Excellent Performance by Mrunmay Mulajkar

Politicizing Terrorism

On 7th July, 2013 at around 5.15 a.m. series blast rocked in 1500 year old Mahabodhi Temple complex in Bodh Gaya. This was followed by a series of nine low intensity blasts and at least two monks are reported to be injured, one Tibetan and the other Myanmarese. Investigation of blast was given to NIA (National Investigating Agency). Three unexploded bomb were also found in Temple complex
Bodh Gaya is the most hallowed place on earth to Buddhists the world over. Situated by the bank of river Neranjana. King Ashoka was the first to build a temple here. It is famous for being the place where Gautama Buddha is said to have obtained Enlightenment (Bodhimandala). In 2002, Mahabodhi Temple, located in Bodh Gaya, became a UNESCOWorld Heritage Site.
The place, where bodha found peace and now there is no peace anymore. India as a country has place for many more religions, casts and languages and has unique identity for that. The same country now become land of politics based on cast, religion, region and language etc.

Just after blasts in Bodh Gaya, one of senior politician linked it to particular politician and particular party. After this politician’s tweet, there were many debates, arguments from every party to take mileage out of this sad incidence. Intellectual politician who tweets first, earlier also called most dangerous terrorist as “Shri Osa…ji” and he also visited to one of northern district in India to give sympathy to suspected terrorists killed in Batla encounter. There was and is enough politics  around Batla encounter. Finally court certified it was not fake encounter still same politician can not digest it. I am not against this politician or his party, but definitely against politicizing issue of terrorism, giving religious color to any terrorist activity. Terrorism is Terrorism. There is no color, religion, region for terrorist. But now politics in India gone to the level, where parties will use religions, casts for their benefits.

When Obama was campaigning in USA for his nomination as president of India, nobody campaigned there on the basis of skin color, religion or place of birth. Everybody was talking there about: whether he can pull out country from worst economic crises. Can he keep American dream alive? Obama won election and become  president of USA defeating  John McCain. But most notable thing was John McCain’s speech after lost in election. Few beginning lines from his speech.  “My friends, we have come to the end of a long journey. The American people have spoken, and they have spoken clearly. A little while ago, I had the honor of calling Sen. Barack Obama — to congratulate him on being elected the next president of the country that we both love”. His supporters were carefully listening speech in tears. Nobody raised slogan, nobody talks about election result as unfair and there was polarization based on skin color. I am not sure when we will have such mature political leaders and so much mature audience/ citizens. Afterwards USA kills its no.1 enemy without any hype. Nobody politicize issue of killing  terrorist. Coming back to the point again, calling same terrorist by senior politician as “Shri Osam…ji” and polarizing people on the basis of religion.

It is not about any particular party and politician. Every party/ politician tries to polarize country on the basis of cast, religion and language from time to time.

After 65-66 years of independence, we cannot have elections based on national interest and issues such as “Better infrastructure, health, education system and foreign policies etc”.  Whereas we have many more challenges in front of us .eg. Depreciation of Rupee, higher fiscal deficit, country known as aspiration to become economic superpower also known for highest malnutrition cases in the world. Every politician is busy in dividing India based on their definition of secularism. Bodh gaya incidence is not first such incidence, when politicians tried to polarize India. Earlier hanging attacker of Indian parliament became talking point for many years (more than decade). There is long list of such incidences. Few terminologies used regularly in India and politicians are proud of using such terminologies (e.g. Lingayat leader, Maratha strong man, aspiration to become first Dalit PM, Marathi manoos and Muslim Maseeha etc). Important ministries are distributed based on cast and religion not on their caliber. There are no signs of improvement to change the scene at all.

I am afraid and frustrated, whether scene can change at all. Only miracle can change this. This post is somewhat negative and does not give clue on how to come out of this situation. But this is a real condition, even politicians cannot deny. Not sure, when politician can forget formula of “Divide and Rule”.
Some positive sign of change in recent days: Court banned rallies arranged on the basis of casts and religion in UP (largest state in India). Many such petitions/ PIL are likely to get filed in coming days looking frustration of common man.

