My Indore weBlog

Indore's pathetically Woeful state

2009-05-12T09:53:00.002+05:30

I feel pathetic writing about this state of affairs of a city which I like to call my home...

This city has not received drinking water for the last 1 whole week... I landed here on 10th, and today also, there was no water supply... and this has been happening since 4 days before I landed
Do you think such cities of the nation can ever attain any kind of progress when the basic amenities like water and electricity are being so pathetically mis-managed

the state of affairs of the middle class is that they can at least go buy some drinking water.. what about the poor.. lately, I read that water is being distributed under police supervision.. what a state of affairs.

The state of MP is going to dogs as I see it with no positive progress seen except the city being raped point blank by concretization drives which are turning everything that this city once felt proud of into a cemented grave... everywhere, they have dug up the roads, there seems to be no plan to do things in phases but it all seems chaotic, there is no greenery left in this once upon a time green city
now the corporation is 'driving' people to plant trees.. where??? is the Re. 1/- question.. when all spots have been covered by concrete.
but who cares to ask as long as their pockets are getting stuffed..

the citizens of this city are taking everything sitting down.. and they are not bothered a bit to do anything but to go earn money amongst all this chaos...

I feel ashamed that I can't do much about it but write and spread the word that this is the situation - AFTER - the elections have been completed... now the elected officials know people can't do anything but crib and then they too will bear the suffering silently...

hopes are really fading but people here are not bothered at all...

Cable war or Customer neglect

2009-05-06T17:59:00.004+05:30

The attitude of the people of this city is really getting too crappy..
they put up with anything and everything.. and they don't care about what happens around them.. as long as it is not happening to them..

this is the attitude with most of the people esp. also because the governance is callous and also because there is a huge influx of people from around the state into the city and there is total mismanagement

the cable operator in my area - SR Cable - has been giving us a lot of trouble of sorts...
we have been the cable consumers way back since 1992 when Parsai was the distributor.. who eventually sold it off to SR.
Parsai was a known friend, so things happened smoothly.
SR cable never has been able to maintain proper service quality. People of course are willing to pay money but they do not demand anything in return from the provider.. so whatever they get, they are just satisfied with it.
in my place, this Feb, I got set top box installed - initially it was for free; for the cable war between BTv, SR and one other operator was in full force.. with each of them cutting off the others supply often

apparently over the set top box distribution issue they reached an agreement and now they charge Rs. 1000- per customer for the STB - a grossly over rated figure and an openly looting policy...

Now let me tell you what our need is... we are the few South Indian families that live in Indore and are still keen on maintaining our interest and touch with our traditions and culture and most important - Language - for which TV is the only option today other than reading the newspaper/magazines.
We need thus to get access to the Telugu channels of Zee, E-TV, Maa, or for that matter Sun network. Other than getting the Tamil and Malayalam channels which seem to have a higher penetration and demand, the Telugu channel penetration is very limited... maybe because the demand too is limited????

Probably the need to give customers the right treatment and attention has not yet come into most TierII cities and below.. for you still find local ruffians involved in the operator wars, and in ensuring that the monthly charges are collected from the customers coercingly if not otherwise.
As a result of this behavior, low volume demands like ours for channels which others are not interested in, cause a lot of issues..

.t.b.c

Double Murder

2009-03-28T16:23:00.003+05:30

On my recent trip home to Indore.. got to read about this ghastly double murder... by a son of his old parents... contracted out to professional killers...

a pathetic tale of what the greed for money can do.. and how value systems are all going down horrifically... and people are giving up everything for money..

is this the life that the parents would have thought they'd end with?
the son apparently was a wagabond .. having probably tasted temptations early in life and fallen for them.
even the old couples' daughter seemed to have left her home in a love marriage situation.. no matter how the parents would have been themselves, maybe the father was a more valued disciplinarian.. or maybe an aristocratic or an authoritarian.. never the less, to have them murdered for they not paying for the son's habits.. is something horrific..

shocking to imagine what is to come of this world

An SOS for Anshuman of St. Paul's Indore

2009-02-19T18:20:00.001+05:30

Dear Pranjal,

As per the discussion we had over the phone I am sending herewith the details of our student:
One of our extremely talented students Master Anshuman Dubey of Class IX, who is also a prolific poet , equally at ease with English and Hindi , is in a critical condition, suffering from a rare disease CIDP (Chronic Inflammatory Demyelinating Polymyopathy),a kind of degeneration of the muscles .

His father Mr. Ashutosh Dubey has made a fervent appeal to the staff , students et al for some financial aid. So , may I, on his behalf, earnestly implore your help for this noble cause. You may donate any amount and help your ailing Paulian brother . The mode of remittance may be by cheque , draft or cash as per your convenience.

You may forward this to all your batchmates.

With love and best wishes,
Amitava Saraswati

reconnection

2009-02-16T07:42:00.002+05:30

It was a day of erconnection of sorts with people from the good old past

Spoke to Pranjal, in a while since I came back on 2nd.
Then Called up Naresh D to thank him for sending a boy to help pappa.
Hope this boy is a sincere and good helper.
I am always scared reading all those news items of such people...
I just hope the lords will be keeping them safe from all harm and he will prove to be a good help..
then Naresh told me about Navin being in town...
it was a wonderful reunion.. talking like the old school boys
incidentally, Navin took time out to come meet me at 11pm... did'nt expect this of him but maybe he has found his good bearings through time....

