The Suicide, that wasn't!

After repeated failures, his morale met the same fate as that of a sea wave reaching the shore. While turning the pages of newspaper, though reluctantly, pictures of big politicians visiting house of a student who had recently committed suicide caught his eyes. After reading the whole story he came to know about hefty compensation paid to the family of the deceased student and various proposals to institute awards in his name. I didn't get what I deserve even by fighting against all odds and he gained so much by surrendering to the circumstances. Cowardice is being worshipped and bravery is being stamped with failures repeatedly. He got lost into the vacuum of the sky contemplating his journey of life.

Mesmerized by the name and fame earned by surrendering, he too decided to try his luck into life after death.

"Why did you end your beautiful life prematurely, my son?" A strange voice awakened him from his illusory life.

"Because I wanted to earn name and fame, which I couldn't do despite my best efforts. But who are you?" He enquired

"I am the prime mover my dear." The invisible source of voice replied,"I am here to gift you the realization."

His mind was too confused with the events to comprehend the situation. "Do you belong to historically oppressed class? Do you have great struggle story so that your death can make news worth selling?". The voice interrupted the toxic silence.

"No, though I belong to upper caste my father hardly earned enough to afford both bread and butter. I have had tough time in childhood to get the textbooks. I had to ask my seniors for the books. I started teaching tuitions in my college days the help my father financially....."

"No, no my son this is not struggle in Kalyuga. Today struggle means that you are born in a caste which is recognized as oppressed caste irrespective of current economic status. You may go to the best school, college, with best of coaching and books to your service but your life will be labelled as great struggle because some hundreds of years ago your caste was backward."

"That's very unfair", he murmured

"Yeah, every unfair thing is fairly fair in Kalyuga. Ok now tell me do you belong to the community one which can constitute significant vote bank?"

"Yeah, " he said in excitement;" I belong to the religion which constitutes 80% of the population....."

"Ohhh! You are so innocent my dear child." He was interrupted again," electorally important community is the one which is in minority and can be easily projected as victim. Since you belong to numerically dominant religion, you disqualify from earning attention."

"So, my suicide has gone in vain?", he asked in frustrated voice

"I have full sympathy with you, but since you belong to general category you have the least importance in your society. Your struggle is really great, you have the one of best intellect, and it is the failure of the system that you still don't matter."

The darkness of silence engulfed his hopes of getting name and fame after committing suicide. His heart was racing like a sprint runner, he was sweating profusely in anxiety. His life was a failure and his death also proved to be non mover. He kicked in air in frustration.

"Ouch! Can't you  mind your legs during your sleep."

This familiar voice interrupted his journey into death. After stupor of few seconds he smiled and said, "sorry darling."

A nightmare showed him the futility of his dream of suicide.

Odds of odd even

Finally Delhi government's much hyped odd even trial ended. Initially there were many hoardings, audio-video advertisements asking people to follow odd even and now there are big hoardings thanking people of Delhi for complying with the said program. The first beneficiary of this policy seems to be advertising industry. It is undoubted fact that Delhi is one of the most polluted city. Causes of such high level of pollution are complex ranging from climatic conditions to traffic congestion to industries. Traffic congestion in Delhi despite of world class metro services is due to lack of last mile connectivity, increasing proportion of upper middle class and consumerism. Odd even policy has been poorly thought without backing of scientific reasoning as far as pollution is concerned. If government is serious to tackle pollution then it should take steps to pull people towards public transport rather than pushing them into public transport. Let's analyse impact of odd even policy with respect to traffic congestion, public transport, politics and pollution.

It can not be denied and should not be denied that traffic congestion came down to some extent during first week of January 2016. Heavy penalty of 2000 Rs for violation has been responsible for this to significant extent. I have not seen any enthusiasm among car owners to follow this rule. However traffic congestion increased in the second week as people got settled with the policy by means of car exchange, getting CNG stickers and even number plate tampering can't be ruled out. This decrease in traffic congestion helped exempted categories like VIPs, CNG cars, single women drivers, bikers, commercial cars and people having two cars. Therefore this policy got thumbs up from certain sections of society who got benefit of the policy without sacrificing luxury.

