Ordinance on Convicted Lawmakers

Gandhiji and B.R.Ambedkar will definitely  be rolling in their graves.  They probably would even be sorry for what they did, for it is going to be hard for them to see their beloved people where we are today! Imagine Nehru speaking to Gandhi about an ordinance that that protects convicted lawmakers from being immediately disqualified. May be in those days it would have still made sense, after all there were many freedom fighters convicted for political reasons. I wonder how would Ambedkar and his constitution drafting committee react to this development. I bet they did not in their wildest dream think of a scenario like this one. They were after all men of honor and despite their best efforts could not envisage a scenario of our democracy being hijacked by dishonorable men at whose helm is a man I esteemed so much, a person who was supposed to be one of the best brains in my profession! Sorry Dr.Singh this is indeed the last nail in the coffin. 

It is not surprising that politics is the last refuge of a scoundrel, but it is indeed surprising that they have become shameless and blatantly so. Despite being greedy, power hungry and all that they were, there were some ethics, a unspoken code of conduct, a certain dignity and respect towards the electorate. After all they needed us twice every decade, sometimes  even more than that!

Surprisingly, it is out right stupid.  They could have done it intelligently by introduced a bill, there could have been  a  pretense of a debate in the parliament, a guise of functional democracy.  No! they want to take the shortest and quickest route even if it meant circumventing the democratic process, and of course disregarding our esteemed supreme  court.  This is a stupid move because you do not shoot yourself in the foot during an election year, not to forget anti-incumbency and  a formidable opponent with a strong track-record.  It is a wonder that Congress forgot that there are educated and urban voters who are can see through vote-bank politics who will definitely be upset by such open disrespect to the electorate.  

No wonder the Gen-Z  leaders in the Congress party are openly criticizing the ordinance. Kudoos to Rahul Gandhi , Milind Deora for calling a spade a spade. Not that they are always on the ‘right’ side, but this time they are. For once Rahul Gandhi said something I whole heartedly agree. This ordinance is utter nonsense. Thanks Rahul for bringing legitimacy (you can do that, thanks to your parentage)to a point of view so diverse from the leaders in your party. Thanks Rahul for making us the Aaam Janta feel a little less despised. Thanks Rahul for making us, voters feel a little more than just  votebank=function(caste, religion,(money+bottle)).

Masala Dosa and the purchasing power of rupee.

The other day I watched a Kannada movie called ‘Super’ by Upendra. Like all Upendra movies, the movie had a few feel good, a few thought worthy elements but on the whole it was stung into a very gaudy but blotchy story piece. The element that connect this piece to the movie is the exchange rate of a Rupee! In that movie a Rupee is equivalent to $100! Wow. So the film makers aspire for Rupee to become so expensive. May be it an aspirational factor, maybe there are a lot of us who think it is desirable to have an expensive Rupee. What does that really mean in the context of recent depreciation of Rupee?

To begin with let us think in terms of Masala Dosa. I say Masala Dosa, because that is one of the first things I buy as an expat on a pilgrimage home! In 2007, the price of a Masala Dosa in say a typical Darshini in Bangalore would cost about  INR 15. As given in the table below, in terms of Dollar one Masala Dosa cost $0.41. In 2009, my next subsequent trip to India, I found that the same Masala Dosa cost about INR 25 or about $0.61. Currently the same Masala Dosa costs about INR 50 or about $0.94.

Purchasing power of Rupee in terms of a Masala Dosa
Year	$1 = INR	Cost of Masala Dosa	Cost of Masala Dosa
2007	37.00	INR 15	₵ 41
2009	41.00	INR 25	₵ 61
2013	63.00	INR 50	₵ 79
Annual inflation		27% (INR terms)	18% ($ terms)
Annual Depreciation	12%
One Masala Dosa should approach $0.81 at the depreciation rate of 12%

At the same time, Rupee has depreciated about 12 % per annum(roughly, it is never a straight line process, there were lots of ups and downs, but roughly the trend) from about INR 37 for a dollar to about INR 63 right now.  So if we adjust the price of Masala Dosa in terms of depreciation, we will see that it should approach $0.81. Which indeed it did, at current rate it is about $0.79. So  thinking  of purchasing power of rupee in terms of a Masala Dosa, currently rupee is fairly valued after all.

