Greed is Good...

Greed is Good....
If you think that Gordon Gekko had said that way back in the 1987 movie, Wall Street, well, yes. But the same philosophy has been followed at home by our dear Behenji Mayawati.

The garland made of Rs. 1000 notes has left people speculating how much it was actually worth. A few crores? A few lakhs?

Where did the money come from? Where did it go?
A very "learned" JNU professor on Vikram Chandra's show "The Big Fight" disputed that the garland was made of notes.

Another guest on the show complained that it was the English media which was all out to malign her.
Her shenanigans have inspired a round of raw, pithy satire and poetic creativity on Twitter and Facebook, which was indeed enjoyable.


Whatever....
But was the Rs. 200 crore spent on the rally of the masses worth it?
That money could have been used for, say, setting up a school, a polytechnic, a college, clinic, etc for her so called constituency, the Dalits.
Mayawati has other members in the "Greed is Good" club. Why else would India have the dubious distinction of topping deposits in Swiss bank accounts. I came across two sources on the Net which referred to Swiss Banking Association reports of 2006 and 2008 which talk of deposits from India exceeding US$ 1.5 trillion, now that's an obscenely, astounding Rs. 65,25,000 crore.

This kind of money could not have gone out to Switzerland without political patronage.

Bottomline, all politicians here are greedy, but Mayawati has taken that greed to a new level. She is shouting out that "Greed is Good...."

A Misty Afternoon at Mulshi....

Breathtaking views of the clouds kissing the hills at Mulshi Lake, Pune...

So fresh and green....

The woods are lovely, dark and deep, but I have miles to go before I sleep....

Standing firm, defying the waves...

What a view....

This kid patiently waited for over 30 minutes to hook the fish....

A photo for the postcard...

Afternoon siesta....

Rusting in peace....

Billed for the Future....

Finally, after a grand Tamasha in Parliament, the Women's Reservation Bill has been passed in the Rajya Sabha.

The big question everyone is asking is whether this is really a big deal or not?

We are not talking of the fuss created by the Yadav trio.

On the way to office today, I heard the very interesting Rajesh Tambe, a guest speaker on Meow 104.8 FM say that the bill will perpetrate dynastic politics. It could result in proxy candidates being put up on the electoral front.

True, all that could be true. It is quite likely all this would happen.

After all, it had happened in the past.

Indira Gandhi was propped up as the "Gungi Gudiya" by power centres in the Congress after Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri passed away in 1966. But 5 years later, after the decisive victory in 1971 war, she was labelled as "Durga", that too in Parliament, by none other than Atal Behari Vajpayee.

I am no fan of the Lalu Prasad Yadav clan, but Rabri Devi did manage to achieve quite a transformation in the three terms that she had as the Chief Minister of Bihar.

Reservation for women is not new. Women have had this privilege for some years now in the village Panchayat elections. And some newspapers say that it has been quite a success, with a cleaner, less corrupt and action oriented style of functioning.

We in the corporate world have seen successful women professionals, though one often hears snide comments and knows "visible" glass ceilings exist.

But the Yadav trio seem to be worse than them....

And what Mr. Tambe said could be true for 5, 10 or 15 years, but surely women lawmakers will catch up with time, like the way they did in the Panchayats.

This could be an epochal moment in our history and our women lawmakers are certainly billed for the future...

One Question for Mr. Hussain....

What a ruckus has MF Hussain's acceptance of Qatari citizenship created..... !!!!

It is undoubtedly true that we failed to provide to provide him the necessary security. It is also true that while he was hounded by hordes, the lawmakers and intelligentsia had kept quiet. So why the hullabaloo on TV now? For TRPs?

Isn't it true that an artist has a right to express? Ancient Indian artists expressed themselves and created wonder like Khajuraho, Ajanta Ellora, etc.

So has Mr. Hussain.

But freedom has limits, and each individual (artists included) need realise that, before they cross the rubicon.

MF Hussain may have crossed the rubicon ..... I am not sure.

But I only have one question for Mr. Hussain.

Won't the Qataris throw him into the Persian Gulf if he artistically painted local historical or religious figures in a certain light?

Aman ya Jung?

The one thing that has angered me over the last few months was the Aman ki Asha campaign, initiated by Times of India.
I have a question - will you ever sit and have a cup of tea in an aman shanti ka mahaul with a neighbour who is always pelting stones on your house?

Never, would be the unanimous answer.
Would the pseudo-liberals, pseudo-intellectuals who have spearheaded Aman ki Asha have tea with their own belligerent neighbours.
Not one would do that in reality, yet it seems the country, India, does not matter for them.
And while we kept the asha for aman and mohhabbat, we got a lovely Valentine's Day gift reecently. A grand blast and about 14 deaths at the German Bakery in Pune.
As if that's not enough, the much wanted, Hafiz Sayed, addressed a public rally in city of Lahore after the German bakery blast, and said that one 26/11 was not enough for India, there need to be more. He went on to say that they will drink blood of the Indians, rather than die thirsty.
All this in broad daylight, in a public rally, in the city of Lahore and the Pakistanis claim they cannot arrest him, because they do not know where he is.
What a bloody joke!
Just as we were coming to terms with the Pune blast, Salman Bashir and his Pakistani delegation caame to India. The press waxed eloquent about his pragmatism, attitude and his personal rapport with Nirupama Rao.
The talks happened, or rather should I say we had "tea" again. And after that the vitriolic press conference made the Pakistani intentions very clear. They'll continue throwing stones.
Its barely been two days since the talks got over and today, Indian interests were targeted in Kabul. The result: 6 Indians died.
The Taliban claimed responsibility. No prizes for guessing who supports the Taliban.
And what do we do?
We keep the Aman ki Asha.
But this is a Jung.

In one of my blogs titled "Is India Truly Independent?", I had written that we need to retaliate, an eye for an eye.
Why can't we learn from the Israelis?
An eye for an eye, a limb for a limb, should you dare touch my countrymen, should you dare even look at my motherland.
That's what we should do - systematically throttle Pakistan, cultivate fringe groups in Pakistan, encourage Baluchis and the Sindhis and get them to eliminate terrorist leaders, one by one.
But we certainly caannot afford to have tea with our neighbour. We certainly cannot hope to have any Asha because the neighbour wants a Jung.
And our pseudo-liberals, pseudo-intellectuals better realise this fact of life in India, that this is a full fledged, yet undeclared war, the Jung of our lives.