The Noon meal Tragedy in Bihar: Callousness and Mis Governance

A look at the world of politics, statecraft, diplomacy and books

Two days dack, in a village Chapra located 65 kilometers from the capital Patna 25 schoolg children all below the age of 11 died after having taken their mid day meals in school. In India, the mid day meal is a major incentive for families from poorer sections of society to send their children to school. Origally conceived in the Southern state of Tamil Nadu by the Cheif Minister M G Ram,achandran, the mid day meal program caught on and even in the mis governed states like Uttar Pradesh and Bihar this welfare scheme is presently underway. The fiances for the scheme are part of the state budget and the school appoints a cook and an attender to run the mid day meal programme.

However, in states like Bihar and Uttar Pradesh there is massive corruption even in this scheme. In fact Bihar has the dubious distinction of having had a Chief Minister, laloo Prasad Yadava who was caught taking the money ear marked for animal welfare. The now infamous Fodder Scam is reaching its final stages in the courts and will end up convicting laloo Prasad Yadava. Even athug like this Laloo Prasad was not able to kill all the 347 witnesses. The current Chief Minister, Nitish Kumar, a past master in the old style identity politics rode to power on the strength of a very fragile social coalition consisting of intermediate caste, landed caste and the higher castes. After taking over the reins of government for the second time, Nitish Kumar began to feel the weight of his victory, but interpreted it as an endorsement of his personal "charisma". And this wrong and ill conceived notion was his undoing.

The tragedy in Bihar took place only because of mis governance. The last 2 years the state administration has been paralyzed due to national ambitions of Nitish Kumar. Ever since he declared his opposition to the Prime Ministerial candidature of Honnourable Narendra Modi, Nitish Kumar regime has been floundering. Corruption, mal administration, scams and scandals have become the order of the day. The death of the 22 school children is a testimony to the plight of Bihar under Nitish Kumar.

The shocking facts have emerged from the news reports. The food itmes for preparing the noon meals were sourced from the shop of the husband of the Head Mistress of the school, a man who as it turns out is an activist of the Rasshtrya Janata dal whose leader is the fodder scam accused, :Laloo Prasad Yadava. The shameless state government sought to shift the blame to the RJD by implying that the RJD wasbehind the tragedy in order to undermine the regime of Nitish Kumar. The level to which politics has sunk in India can be understood from the fact that the Government refuses to see the tragedy as one caused by itts own failures, but is quick to see political conspiracies everywhere. Corruption in the mid day meal scheme is the real factor.

Even after the children took ill, it took over six hours for the children to be shited to the Primary Health Centre and there there was no nurse or doctor and there were no drips to provide immediate releif. This sate of affairs prevailing in Bihar is a national shame and  people must realise that identity politics will lead to the grave as it did for the 22 children

The World Bank and the IMF have given loans, soft loans to Bihar but the utilization of these loans is so poor that the international funding agencies are now wary of giving loans to Bihar. The country as a whole has slid backwards under the rule of the Congress Party and its allies and if India needs better Governence it must vote for change..

The Storm over Narendra Modi 's Interview

A look at the world of politics, statecraft, diplomacy and books The outrage industry is hard at work once again: pouring out anger, invective, hatred and scorn at the emerging national persona of Narendra Modi, the Chief Minister of Gujarat. Taking sentences out of context, distorting the meaning of his sentences and putting words into his mouth, the apologists of the Congress Party like Shoma Choudhary, the notorious Abhishek Manu Singvi, Sanjay Jha and scores of Congress friendly "intellectuals" came flooding to TV studios to have their fifteen minutes of fame. They tried to suggest that Naredra Modi had overreached himself and had exposed his "communal" ideology. The riots of 2002 are always brought out when the Chief Minister of Guharat is discussed. However what is ignored deliberatelyy is that the Supreme Court if India has monitored the investigations into the 2002 Riots and has declared Modi absolutely free of any fault either of omission or commission.

