Indian Interests

[ramana]

Pranav thanks for being here.

[Pranav]

^^^ Thanks. One snippet from Quigley's "Tragedy and Hope" (1966) that I missed including in the last post:

The powers of financial capitalism had [a] far-reaching aim, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands, able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole. This system was to be controlled in a feudalist fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert by secret agreements arrived at in frequent private meetings and conferences (p. 324)

This ties in with an older quote from historian Arnold Toynbee, who it appears was part of the syndicate:

I will merely repeat that we are at present working, discreetly but with all our might, to wrest this mysterious political force called sovereignty out of the clutches of the local national states of our world. And all the time we are denying with our lips what we are doing with our hands, because to impugn the sovereignty of the local national states of the world is still a heresy for which a statesman or a publicist can be — perhaps not quite burnt at the stake, but certainly ostracized and discredited"

- Arnold J. Toynbee, "The Trend of International Affairs Since the War," International Affairs, November 1931, p. 809

Apparently the syndicate has pretty much controlled the US since the late 19th century, as this quote from FDR suggests:

The real truth of the matter is, as you and I know, that a financial element in the large centers has owned the government of the U.S. since the days of Andrew Jackson.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt, in a letter written to Colonel E. Mandell House link

(IMHO, Lincoln was trying to be independent of the Syndicate, which was one of the hidden causes of the Civil War, and his assassination.)

This is getting a little OT for this thread ... perhaps a new thread - India and the "World Order" - might be useful.

[ramana]

Start it in the GDF and take leadership of that thread. Post reading material for people to get upto speed. Includes you report any extranous non-sequitor, trolling posts in it.

[Pranav]

Bad news:

Exemption to CJI among proposed RTI amendments

Vidya Subrahmaniam

New Delhi: It is official. The government is contemplating amendments to the Right to Information Act, 2005.

The Department of Personnel and Training, which admitted to considering about a dozen amendments to the Act in an April 30, 2010 letter to RTI activist Subhash Chandra Agrawal, was upfront about the nature of at least two of the amendments: exempting the office of Chief Justice from the RTI Act and barring applications which could be deemed to be “frivolous or vexatious.” Other amendments proposed relate to “disclosure of Cabinet papers”; constitution of “benches” of the Central Information Commission; and exemptions for organisations possessing sensitive information.

Chief Justice K.G. Balakrishnan recently wrote to the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh seeking exemption of the office of CJI from the Act.

http://www.hindu.com/2010/05/04/stories ... 510100.htm

There were some reports a few days back about Sonia being opposed the amendments. 400% tamasha onlee. Just making MMS the fall guy, while the dynasty continues to be pious.

Proposed RTI changes worry activists

For RTI pioneer Aruna Roy, the proposed amendments are an indication that “they won't let go.” Says Ms. Roy: “The truth is that RTI has opened a million cans of worms. It has put the fear of God in the government. The RTI has brought in transfer of power on an unimaginable scale and no government wants that.”

http://www.hindu.com/2010/05/04/stories ... 521200.htm

[Pranav]

No water under the bridge here

P. Sainath

Many projects for supplying water in Vidarbha remain on paper, though the money allotted is very real.

http://www.hindu.com/2010/05/04/stories ... 581100.htm

[RamaY]

Now, in order to create a similar false choice for the natives in India, two puppet parties are required. One pole of this order appears to already exist - the Congress Party. The interests of the syndicate would demand that Maoists be protected and the use of EVMs be supported. Sonia Gandhi and her loyalists appear to be adhering to this. But the system is not stable until there is an opposite pole, and this is the role that the BJP is supposed to play.

It would have been best for the syndicate if the BJP were as much their puppet as the Congress appears to be. Then, the BJP could be allowed to win from time to time, thereby easing suspicions of vote fraud amongst the natives. However, it appears that the installation of Gadkari as the president has upset these plans. Indeed, the self-confessedly Anglophilic columnist Swapan Dasgupta, who harshly criticizes "conspiracy theories" about EVMs, regards the nomination of Gadkari as a "coup" in the BJP.

This brings up back to the article we started with: If the BJP cannot be reliably controlled, the syndicate may consider it better to not have a Hindu nationalist party in India at all. Severe rigging may be required to keep the BJP out. But the media can be relied on to mount a campaign that the BJP's support is eroding. That may make it easier for the natives to swallow their medicine.

This is what RM-ji was saying indirectly (I know he presented the point in a different way, but the message was the same)

[Atri]

However, it appears that the installation of Gadkari as the president has upset these plans. Indeed, the self-confessedly Anglophilic columnist Swapan Dasgupta, who harshly criticizes "conspiracy theories" about EVMs, regards the nomination of Gadkari as a "coup" in the BJP.

Very important observation, Pranavji..

We need to create a pool of intellectuals and network them. The networking of "Sajjan-Shakti" is what time demands now..

[RamaY]

Would like repeat few of my observations in view of Pranav-ji's post

1. BJP must standardize its governance model. Irrespective of the CM, any BJP govt must execute key development projects. N.Modi's governance should not be a Gujarat story. It should become a BJP story. Two key states are KTKA and MP.

2. BJP should work (may have to go to great lengths to achieve this, if needed) towards getting another term. NDA's first full-term should not be seen as ABV success story. BJP need to have another full term to remove this dogma and create a political alternative to INC. Another successful term for NDA will bring the urban voters into BJP fold.

The next NDA government, when formed, must bring a completely new perspective on governance, administration and national security.

