As a supporter of the BJP, I have been only distressed by the direction that the party has taken in the recent times. Many others too feel the same way...that they have been let down by the party which they thought to be the only credible alternative to the Congress. With this mess in the BJP, the Congress is virtually without opposition, save a ragtag bunch of meglomaniacal idiots. TV anchors have started speaking of the decline of the Sangh, and the BJP in particular with undisguised glee. But being the eternal optimist that I am, I still see hope, although I must confess that the vision of hope is still hazy without a strong leader in the cowbelt. Also, I must mention that I am thinking long term, that is 2019, not 2014, where I see little chance.
At a logical level, I am confounded by all this talk of BJP being in terminal decline, a patient on life support. In such a widely split polity, a party that brings in about 22% of the popular vote is by no means insignificant or in terminal decline. BJP won by handsome margins in many states and that might explain to large extant ass to why the votes did not get translated into seats. It has the core support base of the Sangh, which is estimated to be about 20 % and the BJP has always fluctuated between 20% to 28% of the popular vote. BJP or its long term allies have strong presence in India's wealthiest states of Karnataka, Maharashtra, Gujarat, and Punjab. It is significant in many other small states. So at one level all this talk of the party being in decline is a wee bit presumptuous and tinged with a healthy dose of bias.
But the scary part is that BJP has no leader of Vajpayee's repute who brought in the additional 8% of the vote that helped BJP form a government in 1999. And that leader has to be from UP, where the party can grow the most.
Now a leader is not born overnight and has to be groomed over a 5-10 year period. This is where the RSS's role becomes important. It is the only organization that can provide BJP the leaders and more importantly help it regain the moral compass it had lost track of the past few years. This is truly a long term project and only the RSS has the wherewithal to see it through. Of course, the RSS also needs to see some things differently, but its nothing that cannot be accomplished. In the interim, the BJP must play it role of opposition to the full and encourage its state governments to improve the level of work they are doing.
My unstinted support for the BJP stems from the fact that its time that India took a right turn in its economy and politics.A continuum would mean more of under achievement in terms of wealth creation. The Congress cannot take that right turn because it is too short sighted and does not have the guts. The BJP must stand up now and try to define itself as a true Right of Center party. It owes this much to itself, its supporters, and ultimately to the country. The good people at Jhandewalan House and Ashoka Road must have realised this much. Lets hope they can see it through.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Friday, August 14, 2009
A Joke Called the ATS and other Stories
I'm posting after a long long hiatus, been busy in life doing meaningful things for a change. Plus there was no news at all. It was disarray in the BJP, with the prospect of a comeback looking bleaker with each passing day and was business as usual for the Congress in the Govt, shouting Inclusiveness from North Block's rooftops and doing nothing about anything. Also I was cut off from the idiotic Television Media which has always been my inspiration.
Then Mr Ghulam Nabi Azad came along and provided some welcome entertainment with his foot in mouth disease. Blaming a dead 11 year old kid for spreading the Virus requires suspension of a good deal of Grey Matter, coupled with a dose of insensetivity. But what really set me thinking was a little noticed news event, the removal of MCOCA on Praygya Thakur and Col Purohit. It was a given that the baised English Media would not cover the event after the huge amount of screen time and reams of paper they had spent in telling us about the "Hindu Terrorists". Plus of course they had to stoke the Swine Flu fear to drive TRPs in an otherwise dull news season.
What happens with the removal of MCOCA is that one of the main evidence of the Prosecution, the confession, becomes invalid. This makes the case even more fragile, making it rest just on video tapes and taped phone conversations, both inadmissable as evidence.
Though the innocence of the accused is yet to be proved, the whole case begs a larger question, that of the extant that the governement is willing to go to for a few votes. As a wise English Judge had observed, It is better to acquit a hundred criminals than to convict a single innocent man. It is true that our Police and Judiciary are woefully slow and incompetent, but this case clearly is a conspiracy, with the involvement of the executive. Thankfully better sense has prevailed in the judiciary for now. If this turns out the I hope it would, the Sagarika Barkha media will have a huge collective egg on their faces. Of course they wouldn't report it, afterall who would like to make a fool of themselves. And the incompetency of the ATS will be further proved. What can be expected from an organization that cant even defend its own Chief from a 19 yr old Paki.
