Narendra Modi vs the Dynasty: Contrasting Ideas of India

IndraD · Post by **IndraD** » 21 Jan 2014 17:43

somnath bharti was found emerging from ladies' toilet today while gent's toilet was empty

pankajs · Post by **pankajs** » 21 Jan 2014 17:47

He was on inspection saar on inspection .. who knows what is happening inside those toilets .. sex trade or drugs??

member_28352 · Post by **member_28352** » 21 Jan 2014 18:07

Somnath Bharti has no future in India. He is getting on the job training for US cavity search inspector's post. New T3 category visa is for him only.

member_28173 · Post by **member_28173** » 21 Jan 2014 18:24

Guys :

The thing that is worrying me is not all superficial but something very nasty - the last para : ASHAMED to be Jain ... - Jain can think so low.

(D) PREVENTION AND CONTROL of COMMUNAL RIOTS

There is where the author uses "secular" word....

So Now Jain can complain against Hindus ... WOW... Rest of scenorios you can guess and the backslash BANIAs as community gets is you know.....

Help me stop this nonsense. TO BE HONEST Jains and HINDUS have no issues normally but how about creating fabricated case for political gains and tamasha. HINDUS have due respect for our religion and visa versa. but 1 case and we loose years of respect

vishvak · Post by **vishvak** » 21 Jan 2014 18:34

Jains have by default religious practices like nonviolence, cow protection etc. I don't see how all this can be an issue except some manufactured one. I can't find a post from me in Nukkad forum perhaps about how state has extended facilities for minorities in Keral as a friend said. Jains should see how it helps brihad samaaj as well. Sorry can't find my post.

member_28173 · Post by **member_28173** » 21 Jan 2014 18:43

GUYS ( Especially Rahul Mehta )

I am researching whole day and to my dismay there were some petetions from Jain. Yes I also read Quite a few Jains have opposed the same and THATS why so long it was not granted.

I am against it. I rememeber before 2009 election ; there was sort of referendum in Jain samaj to accept or reject MINORITY status. It was mostly Against it.

but was then --- before communnal violence bill. NOW it is matter of real shame to be minority.

HELP ME WRITE ANSWER WHY JAINS should not be minority. Plz

MY point ---> Minority or Majority should also account CONTRIBUTIONS to the society. Jains pay 17% Income tax even when they are 0.4% of India - Near 50 Lakhs. COmmunity that contributes should be may be Positively rewarded but not
degraded

http://creative.sulekha.com/century-old ... 26243_blog this gives the story of confusion but there is PRO MINORITY BIAS but yes all whom I know oppose. but it is again before communal violence bill.

prahaar · Post by **prahaar** » 21 Jan 2014 18:46

vishvak wrote:Jains have by default religious practices like nonviolence, cow protection etc. I don't see how all this can be an issue except some manufactured one. I can't find a post from me in Nukkad forum perhaps about how state has extended facilities for minorities in Keral as a friend said. Jains should see how it helps brihad samaaj as well. Sorry can't find my post.

This decision can have potentially disastrous implications in Gujarat. I hope sanity prevails and Jains are not taken on the "we are minority victims" path. I thought, this business of minorities is to secure any peculiar religion specific things. Gujarat has had a pretty robust relation between Hindus/Jains, to the extent, that many of my Jain friends used to fill their religion as Hindu (Jain) in their SSC/HSC forms. I have seen some elements in Gujarati Jain samaj that ask their bhaktas to avoid going to Hindu festivals/temples, regardless, both Hindus/Jains worship at each others' temples in my anecdotal experience. This Jain minority thing, seems to be a North Indian push, not likely to be a Guj/MP region phenomena.

Seems like a ploy to break the business community between Hindus/Jains (predominantly Baniya/Vaniya/etc and Jains).

