Phoren Indians

Recent months have witnessed a spate of attacks on Indians in Australia and this has led to various declarations (from people dealing with ideas) that Indians are generally filthy in their behaviour and presentation when they are outside the country. Indians are also infamous for their rude behaviour and the absolute lack of politeness. I condemn violence of all kinds in the strongest terms and violence based on prejudice is its worst form and is deplorable, but we need to think about life outside India (especially and life itself generally). Both of these problems stem from the premise that 'we' are superior and the 'other' is inferior.

Having lived for four years now outside India and having witnessed both types of Indians - those who are very particular about personal and global hygiene and those who care a damn - I understand that there is a problem we need to address. The tendency to 'emit' filth around our homes and the lack of importance we pay to personal hygiene are almost universal traits in us.

Another common problem with us is our unending appetite for rudeness. We don't need to be servile to anybody belonging to any culture, but can't we cultivate the practice of politeness while dealing with people? Why do we think like we think at home in India that the ruder we are, the easier the chances of getting work done our way?

One of my most respected lecturers at college used to tell us that the better patriot is the one who points out our flaws and shows us the way forward, not the one who shoves flaws under the carpet and becomes jingoistic. I agree with opinion makers who say that we need to make an effort to keep our outsides as clean as we tend to keep our insides (puja room, kitchen...) clean. Let me also add for good measure the suggestion that we imbibe politeness as a habit and try and wipe away rudeness from our interactions with people.

Well, hmm, I need a lesson or two to learn there!

Deepesh C

THE LEGEND THAT WAS MJ!
MJ is no more and this critical, scrutinizing world will never be the same any more!
Despite the headlines he made for wrong reasons, we all love Michael Jackson for many of his immortal songs, his dance skills and his genuine attempt to make the world "a better place for you and for me and the entire human race".
But going beyond his flaws and fame, we need to introspect about the way we look at celebrities and their lives. Are celebrities undeserving of privacy? Are they pawns at the hand of the prying public? Do we have the right to investigate into people's lives recklessly without heed to their personal choices, their sensitivities and preferences? Can we sit on judgement as if we are walking epitomes of moral perfection?
Questions abound and I suspect I will never find their answers. And the madness of the paparazzi shall rule roost.
Alas, the helpless multitudes feed on the hunted preys of the media-eagles!
May MJ throb in our hearts through the memorable songs he created for us!

IPL in South Africa

Cricket, many say, is a religion in India and cricketing stars, gods. Even detractors of cricket agree that no nation is as crazy about cricket as India is. Now something unusual is visible. The biggest antithesis to the cricket-as-religion idea is the fact that the much-made-of IPL-II had to be shifted out of India, to South Africa.

Many a patriotic Indian has raised a voice against this 'cruel' move. There have been criticisms against half-filled stadiums and the lack of festivities in this IPL season unlike the earlier one.

Personally, I am cruel enough to derive vicarious pleasure from the fact that the IPL has lost its sheen and flavour and elections, for example, have overshadowed this perennial crowd-puller to such an extent that questions are being raised about the kind of gimmicks the BCCI has resorted to in order to improve TV ratings. Why did the cash-rich arrogant BCCI refuse ICC's offer of expertise on tackling match-fixing issues? What is the truth behind the Rajasthan-Kolkata match ending in a tie from nowhere and concluding with super-overs? This match, for example, had all trappings of a 'saas-bahu' serial or shall I say, top-rated reality shows, so well stage-managed.

I am glad the Indian Political League has paled the Indian Premier League this time and the former has turned out to contain all the 'masala' of a Bollywood blockbuster and has managed to sustain interest for so long. Only long after May 16, when election results will start appearing, does the latter IPL have any chance.

Mr.Lalit Modi has been reprimanded by a court for leaving India without taking its permission. Now who will reprimand him for taking the IPL out of India without the people's permission?

Elections in India

I had never been able to come to terms with the hypocrisy and drama of politics ever before this election season. Having studied at the Jawaharlal Nehru university, where politics seeps into every nook and cranny and anybody with half a discerning eye can see through the farce of how students with no deep knowledge of a particular party's ideology meander into it so casually and become its vehement proponents or how staunch supporters of parties go to any extent to malign the opponents and where, yet the profound principles of democracy are so zealously guarded across the political spectrum, I had become deeply cynical about the humdrum and hullabaloo of elections in India and its attached hypocrisies and brazen divorce from principles, and any talk of Indian politics or elections only brought wry smiles on my face signaling the sense of despair at the futility of it all.

