Posts tagged Indian Politics

General Elections 2009

Election Season is on full swing in Bharat. The dates have been announced. I’ll try to post some good articles covering the election. The General Elections of 2009 would have been a one-sided contest in favour of the opposition parties in Bharat but for the Indian media and the new biased Chief Election Commissioner, Mr Navin Chawla. The Indian media is working all out to project the success of present government, which everyone knows has been a failure. Just remember the number of terrorist attacks in Indian cities during last five years, the number of farmer suicides in the rural parts of the country, the number of corrupt ministers in the cabinet, and the amount of reservation made in educational institutes, based on caste and religion; you get the picture yourself. What matters for the present ruling party and the English media is that another son of the Gandhi family has to be made the future Prime Minister, without any laurels for doing any kind of public service. Ohh I forgot, he has got the right surname !!! 

But then lets remember the failures of this government and ask them what you achieved in last 5 years, rather than believing in the promises they are making to fulfil in next 5 years. They had the chance but they lost it..So throw them out. To conclude, I would just borrow from Mr Obama and ask you to  ”Vote for Change”!!!

P.S. Do go out and vote..!!!

Comments (2) »

After all..It is an Intellectual & Civilizational Fight..

Another gem from the pen of Tarun Vijay. The idea of a singular point of unity for every citizen in Bharat is what is required now. To fight the terrorism, no doubt we need a superior strategic and economic resources, but at first we need to start from the root level. The resource at this root level is mind…intellect…sense of pride…If the terrorists are brainwashed into Jihad, we must be brainwashed into patriotism..nationalism..cultural pride..

Read on..

Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/msid-3772663,flstry-1.cms

THE RIGHT VIEW

India battles to win

Tarun Vijay

29 Nov 2008, 1211 hrs IST


India knew about al-Qaida’s threat to attack Mumbai, but it played it down for apparent reasons of vote bank politics. A United States embassy’s communiqué issued in August 2006 had warned about India being a target of al-Qaida. Though it was issued cautioning about a possible attack around the Independence Day that year, it should have served as an alarm bell to the Indian establishment and activated them to gather more intelligence inputs on al-Qaida strategies on India.

The advisory had said: “The embassy has learned that foreign terrorists, possibly including al-Qaida, allegedly intend to carry out a series of bombing attacks in and around New Delhi and Mumbai in the days leading up to India’s Independence Day on August 15, 2006″. We knew that India had been appearing in the speeches of Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahirias as a ‘target’. In a message broadcast in April, 2006, bin Laden had referred to a “Crusader-Zionist-Hindu conspiracy against the Muslims”. But the government of India chose to play it down. As was reported in the Times of India.

The American warning had appeared in August 2006. But a meeting about it took place next year. The TOI reported on 7th August 2007 under the headline-’Centre plays down Qaida’s threat to India’, ‘A meeting attended by senior MHA officials, intelligence brass, SPG chief B V Wanchoo and Delhi’s commissioner of police Y S Dadwal, on Monday discussed the alleged threat from Al-Qaida.’ Quoting a senior official, it said that he tried to play down the issue but admitted that it had been discussed. “We assess everything threadbare and everyone should refrain from making a larger-than-life image of such threats, which can also prove to be wrong at times,” he said.

Proved to be wrong?

In fact TOI can be credited for having warned the nation a year before the attack came. The above quoted report had said, “Terrorism analysts universally agree that India’s growing closeness to the US may have put it in the crosshairs of the international terror group. The recent announcement of the nuclear deal would have sharpened the focus. ..India’s vulnerability stems from several factors. India is a naturally soft state, which makes it easier for terrorists.” Why did Indian government not take it seriously and sought to play it down?

Pray, what are we doing, have done or intend to do?

A united tricoloured face that’s what India needs today. Every colour and assertion merging into one signpost of our Indianness – the tricolour. Mumbai represents the best of Indian minds, the real secular spirit and entrepreneurship. Its time we salute that spirit and bow our heads before those valiant soldiers, Navy’s commandos and policemen who fought and laid their lives for a cause so dear to us all- India. Hemant Karkare, Vijay Salaskar, Ashok Kamte, Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan, Gajendra Singh are our nation’s heroes.

