What comes first - Rights or Responsibilities?

I left out of social media (FB / Twitter) a few months ago. This was to focus on something more core, something more useful.

I successfully managed to keep my mind away from the beef, intolerance and award wapasi periods. But it seems media and some "liberals" with political agendas want to keep the unnecessary debates about ones rights alive (responsibility is only left for the government because it does not belong to their preferred party).

Last few days, due to available time and inability to use the time for my prime work, I got involved into the current situation again. And well the extent is such that I am writing this post.

Yes its the JNU row which made me get agitated again.

The issue surrounds on the rights of those few students to conduct a "cultural event" in support of a convicted terrorist of the country sentenced to capital punishment.

No I am not referring to the slogan shouting (cause even the liberals with anti-govt agenda would not want to support that part.)

I feel strange that those defending the students are using their right to express dissent. My question is plain and simple - what about the responsibility? Responsibility of those student to not set precedent where every convicted terrorist, murderer and rapists will get supported/felicitated through public cultural event, Responsibility towards families of those who where martyred due to these terrorists, Responsibility towards the the men in uniform who are still standing in the line of fire from colleagues of these terrorists.

When it comes to responsibility everyone is talking about govt's responsibility of protecting rights of these students. Is the Govt responsibility only towards these set of few students? Does Govt has no responsibility towards the families of the martyred soldiers, to the men in uniform still fighting in line or towards the sentiment of rest of the populations?

Ohh well to the defending liberals of these students, sentiments of these students matter more than those protecting our nation. For them "Bharat Mata ki Jai" is merely seen as a chant used by right wings to certify nationalism. Little do they know that regiments in Army use these phrases as war cries. For these liberals, standing up to National anthem or saluting a flag is a fake gesture to support fake nationalism. Little do they know our men in uniform would either kill or die to protect this flag from getting disrespected. Their argument is that they don't need a certificate to be nationalistic. However they would immediately certify others communal based on whether they are wearing saffron or are carrying green flag with star and moon.

They bat for right to dissent but the moment you oppose their views, they would paint you illiterate / uneducated / right wing and so on. They would mock people driven by emotion and passion. Seems they forget that it was the emotions and passion of our freedom fighters which provided them their rights. Right to express has become a tool for these liberals to cover insult/disrespect/abuse.

Its not just these certified liberals but there are certified intellectuals who do not understand the difference between conviction and sentencing. In JNU case one of the argument given by these intellectuals to justify the students action of supporting Afzal Guru is because as per them, Afzal Guru was made a scapegoat due to "collective public conscience". And they very easily refer to part of statement of the Supreme court judgement to support these view.

Strangely if someone really reads into the statement, he would realize that the reason of "Collective public conscience" is used by SC to award capital punishment and NOT the conviction. The statement of conviction clearly states that even though there is no direct evidence to link Afzal with the terrorist organization, there is enough evidences before the court that prove "beyond reasonable doubt" that he was part of the conspiracy.

Most courts in various country has the notion of reasonable doubt. This notion is provided with a simple intent - "Let 10 criminal set free but 1 innocent should not get convicted"

So if SC says that all the evidence before the court link Afzal guru to the conspiracy "beyond reasonable doubt", that means there has to be some merit to the conviction. Yes one can protest the the capital sentence awarded but that does not make Afzal guru a martyr. He still stays a convicted terrorist. 

However strange part is that these intellectuals are using two unrelated statement and combining them together to misguide those who do not understand these details of court judgement. Before defending the rights of the student, aren't these intellectuals have responsibility to not misinterpret the judgement eventually misguiding people?

Presently, there is another parallel case of rights and responsibility in news. Its about Apple Inc.'s stance of putting "right to privacy" over an above its responsibility to help govt agencies in social justice and national security. 

Today the debate is not about  national vs anti-national or right wing vs left wing or secular vs communal, rather I feel the world today is actually divided into only two parts - those who only talk about right ignoring the responsibilities and those who keep responsibilities above their rights. And the world is still working because of later ones.

