No one can escape the huge amount of press on the ongoing disaster called the “Commonwealth Games” in New Delhi. There is little doubt about the train-wreck — it’s inevitable as the locomotive has long left the track and is speeding towards a chasm dragging a long train behind it. The only point of conjecture is how damaging will be the eventual crash. The action is happening so fast that estimates of damage vary widely. But it will all be over soon enough and it will be a very long …

The Chinese leadership knows how to think big — which is more than what one can say about the Indian leadership, which one must remember has been mainly from the Congress party led by the Nehru-Gandhi Dynasty. One case in point is how big the Chinese leaders think about railways.

I think that one feature common to the majority of the third world countries is that they don’t have one law for all.

Mr. B Raman, in his South Asia Analysis Group paper of 20th August — “Counter-terrorism & Appeasement” — writes:
* There have been four acts of mass casualty terrorism since 1981. All the four were carried out when the Congress (I) was in power in New Delhi.

Gurcharan Das writes in the Times of India (10th May) that “The Future Belongs to India.” That’s his argument which I suppose he made in a debate in London on the proposition that “the future belongs to India, not China.” I understand perfectly the need for such an argument because I too feel a lot of distress when I compare what China has achieved relative to India and have to seek comfort in a lot of twisted rationalization to excuse India’s disastrous journey.

It could not possibly be a lack of imagination, could it? Why is everything in India named after Nehru, Indira, Sanjay, and Rajiv? I have pondered that matter here before.

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 …

A fatwa is a religious decree made by a mullah. A “patwa” is like a fatwa but made by Patil. A patwa, like a fatwa, is not based on reason or logic. But it is not just a matter of whim, a fancy, a just-like-that sort of thing. It is calculated to serve Patil’s and her masters’ interest.

Some years ago I came across a single-panel cartoon which showed a statue of a figure on horseback. It was clearly the statue of Shivaji Maharaj, the great Maratha hero. Standing in front was a little kid with an adult. The kid was asking, “But what was the statue called before it was renamed Shivaji Maharaj?”
In Mumbai, the trend is that everything gets renamed after Shivaji. And in the broader context of India, everything gets named after Nehru and his clan. Naming things is easy in India. “Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal, …

A recent Wall Street Journal article, World Bank Disgrace, (hat tip: Prakash Advani) reports that an internal review of five WB health projects in India totaling US$ 569 million in loans shows major corruption. The report begins with
Credit Robert Zoellick for knowing how to put the best face on a profound embarrassment. On Friday, the World Bank president announced in a press release that the bank had “joined forces” with the government of India to “fight fraud and corruption” in that country’s health sector. This is happening at the …

I was born in India. Most of the time I am quite content that the land of my birth is not a hell-hole. But every now and then I am rudely awakened to the fact that to a very large extent, it is ruled by a bunch of slaves, criminals and myopic morons. I read Taslima Nasreen’s heartfelt question “What is my crime?” with rising disgust and distaste for what India appears to be at times — a pathetic Third-world country with the morals of a bottom-dwelling creature and the …

So then the two state-owned Indian airlines are going to merge (according to this rediff report — hat tip: Tejaswi) and the merged entity will be called — umm, let’s see now — “Air Indian,” the title of a blog post last month on the merger.
I have written earlier about the stupidity of changing the name “Indian Airlines” to the even more generic “Indian,” repainting a few dozen airplanes spending tens of millions of dollars, knowing full well that in a matter of months the whole exercise will …

Imagine a restaurant where the number of employees exceeds the number of seats. Would be a very expensive restaurant indeed. Now imagine an airline where the number of employees exceeds the the number of seats. Actually, you don’t have to imagine that one as India has two such airlines where all the employees cannot be seated in the planes simultaneously. When the two state-run airlines merge shortly, they will have about 132 airplanes — my estimate is around 20,000 seats — and 35,000 employees.

Cafe Baghdadi is a little hole in the wall restaurant in Colaba, Mumbai, just around the corner from Regal Theatre and next to the famous street restaurant Bade Miya. Baghdadi’s fried chicken would beat KFC’s chicken any day of the week, by the way. That chicken is good. What tickles me at Baghdadi is a sign which lists a set of rules for its patrons. The list is long and fairly detailed. It says, for instance, that “Customers are not allowed to argue with the waiters,” and that “Alcohol is …

A Letter to Dr Manhoman Singh
If there is one thing that makes me see red, it is senseless discrimination in general and unfair treatment of people. But when it comes to discrimination based on a person’s religion, I abhor it with every fiber of my being. It disgusts me and I feel nothing but contempt for people who discriminate based on religion (or lack of religion, in some cases.) One of the distinguishing features of a civilized society is that it does not treat people differently based on their belief …

“Somebody must have asked for some sites to be blocked. What is your problem?”
I can just hear the derision in that question. That is what Shivam Vij was told by Dr Gulshan Rai, director of CERT-IN, which is the organization which is authorized to issue orders to ISPs. The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) of the Government of India asked that certain domains be blocked (but does not reveal exactly which though it is clear that the list includes *.blogspot.com, *.typepad.com and geocities.com/* .)
Like the imperial rulers they are, …

Haldiram’s is perhaps the only brand known around the world which comes from Nagpur (my home town). They make a great variety of wonderful namkeens (traditional Indian salty snacks), sweets, and other stuff which can be lumped as Indian junk food. It may be my cultural chauvinism which is speaking but I think that Indian junk food (like Indian food in general) beats any other variety of junk food hands down.

Dateline May 4th, 2005, Kolkata: The Slimes Times of India reported that IIT entrance test set for overhaul:
The IIT-Joint Entrance Exam may soon be easier to crack. The Union HRD [Human Resource Development] ministry feels the examination is too tough, causes immense stress to candidates, and needs to be toned down immediately.
The ministry has formed a committee … to modify the IIT-JEE pattern.
Clever, isn’t it? In related news, another ministry has expressed concern about the fact that hunger is a problem to some few hundred million people …

Farce is funny when staged deliberately. It borders on the tragic when it is splashed across the front pages of the nation’s newspapers and is eagerly slurped up by the gullible even in high places.
Just the other day I was taken to task for not high-lighting the successes of Indians and instead focusing on problems that we need to solve to be a real nation of some consequence.

Some months ago, I had recorded here the ideas of the Tathagata (It’s the small stuff, stupid) on the importance of taking care of the itsy-bitsy small bits. Today I was struck yet one more time about that truth. I was waiting at the Kandivali local train station when a huge board caught my eye. It was a listing of EMERGENCY and IMPORTANT PHONE NUMBERS.