We have very little in hand but we will not forget our responsibilities. Few points to be kept in mind: Do not vote somebody because he is from your cast, religion or region. Sometime to keep vote bank intact, politicians concentrate on progress of particular area and voters elect such politician without national interest and actual background of politician in national picture.

Let’s force politicians to forget rule “Divide and Rule” 

 

Road safety in India

It was 21^st may 2013, just before lunch time, email in inbox for condolence of five contract employee’s death in road accident. All these employees were working on third party contract with our company from many years. I knew two of them, as I interacted with them in last few months. All of them were in age group of 25-40 years. It was sad news for victim’s families.

During our tea break on same day, I asked to tea serving person about accident details and victim’s family details. Tea serving person was also from same contract company. Then I asked him, do you have group insurance provided by their employer. He said “no” and went back to his work. Not sure, whether he understood my question. This contract company is MNC (Revenue 18 Billion Euro) and giving housekeeping and maintenance services to many big companies and should have group insurance to their employees.

After about 1 month of this incidence, I thought of writing this post on "Road safety in India"

Although, road conditions in India improved in last few years, but safety is long way to go for Indian roads. Few shocking statistics about road accidents in India are as given below.

1.       One road accident every minute, which claimed one life every 3.7 minutes (highest in the world).  

2.       Maharashtra topped the list of road accidents (68,438), followed by Tamilnadu, MP, Karnatak and AP

3.       53.5% accidents were reported from rural areas, reflecting a rising tide of motorization in rural India. Compared to this urban areas reported 46.5% of the total number of road accidents.   

4.        “A majority of road accident victims – 51.9 %  -- are in the 25-65 age group followed by 30.3% in the 15-24 age group,” the official said. These are age groups contributing to most of India’s GDP

When I was in USA, one of my counterpart (US citizen) who visited to India, two years back expressed few facts of Indian Road system. In his words: “There is no road system in India, Trucks, cars, bikes, and pedestrian, bicycles uses same road. So speed of vehicle = speed of bicycle”.  I was speechless and my answer was simple: “We never thought of so many vehicles in socialist India”.

Few of my observations about Indian Road System and Roads in USA. Of course these are not comparable at all. But few things to learn.

Roads in India	Roads in USA
Many more bikes, bicycles, rikshaws on Highways with High speed vehicles. No low speed limit on Highways. People with low speed vehicles are risking their lives.	There is low speed limit on Highways. So slow vehicles never travel with high speed vehicles
Highways pass through villages, towns. People, animals risking their lives while crossing roads on daily basis.	Safe exits for town on Highways. No highway passes through villages/towns
In city, footpaths are occupied by shops/stalls, two wheelers uses footpath for driving	No stalls on footpaths, nobody is driving on footpaths

Among these points, few are definitely of good infrastructure building and some points are of just discipline. In infrastructure building, we have very little in hand (e.g. pressure group for safety drive). After death of Marathi actor “Anand Abyankar”, artists formed group for safety drive and talked to government. Government acted on some of risky barricades. Good start but not enough. Now there are many good safety drives proposed from government side on Highways. After all ,  rules to be followed by Indians (tough task).

Few of common safety tips, everybody knows but “Chalata hai” approach risking your and others lives

1.       Helmet on 2-wheeler and safety belt in 4-wheeler

2.       Do not reverse 4- wheeler with high speed

3.       Never exceed specified limit

4.       Do not drive, if you have taken liquor

5.       Do not drive in less visibility or if you are tired

6.       Ask driver to take proper sleep, if you are going on long drive. Do not drive continuously for more than 3 hrs. Take appropriate breaks

Safety First

Objectives of Rebooting India

After my post” Do my country need pest control at large scale”. Few people asked me in private, what is goal of the blog? What are real objectives of this initiative?

