Whose Kanhaiya was he Anyways

I have never shied from expressing contrarian views. Then why should today be any different. That Kanhaiya would appeal to me was always a foregone conclusion. I hate jesters and I hate students who dabble in politics and I also hate vehemently playing to the gallery and vending half truths or blending fact with fiction. But in this case it upsets me no end to think that many an educated person is lending ears to Kanhaiya. A glib talker, with a demeanour reminiscent of his mofussil town roots, which seemingly don’t threaten his metro counterparts, he is feeding strong on the errors of commission of the BJP and the ham handed manner in which their  crack teams have handled the situation. BJP acting in concert with its youth wing the ABVP, set out to demonise a relatively unknown student but landed up heroising him.

One thing is clear, JNU is offering an easy to pursue curriculum to it's students else the time they spend in dhaba politics would certainly not be at their disposal. The manner in which they are debating stupid political issues is clearly indicative of a lack of rigor in the curriculum. And also indicative of the fact that they are basking is some pseudo intellectualism which when at its best gets you a seat in the civil service of India, by becoming a part of which, you do what the government has done to JNU, that is charge you with obsolete sections on sedition, usually not maintainable in court of law and perpetuating this vicious cycle of events.

I can never imagine students of premium technical institutions like IITs or IIMs doing what is happening in JNU. In these colleges the curriculum is so rigorous that you cannot think of anything but academics.  The narrative is completely different for humanities where lack of rigour encourages students to play truant, teachers to stay away from teaching and both to dabble in fringe politics. These streams I think all over the country have this reputation. The political parties also are eager to take student leaders under their patronage. And given that politics is one of the most lucrative professions these days - the wealth accumulated by the Gandhis, or Mayawati or Jayalalitha or that amassed by Vadra in such short span is a feat that no business man with even Buffett’s acumen can ever dream of - he who is thick skinned enough, will surely like to join it.

The above not-withstanding, I am not advocating that students should not be politically active or politically conscientious. They are future of the country, and their voice must be heard in moulding the future of the country. But main stream politics with political parties openly supporting student factions on educational campuses is a premature proposition. I think the Lyngdoh Committee also had similar recommendations. The commission was unambiguous in stating in Cl 6.3 : "Dissociation of Student Elections and Student Representation from Political Parties".

Particularly when students as a class are inherently recidivist rebels. Their brand of politics is all about rabble rousing and rowdyism. Their age is such. And this is the innate strain that they take with them when they are catapulted into main stream politics from student activism. And that precisely is the reason for our politicians behaving the way they do. Hence, one way to create a different genre of politics is by banning actual politics in these breeding grounds themselves. But to ensure, that opinion of youth is not stifled and their voices are not muffled, and their participation in the making of the future of the country is not curbed, universities must invent formats of the shadow politics. A genre of clean politics, consensual politics. politics of polite and intelligent debate, of dissent and of decent discourse.

As for Kanhaiya - the Bhumihar from Begusarai - he is savvy enough to keep shifting the goal posts with an adeptness to avoid coming in the direct line of fire. And BJP and it's youth wing ABVP stands in clay footed jeopardy to the 360 degree shoot and scoot by Kanhaiya. In his post bail speech he in a bold and brazen fashion mocked Modi and gave a completely new dimension to the whole debate. The initial issue was simple. It was about anti-India slogans. He turned the whole thing into pro and anti JNU and pro and anti development debate.  Whether he supported sloganeering that encouraged dismemberment of India and whether he memorialised Agzal Guru as martyr were clearly issues he completely skirted. On the other hand he gave a nouveau and poetic twist to Azadi reflecting bourgeois aspirations that resounded well with his audience. Punctuating his diatribe with anecdotal evidence to an audience that continuously cheered him and jeered the establishment.

The Antics of Smriti Irani

Lot of thinking people have been critical about Smriti Irani's speech due to the theatrical content and antics. They may not be wrong. I go a step further. I don't even like rhetoric. I like Just facts which also should be presented shorn of superfluous verbiage with an approach that is brutally rational. But demagoguery has existed world-wide. Hasn't it? Antics also prevail. The US Elections bear such an eloquent testimony to it. Look at Clinton and Trump how they dramatically gesticulate to the gallery and get even with each other. So why condemn Smriti?

