Passionate About India

A few days back, at the fourth International Conference on Federalism, the Prime Minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh, voiced his concerns over the dangers posed by narrow political interests (on account of regional politics) that are coming in the way of the larger national interest. No doubt, our honourable Prime Minister has learnt the harsh realities of coalition politics the hard way, which was evident from his speech. In fact, a classic metaphor of such coalition compulsions was evident in the manner the Centre has been handling the Nandigram issue. The Centre’s stance amply vindicates its sheer helplessness on account of its dependence on CPI(M). All that the Centre did was to send one battalion of CRPF from Dhanbad...And that’s it! As the CPI(M) cadres continued with their victory procession and made sure that the entire Nandigram was reconverted into a red bastion, the CRPF contingent was kept strangled at Tamluk. The reason why something like this happened is no secret, as it is all ...

On November 3, 2007, it was as if history was repeating in Pakistan. General Pervez Musharraf once again imposed emergency in Pakistan – suspended the constitution, dismissed the Pakistan Chief Justice, Iftikhar Chaudhury, along with seven other judges (this being the second time in his tenure as a President), ordered troops to seize the equipment of independent television stations and also ordered for some popular leaders’ house arrest! Sequence of events beginning March 9, 2007, (with the arrest of Iftikar Chaudhury, followed by Lal Masjid siege on July 10, 2007, Supreme Court reinstating Justice Chaudhury, challenging Musharraf’s power on July 20, 2007, Nawaz Sharif’s arrest at Islamabad airport, after his eight-year exile, killing of 139 people in Benazir Bhutto’s procession in Karachi), indicated that a state of emergency in Pakistan was on the cards. In fact, for more than half of the period, since Pakistan separated from India and became an independent state, it has been under p...

As I watched with excitement the finals of Zee Sa Re Ga Ma, glued to the TV sets at a friend’s house, what struck me was the massive number of votes that each of the finalists got. It was a mind numbing figure that crossed a whopping 10,00,00,000!!! Yes! Those were over ten crore votes that were polled! While my friends debated with excitement at how Bengalis reaching the finals of any such show were bound to win due to the massive way they vote, I couldn’t help but wonder at the irony around the fact that these are the same Bengalis who allow their votes to be rigged election after election in West Bengal and allow muscle men to dominate and snatch away their rights to what Bengalis love doing most – vote and debate. After all, Bengal was amongst the first in the world to bring in communism through a democratic process. Though the situation is better in most other states, yet rigging and non-participation in the electoral process remain India’s biggest problems. It is because we belie...

If the government fails to unshackle the imposed market and economic restrictions in agriculture, then the day is not far when we would end up farming more corpses than crops ! ! ! At our institute (The Indian Institute of Planning and Management), since its very inception (1973), we have always emphasised the need for the study of marketing. So much so that for the entire two years of the rigorous course, from day one till the day the students are bid farewell, marketing is taught to every student, irrespective of whether the student opted for finance or human resource or technology as a specialisation stream. In fact at IIPM, marketing has been a compulsory specialisation, because not only do we believe, but also propagate the philosophy that ‘Business’ is nothing else but ‘Marketing’. No business can survive in this world – however much the product might be world-class – unless it is marketed well or gets the right kind of avenues to make it marketable. Interestingly, our nation pre...

To set a new global order which entails a green and peaceful earth, a Hillary Clinton and an Al Gore combination is no more a matter of choice, but an imperative! The choice of Al Gore as this year’s recipient of Nobel peace prize is a pleasant relief for all those who have otherwise given up all hopes about the cause of a greener and better world. In fact, from the very beginning, Al Gore’s contribution and his continuous efforts on environmental issues have posed a striking contrast to the another man who eventually became the President of United States in 2000. From the year 2000 onwards, while Gore and his Intergovernmental Committee on Climatic Change strived hard to caution the world about the ensuing dangers of global warming, George Bush and his coterie have been doing everything possible to make the Kyoto Protocol a non-starter. One just wonders what would have happened if the United States’ Supreme Court verdict of the year 2000 Presidential elections had essentially gone in ...

Immediately after Rahul Gandhi was appointed as the General Secretary of the AICC, he – along with a dozen other appointees – demanded to the Honourable Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh that the ‘iconic’ National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) be extended to the entire nation. This is a quantum jump considering that the scheme encompasses only 330 districts currently. Well, how much of this calibrated action would eventually help the Congress Party in the forthcoming elections is a matter of debate, but the bigger contention is the scheme in itself, which – though brilliant in theory – in practice, has failed to deliver as tangible benefits for the poorer masses of the country in its current form. The NREGA has been drawing flak for long. And surprisingly, the criticism of this scheme has not just been coming from liberal economists and market analysts alone, for whom the fiscal health of the government is more important than anything else. In fact, the more vociferous protest...

The last week of September couldn’t have been better for India. While on the one hand, a young team, coming out fresh from the shadows of the seniors, went to an experimental championship – primarily as underdogs – and eventually came out as victors, the same week also saw Congress eventually coming out of its inhibitions and getting ready to hand over the mantle to a whole new generation of young men. Although the Congress had been deliberating on the move for long, it was only now that it got the gumption to go ahead to appoint Rahul Gandhi as the General Secretary of All India Congress Committee (AICC). Till now, Rahul Gandhi had not been leading from the front and was more active at the backend. But then, eventually, he had to accept this reality that without him at the helm of affairs, the Congress does not have a future. More so at a point in time where there is mounting speculation of an early election on account of the Left allies falling apart on the Indo-US Nuclear deal. To b...