P.S: The assumption here is that BJP is a capable alternative to INC in indian political scene and probably out of foreign influence.

[Pranav]

Very important observation, Pranavji..

We need to create a pool of intellectuals and network them. The networking of "Sajjan-Shakti" is what time demands now..

Right, first need to educate people. Many people on BRF have a pretty good idea about what is happening, but outside there is abysmal ignorance.

Anyway, will start thread in GDF soon, where such information can be collected.

[Pranav]

^^^ New thread in GDF created: http://forums.bharat-rakshak.com/viewto ... =24&t=5525

Please participate.

[Muppalla]

After PM frowns, Service chiefs told not to talk out of turn

Earlier, in November, Kapoor had talked about the possibility of limited war under the nuclear overhang in the Indian subcontinent. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who was on a visit to the US, was forced to make an assertive statement saying that Pakistan does not face any threat from India. “Any other statement distorted out of context should not carry the weight when I have stated categorically that Pakistan faces no threat whatsoever from our side,” he had said in reference to Kapoor’s comments.

Are these statements becoming disruptions to Guboing and S-e-Sing? Huh... what a time period we are going through.

[Muppalla]

^^^^^^

Thinking further about Army -MMS relations, the paranoid in me feel like " daaal mae kuch to kala hai ". The government knows Madhuri Gupta's " achievements " in Pakistan. She is just a fall guy. Eh jo nishaane hai kahi.n ore. Again paranoid in me thinks they may be targetting the right intelligence and army attache officers "in the name of spy ring" but may be brutally removing them to accomodate themselves to a Track-2 and Track - "f c u k" streams.

In summary, all the tension between MMS/PMO and the folks in uniform is the fundamental difference of how to deal with na-Pakis.

[Hari Seldon]

NYT report on the UK-stani poll

Speaking to reporters after an extraordinary topsy-turvy night, Nick Clegg, the Liberal Democratic leader, said that the vote “made it absolutely clear that our electoral system is broken.”
...
“This system, designed for two-party politics, always fails to deliver a Parliament that reflects the way people voted,” Mr. Dé said. “Third parties are always punished, and fourth parties are often invisible.”
...
“In the last election, there wasn’t a single seat in the country where the majority of the electorate had endorsed the winner,” Mr. Dé said, speaking of the 2005 British election. “Today, we’re seeing in certain tight races that some of the winning M.P.’s have won on very small shares of the vote.”

The system penalizes smaller parties like the Liberal Democrats, which have consistent support across the country, but not enough in a single constituency to defeat the winning Labour or Tory candidate. There are no prizes for second place, so the votes in those districts are essentially wasted.

This method translates into disproportional representation in Parliament. The Liberal Democrats emerged from Thursday’s election with 23 percent of the overall vote, but just 9 percent of parliamentary seats. Meanwhile, the Labour Party won 29 percent of the vote, but 40 percent of the seats. The Conservatives, with about 36 percent of the overall vote, won 47 percent of the seats.

“A general election should deliver a Parliament that represents the public,” Ken Ritchie, the reform society’s chief executive, said in a statement. “But what we have is a lottery where Labour can be only 5 percent ahead of the Lib Dems but walk away with five times as many seats.”

Whay here? Well, if the brits can reform westminister - that mother of all parliaments - itself, perhaps, lazy old Des here can be prodded to similarly do so. International precedent and all that.

There's no doubt our polity and poll process is broken too. We need a 2-round poll process with the second round a sorta run-off poll between the top 2 vote-getters in the stage-1 poll. It'll be expensive but it'll force parties and candidates to be genuinely inclusive, centrist etc and marginalize the loony fringe.

Or so I hope.

Jai ho.

[Masaru]

We need a 2-round poll process with the second round a sorta run-off poll between the top 2 vote-getters in the stage-1 poll. It'll be expensive but it'll force parties and candidates to be genuinely inclusive, centrist etc and marginalize the loony fringe.

Loony fringe in action

X-post from Future strategic scenarios thread

Census moves Backwards to 1931

For the first time after 1931, caste will make a reappearance in the form drafted by the Registrar General of Census. The enumerators will, among other things, be tasked to collect information about the caste background of the respondents.

But there was admission that there would be infirmities in the data collected in the process. This assessment is not off the mark as caste based census was abandoned after 1931 when it was found that the exercise was being manipulated for attaining vertical mobility.

In the pre-Independence period, there was a clamour among the underprivileged to leapfrog the social hierarchy by concealing their caste identity and seeking upper caste status by adopting surnames, life style, culture and traditions of those who were traditionally upper castes. This was described as Sanskritisation by eminent sociologist M N Srinivas.



If the mood among politicians is any indication, there will be a reverse Sanskritisation taking place soon. There is realisation that to seek the benefits of reservation, there will be a rush to enter the OBC bracket. As enumerators would have no means to verify their claims, there are fears that OBC figures would be grossly inflated. The home ministry in its note prepared for the Cabinet had articulated these concerns when it said that such a Census could result in “motivated returns through organised and surreptitious means to project higher numbers of a particular caste.”


He also pointed to the other observation of the Registrar General about open-ended categories in the list. “Names of some castes are found in both the list of SCs and list of OBCs. Scheduled Castes converted to Christianity or Islam are also treated differently in different states. The status of migrants from one state to another and the status of children of inter-caste marriage, in terms of caste classification, are also vexed questions,” the minister told the Lok Sabha.


