National Issues

[acharya]

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/quic...058661.cms

With NDA in power, Sonia Gandhi takes up the role of opposition leader and commands respect worldwide.


http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/arti...059281.cms
Why Sonia Gandhi is a brand icon today
AKSHAY BHATNAGAR
INDIATIMES NEWS NETWORK[ WEDNESDAY, MARCH 23, 2005 12:22:13 AM]

Way back in 1978, the ad agency Saatchi & Saatchi was entrusted with the task of creating the ad campaign for the Conservative Party, led by Margaret Thatcher, aimed at the upcoming elections in Britain. The agency came up with the print ad showing a picture of a long line outside an unemployment office.

The campaign directly hit the Labour Party on the plank of non-functioning and catapulted Thatcher to victory.

Cut to year 2004 in India. The Congress party led by Sonia Gandhi hired Orchard Advertising (a Leo Burnett agency) and Perfect Relations to handle its advertising and public relations campaigns respectively for the upcoming general elections. The combination of party's media cell and agencies' think tanks came up with a multiple ad campaign raising a single question Aam Aadmi Ko Kya Mila? (What did the common man get?).

The party's ad campaign promised Congress Ke Haath, Aam Aadmi Ke Saath co-relating its symbol of hand with the common man's need and aspiration.

The media was strategically apprised of the ground realities of the economy. The simple yet very effective campaign took the sheen away from the NDA government's high voltage 'India Shining' campaign. In the marketer's parlance, the seven-year young political brand Sonia Gandhi dislodged the over five-decade old political brand Atal Bihari Vajpayee from the market leadership position.

[acharya]

http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.ph...on~a~first~date

[Guest]

<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.ph...on~a~first~date <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
This article is promoting this type of behavior, where infact rest of world is rethinking on these issues. I call it manipulation of young mind with alien culture. Who’s behind this?

[Guest]

<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Independence Day Charter

We, the undersigned, reflecting the concerns and aspirations of sixteen crores Muslim citizens of the country, issue the following Charter on the 58th Independence Day of India.

We demand the government to strive to establish the Akhanda Bharat by reuniting the geography and populations that were divided off. A United India alone can bring peace, prosperity and harmony in the poverty ridden South Asia. The division of India had truncated the patriotic Muslim community of India who held on to their beloved land in spite of the violence unleashed on them by the Hindu communal fringe. The division of Indian Muslims has reduced us into a small minority and left us in perpetual torment and turned us into a new Panchama caste by the post-Independent political dispensation. We call for the reversal of the Partition that was inflicted to serve the interest of some feudal Muslim leaders and the Hindutwa elements.

We call upon the government to treat the people of Kashmir as its full citizens and provide them development, employment, unqualified democracy and the right to assert human self dignity, and stop alienating them through State violence. We call upon the Muslims of Kashmir to isolate those who generate violence at the behest of foreign powers, and not ever to desert the Indian Muslims fraternity.

The political order of the past 58 years has thrown Muslims, as a community, to the bottom of the socio-economic pyramid and to extreme disenfranchisement. As a means to rescue Muslims from this abyss, we urge the government to provide proportionate reservation for Muslims in all systems of governance and in the private sector. Multiculture  as opposed to monoculture promotes excellence in governance as well as in industrial production. We urge the government to give up the habit of filling the judiciary with upper caste judges who take a consistently hostile position towards reservation for the under-represented communities and towards the poor in general. Don’t attempt to mask the rainbow that is India.

The government must stop the practice of setting up more police stations in Muslim areas than schools and colleges. We demand the setting up of 1000 new schools and 100 new colleges in Muslim majority areas during the term of this government. The government spending on education and health care must not be reduced to provide welfare for the corporate sector. Funding for education could also be sourced from the escalating defense budget. The nation cannot have a better weapon than educated citizens, especially Muslim citizens.

We demand the immediate prosecution of all the anti-Indian tyrants who perpetrated the pogrom in Gujarat. A compensation of Rs 5 lakhs each should be provided to the victims’ families immediately. We deplore UPA government, that came to power encashing the murder of Muslims in Gujarat, for its inaction on the genocide.

We demand speedy action to provide justice to the victims of the anti-Muslim riots of Bhivandi, Moradabad, Maliana and Mumbai. That the criminals are not punished yet glaringly proves the mockery of the delivery system for justice that we have in place.

We appeal to the Election Commission to de-recognise the BJP as a political party since it is not an independent party capable of making its own decisions but dictated by the fascist outfit RSS. Further, BJP has proven that it is not accountable to its membership but to RSS, an organisation run in a fascist manner with a doctrinal opposition to democracy and Indian constitution.

We demand an unconditional apology from Mr Manmohan Singh for betraying our freedom struggle and insulting our martyrs by praising the British colonialists for their ruthless occupation and exploitation of our nation. We also demand that a suitable memorial be built in honour of Bahadur Shah Zafar, who was the only King appointed by the people of India and who was mercilessly exiled to Burma by the invading forces.

We beg the Brahminical media, such as Indian Express, to give us a respite. As the most deprived section of the society we are unequally placed to fight you back. Allow us some time for some education and development and then you can resume your harangue.

We renew our resolve on this Day to struggle for the creation of an India free from discrimination, obscene inequality, poverty, illiteracy, superstitions, caste hegemony and violence.

Fareeda Rahman
Al Nisa Collective
Chennai

Mohammed Bashir
Pan India Muslim Forum
Kozhikkode

Sultan Ibrahim
Shabab E Hind
Chennai
sultanofpeace@...<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->

[Guest]

<!--c1-->CODE<!--ec1-->India needs freedom from politicians
 
Tavleen singh
 
Independence Day usually inspires me to write in a reflective mood. Like all birthdays it provides a chance to do some book-keeping. A chance to tot up promises unkept and list achievements and failures. This Independence Day finds me in especially reflective mood since I am writing from Thailand and see Bharat that is India from the perspective of gentle distance. An additional reason for my being in a reflective mood is an article I came upon on my second day here by Singapore’s mentor and senior minister, Lee Kuan Yew.
Lee Kuan Yew is, in my view, one of the greatest Asian leaders of all time, and in the article, reprinted from Forbes magazine in one of Bangkok’s English dailies, he makes this very heartening prediction. ‘‘Both India and China are integrating their economies with those of their neighbours; together they will pull Asia into an era of dynamic growth.

‘‘The inevitable surprises will occur, but both China and India are on course for a revival of their glorious civilisations. By 2050, the world’s economic centre of gravity will have moved from the Atlantic to the Pacific and Indian oceans.’’

In India, marooned in Mumbai’s flooded streets or travelling down one of our pre-historic roads, I often find it hard to believe that we will overcome our grim problems but distance makes the heart grow kinder and so I find myself totting up achievements before failures.

Our biggest achievement is that we are what Natan Sharansky calls a ‘free society’ as opposed to a ‘fear society’. Sharansky, a former refusenik from the Soviet gulags who has since been a minister in different Israeli governments, believes democracy is the greatest inoculation against tyranny.

In his book The Case for Democracy he analyses with extraordinary lucidity the importance of freedom and free societies in the fight against tyranny and terror.

He defines a free society as one in which you can speak your mind in a public square, have the liberty to practice your faith and have the right to be a dissident. India passes on all three counts and democracy is our greatest strength. There are a few morons in our political class (generally of Nehruvian socialist disposition) who blame democracy for our inability to grow our economy as fast as China and the East Asian tiger economies have. This is rubbish. If our economy does not grow fast enough, it is because of stupid economic polices and an addiction to failed ideologies. Democracy has saved us from total ruin and could be the reason why in the long run India overtakes China, which definitely falls into the ‘fear society’ category.