Let this moment inspire us to flutter tricolour atop our houses, offices, and work stations as a challenge and a victory sign to the cowards who attacked us thinking they can cow us down and instill fear in our hearts. Instead it has further reinforced our resolve to stay united and fight the weeds. How I wish that everything we do, whether creating a blog or buying a bike or a car, that must have an essential sign- the tricolour, like we have bindi or a cross or a 786 locket.

It’s not an emotional outburst but there are times when one has to forget the structural areas of frame worked worship to reach a greater god of a people. That, to me, can’t be anything else but Bharat that is India. If India survives our gods still may have a space to be in. We lost Kabul, Rawalpindi and Lahore. And our gods lost their space too. So be an atheist, if that suits you, but keep your faith in one icon, that’s India. Let a new Anand Math emerge against the invaders and let every colour that India wears be a part of it, as patriotically as tricolour inspires. While politicians failed, it’s the people and the soldiers who held the tricolour high and fluttering. And the nation saluted them with tears of pride and praise. Let this spirit be visible in other areas of national concerns too.

Ugly colours of politics

Congress and BJP leaders should have been seen together in Mumbai to underline signature of united Indians ready to battle and win. But shamefully even on such occasion, party politics took over and the PM chose to trivialize the togetherness, which didn’t occur.

This showed, once more, how ugly our politicians could become. That’s one reason common citizens have begun hating them and praying oh god, please get rid us of these irrelevant dons of the parliament. See the way ad campaigns of political parties have tried to encash the terror. Media houses and channels are playing in the hands of various political parties and their poll eve headlines catered to their political masters. It was so visible and apparent. One newspaper that campaigned against the Hindu Right as a Talibani propagandist, specially picking on Malegaon case, gave a headline-’as forces fought terrorists, BJP is busy seeking votes’. It’s more like a cheap line from a politically opponent’s pamphlet rather than a journalist’s report. If BJP was doing that, what were Sonia and Manmohan Singh doing in Mumbai and why their cohorts used full-page ads to use Mumbai terror to attack their opponent, mixing Kandhar with Mumbai? What was the relevance of it?

Attention diverted for vote banks?

And when time permits, there would be many questions that would have to be answered. Did India pay a heavy price of diverting all security attention to a Malegaon probe giving the Mumbai attackers an unattended space and time they needed? In an interesting reference to it, a highly reputed Army officer Lt. General Ashok Joshi (retd.) wrote,” The indirect cost of the Malegaon-blast probe — still climbing — is very considerable. It is no one’s case that the Malegaon blast probe is either unimportant or unnecessary. It appears, however, that the probe exclusively held the attention of the security apparatus until November 26, 2008, when the disaster occurred. This could well have been an unintended consequence, but it was terrible.”

Media’s ‘Gulag’

Then they say-India is at war. Really? When was it not in the last two decades? Do we have to form our opinion on the words of a de-nationalized media that use every such opportunity to introduce new clichés and idioms to increase their circulation and market brand value? Have you noticed the anchors on the TV screens whose theatrical maneuvers completely overshadowed the person who they were supposed to be interviewing and the ‘guests’ were simply used to have anchors pour their high-pitched speeches? It was so kiddish and morally downgrading that the entire episode of a serious jihadi war was reduced to a page three tamasha , that inadvertently helped Jihadis inside the hotel as the news analysts have now commented. Not a single channel or newspaper devoted a space to question why did it happen to us? None discussed Osama’s threats and the Islamic angle to the entire episode. So terrified and disoriented our media persons have become having ‘possessed’ by a ‘hate the right wing Hindutva phobia’. They simply avoided discussing the basic issues. Was the real motive of the Jihadi attackers to cripple our Economy? Or hurting our business? And terrifying the western visitors and investors? Damaging India’s reputation as a safe business centre? Were all these the real goals or just the means to achieve a distant aim?

