ARE THERE ANY HOLY COWS-MEDIA OR JUDICIARY? : Dated 06/01/2010

ARE THERE ANY HOLY COWS-MEDIA OR JUDICIARY?
Last night in Times now program News Hour Arnab Goswami anchored the show with three guest, all doyens in their own right: Madhu Trehan, Nalini Singh & Senior Supreme Court Advocate Harish Salve. Was interesting debate on whether Media has come of age or its just Media activitism or sensationalism of news item like Rahore in Ruchika Girhotra Molestation case, which shrugged off people from the slumber knowing that even after 19 years of lone fight by the family of Ruchika’s friend the culprit got away with only 6 months sentence and immediately got bail. This is one case but there have been several instances in the past too which have been brought forward by the media, many of them recently, leading to the conclusion, and actually all agreed, that media and especially televison has come of age now post the advent of private news channels. Gone are the days when we had to be fed whatever was there to consume from the government controlled channel, Doordarshan. It was as if pre privatization era of 1991 of Indian economy when the license raj was so strong that we had to wait for as basic thing as Bajaj Scooters or Landline telephones or Gas cylinders for months and years and see the present situation, these items mentioned above have all gone out of date!

But media has its own limitations and the sooner it realises it would be better as now even media is not the holy cow as was rightly said yesterday! So media should also not take anyone for granted and whatever it feds to the common public may not be consumed and ultimately it will lose its credibility if its found out to be untrue and would soon be labeled as sensational. At most Media can raise the issue to the level that its taken seriously and the incidences of rape, molestation, corruption, crime, nexus between politician-Goons-Police, slip-up from our government departments whether in foreign policy or matters of public sanity or question of MPs and MLAs getting their salaries and perks and extra free air and train passes for their family without any debate and discussion in Parliament - these matters are brought to light immediately and thorough investigation, prosecution and trial now have started to be taken up seriously by govt. But the sad part is that its only the individual matters that it takes up which is affected positively (much of the population which has been facing the wrath are poor people and those living in villages which constitute 70% of our population of over one billion where still reach of media is very limited). And that also if the media does some serious investigative journalism (which it does in some cases, but in most of the cases its simply very mediocre in research and often comes up egg faced in many matters due to poor research and loud shouting in the name of breaking news) and provide or rather assist the process of investigation. It can do that much only and not more than this should be expected out of media because media does not have the resources or competency or power or is authorized to pass judgment. But it does have the trickle down effect on the mentality of the people and it is not without reason that cases have started coming up lately, especially relating to crime against women, which were hither to not reported earlier as there were not enough public to support a victim. May be such acts could at least instill confidence on our people and then only our democracy becomes stronger because without that the democracy is just MOBOCRACY. And in this regard the media must NOW UNDERSTAND THAT FOR IT TO BE TAKEN SERIOUSLY IT HAS TO PRESENT ONLY CORRECT FACTS TO THE PEOPLE AFTER THROUGH STUDY OTHERWISE THERE IS THE DANGER THAT THE GENERALISED STATEMENT MADE THAT POLITICIANS, IAS, POLICE, (AND EVEN SOMETIMES JUDGES) ARE CORRUPT, VERY SOON THE NAME OF MEDIA WILL BE ADDED TO THE LIST.

One more important fact has to be remembered , Say, like in present Ruchika case if you take back the clock to 19 years and take up this as a case study and investigate each and every people involved in this matter right from the ministers, Chief Ministers, politicians, Babus and Police officers, to principals, to doctors, to policemen to teachers and subject them to rigorous investigation and bring forward the fault of each and every person who aided in subverting justice and they should be punished so that at least now even the smallest of the person in the entire cycle will have fear in doing any illegal job and that they may be hauled up at any stage of their career ( We should remember that currently Finance ministry is going through the files of each and every elected representatives and verifying whether income declarations thy have filed at the time of filing their nominations are correct or not!) then only it can be said safely that justice has been done and we have got result. Otherwise at best we are just bringing up the matter and in the heat of the moment, under pressure the govt. registers FIR, or orders for CBI inquiry or makes fresh case but ultimately the matter goes through the grind of the SYSTEM and we are back to square one when final justice is delivered. The Judges ultimately will give judgment only on the basis of the facts, evidences, witnesses and merits of the case and for that the whole process of investigation & prosecution has to be done competently. Perhaps constitution of Fast Courts or Appointment of new judges could be the supplementing factor.