The above notwithstanding, no one can say, she was not prepared. She had done her homework. She was thorough with her facts. She had even sequenced them properly. In a country where even the Parliament is rowdy, and rabble rousing is a pass time in which even the fully employed find time to indulge, where facts get morphed with fiction so quickly, such orchestrated rebuttals are the only way to get your point across. 

This time the walk-out was because the opposition was stumped by this sudden volley of facts, temper, emotion and sentimentalism. Kharge to khada hi raha gaya.

The Relevance of Mahabharata

Each passing day as events unfold, I become more and more enamoured by the Mahabharata. How contextual it was then 5,000 years ago, and how so relevant it is even today. If the Mahabharata took place, why has man not learned from it, if its importance is allegorical, how could Vyas so successfully perpetuate the context.

Sonia Gandhi I would imagine is worse than Dhritarashtra. Actually, Dhritrashtrianism is usually a male trait. Women are more sensitised to the limitations of competence of their children. They may love them with their life, but unlike men for whom a child is en extension of personal ego, they are always reluctant to foist them on a platform where they will not fit or worthily justify.

I was once on a flight with RK Pachauri. I think I was traveling to Frankfurt. I was in business class and he was in First Class. I wonder, what is contributes to be able to afford first class. It is quite an irony, that not for profit organisations can always spend more than those for profit.

By qualification, he is an industrial engineer.  Some of them are hoaxes in the name of engineers. He cooked up data.

He has managed weird awards including one from the President of Somaliland. This is called being resourceful in India and you should be able to manage the people who matter. And the people who matter can be managed in India only in one way : late jaao.

I am enamoured by the bold girl who is taking up cudgels against a figure like Pachauri. I pity her for her plight, as Pachauri is one of the ugliest persons I have come across in life. A 74 year old left side hair right side combing man, trying to use his position to force sexual favours.

Men : work hard. Do sport. Build your personalities, build some character, be bold and above all, be men of conviction, and you will have girls falling all over you right from your teens. In India, mothers coax boys to just study, and pass exams or wrangle positions by sycophancy. Then they use these positions to exploit girls. A small percentage of girls is willing to make a compromise in return for a simplified life at work place, most others detest. Some take a stand like this girl did.

But what a pity, she seems to be fighting a lone battle. Women are not supporting her, and shamefully, men are also not supporting her. A man not standing up for a woman's honour is like being a tacit accomplice in the molestation of your daughter, wife or mother. 

It is always an ecosystem that is to blame, but it saddens me nonetheless.

The Judiciary needs to Work more

Since in India, Judiciary is held in high esteem, and there are cultural issues of not questioning why the Judicial system of the country is failing the country, the failure of this arm of governance has far reaching consequences. 

While exoneration of a recklessly driving Khan is widely evident failure, there are many more nuanced ones that we don't see. One example is the NPAs of various banks. Today, particularly the PSU banks are sinking due to NPAs, their plummeting stock prices too have started reflecting this, but if the judicial processes were smarter and swifter and structure of the legal system not meant to protect the defaulter, the NPAs would have been less than half. 

What you treat as NPA to a large extent depends on the judicial / legal system of the country. In our country, it is almost impossible to nail the big defaulters. Then it is upto to the system, which loan it starts to recognise as non performing, and decides to no longer chase. If judicial system was quicker, what the banks recognise as NPA today would be perhaps less than half.

But who hauls up the judiciary. They are still taking 3 months summer vacations like nursery toddlers.

BEATING THE RETREAT : OUR SOLDIERS ROCK

Beating the Retreat : Our Soldiers Rock 

While historically and figuratively, it is the joy of retreating to the barracks after the last bugler sounds his bugle. But literally It is a musical extravaganza that I always treat my senses to. And this years' was a pleasant departure from the past, with stiffened by training soldiers deciding to showcase their own flair for the music more than just playing colonial era martial music. So it was excellent overall, with particularly the BSF's richly caparisoned camels charming me the most. It seems, they are fighting the sun from setting. 

But in public functions, I always wonder, why our politicians who are usually plonked on the front row seats, sit with such sullen expressions on their face. These politicians who don't tire smiling out of sycophancy infront of their bosses don't even twitch much less smile even on occasions like the Republic Day parade or the beating the retreat, where one is filled with pride for valour, training and excellence of our armed forces. 