Disclaimer: The liberals and intellectuals referred in this post are those sitting in media creating these debates and then keeping them alive till they get the next topic to create a debate on.

AAP ke Side Effects

Listing below the major decisions taken by AAP during 48 days in Delhi and their side effects. Most of these side effects are already visible and other will become visible sooner than later.

1. Electricity bill waiver only for those who supported AAP during election campaign
Side Effects:

• Direct case of buying votes against favor
• Also direct case of corruption cause the benefit given is at the cost of governments fund and not from AAP’s fund.

2. Electricity waiver through subsidy
Side Effects:

• Money taken from PWD budget. So no more money to clean Delhi.
• Money given to Power Company (the same company whom they blame to be corrupt)
• Electricity tariff hiked by 8% else Delhi may face power cuts
• Major effect will be seen after Delhi receives its first heavy rain this monsoon and the drainage will get clogged and the government will not have funds to clear it up.

3. Free water to metered house
Side Effects:

• Benefit to middle class and rich class who do not need this subsidy.
• Poor without meter still at large from water. Tanker mafia became more active.
• Make way for the new plumbing mafia which will do workaround on the meters.

4. Delhi Jal board officials shuffled
Side Effects:

• Corruption rates became higher. Beause the corrupt officers have to re-establish themselves in the new area.
• Corruption still rampant in Jal board (source: Aajtak Sting on 3^rd march 2014)

5. Auto Rckshaw drivers can no more be fined for Refusal to ply, overcharging or misbehavior
Side Effects:

• That was the primary reason for the 16^th dec Gang rape in Delhi as near 6-7 auto wallas refused to go.
• Rickshaw drivers can now ask for any exorbitant rates which people will have to pay
• This move again a payback by AAP for supporting them in election adding to public inconvenience.

6. About 90% Reservation in Delhi University for locals
Side Effects:

• Most of the northern states talent seek admission in DU. This will debar deserving candidates from small towns of states like Haryana, Rajasthan, UP, Uttarakhand and more.
• A new kind of regional politics at play.

7. Interference in policy of private schools of Delhi who do not take any funding from government
Side Effects:

• Instead of increasing quality of government school, this decision will bring the quality of private schools close to the present sorry state of government schools. Is this the idea of equality AAP wants to bring in?

Overall 

"AAP fighting elections" 

Biggest side effect of this is: Delhi deprived of stable government

I guess sooner or later the Delhi junta who voted for AAP would be humming the song "O Pappe tujhe vote deke pachtaaya" ;)

PS: I know AAP supporters will call me "uneducated". I am better off being "uneducated" than an "educated fool"

Why I don't endorse Arvind Kejriwal.

Let me first tell you that I have no questions or doubts over credibility of AK. However I do have some doubts over his integrity since he formed a govt with Congress support. But those are still doubts and he can be given the benefit of it. However, what I don’t support in AK is his competence to run a government. Yes, I may end up facing lots of criticism for this but let me try to provide a rational explanation behind the statement. I know when a person is blindfolded by passion, rationality goes out of the window. I have been there during Anna movement.

Let us now try to think how a competent and rational person would behave once he attains office. In ideal ways, the person would first take stock of situation on every aspect. Right from the present budget, deficits, revenues, receivables, burn rate etc etc. All in all a detailed financials of the state. However, what AK did was to announce two subsidies. One in electricity and other in water. Both being an example of how immature he is.

In fact the announcements came as if he is trying to make a record of fulfilling manifesto promises. That seat is not provided to him to create records but to govern a state. Anyways, let me tell you why both the decisions are not wise from the process point of view.

