Before and after a rape

Malini Nair of the Times Group, in an Op-ed article, Story Behind the Rape in ToI on 6th May, 2016 contends that the traditional “adakkavum othukkavum” (which she conveniently, “loosely” translates as control and docility ) introduced to the girlhood by the family patriarchs in Kerala society as acceptable behavior pattern for women, is responsible for Kerala women’s basic tendency to acquiesce, accept and not to rebel or question.

The ridiculous part of the argument is that she cites her discovery as the reason for the innumerable cases of rapes, assaults against the women, sexual harassment, and cruelty by husbands that she quotes from the NCRB statistics of the past one decade! I have lived a major part of my life in Kerala and raised a daughter there; so have my brothers and sisters. “Adakkavum othukkavum” in the familial parlance was never what Malini Nair understands.  I am sure, she knows what it is, but fakes the understanding to get a point of view validated: that patriarchal families forced girl children to imbibe certain traditional values she opposes for whatever reasons, and alleges that those values wanted a “polite society” she finds hateful, being an argumentative and spirited woman herself or is the category she represents.)  

“Adakkavum othukkavum’ is a phrase meaning modesty, forebearance, self-control, humility, fortitude and stoicism” in a society that protected women “like the eyeball”. If one goes by Ms.Nair’s contention, the girls belonging to the new generation of “spirited” women, in the State considered also"gender empowered"(that is equal to men in areas of  political participation and decision making, economic participation and decision making, and power over economic resources) would not have suffered the fate enumerated by her! Jisha was an MA, and was doing her LLB. The only problem was that her family had no money, and no male members to keep a watch over her to see that no harm comes. Poor women have always been targeted, unless they had some other power to compensate for the lack of money: family, associations, employment, or direct political backing.  

A decade ago I had written a long blog (‘Sex and Keralites’) about the unacceptable sexual behavior of the Malayalee males. I had written in there that “Kerala’s major contribution in social life seems to be in giving the go to the element of consent and dragging innocent girls and women in vulnerable plights into the sordid world of sexual exploitation.” And also “People seem to flaunt their affection for not only the other sex, but for one’s own these days”....“Now incest is not the rarest phenomenon it was in Kerala. In fact no relationship seems to have any sanctity. Boys openly crack sexual jokes about their teachers’ wives. Sisters-in-law who used to be equivalent to mothers in olden times have also become desirable sexual objects these days. Friends’ mothers are no different.”

Ms.Nair is silent about what make boys and men behave as they do, and concentrates on why the women have to undergo the horrible experience all their lives. Why is it that any female between the age of six and sixty is unsafe on Kerala’s thoroughfares even in broad daylight, as late M.P.Narayana Pillai bemoaned? I believe, it is not because of the “adakkavum othukkavum” instilled in the girls from childhood, but on account of the breakdown of traditional mores, values, also of the fundamental moral views which were replaced by a modern one: “men and women are like he-goats and she goats; every normally constituted man wants to pop into bed with every normally constituted woman; and vice versa!”I am quoting from memory a character with a nickname ‘Subanovsky’ in a K A Abbas novel. Those who conducted ‘Chumban Samaram”(‘Kiss of Love’) were drawing other people’s sisters to join them in a fake protest, as an initiation process into a form of physical relationship starting from lips! And it was proven so, with some kingpin later being found to operate an online sex racket! The disgusting saga doesn’t end there...

The USCIRF and its (Hindu)India-bashing

Tomorrow, May 2^nd 2016, the U S Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) is scheduled to release its annual report. In the context of the ‘Hindu Nationalist Government’ of India denying visa to USCIRF recently, and the IB stating that USCIRF reports were based on “half-truths, hearsay and standalone cases,” I have a premonition regarding what is coming!

The US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) had in the past unleashed a torrent of invective directed at India, which in its strange wisdom, considers to be a country intolerant of religious minorities! The 2015 USCIRF Report was suffused with hypocrisy and double standards that the SundayGuardian editorially mocked it that were authors of it to ever get tasked to write a history of the subcontinent, they would affirm that it is not Pakistan but India where the share of minorities in the total population has fallen precipitously since 1947!

How do we counter portrayal of our country as a den of fanatics, with the ulterior motive of providing an excuse for the US administration to threaten sanctions and other punitive measures against India? The saddest part of it that the most active “informers” supplying the material against India are the evangelist Christian groups, particularly the CBCI! People who preach religious tolerance to India must ask themselves, does “respectful coexistence of diversity” mean that every Indian has to be a Christian to be SAVED and reach heaven or paradise or has to be either killed or converted to Islam, the one and only true faith?

Hindu Dharma, unlike Christianity and Islam doesn’t divide humanity into those chosen by God and those eternally damned. It requires regarding all as brothers and sisters! Not even the lunatic fringe among the Hindus, do not consider that India’s Constitutional promise of secularism, liberty, equality, and democracy to minorities was inappropriate, with the country’s huge diversity: half-a-dozen major religions, 14 official languages and hundreds of dialects, many scripts and literature. There is only an assertion about a common culture. Does that hurt the USCIRF to know that an 80+percent majority in India embrace the rest as brothers and sisters under an overlapping cultural umbrella; that the mother society feels for the children who have taken up different faiths for whatever reasons? Why is the USCIRF so mystifyingly blind as not to see that  the 3% Christians and the 14% or so Muslims in India, live as full citizens in political, social, cultural and the religious life of India, and  enjoy greater rights and freedoms in than any similar minorities in any other country including the United States?

But of course, the USCIRF cannot keep ordering India for a grovelling “outreach” to extremist Muslims and Christians! Hindus have been happy to live their lives without bothering about Faiths of others. Why are Christians, Muslims (and atheists too) waging war on beliefs that mean nothing to them Well, if it comes to a confrontation that USCIRF is attempting, why can’t we Hindus insist and maintain that we reject all religions that do not agree with Indian thought and values? Muslims attempt to wall off outside influences, permitting only an Islamic education for their children and disengaging from the wider non-Muslim community everywhere. Christians believe that Jesus said “"I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me” and "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me..."If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; from now on you know Him, and have seen Him." Isn’t that denying those who do not become Christians access to God?

And what do the HINDUS believe: They hold on to the Upanishadic philosophy "Ekam sat vipra bahudha vadanti" —"that which exists is One (God): sages call it by various names! Is there a more inclusive philosophy? The moderation of the majority, has ensured the safety of the minority, and those who ignore this fact are diverting attention from countries where religious persecution is the norm!

