The news item is titled “Subramanian Swamy wants ATM-like receipts after casting vote through EVMs.” As Baldrick would have said, “That’s a very cunning plan, my lord.” And as Blackadder would have replied, “It is also bollocks.”

In today’s Business Standard, Pranab Bardhan in his article “India — A case of bad governance“, makes a number of very important points.

It’s been a while since I caught up with my contrarian friend CJ. I asked him what he’s been up to. I nearly dropped the phone when he said that he read in the newspapers that Indian elections were announced. It wasn’t the news of the impending elections that jolted me – I knew that already. The admission that CJ read a newspaper that was shocking.

So it’s time to unveil the IT policy that I had been promising for a while. I have already laid a bit of ground work in the previous three posts — “BJP’s IT for All“, “A Rational IT Policy: The Preliminary Bits“, and “Of IT and Pascal’s Wager.” In the following, I will conclude the introduction with a brief discussion on tools as means, and then present my version of a rational IT policy.

Elections are the most visible of the external trappings of the institution called democracy. Democracy, like other important institutions that support a liberal civil society, has an inside structure — a deep back-end — that is not visible. What you see is definitely not all that there is. There is an internal structure to this institution without which it is only a facsimile and not the real object. It could be a cargo-cult democracy.

We are urban Indians and we number around 400 million. Our aspirations are principally related to working hard for a living, caring for our families, educating our children, and being good and responsible citizens.
As an urban Indian, I will vote for a party that promotes the values that matter to my country, my family, and me. I address this open letter to the political parties who seek my vote in the upcoming elections. Drop me a line if you can credibly demonstrate that you share the concerns and values that …

Although I had planned to, I will not be attending the “5th National Conference on Electoral and Political Reforms” of the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR). It’s happening in Mumbai, and I alas, am in Pune. My colleague Rajesh Jain is going there to be on a panel on “The role of business and Government.” Rajesh mentions on his blog the context of the event.
Since 2002, the major impacts of these campaigns have been on criminalization of politics, and transparency in candidate and political party assets. Leaders of both …

Institutions as Ideas
Institutions defined most generally are essentially ideas. They are big ideas, ideas that are persistent and which have a profound effect on the populations that evolve, and adopt, the ideas. Examples of powerful institutions – therefore powerful ideas – are easy to find: markets, state constitutions, legal systems, systems of governance, and so on. The institution called democracy is also an idea. The instantiation of an idea — its embodiment or implementation or incarnation – varies from place to place, and from time to time. How an institution …

Newly educated and semi-educated classes – social or intellectual – seek positions in government bureaucracies or social advocacy rather than in industry and commerce where competence is inarguably measured at the end of every business quarter. The growth of bureaucracies needed to absorb these swaggering imbeciles is precisely opposed to society’s growth and development both as direct philosophical enemy and as infinitely hungry sump to resources otherwise needed to support productive endeavors.
From “Uncle Al” in a post on the usenet years ago. I spent years on the usenet, the grand-daddy …

Anyone familiar with the disastrous state of India should not be overly surprised to learn that the Indian parliament has an overwhelmingly greater percentage of criminals than the general population. How effectively a nation functions and how successful it is depends on its leaders who make public policy and thus critically determine the outcome. India’s failure to develop and achieve its potential is proof positive that its leadership is lacking.
Underdevelopment, poverty, and all other ills that plague India are an unavoidable consequence of poor public policies and choices.

Is this the much tom-tommed Indian democracy? The convicted 6 who may decide UPA’s fate:
Among those who hold the key to the survival or fall of the government on July 22 are six jailed MPs, some convicted on serious charges like murder, others accused of heinous crimes. Check out the men who both sides are seeking to woo to win that day.

Pappu Yadav alias Rajesh Ranjan
RJD, Purnea, Bihar
SENTENCED in Feb 2008 for life for murder of former CPM MLA Ajit Sarkar in 1998.

Suraj Bhan
LJSP, Balia, Bihar
SENTENCED To …

According to a report in today’s Rediff on Karnataka’s new government, many of the members of the legislative assembly (or MLAs, those who make the laws of the state) are criminals. The report leads off with details of what the personal wealth of some of the MLAs are but later, almost as an afterthought, mentions that many have criminal charges pending against them:

Only recently did I become aware that there is a local politician in Mumbai named Raj Thackeray and that he has been inciting people to violence to stop non-Marathi speaking people from migrating to Mumbai. The man, in my considered opinion, is a certifiable idiot and an evil one at that. But then there is nothing particularly remarkable in Raj Thackeray’s quest for votes through divisive politics. The British quite successfully implemented it and ever since political independence, politicians across the spectrum have been dividing India along regional, caste, and …

I have previously observed here that India has what I call a “cargo cult democracy.” In India’s neighborhood that is not a distinction. The entire Indian subcontinent suffers from that malady. The short version is that around here democracy as practiced is a simulation, a facsimile that should not be confused with the real thing that has something to do with informed choice based on differing perceptions of priorities that matter in the larger scheme of things.
Informed choice is not a matter that can be delegated to people who are …

India is the largest democracy in the world. Or so it is said. It must be because they have elections and what nots. Cargo cult democracy perhaps but democracy none the less.
So here’s the latest cargo-cultish news about Indian democracy. A man who has been a cook to the Nehru-Gandhi family for decades has been rewarded for his loyalty by the Nehru-Gandhi family — his son has been given a Congress ticket.

Character and culture determine destiny. Every time our great “democracy” throws up corrupt immoral shortsighted asinine “leaders” — which is happening with sickening regularity — it is important to remind ourselves that it is the “will of the people” expressed unambiguously through the political process. The nature of the leaders and their policies bear a direct relationship to the basic nature of the people. This is my theory and I continually seek facts to support an alternate not so cynical theory. So far I am unsuccessful.
I was …

One is forced to the generalization that at the level of the individual it is all exogenous, while at the level of the society, it is all endogenous. Take the market, for instance. To an individual, price is something that is a given and whether he or she participates in the market or not, cannot change the price. Price is determined externally and is indifferent to the efforts of the individual. It arises from almost magically from the collective interactions of the individuals in the market. Price arises out of, …

We all know that the government of India is secular because they proclaim it as so. Therefore it must be so. Secularism by assertion. So also we know that in India freedom of expression is a right — as long as what is expressed is in line with the ruling coalition’s preferences.
Ventatesh Rangarajan pointed me to a news item on IBNLive which says “Anti-Congress” Blogs blocked.
The block against various websites has been lifted but the ban is still in place.
It seems there is a definite slant to the websites …

“When a candidate for public office faces the voters he does not face men of sense; he faces a mob of men whose chief distinguishing mark is the fact that they are quite incapable of weighing ideas, or even of comprehending any save the most elemental — men whose whole thinking is done in terms of emotion, and whose dominant emotion is dread of what they cannot understand. So confronted, the candidate must either bark with the pack or be lost… All the odds are on the man who is, …

The most powerful man in the world is an average moron. Considering that average Americans voted him into office — not once but twice — tells you that the average American is a moron. So how does the US economy do so well if the majority are stupid, you may wonder. They do so well because the minority are so bloody bright that they create stuff of such great value that in the aggregate, despite the stupidity of the majority, it is positive.