For electricity, he did quick calculations to tell that how much it will cost the government for the last quarter of this Financial year. However, he failed to answer that how government would fund it. He has not even taken a stock of the present status of Delhi’s budget for this financial year. He has no answer yet that which departments budget he plans to cut to supply funds for this subsidy. This is a gross mistake because eventually it may be revealed that the real cost of production and distribution itself is higher because there is lot of power theft in Delhi. I am telling this from my own experience. What instead he should have done much before declaring subsidy, is to curb that aspect. Minimizes losses and overheads and then recalculate the actual cost. One has to remember that to supply earth  to one place, one has to dig another.

Now take the case of Water. He gave free water and that too with a cap. Now let me explain how the cap part is more harmful. Remember the days when all the LPG cylinders were subsidized? Black marketing used to happen but the customers of this black market were only those who did not have connection. Those who had connection were victimized by the delays only.  But now by putting the cap, the customers of black market include people who have connection. On my connection I have three unknown bookings and deliveries which I have no idea about. This is the real example. In fact Bharat gas gives a transparency portal to check your number of connections. Do check and you may realize even you are a victim. Well, I am taking this matter with the gas agency now and will have to spend time and efforts towards it. But coming back to water. Now instead of tanker mafia, get ready to welcome plumbing mafia. Who will give you ten different ways to bypass/speed down the meter.

Also another fact is that the water subsidies will be towards the people who have connections. So there is nothing for the people who still rely on tanker mafia. So the rich (or who have access to FB / twitter) have got the relief and poor still face the shortage.

Now that the Delhi is in his hands (at least six months before which even a no-confidence motion cannot be placed), shouldn’t the party focus on the state and prove its competence by running it for at least one budget year? Why is so much of an urgency to recruit fresher and place them in Lok Sabha? This brings doubts towards their integrity.

Anyways, my only suggestion towards APP supporters is that do support what you believe but don’t do it blindly. Ask questions. Don’t just defend them by saying it needs time. If AAP really needs time then my vote is reserved against them till the time comes. I will not jeopardize country’s future by voting an unproven set of people no matter how integral they are.

Rahul scores self goals!

11th day into protest and the government is still moving in a circle. One day it moves upward and the other day it takes a U-turn downwards. In an attempt to end the deadlock with the Team Anna, along with trying to save its own intentions to preserve freedom to corruption, the government has been going mad. They agree one day and then they backtrack the other day.

And in this circle the center has been missing in the action (majorly cause she is away from the country physically and away from the movement medically). I would not say that people were really expecting Rahul to step in to fill in for his mother. I also don't think even Congress was missing involvement of their "claimed-to-be-future-PM" in this whole situation. As all we know even Congress would prefer Rahul not to speak during this sensitive situation as the chances are more that he will break the circle and take the government in a downfall.

But I guess, frustrated of the circle, finally Rahul stepped in. And with an intent to jump higher than Team Anna, in a hope to make the agitation look like a peanut, he made two major recommendations that are different from Jan Lokpal. First was to bring the political funding under the control of government. To which, even a dumb person would agree that not a single person present in the parliament would agree with fully (including Rahul's own colleagues). So here Rahul scores the first goal for the opponents. And secondly to show that Jan Lokpal is merely a peanut, he raised his hand in support of creating an anti-corruption institution as a constitutional institution like election commission.

Having Lokpal as a constitutional institution means quite a big thing. It will make the body completely independent of Parliament. And hence the freedom to investigate matters concerning the members of parliament will become reality.

But wait a minute, before starting to dream of a corruption-less (purposely not using corruption-free) India, lets first try to understand the intentions behind such a big suggestion. Is it that Rahul had suddenly got his conscience woken up? Or is it that even he had to pay bribes at 100 locations and hence had been thinking about this problem since a long time?

Or is it that to end the deadlock and to bring back the torn image of his party and the government that he is heading (virtually if not really), he has come up with this "formula"? Why this big idea was put in by him while other very senior and much more educated members of his team (including the PM) being present at the parliament. Is it that since other members had already tried their chances and eventually lost their credibility, they kept Rahul as an ace of spades for the big blow?

