The Hindu of 27th May carried a news item ( “Tell all job scheme is Congress brainchild“) which crystallizes the idea of India like nothing else I have come across of late.
It quotes Dr. Singh: “I request that you should carry the message across to people that this right [to employment] has been given to them by Soniaji. This right has been given to them by the Congress party… If you assist in implementing this law in a proper manner, you will be able to lay a strong foundation for creation of goodwill for our party and our beloved leader, Ms. Sonia Gandhi.” [Emphasis mine.] Continue reading “The Great White Hope — Our Beloved Leader”
Pratap Bhanu Mehta, who resigned in protest from the National Knowledge Commission, quoted Tom Paine that “We pity the plumage, but forget the dying bird.”
Mr Mehta, the plumage don’t enter into it–it’s stone dead. This parrot wouldn’t voom if you put four million volts through it. This parrot is definitely deceased. It is no more. It’s bleedin’ demised. It has ceased to be. It’s expired and gone to meet its maker. It’s a stiff. Bereft of life, it rests in peace. If you hadn’t nailed it to the perch, it would be pushing up the daisies. It’s shuffled off this mortal coil. It’s rung down the curtain and joined the bleedin’ choir invisible. All statements to the effect that this parrot is still a going concern, are from now on inoperative. Visavis the metabolic processes, this parrot has had its lot. This is an ex-parrot.
[Rarely, if ever, does one get a chance to quote Monty Python and do so with such devastating accuracy. 🙂 ]
Swami Vivekanand’s immortal words have the power to inspire and motivate. He should be required reading for the truly educated Indian. It is sad that too many of our “brothers and sisters” (to use his words) are incapable of reading.
Subhas Reddy, a visitor to this blog, was kind enough to send me some excerpts from this site.
True reformer
“If you wish to be a true reformer, three things are necessary. The first is to feel. Do you really feel for your brothers? Do you really feel that there is so much misery in the world, so much ignorance and superstition? Do you really feel that men are your brothers? Does this idea come into your whole being? Does it run with your blood? Does it tingle in your veins? Does it course through every nerve and filament of your body? Are you full of that idea of sympathy? If you are, that is only the first step. Continue reading “Vivekanand on Dispassionate Work”
Why the long hiatus in blogging, you may ask. Don’t really know. I guess that I was ready for a break. For the last couple of weeks, I have been on the road. After leaving Pune, I spent a few days in Mumbai. On the 24th of May, I was briefly interviewed on BBC World TV for their live program “China and India: Emerging Giants.” The interview was at the Taj Palace Hotel with the Gateway of India in the background. Continue reading “Back to Blogging”
I am somehow less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops. — Stephen Jay Gould
The criminal neglect of education, in my considered opinion, is the most important charge upon which the policy makers of India stand indicted. An entire generations of Indians have lived and died since independence—a reasonable estimate would place the number around 500 million humans—about half of whom were illiterate, not just uneducated. The lost potential is stupefyingly mind boggling. How many Ramanujans and Einsteins have they condemned to obscurity and waste, how many did not even see the insides of a school or learn to read, write, reason and do arithmetic?
The answer would break the heart of any thinking human being.
It is time for a full disclosure. My interest in education is not merely academic. I want to transform the current system, which is outdated, outmoded, irrelevant, inefficient and ineffective. Shameless plug follows: if you are interested in working with me in creating the educational system of the future or know someone who may be interested, do get in touch. Continue reading “Reservations about Reservations”
Only humans are capable of free speech, and those who value free speech have freedom. The rest are slaves. They may be slaves to a religious authority or a political authority, but slaves none the less. The whoremasters who try to take away the right to free speech under the pretext that it may be offensive to some are the worst enemies of human dignity and freedom. Continue reading “Still Laboring in Serfdom”
Shortages and Nehruvian socialism go hand in hand. Just take scooters, for instance. You could not just take scooters some years ago, actually, thanks to the quota permit license control raj. You had to wait for years before you could lay your hands on one. You could jump the queue if you paid with “hard currency” or paid a premium (black money) to someone who had the foresight to book one years in advance with a view to capture some of the rent that arises out of shortages.
The situation today would have been unthinkable then. Now dealers of two-wheelers practically drag you off the street, give you a cold drink, and by the time you have finished it, they have arranged financing and you roll out the door on your new bike clutching your free gift of a toaster oven. Then your choice was severely limited to four or five models; now a reasonable estimate must be a hundred different makes and models of two-wheelers. Continue reading “Imagine No Reservations”
Ayaan Hirsi Ali was at Harvard’s Kennedy School on May 9th. A brief biography of Ms. Ali from the Harvard’s Center for Public Leadership announcement reads:
Ayaan Hirsi Ali (born 13 November 1969 in Mogadishu, Somalia) is a Dutch human rights leader, feminist, and a member of the Dutch Parliament for the liberal party. She is a prominent and often controversial spokesperson, author, film maker and critic of Islamism. Her movie “Submission” on abuse of women in Islam, directly led to the murder of the director Theo Van Gogh in November 2004. A death letter left on the body was addressed to Ms Hirsi Ali.
In 2005 Ms Hirsi Ali was chosen among the world’s 100 most influential people of Time Magazine and Reader’s Digest voted her ‘European of the Year 2006’. Meanwhile, she also receives heavy criticism on her views and approaches for change. Ms Hirsi Ali is under severe and permanent security protection.
She, like Wafa Sultan, is fighting for the emancipation of women in Islamic countries and more generally for reforming Islam. She has a collection of essays called The Caged Virgin, an “Emancipation Proclamation” for women and Islam.
I guess that her life insurance premiums must be sky high. Not just a pretty face, she is articulate and courageous. Here is a short video of an interview of her on Swedish television (I don’t have details on the date of that recording).
“Catholic Secular Forum (CSF) activists will go on a fast unto death if the government fails to take action against anti-Christian movies,” CSF general secretary Joseph Dias told the BBC.
Mr Dias is quoted as saying, ” . . . Tempers are already running quite high and there’s no way of saying what could happen if the movie is released.”
I guess the Catholics would go on a rampage and burn down theatres. Eric Hoffer had noted that “when the weak want to give an impression of strength they hint menacingly at their capacity for evil. It is by its promise of a sense of power that evil often attracts the weak.” Continue reading “Fragments — 13”
Atanu Dey : Life is a Random Draw 