But these rational arguments had no appeal for the powerful backward leaders in the Lok Sabha. They used their political clout to force the government accept their demand.


Sources in the government said the it would take a couple of years to tabulate the caste data, to be collected over three weeks. Then ministry of social justice will have to verify the data for authenticity, which may take another three years.

During the 2001 census, this procedure of tabulation and verification for SC/ST took two-and-a-half years. In Maharashtra, many SC had converted to Buddhism and quoted themselves as Buddhists during the enumeration. But later, when they discovered that conversion would exclude them from the SC list, they switched back to describing themselves as SC during the verification exercise.

Lots of interesting points in this article. So the 'caste census' was stopped back in 1931 because people wanted to move up in the social class (which IMHO is a good thing) but is now brought back because every body wants to get classified as a backward. Interesting progress indeed in 80 odd years.

Further, it is pointed out that the so called representatives of the people have little time, patience and may be even understanding to care about real governance issues and more interested in symbolism. The system which promotes this kind of behavior and puts such people in positions of power needs to be looked at afresh before the future of the country can be secured. At present it is closer to mobocracy than democracy and the people who have come through such a system want to preserve this by making social engineering the cornerstone of governance. It is quite disheartening that the few who oppose this are shouted out and the so called leaders are merely interested in cementing their future by appeasing the mobocratic cabal.

Any ideas on reforming this? A 2 tier voting system based on a run-off between the top 2 candidates would be a start I guess which will at least reduce the pervasive special interest based politics.

[R Vaidya]

http://www.dnaindia.com/opinion/main-ar ... rs_1381566
Abrahamic civil wars
R Vaidyanathan
Tuesday, May 11, 2010 3:06 IST
The three children of Abraham, namely followers of the Jewish, Christian and Islamic faiths, have been fighting and waging war for the last two centuries.
Many terms like crusade, jehad, radical Islam, paganism, and kafir have become a part of contemporary discussion, thanks to the Abrahamic hold on contemporary debate.
Of the three, the two younger children are in the news, both in
Europe as well as in the US.There is a ban on the construction of minarets on mosques in Switzerland, thanks to an overwhelming vote by the people.
There is a move in Belgium, France, Holland and Denmark to ban the burkha in public places along with hefty fine. In Europe, local municipalities and cantons are fining veiled women, as indicated by a recent case in northern Italy. Geert Wilders — who could be the prime minister in the next poll in Holland — is an atheist and has called for a ban on the Koran.
He and many other European intellectuals are arguing that the issue is that of the religion itself and not the people professing it.
Earlier, Melanie Phillips, a British journalist, Oriana Fallaci, the late Italian journalist and author, and Andrew Bostom, an author on Islam, have talked about Eurabia developing in the heart of Europe and the UK becoming Londonistan.
It is interesting that godless and secular Europe is suddenly turning antagonistic to Islam. Most of the major churches in Europe are tourist attractions with small attendance, even on Sundays. Radical Islam is as much upset about modern godless Europe as it is by the evangelical part of the US. The fastest growing Christian evangelical groups like the Pentecostals and Mormons are in conflict with various strands of Islam in many countries in Africa like Nigeria and Kenya.
The evangelicals are also spreading fast in many Latin American countries and impacting the traditional Catholic church. The traditional church is facing a crisis due to lack of interest by youngsters in joining seminaries and nunneries. Actually they are outsourcing the priestly functions to youngsters from India in many places in the US as well as in Europe.
Radical Islam is flush with funds due to oil money and global aspirations. A combination of Saudi funds, Pakistani foot soldiers and London as asylum facilitates the radicals. Radical Islam is totally against the covenants of westernism (which is passed off as modernism), namely living together, pre-marital sex, homosexuality, women’s liberation, et al. Radical Islam finds all these obnoxious and hence its fight is with the church as well as the secular modernisers. Europe is a tinder-box which could flare up in a couple of years, or even earlier, if the economic crisis accelerates. The near-collapse of Greece is a symptom of Europe’s growing crisis. In a downturn, the blame is always on the “other” — in this case the Muslims of Europe, of Moroccan, Algerian, Somalian, Turkish or Kurdish origin.
Also, Europe which had over 20% of the world population during World War I, is down to 10% now. It could fall to just 3% in another three decades.
Demography is destiny and the Muslim population in Europe will reach 20% in another two decades. US president Barack Obama is trying to bring a rapprochement with his tele-prompter speeches by speaking half-truths.
He claimed in Cairo (June, 2009) that algebra, the decimal system and printing technology were the inventions of the land of sands when these accomplishments owe as much to India and China. Obama does not have a good rating in his own country and, in the larger Islamic world, his credibility is low due to the continuing war in Iraq and Afghanistan and a threatened one in Iran. The recent Times Square bombing attempt is not helping him win his own people over.
But the 21st century belongs to India and China, both belonging to the non-Abrahamic traditions. For a change, the non-conflicting, non-proselytising Asian civilisations are becoming the economic axis of the world and power is shifting. This is an inflexion point in world history.
What should India do in the context of the wars between the children of Abraham? The best thing is to keep quiet and observe. We have groups within India which will try to push India to one side or the other. The radical Islamists will try to localise global issues like the Danish cartoons. Similarly, the politically active church groups will try to globalise local issues like the Orissa riots or the feeble attempts to prevent conversions. But India should stand firm and maintain that we will take care of the problems of Indians internally. Period.
Our attempt should be to become a $5 trillion economy from the current $1.5 trillion over the coming decade. We should be part of the top four or five global economies. A $5 trillion gorilla will be muscular and no one will try to mess around with it, including that failed terror-sponsoring state on our west.