However, the 2009 elections have helped me get over this cynicism and this is in no small measure ascribable to the extremely nosy and noisy media and the high sense of awareness that the Indian electorate has now displayed. This is shown right from the fact that 'leaders' have become wary of shoe-hurling media men or members of the audience, to the fact that the public (janta) has become king (janardhan) in the true sense now. Having taken the people so seriously during elections under full media glare this time, the vote-seeking politician can hardly hibernate after the elections. People, both urban and rural, have joined hands with the media to grill the 'neta' like never before. The rough and tumble of the rigmarole of elections have led to many a politician across the spectrum being caught on the wrong foot and being forced to retract from casual politically-wrong utterances.

Democracy has truly arrived in the world's largest democracy and this 2009 festival of democracy is greatest proof of this.

I truly regret being unable to vote this time!

This Week's Lessons

The Politics of Hatred

Recent news suggest more than one instance of people being made pawns in the game of politics where only the politician has something to gain and no one else. The pawns who take all this so seriously in the name of loyalty and sycophancy get affected in the process, often much more than they could have ever imagined. Much in the same way, at office or work, we see this happen in small proportions.

The politics of hate has much to do with the way we think- exclusive instead of inclusive. We spend far too much time in our island-selves and often forget that there are genuine people outside these islands - people who probably deserve much more applause than you do. Often, we become so self-centred in our existences that we forget the compulsions that others have.

Another thing that comes to the mind from this week's observation is the fact that often people discuss people more than they discuss ideas. This is such a pity because it is ideas that differentiate the buck from the muck. Let us try to discuss ideas more often and people less often.

Third, is the old communist idea that comes to mind. The all-knowing, all-pervasive, omnipotent state thinks it should take from each the most they can give and give to each the least they need to survive. Does this rule apply for all states? Is this the ideal for administrators all over? I wonder!

I hope to be able to write more often. It is truly cathartic!

Customer is King?

Supermarkets are like televisions…
When you see much variety and choice,
You get overwhelmed and think
Ah! Yes customer is king!
But scratch your head and see again
You only can buy what is sold
And much of what is sold, buy you won’t
Just as on TV, they show you a lot of trash
And in flipping channels for more, you imitate
Life’s story of seeking the beyond. And yet
When you stop to see, you can
Never see what you wanted to see – you merely
Choose from what they think you should see…
God bless you for thinking you are king!
The king in real is the one who owns
The channel that hoodwinks you into thinking
It shows all you wanted to see…
The king in real is he who owns
The shop that outwits you into thinking
It sells all you wanted to buy…
Hmm! Customer is king? Neat deception!
Deepesh Chandrasekharan

Insensitivity in Leaders

Two things that struck me in news recently are one that happened in the US and another that seems to happen in Bengal.
The US President, George W Bush, the World’s First Citizen (WFC), made a very ‘intelligent’ remark the other day about the prospering middle class in India and also in China eating more these days and as a result, contributing to the food crisis. The problem I have with that statement from the WFC is that it sounds very insensitive – as insensitive as Marie Antoinette’s remark during the French Revolution, that people who don’t have bread should eat cakes… What prompted WFC to make that remark were surely accusations that his biofuels policy was responsible for this crisis. In his enthusiasm to provide an alternative cause, he has banked on this brainwave of an argument which economists are not buying. Does WFC know where India and China appear on the globe? Does WFC care what living conditions prevail in these nations? Does WFC treat people in the two most populous nations as mere numbers in his statistics charts or does he care if they exist? Shame on WFC!
Secondly, I have seen a few reports on how terror reigns in Nandigram in West Bengal, that bastion of the Red salute party which likes to make much propaganda of their scruples and their firm faith in secularism. If the reports are to be believed, the Muslims in Nandigram are suffering as much as the Muslims did and do in Gujarat, the bastion of the Saffron salute party. I wonder if the two parties concerned have faith in Democracy and in the belief that voices should not be stifled. I wonder why the Press that misses no opportunity to assert its freedom, is relatively so quiet in this case! Lord Acton‘s prophecy, “Power corrupts; and absolute power corrupts absolutely” comes to my mind.