10-04-2011, 06:37 AM
(This post was last modified: 10-04-2011, 06:39 AM by dhu.)
Posting the full NVS article below, but i am just wondering if the western string-pullers of the UPA would dare to escalate beyond the political as they did after their catholic puppets in Vietnam used up their grace period...
Quote:Dead-end Congress?
The time for non-dynastic political parties has finally arrived, says N.V.Subramanian.
If you consider the troubles of the Congress and BJP at a remove, you could forecast that one of them will survive its present crisis but the other may not unless it transforms itself. Yes, the BJP will overcome its current struggles and emerge stronger. But the Congress party will etiolate and die if it does not shed its dynastic organization and structure.
For any organization but specially a political party to come to power repeatedly, its leadership must be strong, effective and visionary. The Congress party had a dynamic and visionary leader in Jawaharlal Nehru and a powerful ruling deity in Indira Gandhi, who was not accidentally called Durga after her Bangladesh War victory.
Rajiv Gandhi was their less-than-able inheritor. The Congress was rescued from total decline by P.V.Narasimha Rao who, of course, to avenge the slights inflicted on him by the party's North Indian leadership effectively decimated the organization in the North, particularly in UP and Bihar. The Congress has not recovered from that body blow.
Two BJP-NDA terms under A.B.Vajpayee's able prime-ministership delayed the decline of the dynastic Congress, which unexpectedly came to power in 2004 (Pranab Mukherjee was most surprised by this) and still more incredibly in 2009. Because Sonia Gandhi was unsure of Rahul Gandhi, who was anyway too young to be PM, she found a loyal and honest proxy in Manmohan Singh.
Manmohan Singh has proved a disastrous PM. Unless a PM is powerful -- or as powerful as parliamentary democracy permits -- the office is devalued and the government collapses. In the matter of governance, you cannot have division of authority. Much is already known on the subject to write more.
A proxy PM was needed because Rahul Gandhi was not ready. He is not ready yet and may never be. He would be an even more disastrous prime minister than Manmohan Singh and he knows it. In short, the Congress does not have a worthy dynastic PM to lead it to power again and keep it growing strong for a generation.
Success, it is said, has many fathers but failure is an orphan. The previous successes of the Congress launched other political dynasties. The DMK, NCP, Badal Akali Dal, Shiv Sena, National Conference, RJD, SP and so on are all dynastic parties. But at least some of these dynastic parties came out of the Congress or stood in opposition to it. In Andhra Pradesh, the Congress is being choked by one of its own, the late Y.S.Rajasekhara Reddy's son, Jagan.
That, however, is not the entire story. A combination of factors has begun blighting dynastic parties nationwide. The SP, RJD, Shiv Sena, DMK, etc, have either been routed in elections or face deeply troubled futures. They are also ensnared in corruption cases. And one of the worst examples of dynastic governance is provided by Omar Abdullah in Jammu and Kashmir whose staunchest critics are to be found in his own party.
If you notice, the fate of the regional dynastic parties is slowly but surely coming to be shared by that supreme dynastic party at the Centre. The Congress-led UPA 2 government is the most corrupt since 1947. And in the anti-corruption wave courtesy Anna Hazare sweeping the country, the corrupt leadership of the Congress/ UPA 2 won't be spared.
What may have saved the dynastic Congress is if it had a dynamic and visionary scion to lead it to new glory. It does not have that. That phase truly ended with Indira Gandhi. A proxy PM brings an advantage of making corrupt monies in the background. But Anna Hazare and an awakened nation shan't tolerate that anymore.
So where is the scope of the Congress continuing as before?
The natural logic of things ensures that it will have to die unless it reinvents itself as a wholesome non-dynastic party in which a Lok Sabha-elected PM governs independent of the Gandhis.
Is that possible?
No. But without that, the Congress is finished.
Which is why, for all its niggling ailments, the BJP is not a hopeless case. A national non-dynastic party is still a work in progress, and the BJP should be viewed as such. It will have leadership squabbles and umpteen PM candidates. But it will sort out.
True, the overwhelming RSS control of the BJP muddies the waters. But believe it or not, that is also changing. For L.K.Advani's yatra to be inaugurated by Nitish Kumar is a major development with wide consequences. Unless the Congress matches this by telling the Gandhis to ease off, it will run aground sooner than later.
N.V.Subramanian is Editor, www.NewsInsight.net, and writes internationally on strategic affairs. He has authored two novels, University of Love (Writers Workshop, Calcutta) and Courtesan of Storms (Har-Anand, Delhi).
