Better dead than red

High Comedy

2006-01-07T06:39:00.000-08:00

"The Big Fight" on NDTV today is about the relevance of Socialism. Vijay Mallya, Surjit Bhalla, Subhashini Ali (socialist activist) and Atul Kumar Anjaan (CPI Secretary) are the participants.

Subhashini Ali provided a lot of unintended comedy. Comradini Ali claimed that the fact that Russia developed into a superpower within 50 years after the 1917 revolution proved that socialism was a good system (though she did say that 100 years or so of socialism was not enough to judge if it was better than capitalism, which she said succeeded only through colonialism ). When Bhalla predictably guffawed at this suggestion, mixing the name Stalin with mass murder, Comrade Anjaan was sufficiently aroused to claim that Bhalla was un-necessarily maligning the good name of Lenin. In Soviet Union, apparently, all people were equal and they enjoyed the freedom of speech and expression. The US had to create the Taliban in Afghanistan to defeat the Soviet Union (which is partially true). But the fact that commie regimes all over Eastern Europe were being deposed (non-violently, unlike how those countries were originally overrun by Soviet Union, for example Hungaryin 1956) provided the required impetus for the fall of the USSR.

Bhalla asked a simple question which went unanswered by the two comrades on the show - if socialism is good, can you name any country where socialism has succeeded?. While Anjaan tried to dance around the question, Ali claimed China has/is growing economically because of socialism. Bhalla it seems is incapable of understanding the greatness of socialism.

Natwar Singh imbroglio

2005-11-05T20:42:00.000-08:00

The probe into the UN Oil-for-food program headed by former Federal Reserve Board chairman Paul Volcker is over. The Independent Inquiry Committee submitted its final report on the 27th of October. The push for the probe in the United States was lead by conservatives, and in particular by Norm Coleman, the senator from Minnesota. Claudia Rossett has been writing stories on the scam for a while now.

The Indian connection to the scandal appears in the annexure to the above mentioned report. It is alleged that the External Affairs minister K.Natwar Singh paid a kickback to Saddam Hussein through a friend of his son. It is further alleged that the Congress party also paid a kickback to Saddam Hussein through the same individual. The BJP has been quick to pounce on this and has been demanding that Natwar Singh resign from his ministerial post, where he functions as India's official link with other countries.

A few observations can be made of this messy situation.

1) The charges are very serious in nature for a number of reasons. You don't want as the External Affairs Minister of India, or even a memeber of parliament for that matter, a person that accepts money to take a particular position in international fora. Saddam Hussein was a brutal dictator and it does not behoove a member of the Cabinet to be pushing Saddam's case.

2) The involvement of the Congress party, if true, might be illegal by Indian law.

3) Natwar Singh's personal issues may start to affect, if they haven't already, India's credibility and stature at international fora. At a very crucial time for Indo - US relations, with the recently announced nuclear deal hanging in the balance, the news of Natwar Singh's possible involvement in the scam is bad news. Any nuclear deal that the White House concluded with India has to be ratified by the US Congress. The major push for the independent inquiry by Volcker came from influential Republican Congressmen and Senators. Natwar Singh, being India's External Affairs Minister, will be the point man on India's side to see that the deal is ratified. The US congress might not be too keen to ratify the deal if Natwar Singh continues to remain in his post and India does not launch any investigation into the allegations.

The PM Dr.Manmohan Singh has a lot invested in the nuclear deal and wouldn't want to jeopardise it. But he has already given a clean chit to Natwar Singh before any investigation. Isn't there a disconnect there?. There isn't if the PM has reasons to be believe that Natwar Singh is completely innocent. The government has asked India's envoy to the UN, Nirupam Sen, to meet Volcker and Kofi Annan, and request details of the allegations. The government has to order an investigation if anything that Natwar Singh told Dr.Singh doesn't match with what Volcker tells the Indian envoy to UN.

4) The BJP needs to calm down a bit. The charges are serious in nature and deserve an investigation. But it should wait for the Indian envoy to report back to the government what he has heard from Volcker. The presumption of innocent until proven guilty has to apply here.

5) Natwar Singh's statement attacking the credibility of Volcker and the current Iraqi regime (which supposedly supplied the material on which the annexure of the report wasd based on) do not befit a former diplomat (Natwar Singh is a former Indian Foreign Service member). It also does India's chances of getting a permanent seat at the UN no good if he is shooting off his mouth. The Congress party would be also be well advised that the national interest precludes it from serving the UN with a legal notice prematurely. If the allegations turn out to be based on forged documents or just false for any other reason, the Congress party and Natwar Singh have reason to be aggrieved and can approach the UN for remedy. But serving the UN with a legal notice is a dubious approach.

6) If Natwar Singh does not step down, India's national interest can possibly
suffer significant setbacks. If he does step down, there would seem to be a presumption of guilt on his part by the BJP particularly and it would be an injustice to the minister. The PM could announce that Natwar Singh will step down from the post for now and will regain his ministerial berth pending his name being cleared by an investigation. It would still give the opposition something to beat the government over the head with, but in the national interest this has to be done.

