and uncomfortable questions. Was she just tragically unlucky to have been
in the wrong place at the wrong time to have fallen prey to a gang of psychopaths?
Or was her’s a disturbingly extreme example of what happens when a whole
society tolerates a callous disregard of the rights of women and girls? </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Why is the criminal justice system so inept that cases drag
on for years, decades even? Are our judges trained, fair and impartial? </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Can the police be trusted? Are victims safe from the depredations of policemen drunk with the power they wield over ordinary citizens? Do they have the education, training, and resources to do their job, free of political pressure? And are they accountable
for their own actions and misdeeds? </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Are the politicians up to the job of reform? Can they – will
they- accept that we are nothing if we cannot be a nation of laws?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #660000; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Not until these questions are answered will Amanat rest in
peace. Not until these questions are answered should any politician sleep easy
at night. Not until these questions are answered should the protesters allow those
in power to treat this as an isolated case that would be resolved once the accused
are tried. </b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">That would in all likelihood be Amanat’s prayer. All the
fervent prayers of the protesters who gathered in Jantar Mantar for Amanat to
pull through and survive went unanswered. But Amanat’s prayer need not go
similarly unanswered if only because the answers for once lie in our hands. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #660000;"><b>Amanat (not the young woman's real name), 23, died 29 Dec 2012.</b></span> <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-20765320" target="_blank"><b>The events of the night of 16th december are here</b></a> with <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-20765364" target="_blank"><b>further commentary from Soutik Biswas</b></a></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<br /></div>
</div>
JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-33914806921745293552012-08-05T07:30:00.004-07:002012-08-05T07:30:47.356-07:00The Great Indian Blackout of 2012<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
The <a href="http://www.economist.com/node/21559941">unprecedented
breakdown in the Northern Grid</a> between 30 and 31 July resulted in 600
million people across the north and east of India losing their electricity
supply.<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
No lights, no fans, no air conditioning. Hospitals, trains, businesses,
and schools shut down. Life as many knew it was dislocated.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Those who had them used diesel-powered generator sets. Most
people simply sat it out; after all power cuts happen every day in most cities;
we had regular load-shedding as far back as the mid 70’s; in any case <a href="http://indianhillmediaworks.typepad.com/energy_matters/2010/07/rural-electrification-in-india-an-introduction.html">vast
numbers of poor people</a> in thousands of villages are not connected to the
grid anyway. That this particular power outage affected half the country’s
population at the same time was merely a matter of detail. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Or was it? </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
India’s image was tarnished worldwide. One of the BRIC
economies, a nuclear power, a space exploring and satellite launching nation,
India aspired to a seat on the Security Council and Great Power status. And we
still can’t meet basic needs for electrical energy; forget about the level of
per capita energy consumption of China, never mind Europe or America; a third
of the population don’t have access to electricity even for a light bulb or a socket to charge your mobile
phone reliably. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The blackout itself was not the real surprise. What I found astonishing
and disquieting was the response of Mr Shinde, the Union Minister for Power. On
NDTV his replies to fair and balanced questioning by Barkha Dutt was
breathtaking for its arrogance and disturbing for anyone hoping that this would
be the beginning of the end of India’s power woes.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
No, he did not see
anything odd or surprising in his elevation to the Home Ministry. It was all
planned weeks ago as part of a cabinet reshuffle because of Mr Pranab Mukherjee‘s
election as President of India. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
No, he said, it was not the fault of the Government. It was
because all these states, you see, they were drawing more energy than their
allocated quota. Why? Because, stupid, of the drought and the summer heat. That’s
what caused the the grid to collapse, and then the blackout. Simple, don’t you
see?, it’s all the fault of the weather.
</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And by the way these things happen in America too, he
continued. Remember the New York blackout? It took them 2 days to get power
back on; we did it in under 6 hours! So there, we can do power supply better
than the Americans, no need to beat ourselves up over a minor inconvenience of
a few hours of loss of supply.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There wasn’t one word of acknowledgement that the Government
was accountable for its part in the complex mix of underlying factors that are
responsible for India’s chronic under-investment in power generation and poor
management of distribution. There wasn’t
a whiff of an apology for the mess that is energy policy over which his
Government had presided for the last so many years. There was not the least
semblance of understanding of the changes that needed to be made if things are
to get better. Changes that would
involve tough policy choices: from higher prices for those who can afford to
pay to greater incentives for new producers to make the long term investments
in power generation. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Grid can be patched up and we can all limp along with a
few more hours of load-shedding. But if India is to catch up with the rest of
the world it needs to think seriously about fundamental changes to how we
approach the most important parts of our infrastructure. Keeping the lights on has to be a national
priority.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And yet this may be the cataclysmic event we needed to shake
things up. Things usually have to get pretty bad before everyone agrees that
something dramatic has to be done to make things better. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Take for example, the experience of London. Today it is
glittering in the glow of a successful Olympic games But in the summer of 1858 <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/trail/victorian_britain/social_conditions/victorian_urban_planning_04.shtml">a
great stink</a> arose from the River in London – a stench so strong that London
came to a standstill, Parliament shut down, and the Courts planned to move out
of the City. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
London, famed as the centre of global commerce, came to be
seen as the world’s most filthy city. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But The Great Stench also led to reform. It provided the impetus