A cadaverous Pranab Mukherjee barely managed to dismount his vintage carriage and kept his left shoulder drooping in a lousy posture reeking of mental disengagement throughout the function. Modi a media marvel was so overly conscious of his mien under gaze of the cameras that he kept tracking the cameras from the corner of his eyes. The stoic Rajnath Singh stuck to his arms folded posture, with never even a finger moving to acknowledge to the harmony, tonality or timbre of the beautiful music played. The fossilised Kalraj Misra. I don't know who invites him for all functions. He is always there with a constipated expression of when this misery will end. 

But who cares. The day was carried by the soldier who did it with the flourish that is expected of him. And of course the last tune - Saare Jahaan Se Achha - as expected, played together by all bands as the grand finale stole the show.

ON THE QUESTION OF TOLERANCE

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BzdnGoNv7vAiRE1ScGNZMExBWTg/view?usp=sharing

A sad day for India, Lalu a convicted Politician wins

To me, the outcome of the Bihar Elections has been both discordant and grating. I am disheartened although not dismayed, as the outcome was a highly probable one. Nitish- Lalu combine had ensured vote portability. A large majority seeking development voted for Nitish, and the more parochial ones voted for Lalu. I would actually have been very pleasantly surprised if the MGB, the grand alliance, so skilfully coalesced by Nitish Kumar would have lost. That would have signalled perhaps a good departure from caste based politics to clean politics. Of course the question then would be, is BJP clean, and the answer is no.

The word communal has, due to protracted overuse by various political parties particularly the Congress, to brand the right brigade has acquired a pejorative connotation, but actually communalism is the back bone of democratic processes. A democracy is all about issues of the a community or commune, which does not mean a disperse religious group. 

Electorates world over are wise, because collective wisdom is better than individual. But it is distraughtly when collective wisdom glosses over anomalies and legitimises criminality making a travesty of a judicial system.

The latest example is Lalu Prasad Yadav leading the MGB to a landslide victory, despite the fact that he is convicted in the Fodder Scam case and was actually on bail while he was addressing rallies.

THE REAL REASON

At IIT Kanpur, I had a Prof of Sociology, whose father in Law had been the President of India. The latter having the reputation of scholarliness, I once asked my Prof if he was in awe of not the rank - as I knew he would never be - but the scholarliness of his Father in Law.  “Just a mediocre scholar” is how he referred to his father in law, purely in his objective assessment and not out of any prejudice or disregard for the person.

That is when I learnt the term ‘mediocre scholar’. I think, all academics returning their awards are merely mediocre scholars. How can you possibly return that you have already enjoyed for so long. Something that is just a belated recognition of your erudition or contribution to society as the case may be. If this was given by a King, you could perhaps return it, but given by a democratically elected government means, it is recognition given by the people. You could perhaps return the monetary prize which ironically most scholars are not returning. 

We mostly fail to identify the root cause of the problem. All this has been triggered by the Dadri incident. I don’t understand how this incident is different from a murder of a person on the suspicion that he has stolen the neighbours hen or buffalo. I know, in villages, stealing buffaloes is not uncommon, and often leads to murders. How is Dadri different from a murder or lynching of a person who has protested on his land being encroached by a local ganglord, or, in a more urbane setting, not served a drink after closing hours of the bar, or how is this different from killing for wrong parking of a car? How is Dadri more intolerant than killing of an RTI activist for demanding information that he is entitled to by law? What provokes such reaction from the literati today? Is it triggered by a notion of elitism……

Why were awards not returned by after Godhra or Taj Bombing or the mutilation of the bodies of soldiers by Pak forces.

Have such incidents after a communal flare up never happened in India? Have such incidents never happened in any other country? Is there some government that can guarantee that it can completely curb such betrayal of human values and prevent any such madness from happening during their regimes.

What are the two issues that need to be dealt at this point of time :

1.Why do such incidents happen?

2.What is the trigger for this hue and cry now and award returning wave?

Such incidents happen, because there is a general belief in the people that there is a weak rule of law in the country regardless of the government that is in power. One can get away with impunity, should one have numbers with him. The law will be slow if not subservient to them if they have some numbers, political power or pelf backing them. In a democracy, numbers always give legitimacy to the most irrational of demands.

The trigger for the hue and cry is not the sudden deterioration of the situation. It is the silence of a PM who is otherwise so verbose that he is always talking. Earlier there was a PM who was not only dumb but docile. Now we have one, who misses not one occasion to proclaim that he is a braveheart. But his silence too may also not be without reason and may be calibrated to play to a particular constituency. And I think all protests are for that silence.