Weathering the weather

2009-02-03T22:04:00.002+05:30

The weather is changing.. and it is signaling very openly to those who are smart enough to understand, that there is more drastic change to come...
it is changing at a pace that for most of the world seemingly unnoticed but for those who have been watching nature so far, it is VERY Evident.

Few examples I can share... point 1 - the flowers which are referred to in Hindi as 'Tesu' which - I am not so sure but - as the link shows, is related to the Flame of the Forest or the Gulmohar flower.
These flowers at least till 2005 didn't bloom by January. They usually bloomed just a few days before Holi which is usually in March.
This year, these flowers are in full bloom, in the last week of Jan. I happened to see these blooms along the NH3 in M.P. on 25th Jan.
Since they are in full bloom then it means they began blooming a few weeks before, that is much into the first week of Jan.

Point 2 - The Indian cuckoo, or the Koel, usually comes out of its hibernation in the beginning of April, if not a week or so earlier.
This year, I heard the cuckoo off and on through the fall season, around Oct-Dec and then again last week.
Way back in the 80s, the arrival of summer and mangoes was signaled by this bird.

So in 2009, is the cuckoo getting the blues of the weather? or is it telling us all something that we might want to hear and take notice immediately?

Is it telling us that the weather is getting warmer as the cuckoo would expect it to be early April... though it is still end of Jan when we are known to have temperatures as low as 6-7 deg through the Day, and not just in the night???

point 3 - Snow in London. No reason for an alarm as London does experience this kind of weather once in a long time, but in th last 3 years, it is the second time.
So does it need to be noticed and thought about?

point 4 - snowstorm in the northeast US and Ice storm in the lower southern US. Normal phenomenon? ask the weather men!!!

bottom line... the signs are here in India, the world and in the arctics where the glaciers are breaking off...
People in India - the man on the street - understands some of it, but does not bother as we are not a 'scientific' society, we do not think logically and we do not think cause and effect though our culture did bring up the whole concept of Vedanta which is basically cause and effect theory...
But we hardly put it to practice and never relate it to things around us...

So we will be panicking when the effect comes up in a drastic form, and all we shall see will be politicians blaming someone and the rest of us blaming the politicians...

We shall hopefully try and rest in peace at least - in large masses...

of apathy, indifference and some stupidity

2009-01-25T20:05:00.007+05:30

With deep sadness and supreme feeling of helplessness I have to write that eventually people and systems in this nation would be coming to a colossally sad and gory end given the extreme apathy and carelessness that exists in our society.

I am for some reason experiencing these events myself and finding that there are hardly anyone who can come forward to help or even suggest options in such situations.

Today as I was traveling back home to Indore by bus (HANS travels) from Bombay, I had this urge to relieve myself early in the morning at about 530am. I probably drank too much of water last night and the A/C in the bus was in full blast (another apathetic and uncaring expression by the service provider - they don't care, just turn the A/C full blast and shut the door and the people in the sleeper coupe will deal with it) but i was awake by about 530 or so waiting for the morning stop the bus drivers usually halt at.
And I was feeling uncomfortable and wanted to get out at the earliest to relieve myself.
At about 6 AM the bus stops somewhere and I see that everyone sitting in the front near the driver have probably got out to help themselves.
So here I am, getting out of the bus and trying to locate a suitable spot. It was very dark outside with no street lamps at all.
When I got out, I could not see clearly who was where though i could see a guy probably 10 ft in front turned into some corner, and there were a couple of people who were sleeping by some shop front about 20 ft diagonally to the left where i was standing.

Trying to locate a corner I began walking, again, it was dark and I had no clue of anything in front of me and there.. the next step of mine, I am falling into something.
I have no clue what happened after that for I sure realized after a few seconds, that I had fallen into a mucky ditch, as the smell hit me and I felt drowned in the muck. I was cursing left right and center, as luckily the water in the ditch was not too deep, but the ditch itself was about 6.5 ft, for just disappeared into it.
Having no clue what I was into, I somehow, and again, I don't remember how, got out of it, still trying to locate where i was going, and somehow got to some point where I relieve myself, cursing myself, feeling the muck drip all inside me, feeling - not so cold as dirty and totally helpless - but yes very much ALIVE. That's what I am thanking the Lords for, for this was a sure death trap, as I could have hit anything anywhere and probably might never have even lost consciousness, without anyone knowing that I had even fell into the ditch.

There were a couple of people who had gotten out of the bus, who I believe had seen me moving into that direction, there was one guy for sure - he was the cleaner of the bus - who was standing almost 3 ft. from me when I just about landed into the ditch, but he too probably was not sure whether I was a passenger from the bus or some passerby. None of them noticed, except one man who said to the driver that someone had fallen into the ditch, whence the driver began to laugh.
I was seething with anger that these guys were just standing there and no one moved a bit to come and see what the matter was and who was in and if someone needed help.
anyhow, I went to the roadside stall on the opposite side of the road, with the shooting pain in the left shoulder and asked the guy there to help me with some water to clean up. I guess in the light of the tea-stall he was able to see my clothes caked in muck and laughed at the image in his head of me falling into it. But he gave me some water and I tried to clean myself up as much as possible.
While cleaning up, thought about the weather, it was not chilly AT ALL. This is January, no chill, and even the water was okish. I thought I'd catch a cold washing up but didn't.