The liberals who vent their fury at Narendra Modi seem to forget that the Congress party organised the largest masscre of Indians in the post Independence period when in 1984 Congress workers led by Sahhan Kumar, Jagdish Tytler, Lalith Makken and scores of other Delhi based politicians attacked Sikhs all over New Delhi and other parts of North India and killed 5,000 Sikhs in Delhi alone. The count of the dead in the rest of North India is not known. Yet these very liberals are silent in the issue of Congress complicity in the 1984 riots and earlier in the Bhagalpur riots ibn which nearly 1,500 men and women were killed. The reason why they vent their spleen on Narendra modi os only to polorise the electorate and harvest Muslim votes. Unfortunatley, the people of India have not forgotten 1984 and the Congress has neither expressed its anguish over the killings nor has the party apologised for the rampage of 1984. Yet when it comes to Gujarat the Congress men like to pose as if their hands are clean when in fact it is dripping with blood and the stains are there for all to see.

Certain remarks made by Modi have beeb twisted out of shape. Modi described himself as a "patriot", a "nationalist" and finally as a "hindu nationlist". The votaries of the fake secularism jumped at the last label and accused him of being divisive. What Modi meant was that he has a vision of India founded on the values and traditions that are associated with Sanathana Dharma and that forms the inspiration for his statecraft. There is nothing divisive or even politically damaging in this statement. Since he was speaking in Hindi, the Congressmen have created a good deal of confusion by deliberately distorting his remarks. The Supreme Court of India has ruled that Hinduism is not a religion but onlyn a way of life and therefore what Modi has said by no stretch of the imagination can be termed "communal".

During the course of the interview, Modi referred to the pain he felt when even a small puppy is killed by being run over by a car. This remark was made in the context of the pain he felt for the suffering of the people of Gujarat during the 2002 riots. A man who can feel the pain of a small animal rum over by a car is certainly sensitive to the feelings of people. Contrast this statement with what Rajiv Gandhi said when the Sikhs were being killed in New Delhi during his watch as Prime Minister: When a big tree falls the earth trembles. Not only was the Army not called in Delhi to control the Congress thugs, but the Sikh policmen who would have protected the people were told not to report to duty. No police station filed the FIR against the Congress men responsible for the killings and yet none of the outrage mongers of today have a word of condemnation for the Congress and this silence exposes the political purpose in hounding Modi. On Gujarat on the other hand, the police restored Law and Order within 24 hours and there has been no riots since much to the chagrin of the Congress Party.

One last point. Modi rightly said that in democracies issues do get polorised and he went on to show the differences between the Republican and the Democratic parties. The Congress spokemsmanSanjay Jha seems to think that American politics is all talk and not much polirization in US politics. He is just an illiterate fellow who should know that the immigration bill and the Arms Control measures are deeply divisive even in American Society. These days the Congress party has begun holding the US as a torch bearer of value politics forgotting its own stand not that long ago. There is nothing wrong ibn polorising the electorate onto the side of good governance and corruption free India which Modi not only promises but has delivered in Gujarat.

The 2014 General Elections will be faught on the issue of corruption and mis governance and on both these issues the people of India have made up their mind and the Congress party wants to take the agends back to identity politics and is trying its level best to whip up passion against Modi. THe elections will see a total wipeout of the Congresss party.

A trip to Jharkhand: Rohini, a land time forgot

A look at the world of politics, statecraft, diplomacy and books With great trepidation I set off for Jharkhand. I kept telling my hosts that it is unsafe to travel there and they in turn offered police protection from the West Bengal border. I politely declined as I felt safer travelling alone than with a police escort. After all a historian is not really a threat to the Maoists. I am glad I went as I had some memorable experiences there. The districts of Dumka and Devghar constitute the heart of the Santal land and there are well preserved markers of the heroes, Sido-Kunnhu, the two tribals who faught in 1856 against the creeping rule of the East India Company. I found the statue of the two in the heart of Dumka.

Jharkhand being on the border between Bengal and Bihar has been exposed to religious influences which have shaped the identity of the place. One can say that the geographical features and cultural attributes contribute to the making of spatial identities and the best example of this is the Baba Baidynath Dham located in Devaghar. This temple probably of the medieval period is a celebrated Dham of Hindu religion and the puranic lore of the place connects the shrine to the legend of Siva and sati. The heart of sati, the consort of Shiva is said to have falled in this place and the shrine commemorates that event. As a tantric shire this place is marked by animal sacrifices and the crowds there is indeed tremendous. I manged to find my way to the Linga with the help of a muscular panda. Here are some pictures of the Baba Baidyanth Dham.