India must create her own Silk Routes

A very large class of authors of all hues have hinted in their work that India is intellectually richer than China. And vast bodies of works which have examined the past for their historical  and allegorical importance have indicated the same. While on such issues, hard empirical data may never be available, the purpose of this blog piece of mine is not really that. While the edge India may have in that arena not-withstanding, there is clearly another where China eminently excels India today, as much it did in the past and that is Geo-Politics.

While in the blog that I penned just a few days ago, I did say, just like the Soviets, the Indian army must modernize and sweat while in peace, so that it can be galvanised into action when needed in no time, just like Russia did, to dash the American dream of hegemonising Syria. 

Having said that, I believe, more than a well oiled, fleet footed and modern fighting machine, what India needs is a make over of its egregiously week willed geopolitical strategy. In fact it needs a complete re-think and make over, something that took off well with Modi’s ascendancy, but lost steam and direction somewhere down the road.

Post the cartographic mis-adventure that the British did with India, just before they decided to leave India to her destiny, carving out an amorphous Pakistan and Bangladesh from within her, one of the most brazen exercises of creation of nation states based not on ethnicity (which is usually the case) but based on religion, a robust geo-political strategy has become an imperative for the following reasons :

1.Creating a sphere of influence so that wars don’t take place, there is peace and prosperity

2.Ensuring that the 1.25 bn and growing Indians have more land and resources tied to land to live on than to constantly jostle with each other for the same piece 

Geopolitics today is a very subtle art of diplomacy and can help create a virtual sphere of influence and an ecosystem that attenuates the pressure on finite indigenous resources.

Vietnam, Lagos and Cambodia were under the Chinese sphere of influence once upon a time. Nepal and Tibet were under the Indian sphere of influence. While India has lost both, China has gained not only them, but Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Mongolia, parts of south eastern Russia, Pakistan, PoK, several African countries and much more.

While the American sphere of influence once upon a time followed its US Dollar denominated aid, direct or indirect military intervention, the Chinese model is far more sustainable as it rode on foreign investments, trade and the Chinese diaspora, which is what I call the modern silk routes.

Despite India being the spiritual beacon for centuries to several countries of SE Asia including Japan and China, she could never create her own silk routes, and consequently failed to perpetuate her sphere of influence. Despite her people being personally more productive and innovative, the state failed them, right from the time of Nehru, when a protracted political mis-judgement inflicted a humiliating defeat on India in the 1962 Indo-China war. 

If we want to alleviate poverty and suffering from the country and if we seek to provide a basic standard of living to the poor, whose number is increasing every year, the modern silk routes that we create which help us exploit resources overseas and would be as important a factor as growing the domestic economy.

Russia fights for Hegemony

Russia under Putin is a country under a virulent warrior. While this is known that he drives her like his personal fiefdom, he also tries to lord over her neighbours, like even the mighty Czars would not have. 

The Syrian war theatre and the IS unified command, both have fuelled Russia’s immense need to one, make the brute military power that she was always known for felt again and two, even revive the hegemony that she had long lost in international matters. And this under the leadership of a man who seems to have reclaimed her for himself, as though she was always his a ominous development. 

While Putin is known to flaunt his rippling though ageing biceps, that he would do the same for his country was something that I had not imagined. Will this herald the revival of the cold war era is something that we have to wait and watch. I am certain, had it been Bush at the helm of American decision making, the Cold war would have by now been escalated to a Hot war, with the American forces standing face to face with Russians in Syria. 

What both countries - Russia and USA - have very intelligently managed is, their fight for hegemony has always been offshore - Vietnam first, then Afghanistan and now Syria. They have diligently managed to keep the war off their own grounds. Putin may well have been itching for an opportunity of this sort. He had strolled into Crimea and Ukraine and stays on unchallenged. But both these shameless incursions were localised affairs. Now he is taking USA head on under the ruse of helping the Bashar regime on invitation. 

With the annexation of Crimea, Putin added more than 2 mn Russians in one stroke to a country, demographically de-growing and reeling under a death rate of 14.7 double that of the United States. 

But there is a lesson to learn from this. When in peace, his army was sweating. And that is why he took just hours to mobilize jets into the Syrian sky, and Navy into the Caspian sea. India should also use her time of peace to rally its strength and conserve it to use later as a deterrent for border ingressions and skirmishes. I would not recommend Indian army marching into Tibet or annexing Pakistan, even though I personally believe them to be natural corollaries of acquired power, and the only way to ensure lasting peace. But the bloodshed and loss of lives that will bring this about is something that I will never be willing to swallow.

