Tuesday, August 07, 2007

Muzzled media?...Democracy...surely you're joking!

Well, well, well, Das Munshi is at it again. First he shoots his mouth off by saying that every sports channel covering an event that involves India must share the feed to DD, then he comes out to express his 'shock' (oh, so sad) on the verdict against the son of a late, former Congress party man, and now the self-proclaimed soccer daddy of India plans to throw the final ace up his sleeve (or up some other dark recess) in which he's drawn up a plan that will effectively knock down one of the pillars of Indian democracy - the media.

The proposed bill, which has provisions such as programmes that will be rated with a 'U', 'A', or a 'U/A' and appropriate time slots will be provided for them to be aired based on the ratings, sting operations can be carried out only if it's in the best interest of the public and cannot be done on ongoing cases and investigations and if it has to be carried out, permission must be sought from the person(s) they wish to carry out the sting against. Was Das Munshi high when he came up with this?What's the point of the sting if the 'point' is being blunted? It's like asking the teacher for the questions of the exam saying "we'll study for the exam, but you please give us the questions".

The bill also has provisions to enable an officer of the govt to review the content of what will be telecast, and if he/she feels that the criticism is harsh, it can be edited. Whatever happened to free and fair media? This would effectively eliminate the free part of it, as the media wouldn't be free to operate on it's own without interference, and it wouldn't be fair because the content put out would be in accordance to what the govt wishes for us to hear, a la North Korea or the former Soviet Union.

I guess someone forgot to refresh the memory of the govt about the early part of the 20th century in Germany and Italy where rulers like Hitler and Mussolini and Stalin had done the same thing and it was termed as fascism. But then again, since Sonia Gandhi's father was an ardent fascist & a supporter of Mussolini, it shouldn't surprise us that his daughter's party is behaving in this manner (the apple doesn't fall far from the tree). If this is step one of the grand fascist revival plan, then the steps to follow are to suspend elections and bring in one party rule and switch back to communism (or give it a fancy name called socialism) and rename our country from the Democratic Republic of India to the Union of Indian Socialist Republics. The iron curtain will come up again, this time in a new geographical location with newer comrades.

Wednesday, August 01, 2007

Munna turns out to be a bhai after all

At last, the trial for the worst terrorist act in this country has come to an end with Sanjay Dutt's sentencing sealing the proceedings. Many are arguing that the verdict was too harsh, but hey, since when did justice and sympathy for the convict go hand in hand? It's not as if the case against Sanjay Dutt was circumstantial; it was proven beyond doubt and Mr. Dutt himself pleaded guilty to the charges, so isn't this now much ado about nothing?

To state that he has already suffered all these years and hence should be let off is a crime in itself. What about those who were victims of the 93 blasts, aren't they still suffering the after effects of it, don't they still have to go through all the red tape our bureaucracy throws up in front of them for their compensation, etc? In what way exactly has Sanjay Duttt suffered apart from having to attend the trial whenever it was scheduled? He's been in the thick of things in Bollywood, rolling out some memorable hits during the past 14 years, which somehow doesn't come across as 'suffering'.

Is plain repentance enough to atone for the sin? Would the hue and cry raised over the verdict been the same if the accused wasn't a celebrity? The answer to both is an emphatic no and we all know that when you have powerful and/or well known friends, this sort of backlash from the rich and famous is but obvious. Even the I&B minister, Mr. Priya Ranjan Das Munshi came out against the verdict in milder words, but again, it begs to be asked, would the Congress led government have done this if Sanjay's father, the late Sunil Dutt, wasn't an ardent Congressman and his sister Priya, a sitting Congress MP? My guess is if his family members had affiliations with other political parties, the government would have parroted the line of 'law taking it's own course and nothing must come in the way of justice'.

So at the end of the day (actually, the end of 14 years), dear Munna turned out to be a bhai after all, and congratulations to judge Kode for not getting swayed by public sentiments and altering his judgement. Hats off to you, my good sir, may we have many more like you.