A fun Fact to sign off with. In the last Lok Sabha elections, the EC had ordererd current Maharashtra DGP away from polling duties due to his Pro Congress bias. This year, no such notice has been issued. The Navin Chawla- Sonia Gandhi effect?
Then Mr Ghulam Nabi Azad came along and provided some welcome entertainment with his foot in mouth disease. Blaming a dead 11 year old kid for spreading the Virus requires suspension of a good deal of Grey Matter, coupled with a dose of insensetivity. But what really set me thinking was a little noticed news event, the removal of MCOCA on Praygya Thakur and Col Purohit. It was a given that the baised English Media would not cover the event after the huge amount of screen time and reams of paper they had spent in telling us about the "Hindu Terrorists". Plus of course they had to stoke the Swine Flu fear to drive TRPs in an otherwise dull news season.
What happens with the removal of MCOCA is that one of the main evidence of the Prosecution, the confession, becomes invalid. This makes the case even more fragile, making it rest just on video tapes and taped phone conversations, both inadmissable as evidence.
Though the innocence of the accused is yet to be proved, the whole case begs a larger question, that of the extant that the governement is willing to go to for a few votes. As a wise English Judge had observed, It is better to acquit a hundred criminals than to convict a single innocent man. It is true that our Police and Judiciary are woefully slow and incompetent, but this case clearly is a conspiracy, with the involvement of the executive. Thankfully better sense has prevailed in the judiciary for now. If this turns out the I hope it would, the Sagarika Barkha media will have a huge collective egg on their faces. Of course they wouldn't report it, afterall who would like to make a fool of themselves. And the incompetency of the ATS will be further proved. What can be expected from an organization that cant even defend its own Chief from a 19 yr old Paki.
A fun Fact to sign off with. In the last Lok Sabha elections, the EC had ordererd current Maharashtra DGP away from polling duties due to his Pro Congress bias. This year, no such notice has been issued. The Navin Chawla- Sonia Gandhi effect?
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Random thoughts
I'm suddenly starting to enjoy seeing Burkha and Shrill Sagarika on TV recently. The evident discomfort on their faces while discussing the Congress' poll prospects is amusing to say the least. They've been trying desperately for the past week to play the matchmaker between the left and the Congress and also wreck the allaince between Nitish and BJP, with spectacular failure. Nitish sharing the dais was the last straw for them and the secular diploma given to him was hastily withdrawn by none other than the Chancellor of the secularism university, Shri MMS. Barkha was almost angry at Nitish, especially after his kal ka kal dekhenge comment.
Also amusing was the Foot in Mouth disease afflicting the spokepersons of the Congress party. After Renegade Rahul created a huge shitpile of mess, the Congress was blundering away with allies. Unsurprisingly, the Congress has displayed total lack of morals, dumping allies and friends with absolute impunity, Mamta and Lalu were left fuming. Some see it as hard headed behaviour of a tough political taskmaster, but I see it as the soliciting of customers by a old fat political whore. But particulary gratifying was the departure of Oily Moily from the TV sets as a result of his zeal in clearing up Rahul shit. Good riddance, I'd say. But I guess only Rahul Baba has the freedom to make a fool of himself in the Congress. Inner aprty democracy...haah.
But something disgusting that I saw on Tv yesterday was Madam Italiano sitting besides a geriartic writer and listening to a poetic eulogy of a man who perhaps had a hand in the murder of her own husband. Does this woman have ANY self respect? Just goes to show how desperate the party is for power. The congress party simply collapses if its not in power for a lengthy period of time, simply because its the well oiled machinery of favours the binds the congress together. Without power, there's no cash, and without cash, no congress men. This is what has happened in the states of Gujarat, MP ,C'garh and UP. Well motivated cadre based parties like the BJP and the CPI fare better here.