Sorry Upendra, INR 1 approaching $100 still appears a distant dream, definitely when inflation in India is what it is and fiscal deficit is what it is.

The depreciation of rupee is not to be interpreted as a bleak development  either. On the one hand imports become more expensive, so hopefully Indians buy a lot less of gold, a lot less of the flimsy toys made in China, and petrol (may be rely a lot more on public transportation). On the other hand our exports will become competitive in the global markets because everything in global markets are denominated in Dollars. Hopefully our exporters will find more buyers and earn more Dollars improving our balance sheet. Over a period of time, if fiscal and monetary policies are healthy, and the central government is sane, we can hopefully see a time when  inflation and also Rupee will experience some degree of stability.

RIP brave girl...

Finally the girl who was brutalized on a moving bus bid his final  farewell, she was tired and done.  Rest in peace brave sister....You were not the first to go this way or the last given the disproportionately heavy burden of crime that women face.

Of course we are stupid enough to elect and make leaders of people, not even competent to understand what they are saying. Apparently some great politician a few years ago complained about women wearing modern dresses and sending out an invitation to be raped! It was absurd and just went on the state how sick the  guy capable of making that statement. That was not the end, but the beginning.

 "Women should know how much skin they should cover.”- Karnataka's Women & Child Welfare minister C. C. Patil








OK let us discount some minor politician, but if well educated, apparently enlightened bureaucrats say  things like ....
   '“fashionable clothing,” like the salwar kameez is leading to number of rapes' Dinesh Reddy-Andhra Pradesh DGP
 .....you know you are doomed and justice cannot be expected. 


Most so called leaders are just so paranoid about their position, that everything becomes a political conspiracy.  "rapes were a conspiracy to malign the government." Mr Phool Chand Mulana Haryana Congress President. Looks like he took a leaf off Ms Mamatha Banerjee's stance in one such case in Kolkota. She went a step ahead transferring a rare police officer who managed to nab the culprits.

And  then there is more,  women politicians who can brand a rape victim a prostitute.

"They (the Park Street rape and Delhi gang rape) are totally different. The incident at Park Street was not a rape at all. It was a misunderstanding between two parties involved in professional dealing — a woman and her client," Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar, MP

God forbid, after going through such  violation, a women should also suffer from character assassination? No wonder, most such crimes go unreported. After all cops are not only slack doing their job, but can become predators themselves.

"Maan Singh, a senior sub inspector (SSI) posted at Akbarpur police station in Ambedkar Nagar, was arrested on December 14 from a hotel in Faizabad by SSP D S Yadav. The arrest came after the SSP was informed that the cop had brought the gang-rape victim from Ambedkar Nagar to the hotel and was raping her. The victim was rescued from the room after the cop was caught with his pants down. Now the rape victim has alleged that in-charge of the Akbarpur Kotwali, inspector AK Upadhyay, had also raped her." from the Times of India.

This is definitely not the last straw.

So it is not enough that women are unfortunate to go through such violation, they have to put up with more cognition-handicapped politicians who are brave enough to say "I don't feel any hesitation in saying that 90 per cent of the girls want to have sex intentionally but they don't know that they would be gang raped further as they find some lusty and pervasive people in the way ahead." Dharambit Goyat Haryana Congress spokesperson



No leader worth  his or her salt has come down on the crime, either by putting forward relevant legislation  or by taking to task the responsible officers. On the contrary, the suggestions we have been getting include avoiding private buses at night.

"They should also think that they should not go in a private bus at night...We say we got freedom at midnight but doesn't mean we can roam free around at midnight." Botsa Satyanarayana


As if 9.30 PM is midnight. What about women raped in cars, fields, homes and disgustingly enough in play-school..

If you are a women and if you are protesting against the lack of law and order and basic safety then you must be a "pretty pretty women, highly dented and painted" according to Mr.Abhijit Mukherjee, son of honorable president of India.

Then the home minister will brand you a Maoist. You cry for help and you are called a militant?  "It is very easy to ask the Home Minister to go to India Gate and talk. Tomorrow Maoists may come here to demonstrate with weapons" Sushil Kumar Shinde Home Minister.