And, most of all, if the people are not awake and take conscious decision when they go to polls and choose good set of leaders then only it will make the difference. The awakening process should be aided by media. If we elect bad/corrupt/criminal people and send them to Law Making Bodies Parliament and State Legislature, how can we expect justice? We will get Bad Judges, Bad prosecution, Bad Lawyers, Bad IAS officers, Bad Police Officers and Investigating Officers, Bad Police- so on and so forth. This is one fact. The other fact is also true that once the media drops guard then again the system tends to let Manu Sharmas of the world off to parole and partying. But still role of media is commendable.

The another subject was whether Judiciary should be touched for criticism or not. Though I am not an expert on this subject but still some observations can be made. It was rightly pointed out by Mr Salve that any judgment passed by the judiciary must be debated and must be challenged in a way that it should not denigrate the institution of Judiciary. In fact this brings the point of former speaker Mr Somnath Chatterjee’s assertion that judiciary should not intervene in the matters of legislatures as both are at the apex (debatable), Judiciary as well as Legislature, but as a convention, generally Judiciary is held supreme. But if Judiciary is supreme then what about the Legislature and the group of ministers and the Cabinet, who are the democratically elected representatives of people, which is the Law making body in the country? It also supreme All derive power from Constitution of India and constitution of India provides rights to every citizen and it is the duty of the Judiciary to see that no one gets injustice. So like Legislature which is answerable to the people of the country, Judiciary should also be answerable to the people. Of course it a long debatable matter and experts must be thinking over it for a long time.

Actually this whole debate may have also come about because of the decay in moral values of our people in our parliamentary system starting from the top where I have already mentioned that if we, the people, are not alert we deserve the same quality of governance as the quality of people we have chosen. We have chosen bad people and that is why bad sets of decisions are taken and it effects the entire system and it has corrupted the whole system to such an extent that not only the legislature, the executive, the police, the business, even Judiciary or army is not immune to it. This signals the breakdown of entire system which everyone agrees but waiting for someone to start improving the system and start saying NO!. We have to raise to the occasion and demand our rights and do our duties before it is too late. Every individual has to take pledge, I don’t know when but this has to be done and encouraged by recent media activitism this can be achieved. There are tools available in the judiciary systems as well as RTI to question any officer or any decision taken by the govt. Lets be an awakened and empowered society. Not let any injustice be done to anyone and lets be Indian first. Amen Media.

PRIVATISATION OF PUBLIC SECTOR UNITS : Dated 04/01/2010

PRIVATISATION OF PUBLIC SECTOR UNITS
Come on, lets find opinion. Should we go for Privatization of Public sector units in a big way?
Some of the Logics which goes For Privatisation are:

Improved Efficiency

Improved Financial soundness

Improved Accountability

Improved Meritocracy

Fast decisions, No government interference,

Profit to government, govt to use the profits and concentrate on activities it is most suitable or for which it is in existence.

Stock market benefits, better price realization, better dividend to govt and public invested.

Cost cutting in number of persons employed

Improved Customer interaction and loyalty

Quality of Employment


Equally strong Some of the Logics which goes Against Privatisation are:

Precious assets- Land, buiding, capital, people, machineries, disposed-off at throw-away prices. Take the case of privatization of Airport Centaur Hotel, Mumbai by BJP govt. It was sold to a party Batra Hospitality at a throw-away price of Rs 83 crores and later on Batra Hospitality sold it to Sahara Group at a disclosed price of 115 crores in a few months.

Nature of business will change. A viable business is viable business for anyone, whether it is government or private businessmen. If a business can and has potential to generate profits, government can also run it, just good administration is required with farsightedness. Take the case of turnaround of Indian railways. If a businessman knowingly buys a government loss making business, be sure that he will also not run that business. He will either use the property or change the business or do his banking. Don’t be under any false optimism. If government cannot run Air India profitably, so does other airlines in the country, name any airline which is running at a profit. The only low cost carrier airline Indigo seems to be profitable (people in India are very cost conscious, we have been groomed from the beginning to cut costs and save for future) and its model is being looked into by other airlines also and even air India is trying the model, but facing hurdles with unions.