Thursday, July 12, 2007

7 wonders...mmmuaah

What is prompting me to write this is not the fact that I'm angry or sad (I couldn't care less), but the fact that I recently read a blog of a friends friend, which had an article by Gloria Steinem titled 'If men could menstruate', and basically went about the usual ranting and raving about how men try to claim to be superior to women no matter what (even if it was the men who menstruated). It was a nice read, made me smile but also drove home the point that even women are diseased by the 'generalising' factor; generalising all men to be alike and painting all of us with the same brush.





Now I'm not a sexist pig, and I don't give a rat's ass who goes around with whom and does whatever he or she wants to, but what on Earth was Bipasha Basu doing with Christiano Ronaldo, and vice versa? Had it been John Abraham snuggling up with some hot chick, women everywhere would have gone berserk, painting all men with that dirty brush they so often use on men by calling us 'cheaters' who cannot control the penile urges that so often seem to 'control' all our actions. Now that actually leaves one question pending...what was Ronaldo doing with Bipasha? Isn't he supposedly paired up with some hot British chick? Oh that's right, she's British, how stupid of me. They couldn't get any more boring than listening to the leaders of the Congress party hail Pratibha Patil.

Anyway, what interested me the most was that Bips stated something like that it's been taken out of context. Honey, what context has it been taken out of? Oh let me guess, you were kissing Ronaldo out of joy that the Taj Mahal had made it to the final 7, right? Or were you kissing him because you were in that stage in your relationship with John where you're actually allowed to kiss other men? I'm actually not very good at guessing, so I'll leave it at 2 guesses. I just hope there aren't any arrest warrants out for Christiano.

Friday, July 06, 2007

And now Bangalore is sullied

I just hope, for the sake of my dear city Bangalore and it's lovely citizens, that the 3 Muslims held on charges of the UK terror plot, turn out to be innocent. Although the connection between the person held in Australia and his cousins held in UK is still under a cloud, for the 2 in the UK things don't look too good. I mean, how does one explain what he was doing in a car full of explosives that rammed into the airport entrance of Glasgow airport and suffered 90% burns, I don't know, but I do know this: he seems pretty guilty at the moment, and this should once and for all shatter the illusion that people get involved in terror acts due to poverty and poor socio-economic status.

Groups like the Al-Qaeda are full of affluent, well-to-do, prominent, upper-middle class working people and so the hitherto stereotype of a bearded cleric with blazing eyes will have to be trashes into the dustbin. I'm not presupposing that the accused are members of any terror group, but I'm also not absolving them of the charges because of the reason in the first paragraph and also, a lot of today's religious fundamentalists tend to act on their own without any actual instructions from any higher-ups. Oh how I wish they turn out to be innocent, and this turns out to be a big misunderstanding, because Bangalore is still India's knowledge center, and will forever be, but what people do with the knowledge they acquire here, cannot be held against this wonderful city and it's citizens, some of whom still wish for it to return to the yesteryears as being a Pensioners Paradise. Come on Bangaloreans, let's butt-kick any more of these whackos from our city, lest our city moves from the global IT map to the global terror map.

Wednesday, June 27, 2007

What's it gonna be lady?

Just what doesn't Pratibha Patil get? Why is she reminding me of George W. Bush? From one blooper to another, this lady just cannot get things right. First the purdah controversy, then the accusations from a bank of defaulting on loans to the tune of 7+ crores, opening banks that have gone into the red and taken off with peoples savings, followed by accusations of shielding her brother accused of murder, and now she can speak with the dead!!! Speak with the dead! Imagine what the Congress and the Left would have done if someone from the Right wing had come up with some such revelation. They'd have come out all guns blazing against the 'medieval beliefs of the Draconian right wingers (read BJP)' and how they're trying to marginalise the minorities, etc etc etc.

