Babudom and Netaland

One thing that I badly missed during my two year stint in UK was books of my taste. Though there were government libraries providing books free of cost, I rarely found books of my liking. Now that I am back in India, I am on a reading spree since past 9 months. Ideally, I should write a review of at least half of them but the reviews are written best if you write them just after you finish the book. So let’s leave them at that.

Currently the book that is featuring on my pillow is a class 'Journeys Through Babudom And Netaland' by retired IAS officer T.S.R Subramanian who last served as cabinet secretary in Government of India. He is someone who has seen and worked with bureaucrats and politicians from close quarters. The book is a real insight and first hand account of the red tapism and the corruption which is prevalent till the roots in public sector. A perfect blend of humour and satire. It portrays the moment of frustrations he had during his 37 years of service most of which were spent as the collector or district magistrate of small districts in UP.

It’s a must read for nonfiction lovers. There are so many anecdotes that I can mention but this one takes the cake :

"Contrast this with K K Dass, who had been chief secretary of UP in 1960's, and retired from service sometime in 70's.When he served as secretary to the Union Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, his minister was the late Uma Shankar Dikshit. Dikshit soon thereafter became the home minister of India, and his staff officer Rajgopal, a dear friend of mine, showed me a file with exchange of correspondence between Dikshit and KK Dass. On his retirement,Dass had written a polite letter thanking Dikshit for all the courtesies extended to him and formally bidding farewell to him.The next letter in the file was the copy of an acknowledgement from the home minister to Dass, with a paragraph added, asking whether Dass would be available for a gubernatorial assignment. It is the home minister who usually initiates the proposals for the post of governor in the various states; and it was not a casual offer. Dikshit had made a mention on the file that he had discussed the matter with prime minister. In his reply, which is on record, Dass said that he was flattered and overwhelmed by the kindness shown by the home minister.Then he went on to add "I have served the Government of India for nearly 40 years. During this time, I have neglected the two true loves of my life -- my wife and my rose garden. Could the home minister excuse me and allow me to spend the few remaining years of my life in the company of my wife and the roses"

Such men existed!

Cheers!

Where are students?

About 5 years back I visited Hyderabad for the first time. One thing that caught my eye was the number of billboards advertising upcoming or ongoing Telugu/Tamil movies. Sheer number took me by surprise. Almost 80% of the billboards were displaying giant images of movies and it seemed as if whole city was painted by them. Cut to Pune, Oct'08. Here, movies were replaced by the advertisements of upcoming residential societies, Villas and and Apartments.


Two weeks back, I visited my hometown, Gwalior. For Geographically challenged (and I am one of them) its one of the city in Madhya Pradesh. Whole city was carrying large hoardings of new and existing colleges and institutes. Education is not new here. Gwalior had become an educational hub even 15 years back when coaching classes for PET, PMT and IIT mushroomed everywhere. This time I saw a number of hoardings attracting students for engineering, BBA, BCA, MBA, nursing, B. Ed, D. Ed etc. When I cleared my engineering entrance exam in 1999, there were 4 engineering colleges there and now I am told there are 25! I wondered who would be their potential students and wont they find it difficult to attract students. The other obvious question was the capability of the owners of these 'self financed' colleges and Institutes to cough up requisite facilities, campus and labs to start them.


I got my answer today when I read ' No students yet for 42 engineering colleges in Tamilnadu' on times website.


Only 27 colleges including Anna University's three constituent departments and government-run institutions have managed to fill up more than 96% of the available seats in various courses. "Less than 15 seats (1 to 10%) have been filled up in 177 engineering colleges, while 8 colleges have recorded an admission rate of 91 to 95%,"


So the situation is same everywhere. Now we have got a number of sub standard colleges owned by the rich and powerful but no students to join them. This too when every 'gali ka chora' is doing engineering and BCA these days. I heard that the same is happening even with the institutes as elite as IITs. With the number of IITs increased to 13 now, there is a dearth of students even there!


This is a glaring example when you start doing something just to showcase progress on paper. Education is the mirror of the society and the country and its high on every government's agenda be it central or state. Just to show that we are making progress permissions are being granted to all kinds of bogus institutes. This is to enable government to take the credit for opening so many colleges and institutes (needless to say these permissions are being granted in the most corrupt way) and we end up having colleges without students.


Soon we will see colleges distributing cash prizes to the student taking admissions in their institute and soon the headline ' Take admission and get two free tickets to Bangkok' wont be a joke!


Cheers!

Legend

I am not sure why a sporting event as gruelling as Tour de France is not covered extensively either in print or in electronic media. I understand that an event which spreads over 23 days does not attract too much attention from public but then then a race which requires participants to cover 3,500 Kms through steep climbs and arduous terrains throughout France and bordering countries and a race which can be termed as the ultimate test of human stamina deserves a bit more respect. Tour de France 2009 concluded two days back and any of the 1000+ news channels hardly covered it. I dont want to write about the winner. The guy is supremely fit 26 year old.