Whatever being the reason one thing is clear, that the intentions are still not the right one. I would not iterate the thousands of incidences in the near past to prove the prior statement. So what could be the real reason supporting their real intentions? I can think of only one reason. Since everyone know that amendments in the constitution are far longer and complex process than passing a bill, this could be their super formula to buy more time on the issue and temporarily get away from the situation.

However while trying to end the present deadlock temporarily, Rahul had scored another self goal. For many reasons. Firstly that this idea is something which can be looked as complimentary to the Jan Lokpal. Because as Dr. Kiran Bedi said, one has to climb a hill before even thinking about climbing Everest. So now for the government, to show seriousness and support towards their future PM's comment, they will have to seriously show their commitment towards the first step which is Jan Lokpal. And once this is over, it would not be over for them. Because now to abide by a statement for which all the government members clapped, they will have to start working towards it. If at a later stage they show their unwillingness towards taking up the dream statement of their prince to reality, Team Anna or for that matter any other civil organization can start another agitation. And yes they will get similar support for sure.

So in a way, while trying to put an end to this protest, Rahul has given a direction to the civil society and the people of India to start another one.

By the way, he also condemned this movement saying that this agitation will set wrong example and will provoke others to agitate in similar manner for unreasonable demands in future. Firstly, by saying this at least he also agrees that this agitation is not unreasonable (another shot at self post). Secondly, if in future anyone starts an agitation with unreasonable demand, I really don't think that it will get this much support. After all People of India are not so foolish that they will voice their support for any unreasonable demand.

Even the government knows that its not the agitation that is holding them on ransom but it is the huge unprecedented public support. So all I say in future Congress member may actually think of bribing Rahul to 'not to speak'.

Hammer when its red HOT!

The weekend has gone now. For the general working class of people, this weekend means day(s) of their own. The Sunday (as it is off for most of the regular working people) is the day when people get their real freedom from the bounds of their work or professional cells. Hence this day holds importance like no other days. Not even festivals. Because for most of them, the festival holiday means getting out from the bounds of work and getting into the bounds of relatives / tradition / customs.

Other days of equal importance are the three National holidays and a day which comes once in five year. Yes the Voting Day. Its a social fact that the rarer the phenomenon it is, the more important it becomes to cherish it. After all no matter how beautiful the "Dooj ka chaand" (the crescent moon on the second day from new moon day) is, "Idd ka chaand" (the moon seen on the eve of festival Idd) holds more importance.

We always try our best to not let go the one day - The Sunday. Because on this day we get to behave and live the way we want to live. And if we get bonus like the voting day, how can we resist the temptation to feel free. And it is this temptation that gives rise to the cynical views when it comes to voting. We hide behind this cynical attitude just to justify our stealing the purpose out of this one day. The primary purpose being "To Vote". Our excuses?!!! Well its just one vote how does it matter? The whole system is corrupt, even if i give my vote sensibly what is the guarantee that others will? At times it even goes to the level of "I was feeling very sick and hence could not go out!"

Well i am not writing this post to tell you what has been told by hundreds of other videos, ads and articles, prepared under various campaigns to educate people to vote and vote sensibly. But what i am pointing out is that i have seen a ray of hope from these very people.

The ray of hope was in the form of people coming out of their homes, and spending their most important "Sunday" for a cause. But before we start dreaming of a better future, we have to analyze why these people are ready to spend their important Sunday even when they don't feel motivated to spend the voting day to its right use. Is it just the cause? The Anti-Corruption movement? Well there had been more than hundred protests in the past related to this cause but none has gained such a support of people.

I think the answer lies in a word which defines relation between two individuals - "Trust". Its more of a trust or a larger hope which is riding on the trust towards the very people who are leading this movement. And what generates this trust is the fact that here is a set of activists who are not just protesting but are proposing a solution. A solution, which is at least logically correct if not fully technically or practically correct.