So after whatever cleanup I did, I realised my phone was gone. Went over to the bus side of the road and asked if someone could help me look up the phone. No one was willing to come up but one guy somehow said you won't find it in the dark so I asked for a torch. Looked around but no clue. I even decided to take another step into the ditch and scavenge the water with my hands to see if I could find it. Not remembering that I could have called the phone and heard it.... but no.. I was too shaken up for that. Nothaving found it, I gave up and got back into the bus to change into another pair of clothes though i was not fully cleaned up still. But I had no choice. The bus driver was not wanting to wait any longer and I was helpless.
I got in, asked which place that was and was told that we had halted at the roadside stall at Sendhwa, M.P.! No wonder, I thought, this is M.P. and this is how it will remain forever - despite the global investor meet the CM of the state was talking so frikkin highly about... I just wish him all the failure of his life and failure to all the governments of this state henceforth!!!

It sure was my good luck, that I am alive right now to share this event and wonder how many such people are there who might be meeting with accidents and not getting up again. I hear of so many accidents in Indore, where people are falling into open man-holes and not regaining life back, people who are meeting with accidents due to rash drivers and not able to see the next moment.

Saying so much, I simply feel that India has lost its soul of helping caring 'unknown' people. It might be just the case that there are people who are surviving BECAUSE they 'know' someone who came to help them, but otherwise, in general, if you are someone who does not know anyone in a new place or during such travel it is very difficult without people displaying the so called social awareness and social empathy for fellow human beings.
No wonder you hear of so many people dying in public places because there is no immediate help from the human circle around them. This is a VERY sad and dangerous situation and no one but every individual himself or herself have to fight for themselves if they are by themselves.

I am thus, right now alive with a gash in my shin, an injured left shoulder (which was already broken 3 years back) and my senses totally knocked out - and a mobile phone that seems to have either fallen into the ditch or somewhere there abouts.
Unfortunately, my senses were so disturbed then esp. also because the bus driver was honking away to get me on the bus, that I didn't think about calling my phone and locating it. Would have saved me the pain of the loss, and that thought of relocating would have at least salvaged some of my self respect.
Of course I have been equally stupid to have not gathered my bearings properly before I started walking and now I have doubts about my vision too, maybe a part of which didn't help my brain register where I was going, or that I was still too groggy without my conscious brain being aware of it, or too much in a hurry.. but I will definitely say that in my last 20 years of bus travel, this kind of a situation has NEVER come forth, so I do blame the bus driver also for this situation. But he, and everyone else in the bus, are not sensitive and sensible enough to accept a lot of such things, which have a logical thought attached to it, more than common sense - like not thinking about their own familiarity of the area when it comes to driving people around, but also showing more concern for the people who are their responsibility. Anyways, this aspect could go into a whole new tale!!

But yes, lessons learnt for myself, for the people in general; - when traveling
- carry a torch with you ALWAYS

- keep your cell phone on your person, but always covered and safe so that it can be traced in case of a mishap; today, the cell phone is you and your personality, so you have to keep your identity safe for people to come back and trace you in case you are lost as a person

- ALWAYS tell your neighbor in the bus, train, flight where you are going and how long you expect to be gone; Even if these people don't bother to listen then, they will remember later when there is an issue and they have to clear their names off suspicion

- carry a cell phone with it's Mobile Tracker software enabled (some phones now do have such trackers) or set up a password for important notes you store in the phone

- make sure you do not keep any 'critical info' stored as SMS in your cell phones which can be used to hack into your life

So here I am, reviling in the loss and pain helplessly wondering how apathetic will this nation and it's people get before they realize they lost it all...
We are in some very difficult times and the value systems are at a very low today.

Hopefully the value qualities can only go up, but will be possible ONLY when the majority of our population - the ones who do not spend their time on the internet (reading and understanding the changes of society and its impact on them), the ones who are still grappling with the transitions of their lives from small towns to bigger cities and coming to understand what it takes to live in the fast city life - come into their new lives WITH the basic human values and not leave them behind in their homes and towns.

India is getting poorer in its ability to maintain old infrastructure, old roads and lanes what will it do with the new ones that are being put in place all over?

Open to interpretation

2009-01-20T16:09:00.000+05:30

It's a term which has caught my fancy - Open to Interpretation. This term, I heard in the Vodafone Plc. chief's speech a couple of days back, when he came out with the statement that Indian laws in FDI are not clear and 'open to interpretation.'

Coming down to the root cause of the chaos that India is, in general and also in all the environments it supports, spiritual, social, economic or for that matter political - the whole Indian system is 'Open to Interpretation'

In everything that happens in India, people choose to interpret things the way they want to, and behind this very generic cover, several shady activities thrive which have been an eyesore not just for the world in general but also to the citizens in particular.

Look at the way the Indian legal system runs. All it's laws are archaic, and totally irrelevant to today's times. Yet no one wants to change them. Simply because behind these laws, the dirty underbelly of the Indian system hides effectively.

Just like a chameleon, that interprets the surroundings and turns itself into the surroundings, so also, the Indian governance has acquired this art of interpreting the laws and regulations to it's own benefit, thus hiding and carrying out it's underhand tasks there.

Being open to interpretation is even subject to the scriptures of religions esp. the Bhagavat Gita. This epic can be interpreted by several people in their own ways and it will hold true.

This applies even to the way the Indian mythology has unfolded. The Karma of this land is itself open to interpretation. Hence India per se, is Open to Interpretation.

