http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/mumbai/Muslim-group-to-float-party-on-May-1/articleshow/12724397.cms

   | Mumbai

Muslim group to float party on May 1

Mohammed Wajihuddin, TNN | Apr 19, 2012, 03.38AM IST

MUMBAI: Dismayed at their continued under-representation in parliament, state assembly and municipal corporations, a group of Muslims in Maharashtra have decided to float a new political party.

To be formally launched on May 1 (Maharashtra Day) at an auditorium in the city, the party is being presented as a "formidable" Muslim-Dalit alliance and an alternative to the Sena-BJP-MNS, Congress-NCP and SP. A retired police officer who claims that he will not fight elections himself will head the party.

The party's 12-member core committee (its name will be announced at the launch) comprises academicians, social activists, Urdu and Marathi journalists, retired cops and bureaucrats and other professionals who have declared no motives other than "service" to the community.

"Muslims count 20% to 30% in over 60 districts and in a few districts, they are even around 40%. Yet, there are just 11 Muslim MLAs in the current assembly. Our interaction with masses in 21 districts so far gives us hope that an alternative political platform in the state is possible," said educationist Salim Alware, a member of the core committee. Other members of the core committee include well-known educationist Mubarak Kapdi, RTI activist M A Khalid, senior Urdu journalists Khalil Zahid and Sarfraz Arzoo, Mumbai Aman Committee's chief Farid Shaikh. The Dalit group is being led by Marathi journalist Baban Kamble.

Dismissing the argument that a separate Muslim party will only strengthen the saffron alliance, Khalid said: "Muslims have been threatened with this argument for too long. Whichever party gets maximum votes of the Muslims, it comes to power. Now, we want levers of power in our own hands." He added that, although Muslims count around 14% in Maharashtra, there is not a single Muslim Lok Sabha member from the state.

"One Muslim (Hussain Dalwai) has been nominated to the Rajya Sabha, but he has no following at the grassroots. There is a consistent attempt to show that Muslim candidates don't win elections and therefore not many Muslims are fielded as candidates in elections," said a former Muslim Congress MLA.

http://www.dnaindia.com/money/interview_reverse-innovation-is-not-optional-it-is-oxygen_1676369-all

‘Reverse innovation is not optional. It is oxygen’

Published: Monday, Apr 16, 2012, 9:20 IST
By Vivek Kaul | Agency: DNA 

 

