hajjjj

The ease with which I am slipping into a state of not writing is alarming me now. Only last week, I had written a great rant on Rahul Gandhi's visit to Maharashtra and as I was about to publish it, Blogger's new and amazing interface ensured that it didn't auto save it and I lost it all. Needless to say, I was thoroughly pissed off.

Even now, as I write this, Blogger tells me that it won’t be able to save what I am typing and that I should note down an error code and mention it to them to help them rectify the errors. So here I am writing this on a Word document offline, to be copied and pasted into my blog later.

Mmmph, so much for technology. Sometimes I wonder why can’t writing be as simple as taking a paper and a pencil and sitting down and spending a few minutes or hours just writing anymore. Why are there so many different types of blogs, kindles, technology interfaces and what not, and all to make writing and reading a better experience! Its all humbug. The best reading experience is taking a musty old book and sitting comfortably and just reading – with no television in front of you, of course.

Its been over a week since then, and my propensity to understand and read into national politics seems to be declining. As usual, there are many things going on, including Mamata Ban Her ji! And her soirees with the Government of the Banana Republic of India, and her great meetings with Hillary Clinton, who did well to massage the ego and sooth the insecurities of this crazy woman.

A big news today was the Supreme Court telling the government to do away with Hajj subsidies in ten years. The first opinion by R. Jagannathan from Firstpost.com is that it’s a good step, but a small trickling step.

Ending of Hajj subsidies is a case in point presented by all seculars, (no, not the frauds sitting in CONgress, NCP, RJD, BSP, or wherever) that if India is a truly secular country, then no religion should be provided preference over any other. Of course, thinking like a neta does, then the correct answer for this would be to start providing subsidies to other religions! Hindu’s to Kailash Mansarovar and Christians to Jerusalem.

Mr. Jagannathan only repeats the obvious. No government or politician wants to be seen as anti-minority. In India, minority means Muslims and Muslims only. So as always, the Supreme Court has to do to the dirty work and the Government can take umbrage in the fact that they are not doing it on their own accord but only because the Court has asked them to.

Mr. Jagannathan makes a very valid point, about quoting from religious scriptures to uphold law, which, by the way, is not based on the scriptures, but on the laws of modern India.

Another bad idea is the habit of quoting from scripture to uphold Indian law. A decision on the Haj subsidy should be based on the Indian constitution, not interpretations of the Koran or the Hadith.

So when a court quotes the Koran to justify its decision to end the subsidy, it is creating a bad precedent. The Koran is said to proclaim the following: “And Haj (pilgrimage to Makkah) to the House (Ka’bah) is a duty that mankind owes to Allah, those who can afford the expenses (for one’s conveyance, provision and residence).”

One is glad to hear that the Koran is against the Indian government’s Haj subsidy, but what if the Koran had held otherwise? Would we then always have the subsidy?

The courts have to abandon the idea of quoting from holy books and religious tradition while upholding Indian law. Sometimes these laws may support what the constitution says; at other times they may not.

By quoting from scripture, the courts are laying minefields in the path of upholding the constitution – which is their only job.

In fact, it is the Koran which Jihadis use to justify killing non-Muslims, or even Muslims of other sects! But then religious bigotry is a curse of modern society. We use whatever we have to from whatever scripture to do or justify whatever we want. So let me leave it at that.

According to the Indian Express, the Court makes a point that instead of spending so much money on Hajj, use the money saved on uplifting the Muslim community. While this is a noble thought, I think the few hundreds of crores saved and earmarked for the community will only end up in the pockets of a lot of politicians and well-wishers of the Muslim community.

Its not just true for any one community but stands true for the entire nation that we, as a country, are more than capable of taking care of ourselves. The bogey that Indian investments in defense, for example, or subsidies, take away a lot of money from other places, has been shown to be not as debilitating as is made out to be. A higher percentage of the GDP is spent on funding the social sector, and a very high percentage of this money is stolen and siphoned off from the top to the bottom of the pipeline. This has been happening since the country gained independence and that is the reason that despite budgets of hundreds of thousands of crore, we are still the same backward mass as we were before, now only more hypocritical and materialistic.

