Tag: Dirty Politics

Budget Disappoints – As Usual

https://unstoppableafterseventy.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Blind_men_and_elephant.jpg

Six men of Indostan To learning much inclined, Who went to see the Elephant (Though all of them were blind). –Poem by John Godfrey Saxe

BUDGET REACTIONS ARE an annual ritual. They never fail to excite and be praised by the ruling party. And the opposition is always disappointed.

The reactions, at least by some politicians, are written out in advance

According to a friend, this budget has nothing for Poor people like Lalu Prasad Yadav and his family. The former peon could only become a multimillionnaire and not as they hoped a billionaire, which is the birthright of any Yadav.

This budget has nothing for poor farmers like Robert Vadra who keep borrowing crores (of course interest free) to buy land.

It has nothing for the working middle class like P. Chidhambaram and family.

This budget has nothing for Industrialists like Mallya, who asked ONLY for fair deal and justice.

This budget has nothing for exporters like Hafeez Sayeed, who is sweating to export terror and kill hundred of innocents for the sake of Islam.

This budget has nothing for the senior citizens like HD Deve Gowda, trying very very hard to keep himself awake at meetings.

This budget has nothing for those born-rich, like Sonia Gandhi.

This budget has nothing for honest people like Kejriwal, who is honest about wanting power.

This budget has nothing for hard(ly) working people like Rahul Gandhi who has to work 24/7 to learn new words of abuse.

This budget has nothing for (eternal) students like Kannaiah Kumar who is studying hard to split India further.

Chandrababu Naidu is disappointed that no law is made to make Lokesh the next Chief Minister.

Many godmen lament that Modi has not shut down all schools, college, banks and offices to build Ram temples in every locality of the country.

Overall it is a disappointing budget!

The Crime Of Getting Caught

Anti-BJP poster
Kerala poster equates BJP campaigners with rapists

WHENEVER A CRIME report appears in a newspaper or is shown on news channel, the most common reaction of almost everyone is, “So one got caught. How many more may have committed big crimes without getting caught?”

Given the present state of policing and justice delivery in the country, the punishment is for getting caught andnot for committing a crime. The police may deliberately

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IAS ‘Cycle’ of Good And Bad

Sabarwals
Smita Sabharwal, IAS  and Akun Sabharwal, IPS  of Telagana – People’s Officers

INTERVIEWING THE EX-DIRECTOR OF LAL BAHADUR SHASTRI  ACADEMY OF  ADMINI- stration at Mussoorie, P.S. Appu,  just after he resingned  over differences  with the then Home Minister Gyani Zail Singh, I asked him about some IAS officers being inefficient or corrupt while some were committed and idealistic.

Appu

He told me there appeared to be a cycle – some batches at the Academy turned out excellent officers while others failed. It was, I felt, a subject that needed to be researched further, like the phenomenon of IAS officers’ sons or daughters joining IAS.

 

A brilliant ex-Chief Secretary of Bihar and one of the best directors the Academy ever had, the late Pappu felt there was nothing wrong, unless short-cuts and wrong means to do so. “Don’t doctors’ children become doctors and lawyers’ children follow their parents?”,  he asked

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Dirty ‘Devout’ Minds

Kalam statue
Pettty minds fight over great books

ARE MINDS THAT CREATE CONFLICT OVER RELIGION REALLY DEVOUT?  ARE THOSE who want to shed blood in the name of religion really religious?

A controversy has erupted due to an engraved ‘Bhagavadgeeta’ (the sacred Hindu epic)  near the statue the late president, Dr. A P J Abdul Kalam at his recently inaugurated memorial.  His wise Muslim family quickly ended the row by also placing copies of  the Quran and the Bible near the statue.

There motive behind keeping only the Geeta there was obviously ulterior. Dr. Kalam’s family at least had the good sense of neutralize the mischief, but raising a controversy on the issue is equally malicious.

No controversy has been raised over the way Sai Baba, who had lived in a mosque as a fakir in Shirdi, is worshipped with all rituals and huge statues of his with costly crowns set up in lavish temples.

No controversy arose over huge temples built for Shiva who was an ascetic.

No controversy has been raised about noisy ‘matadi jagarans’ (all night singing of songs in praise of a Goddess) with extremely loud amplifiers by those who object to Azan, the call for namaz (Islamic prayer) over loudspeakers in a Masjid at odd hours.

No controversy has been raised by most Muslim intellectuals over the communal politics in Kashmir and the killing of Hindu Pandits there.

And yet a Bhagavadgeeta in a memorial for Dr Kalam is an issue for a controversy

Dr Kalam, undoubtedly the best President India ever had, could quote from the sacred Tamil epic, Thirukkural, and never made a fetish about being a Muslim. For him the Bhagavadgeeta was as sacred as the Holy Quran.

He never made an issue of the Hindutva (pro-Hindu) stand of the BJP which was then in power . So the Congress opposed a second term for him and gave the country’s most exalted post to a woman whose only qualification was subservience (more than just loyalty) to the dynasty and Indira Gandhi.

A controversy was raised when, as President, he went to Ahmedabad just after the unfortunate Gujarat anti-Mulsim riots, touched off when a train carrying Hindus working for  building a Ram temple at Ayodhya was set on fire. Few cared to know that he went there for the centenary of his guru and mentor, Dr. Vikaram Sarabhai who pioneered Indian space science. Dr Kalam’s reverence  for teachers is touching.

Some people just want controversy and tension for their ulterior political ends.