Other than the USCIR, the U.S. State Department too has its annual International Religious Freedom report, a country-by-country catalogue of the treatment of religious groups around the globe! It is actually international policing! How many of us remember enormous kleptocracy named the UPA, remote-controlled by an Italian Catholic lady, had made the unprecedented step of inviting UNCIRF to visit Gujarat and Orissa to study Muslim/Christian persecution by the respective State Governments run by BJP and ally to play politics unmindful of the reputation of the country? Has the US Congress been informed that when in the so called Christian countries churches are closing down in India churches are annually increasing in number?

Noted anthropologist France Boss has held that “if we wish to take over the direction of a society we must either guide it from within its cultural framework or else eradicate its culture and impose a new culture.” What the BJP is trying to do is to ‘guide India from within its cultural frame work’? America doesn’t have much of a culture, being in fact a “refugee settlement” of sorts! They maynot understand this! But if religious freedom is truly the “civilizing discourse of our time” India will participate in it holding its head high and proclaiming that, WE ARE PROUD OF OUR RECORD!

To our “Secular” friends and neighbors

I was reading the excitement-concealed reports of the “secular” press on the funeral of Yakub Memon. 10-15000 people participated in the funeral prayers though a larger funeral procession was aborted by the efforts by Mumbai Police. I am sure, except a handful of close relatives, those assembled were supporters of certain ‘cause’, a belief that Yakub was a holy warrior of sorts, who was unjustly hanged by Hindu India! News papers and News Television channels, forever looking for sentimental stuff made a sob story (a sympathetic Times of India wrote of “erudite” Yakub having a fan-following in the Nagpur jail, of Usman crying during the 90 minute flight with the dead body of cousin Yakub!) out of the whole thing, ignoring that a legal battle was going on for more than two decades, at multiple levels of Indian judiciary and he was convicted and sentenced to death in 2013.

While ‘mercy’ plea was made for him to the Supreme Court of India, the Governor of Maharashtra and finally to the President of India, a hypothesis was put forward by the ‘intelligentsia’ to support their cause; that Yakub had surrendered to Indian authorities an hence he had to be spared gallows. It was totally untrue according to the record of events made by B. Raman (head of the counter-terrorism division of the Research and Analysis Wing, and later Additional Secretary of the Cabinet Secretariat of the Government of India) Yakub went to Kathmandu to consult a relative and lawyer on the advice of relatives and out of his own fear of the Pakistani ISI, to consider the consequences if he chose to return to India. The advice given to him was not to surrender, but to return to Karachi. But before he could board the flight to Karachi, Nepal police picked him up, identified and quickly handed him over to Indian authorities. This was twisted by the pro-life guys and the “secular” media to assert that late Raman had written the opposite. A fine example of suppressio veri, suggestio falsi"!

While on the issue of Mr.B. Raman’s revelations, let me also assert that the upright IPS officer had also written that "There is not an iota of doubt about the involvement of Yakub and other members of the family in the conspiracy and their cooperation with the ISI till July 1994”! Yakub Memon lived in the eight-storey Al-Husseini building near the historic durgah of Makhdoom Shah Baba in Mahim, Central Mumbai. It was in this building that the bomb blasts conspiracy was hatched by Mushtaq alias Tiger Memon, Yakub's brother and the right-hand man of fugitive accused and mastermind Dawood Ibrahim.

Several members of Yakub Abdul Razak Memon’s family, were among the accused in the case in which he was convicted and hanged. Some of them were discharged for want of evidence. (That however, wouldn’t convince a person like Justice(Retd)Kolse Patil and his ilk about justice to Muslims in India.)

There are people who now worry (!) that Tiger Memon and Dawood now wouldn’t want to surrender to Indian authorities! Yakub himself had said, according to some reports that if he didn’t get remission “Dawood Bhai” would be unhappy and wouldn’t ever co-operate with India!

Now, I am not astonished by the 15000 people who went to pray for Yakub Memon or the slogans heard there or the many communally tinged, unsavory comments about the Indian judiciary and our society sympathetic reporters recorded for the benefit of posterity. From “environmental activists” to maverick politician Digvijay Singh people have made comments that would have got them murderous attacks in any less-civilized society. But why do the Muslim community avoid some soul-searching? I wish they would acknowledge for once that they as full citizens in political, social, cultural and religious life of India enjoy greater rights and freedoms in India than their brethren in any Muslim country.

Look around the world. There is war, revolts and daily friction and violence in the countries where Muslims are in majority. Muslims are in more often victims of the Imams, Ayatollahs, and dangerous and inept leadership. Koran, Hadiths, Sira have many and some 70 verses in the Sunnah are used by Islamic terrorists today to justify their beheadings, killing non-Muslims, abuse of women, lying, betrayal, child marriage, slavery, torture, hatred of Jews, and conquering the world in the name of Islam to create an Islamic Caliphate.

Notwithstanding the Muslim denial and secular political correctness associated with the issue of radicalisation of Muslims and their involvement or tacit approval of terror in India, global jihad has been seeping into Indian society for several years. Two dozen Muslim youths posed for a picture wearing ISIS T-shirts in front of the ‘Periya Pallivasal’ (Big Mosque) in Ramanathapuram district of Tamil Nadu, from where some youths have reportedly, already gone to fight in Syria; it was also from where one of the greatest Indians, and a Muslim too, went on to become the First Citizen of India and where he came back to be buried a day ago as millions of Indian cried in sorrow over his demise! It is a tragedy that nearly one hundred Muslims from India are fighting alongside jihadists in Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan.

I will tell you an unpleasant truth: The root of the problem is that just a Nazis believed in a master race, militant Islamists believe in a master faith! They are not willing to accept other religious beliefs at par with theirs, and not even worth existing on earth. Religion is an all-consuming passion which makes fundamentalist Muslims forget everything else. With the result, an Indian Islamic society that is poor, immiserated and indoctrinated to hate non-Muslims, particularly Hindus in India, seem to agree to serve as foot soldiers in a perpetual war with kafirs! I would like to add that there are no Hindu counterparts to radical Muslims and extremists who favor/call for world domination by Islam and violence against non-Muslims!

India is not just Babari Masjid (it was a Shia Mosque, and Sunnis who burn Holy Koran in Shia mosques are at the forefront of war on Hindutva vaadis who want to have Ram Temple restored where they believe, with concrete evidence backing that belief, a Ram Temple existed! Heaven is not going to fall if the vast majority of Indians who feel for it are given their temple and have them build a grand mosque nearby! Blaming Hindu majority Indians for destruction of the Babari Masjid, Gujarat riots etc. and claiming that it triggered all the violence being unleashed and threatened proves only one thing: the extremes of Muslim violence that go beyond anything the community and a friendly media is capable of covering up can only be addressed with more extreme smears of their Hindu victims. The helpful media and certain political parties playing vote-bank politics have been working overtime to disregard evidence of Islamic terrorism, and in the same way also to disregard the lack of evidence when making the case that Muslims are the victims.