While it is important that the Courts be completely religion-neutral, at the same time I feel that being afraid to state the obvious is also not right. Whenever a decision that has to be taken that is right, but many rabid members of a community with vested interests might not agree with, a lot of time and effort is spent in appeasing them with nice words, and extolling the virtue of the decision and the necessity of the decision.

Till now, the Haj was open to all Muslims once every five years. Before the SC ruling, the Government had said in April that they would change that to once in a lifetime. Also, the priority will be given to people over 70 years and those that have been rejected before.

In fact, CON man Salman Khurshid, I mean Congress minister Mr. Khurshid said at once that the Government was working in the same direction for many years now! Oh happy thought that the government and the Supreme Court think so much alike in the affairs of the nation! I think it has been pointed out by many people and at many occasions that India is the only country in the world that provides subsidies to its citizens for Haj travel!

According to various news reports, a lot of people have welcomed the Supreme Court directive. Tabloid of India quotes some gentlemen from Chennai who happen to be Muslim that it will remove suspicions of favoritism, and that the subsidies were given in a very opaque manner. So in a way it will kill one avenue of corruption (among the millions of others, but that’s another story). A minor blip in the Supreme Court order is that it has asked the Government to cut down its goodwill delegations it sends to Saudi every year. This alone reeks of favors and sifarish. In fact, the Supreme Court does call it the VIP quota, which is what it had become.

* Goodwill Haj delegation – The primary purpose of sending the goodwill delegation, according to the government is “to convey goodwill on the auspicious occasion of Haj to the government of Saudi Arabia as well as to the Indian pilgrims”.

The delegation interacts with the Haj pilgrims from India, understands their issues and takes up the same with the Saudi Arabian authorities.

India first sent a goodwill delegation in 1967 with three members. Till 1987, the number of its members remained under 10. Thereafter, the size of the delegation started steadily increasing and in 1997 it had 31 members.

In 2005, there were 36 members in the delegation, in 2010 there were 30 and in 2011 its strength marginally shrunk to 27.

The court noted that the government’s affidavit did not disclose any criteria or guidelines on the basis of which people were selected for being included in the goodwill delegation.

“On the basis of the material brought to our notice, we have no doubt that the way people are nominated as members of the goodwill delegation is in complete violation of Article 14 of the constitution.”

The problem is that religion and politics are so deeply entwined with each other that it is just impossible to for the former to not creep into state policies, and in a democracy like India, religion (s) of the minority becomes an even more important factor considering the belief that it votes en bloc. So routinely you will hear news of flare-ups between communities which quickly take on a political turn with local party ‘leaders’ taking over and directing the emotions of the masses. That’s a pitiable state for our society to be in. 

Rantings.

Yesterday, I read Shekhar Gupta's opinion piece in the Financial Express on the BJP, and how it is totally at a loss to take advantage of the sinking ship that the UPeeA government is. A lot of it is a rehash of the usual accusations and bottom lines that the BJP is always associated with - its hard line Hindutva stance that always alienates the Muslims and also the political parties that swear by their sickularism, such as the CONgress, and potential regional players, such as SP and RJD.

Shekhar Gupta touched on the phenomenon that is Narendra Modi. The one man army is an enigma for most, and he is hated and loved in equal measure across the country. I do not think there is any politically aware person in this country who does not have an opinion on Narendra Modi. Again, Mr. Gupta repeated what so many commentators or pundits or analysts before him said - Modi can't succeed on the national stage at all considering the baggage he carries. Whether he is innocent or is cleared of all accusations, that tag will remain stuck with him forever.

So while many people may be itching to bring him on board the national arena, and even if he gets the faithful, whatever that means, to vote, he will alienate the rest. Basically the BJP does not have anybody to fill the vacuum left behind by Bajpayee ji.

This whole situation in my view is tragic. I do agree that things are not right at BJP, and what hurts me the most is that they seem thoroughly incapable of taking advantage of this great incompetence that the CONgress is displaying at all levels. I really hope that this country takes note of the grand scam that the Sonia Gandhi coterie has pulled on the nation and taken us back many years. I understand it is a tough global economy out there, but the incompetence, complacence, hidden interests, vote bank agendas and absolutely criminal rape of public finances and funds is all our own achievements.

