Saturday, August 4, 2012

My interventions in media through FACEBOOK - Ghulam Muhammed, Mumbai

My interventions in media through FACEBOOK


Sunday, August 05, 2012

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  • Ghulam Muhammed
2 minutes ago
    • I have watched your presentation on NDTV on the subject of Anna Hazare and his movement. I felt your presentation suffered with acute personalized view without giving any quarters for rational and historical perspective to the going ons. Just because you do not like this old business of religiousness mode of public mobilization, given possibly your 'modern' background, you cannot deny that not only it has worked in the past and even now it worked, or seasoned politicians like Congress as well as RSS/BJP both would not have descended on the scene with unusual alacrity. Granted there is a difference between perception and reality; the age of communication is now overwhelming geared to perception. On that count, a nondescript person, from a remote village did attract, not only physical massing of masses of whatever counting, but had registered his own solid record of 4 decades of fighting corruption, successfully in his own state of Maharashtra, with the people at large at national and even international level. He got ministers and babus resigning in Maharashtra, without any approach to courts. Only his public agitation and that too without big crowds, did succeed in bringing shame to politicians and bureaucrats and forcing them to resign. It is natural for him and Team Anna to adopt him to go national. Now just because a Madhu Trehan, feel fasting and hoisting a single person is immoral, fascist, or antiquated, which is quite so in essence if an argument is woven around it. But here it forced the political establishment to at least move some distance over Lokpal bill; which the parliamentarians on their own could not achieve for last 40+ years. Anna and his team should at least be acknowledged as catalysts.

      I felt with your credentials as journalist with a keen mind, you could have possessed an open mind to see other people's perspective too and realized how your public argument was flawed by your personal prejudices.
-------------------

George Alagiah

  • Ghulam Muhammed
2 hours ago
    • I saw your Mixed Britannia. It asked 2 questions. Why Germany acted against race mixing while England was against race profiling and more accommodating to mixed relationship. Don't get surprised if I come out with a politically incorrect analysis. The key to a correct diagnosis of the problem is the presence of Jews in the 2 societies. In Germany, Hitler movement was against Jews. In England, Jews were more assimilated and were able to push multi-culturism for their own protection.

      Second question: Why England recruited the mixed soldier class from the colonies to 'serve the mother land'. England needed soldiers and had to depended on colonies for recruits. Moody question was addressed and solved, as there was no choice. 'The Empire would have broken up.' Naturally, those that remained back on the island and that arrived later when post-war economy had to be powered by immigrant labour ; interactions between races was inevitable and UK tolerated it, and will tolerate till the time, it does not need them. Jews will be in the forefront of sending immigrants back home.

      Moral: Do not underplay role of the Jews, good or bad. They must be given their full exposure. Without putting them in place, none of our analysis will be complete and tenable.
-------------------------------                                                   

The mystery behind Pune serial Bomb blasts ? By Ahmed Sohail Siddiqui - bismillahnews.com

http://www.bismillahnews.in/?page_id=1027



The mystery behind Pune serial


Bomb blasts ?






Explosive ride: Maharashtra Home Minister (C) inspecting a cycle, on which an IED was mounted. PTI
Photo Courtesy: New Indian Express - [Bismillahnews.in-01-08-12-New Delhi-Sohail Siddiqui]




By Ahmed Sohail Siddiqui


Does any civilized country welcomes its first Dalit Home-Minister in such a fashion as Brahmins have? The resentment to tolerate a Dalit in the most powerful seat by the caste Hindus is an open indication that either the Dalit Home Minister Sushil kumar Shinde has to continue with the policies of his caste Hindu Uppercaste precede rs namely LK Advani,Shivraj Viswanath Patil and P Chidambaram or there would be more Diwali.Poor shinde with in 24 hours of this threat publicly announce that the policies of P Chidambaram were correct and he would continue with them.The scared Home-Minister cancelled his first visit as home-minister to Pune encouraging the moral of Fascist Brahmins.

Since Independence after 27 home ministers in various congress and non-congress governments Sushil kumar Shinde is the 28th and first Dalit Home-Minister of India.This post in the past has been handed over to only to three persons from minorities Mufti Mohammed Saeed, Sardar Buta Singh and Giani Zail Singh.Below is the complete list of Home-Ministers since Independence.