How many of you remember that a senior police officer had filed an affidavit before the Srikrishna Commission that RDX landed on the shores of Alibag in November, well before the December 6 demolition of the Babari structure? It is certainly not Babari Masjit that triggers Hindu-Muslim conflicts. India is a lot more than Babari Masjid. It is the only society in the region that allows the freedom to make things better for all communities. But what do the large sections of political Islam in India do? Sometime during July 2014, Maulana Salman Al-Husaini Nadwi, an Islamic scholar at the Nadwatul Ulama seminary of Lucknow, wrote an open letter greeting Al-Baghdadi considered a terrorist by almost the entire West and the East, on his assuming the role of Caliph. Anjuman-e-Haideri, a Delhi-based organisation of Shia Muslims, placed advertisements in Urdu newspapers calling on volunteers to defend holy shrines in Iraq. Ali Mirza of Anjuman-e-Haideri said his group will register one million volunteers. One hundred thousand Shias reportedly registered; of them, 6,000 volunteers have applied for Iraqi visas. It seems Muslims are fighting “injustice” everywhere. Quite obviously, if Islam gets offended it pushes the faithful to go trigger-happy, with Kalashnikovs, grenades and long knives.

What about in India? Well, I fail to pass the political litmus test that so-called (self-identified) progressives see as their default position: namely, being pro-minority/Muslim. So I would dare to attempt some plain-speaking. Contrary to the view propagated by Marxists which certain wretched sociologists/historians tell the Time of India, Muslim League and two-Nation theory did not arise in hostile symbiosis with Hindutva ideology, in the first place. Weren’t Indian Muslims too belligerent and believed that tolerance, justice, diversity etc only applied to positions and people who were their own? But the so-called “secular” media as well as the Muslim intelligentsia would gloss-over the tell-tale facts. Take for example, the case of Kashmir. In sharp contrast to the abundance of sympathy and signals sent to Kashmiri Muslims in support of Article 370, of the Indian Constitution, if anyone from the large Muslim community in India has expressed any intention to speak out about Muslim persecution of Kashmiri Hindus, it has not been recorded yet.

Hindus have been happy to live their lives without bothering about Faiths of others. Why are Christians, Muslims (and atheists too) waging war on beliefs that mean nothing to them Why can’t we Hindus say that we reject a religion that does not agree with Indian thought and values? Isn’t it logical to think that Indian Muslims who subscribe to the ideology of the Caliphate and Shariah Law, really do have views that are incompatible with liberal democracy, secularism human and individual rights? There are 21 Islamic nations in the Gulf region alone. Is any one of them approving of human rights as we know it? Justice for the Kurds, for example, is subjected to the whims of Shiite-Muslim Iran, Sunni-Muslim Turkey, and the Iraqi Shiite-Arab government in Baghdad. Indian workers in most of these countries complain that they are more-or-less open jails!  It is on account of the cultural imperialism of Islam!

What I see at work in these situations is the long established “secular” narrative in which endemic Hindu communalism accounts for all the ills that afflict Muslim Indians. This narrative plays in camouflaging the privilege of those millions of Muslims who live better and have more social clout than millions of Hindus. Islamists’ version of terrorism’s causes: Babari Masjid, seeking integration of Kashmir, arguments for Common Civil Code, and the lack of social justice, which, we are to believe is the beating heart of Islam. Hindus feel that the Islamic “grievances” against the Indian State are not predicated on any human standards of equality or justice, but only their supremacist worldview. India’s Muslims, almost 14% of the population and having more rights than its majority Hindus, isn’t an embattled minority that deserves a defense! And radicalization doesn’t begin with a Babari Masjid, Dawood Ibrahim, Tiger/Yakub Memons, a Madani, and an Owaisi out there or many on social media. It begins in homes, in certain mosques and of course just ends with ISIS. India, and we Hindus in particular, don’t deserve it, our dear brothers! If there are scales of justice in Heaven, we shall weigh heavier in it. Muslims are being unnecessarily and unreasonably paranoid. Life in India showcases the magnanimity and largesse of an Indian society that didn’t cause a backlash every time Jihadis and their local supporters cause terror. To those who cry hoarse for an “inclusive society”, yes indeed. But remember, the next phase is integration. Let the thieves, thugs, mountebanks, and experts in manipulation, often described as “political technologists” and “social engineers”, understand that integration has to be based on what unites us, rather than what drives us apart.

Could Narendra Modi learn from Lee Kuan Yew?

I was always an admirer of Harry Lee, as he was known in my younger days. His passing away, though at the ripe old age of 91on 23rd March made me sad still. There are a few people who see the makings of a Lee in our own Prime Minister, more in the form of authoritarianism. There are others, like me, who ask the question whether the 'Singapore strong man' would be a model for Narendra Modi as a visionary administrator. The following are my thoughts on the issue.

With the possible exception of Cuba under Fidel Castro, it's hard to think of another country where one leader left such a firm, almost indelible imprint. But see where both took their countries! One man stuck to an idiotic ideology which refused to produce results. The other had no ideological anchor. “If it works, let’s try it, "If it’s fine, let’s continue it. If it doesn’t work, toss it out, try another one", are words of a man seeking results that would take his people to prosperity and make the once poor malarial port into a prosperous island nation having a seat at the table of great nations!

His view that India was “ not a real country,” but “32 separate nations that happen to be arrayed along the British rail line,” and his scathing criticism of its leadership and bureaucracy that were in his words “feudal” made many see him as anti-India. To call India “a nation of unfulfilled greatness” he must have been very fond of India because we have everything Singapore didn’t have, not even the elementary ingredients of a nation: a homogeneous population, common language, common culture and common destiny, when he took it over.

Closest parallel India had with Singapore was when it could be said about IndiraG’s leadership also “a unique combination of charisma and fear” as was said about Harry Lee; but unfortunately she, like her father earlier was happy about the India she could rule by birthright, just repeating often the banal blather about her family's sacrifices!(in The brown sahib (revisited) Varindra Tarzie Vittachi, Sri Lankan writer says Nehru was found comfortable with the system he inherited from the British though he criticised it!) Lee, if a despot, was a benevolent one.

To remove the temptation for corruption, Lee linked the salaries of ministers, judges and top civil servants to those of leading professionals in the private sector, making them some of the highest-paid government officials in the world. That worked too!

