If Rahul is Congress, Who Is Priyanka Vadra? Next PM?

    Congress personified: Muslim cap,Christian cross, Hindu sacred thread,                    Rudraksha garland. If unfit, Priyanka can inherit the throne

THE ONE THING common between the ruling BJP-led NDA and the Congress party which may lead the ‘Mahagut(ter)bandhan’ to power in the next Lok Sabha polls is the loud-mouthed ‘loose cannons’ making silly, inappropriate statements.

The only difference, however, is that while Prime Minister Narendra Modi has maintained dignity by not making  such comments Congress President Rahul Gandhi, himself leads the pack in calling him a thief.  Other sycophants joined him to call Modi a ‘chaiwala‘ (tea seller), ‘unpadh gawar’ (illiterate, uncouth  and ‘neech aadmi’ (low class man).

There are many fringe elements in the BJP who know that Modi depends on their votes to stay in power and so use no restraint in making silly statements. So it was no surprise that many NDA leaders chose to comment on Rahul appointing his own sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra as the party’s General Secretary in charge of East Uttar Pradesh.

While one BJP leader commented about Priyanka’s beauty being not enough to get votes and others about the party being dynastic, Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan said the appointment was an admission that Rahul himself failed as a political leader and needed another family member to help him out,

Sumitra, who entered politics as a novice housewife who defeated a flamboyant Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister P. C. Sethi in Indore in the 1980s, is a very sober, mature, person. What she said was just what political analysts have always been saying, even before Rahul inherited the party presidentship from his mother who inherited it from her husband who inherited it from his mother who …

The commentators speculated about Priyanka being brought in when Rahul gave ample evidence of immaturity and earned the epithet ‘Pappu’. Her entry into politics was no ‘plunge’. She was always the hidden trump card.

And even an idiot knows that the trump card is always thrown in when the other cards in the pack are weak and defeat appears imminent. Another factor that silenced the parties, all of them started to oppose the Congress, was that ALL of them were themselves dynastic.

Had they not been disparate to cobble an anti-BJP front ‘mahagut(ter)bandhan’ to garner the Muslim votes, which BJP had  already alienated due to its  Hindutuva image, the parties now backing the Congress would have criticized her entry.

The Congress either is not confident of fooling Muslims or does not want to lose the Hindu vote entirely.  So Rahul, Feroze’s grandson and son of an Italian  Catholic, declared himself a  ‘janevudhari’  Brahmin (without a sacred-thread ceremony) and put up posters  declaring Priyanka an incarnation of  Durga, the Hindu goddess. Of course that is secular, as is the caste-based choice of  its candidates.

So these developments reminded me of a blog I had put out last July, which I reproduce here.  It said —

              RAHUL IS CONGRESS, INDIRA WAS INDIA

Rahul Gandhi’s tweet saying “I am Congress” might have reminded many of his grandmother Indira Gandhi’s Emergency-days campaign (by her sycophants, apparently at her instance), that “Indira is India”.  (I have heard Dev Kant Baruah, the then Congress President, say it in the Central Hall of Parliament. It  is another mater that he was later thrown out of the party).

That no individual is indispensable, that the party is above the leader and that the nation is above party is what any sane person would agree with.

And yet, in most developing countries individuals have been using their power to make it seem that they alone mattered more than everything. Once in power,  all tend to retain power for all time by hook or crook (often by the latter).

The tendency to be lifetime rulers, common in tribal African nations, seems to have spread now to China and Russia, reminiscent of ancient kingdoms ruled by autocratic kings.

Congressmen, obviously, believe that Indira Gandhi can be succeeded only by Rajiv though he had no political background, Rajiv by Sonia though a foreigner, inexperienced and unwilling and Sonia by son Rahul though he was unfit and more of a comic figure.

In fact a senior Congress leader Mani (neech aadmi)Shankar (chai wala) Iyer declared there could only be two persons considered for party Presidentship – the mother or the son. Despite overt wooing of Muslim vote banks, the grandson of Feroze was declared to be a “Janevudhari” Brahmin (wearing sacred thread) though no thread ceremony (Upanayan) was held. He even invented a gotra.

Had Rahul refused (as his mother Sonia did) the sycophants would have unhesitatingly opted for his sister Priyanka and if she thought going to beauty parlours was more important than the strenuous job of being PM, they would have found great talents in her children. If they too preferred playing to the hard job of PM, Congressmen would not hesitate to enthrone the family’s dog which they would find  miraculous and far superior to any of their own selves.