# Picture Name State Term Began Term Ended Prime Minister(s) served under

1 Vallabhbhai Jhaverbhai Patel Gujurat 15 August 1947 15 December 1950 Jawaharlal Nehru

2 Chakravarti Rajagopalachari Tamil Nadu 26 December 1950 25 October 1951 Jawaharlal Nehru

3 - Kailash Nath Katju Madhya Pradesh 1951 1955 Jawaharlal Nehru

4 - Govind Ballabh Pant Uttaranchal 1955 1961 Jawaharlal Nehru

5 Lal Bahadur Shastri Uttar Pradesh 4 April 1961 29 August 1963 Jawaharlal Nehru

6 Gulzarilal Nanda Punjab Province (British India) 29 August 1963 14 November 1966 Jawaharlal Nehru

8 Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi Uttar Pradesh 27 June 1970 4 February 1973 Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi

9 Uma Shankar Dikshit Uttar Pradesh 1973 1974 Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi

10 Kasu Brahmananda Reddy Andhra Pradesh 

11 Chaudhary Charan Singh Uttar Pradesh 24 March 1977 1 July 1978 Morarji Desai

12 Morarji Desai Gujarat 1 July 1978 28 July 1979 Morarji Desai

13 Yashwantrao Balwantrao Chavan Maharashtra 28 July 1979 14 January 1980 Chaudhary Charan Singh

14 Giani Zail Singh Punjab January 14, 1980 June 22, 1982 Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi

15 Ramaswamy Venkataraman Tamil Nadu 22 June 1982 2 September 1982 Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi

16 Prakash Chandra Sethi Madhya Pradesh Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi

17 Pamulaparti Venkata Narasimha Rao Andhra Pradesh 19 July 1984 31 December 1984 Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi

18 Shankarrao Bhavrao Chavan Maharashtra 31 December 1984 12 March 1986 Rajiv Ratna Gandhi

19 Pamulaparti Venkata Narasimha Rao Andhra Pradesh 12 March 1986 12 May 1986 Rajiv Ratna Gandhi

20 Sardar Buta Singh Punjab 1986 1989 Rajiv Ratna Gandhi

21 Mufti Mohammad Sayeed Jammu and Kashmir 1989 1990 Vishwanath Pratap Singh

22 Chandra Shekhar Singh Uttar Pradesh 10 November 1990 21 June 1991 Chandra Shekhar Singh

23 Shankarrao Bhavrao Chavan Maharashtra 21 June 1991 May 1996 Pamulaparti Venkata Narasimha Rao

24 Indrajit Gupta West Bengal 1996 1998 Haradanahalli Doddegowda Deve Gowda

Inder Kumar Gujral

25 Lal Kishanchand Advani Sind Province 19 March 1998 22 May 2004 Atal Bihari Vajpayee

26 Shivraj Vishwanath Patil Chandigarh 22 May 2004 30 November 2008 Manmohan Singh

27 Chidambaram Palaniappan Tamil Nadu 30 November 2008 - Manmohan SinghOut of six bombs four exploded and three of these were placed in bicycles. (AP file photo)
Defusing the unexploded bomb : Photo Courtesy: New Indian Express

Who is behind these blasts?

One thing is clear to the government that the hold of Brahmans when ever is loosened on the sensitive Home-Ministry they blackmail the government and the country in such fashion.The doubt in this case is on moles with the police force who could have done this.The first day statement by government sources were claiming that a Hindu injured victim carrying the bomb packet on his bicycle was the prime suspect and with in hours the Maharashtra police said they have no evidence and CCTV coverage due to non functioning of cameras could not be procured. [ http://newindianexpress.com/nation/article581929.ece
 ] Helpless the angle of investigation turned its finger of suspicion on patent "Indian Mujahideen".So friends the policies adopted by LK Advani followed by Shivraj Patil and P Chidambaran are intact even in the rule of first Dalit Home Minister.[ http://newindianexpress.com/nation/article581883.ece ]
Will Anti-Muslim policy of Brahmins help secular India?

For a short time during UPA-1 it looked like Chidambaram by laying his hands on saffron terrorists is moving judiciously in the right direction to catch the terrorists. But the saffron brigade netted him in scams and bargained with him to retain LK Advani formed policies in Home-Ministry.His last four months saw almost all saffron terrorists getting bail on the ground of no charge sheet by CBI/SIT.SIT gave total clean chit to MODI and states successfully have initiated new pattern of Anti-Muslim violence from kosi-kalan,esthaan,Bharatpur,Adoni etc and most importantly in Assam beating all previous records.The conspiracy angle in the post godhra Anti-Muslim pogrom which should have put LK Advani, Narendra Modi and thousands of right wing workers, politicians behind bars was totally demolished, courtesy Teesta Setalvad and her NGO fooling Muslim victims.Work done satisfactorily Chidambaram is back in finance Ministry handing over the charge to Brahmin bureaucracy with Shinde a Dalit HM remaining a show boy only. 