member_28173 · Post by **member_28173** » 21 Jan 2014 18:47

Should there be Mupati revolt

~~~~~ Protest with " Mupati " Saying " Micchami Dukkadam " Written on it.~~~~~~~~~

Mupati is white cloth on mouth Jains wear. It is saved insects getting hurt.
Micchami Dukkadam means "Sorry" in Jainism

SORRY !!! Raga we dont want minority status.

member_28173 · Post by **member_28173** » 21 Jan 2014 18:51

prahaar wrote:
vishvak wrote:Jains have by default religious practices like nonviolence, cow protection etc. I don't see how all this can be an issue except some manufactured one. I can't find a post from me in Nukkad forum perhaps about how state has extended facilities for minorities in Keral as a friend said. Jains should see how it helps brihad samaaj as well. Sorry can't find my post.
This decision can have potentially disastrous implications in Gujarat. I hope sanity prevails and Jains are not taken on the "we are minority victims" path. I thought, this business of minorities is to secure any peculiar religion specific things. Gujarat has had a pretty robust relation between Hindus/Jains, to the extent, that many of my Jain friends used to fill their religion as Hindu (Jain) in their SSC/HSC forms. I have seen some elements in Gujarati Jain samaj that ask their bhaktas to avoid going to Hindu festivals/temples, regardless, both Hindus/Jains worship at each others' temples in my anecdotal experience. This Jain minority thing, seems to be a North Indian push, not likely to be a Guj/MP region phenomena.

Seems like a ploy to break the business community between Hindus/Jains (predominantly Baniya/Vaniya/etc and Jains).

[red] this is exactly what we fear . I am gujrati Jain. This is 2 effects . Jains first gets divided - pro and against groups. Mostly on state lines . GUJARATI jains being against, Gujarati Jains intermarry Gujarati Hindus very much . We look stupid and OPPORTUNIST [/red]

LakshO · Post by **LakshO** » 21 Jan 2014 18:58

chandturakhia wrote:Should there be Mupati revolt

~~~~~ Protest with " Mupati " Saying " Micchami Dukkadam " Written on it.~~~~~~~~~

Mupati is white cloth on mouth Jains wear. It is saved insects getting hurt.
Micchami Dukkadam means "Sorry" in Jainism

SORRY !!! Raga we dont want minority status.

If you are opposed to this idea, may be, you can adopt the RTI route (query the GoI on the basis this decision was made). If that doesn't work, may be a PIL in SC, saying that this is a pre-poll ploy.

JMT!

Rahul Mehta · Post by **Rahul Mehta** » 21 Jan 2014 19:39

chandturakhia wrote:GUYS ( Especially Rahul Mehta )

I am researching whole day and to my dismay there were some petetions from Jain. Yes I also read Quite a few Jains have opposed the same and THATS why so long it was not granted.

I am against it. I rememeber before 2009 election ; there was sort of referendum in Jain samaj to accept or reject MINORITY status. It was mostly Against it.

but was then --- before communnal violence bill. NOW it is matter of real shame to be minority.

HELP ME WRITE ANSWER WHY JAINS should not be minority. Plz

MY point ---> Minority or Majority should also account CONTRIBUTIONS to the society. Jains pay 17% Income tax even when they are 0.4% of India - Near 50 Lakhs. COmmunity that contributes should be may be Positively rewarded but not
degraded

http://creative.sulekha.com/century-old ... 26243_blog this gives the story of confusion but there is PRO MINORITY BIAS but yes all whom I know oppose. but it is again before communal violence bill.

I am against minority status. IMO, most Jains will oppose it. Handful of wealthy Jains want minority status so that they can get tax benefits and more freedom to run their institutions. I am requesting Jains to order MPs via SMS to oppose this.

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 21 Jan 2014 19:56

gakakkad wrote:does it mean Jains would get reservations ?

I'll revisit for status update later...then please provide me the WL, so that I can confirm if my RAC makes any sense.

chaanakya · Post by **chaanakya** » 21 Jan 2014 20:30

Minority is not equated to SC/ST or OBC. Hence reservation in jobs will not apply. They can agitate for it and like Muslims and converted christians get under OBC category, they may also get it . But being treated as minority they may get better benefits then non minorities i.e. Hindus, I suppose.

disha · Post by **disha** » 21 Jan 2014 20:41

gakakkad wrote:does it mean Jains would get reservations ?

No it has no relation to reservations, but the state can give preferential treatment and in the quota for minorities, Jains can be accomodated.

Mostly it means that they can choose to run their educational and religion institutes unfettered from the GOI. Which is a big step. And this "unfetterance" should be extended to all religions - particularly all indic religions.

disha · Post by **disha** » 21 Jan 2014 20:44

Rahul Mehta wrote: I am against minority status. IMO, most Jains will oppose it. Handful of wealthy Jains want minority status so that they can get tax benefits and more freedom to run their institutions. I am requesting Jains to order MPs via SMS to oppose this.

You against or for minority status is your personal opinion. Ideally there should be no "minority" status in India - only "protected" status. And the "protected" status should be "minimal" - but the politics have taken its own course.

Coming to "most Jains will oppose it" and "wealthy jains" - well you have not been to South India I guess. Or have been but still sadly to say ignorant on lot of things.

disha · Post by **disha** » 21 Jan 2014 20:49

chandturakhia wrote:
Mupati is white cloth on mouth Jains wear. It is saved insects getting hurt.