Vijay Govindarajan is the Earl C. Daum 1924 Professor of International Business and the founding director of Tuck’s Centre for Global Leadership. VG, as he is popularly known, is an expert on strategy and innovation. He was the first professor-in-residence and chief innovation consultant at General Electric. He was ranked #3 on the Thinkers 50 list of the world’s most influential business thinkers. In this interview to Vivek Kaul, VG talks about the concept of ‘reverse innovation’ and his eponymous new book Reverse Innovation: Create Far From Home, Win Everywhere (co-authored with Chris Trimble and published by Harvard Business Review Press). Q: What does the term reverse innovation mean? How did you end up coining the term? A: Historically, multinationals innovated in rich countries and sold those products in poor countries. This makes sense. After all, the United States and Germany have well over three hundred Nobel Prize winners in science and technology. Meanwhile, India and China, with six times the combined population, have fewer than ten. And consumers in rich countries can pay for innovative products. So, it is logical that innovation should flow from the rich world to the poor. Something strange is happening, of late. Innovations are flowing in the opposite direction. Innovations are flowing from the poor countries to the rich. This is the essence of reverse innovation.It is about innovating in poor countries and bringing those products into rich countries. My co-author, Chris Trimble, coined the term. Q: In the first chapter of your book, you talk about the American drink Gatorade as an example of reverse innovation. Can you talk the DNA readers through that example? A: Gatorade is an example of reverse innovation. The inspiration for Gatorade, the Godzilla of sports drinks, came from an unlikely source: Bangladesh. There was an outbreak of cholera in Bangladesh in the 1960s (the country used to be called East Pakistan in those days). Cholera causes diarrhoea resulting in severe dehydration. The Western doctors who went to help the victims were surprised that locals were giving a drink containing carbohydrates to treat diarrhoea. The concoction included ingredients such as coconut water, carrot juice, rice water, carob flour, and dehydrated bananas. At the time, Western medical opinion held that putting carbohydrates in the stomachs of patients suffering from diarrhoea would cause cholera bacteria to multiply and the disease to worsen. Yet, the local treatment worked. Q: Why did the treatment work? A: As Dr Mehmood Khan, chief scientific officer of PepsiCo (which now owns Gatorade) puts it, “by giving carbohydrate and sugar in the solution with salt, uptake was quicker, and patients rehydrated faster”. The success of the treatment was covered in the British medical journal Lancet, and it made its way to a doctor at the University of Florida.The doctor saw a common problem in the need for rapid re-hydration. If such a treatment worked well for cholera patients, it would surely work for healthy football players. Q: And what happened after that? A: Around that time, the University of Florida athletics department was looking for ways to get their football players quickly rehydrated. The research labs of the University of Florida came up with a concoction of water, glucose, sodium, potassium, and flavorings. The tasty cocktail sped the replenishment of the electrolytes and carbohydrates (just as was the case with diarrhoea patients in Bangladesh) that players lost through sweat and exertion. Gatorade took its name from the Florida Gators, the football team of the University of Florida. Q: And this was reverse innovation? A: Yes. The Gatorade story was unusual for its era. It ran counter to the dominant innovation pattern. Innovations typically originated in rich countries and later flowed downhill to the developing world. Gatorade, by contrast, swam against the tide. It was a reverse innovation. Q: What would be some of the earliest examples of reverse innovation? A: I already gave you the story of Gatorade which was an example of reverse innovation that happened in the 1960s. Chicken tikka masala became the #1 favorite food in UK in the 1990s — an innovation from India. If you want to go much before in time, I would single out yoga. Yoga was an Indian innovation thousands of years ago. Americans embraced yoga in the early part of the 20th century as they were seeking ways to control stress. Yoga has created a slew of new businesses in the US: instruction classes, DVDs, books and even clothes. Lululemon Athletica, a Canada-based company, started to sell yoga gear about 15 years ago. The company has a market capitalisation of $10 billion today. Q: Despite these early examples, you suggest that reverse innovations have been rare historically. A: Yes, this is a relatively recent phenomenon. Why? First, as long as the rich countries were growing at healthy rates, multinationals were satisfied to focus on satisfying needs of rich-world customers. Post-2008 financial crisis, growth has significantly slowed in developed countries. Multinationals are therefore forced to look for other avenues for sustained growth. Poor countries offer a significant opportunity. After all, over 5 billion live in poor countries — they represent a huge customer base. But to capture that opportunity, firms must innovate since middle-class consumers in emerging markets are fundamentally different from the middle-class in the rich-world. Second and more importantly, only in the past decade, local firms from developing countries have started to become global rivals. Emerging giants from India (Infosys, Tata, Mahindra & Mahindra), China (Haier, Lenovo, Huawei), Brazil (Embraer) and Mexico (Cemex) have global aspirations. Therefore, ignoring emerging markets can cost multinationals more than a missed opportunity abroad. It can open the door for local firms from the developing world to inflict pain or even severe damage even in multinationals’ well-established home markets. This possibility inevitably draws multinationals into the reverse innovation game. Q: Can you give us a few examples to show that the scene on reverse innovation is changing now? A: Oh sure. PepsiCo drew upon local teams and global resources to develop Aliva, a new savory cracker created by Indians to satisfy the Indian consumers, but with potential to appeal to a wider global palette. In China and India, Harman designed from scratch a completely new automobile infotainment system for emerging markets with functionality similar to their high-end products at half the price and one-third the cost. It has generated more than $5 billion from the new business around the globe. Q: Any other examples? A: GE innovated a portable ultrasound machine for rural China for $15,000 which has generated over $250 million of global sales.Indian farmers cultivate on small pieces of land. Deere developed a small 35 horsepower tractor customised for such lots. In India, tractors often do double duty, both working the farm and providing family transportation. Customers therefore value low price and fuel efficiency — two characteristics on which Deere’s new tractor excelled. Deere has now designated India as the global centre of excellence for small horsepower tractors. Q: What is glocalisation? How does in help the process of reverse innovation? A: Most global companies recognise that emerging markets have become today’s last source of growth. But all they do is modify and export products that they developed in their home country. This is “glocalisation” — a strategy bound to under-deliver. To capitalise on the full potential of emerging markets, they must head in the opposite direction — by innovating specifically for and in developing countries to create breakthroughs that will be adopted next at home and around the globe. Q: Any examples? A: When the giant big-box retailer Wal-Mart entered emerging markets in Central and South America, it discovered that it couldn’t simply export its existing retail formula. It needed to innovate. Specifically, its big box had to be radically scaled down. The company created a version of the Wal-Mart store similar to the more “cozy” retail outlets common in Mexico, Brazil or Argentina. Smaller stores thrive in those places because shoppers typically lack the liquidity to buy in bulk and maintain a home “inventory.” Moreover, consumers not only don’t drive SUVs, they often ride bicycles, mopeds or buses — or else they walk — to do their shopping. There are limits to what they can carry home. Small Wal-Marts matched the needs of the local culture. Q: But how is this a reverse innovation? A: Today, Wal-Mart is doing something that would have been hard to imagine just a few years ago. It is bringing the “small-mart” concept back to the United States. For one thing, its big-box market is saturated. Many US consumers suffer from big-box fatigue. Furthermore, dense urban environments, with constrained space and ultra-high rents, can more easily — and profitably — support numerous small stores distributed around town instead of one or two that are the size of a full city block. A variant of the same logic applies in very sparsely populated rural areas, where a big box simply couldn’t thrive. Wal-Mart will be a powerful rival to small-box competitors, in that it still enjoys vast economies of scale in purchasing and supply chain management even with a small store footprint. Q: You talk about Narayana Hrudayalaya Hospital performing world-class open heart surgery for just $2,000. This price — 90% to even 99% below rich-world’s comparables prices — can this become a reverse innovation? A: Narayana Hrudayalaya Hospital does open heart surgery at a fraction of the cost of what it takes in the US. This difference cannot be explained by differences in labour costs. It is pure and simple innovation. They have taken the manufacturing sector’s principles that have been around since Ford’s Model T —standardisation, specialisation of labour, economies of scale and assembly line production—and applied them to healthcare. For instance, they buy the same world-class equipment you will see in Mayo Clinic (one of the best hospitals in the United States) but they use it 20 times more. That drives the cost per unit down. They are now building a 2,000-bed hospital in Cayman Islands (60-minute flight from Miami) to serve American patients. This is classic reverse innovation. Q: Any other Indian companies doing reverse innovation? A: In 1994, Mahindra and Mahindra (M&M) arrived on American shores. The company, founded as a steelmaker in 1945, had entered the agriculture market nearly 20 years later, partnering with International Harvester to manufacture a line of sturdy 35-horsepower tractors under the Mahindra name. These tractors became very popular in India. They were affordably priced and fuel-efficient, two qualities highly valued by thrifty Indian farmers, and they were sized appropriately for small Indian farms. Mahindra figured its little red tractor would be perfect for hobby farmers, landscapers and building contractors. The machine was sturdy, extremely reliable and priced to sell. With a few modifications for the US market — such as super-sized seats and brake pedals to comfortably accommodate larger American bodies — Mahindra was good to go. Q: And this became a reverse innovation? A: Yes. Mahindra had developed a high-quality, low-horsepower, low-cost tractor for the Indian market. They took that product and created the “hobby” farming segment in the US. This is a segment which uses the tractor not for earning a living but for enjoyment. This is reverse innovation par excellence. Q: What do you mean when you say that “the new reality is that the future is far from home”? A: It is simple. If multinationals have to remain competitive , they must be just curious about the problems of customers in poor countries as they are about the problems of customers in rich countries. Q: What makes you say that “reverse innovation is not optional. It is oxygen”? A: If multinationals do not practise reverse innovation, local companies will and use those innovations to disrupt multinationals in their home markets. This movie has played before. Japanese automakers disrupted the Detroit Big Three during the 1970s and 1980s. Reverse innovation is not optional. It is oxygen. Q: What is the central message of your book that has just come out? A: We have three important messages: 1 Capturing opportunities in emerging markets requires innovation. 2 Local companies in emerging markets are best positioned to do such innovations. After all, who understands local customers better— local companies or multinationals? 3 Local companies can use such innovations to launch global strategy. Vivek Kaul is a writer and can be reached at vivek.kaul@gmail.com