The batton now has been passed on to a Dalit Home-Minister who is himself a victim of Brahman terrorism after the pune serial blasts so what can be expected from him ?

**************
(The writer is Editor in Chief of web-magazine: bismillahnews.com)

Monday, July 30, 2012

Homeless in Kokrajhar - By Subrata Nagchaudhury - The Sunday (Indian) Express - Mumbai

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/homeless-in-kokrajhar/980803/0

The Indian Express




Homeless in Kokrajhar

Subrata Nagchoudhury : Sun Jul 29 2012,
A road slices Gokulkata village in Kokrajhar into two. On one side lived its Muslim residents, on the other the Bodos. But after four days of rioting, no one lives here any more.

What’s left in Gokulkata are rows of burnt houses. The houses with bamboo poles and tin shades have been reduced to ashes while the once-concrete houses are now just sooty walls. Bodies of dead ducks and goats lie amongst the debris. The living have all fled and no one knows when they will be back.

In the past week, villages across Kokrajhar have emptied out, leaving behind burnt homes and an eerie silence.

On Wednesday, Idris Ali walked 35 km with seven others from his family and four cattle from his village Sapkata to the Hatidhura relief camp, only to find it full. So, he continued walking, looking for a relief camp that would take him in.

Ali says the attack on his village last week looked like it had the patronage of the administration. The attackers, he says, came in green camouflage outfits and were seen talking to local security forces before they targeted Muslim houses.

At Tamahata relief camp, Azizul Haque from Moktaigaon village relives the attack that nearly killed him. “I was fired at from close range and a bullet grazed my stomach. I was taken to Gosaigaon hospital first and then to Kokrajhar hospital where again a group of Bodo youth attacked me. I am alive only by Allah’s grace,” says Haque.

At another relief camp in Jaraguri in Gosaigaon block of Kokrajhar, where 3,400 Bodo refugees are taking refuge, Longshri Basumatary of Burichitam village is still perplexed over how the relationship between the two communities soured so quickly. “We had extremely cordial relations with our Muslim neighbours. We used to go to their houses, have tea with them, share meals with them and they too would come over to our homes. The same people set fire to our houses and drove us out,” she says.

Bhadreshwar Basumatary, a forest guard in the camp, says that for the last few years he has been cultivating his one-acre farm along with Muslim farmers in his village Dawaguri. The Muslim farmers tilled his land and he would share his produce with them. They also took care of his banana orchard. With the relationship between the Muslims and Bodos now turning bitter, Bhadreshwar is worried about who will tend to his paddy crop.

Simmering discontent

Trouble in Kokrajhar had been brewing for the last few weeks after minority student unions and non-Bodo tribes began pressing their demand for greater representation in the Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC). On July 6, two Muslim youths were shot at. Suspicion fell on the Bodos. Nearly a fortnight later, on July 20, more violence followed. Pradip Bodo, a former cadre of the Bodoland Liberation Tigers (BLT), and three of his friends were killed, which triggered full-scale rioting.

The riots have brought onto the surface simmering tensions between the two communities. Ever since the clashes between Bodos and migrant Muslim groups in 2008, Kokrajhar, the seat of administration of the BTC, has held an uneasy peace. The area under the BTC’s jurisdiction has seen undercurrents of tension even after the Bodo Accord of 2003.

Rashmi Kant Basumatary, a Bodo leader who is overseeing the Gambaribil relief camp, says the rioting may have ceased but it’s “certainly not the end of it.” “The Muslims have been trying to assert themselves more and more in recent times. Several student bodies of the minorities are spearheading this campaign,” says Rashmi.

At the root of the problem is a “crisis of land”, he says. “They (Muslims) need land to expand as their population is growing.”

Meanwhile, Maulana Badruddin Ajmal, an MP of the All India United Democratic Front from Dhubri, says Muslims have been uprooted in a planned manner with the help of the administration.

There are a number of reasons underlying the tension between the Muslims and Bodos in Kokrajhar. Discrimination is one of them. Minorities and non-Bodo tribes feel only the Bodos have benefited from the setting up of the BTC.