Rohini, a small "princely" state spawned by the zamindari settlemnt in the late eighteenth century has had an interesting history. It was one of the first to introduce the concept of seed bank in the early twentieth century when the sate of Rohini subsidized the grain that was distributed to farmers during a particularly severe famine. This place was also the first major stop in the spiritual journey of Ramakrishna Parahamsa whose Ashram is still located in Devghar. The ruins of the old palaces of Rohini bespeak of an age gone by and here are some of the pictures which evoke a picture of the age that has disappeared forever. The descendant of the Rohini ruling family is a sociologist by training and an extremely gracious person. It was quite an honour to have met him and his two friendsmNandan and Chowdhury, dring my visit to Rohini.

Rohini has earned a footnote for itself in the history of the Mutiny of 1857. Though the residents of Rohini are all convinced that 1857 was a War of Independence, the fact is that the echoes of the Barrarkpore incident had almost an immediate echo in Rohini when three soldiers led by Salamat Ali killed a cavalry officer, Leslie. With some difficulty Nandan and Choudhury and Srinjeevi were able to locate the long forgotten grave of Leslie alongside ther Kolkotta=Mughalsarai Railway line.

1857 and the events around this landmark have fashioned commemorative practices which are kitschy as they are poignant. The place in which Salamat Ali and his two compatriots were hanged has been made into a Shaheed Sthal. a Martyr's Place, which was set up in memory of 1857. The statues of the 3 are found in this park.

Rohini is surrounded by hills and the hill ranges provided space for the early revolutionaries to try out their explosives and also a secluded place for nationalists and revolutionaries alike to seek refuge from the British Secret police. In a forested track located near the outskirts of Rohini is the mid nineteenth century building, the Grant Bunglow.

The trip to Jharkhand, particularly Devaghar and Rohini was a memorable one and I met some very good people there and was struck by the gracious simplicity of the family of the erstwhile rulers of Rohini.

America's Secret War: Mazzetti throws light on CIA Operations

A look at the world of politics, statecraft, diplomacy and books One of the many myths surrounding USA is that it is a great power, a bulwark of liberty in a sea of tyranny. This self serving ideologically laced self representation of USA has made people, especially historians and analysts, ignore certain important aspects of the political and institutional conduct of US. In India, the tele intellectuals of JNU and other leading Universities are only too willing to buy American self ratiocination as the hegemonic weight of post colonial theories seriously impedes our intellectuals from seeing reality from behind the fog of illusions created by American propaganda. India has to learn lessons from the USA, if it wants to be a hard state. Unfortunately the cold comfort of being a soft state gingerly side stepping all important political and security questions is too attractive a prospect for our "intellectuals" to lose. So they continue to mouth the platitudes taught to them by American establishment. A case in point is the controversy over Martha Nussbaum. There are enough morally obnoxious events happening in the USa for this white woman to fret and fume over. But she will issue "fawas" against Narendra Modi and her shrill rhetoric is magnified by Indian intellectuals ever eager to be seen on the same page as the Gucci and Benetton of the American academia. It is in this context that Mark Mazetti's The Way of the Knife is an eyeopener. This book deals with the policies and strategies pursued by the USA in its war against Islamic fundamentalism. What is so striking is the close coordination between the Military and the civilian leadership especially in the fields of espionage and "special operations" US speak for targeted assassinations. Right from the Administration of George W Bush the CIA was involved in an active chase for Islamic militants in Iraq, Somalia, the Horn of Africa and Afghanistan, The hunt had started even before 9/11. The CIA and its method of working is given in some detail. In India we have seen the absolute incompetence of IB and RAW to achieve any national goal. RAW operatives must read this book to get a first hand account of the ethos prevailing in the intelligence community in USA. First of all the Americans rightly think that Intelligence is not the domain for policemen and detectives. Somehow there is a false notion prevailing in India that political and strategic intelligence can be left to policemen. This is like leaving open hear surgery to the chief nurse in the cardiac ward. It is high time India understood that Intelligence is a highly specialized field of expertise and policemen are just not adequate for the job. Another point worth noting is the integrity with which field operatives do their job. They do not white wash reports or tailor them for the political basses. The only instance when this was done was during the WMD crisis when the CIA operatives or eather the outsources espionage hacks filled exaggerated reports. In India the RAW and the IB put up reports with both eyes firmly fixed on the next promotion or the needs of their bosses. Americans usually claim that their Government follows Rule of Law. By and large one can agree with this statement at a very general level just as I will say with utter confidence that in India we have rule of outlaws like Laloo, Mulayam, Karunanidhi and slum dog politicians like them. However, when dealing with grey areas the US Government outsources its policy of inflicting violence. Blackwater is a case in point, Whenever dirty work of killing people or whisking them away for "serious interrogation" read Git Mo treatment, then Blackwater fills the bill. The American tax payer pays heavily so that his President and his Cabinet can deny "criminal culpability" for the actions Black Water carries out. Even in an Outlaw State like India, this kind of deniablity is not possible. The political opposition will not allow the Government to get away with callous, calculated mursder as is done in the USA and Mark Mazzetti has documented several instances of such dubious behavior.