Our other strength is the remarkable enterprise that the average Indian exhibits in the face of the most daunting odds. I speak not just of the businessmen, who constitute India Inc, but of the children who somehow manage to survive in the mean streets of our cities, of the hawkers and pavement entrepreneurs who routinely lose everything they have because of the brutality of our municipalities and routinely manage to rebuild their lives and livelihoods again from scratch. If only we could have one Prime Minister who had the vision to invite ordinary Indians to his Independence Day address from the Red Fort instead of the dreary bunch of politicians and officials who pass as ‘dignitaries’ at the gathering.

Mention of the political class inevitably invokes in my mind failure rather than achievement. So, let’s talk about failures. They are nearly all economic and nearly all on account of the myopic vision of our political leaders.

India, in my ever humble opinion, would already be ahead of China if the political class had upheld its side of the contract. Indians have kept their side.

Indian scientists, academics, doctors, musicians, writers, film-makers, businessmen, journalists hold their own among the best in the world. Our political class and our bureaucrats do not. In the old days, the only Indians who got past the barriers of P-forms and foreign exchange were politicians and bureaucrats and they were an embarrassment abroad. Nearly always they came with begging bowl in hand, whining about our poverty. When I travel abroad these days it makes me immensely proud to see how well Indians are doing in whatever they are doing. Does it make our political leaders and policy-makers proud? No.

Just observe what goes on at our international airports if you want to see the contempt with which officials treat our hard-working workers whose remittances have gone a long way to swelling our foreign exchange account. I have seen workers harassed over gold rings and TV sets as if they were Dawood Ibrahim himself. Our biggest industrialists are not spared either as can be seen from the list of those arrested for not paying duty on some insignificant foreign purchase or other.

In our ‘free society’ our biggest problem lies with politicians and officials who remain nostalgic for the days when in our slavish emulation of the Soviet Union we were nearly a ‘fear society.’ They long for the days when they could control every aspect of economic activity, when television was totally controlled and when freedom was restricted to the right to vote.

Thousands of officials who should be employed to build roads, power plants, schools and hospitals continue to be employed in doing the most useless, controlling jobs.

When they are more gainfully employed we will come closer to winning our fight against extreme poverty and closer to realising our full potential as the world’s largest ‘free society’. Meanwhile, Happy Independence Day<!--c2--><!--ec2-->

[Bharatvarsh]

<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->President's address to the nation on the eve of 59th Independence Day

August 14, 2005 18:46 IST

Energy Independence

My Dear Citizens of India,

On the eve of the 59th Independence Day, I extend to you my best wishes for your happiness and prosperity. My greetings to all our people at home and abroad. Let us resolve, on this occasion, to remember with gratitude, the selfless and devoted services of our armed forces who are guarding our frontiers on the land, over the sea, and in the air. 

We are also grateful to the paramilitary and police forces for preserving our internal security and maintaining law and order. I met 137 freedom fighters from 27 states and union territories on August 9, 2005, at Rashtrapati Bhavan. I saw their enthusiasm even at their ripe age, to bring back nationalism as a living movement. Today our country is free, because freedom fighters gave their best to the nation in their prime of youth. Honouring freedom fighters is honouring the independent nation and its spirit of nationalism. We must thank them with respect and make their lives happy.

Nature's Fury and its Management

While we are celebrating the 59th anniversary of our hard earned political independence, we have to remember the sufferings of our people affected by the recent rains and floods in Maharashtra, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka and Orissa. The city of Mumbai and other areas in Maharashtra bore the brunt of nature's fury.

The people of these areas are meeting the challenge with courage and fortitude. The prime minister had visited some of the affected areas. I spoke to the chief minister of Maharashtra while he was visiting various places affected by the floods and I also shared my concern with other chief ministers. Maharashtra needs help at this critical juncture to mitigate the sufferings arising out of loss of life and properties inflicted by the fury of the rains and floods. All the states need to express their solidarity with the people of Maharashtra in their time of distress and suffering and collectively help in removing the pain of the people. Mumbai needs an urgent reconstruction to face unexpected heavy rains, as it happened this year. 

Rainfall and Floods: Rainfall and floods are annual features in many parts of the country. Instead of thinking about interlinking of rivers only at times of flood and drought, it is time that we implement this programme with a great sense of urgency. We need to make an effort to overcome various hurdles in our way to the implementation of this major project. I feel that it has the promise of freeing the country from the endless cycle of floods and droughts. Also, as a measure for preventing flooding of streets in cities due to heavy sustained downpour, I would suggest the Ministry of Urban Development at the Centre and the state governments to mount a programme to rebuild and modernise the infrastructure and storm-water drainage systems including construction of under ground water silos to store excess water. 

This water can be treated, processed and used at the time of shortages as practiced in many other countries. Fortunately India has adequate technology and expertise in making underground tunnels for the metro rail system. This technology can be used for constructing underground water storage systems. 

Earthquake Forecasting: Another natural phenomenon that affects and causes damages of high magnitude without pre-warning in many parts of our country is the earthquake. To prevent heavy damage to the people and property, we need to accelerate research for forecasting earthquakes. Research work on earthquake forecasting is being done in many countries. We in India should have an integrated research team consisting of experts drawn from academia, meteorology and space departments for creating earthquake forecast modeling using pre-earthquake and post-earthquake data collected from various earthquake occurrences in our country. This can be validated periodically with the proven forecasting data available from other countries.

Earth Systems Science: Many of the countries in the world have experienced successive calamities driven by nature. Till recently, researchers the world over had been pursuing research in unconnected ways, in climate, earthquakes, ocean sciences and earth sciences, without realising the latent, but tight coupling between these areas. This new realisation has prompted many countries to pursue the interdisciplinary area of research, which is now known as earth systems science. It is in fact fast emerging as an area of convergence between earth, climate, ocean, environment, instrumentation and computer sciences. I strongly suggest that India should mount a programme in this emerging area of earth systems science. This will call for a dedicated, cohesive and seamless integration between researchers in multiple areas and in multiple organisations. Further, earth systems science does not obey political or geographical borders. It is truly a science and its intensive results would make our planet safe and prosperous.

Unlike research in strategic areas, wherein nations have to maintain superiority over other nations, earth systems science is the ultimate realisation of human kind to collaborate, since no nation is safe, if its neighbours are not. Nature's fury knows no borders.

Dear citizens, on January 26, 2005, I discussed with you the potential for employment generation in eight areas. I am happy that a number of actions are evolving.

Energy Independence

Today on this 59th Independence Day, I would like to discuss with all of you another important area that is 'energy security' as a transition to total 'energy independence'.

Energy is the lifeline of modern societies. But today, India has 17% of the world's population and just 0.8% of the world's known oil and natural gas resources. We might expand the use of our coal reserves for some time and that too at a cost and with environmental challenges. The climate of the globe as a whole is changing. Our water resources are also diminishing at a faster rate. As it is said, energy and water demand will soon surely be a defining characteristic of our people's life in the 21st Century.

Energy security rests on two principles. The first, to use the least amount of energy to provide services and cut down energy losses. The second, to secure access to all sources of energy including coal, oil and gas supplies worldwide, till the end of the fossil fuel era, which is fast approaching. Simultaneously, we should access technologies to provide a diverse supply of reliable, affordable and environmentally sustainable energy.