to spend 10% of the country’s then GDP to build a massive modern underground sewerage
system that started the great Victorian Sanitary revolution. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The question for India now is this: Will the Great Power
Outage of July 2012 be the impetus for a national energy plan that ensures a
secure energy supply for every Indian? </div>
</div>JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-53056185063832987952012-03-15T09:31:00.002-07:002012-03-17T14:05:11.009-07:00India Travelogue - Nagpur<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br />
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<b><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">Nagpur,
Central India. Some things don’t change.<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">On the
surface a lot has changed in Nagpur since when I was last here as a medical
student living in Gokulpeth, regularly taking the No. 3 bus at 715 every morning from Ramnagar stop to Ajni
via Sitabuldi..<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">The buses
are better, they now have a central wide door and the conductor has an
electronic machine that prints out a ticket. The bus stops, at least in this
part of town, have clear notice boards showing the routes served and the
timings and frequency of buses. Many more cars and motorbikes and scooters on roads
that are no wider than they were 40 years ago. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">The cows and
their place in the road hasn’t changed either. After all this is Gokulpeth. But
somehow they seemed to me to have become even more part of the domestic scene than
all those years ago. They were tolerated then, now they appear to be almost
venerated. They amble along the streets of this locality, seemingly very much
at home; no owner in sight but almost certainly they are well cared for, looked
after and exploited by someone who wouldn’t understand if you tried to explain
that letting them roam free on the public roads was a good example of a
negative externality of the local milk industry. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">On an
early morning stroll I found this cow apparently returning home after a night out
and looking suitably contrite after being put in its place by the owner refusing to get out of bed to let it in. I stood and watched to see what would happen, but the cow had infinitely more
patience than I did and so i moved on. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjK-sdw4Iymhhw3hvLaqcAwfW2NPuoGUhnRot2-u_9DzXy4-5vZsf4JXGBwTINkomf8eJqJq8QDZPss8dJEcnGREJE8qUOdRrCgeUkQsHWdZXUGkdRL1IzJ9vEGLAY2zmZDrwy5J5QxhxCF/s1600/P1020318.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjK-sdw4Iymhhw3hvLaqcAwfW2NPuoGUhnRot2-u_9DzXy4-5vZsf4JXGBwTINkomf8eJqJq8QDZPss8dJEcnGREJE8qUOdRrCgeUkQsHWdZXUGkdRL1IzJ9vEGLAY2zmZDrwy5J5QxhxCF/s320/P1020318.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">Of course
cows have a special place in India, but in Nagpur they are more than just holy
animals. This is the home of the RSS,
for whom the cow is not just a spiritual symbol but also a source of potential
scientific breakthroughs in every conceivable field. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">Nagpur is home also to the politically opposite end of the Hindu spectrum. If the RSS is
the last political defender of Hindu belief, then a visit to Deeksha Bhoomi in
Ramdaspeth, some 3 Km away, brings you face to face with the counterargument.
On this ground, almost 6 decades ago, BR Ambedkar, one of the principal authors
of the Indian Constitution, forswore Hinduism and became a Buddhist. He also
administered the same 22 vows to a large number of <i>Dalits</i> who followed
him to give up their Hindu religion and embrace Buddhism. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">At one
level the vows are a direct assault on the basic tenets of Hindu belief, and
even more directly on Brahminical rituals and practices. Say similar things
about some other religions and you could be in serious trouble! Its a tribute to India's pluralist democratic tradition that Ambedkar is remembered as a national hero. Pity the Government cannot extend the same protection to Rushdie or MF Husain when he was still alive. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">Brahma,
Vishnu and Shiva are not Gods and I will not worship them.</span></i><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<i><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">There are
no gods and goddesses</span></i><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">I will
not take part in any ritual performed by a Brahmin.</span></i><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">I will
not perform annual shraddha ceremonies (for departed elders)</span></i><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">There are
also other vows along the lines of the Ten Commandments, but these, I suspect,
are observed more in the breach than in the strict practice. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">Deeksha
Bhoomi today is a spartan, minimalist monument that is said to attract
Buddhists from around the world but more to the point it serves as a focal
point for the political activism of people from India’s backward castes. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">These
castes are listed and defined in one of the Schedules of the Indian
Constitution (hence Scheduled Castes). Now the Government wants to set up a
database of different castes and communities. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">For the
downtrodden of India, Deeksha Bhoomi has the same power as the ML King Memorial
in Atlanta has for its blacks. I’ve visited both and the symbolism of struggle,
survival and emancipation makes your hair tingle<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">For these
people, BR Ambedkar is a God; his framed and garlanded picture, lit up by oil
lamps and sanctified with incense, adorns many homes. How ironical that having
vowed not to worship Vishnu or Shiva or Brahma, they’ve taken to the worship of
Ambedkar. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">Maybe the
human urge to recognise a God is stronger than Richard Dawkins thinks. Or may
be Ambedkar should have made room for one more vow. Or just maybe the people
Ambedkar tried to help find themselves, despite, or perhaps because of, the
policy of reservations, in much the same plight as before Ambedkar; and so they
still feel the need divine help. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
</div>JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-64038144953349518302012-03-14T14:39:00.002-07:002012-03-17T14:13:18.884-07:00India travelogue - No country for old men<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">Day 3 in
Cyberabad</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">Went to
Ramoji film city yesterday. Got a bit late getting ready in the morning and missed the 0825 bus from Paryatak Bhavan in Greenlands and so we had to
take a Meru Cab all the way. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">It turned out to be a long drive through Begumpet and Secunderabad to exit the city on the Vijaywada highway. Passed familiar parts of the city: Sangeet cinema
where V and I would often go to see a movie when we lived here some 30
years ago; Tarnaka and National
Institute of Nutrition, and Habshiguda where we lived after getting married. Uppal was the outer limit of the twin cities when I knew it. Beyond that its all new to me. What used to be a road going through empty farm land is now a bustling 4 lane road with shops, malls, a Big Bazaar and restaurants and hotels on