“Between being loved and being feared, I have always believed Machiavelli was right. If nobody is afraid of me, I’m meaningless” Lee said openly, confessing also that “I’m not saying that everything I did was right, but everything I did was for an honourable purpose.” He said he didn’t care about being politically correct; but was always correct. According to him freedom of the news media had to be subordinated to the overriding needs of Singapore, and to the primacy of purpose of an elected government. He was unapologetic about the repressive measures he used to impose order, and unapologetic about believing his prescriptions alone were the right ones. Being politically correct is the most important thing in India, not being correct! India is not a tiny Singapore and a “nanny state” at that, but a dysfunctional democracy of over a billion people and (Lee called India a “Soft State” once!) Modi cannot do anything much about a hostile media, except refusing to feed/fertilize them as he does!

 A key strategy of Lee to give people a sense of belonging as stakeholders in society was to provide affordable homes and therefore today home- ownership stands at 90% of Singaporeans. “Citizenship is essentially a question of loyalty,” Lee believed. This is something Modi has to do. Ensure “roti, kapda, and makaan”, band-width too! But loyalty, the scorning of national pride, the decline of patriotism in the public space, multiculturalism and its ethnic separatism, divisive identity politics etc.are territories Lee never had to travel!

Goodbye, Moti

After 4 years I had the misfortune today (14^th March 2015 at 11.55AM), again to bury one of my four-legged children, Moti, an adopted one! The last time it was November 4^th morning, 2010 Jackie Menon, a black Labrador passed away in his sleep. I cannot give Moti my surname because he belonged to all the good people living and working in that wonderful residential colony, The Woods. He came into my life or as I would wish to state, I became a part of his life by happenstance. I was new in Pune, in 2011 residing in The Woods, from the 1^st of October. On the 3^rd day of life in F-202, Crescent-2 my one-year old black Labrador Jackie Menon-III and I were, coming back after his walk for the morning constitutional outside the colony. As I enter, I find this medium-sized dog, creamy-brown in colour, coming towards us without anyone in control, no leash, not even a belt around his neck. I was scared because the chap with me is already a confused one and as undisciplined as only he could be under the Sun, raring to go for a fight. He was brought up in Kerala, in a two-acre plot walled all around with the contact of his like rare when we took him to a Vet. I brought him to Pune in the backseat of an air-conditioned Honda City. I held his leash tight as he lunged forward at every passing animal, stopping every 2 hours as per learned advice. I could see his anxiety about the loss of the house, the compound, and even the landscape around him. And later he was living in two 3metre square balconies: in the western one in the sunny mornings and the eastern one when the Sun beats down in the other. Out in the open he was looking around obviously for the house he lost after a happy life there for a whole year. So I was worried about the possible quarrel between Jackie and the free stranger, when one of the security men at the front gate sensed the mischief-potential of the situation and the fear on my face, told the other dog in a normal voice: “Moti, ja!” Moti walked back without even any curiosity to size-up the new guy in the colony. I was impressed by Moti’s dignified behaviour.

That’s how our relationship begins. I started giving Moti a packet of glucose biscuits (10 or so) in the morning. He would at times come with me as I took a walk in the colony. If he joined me half-way through my walk, I would complete a round at the Om Super Market and buy the biscuits and give them to him before completing my 4-5 rounds. One day he was following me as I reached the end of the Vista blocks, I see him suddenly go the lawn of a bungalow. I thought he would say hello and come back. He didn’t. I heard the owner of the house tell him “baidt” and he sat there! I waited for another minute or so and went on walking. I went to Raju, the owner of Om and told him about Moti leaving me, a flat-resident (not even an owner then) for the august company of the owner of a bungalow. Raju told me that was Bafna Seth, who used to give him milk everyday when he was a pup. Moti went another notch up in my esteem for him.

I thought why not feed Moti the food we were making for our Jackie? We buy fresh mutton/buffalo meat or chicken and cook with rice and a little turmeric powder. 200-250gm meat was our daily feed for Jackie; and a little ghee once or twice a week. I made a little extra one day and took it to Moti. He rejected it. I bought Pedigree, the chicken-flavoured one and gave him and he ate it with relish. Somebody would have fed Pedigree to him for some time and he recognised the stuff. I started adding Pedigree to what we cook for Jackie and he started eating it. That was how I introduced non-vegetarian food to Moti. My wife at times would ask me why I seemed to be giving Moti extra-chunks of meat, and I would tell her that our chap anyway was getting ghee-dosa extra from mama!

When my wife and I happen to go to Kerala for a few days for some important function, my daughter would feed Jackie and Moti. My granddaughter Trisha found she could fondle Moti without Moti trying to reciprocate. And my daughter observed that Moti who never had a bath ever, didn’t have any foul smell emanating from his body. That could not be said about our Jackie who gets a good shampoo-bath once every month! Moti,I am told has never defecated inside The Woods! On rare occasions when all of us had to go out of Pune, the maid and Sandesh, the walker for Jackie together took care of both our furry children. And when we come back, what a rousing reception they gave us. Moti would start drooling from a distance "ahh rooo uuu!" or whatever! But he meant he missed me (us) and was so happy to see us! Of course, he can’t use his tongue and lips very well, which makes it difficult for him to match many of the sounds I would like/expect him to say to me! He greeted, me his tail wagging more forcefully from side to side or at times even moving in a circular pattern if I was away for a few days. Or after eating his meal tail wagging he did the downward stretch, paws forward like doing a namskar! We call him ‘son’ and tell him about us as ‘dada’ ‘mama’ and ‘checchi’(‘deedi’ = elder sister, that’s my daughter) and little Trisha arrogated herself to the role of Moti’s ‘deedi’ too!

I tried to de-worm Moti several times masking the powdered tablets with milk sweetened with honey, sugar, etc. or food with more minced meat, and even mixed with cooked liver which the Vet said was a fantastic idea because the blood smell would trick the dogs. But not Moti! I was astonished to find I could cheat my Jackie, a Labrador known for his “sniffing abilities” in many ways to have powdered Praziquantel+Pyrantel Pamoate+Febendazole for de-worming but Moti a mongrel by all signs could catch the smell of Plozin tablets a few inches away!

Towards the middle of 2014 Moti started getting unwell and refuse food except some milk and at times a few biscuits for several days at a time. He would lie where he used to wait for his food next to the stairs and lift at the ‘F’ clock, and lift the legs apart to show me where it hurt- around the penis. Bloody serum would be seen to ooze from that area. I would apply some pain/ant-septic balm, and once when I used a spray he ran away, perhaps in his genetic code was the fear of the hissing reptile, snake! I used to have a Vet come for Jackies inoculation/treatment etc, and always wondered how I could get him treated too. But never had an anti-rabbies shot in his life, no belt or leash. How would I call a doctor when I don’t know where the patient would at any given time. It never occurred to me to consult the security staff about their possible involvement. That is the saddest part of this story! Moti used to get alright after a few days of abstinence of food, and that I have heard from my childhood, was their ‘traditional’ naturopathy-like treatment.