Wrong!!!! Some stupid thaparite wrote a wrong thing in NCERT books and it is propagated ad-nauseam.

Here is a Jain with mukhpatti http://www.drshaileshjain.in/ -> draw your own conclusions!

Anyway, yes the dynastic tradition of hand me down is wrong. At the same time this is the first time an indic religion has got a boost. In S.I several jain digambar temples are coming under encroachments and this status will atleast give them a fighting chance.

No more on this from me.

rvishwak · Post by **rvishwak** » 21 Jan 2014 21:13

For 5 Ts of Namo, we can have 5 A's for which AAP stands for....

1) A: Anarchy
2) A: Arvind is always right
3) A: ??
4) A: ??
5) A: ??

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 21 Jan 2014 21:15

from what appears in the pehala post article about KA, that yeddi's patch is not working even though Modi is preferred. so the erring BJP men can do more disturbances and disruption than AAP(arrongant aams), SHAAP(erring bjp men) or PAAP (congress).

disha · Post by **disha** » 21 Jan 2014 22:02

Apologies to break my own rule., but I am glad this churning is happening:

http://www.firstpost.com/india/after-ja ... 50609.html

According to Sandhya Jain, state interference in running Hindu institutions is huge. Giving statistics from just one state- Tamil Nadu – she writes: “Tamil Nadu’s Hindu Religious & Charity Endowments (HR&CE) department controls 36,425 temples; 56 mutts; 47 temples belonging to mutts; and 1,721 specific endowments and 189 trusts.” The dead hand of the state has been, and will be, used to debauch Hindu/quasi-Hindu institutions, with laws created by politicians to cater to their own votebanks. Only "majority" institutions will be fair game for political decisions on quotas and the applicability of ill-thought-out laws like the Right to Education (RTE). Minority unaided institutions are not bound to follow the RTE, according to a Supreme Court judgment.

The perversity of the idea of denying to the majority what is constitutionally available to minorities was nowhere demonstrated better than in the case of the Ramakrishna Mission - which encapsulates Swami Vivekananda's ideas on inclusive Hinduism. Some years ago, the Mission wanted to be declared a non-Hindu minority institution to avoid being hounded by atheist, Left-ruled West Bengal. The Supreme Court rightly refused to sanction this self-denial and better sense prevailed in the Ramakrishna Mission. It is worth recalling that in the south, from the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD, India's richest temple) in Andhra Pradesh to many other smaller temples, the state interferes in the administration of Hindu temples. There are entire laws devoted to the state managing and directing Hindu religious endowments in the south. In Maharashtra, the state government is seeking to take over the Sai Baba Trust in Shirdi. It already runs the Siddhivinayak temple in Mumbai. A hopeful sign came recently from the Supreme Court which is now beginning to recognise the nonsensical nature of denying Hindu groups the right to administer their institutions. The court recently overturned the takeover of the Chidambaram Natarajar temple by the Tamil Nadu government with the appointment of its own executive trustee. The temple, set up in the 19th century, is run by a community called the Podhu Dikshitars. It was taken over by the state on the plea that it was not properly administered. The court, while rubbishing this claim, said that even if a temple had to be taken over for the stated reasons, the state had no business staying on as administrator once the damage of mismanagement was undone.

Instead of cribbing about whether a Jains should get minority or not., please go about pointing out the perversity of the state managing the temples. This is truly a nehruvian idea and should be put to death.

At this stage, lot of Jain temples in J&K, Bihar, TN, WB will be out of the purview of state. More and more sects of Hindus should apply minority status., in fact the entire absurdity should be that all of the sects put together constitute the Hindu majority but they are "minority" within themselves.

Atri · Post by **Atri** » 21 Jan 2014 22:32

disha wrote:Apologies to break my own rule., but I am glad this churning is happening:

http://www.firstpost.com/india/after-ja ... 50609.html

Instead of cribbing about whether a Jains should get minority or not., please go about pointing out the perversity of the state managing the temples. This is truly a nehruvian idea and should be put to death.

At this stage, lot of Jain temples in J&K, Bihar, TN, WB will be out of the purview of state. More and more sects of Hindus should apply minority status., in fact the entire absurdity should be that all of the sects put together constitute the Hindu majority but they are "minority" within themselves.

Bhaaratiya Plurality and Indianization and assimilation of Islam.

My Solution -

1. Stop using the term Hinduism. Identify Vaishnava, Shaiva, Shakta, Samkhya, Yoga, Mimamsa, Tantra and all the other sub groups which are clubbed together as Hinduism by british as separate religions. That is what they are..