As you all know, our annual requirement of oil is 114 million tonnes. A significant part of this is consumed in the transportation sector. We produce only about 25% of our total requirement. The presently known resources and future exploration of oil and gas may give mixed results. The import cost today of oil and natural gas is over Rs 120,000 crore. Oil and gas prices are escalating; the barrel cost of oil has doubled within a year. This situation has to be combated. 

Energy scurity, which means ensuring that our country can supply lifeline energy to all its citizens, at affordable costs at all times, is thus a very important and significant need and is an essential step forward. But it must be considered as a transition strategy, to enable us to achieve our real goal that is -- energy independence or an economy which will function well with total freedom from oil, gas or coal imports. Is it possible?

Hence, energy independence has to be our nation's first and highest priority. We must be determined to achieve this within the next 25 years, therefore by the year 2030. This one major 25-year national mission must be formulated, funds guaranteed, and leadership entrusted without delay as public-private partnerships to our younger generation, now in their 30s, as their lifetime mission in a renewed drive for nation-building.

Goals and Policies
Now friends, I would now like to discuss with you some goals, strategies and policies for a major national mission to attain energy independence.

Energy Consumption Pattern in India in 2005: We have to critically look at the need for energy independence in different ways in its two major sectors: Electric power generation and transportation. At present, we have an installed capacity of about 121,000 MW of electricity, which is 3% of the world capacity. We also depend on oil to the extent of 114 million tonnes every year, 75% of which is imported and used almost entirely in the Transportation sector.

Forecasts of our energy requirements by 2030, when our population may touch 1.4 billion people, indicate that demand from the power sector will increase from the existing 120,000 MW to about 400,000 MW. This assumes an energy growth rate of 5% per annum.

Electric Power Generation Sector: Electric power generation in India now accesses four basic energy sources: Fossil fuels such as oil, natural gas and coal; hydroelectricity; nuclear power; and renewable energy sources such as bio-fuels, solar, biomass, wind and ocean.

Fortunately for us, 89% of energy used for power generation today is indigeneous, from coal (56%), hydroelectricity (25%), nuclear power (3%) and renewable (5%). Solar energy segment contributes just 0.2% of our energy production.

Energy Independence in Electric Power Generation

Thus it would be seen that only 11% of electric power generation is dependent on oil and natural gas, which is mostly imported at enormous cost. Only 1% of oil is (about 2 to 3 million tonnes of oil) being used every year for producing electricity. However, power generation to the extent of 10% is dependent on high cost gas supplies. We are making efforts to access natural gas from other countries.

Now I shall discuss another fossil fuel, coal. Even though India has abundant quantities of coal, it is constrained to regional locations, high ash content, affecting the thermal efficiency of our power plants, and also there are environmental concerns. Thus, a movement towards energy independence would demand accelerated work in operationalising the production of energy from the coal sector through integrated gasification and combined cycle route.  In 2030, the total energy requirement would be 400,000 MW. At that time, the power generated from coal-based power plants would increase from the existing 67,000 MW to 200,000 MW. This would demand significant build-up of thermal power stations and large-scale expansion of coalfields.

Changing Structure of Energy Sources: The strategic goals for energy independence by 2030 would thus call for a shift in the structure of energy sources. Firstly, fossil fuel imports need to be minimised and secure access to be ensured. Maximum hydro and nuclear power potential should be tapped. The most significant aspect, however, would be that the power generated through renewable energy technologies may target 20 to 25% against the present 5%. It would be evident that for true energy independence, a major shift in the structure of energy sources from fossil to renewable energy sources is mandated.

Solar farms

Solar energy in particular requires unique, massive applications in the agricultural sector, where farmers need electricity exclusively in the daytime. This could be the primary demand driver for solar energy. Our farmers demand for electric power today is significantly high to make solar energy economical in large scale.

Shortages of water, both for drinking and farming operations, can be met by large-scale seawater desalination and pumping inland using solar energy, supplemented by bio-fuels wherever necessary.

The current high capital costs of solar power stations can be reduced by gridlocked 100 MW sized Very Large Scale Solar Photovoltaic or Solar Thermal Power Stations. In the very near future, breakthroughs in nanotechnologies promise significant increase in solar cell efficiencies from current 15% values to over 50% levels. These would in turn reduce the cost of solar energy production. Our science laboratories should mount an Research & Development Programme for developing high efficiency CNT based Photo Voltaic Cells.

We thus need to embark on a major national programme in solar energy systems and technologies, for both large, centralised applications as well as small, decentralised requirements concurrently, for applications in both rural and urban areas.

Nuclear Energy

Nuclear power generation has been given a thrust by the use of uranium-based fuel. However, there would be a requirement for a 10-fold increase in nuclear power generation even to attain a reasonable degree of energy self-sufficiency for our country. Therefore, it is essential to pursue the development of nuclear power using thorium, reserves which are higher in the country. Technology development has to be accelerated for thorium-based reactors since the raw material for thorium is abundantly available in our country. Also, nuclear fusion research needs to be progressed with international cooperation to keep the option for meeting the large power requirement, at a time when fossil fuels get depleted.

Power through Municipal Waste

In the power generation sector of the energy economy, we need to fully use technologies now available for generating power from municipal waste. Today, two plants are operational in India, each plant generating 6.5 MW of electric power. Studies indicate that as much as 5800 MW of power can be generated by setting up 900 electric power plants spread over in different parts of the country, which can be fueled by municipal waste. Electric power generation and creation of clean environment are the twin advantages.

Power System Loss Reduction: Apart from generating power and running power stations efficiently without interruption, it is equally essential to transmit and distribute power with minimum loss. The loss of power in transmission and distribution in our country is currently in the region of 30 to 40% for a variety of reasons. Of about 1,000 billion units of electrical energy produced annually, only 600 billion units reach the consumer. This is the result of transmission loss and unaccounted loss. We need to take urgent action to bring down this loss to 15% from 30 to 40% by close monitoring of losses, improving efficiency and increasing the power factor through modern technology. By this one action alone, we will be able to avoid the need for additional investment of around Rs 70,000 crore for establishing additional generating capacity.

Transportation Sector

The Transportation sector is the fastest growing energy consumer. It now consumes nearly 112 million tonnes of oil annually, and is critically important for our nation's economy and security. The complete substitution of oil imports for the Transportation sectors is the biggest and toughest challenge for India.

Use of biofuels: We have nearly 60 million hectares of wasteland, of which 30 million hectares are available for energy plantations like 'Jatropha'. Once grown, the crop has a life of 50 years. Each acre will produce about 2 tonnes of bio-diesel at about  Rs 20 per litre. Biodiesel is carbon neutral and many valuable by-products flow from this agro-industry. Intensive research is needed to burn bio-fuel in internal combustion engines with high efficiency and this needs to be an urgent R&D programme. India has the potential to produce nearly 60 million tones of bio-fuel annually, thus making a significant and important contribution to the goal of energy independence.

The Indian Railways have already taken a significant step of running two passenger locomotives (Thanjavur to Nagore section) and six trains of diesel multiple units (Tiruchirapalli to Lalgudi, Dindigul and Karur sections) with a 5% blend of bio-fuel sourced from its in-house esterification plants. In addition, they have planted 75 lakh Jatropha saplings on railway land, which is expected to give yields from the current year onwards. This is a pioneering example for many other organisations to follow. Similarly, many states in our country have energy plantations. What is needed is a full economic chain from farming, harvesting, extraction to esterification, blending and marketing. Apart from employment generation, bio-fuel has a significant potential to lead our country towards energy independence.