The reporters whose every single line while reporting Malegaon was laced with ‘Hindu terrorism’ saw to it quite consciously not to mention ‘Islamic Jihadi’ even once in the passing. But there were efforts by a couple of media chatterers on the screen to mention ‘now we have Hindu terrorism too’ while discussing Mumbai’s agony! This hate attack of the seculars even in times of such a tragedy is as killing as were the gunshots of the Jihadis inside the Taj and Oberoi. And they have monopolised the channels and the print media turning them into virtual Gulags.

The same crowd which has been singularly responsible for providing shields to the jihadi terrorism and speaking in the abusive language against the nationalist saffron side, was most vocal to question why police is not being given the appropriate arsenal, sophisticated guns and a proper combat ready uniform. The same words were heard when parliament was attacked. Nothing happened afterwards and none remembered it either. Police remains a soft target for the seculars and security forces are denied any rise in the sixth pay scales on the eve of Diwali. That much for their concern for men in Khaki and Olive green. None, yes none of them tried to ask one simple question, why it happened?

What wrong India has done to al-Qaida or the terrorists’ organisations or their religious leaders that they should act in this horrendous manner? And is this the ‘first’ time, the very first and unique kind of an attack, which is the most ghastly so far? Why? And how? What had happened when the terrorists had attacked Akshar Dham? Do you remember the visuals and the commentaries and the reactions of the same old, seasoned and concerned glamorous media persons and leaders then?

What had happened when they had attacked the parliament and the members of parliament were holed up inside the central hall and the security forces fought a fierce gun battle on 13th December 2001? Were all those attacks just casual, old fashioned and without any trace of uniqueness? And this was too unique because Taj being Taj, a super high elite was involved in the tragic incident, which was made to reminisce in the dark hours of the active war zone how they had met their first girl friend in its heritage building?

Mumbai attack was like it had always been. Killings of the innocents and blasts before they prepared themselves to die.

Why?

Why they chose to kill our people even at the cost of their life? They were no small, ordinary thieves and supari-killers. Those who support their heinous crimes would call them ‘brave and committed’ men. Young, and ready to lay their lives for a cause so dear to them that they would forget the family bonds and a desire to live and enjoy this world. They were taught to prepare for a ‘big contribution’ to their faith and enjoy the after-life up there. They believed in every thing that was taught and did what they did.

Hence the question that must disturb us and make every Indian to seriously analyze and formulate a strategy is ‘why India is on their target?’

India hasn’t attacked them; on the contrary we always tried to project ourselves as friendly to Muslim countries even after getting insults and non-cooperation from them. Remember Rabat and the way Saudis and Malaysia has treated us and our people who are our blood and flesh. And the tightlipped Muslim countries during every war we fought. We are the victimes of their Jihad. Our land was bisected, our people were uprooted, killed and insulted, and our temples razed and land grabbed. Yet we chose the dialogue path. Then what’s the reson of this ‘revenge’? The answer lies in their ideological hatred for us, which has to be discussed on the intellectual level.

Weak leaders, strong commoners

Unfortunately India never had such a weak ideological and political leadership. During the Moghuls, Portuguese and the British, we had best of leaders who led the society through literature, culture, religious reformism, helping organize resistance to the invaders and had no confusion regarding the friends and the foes. They were definitely helped by the moneyed elite too, but the moneybags were never allowed to influence decisions. Their biggest forte was credibility and an uncompromising, predictable behaviour.

Today the biggest casualty of the Indian national movement has been the credibility gap and the growing influence of the moneyed, alienated elite with a colonized mindset that compels to convert our language and purposes into a secular framework before any inclusion in their invite list. The Congress, used to be a grand old alliance with a strong nationalist pitch. We have lost it to the same pressure groups that stand for a compromised hue of the alienated. And BJP is still fighting for its right-full space.

Any war is first fought intellectually and then on the grounds. India is facing its worst ever ideological war since the days of Shivaji and Guru Govind Singh. The attackers are not coming here to loot or colonise us. They are here to attack what they still perceive a Hindu India that has to be broken to expand their school of thought and faith. It’s happening not because we have offended them. It’s happening for just being what we are. And we have begun to assert our individuality, our distinguished way of life, within our precincts. And that’s intolerable to them.