In August I moved into my own flat in Park Street. The only worry was about continuing to feed Moti. In those days I used to give him a lunch and dinner. Park Street was just walking distance and I could meet my friends for our regular chat session in the evening and carry Moti’s food as I came! I tried to serve him lunch for almost a month, walking down in the hot Sun which my wife didn’t like. And her scientific argument that dogs needed to be fed only once, worked when I had to go to Kerala for a few days. It was in January 2015 that my daughter received a Whatsapp message from a friend in the Woods that Moti had some terminal disease. When I enquired with The Woods security Chief, he told me a bungalow-owner had called a Vet from Baner and some injections were given and a few tablets and capsules had to be given to Moti. Would I mix the medicines in the food I had brought for him? I said he would not touch the food if medicines are mixed with it. They could take a portion of the food and try, but if I went to assist the process, he would boycott the entire food. It happened the same way. After a few minutes I went to him with the food, and his first reaction was “isn't this the stuff they were trying to trick me into eating?” I cajoled him with some endearing words of appeal and thanks to his hunger and the lack of medicinal smell in the utensil I held before him, he ate.

It was then that I volunteered to do everything to save Moti. My Vet lived close to Kaspade Vasti and Dr. Ingle was, in my experience, accurate in diagnosis and very effective in treatment. On January 13^th Dr. Ingle came to The Woods and the security staff found Moti, and put a belt in his neck and a leash on him.It came off and Moti walked away. Debashish brought him back. (This kindly young man offered any help for Moti any time!) My friend Mathur also helped Moti not to get upset.Dr. Ingle said it was a type of cancer, curable by treatment. He gave a shot of Vincrystin-Vinblastin combination intra-venus and several other injections, including anti-rabies vaccine. After a week one more dose of anti-cancer drug was given. Dr. Ingle found very positive change in Moti and assured me 100% cure. But for next one whole week Moti went hiding, wouldn't eat the food I brought, and would walk fast and away from me. I was pained by this behaviour. At times he came wagging his tail, but smelling the food would go away in a hurry, as if telling me “I won’t trust you anymore after all those injections you made me suffer those pokes and pricks.” I brought food regularly, thinking that when he was okay, and hungry, food must be around. I had arranged Sandesh and our maid Vyjantha to pour milk into his bowl after cleaning it, just in case he didn't want to have it from me. One day they reported Moti was missing. I was not well, and it was my wife who went with milk. I had her look under the Kalewadi over-bridge for him. Then Sandesh said he spotted Moti inside The Woods and he consumed some quantity of milk given by him. After 8 days, Moti comes drooling and wagging his tail a he saw me. I had brought some food and some milk too. He ate some food, and had the entire milk. For the next one week he polished milk and chicken&rise I gave him. Then the Front-gate security men told me some youngster living in Vista was providing milk in a steel-bowl kept at the gate. Moti came to say hello to all of us sitting and chatting, and on my request sat amidst us with a smile on his face. (I should have clicked a photograph then!) I thought he looked very well, the furry coat giving a shine! Shortly thereafter, on 12^th March Moti stopped eating once again. On 13^th also he didn’t eat. Nor was he drinking milk. 13^th was the day he was to get anti-rabies booster shot. Under the circumstances I didn't know whether we could get that done. This morning, walking on the treadmill in our gym, I was thinking of asking Dr. Ingle whether it was advisable to give the anti-rabies shot now or later, would the lapse require the procedure to be repeated all over again, etc and request him to have a look as well. As I was coming back from the gym, near the lift was my wife holding my mobile phone and the car key. “Don’t get upset. There was a call from The Woods. Moti is no more. Come home, drink some water. Don’t get upset. Or there is water in the car. Drive carefully. Trisha is alone, so I can’t drive you to The Woods.”

I reached The Woods completely devastated. My pet was lying in the ‘E’ Block corridor, a little away from the D Soft Communications office, towards the lift. He appeared to have died in his sleep. Apart from my friends, he was the most intimate contact I had in the colony. In fact I loved him more dearly than others because he needed me. When my son Dileep asked me once half-in-jest-half–seriously, whether I loved Jackie more, I said the same thing. A pet-passionate persons like me, my son understood. Moti could not talk to me. But I talked to him softly. Son, dada misses you. Not just me, the entire colony would miss Moti. He was a happy, secure, submissive dog. Never heard him growl, bark angrily or snap, except when Jackie arrived on the scene, with more curiosity than aggression on his mind in my view, as he walked past for his outing with Sandesh. Children pulled his tail, sat on him and misbehaved without malice in their weekend/vacation-induced mischievousness. My daughter told me one day she scolded an over-weight 10/12-year old who was sitting atop Moti, who meanwhile bore the heavy discomfort without even whining!

The Woods management graciously agreed to have Moti buried in a corner of the nursery of plants. We gave him an almost human send-off. I put vaikkari (the ceremony putting some grains of rice in the mouth) to my dear four-legged son, and after lowering his body into the pit, all of us, Mr. Khatri and administrative colleagues, the security chief, staff, Maheswariji and I put hands full of soil and flowers on his body we used to stroke once with so much affection, concern and love. As I laid a garland of flowers on the mound of earth, I couldn't control myself anymore. I burst out crying unashamedly. Everybody consoled me saying it was time for him to go. Maheswariji told me "you are a little too sentimental!"The security guards told me the story of Mr.Patil, a retired old security man who took care of Moti as a pup coming to The Woods two days back and Moti hugging him with both paws and giving the"ahh rooo uuu!"drool! They said Moti was perhaps waiting to see him before leaving this world!   

As I returned home, I thought of my whole family believing that our Tony was reborn as my daughter Neelu; our Jackie-1 coming to us as our granddaughter Diya, and Jackie-2 as Trisha, Neelu’s daughter. Her father wouldn't like to hear it and we changed it. Jackie-III is Jackie-II reborn. I am asking God to Keep Moti with him either to be my companion when I too go, or till the time my daughter decides to have another child!

In the evening I went to The Woods, empty-handed for the first time. As I entered I held back a sob. I used to turn to ‘F’ block, to give Moti his food. I turned to the left and realising my mistake, corrected the course. I suddenly realised that I had lost a part of myself; I had lost a purpose in my life too. Moti has become a memory, a memory that would shine like a moti, pearl in Hindi. I cannot end this piece without admitting a mistake I made this evening. I suggested some rock-salt had to be purchased to ensure the mortal remains of Moti digested in the soil faster. Raju, owner of Om Super Market brought 10Kg salt and left for some urgent work. After our chat session outside the Club House, I went to Om, and found Raju was not there. His wife came and I reluctantly, and with some embarrassment raised the issue of making payment for the salt. Raju’s wife gave me an amused look and asked me tauntingly, with a smile ”why can’t we also make some contribution?”Well I was wrong, foolish too. I should have seen a common humanity that transcends education, profession, position, money etc. working in the case of Moti, if not everywhere else. We always tend to see the gloomy inventory of cruelty, dishonesty etc. and tend to ignore pearls of wisdom, kindness, love and so on. Moti, my dear son, adieu.

