looking under the lamp post

USA's war on the terror reminds me of this story about this guy who was pacing up and down under a street light looking nervous and worried. A passerby asked him if he needs any help. "I lost my wallet." He said. " O.K. I will help you look for it . Was it around here?" Passerby offered. " No! Actually it was over there". "So why are you looking for it here", Passerby wondered . " Because it is dark over there"; the worried man answered !

Not only was USA's Iraq mission seriously flawed and totally unnecessary , remember no WMD's were ever found . Just because they were never there in the first place. Then came the quest for Top leadership of Al Quiada and US made a greater blunder by going into the wrong country again by moving forces into Afghanistan when they should have gone into Pakistan first. Have they found a single significant leader ? Without degrading Al Quaida's support systems nurtured by the Pakistan Army's ISI itself, no significant military objective against them can ever be achieved.
Remember Taliban is sandwiched between US Forces in Afghanistan and Pakistani army. You have to ask this question as to how and where does Taliban regroup and where do they get their supplies from. Which army is either incompetent or is sleeping on the wheel. Or maybe in direct cahoots with Taliban. Which army?

Although US is now trying to take the war to Al Quaida in the Pakistani territory by making some insipid drone attacks which have invariably hit civilians and done more damage to the cause. And believe it or not - by throwing more money at the Pakistani Army. Very same one which is long confirmed of secret links with Taliban and Al Quaida. This exercise also seems to be a case of too little too late and doomed from the start. Again a case of looking for answers in the wrong place .No wonder US allies are hunting for an exit strategy from Afghanistan without caring if the world is more unsafe than before. Remember Pakistan has a confirmed WMD and their national hero A.Q. Khan was running a nuclear Walmart just a while ago. Much as US would like to paint Iranians in the dark colors it is the Pakistani regime which has engaged in the proliferation . In fact that has been the mainstay of their nuclear programme. Do not be surprised if a couple of dirty bombs are lurking in some basement in Islamabad waiting for an opportune moment.

US may close its eyes to this , feeling that they are too far away for such a mess to be directed at them and it is more of a problem for India. Trouble is they have been wrong before . Before 26/11 they could not imagine such an attack on the American soil either. For a change they must try looking beyond the streetlights and focus on South Punjab province of Pakistan; they'll know who nurtures Taliban infrastructure both overtly and covertly. Also it must be clear to even the most dense US commander in the field that without emasculating the GHQ in Islamabad you can not win in Kabul. Question is how long it will be before they can convince their politicians to stop looking under the Lamppost.

Journey - Clockwise

If you rent a house in a rough neighborhood, you can move as soon as your lease is over ; sooner if you have enough money to go to the better part of town. If you own your home, you can only sell it- even at a loss . In the long run that would be a better deal than raising your kids in such a neighborhood where drug menace is looming large and a constant atmosphere of fear and mindless violence prevails. What can you do if your country is in a seedy part of the world? You can not all possibly get up and leave.So is the case with India. If this country was in any other corner of the world than it is in now; That corner would simply be "the World". For a change let us look at what India can do to realize her potential other than point fingers and lament her geographical ill luck.

Firstly Pakistan on her 9 o'clock is simply obsessed with the fear of India . Their fear is not entirely irrational however they are overcompensating for it by ridiculously audacious proactive policy of killing the enemy by a 1000 cuts. In the process they have practically sold their country to the devil- devil of Fundamentalism; dictatorship; permanent insolvency and dependency. It does not matter to them . They are happy that they have successfully kept India at bay and inflicted humiliating blows on it from time to time. That is their national objective and they are clearly achieving it. India on the other hand is in deep denial. So far she has concentrated on telling Pakistan about shared values , shared history, shared ancestry and hoped for the best. The reason it has not worked is because it is not true. Pakistan is not the same as India. They completely reject even a vestige of sameness. They have forgotten about it and in the last 60 odd years have made conscious and concentrated efforts to distance themselves from it. It is their choice and India has to understand that appealing to shared values and candle light vigil at the borders is not going to yield any results. If one needs to learn from recent history than one would realize that periods of relative calm have followed their military rout.