[size="4"][url="http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics/nation/congress-to-project-rahul-gandhi-as-future-leader-pranab-mukherjee/articleshow/10234436.cms"]Congress to project Rahul Gandhi as future leader: Pranab Mukherjee[/url][/size]
This was widely anticipated that with 2G scam taking its toll on the main seat warmers, the INC would push for Rahul baba.
1. I bet there will be a court verdict on his true citizenship by then.
2. In any case there must be a vacancy for him to fill. Such will not be the case either before or after the election whenever it would take place.
3. The UP election will prove his albatross and it will be the end of his story (or history!)
[size="3"][url="http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/opinion/edit-page/Shooting-the-messenger/articleshow/10209894.cms"]Shooting the messenger[/url]
[/size][indent][size="3"][quote name="Editorial, The Times of India" date="Oct 3, 2011"]Congress general secretary Digvijay Singh has filed FIRs against 10 websites, including social networking hubs Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. There's no denying that a lot of hate mail is out there. If the originators of hate mail can be identified Singh would be perfectly within his rights to move cases of defamation, perhaps even incitement, against them. But it's misunderstanding the nature of new media to hold them culpable for messages that may be carried by them. That's akin to suing the telecom company if two people should have a hateful conversation - or even plan a criminal operation - over the telephone. Just as the telephone company cannot possibly disconnect all such conversations, websites don't have the means to filter out discordant messages among the millions of conversations that they carry daily.
Also, a degree of robustness is called for in politics. Lampooning, after all, is a fine art of Indian politics. And Singh himself is known to breathe fire against his rivals. A sensible response to what's deemed unworthy behaviour is ignoring it - not unleashing a barrage of FIRs against host websites. Otherwise, what's next? Agitations against apps? Fasts against Facebook? Demands to lodge Mark Zuckerberg in Tihar? It's time our politicians smelt a very real change. Today, they're facing a public that's equipped via multimedia to talk back to them - and that will include virtual brickbats as well as bouquets. Public life demands that leaders handle all forms of criticism with equanimity and insight. They would be well advised, in fact, to utilise the new media and turn the internet and social networking sites in their favour - as Barack Obama did to brilliant effect while contesting the 2008 presidential election in the US. [/quote]
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10-09-2011, 12:53 PM
(This post was last modified: 10-09-2011, 12:53 PM by sumishi.)
[size="3"][url="http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Govt-bid-to-gag-TV-outrages-broadcasters-libertarians/articleshow/10283957.cms"]Govt bid to gag TV outrages broadcasters, libertarians[/url] : TOI, Oct 9, 2011
[/size][indent] [size="3"]Quote:NEW DELHI: The government's decision to recast policy guidelines for TV channels, which in effect has held out the threat of canceling the licence of news channels if they are guilty of five "violations", has created an outrage among broadcasters and civil rights activists who have described it as a knee jerk reaction and demanded an immediate withdrawal of the order.
Broadcasters feel that blocking a news channel can't depend on executive decisions which are often prone to whims and fancies of the powers that be. Instead, if a channel is at all to be blocked, there must be due process of law that must be upheld by the courts. Otherwise, the Constitutional guarantee of freedom of the press would be in jeopardy.
Broadcast Editors' Association president Shazi Zaman said, "The new norms of renewal of news channel license are shocking. The government has subverted self regulation by putting the five-violation clause for renewal. This clause has a dangerous potential for arbitrary use. This move is a direct attack by government on freedom of speech and should be reversed immediately."
The decision, cleared by the Cabinet on Friday, says that renewal of a channel's license will be subject to it having five or less violations. These `violations' of the program and advertisement code are part of the uplinking and downlinking guidelines and have to be adhered to by all channels.
However, it's a government committee that is empowered to determine whether a channel has violated these conditions which cover a vast range - from programming that is deemed vulgar, obscene, anti-national or hurtful of any community. Several of these are open to subjective interpretation. Therefore, the decision must be subject to the court's scrutiny and sanction, say broadcasters.
NDTV's senior managing editor Sonia Varma said she was studying the guidelines more closely but her initial reaction to the government move was "unflattering". "We don't believe that the government should dictate guidelines to broadcasters. We have an independent regulatory mechanism under Justice J S Verma and would prefer that this is done through an independent mechanism."
Centre for Advocacy and Research (CFAR) head and media watcher Akhila Sivadas said that it was a disturbing sign that the government chose to behave like a "Big Brother", swinging from knee-jerk responses to a hands-off approach. "There is need for a transparent consultation process rather than this inconsistent and incoherent policy by the government," she said stressing the need for "participatory regulation".
She added that the media industry was responsible for creating awareness about viewer rights. Supreme Court lawyer and Team Anna member Prashant Bhushan who has advocated strong media council at various occasions said "it was absolutely wrong" for government to make rules that entail shutting down of a channel at the behest of a government committee.
