The Most Foolish Decision taken Yet by UPA Govt.

Operation Green Hunt was launched by the Congress led UPA Government some one and a half months ago and what has happened after that! During the intervening night of the 7^th and 8^th of April, the Maoists launched one of the deadliest attacks yet on the security forces when they managed to kill 75 CRPF Jawans. And now that the carnage has taken place we are seeing more and more drama being doled out by the Congress government and Mr. P. Chidambaram, Union Home Minister with him sending a letter to the Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh accepting moral responsibility for the attack on the jawans and offering to resign from his post as Union Home Minister and with his saying that the buck stops at his desk and the Prime Minister refusing to accept his resignation from the post. How much more drama will we have to endure in the days to come is a matter that is of great interest for, now that the Congress Government has got into a mess and a big one at that, I don’t see this drama ending very soon as everyday something or the other will be said in the media which will spice up the situation and create a flutter and in the end what will happen is that the whole matter will get brushed under the carpet and the whole thing will be done and dusted with, if we are to get any indication from the track record of various governments be it run by the Congress or the BJP.

What was the need for the Government to put preconditions for talks with the Maoists in the first place? The foolishness started from there itself. You cannot have a successful dialogue with a violent group of people by keeping the precondition that Maoists should give up their ammunitions and only then will the government hold talks with the Maoists. Of course they will not give up their arms till their demands are not met and we have to understand that they have a justified demand and the government has itself to blame for the bad situation that they are in with the Maoists, simply because they have been constantly ignoring the demands of the Maoists, which is that there should be development in their area too. There areas are the most underdeveloped areas in the whole country and Bengal is the best example to show how the government there has done absolutely nothing to develop the area and the most shocking thing is that, that government has been ruling there for the past 32 yrs and still there has been no development in those areas which are affected by Naxalism and surprisingly or unsurprisingly it is the Communist Party of India which has been ruling there and which claims that it stands for the people and will continue to fight for their rights. Its so ironical but it is so true, that once one gains power, one looses all sense of morals, ethics, values and promises that one makes before gaining power and that is exactly what has happened with the Communist Party of India and it’s a wonder how the people have continued to vote for a party that has done no work for the past 32 yrs! The fact is, everywhere vote bank politics is prevalent so that’s why they have managed to survive for these many years. The problem that the Central Government should look into is why, though they give so much money to various states for their development, yet very little amount of money reaches the people who actually need it! A case in point, during the Kosi floods in Bihar, for the relief of the people in the areas affected by flood the government allotted around 500 crore rupees for proper rehabilitation and other purposes like healthcare problems and the like, but yet the people in Bihar, who were most severely affected by the fury of the floods got cheques worth rupees 5 from the government!! Now where did the rest of the amount go? If people are receiving 5 rupees cheques then there is a lot of pilferage of money that is taking place which the government has no idea about! And then when the Bihar State Government asks for more funds for rehabilitation they are refused flatly by the Central Government saying that they have already given whatever money they could for the rehabilitation and they should have managed the money in a better way! While it might be true that the State Government is itself siphoning off the money for its own purposes, the fact remains, that whatever amount the state government got was way less than what was the requirement because half the money has been siphoned off by the middlemen on the way and of course the state government itself siphons off some money with the result that the people who actually need the money, the areas which actually need money, including areas where Naxalism is at the forefront and areas otherwise affected by the floods in the case just discussed, never reaches them, with the result that they remain under developed and remain without proper rehabilitation facilities. So, there is an unholy nexus between state government, central govt. and the middlemen and the central govt. is at the forefront of this unholy nexus since they are the ones who have created these middlemen.

The second foolishness committed by the Congress led UPA alliance was that when the Maoists refused to hold talks with the government without giving up their arms, then the decision that was taken was that they will launch an attack on the Maoist affected areas and eliminate the Maoists and this operation was called ‘Operation Green Hunt’. The foolishness in this decision was that they did not learn there lessons from what happened in Sri Lanka, where the Sri Lankan Government tried to do the same thing with the LTTE and while they managed to finish off the LTTE the fact is that this decision will come back to haunt them later as another organization similar to the LTTE will come up in Sri Lanka to fight for the rights of the Tamils in Sri Lanka. Will the government do the same thing when the new organization comes up? It seems most likely that there will be a repeat of what they did with the LTTE. Little did they realize that this decision of there will anger the Tamils in Sri Lanka so much! Similarly, in India itself they could have learnt from what followed after the Operation Blue Star in Amritsar when incidentally it was again the Congress Government which took this decision with the result that there was a backlash by the Sikh Community which led to ultimately the killing of Mrs. Indira Gandhi and what followed was the most chilling attack yet on a particular community, and that was the Anti Sikh Riots of 1984 where there was a systematic targeting of the Sikh community in Delhi which was led by the Congress Government with members of the parliament of the ruling party, Congress, instigating Hindus to attack any Sikh that they found on the streets. And the rest is history!!!

