Tamil Nadu was the worst hit state in India by the Killer Tsunami waves. Now the Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa wants to do something to prevent such an event in the future. Bless the lady, she wants to build a wall all along the TN coast. She wants a little
financial help from the central government. She's only asking for Rs.5000 crores (Rs.50 billion). Is she nuts?. Her government cannot maintain roads properly in the city of Chennai and she wants Rs.5000 crores to build a wall along Tamil Nadu's coast.
She's got some nerve asking for that money. The Central Government should take exactly 1 second to consider this proposal and laugh at this ridiculous request. Giving her this much money is like locking a Chocophile in the Hershey manufacturing plant. Something bad will happen.
She's got to be doing this for one of these reasons:
1) She's geunuinely worried about another Tsunami attack (I know, I am on thin ice here, but hear me out) and wants to do something about it.
2) She's worried that DMK and MDMK and various other opposition parties will target her if she's seen doing nothing. SUN TV will run propaganda pieces on their news (the word is used rather loosely here) telecast and with elections coming in 2006, she can't afford to lose ground on such a big issue. (most reasonable explanation)
3) She sees a big opportunity to make a lot of money before she's voted out of power in two years. She might never again retun to power or who knows what will happen. So make use of all available opportunities to make money. (most cynical reason)
Reality is probably close to 2 right now. But anyways, she should get exactly zero money for this crazy project of hers. PoliticaL parties in India are just not mature enough to act in national interest. What one government starts will be decided to be crazy by the next government and big projects tend to get stalled depending on which party is in power.