No wonder you find so many people reading about so many aspects of this land and feeling fascinated by it because for each one of them, this land holds its own interpretation.

Boiling down from all this is one simple fact. The spirit and existence of India is open to interpretation and so also are its people and laws and governance. The only aspect that hinders this 'open to interpretation' thought process - which is the basis of the chaos that it creates - is the overlap of a logical thought process of order which runs against this free interpretation aspect.

As a result, there is so much of perceived disorder in the nation and everything that happens to its citizens.
As I mentioned in my earlier blog entry, the Karma of this land is to be in chaos, to be always turbulent and to emerge victorious out of it.
The people who inhabit it are true embodiments of this spirit of free will and bringing any forced order to it will never be possible or will not bring in positive results in the long run, for there will be some other force that will run that will be perceived to be 'against' the orderly thought process.

Hence all of us in this nation should learn to 'interpret' things for our own convenience to have a more 'fulfilling life

- with just one caveat -

keep your morality and conscience aspect in mind, so that your interpretation and its implementation does not hinder someone else's interpretation and implementation to cause a clash of an extreme kind - something similar to the old English phrase which is no longer being used anywhere in our regular lexicon -
"your freedom ends where my nose begins"

Fraud of the Nation

2009-01-07T14:44:00.000+05:30

Another point going into the prove that the India story is being built on a very very weak base - a base without values, checks and balances - is the Satyam fraud story.

In my opinion, 'corporate governance' can now probably be seen as a cover for acts that companies would commit which didn't need to be in public attention and hide under this cover and still get away.
I have very grave doubts on why the Independent directors of such a company not have any moral or ethical accountability to be the whistle blowers and highlight such a fraud right upfront?

Resigning on moral grounds, leaving investors in the lurch is not an act of bravery but that of cowardice and utter contempt of trust and faith.
That such people who under the political and monetary influence agree to be on boards of companies is an utmost immoral activity but unfortunately, on the legal front, India will not have any law to prosecute such people for ages to come... simply because the laws are brought in by politicians and they eventually need to protect their self interests.

The fraud by Satyam has put a blot on the whole concept of CG in India. People will go about tom-tom-ing that probably Satyam is a one off company to have done such malpractice, but just imagine the situation - a company that received an award for CG itself has admitted to fraud.

Frankly, I might sound pessimistic like a few others but today, India's inflated position as an IT Major or whatever industry major destination has not been reached without such malpractices.

You see even the US has achieved the dubious distinction of being on top of the world as a major power, but it has not got there without committing fraud at one level or another.

The India story is hopefully not as big a sham but I think a lot of skeletons are being piled into the closet of lots of companies which have only taken advantage of the Indian political mess, lack of national governance and corruption and have duped the public which thought India is going places...

Only those who have power, money and the influence of high level connections will survive in this nation.

The rest of us, who might admit to being pessimists are probably right being so, because we are the ones who have a high regard for the Indian value system which is getting corroded and eroded due to this manic money making binge that industries are going on post the liberalization-political-game that has been unleashed on the citizens of this nation.
But we do not have the power to change the situation as we see it and hence we end up being on the pessimistic side of the coin.

We all as citizens of this nation - hard working and honest - have to be very careful of our future.

We are in really bad times and will before a long time to come unless someone at the national governance level does not take a deep hard look at where they want to take this nation.

We as honest hardworking citizens need to take a deep hard look and decide if this nation is taking us in the right direction or not.

I totally concur with M. R. Venkatesh's article on CG written some time back.

All these negative events make me conclude that the hard working honest people of this nation will have nothing to our credit till this nation has its house in order - which unfortunately is not possible for the next 100 years - even IF we survive another foreign invasion.

Is someone paying attention??

2008-12-18T16:38:00.001+05:30

The chilling levels of terror that is going to unfold if not checked RIGHT NOW at a very fast pace can be gauged by this comparison of the modus operandi of training for such modules.

We have all heard that in the neighboring nation, ex army people are training the so called militants who unleash terror in various ways.

Look at the similarity of this event unfolding through the investigations in the Malegaon case. You find an Indian army guy, in service, doing just the similar thing here in India - if the investigation allegations are to be believed.

If the similarity of these two events click in your head, you see that at the ground level, the radical youth see how the militants across the border are functioning, and they are trying to replicate that model here.

Now look at the location where this seems to have originated. SIMI and Abhinav Bharat are 2 of the organizations that have been blamed so far. Both have roots in the central state of MP.
Does this mean, that the cops and intelligence in the state there are NOT aware of the simmering heat and smoke signals such activities generate?

Is M.P. becoming a hot bed of such 'criminal' activities today, esp. also because there has been a huge influx of youth from the rural parts of other states into MP given it's 'education center' tag?

Is this kind of a situation even being considered by the cops there or they are under severe political pressure to perform to the tune of the politicians and thus ignore such happenings?

In my opinion it is not possible that the intelligence and cops are not aware of this. They are aware but they are probably under some pressure from somewhere to keep quiet about it.

But if the converse is true, that if the cops are really unaware of this ground level activities of these groups when they were formed, then it is a matter of highest level of shame (if we Indians have retained the meaning of being ashamed)

- that all of us are living our lives disconnected from everything but our own selfish pleasures.