The other critical options are development of electric vehicles; hydrogen based vehicles, electrification of railways and urban mass transportation.

Conclusion

By 2020, the nation should achieve comprehensive energy security through enhancement of our oil and gas exploration and production worldwide. By the year 2030, India should achieve energy independence through solar power and other forms of renewable energy; maximise the utilisation of hydro and nuclear power and enhance bio-fuel production through large-scale energy plantations like Jatropha.

We need to evolve a comprehensive renewable energy policy for energy independence within a year. This should address all issues relating to generation of energy through wind, solar, geothermal, biomass and ocean. The nation should also work towards establishment of thorium-based reactors. Research and technology development of thorium-based reactors is one of the immediate requirements for realising self-reliance in nuclear power generation and long-term energy security for the nation.

We should operationalize a 500 MW capacity power plant using integrated gasification and combined cycle route within the next three years from the existing pilot plant stage.  

Bio-fuel research should be extended in collaboration with R&D laboratories, academic institutions and automobile industry to make it a 'full fledged fuel' for fleet running in the country in a time bound manner. This should lead to a mission mode integrated programme encompassing various ministries and industries. Also, there is a need to formulate a comprehensive bio-fuel policy from research, development, and production to marketing.

Energy security leading to energy independence is certainly possible and is within the capability of the nation. India has knowledge and natural resources; what we need is planned integrated missions to achieve the target in a time bound manner. Let us all work for self-sufficient environment friendly energy independence for the nation.

Jai Hind.
May God bless you all.

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[acharya]

At Home in the World
JAYAPRAKASH NARAYAN



Posted online: Thursday, August 18, 2005 at 0000 hours IST

Over 20 million people of Indian origin are dispersed in 110 countries all over the world outside India. About half of them are first generation immigrants or their immediate families — mostly in North America, Europe, the Middle East, and South-East Asia, apart from our own regional neighbourhood.

In modern times many factors caused this wide dispersion — compulsion (indentured labour), hunger for knowledge and exposure, ambition and opportunities. India’s civilisational values, strong family bonds, nostalgia, and national identity exert a strong pull on all expatriates wherever they live. As is commonly said, you can take an Indian out of India, but you cannot take India out of an Indian.

Expatriate Indians are making vital contributions to India. Huge foreign exchange remittances, transfer of skills and technologies, establishment of market linkages, investments, and building a strong constituency for jettisoning economic orthodoxy are among their major contributions. This role is increasingly acknowledged and appreciated.

The Indian state too is responding with some sensitivity in dealing with the needs and aspirations of expatriates. The meteoric success of accomplished Indians is helping transform the image of India, and our recent economic successes in turn are shoring up the self-esteem of expatriates.

But expatriates are playing an even more vital role in transforming India. Overseas Indians have a disproportionate impact on our national life. Most of the million elite families in India dominating our politics, business, bureaucracy and professions have one or more close family members living abroad.

These strong bonds are shaping our attitudes, influencing policies and fueling aspirations. How can we channelise these energies constructively to build a liberal, democratic and humane society fulfilling our true potential and meeting the challenges of the future?

There are three broad areas awaiting the infusion of new ideas and modern attitudes. First, our politics has become big business, and rent seeking and abuse of power have become endemic. Money, muscle power, caste clout and pedigree have become the chief determinants of political recruitment, not true leadership qualities and contribution to public good.

Our democracy is robust and liberties are real. But our polity is in disrepair and needs mending. Greater representational legitimacy, democratic management of parties, better systems to make honesty compatible with sustenance in power, institutional checks and balances to prevent abuse of power, true empowerment and participation of people through local governments, accountability, and effective mechanisms to combat corruption are all critical to make our democracy work for the people.

We need to reclaim the republic stolen from our people. Expatriates who have seen how democracy can work for public good and prosperity, human dignity and empowerment, rule of law and institution building can play a creative role in reshaping our polity.

Second, India is confronted by growing challenges of modernization. Vast numbers complicate the crisis immeasurably. Even if we assume the will, commitment and resources, we lack the domain expertise in meeting these challenges. Education, healthcare, urban management, policing, delivery of justice, water, drainage and sewerage systems — all are in crying need of rejuvenation. Even a casual acquaintance with European public transport, British healthcare, American universities or the world’s great cities reveals how much we have to do to make up for lost time.

It is not merely a question of investment and infrastructure. We have to redesign them and make them replicable and sustainable by viable institutional and technical mechanisms. We need to adapt the best practices and innovate constantly. Who better than expatriates to make it happen, with their understanding of our special problems and intimacy with the best systems elsewhere, that work?

Finally, our society has unique advantages which promote harmony and happiness — strength of family, respect for elders, civilisational ethos, great sense of right and wrong, societal pressure moderating individual behaviour, contentment and natural propensity for restraint. But we also have some terrible deficiencies.

Moral neutrality to inequity by birth, wealth or position, mistrust and antagonism across groups and vertical hierarchies, and lack of a sense of common fate are our great failings.

These are cultural traits in an ancient society with enormous baggage. Egalitarian approach to life, fair reconciliation of conflicting interests, and fusion of private gain with public good must all be integrated with our societal life. Expatriate Indians have the advantages of distance which lends objectivity, and exposure which opens new vistas.

They need to be in the vanguard of a social movement to overcome some of our egregious propensities. Our national leaders during freedom struggle were inspired by the liberal values and rationalism of renaissance. But popular nationalism was largely shaped by resentment against British racial bigotry, cultural atavism and idolatrous sense of patriotism. Expatriates can help us rediscover true nationalism based on liberal values, human dignity, enlightened self-interest, fulfillment of our potential, mutual respect and harmony.

The writer is the coordinator of Lok Satta movement, and VOTEINDIA, a national campaign for political reforms Email: loksatta@satyam.net.in

[acharya]

Two steps forward for India

V.P. Singh

The passage of the Right to Information Act and the introduction of the national Rural Employment Guarantee Bill are welcome steps with far-reaching consequences.

THE UNITED Progressive Alliance Government has taken two major steps in a little over a year of being in office. One is the passage of the Right to Information Act and the other, the introduction of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Bill. These are most welcome steps with far-reaching consequences. I feel particularly pleased as these were two unfinished tasks of the Government of which I was Prime Minister. The Right to Information Act effectively empowers the people to monitor government spending at all levels. The Employment Guarantee Bill, which is expected to be passed early next week, opens the door of hope for poor people for employment.

Suggestions for changes in the original Bill were made by the Left parties and various people's organisations such as the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS) and the People's Action for Employment Guarantee. I also appeared before the Parliamentary Standing Committee and gave my suggestions in consonance with them. Many of these suggestions have been incorporated in the Bill that has been introduced in Parliament. These suggestions include extending the coverage of the Act to the whole of rural India within five years; disentangling the scheme from the bureaucratic web tied to the identification of below the poverty line (BPL) beneficiaries and, instead, making it universally applicable to all who want to work; ensuring that the scheme functions as a real guarantee and not a tentative one that can be withdrawn by the Government at will. In addition we had pressed for an effective social audit at the gram panchayat level to be included in the provisions of the Bill.

However, two issues still remain to be addressed. The first, is a provision in the Bill that if the Central Government thinks that there is corruption in the implementation of any "scheme," it can stop funding the scheme. This is highly unjust, because with such a step instead of the corrupt being punished the people, who themselves are the victims of corruption, are being punished.