Meritocracy- You cant bet, we are Indian, vested interests are present everywhere.

Corruption - Cannot surely say. No one is immune to it. We talk big every time we get an opportunity to speak on any public platform that Politicians, Babus, Police, Judiciary, even fifth estate, media , are corrupt, but give one a chance and ensure that this deal will not be revealed to anyone, he will not let the opportunity go!

Financial soundness - Even government can do it. After all it has all the banks and resources of the world are at its disposal. In fact Government can mobilize resources at minimum costs and guarantees as it does for infrastructure projects.

Accountability- With rising public interests and tools like RTI and efforts like e-governance and computerization of land records or individual efforts like communicating with Maharashtra Chief Ministers by MLAs only by email, etc, this can be achieved by government also. And on top of it we have PAC, CAG, CVC as watchdog bodies.

Efficiency - Even govt can do it. With little interference fast decisions could be taken. Meritocracy - Do we know that govt has some of the best brains in the country. That they are not able to use it is different matter.

Employment: Public sector employees are not in constant tension that their job is unsafe so they can concentrate on work always looking at long term perspective and benefits. Contrast it with a private employee where there is so much target on his head that for fulfilling the target he goes to any level to see that the work is done at the moment, leave alone the long term implications that some of such decisions might be.

Customer Loyalty: Its better not said. Do you know that people or even companies prefer to bank on government banks as they know that their money is safe, minimum charges are applied, etc. Yes, they do have trouble in standing in queues and getting their money little late but it is more than compensated when the Branch Manager gives a patient hearing to his problems and solves them in minutes and is always available on one phone call. Do you have such personalized service available with a private bank. Is it not customer loyalty or customer satisfaction?

Stock market benefits: Rise in stock market just raises the notional value of the stock, not necessarily the valuation of the company. The valuation is done by strength of balance sheets and not by stock market rise, which is the result of many factors like speculation, lobbies, rumours, news, etc. And balance sheet? Its in the hands of CAs. They can make any projection and manipulate any balance sheet as per the convenience of promoters. Its, better not said.

In fact in case of Public sector, the decisions are taken consciously as the money involved is public money and the public can raise questions even later also through any forum. In corporates huge sums of money can be conveniently shown to be written-off in many ways if the promoters agree and shareholders permission is granted. No such luxury is available in dealing with public money in a Public Sector concern.




Social and emotional costs
This intense chapter should be factored in before taking any privatization decision. There is a question of rehabilitation of a large number of people who are past their prime in terms of getting employment in some other companies as they have been conditioned for a particular type of job and all of a sudden whosoever has not updated his knowledge or diversified his skills or developed alternate source of employment/income, their families are in trouble. No amount of Pensions, or VRS or Gratuity can understand or minimize the pain and insecurity and crisis they undergo in midlife of the career. There is a danger of increase in number of unemployed or unemployable in already overburdened problem of this country and has potential cause of many unrest and class and social struggle.

Conclusion
Its very easy to go for privatization but very difficult to roll back or undo the damage done in entire financial, administrative and social fabric of the company (and it includes the ancillaries and other suppliers shops developed in and around the premises of the company) and that also just for the sake of some additional money to be made available for the government to spend in developmental works! This is much less than what we are not able to use it or waste it or used in unprofitable way. The money which in any way lies unused by the elected representatives every year which is allotted to them to spend for their constituency or by the state governments who themselves who return every year the money allotted to them by the Union Budget every year which they are not able to use it in any developmental works due to lack of available avenues for the betterment of the state or the amount of money which is lost due to corruption in the system (as high as 85% money never reaches the people and only the rest 15% goes to genuine public) .

The choice is before us to decide. Perhaps Divestments may be a better options and we will talk about its for and against some other day.