The book makes fascinating reading and is written in a racy, page turner sort of style which makes the book more interesting than John Le Carr's Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. However, the author like all Americans is a bit squeamish when it comes to drone warfare. He hints that there are questions about the legality of such attacks but does not explicitly state that US policy is illega. However, the author has provided enough instances to show that the much vaunted drone warfare has caused huge causalities. In Somalia and in Afghanistan drone attacks has led to more than 5,000 deaths and the body count is rising. I like the book and I reccomed this book to all those interested in US policies in our part of the Globe.

Narendra Modi and the BJP; The Internal crisis and its ramifications

A look at the world of politics, statecraft, diplomacy and books The elevation of the Hon'ble Narendra Modi to head the election campaign for the 2014 General Elections was not unexpected. The BJP has seen in the Chief Minister a new kind of leader, one who has the largest appeal in a country where the majority of the population is less than 30 years of age. The demographics of the electorate dictates the choice of a campaign strategist who can connect with the younger sections of the population. Another important point. After fomenting "identity politics" based on confessional sects, the country particularly the Muslims were willing to give the Congress party its thumbs up by default. The Congress party had learned the art of whipping up minority fears for its own dynastic purposes. The happy fallout of the Jaswant Singh controversy has been that it has led to a rethinking about the role of the Congress in the tragedy of Partition and many are now willing to concede that the Congress too was complicit in the tragedy. Minority fears also revolve around the unsettled and ongoing controversy of the role of the Congress Party and its leadership in the anti-Sikh Massacre of 1894. One happy consequence of all these developments is that the Congress propaganda of being a party which protects minority interests has been questioned. The changing nature of Indian society and demography has led to VIRTUAL REJECTION OF POLITICS OF the "old kind". The cobbling together of caste groups, vested interests and sundry other sodalities into a combination that can hurl a candidate across the winning post and in the first past the winning post system this strategy was often successful. The only exception to this general rule was the 1977 election which was a referendum on the Congress Party imposed Emergency. The 2014 Elections is showing every sign of snowballing into a referendum on the Congress and its performance. The series of scandals involving powerful congressmen like P Chidambaram and Pawan Bansal, regional allies like the DMK and the rest has made the entire country restive. Indians have come to accept a fair degree of corruption as then price for democracy, unlike China where the Confucian ethics curbs the predatory instincts. However the rising crime graph and the impunity with which the Congress dealt with the question of accountability has outraged the nation and so the 2014 Election will be fought on the issue of governance and accountability. The Chief Minister of Gujarat, Hon;ble Narendra Modi has been able to articulate a vision of politics which the young find highly inspirational. He has turned politics over to Economics and has made development the sole criterion for political legitimacy. In this, Modi is essentially following the East Asian and China model which placed salience on develpment. The growth rate of Gujarat over the past decade has been virtually in the double digits and even the hostile Indian print media has had to acknowledge the vast improvement in the economy of Gujaratt. There are however questions of inclusion which still remain. We must say that only after the economy has grown can one address the issue of inclusion. The ideologues of the Congress and their cohorts in the Indian "social science" establishment have raised quetions about the "inclusive" nature of Gujarat's growth story. What these ideologues fail to grasp is that over the last decade Gujarat has become almost a developed state and all social indices are positive. It is against this background that Narendra Modi began to draw attention. The people of India, particularly the young want better lives for themselves, better education and better living standards and are convinced that the old style of identity politiccs favored by the Congress is not taking the country anywhere except toward crime and corruption. The schemes launched by the Gujarat Government if replicate on a national scale will lead to tremendous progress. Governance in GujarAT IS FREE FROM THE MALAISE OF CORRUPTION. hON.BLE nAREDRA MODI is perhaps the only chief minister who does not face charges of corruption and financial maleficence. And the people of India want to give this new kind of politics a chance. The BJP like any Indian political party is full of factions. L K Advani has virtually disassociated himself from the leadership of Shri Modi, This is unfortunate as Advani is a tall leader and well respected within the party and outside. I have great respect for L K Advani and I think that he is too great a man to let the clouds of today rain out the prospects for a better India. However Modi has a toough job ahead of him. Being the chairman of the Election Committee he would need to interact with state level leaders who are aligned to various factions and the defeat of the party in Karnataka must have led to the realization that factionalism is self defeating. Modi must quickly develop a line of command which reports directly to him and not to the faction bosses. The 2014 Elections will be fought on the issue of governance and corruption and Modi has demonstarted success in both.

