Poor pay, poor self-esteem and professionalism goes for a toss

My grievance has been that Indian police is unprofessional, devoid of the general capability for forensic investigation. It depends on the use of third degree and can, if it chooses to, get a conviction by making a criminal out of an innocent.

Terror attacks by now just around the corner, the deed carried out with the knowledge that the chances of being caught are minimal. Given my premise, I am not sure if all the really guilty have been brought to book in cases where they say 'success' has been possible in solving them.

Now, it transpires that even the guys recruited for an elite Intelligence unit in Maharashtra are fleeing, even before completion of their training, because of low pay. Low pay makes for low self-esteem. Which does not add to professionalism, which anyhow is missing.

I wrote this on a blog www.firstpost.com

254 ricks with e-meters

A threat of penal action by the Thane RTO has seen autorickshaws lining up with digital meters.

As many as 254 of them had them installed last week in Thane City, Pudhari said on Wednesday..

The rickshaws were reluctant to change from mechanical meters which were rigged in most cases and cheating the fares.

The reluctant autorichskaws were even avoiding their annual certification.

A skywalk proposed

A skywalk from Vitawa and Ganapatipada to Thane Railway Station has been suggested to the MMRDA. This would obviate a three-km trek along the railway tracks and save many a life. People use this three-km path to cut their long and circuitous road route. Most are the poor who cannot afford the cost of a rickshaw fare.

MMRDA has agreed to consider this at its next board meeting, Pudhari said on Wednesday..

When MPs talked black money, no one believed them

Why is it that the debate in parliament earlier this week on black money does not carry conviction with the people?

This is a question that is asked not rhetorically, of the people who voted the debaters to parliament.

It is directly at the MPs.

It does not. And here’s why.

Note for instance, the wording of the adjournment motion is a dead giveaway. It centred on “the situation arising out of money deposited illegally in foreign banks and action taken against guilty persons". It was limited to what had been spirited away and squirrelled away overseas in tax havens.

There was no mention of the money that has sidestepped the legitimate economy and runs on its own steam, large enough, we have been told time and again, to add one or two percentage points to India’s GDP growth every year. This is an economy that has not – and perhaps is not – easy to assess for size.

And not all of the money that escapes the taxman has gone overseas. Even if the money that has been shifted abroad is huge, that which lingers in India is perhaps larger. They may not always be big-ticket numbers in each individual case. Together, what the policeman takes, what the tahsildar steals from you for giving you your legitimate due, what the municipal contractors grabs and shares with the petty politician would add up to something that can choke the horses in all cavalries of your and present.

What about that?

It is nobody’s case that what lies hidden outside of India ought to be bypassed and focus shifted to the internal accruals of black money. Since this domestic loot remaining within India is what is running things in the country – businesses to politics. This is what is queering the pitch for the common, ensuring that he is at a disadvantage; that he lies lower on the rung of citizens because he cannot pay the extra buck which the black system demands, riding on the legit.

Anna Hazare’s campaign caught the fancy of the middle classes because he knows that the big businesses have been corrupt much as the small babu is except in terms of numbers of currency notes and their denominations. It is this that is hurting the common man and it is here the politician steps into the picture. He wants to amass and he involves the bureaucrat. He asks the patter to collect for him or he collects from a client and asks the bureaucrat to bend the rule, hasten a process or wink at an irregularity.

That is why when politicians talk about corruption, which is not just near-endemic but endemic, people are not amused. People believed some in the past, for instance propelling V P Singh on an anti-corruption plank which put Rajiv Gandhi at the centre of it. The target remained Rajiv Gandhi, not corruption. If a government could be brought down, citing Bofors as a symptom of a deep-rooted malaise, others who followed did not remain saints. Each of them fought elections; each of them needed cash – as distinct from legitimate money – to do better the rivals at the hustings. It does not lie in their mouth to talk about cleansing the system. 

Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee’s assertion that neither he nor his party protected black money holders too would was incredulous. What gave up the game was his saying when black money was accumulating since 1948, “what was the hurry” now? In such a background, his perfectly valid justification for due process since international treaties were involved, and that he cannot send forces to recover the black money overseas is, to the common man, just so hot air. The anxiety shown by Advani is matched by all those who pay taxes. It must have shocked them when Manish Tewari put a figure to it: one trillion in foreign banks. Shashi Tharoor referred to it being, on someone’s estimate, that it was 20 times India’s GDP.

The system is so far gone into disrepute with the citizens that any suggestion that the names were being withheld pending full process to secure the assets raised eye brows. Can a corrupt revenue system be trusted to keep confidences when oodles of money were involved? After all, this system works on quid pro quos and a helpful hint means a lot to the tax man.

When ministers sitting behind Mukherjee smiled – probably others did too, but the Lok Sabha TV did not pan at that moment – when he said he did not find a single MPs name on the list of people holding black money. Ask the sceptical people what they think. It unlikely that they would agree with the honourable Finance Minister. For, the trust deficit, notwithstanding claims to good deeds, is so enormous, that the debate may as well have not been held at all.

That is the common man’s logic, or the worm’s eye view.

Chew on that.

Tourism is a pickpocket industry in India

Tourism industry in India is pick-pocket style, the eye on the overseas visitor's wallet, with nothing to show except badly maintained places. The tourist may drink that sight in but his experience is not he would write home about. Incredibly, despite that, the arrivals are growing. My view on this paradox here on a portal, www.firstpost.com

The rich and the show-off!

It is often the case that the rich are known for being rich and they don't have to show off. Those who are very rich and have fine tastes let the world know it quite subtly. Not for them the loudness of the neo-rich where the fresh cash crackles out of every crease of their lives - their clothes to everything else they do.

Mumbai has its rich array of the wealthy, or should I say, the super-wealthy before whom almost everyone else would be a creatures fit to remain near the sty. They have their mansions, huge apartments, week-end getaways, a few well fitted expensive cars, and even aircraft or helicopters that is run perhaps on their company fuel.

But this Mukesh Ambani stands out though being the country's richest and one amongst the world's rich, he needn't be as flashy as his new home, Antilla built in Mumbai tony Altmount Road. It towers to an height of 60-storeys but would only have 27 floors and is reputed to cost either US$ 1 bn or a bit more. A bit, for a man like M Ambani being quite some, I should imagine.

Wonder in what category of architecture that building falls but from newspaper accounts, and accompanying pictures, it sticks like a rich sore thumb. It betrays the slick tastes of a neo-rich and not the refinement of money that has come down to and added upon by the second generation. It looks grotesque, like building blocks of varying dimensions stacked one-upon-another by a child who had the sense enough to make sure that one side were all well-aligned.

Indian media - this is my pet peeve always - has reported this buildings with awe but never with disapproval and thought that the awe would forever remain. But suddenly, when New York Times put out a story, the Indian Express carried it with the headline Soaring above poverty on November 6, 2010. Then I discovered that the Times of India had the same piece on October 29 with a sightly different headline. That was from the syndicated set of stories put out by the New York Times.

The point is not about the lag between the Times and the Express. But the point is that they printed it at all for the Ambanis know how to ensure controlled exposure about themselves on any aspect in the media. The way the NYTimes packaged it is interesting - it does not think much of the building, the idea behind it and the amount spent on it - critical, quite tongue-in-cheek too.

It is worth a read. Here is the link:

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/Soaring-above-poverty/707502

This is how it happened

Ever wonder how a news TV crew managed to get two politicians of Maharashtra, India talking about how they gathered money for Sonia Gandhi's rally in Sewagram this week?

They did it because the two - Maharashtra Congress unit chief Manikrao Thakre and former minister Satish Chaturvedi were foolish enough to talk their private thoughts five feet from the TV cameras being set up and the microphones arrayed for a press conference.