- that we common people have taken our life and our system and our degrading existance for granted and are willing to die like insects esp. in a nation which seems to have a more evolved existence in the past. (it does not mean we have to only rest on our past laurels but it shows that we don't care about our individual worth in the present)

- that all of us are no longer considering ourselves as part of this nation, but each of us is an island unto ourselves with our super Egos and our mis-conceptions and out pre-conceived notions.

- that we are just living the lives of those chaotic soap bubbles that get formed when water is agitated, only to burst up and die out - without trying to really live to our full capacities of our human form and function.

Unfortunately, this is what the terrorists are making of their own lives and spreading the cancer in all societies, esp. the ones like India where there is high vulnerability, helplessness and utmost corruption in the governance and everyone is living in their own world uncared about what happens around them - till it happens to them.

Only then they pay a little attention.. and then they get into their daily grind...

We the silent majority....

2008-10-08T20:08:00.005+05:30

The following piece in the HT 07-10-08 reflects what people like me are going through today ..hence I present it here for you verbatim...

- about the current state of affairs of the nation and how it has impacted people like me..

The last line underscores the mindset of people like me, who feel helpless about the law and order situation around me, are seeking... and believe me, we are not insane, when we demand a gun for ours and our family protection....

are we not looking at signs of what one can call.. a civil war????

on a side note, I see a parallel between India today and the US of the past, which might have led the gun laws to be set up there 'cos I think the US has probably gone through similar times before it reached today's state.
But that does not help me today 'cos my safety is at stake and I need protection from what the state has failed to control... increasing violence and reducing value of the human life....
-----------

Searching high and low for the law - Gautam Chikermane, (HT)

There are two forces of physics acting upon a changing India today. On the economic front, as India expands into global terrains, a centripetal force is gathering momentum, best represented by the country’s 8 per cent growth rate. This force, however, is being pulled back, through an equally strong centrifugal force that looks inward, is fragmented and savage in its execution. Caught in between are the rest of us. If economic development and mass prosperity have to be delivered, the politics of violence that the centrifugal force represents needs to die. And there lies a political opportunity for
Elections 2009.

The most high-profile wart of this centrifugal force is the Nano’s undignified exit from Singur. Last week Ratan Tata had said that Mamata Banerjee had pulled “the trigger on his head”, forcing him to move out of West Bengal to Gujarat, the trigger being his employees’ safety.
Earlier, L.K. Chaudhury, CEO of the Italian company Graziano Trasmissioni, was beaten to death by workers in Greater Noida, some 20 minutes from the national capital, with the Labour Minister subtly trying to build political capital from the crime by saying, “This should serve as a warning for managements.” (He later backtracked, but the damage was done.)
North Indians are being targeted in Mumbai by Raj Thackeray and his Maharashtra Navnirman Sena as an investment into future elections to garner jingoistic support. Churches are being burnt in Orissa and nuns raped under the blind eyes of the police while the state’s highly articulate Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik says he’s doing his job.
A young journalist dies a mysterious death in Delhi and its Chief Minister Shiela Dikshit says women should not be “adventurous” and that companies, not the police, should take responsibility for their safety.
The message from our politicians who have built walls of protection with taxpayers’ money around themselves and their families: India is,and will continue to be, run by thugs, so please watch out for yourselves.

As the rest of us take events like these in stride and get desensitised by the never-ending images on TV, permanent headlines in newspapers and infinite opinions on blogs, never has the need for law and order as the first and foremost electoral expectation of voters been so high, so acute. Law and order is something we are supposed to take for granted. It is only riding this safety infrastructure that we can do anything else — pursue jobs, buy groceries, watch films.
On the other hand, we are gradually beginning to accept lawlessness,particularly by the rich, the powerful and the organised mobs they manage to cobble, as one more dinner-table discussion — ‘Pass the death toll, please.’ As this anarchy gets political support, we are gradually being pushed into a corner, where an unvoiced frustration with governance is systematically eating into our democratic and civilised innards. With weapons in the hands of a small clutch of ineligible political aspirants, the man on the street has never been in as much physical danger as today.

Lawmakers are breaking the law as if it’s their birth right. And when stopped — as Virendra Kumar Khatik was, as he tried to barricade the arms of the law from an anti-encroachment drive, only to face collateral damage — action is taken, not against the honourable Member of Parliament for attempting to come in the way of the law, but against the junior policemen who tried to implement it. They’ve been charged with an attempt to murder and have been suspended from duty. Shed a tear for them.

Those whom voters have entrusted with democratic power and white car privileges — and with them the responsibility to provide law and order — are all but numbed into submission under this new force gathering strength, issue by issue, in state after state. Leadership at the highest levels is reeling under the weight of a moral compulsion to let people, who any right-minded person would call murderers, rapists, repeat offenders, and bad characters, have a free run on the rest of us, feed on our livelihoods, our fears. And our freedoms. (“Today, terrorists are being worshipped,” said Justice J.N. Patel referring to Raj Thackeray, who, in turn, instead of feeling the fear of the law as any law-abiding citizen should, is brazenly asking the court to “define a terrorist”.)

The CPI(M)’s West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee virtually offered a free hand to Mamata Banerjee and her mob to stop workers seeking nothing more than an honest day’s job from working. The Congress’s Maharashtra Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh is standing still, watching non-Maharashtrian citizens of India being beaten and threatened, their businesses, taxis and trade being destroyed. The Biju Janata Dal’s Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has nothing more than lofty words to offer Christians being mauled in his state.