Right from the beginning of this election season, we've been led to believe that this election was Congress' for the taking. The media had put out poll after poll anouncing that it would be a walkover for the UPA. But their spins have unravelled spectacularly as the voter has talked. NDTV was the last man standing till the 3rd phase, when it gave the Congress 171 seats. At the end of the fourth phase they refused to give any figures, except of course their prepostrours satta market figures(pig headed idiots). Even Yogendra Yadav refused to pinpoint the figures. But the thing about Yadav is that his misinterpretations are based on actual statistics. But Dorab Sopariwala of NDTV conjures up mythical figures based on pig headed statistical operations on false data collected from non existant people. And even if that does'nt work out in your favor, as you see it, you can always quote the satta market for spins.
But I've always wondered why these journalists are so pro congress. It must be their education actually. Without fail, all of them are from elite colleges in Delhi, where their youth must have been spent in listening to stupid speeches about Communism. But the surprising thing is that inspite of practising a profession where facts are your only tool, these journos have been so brainwashed that they cannot see the spectacular failure of Socialism and the Disaster of Congress rule. That makes them pretty dumb.
If governance record was the only criteria for voting in India, the BJP would be a shoo in almost everywhere. Read this http://ajayshahblog.blogspot.com/2007/02/maharashtra-vs-gujarat-on-cotton-and.html, just another example of how disastrous ideas of Nehruvian Socialism have been.
Also amusing was the Foot in Mouth disease afflicting the spokepersons of the Congress party. After Renegade Rahul created a huge shitpile of mess, the Congress was blundering away with allies. Unsurprisingly, the Congress has displayed total lack of morals, dumping allies and friends with absolute impunity, Mamta and Lalu were left fuming. Some see it as hard headed behaviour of a tough political taskmaster, but I see it as the soliciting of customers by a old fat political whore. But particulary gratifying was the departure of Oily Moily from the TV sets as a result of his zeal in clearing up Rahul shit. Good riddance, I'd say. But I guess only Rahul Baba has the freedom to make a fool of himself in the Congress. Inner aprty democracy...haah.
But something disgusting that I saw on Tv yesterday was Madam Italiano sitting besides a geriartic writer and listening to a poetic eulogy of a man who perhaps had a hand in the murder of her own husband. Does this woman have ANY self respect? Just goes to show how desperate the party is for power. The congress party simply collapses if its not in power for a lengthy period of time, simply because its the well oiled machinery of favours the binds the congress together. Without power, there's no cash, and without cash, no congress men. This is what has happened in the states of Gujarat, MP ,C'garh and UP. Well motivated cadre based parties like the BJP and the CPI fare better here.
Right from the beginning of this election season, we've been led to believe that this election was Congress' for the taking. The media had put out poll after poll anouncing that it would be a walkover for the UPA. But their spins have unravelled spectacularly as the voter has talked. NDTV was the last man standing till the 3rd phase, when it gave the Congress 171 seats. At the end of the fourth phase they refused to give any figures, except of course their prepostrours satta market figures(pig headed idiots). Even Yogendra Yadav refused to pinpoint the figures. But the thing about Yadav is that his misinterpretations are based on actual statistics. But Dorab Sopariwala of NDTV conjures up mythical figures based on pig headed statistical operations on false data collected from non existant people. And even if that does'nt work out in your favor, as you see it, you can always quote the satta market for spins.
But I've always wondered why these journalists are so pro congress. It must be their education actually. Without fail, all of them are from elite colleges in Delhi, where their youth must have been spent in listening to stupid speeches about Communism. But the surprising thing is that inspite of practising a profession where facts are your only tool, these journos have been so brainwashed that they cannot see the spectacular failure of Socialism and the Disaster of Congress rule. That makes them pretty dumb.
If governance record was the only criteria for voting in India, the BJP would be a shoo in almost everywhere. Read this http://ajayshahblog.blogspot.com/2007/02/maharashtra-vs-gujarat-on-cotton-and.html, just another example of how disastrous ideas of Nehruvian Socialism have been.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
A Case of Exploding Egos
My pun on the amazing book by Mohd Hanif, was inspired by the tepid response(tepid only by oratory, not words) given by that glorified -seat warming -petty babu-masquerading as the PM MMS to Advani's exhortations that he was the weakest PM ever. Now I wonder whether MMS was actually hurt enough to say the things that he did or was he ordered by the Italian to say so.