Mrs Patil, if you really want to be President, please keep your mouth shut until the elections are over, because we are already aghast that a rank outsider like you has been chosen because of your loyalty to the Gandhi family over other competent politicians (although personally I'm against politicians becoming President). Even if you do get elected as President, I will never accord you with the respect you deserve, and I will not refer to you as President Pratibha Patil, but only Mrs Patil, not because I'm against women and against a woman becoming President, but because I'm against anyone who wags their tail in front of their masters to get a better and/or bigger biscuit.

I hope, for the sake of the post, the Presidency, she can come clean on the accusations of the loans and shielding her brother in a murder case, or else, as the cliché goes, 'this happens in India only' will be on the uprise once again.

Tuesday, June 19, 2007

Purdah, Presidents and what not

So, the presidential race hots up and once again with the Congress party, we see loyalty taking precedence over competence. A Gandhi family loyalist gets her name picked from the fracas of the process of nomination, and the reason the pricks in government and their commie cronies give us is because she's a woman and this would be an historic moment in Indian history, and whats more she's a 'simple' woman, covers her head and so epitomises what is best in Indian women.

Who the hell are they kidding? We all know the post of President, the highest office in the land, although a political appointment, must be executed without bias, but by selecting a virtually unknown person, a known loyalist to the family and overwhelming her with joy, they just ensured that they have a stooge at Raisina who will sign their bills without causing an embarrassment and without telling them what is moral and what is not.

So ladies, if you think that this is an historic moment, please think again, in an unbiased way, because in the name of feminism, this government is using this lady as a pawn, yes, a pawn, to achieve their sadistic ends, which is to fuck the middle class even more and consolidate their Muslim vote-bank by allowing illegals from Bangladesh to enter and settle down, changing the demography of the north-east of the country, not to mention increase the security risks.

Now on to the other controversy, the wannabe-to-be President, Mrs. Patil, made a remark about the origin of the purdah and attributed it to the Mughal invasion. OK, so the future Indian president doesn't know about Indian history, or she thought she knew, but was obviously wrong. But what was shocking if not amusing was the statement made by Amar Singh; he said "it's wrong to call the Mughals as aggressors". Er, excuse me, but weren't the Mughals the ones who came to erstwhile Hindustan, raided, looted and plundered the wealth, raped women and killed innocents and desecrate places of worship? Isn't that a sign of aggression? Usually when a blow job is given, it's done in private, not in public, so I'm pretty amazed that Amar Singh would resort to administer a blow job on his Muslim chums in the hope of garnering some more nuts in his jockeys, but then again, to say what he said clearly shows the lack of nuts in his jocks, so I guess I can say that I understand.

To wind up, this presidential election is not about empowering women, this is about showing that loyalty scores over competence, the President is nothing more than a puppet and the government is its puppeteer and at the end of the day, purdah or no purdah, let's hope we have a person at Rashtrapathi Bhavan who has the good wishes of the people of this country, and not it's politicians.

Friday, May 11, 2007

Everything that i missed thus far

Holy crap, it's been a long, long time since my thoughts hit the blog world, and a lot of water seems to have passed under the bridge. The American soldiers are still getting blown to bits in Iraq, Bush is continually under fire at home and abroad while his stooges in the churches of America and the Fox News network have increased their support to him. And I thought only George Bush was stupid!

Closer home, Rahul Gandhi shot his mouth off while campaigning in UP about the independence struggle and the 1971 war. I actually don't blame him for getting the facts completely wrong. For those who aren't aware of what he said, he basically said, or made it sound like his family members were solely responsible for India's independence and also for thwarting Pakistan during the 1971 war. Like I said, I don't blame him because it must be hard for someone to learn his history from family members and not textbooks and, as many of us later do, through authenticated works by various historians. I mean, I guess he had sessions with his grandmother, Indira Gandhi (who had her sessions with her father, Nehru). That must have been a really boring history class!