Even those who believed in the dynastic rule of kings would not have been such great believers in dynasty. All because every one of them belongs to some caste and are bound by caste rivalries, while the Indira dynasty had to no caste as Nehru’s daughter Indira married Feroze, either a Parsi or, as some say, a Muslim.

And these casteists, who demand reservations for Dalit (low caste) Christians and Muslims (who claim to be casteless), call Bharatiya Janata Party communal!

All parties with dynastic leaders now join hands with the Congress. But all want the throne.

If Indira is India and Rahul is Congress, what is Priyanka? The next PM?

 

 

Thanksgiving? There is Much to be Thankful for

WHAT ARE YOU thankful for? A grandchild asked in the USA where Thanksgiving Day (last Thursday) is a big occasion.

I could not think of anything. That’s perhaps the reason why the day is not celebrated in India.

My ‘nothing’ shocked everyone. Are you not thañkful for being alive? No. I always wanted to end a meaningless and futile existence.

For your family? It only gives me pain – when I realise I am only a burden.

For all the good things you have had in life? I realise that they were all because of others. I did nothing to deserve them. My (late) wife and children tolerated my shortcomings and their good deeds were rewarded with my not causing them any more problems than I already created.

I could have come for just a few days – not months just to justify the big cost of flying here. But I realised it too late.

These are facts I cannot do anything about now.

Yes. There is much to be thankful for… that at almost 80 the end (hopefully) is not far away.

Time To Shut Up?

WORDPRRSS SHUT ME out of my own blog on laptop asking for a decade-old passwornd. I could not get the ‘title’ page to write on.

I found, however, that the WP app on my smartphone enabled me to keep writing. I could resume the blog; I felt I was really ‘unstoppable’.

It was a miracle of technology and though too old to master it, I clung to it desperately.

Writing on phone in a train or plane with auto-‘correct’ changing correct words into meaningless gibberish, has however added to the problems of failing sight and memory.

Though I found quite a few blogs written in poor language and with mistakes of grammar, too many typos in my posts worried me. After all I lived for the last 60 years on writing.

But along with technology habits also changed. Reading has beome out of fashion and Google the repository of all knowledge. S

o you need not have any background or information. You just Google for it when needed.

It all comes back to the basic issue of old, outdated, worn-out brains still thinking they have some knowledge (from just being alive for too long, which they confuse with experience) to pass on to the new generation.

It is not easy for ‘old foggies’ to accept the truth that it is no virtue in being ‘unstoppale‘ just by being alive just on borrowed time, having ‘outlived their utility‘, an expression one of my ex-editors was fond of (and which, I argued then, meant it was time for them to die).

He was right. And luckily he is dead.

I am not that lucky..

The Long And Short Of It

THE  ONLY ONE  (OR ONE OF THE TWO OR THREE)  WHO READS ALL MY POSTS,  A former student of my journalism class, commented on  a recent post, “Good…but could be a longer post.”

I replied that I found blog posts of a few words get scores of ‘like’s and followers while long, studied, researched ones with a lot of information get very few.  And, moreover, Continue reading The Long And Short Of It

Are You Retired But Not Tired?

not-tiredWhen you are over 70  ( unstoppable or not), old age and death never cease to be on your horizon. Your eyes drift to the obituary column involuntarily. Some put up a cheery facade and hide those thoughts. Others like me plan a book like ‘THE OUTHOUSE ON THE FIRST FLOOR – Coming of (Old)Age in India‘ only to abandon it as no one takes it seriously.
imagesThe first confrontation a working person has with old age is retirement.

Retirement is traumatic. When 59 years, 11 months and 29 days old, you are an earning member doing your duties diligently. The very next day you are considered useless. From a contributor to the economy, you become a human parasite, a burden on the society and on your own family.  In the USA Continue reading Are You Retired But Not Tired?

Sau Sal Nahi, Sau Pal Khushi Ke Jiyo

geri-robotYou greet an elder with respect in India and he or she would say (or at least used to say) “Sau Sal Jiyo”  (Live a Hundred Years). Every language in India has an equivalent of this blessing, though some  may consider it a curse today.

Is long life desirable at all? Will not many people welcome being able to end their lives if it could be done painlessly, quickly and without causing any problem (other than emotional) to others? Should  euthanasia be legalized?

These questions, especially the last one, keep popping up every now and then. Courts have been approached several times to allow either euthanasia (mercy killing) of people with incurable diseases or suicide by those who feel death would be merciful to themselves and those

A  ‘Geribot’ to care for the aged?

Continue reading Sau Sal Nahi, Sau Pal Khushi Ke Jiyo