Modern superstitions, Biotechnology,GM crops etc.

Modern Superstitions, Biotechnology, GM crops etc. 

My first-cousin, Dr.T. Ravindranathan who was an authority in Synthetic organic chemistry and had retired from the National Chemical Laboratory Pune, as Deputy Director a few years back, suggested to me that I should perhaps write on Superstitions outside the traditional realm of religion. The reason was that both of us have independently come to a conclusion that a lot of effort by governmental and non-governmental organisations are being wasted in eradicating conventional superstitious beliefs, rituals and customs though they are far from being of any significant influence in our society anymore, barring, say, among a lunatic fringe consisting of stray individuals. At the same time there are new superstitions coming up and spreading virally on the strength of their association with the so-called “scientific views”. For this reason they are far more dangerous of the superstitions of the ignorant and emotional people. We need to attack these modern superstitions more vigorously.

Many would agree with me that after Independence, thanks to the long freedom struggle organised by leaders who were political activists-cum-social reformers, the worst evil prevalent in the majority community of Hindus who comprised 85% or more of India’s population - the caste system – had begun to crumble. The philosophy of caste-system was almost destroyed, leaving only the morphology. But the dynamics of Indian democracy in the later years revived the caste system as a political tool in the hands of the “brown raj” with its own “divide and rule” policy to garner votes. Now caste system is defended as the be-all and end-all of social justice! A system of reverse discrimination is firmly in place as described as “scientific” and politically correct to boot.

What I meant by describing above was that progress can produce its own retrogression. I am worried that it is spreading to areas outside the realm of politics and sociology. Science appears to have generated its own regressive clones which are potentially as harmful to humanity as the other variety I touched upon. Environmental Science has a deadly clone of superstitious ‘environmentalism’ with its hair-splitting pseudoscience and illogicality currently trying to undermine every aspect of development in the world. From Dr.Vandana Shiva and Medha Patkar to innumerable compatriots of mine in Kerala (most of them without any science-education), ‘practice’ in this field spreading “under-cooked” and ill-digested information, many indeed generally scaring people away from even fruits, vegetables and of course, soft-drinks but almost carefully ignoring the non-vegetarian fare and sometimes even promoting consumption of cow’s meat in the name of valuable nutrition for the poor and under-nourished, unmindful of whether the animals are diseased or not!

I regularly come across reading material from KP Prabhakaran Nair, a former boss of Monsanto thrashing biotechnology to hurt Monsanto mainly, and have wondered at his assertions bordering on total lack of faith in biotechnology unless it is contributing to development of GMO in China, not known so far for any serious concern for environment as against economic development! Monsanto ignores him, though. Latest I read in the genre was an interview in Sunday Times of 2^nd November 2014, by Suman Sahai who heads the NGO ‘Gene Campaign’, and notably a geneticist and someone who has also won the “Norman Borlaug Award” (an award given to recognize exceptional, science-based achievement in international agriculture and food production etc.?) winner! Norman Borlaug was n American biologist, humanitarian and Nobel laureate who has been called "the father of the Green Revolution", "agriculture's greatest spokesperson" and "The Man Who Saved A Billion Lives", Nobel Peace Prize winner and founder of the World Food Prize as we know him. He had developed successive generations of wheat varieties with broad and stable disease resistance, broad adaptation to growing conditions across many degrees of latitude, and with exceedingly high yield potential. Suman Sahai’s problem is that she suspects or believes in the toxicity and allergenicity in GM foods, and worries about the   interruption in the natural process by biotechnology in this pursuit!

But man has been applying biotechnology since the dawn of civilization! Modern biotechnology is simply using living systems to give society better or drugs, foods and other products. Unfortunately, there is much misinformation, misunderstanding and confusion about biotechnology, giving rise to needless anxiety. The situation also obscures any real hazards that might exist as well as possible means of controlling them. A basic understanding of the techniques and goals of biotechnology research is important for deciding the merits of concerns and proposed solutions. Our understanding of science, especially genetics, has advanced currently to the extent we can optimize specific genes and traits to provide even greater benefits while reducing or eliminating undesirable features. Removing toxicity and allergenicity are basic in any serious GMO research! Biotechnology, based on recombinant DNA (rDNA), is called Gene Splicing, Genetic Engineering (GE) or Genetic Modification (GM), giving rise to genetically modified organisms (GMO) such as Bt Cotton, Bt brinjal and so on. Seeds are developed in laboratories and field-tested for long periods of time to ensure that the plants eventually enhance nutritional value or resistance to drought, disease and herbicides. Molecular plant breeding can provide higher precision to increase crop yield and nutritional enhancements at little or no additional cost. There are other carefully tailored improvements like better flavours and longer ripening period etc., all possible in shorter time.

A study by noted scientist Charles Benbrook of the Washington State University published in Environmental Sciences Europe claiming substantial use of pesticide use in the US since the introduction of genetically modified crops many years ago is perhaps the source of similar claims by various people in our media because I am not aware of any serious study into this area in India. After the controversial Seralini GM maize study (originally published in Food and Chemical Toxicology (Elsevier) in September 2012 which the scientific community generally considered was without proper statistical refereeing, and also using obscure methods and reporting) and questions about the safety of foods made from genetically modified crops, Benbrook’s was another line of attack on biotechnology claiming that GM crops were environmentally unfriendly, interestingly by the fierce critic of crop biotechnology that he was, who claimed that the public data showed pesticide use steadily increasing in the US since GM crops were introduced in the 1990s.

Media coverage of the Benbrook study comprised selective presentations from anti-GM journalists; some at organic publisher Rodale. It was a pity the context provided by more mainstream sources like Reuters, which uncritically echoed a report under the title “GMO crop technology backfires” was very damaging. Interestingly, a former University of California Davis scientist Steve Savage, had reached astonishingly at a far different conclusion from the alarmist view, and while confirming a very modest multi-year increase in the use of some less toxic versions of pesticides than the ones used earlier, he viewed it as a sign of significant environmental progress! It seems the horrors Benbrook arrived at came from subjective estimates of herbicide use from data provided by the US National Agricultural Statistics Service which didn’t differentiate between GM and non-GM crops! Well, breaking down Benbrook’s numbers some researchers have also found that pesticide use is actually falling on a yield per hectare basis—aligning with what biotech proponents have predicted would happen! More specifically, Graham Brookes of PG Economics, a UK consultancy firm(Dorchester) crunched the almost identical data and published a peer reviewed report that found GM crops possibly reducing worldwide pesticide use by 9.1 per cent!