2. So there will be Shaivas, Vaishnavas, Buddhists, Sikhs, Jains, Shaaktas, Samkhyas, Tantrics etc etc... all of them separate individual religions.

3. Club them together as "Religions of Indian Origin". No body will object to this term. Since it will be pain in the ass for counting people of thousands of individual religions separately, count them together as Religions originated in India.

4. This means Islam, Christianity, Judaism and Zoroastrianism are Religions not originated in India.

5. This will bring together all people of following Indian religion under one denomination.

6. Parsees, Jews won't be any trouble.. Most of Christians, except the evangelical ones will be fine as well..

7. Christians can further be encouraged to start a movement to establish a Church of India like Greek orthodox church, Russian orthodox church, Church of England.

8. Build similar pressure on Muslims to start something similar. Ahmediya sect was established in India and can be clubbed along with Indian religions. So can be the Bahai faith.

9. Those who follow Indian religions, including Ahmediya and Bohra people, can be referred to as Indian because it will be a chaos to refer to each religious group by its name. Jews and Zoroastrians can be declared as minorities. Muslims are not by any means a minority and they follow a religion which is not Indian in origin.

10. The socio-political movement for encouraging Muslims to

- read Quran in their mother-tongue.
- Write Urdu in Devanagari script
- stop dressing like Arabs and start dressing like the local population
- government subsidies and reservations of Muslim women for their education and self-employment to empower them.

There can be some indirect subsidies on minorities and Indic people. We are not succeeding as yet because we are not unleashing our diversity. It is perfectly safe now because there is very little probability of India being ruled by Muslim rulers in next 150 years. We can afford to take this step. The dire need we had from 1100 - 1800 for uniting under one religious denomination to fight is over now.

Our strength is unity in diversity... This will be the Vishwa-Roop Darshan of all Indian religions... Thousands of them manifesting simultaneously.. The Jihadis will have to either identify the Kafirs individually, Or as Indians. If they identify individually, it is BIG pain in their ass. If they identify Indian religions as kafirs, they will have to be referred as Indians.

pankajs · Post by **pankajs** » 21 Jan 2014 22:41

Ravi ‏@ishuaadi 5m

@anilkohli54 best slap from a cartoonist. pic.twitter.com/EBcWYoTUsS
---------------------------------------->>

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 22 Jan 2014 00:10

Atri wrote:
disha wrote:Apologies to break my own rule., but I am glad this churning is happening:

http://www.firstpost.com/india/after-ja ... 50609.html

Instead of cribbing about whether a Jains should get minority or not., please go about pointing out the perversity of the state managing the temples. This is truly a nehruvian idea and should be put to death.

At this stage, lot of Jain temples in J&K, Bihar, TN, WB will be out of the purview of state. More and more sects of Hindus should apply minority status., in fact the entire absurdity should be that all of the sects put together constitute the Hindu majority but they are "minority" within themselves.
Bhaaratiya Plurality and Indianization and assimilation of Islam.

My Solution -

1. Stop using the term Hinduism. Identify Vaishnava, Shaiva, Shakta, Samkhya, Yoga, Mimamsa, Tantra and all the other sub groups which are clubbed together as Hinduism by british as separate religions. That is what they are..

2. So there will be Shaivas, Vaishnavas, Buddhists, Sikhs, Jains, Shaaktas, Samkhyas, Tantrics etc etc... all of them separate individual religions.

3. Club them together as "Religions of Indian Origin". No body will object to this term. Since it will be pain in the ass for counting people of thousands of individual religions separately, count them together as Religions originated in India.

4. This means Islam, Christianity, Judaism and Zoroastrianism are Religions not originated in India.

5. This will bring together all people of following Indian religion under one denomination.

6. Parsees, Jews won't be any trouble.. Most of Christians, except the evangelical ones will be fine as well..

7. Christians can further be encouraged to start a movement to establish a Church of India like Greek orthodox church, Russian orthodox church, Church of England.

8. Build similar pressure on Muslims to start something similar. Ahmediya sect was established in India and can be clubbed along with Indian religions. So can be the Bahai faith.

9. Those who follow Indian religions, including Ahmediya and Bohra people, can be referred to as Indian because it will be a chaos to refer to each religious group by its name. Jews and Zoroastrians can be declared as minorities. Muslims are not by any means a minority and they follow a religion which is not Indian in origin.

10. The socio-political movement for encouraging Muslims to

- read Quran in their mother-tongue.
- Write Urdu in Devanagari script
- stop dressing like Arabs and start dressing like the local population
- government subsidies and reservations of Muslim women for their education and self-employment to empower them.