This affects not only the EGA, but the Right to Information Act 2005 as well. For instance, one of the ways in which people are prevented from monitoring rural works is the threat used very effectively that if they do so their names will not be entered in the muster rolls, their payments and the work itself will be stopped. Even in major cases of misuse, proven by government enquiry, the Government and the district authorities themselves stop issuing sanctions for new works, thereby "punishing" people for exercising their right to protest against mismanagement and fraud. The net result would be that the people would stop complaining for fear of losing employment so necessary for their survival. This clause would embolden the already adept and corrupt mafia, providing them with an additional stick to beat the disempowered with. Instead, the hands of the complainants should be strengthened with prompt action against the guilty. And there should be rigorous punishment for those who resort to corrupt practices that deny the poor their due share. Provisions for social audit can only be made effective if the people are given an incentive to monitor and blow the whistle against malpractices. In any case, to shut down rural works because of corrupt officials is an argument that reveals a bias against the rural poor. If there is corruption in the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), will the Government talk about winding it up? Would that be fair to the investor?

The second issue is regarding minimum wages. The present Bill provides for a uniform minimum wage rate of Rs. 60 a day. In many States, the minimum wage is higher than Rs. 60 a day. This has taken away what is statutorily provided for in such States. What is worse is that this provision explicitly overrides the Minimum Wages Act. This will set a dangerous precedent. For instance many programmes are going to be merged with the EGA and will therefore deny the minimum wage which they have had to pay so far. The private sector contractors and landlords might also use this as an example to argue against the need to be bound by the Minimum Wages Act. It must be remembered that minimum wage has been one of the only protective legislation for the unorganised sector, in urban and rural areas. It has given them the legitimacy to fight for survival, with dignity.

Therefore, from our perspective, the wage paid should be either the minimum floor wage or the State minimum wage, whichever is higher. This is also what had been recommended by the all-party Standing Committee.

Finally, I hope that the Government will heed these suggestions while ensuring that the Employment Guarantee Bill is passed without further delay. The Manmohan Singh Government should be complimented for enacting these historic legislation, and also Sonia Gandhi whose keen interest and efforts facilitated the necessary changes needed to strengthen these legislation.

(The writer is former Primer Minister of India.)

[acharya]

India’s caravan rolls on
Tarun Vijay
Asian Age
August 19, 2005

The first thing I received on August 15 morning was an SMS from a friend greeting me on Independence Day.

Technology has changed the way we used to celebrate festivals, and though August 15 was always a great celebration, yet getting into the usual festive mode like Holi, Id and Christmas was something we had to wait for till the SMS culture arrived. It is a great feeling indeed. We may have a thousand complaints about the way our republic seems to be functioning, yet, a feeling of moving ahead is writ large on the face of Mother India. This is nothing less than a miracle.

A thousand million people are struggling to find a new, better and respectable place under the Indian sun, and wherever I go, from Kochi to Tawang, or from Chushul to Port Blair, a new rising shows up with a sparkling beauty. Never before in our history have people moved forward so much. Technology has brought about a change in our thinking, food habits, attire and behaviour. Job profiles have undergone a sea change and earning more is becoming a habit despite the fact we did not have a Deng Xiaoping to give the clarion call.

A boy in Mumbai, originally hailing from a remote village in Karnataka, sends an air ticket to his father to visit him: this was inconceivable till recently. That’s the revolution that Air Deccan and other budget airlines have brought about. Common people, usually taking a bus to reach their destination, now feel bold enough to buy an air ticket. A recent cartoon depicted the situation well by showing a squirming "stiff upper lip" elite passenger sitting next to a villager and saying, "If this goes on I may have to think of taking the train" ­ so common have become things which were part of the elite domain till yesterday.

The significant factor is the urge, the strong desire to climb up. I just came to know about an interesting telephone conversation. A mother of a 13-year-old lad from a village 200 km from Itanagar in Arunachal Pradesh, called an Uttaranchal IT institute run under the guidance of the famed IT scientist Ashok Jhunjhunwala, to have her son admitted there.

She is not exactly a literate lady, but her son, now in his first year secondary, wants to go to a better place to study and so she is making an STD call from a tiny tribal border village. Sons and daughters of Haryana farmers and Kerala babus and Rajasthan priests are standing in queue at the US embassy for study visas, and the person who never dreamt beyond a bicycle is now riding a high-speed smart motorbike at least. First, Maruti revolutionised our roadmap for ever, for a scooterist can now afford a car to move around with his family, then came the STD booths and cellular phones. It is now an unstoppable march into an exciting future for millions of people.

And this, despite the fact that we have bad governance, lethargic and insensitive administration and an archaic judicial system, remote villages, shortage of power and a thoroughly corrupt and disoriented political set-up which works more like the local Mafia than a group of visionaries in the nation’s interest. What is important is that India has achieved all this in spite of an undesirable crowd of political leaders. So this shows an extraordinary power of resilience and inner strength of the Indian people. No nation on earth has faced so many brutalities for centuries, subjugation, destruction, loot and a contemptuous series of invasions like we have. Yet, no other nation has been able to show the power to rise again and again whether we had a great leadership or not. This can very well be expressed through the Somnath spirit after the legendary resurrection of the old temple on the western shores. It was demolished umpteen times, yet rose again and again despite all the odds working against it.

It is true, even today the odds are not few and their character too has become more damaging in the long run. Our villages are yet to see real change touching their lives. Poverty and unemployment are ever increasing, widening the gulf between India and Bharat. Our sense of nationalism is also facing a grave threat, because of a strange secularism which thrives on self-negation, humiliating everything that belongs to the civilisation of this ancient land. Terrorism is nothing but a by-product of the weakening of the sense of nationalism, and a blurred vision when it comes to defending our people. We have yet to develop a sense of respect for the Indian citizen, and the rulers ­ whichever class or colour ­ still look at an ordinary Indian national with the eyes of a British sergeant, a colonial legacy inherited and so calmly cherished by our brown sahibs.

I met a villager from the Tarai region near Nainital recently and he gave me a very illuminating insight. He said, nothing is achieved depending on these netas, as every one of them is simply concerned with one’s own safety and welfare. "Sahibji," he continued, "you are an akhbarwalla (media man), all that you publish is news about everything bad happening in the country. If you read all the bad material every day, first thing in the morning, can you have any hopes for a better future? Come to the villages, the changes occurring there will open your eyes, but you people never report that. We are moving ahead, think about yourself."

He was right. People are always complaining; but wailing gets only tears in return. But those who decide on a path, and take the first step, can hope to reach their destination some day. India is on that path, despite all odds. We will rise high if we "want" to rise high. The great RSS thinker H.V. Sheshadri, who passed away on August 14, will always be remembered for his singular contribution in rekindling a hope for the glory of India. He used to say, "Come what may, India can never be cowed down by the fissiparous tendencies we are seeing today. We have dharma with us and none can stop victory reaching us."

As Sri Aurobindo said, India’s destiny is much greater a force than these political pygmies. The collective will of the people will overcome the challenges, looking insurmountable now, when the right moment arrives. The question is: how many of us are ready for that moment? Preparation means equipping ourselves with the values and the inner strength of this civilisation. Think: where are you standing in this great surge forward, amongst the complainants or with the caravan?