We, the silent majority, have allowed this small band of hoodlums to decide whether we have the right to work, to religion, to celebration, to life, to love. Too busy to look beyond the prosperity that the economic centripetal force has brought, in the form of our 2-BHKs and iPhones, we are allowing a new political culture to invade our country.
It’s almost as if we are being conquered all over again, this time by some of the smartest minds this country has produced, minds — like the smart lawyers, accountants and financial engineers who recently ran the global financial system aground — that are finding and punching holes in the law to usurp power.
A leveraged buyout is underway, where a small bunch of private interest groups cobble together to create visible damage for maximum impact. We are being forced into believing that violence is the currency of political or social intercourse in a modern, trillion-dollar economy. That if we want something bad enough, we can just go out and collect thugs. This faith needs to be destroyed. These mobs and their political masters need to be dragged under the purview of the law, before this belief system becomes a mass religion. For any responsible party, this presents a so-far ignored political opportunity. In the last elections, with a focus on economic growth, our attention moved from ‘roti-kapda-makaan’ to ‘bijli-sadak-pani’. It’s time now to go back to basics and devise a new slogan around ‘suraksha-kanoon-dand’ (safety-law-punishment) — and implement it ruthlessly. Political profits are guaranteed.

Until that happens, can anyone tell me where I can buy a gun?
(C) HT 07-10-2008

Why Indore Sucks

2008-10-07T22:52:00.004+05:30

I have been attached to this city over a long time. I in a way fell for it's open grounds, spaces and greenery which have always been a part of my living times all along.
So it was probably nature that makes me connect with this city.
But with the recent times, even that connection seems to be wearing off.
The city wears a deserted look, with all the big trees, 50-100 yr old trees being felled for want of space.

I have lately reached a conclusion that this city is on the verge of going into negative growth in real terms than really showing all round growth.

I will explain with simple instances of locations which anyone would assume would have changed positively over the last 10 yrs. But unfortunately, the situation is in the exact opposite.

before I write anything about the locations or the city in general, I must admit that the attitude of the citizens of this city has degraded to the worse that one can experience.
The reasons are many - the city has an influx of people from the nearby villages (which themselves are in the state of becoming small towns or extensions of towns).
The citizens have a VERY HIGH LEVEL of immaturity written all over their face and they inherit the aggressiveness that comes with this immaturity.

The citizens have very limited levels of patience and those who belong to the uncivilised gentry have no patience at all.
I have had instances when people would ram their bikes into mine though i am right at the edge of the traffic and then turn around showing aggression lest their show gets spoilt.

On the other hand, the apathy also has increased towards any incident. There have been incidents where people have been hit by vehicles or have been attacked at the slightest provocation and the rest have just watched the duel unfold.

People carry knives and sickles which they have no qualms about taking out at the time of any slight altercation to show their might, and they would not think twice using it either 'cos the law and order has taken a back seat and takes no action on erring citizens. money power has come to rule the roost as in most cities of the country.

coming to the degrading situation of public attitude, the locations which are these symbols of deteriration are
a. Jail road - the junction and the area around there has turned into a virtual mayhem. Especially the signal where there is no order in following the rules of traffic.
People do not care about pedestrians at any place in the city, esp. now with the city roads being dug up or being dug out since ages, where there seems no scope for any road to exist and unruly people driving bikes, scooters, autos and 4 wheelers consider the road their sole domain to drive.
Imagine a 100 thousand people thinking this way on narrow streets and you have the situation of the city roads and junctions.

On top of this, the parking of vehicles has assumed hugely mismanaged proportions.
The city has NO parking system. You would find streets where people have parked bikes, hapazardly, and next to the bikes, you would find 2 rows of cars parked. Effectively a 40 ft road is reduced to a 10 ft for both sides of traffic, with SUVs and cars and autos not only plying along those roads but also making random U-turns and reversing to get into bylanes where there is virtually no parking rule.

Another aspect of driving esp. at night is that everyone drives with their headlights on high-beam. On top of this, there are some folks who, in order to show off their new found immaturity put white neon headlamps and drive with full high beam, virtually blinding people driving on the opposite side. Esp. since there are no road dividers, the chances of one individual getting blinded and tailgating the one in front is very high.

MP, Indore and development

2008-09-04T13:08:00.006+05:30

Being the centrally located state of the nation, and being geographically located in a plateau with the Narmada river serving most of it's water needs - the Malwa Plateau, MP, and it's cities had an advantage for almost all kinds of industries.
Unfortunately, the lack of political will and focus on some real development for the state has landed this state into more of a dependent status than being independent and contributing to the nations' GDP.
Though things are likely to change, it takes a huge amount of time in this state to take decisions, most of them being passed around like a bucket of popcorn.
The Global Investor's meet in Indore, that the MP government called for last year should have probably taken off in a huge way, had things really been moved positively.
Several reknowned people and companies did agree to participate then. I was not able to find out about any further details on the success of the meet and any action items highlighted in the same.
Things still are at a very basic level of planning even today, and implementation details are thus awaited.
On a personal note, I know of one company - SemanticBITS which wanted to invest in Indore, but has backed out and decided to locate in Hyderabad. I'd say, a loss for the state. Another level of loss comes from the relocation of existing companies like CSC, who, finding infrastructure development very slow have decided to get most of their work moved to locations like Hyderabad, Chennai and Noida.