The BTC, says Sarath Narzary, former principal of the Kokrajhar Government College, has not been able to fulfill the aspirations of the people. “It has been constrained with limited powers and limited resources and has proved beneficial for a handful of people. Non-Bodo communities feel that the creation of the BTC has opened up vast opportunities for the Bodo people, which, in fact, is not true. This feeling that ‘they are enjoying the fruits of power while we are deprived’ could be one of the prime causes of the worsening relations between the Bodos and the non-Bodos,” says Narzary.

The issues of discontent are many. Population pressures, land rights, self determination, illegal migration and occupation all led to a tipping point. Khampa Borgoyri, deputy chief of the BTC, says it’s time the council undertakes a survey of the land holding status within the BTC area. “We are sure that over 35 per cent of government vacant khas land has been encroached upon by illegal settlers,” he says.

The region has seen much violence in the last few years. U G Brahma, former president of the All Bodo Students’ Union (ABSU) and a former Rajya Sabha member, says at least 200 Bodos have been killed in the last couple of years in isolated attacks from unidentified assailants.

The last few years have also seen mounting pressure from Muslim groups to dissolve the BTC and also to exclude those areas from the BTC where the Bodos are not in a majority. Bodos, says Ajmal, constitute only 27 per cent of the population of the BTC.

The growing clamour against Bodo influence has culminated in the formation of a Non-Bodo Suraksha Samity, which, according to political sources, wants to bring various non-Bodo communities under one umbrella. At the helm of its activity are surrendered ULFA members, extreme Left outfits and various Muslim student bodies.

Moinuddin, president of the All Bodoland Minority Students’ Union, alleges that the Bodos want to increase their numbers in the BTC and push for a separate state. “The recent flare-up coincides with the raising of demands for a separate statehood of Bodoland,” he says.

As the accusations and counter-accusations continue, in the relief camps across Kokrajhar, villagers dream of the day they will return home.

--------------





Sunday, July 29, 2012

As Tensions in India Turn Deadly, Some Say Officials Ignored Warning Signs - By Gardiner Harris - The New York Times

The delay in getting army to step in, holds the key to Assam State Government's sinister policy to fish in the muddle waters and using carrot and stick approach, prepare for the next elections. It is downright a criminal act, when State itself by its acts of commission or omission, is directly responsible for deaths, destruction and mass exodus due to ethnic cleansing. Those responsible for the security, either in the state or at the center, should be made to resign and stand trial.

Ghulam Muhammed, Mumbai
<ghulammuhammed3@gmail.com>

------------------------------

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/29/world/asia/after-tensions-in-indias-east-turn-deadly-claims-officials-turned-a-blind-eye.html?_r=1&emc=tnt&tntemail1=y

New York Times


As Tensions in India Turn Deadly, Some Say Officials Ignored Warning Signs

Anupam Nath/Associated Press
Women from the Bodo tribe, which is feeling squeezed by Muslims from Bangladesh, at a relief camp on Thursday in Assam State.
By
Published: July 28, 2012

NEW DELHI — There is a numbing familiarity to the riots that struck the eastern Indian state of Assam this month, leaving 48 dead and 400,000 people homeless. The violence had been building for months and even years — thousands of years.
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Diptendu Dutta/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Indian paramilitary forces in Kokrajhar district.
The New York Times
Recent clashes in Kokrajhar reflected years of tensions.
So why, critics ask, were the authorities caught by surprise despite clear warnings of impending conflict?

“The district authorities should have seen the tension building up and acted sooner to prevent the kind of violence that we have seen since,” said Meenakshi Ganguly, South Asia director of Human Rights Watch.

The Bodo tribe in the finger of land between Bangladesh and Bhutan has long been feeling squeezed by Muslim Bengalis immigrating from Bangladesh, one of the most densely populated countries on the planet. In addition to having less communal ideas about land ownership than the Bodos, the Bengalis, whose numbers are growing, increasingly threaten the Bodos’ dream of having an independent state.

The Bodos, many of whom have been converted to Christianity, now represent just 10 percent of Assam’s population of 31 million, but have ancestral claims to roughly half of its land.

Four years ago, Bodos and Bengalis, who speak different languages, clashed in Assam, leaving 70 people dead. Tensions began to build anew on May 29, when a local Muslim youth group called for a strike in Kokrajhar to protest the removal of a signboard from a mosque. A series of drive-by killings followed until generalized violence exploded on July 19.

State officials said they were caught unaware. “We had requisitioned the army on the very first day, but it took four, five days for the forces to reach the state,” Tarun Gogoi, chief minister of Assam, said Friday at a news conference.