7) It remains to be seen whether the UN would take any action based on the report, or they follow the time honoured tradition of Governments all over the world ignoring the recommendations of inquiry commissions they have setup. It wouldn't be a surprise if the UN did just that - after all the UN is a kind of world government.

Frankly speaking - NDTV edition

2005-06-07T05:38:00.000-07:00

1.A few weeks back, Harkishen Singh Surjeet, the ex-general secretary of the Chinese Sympathisers Part of India (Morons), also known as CPI(M), was in Jakarta for some conference. While there, he took ill and came back home. NDTV had a report on this and it started

Comrade Surjeet....

2. Today, NDTV sought Sitaram Yechury's reaction to Advani's resignation as the BJP president. The reporter started by asking him

Do you think that the brand of politics practiced by BJP has come back to haunt them?

Make the flakes be with you

2005-06-06T06:27:00.000-07:00

We got a big box of Kellogg's cereal a couple of days back and my mother was talking about some spoon that was "free" with the cereal box and was supposed to be inside. This brought back memories of us buying Boost (instead of alternate malt drinks) long back just for the spoons that were given free with it. I had forgotten about this spoon till I saw a thin, long box in the kitchen today. The words Saber Spoon caught my eye.

Flickr
Think it's just another plastic spoon?

Flickr
Think again, partner

Flickr
Watchout Darthboy!. Master Pachalla is at hand.

Visit my Flickr account for more photos.

Individual freedom - India vs America

2005-06-05T01:03:00.000-07:00

Gaurav Sabnis talks about Freedom Vs Sovereignty and compares the freedom Americans enjoy to do their own things as long as it doesn't affect others. Indians, he says, tend to think of freedom in the sense of sovereignty, in a free from British way, whereas Americans value personal freedom. I agree with him. One of the reasons that we Indians don't have the kind of freedom Americans enjoy is our constitution gives our government a lot of power to restrict it. It bears noting that the American consitution is all of 5000 odd words and has been amended 27 times in 200+ years. We are now at 82, I think, after 55 years. The US Congress has enormous power to make laws no doubt. But the laws aren't there in the constitution. So if the Congress there wants to enact a law to restrict freedom, some would say like the PATRIOT ACT, their constituents can raise a stink and make them think twice about enacting the law. There is also the check on their power in the form of the President excercising his veto. In India, on the other hand, many laws are hardwired into the constitution. It is a humongous constitution, maybe the longest in the world.

I am reading a book on the history of our Constitution by Granville Austin. I have just finished the first part dealing with the Nehru years and am surprised by what I've read. Nehru and Patel and his cabinet had a huge fight with the Judiciary over the Government's right to restrict property rights (redistributing Zamindar lands etc) and also many speech rights. Nehru wanted to be able to prosecute papers which endangered national security, by their reporting, or caused disorder or for a few other things. Rajendra Prasad was very concerned about this and consulted a lot of legal experts before signing his assent to those laws.

The Supreme Court and many High Courts struck down many laws made by the state and central governments of the day. The American first amendment guarantees free speech amond other things. In contrast our first amendment, which is an absolute mess to read for an engineer like me because it makes additions and modifications to an existing statute in the consitution, takes away freedom and gives the government the right to make some laws without Court interference. It was written specifically with a lot of court decisions (which went against the government) in mind. They tried to undercut the judicial review of laws made by placing them in the Ninth Schedule of the Constitution, which apparently puts those laws out of the purview of the judiciary. The author says that it took the courts about 30 years to find a way around the Ninth Schedule. He says he deals with it in later chapters, which I haven't come to yet.

It might be politically incorrect to say this, but the huge illiteracy numbers in our country make it easier for the government to restrict freedom and not pay a price for it. If you don't know rights, how do you know if they have been taken away?.

There are reasons to love America and there are reasons to hate it. Their constitution is one thing we can admire them for. I am not a lawyer and I don't play one on the internet. But the American constitution is a fantastic document, while ours is a bigger, fatter, uglier 5th cousin. A lot of intelligent, smart and honest people worked on writing our constitution, but a lot of geniuses worked on the American one.

Frankly speaking

2005-05-30T01:18:00.000-07:00

A few weeks back, Aligarh Muslim University decided to introduce 50% reservation for Muslims in all courses. This decision had to be okayed by the HRD Minister Arjun Singh. Being the secularist that he is, Arjun Singh promptly gave the proposal the thumbs up. In an interview on NDTV last week he said, in a bit of frank speaking,

"... I can't make decisions based on whether they are legal or illegal."

.

A couple of days back on NDTV's big fight, the topic du jour was "Is secularism a political gimmick?", with the guests being Mani Shankar Aiyar ( Best Indian Ever), Rajiv Pratap Rudy, Seshadri Chari and Teesta Seetalvad. Mr.Secular Fundamentalist in a moment of lucidity claimed

"I am a better Indian than people of their ilk (Rudy, Chari etc) because I am Secular and they are not."

.

Henceforth Arjun Singh is Mr.Metalegal and Mani Shankar Aiyar is Best Indian Ever.