[Guest]

I have to agree with the above article completely. In ahmedabad I was greeted with "happy independence day" by atleast 5 people. Even small chai walla dukans displayed the tricolor which was available at every cross roads. 1 flag for 1 Rs. <!--emo&--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif' /><!--endemo--> Oh and we had "independence day sale" all over the place.. Lots of fun.. <!--emo&:rocker--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/rocker.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='rocker.gif' /><!--endemo--> <!--emo&:ind--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/india.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='india.gif' /><!--endemo-->

BTW just came back from Somnath.. <!--emo&:rock--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/rock.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='rock.gif' /><!--endemo--> <!--emo&:guitar--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/guitar.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='guitar.gif' /><!--endemo-->

[Guest]

moved

[acharya]

Do not criticise elected government, minorities told
http://www.hindu.com/2005/09/04/stories/...970700.htm


Special Correspondent

It will be preposterous to question the sincerity of the Government: NCM chief

JAIPUR: The Chairman of the National Commission for Minorities, Tarlochan Singh, on Saturday called upon the minority communities to discard the habit of criticising democratically elected governments with constant complaints of "perceived discrimination.'' He said the fear psychosis created among the minorities would harm them in the long run.

Mr. Singh was interacting with reporters during his visit to attend a function of the Sikh Sangat here. [/size]He said minorities had no right to denounce the elected governments as the latter had the people's mandate in their favour. "Holding the Government or the ruling party responsible for communalism in the society is improper,'' he said.[/size]

Mr. Singh — who is also a Rajya Sabha MP — pointed out that an elected government was answerable to the people at large irrespective of who voted for it and a Chief Minister was duty-bound to fulfil the aspirations of the entire population of the State. It would be preposterous to question the sincerity of the Government, he said.

The Minorities Commission chief said he had led a delegation of Muslims that met the Gujarat Chief Minister, Narendra Modi, in the aftermath of violence in 2002, when Muslims had announced boycott of the Bharatiya Janata Party-led Government. <b>The grievances of the community were settled in a "congenial atmosphere'' with his intervention.</b>

On the observations of the Prime Minister's high-level committee that visited Rajasthan recently to study the socio-economic and educational status of Muslims, Mr. Singh said he did not find any atmosphere of fear, distrust or terror among Muslims in the State.

[acharya]

Notion of `developing' India questioned

Special Correspondent

Status of basic healthcare and primary education continues to be poor, points out report

BANGALORE: The Citizens' Report on Governance and Development, released here on Wednesday by the Karnataka Social Watch Consultation, was all about monitoring development goals and "policy promises" by the Union and State governments.

The report questioned the notion of "rapidly developing" India because of various human development indicators reflecting the country was unable to guarantee basic developmental rights to a large section of its citizens.

Accountability

The status of basic healthcare, primary education and hunger continued to be poor; many disadvantaged communities did not have access to them, the report said.

The report commented on the role and accountability of the Government which were the key to reach development goals and policy promises.

Political controversies

Parliament had on occasion failed to make democracy work by wasting time on political controversies.

In 2003, the Lok Sabha lost over 60 hours to disruptions. However, there was some improvement since then.

The report also referred to "shrinking question hours" and absenteeism at meetings of parliamentary committees. Question hour proceedings did reveal there were considerable variations in spending on the social sector, among the States.

Assurances

Both Houses of Parliament had "pending assurances" in regard to several sectors.

The progress made and yet to be made in regard to livelihood prospects, food security, healthcare, primary education and implementation of the Common Minimum Programme were listed in the report. The prognosis was "cautious optimism."

Initiative

The participants at the meeting agreed that a Social Watch Initiative could be taken up in Karnataka as had been done in Kerala, Andhra Pradesh and some other Statesby collaborating with existing civil society organisations and by involving other organisations and individuals.

[acharya]

`India is poised to top the world'

Staff Reporter

A silent revolution is going on in the panchayats: B.S. Raghavan

COIMBATORE: Backed by ancient wisdom and the ability to survive as a democracy, India is likely to emerge as a vibrant nation in the years ahead, the writer and former Policy Advisor to the United Nations, B.S. Raghavan, said here recently.

"Wherever I go, I see enthusiasm. A silent revolution is going on in the panchayats and that will uplift us. Among businessmen there is a `We can do it!' attitude. India is heading for nothing but the best," he said.

Mr. Raghavan was the chief guest at the 23rd Continuing Orthopaedic Education Course-2005, jointly organised by the Orthopaedic Research and Education Foundation and Ganga Hospital.

"India is an ancient country with a 10,000-year history and traditions. It will have to absorb changes in a manner that is beneficial and in keeping with its own dignity and glory," he observed.

Being an "enduring democracy", the country could not do away with dissent and contrary views. It took time to convince people through debate, discussion and appeal to logic and the intellect.

"We have shown we can make our country great and that we are second to none," Mr. Raghavan noted.

However, the country was individually very good but collectively did not synergise in order to bring together skill and talent. Citizens were not involved in improving the quality of public life. They confined themselves to speaking ill of politicians instead of taking steps to cleanse politics. Party politics should be transformed to people's politics.

"We must accept nothing but the best, without making allowances for inefficiency and ineptitude. We seem to have an infinite tolerance of inefficiency, lapses and deviations," he said.
<span style='color:red'>
"India is You. What you are going to do or fail to do, what you have as your vision, all this is going to contribute to what India is going to become. A country is an abstraction. How can it become No. 1 if we do not become No. 1? Ask what you are going to do to make India what you want it to become," Mr. Raghavan added.
</span>
Revolutions used to occur at long intervals but at present, there were simultaneous revolutions taking place in the growth of knowledge, development of information technology, growth in communications, increase in technology and changes in social attitudes.

[Guest]

<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Does India represent Hindus? </b>

By Balbir K. Punj

After celebrity conversion of Yusuf Youhana it was the turn of three young and non-descript Hindu girls in Pakistan to ‘embrace’ Islam. Three Hindu girls viz. Reena (21), Usha (19) and Rima (17) went missing from their Punjab colony residence in Karachi, Pakistan on October 18 last. Their father Sanno Amra, a chauffer and mother Champa, a cook were understandably people of humble means. After searching frantically they went to police station where the SHO refused to register a case. But fortunately they had a patent hearing from DSP Raza Shah who got the FIR of abduction registered on the fourth day. The needle of suspicion pointed towards three young men, obviously Muslims, in that locality. But now the sole Hindu family in that neighbourhood began to receive threats.

Within a few days the family received a courier containing three identical affidavits apparently dictated by the same person. The girls, in those signed affidavits, said that they had accepted Islam voluntarily. The declaration concluded “That since my parents are Hindu and after conversion of my conversion of my religion, it is not possible for me to live and pass my life in Hindu system/society and therefore I have decided to live separately…”. The girls were finally located in a hostel of madrasa Taleem-ul-Quran and a court directive facilitated their parent to meet those girls. The parents were shocked to find that Afshan, Anam and Nida, as they were called post-conversion were clad in burqa from head to toe leaving only their eyes uncovered. The eye of the youngest daughter was blood red from weeping. The only thing the parents could learn from their daughters was that they should be left where they are.

Cases of abduction of Hindu girls and their forced conversion to Islam is nothing new in Pakistan and Bangladesh. In fact, fugitive Bangladeshi author Salam Azad lamented what kind of ‘Renaissance’ is possible in Islamic world where madrasas teach that if a Muslim converts a non-Muslim, marries a non-Muslim even kill or rape a non-Muslim he will go to paradise! Such poignant stories of abduction of women by Islamist touch a raw nerve of Hindus. Immediately, they conjure up images of medieval Islamic rule, where slave taking was an established practice. Islam has not changed the wee bit (it will even be a blasphemy to expect it should change) rather going on rampage on its medievalist drive.