"There needs to be external regulation rather than government control. There is a need for a strong media regulatory body that is independent of the government and the industry," he said.
Media watcher Sevanti Ninan said that the five-violation guideline appeared arbitrary and was not a substitute for a properly constituted regulatory mechanism. She said, "Today it is arbitrary, the ministry simply shuts down a channel for a while. Guidelines are not a substitute for a properly constituted regulatory mechanism with detailed guidelines for deciding what is a violation. If the definition of violations is left to somebody's discretion, it endangers free speech."
Ninan added, "I think the government should look at the growing problem of political ownership of media [color="#9932cc"]{ A pious but oxymoronic statement! }[/color]. As the Chief Election Commission said recently, at election time this gives some contestants an unfair advantage."
Times Global Broadcasting Ltd MD and CEO Sunil Lulla said that the new rules were "shocking". "We already have a regulatory mechanism in place with guidelines that have been put in place in consultation with the I&B ministry," he said, adding that the new norms were never discussed.
The BEA said that across all democratic nations, governments have no role in issues pertaining to content. In a statement the broadcasters' body said, "With the new norms, government is trying to control an otherwise independent electronic media by sending a subtle message that their permission to uplink can be withdrawn should they not 'behave'."
"Can content be left to the wisdom of the bureaucrats in a democracy," the BEA asked. The association said that the result of the new norms would be that an officer of the government can question an individual channel on content for four times on one pretext or the other, and finally, threaten that channel of non-renewal, should it not fall in line. It said the move was an attempt to undermine the steps taken towards self-regulation.
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Congress is going ahead with its soft "Emergency" rule. Drip, drip they are snatching power from the people. Its outrageous. Mussolini is back from Italy. I hope Indian will give same treatment what Italian gave to Mussolini.
[size="3"][url="http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/opinion/edit-page/Take-it-easy/articleshow/10306738.cms"]Take it easy[/url] : TOI, Oct 11, 2011
[/size][indent][size="3"][quote name="The EDITOR, TOI"] In a bow to babudom and 1970s style censorship, the Union cabinet cleared on Friday a proposal empowering the information and broadcasting ministry not to renew licences of TV channels, if the ministry should deem programmes aired on them to be vulgar, obscene, anti-national et al. The pertinent question is: Can a modern 21st century government hand over a job as sensitive as media monitoring to the bureaucracy, which has its own vested interests to protect, besides having zero expertise in the subject?[/size]
[size="3"]The proposal is even more inexplicable given that there is already a functioning self-regulatory News Broadcasters Association, with its own redressal mechanism to check code of ethics and broadcasting standards violations. Rather than engage with this association and smoothen out tensions, the government now wants ministry bureaucrats to filter programmes. Such arbitrary censorship would be based on the censor's subjective interpretation of what he deems obscene or anti-national.[/size]
[size="3"]What is more disturbing is that the latest move comes at a time when the government generally seems to be going back on some of the UPA`s crowning achievements, which have transformed governance rules. The government now wants to tighten the RTI - which has promoted government transparency. The UPA government - at least on paper - is committed to promoting greater transparency of governance. But by trying to control the media, it is going back on one of its basic mandates. True, successive governments in the past had toyed with media censorship. But each time the proposals had met with resistance. The Broadcasting Services Regulation Bill, 2006, was widely opposed for its draconian 'inspector-raj' provisions, giving sweeping powers to the government and its representatives to control the media. In a democracy, the need for media regulation cannot be used as a fig leaf to promote state control.[/size]
[size="3"]As far as the bogey of obscene media content is concerned - let's not forget that consumers are the best judges of what is appropriate for viewing. India may be in the throes of change, yet it's essentially a conservative society. Smutty programmes do not have broad acceptance among viewers. Nor do advertisers want to lend their brand names to such programmes, as that would alienate their core constituencies. Above everything else, such censorship attempts are meaningless in the present digital age, where Net users have unbridled access to information and images. In this situation, self-regulation by professionals outside of the political and bureaucratic establishments can be the most effective media filter.[/quote][/size]
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10-11-2011, 10:06 PM
(This post was last modified: 10-11-2011, 10:12 PM by Husky.)
Was there a Kasab thread anywhere? Because, just like Mohammed Afzal, Kasab also gets off the hook:
newsblaze.com/story/20111010064319adi1.nb/topstory.html
October 10, 2011
[color="#FF0000"] Indian Court Stays Execution of Pak Terrorist Ajmal Kasab[/color]
Answers the old question at the Rajeev2004 blog ( x-posted):
Quote:rajeev2004.blogspot.com/2011/09/indian-govt-wasnt-serious-on-headley.html
Quote:Saturday, September 03, 2011
Indian Govt Wasn't Serious on Headley Extradition
Now that the entire WikiLeaks repository has been exposed to the public, further perusals of US diplomatic cables have exposed that the Indian govt wasn't really serious about extraditing 26/11 accused David Headley. M K Narayanan is quoted as saying to US officials that his govt merely needed to keep up a false front for the public's consumption, and that Headley's extradition was not being sought.