The duo spoke how each cabinet minister was asked to cough up Rs 10 lakh apiece, how one of them gave only half of that and how the chief minister Ashok Chavan fell in line and conceded Rs 2 cr to pay for buses to ferry audiences to the rally. For more, read what I wrote on this - the how part by clicking on this link:

http://thehoot.org/web/home/story.php?storyid=4871&mod=1&pg=1&sectionId=14&valid=true

You would now know that the news channel got quite some juicy stuff without having to do an elaborate sting. The sting is a strict no-no to many journalists but here these guys just invited themselves to be massacred by the media by keeping their guard down.

Fears coming true!

My fears about the Shiv Sena launching a larger campaign against Rohinton Mistry's Such a long journey seems to be coming true. The Shiv Sena has said that it is a book not fit enough to be taught in any university course but only good enough to be sold at railway stations. One hopes that it stops there and does not get foolishly raucous and into street actions, a la the campaign againt the movie, Fire.

However, one must concede a point - if we fault the Sena for this attitude, how can one digest the high decibel protest by Congress spokespersons like Manu Abhishekh Singhvi threatened legal action against Javier Moro for his Red Saree, an unauthorised tale of the Nehru-Indira family as told through Sonia Gandhi? The intelligentsia did not make much fuss.

There cannot be two ways of looking about it. We cannot be ambivalent about freedoms.

It does not however mean we accept the Sena's view point. Far from it.

But one ought to appreciate the single-minded reportage of the Mumbai Mirror, about which thehoot.org, a media website and I took note of. The press woke up to the issue but in a desultory manner, is at it.

Get the book back in curriculum! Somehow!!

Last week, I had voiced my serious misgivings about the way Rohinto Minstry's Such a long journey was taken off the Mumbai University's curriculum but I find that the issue is gathering steam. I thought it fit to give a wider audience for that issue and wrote about it in my fortnightly column on www.rediff.com, where it appears once a fortnight.

However, the media, save the Mumbai Mirror, by and large has given the issue a miss though this particular newspaper, after breaking the story on October 2, 2010 - mark the irony, on the day linked to Mahatma Gandhi, man who believed in freedoms - is persisting with the exposure, the latest one being today, October 13, 2010 where it asked the Vice Chancellor, Dr Rajan Welukar three questions.

I share Mirror's scepticism: Dr Welukar would remain quite, playing possum, hoping it would blow over. It would be nice to see this storm developing into a full scale demonstration against thoughtless, mindless mania of proscribing anything one individual or a group dislikes.

Let us see what unfolds as the days roll on. Will the Chief Minister, Ashok Chavan act and breach the sham veil of autonomy of the university and have the book restored? It has less to do with quality et al but more to do with freedom and procedure not yielding to goons because they feel it is bad medicine to have it on the syllabus.

More about banned books

Now that Rohinton Minstry's Such a long journey has been dropped without much ado by the University of Mumbai, would that day be far away when the Shiv Sena, to which Aditya Thackeray has filial links and is to launch a new youth wing with his grandfather's blesings in the next few days, demand that the book stores cease stocking and selling it?

I would not be surprised if that is the first agenda of the proposed Yuva Sena. But I do hope it would not be for in India, the list of books either restricted because of mob fury or proscribed because of the government's lack of intellectual strength, is only growing. If books get banned, then what happens to the researchers of the future? Where would they look for them for references?

When the Supreme Court of India recently ruled that James Laine's work on Shivaji, The Hindu king in Mughal India (Oxford University Press) was to be allowed to be stocked and sold, it did not translate into their reappearance on the book stores. I tried in Hyderabad. I looked for it in Bangalore but no, the book stores said, they had been advised that the publishers may send it to them but it has not happened. It is not banned now, but it is now available.

This issue of the value of a banned book did crop up at The Asiatic Society of Mumbai recently but a resolution that the society "institute a reference section of banned books where the same will be available to researchers for reference" did not pass muster. It was sensible thing to do but then Society is trammelled by the fact that it secures state funding. And a banned book, if retained, is illegal. The Managing Committee's comment in the agenda papers was, 'Stocking of 'banned' books is illegal and the Society may land in trouble if such books are purchased, lent for reading or kept for browsing, even for research purposes".