Score one for Laloo a.k.a Paswan closer to irrelevance

2005-05-23T08:55:00.000-07:00

Laloo Prasad, the Union Railiway Minister, pulled out all the stops and got the UPA Govt. to dissolve the Bihar Assembly. The offficial reason given for the decision is an urgent need to prevent horse trading by the NDA.

"Patil said Bihar Governor Buta Singh, in a report to the government, had said that unconstitutional and illegal steps were being taken by political parties to win over legislators".

NDTV is however reporting the UPA sources admit in private that Laloo had gotten some indication that the NDA was ready to stake claim to form the government with the help of the breakaway LJP MLAs and independents. On Sunday evening, after a ceremony to release a book about the achievements of the UPA government during its first year (I wonder if Goa, Jharkand, Shibu Soren, Laloo Prasad Yadav, Saptarishi were mentioned in the booklet), Laloo reportedly told Manmohan Singh it was now or never, and that if the answer was never, "complications" might arise in the government.

A bomb blast at two Delhi cinemas necessitated a late night cabinet meeting, but the issue of the Bihar Assembly dissolution was also discussed, according to NDTV. Soon the Govt. recommended that the Assembly be dissolved. The NDA (BJP and JD-U in particular) is going nuts at this decision and the usual threats of Bandh and going to courts have been made.

Now to the analysis: the biggest loser in all this has to be Ram Vilas Paswan and the LJP, closely followed by the NDA. The Congress will now have to go with the Laloo and the RJP to save its government. Laloo is promising to give it more seats during the elections and it remains to be seen. Ram Vilas Paswan is however caught between the devil and the deep sea. He cannot possibly go with the RJP having opposed him tooth and nail so far and having made it his election platform during the elections a few months back. But he cannot join the NDA for the assembly elections alone because the UPA will throw him out of the government. It is quite a big fall for him from a few months back, when he looked like a kingmaker, with a real possibility of controlling Bihar and also getting a plum ministry in the Union Govt. in return for keeping the NDA out of power in Bihar. There is a real possibility (small but significant) that he could lose his Cabinet position in the run up to the Bihar elections if he chooses the wrong side, and also end up not ruling Bihar as well.

Laloo cashed in on his 25 MPs in the Lok Sabha and made the spineless Congress accede to his demand of dissolving the Assembly. The RJP will in all likelihood head a coalition consisting of itself, the Congress and the Left parties, and maybe even the LJP.

This spells big trouble for the NDA though. The electoral arithmetic does not favor them and they might face a rout in the new round of elections. BJP has to be very worried. Nitish Kumar has resisted all efforts so far fromPaswan to leave the BJP. However this is the crunch time. An alliance with the LJP might get him the one seat he has coveted for long - the CM of Bihar.

They need a miracle to get out of this logjam. If they take this to the courts and the courts hear the case (highly unlikely in my opinion, what with the President having already acepted the Cabinet's decision to dissolve the assembly), they can take the moral high ground in this whole issue. It will be another event that follows in the pattern of Goa and Jharkhand, where the UPA Govt. has blundered and were admonished by the courts for their hasty and ill-conceived actions.

The NDA needs to start praying to RAM right now. Even he might not be able to get them out of this one. Laloo seems to have outwitted and outlasted them and it looks like Rabri will be back for a 2nd innings. The Bihar people get only a brief reprieve from Laloo. They might just be the biggest loser in all of this. However they have a chance to control their destiny through the ballot box. Will they be allowed to do so and, more importantly, will they vote for a change?.

Senior what?

2005-05-17T06:49:00.000-07:00

The American magazine Newsweek caused a major uproar in many Islamic countries with a report about mishandling of the Quran (flushing a copy of Quan down the toilet) at Guantanamo Bay by American soldiers. After many people were killed in the riots and after their anonymous source backed away from claims previously made, Newsweek retracted the story. This is not enough says a senior militant. Yes, you read that right. Senior militant!. So there we have it, the official reaction from the militants. You know it wouldn't be so reliable if it were coming from just a middle-level militant or some "Junaid come lately" who had just been in the organisation for only a few months.

Was the British Empire good for India?

2005-05-10T08:43:00.000-07:00

In the conservative magazine New Criterion, its managing editor Roger Kimball responds to a "third world feminist of colour with this justification of British colonisation of India. He says "I don't check messages to our letters address very often, which means that I may be missing some amusing (albeit inadvertently amusing) communications". In the event he checks the messages today, he will find this email from me.

Mr.Kimball,
This email is in reference to your post in
reference to the "fan mail" from the "third world feminist of colour". Reading your comments on India being the beneficiary of British colonialism and how the West brought "freedom, education, and language" to the savages, reminds me of the famous Disraeli reply to a politician who attacked him for being Jewish - " Yes, I am a Jew and when the ancestors of the right honourable gentleman were brutal savages in
an unknown island, mine were priests in the temple of Solomon." Yes, Indians were savages in the 18th and 19th century and when your ancestors were brutal savages in an unknown island, we were busy building great civilizations in Harappa and Mohenjadaro, fighring Alexander near the Indus, composing epic literary works in many languages. This is not to say these things somehow make India a superior country. But it is just to say Indians definitely were not savages at anytime during the last 2500 years.