R Vaidya

[ramana]

Vaidya garu, Awesome thinking about the future. What measures must India take to achieve that?

But the 21st century belongs to India and China, both belonging to the non-Abrahamic traditions. For a change, the non-conflicting, non-proselytising Asian civilisations are becoming the economic axis of the world and power is shifting. This is an inflexion point in world history.
What should India do in the context of the wars between the children of Abraham? The best thing is to keep quiet and observe. We have groups within India which will try to push India to one side or the other. The radical Islamists will try to localise global issues like the Danish cartoons. Similarly, the politically active church groups will try to globalise local issues like the Orissa riots or the feeble attempts to prevent conversions. But India should stand firm and maintain that we will take care of the problems of Indians internally. Period.
Our attempt should be to become a $5 trillion economy from the current $1.5 trillion over the coming decade. We should be part of the top four or five global economies. A $5 trillion gorilla will be muscular and no one will try to mess around with it, including that failed terror-sponsoring state on our west.

Even in Cold War India tried the do nothing policy but got sucked into FSU orbit thanks to US aiding TSP.

I have maintained India should not get sucked into any quagmires by willing fools but build and retain all aspects power to make decisive intervention as needed.

Thanks for your article.

[RoyG]

Muslim man's wedding void if woman fails to convert, says HC

PTI, May 11, 2010, 07.38pm IST

ALLAHABAD: The Allahabad High Court has held that a Muslim man's marriage to a woman of another religion shall be considered void and against the tenets of Islam if he fails to get her converted to the religion before wedlock.

In its order, a division bench comprising Justices Vinod Prasad and Rajesh Chandra also ruled that remarriage of a Muslim man shall be held void if he abandons his first wife without divorcing her and fails to treat children born of the marriage in a fair and just manner.

The order was passed on Monday when the bench dismissed a writ petition of one Dilbar Habib Siddiqui, a resident of Allahabad, who had married a Hindu girl named Khushboo on December 29, last year.

Siddiqui had moved the court with the plea to quash the FIR lodged against him by Khushboo's mother Sunita Jaiswal alleging that he had kidnapped her daughter, a minor at that time, and had compelled her to marry him.

Refuting the charges levelled against him in the FIR, Siddiqui produced a copy of Khushboo's high school certificate to prove that she was a major at the time of marriage and her (Khushboo's) representations to higher authorities, upon learning about the FIR, that the marriage was a result of mutual consent.

While holding that having more than one wife is permissible under Islam, the court, however, took strong note of the fact that before tying the knot with Khushboo, Siddiqui had not disclosed to her that he was already married and was the father of three children.

His first wife had appeared before the court during the course of the hearing and alleged that Siddiqui had abandoned her and their three children, compelling them to "live like destitutes".

The court noted that Siddiqui "albeit married, had deceived Khushboo Jaiswal, who did not intimate us that she was in the knowledge of the petitioner's first marriage".

"For a valid Muslim marriage, both the spouses have to be Muslim. In the present writ petition, this condition is not satisfied", the court remarked and quoted from a verse in the Holy Quran which says, "Do not marry unbelieving women until they believe... Nor marry your girls to unbelievers until they believe".

Besides, the petitioner's marriage to Khushboo without divorcing his first wife and not dealing with his three children in a fair and just manner was "against the tenets of the Holy Quran" and hence "cannot be legally sanctified", the court said.

The bench quoted the following verse from the holy book while making the above observation - "Marry woman of your choice, two, three or four; But if you fear that you shall not be able to deal justly (with them), then only one... that would be more suitable to prevent you from doing injustice".

Dismissing the petition, the court directed that investigations in the impugned FIR be conducted expeditiously and authorities of the Nari Niketan, where Khushboo is currently housed, hand her over to her parents.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/indi ... 918103.cms

[sanjaykumar]

Our attempt should be to become a $5 trillion economy from the current $1.5 trillion over the coming decade. We should be part of the top four or five global economies. A $5 trillion gorilla will be muscular and no one will try to mess around with it, including that failed terror-sponsoring state on our west.



This will be the greatest catastrophe to befall Christendom and Islam over the last two millenia. Not because India is particularly antagonistic to the two, but because it is fundamentally indifferent.

[Prem]

5 Trillion Dollar Economy with 1T in reserve (Manly in Gold) and real Muscular Military to back up any indian initiative in World arena. MMS, do have the economic vision , next one must move and oil the Military wheels. Great thing is that economic and military vision is realistic and can be easlily achieved in 10 years. It will be a smooth ride after this as this will be the first phase of Indic arrival, the fruit of the sacrifices of 40-60 generation. Next stop, next vison by the post 70-80 generation ,cleaning the house and the neighborhood as well quadrupple the economy by 2032.