Rush in metro trains was unprecedented especially in the first week. Supporters of this policy commented that rush is not alarming. Their definition of alarming isn't clear. It seems they are waiting for casualties to label it as alarming. Further there is need to find out impact of odd even policy on business of auto rickshaw and taxi industry. If people leave their petrol cars at home and travel in diesel run taxis then it will increase the pollution. Also personal cars undergo regular servicing and are less polluting than commercial vehicles.

Politics has been main beneficiary of odd even policy. Various campaigns especially TV add showing a person in muffler is blatant violation of SC guidelines. It shows self promoting attitude of Delhi government. Further during initial days of odd even media theatrics of going by bicycle, e-rickshaw was performed. If Delhi government is serious about leading by example then why don't its ministers, officers use these means throughout the year. Also false non-scientific data production claiming reduction in pollution has been cheap measure to mislead people. Also it has been equated with Swachch Bharat Abhiyan, forgetting that latter is concrete 5 year program including public participation, building toilets, solid waste management etc. Yeah in terms of money spent on odd even in 15 days it might exceed budget of SBA for 15 days for whole nation. Therefore odd even policy seems to be means to make political ends not to curb pollution.

Now coming to the most important aspect that is pollution. Data from Delhi pollution control committee suggests that there has been no significant effect on pollution during implementation period. Following is data of ambient air quality index comparing 13 day period of odd even and 13 days without odd even. Sundays being odd even free day have been included in non odd even days. Therefore based upon following data it can be concluded that there has been no reduction in pollution after odd even.

Date	PM 2.5	PM 10
1-Jan-16	600	976
2-Jan-16	397	566
4-Jan-16	613	978
5-Jan-16	331	707
6-Jan-16	370	890
7-Jan-16	550	1030
8-Jan-16	197	381
9-Jan-16	91	445
11-Jan-16	282	817
12-Jan-16	282	576
13-Jan-16	442	648
14-Jan-16	252	428
15-Jan-16	161	266
Average	351	669

  

Date	PM 2.5	PM 10
24-Dec-15	454	630
25-Dec-15	262	450
26-Dec-15	796	912
27-Dec-15	374	527
28-Dec-15	283	410
29-Dec-15	326	1019
30-Dec-15	351	874
31-Dec-15	450	627
3-Jan-16	230	807
10-Jan-16	236	615
16-Jan-16	218	427
17-Jan-16	321	541
18-Jan-16	302	588
Average	354	648

Now let's examine the consequences of odd even is made permanent. People who can afford will new cars. It won't be difficult for a Mercedes owner to buy another Honda City. People those who can not own new car will go for second hand cars which will definitely be more polluting than their new cars. Further those people not affording second hand cars will go for motorcycle and so on. Also there will be hoarding, black marketing and misuse of CNG stickers. In long terms this policy will increase number of vehicles not otherwise.

Now coming to constructive solutions to tackle the problem of traffic congestion and vehicular pollution. Strategy should be two pronged. First people should be pulled towards public transport by providing last mile connectivity. DTC bus routes should be improvised, frequency of metro trains. number of coaches should be increased. Auto-rickshaws should be governed in better way. It seems being a vote back auto drivers are protected by government and given a free hand to loot, and harass. traffic police should be proactive in curbing such loot. Further e-ricksaws should be promoted. E-Rickshaws have social, economic, and environmental benefits. Second prong of strategy should be to deter people from using personal cars by increasing parking charges, congestion charges. Also use of no-entries, one ways be made to tackle traffic congestion.

Also phased transition from BS-IV to BS-VI norms be made to reduce emission. CNG cars should be incentivised by provision of low parking charges, subsidy in taxes etc. All commercial taxis should mandatorily be converted into CNG cars. 