both sides. And granite/marble outlets. I come to the conclusion that just like cranes
dotting a city skyline are indicative of a buidling boom in progress, in India,
the number of outlets dealing in marble or granite gives the best measure of
building activity. Counted at least 50 of them before reaching Hayathnagar. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">Ramoji
Film city is a marvel in its own right; its a theme park, film production
facility and tourist attraction all in one 2000 acre campus. Its quite a
remarkable achievement of one man's vision. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">A large
party of girls from St Ann's school in Bolarum, assorted tourist groups from
all parts of India and families of various sizes. For a working day, it was
good to see so many people out to enjoy themselves and yet the facilities and the infrastructure
handled it all easily. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">The
entertainment was pretty good too. A delay in the start of one of the shows
gave the audience, including the St Ann's contingent, the opportunity to provide
their own entertainment in the form of impromptu dancing to whatever bollywood
song was on the PA system. A semi-competitive spirit seemed spontaneously to emerge with groups in different parts of the huge auditorium trying to
outdo each other.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">It dawned
on me that the vast majority of the audience were under 25. Suddenly I realised
first hand the implications of what is a well known demographic statistic; this
is a young country with the proportion of under 25s set to rise even further. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">No
country for old men or women, India. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">Its the
young you see everywhere, they supply the services and the labour and also
consume the product or the service. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">Back home
after a long day I check with the railway reservation website (IRCTC.co.in) to discover that
we are still on the waiting list for the journey to Nagpur. No option but to
try and book tatkal (Emergency) tickets. These special tickets are open for
booking a day before the journey but demand is high and only the first few in
the queue have any chance of getting it. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">So off I
go to Khairatabad station at 7.15. The
counter opens at 8.00 but the queue had already built up with 20 or so people
ahead of me already. Doesn't look hopeful. At 7.30 I learn from others in the
queue that you need a photocopy of your photo-id to apply for a tatkal ticket. I
remember reading something about this but assumed you needed to produce a photo id and so I was
carrying my PAN card, but a photocopy? That’s a bit much; what do they want to
do with it? Frame it? </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">But I’m
told it is a must, without it my application for tatkal tickets won't even be
considered. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">My situation looks increasingly hopeless. I went
off in search of a xerox shop - at 7.45 am nothing is open except tea stalls
and petrol stations. One stationery shop
with a photocopying machine is just about opening but No, he isn’t really open
until 8.30; the lad who operates the photocopier doesn’t come in till then.
Cant I operate the machine? I ask. He is aghast at the suggestion; No way he says. The guy is clearly getting annoyed at my inexplicable persistence, so I give up.. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">Then I notice that the
Khairatabad branch of ICICI Bank is just about opening but the armed guard
shuts the door after letting in a pair of staff members and takes his place in a plastic chair by the door, rifle by his side. I decide to try my luck. They are just opening
up the branch he tells me, the bank itself is open for business only at 8. That's too late for me, so I plead my case for special treatment. Finally I
manage to sweet talk him to helping me ('I am an ICICI bank
customer with xx lakhs on deposit, a photocopy isn’t asking much'). He must be
the first Indian official not to be a job's worth. He agrees to do it himslef, goes back inside, locks the door and goes away with my PAN Card, and returns a few minutes later with the all important photocopy. Quite remarkable I thought
to myself even as I invoke god's blessings on him and his kids. He smiles and
waves away my gratitude, addressing me as uncle-ji - Ive made his day and
learned that there may still be a place for old-ish looking men in this
country.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">I may have
been pleased with my success of getting a photocopy of a document at 7.50 am but Indian Railways
proves altogether more intractable. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">My place
in the queue has been maintained by friendly fellow sufferers who are pleasantly surprised at my triumphant return with the necessary photocopy just as the counter was opening. They agree the
pointlessness of the photocopy-of-id requirement but philosophically shrug
their shoulders in a gesture that indicates the futility of arguing with it. By
the time my turn comes up at the counter, all that is left is a position on the
waiting list even in the tatkal quota. That's of little use to me, so I turn
down the offer and walk away with a photocopy (of my PAN card) that I did not want and without the tatkal tickets that I did want. You win some, you loose more. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">I cross
the road back onto Rajbhavan Road towards home taking advantage of a lull in
traffic at the lights that I thought was good driving behaviour. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">No such
thing. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">All the
traffic on Khairatabad cross roads had been held up to allow a motorcade of
important looking cars to sweep down Banjara Hills into Raj Bhavan Road. A Merc with darkened windows, police jeeps with
sirens going in the anemic way only Indian police cars do, and a couple of
white Ambassadors with guys in impressive military uniforms. No autos in sight
but manage to hop into a bus with a couple of seats spare! </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">Back home
I decide to solve the problem of how to travel to Nagpur by throwing money at it.
I went on the net, logged into MakeMyTrip.com
and within minutes I had booked flights
to Nagpur on Sunday. We'll get there 4 hours later than we would have by train.
It took me longer to learn that buying emergency quota rail tickets is not
straightforward, while booking a flight, provided you have the means to pay, is
relatively simple. Let's not even consider the carbon factor, after flights
from and back to England are taken into account, this is a relatively small
extra puff. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></div>
</div>JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-44251165938029029432012-03-14T14:11:00.002-07:002012-03-17T14:12:50.674-07:00India Travelogue - cell phones and confectionery<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">Day 2 in Cyberabad</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;"> I am
distraught that we don’t have a cell phone connection in India. I thought we
had one but Idea Cellular disconnected us since we had not used it in 3 months!