And yet when I hear my friends telling me that there are no other options, it pains me. A part of it is, I am quite sure, the great sway on the media that the Gandhi family and their posse seem to have. The one thing that they can do better than anybody else is media management, with Times of India, NDTV and other big names firmly in their sphere of influence.

All in all, I have written many times that it is very fashionable in the country today to be a pseudo-secular, and Hindu bashing is a national past time. A lot of idiots believe it is cool to speak ill of Narendra Modi and RSS and some aspects of the BJP, and that the CONgress is the modern party that will take India into the next generation, with Rahul Gandhi at the helm. Of course, the CONgress has worked very hard to take into the next generation - of poverty, socialism, crony capitalism and corruption.

Unfortunately, the big pessimist in me believes that it is beyond the BJP or the CONgress to actually stem the social and economic rot in our country. Now that the people have tasted blood when it comes to making money by hook or by crook, any efforts by the Governments to being some semblance of rules and regulations in our currently free for all economy will be met with huge resistance, and to meet that resistance, we need strong willed governments and leadership, which we simply do not seem to possess. So its beyond the political spectrum that I believe our society to be damaged.

A lot of people, including writers in the East and West, talk of India being in this chaotic stage because this is the only way to go about the economic and social change it is facing today. It takes time for the chaos we see around us to settle down because I would imagine this is a very uncertain time for a lot of us. The tribals are afraid the big corporates are going to take over their lands and resources, some communities are afraid other communities are going to take over, some communities are afraid of being sidelined so ask for reservations, some states are afraid to let in people from other states, and this entire spectrum of fear and apprehension is buttressed by a huge cloud of hypocrisy and double standards that, to me, permeates each and every aspect of our society. That is something nothing we can solve on our own.

BRICS....

While returning from my trip from Surat to Mumbai earlier this week, I was sitting next to a man who was on his way to Maputo that night to visit an entrepreneurship center that he had founded there, and he was to dine with a big Government official of the Mozambique Government soon.

He was a counselor, a teacher, an entrepreneur, and it was a pleasure to talk to such a man about all the topics that interest me - Africa, China, India, governance, and the global economy. In fact, I started talking to him when I noticed he was reading Joseph Stiglitz's latest book, Freefall, which was published in 2010. So I mentioned to him that Mr. Stiglitz had visited India recently and he said yes, he had met with him in Cochin when Mr. Stiglitz stayed at his friend's hotel, the last surviving Jewish hotel in the city!

The second interesting thing about the person was that he knew Mohammad Yunus very well, and he was telling me about how corrupt the entire microfinance industry in Bangladesh has become, and how these companies are now raking in millions in aid money from the rest of the world, and using it for so many things other than actually funding the bottom of the pyramid. An example he gave me was of many top micro-finance people in Bangladesh coming to Calcutta for their shopping trips and booking expensive suites in the five star hotels there. Something quite similar to the stories I hear of Pakistani elites coming to Delhi for their wedding shopping trips.

He was telling me of how the Chinese built their Embassy in Maputo by bringing in prisoners from the mainland and making them work in chains! And this shitty country wants to be the leader of the new world. Unless the new world is a mirror image of the medieval world, I do not think that this'll go down too well with most of the world. Of course, most of our society is still barbaric, what with the human trafficking, torture, exploitation, ruthless pursuit of wealth, but that's the price we have to pay for being God's most imperfect creation.

Definitely the biggest parasites sucking off the third world are their own. The reason I bring this great meeting up is because I mentioned to him that I am happy that the BRICS are coming up, no matter how much I despite the Chinese, I am keen to see a new block of emerging nations that is standing up to the economic hegemony of the developed white world.

So the Professor said he didn't agree with the concept of BRICS. In a way, the entire legitimacy of the BRICS, and its earlier avatar, the BRIC, seems to have stemmed entirely from the fact that a person doing God's Work at Goldman Sachs coined the term. So he was of the opinion that the BRICS are destabilizing the polarity of the world and that will only lead to a greater power struggle in the future. Then I told him that my opinion was that the BRICS were only making the global economy more equal, and I told him that I look forward to the day when the first world becomes irrelevant mostly to the economic future or strength of a third world nation. In my mind, south-south cooperation is the way to go forward.