That is sad. If I know its head, Dr Aroon Tikekar, a scholar, researcher, and writer is a person who does not like proscribing books for it is an assault on freedom to think. But apparently the legal compulsions seem to be superseding any intent to ensure the availability of such books. I wonder if it were possible to scan and upload such books on the Internet so that access becomes possible? Individuals with the means to do so ought to be coming forward. I appeal to such persons to step forward.

Just for those why may have missed it, here is a report from the Times of India which my friend Ambarish Mishra wrote just prior to the debate at the Asiatic:

Mumbai: A two-line resolution demanding that the library of the Asiatic Society of Mumbai should stock books that have been banned by the government over the years has triggered a fresh debate on censorship and the states role in it.

The resolution will come up for discussion at the Societys general body meeting on Saturday.

The Society was flagged off in 1804 and is a treasure-trove of rare books,manuscripts and coins.Activist and Malayalam writer K Haridas,a senior member of the Society,who moved the resolution,said, "Those in power ban books right,left and centre and,that too,on extraneous grounds.Owing to that,researchers and scholars are often deprived of rich study material. So,these prohibited books should be stocked in library but the Society should frame stringent rules to avoid their wrongful use". The resolution has been seconded by another member and scholar,M V Kumar.

However,in its comment on the resolution,the Societys managing committee warned that stocking banned books might mean flouting of statutory rules.Keeping prohibited books in the library is patently illegal, said society president Aroon Tikekar.Elaborating on the point,he added,The Society cannot violate the law of the land.Moreover,what if a researcher who is given access to a banned book misuses or distorts information. Should this happen,the Society will have to bear the brunt as it happened in the James Laine case.The hooligans went on the rampage at Punes Bhandarkar research institute.

Haridas has suggested a way out.The Society should write to the Central as well as the Maharashtra government,seeking exemption for the books that have been banned.Given the Societys fame as one of the most illustrious institutions of learning and scholarship of the country,I am sure the government will take a generous view of it, Haridas said.

Many members will also share scholar and cineaste Veerchand Dharamseys concern.The problem is that the Asiatic Society has no proper rules.Who is to decide the credentials of a scholar Tomorrow,anyone may walk in and ask for the copy of a prohibited book as there are no sharp guidelines on this issue, said Dharamsey.

Marathi literateur Ashok Shahane,another senior member,said it should go ahead and adopt the resolution without worrying about possible cases of vandalism.Vandalism is the home departments worry.Put the ball in the court of the police.They should tackle the hooligans, he added.

Pointing out that the British Museum stocks banned books,Shahane said the Asiatic Society has survived many regimes,including the British Raj.Knowledge outlives politics.We should not allow politicians to encroach on the republic of knowledge.Dr Tikekar,too,agreed that banning books is ethically wrong.Knowledge has no barriers and it is timeless."

Yet again, intolerance

On October 2, 2010 the MUMBAI MIRROR described the success of Adiyta Thackeray's success in getting Rohinton Mistry's Such a long journey dropped from the English Syllabus of Mumbai University's second year BA course. The Vice Chancellor Rajan Welukar just acted to the demand without much ado - in fact, without a whimper. And the tragic thing is that not a single voice has been raised in protest.

And mind you, Aditya Thackeray, grandson of the Shiv Sena's founder and son of Uddhav Thackeray is himself all set to enter politics with the launch of the Yuva Sena, the youth wing which is apparently distinct from the Vidhyarti Sena of which nothing much is heard from its leader Raj quit the party. One expected that being modern, educated, and young, he would be more tolerant to the not so favourable references to the Shiv Sena in Mistry's work. That is a disappointment for intolerance is being carried to the third generation. His great grandfather, generally referred to as Prabhodhankar was a progressive.