Yet the current Congress government went ahead with its decision to launch Operation Green Hunt thinking that the Maoists will be eliminated and then the whole issue would get resolved. Little did they realize that the Maoists had far superior warfare technology than the armed forces and that it ultimately would lead to the killing of 75 CRPF Jawans off the 82 that had been sent for the mission to eliminate the Maoists!!

The third and final act of stupidity by the Congress Government was Mr. P. Chidambaram’s statement in the press, just a couple of days ago before this unforeseen carnage, took place at Lalgarh in West Bengal where in a press conference Chidambaram said that the Maoists were cowards as they were fighting from behind the trees and if they have the courage they should challenge the armed forces head on and not from behind the trees. Now what was the need for Mr. Chidambaram to make that statement from as sensitive a Maoist area as Lalgarh, and even if it was said not in Lalgarh what was the need to say it at all in the first place!! Then they were planning to launch the air force to annihilate the Maoists but thankfully good sense prevailed and they decided not to bring the air force into the picture. It seems Chidambaram has not learnt his lessons from what happened as just a few days ago he made a similar statement and said that if need be the air force will be pressed into service. Lets hope Chidambaram stops making these embarrassing comments in the media and lets also hope that good sense prevails in the Congress decision making and the foolishness ends here just like Chidambaram said that the buck stops at his desk although that was just a statement made to please the people in the country that he was setting an example by accepting moral responsibility for a thing which should not have taken in the first place!!

Welcome to Lazy and Corrupt Delhi Police

The Delhi Police says:"With you, for you, always." But this is far from true. Infact, the police emblem should say:"Welcome to Lazy and Corrupt Delhi Police." I am making this comment especially with reference to the Delhi Police taking six months to discover the murderer of Soumya Vishwanathan, the young reporter of Headlines Today. It took another murder of an employee in a call center for the Delhi Police to catch the perpretrators of the gruesome murder of Soumya Vishwanathan.

I fail to understand how the Delhi Police could not catch the perpetrators of Soumya Viswanathan when the group who had committed the crime was roaming around the same place for the past six months. Whats even more shocking is that the person who was acting as an informer was directly involved in the murder of Soumya Viswanathan. That's as horrible as it gets! That means corruption is rampant in Police ranks. Everyday you find truck drivers, bus drivers getting away with breaking of laws just by paying bribes to police officials who stop them. Isn't it the police's responsibility to put law breakers in their places? At least in Delhi Police that doesnt seem to be the case.Police should be the law enforcer rather than being an alibi to the people who break the laws. How is it possible that the perpetrators of Soumya Viswanathan's murder takes six months to be discovered while the perpetrators of Jigisha Ghosh's murder are discovered in just two days? Had the police been a little more alert and acted smartly another person's murder could have been prevented.

There is a serious need for the police to be more alert and prevent unnecessary murders like that of Jigisha Ghosh. There is also a serious need to curb corruption within the police ranks so that those who are guilty are brought to the book and do not get away in case of murders and also that people do not break laws by their wish and get away with paying bribes to the police officials. Having said this I think that the government has to think of its policies regarding payment to police officials since police officials are paid very less and with that kind of income they can barely make their living.

I hope there is some improvement in providing justice to the victim's families and the head of the police takes some action against the high handedness of police officials and corruption among official in police ranks if there has to be any significant drop in the murder rate and drop in law breaking.

Genesis of a Recession

A recession is a period of sustained falling GDP rates for two consecutive quarters. The Global Economic Recession or the Global Financial Crisis, as it is called in india, is caused when there is a lack of aggregate demand. Aggregate demand is the total demand for final goods and services in an economy at a given time and price level. It is the amount of goods and services in the economy that will be purchased at all possible price levels. This is gross domestic product of a country when inventories of the country are static.

