India Has Limited Freedom of Speech

Rest in peace, Balasaheb. May you continue to roar in the next life as you did in this one. Balasaheb Thackeray was a pioneer in Indian politics. He can be credited into bringing unabashed Hindu Nationalism into mainstream politics. In that respect he will be remembered forever.

I am a great admirer of his even though I did not agree with him all the time. A great man, he still was a subset of Mother India. No one is greater than Mother India and the system which represent her. Our democracy is second to none in the sheer number and the diverse nature of its followers. It is our crowning achievement, our rotten politicians notwithstanding. One of the hallmarks of any democracy is the freedom of speech and expression. It has to be preserved at all cost. Short of threats, deadly or otherwise and yelling fire or any such criminal mischief, we should be allowed to say whatever we want to say and the system should protect us. Just because Hindu nationalists say negative things about the Gandhi family on the social media, the government should not go out and ban facebook or twitter accounts as the Congress governments are wont to.

By the same token, if the leftists, pseudo-secularists or the religious minorities say something nasty about our heroes then should be allowed to do so and be protected by the full power of the law. Arrests of the two girls in the aftermath of Babsaheb’s demise were disgraceful. The decorum and the control that the Shivsainiks showed at the funeral should have continued afterwards and the girl’s uncle’s clinic should have been left alone.

That said, we should never ignore the ground realities of our country. We cannot become like the US overnight. Even the most corrupt of our politician is likely to be very sensitive about him or her and resort to violence to protect his or her “image”. The religious minorities are even more sensitive, if that were possible. We all should realize that India has very limited free speech and breaking that unsaid rule can have serious to dire consequences. The system favors the powerful, judiciary is slow and mobs cannot be controlled. We should strive for total freedom of speech but should never forget where we are.

Kasab’ Hanging: A Political Move By Congress

Kasab’s hanging was a political move. Pure and simple. Congress is doing it for selfish reasons. It was like a trump card in a card game. They need to do something to make a difference in Gujarat elections. They need to stem the tsunami of corruption charges against them and turn the enormously negative public opinion against them. I do not know what kind of dividend they would reap but the pro-Congress press has already started to crow over this “achievement”. What the Congress and their chamchas choose to ignore is that if the fickle minded and myopic voters of India can forget mega scams, how long will it take for them to forget this hanging, especially since they well near forgot about this Kasab fellow by the enormous delays in what should have happened a long time ago. If Congress were really this justice oriented then Afzal Guru would be rotting underground somewhere by now. Of course Afzal is an Indian Muslim and thus untouchable by Congress and other pseudo-secular parties. They chose to sacrifice a non Indian Muslim for their survival.

This is all part of the way Congress does business. Everything is about their survival prosperity. This was not about justice. The day they catch the Indian collaborators for the 26/11 attacks is the day I would change my opinion. They went after the Bhindranwale and his terrorists with a vengeance while none of the Muslim terrorists form SIMI and other outfits are still roaming free. Hanging this lone gunman is not like the Americans going after Osama and hunting him like a mad dog. Congress took the easy way out to show that this matter is now closed. FAR FROM IT. It will take a lot more than just hanging of one terrorist to change my mind and hopefully that of any patriotic Indian.

Does all this mean that hanging of Kasab was bad or wrong? I am torn about it. He was just the guy who pulled the trigger. The masterminds who really are responsible are still roaming free and until those people are caught and brought to justice only then will the victims’ families will get closure.

I am not the kind of guy who starts singing “Mere dushman mere bhai” at the sight of Pakistanis. I believe in ripping the enemy’s head and pissing down their throats (in a manner of speaking) like the western armies do. Once the guilt is established beyond a doubt, then people like Kasab should be denied a Muslim burial. Why should we fulfill their desire of martyrdom?

This hanging was done for political benefits and not justice. This hanging still leaves the real terrorists roaming free, either in India or Pakistan. Hanging Kasab is like burning someone in effigy. Symbolic. That is why it does not feel right. I urge the Indian voters to stop celebrating and continue to ask the hard questions from this corrupt and impotent regime led by Gandhi family and Congress.

RSS, BJP- Please Do The Right Thing!

Swami Vivekananda. Dawood Ibrahim. Let us add one more name to the list. Nitin Gadkari. I don’t know whose IQ is what or which two have the same IQ. Hard for me to say. But what I can say for sure that I know whose IQ is the lowest.