Forget about Indian government doing something about the ‘Karachi episode’ it is unlikely the government can say something. What can Indian government do in Pakistan and Bangladesh when it failed to save its minority Hindus in Kashmir? Such Islamic abductions and conversion take place in India by thousands, in Muslim majority areas, that people commonly identify as ‘Mini-Pakistans’. But the Indian government is bound by its creed even to say something against such acts of persecution. It is because the government of India is secular and not Hindu! So while Hindus might think that India is their only country, the country for which they can lay down their lives, India ‘constitutionally’ doesn’t think it has any obligation towards Hindus. Thus Nehru could abandon ten million Hindus of East Pakistan by Nehru-Liaquat and Nehru-Noon Pacts of 1950.

This sad state of affairs is actually an offshoot of the creed of Indian National Congress from the beginning. Congress, by its creed was a secular platform, although most of its members were Hindus. From Sir Sayyid Ahmed Khan to Jinnah Muslims identified Congress a ‘Hindu Party’, although Congress was avid to welcome Muslims to its fold. Jinnah said Muslim League stood for Muslims, and Congress for Hindus, and India should be divided on Hindu-Muslim lines with attending exchange of population like the one took place between Christian Greece and Muslim Turkey in 1923.

But Congress persisted it represented everybody (which actually means no body). But did not save the Congress from being wiped out from those parts of India where Pakistan/East Pakistan came up. The biggest refugee from Pakistan in 1947 was not Hindus or Sikhs but the ‘concept’ called Congress. But Congress did not come out of confusion rather infused that confusion about whom it represents. That confusion has proved contiguous to other parties of India as well.

The feminist organisations of India, to whom secularism is an article of faith, and jumps bandwagon whether it is Bilkis Bano or Ishrat Jahan case are also silent. But they were silent in Imarana episode. Don’t they think that a lady being clad in burqa by customs whereby she looks like ‘a walking ghost’ is utterly discomfiture to the very concept of freedom they are trying to promote? This is certainly not modesty, but graveyard of humanity.

Post-conversion Yusuf Youhana had said that if all inhabitants of Pakistan accepted Islam then the country would become ‘land of the pure’ in the literal sense of the term. He also expressed the hope that Islam would become the dominant religion of the world. The affidavits of these girls, notwithstanding they might have been dictated by a Mufti, says contact with Hindu (read Kafir) parents in not tenable. These utterances should not be dismissed as merely coincidental. In fact, they are rooted in Islamic credo. Prophet Mohammed did not pray at his mother’s grave because she was not a Muslim. A Muslim will have to distance, dissociate, and disown his non-Islamic past. This is as true for a converted individual as for a converted civilization. In fact, this is the creed of Tablighi Jamat, started as an apolitical movement in India in 1926 by Maulana Mohammed Ilyas. Its mission is to gain new converts to Islam, and purify the non-Islamic vestiges by making them more and more devout. The other is Islam’s urge to ‘dominate’ the world, which is missed by whisker between 7th and 16th century. Maulanas still lament that world had ‘almost’ become Islamic were it not for a few vital reverses the army of Islam faced at most critical hours.

(The writer, a Rajya Sabha MP and Convenor of BJP’s Think Tank can be contacted at bpunj@email.com)
<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->

[Guest]

<!--emo&:angry:--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/mad.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='mad.gif' /><!--endemo-->

Nagpur Attack
Police foil terror bid on RSS HQ

Agencies & PTI
Posted online: Thursday, June 01, 2006 at 0920 hours IST
Updated: Thursday, June 01, 2006 at 1337 hours IST

New Delhi, June 1: A major attempt to attack the RSS headquarters was foiled when three heavily-armed militants were shot dead in an encounter with the police while trying to enter the heavily-guarded sprawling premises in the wee hours on Thursday.

RSS chief K S Sudharshan was not present at the headquarters, when the militants dressed as in police uniform and travelling in a white Ambassador car with a red beacon light tried to pass through the barricade but were challenged by policemen deployed there.

Intelligence sources had a tip off about the terror plan and had informed the Maharashtra police. Ram Madhav, former RSS spokesperson said that both the police and the RSS had prior information about the terrorists plan to carry out attack on the headquarters this week. Madhav said main concern now was the security of RSS offices all across the country and they were taking steps in this regard.

The militants are believed to have come to Nagpur from Patna. Police suspects the militants belong to Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Toiba. Three AK-56 rifles, huge quantity of RDX and 12 hand grenades were recovered from the slain militants after the encounter that took place around 4 am about 100 metres away from the headquarters. The arms and ammunitions were being transported in computer boxes.

The militants were in the age group of 20-22 years.

Giving details of the encounter, City Police Commissioner S P S Yadav said at the site that a police team gave chase to their vehicle after they broke the first barrier about 200 metres from the headquarters.

When challenged by the police, they opened fire from their AK-56 rifles, he said, adding the trio was killed in retaliatory firing.

Yadav said two police officers were injured in the encounter, which lasted for about five minutes. The condition of one of the injured was stated to be serious.

The identities of the three are yet to be established, police said.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh condemned the terrorist attack at the RSS headquarters and appealed for calm and communal peace.

"The entire nation is united against terrorism. All communities should live in amity and peace," said Singh.

[Guest]

<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Nation that kills talent </b>
Pioneer.com
KPS Gill
Education, Bertrand Russell remarked, is the key to the new world. In our political discourse, clichés regarding our children being the future of the nation, youth power, and India's burgeoning 'youth bulge' abound; but the profile of this great potential engine of growth and, more significantly, of civilisational development, is, with small exceptions, distressing. The circumstances within which our children and our youth are being brought up and educated reflect the most deplorable waste, indeed, destruction, of talent, of aspirations and of natural potential.

Over the past months, India's youth have been projected in stark relief through the media in circumstances that have been personally tragic for the protagonists, as in the current controversy over drug use among the affluent and powerful, or fruitlessly polarised, as in the unnecessarily provoked anti and pro-reservation demonstrations. These are certainly not the images that India, as a nation, would be tempted to project and publicise, and these are far from the worst aspects of the country's profile of youth.

The image that pleases us most at present is a tiny pool of dynamic youngsters coming out of a handful of premier educational institutions in the country, burning a trail of success in the IT, technical and business sectors, fuelling national 'great power' ambitions and creating small islands of great productivity and wealth in booming urban economies. This young population has certainly given the country much power and pride. But even this segment, overwhelmingly, is a class without significant social consciousness or commitment, seeking personal goals and personal advantage wherever (and often by whatever means) these can be found. This, nevertheless, is the tiny but dynamic fragment of India's vast population of youth.

Beyond them lies darkness.

<b>Within what passes for the young 'elite', we find a significant population of the idle rich, conscienceless parasites who fuel the economy of corruption, crime and prurience in their frenetic search for titillation and endless, illusory, diversion. Then we have a generation of privileged inheritors, who lay claim to their parental legacies - financial and political - with little preparation or aptitude, but with great arrogance and sense of entitlement. Not all inheritors are, of course, sybaritic wastrels, and there is a small cohort among the privileged classes who have built enormously on their inherited legacies - but these remain the exceptions. Even among them, however, there is little vision. Their education has been practical or ornamental; seldom social or moral. </b>

There are, of course, the middle classes and the fortunate few among the poor who are able, through a quirk of circumstances, to break through near-insurmountable barriers to acquire an education that allows them to become productive members of the community.<b> In the main, however, their vision is exhausted by the imperatives of building the narrow material base of comfortable living that is the natural ambition of any among the first-generation that secures access to a modicum of affluence</b>.

