Rumi Nations

You think you know what all your tax money accomplishes? Well you might find a few surprises. Apart from a bunch of Kendriya Vidyalayas and IIMs and IITs and the training colleges for everyone and the Indian Council of Medical Research and the PGIs and the astrophysics research and the particle physics research and the jute and textile research, here are a few more esoteric activities the Government sees fit to associate with: The Government of India does  fusion research . And it is planning a  mission to Mars . But does the government of India do research into pomegranate? Sure it  does . What else does it do?

At last, the Government has chosen to adopt the easy route of banning pre-paid mobile services in the state of Jammu and Kashmir. This is such an asinine decision that it boggles ones mind. Are we living in a democracy or what! Just because a few individuals are using mobile phones to plan their anti-India activities, the Govt. thought it fit to issue a dictat that will inconvenience hundreds of thousands of innocent people going about their daily lives. What do the ordinary people of J&K use their pre-paid connections for? I imagine they would use it for the same purposes as people anywhere else in the country would ... to enable families to stay closer and stay connected, to share the family gossip, youngsters of course would be using these connections to pursue their illicit love affairs, or secret love affairs, I should say, traders and small businessmen would be using phone connections to keep their ears close to the ground and be one up on the competition, the owner of an app...

Peggy Noonan has questioned the maturity of the people in goverance in America today in a compellingly argued article here ... http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703363704574503631430926354.html?mod=djemEditorialPage She has talked about people becomeing "disenchanted" or "disheartened" with government. People do not think that the Government can make it better, she says. Also, the leaders are showing a mindless ... something akin to optimism, she continues. Fascinating perspectives indeed. I am wondering what relevance do these have for Indians. If anyone thinks they are irrelevant, well, I would beg to differ. I think all of us Indians can identify with the feeling of being "disheartened" with Government. India, of course, has never been the "hope of the world," or the "savior of mankind," or the "strongest nation of the world." But, the lesson to learn there is that we have to aspire to such things. Unfortunately...

Today, the Bhubaneswar-New Delhi Rajdhani was hijacked for some time by Naxalites ... One more incident showing the growing threat posed by the movement. One wonders how much of the movement is idealistic, what portion is self-serving, how much pure terrorism, what portion is out of coercion, etc. I think the same combination is at work also in other places as well: be it Kashmir, or Taliban infested Afghanistan, and the many trouble spots in Africa. It would seem therefore that it won't do much good to look at any of these problems as a one-dimensional law and order issue and try to crush them using crushing military strength. Recently, I read that the Government of India was considering banning pre-paid mobile services in Kashmir as that was being misused by the terrorists ... imagine, the Govt. does not mind alienating 38 lakh innocent civilians to inconvenience a few thousand outlaws!