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MUSLIM TRUMP CARD

Both so-called national political parties and their coalitions, UPA and NDA are in serious disarray and disintegration. Both have reached this stage by antagonizing Muslim voters in states as well as on national level. Their reputation has been so damaged that elections after election, the Muslim marginal votes that could have saved them from going under, has been irretrievably lost to them. The Muslim voters' trump card has become very aware, very choosy and very decisive. Muslim masses have now fully realized that both 'national' political parties are nothing but communal Brahmin organisation and will never ever give any handle to Muslims as long as they are in power. The regional parties, though sprung from the same milieu are now starting from a clean slate and had come to full realization that without Muslim support they can never come to power. National media has finally gathered courage to project the disarray of the both national parties and openly weave Muslim factor into their disintegration scenario. The worst party is that both Congress as well as BJP have become so committed to their anti-Muslim policies, that they just cannot make any change their policies - Congress with its communal tradition, BJP with its Hindutva baggage.

This is the time, Muslims should start formulating their own strategies, to reward only those that meet their demands or/and form their own Muslim led political vehicles, however much inexperienced, untested, under-funded, unorganized. 

Time is on their side.

The following 2 OP-ED articles in leading English Newspapers, are enough to prove the hopeless state of the both leading Brahminical political parties.

Ghulam Muhammed, Mumbai

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

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/national-interest-bjp-the-lonely/936574/0

National Interest: BJP, the lonely

Shekhar Gupta : Sat Apr 14 2012, 01:37 hrs

UPA is sinking, but the BJP is adrift, having failed to reconfigure itself to a changing urban India


There are reasons why it is easy to understand the BJP’s jubilation at the Gujarat SIT’s reprieve to Narendra Modi, and there are reasons why it isn’t. For a full decade now, Modi has been the party’s unanointed leader. A star, crowd-puller and vote-catcher, though that claim has never been proven outside his state. So you can see why the BJP should be happy with what they see as Modi crossing one more hurdle on his way to the national stage. The problem, however, is that while he may fire the imagination of the faithful, he would still bring — no matter how many exonerations he collects — the baggage of his past that will make it that much tougher for the BJP to rebuild NDA into a real claimant in 2014. In indictment as much as in exoneration, the Modi phenomenon cuts both ways. It gets more votes from your own, but raises barriers for many likely allies. The issue with Modi is not legal, but political. Even if he is never convicted, or even charged by a court for any role in the 2002 riots, he will continue to be spoilt goods politically. This will reduce the resultant NDA to three parties at best: the BJP, Akali Dal and Shiv Sena, the core of natural allies.

This is not the only contradiction the BJP has to deal with. But this is the most challenging. Modi cannot be the answer to their prayers in 2014 unless he can lead this three-member NDA to a 225-plus mark. The rest will then be found among some of the regional parties, notably one of the Dravidian parties. That, no matter how damaged the UPA is by 2014, looks improbable.

That is why, moments of celebration at legal victories apart, the BJP has to rethink its politics and ideological offering more carefully if it has to have a chance.


The party’s central problem is this: even more than who is whose natural ally, coalitions in India will be formed on the basis of who will never go with whom. Because of this, the BJP, even with someone more widely acceptable than Modi in the lead, would need at least 200 seats in the Lok Sabha to have any chance of reaching that half-way mark, whereas for the Congress, 150 could still be the 272 in 2014. This is easy to explain. L.K. Advani often says he is open to aligning with anyone but the five parties that consider the BJP anti-national. These are the Congress, the Left, SP, RLD and IUML. But of the rest too, any party with any hope of getting the Muslim vote would never join an NDA unless it is led by a Vajpayee-like inclusive personality. The BJP hasn’t got one even remotely like that, and Modi will be the exact opposite. In fact, with Modi as leader, the alliance will find it impossible even to hold its biggest star today, Nitish Kumar. It was Vajpayee’s personality that brought Mamata, Naveen Patnaik and Chandrababu Naidu into the NDA. With Modi in front, you can write off all of these. Even with a less controversial leader, a first among equals who may emerge closer to the elections from the BJP’s current top five, it is difficult to see any of these satraps risking minority votes, particularly when the BJP as an ally cannot bring them many transferable votes in their respective states.

How does the BJP handle this challenge? Or can it? One way is to accept the limitations of its politics and look for that “first among the equals” outside. For example, Nitish, or a Nitish with multi-state appeal if he/she brings a large contingent of MPs. That leader could then be the new, non-communal mukhauta (mask) of the BJP. But ask any of the party’s top five (Modi included) and they will ask you, is that why you think they have been in public life for all these decades? They see the Congress declining, its allies chafing and impatient, state after state falling to the opposition, a lurching government, a punch-drunk Rahul and a less and less visible Sonia. All this, with a scam a day, the growing conflict between the government and the institutions and a fast vapourising growth story, convince them that their moment has come. The question they are ducking is, however, is their politics ready to seize it?