Two things suggest the latter.
1) MMS being the petty Yes Madam babu that he is, would'nt do anything without being directed to do so and
2) He actually was the weakest PM we've had (I dont count Gowda Gujaral as PMs). So he shouldn't feel hurt when the truth is told.
What really pains me here is the kid glove treatment that the 'free' media has given to MMS and the Italian. He is the ONLY democratically elected leader to have never given an interview. And now his family is being brought out to give interviews to the obliging media. In our dumb media's eyes Rahul's post poll alliances are more important than the Naxals. The media laps up everything that the family dishes out like faithful dogs.
Which brings me to the reason of my post. Why the congress is bad for us.
This, the Undie TV's of the world won't tell you.
The Congress party has gotten away with 55 years of absolute misgovernance without anybody raising an eyebrow.
Nehru was a wimp who did'nt know what he was doing. Communism or capitalism. He served a mishmash of both taking the worst of both the worlds, encouraging crony capitalism through excess govermentel controls and also forgetting the basic faciliteis the a socialist governement provides. So we got the IIT's but did'nt get the primary schools. We had the AIIMS but not the health centres. All in all he was a failure who lost a big war and left the country poorer, hungrier and more corrupt than it was in 1947.
Indira Gandhi was a thug and a dictator. Period. She presided over the criminalisation of politics through her cynical maneouvers and a steady devaluation of the constitution, culminating in the excesses of the emergency. Whatever good she has done the dictatorial and the anti development attitude of hers set the country back by years. Of course we were better off in terms of food, but no where near our potential.
Rajiv was another man who did'nt know what he was doing. Lurking his way from one crises to another IPKF, shah bano, Bofors, St Kitts and Nevis, he was our disaster guy.His only lasting acheivment, Lowering of the voters age.
Narsimha Rao, is a person I dont know much about. Though I must admit, he inherited a huge shit pile of mess from the Gandhis, and did a commendable job of cleaning it up. He was the driving force behind the reforms (encouraged along by the IMF). Basically reforms meant taking out the stupid laws that Dumb Nitwits like Nehru and Indira had put in place. So no much credit there.
Gowda and Gujaral were an abomination on the post of the Prime Minister.
As is MMS.
He has watched as the ministries he should control are doing their own thing. Some of them did good jobs, like the aviation ministry, but some of them just did'nt, and he did'nt say anything. This supposedly 'honest' man watched as ministers stole merrily. The full form of DMK became Delhi's Money to Karunanidhi.
Of course there was growth, but most of it was default and in the Khyali Pulao sectors like I banking and IT. Hard things like Roads, Railways Power were simply forgotten. As was the massive increase in food prices.
Orders from the high priestess has prevented him from appointing a full time Finance Minister and a full time Foreign Minister. This ,at a time when we are facing a huge economic crisis and our neighborhood is going up in flames. His electile dysfunctionalism has gotten translated into executive delinquency. Do these people care about the country or about their posts?(Not to mention, their delinquent sons)
Do you really want to vote for a party with such a pathetic record at governance?
Here's why the BJP is a better option. Its a rightist party and favors lesser governement and better srevices to the people. Its about giving the governement back to the people.
When the BJP says it will provide rice at Rs 2, it wants to introduce food coupons, so that the poor can buy good rice from private shops, not the shit that you get at the PDS (most of it is pilfered anyway).
The BJP wants to talk about infrastructure, it is the only party to have released an infrastructure vision.
The BJP wants to bring back the black money, and thereby bring back the forgotten topic of corruption into public debate.
And Barkha wants you to talk about Priyanka's nose and Rahul's dimples.
Congresswalas will tell you 'look at the NREGA, it has given money to poor people'.
Well it has, but also it has kept them terribly poor. What kind of assets are we creating by giving money to people for digging ditches and filling them up. Build more roads, you idiots. As the saying goes, Dont give fish to the hungry, teach them how to Fish.
What about the stupendous profits in the Rail Ministry?
