Teacher

At this auspicious moment of the day, Thank you teacher, all I wanna say, And express my gratitude, For all knowledge and aptitude, Those were gifted by you, And changed my world and worldview, I still remember the day, When to you I had made my way, With mind full of fears, And uncertainties, Oh my dear! I was poor in knowledge, And low in intelligence, But you my teacher, With all your elegance, Guided me. Teacher o teacher, I have come to you, Once again, To seek your blessings, To serve humanity, without any greed to gain, Kindly guide me to follow inner voice, To adhere to virtue, And fight vice!

The Morons

"Why should we bear the cost of lavish lifestyle enjoyed by few?" an usual voice of unusual dissent interrupted the conforming silence in the parliament of Banana Republic of Mor.

Banana Republic of Mor has two distinct group of people. A few enjoy austerity blissfully. They sacrifice their sweat and blood for development of Mor.

On the other hand a majority of citizens struggle through intoxication of liquor and drugs at plush bars of the country. Since democracy is twin sister of majoritarianism, these addicts were the ruling elites of the nation.

Lately, these elites were finding it difficult to accomplish their infinite greeds through their finite resources. Parliament was convened to deliberate upon this issue. Elites proposed that Republic of Mor should adopt socialism and whole income should be pooled and all citizens should be reimbursed from this pool towards their needs.

One parliamentarian representing austere class understood the implications of this policy. He could forsee that, under guise of socialism, lavish extravagance of elites would be sponsored by taxing hardworking austere citizens.

"This is against the concept of socialism, here we are trying to fund elites by taxing poor", he tried to make some sense among Morons (People of Mor).

"This person is anti-national, wants to created faultline in our nation. Wants to divide it. Kick him out...." shouted on elite.

Dissenting voice of  sensible minority was crushed by powerful majority. Resolution was passed and citizens of Mor started paying for hedonism of elites.

Can we see parallel in today's society? Tax system? Rising NPAs of banks?

All of us are progressively becoming citizen of Mor that is Moron by complying without asking questions!

Magical Strike

"Surgical Strike" by Indian army on the night of 28th-29th September and government's decision to make it public is not less than a master stroke. I call it a master stroke because it has achieved many desired objectives.

First and the most important achievement is that it has given strong message to Pak that days of soft diplomacy are over. Pakistan's response has been confused. From warning India of dire consequences by non state actors, to complete denial and terming it merely as ceasefire violations.  Pakistan's positions is understandable. If it accepts the surgical strike, its army and civilian leadership will suffer credibility crisis both domestically and internationally. However, actions of Pak army and government indirectly confirm the strikes. Moving Hafiz Sayeed into army camp, government convening urgent session of parliament are some of these. Further some newspaper reports have quoted local people and police officers corroborating the strikes.

Next objective has been international support. Almost all big players in the international diplomacy have endorsed India's right to self defence. 

Further this strike has satisfied the aspirations of right wing voters. Modi government came into power riding of enormous support of right wing voters. These voters were disappointed by soft diplomatic attitude of Modi government in spite of Pathankot and Uri attacks. Now government has given message to its core constituency that Pak's proxy war will be retaliated appropriately,

Lastly domestic opposition has been rendered into catch 22 situation. Initially they supported the government's action but later adopted varied approaches to trivialize it. But every action of opposition has proved to be counter productive. Firstly they tried to question whether strikes happened or not. Then they asked for video evidence of strikes to substantiate. 

In the political fight the most important question is forgotten. Why the opposition especially Delhi CM is asking for video footage? Reason may be purely political one. But another possibility may be more sinister. It is well known fact that countries try to have moles in  other countries to fulfill its interests. Video footage may have some classified information regarding strategies of army. Releasing video may help Pak Army and ISI to have access to these. Is demand to release video is strategy to pressurize government politically to help Pak? We as voters need to consider demands of opposition camp from this point of view.

Experiencing failure of above strategy, opposition claimed that this is not the first time strikes have happened but never hyped so much. I fully support such claims. Being right winger it satisfies my aspiration of hard diplomacy. But my question is why didn't Congress make these strikes public? Reasons may be political. Congress enjoys support of people with left of centre inclinations. Many of these people have "soft corner" for Pak . So probably congress didn't want to take political risk of loosing these sympathizers by making these strikes public. Another possibility may be fear of international backlash. May be Congress government was apprehensive of international reaction to these strikes. In such scenario, it is failure of diplomacy of the government to the day to convince international partners of one's sovereign right to defend. Therefore these strikes are different that previous ones in the way that we are not afraid of conveying it to the world. 