In some ways it is, but in many, more important ones, it isn’t. What works for them is their chief ministers and regional leaders. The Congress has nobody even remotely comparable to Modi, Raman Singh, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Vasundhara Raje, Prem Kumar Dhumal, Parkash Singh Badal, Nitish and even B.S. Yeddyurappa in their respective states. If the Shiv Sena and the MNS somehow merge, or come closer in the next two years, the UPA will struggle to get even a third of the seats in Maharashtra. But this is where the good news ends for the BJP.

They have wasted seven years now by failing to address the one issue that limits them to competing for not more than 70-75 per cent of the electorate even in the states where they are strong: suspicion of the minorities and the increasingly liberal-secular-modern urban Indian. Modi apart, many other aspects of their politics are out of tune with the times. It is one thing for them to get the “secular” parties, even UPA allies, to join hands with them in opposition to many central moves, like the NCTC and GST. This is great for embarrassing the Congress. But unless they move their
ideological positioning absolutely to the centre, these alliances will remain transient and fail to grow into partnerships in power. The BJP’s economics is one more example, though it is easier to rectify than Hindutva. Every time they block a reformist move or legislation, their own loyal as well as fence-sitting voters take note. 

If they want an India closest to the “socialist” promise of the preamble of its Constitution as rewritten by a Parliament on stolen time in the Emergency, wouldn’t they rather vote for the UPA? In marketing terms, then, what product differentiation does the BJP offer? And in the language of politics, you may just ask them: why can’t you see the writing on the wall?
--------------------

http://www.timescrest.com/society/when-plan-g-failed-7685

TIMECREST.COM - A Times of India publication

 

Perspective

When plan G failed

Arati Jerath | April 14, 2012

 

Few succession plans have unravelled as grievously as the one scripted for Rahul Gandhi. An eight-year long internship that bore a remarkable resemblance to a discovery of India tour was to have peaked in Uttar Pradesh to win back the Hindi heartland for the Congress and set the party on the road to revival. If the narrative had unfolded the way it was written, the 2012 UP assembly polls would have catapulted Rahul to political stardom and bestowed the legitimacy he hankered after for his accession. He would have earned his spurs as a charismatic young leader fit to head India's Grand Old Party.

But fate decreed otherwise. When the results came in, the Congress had finished a poor fourth in UP with Rahul comprehensively beaten by the scion of another political dynasty, Akhilesh Yadav, son of the wily Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav.

Coming on top of poll debacles in two other states, including Punjab which the Congress had expected to win comfortably, the news from UP was more than a devastating personal blow. It was a huge setback to Rahul's future plans. His take-off stood aborted and his launching pad destroyed. Team Rahul's master plan for the coronation of the Congress party's new leader had collapsed.

It is evident from Rahul's body language and behaviour ever since the results came in that he has abandoned the trajectory that was mapped out for him. He disappeared twice to undisclosed destinations. When he showed up, he stayed in the background even as his party and the Manmohan Singh government lurched from crisis to crisis, instead of stepping up to lead from the front as he was expected to do after the UP polls. He seems to be mulling over his next steps.

He will obviously need a fresh script and from all available indications, the Gandhi family and Rahul's core team of aides and advisors are back at the drawing board, scratching their heads for ideas. "The aura will have to be recreated, " admitted a Congress leader who spoke on the condition of anonymity. "We will have to build a new platform to launch him. "

DAMAGE CONTROL

The most obvious indication, and indeed an immediate consequence, of Rahul's reluctance to take a frontline leadership position at the moment is Sonia Gandhi's renewed activity. For two years, she has lain low, partly due to health reasons but also because she was keen to push Rahul forward. Congress leaders say that she used to encourage people to approach her son with their political problems and increasingly, state and national office bearers as well as government ministers had started consulting him on a range of issues. But after the poll disaster, she has perforce stepped in to fill the void that is looming because of Rahul's withdrawal.

For the past one month, she has been meeting Congress leaders and workers regularly. During the recent budget session, she would be found in her Parliament office for over an hour every morning. And in the afternoon, she has been receiving people at her 10 Janpath residence. Although she is not keeping the kind of hours she used to maintain in her early years as Congress president, when she often worked till late at night, she puts in nearly a full day, say party sources.

Those who know Sonia feel that this is merely a temporary measure while she waits for her son to take stock and chalk out his future moves. Her heart is no longer in full-time politics, they say, and although she is clearly much better after her surgery last year, her health does not allow her to keep the demanding schedule of a 24x7 politician. She wants Rahul to take over as soon as possible the seat she has kept warm for him for 15 years. This came through again most recently when she abruptly dropped out of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's lunch for Pakistani President Asif Zardari. Congress circles believe that Sonia wanted the spotlight to be on Rahul, who remains her chosen heir despite a dismal showing in UP.

Sonia may have to wait a while though before her wish is realised. After the collapse of the last succession plan, it will not be easy to craft a new one. Team Rahul is largely apolitical, inexperienced and now, on the back foot. In fact, some of them were the unstated target of criticism from UP Congress workers at the recent two-day meeting chaired by Rahul to review the UP debacle. The workers talked about a "videshi' ' style of functioning as opposed to "desi" style and wanted it changed. This was seen as a reference to Rahul's foreign-educated aides who flaunt BlackBerry phones and insist on email and SMS interactions rather than old fashioned face-to-face meetings.

According to an informed leader, there is a proposal to draft in some experienced hands to correct the imbalance. No names have been mentioned yet but it is possible that the Gandhi family may draw on those who helped to launch Sonia into politics.