My lament is less about the blood and DNA being stronger in the Thackeray family than ideas are. My anguish is about the willingness to accept intolerance without even batting an eye. Ambedkar's Riddles in Hinduism, then Salman Rushdie's book, and yet again, James Laine's Shivaji: Hindu King in a Mughal India have all been proscribed not because of any scholarly objections but by the unthinking leaders of political parties who have a gallery to play to, not lead the country into a new era where critique becomes essence of democracy. There was that film Fire, if you recall which was victim of mob fury.

Adiyta is a poet, and I am sure within the family, there would have been some celebration at the manner in which he secured compliance. he has drawn the first blood using intolerance. Tomorrow's dictator is thus born.

This decision to excise Mistry's book mid-term, even after the test papers have been set for the course, is a sad reflection of the university's leadership. This supine compliance by Welukar even before the world debated the demand shows that the university is not going in the right direction. He was the first to be picked by a rigorous selection method to ensure the university's academic progress; this first milestone is a negative, surely.

Other segments of the media did not react at all to the news item on the front page of the Mumbai Mirror and only person who argued against such tendencies, again only in the Mirror the next day was Aroon Tikekar who pointedly said that "timidity has no room in academics". The silence by others is ominous and distressing.

The point I would like to make is that Welukar is differently positioned that the government's executive and he has no political compulsions to ride to keep the university going. He is the custodian of the university's autonomy. If he had had the Academic Council review the syllabus and found that Mistry's fiction was not worth being in the syllabus, it would have been different. No such review of syllabus is periodically rigorously carried out.

Not acceptable.

B G Verghese

This has to be told; it could mean something to the newspapers of these days. I know the television, given its DNA, would not give a damn about the sage counsel from B G Verghese, the doyen of responsible journalism.

It was 1972 winter and as students of journalism from Osmania University, we called on B G Verghese, then the editor of Hindustan Times in his office. He talked to us in his soft tones about what the game of journalism was all about. And then came to the point.

"You would have been taught about the need to answer the W's and H when writing a news story. The what, where, when, why, who and how. But after these are answered, ask one more question: so what?"

"Once you ask and respond to that, half the muck that appears in the newspapers would disappear. People would get something useful to read because more space would open up for better stuff."

That guided my journalism for three decades and more. I try to tell younger ones when I get to mentor them but newspapers don't much care for that; it is visible when you turn the pages. Information which titillates, not inform. For instance, if a new bus service is introduced, the newspapers don't tell you about the actual route, the frequency, the timings. Not reader-friendly at all.

Now Verghese has written a book but it is likely to be autobiographical, in is impeccable English, toungue firmly in cheek, subtle humour. A friend's blog has a piece by another journalist, TJS George on the gentleman-journalist which I'd like to share. Here is the tribute to the man who has a deep mind with a straight face and stands tall.

You can't find such journalists these days.

Nandan Nilekani - stay on the deck

I put this up first as a note on my Facebook account. Why not on this blog?

So here it is:

Within hours of the launch of the UID and assignment of IDs to ten tribals in Nandurbar of Maharashtra, a cacophony was heard on national news network - it would lead to profiliing, invasion of privacy et al.

To such of those who have fears, I say, please listen to this reasoned plea:

Of course, privacy invasion is a serious issue. People need to be protected from such breach. But here, the UID is a basic biometric ID more foolproof than the Know Your Client ( KYC) norms which the banks need. It tells everyone who needs to deal with him to deliver his entitlements that the person he says he is he is. That obviates possibilities of leakages.

For instance, foodgrains meant for the poor via the public distribution system (PDS) leaks into the private markets not because the poor foregoes his claim but is helpless when someone else robs him of his entitlement. Now, if the PDS card has his UID and the shop is linked to the system, no one except the ration card holder can draw the rations. If the ration is then not sold - because every sale would have to be recorded thus to a central computer, then the mischief stops.

If that is possible, then I am happy with the invasion of the poor's privacy and find out if the entitlement reached him.

Likewise, with NREG.