There can be some indirect subsidies on minorities and Indic people. We are not succeeding as yet because we are not unleashing our diversity. It is perfectly safe now because there is very little probability of India being ruled by Muslim rulers in next 150 years. We can afford to take this step. The dire need we had from 1100 - 1800 for uniting under one religious denomination to fight is over now.

Our strength is unity in diversity... This will be the Vishwa-Roop Darshan of all Indian religions... Thousands of them manifesting simultaneously.. The Jihadis will have to either identify the Kafirs individually, Or as Indians. If they identify individually, it is BIG pain in their ass. If they identify Indian religions as kafirs, they will have to be referred as Indians.

Worst idea ever .. sorry but thats what it is. It has taken almost 60 years for many Indians to realize and understand their shared interests under the Hinduism umbrella and they are still struggling out of the caste hangups...and now we have to divide as shaivites and vaishavites etc.
This is the exact thing the Shankaracharya thankfully fought and created an overarching umbrella for people to come together with.. and now we should rescind that and end up going the path of Sunni vs Shia ..which TBH is very likely to happen given how easily Indians and all humans fall into us vs them thinking.

fanne · Post by **fanne** » 22 Jan 2014 00:24

I agree bakwaas idea. Just to get reservation benefit doing this is a death knell. Lets make reservation/benefits based on religion unconstitutional.
We are ok then.

chaanakya · Post by **chaanakya** » 22 Jan 2014 00:26

There is no reservation based on religion.

fanne · Post by **fanne** » 22 Jan 2014 00:32

benefits - CMC can researve all seats for a particular religion so can AMU. It smells like reserv sir however you look at it.

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 22 Jan 2014 01:27

yaar leh rahan hain meri yeh RaGa ke speeches...freaking ads are all over the place, interrupting songs on YT with his dullard speeches, ads on every site at the right left below centre etc.. tried clearing every cache etc but still there... perhaps auto detect of ISP.. anyways let them blow money like this...if there are idiots in this country still impressed by this twit, nothing can be done..

Lilo · Post by **Lilo** » 22 Jan 2014 02:08

^
Karan M ji,
Use an ad blocker(ex: adblock plus) in your browser.
I am using Bluhell firewall (an adblocker) with my Firefox browser on Android.

RajeshA · Post by **RajeshA** » 22 Jan 2014 03:10

Atri guru,

In Bharatiya thread we discussed these issues.

I was of the opinion, that we should make a very fundamental distinction between Abrahamics and Bharatiyas, and that is that in Bharat we simply do not have religion. We may have many Bhaktipanths, but we differentiate Bhaktipanth from Religion along very hard lines.

Then we transfer the right of freedom to propagate, preach and practice from religion to a Dharmic Bhaktipanth, and call out religion as anti-national and insist on various religions in India, Islam and Christianity to package themselves as Dharmic Bhaktipanths, rejecting all aspects of religion in them.

That would be a fundamental way to change them.

However if we accept our various Bhaktipanths as religions, then we will be forever in a subordinate position. Bhaktipanths should not be a means of grouping people in any way.

The problem is grouping based on faith. Bhaktipanths don't have that. Religions do.

Anyway OT.

Atri · Post by **Atri** » 22 Jan 2014 03:54

Karan M wrote:
Bhaaratiya Plurality and Indianization and assimilation of Islam.
Worst idea ever .. sorry but thats what it is. It has taken almost 60 years for many Indians to realize and understand their shared interests under the Hinduism umbrella and they are still struggling out of the caste hangups...and now we have to divide as shaivites and vaishavites etc.
This is the exact thing the Shankaracharya thankfully fought and created an overarching umbrella for people to come together with.. and now we should rescind that and end up going the path of Sunni vs Shia ..which TBH is very likely to happen given how easily Indians and all humans fall into us vs them thinking.

I agree. This was a dated article by me. Almost 5 years ago. This was much before I read Breaking India and Being different.

But you are missing the point. As RajeshA garu has mentioned, we have discussed it in deracination thread and later in Bhartiya thread - but that was mostly philosophical aspects of this idea. There is a reason why I put this in NaMo thread. What I am trying to bring to attention of public here is the immediate political aspects of this idea. This is what is we are heading towards. And in case something like this materializes, what Adi shankara has achieved will be undone. Will it be for good or bad, well can't say. But this has already beginning to appear in certain parts of western MH where shaivism is beginning to be considered as separate religion (politically religion, not a moksha-maarga in dharmik sense). while that constituency is small, it is growing and has state patronage.

try and game this on pan-indian scale and you have the situation that I have described. and in that case, these are the steps which hindus will most likely take.