These are family loyalists who successfully refashioned her public persona through innovative ideas like showcasing social welfare projects at a conclave of Congress chief ministers, taking her on road shows through villages in election-bound states and getting her to take a dip in the Ganges at the kumbh mela. From being perceived as a withdrawn veiled widow, Sonia was transformed into a benevolent rajmata-like figure. Unfortunately, some of those who were involved in the Sonia project are out of favour now, like M L Fotehdar and Natwar Singh;others are union ministers, like Ambika Soni, and would have to be brought in at the cost of weakening the government.

DRIFTING APART

Perhaps the biggest challenge is how to insulate Rahul from the plummeting image of the Manmohan Singh government. Buffeted by a never-ending storm of corruption scandals, the government is in complete disarray with ministers openly taking potshots at each other. The infighting at the top is no longer a secret and Congress ministers now candidly talk about the war within amid deepening fault-lines between the PM, home minister P Chidambaram, finance minister Pranab Mukherjee and defence minister A K Antony.

As long as Sonia was in command, ministers stayed within the boundaries of good behaviour. The problems erupted when the leadership transition process was set in motion. Sonia and Rahul seemed to have different timelines. She began withdrawing long before Rahul was ready to take over. He wanted to cross the milestone of the UP polls first but Sonia's health was too fragile to wait till 2012. Their inability to bridge this gap has played havoc with the party as well as the government, both of which have been drifting in a leadership vacuum and are now threatening to go into free fall.

A flashpoint is looming ahead in the upcoming presidential election, due in July. The Congress does not have enough votes in the electoral college to send a nominee of its choice to Rashtrapati Bhavan. It will have to try for a consensus candidate or risk an election which it could lose. The machinations have begun and regional leaders like Mulayam Singh Yadav, Jayalalithaa and Mamata Banerjee, who control large blocks of vote by virtue of the size of the states they rule, are in play as potential kingmakers.

There are added complications. Mukherjee has never hidden his desire to crown his long innings in politics with a stint in Rashtrapati Bhavan. And now, the names of Manmohan Singh and Antony have been added to the list of contenders. If the speculation is to be believed, the recent controversy around reports of a possible army coup was aimed at discrediting Antony and removing him as a presidential probable. Congress leaders frankly admit that the election of the next president could tear the party and the government apart, reviving memories of the manner in which Indira Gandhi split the Congress in 1969 after a wily manoeuvre in which the official party candidate was defeated by her nominee, V V Giri.

CHANGING EQUATIONS

These are difficult times for the Congress and certainly not conducive for an image-building exercise that will pave the way for a smooth transition for Rahul. For the moment, the Gandhi scion seems to have decided to narrow his focus again and concentrate on UP rather than address the big picture. But his plans for UP are inextricably linked with the fate of the Manmohan Singh government. There is talk about shifting some of the younger UP ministers back to state politics. The names being mentioned are Jitin Prasada, RPN Singh and Pradeep Jain. There is also speculation that senior ministers like Salman Khurshid, Beni Prasad Verma and Sriprakash Jaiswal may pay a price for their unwarranted utterances during the campaign which many believe boomeranged on the party. In fact, Mulayam Singh Yadav is believed to have told a senior Congress minister that his party won 50 seats more than he anticipated after Jaiswal talked of president's rule in UP.

Rahul's brave talk about punishing those who failed to deliver in the assembly polls may not amount to much because of governmental compulsions. It is difficult to move out so many ministers without a clear plan like the one formulated by K Kamraj during Nehru's time. As many as six union ministers and six chief ministers resigned from their posts in 1963 to devote their energies to revitalising the party. But the Congress of today is quite different to Nehru's party and it lacks leaders like Kamraj who had stature and political acumen.

The pall of gloom hanging over the Congress has only deepened with the realisation that the succession for which it was waiting is not likely to happen soon. Although there is talk of a major reshuffle both in the organisation and in the government, most believe that the changes will only be cosmetic. Certainly not vigorous enough to pull the government out of its comatose state or prepare the party for the next Lok Sabha polls.

The Gandhi family rarely reveals its plans, preferring to keep the party guessing. Most Congress leaders are, therefore, clueless about Rahul's next moves. They know that discussions are taking place within the four walls of 10 Janpath and 12 Tughlak Lane to prepare a fresh launching pad for the man in whom the party has vested its future. But till the platform is ready, it looks like Sonia will have to shoulder the responsibility once again.
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Empires Then and Now

Empires Then and Now By Dr. Paul Craig Roberts

Global Research, March 27, 2012

paulcraigroberts.org

URL of this article: www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=29988