Britain has produced some of the greatest scientists ever (clearly the greatest in Newton) and many of the greatest writers (after all it is your native language). But don't forget that the various parts that make up India have a great tradition of literature (including my own mother tongue, Tamil, stretching back to nearly 2000 years), architecture and ofcourse religion.

For a supposedly civilized country, the conduct of Britain in India (as in many of its colonies) is littered with brutality, inhumanity and plunder of resources. The great famine of Bengal and the genocide it brought upon Bengal is just one of the many examples of the inhuman nature of the British empire. Maybe you are using the Black Hole of Calcutta (that enduring myth) to justify your claim that the British civilized the Savages.

'If the British sinned, it was not because of their colonial rule, but because of the failure of nerve that led them to withdraw too precipitously from colonies that were ill-equipped to govern themselves--colonies in Africa, for example, and India itself. Had Britain had the courage to face down Gandhi and his rabble a few years longer, the tragedy that was the partititon of India might have been avoided." Well, how about this - if the British had never colonized India, they wouldn't have had to face down Gandhi.

"Never since the heroic days of Greece has the world had such a sweet, just, boyish master. It will be a black day for the human race when scientific blackguards, conspirators, churls, and fanatics manage to supplant him". That last bit you quote from Santayana sums up your attitude and it isn't a pretty picture. Your contrast of the good kind of colonialism that Britain practiced to the bad kind that Belgium practiced would be funny if it weren't so wrongheaded. You can keep believeing that Britain left India better than it found, but the fact of matter is that if India was better when the British left it than when they arrived, it was not because of the British, but inspite of them.

I am deeply disappointed with this screed you have written and it does nothing but show you in a poor light.

(I corrected some spelling and grammar mistakes from my email)

Unsynchronicity

2005-04-25T09:51:00.000-07:00

I had a mixed experience watching Chandramukhi - I liked the movie but I was distracted quite a bit in the first half by a slight lack of synchronisation between the sound and the visual. The sound was behind the lip movements by about 1/8th of a second I think - whenever this happened I was focussed more on estimating what the time difference between the sound and the visual was, and I forgot to focus on the action on the screen. This problem occured only during the first 45 minutes or so and even then not always, but it happened often enough to distract from the movie watching experience. I wonder if it was just that particular screening or just that particular theater (Santham) or widespread. I wouldn't think it was the last, otherwise there would be an issue made of it in the newspapers and on the net. I haven't come across anyone else having experienced the same problem. This is not a "woe is (was?) me" post, but just a way to get it out.

Superstar vs. One Rupee Coin

2005-04-20T23:06:00.000-07:00

Sunday 5.14 PM: I last saw a Thalaivar(T) movie in a theater about 13 1/2 years back. This is the kind of admission that draws "if looks could kill" looks (justifiably, I might add) and "what is wrong with you?" comments. Yes, I have seen Dalapathy, Mannan, Annamalai and Baasha (unforgiveable and something I deeply regret) only on TV. There have been other forgettable T movies (Pandian, Uzhaippali, Baba) along the way and I don't regret having not seen any of them in a theater.

Sunday 5:15 PM: My brother got three tickets to Chandramukhi for the Wednesday evening show (6:45 PM) for my cousin, but my cousin has work and so has no use for the tickets. I was planning to see Chandramukhi anyway, but I hadn't gotten the tickets yet and combined with my apathy of late to things that need to be done, it is possible I might have missed watching another T movie in a theater. So I am grateful to my brother for the tickets.

Tuesday 6:30 PM: Looks like I might have to go alone to the movie even though I have three tickets.

Wednesday 6.10 PM: I am ready for the movie. The theater is at worst 15 minutes from
my home by bike (Y - important enough in the narrative to merit an initial). So I sit down to catch a bit of Simpsons on Star World before I leave.

Wednesday 6.20 PM: I couldn't really concentrate on TV (you need to do that?) and so I decide to head to the theater. I get the Y down (house is two feet above street level and to get the Y down to the street we have a 10 foot long, one foot wide wooden plank) and get the aforementioned plank back into the house.

Wednesday 6.22 PM: I kickstart the Y, check if the fuel switch is in the one position and press the clutch (C). It feels a tight and as if there is no pull. But I persist and then put the Y into first gear. The Y leaps a foot forward and dies. I think that I let go of the C too soon - a simple mistake that someone just learning to ride a bike makes, not something that someone who has had a bike for as long as I have should make. I kickstart the Y and press the C (still tight) and get into the first gear and Y stops dead after a leap forward. What the hell?. I persist in getting my Y to move and once even quick switched to the second gear and get to the end of the street I live in. I have to stop before I can take a turn left. I try to get into first gear, put the break and keep the C engaged till traffic clears. But my Y has other plans apparently and stops dead again. Obviously something is wrong with the C and I start panicking. The movie is scheduled to start in 23 minutes and the Y is misbehaving. Should I forget the movie and go back home (less than 50 m away) and get the Y repaired the next morning?. I didn't know how serious the problem with the Y was. The shop I usually get my Y repaired at is near (6-7 minutes pushing the Y I learn later!).