The current financial crisis has often been compared to the Great Depression of the 1930s US. This is because markets then, as now, collapsed; banks had to file for bankurptcy; and thousands of people were left jobless, with nations reporting double digit or near double digit unemployement figures for their populations and workforce. This current economic recession was caused due to the bursting of a housing "bubble" which started in 2005-06. The housing bubble was a bubble which was created because of unsound loans and financing of houses way beyond their real woths. People were pushed into buying houses they couldn't afford, using financial loans and schemes which were dodgy at best and criminally negligent at worst. As a result, in 2005, housing prices peaked, and in 2006 they began to decline, and ultimately collapsing. Suddenly, the best of houses in the best of locations were worthless. People defaulted on their loans, the financial structure shivered massively, threatening to bring the entire financial superstructure down. Greed in the housing sector was now threatening to toxify everything it touched. Banks were scared of lending. Credit was in crunch. A vicious cycle was playing out: banks were unwilling to lend to businesses, these businesses were unable to pay their employees, and employees were now losing their purchasing power, thereby putting the entire economy, including its vangaurds- the banks- in grave jeopardy. Liquidity dried up, loans were defaulted upon by those who were never eligiblefor them in the first place, and banks now stood on the percipice of bankurptcy. Indeed, Lehmann Brothers, Bear Streams, Merrill Lynch, Northern Rock and countless others, in a scary but faricial reenactment of the "Great Depression", collapsed. Innovative money making devices- securities, derivatives, credit default swaps, subprime mortgages and loans- heretofore the shining stars of capital, were now its biggest, most vile criminals. These were primary causes, along with the Federal Reserve and SEC'S negligence to respond to frequent warnings and red flags.

There is a difference between economic recession and slowdown. A slowdown is when the industrial production dips whereas in a recession the whole economy comes to a halt. So what India is experiencing right now is an economic sslowdown wherein we are seeing that only the industrial production is going down and the GDP of the country is positive. But in the US the GDP had been negative for two consecutive quarters and the industrial production has been very low for 6 quarters and hence we can say that US, along with a large part of the world, is experiencing recession.

Independence Day: The challenges the country Faces

India is going to turn 63 on August 15 this year. Many things that were supposed to change have not changed, infact, there are added challenges to this country which is so diverse that sometimes it becomes difficult for the government to manage.
The first challenge for the country is maintaining unity in diversity. Today there are many secessionist movements that are taking place to create a seperate state. This is challanging the basis of what is mentioned in constution where it is said that India is unity in Diversity personified.

Our secular credentials also face a grave challenge. Both the major parties of the country should think before calling themselves a secular country. Secular does not mean that you cut a hand of a Muslim or that you crush a person under the roller. I think it is high time we revisited the constititution and get the definintion of secular clear in our heads. Secularism means that there is mutual peace and coexistence between all member communities and that the government does not interfere unnecessarily. Secularism doesnot mean that u deny a house to Emraan Hashmi just because he is a Muslim.

Our judicial system is down in the doldrums. We have to seriously think about bringing reforms in our bureacracy so that justice can be provided to every victim. It seems the judiciary has forgotten for what purpose it was formed. How many times have we seen that courts take endless years to conduct trials and in the end leave the accused scottfree to roam in the country because according to the judiciary there is a lack of evidence. Take for example the acquital of Sajjan Kumar and Jagdish Tytler in the anti sikh riots of 1984 for lack of evidence. Take the most recent example of Professor Sabharwal's perpetrators roaming around freely because again the prosecution failed to give enough evidence to convict the accused .

Unless these challanges are met and unless there is equitable distribution of wealth in the country till that time we cannot say that the country is progressing and we can keep dreaming of becoming a superpower one day.

JAI HIND!!!

Rita Bahugana's Remarks regarding Mayawati

I think Rita Bahuguna made a really irresponsible remark regarding Mayawati. Although i agree that Mayawati is not doing enough in Uttar Pradesh to help its people but i think we could have avoided this unnecessary comments and unnecessary controversy as this will prove to be a setback to the congress as it was gaining advantage in the states where BJP was losing ground. As it is politicians can do anything to gain political mileage and this was also done to gain political mileage. I hope the Congress takes action against this so that it can maintain its high moral ground.

Kapil Sibal's Proposals

I think Kapil sibal's proposals regarding education reforms are good. He wants to abolish class 10th boards which will reduce pressure on students, he wants to abolish all state boards and have one central board which is good as it will reduce the difference between marks obtained by students giving cbse examinations versus students coming through state boards. However the third proposal regarding abolishing 12th boards are not rigtht since now according to the proposal students will have to give a competitive exam for admission to college which i think is going to put extra pressure on the students to perform well. But the challange for the govt will be to implement these decisions and given our history of non implementation it is going to be an uphill task for the government.