[Prem]

Will they ever learn and let our country go
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2010/05/fatwa ... amily.html

LUCKNOW: Darul Uloom Deoband, the self-appointed guardian for Indian Muslims, in a Talibanesque fatwa that reeked of tribal patriarchy, has decreed that it is "haram" and illegal according to the Sharia for a family to accept a woman's earnings. Clerics at the largest Sunni Muslim seminary after Cairo's Al-Azhar said the decree flowed from the fact that the Sharia prohibited proximity of men and women in the workplace.
"It is unlawful (under the Sharia law) for Muslim women to work in the government or private sector where men and women work together and women have to talk with men frankly and without a veil," said the fatwa issued by a bench of three clerics. The decree was issued over the weekend, but became public late on Monday, seminary sources said....The fatwa, however, drew flak among other clerics."Men and women in Sharia are entitled to equal rights. If men follow the Sharia, there is no reason why women can't work with them," said Rasheed, the Naib Imam of Lucknow's main Eidgah Mosque in Aishbagh

[derkonig]

^^^^
Tiger don't change their stripes and donkeys don't grow horns. Somethings don't change by themselves. They need to be changed via external stimuli.
Besides, has burkha dutt, suzanna roy & the rest of the enlightened pink chaddi banshee brigade cared to speak out on this? What about the NCW? They surely didn't loose any time investigating the Mangalore pub incidents.

[ramana]

RVaidya garu, $5T is not too far if we go by this report!!!

http://www.forbes.com/2010/05/11/china- ... gechannels
Intelligent Investing
India Or Bust
Richard Kang,

The fifth-largest economy in the world tells a story U.S. investors need to hear.

There has been much focus on China, but we know that the Indian economy has been hot, hence the recent monetary policy tightening by its central bank to control inflation. In addition, positive sentiment within India about their own economic situation, second to China, is extremely high, according to the Pew Global Attitudes Project. Furthermore, the Chinese economy has been so focused on exports and now on greater reliance of domestic consumption of those goods, while India can compete globally and domestically on a different front since their economy has a strong bias to services to enhance the production of goods.And what's more, India boasts the fifth-largest economy in the world, with a reported annual gross domestic product of $3.56 trillion, growing at a rate of 8.5% annually over the last five years, according to Deutsche Bank ( DB - news - people ) research (U.S. has grown U.S. 2.5% annually; U.K., 2.3%
The country runs at a fiscal deficit of 6.6% of GDP. Reserves of foreign exchange and gold are at about $287.5 billion and they have a savings rate of 35% of GDP with an investment rate of 32.1% of GDP, including a handsome chunk earmarked for infrastructure

I guess this PPP

[AjayKK]

Caste and liberals

R Jagannathan Wednesday, May 12, 2010

There has been much liberal hand-wringing over the Centre’s decision to include a caste-count in the 2011 census. This is wrong-headed because a caste-count is not going to promote further casteism just as its absence will not usher in a caste-free society. If we have a reasonably accurate estimate of how many people belong to what caste, we can at least know where we stand.

Of course, no caste enumeration is going to be right. In the last count in 1931, the British found that entire groups of jatis used the opportunity to move up the hierarchy. This time around, the reverse could happen. Our guilt-ridden upper classes may stop indicating their castes while the rest may try to up their numbers in the hope of pressing for more reservations. What is not going away is our obsession with caste.

The real problem with caste is the liberals’ approach to it. Thanks to a deep sense of guilt about the inequities of the system, the Indian liberal (which usually means upper caste Hindus) is overapologetic about caste, and refuses to make peace with it. He is thus giving caste-based politicians an emotional handle with which they can stifle rational arguments for change and greater inclusiveness.

It is time for all liberals, and especially the Hindu upper classes, to abandon unwarranted guilt about caste. Caste may have originated in the religious-civilisational system we now call Hinduism, but it is owned by all Indians. Islam and Christianity have embraced caste even though these religions have no scriptural sanction for it. The bottomline: caste is an Indian system rather than just a Hindu albatross.

Caste is not something that could have been invented by anyone. It can grow only when almost everybody accepts it. It grew from this soil and struck deep roots. With every invasion and religious or reformist attack, its roots went deeper. Caste has proved to be a stronger binding force than religion precisely because it is rooted in Indian realities.

The biggest attacks on caste —all futile — have come from sons of the soil, and not Islamic invaders or Christian proselytisers, as some liberals are prone to believe. The Buddha didn’t succeed. Neither did Vivekananda, Kabir, Guru Nanak, Ram Mohun Roy, Dayanand Saraswati, Ramanujam, or even Gandhi and Ambedkar. All frontal attacks on caste have been repulsed. The post-Ambedkar Dalits, and especially Kanshi Ram and Mayawati, have gone the other way and embraced caste with a vengeance.

They opted for a political consolidation of the Dalits and lower castes. The other backward castes have also made a virtue of caste consolidation and reaped huge gains from it — it started in the south and moved north. In the south, caste oppression today means non-Brahmin oppression of the lowest castes.

To get an arm around caste, you first need to understand it. For one, it is not just a system of discrimination; it became one. Caste is about kinship and community ties. It offers a protective cocoon for members in turbulent times. Caste will weaken and disappear only when people feel secure about themselves and their future. It will dissolve when the state protects individual rights, without necessarily setting it against community rights.

Caste survived in India because we took a different approach to diversity. In the west, diversity was treated as a threat, and thus met with annihilation and destruction. The Americans annihilated the Red Indians, the Australians massacred the aborigines, and so on. Ambedkar, quoting 19th century French theorist Ernest Renan, makes much the same point about the role of brutality and extermination in creating homogeneity in society. “Unity is ever achieved by brutality. The union of northern and southern France was the result of an extermination, and of a reign of terror that lasted for nearly a hundred years.”

In India, diversity was not seen as a threat. The approach was to accommodate, with minimal violence, different groups without disturbing the power structure. This is how castes grew with every invasion, with every expansion of the Hindu economy. In hindsight, perhaps we could have achieved a casteless society through much brutality in the past. But we chose the other route of peace and compromise.