The poor can have bank accounts and the government can ensure payment by wire - no middle man, no cuts taken.

The fears of privacy are outweighed by the real gains of the poor who are deliberately robbed because they are the helpless without a voice.

Nandani Nilekani - go to it. Ignore the Cassandras.

Media as a vulture? Why, yes!!

A post on the Facebook this morning has set me thinking about the media's role in the Ayodhya issue.

The post they simply said the person was "convinced that the only people interested in tomorrow's Ayodhya verdict is the media.... Just like vultures are the only ones interested in dead bodies! Everybody else is keen to bury and move on!"

That imagery of the media as a vulture is quite appealing.

What makes the notion interesting is that he is not a mere reader, a conscious citizen or a thinking person but apparently involved in Public Relations, a business which used media extensively to mould public opinion. While those who buy newspapers or see television news channels are consumers, this person is a user of the media - that is an interpretation stemming from the role and function of PR. He ought, therefore, be quite in tune with the media.

After much mulling, and replaying things that I saw and read over the past few decades on the issue of Ayodhya, I think the view is bang on target. The media, it seemed then and it does now, just wanted to keep the story alive. And if that sustained the communal strife, so be it - more grist to the mill. One did not have to go and look for a story to tell; they just developed, fuelled by the media itself.

I too have reported communal strife, the one especially in Ahmedabad in 1985 and then the readers demanded that going by convention, no reportage of the events there ought to be written in a manner as to cause a reaction elsewhere. There was a clear embargo on identifying communities, if a person was injured or dead, the name was not to be mentioned. It was set that a communal incident should be reported with restraint. If you ask me, rightly too. We were told that the best reference was "a communal incident" and a temple or a mosque had to referred to as only a "place of worship". Sensible.

The early 1990s riots in Mumbai put an end to that restraint. The communities were freely mentioned, the death tolls helped identified the scores and if you please, the media did not emphasise that soon after the structure was demolished in Ayodhya, the anger of the Muslims was directed at the state or its visible instruments - from the police to the bus stops. Even the Srikirshna Commission report is unable to point out at which point the first phase of riots - remember, they were two, the second being after the or due to the killings in Jogeswari slums - became communal.

About that Commission's report - more some time later.

Journalists at that time, either because they felt seriously upset because at one point the Muslims became clear targets of the majority Hindus, that all stories had quotes from one community and not another, the ignored getting space only when something provocative was said by that section. Of course, hardly anything non-provocative was ever said by any since those days.

Everything was seen from the prism of the communal riots ever since, be it elections or be it policies. For much good has been done in Gujarat in the past decade but even pro-people issues well handled get a short shrift because the policies stem from Narendra Modi. There is this marked refusal to separate the two - the assumed, presumed, alleged or yet to be proven crimes of Modi and the public policies and efficiencies brought into the delivery mechanisms. The media which made much of the lathis carries by RSS workers at their shakas were seen as instruments to bully others but when Lalu Yadav took one, and said, come on, I'll deal them a blow, it was carried with pictures. Not necessarily because of his buffoonery but it was a bias.

At no point am I to be assumed to be a votary of HIndutva politics and their belligerence but the reporting we saw then was not what made for ideal, neutral reportage of a sensitive issue. Such neutral reporting was seen as sissy stuff by spineless or gutless journalists. I was damned by my colleagues who showed extraordinary interesting in reporting on the communal issue as one of the two, spineless or gutless. Or maybe both. I only smiled then and do so now.

And that far too frank a reportage and evident biases have harmed the country a lot more than one could imagine.

Where is the artistic liberty?

Why can't, for instance, Peepli [Live] be sent as an official entry to the Oscar? Because some people think that to show a farmer readying to commit suicide is negation of the reality.

The Vidarbha Janandolan Samiti, which has been voicing the farmer's grievances now says it misrepresents the cause because farmers don't do that. They may well not take recourse to suicides to get some relief for the family in deep distress. But farmers are dying nevertheless and poverty drives them to it. No dispute about that.