This is the minuscule human resource base - no more than a few hundreds of thousands among the many millions of children and youth in India - that currently has access to a meaningful education, one that prepares them for productive employment in the modern economy. As for the rest, there is the despair and hopelessness of most village or Government schools, the permanent lack of skills, and a lifetime of uncertainty and apprehension on the forgotten margins of the economy.<span style='color:red'> Many among them are joining the thuggeries of the extreme Left, the lumpen support-base of other political parties or movements, or the widening sphere of crime and disorder in the country. For the rest, there is only the consolation of fatalism or the dead-end of hopelessness</span>.

From time to time, these millions are cheated with a false offer of special access to the better institutions in the country through reservations. But few of them have the capacities to cope, even if such access is provided at the expense of others, who are then left out. This may answer to some notion of 'social justice', but reflects a certain and personal injustice to those who are denied opportunities. In the interim, there is a precipitous decline in the entire educational infrastructure at all levels that has little to do with the controversy over reservations, but reflects "a much bigger crisis" in which India's premier institutions increasingly fail to secure candidates who meet their minimal standards for admission.

This much bigger crisis must secure the most urgent and massive attention if India is not only to maintain its current trends of growth, but indeed, even to survive. <span style='font-size:14pt;line-height:100%'>Absent a tremendous expansion of the educational infrastructure at all levels, and its most fundamental transformation in terms of the quality and content of instruction imparted and of facilities, tools and opportunities available, the entire network of national enterprises will be systematically eroded, and will eventually collapse. </span> <b>The future of a modern nation is defined by her schools, her universities, her technical institutions, her capacities to produce human resources with contemporary skill and abilities, and to create a visionary leadership that can mould the coming age. But this idea and these objectives have been lost in the cacophony of needless political debate rooted in ignorance</b>.

The truth is, the ideal of an educated democracy, so powerfully articulated by Jawaharlal Nehru in the early years of Independence, appears to have been comprehensively abandoned. The many and great educational centres he created, and on which India's present reputation as an intellectual powerhouse is based, are in decline, and in some cases, terminal. Few have been added to those that were created under his guiding hand, and it is increasingly the case that a decent education is available only to those who are able to pay a most exorbitant price.

The teaching profession, at one time perhaps the most honoured, is becoming the refuge of - at best - the lazy, the easygoing and the unmotivated; and - at worst - of unemployable incompetents, failures and scoundrels. It is useful to recall that, in the greatest civilisations of history - including India's own at its cultural zenith - teachers were honoured above all others, and even emperors bowed to their moral authority. It was this honour, this position of unmatched privilege that attracted the best minds into the profession, and that created the intellectual profile and vision that could shape and fulfil the potential of the successor generation.

Where the teacher is not honoured; where the school and the university become shops; where pedagogy becomes a ritual that is forgetful of its own purpose; and where the educational sector is thought of as secondary or subordinate, cultures, civilisations and nations perish.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->

[Guest]

<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Sir C V Raman's message TO INDIANS</b>

‘I would like to tell the young men and women before me not to lose hope and courage. Success can only come to you by courageous devotion to the task lying in front of you. I can assert without fear of contradiction that the quality of the Indian mind is equal to the quality of any Teutonic, Nordic or Anglo-Saxon mind. What we lack is perhaps courage, what we lack is perhaps driving force, which takes one anywhere. We have, I think, developed an inferiority complex. I think what is needed in India today is the destruction of that defeatist spirit. We need a spirit of victory, a spirit that will carry us to our rightful place under the sun, a spirit, which will recognize that we, as inheritors of a proud civilization, are entitled to a rightful place on this planet. If that indomitable spirit were to arise, nothing can hold us from achieving our rightful destiny.’<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->

[Guest]

<!--emo&--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/sad.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad.gif' /><!--endemo--> UP govt a complete failure: RLD
[ 11 Aug, 2006 1141hrs ISTPTI ]


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LUCKNOW: While Samajwadi Party President and Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav was busy distributing unemployment allowance cheques to unemployed youths across Uttar Pradesh, voices of dissent started emanating from his two alliance partners Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) and Loktantrik Congress Party (LCP).

The war of words between SP and RLD has come out in the open with the latter alleging the state government "was a total failure" and the former questioning RLD's continuance in the ministry if it was not satisfied with the performance of the government.

Yadav also rejected the RLD's demand for creation of a separate Harit Pradesh, carving districts of western region of the state.

Harit Pradesh had been on top of the agenda of RLD and was its plank in the last assembly polls and the party had again been trying to rake up the issue, apparently with an eye on the next assembly polls due early next year.

"You (media) should ask RLD chief Ajit Singh why his party is in the ministry if he is opposed to us", SP General Secretary Amar Singh had recently said. Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav had also out rightly rejected any further division of the state to create Harit Pradesh.

"<span style='color:blue'><span style='font-size:21pt;line-height:100%'>We do not want any division of the state. The results of division in the past have not been good...Smaller states are weak", Yadav had recently said citing the examples of Chhattisgarh where he said the naxalites had been killing innocent people. </span></span>

[Guest]

<b>Survey to be conducted to ascertain various languages</b>
New Delhi, March 14. (PTI): The Government proposes to conduct a survey to ascertain the languages of various parts of the country, Minister of State for Human Resource Development D. Purandeshwari informed the Lok Sabha on Tuesday.

The proposed survey, report of which will be available after 10 years of its commissioning, aims at providing a <b>systematic and comprehensive account of the status of Indian Language diversity, multilingualism, interlingual relationships and dynamics of a language</b>, she said in a written reply.

As per 1991 Census, she said there are 114 languages in the country, 216 mother tongues, each of which is spoken by 10,000 or more people, are listed under these languages.

The 216 mother tongues together are spoken by nearly 99 per cent of the population and belong to four language families names, <b>Indo-Aryan, Dravidian, Austro Asiatic and Tibeto-Burman, </b>Purandeshwari said.

To another question whether the Government proposes to set up "finishing schools", she said in order to impart communication and IT skills to engineering graduates as well as brush-up their knowledge of core subjects in order to make them employable, it has been decided to start finishing schools, initially in seven National Institute of Technology (NITs).

Each Institute would conduct finishing school courses for a period of eight to 10 weeks for engineering graduates who are unemployed, she said.

Purandeshwari also informed the House that a <b>one-man Review Committee headed by D Bandhopadhaya has submitted its report on the functioning of the ICHR and has also looked into the issue of missing file on "Towards Freedom" project. volumes related to the project. </b>

The Committee, she said also found that unless important files were retrieved, much of the material relating to the non-publication/stoppage (of) "Towards Freedom" project would never be unearthed.

The Committee made many recommendations regarding this project including that the project be revived immediately and recommended that it should be completed within the next 24 months, She said.

It has also made wide ranging recommendations regarding the reconstitution of the Editorial Board and suggested ways and means of ensuring prompt action for printing and publication of the volumes related to the project.

The Government have accepted the recommendations of the one-man review committee and have asked the ICHR to implement the said recommendations, she said.

http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/holnus/...00703140312.htm