Is India even a civil society?  I cannot think of any other term but BARBARIC.





Come on..there is more to it, the all powerful and all notorious Khaps of Haryana who sanction honor killings, get the first prize.

"The meeting aims at knowing the views of various khap panchayats about the issue of lowering the marriageable age to prevent rape incidents in the state. Representatives of around 100 khaps across the state will attend the meeting to share their opinion and to present their proposals on the issue," Sube Singh Samain, spokesperson of the Sarva Khap Jat Panchayat


Not only they have violated all the unspoken rules of a civilized society, they go further every time! This time they have outdone themselves, and everybody in the race to dubious distinction.

Congratulations you brutes and barbarians; It is not just Afghanistan that is lawless, India too is just as lawless.  Go pick up a girl walking home from school, or even a toddler playing the park, violate her and do what you want, you did still walk away scot-free. 

CA Prop 37

The conservatives are a strange bunch. They accept and promote the neoclassical thought saying that Americans should be ‘free to choose’. They should be ‘free to choose’ in economics, in what they want to produce and market. Same goes for gun control. Americans should be ‘free to choose’ if they want to own guns, even the kind police officers do not carry with them. American corporations are ‘free to choose’ what ever it takes to maximize profits including technology that can cause irreversible environmental damage, opposing the labeling of genetically modified food. 

Americans are ‘free to choose’ everything. Well when they say 'Americans' probably that automatically excludes the American women, the sexual minorities etc. The women are not ‘free to choose’ whether they want to carry on an unwanted pregnancy or not. Gay people are not ‘free to choose’ whom they want to marry. So much so that two people who are in love and want solemnize their relationship are not ‘free to choose’ the word ‘Marriage’ to define their relationship. Other ordinary Americans whose lives are affected because of apathetic pollution are ‘free to choose’ to pack up their bags and leave but are not ‘free’ to ask for damages. Are not these serious flaws in the thought? If ‘Americans are free to choose’ so should be American women, American queer community etc.

Thankfully they also thought that drafting goes against the tenet. So indeed Americans are ‘free to choose’ if they want to go and fight a war or not.

If I ask for labeling of genetically modified food, I will probably be branded a ‘tree hugger’, so I am not ‘free to choose’ what I want to eat. The corporations that sell me food whereas are ‘free to choose’ to feed what me what ever they can make a profit on.

CA please vote yes on the Prop 37, so that one day we are ’free to choose’ if we want to eat the GM garbage or not.

Arrange Marriage or Love Marriage

Heard a celebrity scholar comment on arranged marriages on the radio. He was of the opinion that arranged marriages are unworkable in our times. The forcefulness of his argument made me sit and  think. Are arranged marriages so bad? after all I have always loved love stories and of course love marriages are so exciting. But then marriages are not about love story.

Let us get to the advantages of arranged marriages:

1. No dating pressure, peer pressure to have a girl/boy friend and will not have to keep looking for love if it does not happen.
2. The whole processes of looking for a soul mate is out-sourced and elder family members will do it for you.
3. People with absolutely no decision  making power will end up marrying. If not for arranged marriage, they would be single.
4. 'Lemons'(not to be condescending to others. I respect everybody but then our society is prejudiced and I cannot deny it) -will eventually find partners. For example darker girls being married off even if it means a large dowry. (I am dark myself, and I am happy with my skin)
5. Eventually there will be more couples and  procreation will go on. Not that our species is under the threat of extinction.
6. Post marriage troubles are usually addressed by the elders.
7. Fewer compatibility issues on the grounds on of food habits, language and so on
8. Both the partners start with lower expectations. No love-rush before getting married and disappointment later on after the love-rush subsides.

Now for the disadvantage

1. Arranged marriages are very expensive. The cost can be prohibitive and crush  people on the fringe under the load of debt.
2. Everything goes for a price, and the natural bio-chemical attraction has no place in the market.
3. Personality mismatch.

Now for the advantages of love marriages:

1. You think you know your partner well enough and decide consciously to live together.
2.  Pure bio-chemistry at play. Something inexplicable is driving the relationship and it must be strong enough to stand the test of time.
3. The feeling of being in love is unbeatable. People go berserk when they feel they are in love.
4. Love marriages unless taking the conventional wedding route can be very inexpensive.
5. Children born out of love marriages are most likely to learn more languages.  They are also exposed to many more cultures and more likely to be more pluralistic.