Wednesday 6:30 PM: I am at the mechanic shop, sweating profusely from having pushed the Y in the warm, humid weather. The mechanic (M - nice guy, always helpful, always courteous and, btw, a good mechanic too) is working on another bike. Come on, doesn't the world know I am going to a T movie and I have to be there in 15 minutes. Thanfully M finishes work on the other bike in a couple of minutes and gets started on my Y. I don't tell him it is urgent but he might have guessed it from my body language. He starts working at a furious pace with his screw driver. He opens up the gear box (is that the right term for a Y?) and finds the villain - a greasy one rupee coin (ORC) is inside the gear block and has been jamming the spring attached to the clutch. I know how it got there - a couple of months back I was at a petrol buck on Cathedral Road getting oil for my Y. The young man there offered to pour it into the oil tank under the seats. I rememeber now that he first used a ORC to get a screw (holding the oil tank tight) loose. He dropped it somewhere on the bike and couldn't find it. I was a little miffed and promised myself to look for the coin later in case it gets stuck somewhere and becomes a problem. Ofcourse I forgot to look for the coin and now the coin apparently felt lonely and wanted to be found. Couldn't it find a better time to be get itself found? or finded or unlost?. I hate ORC's with a vehemance I usually reserve for RJs that talk too much and play awful tappankoothu songs way too frequently.

Wednesday 6:45 PM: M refuses to accept any monetary compensation for his heroic effort in finding the ORC. I get the Y started and am off to the races. About hundred yards later I meet a huge pile of earth piled high at an intersection and am forced to go real slow in my more immediate quest to get to the other side of the huge pile of earth.

Wednesday 6:49 PM: I barely beat the signal at an intersection only to run into a red signal. The timer on the signal indicates I have red for another seventy seconds. I hate this signal - I take the above combination of signals quite often and almost always end uo with a red on the second signal. Doesn't the world know I am going to a T movie and I sould have been there 5 minutes ago?.

Wednesday 6:55 PM: I have not encountered any more red signals and am in the last stretch to the theater, a straight road to the theater with out any more signals. It is a narrow road though and nearly half of it has been rendered unusable because of road work/electricity work/ metrowater work. I have to go slow and wait for cars from the opposite direction to go past me. Can't they have taken a wider road?.

Wednesday 6:59 PM: I am in the parking lot of the theater and get a nice spot to park. How much of the movie have I missed?. Have I missed the very important T introduction song?.

Wednesday 7:02 PM: I am inside the theater and thank god the movie hasn't started yet. Infact, the screen is black and even the trailer/ads haven't started yet. I take my position (second to fourth seats in a row - easy to get out but painful to pull your legs back for others desirous of going out).

Wednesday 7:10 PM: The movie han't started yet. There have been ten ads so far. Excuse me Mr.Operator, can you start the movie soon?.

Wednesday 7:15 PM: S U P E R S T A R

The movie starts atlast and, while the last hour has been stressful, I forget it all as soon as I hear the traditional T intro music behind the word SUPERSTAR.

Musharraf visit

2005-04-07T00:34:00.000-07:00

Many Indian bloggers have decided to protest Musharraf's visit to India to watch an ODI by putting up a "Not welcome banner". I am joining the protest too.

Musharraf stabbed India in the back while Vajpayee was in Lahore trying to further the peace process with Nawaz Sharif. For this reason and many more, it is rather painful to see the US government treat Musharraf as a great ally in its War on Terrorism. How the Americans can trust Pakistan when A.Q. Khan has been caught passing on nuclear technology to Iran (and possibly other countries) is hard to understand. In this context, the Ackerman Bill is to welcomed by all "right" thinking Indians and Americans. The ISI, atleast by Indian and American media accounts, is a very powerful force in Pakistan and it is not believable that A.Q.Khan engaged in his nefarious work without their (and hence Musharraf) knowing. The quick pardon(Seymour Hersh, CNN, Rediff) that A.Q.Khan got from Musharraf also supports this conclusion, becuase it serves both their purpose - A.Q.Khan get spared and Musharraf escapes blame by pinning the entire episode on a rogue nuclear scientist who cannot be punished severely on account of his being a national hero. Nice charade.

While searching for articles about A.Q.Khan's pardon, I came across this - US supports A.Q.Khan pardon. So the issue (Nuclear proliferation) that both US presidential candidates considered the most important security threat to the USA is swept under the carpet by the pardon and the US supports, but Modi is a mass murderer (proved so in a court I guess) and must be denied a visa.

Since the communists gave the clean chit to Musharraf a few weeks back and rile about Modi, their position on A.Q.Khan is pretty clear too, I suppose.

For details about image, go to The Acorn.

End of days

2005-04-06T02:03:00.001-07:00

If life on earth comes to a sudden end in the next few days, you could do worse than blaming it on me ("how can we blame you after life came to an end?" - well, aren't you the dickens!). I was at Landmark yesterday and as I was leaving, having paid the right amount (more on this in the next post), I saw cassettes and CD's of Bose: the forgotten hero placed strategically to make people indulge in impulse buys and I obliged. Bose is a Hindi movie directed by Shyam Benegal and scored by A.R. Rahman. Now why would that cause an end to life on earth.