The situation between Gadkari, RSS and BJP is still very fluid. People are changing their stances on the issue on a daily basis. Clean chits are being issued by people with no locus standi. Be that as it may. What is really really flummoxing is that no one seems to be doing the right thing or even remotely interested in the pursuit of the right thing.

I come from a family of RSS / Janasangha / BJP supporters. I used to go to shakhas myself. I am an abashed admirer of the RSS, the work they do and what the organizations stands for. However, I have lost all respect for the current leaders of the RSS. They are not behaving like egoless leaders of a patriotic nationalistic organization. They seem to be out of touch, control freaks who are willing to destroy any advantage that the BJP has over Congress by continuing with Nitin Gadkari whose incompetence is only matched by his ability to make highly irresponsible statements. This man has no business being a leader of a party which wants to be the party of difference. His only function seems to be that of an RSS installed puppet. They want the Congress out based on corruption charges but they are willing to forgive Gadkari the same sins. It would seem that the BJP and the RSS are busy issuing clean chits to Gadkari based on the argument that “everyone does it” and that it is not the corruption in the same vein as the Congress corruption. But that is the Beni Prasad Verma argument who referred to Salman Khurshid’s 76 lakh “Chori” as not real “chori”. Is this how the BJP plans to portray themselves to the voters – Congress lite? Do they think that the voters are going to forgive them like they are forgiving Gadkari?

This is a great opportunity for the BJP to oust the Congress and install a real leader as the PM. They can then make some real differences in the lives of aam aadmi and cement their standing a patriotic nationalistic party. Indulging in war of semantics and speaking legalese to absolve themselves of the responsibility of doing the right thing here which is cutting their ties with Gadkari in the same way as they did with Bangaru Lakshman and others is irresponsible and dangerous.

No one expects Gadkari to do the right thing and resign. He is only interested in his own survival. BJP is a political party and they can also be given some leeway when it comes to taking hard decisions because of political expediency. However, the RSS leaders who are still protecting Gadkari CANNOT be absolved of their sins by commission. I am holding them responsible and will blame them if the BJP loses the 2014 election. Mr. NV Subramanian as expressed it well when he looks upon this as a fight between RSS and Modi. He says:

Institutions cannot change their thinking overnight, so the RSS-Narendra Modi clash will continue for a while. If not Gadkari, RSS will try for another BJP president, a provincial lightweight, so it can have its way. But it won’t work for long. If Narendra Modi and Arun Jaitley play their cards right, they will be Vajpayee-Advani-2 giving BJP its second coming. The RSS leadership would do the country a great favour by stepping out of their way. If they believe and act upon what they say every so often, that the BJP makes its own decisions, it would be evidence of the RSS’s wisdom. And in Narendra Modi, BJP will have its first leader who is not dependent on RSS backing, as he has repeatedly shown in Gujarat. Under him, BJP will come into its own.

We all know what the right thing to do is. We just have to wait and see who does it.
The url for NV Subramanian article:http://www.newsinsight.net/Contestofwills.aspx#page=page-1

Khap Panchayats And Rapes In India

This is a sensitive topic and after much deliberation, I have decided to talk about. I had to read the psychology of the act to see if my sentiments on the matter are correct. It turns out that for the most part I am right. You can read the very unpleasant topic to see it for yourself. All the articles on rape will tell you that it is about violence, gender domination, revenge, criminal insanity, confusion between sex and violence etc. What it is NOT about is sex / companionship as has been insinuated by the Khap Panchayats.

These Khap Panchayats do serve a purpose. Solving trivial disputes in a village at no cost to the taxpayer is an important objective. However, most of these men are have little formal education. I am quite sure, without running the risk of sounding elitist that these men have no training to opine on topics like rape. To say that by lowering the age of marriage a solution to rape, they are exposing their ignorance at best and a sick mentality at worst. State government or the Central government need to step in and take charge of the situation in the rape-infested areas and come up with ways of solving the problem.

However we are seeing an alarming trend in the rest of the country as well. Recent rapes in West Bengal and a public assault of a girl in Guwahati are some examples. Mamata Bannerjee made some reckless remarks about the cause of rapes being the free mixing of the two sexes. I am sure that she will be at a loss for explaining rape of very young girls, old women and kidnapped girls. Better stuff is expected from a woman chief minister of one of our most literate states!