</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">I know
its not vitally necessary but in India,
not having a cell phone means belonging to the 48% of the population who don’t.
Its the fastest growing cell phone market in the world, and with the keenest
pricing too. But today after two trips
to the Vodafone shop in Smajiguda I succeed in getting one. Its no mean
achievement! </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">Its all
to do with the rules laid down by the Government. No one can get a cell phone
connection - at least not legally - until he can establish his identity and an
address. So far so straightforward. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">But the
way the rule is interpreted makes it almost pointless. I produce my UK passport
but it does not have an address in it so it is deemed less than useful. Apparently
an Indian passport does show your address though so far as I know it is not
illegal to hold a passport with an outdated address on it. I also produce a Hyderabad
Municipal Corporation tax bill in my name and showing my local address but that
is rejected - it has to be an electricity bill. Why? Who made up this rule? The fact that this latter piece of paper shows
my address but not my name is okay apparently. Luckily my OCI card saves the day - not only
is it issued by the Govt of India but it also shows an address - never mind
that its a UK address. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">But I
also need a passport photo. That's easy. I have my laptop and my entire photo
collection so I find an official photograph of myself, put it on a memory stick
and take it to a photolab just down the
road from the Vodafone shop. The guy reads it into Photoshop and with a series
of speedy mouseclicks and key strokes crops it, resizes the cropped version,
adjusts the color balance and prints off 6 passpost size photos. This guy knows
Photoshop like a violin maestro knows his strings. 40 Rupees he charges me. You
couldnt get this service in Jessops in Birminham. He might do 4 passport photos
but a) he'll have to take it himself, b) it would cost 5 pounds.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">A little
more form filling and signatures and I acquire a Vodafone sim card for 42
Rupees with 28 rupees talk time on it. Some
victory. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">The
question I am left with is how on earth do poor, ill-educated folk cope
with all this bureaucracy. Clearly they must be managing somehow if you believe
the figure of 600 million cell phone connections in India with 2 million
being added every month. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">In the
evening V and I venture out on the roads again</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">First
stop the Titan watch showroom to see if they can fix V's watch strap which got
damaged when she fell and hit the watch against the bedstead. Easy, of course
they could; the clasp needed bending into shape and a woman in overalls who was
obviously the chief repair technician took a small hammer to it, before handing
it back to V with a smile and a flourish. Oops, too tight, once you fastened the
clasp it wouldn’t open. No problem. A
few more sharp taps of said hammer this time with a chisel between hammer and
watch sorted the problem. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">No
charge; its a free service. Really! Titan Watches had acquired one satisfied
(potential) customer.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">On then
to G Pulla Reddy Sweets in Greenlands. But that involves crossing 2 roads. The
traffic is never ending and no one really stops at the pedestrian crossing. Looks daunting and almost impossible but there
had to be a technique. You need to put yourself in the same frame of mind as a
buffalo that slowly ambles across the road in a vaguely diagonal direction,
looking guardedly but defiantly and without blinking, straight into the
eyeballs of drivers of vehicles potentially capable of major damage should you
happen to collide with them. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">G Pulla
Reddy is unlike any other shop in Hyderabad. It has the air of old world charm
and quality about it, an ambience that projects service and style. The range of
products is almost the same as when I first came across their Nampally Station
Road branch in 1980. The large shop floor is deliberately kept spare and
empty. A glass enclosed counter runs along just one wall behind which attentive
shop assistants assign themselves to each customer by an unwritten system that
involves catching the eye of the sales assistant. As you make your choice the sales
girl collects your purchases for you, totals up your bill and accompanies you
to the counter to pay and collect your bag of delicacies. Its a kind of old
world personalised service you might find in the finest delicatessen. Its all
very quiet and unhurried, feeling refined and unpressured.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">What a
contrast - buying a cell phone connection and buying sweets from G Pulla Reddy.
Not quite a clash of cultures but I'm glad they've kept up their practice of
selling the finest sweets with their distinctive style of customer service. </span></div>
</div>JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-5154235448324276822012-03-14T13:50:00.001-07:002012-03-17T14:10:46.895-07:00India Travelogue - surviving a long haul flight<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Feb – March 2012. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
V and I recently went back home to India for a short break.