Well the second largest employer cannot be a one man show, right. And how could have Laloo over loaded those wagons without the 17000 crores that Nitish set aside for safety. We have'nt seen a ghastly train accident which used to be very common. Thank Nitish.
Jaswant Singh and Yashwant Sinha were the only FMs who bothered about the tax machinery and reformed it. Making it more simpler for people, through the use of IT.
And of course the BJP built great roads and had a robust foriegn relations policy. And it had far fewer terror related deaths.
The BJP has demonstrated its good governance credintials amply. It has pulled Rajasthan and MP out of BIMARU and Bihar is on its way. Gujarat of course is the model of governance.
The Congress also raises the secular vs communal bogey. It wants parties to pass a secularism test. But do you think their 'secularism' is a matter of high principle ? No it isn't. It is pandering to the minority votebank by raising the threat of the BJP. The way they flirted with Hindu, Sikh and Muslim extremists in the 80's shows that they are a party that will do anything for votes and power. As soon as they get into power, their first thought is, how do I win the next election? The number of times that the constitution has been subverted by them to hold on to power especially in Goa and Jharkhand shows how power hungry they are.
And about the community that uses its precious vote not to elect a good candidate but to keep out a particular party, well, they are destined to live in misery. They chose it. They'll get their Sachar Committee reports, nothing more.
This election should be about government delivery of services, And we dont need an overhaul of the system for that. Look at Surat, where the SMC provides world class services within the current framework. Mumbai can learn from Surat, it should. Surat can only be replicated by a government that thinks the government is of the people. Not by a party that thinks the governement belongs to family, passed down from mother to son.
PS- To end, a quote from twitter
NDA log tanki bharkar gaadi tumko diye aurtum saadechaar saal mein, bina koi maintenance ke,bina repair-reform ke,poor itanki khalikardiye :)
Also I have accused Sonia G of many things that she is clearly not capable of intellectually. It is a family problem.
Two things suggest the latter.
1) MMS being the petty Yes Madam babu that he is, would'nt do anything without being directed to do so and
2) He actually was the weakest PM we've had (I dont count Gowda Gujaral as PMs). So he shouldn't feel hurt when the truth is told.
What really pains me here is the kid glove treatment that the 'free' media has given to MMS and the Italian. He is the ONLY democratically elected leader to have never given an interview. And now his family is being brought out to give interviews to the obliging media. In our dumb media's eyes Rahul's post poll alliances are more important than the Naxals. The media laps up everything that the family dishes out like faithful dogs.
Which brings me to the reason of my post. Why the congress is bad for us.
This, the Undie TV's of the world won't tell you.
The Congress party has gotten away with 55 years of absolute misgovernance without anybody raising an eyebrow.
Nehru was a wimp who did'nt know what he was doing. Communism or capitalism. He served a mishmash of both taking the worst of both the worlds, encouraging crony capitalism through excess govermentel controls and also forgetting the basic faciliteis the a socialist governement provides. So we got the IIT's but did'nt get the primary schools. We had the AIIMS but not the health centres. All in all he was a failure who lost a big war and left the country poorer, hungrier and more corrupt than it was in 1947.
Indira Gandhi was a thug and a dictator. Period. She presided over the criminalisation of politics through her cynical maneouvers and a steady devaluation of the constitution, culminating in the excesses of the emergency. Whatever good she has done the dictatorial and the anti development attitude of hers set the country back by years. Of course we were better off in terms of food, but no where near our potential.
Rajiv was another man who did'nt know what he was doing. Lurking his way from one crises to another IPKF, shah bano, Bofors, St Kitts and Nevis, he was our disaster guy.His only lasting acheivment, Lowering of the voters age.
Narsimha Rao, is a person I dont know much about. Though I must admit, he inherited a huge shit pile of mess from the Gandhis, and did a commendable job of cleaning it up. He was the driving force behind the reforms (encouraged along by the IMF). Basically reforms meant taking out the stupid laws that Dumb Nitwits like Nehru and Indira had put in place. So no much credit there.
Gowda and Gujaral were an abomination on the post of the Prime Minister.
As is MMS.