Well, it was the first Hindi movie cassette I had ever bought. So what's the big deal you ask?. As a student in a CBSE school I studied (in a "to pass the exam" kind of way) Hindi for eight years. My lack of Hindi "skills" is legendary among friends. I passed Hindi exams for 8 years without ever learning to read (understanding what I read) or speak Hindi. I could write a little bit in Hindi (that is if I did not forget what little I had memorized the day before the exam). So I almost never watch Hindi movies and, while I have passed the phase of physically attacking friends who conversed in Hindi in my presence even though they could have conversed in English or Tamil, try not to subject myself to anything Hindi.

I bought the cassette because it was an A.R.Rahman score and because i read somewhere that the theme music was good. My first impressions about the score are positive. It is haunting and melodious (sometimes together) and makes me look forward to watching a Hindi film for the first time in my life. Also, Netaji was and still is a very interesting personality and Shyam Benegal is a well respected film maker. It would be interesting to see if he takes any creative liberties with regard to Netaji's disappearance and also how he deals with Netaji's contacts with the Nazis.

Violence on field in sports

2005-03-02T02:54:00.000-08:00

John Bracewell, coach of the NZ cricket team, has threatened to sue Brett Lee for bowling a beamer at Brendon McCullum, citing as precedent an
incident in rugby league.

There is an increasing trend to prosecute sportsmen for onfield transgressions. Todd Bertuzzi, an ice hockey player in the NHL, was
prosecuted for a vicious on-ice attack on an opposing player. This follows Marty McSorley (Gretzky's protector during his golden years with the Edmonton Oilers) being found guilty for a high sticking incident against Donald Brashear in 2000. Recently, 5 Indiana Pacers players have been
charged for their roles in a crazy oncourt brawl with fans.

While this growing trend of prosecuting athletes for onfield incidents is inevitable as the athletes become faster and stronger and hence cause more serious injuries to others, it is not always easy to judge intent in these incidents. Ponting is claiming that the field was wet and so the ball may have slipped from Lee's hand. John Buchanan, the Aussie coach, claims that bowling at the pace Lee does can cause some loss of control and that Lee didn't bowl an intentional beamer. However Lee has bowled 5 or 6 beamers in this season and maybe skirting with the law. He needs to be careful, which is sad beacuse an unfettered Lee bowling upwards of 150 KMph is a great sight.

Athletes have to become more wary of the long arm of law and try not to be reckless. Sadly this will take way a bit of the instinctivess that makes sports so unpredictable and entertaining.

Importance of being an idiot

2005-02-15T02:23:00.000-08:00

Praful Bidwai, the noted pinko-commie, pseudosecular member of the intelligentsia (I am probably repeating myself), has a column out at rediff.com titled "The Importance Of Sania Mirza". Apparently Sania Mirza is a "...modern, liberal, educated, well-informed Muslim who has an open mind and cosmopolitan outlook" besides being a woman, the types of whom "The Hindu nationalist as well as the middle class pseudo-liberal is deeply uncomfortable with...". His thesis is that a Muslim woman has become an icon and will cause discomfort to conservatives as she does not conform to their stereotype of a Muslim woman.

In a rather surprising turn of events, he goes on to rather effectively destroy his own arguements by producing a list of Muslim sports and movie figures who have also made a mark on their field like the Khans in movies, Azhar, Pathan, Zaheer etc in cricket. Now tell me Karl, these people promote items that the poor probably can't buy and middle class gobbles up (not that there is anything wrong with that, though your communist sentiments might not be too impressed) but the middle class pseudo liberal is supposed to be uncomfortable with them. If that were true, why would the middle class continue to patronise the products they promote?. He then lists Muslims who have made it in other fields too - even more evidence to counter his own claims of middle class discomfort with successful Muslims.

Bidwai has an agenda to force through to his readers - middle class bad, BJP and its sympathisers bad, Muslims good, (pseudo) secularists very good. Too bad he had to take a moment that made many Indians fell proud and make it fit his agenda, falling way short along the way.

Sania mania officially begins!

2005-02-12T07:25:00.000-08:00

Sania Mirza has won the Hyderabad Open, becoming the first Indian woman to win a WTA tour title. It is a small tournament but Sania was playing in only her fifth WTA tournament and she is eighteen years young, meaning she has to start somewhere. It must have been awesome to win a tournament in her hometown (I believe Hyderabad is her hometown) with her friends and relatives in the crowd. I only hope skeptics and naysayers giver her time to savour this victory. There has been plenty of coverage of Sania after her third-round showing at the Aussie open, which ended with a defeat to Serena which was not completely a rollover, but this tournament victory kind of justifies the coverage from the media. And before I forgot, Sania has one more WTA singles tournament victory than
someone some of us know and love and pray to every day!