Again losing opposition adopted next strategy of "crisis of credit". The opposition camp said that these strikes are done by army not Modi, so Modi should not be given credit. This is the most absurd argument. It can not be denied that such strikes can not happen without bravery of jawans. However political leadership of the day is to be credited for all good or bad. In last two years opposition has blamed Modi for every trivial issue whether suicide of a frustrated "student" at UoH, or actions of censor board, though Union government has nothing to do with these things. However decision to conduct surgical strikes need decision from the highest quarters so it must have been final decision of Modi to give go ahead. History is witness that political leadership is credited for everything. Hitler is credited for everything Nazi soldiers do not the individual soldiers. Similarly Indira Gandhi is credited for BD freedom, not the individual soldiers. Gandhiji is credited for satyagrah not the individual satyagrahis. Therefore it is not wrong to credit the political leadership for the day for surgical strikes.

Agusta not so August

With so much of facts and figures in public domain relating to Agusta Chopper scam, I need not to repeat multi million Euro money trail. Common sense traces the money trail up to the doorsteps of the first family of Congress. However, many times common sense judgments are not true. It is matter of investigation to take the case upto logical conclusion. With reputation of Indian investigating agencies and efficiency of judiciary, Agusta is in all probability going the Bofors way unless extreme political willpower is shown at the highest level.

Agusta scam is just the tip of iceberg of deeper pathology that is of cronyism. Till businessman-politician-bureaucrat nexus is broken such scams will keep on flourishing, with few getting exposed (thanks to foreign media/investigating agencies). The question arises, how to break this nexus? All claims of various recruitment agencies of having examination system to select officers with courage, integrity and honesty have proved to be hollow, with recent example of an officer of IAS with 800 Cr Rs assets. Further rigid political system requiring multi crore Rs to survive, it is mirage in recent future to expect truly honest politician. Businessmen exploiting these weaknesses in our system promoting cronyism. This pathetic state of affairs has been made worse by partisan and corrupt media.

Various solutions have been proposed but there has been execution lag. The root cause of flourishing cronyism is expensive elections. Though EC has capping on expenditure for various elections, but these norms are rarely complied with. Such account details are not scrutinised. A written declaration by concerned candidate is regarded final in this regard. This is high time election expenditure is scrutinised strictly. We can have panel of independent accountants and auditors to do this job. Few random constituencies can be chosen on pilot basis to start with. State funding of elections is good idea in this regard but citing large number of candidates, this is not feasible citing our fiscal health.

Further there should be complete moratorium on cash transactions beyond reasonable limits especially during election time. Poor infrastructure in rural areas is the common excuse to delay implementation. Atleast in cities where we have sufficient electricity and network coverage, cashless transactions should be implemented.

There should be complete transparency in government tendering processes. Specifications should be finalized before tendering process and once such process has started, government requirements should freeze. Agusta scam is prototype example where government specifications were manipulated to shortlist one specific company.

There are many more proposals in reports of various commissions and committees, but basic problem remains the same, that of political will power.

Poverty of common sense!

India houses world's largest number of poor in terms of economics. There is no standardized method to estimate prevalence of intellectual bankruptcy. I am sure, if we can devise any methodology to estimate it, it will not be less than economic poverty in India. Many examples to substantiate my claim can be given, the latest being shifting out IPL out of Maharashtra due to "drought" in Marathwada.

I am as concerned and as sensitive with respect to drought as any responsible citizen should be. But dictating a sporting event to be shifted out of a state that too at the last moment is not justified on any ground. It seems media hype and communist activism played on the mind of hon. judge pronouncing such judgment. We should ask two questions to ourselves before slamming IPL. First, is IPL responsible for chronic water scarcity? Second, will shifting IPL out help to tackle this crisis? Answers to both the questions are no. Then it is beyond common sense that IPL has been targeted.

On the contrary IPL could have been utilized as a tool to fight the current crisis. It needs optimistic attitude and innovative mind, which is as scarce in Indian system as water in Marathwada. First concern is whether potable water is used to prepare the pitches. This should not be dilemma for any administration. Maharashtra government could have shown some intellect and submitted that no potable water to be provided for preparation of pitches. Sewage treated water is good enough for preparing pitches. Indian premier league is not charitable event. Therefore, IPL administration could have been made to pay for this water. And thus Maharashtra government could have earned revenue by supplying sewage treated water. Now considering the fact that this sewage treated water can not be supplied to Marathwada, it will get evaporated partially and let into Arabian sea substantially. Blindly banning IPL matches in Maharashtra, an opportunity has been lost to generate revenue.

Now, since IPL is less of sporting activity and more of entertainment (considering match fixing, spot fixing, short boundaries and flat pitches), entertainment tax is another option of revenue generation. A portion of such revenue can be earmarked as relief package for the most affected village.

Since various corporate groups are involved in this mega "Sportainment" event, corporate social responsibility could have been imposed on various franchises for building water reservoirs in drought affected regions.