Amar Singh and Mulayam Singh would have to leave their fiefdom and hand it over to the sorceress, Mayawati, who will soon make it a dalit haven and unleash her scourge against the tyrannical upper castes. Soon, we're going to see a ot more statues of Ambedkar and Kanshi Ram, and probably have multi-crore birthday bashes for Mayawati, sposored by a party that claims to represent the poorest and most down-trodden community in independent India. Makes me wanna cry. Sniff, sniff, sob.

Cricket, and we finally managed to win a match, against Bangladesh, when it looked like we were about to lose (like it matters now!).

Cops in India seem to have had a nice long session of target practice on innocents (while, not exactly, Sohrabuddin was a criminal after all). Seems like now criminals better start praying that there IS evidence of whatever crime they are charged of because that way, they have a better chance of beating the courts and getting free, but if there's no evidence, like the saying goes, pop goes the weasel. Ask Alister Pereira. He ran over 7 people on a footpath in Mumbai in a drunken state, and was sentenced, for 6 months!!! These criminals just aren't smart enough these days.

Until some other bloopers come up, my next article will be the most damning of all. It's going to target, that's right, target religion and the concept of God.

Monday, March 26, 2007

Please burn Sachin's effigy

Another cricketing defeat and another violent and raged reaction by our cricket crazy junta, the only difference this time around was the loss was at cricket’s showpiece event, the world cup, and the loss was at the hands of one of the minnows, Bangladesh. In the past too, pathetic performances were greeted with brick-bats and the defeats were attributed to the endorsements and TV commercials that the cricketers were part of. But seriously, what has endorsements and commercials got to do with on-field performances? Sure, they get plenty of money from them so one may be incline to think that that would result in complacency on the field and a ‘don’t care’ attitude, but given the nature of our public, I seriously doubt that would be the case, and only a fool would try to reason out with our enraged public, especially with the lack of proactive response from the police.

Sachin

What amazes me after every such defeat is that not once is Sachin Tendulkar, the so called ‘little master’, or ‘maestro’, or ‘God’ ever talked about. The fall guys always happen to be Dravid, Sehwag, and more recently Dhoni. Never once have I seen the public burning effigies of Sachin, or maybe the media (which claims to be neutral) just doesn’t show those images because they don’t like show images of Sachin being blamed for any debacle. Let’s consider the aftermath of the recent past. Dhoni’s house under construction was vandalized, Kaif’s house was stoned after his failure at South Africa, Dravid and Chappell’s effigies were burnt by the black sheep spectators of Indian cricket (Bengalis), etc. But never once was Sachin a target or recipient of such treatment, or, as I said, never was it shown. I have a simple one worded question: why? Sachin hasn’t had a single match winning performance for more than a year, and even his 50+ scores haven’t been special, but a supplement to the team score. The sooner we end this romanticism with Sachin, the better it would be. At present, he is nothing but dead weight in the team, blocking the entry of younger blood into the team and needs to be dropped from the team and asked to play Ranji cricket to get a few knocks under his belt (a la Ganguly). Yes, you heard me tight, HE NEEDS TO BE DROPPED! It ain’t taboo to say so, and I’m not afraid to say it. Ajay Jadeja said the stupidest thing on NDTV when he said that “world over the best players are pushed up the order, but we (Indian team) bring in the best players when the situation is difficult”. Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t your best players supposed to help get you out of difficult situations? Isn’t that why they are called ‘best’? To cap all the crap about Sachin, there's talk about him replacing Dravid as the captain. I don't think there could any move that would be more disastrous for Indian cricket than this. Sachin is not, and I repeat, NOT a good captain. He is an extraordianry player, but not a good captain, and the sooner the selectors recognise this, the better. All great players needn't be good captains, as is the case with Sachin. I hope common sense prevails and Sachin rejects the captaincy and suggests that Dravid be retained as captain.