SUNDAY AFTERNOON DIARY : Dated January 3rd, 2010

SUNDAY AFTERNOON DIARY JAN 3RD, 2010
Reviews:
Newspaper: Hindustan Times: Collumns : Vir Sanghvi & Khushwant Singh
Times Of India : Collumns: Swaminathan S Alankesaria Aiyar, MJ Akbar,
Swapan Dasgupta
TV News: NDTV 24x7 & DD News

Ruchika Suicide Case
Judiciary
Media trial
Progress by Bihar and other Bimaru states
Indo-Pak bon-homie, Kashmir, Corruption in Pakistan
Movie – 3 Idiots


We are a functional Democracy. Our police, administrative system, judiciary will be as good as our people. If we elect bad/corrupt/criminal people and send them to Law Making Bodies Parliament and State Legislature, how can we expect justice? We will get Bad Judges, Bad prosecution, Bad Lawyers, Bad IAS officers, Bad Police Officers and Investigating Officers, Bad Police- sp on and so forth. In fact it is interesting to know that not only corrupt and criminals are getting elected every year, people go and vote along Caste/Community/Religion/Regional lines is such a way that they elect criminals from their Castes/Community/Religion/Regional so that they can be protected by the terror of the people from other Castes/Community/Religion/Regional. Who looks after the track record of which person is corrupt or who is educated, or who is capable? The result, they elect the same set of people again and again every years, and anyway, India was ruled by foreigners for years and we like being ruled so Royal families and Political families are always elected year after year (after all they are the ones who actually know how to govern!). Not to mention luring and intimidating voters on the voting day with A Rs 100 note, a saree, a bottle of country liquor, a film show, a joy ride, a vacation, a holiday- are better no need to be discussed! The matter has been further compounded by a plethora of parties and growth of regional and personality based parties. How long will media take up the case and run the show to its conclusion. After all media is not a tool of giving justice, at most it can give prominence in any case so that proper investigation and importance be given to a particular case and that also only limited to main cities , but what about the interiors of villages where 70% India lives? How many Ruchikas or Jessikas come up in the limelight? Who takes up the matter apart from the victims family and that too only if the family is well to do and has the courage and capacity to fight it long to take on the higher-ups in the society (See what happened to Shibu Soren whose case is still coming up in Supreme Court in march involving the murder of his ex PA Mr Shashinath Jha. No one is taking up the matter even for one show now, the reason that this is an old case. even I get the answer that this is useless to raise the Shibu Soren case now as the matter is old, from Jharkhand, not major city and does not revoke the king of sympathy it once generated. The result, he is becomes the Chief Minister of Jharkhand, the state which has just come of the Madhu Koda’s corrupt regime. And on top of it Soren is being aided by BJP, the party which claims to me clean party with committed workers working selflessly for their whole liefetime! All in the name of political expediency and just because the state was in danger of President rule or because the MLAs were being subjected to sale-purchase!

At most Media can raise the issue to the level that its taken seriously and the trial does take sincerely. But the sad part is that its only the individual matters that it takes up is affected positively. And that also if the media does some serious investigative journalism (which it does in some cases, but in most of the cases its simply very mediocre in research) and provide or rather assist the process of investigation, it can do that much only and not more that this should be expected out of media because media does not have the resources or the competency or power or authorized to give judgment. Its ultimately the courts of India to decide or pass judgment. For all other matters these once-in-a-blue -moon cases does not instill enough fear on erring officers to deter them from repeating the same practices again and again and so for all the other matters the same problems of judiciary recurs. In the case of villages most of the matters especially related to women don’t even come up. Why will they come up? Who will defend the girl? Who has the courage to fight the system? The poor girl is left to her family to defend her, if her family wants, as in most of the cases the family itself wants that the girl be sent to remote place where no one knows her and is married off and the matter is “settled” in that stage itself. In majority of the cases the family is left alone to defend itself, no one comes to its aid, their friends, officers, any politician or any NGO.