1947 they lost the battle to take over Kashmir and for the next 19 years there was relative peace, Only in 1965 another war broke out , partly because Pakistan got emboldened by Indian losses in the '62 war with China. More about which later. Pakistan considers that war drawn if not actually won by them, so this time peace lasted only 6 years. Then came 1971 war ; their crushing defeat and break up. That war was followed by another 19 year hiatus, broken by Pakistan's Kargil misadventure. Can you see a pattern here? By that time Pakistan had perfected the art of 1000 cuts and India completely lost her way with them. Pakistan ran a largely successful Islamic terrorist campaign in Kashmir with India only threatening to do something about it without any action on the ground. Then India allowed them to get away with Kandahar and Kargil ;so Mumbai happened and smaller mumbai's happen every once in a while. Can there be any peace, no matter which dispensation comes to power in Pakistan? Only two things will work with Pakistan. Firstly make sure that they do not have any valid reason to fear an attack from India. Secondly make them pay an exceedingly steep price for any misadventure. No half way house will work. Do not tell them we are the same people because we are not same any more and they won't buy it. Make sure that they understand that we do not want to absorb them in " Akhand India". We do not want them - period! Also carry a big stick and use it liberally. Candle vigil at Vagah has not worked and sadly there is no hope for that kind of language to be understood by Pakistan.
Further west Afghanistan needs deeper engagement , remember Kandahar and ensure that a repeat is not feasible. If a forward looking policy is not adopted India will have to rue it at leisure . Learn some lessons from the Tibet debacle.

On India's 12 o'clock is another headache which is kind of a unique problem. Kashmir is a potent poison with both a domestic and a foreign component. Without forgetting the international dimension it would be better if India looked at the domestic component. Again the trouble is one of the Indian state in deep denial. Let us face the facts ;Kashmir problem is simply a problem of the Muslim population of the valley. Pre dominantly Hindu Jammu and Buddhist laddakh pose no concern at all. Comparatively recent converts to Islam largely by force , kashmiri muslims are hell bent on proving themselves more loyal than the king. It will not do to deny the religious nature of this conflict. A fact that all parties roundly deny. kashmiri's call it their freedom struggle and the State likes to call it Civil disturbance. Dishonest - both of them. This is an Islamic separatist movement and as such must be dealt with accordingly. No use blaming Pakistan, al quaida, Hizbul etc. etc. It is the kashmiri muslim bureaucracy represented by municipal clerk to tehsildar; It is the beat constable to heart specialists at the hospital and professors at UGC funded university that sustain and nurture this conflict at the same time that they are getting paid a salary from the public exchequer. Would it surprise you to know that the separatist leader Gilani draws a pension for being an ex member of the same Indian establishment he fulminates against his every waking minute. would it surprise you to know that as a self declared Pakistani ,he gets top class medical treatment for every real and imagined health issue at All India Institute of medical sciences - free unlike other Indian citizens who have to wait forever . No prizes for guessing who is providing him a security cover at public expense. If you guessed India, you'd be right. If this is not a farce than what is ? India has only herself to blame for a muddled, weak kneed Kashmir policy. Forget Pakistan , deal with their agents first. At least stop paying them if at all you are serious!

India's 2 o'clock has a large opportunity wrapped in a bigger problem - China. it would be an understatement to say that India has not been able to understand China completely. China represents simply the biggest most cohesive nation on earth. This is not to say there is no diversity there. But Han Chinese are a monolith , a huge sledge hammer that can work with you or at you. So far this hammer has worked at India. Historically India has deluded herself that since Indian Cultural influences on china are deep seated what with Buddhism etc. etc. ; China would somehow see the Indian Point of view. Much was made of Huen Tsang's visit in some ancient times. Dr. Kotnis was made into a romantic hero representing India's contribution to modern china. Are we stupid or what? No one remembers them in China. They do not base their statecraft on some romantic notion. Moreover how could we forget that China is not a buddhist nation any more. In fact they do not have a God unless you consider the dollar. In addition all those interactions happened thousands of years ago. China adopted Indian concepts and made them their own in their own way . India was just a faint memory for them. Shared religious beliefs anyway are no guarantee of peace. Remember America's war of Independence was fought against British. Their exact photocopies in every respect but in the matters of state and commerce.

India made a blunder by not paying attention to the Tibetan Independence when it was feasible. That would have ensured a buffer state with less chance of a friction between the two. So that opportunity was squandered by a romantic . The other lapse lied in not shoring up Indian defenses even when Tibet was gobbled up by china. That should have told us that "panchsheel " will not work with modern china and " Hindi chini bhai bhai' is just a soundbite. We were caught napping by China again and received a thorough drubbing in '62. Since then China has treated India derisively as a weakling . That was a much weaker china than it is now. That was a China in direct confrontation with USA, unlike now when it is their greatest trading partner. No surprise that it likes to put India in her place periodically , just because it can. Incidentally India is not the pushover she was in 62.