Dravid and Chappell

So yeah, the captain and the coach are usually the fall guys, but should they really be chastised for this debacle? Dravid has accepted full responsibility for the debacle, which I’d like to point out that no previous captain has admitted to, but should he and Chappell be made the scapegoats? There are a number of people who are against Chappell because he is a foreigner and because he was the reason Ganguly was dropped for a while and stripped of his captaincy, but seriously, the way the team played, I don’t think even an Indian coach would have been of any help. What surprises me the most was when Kris Srikkanth made this comment on CNN-IBN (sacking Chappell coz he’s a foreigner), or when Jadeja made his comment, what the hell were the perpetually brain-dead TV anchors doing? Couldn’t they have questioned the wisdom of such statements? Navjot Sidhu wants Dravid out because he feels Dravid wasn’t and isn’t a motivating captain! I don’t know Sidhu personally, nor do I know Dravid or any of the current team members, but I think it’s easy to say that Dravid is the best captain we have right now, and his calmness is often mistaken for a sign of passiveness, one that lacks aggression, which, Mr. Sidhu, I’m afraid you are guilty of. I don’t think stripping your shirt on the Lords’ balcony should be viewed as being aggressive and motivating – it was, as we say, ‘losing it’. The Bongs (the black sheep – Bengalis) want Dravid and Chappell out because they think he (Dravid) was handed something that ought not to have left Ganguly ‘fiefdom’ (the captaincy) and Chappell was the cause for it. Speaking of Greg, I think the way he handled the media after the loss to Sri Lanka was extremely good and professional, and I think it’s his professionalism that we Indians have a problem with. I mean what’s wrong is saying that a question is inflammatory when it is – calling a spade a spade? Asking him if heads ought to roll at the top is nothing but inflammatory – that question ought to be asked to Vengsarkar, not Chappell.

Endorsements

One of the prime reasons being attributed to the failure at the world cup is the number of advertisements the cricketers are part of. Common sense ought to prevail over here while making such comments because I fail to see how something done at the time when they are not in the nets practicing could affect their performance so dramatically on the field. All the commercials are shot during the free time that the cricketers have, and come on, if you're telling me they aren't entitled to have a social life, then you go get a life. If that were the case, Azharuddin should have been removed long before he was because his messy divorce with his first wife and subsequent affair with Sangeetha Bijlani leading up to his marriage was sure to affect his game, Sachin ought to have been dropped after his father passed away since his father was such an inspiration to him, etc. One theory is that with the amount of money the cricketers make through endorsements, they really wouldn't care about the money they get for playing, and hence, neglect their game. Going by the reactions of the public in the subcontinent, I don't think any sane cricketer would think of taking such a chance, much less implement it.

The end?

Sacking the coach and replacing the captain would be nothing but a reactionary measure, and as medical practitioners would say “it’s a case of treating the symptom, not the cause”. Although viewing things objectively has never been a virtue the Indian cricket fan had or for that matter most Indians, if we do, then I think it would be fairly ominous that the defeats were a result of a collective batting failure on 2 days, that’s all. No nonsense about a foreign coach, or a de-motivating captain or any of that mumbo-jumbo.

Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Now you see me, now you don't

Another cricket match, and again we have the telecast controversy over whether the feed should be shared with DD or not. What the hell is the matter with our cricket board (well, technically, there was nothing right for a long time, but I just had to make that comment) ? Don't they realise that by screwing around with the telecast rights, they're screwing around with the viewership for the game? I don't think this a ploy to get more people to come to the stadiums to watch the game, because at present in India, the stadiums are packed with people for any international match, what with people sleeping outside the stadiums to get tickets.

What's most shocking about this entire episode is the reaction and comments made by the politicians, especially the information & broadcasting minister Priya Ranjan Das Munshi. The nut case goes on the say that the BCCI has no rights to not let DD telecast the match because watching cricket is his right. So? How can the state machinery bully the private players into sharing their feed, for which they shell out hundreds of thousands if not millions of dollars? What kind of a democratic institution do we have in place? Zee Sports, Neo Sports, et al, I pity thee. Then again, I don't. I might be found guilty of taking sides with those who violate the rights of the cricket loving junta, who inspite of paying the highest to telecast matches, end up on the losing side.
 
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