The disadvantages of love marriages:

1. Incredible amount of pressure to fall in love and find a partner and get married.
2. Complete decision making on the individual. May be a lot of pressure.
3. Pressure to find love might make people choose the wrong person.
4. 'Lemons' might never be able to make it to the market.
5. Courtship can be expensive, with movies and restaurant bills to foot

To see it in a way, arranged marriages are like command and control economies and love marriages are like free market.Just like the command and control economies, arranged marriages are planned and directed by some authority above. Just the execution is left for the individuals. The match is arranged, the date and venue everything is decided by the elders of the two families and the individuals might or might not have a say in all of  these. The  individuals just execute the plan given from above, get married and then procreate.

Whereas in the love marriage, individuals are free to choose whom they want to get married to and the way they get married to etc. They might want to have the wedding the way their parents desire but then the primary decision is all their own. That is, they decide what to do with their resource(life), and eventually execute it the way they want it. Just like free market.

So, if you are above average person (financial, looks,confidence etc) then try your luck in the free market. Free market rewards the 'haves' better than 'have-not'. And chances are that you will find a partner of choice and of course experience the love-rush that can beat the most thrilling of roller coaster. Otherwise arranged marriage might not be so bad.

The only take away from my  thought process is that an individual should as much have a choice of going for an arranged marriage as for love marriage. Just like no one should be stopped from marrying a person  they love (regardless of sex,colour, caste,creed) no one should be stopped from choosing arranged matches either. I  hate it when people stigmatize arranged marriages.  Not all arranged marriages are brutal and forced co-habitation of a city bred modern girl and a tribal from the Hindu Khush.

FDI in Multi-brand retailing in India

Recently there was a proposal to allow foreign players in the Indian multi-brand retailing sector which was eventually rolled back due to political pressure. Here is an opinion with regard to the development.
There are 5 stake holders in this process.

1.      Ordinary consumers like you and me

2.      Ultimate producer like farmers, small scale industries, big conglomerates like Tata, reliance, ITC and everybody in between producing apparel, shoes, house wares, toys, soft goods, knick knacks and everything that is typically sold in a super market.

3.      Middle men like commission agents, and agents in the procurement chain and sellers through the distribution chain including huge distributers, wholesalers, retailers at various level etc

4.      Foreign owners of multi brand retailers like Bharati-walmart,Tesco, Carrefour etc

5.      The homegrown multi-brand retailers like Pantaloon (Big Bazaar, Shoppers Stop), Tata ( Westside) etc.

The proposal to allow foreign investment into multi-brand retailing essentially means allowing stakeholder number 4 to open shops in big cities in India. If the investor-retailer like say Walmart does not make any stupid mistake, entering a market like India is very profitable. It makes complete sense as the developed markets are already saturated and aging therefore cannot offer returns the way a younger, growing, more recently prosperous ( at least certain segments which incidentally happens to be as big as the entire population of say Germany, Australia and United Kingdom combined) and not to mention a more populous economy like India can offer.  


For other stake holders it means,

1.      Bigger investment, construction of large stores like Wal-Mart in India, product sourcing and distribution network, an array of construction including warehouses, front end and back end operations etc.

2.      Jobs created in the scope of all the above mentioned areas and more.

3.      Improving efficiency due to scale of operations, they are just too big and their size should allow more efficient operation.

4.      Consumer stand to gain because competitive pricing, better choice and convenience- Imagine going to 10 different shops or going to one huge Wal-Mart.

5.      Producers stand to gain because they can bargain directly with the retailer, eliminate middle men and therefore enjoy better price realization. Apart from better price realization, larger and more stable order will enable the best of producers to become more efficient and eventually more successful. If they are indeed very efficient, they can become suppliers at the global level. I mean Wal-Mart becoming a platform for XYZ company which is very efficient in say producing steel tumblers to be able to sell its products in Wal-Mart all around the world.