No particular purpose such as a family wedding or event – though as it happens
we did turn up for a wedding in Chennai – just to visit family, laze about and yes visit a place we’d always
heard about and have always talked about but never visited before -God’s Own
Country. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Day 1.</b> </div>
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I don’t usually enjoy long haul flights; the stress, the
claustrophobic feeling and the sleeplessness giving me a migraine more often
than not. But I think I’ve finally discovered the secret to emerging at the
other end in good spirits. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Here’s my tip: don’t look at the watch and keep asking: are
we nearly there yet? Instead immerse yourself in carefully selected films and
you'll find yourself saying 'are we there already' when they come to collect
your head sets just as you're about to discover how it all ends. <br />
<br />
Applying this rule I selected the following films to watch when i checked
in on line.</div>
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1. Margin Call. Its
about the experiences of the traders in a big bank and how they experience the
financial meltdown of 2007. Jeremy Irons was great when he says to the young
guy with a PhD in particle physics – Hey kid, explain this to me in English, and
like I am a 5-year old.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
2. Aarakshan - Caste is a dangerous subject to explore in
public in India and no wonder this film got banned in some states where caste has
the same implications as race or color has in some parts of the world. But it
turned out to be a good film; a social commentary on all that is wrong with an
education system that is all about commercial opportunity, and where learning
has been sacrificed in favour of a race towards exam grades. The poor kids who
are caught up in the mad world of the Indian educational system seem to fall
into two camps: those no one cares about – whether they turn up at all, and if
they do whether they learn anything useful; and those who are constantly under
pressure to achieve higher and higher grades. Both groups sacrifice their
childhood, the former as a result of neglect, and the latter, paradoxically, of
too much attention, all of it on the wrong outcome. </div>
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3. And a chance find:
'The Sound of Mumbai' a 70 minute long docudrama about kids from Mumbai’s slums
training for a choir performance in the city’s National Centre for Performing
Arts of the songs from The Sound of Music. Uplifting yet depressing but
altogether unmissable. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
11 year old Ashish from the slums gets to perform a small solo piece
and takes up the challenge at some personal cost. The contrast between his life
in the slum and that of a 10 year old parsi girl in her middle class apartment
is stark. It’s probably true of
any city in the world that 10 and 11 year old kids a few miles apart can have very different lives,
but in Mumbai they might as well be living in separate worlds of hope and
expectation while sharing the same if unequally realisable dreams. I’d give it 5 stars, <a href="http://www.thesoundofmumbai.org/">Catch it here on the net</a> if you can,
or <a href="http://www.amazon.com/NEW-Sound-Of-Mumbai-DVD/dp/B004KVXC5U">get
the DVD</a></div>
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</div>
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<b>Hyderabad, Rajiv Gandhi International Airport.</b> </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A gleaming marvel of architectural class and technological
efficiency, set in arid fields 30 miles south of the city, like an oasis with broadband and air conditioning in a
dusty desert of settlements without sewerage or piped water. Pity they didn’t think to connect it to the city with a rail or
metro link yet. Instead they built an 18 kilometer long elevated expressway
that has the remarkable feature that you can only go from one end to the other;
there are no entry and exit points en route. The road goes through villages that
were always there and townships that have sprung up since the airport opened a
few years ago. But all the development and economic opportunity seems to be
only at either end of the expressway, not along it. Lopsided priorities but that’s what you get
when the decision makers think of the needs only of the class they represent. After all the expressway allows the denizens of Banjara Hills and HiTech city to get to the airport without the inconvenience of negotiating the <i>bastis </i>beneath it.</div>
</div>JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-68571979649520397432012-01-21T04:44:00.000-08:002012-01-21T04:44:08.514-08:00Welcome to general practice 2012<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br />
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 5px; text-align: center;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: small;">At McDonald’s they say, ‘Hi, can I help you please?’ The smile may be trained but its not hostile. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: small;">At airline check-in desks they’re usually polite even if they don’t look overjoyed to see you. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Even Royal Mail post offices have sharpened up their act. When its your turn at the counter they smile and then, after dealing with you they try and sell you their latest credit card deal.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: small;">None of these service outlets is ever as unremittingly unwelcoming as a GP’s surgery. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: small;">The receptionist looks positively displeased to see you. You’re lucky if they merely glum, sometimes they can be grim indeed. The doctor or nurse are fine; they welcome you, smile and are polite. Its the general get up of the waiting area that I am complaining about.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: small;">The place is permeated by a culture of sullen tolerance, a forbidding lack of those finer elements of human exchange that is the stuff of a warm welcoming reception when a customer enters a shop.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Take the reception / waiting area, for instance. It is full of stern sounding admonitions. The gentler ones tell you things they've decided you need to know but in a tone that says ‘ accept this or else’; the more forbidding ones are positively finger- wagging. They threaten consequences for acts you might never commit, but are assumed perfectly capable of contemplating.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Like this one.</span></div>
<div align="center" style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10pt; margin-left: 77.95pt; margin-right: 139.5pt; margin-top: 0cm; text-align: center;">
<u><span style="background-color: #d9ead3; color: #20124d; font-size: small;"><b>Blood tests</b></span></u></div>
<div align="center" style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10pt; margin-left: 77.95pt; margin-right: 139.5pt; margin-top: 0cm; text-align: center;">