Since last week, when the national media was/is too busy covering the war between the Chief of Army Staff and the Shitty Government of the Union of India, the leaders of the emerging world met in New Delhi, including the Head of the Shitty Government of the Union of India.

While all the 5 nations have their own unique and individual ambitions and ways of doing things, they also have a lot in common. Each of the 5 states, while grouped together as emerging nations, are in various stages of economic development, and of course, each with their own unique sets of problems. However, given the globalization of the world today, and each economy connected to every other, they also share a lot of common opportunities and problems, and I suppose at the bottom of it all, the need to reduce the dependence on the developed white world is something that is very important.

So while they can't see each other eye to eye, and some more comfortable with one member than the other, and some not comfortable with each other at all, such as India and China, its unlikely they will ever find a plank to stand together on. China's entire economy is based on the western consumption model and becoming the factory of the world. It is in their interest that the developed world keep consuming what they produce. Eventually, as they would agree too, it will run out. Russia is slowly reemerging as a power thanks to the uninterrupted rule of Vladimir Putin, Brazil growing rich quick and turning into the world's raw material warehouse, and South Africa, as the Professor on the train said, was fast on its way to becoming the next Zimbabwe!

India? Oh India, India. All that potential, and all that talent, and we end up with such a hodge podge of medieval feudal mindsets and colonial legacies and new age democracies and a society in such a agitated state of upheaval that I am sure nobody can be sure of which way our country is headed anymore.

One interesting development that the leaders talked about was a BRICS Bank. The talk coincides with the recent American nomination of former Dartmouth President Dr. Jim Yong Kim as the next President of the World Bank, following the tradition of US and Europe sharing the 'responsibilities' of running the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund between them.

He is competing with two strong candidates from the emerging world, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala of Nigeria and Jose Antonio Ocampo from Columbia. Most of the world outside the United States and Western Europe would like to see some fairness and merit involved in selecting the post, and Stiglitz wrote recently that its ridiculous in today's day and age that the US still gets to choose the head of such an important body.

Okonjo-Iweala has been widely acclaimed to be the most qualified candidate for the multilateral development institution's top position.

In a related development, a group of former World Bank officials has written a letter backing Okonjo-Iweala, to be its next president.

Traditionally, the post is given to the candidate put forward by the US, the BBC reported.

But in an open letter, 35 former economists and managers said the bank should choose the next chief on merit.

The letter in support of Okonjo-Iweala, which is signed by high-ranking managers and economists, including Tunisia's central bank chief, Mustapha Nabli, criticised some aspects of the selection process.

Under an informal arrangement, in return, Europe appoints a European as head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), a sister Bretton Woods institution. It is currently run by Frenchwoman Christine Lagarde.

Emerging economies have become increasingly unhappy with this system and are pushing for change.

The leaders of Russia, Brazil, China, India and South Africa recently called for a review of that weighted voting system.

So given this scenario that there are loud grumblings of unhappiness at this decades old arrangement between the two economic blocs, its quite possible that the BRICS Bank could possibly emerge as a bank for the third world sometime in the future. At the same time, all these nations are very deeply connected to the United States. In fact, Dr. Kim was in New Delhi recently and met the Prime Minister and other cabinet ministers and officials.

In another outcome of this Fourth BRICS Summit, the members said they are keen to start trading in their own currencies.

 Again, this talk of reducing the influence of the USD as the world's common currency has been on for a while, and once the global economy tanked, everybody realized that perhaps its best to hold onto those Dineros. Iran has been trying to trade with countries in their own currencies for a while now to sell its oil, and this is one big conspiracy theory that this is the reason why the US is going to war with it because it is bypassing the global oil exchanges that trade in USD at New York City and London.

This is something I whole heartedly welcome. The US is feeling the pressure these days because there is nobody to sponsor its wars for it, and other nations are raring to go ahead.

I think what the Professor was trying to tell me was that the world may not be able to sustain another pole. The BRICS will create another pole and they are getting more and more powerful. Even with their own individual ambitions and plans, there is a lot they can work on together, and as much as I hate to say it, China's a part of it too.