He has watched as the ministries he should control are doing their own thing. Some of them did good jobs, like the aviation ministry, but some of them just did'nt, and he did'nt say anything. This supposedly 'honest' man watched as ministers stole merrily. The full form of DMK became Delhi's Money to Karunanidhi.
Of course there was growth, but most of it was default and in the Khyali Pulao sectors like I banking and IT. Hard things like Roads, Railways Power were simply forgotten. As was the massive increase in food prices.
Orders from the high priestess has prevented him from appointing a full time Finance Minister and a full time Foreign Minister. This ,at a time when we are facing a huge economic crisis and our neighborhood is going up in flames. His electile dysfunctionalism has gotten translated into executive delinquency. Do these people care about the country or about their posts?(Not to mention, their delinquent sons)
Do you really want to vote for a party with such a pathetic record at governance?
Here's why the BJP is a better option. Its a rightist party and favors lesser governement and better srevices to the people. Its about giving the governement back to the people.
When the BJP says it will provide rice at Rs 2, it wants to introduce food coupons, so that the poor can buy good rice from private shops, not the shit that you get at the PDS (most of it is pilfered anyway).
The BJP wants to talk about infrastructure, it is the only party to have released an infrastructure vision.
The BJP wants to bring back the black money, and thereby bring back the forgotten topic of corruption into public debate.
And Barkha wants you to talk about Priyanka's nose and Rahul's dimples.
Congresswalas will tell you 'look at the NREGA, it has given money to poor people'.
Well it has, but also it has kept them terribly poor. What kind of assets are we creating by giving money to people for digging ditches and filling them up. Build more roads, you idiots. As the saying goes, Dont give fish to the hungry, teach them how to Fish.
What about the stupendous profits in the Rail Ministry?
Well the second largest employer cannot be a one man show, right. And how could have Laloo over loaded those wagons without the 17000 crores that Nitish set aside for safety. We have'nt seen a ghastly train accident which used to be very common. Thank Nitish.
Jaswant Singh and Yashwant Sinha were the only FMs who bothered about the tax machinery and reformed it. Making it more simpler for people, through the use of IT.
And of course the BJP built great roads and had a robust foriegn relations policy. And it had far fewer terror related deaths.
The BJP has demonstrated its good governance credintials amply. It has pulled Rajasthan and MP out of BIMARU and Bihar is on its way. Gujarat of course is the model of governance.
The Congress also raises the secular vs communal bogey. It wants parties to pass a secularism test. But do you think their 'secularism' is a matter of high principle ? No it isn't. It is pandering to the minority votebank by raising the threat of the BJP. The way they flirted with Hindu, Sikh and Muslim extremists in the 80's shows that they are a party that will do anything for votes and power. As soon as they get into power, their first thought is, how do I win the next election? The number of times that the constitution has been subverted by them to hold on to power especially in Goa and Jharkhand shows how power hungry they are.
And about the community that uses its precious vote not to elect a good candidate but to keep out a particular party, well, they are destined to live in misery. They chose it. They'll get their Sachar Committee reports, nothing more.
This election should be about government delivery of services, And we dont need an overhaul of the system for that. Look at Surat, where the SMC provides world class services within the current framework. Mumbai can learn from Surat, it should. Surat can only be replicated by a government that thinks the government is of the people. Not by a party that thinks the governement belongs to family, passed down from mother to son.
PS- To end, a quote from twitter
NDA log tanki bharkar gaadi tumko diye aurtum saadechaar saal mein, bina koi maintenance ke,bina repair-reform ke,poor itanki khalikardiye :)
Also I have accused Sonia G of many things that she is clearly not capable of intellectually. It is a family problem.
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
The Missing Philatelists
The kid next door to me wanted a stamp of Canada for some sort of exhibition in his school. As I dusted out my old stamp book, I was struck by the kid's lack of knowledge or interest in the hobby. When we were growing up(10 years back, I'm not that old), philately was a big hobby. We had a gang of stamp aficionados, and would set off on our stamp quest every weekend, seeking out new bakras to exchange stamps with. We would target those kids who had a large philatelic inheritance and seek out friendships with them, just for stamps. Boy were those days fun!!!! Not only that, got to learn a lot from the whole hobby.