Naxalite Violence in Chatiisghar: Is the Congress Party responsible for the cycle of violence

A look at the world of politics, statecraft, diplomacy and books The Naxalite Movement has created a state within a state in India and with the eroding legitimacy of the Indian state based on the 1947 Settlement it is time to ask the fundamental question: Is the Indian political class of which the criminal organization called the Congress party is the preeminent example the main and fundamental cause for the cycle of violence. During the course of the last 60 years the dynastic fascists have ruined India by foisting a corrupt political culture in which courtiers masquerade as politicians. Every institution of the land, the Parliament, the steel frame of the bureaucracy, the constitutional bodies like the CVC and investigative agencies like the Enforcement Directorate and the CBI have been perverted to serve the cause of the dynastic fascists. The Indi9an constitution does not advocate a dynastic sate and the criminal CONGRESS PARTY HAS CONVERTED THE POLITICAL PROCESS into manipulated endorsement of dynastic rule. Unfortunately the other political parties like the BJP and the Communists play along without realizing the fact that dynastic fascism is the root cause of political and administrative corruption in India. The present regime of ManMohan Singh is floundering in the ocean of corruption on a monumental scale of which the Coal Allocation Scandal and the @G Spectrum Scandal have caused a loss of nearly 15% of the GDP.If India did not have this parasitical political class it would be a very rich country indeed. It is against this background that the violence against the Congressman unleashed by the Maoists in Chatiisghar has to be viewed. The Congress Party always speaks in two voices on all major issues and hence there is no consensus in India on any issue. All criminology parties will unite in the name of fighting communslism without understanding that the bogey of ":communalism" was created by Nehru in order to defelct attention from the Congress complicity in enforcing the Partition of the Country and since then the artificial fears of "majority" rule has been cleverly used to fragment Indian electorate into pliable voting blocks. The BJP unfortunately plays along with the Congress without realizing that the political futre of India lies only in the demise and extinction of political forces like the Congress. In Punjab the Congress sided with the Sikh militants and lent support to Bhindrenwale, in Sri Lanka the Congress Government of Indira Gandhi armed and trained the LTTE and in Assam, the Congress is in direct cahoots with the ULFA and uses the militancy in order to intimidate the other parties including the BJP. Therefore for the Congress leadership to say that the attack on the "Parivarthan Yatra" is an attack on the "democratic process" is both false and disingenuous. The Congress has been using Dig Vijaya Singha to discredit any attempt at reigning in jehadi inspired terrorism. Now when it has to face the consequences of its own misguiged policies to cries out as if "Democracy" is in danger. The dynastic fascists re the biggest threat to democracy in India not the Naxalite Movement. Unfortunately, establishment figures like Ramachandra Guha fail to emphasis the obvious link between Congress double speak and the culture of violence unleashed by that party. Now the people are responding in kind. Another example of the double speak is the patronage given to the anti naxalite militia, the Salwa Jadum founded by Mahendra Karma who was killed in the attack recently. The petition of Ramachandra Guha made the Supreme Court oder the disbanding of the Salwa Jadum while the Naxalite movement did not get any adverese notice from the Court. The ideologues like Arunditti Roy and Ramchandra Guha denounced in very strong language the violence of the Salwa Jadum but were certainly not too vehemnet in teir criticism of the Naxalite. In fact Arunditti Roy even calls them "Gandhians with Guns". In fact the Congress patronage of the Salwa Judam made this anti naxalite movement into a major force in the so called anti naxalite movement. The Congress trumpeted its Operation Green HUnt" after the Dantewada Incident but as is always the case with the Congress it lacks both the skill and the expertise to do anything excet corruption. Operation Green Hunt degenerated into a tribal killing movement and this engendered more support for the anti Congress Naxalite Movement. If the Naxalite target the Congress and other criminal political forces the p[eople of India will not give a whit. It was Karma, a Congressman who created and launched the anti tribal militia and the naxalites took him out in a ruthless amnner. Jairam Ramesh the "intellectual" face of the dynastic fascists publically humiliated Mahendra Karma in the rally signalling the Congress no longer found Karma useful and therefore expendable. The result the brutal killing of this Congress tribal political leader. The Congress Party itself is responsible for the killing not the state Government under Dr Raman Singh. The Home Ministry guidelines are very clear that in Naxalite liberated areas the conventional political parties should not move in large convoys. The convoy of nearly 40 cars was struck by well trained and armed militants. As was the case with the Rajiv Gandhi rally in which Rajiv Gandhi was eliminated by his political rivals the LTTE, in which the participation of Congress insiders is still suspected. in the case of the present attack the route of the convoy was changed at the last moment and this led to the attack. In other words the congress men themselves were responsible for the brutality. Had the route not been changed then the attack may not have taken pl;ace. Do we care about what happened. I think the Indian nation does not care for the fate of its politicians. V C Shukla was the Information and Broadcasting Minister during the Emergency and that says it all. The BJP must not go overt board in condemning the attack as the Congressmen invited the attack on themselves.