Fact remains however that to make a point to a larger audience, a film-maker may take a particular dimension and evolve a story and get the message across. With Peepli [Live] the message seems to have been driven home so much so that the Planning Commission had a special screening for itself to understand what the movie was trying to convey.

Which is much more action from the authorities than all the petitions that have been sent any number of times to New Delhi and Mumbai and given even to tomorrow's heir presumptive Rahul Gandhi with little to show for it on the ground. There ought to be some satisfaction at this development.

The film seems to have advanced the cause of the group that now wants the film to be withdrawn while it ought to be thanking it for highlighting the issue of farmers' suicides so ably portrayed in the media by P Sainath in The Hindu.

It is time we let people do their job without jibes. But it is certain that in India, we in India continue to be quite intolerant. No other point of view is valid, people seem to say, than their own. Others had better shut up is what it means.

That won't do.

Best you can do with what you disagree is argue your case or ignore the other point of view, but don't demand the withdrawal of a perspective.

It would hurt us all in the long run, otherwise.

Being on time!

Lalit Bhanot, despite all the inefficiencies his Commonwealth Games Organising Committee has shown put the finger on the number: India is not a country with high enough standards of hygiene which other civilisations would find acceptable.

One point he missed, which was of some consequence with respect to the CWG 2010 was the sense of time which is largely missing in India. Time is stretchable to the extent that Indian Standard Time (IST) has been lampooned as Indian Stretchable Time, no less by Indians themselves. That is perhaps a healthy way to laugh at oneself but in the contest of the CWG 2010, we are being laughed at.

The point is that time is of the essence in everything and I have generally been conscious of that. Most often than not I am on time, possibly a few minutes before the appointed minute. The importance was stressed by Manohar Joshi, Maharashtra's chief minister when I caught him at the steps of his official bungalow years ago and engaged him in a conversation, seeking to ferret out some significant piece of information. He gamely stood there and tried to help but the time available was not enough; he had to be present at a public event and wanted to leave.

He threatened me with a simple statement. If I engaged him for a whit longer, and he was late for his engagement, he would announce that I was responsible. "I would do it with you full name and designation!" he said. That shook me.

Did a minute's delay matter? Yes, indeed, it did, he said. If you are late and another is waiting, it shows disrespect to another man's precious commodity which cannot be earned and hoarded again: TIME.

That moment I fully learnt my lesson to the extent that if I am late by a minute, I shiver at the prospect of robbing someone of his treasure. It is another matter what the other guy does with his time but I cannot recklessly poach on it.

So much so, even for cocktails which are generally "7 pm onwards", the attempt is to be there on the dot. And by doing so a whole lot of gain has been made over the years. Other early birds who trickle in early are also looking around and that is the best moment to get to shake hands, know them and what Rotarians call "build fellowship". It may not often benefit me but it at least indicates who can be approached again for anything useful. There can be a kind of sieving, the grain can be discovered amid the chaff. Haven't I often heard my wife complain when she is hastened to get ready for an event she too was to attend? Her blunt point: Are you going there to set the dishes?

Hard to explain but she sees a cocktail as something different - people just drift around and nothing worthwhile ever happens. A plastic smile, a reluctant shake-hand and then drift to another group. Unless some known friends unmet for a spell are going to be around.

Importance of time has been explained enough. But as a journalist I have often found that public figures, who decide on policy and help implement them, are most often - bar a few exceptions like Joshi - late and couldn't give a tinker's damn if the audience was waiting. Imagine the collective time lost!

Likewise, the time lost in getting the CWG ready for the appointed date. That silly minister for sports, MS Gill thought that it would all be done in time like most Indian weddings are, which to mind is a huge confusion regardless of how well it is organised. Even the best of weddings have flaws. His predecessor, Manishankar Iyer did not thinks sports was important enough and how he hated it and allowed quite a huge chunk of valuable time, measured in years out of the seven provided on a platter, to lapse.