<span style="background-color: #d9ead3; color: #20124d; font-size: small;"><b>If you have been told to come fasted for a blood test but have not fasted then your test will be cancelled and you will have to make another appointment.</b></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Or this one (its still up in my GP's clinic - years after the scare was over)</span></div>
<div align="center" style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10pt; margin-left: 78pt; margin-right: 160.7pt; margin-top: 0cm; text-align: center;">
<u><span style="background-color: #f4cccc; color: #20124d; font-size: small;"><b>Important notice about swine flu</b></span></u></div>
<div align="center" style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10pt; margin-left: 78pt; margin-right: 160.7pt; margin-top: 0cm; text-align: center;">
<span style="background-color: #f4cccc; color: #20124d; font-size: small;"><b>If you think you have swine flu then you must not come to the surgery. Telephone the help line for advice on how you can treat yourself with simple remedies. Think about staff and other patients.</b></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-right: 160.7pt; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: small;">This one is plainly intended to put you in your place</span></div>
<div align="center" style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10pt; margin-left: 3cm; margin-right: 146.5pt; margin-top: 0cm; text-align: center;">
<u><span style="background-color: #fce5cd; color: #0c343d; font-size: small;"><b>Mobile phone use</b></span></u></div>
<div align="center" style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10pt; margin-left: 3cm; margin-right: 146.5pt; margin-top: 0cm; text-align: center;">
<span style="background-color: #fce5cd; color: #0c343d; font-size: small;"><b>Don’t use your mobile phone in the surgery. If your mobile phone goes off you will be asked to leave the surgery and take the call outside.</b></span></div>
<div align="center" style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10pt; margin-left: 3cm; margin-right: 146.5pt; margin-top: 0cm; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: small;">I can quite see the staff enforcing this rule with particular vigour when it is wet and cold outside. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Even minor transgressions are not tolerated. This notice has no understanding of the legal concept of proportional response or of reciprocal rights.</span></div>
<div align="center" style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10pt; margin-left: 3cm; margin-right: 160.7pt; margin-top: 0cm; text-align: center;">
<span style="background-color: #fce5cd; color: #20124d; font-size: small;"><b>If you are more than 2 minutes late for an appointment then there will not be time for the doctor or nurse to complete the consultation. Your appointment will be cancelled and you will have to make another one</b></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: small;">And just as the needless unfairness of it all gets to your blood pressure and you start tspoiling for a fight, you see this little notice that tells you how not to respond:</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10pt; margin-left: 121.05pt; margin-right: 146.5pt; margin-top: 0cm; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="background-color: #cccccc; color: #660000;"><b>Our staff have the right to work in a safe environment. Aggressive behaviour towards staff will not be tolerated and may even be prosecuted</b></span>.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: small;">Why isn’t there one simple sign that said, even if it was not sincerely meant, that said</span></div>
<div align="center" style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10pt; margin-left: 99.25pt; margin-right: 160.7pt; margin-top: 0cm; text-align: center;">
<u><span style="line-height: 14px;"><span style="color: blue; font-size: medium;"><b>Welcome</b></span></span></u></div>
<div align="center" style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10pt; margin-left: 99.25pt; margin-right: 160.7pt; margin-top: 0cm; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #0c343d;"><b>to our surgery. We’re sorry that you’re not feeling well or in need our medical services. We can’t promise an instant cure but we’re glad to serve, and with your co-operation, we’ll do our best to solve your problem</b></span>.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: small;">General practices claim to be businesses but that seems to apply only to their billing procedures. When it comes to culture and attitudes towards us - their ‘customers’ - they behave like the worst of Soviet-era state run bureaucracies.</span> </div>
</div>JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-25379619744750162152011-11-30T01:34:00.001-08:002011-11-30T02:14:55.954-08:00For the want of a ruddy shoe<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br />
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Tomorrow I shall be turning up for a hospital out-patient appointment with a Consultant Orthopaedic Surgeon. I don’t particularly want to, but I have no choice.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: 16px;">Why do I not want to go? Quite simply because its a waste of my time and more importantly a waste of the surgeon’s time and a waste of NHS resources.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: 16px;">Why do I have no choice, but to go? Because the bloody stupid system says I have to.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: 16px;">You see, I need supportive shoes for my foot deformity –childhood poliomyelitis but that’s a long story. The upshot is I have a limp and without strong supportive footwear to correct the </span><i style="font-size: 16px;">talipes equino-varus</i><span style="font-size: 16px;"> of my right foot, I am unstable and can slip and fall - as indeed I have, many a time.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: 16px;">Many years ago I saw an orthopaedic surgeon who tried half-heartedly to offer me corrective surgery. Risky venture I thought to myself. The trade-off for me was between my present state (pain free, but with a slight limp that is hardly noticeable with the correct footwear) and the risk of surgery going wrong with the possibility of some but by no means guaranteed improvement in the stability of my right foot. I</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: 16px;">No, thanks, I decided, opting instead for corrective footwear. So off I went to a very nice orthotics expert and over the years I have been one of their more satisfied customers, turning up every autumn to ask for a new pair of shoes made to my measurements with the right shape and support for my right foot. </span><span style="font-size: 16px;"> </span><span style="font-size: 16px;">They offer to make me 2 pairs but each time I decline, on the basis that I can only wear one pair at any time, but to be honest feeling somewhat guilty that I am getting a free pair of shoes.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: 16px;">Fast forward then to Oct 2011, Andrew Lansley in charge, Health and social care bill going through Parliament, 20 billion to be saved. I ring up the orthotics dept. ‘Please can you order me a new pair of shoes; my present pair is getting worn and losing its grip, I am sure you have all my details with the measurements and the correction needed.’