6.      More investment will bring in modern supply chain management practices. (Hindustan Unilever has done an awesome job in  this regard but the scope for  improvement is enormous ) Again improving efficiency and thereby benefits to most stakeholder. Think better management of perishables like tomatoes. We hear price of tomatoes crashing and farmers abandoning their crops by the truck loads on the highway. A big retailer can offer farmers offer to buy certain quantity of produce at certain time at a set price. (contract farming) Quite easily applicable to apparel and many other sectors. The idea is that the producers will enjoy better price stability and fewer market gluts and associated losses.

Problem with the proposal

1.      The ground of operation for middlemen will gradually erode. This won’t happen immediately but over a period of time. If the system can work better without them they will be gradually eliminated; That is, if they are something called 'dead weight loss' neither beneficial to producers nor consumers.. But they cannot be eliminated completely because there will always be pockets that are not served by the big retailers.

2.      The home grown retailers will face increased competition. Because the target is the well healed and Indian consumers are crazy about anything ‘imported’ the concern is very real.

Implication:

3.      If the government wants to protect the middlemen and other supply chain inefficiencies, they are shortchanging the other two stakeholders- the producers and consumers. From what it looks the consumers lack the lobbying power of the traders-middlemen and therefore loose most. Producers do not what to irk their traders-middlemen because the competition out there is brutal.

4.      The greater lobbying would be by the existing multi-brand retailers. We know that our home grown conglomerates are not all that fair. They are there to make money at what ever cost. We know now that the Ambanis can bribe their way through our political system to procure public goods at a discount. They launder money and do everything to protect their interest. And they cannot be held accountable judicially or legally. Same with our other conglomerates. After all they are the chief patrons of our political elite.

5.      Mom and pop stores the protestors say are going to go bust. Well it is hard to say. To think of it this way, the Kirana shops have been there for ages because of a reason, convenience -they are often located in the neighborhood of the consumer, they offer credit facility which organized retailers cannot, unless you have a store branded credit card which obviously not everybody is eligible for. They are very competitive in terms of price and service. They offer personalized service and home delivery which a big box retailer can never. They know their customers; can make drastic changes in their style of operation, management. They are way more agile than big-box retailers. Janta Bazaars are dinosaurs but Kiranas are still around and are doing as well as they had been before, may be even better. On the other hand, they will never be able to offer the kind of product assortment and choice the big retailers can offer.

6.      The political debate is just political, not technical nor economic. Election is nearing and all our damned politicians want a piece of populist pie. They are not worried about the 'Aam admi', they never were.

7.      Have you noticed that just because Reliance opened a huge vegetable shop (what ever it is called 'fresh' or something, the vegetable-fruit supermarket I mean) did not lead to the extinction of vegetable market at 9th block Jayanagar or the vegetable vendors on the push cart. It just leads to more choices to the consumer. If you are price conscious and quality conscious you will probably go to reliance. If you get down a bus at 9th block and do not want to go that extra mile you will probably buy at 9th block and if are at home and do not care much about what you might get but do not want to step out of the house you will buy something from the push card vegetable vendor at your door step at a more steeper price. So they are all there very much still in business.

The story here is that there is scope for everybody in the business. The pie is huge and it is growing! Is our population slowing down any soon? No and our wants are anything but reducing. Allowing foreign retailers means better integration with the rest of the world and more choices for our consumers and better price realization for our producers, yes we will see some inefficiencies reducing. Home grown retailers will be forced to be more efficient and middlemen will have to find something else. This is a brutal world that is not forgiving. We all need to fight for our bread. Why should a political favorite be given an easy life when the rest of us are working hard?
 But politics is so much about sticking to power rather than addressing the aspirations of voters. Who can help these self centered politicians? I wish (due regards) Anna Hazare sticks to ‘fasting against corruption’ and stop talking as if he knew what he was speak out against. It is indeed tragic that the proposal was withdrawn, a sad victory of meaningless politics over meaningful economics.

Election 2009

I was very elated when BJP was elected to rule Karnataka a few months back. For one, Karnataka has been ruled by both Congress and Janata dal, both parties did nothing worthwhile. They were both disappointing, sometimes outright stupid. On the other hand BJP was a fresh option, with promising fresh ideas and fresh ways to do things. So personally though I was unable to cast my vote, I was happy for my state and my people. May be there will be a change, a positive one.
Unfortunately my optimism is misplaced. There are numerous allegations of corruption like the one involving real estate lobby and the Bangalore master plan, some mining company and its gross violations, transfers for money all that were very well features of the past governments, BJP being no different. The worst part of the whole process however is the aggression of fringe Hindutva groups.