Great empires, such as the Roman and British, were extractive. The empires succeeded, because the value of the resources and wealth extracted from conquered lands exceeded the value of conquest and governance. The reason Rome did not extend its empire further east into Germany was not the military prowess of Germanic tribes but Rome’s calculation that the cost of conquest exceeded the value of extractable resources. The Roman empire failed, because Romans exhausted manpower and resources in civil wars fighting amongst themselves for power. The British empire failed, because the British exhausted themselves fighting Germany in two world wars. In his book, The Rule of Empires (2010), Timothy H. Parsons replaces the myth of the civilizing empire with the truth of the extractive empire. He describes the successes of the Romans, the Umayyad Caliphate, the Spanish in Peru, Napoleon in Italy, and the British in India and Kenya in extracting resources. To lower the cost of governing Kenya, the British instigated tribal consciousness and invented tribal customs that worked to British advantage. Parsons does not examine the American empire, but in his introduction to the book he wonders whether America’s empire is really an empire as the Americans don’t seem to get any extractive benefits from it. After eight years of war and attempted occupation of Iraq, all Washington has for its efforts is several trillion dollars of additional debt and no Iraqi oil. After ten years of trillion dollar struggle against the Taliban in Afghanistan, Washington has nothing to show for it except possibly some part of the drug trade that can be used to fund covert CIA operations. America’s wars are very expensive. Bush and Obama have doubled the national debt, and the American people have no benefits from it. No riches, no bread and circuses flow to Americans from Washington’s wars. So what is it all about? The answer is that Washington’s empire extracts resources from the American people for the benefit of the few powerful interest groups that rule America. The military-security complex, Wall Street, agri-business and the Israel Lobby use the government to extract resources from Americans to serve their profits and power. The US Constitution has been extracted in the interests of the Security State, and Americans’ incomes have been redirected to the pockets of the 1 percent. That is how the American Empire functions. The New Empire is different. It happens without achieving conquest. The American military did not conquer Iraq and has been forced out politically by the puppet government that Washington established. There is no victory in Afghanistan, and after a decade the American military does not control the country. In the New Empire success at war no longer matters. The extraction takes place by being at war. Huge sums of American taxpayers’ money have flowed into the American armaments industries and huge amounts of power into Homeland Security. The American empire works by stripping Americans of wealth and liberty. This is why the wars cannot end, or if one does end another starts. Remember when Obama came into office and was asked what the US mission was in Afghanistan? He replied that he did not know what the mission was and that the mission needed to be defined. Obama never defined the mission. He renewed the Afghan war without telling us its purpose. Obama cannot tell Americans that the purpose of the war is to build the power and profit of the military/security complex at the expense of American citizens. This truth doesn’t mean that the objects of American military aggression have escaped without cost. Large numbers of Muslims have been bombed and murdered and their economies and infrastructure ruined, but not in order to extract resources from them. It is ironic that under the New Empire the citizens of the empire are extracted of their wealth and liberty in order to extract lives from the targeted foreign populations. Just like the bombed and murdered Muslims, the American people are victims of the American empire.

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/18-get-life-terms-for-killing-23-in-ode/936172/

18 get life terms for killing 23 in Ode

Express news service : Anand, Fri Apr 13 2012, 01:03 hrs 
Eighteen of the 23 people convicted of killing 23 Muslims in Ode in 2002 were sentenced to life terms on Thursday. The other five were given seven years’ rigorous imprisonment.

The court also fined the convicts for offences like arson, rioting and making provocative statements.

Additional Sessions Judge Poonam Singh had on April 9 convicted 18 people of murder and allied charges, four people of attempt to murder and allied charges, and one person of arson and rioting.
All the convicts belong to the wealthy and politically powerful Leuva Patel community of landowners.

Twenty-three Muslims were locked inside a three-storey building which was set on fire in Ode in Anand district on March 1, 2002.
This was the first post-Godhra riots case in which the court upheld the conspiracy charge. The Supreme Court-appointed special investigation team had sought death for all 18 convicted of murder.

Relatives of the convicts raised slogans against the sentence and Chief Minister Narendra Modi as the news came. “Haay re Modi haay” and “Aa nyay nathi (this is not justice)”, shouted the crowd, comprising mostly women. The situation threatened to get out of hand at one point before the police scattered the protesters.

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http://www.indianexpress.com/news/one-verdict-contrasting-emotions/936102/0

One verdict, contrasting emotions

Parimal Dabhi : Ode, Anand, Fri Apr 13 2012, 00:05 hrs

On March 1, 2002, Majidmiya Malek lost his parents and sister, killed by people with whom they had once shared meals but who were then throwing burning rags into a house in which they were locked in.

Ten years on, Diksha Patel is grieving for her father and her uncle, who are among the 18 sentenced to life for that mass killing.

Malek, now 50, says the judgment has reinforced his faith in the justice system while Diksha, who lives in London, insists her father is an innocent victim of a political game.

Malek survived as he was in his fields when the rioters arrived. When he returned, he saw the house of Akbarkhan Pathan being burnt by a mob that included many of his neighbours. Sixteen of the 23 killed belonged to Malek’s family, including his father Muradmiya, 65, mother Sugrabibi, 60, and 17-year-old sister. “I saw my family members being burnt alive,” he says, recalling having seen the bodies of Sikandar and his two-year-old daughter, Guddi, clinging to his chest.

“The judgment has given me immense satisfaction. Justice is there for us, even though after 10 years,” says Malek, one of the case’s main witnesses and who identified seven or eight of the accused during the trial. He has since moved to Dhunadara village and resumed farming.

Diksha flew to Ode on Monday, the day her father Harish Patel, 61, was found guilty. Hers was the loudest of the protests outside the court in Anand. Harish Patel, who runs a lucrative tobacco business, has been convicted of murder, attempt to murder, and arson. He was described as one of the main conspirators.

Diksha’s uncle Dilip Patel too has been sentenced to life imprisonment. Her brother Kalpesh, 23, was among the 23 acquitted, a relief for their mother who would have been otherwise alone in their huge bungalow.

“There was no evidence against my father,” Diksha says. “If there was a mob of around 1,500 to 2,000 people, why have only a few of a single locality, that too only Patels, been convicted?” Diksha says.

She worries for the health of her father, whom she describes as a very “respected” person in the community. Of the 23 killed, the bodies of only two could be recovered. Diksha questions how her father could be held responsible for the murders of those whose bodies have not been found.

8 still wanted from town that has sent 2,000 abroad

Of those accused in the killing of 27 people in the Ode cases, eight have red-corner notices against them. Two of these absconders are wanted in the Pirawali Bhagol case, in which 23 were sentenced on Thursday, and the other six in the Malav Bhagol case, in which three people were murdered. The 27th death was that of Rafique Mohammad Gulam Rasul Saiyed, 80, burnt alive in Suriwali Bhagol.

Most of the absconders are believed to be hiding abroad. Ode town is said to have at least one member of every Patel family settled abroad, roughly accounting for 2,000 or more NRIs. Police officials say the legal procedure for the extradition of the absconders is on.

