This blog reviews books, politics and international events from a distinct perspective. Book reviews will be interesting to everyone with a lively interest in the world around. I am a trained Historian with a PhD in Medieval History from the University of Hawaii at Manoa.
Sunday, May 2, 2010
Telecom Scandal, Dynastic Fascism, and Political Corruption
It is only a matter of time before A Raja the Telecom scamster is shown the door. The 75,000 crore scandal he presided over is directly linked to the DMK party funds.In almost all the recent by-elections the party has spent crores of money and it is quite obvious that some of the money has come from the Telecom scam. A Raja in fact violated the written directive from the Prime Minister's Office which instructed him to keep the "empowered group of ministers" in the loop. It shows that in this Age of coalition politics, the dictates of the PM can be ignored with impunity. It is also possible that the PM's directive was issued to provide a line of defence to the PM, just in case the scandal became too much of a stench. The Congress has perfected the art of political corruption and has trained its 'secular" allies very well in this art. Corruption and Dynastic Fascism are both the great gifts of the Congress to the country.
The only way to rid the nation of corruption is to appoint an audit committee to look into the funding and accounts of all registered political bodies. This is well within the purview of the Election Commission. After all political parties are only unincorporated association in law and it is within the competence of the Election Commission to order an audit into the accounts of all parties. If Hawala money poisons the IPL chalice, why not the political parties. And parties that refuse to comply must be forbidden to compete in the ELECTIONS.
This is a reform well worth attempting.
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Unrestrained Killing in Iraq
The US war effort in Iraq is undermined by the very savagery of its sometimes unrestrained killing. Of course, in a war zone the forces are at liberty to shoot and shoot to kill if need be, but it appears that gratuitous acts of great violence are being carried out without any tactical advantage or objective.
On July 12, 2007 an employees of Reuters, Baghdad,Namir Noor-Eldeem who was all of 22 years old was killed by a deadly burst of 30 millimetre M230 chain guns mounted on AH-64D Apache helicopters which have become the backbone of the US military for decades now. Sometimes called the Black Hawk because of its predatory shilloutte this war machine is etched in American consciousness due to another unfortunate incident in Somalia several years back. Namir Noor and his colleague were killed on the spot even though both of them were neither terrorists nor were they armed. In fact both men took extreme precaution not to send wrong signals as the site of their killing has witnessed sectarian strife. What is shocking is that the US military did not even acknowledge that such an act had taken place and tried to cover up for the error in judgement. It is not any one's case that the pilots were seeking out innocent targets and were getting their kicks by killing innocents. We are saying that the US military in its field operations has given far too much leeway to its soldiers and all damage justified under the label "collateral damage".
This incident would have been forgotten but for a happenstance. The video footage of this particular attack was loaded on to a little known site called Wiki leaks. It is obvious that someone from within the US military establishment has had the courage to leak the footage either to embarrass the military or to assuage the conscience. Either way the damaging video soon became one of the most watched videos even on you-tube where it is presently hosted.
The video has to be watched for one to understand the absolute cold bloodiness of the soldiers in the helicopter. The gunmen in the helicopter open fire on the Small group of unarmed men and kill all of them. Not content at this massacre they wait for the relief van to pull up and in the video one hears a voice with a mid-western accent: Come on, let us shoot.
When the US military was done with its deed 8 men and children lay dead and not one was armed or even remotely associated with insurgency.
This is only to bring home the horror of what is unfolding in Iraq.
Monday, April 19, 2010
Tharoor, Tweets and Twats: A Long Day's Journey into Night
Tharoor broke a few rules of the political game. First, unlike N D Tiwari, Tharoor flaunted his penchant for pretty women. When that Bharka woman from NDTV was inteviewing Tharoor on NDTV a few days back, I thought that Dutt would just sidle up to Tahroor. Such is the force he exudes. We have chief minister of one southern state with more wives than he even cares to remember and his children from different women are fighting for his political legacy even as the old man like King Lear is still technically alive and kicking. No one says anything. The First Prime Minister, Jawarhar Lal Nehru accepted the Partition of India as suggested by Mountbatten because Lady Mountbatten was his lover and we keep that singular fact under the carpet. Tahroor openly associated with a PRETTY WOMAN AND THAT was his first major mistake. He took her to official parties and made it clear to all that she was his love interest. Indians being a hypocritical people do not appreciate an honest relationship. Had Taroor kept Sunanda Pushkar (the pun is unintended) no one would have objected. But he was honest and that was his undoing.