One can always argue that this may not be the right way to get things sorted. This is more of a "blackmail". But I look at it with a different angle. I look at it as a step in getting the trust of people towards a set of people who are real activists, who want to really bring change to this society without seeking any personal favor.

This movement has proved that people are no more ready to stay inside their home and spend relaxing Sunday. They are ready to come out and voice their views provided they have someone whom they can trust to lead and do the rightful. So what is now required is to make sure that this agitation does not go cold and in the meantime, we prepare ourselves to take a bigger step of being directly part of the government.

I compare this protest to the heating process of an iron bar. And when its the right time, the time for election, the time when the iron really becomes read hot, I believe that people will be ready to come out of their home and hammer it hard with their votes. With a possibility of 1.2 bil hammer shots, forget about iron we can reshape Titanium!

From a techie to a social protester

I never endorsed any kind of protests / rallies. Being a cynical hardcore techie, I always felt that only those resort to such thing who dont have anything else to do. I also had cynical views towards the people taking part in such protests/rallies/marches. I used to think that not more than 20% of such crowd will even know why they are protesting. I even hated such demonstrations and protests as they raise inconvenience to other common people who may not be directly concerned with the movement.

But that dosen't mean that I had no feelings or emotions towards my society or my country. Whenever there is anything related to our Nation, I become emotional. Even today, National Anthem makes my Tshirt become XL from L. Patriotic Songs like "Vande Mataram", "Ma Tujhe Salam", "Ae Mere Vatan ke logo", "Kar chale hum fida" etc bring shivers through my body.

I recollect feeling that i was having while I was coming out of the theater after watching "Rang De Basanti". That was firstly because of the topic that struck the right cords connected to common man like me and secondly it was a well orchestrated and directed feature with all the right music and other effects. Two days ago, I had the same feeling.

No, I haven't been to movie theater this time. This time it was a road which had been so regular to me that I would have passed by it more than hundred times before. But this time there was something different. I was on a two wheeler. The traffic was moving at a snails speed. Ahead of me there was a group of near 40-45 motor cyclists with tricolors in hands. Those people were shouting slogans ranging from "Bharat Maata Ki Jai" to "Anna Hazaare tum aage badho, Hum tumhare saath hai".

I could never imagine to be a part of any kind of protests on street or to shout at the top of my lungs on public streets. Even that day when i joined that two-wheeler rally, i was quite (or i was trying to stay quite.). But then suddenly the motorist besides me shouted "Bharat Maata Ki" and within a flash after him finishing, my mouth opened and my ear heard one unbelievable voice of my own. "Jai" was the word that I remember hearing from myself. Strangely it was difficult for me to comprehend that how can the same environment be generated by just a group of people in an open street which i experienced in a closed theaters with a well directed feature and best sound effects.

The first shout was the icebreaker. After that without thinking any further, my voice joined the chants and shouts for the rest of the rally. In fact there were stretches when others stopped chanting the leading lines, I was the one giving the lead followed by huge roars. I just cant express the feeling that I had after getting huge roar to follow my lead from people whom I never met before or will never meet again.

This movement has something special that is making people in individual capacity to join. They are not being brought in trucks or buses or neither they are getting paid to be a part of it. For the first time people are joining because they really want to support. Cause the issue is something that relates to every individual from every class. Strangely, this movement even has support from the other side of the barricade. This movement can never be compared to the likes of Egypt, Myanmar etc.

Frankly speaking in spite of voting for a rational person (Mr. Arun Bhatia) in last LS election, I saw Kalmadi winning it with huge margins. I surely had lost my faith in the democracy that we practice. I never thought that I, in my individual capacity will ever be able, to be a part of bringing change to this country. But this movement has opened my perspective. And yes from a hardcore techie who preferred to limit his views to his friends circle sitting under sheds, I have become a protester who is not shy of voicing his views at the top of his lungs in busy streets.

Jai Hind!