Definitely I have good objectives and intention to start this blog. I like to share my thoughts on “Objectives of Rebooting India” in this post. Main idea of starting this blog is to discuss 

      ·         Challenges in front of the people to build India as better nation

      ·         Idea for appropriate solutions to challenges

      ·         To build better Indian value system

Many people thought, why we should be part of this initiative when there is enough think tank to advise government in policy making, inspiring personalities to publish books and deliver speeches to mentor people. That’s true. But generally people of that stature disconnected from real problems and do not really get the ideas for solutions from the people, who are really facing these issues. Few of these people have good intentions and few of them do just as change in their life style. Type-2 people travel by local train for one day to understand livings of Mumbai people or stay for one night to dalit’s house to understand their problems. These are definitely media stunts and cosmetic design for their faces. Similar people who are part of such drive then think people traveling by 2^nd class train tickets are of cattle class or women protesting in Delhi rape case are dented and painted women.

I like to discuss problems in this forum and also collect ideas from people who talks on coffee tables/ drawing rooms and throw many out of box and still simple ideas for complex issues.

Few of top most challenges, which I can think at this point

      ·         Corruption

      ·         Crony capitalism 

      ·         Safety of common people

      ·         Health & Education

      ·         Gender biased thinking

      ·         Protecting childhood

      ·         Young generation distant from social issues

      ·         Energy deficit

      ·         Environmental issues

      ·         Vote bank politics

Government is not responsible for all problems and agitation/protest cannot be solution to all issues. Off course, for few issues, agitation help in mobilization of the people, increasing awareness of issues and can build pressure on system to bring changes.

Let’s build better India, which will be safe, peaceful, supporting good value system for us, for our children and generation to come.

While uploading the contents of this post, there is naxal attack on “Parivartan Yatra” in Chhatisgarh. I will follow the story. Naxalism is another issue in India. After 65 years of independence, these people are not part of the system. Neither system is ready to include these people as ordinary countrymen nor these people ready to adopt Indian system

·      

Do my country need pest control at large scale?

Morning of Saturday(18-May-2013), somewhat lazy day for people working in 5-day schedule. I need to take my family(wife and two kids) to my in-laws house (just 20kms away from my residence).My wife and I planned to have pest control of my house, when they are not at home as my son is just 3 months old. After leaving  family to in-laws house, I came back to home and called pest control agency and had done pest control around 1.00PM.

Now for 3-4 hours, I cannot enter house because of chemicals used in pest control and need to spend time outside house. I went to Amanora mall thinking its good location to spend 3-4 hours in hot summer days. I checked Inox for current movies, but there was not any good movie, which you can watch alone. Then I thought of purchasing good book from “Crossword” and read book in Mall common space itself. I asked for books” “Walking with lions” by K Natwarsing and “More salt than pepper” by Karan Thapar. But to my luck, neither of these titles were available. So I was just checking available options and could locate a good book: “anna,  13 days that awakened India” by Ashutosh. I quickly read introduction of the book by Yogenda Yadav and found worth to read it. Now I need not to think about any other entertainment.

While going though book, I feel it is really suffocating in Indian democracy, where powerful people can do anything and nothing can be done against them. After series of scams 2G, CWG, Coalgate; government was in denial mode to take any actions against wrongdoing and to prevent wrongdoing in future. It is not only party in power, but their alliance partner, oppositions supported not to have any real concrete actions.

I supported “Lokpal Movement” because it was not against any party, but it was against system; which has high immunity to corruption and wrongdoings. There are many more junks, spams, Trojans in current system. In book “What young India wants” by Chetan Bhgat he correctly pointed out that system is unhealthy and just “Crocin” will not be helpful, it require strong antibiotic dose to recover from illness. I fully agree to reboot the system completely.

It was 5.30PM and I was still reading book. I thought of returning to home (Intensity of chemicals used in pest control must have come down by that time). When I opened doors and windows for fresh air, thought of starting blog comes along with fresh air. It clicked easily and start blog Rebooting India- http://rebootingindia.blogspot.in

Once I entered in house, I saw many died insects and suddenly I thought can we have similar pest control in country to finish corrupt insects and parasites. My heart says “Yes We can!” If every good individual  think for change, we can change complete system. In Obama’s word “Change-That we can believe in.”

Beginning step of change could be small. Just register your name in voter list. Vote to right candidate without failure. Your attempts may fail, but do not fail to make any attempt. If you come across any difficulty in registering/transferring name in voter list, write your difficulty in comments. We will have resolution in forum. We can and we will change the system