Environment is collective responsibility. It is unfortunate that pollution control has been reduced to theatrics and political gimmick. It takes away the seriousness of the issue. I hope that government will take a reasoned decision with respect to environmental pollution.

Poverty of sense

Pathankot is very unfortunate incident and loss of life of jawans is regrettable. However seeing celebration of Modi haters, terming it a new low in Indian politics would not be exaggeration. It seems that opposition is overjoyed with this incident and they want to capitalize on this issue politically. There may be ideological and political differences in democracy but national security should prevail over all such differences.

Some people are terming it a complete failure of intelligence, foreign policy, and some have gone to extent of doubting capacity of Indian armed forces in handling terrorists. For example one leading news daily published an editorial saying that it is taking too long for armed forces to tackle POORLY TRAINED terrorists. Such irresponsible comments not only demoralize the forces but also exposes your complete failure to understand the issue.

Pathankot has many positives to embrace and many lapses to rectify. I will put down my observations in following paragraphs.

Firstly it was one rare instance when our Intel input was bang on and also army and NSG was not mobilised accordingly. This preparedness has definitely minimised the loss. However obsessive haters don't see this positives. Compared to Mumbai attacks 2008 a lot of improvement is observed. In 2008 we were completely caught on backfoot. It took hours to mobilise NSG.

Secondly our jawans successfully protected strategic assets. Probably it could have been the reason for delay in elimination of terrorists. Armed forces avoided unnecessary risk to life and resources.

Thirdly loss of life has been minimised. Every loss of jawan is painful. But tactical expertise of armed forces minimised loss of life of jawans in direct combat. First 4 lives were lost in assault by terrorists and one jawan died while diffusing bomb. If it was not tactical expertise, loss might have been more. We should credit our forces for it rather than demoralizing.

Further no civilians were harmed. In airbase there are families of air force personnel, schools etc. Our armed forces ensured safety of civilians residing inside airbase.

Next positive aspect is candid confession by defence minister about lapses. It shows gvt's insight and willingness to improve upon. Let's hope that gvt acts on this front and it is not repeated.

Pakistan has agreed to cooperate to fix the masterminds in contrast to previous instances where it took years to convince pak about role of pak based organizations.

Lapses are in policing and patrolling. Firstly BSF  shd wake up and look into causes of frequent cross border infiltration. Border management is one thing that needs urgent attention.

Further Punjab police shd accept its laxity. VIP culture of red/blue beacon car is also responsible for it. Had these cars not been exempted, terrorists would not have sailed freely inside Punjab. Also it is reported that Punjab police did not give appropriate weight-age to kidnapped SP's information.

Poor media management has been another issue. Many news channels kept on running live commentary with visuals of sensitive areas and critical tactical decisions. It was complete abuse of freedom. Also by questioning capability of forces it tried to demoralize.

Further relating it with Modij's pak visit is moronic interpretation. No such training in guerilla warfare, arrangement of arms and ammunition, precise planning is not possible to be done in 6-7 days. Therefore saying that these attacks are retaliation by not peace loving factions in response to PM's Lahore visit is idiotic.

In this time of crisis let's support Indian Armed forces and the trust them. They have protected our territory in last 68 years and they are capable of doing so in future. Sitting in AC chambers and sipping alcohol doesn't make one strategic expert. Let the armed forces do their work. They are in better position to analyse and the act.

Lastly on the issue of India pak talks, talks can't be suspended forever. It is the best time to talk to Pak. But we should talk terror first. Its only when terrorism and terrorists are fixed then territory, trade and other issues arise. Yeah by territory I mean PoK not J&K.

नव वर्ष,
नव संघर्ष,
मुबारक हो।

नयी तारीख़,
बनो सांसारिक,
नया दिन,
रहो खुशदिल,
पूरी हो सब,
मनोकामना तुम्हारी,
यही है,
कामना हमारी।

आप में,
नव चेतना,
नव ऊर्जा,
का संचार हो,
खुशियों की
बौछार,
एवं दुखों का
संहार हो।

नव वर्ष,
नव संघर्ष,
मुबारक हो।