Who has the money to fight the case so long say 19 years. And even if she fights the case what is the guarantee that he or she will get justice. I was aghast today to find from the words of former CBI chief Mr Joginder Singh who cited the findings of a study that says that considering the pace of disposal cases in judiciary in India it will take 466 years to clear the backlog. So leave alone proper investigation and adjudication even opening and closing the file is enough for any matter to get delayed. How can we expect speedy judgement? Case disposal has to be fast not only for women related matters but also other corruption related matters too so that it gets the message to the men in position that you cannot play with the system as long a you want and you could be put behind bars. Only then we can expect fear among people. Say like in present Ruchika case if you take back the clock to 19 years and take up this as a case study and investigate each and every people involved in this matter right from the ministers, Chief Ministers, politicians, Babus and Police officers, to principals, to doctors, to policemen to teachers and subject them to rigorous investigation and bring forward the fault of each and every person who aided in subverting justice.

In actual practice when the cases come up, the matter is not investigated properly by police or investigating officers in collecting proper proofs or evidences to expect any justice from the court. For proper justice the Prosecution should stand up and see that the client gets justice, the other party is not deliberately resorting to dilatory tactics, presenting false witnesses, intimidating genuine witnesses, see that genuine witness come in time, etc, etc. But how it can do? In how many cases the prosecution Lawyer is a learned man or is taken seriously? In most of the courts in India only the laggards and less qualified people are appointed as public prosecutors as it is considered unglamorous. (We should thank M N Singh, then Police Chief of Mumbai for at least getting Advocate Ujjwal Nikam from far-off Sholapur and getting him as Public Prosecutor in Bombay High Court, but this is a rare event). In many cases since the fight is between lawyers, the lawyers of both the parties themselves collaborate and let the cases run for years. In some cases the judges are corrupted to let the cases delay for years. So even if you have fast courts or getting any complaint registered as an FIR or FIRs registered by emails whether the process of prosecution or investigation or fair trial or fair justice would be expected to be delivered fast or not, that should be better left to time. Lets hope for the better.

People should come up and assert demand. There are tools available in the judiciary systems as well as RTI to question any officer or any decision. Actually we are the country of cowards and too much tolerance level. (The only exception comes when the politicians create and mob situation for any matter of Caste/Community /Religion/ Regional or we catch a petty thief and the mob lynches it or when the trains, buses or airlines are running late - we use all our resources in hand to destroy public property or burn buses or use lathis in injuring and killing people). Our Chalta Hai attitude creates all sorts of problems. We take for granted any lapses in law and order or any problem related to harassment or region or language and and let the transgression go till it reaches out of hand and creates crisis. Be it Naxalism, Terrorism, a Bhindrawale, a Raj Thakre, Gujjar movement in Rajasthan, Telangana, Gorkhaland, Kashmir to name a few phenomenons. Lets be an awakened and empowered society. Not let any injustice be done to anyone and develop our ability to question any injustice and fight for our rights. Lets be Indian first.

One surprisingly positive news was about performance of Bihar 11.03% growth rate. Credit goes to the Chief Minister Nitish Kumar. Bihar has dubious distinction of being the only state which did not get a worthy Chief minister after 1st Chief Minister, Sri Krishna Singh (Bhagwat Jha Azad was only for a brief period and was booted out soon). Just see the potential of Bihar. One Chief minister’ regime has made it possible in 3 -4 years. Imagine the development if we had got worthy Chief ministers in past 60 years! Biharis always had the ability, it was only that they displayed it in other states or out of India. Cheer Up. Just with its sheer weightage in its contribution to the overall GDP of India has risen up dramatically in India and I think it will be the development of the BIMARU states(Bihar, MP, Rajasthan & UP) + Orissa along with Gujarat will ensure that India has a decent growth rate of 8% going forward.