The temple priests of Somnath or the Acharyas of Nalanda hadn’t gone to Turkistan or the barren lands of the Arabia to offend them and invite their wrath. We were always attacked for being just what we were. Hence this fight can’t be replied without going into the real causes of the war and preparing an intellectual resistance that strengthens the minds before that empowers the sinews. That has to be an inclusive bond defining cultural and civilisational stream. Stress on the elements that unite rather than those which divide.

This war requires forging a united Indian resistance based on the love for our motherland and the elements that express her glory. We must ensure that the different faiths of worship do not get into a conflict with the patriotic fervour and we have shown, we can do it successfully, many times before. 1857 is one shining example of that. We showed it in 1971 and in Kargil too. We WILL show it this time too, come what may.

The author is the Director, Dr Syamaprasad Mookerjee Research Foundation.

I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did.. Any comments are welcome..

Comments (1) »

Reactions of a common man after 26th November 2008!!

As I followed the turn of events which unfolded in Mumbai after the night of 26th November 2008, my emotions ranged from one extreme to another. First of all, the feeling was of Shock…then it turned into Disbelief..then into Horror.. then into Prayers..then into Sadness..then into Frustration..then into Anger..then into Rage..!!

First of all, I salute all the men in uniform who laid down their lives to protect the lives of common man and also those who fought and finally killed the Islamist terrorists who attacked on Mumbai. I hope the country never forgets their bravery and sacrifice.

Right now, what I feel is that we need a change..The whole country needs a change..The system needs a change.. A change from the current creed of politicians.. Do we deserve a Prime Minister who was as always “shocked” by the terrorist attack..?? Even after more than 70 attacks in last 6 months, he just feels a shock, nothing more than that!! While hundreds of common citizens dies in terrorist attacks which happens every month in some part of our country, our leaders continue to live peacefully and becoming filthy rich under Z+ security. To top this, the deputy CM of Maharashtra says ” it is small incident in such a big city like Mumbai”. Is he a warm blooded human who can feel and think or a cold blooded animal with no ability to think.

What are we waiting for? Why don’t we act?Why still we think that we have to diplomatically correct? why still we are asking Pakistan to help us in investigation? What then is the use of having the 4th largest military force in the world? Is this the way we will join the league of superpowers of the world? Is not time to say Enough is Enough?

The country doesn’t need Gandhi and Nehru anymore. Bharat now needs Subhash Chandra Bose and Sardar Patel !!!

Leave a comment »

Why are Bharatiyas angry??

This is the second article by Tarun Vijay, which I am reproducing here on this blog. He has once again struck a chord with the sentiments and feelings of millions of Hindus/Bhartiyas, which is clearly reflected by the number of comments, mostly compliments, this article received when it was published on TOI website. This article is well researched, rational, and thought provoking. I completely agree with what he has said, by clearly stating out the facts and then deriving the rightful conclusions. Read on:

THE RIGHT VIEW

Why are Hindus angry?

18 Nov 2008, 1136 hrs IST, Tarun Vijay

Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/3726631.cms

In Srinagar, a Muslim women’s organization – the Dukhtaran-e-Millat – vows to impose the strict Islamic code on women through violence and declares that it is in the interests of women. The leader of this outfit, Asiyah Andrabi, was jailed several times for working against the nation and for being a conduit for money to jihadi groups who used that help to kill Hindus and create disaffection among people against India. The US State Department Report of 1995 held a Dukhtaran-e-Millat activist responsible for a parcel bomb blast at the BBC office in Srinagar in which one person was killed and two injured.


The DeM has recently been linked to certain money laundering cases. Andrabi was booked under POTA (Prevention of Terrorism Act) for receiving ISI money through hawala channels. Whenever she speaks against India, there is no emotion or any sense of regret.

She was never subjected to a narco test nor did the media feel anything bad about her. Instead, women’s groups interviewed her, called her the “new face of Muslim feminism”, and glossy magazines splashed her interviews with a tinge of revolutionary romanticism.

