Still working against the nation

I think i've made this point before, and i'll make it again: politicians are loathe to take decisions that will strengthen the foundations of this nation because it will unsettle their own power and influence over the country. The dumb decision to block websites and blogs by the Government was as ham-headed as it can get, and it again showed that the politicians of India have no brain to thrive in a new world and a new economy.

But then again, looking at the first line, it could also imply that politicians of India know what's going on, but do not want to do the right thing. The other thing is the sneakiness with which these monkeys have subverted the system, and when the media and the common man have raised their objections, the government fully insists that there is nothing to argue about and that its a done deal.

A few days ago, I learnt that there is a Union Social Justice ministry when they said that the castes of the SC/ST bureaucrats should be dropped from their profiles when their names are circulated for appointment in departments and ministries at the center. According to the honorable Minister, a very old worker in the Gandhi household, Meira Kumar, there will be a danger of social bias coming into play.

I found is surprising that they say this, because this is exactly the kind of bias that her cohorts are trying to bring into India's higher education sector and the private sector. As far as I know, the private sector has, for the most part, always focusing on merit to hire, and now the illustrious Con'gress wants to change all that. I have said it before and i'll say it again, I firmly believe that now this country needs economic equality just as much as it needs religious and caste equality. The sad fact is that our baboons of netas have managed to fuck up the latter already, and are now trying to mess up the former.

This UPA government, like i said, has no plan for the country. The cabinet ministers work at their own whims and on their own agendas. There is no communication among them, and they have been unable to put together a single coherent policy together. Most of the economic liberalization policies of today are heavily dosed with the Common Minimum Programme, and thus for every step forward, the government takes 4/5th step backwards. Today's government is running on two incentives: do not piss off the commies, and do not let the BJP get any mileage from any tragedy.

Arjun Singh is a man on a mission, and I do not know what the mission is, but I do know it is not in the interests of this country's development. A fellow forumer on Skyscraper City posted this piece of news which filled me with even more loathing for the government. A few years ago, the netas sitting in the Parliament had passed a law that made the right to basic education a fundamental right. There is a lot that goes into making that a reality, and the government was working on the draft of a bill that would have laid down the guidelines and rules with which we could turn this dream of universal education into a reality. Instead of implementing it, apparently the government has decided to shift the responsibility onto the states. I understand their action though, subverting the rule of law and lying spineless and gutless on the ground in the face of national threats is really hard work.

According to the Telegraph of Kolkata, even the Commie allies did not know that the government had done this, which is surprising, considering the commies have had a butt hanging in every decision that the Con'gress led UPA has been taking. Anyways, heres the story.

Education bill buried

Four years after education was made a fundamental right, the Centre has quietly junked a planned bill aimed to make the right a reality with even key allies not aware of the move.

CPM politburo member Sitaram Yechury recently expressed surprise when he was told the government had passed the buck to the states. “We don’t know about this. Education is a priority area for us,” Yechury said.

The bill was to provide for free and compulsory education to all children between 6 and 14. Last month, the human resource development ministry dropped plans to table it in Parliament and, instead, sent a diluted version to the states, asking them to adopt it.

The states are reluctant for two reasons. One, not all of them have elementary education on their main agenda. Two, unlike the junked bill that bound the Centre to foot the entire bill for implementing the provisions, the latest version provides for a 50:50 split.

The non-government People’s Campaign for Common School System has threatened to hit the streets in protest, hoping the political parties, too, would respond inside and outside Parliament.

It was the NDA government that had paved the way for the education bill by getting the 86th Constitutional Amendment Bill, which makes education a fundamental right, through Parliament.

The HRD ministry, then headed by Murli Manohar Joshi, had drawn up an enabling bill to implement the right, but the Vajpayee government lost the May 2004 elections and the bill remained on paper.

The UPA government set up the Central Advisory Board of Education (Cabe), which revised the bill and sent it to a committee headed by Union minister Kapil Sibal for further consideration.
But the Planning Commission and the finance ministry dealt a death blow to the planned bill, pleading lack of funds.

The model bill sent to the states does away with many of the stringent provisions of the Cabe version, such as punishment for those who hire child workers and prevent them from going to school. It also ignores Cabe-suggested norms for hiring of schoolteachers to improve education quality.

Had the Centre got the bill passed in Parliament, it still could not have forced the states to adopt it since education is on the concurrent list. But it would have given the fundamental right some legal teeth.
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Lack of funds is cited has the reason for many of the plans which the government says it cannot implement. I understand that, since it has been the case for ever since I can remember, but if somebody high up there really had some common sense, wouldn't it the case for allowing more private enterprise in the country so that the government could focus on the social sector instead? Its so funny that while the UPA government keeps saying how committed they are to the social sector, all their time is spent on trying to control private enterprise, and in most of the cases, our fundamental rights.

To end it all, it seems the blog ban is over. I suppose the brainless invertebrates didn't realize there would be so many internet users in the country who would have something to say on the matter. But props to them all, because the media frenzy it generated probably made the netas realize that maybe subversion of our basic rights is not the right way to grasp onto power. Because as much as the politicians don't like it, most people of India do have eyes, and do have a common sense to see the obvious.