Now comes the Indo Pak matter. M J Akbar is right in providing his version of the historical perspective of the problem of Kashmir and need for it to be resolved but he did not give solution. I too think there is no solution as of now. But honest efforts should be attempted to resolve the dispute. As far as my limited thinking goes let me venture out and draw a path to the resolution of Kashmir issue, as a common man. I see the only way to start finding the solution is that first both the parties have to seriously think whether they want to solve the problem or not and continue with the current position of not letting and inch go from their stated position. Because it needs strong and farsighted decision and some sort of compromise is needed which has to be approved by people from all three apparent players in the issue: India, Pakistan and Kashmiris. If not then it has to be understood there can only be war, whether full fledged or semi warlike or tension of an imminent war every time, and war is not the solution. Gone are the days when any country defeated another neighboring country and especially when both are Nuclear capable as the world will not let it happen and it will not be beneficial to any party involved either. So once it is decide that the solution has to be found out then talks should be organized between all the parties where the premises has to be decided, boundaries created and tried to find out till which position the other party is willing to go. Once this is done by all the parties then they should go to their respective camps and take some time to debate and decide on the possible position to be put forward in the next meeting. The parties should then meet again with their new positions. Here they must chalk out the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU).Once the MOU is prepared the matter should be debated threadbare in Parliament or Law making bodies of all three affected parties and get it ratified. Then again final meeting of all the parties should be organized to sort out the differences and concerns arising out of the debate in their respective countries and tried to further fine-tune the MOU to suit all the parties. Once that is done, all three heads should come and sign the deal at a commonly decided place. After that the only way is to move forward and implement all the solutions as per the terms and conditions mentioned in the MOU and the efforts started to loosening the tensions between boundaries of both countries. Once tensions are reduced then only next time you will have to decide how much flexible you can be with regards to sports visa, writers and artists visa, or other Sanjhauta Express type of trains or bus service between both the countries to inculcate a sense of confidence in all the parties among themselves and once that is done then only we can think of free pass between all three states like India Nepal or a porous interstate border like EU and later on experiment with EU type of currency and later on include Nepal, Sri Lanka , Bhutan or any country which wants to come in. Then the Bon-homie which is talked about should be promoted in a big way. Meanwhile this bon-homie type of things should go on but don’t expect much from these meeting and exchanges as our experience says it only lasts for a few months or years and then an unfortunate incident happens which negates all the good work done in building bridges and we are back to square one. This will take time and all the process should not necessarily follow the same sequence. This is not to say that its not being attempted right now. I think back channel negotiations is going on but since its not getting desired results people are losing their patience and India is meanwhile burning with terror strikes.

Pakistan leaders are all corrupt like our present day politicians, because they are our people only and corruption as a subject will be presented by me later on.

Meanwhile new year has come and I wish all a very happy, prosperous, disease free 2010. This year is crucial for India, as in this year we have to complete the backlog of all achievements which was meant to be achieved in this decade so that we finish it off with the what its truly an Indian decade. I think we can do it. Everyone has to rise above what he or she can do best and contribute to the growth of the country in whatever best way its possible.

Mr Vir Sanghvi has rightly pointed out that the grace which was deserved for Chetan Bhagat was all that was needed from Bollywood’s Vidhu Vinod Chopra for Aamir starrer "3 idiots", like the way credit which is deservedly given by their Hollywood counterparts to the contributors in the success of any film. That’s all. Chetan Bhagat is a celebrity writer and has seen enough fame, and money and presently too he is a media darling. After all if a film is a success everyone should make money. What would have cost the producers of “3 idiots” if Chetan demended his name in the starting sequences of the film rather than in the end of rolling titles? Be a large hearted Punjabi Man Vidhu!

“3 Idiots” came as a big surprise packet and whatever accusations may be hauled on the success of the film, comments by any columnists or media won’t affect the success of this film if people are loving it. What is wrong in doing what you can do best? What is wrong is challenging conventions? What is wrong in saying that the present education system is bad in India and creating a pool of unemployables? Its better we catch up the student when he or she is young and then train them early in the field which is best for him. But till then we have to see that he or she understands what is right or wrong choice and it’s the parents who cannot shun their responsibility and find out what is best career path for their child as per his or her talent and the available career avenues in the market. Till them this type of challenges to the systems will take place and these films with certain message will be succeed.