U. G. Brahma, a former member of Parliament from the region, said police and other government officials did nothing to stop the violence for several days. “This is a deliberate act of negligence,” Mr. Brahma said in a telephone interview.

Mr. Gogoi said no further violence had been reported for at least two days, although bodies from earlier outbreaks continued to be found and homes were still being burned.
Mr. Gogoi rejected the charge that the government was slow in its response and said he had no intelligence before the rioting suggesting the need for troops. Such riots have been part of India’s history since its violent birth in 1947, but its roots go back far longer.

Indians’ genetic variability is vast. Scores of languages are spoken, 15 of which appear on the nation’s currency. The Hindu, Muslim, Christian and Buddhist religions are all strongly represented.

And then there is the issue of land, a scarce resource in a nation of nearly 1.2 billion people.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh visited two relief camps in Kokrajhar on Saturday. He called the fighting “a blot” on India, The Associated Press reported, and promised to provide $3,600 to each family of those killed and $900 to those seriously injured.

Sultan Alam, a member of a Muslim student group in Assam, called for an inquiry by the nation’s top law enforcement agency. “The minority community here has been ruined by the violence,” he said in a telephone interview, demanding more benefits for Muslims. “We just want our rightful share in everything.” A representative of a rival Bodo student group could not be reached for comment.

Opposition lawmakers accuse the Congress Party, the dominant party in the governing coalition, of turning a blind eye to the immigrant issue, since Muslims tend to support the coalition.

Vijay Goel, general secretary of the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party, said the influence of Muslim immigrants in elections had grown too great. “We want the illegal immigrants to be identified and deported,” he said, according to news media reports.

At the news conference, Mr. Gogoi said politics played no role in his decision making and blamed his political opponents for the violence. “The situation has flared up because of the N.D.A. regime,” he said, referring to the National Democratic Alliance, an opposition coalition that includes the Bharatiya Janata Party. “It is not me who is playing vote bank politics. I do not need a single vote of the illegal migrants.”

Bengali Muslims have been a significant part of Assam’s population since India’s founding, and separating the recent arrivals from those who have been in the state for decades would be difficult. Each side in the conflict has long-held grievances.

Ms. Ganguly said the state should have done far more in recent years to ease tensions. “This is a battle over resources, not religion,” she said.

Mr. Gogoi promised action.“The only solution to these waves of ethnic conflicts is development, and tomorrow the state government will seek some kind of development package from the prime minister,” Mr. Gogoi said Friday, joining a long line of state officials seeking more money from India’s central government.


Malavika Vayawahare contributed reporting from New Delhi, and Samrat from Mumbai, India.

Saturday, July 28, 2012

In defence of MS ( Manmohan Singh or Muhammad Shah)- By Aakar Patel - LOUNGE - LiveMint.com

Aakar Patel's reconnoiter of India's history, recent past and the present, in the breezy style of the historian Ramachandra Guha, is both readable and thought provoking. In his short essay, Patel has painted the broad strokes of historical currents that more or less appear to be permanent fixture of our public life, give or take a comma here, a full stop there. However, Patel should be credited for his courage to expose the dark forces, that always muddy the historical current and are the main cause for the deluge that destroys the nation again and again.

Ghulam Muhammed, Mumbai
<ghulammuhammed3@gmail.com>

------------

http://www.livemint.com/2012/07/26212751/In-defence-of-MS.html




In defence of MS
Across India, power has drained away from Delhi. The peasant leaders have captured the Gangetic belt in collaboration with Muslims. Both Bihar and Uttar Pradesh are lost

Reply To All | Aakar Patel

I’m fond of the leader in Delhi (call him MS for short). Most Indians don’t like him because he’s seen as being soft and manipulated by the real power, S. Mind you, S is not popular either, being born a foreigner and of different faith.

Our finest historian has harsh words for MS: “Weak”, “puppet”, “timid”, “fickle”, “idle”. He admits MS is “free from insolent pride” and possesses “courage of a certain kind”, but adds that he has “no inborn capacity to rule”.


History repeats: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh(Sanjeev Verma/Hindustan Times)
History repeats: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh (Sanjeev Verma/Hindustan Times)
 
I find this judgement a little unfair. I’m fond of the historian too, but he doesn’t see one positive aspect to MS. Besides, the conditions were forced upon MS, and not of his doing.
The dynasty was great 25 years ago, before he arrived. He stands on an ever-shrinking base of power. How can he sustain himself on past glory alone? His position is difficult.