Thus a better solution the way forward is perhaps not a strong BRICS, but a stronger G20. A group of the world's twenty most powerful nations, including the 7 strongest developed economies, will be a more equitable group and can combine the best of both worlds.

A ‘multilateral letter of credit confirmation facility agreement’ was signed among the five participating banks — Brazil’s Banco Nacional de Desenvolvimento Economic e Social, Russia’s State Corporation Bank for Development and Foreign Economic Affairs (Vnesheconombank), Export-Import Bank of India, China Development Bank Corporation and Development Bank of Southern Africa.

The new and expected in UP and elsewhere

A very big political exercise just came to a grand finale last week and I don't think i've written about it anywhere. Either that or I am so out of touch with my political ranting self that I now forget all the political talk I blog about.

So Akhilesh Yadav is the newest Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh. As with any new leader of a democratic government, there are hopes and concerns and best wishes galore, and lots of friendly advise from many commentators in the media.

Samajwadi Party, though, is notorious for the company it keeps, and the people it gives tickets to, including some very notorious gangsters who are roaming free because well, our laws can't reach them. One of them, Raghuraj Pratap Singh, is in the news more because he's just been made a Cabinet minister.

There was a very interesting article in a newspaper a few days ago that again ran a favorite media exercise of listing the number of MLA's in UP's newest legislative assembly with a criminal background. Some of the stalwarts in the list have over a dozen cases of murder pinned on them! And yet our strong democracy and weak laws ensure that people vote for them and they get to lead them. Here is my question, actually, I may find the answer as soon as I finish typing this, is that do the people really vote for such criminals, or is it the classic old case of booth capturing. But considering that there are dozens of such politicians who have looted and murdered and pillaged and gotten away with it so that means there must be plenty of booth capturing going on in the country! That, to the naked eye, seems ridiculous.

Its been over three weeks since I stopped writing this blog post and left it in the middle somewhere, so some of the news will be certainly outdated, and I really do not feel I have the time and energy to update any information or add any latest developments to this post, so I want to take this opportunity to rant a little about what I think, something which I feel I haven't done so in so long!

So coming back to the reason why we have criminals being voted into power, I have already crossed out the possibility that there is a large scale booth capturing going on in the country. Sure, the EVM's have been shown to be prone to tampering, but surely even a party as dishonest as Sonia Gandhi's Congress party will not be able to pull it off at a national scale. So it brings me to the point that in India, we will never get rid of our feudal mindset. We always need somebody to hover over us their grace and benevolence, and I am not talking about God. While there is a big difference in the lifestyle and habits of the urban folk and their fellow citizens in the hinterland, the difference exists in the mind as well. To be fair to the rural folk, I certainly believe they have a lot more spine than the urban folk, because in the urban landscape, the majority always seems afraid to stand up. That is why the agitation by Anna Hazare and others was so keenly followed, and so many commentators concluded that the sleepy self-centered Indian middle class was finally standing up. Of course, I am getting ahead of myself. This country is simmering at all levels, be it political, economic, regional, religious, everybody seems to have a gripe. I am just amazed at the level of discontent that is prevalent in this country.

Perhaps then should I be understanding to the fact that in such a situation when the society is simply unable, or unwilling, to come together to fight against injustice and take care of its women, children and the needy, any common person's best bet is to put his/her head down and just work to protect themselves, and totally ignore everything else that is going on around them? I think I should, because even I do it so many times.

Coming to Uttar Pradesh - its politicians love to take it for a ride all the time. Akhilesh Yadav has emerged as the new messiah but perhaps his biggest obstacle will be his heritage, and the system he inherits. We all know the oft-repeated cliche, that the system is unbeatable. We, as a society, have been simply unable to wield this unwieldy system to work for us. Whether its healthcare, education, housing, and every citizen not related to the Government is scared to engage the government in any form or way.

We would rather pay our way out of a traffic ticket, we would rather pay a middle man to take care of our duties and paperwork on our home, we would rather pay a tout to buy us our driving license, all in all, we are simply becoming more and more unwilling to stand in line and follow procedure. Now I do not know if it is because now as a society, we are thoroughly convinced that the only way to get by in the system is to grease the path, or because we simply refuse to engage the system anymore.