SAVE JHARKHAND CAMPAIGN : 30/12/2009

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What wrong have the people of Jharkhand done to warrant an another Chief Minister in form of Shibu Soren after the wreakage it had just undergone from the Madhu Koda. This is not the first time that these things are happening or the corruption was non existent earlier. But the fat of the matter is that public activitism and outrage post the judgement of 6 months sentence on Rathore in Ruchika murder case, does encourage people like us to include the matter of Shibu Soren also if we demand public justice to the oppressed and downtrodden in our society. Have the family of Shashinath Jha the former PA of Mr Shibu Soren whose murder case had Mr Soren nearly convicted to life imprisonment, not traumatized all these years? Are they not going to suffer much now that Mr Soren has become the head of the state and only yesterday when the media people asked questions to him about the Shashinath Jha case he shrugged off by saying that he is not the servant of Jha’s family! See the disdain! If now, when he still not got the full power, he can dare to say these words in full media glare, don’t we people realize that after taking control of the whole state machinery what he can do to the family of Mr Jha.

This is one matter. And then even if Mr Soren is given credit for the separate Jharkhand state, does it mean he is capable of running the state? Who has seen his qualifications. Has anyone bothers to see how the Jharkhandi leaders are down with HANDIA (A TYPICAL SMELLY COUNTRY LIQUOR PREPARED BY FERMENTATION OF RICE, EASILY AVAILABLE IN ROADSIDE IN JHARKHAND). Do you expect a program for development of the state from these people? How can BJP claim it can do qualitative change in them with their support and presence? This is BJP’s double speak at its best.

And suppose due to public pressure, may be, as the matter of Shibu Soren is up for hearing in Supreme court in March, Shibu Soren has to leave his chair , then who becomes the Chief Minister of Jharkhand? Hemant Soren, the son of Shibu Soren? Or someone like Madhu Koda again? Does Democracy or people power mean we can be taken for a ride by the public representative or Demagogues who manage to enter both the house of the legislature with the help of Goondas, purchased voting to the voters by offering them wines, sarees, rice, Rs 100 notes or women or any favour to influentials, on the polling day? Is it Democracy? If this is Democracy then how can India be among theBRIC countries in 2050? People of Jharkhand awake! This is not the time to let happen what it is happening. You will be left behind.

Media, the fourth estate, is the the prime catalyst and you are the voice of people. SO what the ordinary people do not have voice, at least the intellectuals in Jharkhand (Ranchi , Jamshedpur, Bokaro, Dhanbad) have voice. Why don’t you talk to them and let the voices be known to Indian people, Central Govt, Governor, President. What a sorry figure we are cutting in front of the whole world. If Bihar can get a Chief Minister like Nitish Kumar, what wrong have the people of Jharkhand done not to get a cheif minister like him in Jharkhand afte so many years. DO the people of Jharkhand have to wait for 50 years to get a good chief minister like Bihar or in the age of internet it can be done fact?

On the eve of new year I ask all like minded people to come and join the movement to dislodge the corrupts and criminals from the corridors of power. This will be a great service to the nation and future generation.

Congress at 125 : Dated 30/12/2009

Only Congress can claim to have leaders at all the levels and from all areas in India. I remeber vividly the comment from one of an old man some years ago that it was only Congree wich can claim to get at least one vote from any constituency in India. Of course that may not be true as of now but at least we can aim fo...r it, we can achieve that greatness. We have men like Rahul leading from the front. I remember "Late Dada Shrikant Jichkar who used to say these parties are definitely ruling in some states but don't worry ultimately its the Congress which will rule the country and all the states.Is not a mere coincidence that after the Congress became weak in cow belt the regional leaders and parties started cropping up, Mandal, Kamandal, Ram Janmabhoomi, then regionalism, naxalism, even Fanatic Islam, terrorism, etc ills started cropping up in Indi and we became increasingly unstable with ephemeral parties and ephemeral government with multi-party govt started coming up and surprise among surprise Jharkhand got an Independent chief minister with outside support and so corrupt that one 5th of the state GDP was singularly cornered by him and his cronies. Congress has to rise above petty politics and cheap populism and always look for long term solutions and prospects. We should not promote the demagogues. We have to see that fruits of independence and free market reach to the poorest of the poor and elections after elections there should not be old archaic issue like Bijli, Sadak , pani. After all we are a democracy of the people, for the people and by the people.Rise my countrymen.This is the message for the new year to all.That finish off this year2010 with such great achievements that this whole decade becomes Indian decade. Amen!