Let’s survey and assess the situation as MS himself might see it.

Across India, power has drained away from Delhi. The peasant leaders have captured the Gangetic belt in collaboration with Muslims. Both Bihar and Uttar Pradesh are lost. In Lucknow, power has passed from father to son. Delhi dispatched the heir to campaign there personally, but he could produce no result.

In Punjab, there is dependence on the scion of the royal family of Patiala. But the Sikhs are with the Akalis, and they have had little trouble in managing him.

Near Delhi and in Haryana, the Jats are a nuisance, let’s be honest. Primitive in their rules, horrible with women. There’s no chance of reforming them.

In Rajasthan, the Rajputs are martial only among themselves, and forever surrendering to the Marathas. See how shamelessly they prostrate before the Scindias.

Gujarat was lost long ago and there appears little chance of it coming back. The Gujarati wants two things: firm rule and and an environment for business. These he has, and so he doesn’t need Delhi.

Bengal says it is with the Centre but behaves petulantly and often nastily. The Bengali leader is strong and brave, true. But also untrustworthy, petty, quick to anger and immature. Because there is no trade in and little revenue from Bengal, it is unimportant as a state. Important only in the negative sense as a nuisance.

In Madhya Pradesh, another Scindia wants to instal the heir in Delhi. He’s mostly talk and little fight (blood will tell: The Scindias fled the field at Panipat).
The tribal belt in central India is not under Delhi’s control any longer. The state has entirely given up trying to enforce the rule of law there except for the occasional skirmish in which many claims of killing rebels are made (mostly untrue).

Karnataka is lost to MS, Tamil Nadu was never his. In Andhra Pradesh, the son of a dead satrap is certain to install himself over the wishes of Delhi. Resistance to this is futile, because much of Delhi’s power comes from the state. In slow motion that state is being lost.

In Maharashtra, the Maratha shows how shamelessly venal and corrupt he has become. Scandal relentlessly follows scandal, tarring a once-great society. The Chitpavan Brahmins continue to plot their fantasies of Hindu rule over Pakistan.

From across the border, the enemy sends its fighters to harass India. Afghan mercenaries are used as they have been for centuries. Afghanistan is in turmoil and the Pashtun leader is trying to hold the country together.

Such is the story of the time of our leader. I think our historian, Sir Jadunath Sarkar, was not entirely fair with MS, whose 310th birth anniversary is next month. MS was known to history as Muhammad Shah, the Mughal emperor who ruled from 1719-48.

The S whose thumb he ruled under was Safdarjung, the wazir from Iran who was Shia.

Chitpavans used to be Peshwas till 1818; after 1925, they became Sarsanghachalaks. The Scindias here were Dattaji and Mahadji, ancestors of Vasundhara Raje and Jyotiraditya, and the Patiala ruler Ala Singh, ancestor of Amarinder Singh and servant of Ahmed Shah Abdali. Many of the other characters are interchangeable from 250 years ago. Certainly the circumstances are much the same.

There’s a reason we saw familiarity in what was written. The Mughal empire was built around the emperor. When his power was weakened, the empire couldn’t function. The republic of India is also constitutionally designed for a strong centre. This came from a wide consensus which included B.R. Ambedkar and K.M. Munshi, as Ramachandra Guha shows in India After Gandhi: The History of the World’s Largest Democracy.

But a strong Centre assumes clean Lok Sabha majorities and at least one pan-India political party. Our tribal nature of voting has inflicted on India a federalism of the late Mughal variety. The Centre reigns but does not rule. As the Congress has declined in time, it is every caste for itself and every state for itself, squeezing Delhi for personal profit. We haven’t had a party with a majority for two decades and should be prepared to see this helplessness of Delhi as a permanent feature.

The position of Manmohan Singh is almost the same as that of Muhammad Shah, who called himself Rangeela—the colourful.

Not all of Rangeela’s rule was bad, and this was the positive aspect I referred to earlier. His patronage gave us Sadarang, composer of many popular Hindustani bandishes (Bhimsen Joshi said when he forgot the antara’s lyric in a song, he would wail “Sadarang!” to fill space).

Ending his four-volume Fall of the Mughal Empire, Sarkar stepped back to assess what he had studied for six decades.

“Corruption, inefficiency and treachery disgraced all branches of the public service. In the midst of this decay and confusion, our literature, art and even true religion had perished.”

