Month: July 2008

We have met the enemy and he is us

The events of the last few days which ended with the UPA government winning a vote of confidence yesterday in the Indian parliament demonstrate something quite dramatically. Rajinder Puri’s editorial in today’s Free Press Journal goes a little bit into the matter but not far enough, in my opinion.
Continue reading “We have met the enemy and he is us”

Plagiarism on blogs

The bad news is that it is easy enough to get a free blog (wordpress, blogger, blogspot, etc) and it is easy enough to cut and paste stuff to the blog. The good news is that if inexpertly done, plagiarism is easily noticed.

Here’s a case in point. This post on DKSHAMLI’S BLOG (July 5th, 2008) is an exact copy of my post titled “Unfair and Unlovely” (April 20th, 2007). This is done without the slightest nod to the original. Nowhere on the dkshamli blog is there any indication that it was not written by dkshamli.

Not very nice. A real shame.

Update: (6 PM IST 22nd July) I had reported the matter to WordPress.com. I got an email from tosreports@wordpress.com saying, “The blog has been deactivated, and the user will be forced to get in touch with us and remove the post.“

About the Nuclear Energy Deal

One has to defer to experts when it comes to matters that one does not know much about. I don’t know what the deal is with the nuclear agreement with the US is and over which the UPA government is possibly going to fail tomorrow.

In the mail today was a piece by a retired chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission. It is reasonable to suppose that he knows what he is talking about. So here’s what he calls “Ten misconceptions about the nuclear deal” by P. K. Iyengar below the fold.
Continue reading “About the Nuclear Energy Deal”

Data on Criminals in the Indian Parliament

Anyone familiar with the disastrous state of India should not be overly surprised to learn that the Indian parliament has an overwhelmingly greater percentage of criminals than the general population. How effectively a nation functions and how successful it is depends on its leaders who make public policy and thus critically determine the outcome. India’s failure to develop and achieve its potential is proof positive that its leadership is lacking.

Underdevelopment, poverty, and all other ills that plague India are an unavoidable consequence of poor public policies and choices.
Continue reading “Data on Criminals in the Indian Parliament”

Convicted Criminals as Members of the Indian Parliament

Is this the much tom-tommed Indian democracy? The convicted 6 who may decide UPA’s fate:

Among those who hold the key to the survival or fall of the government on July 22 are six jailed MPs, some convicted on serious charges like murder, others accused of heinous crimes. Check out the men who both sides are seeking to woo to win that day.

  1. Pappu Yadav alias Rajesh Ranjan

    RJD, Purnea, Bihar

    SENTENCED in Feb 2008 for life for murder of former CPM MLA Ajit Sarkar in 1998.

  2. Suraj Bhan

    LJSP, Balia, Bihar

    SENTENCED To life last month for murder of a farmer in 1992.

  3. Ateeq Ahmad

    Phulphur, Uttar Pradesh

    Charged in: 21 criminal cases, including some involving murder. One such was the murder of Bhartiya Samajwadi Party MLA Raju Pal in 2005.

  4. Afzal Ansari

    Samajwadi Party, Ghazipur, UP

    Brother of Uttar Pradesh don Mukhtar Ansari. In jail facing charges in murder of Bhartiya Samajwadi Party MLA Krishanand Rai in 2005.

  5. Umakant Yadav

    BSP, Machhlishahr, Uttar Pradesh

    Jailed for allegedly razing shops and houses while trying to forcibly occupy land in Azamgarh in Uttar Pradesh in 2007.

  6. Mohd Shahabuddin

    RJD, Siwan, Bihar

    Convicted in: 3 cases between March and August 2007: life term for kidnapping leading to murder of a trader in 1999, 10 yrs for attack on Siwan SP in 1996 and 2 yrs for attack on CPI(ML) office in 1998.

I think it is a cargo cult democracy. I have long maintained that the Indian government is the real enemy of the people of India. This is not at all remarkable considering that it comprises mostly of criminals and other low life.

Crackergate

The world is going to hell in a handbasket. That’s what you’d think if you consider all the bad news coming at you from all quarters — inflation, the rising price of food and fuel, the commies taking their ball and going home (you wish), the possibility of a disappointing monsoons, sundry acts of terrorism, and so on. Comic relief is what one sorely needs to lighten the doom and gloom.

So here’s some news of the weird that fits the bill. It comes from the University of Central Florida. (You have to take what you get — even if that is half-way around the world in some godforsaken state.)

‘Body Of Christ’ Snatched From Church, Held Hostage By UCF Student, reads the headlines.
Continue reading “Crackergate”

India’s Energy Challenge

I have a piece in today’s livemint.com on India’s Energy Challenge. The money quote is this:

The advanced industrialized economies were lucky to have had their development fuelled by cheap fossil energy. Today’s developing economies have a much tougher challenge. It was a very short window of opportunity which opened just about 150 years ago and is likely to close in the next 40 years, by when the known reserves will be depleted at current levels of consumption.

All told, 200 years is a very brief interlude considering thousands of years of human civilization and hopefully hundreds of thousands of years yet to come. At some time in the distant future, they will look back and remark that the age of fossil fuel was a short inflection point, a point at which humanity passed through the bottleneck of dependency on oil from the ground. Before that point, humanity’s primary source of energy was the sun, and so it will be after that point.

The full article is below the fold. Continue reading “India’s Energy Challenge”

Guest Post: Reservations on Reservation in Indian Education

India is a country that’s renowned for its diversity – the country is a potpourri of different languages, religions, castes and cultures. While this variety makes the nation more interesting and intriguing, it’s kicking up a storm in the sphere of education. The country’s government-aided institutions all allow a certain quota of seats to be reserved for educationally and socially backward classes and for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes.
Continue reading “Guest Post: Reservations on Reservation in Indian Education”

Off to Chennai

I have been busy in meetings in Delhi and could not find time to blog. Waiting at the New Delhi airport for an Indian flight to Chennai, which is delayed an hour. Will keep in touch later.