Does this mean caste, and its negative consequences, will be with us forever? Not quite. Market forces, urbanisation and globalisation are chipping away at the edifice. It will be diluted in due course. Socially, we can help the process by making simple changes in the institution of caste by drawing up objective entry and exit rules. Caste cannot remain an institution driven purely by birth. Once it behaves like a regular club, with proper entry and exit rules, its worst excesses will tone down. We can allow demography and market forces to finish the job.

Liberals should not wallow in guilt about caste. They need to reform caste, not fight it.

http://www.dnaindia.com/opinion/column_ ... ls_1382398

[RoyG]

Caste as we know it today is a colonial construct.

Reforming caste? The government should just leave it alone.

Let the people decide what it means and I'm sure it'll go away for the most part.

Active forms of tolerance just end up making things a whole lot worse.

Let's not secularize caste.

Why can't the gov just provide an efficient court and tax system, sound currency, policing, private and public property records, & national defense?

[ramana]

I wonder if we need a decolonizing the Indian mind thread? Now bollywood fashists are aping Western clothes with wrong physiques!

EDITS | Friday, May 21, 2010 | Email | Print |


The absurdity of it all

Sunanda K Datta-Ray

Aquaint notice in Chennai’s Madras Gymkhana Club (sounds tautological until one remembers that the ‘Madras’ doesn’t refer to the city but is an integral part of the club’s name) underscores the complexities of the dress code that baffles many Indians. A sign permits men to appear in the mixed bar in “bush coat, shirt, open neck shirt with collar with slacks, shoes and socks or sandals without socks” at certain hours. It’s the “without socks” that some think is a concession to India, modernity or the climate. It’s not. It’s asserting the old British rule that socks are never worn with sandals.

Indians tend to wear what they please. But the political symbolism of clothes more than compensates for sartorial anarchy. There are as many fashions as there are Indians which may convey a message about anarchy of a more fundamental kind in India that is Bharat.

Some indigenous foibles are as absurd as those the British left behind. There can be no justification for khadi, for instance, when India is trying desperately to catch up with the West’s industrial revolution. Nor for the sentimental value attached to minimalist attire. Both can be traced to Mahatma Gandhi whose famous reply — “His Majesty wore enough for both of us!” — when asked if he really saw King George V in his scanty dhotiis regarded as the epitome of swadeshi virtue.

{I beg to differ. The Mahtma's dress code was to who his empathy for the people of his land. It also could be seens a a partial rejection of Western supremacy of ideas. Khadi has its place in the marketplace and let the market determine its relevance.}


Debates like the one over graduate gowns are usually ignited by political operators hankering for the headlines. That is part of public life. Many years ago, Mr Rajmohan Gandhi, the writer and academic, was refused entry into the Madras Club, Chennai’s grandest, for being in slippers. Again, the suspicion of a calculated gesture of defiance could not be ruled out for Chakravarti Rajagopalachari’s grandson must have known everything there is to be known about the city that was then Madras.

Unfortunately, the presumed motives of such actions rob the actions themselves of value. There is a sound case for not perpetuating sartorial regulations we barely comprehend and which are as far removed from Indian reality as the casteless society of Jawaharlal Nehru’s dreams. But rejection cannot be convincing if it is not based on knowledge. I was at a formal banquet once where a leading Bollywood actor flaunted with his brocade jacket a long black tie such as one sees only at Christian funerals. Questioned, he whipped out the invitation card which specified ‘black tie’. Bollywood was unaware in those days of innocence before stellar Indians began to flit to Cannes that black tie means dinner jacket as opposed to ‘white tie’ which stands for tails.

Kolkata preserved this ritual of dressing longer than other Indian cities. Black tie was assumed for dinner and even cocktails (on the presumption that you were going on to dine) when the card was silent about dress. ‘Informal’ signified lounge suit. ‘Red Sea kit’ was everything that black tie decreed except the jacket. Instead, a cummerbund could be flaunted. The much later ‘smart casual’ allowed males to indulge in gaily coloured silks or vivid prints. No code was imposed on women who strove to look as different from each other as men strove in those days to look alike.

There is no reason for Indians to be a prisoner of these distinctions. But let us not make fools of ourselves in following them like that Bollywood star. Or make a ridiculous song and dance over trivia. If you don’t like the dress stipulations of a club or restaurant, the honourable thing is to ignore the place. To go there only to flout its rules is childish posturing.

The British made some concessions to the climate. They excused judges and lawyers from wearing wigs in court. White cotton bands at the neck could be replaced with ordinary collar and tie. But they still insisted on black jackets and gowns. Apart from often being shabby and seedy, the combination must be torture, especially in district courts subject to power cuts. In fact, one reason for the huge backlog of cases is that hearings are repeatedly adjourned when the electricity fails. I know that from experience.

{My father had collarless white shirts with a box of collars to wear. by the 70s these were antiques! The advent of ready made shirts (Mafatlal etc) dispensed with the detachable collar models}

Now, the parents of some Chennai kindergarten schoolchildren are objecting to leather shoes and ties, complaining that with the temperature nearing 40 degrees Celsius, both are uncomfortable for the little creatures. The authorities seem prepared to meet them half way. Ties can be dispensed with in summer, they say, but shoes are a must. It’s an understandable regulation. Shoes can make for uniformity. The alternative of sandals cannot be similarly regulated; it’s a short step, too, from sandals to slippers and from slippers to bare feet. There are circumstances in which children should be encouraged to romp around on the grass without shoes but bare feet in the dirt and dust of our cities — Chennai is no exception — are hardly to be recommended.