Quit (South) India movement - 2004 style

2005-01-11T23:48:00.000-08:00

You know this Sankaracharya dude is so evil and so powerful and stuff that his very presence within 700-800 KM of Kanchipuram will adversely impact the ongoing case (case:fiasco :: potato:potatoe). So the meek and powerless TN government wants him out of South India. Good on Jayalalitha. This will show those opressive Brahmins not to be oppressive, I suppose.

Scam Alert!

2005-01-07T19:54:00.000-08:00

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.

Disaster on Boxing Day

2004-12-31T20:40:00.000-08:00

Tsunami, as probably most people in India have come to know under unfortunate circumstances in the last week, means "harbour wave" in Japanese. It can be tremendously destructive if coastal regions are heavily populated(as they usually are because of fishing). Still, the destruction caused by the tsunami wave in South Asia is hard to imagine, even more so because possibility of a Tsunami wave striking India was so low and therefore its capacity to cause destruction is not understood by most people.

Earthquakes occur more frequently and the images of the trail of destruction they leave behind have been shown countless times on television. So there is some understanding of the earthquake's power. While it might be convenient (and human nature) to blame someone for this massive loss of life, the blame is to be shared universally. But the time for the blame game (over preventing loss of life and evacuation of people in coastal areas) is not now (and probably never).

"Maha" disaster for BJP-SS

2004-10-20T00:32:00.000-07:00

The trends showing BJP-SS leading in more seats than Congress didn't hold and the BJP-SS combine suffered a big defeat in the elections. This is a body blow to the BJP and led to the resignation of Venkiah Naidu as the party president. Advani has taken over for now and has the monumental task of energising the party, prepare a plan of succession and stop the seemingly unstoppable path to irrelevance that BJP is on now. It would seem like an overstatement to consider the BJP to be on a path to irrelevance, but with many states scheduled to have assembly elections next year, in every one of which the BJP is expected to do rather badly, it is the most important time in BJP's existence. It is a good thing that the man who made BJP relevant in the 80's and early 90's is at the helm to try and make the party strong again. But it begs the question, whither the new generation of leaders in the BJP?. Advani is in his late 70's and cannot possibly carry on for long, especially not at the energy level needed to campaign in numerous state elections.

Advani's job has been made that much more harder by the public disaffection with hardcore hindutva politics. BJP has to somehow craft a development based agenda that appeals to both urban and rural voters. It is easier said than done. As Swapan Dasgutpa poined out on NDTV yesterday, economics has never really been the BJP's strong suit. It is now in the unenviable position of building an economic agenda from scratch. They don't seem to have any clear ideas on that front, with some RSS leaders spouting protectionist "Swadeshi" policies and senior BJP leaders like Jaswant Singh and Yashwant Sinha favoring reforms and liberalisation. Adavni has never really spoken much on economic issues and it is high time he did.

Oh, yeah I forgot. The Congress and the NCP are in the middle of their first fight (of the new election cycle) even before forming the government. Well it figures, because the problem is with forming the government. NCP surprisingly (or maybe not surprisingly) won more seats than the Congress and is now claiming the CM's post for itself based on the formula on which the 1999 elections were fought which said that the party that won more number of seats would get to choose the CM. Congress never expected this and are now trying all sorts of arguements to convince the NCP to give up its claim to the CM post. But Pawar is having none of it.

The worst thing for the saffron alliance in all this is that they lost to this alliance. Advani has a job that no one else really wants (and frankly no one else can handle) because any one else will most assuredly fail initially and never ever get another chance to lead the BJP. Exhibit Number 1 being Venkiah Naidu. So Advani has to pick his successor and create conditions which will be suitable for that person to move the party forward and make it stronger.

Test Match balanced on a knife edge

2004-10-15T20:52:00.000-07:00

India goes into the 3rd day of the 2nd Test against Australia leading by 57 runs with 4 wickets in hand. Kaif and Patel played reasonably well in the final hour of play to build a lead for India. They have to stay as long as possible (duh!) and try to get a lead of 150 for India.

This Test match looked like a vintage India vs "team that can't play Kumble" from the mid 90's, you know like England or WI or SA or even SL. Australia were shot out for 235 by a briliant Kumble spell and then yesterday Sehwag batted like a champion. But give the Aussies credit for pegging away and getting wickets at regular Interval after lunch. The match could have easily gotten out of hand for the Aussies, but they bowled themselves back into it.

This Test match reminds me so much of the India-Australia Test match played in Chennai in 1998. India made 230 odd in the first innings and then Australia made 328 in their first, getting a lead of 90 odd in the process. Then first Sidhu and then Sachin batted brilliantly and piled on a huge score for Inda and then the spinners routed Austalia in the fourth innings of the game. Sachin made a magnificent 155*, hitting Warne (bowling around the wickets) repeatedly over mid-wicket and over cover. Can someone in the Australian camp do it today?. Ofcourse Hayden is perfectly capable of doing it. Look for him to attack Harbhajan and Kumble right from their first deliveries. I am excited by the prospects of a great day of cricket.