Lance Armstrong, a seven time Tour de France champion, at the age of 37 years stood 3rd. Now thats an achievement. Now consider this. He retired from professional cycling 3 years back after winning the event consecutively between 1999 and 2006 and returned from retirement only this year.

That he battled life threatening cancer disease at the age of 25 ( before winning any of his titles) make him the stuff of a legend. Two years back I got a chance to read his autobiography, Its not about bike and it had a deep impact on me.

Those who are looking for some inspiration from real life heroes, this book is a must read.

PS: Dont read his second book, Every second counts. That was written only to milk the success of his first!

Cheers!

Tears...

...sometimes its good to shed a tear or two...your gender not withstanding...

The Maestro

You must have read hundreds of articles on him. I have.

This is one that touched me.

Yes. Bit long but then all good things don't come in small packages!

Cheers!

The mystery of 49-O

Since the terror attacks, there is a flood of mails cursing the politicians, need for change and asking people to use Rule 49-O of ‘The Conduct of Election Rules’. There seems to be loads of myths associated with this rule. Even the websites on the net are providing wrong information (Check THIS and THIS) let alone social networking forums. This post is just to break a few myths associated with Rule 49-O.


49-O is not an article of Indian Constitution. Its one of the Rule of ‘The Conduct of election Rules .


Under this rule, you can visit the polling booth, identify yourself to the presiding officer at the booth and then inform him that you do not intend to vote anybody. Please note that in the process your identity will be revealed which is against the essence of Secret Ballot. This is just a way to indicate that you voted (So your vote cannot be misused) but not in favor of any candidate. Your vote would be a part of official counting numbers but it won’t have any impact on the outcome of the results.


Under no conditions there would be any re polling or cancellation of elections.


A few sites suggests if the no. of ‘ voted nobody’ is greater than the winning margin then the election would be declared void and there will be re-polling. Some even suggests that these candidates cannot be a part of re election process. These are baseless statements.

Cheers.

Terrorist Attack...2

Indian media is terming the recent terror attacks in Mumbai as 'India's 9/11'. I agree, it was. Hundreds were killed at WTC and large number of people were injured. Same happened at Taj, Oberoi and Nariman house. But let me assure you that the similarity will end there. Don’t fool yourself thinking that there will be preventive measures or stringent actions against terrorist outfits as done by America. Political eyewash has already started. RR Patil has resigned, Shivraj Patil has been shown the door and Vilasrao Deshmukh has followed the suit.

This was not the first time when the ‘new age terror’ struck India nor it will be the last. Not so long ago, we have witnessed attack on the Parliament (which was also termed as attack on Indian soul or something), blasts in Jaipur, Bombay local trail serial blasts, operation B.A.D just to name a few. Every time we saw the rhetoric of politicians, blame game from the ones in opposition, promises of strong actions against terrorism and appeal to remain calm to the people of India in the hour of crisis. Needless to say, nothing concrete happens.

The problem lies elsewhere. These terrorists are not interested in killing a certain number of people. They make bold statements. That your parliament is vulnerable. That the life line of Mumbai can be cut. That the premier cities of India can be made to bleed at will with well planned serial blasts. Even they now know how soft we are on terror. Afzal Guru is a glaring example. What will come out of this Taj/Oberoi investigation? May be it will throw some names and a few arrests. What will we do with them when we cannot hang Afzal Guru even after Supreme Court ruling is a big question.

It’s been a decade since we are asking for a permanent seat in the UN Security Council. Not sure how much we are going to add there when we have bigger security issues at home.

Much has been made of Mumbai’s undying spirit and its ability to bounce back. In this very spirit of Mumbai, politicians used to take shade in. For me, it’s not the spirit; it’s the hunger, the need to work for millions of Mumbaikars who cannot afford to sit back for a day or two as it would mean empty stomach at the end of the day. Is there any option left to the common man other than going to work and start doing the routine? This time even that spirit was broken. Mumbai didn’t bounce back for 4 days.

Whenever there are talks of national security, only two parties participate, Congress & BJP. Rest like NCP, SP, BSP, DMK, TDP, ABC, KBC, KKHH, HAHK goes into hibernation as if it’s not their headache. They come out of their hiding only when its time to form a coalition. In few days time, general elections will stare these political parties and all will get busy in deciding candidates, election rallies and India Shining campaigns. They will do what they can do best, Talks and Promises. As far as this media is concerned, somebody will fall into a bore well soon and they will be on their way to capture the ‘news of national importance’.

As for us, nothing will change.