I personally believe that too much of vedanta and bhakti-maarga which took root in India isn't good. Because it happened at the expense of other more "rational" darshanas like mimansa, nyaya, sankhya. Contrary to popular opinion, Shankara had most profound effect on non-vedanta schools of aastika traditions. Buddhism, per se, was defeated by Kumarila bhatta few decades before adi-shankara. So, I won't find it strategically bad idea. Although I would prefer this to happen in Akhanda-Bhaarat which is militarily strong. What is in our hands at the moment is how to reach that stage. Because in militarily strong and economically sound akhand-bharat, this transition from vedanta-centric dharma to more diverse darshanas won't be at the expense of our sovereignty over our land. In other scenario as seen on the cover-page of RM's Breaking India, this transition either won't materialize OR would have been too late by then which resulted in materialization of the cover-page map of India.

Food for thought. It is thin end of the wedge, in given scenario. And once granted, it will only accelerate the process that I speak of. this is the contingency plan to think about wht to do, if that materializes which was started by giving Sikh-panth a separate religion status and now jains. shaivism-vaishnavism-Shaktism and vedik-religion are three most probable candidates next to apply for status of "separate religions". First schism will be vedic religion will be thrown out of "Hindu religion" (either using all the AIT, AMT crap OR simply stating that vedic gods are different from "hindu gods" and vedic religion is intruder in Hindu religion). Once vedics (vedas) are thrown out, the natural schism is shaivism-vaishnavism-shaaktism.

If this materializes, there has to be a contingency measure for dharmiks to survive. Whts in the link above is mostly that.

Prem Kumar · Post by **Prem Kumar** » 22 Jan 2014 03:58

IndraD wrote:somnath bharti was found emerging from ladies' toilet today while gent's toilet was empty

He was collecting urine samples

Prem · Post by **Prem** » 22 Jan 2014 04:06

Atri wrote:
disha wrote:Apologies to break my own rule., but I am glad this churning is happening:
. The Jihadis will have to either identify the Kafirs individually, Or as Indians. If they identify individually, it is BIG pain in their ass. If they identify Indian religions as kafirs, they will have to be referred as Indians.

I call this IOI= Indian or Islamist/ Indian or Internationalist/ Indian or Inbreeder /Indian or Italian

SBajwa · Post by **SBajwa** » 22 Jan 2014 05:37

Shameful!!!

chetak · Post by **chetak** » 22 Jan 2014 06:27

Snoopgate on Modi backfires on media

Sandhya Jain 20 Jan 2014

Avant garde vigilante media like Cobrapost and Gulail and the anti-Narendra Modi mainstream electronic and print media have been caught between a rock and hard place with the Supreme Court upbraiding suspended IAS officer Pradeep N Sharma for repeating scurrilous allegations against the Gujarat Chief Minister instead of removing the objectionable references in his petition of 2011, as directed by the Court and promised by his then counsel Colin Gonsalves. Pradeep Sharma and his new counsel, Prashant Bhushan, risked contempt of court in their attempt to malign the Chief Minister and bring him within the ambit of their case on Friday, January 17, 2014, but failed.

SIT-gate to snoop-gate: Can’t derail Modi juggernaut

This has made all media reportage of the alleged snooping into the movements of a young female landscape architect at the supposed behest of the Chief Minister utterly baseless, defamatory, and liable for legal redress if the much-maligned gentleman chooses this course of action. It is a timely and salutary warning to the media about the need for stringent precautions when playing with the reputations of Constitutional authorities.

It bears noting in this connection that the intern who defamed Justice AK Ganguly and had him hounded out of the West Bengal Human Rights Commission’s office has still not answered the police summons to file a case of sexual harassment against him. The Supreme Court, which then acted in undue haste at the behest of Attorney General GE Vahanvati, has since become cautious in the matter of allegations against Justice Swatanter Kumar. There is a feeling in judicial circles that like Justice Ganguly, he too may be the target of some party aggrieved over a judgment or matter pending with the National Green Tribunal that he is presiding over.

As for the snoopgate story, it began and may well end with Pradeep Kumar. Unknown to most citizens, it was officially ‘launched’ in 2011, when the former Collector from Bhuj approached the Supreme Court with a petition against the Gujarat Government and Chief Minister. It made a colourful reading, to say the least.