Maha Elections D-Day

2004-10-15T20:47:00.000-07:00

The counting of votes for the 2--4 Maharashtra assembly elections started this morning and trends are coming in quick and fast. Rediff.com says BJP-SS are leading in 107 seats and Congress-NCP in 109. This is closer than the 1999 elections when thr COngress and NCP fought separately and together won 137 seats. This is good news for BJP but not great news. It might be a hung assembly again and with so many rebel COngress-NCP candidates winning, those rebels might return back to the mother ship and help them form the governement again. Now that won't be good news for BJP.

Update: Rediff.com now show BJP-SS leading in 119 and the "other guys" leading in 111. Wohoo!!!. I am getting nervous.

Congrats to Warne!!!

2004-10-14T22:38:00.000-07:00

Warne just got Pathan caught at slip by Hayden for his 533rd wicket is Tests and is now the sole holder of the world record for most wickets in Test cricket. ABC radio just had some stats comparing him with Murali. Murali it seems has 87 wickets against Zimbabwe and 20 against Bangladesh. Warne has 6 against Zimbabwe and hasn't played Bangladesh. So that is a 107 to 6 advantage against the minnows for Murali. This does put Warne's career in perspective. But this is not to diminish Murali's achievements. Both Murali and Warne have done well against teams that struggle against spin (everyone except India and Australia to an extent,in this era), as they should.

Now that Pathan is gone and the score is at 88 for 2 with ten minutes to go before lunch, the game is delicately poised. India has to go into lunch without losing any more wickets. They have to bat till atleast lunch tomorrow to win this game. India cannot expect Australia to collapse once more in the 2nd innings and so they have to get a sizeable lead in their first go around.

Warne seems to be bowling well, but for me the danger man is Gillespie. He has the pace (that Mcgrath does not) and can bowl a great leg cutter. Kasper, despite his relative success in India, has been underrated in this series. He is also a danger man. Mcgrath for all his success in the previous Test matches in India does not seem to have it on this occasion. Pathan played him quite this morning.It remains to be seen how he well does.

Kumble destroys Australian middle order!

2004-10-14T03:29:00.000-07:00

Kumble just caused a sensational collapse of the Australian batting lineup. The Aussies went from 189 for 2 to 235 all out!!!. Kumble took 7 wickets in 60 balls. Great stuff from the veteran legspinner and he crossed Ambrose (407) on the all-time wickets list.

I thought India needed to win the lunch and post-tea session (see previous post) to get back in the game after the great start for Australia and they did that quite brilliantly. There is still an hour's play to go and India need to win this portion of the day (or atleast tie)to end a great day for them. After lunch Harbhajan got the breakthrough with 2 wickets in 3 balls (Hayden and Langer) and then at the stroke of tea Kumble started his magic.

Tomorrow (2nd day) should be a great day of cricket. As I am writing this Clarke drops Yuvraj of Mcgrath in the first over. My,my, how I wish I was home watching this on TV or even better be at Chepauk watching it all live.

India vs Australia, 2nd Test

2004-10-14T00:55:00.000-07:00

The Chepauk test match got underway this morning and the Aussie openers Hayden and Langer have put India on the back foot right way. The score is 123 for no loss after just 29 overs. This is not good for an Indian team hoping to comeback after the disastrous first test. Hayden didn't make a lot of runs in the first tests and he was due.

With the Aussies batting first, India has to get them out for within 350 to have a chance of winning. The Indian batting has been shaky for the last few months and they just can't let the Aussies make a huge score and put the pressure on them again. The Chennai pitch will apparently have a bit of bounce and Mcgrath and co. will definitely be licking their chops to have a bowl on this wicket. The series hangs in the balance for the Indians and they have to win this session and the next one too. They better have the Aussie 6 or 7 down for less than 320 at the end of the days play or this test could be over.

Petrol Pump Scandal

2004-10-14T00:42:00.000-07:00

This does not bode well for the BJP. Nearly three-fourths of the petrol pump allotments made during the NDA rule were found to be improperly awarded by a panel setup by the Supreme Court. The list given by Indian Express in that link above has lots of relatives of BJP politicians and RSS functionaries (a few relatives of politicians from other parties). Ram Naik has a lot of explaining to do. BJP's "party with a difference" slogan is ringing very hollow right about now.

Maha Elections Redux

2004-10-13T22:50:00.000-07:00

The elections to the Maharashtra assembly were over yesterday. NDTV (in alliance with Indian Express and Lok Satta) had a one and a half hour long exit poll program. I was surprised by the results of their polls. They seemed to give the BJP-Shiv Sena combine between 125-135 seats and the Congress-NCP combine between 120-130 seats.

The Headlines Today Polls (owned by India Today magazine I believe) had it for the Congress (140-150 seats) over the BJP-Sena (100-110 seats).

Maha Elections

2004-10-13T03:19:00.000-07:00

This is the first post to this blog. I hope to give a "from India" perspective on all things India.
The most important event today is the elections to the Maharashtra assembly. Opinion polls seem to indicate that the Congress-NCP alliance will be back in power despite lots of rebels contesting against official party candidates. If true this will be a big blow to the BJP coming just a few months after it "lost" the Lok Sabha elections. (Yes, as far as I am concerned, BJP lost the elctions and Congress did not win it. You can't claim a victory if you have only 145 odd MP's in a house of 537(?)).