</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: 16px;">‘Ah yes indeed we have your details but things have changed, we can’t order </span><span style="font-size: 16px;"> </span><span style="font-size: 16px;">a repeat pair without a new referral from the oprthopaedic surgeon’, says the nice orthotics dept receptionist. The system had changed, someone in management decided that people were turning up with alleged deformities and getting shoes made for free without clinical need. After all some deformities do get better with a couple of aspirins. Maybe the human foot has acquired the organic ability </span><span style="font-size: 16px;"> </span><span style="font-size: 16px;">to grow back into the normal shape.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: 16px;">Anyway, there was no point arguing, it wasn’t her fault, she was just doing as she was told.</span><span style="font-size: 16px;"> </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: 16px;">I rang the Orthopaedic secretary, repeated my story to her. She was really sorry, she understood the situation, she said, but (sounded ominous that 'but') she was equally helpless; the orthopaedic surgeon was not allowed to refer to orthotics without assessing the patient, and she couldn’t make an appointment for me to see the surgeon without a fresh referral from the GP. In fact they could only make so many follow up appointments before needing a fresh referral.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: 16px;">Again no point arguing, it was the system you see. You can argue with an unreasonable person, you can even reason with an argumentative person, but there is only one thing you can do with a stupid unreasonable obstinate system. Give in and go along with it.</span></div>
<div style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: 16px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white;">So I sent an email to my GP; you see ever since I wrote an</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; color: yellow;"> </span><a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2541748/pdf/bmj00469-0009.pdf" rel="nofollow" style="text-decoration: none;" target="_blank"><span style="background-color: white; color: red;">editorial in the BMJ about telephone follow up</span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white;">, I have been a fan of e-comunication if it saves the time of busy professionals.</span></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: 16px;">My GP, being an independent contractor and basically a sensible chap able to decide how he works, was not under an obligation to a silly system. He could so easily have said that he could not make a referral without seeing me and my allegedly deformed foot. No, being a sensible chap, he referred me to the Consultant Orthopaedic Surgeon.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: 16px;">And so that’s how I am reluctantly turning up to clinic tomorrow. I have no doubt we’ll have the same conversation as we had all those years ago (its not the same surgeon you see, so I'll have to repeat my story), we’ll come to the same conclusion (its the same foot, the same deformity, the same disability and so I can’t see how we can reach a different conclusion, unless the clever lab boffins have found a way of growing a whole foot from a toenail); I’ll be sent off to the orthotist who will finally order a corrective shoe for me.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: 16px;">Meanwhile I shall be off with my old pair to Timpson’s in the High Street and explain to the friendly fellow there why I want him to put a double thickness sole on the right boot but only a single thickness sole on the left shoe. That should last me for a few months.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-top: 5px;">
<span style="font-size: 16px;"><b>Saving costs is an expensive business. </b></span></div>
</div>JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-37837486034020492522011-11-20T13:51:00.001-08:002013-01-11T00:19:31.719-08:00Gifts<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
I have just come back from a visit to my local town centre;
depressing and enjoyable in equal measure. Enjoyable because it was a bright, if somewhat
cold, and it felt good to be among people busy with the routine excitement of a
Saturday outing. Depressing because of
the forced jollity of the seasonal decorations that far from being a reason for
good cheer somehow seemed to remind you that we needed it if only to counter a
general mood of economic malaise. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so to shopping – not for the essentials but for those
other things that allegedly brighten the day – gifts. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Conventional wisdom has it that gifts are a wonderful thing.
The recipient and the giver are both blessed, or so it is often believed. And buying
gifts definitely benefits the retail sector and therefore the economy. (Though as far as the economy
goes, what’s important is that people spend their money on buying things. The
giving of whatever has been bought as a gift is not necessary for any economic stimulus
– unless it is a battery operated thingy, in which case it is good for the
battery trade.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But conventional wisdom is subject to the corrosive effect
of convention. Routine and custom gives
rise to perfunctory duty rather than joyous spontaneity in much the same way
that familiarity breeds contempt. Expectation
of a gift leaves the recipient vindicated rather than fulfilled if the gift
materialises at all and disappointed if it does not. A sense of obligation to give converts what
might have been a voluntary and joyous act into a reluctantly discharged duty.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In <i>A Thousand Splendid
Suns</i> Khalid Hosseini describes the gifts that Jalil makes to his
illegitimate daughter as ‘<i>half-hearted
tokens of penance, insincere, corrupt gestures meant more for his own
appeasement than hers..</i>’; ouch!</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
With marriages, anniversaries, birthdays, Divali, and now
Christmas, not to mention special days like father’s day, mothers day and the
soon –to-come new year’s day presenting not-to-be-missed opportunities for
giving and receiving , the potential for trouble is immense. The appropriate
gift must be chosen, bought, packaged and presented with the right element of generosity. The recipient has to show the
right degree of surprised pleasure taking great care to hide any disappointment
at the choice of gift. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Altogether too many opportunities for getting things
wrong with serious consequences for </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
social and family relationships.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A few of us discussed this over dinner one day and came up
with a set of Rules of Gifts (based loosely on Isaac Asimov’s rules of robotics).