But nowadays I see a distinct lack of interest in philately in the young people of today. They are not simply bothered, they play cricket, watch T.V. and go to sleep. If you are lucky, you might find them reading something other than textbooks. I was pondering over this demise of the hobby for quite a while and the search for the answer led to the question as to why WE collected stamps. The answer was of one word. Curiosity.
Ours was an innocent age. Mobiles were a feet long, there were 10 cable channels and of course internet was something rich kids had. There was no information overload, no screaming anchors or no 24*7 internet. And we had curiosity about the world. I remember how thrilled I used to be when I would get a stamp from a far off country like Burukina Faso(bet kids haven't even heard that name). How I would place it on the map and look up the Manorama year Book to read all about it. I remember how I learnt about the British Boer wars and the Angkor Wat because of a stamp.
Come to think of it, Its amazing how much you can learn from a square inch of paper. How much of history is hidden in there, waiting to be explored. I would owe a lot of my knowledge to those pieces of paper.
Of course, kids today have wikipedia and what not. Their curiosity(whatever remains of it) is satisfeid by a few types on the keyboard. And in the process, a lot of magic goes missing. And so does a whole world of stamps and the stories behind them.
This is one of the many quaint ways technology has impacted the way we live. We revel in the connectivity but have we ever taken a moment to think what are the little things that we have lost due to technology. If we do, I am sure each one of us could come up with many quant little things that we dont see any more.
Gosh!!! Writing this has made me seem older, it all seems so long ago. And in a slight irony, I am logging on to Facebook now to look out for my old stamp buddies.
But nowadays I see a distinct lack of interest in philately in the young people of today. They are not simply bothered, they play cricket, watch T.V. and go to sleep. If you are lucky, you might find them reading something other than textbooks. I was pondering over this demise of the hobby for quite a while and the search for the answer led to the question as to why WE collected stamps. The answer was of one word. Curiosity.
Ours was an innocent age. Mobiles were a feet long, there were 10 cable channels and of course internet was something rich kids had. There was no information overload, no screaming anchors or no 24*7 internet. And we had curiosity about the world. I remember how thrilled I used to be when I would get a stamp from a far off country like Burukina Faso(bet kids haven't even heard that name). How I would place it on the map and look up the Manorama year Book to read all about it. I remember how I learnt about the British Boer wars and the Angkor Wat because of a stamp.
Come to think of it, Its amazing how much you can learn from a square inch of paper. How much of history is hidden in there, waiting to be explored. I would owe a lot of my knowledge to those pieces of paper.
Of course, kids today have wikipedia and what not. Their curiosity(whatever remains of it) is satisfeid by a few types on the keyboard. And in the process, a lot of magic goes missing. And so does a whole world of stamps and the stories behind them.
This is one of the many quaint ways technology has impacted the way we live. We revel in the connectivity but have we ever taken a moment to think what are the little things that we have lost due to technology. If we do, I am sure each one of us could come up with many quant little things that we dont see any more.
Gosh!!! Writing this has made me seem older, it all seems so long ago. And in a slight irony, I am logging on to Facebook now to look out for my old stamp buddies.
Thursday, January 29, 2009
The Media Morons are Losing It
Before I go on I'd like to apologize for the longish break. MBA dreams needed some work. GD PI prep and all that bullshit. Actually haven't much to do, so thought to go in for MBA.....lets see how it works out.
Actually due to all the kinda prep, I had got into a sort of writers block (yeah I know tooo amateur for that, but what the hell!!! ) But today, Arnab Goswami gave me some inspiration. After ranting on that irrelevant Mutalik and making wild allegations based on mere conjecture, he aired a Dawn News report on alleged RAW agent and then proceeded to mock the channel for its standards with aplomb. Without even being tongue in cheek or a trace of irony.....me being the discerning viewer saw them as the sides of the same coin, the coin which has the portrait of idiots on both the sides!!!