The 86-year-old scholar concluded that our condition is the result of “the rottenness at the core of the Indian society”.

Aakar Patel is a writer and columnist.

Send your feedback to replytoall@livemint.com
••••••

Wednesday, July 25, 2012

Comments posted on NY Times article by Thomas L. Friedman - Syria is Iraq

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/25/opinion/friedman-syria-is-iraq.html?emc=tnt&tntemail1=y

Comments posted on NY Times article by Thomas L. Friedman - Syria is Iraq:


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  1. Thomas L. Friedman is a thinker and his out of box style of thinking and theorizing is widely treated as readable and interesting, though not always practical. Visionaries are poor activists. In his following article: Syria is Iraq - he completely overlooks, that both countries have their own people and if, as he himself wrote, the change from bad is not necessarily good, but could be worse. Here the change that is most important for the natives, is if the change means going under US bombardment and mass destruction of the country. Common Iraqi cares more about his own life, his own family and his prospect for future. US assumes that the native is prepared for war and bloodshed for a 'change'. In fact he is not prepared for the bloodshed. He is not given a choice between a dictator and a US controlled democratic nation. All he is supposed to do is to sing the paeans of US armed intervention in the cause of 'regime change', and mourn his dead. Thomas L. Friedman, who may not be equated with America's Jewish Neocon cabal's agenda for New American Century; but he is incapable of thinking or even attempting to think how the natives feel. His thinking is on a vastly different level than the thinking feeling of common people of the Middle East. One can say, America and Americans care a hoot. But in essence, America cannot flee from the consequences of the violence it is prepared to unleash around the world and hope that it will not suffer Aurora fate in its own home ground.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/25/opinion/friedman-syria-is-iraq.html?emc=tnt&tntemail1=y

New York Times

Op-Ed Columnist

Syria Is Iraq

By
Published: July 24, 2012 5 Comments
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Thomas L. Friedman

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Readers’ Comments

And Iraq was such a bitter experience for America that we prefer never to speak of it again. But Iraq is relevant here. The only reason Iraq has any chance for a decent outcome today is because America was on the ground with tens of thousands of troops to act as that well-armed midwife, reasonably trusted and certainly feared by all sides, to manage Iraq’s transition to more consensual politics. My gut tells me that Syria will require the same to have the same chance.
But because I absolutely would not advocate U.S. intervention on the ground in Syria or anywhere in the Arab world again — and the U.S. public would not support it — I find myself hoping my analysis is wrong and that Syrians will surprise us by finding their own way, with just arms and diplomatic assistance, to a better political future. I know columnists are supposed to pound the table and declaim what is necessary. But when you believe that what is necessary, an outside midwife for Syria, is impossible, you need to say so. I think those who have been advocating a more activist U.S. intervention in Syria — and excoriating President Obama for not leading that — are not being realistic about what it would take to create a decent outcome.
Why? In the Middle East, the alternative to bad is not always good. It can be worse. I am awed at the bravery of those Syrian rebels who started this uprising, peacefully, without any arms, against a regime that plays by what I call Hama Rules, which are no rules at all. The Assad regime deliberately killed demonstrators to turn this conflict into a sectarian struggle between the ruling minority Alawite sect, led by the Assad clan, and the country’s majority of Sunni Muslims. That’s why the opposite of the Assad dictatorship could be the breakup of Syria — as the Alawites retreat to their coastal redoubt — and a permanent civil war.
There are two things that could divert us from that outcome. One is the Iraq alternative, where America went in and decapitated the Saddam regime, occupied the country and forcibly changed it from a minority Sunni-led dictatorship to a majority Shiite-led democracy. Because of both U.S. incompetence and the nature of Iraq, this U.S. intervention triggered a civil war in which all the parties in Iraq — Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds — tested the new balance of power, inflicting enormous casualties on each other and leading, tragically, to ethnic cleansing that rearranged the country into more homogeneous blocks of Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds.
But the U.S. presence in Iraq contained that civil war and ethnic cleansing from spreading to neighboring states. And once that civil war burned itself out — and all sides were exhausted and more separated — the U.S. successfully brokered a new constitution and power-sharing deal in Iraq, with the Shiites enjoying majority rule, the Sunnis out of power but not powerless, and the Kurds securing semi-autonomy. The cost of this transition in lives and money was huge, and even today Iraq is not a stable or healthy democracy. But it has a chance, and it’s now up to Iraqis.
Since it is highly unlikely that an armed, feared and trusted midwife will dare enter the fray in Syria, the rebels on the ground there will have to do it themselves. Given Syria’s fractured society, that will not be easy — unless there is a surprise. A surprise would be the disparate Syrian opposition groups congealing into a united political front — maybe with the help of U.S., Turkish and Saudi intelligence officers on the ground — and this new front reaching out to moderate Alawites and Christians who supported the Assads out of fear and agreeing to build a new order together that protects majority and minority rights. It would be wonderful to see the tyrannical Assad- Russia-Iran-Hezbollah axis replaced by a democratizing Syria, not a chaotic Syria.
But color me dubious. The 20 percent of Syrians who are pro-Assad Alawites or Christians will be terrified of the new Sunni Muslim majority, with its Muslim Brotherhood component, and this Sunni Muslim majority has suffered such brutality from this regime that reconciliation will be difficult, especially with each passing day of bloodshed. Without an external midwife or a Syrian Mandela, the fires of conflict could burn for a long time. I hope I am surprised.
A version of this op-ed appeared in print on July 25, 2012, on page A25 of the New York edition with the headline: Syria Is Iraq.
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Tuesday, July 24, 2012