I propose that universal acceptance of these rules will promote harmony, reduce conflict and
enhance relationships.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Rule 1. The potential Giver has the right but not the obligation to make a gift.<br />
Rule 2. Once a Gift has been given, the Recipient has sole
rights over its fate.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Rule 3. The Receiver has a duty to accept the gift in the
spirit in which it is given but has no further obligation to the Giver.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Rule 4. All other parties are irrelevant to the transfer of
the gift from the giver to the receiver.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And that is my gift to the thorny problem of gift-giving. </div>
</div>
JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-79830883156402032742011-10-13T10:01:00.001-07:002012-03-14T13:54:51.049-07:00The liberty that we take for granted<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
While researching something completely unconnected to this topic I came across these fascinating quotes from James Madison. He was the 4th US President, but it's not for his presidency he is best remembered, but rather for his work and contribution to the US Constitution.<br />
<br />
Among the many volumes he wrote about liberty, the role and place of the State and the responsibilities of the people are these gems.<br />
<br />
"I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachment by those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations."<br />
<br />
and then this masterpiece;<br />
<br />
"It is a universal truth that the loss of liberty at home is to be charged to the provisions against danger, real or pretended, from abroad"<br />
<br />
and further;<br />
<br />
"If tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy."<br />
<br />
<br />
Could Madison have been thinking of 9/11 and the infamous Patriot Act?<br />
<br />
A.C. Grayling presents a tremendously powerful defence of liberty in his book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Liberty-Age-Terror-C-Grayling/dp/1408802422" target="_blank"><i>Liberty in the age of terror</i></a> <br />
<br />
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<br />
<br /></div>JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5825093179249046841.post-38341797673780137622011-09-11T11:03:00.000-07:002011-09-11T15:09:06.556-07:009/11 Ten years on<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">I haven't blogged for some time now.<br />
<br />
It's the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the other two terrorist attacks on US targets.<br />
<br />
The TV coverage is extensive, sombre and occasionally reflective, but for the most part it makes painful harrowing viewing. It was a dramatic, deliberate and deadly attack, so utterly successful in meeting its malign objective of spreading fear and provoking a response.<br />
<br />
What can I add to the thousands of hours of media debate on the aftermath of 9/11?<br />
<br />
Did it change the world? Was America's response right? Are we safer now after all the violence unleashed by American forces in pursuit of their arch enemy, after all the missile and drone attacks, in Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan, the bloody pursuit of non-existent WMD in Iraq, after regime change in Iraq?<br />
<br />
Who knows? Every politician's answer to these questions merely reinforces their prejudices. No one wants to admit they got it wrong, everyone seeks to justify, however tenuous the logic, the decisions they took at the time.<br />
<br />
But whatever we may think of the long term effects of the 9/11 attacks, they cannot be fully disentangled from the consequences of the particular policies pursued by the US and its allies in their attempts to guarantee the security of the homeland. By one reckoning the hundreds of thousands of deaths added by the wars of the last decade to the 3000 of 9/11, were all worth it - justified by the fact that there has not been a repeat of 9/11. By this reckoning we at least know the relative value of a human life in different parts of an unequal world. After all the dead of 9/11are being remembered and commemorated today; the others are statistics remembered fleetingly, namelessly in blogs like this one.<br />
<br />
By another reckoning, US actions following 9/11 made a scary situation terrifying; the war on terror heightened the risk of terrorism worldwide even as it made it harder for another attack on US soil. Arguably 10 years of war and trillions of dollar expended on a military response against whole peoples, accompanied by debt, and the near collapse of the financial system in 2007 and the subsequent recession, have left America weakned to the point where the only positive claim it can make for the last 10 years is that there has not been another attack by aliens on US soil.<br />
<br />
What a calculus of terrorism and counter-terrorism, attack and reprisal!<br />
<br />
What a legacy for the true victims of 9/11! Avenged, yes but future enemies deterred? Lessons learned? The world a happier, better, more peaceable place?<br />
<br />
Maybe not.<br />
<br />
It all depends on what you mean by security and how that translates into living in safety. One way to gurantee security is to have friends, the other to have better defences and more guns than your enemies. The one prevents attacks, the other at best lets you thwart an attack at the cost of infringeing your own liberties, and at worst, gives you a half decent chance of going after your attackers should they breach your defences. The one is based on equality, and respect for others, the other on a stubborn belief of inherent superiority over everyone else.<br />
<br />
There were a few voices back then in 2001 calling for a different response to the 9/11 attacks than the one we got, but they were unpatriotic, cowardly appeasers who deserved vilification by the press until they were muted. Like Susan Sontag's whose essay in the New Yorker is reproduced here in full:<br />
<br />
Susan Sontag's essay:<br />
<br />
<br />
The disconnect between last Tuesday's monstrous dose of reality and the self-righteous drivel and outright deceptions being peddled by public figures and TV commentators is startling, depressing. The voices licensed to follow the event seem to have joined together in a campaign to infantilize the public. Where is the acknowledgment that this was not a "cowardly" attack on "civilization" or "liberty" or "humanity" or "the free world" but an attack on the world's self-proclaimed superpower, undertaken as a consequence of specific American alliances and actions? How many citizens are aware of the ongoing American bombing of Iraq? And if the word "cowardly" is to be used, it might be more aptly applied to those who kill from beyond the range of retaliation, high in the sky, than to those willing to die themselves in order to kill others. In the matter of courage (a morally neutral virtue): whatever may be said of the perpetrators of Tuesday's slaughter, they were not cowards.<br />
<br />
Our leaders are bent on convincing us that everything is O.K. America is not afraid. Our spirit is unbroken, although this was a day that will live in infamy and America is now at war. But everything is not O.K. And this was not Pearl Harbor. We have a robotic President who assures us that America still stands tall. A wide spectrum of public figures, in and out of office, who are strongly opposed to the policies being pursued abroad by this Administration apparently feel free to say nothing more than that they stand united behind President Bush. A lot of thinking needs to be done, and perhaps is being done in Washington and elsewhere, about the ineptitude of American intelligence and counter-intelligence, about options available to American foreign policy, particularly in the Middle East, and about what constitutes a smart program of military defense. But the public is not being asked to bear much of the burden of reality. The unanimously applauded, self-congratulatory bromides of a Soviet Party Congress seemed contemptible. The unanimity of the sanctimonious, reality-concealing rhetoric spouted by American officials and media commentators in recent days seems, well, unworthy of a mature democracy.<br />
Those in public office have let us know that they consider their task to be a manipulative one: confidence-building and grief management. Politics, the politics of a democracy—which entails disagreement, which promotes candor—has been replaced by psychotherapy. Let's by all means grieve together. But let's not be stupid together. A few shreds of historical awareness might help us understand what has just happened, and what may continue to happen. "Our country is strong," we are told again and again. I for one don't find this entirely consoling. Who doubts that America is strong? But that's not all America has to be.<br />
<br />
—Susan Sontag<br />
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</div>JayEnAarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08127753607029493743noreply@blogger.com0