But even in the few years that was available after Iyer's spell, there was sufficient on the plate to dip into and organise the games without much confusion. But the innate ability of the Indians to while it away and then get into a rush seems to ingrained in the DNA that we can do anything at all only if it is in a crisis mode. Which the media ensured was indeed pushed into a crisis mode. One of the few times the media did well - thank you!

But we cannot afford to go on like this. We cannot plan only for the events. We need to plan for the things after the games. What happens to the expensive - bloated by unreasonable invoices possibly - stadia that have been built? Would we be able to convert them into something that helps spin something positive out of them, like the Bird's Nest stadium in Beijing built for the Olympics which is a huge water park? I am sure when the stadium was planned, the uncanny Chinese had the contingency plan ready - it is about a year since that water park has been bringing in hoards of the population who spend and have a whale of a time.

It was alright to imagine that we can do better than the Chinese. To do that, we have to learn from the Chinese. If we had, the guys who messed with the CWG 2010, the time and money spent, would not be around there facing the cameras and getting excrement on their faces which they know how to wipe off and smile. They would have been punished. But then, even here we waste time don't we?

Knowing how this country reacts to misfortunes, I think I too wasted my time fulminating.

Or did I?

CWG: from the collapse would come a better future

I thought and said that the collapsed CWG - Delhi 2010 would be an opportunity to cleanse up the Indian image of a corrupt people. My fervent hope that it would collapse under inefficient management and lead to full-throated cry for redemption from such unscrupulous people as who make the managers - from Prime Minister down to MS Gill and S Kalmadi was dismissed as anti-national, anti-games. I was called a spoilsport but was, save for a very few who agreed with me on the Facebook. However, The Economist comes quite close to it for it sees an opportunity in this games.

In its September 25, 2010 edition, "Better if India takes the flak for the games' shortcomings not as an insult, but as a jolt that can be turned to good use, by recognising three truths edition about the country of which Indians often prefer to ignore". It lists corruption seen everywhere at every tier of the society and the vulnerability to terror, the latter being a facet pointed out to by the Australian Prime Minister as being worrisome. The third - happily - is democracy but which, from my point of view, is not functional but put to good use by the rent-seeking class.

Read on - you'd find the link in the first para.

And tell me if I am wrong.

Corruption and a minister can't see it!

It was surprising to read a view from Law Minister Veerappa Moily contradicting the just-quit Central Vigilance Commission Prayush Sinha that 30 per cent of Indians were 'utterly corrupt' and that a half were 'borderlines' cases. Which situation called for urgent attention and efforts to strengthen the laws, ensure implementation of all laws were stringent. But no, Moily stood apart and said retired bureaucrats like to play saints.

Moily (yes, the same of the infamous Moily Tapes) needed to be responded to though sadly, not a single newspaper - I read several - even managed to engage him in a dispute. I picked up the gauntlet and said my piece. The www.rediff.com gave me the space:http://news.rediff.com/column/2010/sep/15/on-corruption-moily-is-utterly-wrong.htm

A year on - revival

It has been a year since I wrote on my blog. There were too many other things to do, including help prepare the Mumbai Human Development Report 2009, the first of its kind for any city anywhere, and supported by UNDP. The Oxford University Press brought it out last year. Then came the turn of a narrative to be written which happily was supported by the ICSSR.

However, it was not as if I had no views - no, I shall have them till I am put away inside the furnace in a crematorium. Several times my angst was expressed on the portal www.rediff.com and when opportunities arose, in at seminars and when people could be buttonholed, I had my say.

Now, hopefully, I shall return to the blog.

When media gets my goat

When the media gets my goat, I express myself strongly and to the extent I can, try to be rational about it. It happened when Mumbai-based Daily News and Analysis (DNA) twisted things so crudely, I could not but go out and hang my opinion out there on a media blog, www.thehoot.org. Here is the link to that piece.

http://thehoot.org/web/home/story.php?storyid=4803&mod=1&pg=1&sectionId=5&valid=true

I am sure those who read it would have a view. I'd be happy to hear about it.