So coming back to the sorry state of UP, only time will tell what happens in the state, but as a thumb rule, I do believe that we as a society are currently incapable of moving towards being a more liberal, understanding and law abiding society, and as somebody said, a politician is but a mirror of the society. When we cry about how corrupt a Sharad Pawar is or a Praful Patel is, we very conveniently fail to cringe at the vast number of population that swears by them and votes for them. A bad politician is very easy to single and point out, but the bad society they emanate from is very conveniently made the big elephant in the room that nobody acknowledges.

On March 6, yesterday, the results for the 2012 Assembly elections in 5 states were declared. The big daddy, Uttar Pradesh, saw the Samajwadi Party ride into power after 5 years of Maya raaj.

Just like the Bahujan Samajwadi Party rode into an absolute majority in the previous edition, this time as well, the SP gained over 220 seats, way over the simple majority needed to form the government. So in a way, the previous elections and this current elections show that no matter what the ideologies and methodologies of the parties that won, the people of the state have indeed shown a strong desire for political stability, and that, in a democracy, is a fairly good thing in itself.

There are quite a few surprises and some not-so surprises thrown up this time. For one, and perhaps not a surprise to anybody, was that despite the CON mafia's first family throwing everything in with the kitchen sink into campaigning in the state, they still came in a pitiable 4th. Even with the number of seats won by their ally RLD, they are still behind BJP, which came in third with 47 seats, still 4 short of its number in 2007.

According to the news report in The Hindu, SP made strong inroads into former BJP and Congress bastions of Lucknow and Rae Bareilly/Amethi respectively. Another stat thrown up this time was the relatively higher number of urban voters going for the SP, who in the past have shown a tendency for voting for either of the two national parties.

First Post has done a small write-up on the next big thing in UP politics, Akhilesh Yadav, who is 38 and could well be the Chief Minister of UP, despite stating that it will be his father who will hold the post.

Now I personally do not have an opinion if a younger Chief Minister or MP or MLA or whatever has any bearing on their propensity to be a good and just administrator and office bearer, but his past does make for an interesting read because First Post shows him as a very simple, reserved and educated person. He is 38, and if indeed he does become the Chief Minister, and is able to bring some of the modern thoughts of equitable development, education and healthcare (imagine calling them modern even after 60 years of fighting on the same poll planks!), into UP politics, that will be a good sign.

Of course, SP and BSP are two peas in the same pod when it comes to the kind of political leaders they keep, including gangsters, criminal politicians, and old feudal lords. Maya tried to clean her image, and such a fairly obvious fake pathetic attempt it was, by removing some 'tainted' ministers from her cabinet, and apparently so did SP before the elections. Isn't it a sad thing in Indian politics - you can kill and loot and subvert justice and you'll still be only 'tainted'.

Of course, despite all the good intentions, old habits die hard. Even I have had to heard queries about my own attitudes and background because I belong to UP, so despite all the good vibes and hope going around, some UP bhaiyas will be UP bhaiyas, and First Post reports, a child died in Sambhal because of guns being fired into the air to celebrate an SP victory. In Jhansi, apparently angry SP party members have detained members of the press who are hiding in a school building and destroyed their equipment after their candidate lost.

In terms of the real issues of development, education, health care and all that jazz, it remains to be seen what Mr. Mulayam Singh Yadav does now. There are a few poll promises he made towards education and girls and Muslims, and I would love to see many of them be put into practice with earnest. The fact is that this state is now perhaps the most backward state in the country, and it just refuses to get out of its impoverished mentality. There is practically no law and order, no electricity, and its just been crumbling away in terms of social development.

When it was certain that SP would win in the state, the Anil Ambani stocks started going up, and the Jaypee Infrastructure stocks started going down. I mean its kind of pathetic and wrong in a way that the political-business nexus is so fairly obvious in the state, and not just UP, but even nationally, but if they can create some decent infrastructure and bring some modicum of development through their activities, then perhaps it should be welcomed to an extent. Of course, they will make crores in the process for themselves, but then that's exactly how it works in the country anyway.