I hope though that the state does a lot more to invite companies, esp. by ensuring quick deployment of infrastructure and power and zero red-tapism for companies to set up and do uninterrupted business in the state.

Destruction for Development

2008-08-19T16:58:00.007+05:30

All over the world, one thing that really stands out in stark contrast is the amount of destruction that mankind unleashes in the name of development.
So also, in a city like this, I was appalled when I came across the fact that the so called city planners were totally unprepared at the influx of people into the city and over the last 5 years or so, have unleashed unplanned development projects in the city... at the cost of high amounts of destruction - of nature.

The first prime targets of all development are the lungs of a city, the trees.

The destruction of trees in Indore began almost 4 years back, at various locations including the existing A.B.Road which passed outside the erstwhile old Indore city. The excuses given by the city planners was that the trees were a hindrance for development and hence they must go....

I wonder what kind of qualified planners these people are that they failed to recognise the need for building their designs around existing natural structures than destroying the structures to the extent that the whole city feels the impact.
Almost 40 odd trees were cut down on the Starlit road to widen it to accomodate more traffic and more commercial structures.
Around 100 odd trees were cut down on the A.B.Road all along from the outer ring road on the South till Scheme 74 on the North, under some plan, where they were to widen the road.
But today, the plan has been scrapped and no one has bothered to calculate and consider the loss they have unleashed by destroying trees that were probably more than 100 yrs old.

Open lands have been usurped by the builder politician nexus, killing the real spirit of progress for the city.

Unfortunate again, that the common citizen in that part of the country is one who seeks for his self, there is no collective conscience that the citizens bring together to ensure that their city preserves it's charm at least for the sake of the Nature that it was known for;

Shab-e-malwa - the glorified evening of Malwa - an erstwhile oft repeated Urdu phrase that described succinctly the glory of the breezy evenings of the Malwa plateau that Indore is part of, now no longer retains it's meaning or charm.
The balmy breezy evenings have been replaced by hot dusty winds that bring in dust covering everything in it's path, turning the landscape into a bleak, dreary, hot parched brown cover.
So much so the price to pay for development in once upon a time beautiful city.

61 - Proud to be an Indian?

2008-08-14T17:40:00.000+05:30

61 years - 61 summers 61 winters 61 monsoons, 61 billion and counting…- this is the story of what came to be called the Golden bird, the land of Spiritual renaissance, the elephant that was learning to dance, the tiger that never got it’s due and the abode of Gods.

The sum of the age digits add up to 7 - a lucky number for some, probably has several hopes pinned on now to hold lucky for not just an individual but for an entity, a nation.
India’s astrological star sign is the Leo – the Lion, if it ever means that India was really ‘born’ on 15th Aug 1947.

Though it existed long before it was born, discovered or for that matter ‘created’, India – a capricious notion - existed in various states, geographies, beliefs and spirit much before it was ‘still-born’ in it’s 19th century polity that the planet Earth is actively keeping history of now.
So after 61 years of that fateful midnight, a conflicting and fighting mass of people was shorn off - a forced caesarian of sorts of a predominantly British mother – to be recognized as an individual polity/entity, albeit with a polit-o-genetically misaligned twin attached at it’s head - a head that today is very messed up.

The train of fate for these, almost million odd men and women, fighting, conflicting at various levels of existence, hurriedly switched tracks to rush off into an unknown direction - much like a toy train that, totally ignored by a bored child - that accidentally slips off it’s toy tracks and veers off trying to balance on it’s tiny toy wheels, till either the child turns it’s attention to put it back on it’s tracks, or is left to crash somewhere, unattended.
Today, 61 years later, the toy train, is really ‘lucky’ for not having been pulled down by gravity - gravity of the situation it has found itself in, since then.
Lucky – to be still on it’s wheels, trembling, shaking, teetering on a path not designed for it’s wheels, but yet, somehow keeping itself up, balancing, yet chugging along laboriously with increasing mass - the bored child nowhere in sight - looking for those lost rails that it was probably smoothly running on up until 300 years back.
Even after 61 years, with its hurriedly chopped off psychogenesis umbilical cords still dangling from it’s disintegrating and misappropriating spirit and it’s unattended psychopathology, this entity is alive, and is considered an anomaly of sorts by – pardon the pun – even God.

Today, this growing, once-upon-a-time-stillborn entity, is still a kid at heart, though 61 years old.
The kid that wants all that the world can give it’s consumerist population; the kid that still wants to be on the stage struts its glamour stuff with the grandeur of cinema, music, with it’s ill-kept but still considerably beautiful contrasts of human life with nature; the kid that cries loud for a seat in the security council yet not being able to get past the bullies that guard the seat; the kid that wants to grow into a mature adult, but ‘luck’ in one form or another hushing down it’s need for growth…

So what does it mean - to be an Indian - 61 years later - today??? I say -

embarrassingly Proud!

St. Pauls School

2008-08-03T00:24:00.006+05:30

It would be incomplete if I mention Indore and do not mention my alma mater - St. Pauls H. S. School, Old Sehore Road, Indore.

I plan to thave a series of thoughts on my alma mater as time and inclination permits.

Let me start this series by touching upon the latest news from the school - a memorial day event. An event that began a a homage to departed souls of the 1988 batch, who once upon a time were my playmates and lab mates and house-mates.

But this day has been eternalised as a day to pays homage to all students of the school who now rest in peace due to their untimely departure from the living world.