My comments posted on article: The root causes underlying Manesar plant riot and a lesson to learn

My comments posted on "

The root causes underlying Manesar plant riot and a lesson to learn"


Amaresh Misra, a historian and social scientist observes parallels of the incidents at Manesar and the 1857 uprising against British colonials. The management/labor relations at Maruti /Suzuki, do not necessarily abide by the dialectics of modern labor management in India unless the power of religious symbolism is given equal or even more weightage in any analysis. The benign neglect or even proactive degradation of religious and cultural sentiments by management may first appear to be merely triggers, but in fact that is the very background against which any foreign intrusion, benevolent or malevolent is judged from the very outset by the Indian society. Be that Japanese management or foreign trained Indian management, the reaction to the tradition-bound ethos, is continuously evaluated and judged by the community as well as the wider society. It is therefore incumbent on the Maruti-Suzuki management, not to interpret the outburst in purely modern capitalist/labor inter-relationship, but accommodate willingly and proactively the deeply entrenched religious, social and cultural ethos of the locals. That is not an impossible task. Mughals ruled for 300 years with those strategies.

Ghulam Muhammed, Mumbai

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The root causes underlying Manesar plant riot and a lesson to learn

July 24, 2012, 10:17 IST by CarTrade Editorial Team



Recently, the country's largest car maker, Maruti Suzuki India Limited (MSIL) received a jolt when the infuriated mob of workers at its Manesar plant attacked the officials and set the production line on fire. The incident claimed life of one of the Senior Managers, injured nine policemen and left 100 officials being hospitalised. The incident was a blot on the entire history of the car industry being one of the most violent, even though India is not new to such incidents and demonstrations. The mishap has left the plant at Manesar gasping with parts of the assembly line being burnt down and around 1,200 policemen have been called-in to avoid any kind of repercussion.

According to Maruti spokesperson, the conflict began after the Maruti Suzuki Worker's Union stood up for a worker who has been suspended for roughing up a company executive. The official who is being currently treated in a hospital stated that the attack from the worker was unprovoked. According to the executive, who suffered a broken elbow and received injuries in head, ribs and legs, “The workers grabbed whatever they could, split up in small groups and attacked us.” Police has arrested a number of workers of the Manesar plant under the charges of murder and attempted murder.
MSIL commented that the riots were not due to the friction between the white collared and blue collared workers over working conditions and wages. But than the question arrives, what actually triggered the whole conflict. True that there were low cohesion between the workers and management on the issue of the suspended employee; however, that is not enough to drive the incident to this level wherein a manager lost his life.

Then what drove the worker's mob to shun against the law and claim a life. The root cause of the whole incident is the underlying aggression and the anger of the workers. After the strikes in 2011, the then worker's union ceased to exist after its official submitted their papers being faced with severe penalties. Ever since then, there has been unrest among the workers regarding the working conditions and the wages.

Besides these, there has also been a lack of control and discipline at the Manesar plant. One could easily mistake the plant for a railway station with undisciplined workers voicing their grudges loudly and no senior official in sight. A Japanese manufacturing plant, even if it is located on the outskirts of Delhi, is expected to follow an unannounced code of discipline, which was not so in the case of Manesar plant. The incident at the MSIL plant is a perfect example for the others auto makers in the industry as to what can happen in the absence of a proper protocol and employee satisfaction.