SaSHI Tharoor is a serial offender as far as women are concerned and that is a personality disorder not a crime. The Tiger Woods syndrome affects even successful writers. Tharoor is the author of an outstanding novel, The Great Indian Novel and is still regarded as an outstanding piece of post-colonial literature. His short stories collected in Five Dollar Smile and essays in Book less in Baghdad are well written.
The first rule of Indian politics is that keep your twats under wraps and do not flaunt them. Tharoor paid no heed to that. The second rule of Indian politics is bow and scrape and do not ask questions. Tharoor was tweeting away even on extremely sensitive issues. I have a blog in this site on his "cattle class" remark. I think that the Indian Media too does not know how to deal with a highly educated and accomplished man and was complicit in undermining Tharror.
The most important mistake that Tharoor made was to associate with low brow convicts like the IPL commissioner, Lalith Modi. This convicted drug dealer is not from the same class or status group of Tharoor and Sashi must not have been seen associating with such muck. And he will pay for that.
Sashi Tharoor fell for a woman who for all her looks and glamour did finally show some character. When the sweat equity of 70 crores became an issue she did surrender the equity hoping therby to pull her beau out of the crisis. Sunanda Pushkar husband Menon committed suicide in New Delhi two years back according to the latest Outlook and now see the mess Tharoor has landed in. The moral of the story: Keep your twats strictly out of public glare and scrutiny.
Friday, April 9, 2010
It was such a pleasure meeting this poet
Thursday, April 8, 2010
Dr Srinivas Siras and the Alighar Muslim University
Kapil Sibal came to my University the other day and delivered a splendid convocation address. Though I have little patience for congressmen, I must admid that Kapil Sibal's address was both scholarly and inspiring. I wish he takes time off to see the horrible service conditions of teacher's in Central Universities. Unlike bureaucrats, teachers do not have a CAT and have to approach the civil courts and hence the Universities convert all disputes and grievances into disciplinary cases by misusing the so called autonomy. The murder/suicide of Sr Siras proves my point.
I am shocked at the incident and I pray that his soul finds eternal peace.
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Erich Segal: Poet, Historian, Novelist
I am sure that this scholar with a Ph D in Classics who taught Latin and Greek at Oxford was influenced by the great traditions of European tragedy particularly Sophocles who was in the fragility of human existence the inexorable hand of fortuna.
Some of the lines from this novel like Bob Dylan's "blowin in the wind" have become part of American popular culture.
Erich Segal deserves to be remembered as a great scholar and novelist.
Friday, January 8, 2010
DMK MINISTERS WATCH AS POLICEMAN IS HAKED TO DEATH
Nothing illustrates the degeneration of the political culture and humanity in Tamil Nadu than the callous manner in which two manmamigus (sarcasm intended) the ministers Pannerselvam and Muhammad watched with utter disdain the death of Shri Vettrivellan, a sub-inspector of Police in Tinevelly District who was involved in arranging the security for the ministers. A few minutes before the arrival of the convoy of the manmamigus Shri Vettrivellan had been attacked with country bombs and hacked with avuvals (a local weapon glorified in Tamil Nadu as the Tirupacchi) and as he lay dying the two honourable ministers watched the fun with their dothis folded up and not one of them even bothered to send the dying man to the hospital even though an ambulance was part of the ministerial convoy.
Tinvelly district has become notorious for gang warfare between Maravars and Kallar politicos and thew police are part of the gang warfare as they are used by rival gangs to settle scores. This kind of violent politics has been going on in the region since the late eighteenth century and it is high time factional fighting is checked. Rayalseema area of Andhra Pradesh is another region where such violence has become rampant.
The two ministers must be forced to resign as they acted in a highly irresponsible and criminal manner.