The eight absconders are Dilipbhai Babu Patel, Hirubhai Ravjibhai Patel, Natubhai Satabhai Patel, Ankurbhai Shahpurbhai Patel, Samirbhai Vinubhai Patel, Rakeshbhai H Patel alias Rocky, Mohanbhai R Patel alias Sasin and Nikul Ravjibhai Patel.

They are believed to be in Australia, the UK and the United States, staying with their relatives, but in the cases of only two is anything definite being said.

According to sources, Ankur Patel's whereabouts have been traced to UK, the Indian embassy has been contacted for his extradition, and the matter is now pending with the government.

Dilip and Hiru Patel are the two absconding in the Pirawali Bhagol case. Residents of Ode said Hiru is living with his relatives in the UK while the whereabouts of the rest are not clear.

The Special Investigation Team probing the killings had issued red-corner notices in 2008. Residents said that the local police had glued posters of the absconders declaring them “most wanted” but there hasn't been any information about them.

Who did what

The 23 convicts, and what they have been sentenced for

* Vinubhai Bhikhabhai Patel, 53, life
* Vijaybhai Ravjibhai Patel, 43, life
* Atulbhai Dahyabhai Patel, 42, 7 years
* Devangbhai Harshadbhai Patel, 35,7 years

As part of a conspiracy, they allegedly assured Akbarkhan Pathan he would not be harmed but then led a mob to his house where 23 people had taken shelter; the mob locked them in and killed them by throwing burning rags inside. They were also in the mob that injured Mehrajbibi Pathan of Pirawali Bhagol and two policemen who were trying to stop rioters. This mob attacked the Muslim locality of Suriwali Bhagol, plundered homes abandoned by Muslims, and made religiously hurtful statements.

* Dilipbhai Vallabhbhai Patel, 50, life
* Dilipbhai Vinubhai Patel, 40, life
* Dilipbhai Ranchhodbhai Patel, 55, life
* Dilipbhai Shanabhai Patel, 63, 7 yrs
* Harishbhai Vallabhbhai Patel, 61, life
* Jayendrabhai Satabhai Patel, 50, life
* Sureshbhai Bhailalbhai Patel, 43, life
* Pareshbhai Ranchhodbhai Patel, 38, life
* Arvindbhai Ravjibhai Patel, 67, life
* Hemantbhai Satabhai alias
Gokalbhai Patel, 33, life
* Sanatkumar Ranchhodbhai Patel, 36, life
* Manubhai Jethabhai Patel, 73, life
* Punambhai Laljibhai Patel, 50, life
* Dharmeshkumar Natubhai Patel, 34, lvice-president of Ode nagarpalika, ife
* Vinubhai Shanabhai Patel, 53, life
* Natubhai Mangalbhai Patel, 48, life
* Pravinbhai Mangalbhai Patel, 45, life
* Girishbhai Somabhai Patel, 64, 7 yrs
* Prakashbhai Jashbhai Patel, 43, 7 yrs

Allegedly in the mob that carried stones and inflammable material, torched Muslim properties and killed the 23 in the house; many of them were also part of the conspiracy that led to the torching of the house. They allegedly attacked two others who tried to escape and who became eyewitnesses in the case. They were also in the mob that attacked the two policemen, and plundered Muslim homes.

Police had lathicharged the mob on hearing screams from inside the house; mob attacked the two cops.

Dilip Patel, with different middle names, is common to 3 of those sentenced to life and a 4th awarded 7 yrs.

* Dilip Sata Patel was acquitted.
* Dilip Babubhai Patel is absconding.
* Dilip Dahya Patel, relative of convicts Atul Dahya Patel (brother) and Dilip Vallabh Patel (brother-in-law), grabbed the dupatta of a  
woman in the crowd after the sentence and apparently tried to hang himself, though the crowd didn’t let him.
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" WHAT THE COURT SAID

The objective of this punishment is to remind the accused that their crime was not in their welfare or of the society.

Conspiracy is established as all those gathered were Hindus with intention to kill Muslims and damage their property. The gathered on Friday and charged towards homes of the Muslims fully aware of the fact that it was Friday and all people would be in their respective homes. They knew that victims keep grass and tobacco in the house, so as per plan they threw patrol and kerosene first.

Intention to kill and preparations were established from the fact that fire was caused to an extent that even the bones were burned down, as there was not even a bone available in the burnt houses....
Godhra carnage is the reason behind occurrence of this incident.

The case does not fall in the category of rarest of rare. There is no criminal antecedent of the accused persons. The situation wa tense then and looking at such circumstances, death penalty cannot be handed out at this stage. "

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UP NEXT

These sentences were for a mass killing in Pirwali Bhagol, Ode town. The next judgment will be for mob killings in Malav Bhagol, also in Ode town. Three Muslims were burnt alive by a mob and 41 persons, again mostly Patels, are facing trial. A special court headed by additional session judge R M Sareen has been conducting the trial, which is almost over with the court having heard both sides. April 16 is the tentative date for the judgment.

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http://www.indianexpress.com/news/the-probe-its-officers-and-the-challenge/936105/

The probe, its officers and the challenge

Satish Jha : Ode, Anand, Fri Apr 13 2012, 00:08 hrs 
The investigations into the Ode killings were marked by constantly changing investigating officials and the basic challenge of establishing that 23 people had indeed been killed.

The killings were first investigated by sub-inspector R G Patel of Khambholaj police station in Anand district, under whose jurisdiction Ode falls. He was transferred to Ahmedabad as an inspector and was suspended in 2009, after a hooch tragedy with 157 deaths blew into a scandal that exposed a nexus between policemen and bootleggers.

Till the Special Investigation Team took over, the state police had already arrested 46 accused, of whom 23 have been released.

To establish that 23 people had been killed, about Rs 16 to 20 lakh was spent on digging the areas where the remains were allegedly disposed of, but no evidence was found. “When the SIT took over the case in 2008, the challenge was to find evidence of homicide. 