Negativity gets Front Page Prominence in Newspapers

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BzdnGoNv7vAiTmM4VDJQNG5ycms/view?usp=sharing

My Interview with Thomson Reuters

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUdQebcAaMU

RELIGIOUS TOLERANCE

RELIGIOUS INTOLERANCE

Trusting the law and respecting the process of Law, is a very simple way of channelising your anger and curbing intolerance. 

While there is once again a raging debate on the “Agnes of God” in quick sequel of the beef eating controversy, my view in such issues is simple. If a community at large finds some content or conduct offensive, then it should not be done or displayed.  After all, that is what democracy is all about. But it is important to, with certainty ascertain, that the community is actually offended, and it is not some vociferous fringe elements, trying to catapult themselves to a position of leadership  for personal gains or seek political mileage by bandying the band wagon of intolerance to some form of expression.

It is also queer, questioning the existence of God per se is not blasphemous. Even if it is in some cultures, at least the believers, but for the fanatic muslims or Islamites, have learnt to live with that scepticism. What intrigues me most is, if people can live with scepticism on the very idea of God, why does an allegedly aberrant depiction pique communal sensitivities

  

Jurisprudence : Besides, both groups, those who question, in toto, or in the name of art, and those who want to decisively quell that questioning, don't have faith in the law, and the law does not act sou moto, but keeps waiting for the situation to get ugly, before it gets galvanised into action.

If only would people trust the system and have faith in the law taking its course to punish the people who flout it, such incidents of mob fury and justice will get automatically weeded out. The fact of the matter is, mob fury, or community justice is meted out only when the perception of systemic dys-functionality has become deeply set in the minds of the people.

Those you suspected that beef was stored and consumed in a families house, could have lodged an FIR with the concerned police station. And the police should have taken action as per law. But they did not. Because, to gain cheap popularity, the chief patron of the state, the father of the CM of the state would invariably have instructed the police to not entertain such complaints against the muslims, whose messiah he wants to portray himself as. And similarly, the champions of the sentiments of the majority faith, who have always questioned the politics of appeasement, also went overboard taking the law in their hands, once again as they suspected that law will not act.

When I was a class 12 student, a friend of my father in the police services told him that Mulayam Singh had clearly instructed them to not file any FIR against any Kanpur Muslim family for theft of electricity. Similar special status was conferred on the Yadavs also, the community that Mulayam himself hails from. And favouritism is not shrouded. It happens openly, for if it is shrouded, then the electoral benefit that can be reaped from such political brazenness will be far less. 

What a shattered self-concept we have?

Today the front page of ET, the leading Indian financial newspaper screamed, Maggi safe in the UK but not in India, as though it was taunting Indian FDA.

Something, which the westerners, the Canadians and the British can eat, of course it is too good for the Indians to eat. And how dare they fault it? And mind you, this is not what the west is saying, this statement fraught with surprise, and as much animation as intrigue is emanating from the Indian media. Instead of lauding the Indian FDA for scrupulously testing a product as per Indian regulations, they now choose to be disdainful about it, in view of the acceptance of the product in some western markets. Is this not exactly what Nestle India wants at this point of time?

When the US FDA bans and Indian pharmaceutical company even though the British FDA and other FDAs continue to buy from it, we don’t ridicule the US FDA, on the contrary we laud their exacting standards, feel enchanted by their rigor and feel obliged to commend their grandstanding.

Another example :

A couple of days ago, I was at the pre-admission acceptance talk of a British University organized by the Chopras – an agency of great repute in academic facilitation. The speaker, a young man from the international placement cell of the university was addressing a small crowd of Indian students seeking or aspiring to obtain admission in this UK University. Just for comfort and first hand inputs they had invited an Indian origin alumnus also for the interaction. While the British spoke with flawlessly structured chain of thoughts, confirming the hours that he must have toiled before he spoke, the Indian was tentative and even somewhat disdainful about his own roots and origins.

I asked a very simple question on what the type and standard of the accommodation would be. This Indian said “by Indian standards, it is 5 star accommodation.” To be candid, regardless of the general condition in India, the Indian 5 star hotels are far superior to the European hotels as they are built as pockets of excellence. But assuming, this Indian alumnus spoke metaphorically, he was still pejorative about India and his uncalled for comment reflected a weak self-concept.