All this confusion arises because there is no natural national dress. Regardless of party affiliation, our politicians have lately taken to draping South Indian angavastrams (red border on one side, green on the other) round their necks, like a chaprassi’s uniform. But there is no uniformity otherwise. As Ambassador to the US, Mr Siddhartha Shankar Ray presented his credentials in Washington in a flowing dhoti over which he draped an ancestral doroka Kashmiri shawl. But as Ambassador to Mongolia, Mr Karma Topden was warned that his native ankle-length kho would make him indistinguishable from old-fashioned Mongolian notables, while Mongolia’s President uninhibitedly sported a Western-style lounge suit as China’s leaders have done ever since Premier Zhao Ziyang boasted of the cut of his suits.

{SHQ used to say Mr. SSRay was draped more conservatively in his shawl, then his wife Mrs. Maya Ray!}

JBS Haldane, the British scientist who made India his home, ridiculed Nehru’s partiality for the sherwani, claiming it was as foreign as tails or dinner jacket, being copied from earlier Muslim conquerors. The prince coat favoured by some politicians when abroad (PV Narasimha Rao, Jyoti Basu, Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Mr Manmohan Singh) is only a truncated sherwani.

Some might say there is no national garb because there is no Indian nation. It’s each for himself. Even the sahib dancing at a Boxing Day celebration in the Madras Gym’s commemorative book looks dressed for work while his memsahib is outrageously attired in three-quarter jeans (cargo pants?) and sneakers without socks. No wonder night enveloped an empire whose representatives couldn’t live up to their own codes.

-- sunandadr@yahoo.co.in

A timely article when I see the TV networks.

[ramana]

There werw posts about the shifting of power in UPA-II term.

Op-Ed in Pioneer describes the matter.

Sonia Takes charge of Policy


A corrobaration of what was suspected here for sometime.

[Prem]

Hinduja to Buy KBC’s Private Bank for $1.69 Billion (Update3)
May 21 (Bloomberg) -- India’s Hinduja Group, controlled by billionaire brothers Srichand and Gopichand Hinduja, agreed to buy KBC Groep NV’s private bank for 1.35 billion euros ($1.69 billion) to expand its wealth-management business in Europe.Hinduja Group, based in Mumbai, plans to complete the purchase of Luxembourg-based KBL European Private Bankers SA, which has 47.4 billion euros of assets under management, in the third quarter. Brussels-based KBC said it will take a charge of about 300 million euros in the current quarter.KBL employs 466 private bankers in 10 European countries, adding to Hinduja’s wealth-management business in Switzerland.

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-0 ... ate3-.html

[RamaY]

There is a systemic effort to undermine non-congress govts.

Apparently Karnataka Governor H.R Bharadvaj gave a notice to the Karnataka mining minister Gali Janardhan Reddy. Here the question is not about Mr. Gali. It is about the governor's capacity to give notices to state cabinet minister. He is supported by central justice minister Mr Veerappa Moily.

If this is the case 90% state cabinet ministers must receive governor notices on one or the other pretext.

Looks like history is repeating. Perhaps Sonia/Rahul are repeating 1974-84 congress coterie politics. It will be detrimental to their own interests in the long run.

[Prem]

English skills raise wages for some, not all, in India
Does it pay to speak English? This column presents evidence from India that being fluent in English increases the hourly wages of men by 34% and of women by 22%. But the effects vary. Returns are higher for older and more educated workers and lower for less educated, younger workers, suggesting that English is becoming a complement to education.One in five Indian adults can speak English. Four percent report that they can converse fluently in English, and an additional 16% report that they can converse a little in English according to the 2005 India Human Development Survey. English-speaking ability is higher among men (26% of men speak at least a little English, compared to 14% of women), younger people, more educated people, higher castes, and urban residents. Figure 1 shows mean English ability by states or union territory. The smaller territories tend to have the highest English ability, suggesting that English serves as a working language in a linguistically diverse country where people will often not share a mother tongue.

http://www.voxeu.org/index.php?q=node/5099

[Adrija]

Strongly recommend this book for everyone interested in this particular thread

http://www.flipkart.com/becoming-indian ... 0670083461


Apologies if already covered

[Prem]

India divided over question in census about caste identity
By Tim Sullivan
NEW DELHI — Bollywood’s biggest star has an answer ready if census workers ask about his caste: “Indian.’’
NOte how an BC EJ trying best to damage Indian society.