IPL MATCH FIXING AND THE GAME OF CRICKET: BEYOND A BOUNDRY,by C L R James

A look at the world of politics, statecraft, diplomacy and books The recent expose has of course, shocked everyone. Each time a juicy scandal breaks out and the heart wrenching dirges that are sung about betrayal reminds me of the famous line in Casablanca when the police officer says, "I am shocked that gambling in goin on here" even as he pockets his earnings. Sreesanth has been caught largely because he is an outsider and a marginal member of the Indian test team. In fact, right from the time of Kapil Dev Indian cricket has been bedeviled by allegations of match fixing and Mohammad Azuruddin the Hon'ble member of thew Congress Party and an MP to boot from Rampur, UP was even convicted of match fixing. Unfortunately, the man went on to become an MP and thus prove to the whole country that even if you are caught in a scandal the political class is above common consideration of decency, loyalty to country and dignity. In fact Indian cricket is a mirror of contemporary India in which fixers of every kind, colour and shape thrive. Just see the shenanigans of the Congress Party over the Coalgate Scandal and the involvement of the Law Minister in the whole affair. Cricket has had a rich and colurful history. Ranjit Singh documented his life in cricket in the Jubilee Book of Cricket. India unfortunately has not produced a single historian who has been able to write the history of the game as a reflection of social, political and cultural trends. The last great cricketer which India had was Gundappa Vishwanath, a stylish batsman who displayed both verve and style on the wicket. Now we have corrupt clowns masquerading as national icons and the decline began, yes, with Sachin Tedulkar. The clamour for giving his a "Bharat Ratna" is indeed obscene. Beyond a Boundry by C L R James is one of the best books on cricket that I have ever read. I have read Neville Cardus and the like but James is able to interweave the history of cricket in the West Indies with social history. The racist society of Jamaica and Trinidad did not allow the blacks, the descendents of slaves who worked on the sugar plantations any venue for social mobility. C L R James write the history of west Indian cricket as a social history of the blacks trying to assert their identity in the face of intense institutional racism and marginalization. Obviously with such a history, you are not going to see match fixing and and like. Every lover of cricket must read this book.