I have been a passive supporter of Hindutva, not because it appeals to me and I believe in all their ideas, but that the other voices – the voice of centre and centre-left leaves me very uncomfortable. The centre-leftish groups in India are the most vocal, followed by the Hindutva voice. Unfortunately I do not identify myself with the centre-left because for them, I being a part of majority am less worthy than a minority who votes en-block for these parties. Therefore they are not ready to listen to me, they do not want people like me to unite, they always support ideas that are in sync with their ideologies. For them, Ramayana is just a poem but Quran/ Bible is extremely holy. If a non-hindu criticise Rama, Krishna or any other mythical holy men, it is freedom of speech, human rights etc. If a Hindu criticises a non-hindu holy man, holy symbol etc, it is gross violation of minority rights. So while M F Hussain’s filthy pictures constitute an artist’s freedom of expression, Rushdie’s ‘Satanic Verses’ and Taslima Nasreen’s “Lajja” are banned because they hurt minority sentiments. So their logic here seems to be that hurting majority sentiments is fine as long as the minority sentiments are unaffected. I can see it plain and clear that there is no level playing field in India when it comes to non-Hindus vis-à-vis Hindus. As a Hindu with rights to no other land but India, as a Hindu whose forefathers withstood persecutions for being Hindus remained Hindus and paid hefty price doing so, as a Hindu who has struggled to protect the culture and civilisation for centuries, I feel extremely marginalised and threatened.
Reading the English language new papers like The Hindu, Asian Age, Times of India, and watching the news media based out of Delhi, my feeling of marginalisation has aggravated. I know most of these folks at JNU, ACJ who eventually populate media, are hotbed promoting this kind of thinking. In fact these institutions do not encourage original thought, curiosity and questioning; they merely promote a particular way of thought. So promoted is the idea that hurting majority is ok as long as minorities are ok. It has hence become intellectually fashionable as well. So much for the quote that hangs everywhere in JNU, “A University stands for humanism, for tolerance, for reason, for adventures of ideas, and for the search of truth. It stands for the onward march of the human race toward ever higher objectives. If the universities discharge their duties adequately then it is well within the nation and the people” Poor Mr Nehru must be rolling in his grave.
There are also certain academic debates which I find rather one-sided. So how many school children even know that there are two view points on the crucial question ‘who are we?’ Aryans? Dravidan? Eastern Europeans? South Asians? Who are we? What were we before? In fact the major debate is between the Aryans as central-eastern Europeans nomads invading and destroying the Dravida-Indus Vally civilisation to build their own edifice of a civilisation; which is popularly known as ‘Aryan Invasion Theory’ or the AIT. Other the other hand there are scholars who are of the opinion that there is nothing called Aryans and Dravidans, we are all just south-Asians and everything we see today originated and grew here; it is popularly known as Out of India hypothesis. The debate is still inconclusive and we still do not have a concrete proof as to who is right. But how many of us even know about these theories as a part of our school curriculum? Not many. Are children in India learning these possibilities? No? every Indian kid only knows that Aryans were invaders and they destroyed Indus valley civilisation. Therefore a perpetual fissure between the Aryans and Dravidian is perfectly valid. What are these teachings and text books except for being divisive at best and devious at worst? Another element is the wilful ignorance of Muslim brutality on Hindus in the medieval period. As a student of History during my under-grad, I read only two lines about Jaziya, temple destruction, conquest, subjugation and conversion of Hindus. No more than that. All these indicate a lot of social turbulence between the Hindu and the non-Hindu communities, lot of blood, lot of violence but how much of it do we know as a part of structured syllabus? None. (More or less S.L.Bhyrappa’s views here, I could never agree more) Even after studying Tippu Sultan for so many many years I did not know his missionary zeal to persecute Hindus till S.L.Bhrappa’s controversy and the associated press coverage!! Is it not strange? Just that I studied the syllabus and texts prescribed by the great Bangalore University. Why should not we learn history as it happened? Instead learn politically palatable history? On the other hand tt is interesting to note that when ever the Hindutva supported academic groups comes to power, any attempt to revise school textbooks is termed as ‘saffronisation’ etc which is a well known bull crap.