The complainant had claimed that the victims’ last remains were thrown into a step-well and another well in the locality. The SIT tried to drain the whole step-well for eight days and brought officials from the irrigation department. The exercise went on for more than a week but nothing was found,” said a former investigating official.

The SIT later appointed Girsh H Patel, DySP, as IO. He retired midway through the probe and DySP Himanshu Pathak took charge.

The day the complaint was filed by Rafiq Khalifa, then assistant sub-inspector Bhimsinh P Raulji registered the FIR. When Gulam Rasool Saiyed, 80, was burnt alive, no fresh FIR was lodged. According to the victim’s family, separate cases were filed on March 1 and March 2 but the police registered only one FIR, a matter that remains controversial.

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Comments posted on Radiance Viewsweekly website over its article:Introduce Alternate Banking Window in Conventional Banks: ICIF :

Indian Centre of Islamic Finance delegation's visit to an Indian government official to lobby for introducing Islamic Banking windows in conventional Banks as a pilot project, is a sincere effort to help provide Islamic Banking facilities to primarily Muslim citizens of India to abide by their strict Islamic injunctions against interest. However, as the balance of power is in the hands of a committed bureaucracy as well as the ruling class, ICIF should realise that even if Islamic Banking is adopted by Indian Banking system, the entire control of the facilities offered may or may not be in strict compliance with Sharia requirements. ICIF should consider how Muslim Personal Laws are being flaunted with impunity by the government, legislation,bureaucracy as well as judiciary and we have a big ongoing struggle to get Government to grant us full constitutional freedom to practice our religion in all its manifestations and corollaries. Time and again simple minded and sincere people have relied on State to be fair with Muslims. However, there seems to be a ideological reluctance by all section of Indian governance, to 'appease' Muslims, even though their demands are just, constitutional, legal, viable and deserving. Muslims have no effective political leverage with the political class. So much so, that we have not even planned to lobby the political parties first, to include Muslim demand for Islamic Banking in their manifesto. I doubt even either Muslim League or Welfare Party of India, has included in their manifesto, the Muslim demand for Islamic Banking facilities. So all such visits to government ministers and bureaucrats become fruitless and increase Muslim frustrations when their most cherished demand are merely given polite hearing but never any effort to move in the direction of even remotely coming forward with any positive sign that Islamic Banking is under consideration. This state of affair should force us to review our strategies for the achievement of our goal. A window of opportunity could open, when globalized India now desperate for Foreign Funds might look to Gulf countries with bulging Sovereign Funds, to invest its major infrastructure projects. I would suggest that we should lobby with investing Gulf counties, to channelize their investment through Islamic Banking system and as an extension of cooperation, lobby with Indian authorities to allow private Islamic Banks from Gulf countries to open their full branches as pilot project to offer Islamic Banking facilities to all sections of Indian population. Since we would be helping our country to raise billions in investment funds for national or private projects, we will certainly cultivate some leverage to our demands on our government to come to a trilateral arrangement, so that it may not appear to be politically vulnerable to opposition charge of 'appeasement' of Indian Muslims. Our efforts will be based on a fair exchange of give and take and we will not be begging for favors of without any direct and visible quid pro quo. I would request Indian Centre for Islamic Finance (ICIF). ICIF must proceed with the project in a professional manner instead of throwing the ball in the court of a reluctant government that is not interested to play the ball with its Muslim citizens.

Ghulam Muhammed, Mumbai
<ghulammuhammed3@gmail.com

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http://www.radianceweekly.com/301/8545/developing-economies-ready-to-contain-bluff-of-developed-worldbrics-stands-firmly-with-iran-and-syria-against-foreign-interventions/2012-04-08/report/story-detail/introduce-alternate-banking-window-in-conventional-banks-icif.html

Introduce Alternate Banking Window in Conventional Banks: ICIF

Report

By ALI JASIM

In its relentless pursuit to introduce Islamic Finance and Banking in India, a delegation of Indian Centre for Islamic Finance-ICIF called on Union Minister of State for Finance Namo Narain Meena at his residence in the Capital on Mar 26. The delegation presented important documents to the minister and discussed the possibility of introducing Islamic banking windows in the conventional banks as a pilot project to start with, and also constituting an expert committee to look into the feasibility of Interest-free Islamic banking in the country, taking into account the experiences in modern, secular and industrialised countries like UK, Japan, France, Singapore and Hong Kong and recently in China.

The delegation also convinced the minister that this system of banking is not confined to a particular class or particular religious followers. It pointed out that as countries like China are forging ahead into Islamic Banking in a big way, India that has a tremendous potential to introduce this system also should not lag behind. India has a preferable edge over China because of the historical ties and cultural affinity between GCC countries.

Referring to two documents – Standard & Poor’s “Will Islamic finance play a key role in funding Asia’s huge infrastructure task?” and The Economists in which details of Sukuk-asset based bonds for infrastructure development were discussed, the minister enquired more on its details and assured the delegation that he would go through the documents and forward them to RBI for follow-up action.

ICIF General Secretary also referred to the recommendations of the Committee on Financial Sector Reforms chaired by Dr Raghuram Rajan of the Planning Commission of India which recommended interest-free banking to be introduced in the main banking system for inclusive growth with innovation.

The delegation made the following two specific requests before the Minister:

a)      To introduce Alternate Banking Window as a pilot project in the conventional Bank, which requires only an executive order from the Finance Ministry. A document in this regard has been submitted to the Finance Ministry.

b)      To constitute a committee of experts to explore the feasibility of alternative interest free banking in the country in the light of the experiments carried out in modern, secular and industrialised countries like UK, Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan and recently in China as well.

The delegation consisted of ICIF General Secretary, Mr Abdur Raqeeb; Secretary Jamaat-e-Islami Hind Er. Mohammed Salim, Mr. Ali Jasim and Mr. Anisur Rahman Nadvi of ICIF.