For Indian seculars, the Srinagar crowd working against India brings added fizz, a thrill and a heroism that has to be “understood” rather than condemned. Serious academic columns are published saying that if they are so passionately and aggressively pursuing separatism, why shouldn’t we give the Kashmir valley to them?

It’s only when a lady monk is killed in Kandhamal or arrested in Nashik and appears to be wearing saffron rather than green that expressions become stern, the law becomes the guiding force, narco tests are immediately ordered and before anything can be even remotely established, the person is pronounced guilty. No women’s organization comes out openly to say she is a woman and hence the police must protect her honour and religious obligations at all cost.

Her father says she is innocent. No one gives any importance to that statement.

She cooperates during the narco test and nothing incriminatory is proved. The police say she practices yoga, hence the narco test didn’t work.

The bike, the RDX, the targets – nothing is proved. Yet, she is tortured in police custody.

The women’s commission that swung into action when an item girl used it to get cheap publicity and hot assignments maintains a studied silence.

The Human Rights Commission remains unfazed and the red sirens of the Marxist class look the other way. They had been demanding a pardon for Afzal although the Supreme Court convicted him. But the issues involved were of secular nature; hence they had to speak.

Nobody still knows what Pragya actually did or didn’t do. She has to be severely dealt with just because the colour she wears is not registered as secular in the government’s registry of protection where rapists, extortionists and scandalous criminals get a cabinet berth and a murder accused jailbird becomes a chief minister for being on the correct side politically.

First they said an army officer used 60 kg of RDX to blow up the Samjhauta Express. Then the denial comes; no RDX was used, it was ammonium nitrate, oh no perhaps IEDs. Then the Mecca Masjid blasts are linked with Malegaon, then the Hyderabad police issue an official statement that nothing has been found to link the two. The motorbike, the disfigured numbers on the chassis, the absconding person, the real mastermind, the saffron terror guru … Remember when the Kanchi Shankaracharya was arrested, what kind of charges were levelled against him? Rape, murder, financial fraud and womanizing. And women came foreword to issue statements about how they were “lured”. What happened afterwards? Even “nothing” won’t convey the nothingness of the entire plot.

But the damage to the great seat of Hindu reverence had been done.
After Kanchi and the Kandhamal murders, a new tool in form of Hindu terrorism has been crafted to make the Batla House terror gang happy.


Not a single Hindu will ever condone terrorism. It’s not in our genes. Our blood group in this matter is different. If someone does it he is guilty of doing an un-Hindu act. Anyone caught and proven guilty must be severely dealt with. But why humiliate a majority community that defines the character of the nation for election gains?

Words, cacophony, a celebrative secular media’s new 24-hour preoccupation – lynch the saffron, light the party fire.

Just one incident and look how Batla House terrorism, Jamia’s protective belligerence, Assam blasts, Pakistani flags carried in Bodo areas by Muslim infiltrators, the Ram Setu destruction and affidavits that humiliate Hindus, everything got under cover. Only the newly manufactured “Hindu terrorism” is reigning in the national debate as a new fashion statement.

The invention of “Hindu terrorism” helped the government get out of a defensive shell and be extraordinarily active to crack a whip against “bad elements”.

It had never displayed this action-oriented thrill when the Delhi blasts occurred or the Jaipur blasts claimed more than 60 lives. No Maulana was arrested or caricatured in the media as the bloody green terror guru or ghastly Islamic terrorism.

No, they said, terror has no religion hence these blasts, though done with a holy book surrounded by AK47s, and long quotes from it to justify the blasts and the killings of Hindus shouldn’t be sourced to religion. These must not be explained away as Islamic terror, but just the work of some misguided people who are giving a bad name to a peaceful, brotherly way of worship.

Fine.

But when they see saffron, everyone loves to tie them with the speeding bus of law enforcement and constitutional propriety and beat them black and blue to prove a secular manliness of dhimmitude variety.

Pragya says she was tortured in police custody but no one took any notice of that. Why?