As the world economy is tanking and jobs are being lost, as the Indian laborer losing his job, and while the PM is recuperating from a serious surgery and a 74 year old workaholic is handling 6 portfolios, and polls being 2 months away(as announced by an idiotic Dy EC), as Pakistan is set to activate its denial ministry again, what do you expect the great Indian Media to report?
Goons in Mangalore, an idiot of the lunatic fringe hogging the headlines, and to top it all, a jilted lover committing suicide.
Such is the journalistic bankruptcy of the electronic media and it has disproved all the economic theories about competition giving better value to the consumers. Because this is what competition has done to the media.
I realised this while watching DD today, the Lok Sabha channel. The discussions there were so civilized and speakers so knowledgeable that I was left stunned.No screaming Sagarika or breathless Barkha or Raajdeep rhetoric. Just an impassioned debate that derived it watch ability from the good ol fashioned thing called content and examples. Admitted, the production values were tacky, but the heart of the makers was in the right place. And DD doesn't have competition.. What this competition and 24*7 news has made them do is to make them sink to the lowest common denominator and make the television idiot proof, and as a result of the process they've made and idiot out of us all.
And if this isn't an issue of corporate governance, than what else is? Its about delivering value to your most important stakeholder, your customer. Because remember, its us, the well informed consumer, the advertisers target, who revenues to the channels. the advertisers are not interested in the loser who is interested in "chajje pe billo rani". So we as a consumer have a right to better news, not Chand Fiza bullshit.
I'd love it if some of us took the initiatives and the concerned among us just switched off these lazy channels and watched soaps instead. Unfortunately that is all we can do as a consumer.
PS
The next EC, Naveen Chawla was given a character certificate by the SC stating that "the person is not fit to hold any public office that demands fairness" for grovelling before Indira G. And look at him now.
Better news that Pramod Mutalik, What say?
Actually due to all the kinda prep, I had got into a sort of writers block (yeah I know tooo amateur for that, but what the hell!!! ) But today, Arnab Goswami gave me some inspiration. After ranting on that irrelevant Mutalik and making wild allegations based on mere conjecture, he aired a Dawn News report on alleged RAW agent and then proceeded to mock the channel for its standards with aplomb. Without even being tongue in cheek or a trace of irony.....me being the discerning viewer saw them as the sides of the same coin, the coin which has the portrait of idiots on both the sides!!!
As the world economy is tanking and jobs are being lost, as the Indian laborer losing his job, and while the PM is recuperating from a serious surgery and a 74 year old workaholic is handling 6 portfolios, and polls being 2 months away(as announced by an idiotic Dy EC), as Pakistan is set to activate its denial ministry again, what do you expect the great Indian Media to report?
Goons in Mangalore, an idiot of the lunatic fringe hogging the headlines, and to top it all, a jilted lover committing suicide.
Such is the journalistic bankruptcy of the electronic media and it has disproved all the economic theories about competition giving better value to the consumers. Because this is what competition has done to the media.
I realised this while watching DD today, the Lok Sabha channel. The discussions there were so civilized and speakers so knowledgeable that I was left stunned.No screaming Sagarika or breathless Barkha or Raajdeep rhetoric. Just an impassioned debate that derived it watch ability from the good ol fashioned thing called content and examples. Admitted, the production values were tacky, but the heart of the makers was in the right place. And DD doesn't have competition.. What this competition and 24*7 news has made them do is to make them sink to the lowest common denominator and make the television idiot proof, and as a result of the process they've made and idiot out of us all.
And if this isn't an issue of corporate governance, than what else is? Its about delivering value to your most important stakeholder, your customer. Because remember, its us, the well informed consumer, the advertisers target, who revenues to the channels. the advertisers are not interested in the loser who is interested in "chajje pe billo rani". So we as a consumer have a right to better news, not Chand Fiza bullshit.
I'd love it if some of us took the initiatives and the concerned among us just switched off these lazy channels and watched soaps instead. Unfortunately that is all we can do as a consumer.
PS
The next EC, Naveen Chawla was given a character certificate by the SC stating that "the person is not fit to hold any public office that demands fairness" for grovelling before Indira G. And look at him now.
Better news that Pramod Mutalik, What say?
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