China is an opportunity but that needs to be nurtured carefully. Many centuries ago we may have taught them but now we must learn real politic from them. India has to bide her time and in the meanwhile expand economic ties with China as much as she can. so far India has made a hash of it . All trade is nearly one way as of now. Make it two way and make it big enough for China to never ever entertain the idea of crossing India wrongly. Imagine these two countries have nearly half the worlds people. A vibrant economic relationship is most beneficial and the only way forward. It is not going be easy because there is a sense of competition among the two, but it can be done and only by India becoming economically strong will China once again give her due respect , not otherwise. China will continue to keep putting pressure on India and keep it unbalanced but I do not imagine that it wants to openly confront India on the battlefield. In the meantime India must hold the line on the border, in trade talks, in The UN, everywhere. No confrontation should not mean cave -in. That includes limiting and counteracting their influence in Nepal and Bhutan.

That brings us to India's 3 o'clock which is Nepal. No two countries are so closely related throughout history, culture , economics and at the level of people than these two . Yet we find that all is not going well. Without pointing fingers at anti - Indian Maoist, corrupt monarchy etc. etc. we should look at what we have to do now. Because if this relation deteriorates any further , Indian security will face her greatest danger. The consequences for Nepal will be worse. Does anyone even know how many Nepali citizens actually work in India? What happens if they are asked to go home ?

At 4 o'clock is Bangladesh. If that is a problem, it is one we have created ourselves- literally. In retrospect it might have been better not to intervene in their civil war with west Pakistan. Bangladesh would have been the albatross around Pakistan's neck. Then again India did not complete what it started. Sheikh Mujeeb was allowed to be killed by forces which are Pakistan friendly. Today Bangladesh has a very strong and wide spread anti- India culture; stronger than when it was East Pakistan. Their bug bear was West Pakistan then, it is India now! It is that simple. Illegal immigration by millions, all kinds of smuggling rackets and known terrorist bases are some of the known trouble spots between The two nations. For political reasons the time bomb of illegal immigration is ignored by Indian politicians,; worst being communists in west Bengal. That is the most important area where India will have to crack a whip asap.
Further down that road is Burma which seems to have fallen off Indian Radar entirely. China has filled the void creating yet another potential choke point for India.

At 6 o'clock lies another blunder - Sri lanka. Not all is lost yet at least I hope so ,but our blow hot blow cold response to LTTE has not helped any. We are a friend to nobody even when our stakes in that conflict are huge. Stupidly we have give lot of room to both China and Pakistan to play in our back yard because we could not make up our mind whether LTTE is to be supported or crushed. More influence they have in Sri lanka more trouble it will be for us. India now has to take an active part in the Tamil resettlement. It is too important to be left to Sri Lanka alone.

So Only silver lining - Maldives. That is what I think. But I have been wrong before!

Publish Post

Book haters Club!

Since humans learned to write, they have been writing books. It does not look like the human race is going to stop writing them anytime soon. So by now there are many books and many book lovers. I for one would prefer to spend my evening with an interesting book rather than with Paris Hilton. Trouble is that all books are not that interesting ; at least not to everyone. They can be a lot of trouble though ! As various authors have found from time to time. There is something forceful about a written word that increases its potency manifold , compared to if it was just a spoken word.

Books have launched civilizations , like Bible and its various versions can be safely said to be the guiding light of western civilization. Books have launched wars like crusades and Jihads. Expansion of Islam throughout the world was entirely guided by Koran. Even now most of the wars and violent acts have a Koranic angle to it . Some are fighting to preserve it and some are just fighting to save themselves from it. Books like Das Kapital have launched successful revolutions such as the Soviet one . Even its Chinese version was guided by Mao's Little Red Book. Nazi revolution was guided by Mein Kampf. Later on The Iranian Islamic revolution was again achieved by the book.

Some books can get you killed or almost killed as Salman rushdie found and some can get you banished into a gulag as Solzhenitsyn found, some books can get you expelled from your own country as Taslima Nasreen has found . Some books are less potent and they can get you expelled from a political party as Jaswant Singh has found. Even then I am confidant that none of these authors hate their books.