To make my point I have to discuss a TV show that I was made aware by a US based friend. On a TV channel called MSNBC, there is a show where they run a sting operation. Essentially, a police officer poses as a teenage girl and lures sex predators to a house where the TV show host waits for them along with the police. When the show was hosted in Silicon Valley, a large number of Indian techies were arrested. I am attaching two urls for you to see. The percentage of the techies caught was disproportionately higher than the Indian population in that area. And to think that all these guys thought that it is OK to have sex with a thirteen-year-old girl tells you something about them. I have struggled with a possible explanation for this depravity.

One possible explanation could be that boys in India are raised with a different degree of entitlement than girls. Preference for male child drives this kind of behavior. If a child is instilled with this attitude from infancy then what is going to be his attitude towards those whom he deems lesser people (girls, servants and other domestic / public help)? Does this kind of attitude objectify the girls, making their exploitation and rape acceptable? It does bear looking into.

Maybe the middle class boys who are raised in almost cocoon like atmosphere when exposed to public mixing with girls, mistake friendly overtures as loose behavior. Since when is a smile invitation for aggressive sexual behavior?

The point I am trying to make is that as a society, we need to drastically modify our view and way of raising sons and daughters. We clearly have lost our Hindu way of life where our goddesses are as revered as gods, where “Kanyadaan (giving away a daughter)” is deemed as a “Punya (grace)” and where the country is referred to as “Bharatmata”.

I am not a psychologist but a concerned father and an Indian. I can only talk about my angst in the matter. I do not have a solution for this problem other than what I can tell and teach my own kids. I tell and teach my son that no matter what the provocation, IT IS NEVER, EVER OK to strike or behave improperly with a girl. I thought that I was just doing the common sense thing here. Apparently it is not such a common sense thing after all.

A NY Times article on the matter can be read at: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/28/world/asia/a-village-rape-shatters-a-family-and-indias-traditional-silence.html

An eye opening article on the psychology of rape can be read at: http://www.pbs.org/kued/nosafeplace/articles/rapefeat.html

Mamata Bannerjee comments on the topic can be read at: http://ibnlive.in.com/news/rapes-happening-because-men-and-women-are-interacting-more-freely-says-mamata-banerjee/300585-37-64.html

The Indian pedophiles article can be read at (and in the url within the articles): http://rivr.sulekha.com/indian-sex-predators-in-america_190725_blog
http://niralimagazine.com/2006/10/looking-for-love-in-all-the-wrong-places/

Narendra Modi Versus Pushkar / Tharoor

Sunanda Pushkar and Shahi Tharoor do make a good looking couple. It took them two failed marriages each to find each other . Looks, power and money – a potent combination indeed. I hope that they finally find some stability that most Indians take for granted. However, they are as relevant to the plight of aam aadmi as a bicycle is to a fish. Which is why, I have a bone to pick with Bhai Narendra Modi. He is too big and important to waste even a breath on someone like Pushkar. He needs to focus on the 2014 election like Arjun on the eye of the fish and not get distracted.

Having said that, I would like to examine the statement he made. He called Pushkar a 50 crore girlfriend. Now it could mean that Tharoor paid 50 crore to get her (which would be offensive if true) or it could mean that she is worth 50 crores (which is true and harmless / inane). It is not like Modi to mean the former because it is simply not true. What is true is that Pushkar was involved in wheeling and dealing of the IPL Kochi team and made a ton of money which would not have been possible if she were not using Tharoor’s influence. That makes her a social climber and Tharoor yet another Congressman. Her vitriol directed against Modi amuses me. A woman of her background should be careful lest someone decides to explore it. A 70 crore Sweetheart deal leveraging Tharoor's official position in the Government by a would-be is acceptable, whereas a mere mention of the term 50 core Girlfriend becomes derogatory. The entire English electronic media seems to have forgotten to see the "Quid-pro-quo" that is so freely mentioned in all the other scams being unearthed.

What really bothers me is the vitriol of these elitist feminists who seem to have been rankled badly and are berating Modi in severe terms. The same women seem to keep quiet and are never heard from on topics like the rape epidemic in Congress ruled Haryana or dowry cases or female trafficking or female feticide or domestic violence or innumerable other tortures being inflicted routinely on our sisters and daughters. That my dear readers, is what upsets me. Pushkar is not an innocent victim and is far from being helpless. Yet she gets all the help from these women. That speaks volumes about Pushkar and her supporters.