The 1988 batch was first of it's kind
- a batch that was the first class XII (10+2) batch of the school
- the first batch to get a general promotion (GP) by the then CM, Arjun Singh
- a batch which had almost 40 of it's students getting selected in PET for engineering college admissions

The pictures here should suffice to say that under the initiative of some die-hard St. Pauls alumni, the Smruti Divas (Memorial day) has been launched officially.

I would fail if I do not mention a few of the wonderful teachers who have been with us through these years guiding us in their own way, with their invisible presence in our lives, who have shaped us the way we are today.

Mr. Amitabh Saraswati - the man with the western look way back then, never was able to understand if he was the rebel with a cause or without one.

Mr. Sudhir Paradkar - the man with the look of a serious activist who took his work and duty seriously and made sure most of us did

Mr. Deshbir Singh - the chemical man, whose love for organic chemistry and chemistry in general was very visible in the way he went about teaching us the molecules and atoms that made this world go round.

They were present at the memorial day function organized by the representative alumni of the 1988 batch.

Change for the better

2008-07-14T16:44:00.004+05:30

Indore as a city has evolved like the other cities of the nation, albeit in a different way. The city earlier was not so well known for it's education prowess, but it was since 1995 that some inroads began into the city for the education industry. This was esp. possible because the city began to have a better connectivity to the North and West by rail and road.

It was a fact since a long time that Indore produced some very talented people in the media industry. Some very familiar names are Lata Mangeshkar & Kishore Kumar(who studied in Indore, though he came from Khandwa) from the music industry, Vijayendra Ghatge from the acting field, Salim Khan, the script writer of Salim-Javed duo who wrote for Sholay (dad to the most popular Khan - Salman) and in the last decade names in the National News presenters - Akash Soni and Siddharth Sharma.

So the city has created an image for itself of being a city of opportunities. Indeed the opportunities have emerged and along with it, have people. Pouring in from the smaller cities, the city has seen exponential population growth though infrastructure has been slow to catch up, as usual.

The changes that the city has seen have put pressures on several aspects. One is safety and security.
- of vehicular traffic drivers
- of Senior citizens
- for children being ferried to/from schools
- of houses from burglaries

Pressure is there on infrastructure development at the cost of losing the green cover.
Impacted by the loss of green cover is the increasing levels of air pollution, heat levels, decreasing water content and impacts on the psyche to develop related diseases.

So also with increasing number of people from the nerby cities, when they come to the mini metro, they come with a set mindset that the big city will give them all the freedom to live and exist the way they want to - away from the pressure of family control.
It is this attitude that needs a huge change.

Unfortunately, it has been seen that the mindset of the people who come from the rural areas is initially very much self oriented. They do not understand the complexities of living in a city life compared to the small rural life they had. As a result of this notional belief, very often the city life is very disillusioning. This kind of an attitude leads to inflated ego levels.
People think they have a right on everything and anything.

Indore suffers from this attitudinal inflation in a huge way. Most often you will find that people want to show off themselves in a lot of ways. They get into fights in the smallest of incidents, they try to ensure that they are in the center of the limelight by adopting shortcuts in life.

It is this that makes people very vulnerable and also very dangerous.
The need of the hour in the city and in the state is sensitization.
Sensitization towards all the above problems and their associated side-effects and how individuals need to have a broader perspective when they live in a city.

Unfortunately, in this age of rapid fire progress, people can't stop for a minute. People are in a rush to live and make it better than they were. In the process they lose more than they gain. But they do not stop to think.

It is the importance of this Pause that is very much needed to be 'taught' to the people in a variety of ways. the media is one such agent. But the media itself in such cities needs to first grow up and over their smaller interests that they had earlier.

The media and the law of the land have to be the first participants in this change by being abreast of all impacts of change and ways to handle this impact.
They should then become guides to people who are experiencing and causing the changes in their individual and collective city lifestyles.

Not sure if people in these times still understand the tradition and concept of 'city elders' but it is the city elders who have to change for the better, First.
The movie 'Happy Feet' depicts beautifully, what I am alluding to;
Maybe something of a change can come in slowly in the outlook of this city from such media.

Indore - and terror

2008-07-07T11:32:00.008+05:30

Giving thought to my connection with Indore again, I see, given the current situation that though th city has created an aura about being an 'educational center', the mentality of the locals is still not as progressive as they are teaching through the institutions.
And hence I am not able to decide, that as an IT professional, where in Indore can I really fit in with my experience and outlook that I have developed in a cit like Bombay.

the current issue there with communal riots, an indefinite curfew and the recently unearthed terrorist links puts the city law and order situation in quandary and also puts the image of Indore as a 'global outsourcing destination' into deep dire straits.

The city has an IIM and the city is expected to get its IIT also shortly.

For educational institutions to meet their goals and the students to get the most out of them, basic law and order is a must. Students need to attend classes regularly. Given the fact that IIM and IIT students live on campus, the impact might be less. But nevertheless, the fear factor will always be there.

Given this, and the growing number of cases of burglary, murders and inability of the police system to even identify a pattern, leave alone the culprits, is a huge lacuna in the overall governance system which has in a way left the residents in fear, in several areas.

Senior citizens are the most prone and it has actually caused a lot of stress for me to try and keep myself from being carried away with my parents' welfare there. There are several families there where the old parents live by themselves. Imagine how a curfew like situation will affect such people. Does anyone for that matter think about such impacts?