So there are good books , there are badly written books, some books go on to become great classics , some are kept in the library and some go in the trash bin right after you have read them. Some books are so bad that all you can use them is for making paper bags and some times beautiful paper machie. Obviously books can not be ignored , you can only be in awe of them unless you happen to be in love with them like me.

Any book haters out there ?

A house for Mr. Hashmi

Emran hashmi is not able to buy a house. No , no he is not living on the streets of Mumbai, He has a home . A fairly good one. He just wants another. He has tonnes of money, he has lot of fame, he has success lapping at his feet , yet he was not allowed to buy the home that he wants. Looks like the person he wants to buy his home from is not willing to sell. The building society in which this flat exists also has some rules and procedures that Emran does not wish to comply with. But he wants the home. So he goes to town with the best strategy in contemporary India. "Muslim Persecution". He is not being sold to because he is a Muslim. Well there may be a grain of truth in it. In fact there maybe a lot of truth in it. Maybe he is a Muslim? Although there is some doubt there since he has mixed parentage, but let's grant him that. He still seems to be missing a big point here.
All everyone is concerned about is his rights. How about the rights of another hundred odd residents of the building. Do they have a say in who they will live next door to?
Let us say there is a room full of asthmatics chatting and sharing their good and bad moments together. Suddenly a chain smoker enters the room and insists on joining the discussion and stay for dinner and be invited for all their future meetings. Is this group of asthmatic people within their rights to feel trepidation at the thought of having a chain smoker in their midst? Are they within their rights to try and discourage this chain smoker? What if the smoker is named Emran. Can he turn around and say that he is being denied entry because he is a Muslim?
Almost all Jama masjids have a number of shops attached . let's say someone wants to rent or buy a shop in order to conduct a business of selling barbecued pork chops.
So he is not allowed to rent or buy, for obvious reasons. Let us say this fellow is called Sher singh. Would you say he was denied a fair chance to earn a living because he was not a Muslim? Laughable,but that is the kind of argument Emran and his supporters are making.
The other thing is his identity as a Muslim. Is this how he has defined himself so far? I thought he always projected himself as a very liberated actor. He cultivated his image as a bold lover boy, a serial kisser. He never said that people watch his movies despite his being Muslim.
Apart from that he is also a young male and lot of other things. Did he even stop to think that maybe it is one of the other identity that is the cause of his trouble ?
Then how about the seller; can he decide if he wants to sell or not, and to whom- no ?
The real issue is less houses more people. If it was otherwise such controversies would not arise.
And he should not forget that Individual rights are important but they can not be more important than collective rights.

ROMA ARE INDIANS TOO!

I had decided that I am not going to take up the subject of the Indian Diaspora for some time but the recent actions of the Canadian government have kind of forced my hand .'Roma' are the Indians, India has forgotten about and they themselves have a very faint recollection of their roots. Mainly their language, social customs and their physical features suggest this bond. They are the much reviled and persecuted 'Gypsies'. For centuries they have lived the life of itinerant nomads on the periphery of European society. Shunned by all.

During Nazi era they came for special attention of the SS and were systematically butchered as part of the "final solution". Their actual number killed is not clear, probably owing to the fact that they came from all different countries in the Europe and were included in the statistics from that country. Some estimates put their actual numbers killed , more than that of Jews. Now that is a staggering number.

Even today when they are no longer nomads;when they have adopted the names and faiths of the countries they live in, the resentment against them is remorseless. They are shunned by the society and regularly persecuted by the regimes as a normal course. Eastern Europe is particularly a region with deep seated racist and neo- nazi tendencies that have strengthened post the communist era.

Canadian government has in the past stopped Indians from landing in Canada,; stopped Jews from immigrating during Nazi era and so on. Today Canada would like to pose as a champion of civil liberty, a bulwark against persecution and a heaven for the oppressed. But recently they have made visa compulsory for Czech and Mexican citizens because they say that people from these countries come and claim refugee status.

Actually they are trying to stop Roma from coming in. These Roma are Czech citizens who are treated abominably in their country. Mexicans were added to the order just to camouflage the real reason. White Europeans are welcome. Roma are not. Visa will ensure that they do not get in. If their homes get fire bombed in Czech republic , it is a local law and order problem,nothing to do with Canada. With the visa in place Canada can sleep tight; it will stay white! This order shows the Canadian regime for what it is, worse however is the extreme insult it is to the majority of The Canadians who are not racist. Maybe I am wrong on that count!

Hitler must be a happy man today!

Indian By Choice; American by Chance!