[color="#0000FF"]Will Kasab ever hang? Or Afzal Guru?[/color]
[color="#800080"](*Who* is expected to hang Kasab or Mohammed Afzal? The christogovt? Not likely. They need the islamic vote and jihadism to undermine the Hindus - the way the christobrits used it to keep the Hindus' search for autonomy in check. How else - without the leverage of Indian islam - can the minority christians hope to rule India - and christian rule is a prerequisite for India-for-christ.
Consider the clear message the christogovt is sending to islam and jihad in India and the entire subcontinent: "Jihad away. We'll make sure you get away with it scottfree. Remember who to vote for and who to aim your jihad at.")[/color]
Posted by san at 9/03/2011 09:48:00 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: mumbai, terrorism, usa, wikileaks
Reactions
Compare the treatment of Mohammed Afzal ("chicken biryani in prison" was it?) with what the christogovt has done to:
- Dara Singh ( admitted by the courts as innocent in the murders of christo Grahame Staines and his kids - Dara wasn't even there when it happened),
- Swami Aseemananda and other innocent Hindus framed by christoterrorism under the carefully-concocted "Hindu Terror" christolie.
Who thinks the Indian christogovt is waiting for the occasion of a hijack of Indians by islamaniacs, so that it can give Mohammed Afzal and Kasab back to TSP/the jihad - as a sort of "trade" in the "hostage negotiations"? After all, christogovt needs its dear best islamaniac friends alive: they did both terrorise India so timely for christoism. And it all worked out well for the christocongress thanks to them. Others here had remarked that christogovt in India organises a lot of such timely and convenient islamic terrorist attacks against the nation. So it's rather possible that the christogovt is protecting its own collaborators here. "You kill the Hindoos, and we will prevent you from getting executed. Plus you get chicken biryani." (That's probably more than was available in TSP.)
[url="http://janamejayan.wordpress.com/2011/10/12/bjp-defends-swamy-says-cong-%e2%80%98vindictive%e2%80%99/"][color="#FF0000"][size="4"]BJP defends Swamy, says Cong ââ¬Ëvindictiveââ¬â¢[/size][/color][/url]
Looks like Amar Singh got bail to go to Singapore for his medical checkup. The bail amount was Rs 5 lakhs.
11-26-2011, 11:03 PM
(This post was last modified: 11-26-2011, 11:03 PM by dhu.)
[size="3"]Kangressis/NCP are targeting Sikhs after Halwinder slapped the corrupt Sharad Pawar.
Quote:At the same time, the Jathedar also censured NCP activists for targeting Sikhs. ''Efforts should be made to maintain peace and communal harmony and not give a communal twist to the incident,'' he said.
Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee president Avtar Singh Makkar appealed to Maharashtra government to take strict action against persons who were targeting Sikhs. Condemning Harvinder for slapping Pawar, he said Sikhs believed in peaceful coexistence. He urged the Maharashtra government to take appropriate steps to ensure the safe return of Sikhs who had gone to Maharashtra for Gurpurab. [url="http://m.timesofindia.com/PDATOI/articleshow/10877782.cms"]link[/url]
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This is sad, Pawar is taking out on Sikhs, but when terrorist attack India, he call for harmony with Muslims, Why double standard?
12-03-2011, 01:54 PM
(This post was last modified: 12-03-2011, 01:55 PM by sumishi.)
In [url="http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/opinion/edit-page/Stand-and-fight/articleshow/10946033.cms"]Stand and fight[/url], a pro-FDI editorial piece in the TOI on 2nd Dec 2011, is this gem of a statement:
[indent]"... Let's not forget that the government is well within its rights to take executive decisions and need not seek the consent of Parliament on every single contentious policy ..." [/indent]
Latest report by the kangressi government in the wake of Sibal's anti-internet rants:
[url="http://m.rediff.com/news/report/terrorists-using-online-social-networks-says-government/20111214.htm"]Terrorists using online social networks, says government[/url]
news.in.msn.com/exclusives/it/article.aspx?cp-documentid=250375566
Original source is credited as www.indiatoday.in
Quote:Not enough Muslim policemen in country: Govt
The Union Home Hinistry, in order to build confidence, wants to post senior Muslim personnel in minority population areas.
Rest at link.
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