I agree it is not easy to change this. Such feelings are not only deeply ingrained into us, they get reinforced umpteen times a day by all that goes around us. But that is where personal strength of character comes into play.

Thai Airlines off load a Rude Traveller

Today, Thai Airways flight from Bangkok to Delhi, which was already on the run way for take off, taxied back to position to off-load a rowdy passenger.

This upstart of Delhi’s belly, allegedly, asked some cabin crew, who was struggling to reason with his wife, that their infant child was too big for the basinet, to “shut up”. It turned out, as per the Thai people ‘shut up” is not only impolite, but also an act of hostility.

Since the flight was still taxiing, the “shut-up” impropriety was reported by crew to the captain and by the captain to the ATC, and the latter determined that the flight could return to off-load the passenger.

A couple of co-passengers intervened, but the TG staff was adamant, despite an apology, albeit a delayed one, the family was off-loaded. When I argued to not off-load, the chief flight purser with hands folded kneeled by my seat, and explained the peril of flying off with a hostile passenger on board. Interestingly, he went on to explain, such problems were experienced more on the Delhi and Calcutta flights and not so much on the Hyderabad and Bangalore bound flights.

In India, both the organized and un-organized private sector un-excepted, people are becoming increasingly more aggressive. Democracy, civil rights movements, and public school education, all together are seemingly failing to inculcate a sense of sobriety, somberness and decency in the people. While cinema halls are increasingly getting replaced by multiplexes, yet the conduct of the audience is becoming increasingly pedestrian than elite.

North of the Vindhyas particularly, there is too much of un-necessary aggression, something that this part of the country can certainly do without. In shopping malls, cinema halls, eating places, fetes et all, even the hoi-polloi struts around with a very un-called for swagger, something that really threatens women, works to the discomfiture of the old and challenged, triggers parental anxiety, and necessitates worthless men to act as worthy chaperons.

We also tend to confuse, aggressiveness with assertiveness. We believe, if we are not aggressive, intimidating or pompous, we cannot be assertive and would not be taken seriously.

This mentality clearly does not augur well for a civilized society. In fact it has an ominous butterfly effect. I have often seen my lady colleagues become un-necessarily angry in traffic and parking lots or at crowded entry points, as they believe, womanly dignity will not take them anywhere in a society that understands only aggression. While I know, that notion is not completely correct, yet it is not wrong either. If you wait for your turn with dignity, your turn continues to elude you. If, you nudge, poke, scorn and elbow, you at least get your turn.

There is plethora of empirical evidence that heightened aggression leads to conflict. And that aggression is not at all genetic but acquired. While lot of people seems to retract just before the conflict becomes irreconcilable, nevertheless the whole process is very consuming.

The Thais are very polite people. Sometimes, we may confuse their politeness with submissiveness, and their mannerisms with obsequiousness, but that would be a blunder.

I have lots of Bihari friends. They are very polite and decorous. But they are not push-overs. And push coming to shove, they may even not fight shy of pulling the trigger, but would not deign to be un-decorous. I have several Punjabi friends, great people if you know them, but in anonymity they take an aggressive posture at the drop of the hat, but chicken out, when their posturing gives rise to debilitating conflict.

I am no way trying to advocate the much touted theory of genetic pre-disposition when it comes to aggression. Aggression is an acquired behavioral trait. It is a by-product of societal conditioning.

Having travelled to about 110 countries, ironically, as a society I think, I find India to be very aggressive. When on the road, we honk with a viciousness that can unsettle the most stubborn. While entering a train, we jostle to board first, inconsiderate to even ladies and children, when there is no prize for being first.

It is understood, it is an eco-system issue, and not nationality specific, perhaps, a British subjected to the environment of denial and rejection that an Indian grows up in, would exhibit similar behavior. But that is no excuse for not improving or making the much-needed change.

I have a friend who is a cop. A very good cop! And a very very good father! He has a pet theory with which he has been experimenting, and I am not only writhing in curiosity but also extremely eager to see the outcome of his real life experiment. He believes, aggression of society can be curtailed to a baseline if not out-rightly weeded out, if parents and schools can channelize that in sports in the formative years of the child. He also believes, criminal predilection can be curbed significantly, if sports are rewarded, recognized and re-emphasized both in schools and society.