Recently I came across two life stories' let us call them Mr. C and Mr. P. First about Mr. C. This gentleman has been living in the west for the past 50 odd years. Practically grew up here. Worked here and raised a family here. He is retired now and seems very comfortably off considering his pricey downtown slick condo accommodation. Last person you would imagine that wishes to go back and live in India or at least spend a large part of the year there. Wrong! To my utter surprise this gentleman was practically begging for some information/ advice that would enable him to go live in - hold your breath - Delhi.!

To my utter surprise and greater dismay he practically gave me ; a total stranger, his life history. Just because I was an Indian and from Delhi ,he hoped I could help him!. To use a metaphor this was the only straw that this drowning man was trying to clutch! All he wanted was someone to rent him a room for 5/ 6 months, then he will see .

If you are guessing that he is going because of family ; you would be wrong again! He has no family to speak of in the city. Remember he left India decades ago around the time Nehru was the PM. In fact his wife has passed on and all his children live close to him in the US and Canada. Everybody he has known personally, socially and professionally is in North America. No one remembers him in India. No one is looking forward to seeing him. He has no property in India.

So What can move a 75 year old to leave what he built all his life in the west and seek solace in India. He is just a regular person , he is not going to conduct research, he is not going to find God, he is not going to invest ; he is not going to do any social work; he is just going. After spending all his adult life outside he thinks he will be among his own only in India. This is so when this metro has nearly 600000 people of Indian origin. Even than he feels like a stranger.

He is an Indian in his heart- an Indian by choice. So he thinks this is no place to live. Makes you think seriously about identity crisis. The crisis of being old, alone and an Indian in America. I hope he finds his happiness in the evening of his life ,although I am afraid he will be disappointed.

That brings us to Mr. P. He is my friends father. Or I should say was, since he is in his heavenly abode. Now this gentleman arrived some years ago from India and he lived and worked in the US for a decent length of time. As he neared the retirement age he moved back to India. Since according to him this was no place to die. Anyway he was recently visiting his son when he was taken ill. And to cut the long story short he passed away of all the places, in America. One place he did not want to die in. He did not want to be an American , just became one by chance or should we say American By Death!

Speaking of death- so the path breaking performer Michael Jackson died .Maybe the God of death did him a great favour by taking him away when he was still popular enough to be missed by fans. Had he lived another ten years people might have said "Michael Who?" instead of ''Oh no, not Michael!" Now that would really really mean death , this untimely death has made him live forever .

Habib and Husain

Habib Tanvir is no more. If you never saw his play, you missed a great experience. Unfortunately a play can not be preserved like a film or a painting so it is rather difficult to recreate the experience. This loss is permanent now.
Habib used Indian idioms , folk traditions and typical desi traditional music in his work with style , understanding and with telling effect. AS such his contribution to theatrical arts is immense. The great thing that distinguishes his work is the passion and zeal with which he used his symbols, his stories and his folk genre. He was true to his traditions rooted in Madhya pradesh and Chattisgarh. He actually enriched them and by bringing them to people in general he helped preserve them. Yet his plays were not a simple copy of a traditional performance or a classical story. He infused new meanings, new thought processes and concepts in them. He raised contemporary issues, he raised important concerns and he had his feet firmly planted on earth.That is what makes great art out of a craft. Your intellectual input and your passion and your feel for your subject coupled with your technical craftsmanship is what distinguishes great art .Whether you liked his marxist slant or not, Habib tanvir was among the greats and there is no doubt about it.
He reminds one of another "great", Husain. who also used Indian motifs and cultural symbols in his art . Alas ! without passion and without any attempt to infuse any intellectual concept to it. Husain's use of Saraswati , Durga , and sita icons or even ganapati for that matter were just a sales trick. He painted what he thought would sell. He was of course right. He continues to sell for staggering sums. It is however just plain craftsmanship. Very much like a street vendor who sells diwali cards in october, next month he sells christmas cards and next week new year greetings. Whatever sells! It is good business but not necessarily great art.
Habib must have realized early on that he might never become rich doing what he is doing but he did not betray his art form. It sure was not easy to use Chatisgarhi music , ethos and even dialect to perform and still be economically viable. habib strived all his life and Habib made folk mainstream or I should say acceptable to cultural czars. I personally was part of a long workshop conducted by Habib where I had the occasion to see this great master at work and also design a set for one of his plays. The biggest compliment I can think of at his passing away is that he was for art what husain can not be .