I would like to ask hon court and various "(senti)mental" activists, how can banning IPL in Maharashtra help to tackle drought issue? What is your next target? My bathroom? Is HC going to restrict number of baths a person should take? because successive governments have failed to find out sustainable solution to problem of water scarcity.

Political crisis an opportunity to seal the loopholes.

Recent crisis in Uttarakhand and similar situation in Arunachal Pradesh three months ago give us an opportunity to introspect the current status of functioning of the parliamentary democracy. We have adopted representative form of democracy in center and states. As per the constitution CoM in Center and State is collectively responsible to Loksabha and Vidhansabha respectively. This implies that the leader of party or alliance enjoying absolute majority should be appointed as PM or CM. The common sense says that the leader should be elected by members of Loksabha and Vidhan Sabha. However it has been observed that such leader has been nominated by party high command especially in case of National Parties. This practice of high command nomination is substantially responsible for the current crisis.

One significant drawback of high command nomination is that such nominated leader will be accountable to high command rather than to legislature. It creates two centers of powers and super cabinet.It gives rise to centralization of governance and thus against the federal structure. What if a leader is more popular among the elected members of the party than one nominated by high command? Now due to anti-defection law which requires cohesion of atleast two third members of the party for any split. This forces elected members either to comply with the high command or to get disqualified from the membership.

Opposition parties get an opportunity to lure dissenting members. This leaves a hiatus for horse trading. In Uttarakhand constitutional machinery was subverted during budget session. The speaker was aware about intentions of rebelling MLAs from ruling party. When a government fails to get apppropriation bill passed, it is assumed that it has lost confidence of the LS/VS. in the instant case of Uttarakhand, if speaker had allowed division of votes, then there was possibility of it getting defeated. Thus current government would have been compelled to resign. Further as per tenth schedule of constitution, these MLAs would have been disqualified. This sequence of events might have averted the current political crisis.

Instead speaker decided to go by voice vote and rule that the appropriation bill has been passed. Reliability of voice vote is another contentious issue. It is very subjective. There should be provision that even if a single member asks for division of votes, it should be granted. It will be beneficial in two ways. First it will remove all doubts over validity of votes and also it will help voters to know the stand of his representative on a particular issue.

In this context, anti-defection law should be improved upon. Firstly scope of this law should be limited on the issues which affect the stability of government like budget, confidence, no-confidence motion etc. It will help to improve quality of debate as members as individuals may differ from their parties on certain policy  matters. Secondly requirement for merger should be reduced to just more than half of total membership of the concerned party rather than 2/3.

Now coming to question whether imposition of president rule is justified or not. It is up to judiciary to decide whether denial of division of votes amounts to failure of constitutional machinery or not. In my opinion speaker's decision to disallow division saved the government which was set to fall. Thus it amounted to failure of constitutional machinery.

Constitution has enough checks and balances. This proclamation has to be approved by parliament within two months. Since ruling party at center lacks majority in RS, it seems difficult that it will last for more than two months. Whatever be the political outcome of this crisis, it is time to improve upon the current practice.

Cricket not just a game

It was great game of cricket not only from game's point of view but it gives important life lessons. First it teaches the self belief. Bangladesh showed confidence in their batting line up by opting to field first against strong looking Indian batting. They almost succeeded in their game plan. Be confident and have self belief, success awaits you.

Second lesson we can learn is power of mind. Bumrah after mis-fielding and dropping a catch  gave 16 runs in an over. In his short career he has given these many runs in his full quota of overs. Finally he succeeded in delivering two overs with quality yorkers in the death. It was possible only when he came over his failure in power play. Every moment is fresh moment. Forget the failures of past and one can achieve unthinkable.

Further we should appreciate importance of positive attitude When It seemed that Bangladesh was cruising towards victory, Dhoni brought in slip fielder, and it was not the tactics to apply just pressure on batsman as he put in his one of the best fielders in that position. And he got out a set batsman and which can well be considered as the turning point of the game. Almost all captains would have gone with defensive field at that moment. So optimism almost always delivers.

The most important management lesson this match teaches is of having confidence in your juniors. With both Bumrah and Pandya having failed in the first half of the innings, most of the other captains would have gone for other alternatives like Raina, Yuvraj, Rohit, Kohli in 11-15 overs and saved Ashwin and Jadeja foor last 3. But Dhoni  reposed faith in the abilities of Bumrah and Pandya. Support of seniors encourages one to perform best.

Next we learn not to celebrate prematurely. One should wait for the final result before celebrating. BD batsmen because complacent after second boundary of the last over. They became object of all sarcasm for their celebration. Premature celebration brings complacency and overconfidence and these two are sufficient to snatch defeat from jaws of victory.

And finally one should be aware about his best trait. In the last ball Dhoni could have thrown the ball at the stumps but he ran instead..as he knew he can better run fast than aim. This insight helps one to utilize his best quality when it is needed the most.