The other voice I hear is the hard core Hindutva voice. I cannot even say it is Hindutva, because I have very strong reasons to believe that many people today who speak of Hindutva do not even know what they are talking about. I do not believe in hate mongering, I do not believe in orthodoxy, I do not believe that women should be confined to kitchen, I do not believe that preserving our tradition means having to dress in a particular way, I do not believe in tradition meaning not wearing lip-stick or cutting my hair. But there are fire band leaders who are interpreting Hindutva along these very particular lines. They also happened to be gifted speakers trying to hijack the Hindutva plank for their own selfish reasons. That is how controversy is created around Ram Temple, Ramsethu, which has now extended to attack on women in pubs, those wearing jeans, those wearing modern outfits! The BJP incidentally benefitted from the Ram Janma Bhoomi issue though they failed to do anything significant about it. They also abandoned Uniform Civil Code thereby enabling Mr Mohan to marry Ms Arundati aka Fiza! So my country is a secular land where Hindus can never be equal to non Hindus. They also abandoned article 370. However they resorted to eye wash action like attack against Valentine’s day, attack on women in pubs, attacking women wearing modern dresses. The valid successors of ideologues like Swami Vivekananda, Veer Savarkar they have debased themselves so much that today thy are all but just thugs waiting for their turn to make money. Of course I identify with none of these myself as a jeans wearing, pub-going, freedom loving, modern but devout Hindu with a large number of non-Hindu friends. Of course if anyone did come to me and say I better wear a Saree instead of my usual pair of jeans, I did say ‘go to hell’.

This is pretty much who I am. So the question is who represents me better? Who will safeguard my interests? Where is the voice that speaks for me, identifies with me and understands me? I am looking for this voice which will let me know the history of my civilisation in its entirety, not only politically palatable parts, I am looking for a voice that will let me know more about the injustices and persecution my forefathers went through, I want to know what were the temples that were destroyed, what eventually happened and when, I also want to know how different Hindus were treated differently, I want to know the previous societies with all its flaws and problems. I want to know how people coped up with all those problems. It means so much to me because it answers big questions that I have about myself – ‘who am I’, ‘where did I come from?’ and ‘now that I am here, where were we before?’ I want a voice that will criticise me when I am irrational, at the same time, criticise others irrespective of their religious orientation when they are irrational. I want a voice that will not put me into disadvantage because of my religion or gender. I want a voice that will give me the reassurance that I am not marginalised and I am being heard. I want a voice that will guard my sanity, freedom, history, present and future. I want a voice that will respect me, love me and make me feel wanted for what ever I am, irrespective of my religion, race, sexual orientation, gender, etc. I want the objects of devotion to be as holy to everybody else as it is me. I want a voice that says destruction of Ramsethu amounts to damaging Hindu beliefs (ecological effects apart), I want a voice that will respect Rama the same way as it would say Prophet or Jesus. I want a voice that is blind and fair; if Rushdie’s and Nasreen’s books are to be banned, so should M F Hussain’s. On the contrary if Rushdie and Nasreen’s books are published, let M.F.Hussain be allowed to do more nudes of his choice may it be Saraswati or Madhuri who cares. But let there be level playing field. I want a voice which will tell me to be proud of being a Hindu and not be apologetic for having celebrated Dasara or Deepavali. I want a voice which did treat me more like a human being rather than a voting head. I want a voice that condemns the action of a minority chief minister disrespectful towards one of the holiest of Hindu shrines. I want a voice that will speak against the practice of government alone managing Hindu temples while Mosques and Churches are not. I want a voice that will speak against subsidising non-hindu pilgrimages abroad at the same time confiscating the Hindu temple collection.
These are my desires as the election dates are announced and India readies to elect another government for another five years. But what do I hear? Devil here and a deep sea there, I am stuck between these two and still searching for something to call my own; Just the two extremes and the political parties ready to squander money during elections just so they can make more later. All I see is opportunistic shameless figures, ready to be strange bedfellows just for the sake of money….