Gujarat to explore legal options against Centre’s probe on snoopgate

After hearing arguments from the counsel for the petitioner, the Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, and the State of Gujarat on whether or not to admit the petition, on May 12, 2011, Justices Aftab Alam and RM Lodha ordered, “Colin Gonsalves, learned senior counsel appearing for the petitioner states that he does not wish to retain the averment made on page F of the synopsis in its present form and the elaboration of that statement as contained in paragraphs 15 to 25 of the Writ Petition. In this connection, he states that he will file a supplementary petition making suitable amendments to those averments which tend to cast unintended and wrong information in their present form. Gonsalves added that neither he nor the petitioner has any intent to make the faintest allegation of any personal impropriety against the Gujarat Chief Minister”.

In an astonishing move, however, Pradeep Sharma did not amend his petition and simply lay low for a while. Then, suddenly in November-December, 2013, the web portals, Cobrapost and Gulail carried sensational news about the Gujarat Chief Minister and former Minister Amit Shah as an exclusive investigation (read plant). They aired audio tapes related to the salacious averments in the not-admitted petition, with a ‘statutory warning’ disowning responsibility for their authenticity. Several leading television channels, newspapers and magazines picked up the non-story and flogged it for all it was worth (or not, as the case may be).

Confident that the ‘groundwork’ for his case was established, Pradeep Sharma filed a fresh petition on November 23, 2013 and far from removing the impugned paras 15-25, he cleverly condensed the allegations. But when the petition came up for admission, he was promptly caught out by Justices Ranjana Prakash Desai and MB Lokur, who said that his plea for a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) would be examined only after verifying that he had complied with the previous order to delete the ‘scurrilous’ allegations against the Gujarat Chief Minister.

Prashant Bhushan pleaded that the gist of the allegations were necessary for the Court to understand the mala fide behaviour of the Gujarat Government which had allegedly filed a number of ‘false’ cases against the IAS officer Pradeep Sharma and his brother Kuldeep Sharma, IPS (retired). But the bench would have none of it, and also denied Sharma the permission to visit his wife and son in the United States. The crux of Pradeep Sharma’s demand is to have the four cases pending against him with the Gujarat Crime Branch transferred to the CBI.

Disgraceful conduct of the Sharma brothers

Journalists and media organisations that gave Pradeep Sharma and his twice-punctured hot air balloon prime time publicity day after day in 2013 need to introspect about the calibre and credibility of their work. Standard reporting norms and professional ethics were given the complete go-by, and the media seemed satisfied to be petted and cheered by the Congress spokespersons on Twitter!

It is an unspeakable embarrassment for the media that the Supreme Court has said it will examine Pradeep Sharma’s fresh petition para by para against the old petition of 2011 to ensure that he has removed the impugned references to Narendra Modi. Sharma now has the option of withdrawing his appeal altogether, or filing a fresh petition within two weeks, as stipulated, without any overt or covert references to the Chief Minister and the snoop-gate story. That should save the lame duck UPA Government, the trouble of finding a judge willing to impale Narendra Modi at its behest.

gandharva · Post by **gandharva** » 22 Jan 2014 07:12

harbans · Post by **harbans** » 22 Jan 2014 13:15

Why Narendra Modi is different:

http://vicharprachar.wordpress.com/2014 ... different/

Have rated major politicians since independence on some core factors. Please do give your inputs/ comments. May edit later.

Atri · Post by **Atri** » 22 Jan 2014 14:37

harbans ji,

Please define what excellent, poor, good, fair etc mean elaborately. This will make it fair. Furthermore, make two charts of those who have been PMs and those who are currently in the PM race.

this will make it more complete.

harbans · Post by **harbans** » 22 Jan 2014 15:02

Atri ji many thanks. Will work on a more interactive version and make it more objective. Possibly 1-10 scores with some objective benchmarks could be made.

pankajs · Post by **pankajs** » 22 Jan 2014 16:19

How they killed our factories

The government of India, it seems, has decided that factories must not be allowed to come up or to run.

Uday Kotak said a few months back, in the course of an interview, that he was amazed that in his new office in Mumbai, not one of the furniture or fixture items were made in India. My friend Rahul Bhasin conducted a similar exercise in his office in Delhi and discovered pretty much the same thing. The carpet is from China, the furniture is from Malaysia, the light fixtures are from China, the glass partition is from all places, Jebel Ali in the Middle East and so on. Kotak went on to add that even Ganesha statues are no longer made in India. They are imported from China.

Our great, glorious, imperial, imperious government in Delhi, I am told, organises what is called a cabinet meeting every week. The first item on the agenda is to take stock of how well the country has progressed in destroying its manufacturing base; the second item is to think up Machiavellian new ways to further emasculate what is left of Indian manufacturing. I am told that it is during one of these sessions that it was decided that the income tax department should mount a strong and no-holds-barred campaign against Nokia, a defenceless Finnish company which had shown the temerity and gumption to not only bring FDI into the country, but to actually be one of the few (only?) investors to set up a manufacturing facility.