Even the most dreaded women criminals have been accorded human rights protection. Pragya is no criminal, she doesn’t advocate violence against the state, she is not a traitor, she doesn’t impose any kind of obscurantist code on women nor does she use acid, like Andarabi, to make other women fear her dictates. She has not said she is out to kill others to bring about any kind of religious order. But she is tortured and no one says it a gross violation of human rights. Is she not to be given the protection that every woman is entitled to?

Those who write against the nation, insult our heritage and support secession, get applauds and awards. But those who die for the nation and protect the civilisational flow are tortured in police custody.

That’s the brevity and power of a state that’s in reality headed by a woman and is being actually run by another.

More than 60,000 Hindus have been killed by Islamic jihadis, in the name of their religion and not a single Hindu stood up to say: Enough is enough, I will now see the wicked are punished and innocents are protected.
There is a list of more than 200 Hindu temples razed or desecrated in the Kashmir valley. No Hindu Kashmiri vowed to establish a Hindu terror group to take revenge because the state apparatus has failed to provide them safety.


Seema, a six-year-old girl, was found lying unconscious in a pool of blood in Doda when Islamic terrorists came to her house in the thick of night at 2.30 am, woke up her father, mother and her 11-year-old brother, killing them after brutal torture. They used big knives to cut them into pieces.

Still no Hindu terror group was formed to teach them a lesson.

A two-and-a-half-year old boy who was crying for milk as his mother was shot dead by Islamic terrorists in Wandhama attracted the attention of the jihadis and the bullets silenced him too.

Even then, Hindus didn’t become terrorists.

The great socialist leader Ram Manohar Lohia use to say – India has three dreams – Ram, Krishna and Shiva. The abodes, the principal temples of the global Hindus dedicated to these three dreams of India were destroyed and desecrated by Islamic invaders. Go to Google and see how the Shiva temple in Kashi has been turned into a mosque in such a style that the pillars of the old Hindu temple remain clearly visible to show Hindus that here was once the temple they used to worship, which has been converted into a mosque.

Yet for the last four centuries no Hindu has turned a terrorist to take revenge in Kashi.

Now when elections are underway, the government is in shambles showing utter unworthiness to govern and protect patriotic people. Suddenly every single person arrested for terrorism is a saffron, a Hindu and nothing is appearing on the channels or in Sunday magazine features except the “grave danger of Hindu terrorism” and the army getting the saffron “tilak” of terror.

Even the Ghaznis, Ghauris and Abdalis haven’t done so much of character assassination of a majority community as this government has done just to garner a few Muslim votes.

Is it fair?

Will it not create a reaction among those who have been chanting mantras of global peace and fraternity and praying for the welfare of all, irrespective of faith or colour? Pushed to a corner, restricted from crying and blackholed like the Jews during the Nazi regime, will it not be a bit too naive to expect that Hindus will remain silent and offer their necks for the secular sacrificial ritual of election gains? Their temples are bombed, their children are killed, their property is looted, their orchards are burnt, their motherland is disfigured and assaulted, yet the state declares a war on their sensitivities, the media muffles their voice and bans all for a for them to express their views. On the contrary, it shows the victims as aggressors, humiliating them in the eyes of the real attackers.

Nature abhors such Siberian gags. Peace is strengthened by justice alone.

The way Pragya has suddenly become a hero must make sane people sit up and take note of the wave passing through the Hindu heartland. Tsunamis don’t send advance emails before they strike.

The author is the Director, Dr Syamaprasad Mookerjee Research Foundation.

With the latest terrorist attack on Mumbai, which will be long remembered for the sheer audacity and magnitude of scale, I believe it is now time to rise up and take a tough stance. Bharat doesn’t need any more Nehru’s and Gandhi’s, it needs likes of Subhash Chandra Bose and Sardar Patel. The government must make a strong point that terrorism will not be tolerated any more in this country. To begin with, it must immediately carry out the death penalty imposed on Afzal Guru, the mastermind of Parliament attack.

Any comments on this post are most welcome.

Comments (1) »

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.