http://www.boston.com/news/world/asia/a ... _identity/


“My father never believed in caste, and neither do any of us,’’ Amitabh Bachchan wrote in his obsessively followed blog.\
Comments like Bachchan’s are common in modern India, which prides itself on how it has transcended some of its most rigid traditions — and those beliefs are being heard more often as the government debates whether the national census should delve into caste.But Joseph D’Souza doesn’t believe such talk for a moment.“When it comes to sharing power, to interaction, to sharing social status, low-caste Indians are very much marginalized,’’ he said, arguing the census could provide firm data about the vast divisions.India’s census, being held in stages over the next year or so, delves into the wealth, living conditions, and other personal details of the country’s 1.2 billion people. But still undecided is one question — “What is your caste?’’ — that has infuriated much of India’s elite, energized caste-based political parties, and left in doubt millions of government jobs and university slots.The debate has also made very clear that caste, the Hindu custom that for millennia has divided people in a strict social hierarchy based on their family’s traditional livelihood and ethnicity, remains a deeply sensitive subject.“The biggest issue [with the census] is the inability of India to come to terms with this really ingenious form of discrimination,’’ D’Souza said.Bachchan, who has dominated Bollywood for decades, proudly says his family has married across India’s vast geographic spectrum — with a Bengali, a Sindhi, a Punjabi, and a Mangalorean. But D’Souza notes that none of those relatives are low caste and that the movie industry has not one dalit star.The question’s fiercest backers include India’s most powerful caste politicians, who believe they could use the census data as fodder for votes and government funding.Its bitterest opponents include much of the establishment. “At one stroke, it trivializes all that modern India has stood for, and condemns it to the tyranny of an insidious kind of identity politics,’’ Pratap Bhanu Mehta, a prominent Indian commentator, wrote in the Indian Express newspaper.
The last Indian census that measured castes was in 1931, when colonial Britain still ruled.
http://www.boston.com/news/world/asia/a ... _identity/

[jaibhim]

Our attempt should be to become a $5 trillion economy from the current $1.5 trillion over the coming decade. We should be part of the top four or five global economies. A $5 trillion gorilla will be muscular and no one will try to mess around with it, including that failed terror-sponsoring state on our west.



This will be the greatest catastrophe to befall Christendom and Islam over the last two millenia. Not because India is particularly antagonistic to the two, but because it is fundamentally indifferent.

Without primary education, social justice, sound R&D, a judiciary that delivers and a police and RPF that is not perceived as a goonda [we need not reminisce our Bhagyanagari express journeys when the RPF rudely pushes away the rural couple who want to alight at odella for some place to sit parking the arcane rifle aside and forcefully offloads the palli seller's ground nuts for himselfand when asked to pay for it uses his cane and out come the expletives ].
I have seen quite a few policewomen and men in the UK and they seem to the diametric contrast to our potbellied starved frustrated cauvery bhavan constable who is doing menial jobs of the powerful memsahib like carrying her slippers instead of preventing theft , concrete research and development programs that have rigorous monitoring programs of targets and results and that begins in the phd stage itself[no one can make the university as a brothel or live and riot for 20 years as a research scholar a despicable name], emphasis on primary science and hard core engineering[foundational kind] research a 1000 more IISc centres of excellence, where plagerism in research is a crime and is fit for humilation and punishment, sound state development mechanisms that deliver justice and economic growth to the bottom pile, merciless war on corruption the root cause of all problems and as Bardhan points out bringing more people out of poverty; a trillion dollar economy is a joke, a pipe dream worthy of another sobbing guradian article of snake dancing boys! Will Indian politicians travel with other common passengers in SL? In the UK they seem to be doing away with chauffeurs. One is not enamored but credit ought to given where it is due.

[svinayak]

Without primary education, social justice, sound R&D, a judiciary that delivers and a police and RPF that is not perceived as a goonda

All of the above is acheived by leadership. Your post and lot of others do not even mention that word. Our political system does not create leadership in the system. Without that country cannot inspire people[huge population] to change and progress.

[RamaY]

That leadership must bring clarity of national purpose too.

[svinayak]

That leadership must bring clarity of national purpose too.

That is implicit in that role

[RamaY]

Just wanted to be clear Acharya-ji. For majority indians Rajamata, Rahulbaba, Karunanidhi, Lalloo, Diggi raja, Burkhadutt, Suzanne Roy, Maoists, Prakash/Brinda Karat, KCR etc are leaders.

[svinayak]

Just wanted to be clear Acharya-ji. For majority indians Rajamata, Rahulbaba, Karunanidhi, Lalloo, Diggi raja, Burkhadutt, Suzanne Roy, Maoists, Prakash/Brinda Karat, KCR etc are leaders.

I will be blunt. Lot of media created leaders have been created in the last 20 years.

[brihaspati]

Same old problem of chicken and egg. If correct leadership only can create the correct system which only can create the correct leadership, neither correct leadership nor correct system can ever be.

This is a classic problem of transition of societies from one system to another. Nowehere in the world it has been achieved democratically. Transitions of societies always take place under dictatorial conditions. That dictatorship could be that of an individual, or a party, or even an external force. The key factor is that the dictatorial entity wants to change the system and it is not dependent on the major portion of the system it wants to change, for its power to change the system.

Every histroical change one can think of as proper examples of profoundly changing systems, will always throw up this "dictatorial" angle.

[Pranav]

Same old problem of chicken and egg. If correct leadership only can create the correct system which only can create the correct leadership, neither correct leadership nor correct system can ever be.

This is a classic problem of transition of societies from one system to another. Nowehere in the world it has been achieved democratically. Transitions of societies always take place under dictatorial conditions. That dictatorship could be that of an individual, or a party, or even an external force. The key factor is that the dictatorial entity wants to change the system and it is not dependent on the major portion of the system it wants to change, for its power to change the system.

Every histroical change one can think of as proper examples of profoundly changing systems, will always throw up this "dictatorial" angle.

Not necessarily B ji. Consider Turkey, which has transitioned from being controlled by a secular Military (allegedly dominated by the Donmeh crypto-Shabbatian sect), and allied with Israel and the US, to a more traditionalist government more reflective of the Anatolian peasantry and conservative middle classes.

But the key thing for peaceful change is a genuine democracy, which cannot be guaranteed under an electronic voting regime.

[ramana]

Actually what is needed is true representative govt. What the get is fake democracy with chosen representatives to be stamped with approval.