A responsible newspaper like the Time of India should have weighed and contextualized the view provided by Ms.Sahai. For instance, Ms.Sahai is suspicious of the refined Soya oil India is importing, ignoring the scientific fact that cooking oils from GM corn, soy or canola will provide lower saturated fat content, and making it possible for us to eat French fries with fewer calories. GM potatoes with enhanced starch content absorb less fat during frying. Ms. Sahai says high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) is unhealthy and associated with metabolic disturbances; but HFCS is basically the same as sugar, in terms of composition as well as in the number of calories they contain. Since HFCS and sugar are so similar, the human body absorbs them the same way! She has probably read a 2004 study which had misunderstand chemistry, and draw erroneous conclusions. (A former CPM Member of Parliament once wrote an article in Mangalam Daily extolling the virtues of the alcohol manufactured in Cuba from molasses-fermentation, topping it with a fantastic nonsense like its energy output being higher than the alcohol we produce in India using the same process! I wrote to the paper, but they would rather believe the influential politician than me; and I stopped subscribing to the paper!) Ms.Sahai should also know that sensitive new testing kits can detect tiny amounts of potentially harmful toxic contaminants in foods and India certainly has the competence in this field.

The most successful defender of GM food I have heard was a young woman scientist in the Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Biotechnology in Thiruvananthapuram: she vanquished in about five minutes three vociferous GMO-haters thumping French & American books and holding forth before a sympathetic anchorperson on a TV programme. It is a pity that institutions like hers do very little public awareness activity. However, gradually there is an environmental consensus emerging on relative safety of GM crops, irrespective of well-publicised alarmist opposition to GM crops that GM crops do not pose unmanageable environmental threats. It is agreed that crops bred for a natural resistance to pests harm biodiversity less than conventional crops because glyphosate, the pesticide used in conjunction with GM crops, is less persistent in the environment and less toxic to animals. In 2004, the International Union for Conservation of Nature called for a halt to the release of GM organisms, but its 2007 report said that there was “no conclusive evidence of direct negative impacts on biodiversity of GMOs that have been commercially released”. By 2010, the once sceptical US National Research Council Reporter agreed that “Generally, GM crops have had fewer adverse effects on the environment than non-GM crops produced conventionally”; the European Union report summarizing 10 years of research, also concluding that GM crops were not ”per se more risky”.

If farmers see emergence of new weed varieties, or resistant new weedicides like glyphosate, remember, that is a problem in conventional agriculture from time immemorial. The worry about the “Superweeds” is perhaps only a temporary reflection of the current market reality that farmers have a limited menu of GM crops to choose from. With a larger variety of crops using different pesticides, resistant-specific weeds are less likely to emerge. New plant varieties developed using biotechnology and biologically protected against insects and diseases are now on the world market helping farmers hard-pressed to maintain efficient production with fewer chemical pesticides etc. Leaner meats will come from cattle and pigs improved both directly and through improved feeds. As the knowledge of molecular genetics increases, the ability to improve the foods and farming will increasingly benefit farmers and consumers alike. As the farm economy will improve, removing hunger from the world, and consumers will benefit by more diverse, more nutritious, more abundant and less expensive food.

Now let me ask you, are people like Ms. Sahai deliberately spreading misinformation, ignorant, or superstitious in a “scientific” way? I searched Wikipedia for getting a little more information on Ms.Sahai’s claims to fame to be interviewed by the Sunday Times. I was astonished to gather that “In April 2013, Sahai was shown to have committed plagiarism in her habilitation thesis in human genetics which was submitted to the University of Heidelberg in 1986(Sahai, Suman: Elucidation of the role of neurotransmitter glutamate in normal and abnormal mental function) On 14 April, 2013, the University of Heidelberg confirmed that plagiarism had taken place, that Sahai has no right to call herself a professor of the University of Heidelberg, and that in consequence Sahai had agreed to renounce her venia legend. In addition, she was accused of presenting herself as being or having been a professor at that University, without ever actually having occupied such a position. Now is she a winner of the Norman Borlaug Award? As per The Hindu report she was winner of the 2004 award bestowed by the Coromandel Fertilizers along with one I.V.Subba Rao, a soil scientist; and repeats the grievous error that Ms.Sahai was Professor at Heidelberg! 

A speech I would like NaMo to make at his inauguration

Gurujan, bahujan, brothers and sisters,

With your votes and blessings I am here, working my way up from very small beginnings, with no legacy behind me for support. Patriotism, my Party, passion, & hard work helped me gain your esteem to reach this position that gives me more capacity to serve you better.

This is no time&place to say anything controversial. But then there was a concerted, planned effort lasting a dozen years to smear and demonise me, death threats to me to this day to end my political career, banish me from Gujarat, not to speak of stopping my ascend to this august office, I have a few things to tell the whole nation: I have been sinned against. I did not deserve the unprecedented, unwarranted, ugly and divisive adversity that transgressed the boundaries of the “political correctness” in vogue. While my political rivals blamed me for the Gujarat carnage of 2002, they chose to ignore innumerable similar or fiercer riots that flared up  with obvious regularity during earlier regimes. They ignored that Ahmedabad incident followed another unforgivable carnage in Godhra. The whole thing was programmed carefully to bring down NDA which ruled the country under the leadership of Atalji. Ahmedabad riot of 2002 was no one-way street, and from the death of rioters belonging to both communities, you can see the State government took fast and proper action. Never afterwards the communal situation worsened in Gujarat though we have a porous border with Pakistan and any time thousands of Bangladeshi’s whose intentions are not clear are swarming Gujarat too like the rest of the country. We have the determination to establish peace.

The Supreme Court of India was directly supervising investigations against Gujarat government, Modi the CM, and his colleagues in Govt and party with respect to a range of allegations from inaction to collusion with respect to the 2002 riots; and a reputed former CBI Director of unquestionable integrity headed the SIT that eventually found me innocent; my government prompt in action. Nobody claims riots were not unfortunate. But to blame it all on me, BJP and RSS is unfair in the light of all evidence to the contrary. But our political rivals need a handle to whip us, the professionally outraged minority activists and the NGOs do not want to see anything other than what would help them get funds from abroad and from inside the country on “humanitarian” grounds. The media either do not want facts get in the way of a hot controversy, or do not travel where truth lies in the open.