The super-patriotic, super-matriotic cabinet of the super-intelligent republic of India has decided that land must not be made available to factories, electricity should be denied to factories, factory managements should be harassed by various super-inspectorates and flexible labour policies must be denied to factories, thus discouraging the employment of labour in our factories. The reason this is being done is clear. We must be different from China in every single way. In China, land is easily made available to factories; in China, good quality electric power is made available to factories; in China, local government officials do not harass factory managements — au contraire, local officials encourage factory managements; in China, factories are allowed flexibility in labour practices; paradoxically China’s factory managers hire lots of labour. Our hyper-patriotic, hyper-matriotic, hyper-intelligent cabinet has succeeded brilliantly in achieving what it set out to do. We are one hundred per cent different from China, at least as far as manufacturing and factories go. I teach young engineers at IIT Bombay. These days, quite a few of them are interested in becoming entrepreneurs rather than in taking up salaried corporate jobs. Their enthusiasm is boundless and quite impressive. The interesting thing is when I ask them as to what kind of enterprises they plan to start, they all talk about dotcom companies, data analytics companies, mobile software applications companies and so on. Not a word, not a whisper about factories or manufacturing. And these, mind you, are some of the brightest engineers in the land. When questioned, they tell me that the very thought of starting a factory is so daunting that they give up. These young persons all seem to be aware that it is the objective of the great government of India not to have factories in the country. Being patriotic youngsters, they are merely following the directions of our benevolent government.

I have always felt an inner glow and a tightening of the stomach whenever I have visited a factory, be it the weaving section of a textile mill, the metal-bending shop of a shock absorber plant or the assembly room in a capacitor production facility. It is just a thrilling experience. When I did some research, I discovered that our cabinet ministers have received official instructions to avoid visiting factories as far as possible and under no circumstances should they allow positive vibes to hit them. They are obliged to look down on factories. Numerous NGOs have submitted well-thought-out and brilliantly researched position papers that all factories are polluting, industries, both big and small, are dangerous for our national well-being and so on. Cabinet ministers, I am told, are required to read and memorise these papers. Every Tuesday morning, a quiz is conducted, where the honourable minsters are tested with respect to their knowledge on the subject of anti-industrialism. So here we have honourable persons who are discouraged from visiting factories, who feel no joy when they visit one and who are coached into accepting the self-evident truth that all factories are polluting beasts that should be shunned.

Rahul Bhasin is a private equity investor who is trying to invest in Indian factories despite the government of India emphatically telling him that this is not a smart thing to do. He had two stories to tell me. The first is as follows: Bhasin received a business investment proposal from a dynamic entrepreneur in Tiruppur. The proposal involved dismantling the existing factory in Tiruppur and moving it to Oman. The entrepreneur claimed that despite Oman’s high labour costs, the sheer ease of doing business there would make this proposed shift economically viable and profitable. Needless to say, Bhasin, being an Indian patriot of the subdued variety and not a hyper-minister, was not sure whether he should weep or laugh. The second story is about a run-of-the-mill factory. The factory manager answered all questions competently. When it came to questions relating to the use of the back-up diesel generator, the manager started to fumble. Finally, he said rather sheepishly: “To tell you the truth, Mr Bhasin, we have never had a need to use the back-up generator in years. Our power supply has been quite reliable.” No prizes for guessing — this factory is in Gujarat. If I were advising the BJP’s think-tank, I would suggest to them that this story is a much better election plank than temple-building, at least with those citizens who like textile mills, forging shops and assembly plants. They might of course lose the votes of the NGOs who hate what they refer to as the “industrial civilisation”.

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 22 Jan 2014 16:45

Lilo wrote:^
Karan M ji,
Use an ad blocker(ex: adblock plus) in your browser.
I am using Bluhell firewall (an adblocker) with my Firefox browser on Android.

Thanks, will try!! Fed up of all the spam. On the other hand, this is what they spent Rs 500 Crores for ??

Hari Seldon · Post by **Hari Seldon** » 22 Jan 2014 16:49

pankajs wrote:How they killed our factories
The government of India, it seems, has decided that factories must not be allowed to come up or to run.

Deeply saddening to read such systematic destruction of the biggest chance for a better life that our masses currently have - moving in manufacturing. All big countries went through this phase before moving to a higher income trajectory.

Didn't want to say it but seems like the UPA is following a scorched earth policy... they know they can;t win this time anyway. But such wanton destruction is treasonous, to put it mildly.