Instead of giving Indian voters something to believe in, the “secular” politicians and their friends in the media give them someone to hate: Narendra Modi vesting him with a bogus and negative political identity. The Grand old Party or the family that owns that party runs on “progressive”, communal and caste paranoia, and recently gender paranoia was added to it (“empowering women!”) They have been obsessed with portraying BJP as a Nazi cult; and Modi worse than Hitler. Some propaganda consultant told them: don’t be stingy, lay it on with a trowel and pile up thick, so that some of the muck will remain on them; don’t be vague, give numbers: so they said if I become PM 22000 Muslims will be killed! But this time around they went wrong in assuming that a majority of Indians are gullible people.

So, Narendra Modi has traversed toughest terrains to stand before you, you helped me, and your blessings give me more strength, determination and passion to serve Bharat Mata. I promise you good governance on behalf of my party, allies and my team of ministers and civil servants. I will not fail you. I have deeply held ideals about governance, my country’s development & its stature in the international community of nations, about Indian peoples’ destiny, justice, social consensus and OUR future. Some of you would have read our manifesto: it is not a policy document but a declaration of guiding principles, describing broad outlines of a vision. Good governance I promise means corruption-free administration, food security, health facilities, affordable housing to the economically weak, jobs for the unemployed and under-employed through agricultural, industrial and trade development; better roads, universal access to electric power, greater availability of water, burgeoning direct investment, and rapid economic growth in general. I will not talk about 100 days or 200 days of to do a certain amount of work, but my team will be on these activities from day one, till we accomplish what has to be done.

All sorts of fears and anxieties are created about the NDA. Congress Party had always been creating and exploiting Anxieties in the minds of minorities and Dalits.I repeat what I have been saying earlier, and throughout the Lok Sabha election campaign: my rulebook for governance will be the Constitution of India. We are not in the business of ruthless cultivation of vote banks in the Grand old Party’s style. The Nationalist government led by Narendra Modi is not going to be acting on centuries’ worth of grudges against Muslims and Hindu ambitions. My Hindutva defines all those who are Indian and say “Bharat Mata ki Jay”are Hindus. Our party, alliance and its government led by me is committed to ensure that caste, community, regional, linguistic solidarities will not overwhelm our Indian Nationhood. My government will have the political spine to back up words with deeds, I can tell you.

Our political rivals have done a lot of damage to India’s reputation as a secular democracy by propagating the view that Hindu nationalist agenda includes excluding the minorities, particularly Muslims and Christians from India’s mainstream. The propaganda through outgoing and incoming delegations, political exchanges, public outbursts abroad by Cabinet ministers, religious organizations, the publicity apparatus Central Government assiduously created for such activities, and more importantly, a hostile media. India’s old society and ancient values are subjected to relentless indictment thanks to their combined work. On Gandhi assassination we are well into the seventh decade of fake knowledge and spurious narrative of RSS involvement dominating media discourse. Proponents of Hindutva are cast as bigots and efforts increased to rule their perspective altogether out of the realm of acceptable public discourse. The oldest party in the country that ruled India for most of the post-Independence 6 decades has so much propaganda on “secularism” that the expression has unpleasant connotations now. In their enthusiasm to keep minority communities in India as their exclusive vote banks; to the extent they don’t want Hindus living in peace side-by-side with Muslims n Christians. Recently a famous British magazine openly advised Indians who to vote or rather who not vote. The overall tenor of the magazine article was as if India has been a nation of close-minded bigots requiring the intervention of a Congress government to force them into tolerance and diversity! I promise everybody that no one in my party, our alliance and my team is parochial, and prone to put self (and re-election) before country, or incompetent at fulfilling her or his basic constitutional responsibilities.

Remember, when Atalji’s government went ahead with Pokhran-2, the then opposition, erstwhile rulers of India for several decades were gloating about the possibility of Western economic sanctions destroying Indian economy. All those who disliked our nuclear independence came around to see reason and Indian economy was un- affected. I have read somewhere that history isn’t made by nations defending international law, but acting on their own imperatives. My government’s foreign policy will support that view to some extent. We cannot afford to have permanent friends or permanent enemies, but we must, and have indeed, permanent national interests. Come what may, India will not pursue fruitless negotiations that hostile neighbours are likely to exploit. We want friends in our neighbourhood. Like parents, you cannot choose your neighbours. But unlike hostility, friendship cannot be unilateral; it has to be bilateral.

We have been in the opposition, in States and at the Centre and also in power in the states and at the Centre; and hence we understand the complexities of Centre-State relations. To the States ruled by BJP, allies or others, all I have to say as India’s Prime Minister is just what Sardar Patel told the Sates “We are all knit together in bonds of blood and feeling no less than of self-interest. None can segregate us into segments; no impassable barriers can be set up between us”. Our concept and my personal conviction too is that Bharat Mata is an indivisible entity. The whole of India is one and divided for the purpose of administrative convenience. If a CM asks for financial assistance beyond the Central Plan allocation to it, I shall not ever deny it saying “money doesn’t grow on trees” even if that State is ruled by our political rivals.

We have a lot to do to keep our promises. Where can the money be found? We'll have a tax regime that encourages compliance perhaps would more Indians under the net and earn much higher tax revenues. Apart from expanding the base, collection can improve enormously with corruption-free and more efficient collection systems. As an interesting aside, I would mention an income tax official who quit his job to enter politics and eradicate corruption, in good company, realising that corruption after all, was less important than communalism, the whipping boy who always came to the rescue of the corrupt politicians!Congress party and families of some top leaders seem to have become a self-perpetuating aristocracy of wealth whose dimensions now appear to have exceeded all previous accumulations of financial power. The UPA governments have been sitting on some vital information of illegal money accumulated abroad by Indians from Pranabda’s time in the Finance Ministry. Believe me, a Congress leader appears 21^st in a list of 24 people in the world living in luxury! Recently hearing a petition by former NDA law minister Ram Jethmalani to retrieve Indian black money hidden away in foreign banks the Supreme Court sought immediate action. Global Financial Integrity reports speak of amounts worth Indian Rupees 60lakh crores! According to an 8yr-old report of Swiss Bankers Association Indians are hiding $1.2trillion in Swiss banks are No.1 in whitewashing black money. Professor Vaidyanathan of IIM-Bangalore says the amount abroad is equivalent to Rupees 70lakh crores. My government will investigate all these, carefully collecting evidence and do our best to bring as much of this money as is humanly possible back to India, with the help of foreign governments and overseas Indians.  

I don’t have to remind you how mother India is described in the revolutionary song ‘Vade Maataram’. We promise you that our endeavour will be to make Mother India “Sujalaam, suphalaam, malayaja sheetalaam.. rich with hurrying streams, bright with orchard gleams, cool with thy winds of delight, Green fields waving Mother of might, Mother free of all woes, her children living together as a huge extended family, happily hereafter...I can see your hope and mine smiling from the threshold of the years to come, Whispering 'it will be happier'!

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