RAINCOAT can make your eyes wet!

Imagine you are sitting in front of your lost childhood sweatheart after a gap of few years and she is married. What does it feel like? Is there a lump in your throat everytime you try to speak a word. Now imagine that the first hurdle is overcome and you both are talking all sorts of things about your life, marriage and job but both of you can't express the pain you feel each day for each other. None of you try to explain the dark conditions of your lives to each other but both of you are going on talking about every other thing. This pain is realistic and aptly described in the art film ''Raincoat'' by Rituparna Ghosh.

 The two hour movie just doesn't let you breathe properly in anticipation of the unfolding of the story. I never heard of parallel cinema of bollywood untill the death of Rituparna Ghosh when media gave him respect for being a comrade of the force behind art films of bollywood. It was then that I discovered the true world of cinema where reality is honestly portrayed without racy item songs or mindless promotional events. Unlike the big stars of commercial cinema the actors and directors of art films are not attention seekers and thatsy many of us are unaware of their existence. These films touch our mind and heart equally and make us think at least for a few minutes which is way more beneficial than laughing hours on adult comedy which has made a prominent place nowadays in commercial cinema.

The movie Raincoat is shot in record time of 17 days and the brilliant direction and acting won it the National Award too. Aishwarya Rai as Neeru is so beautifully portrayed that you could actually feel the character as if it was alive. Ajay Devgan also played one of his best roles according to me in this film as a passionate lover from a village Bhagalpur who visits kolkata to collect money from his past friends in order to come out of financial crisis. There he visits his childhood love Neeru's house for a short trip and the twists and turns keep us glued to the movie along with occasionally thinking deeply about the awesome story originally written by O. HENRY.

 After two hours of this moving experience I thought why not ask my friends if anybody had heard of this film. It turned out nobody among my friends and not even people on quora have any idea of this movie except some freaks. The movie did decent work in box office despite being a low budget art film. I wonder if anymore such films would come up in India given the conditions of neglect towards such films. Such realistic films are instant Flop generally in the bolly market which only wants khans and kapoors dancing with bikini clad dancers. If even a small percentage of money that meaningless films earn nowadays could go to these art films we could have hoped for more such movies.

If you haven't enjoyed it, Go to Youtube and keep napkins ready!!!! I bet you will remember this movie whole life.

AAPun ka DILLI : A political review

Almost a month has passed since the so called revolutionary AK took oath to uphold the constitution in Delhi and here am I as promised with a crisp and sour review of it's performance so far.

Lets start with the HITS first !

The infant party has certainly given every common man a hope to fight elections and win at a healthy budget given the fact that average spending of AAP Mla's was around 4 lakhs. Earlier even a college election would not be wrapped up without going to crores although Congis and Bjpians never openly accepted this fact!. Hoax or fact only time will tell but as of now the issue of black money and huge spending in elections has been reduced at least in a single state ( Or claimed to be so ). They must be given the credit for raising a hope for a better democracy.

Second hit was quick decision making (although immature as of now but it can be made better in near future by more maturity in handling the things). We can't be hypocrites cause it was we the same people who always cursed the long processes existing in governmental work. So even if few decisions were in fact misses it can be rectified and a better decision making mechanism can be developed but at the moment we must praise the commitment to quicker governance. The audit of power companies was a good decision again.

Third hit was that ministers stayed like commoners and did a lot of surprise visits to supervise to keep things in proper order. AK didn't take the 5 bedroom home after people protested. I don't remember any minister in history to have done that after people's request.

Fourth and the last HIT according to me was the idea to convert unused buses into night shelters. It is a great initiative by AK cause we were tired to see assets rendered unused largely under government control like old ambassador cars, buses, rail coaches, empty water tanks, machine parts etc. If these are put to some beneficial use it would amount to development that is sustainable. Hardly any other leader in India talks of sustainable development!

The MISSES now:

INEXPERIENCE: Law minister who himself is a lawyer calls a meeting of judges and argues with secretary when he said that judiciary is independent of legislature and only Delhi high court has power to call meeting of judges. It was a laughing matter for many. Sense of power is creeping onto the nerves I think barring brain to think rationally.

IMMATURITY : The decision to subsidize power or free water for three months to show how you are fulfilling promises? Since sixty years congress is winning by freebies like these through subsidy. Honestly I expected better decision in this for these two were main poll promises. " If you exceed free water limit of 20 Kilo liters a month you have to pay full amount". WOW. Cleaver play of words. Its for the public to interpret now whether AAP really fulfilled the poll promise cause they are using taxpayer's money to subsidize electricity and have NOT reduced electric bills by even a penny. It's again clever tactics to give freebies just like congis did all these years. Many CMs of other states have done much better work in this regard by giving 24/7 power at cheaper rates.

Janata Darbar flop ! - The day when media followed the street beside Delhi assembly all day but only to witness a flop show. CM and ministers were to sit on street every Saturday to listen to public grievances and take immediate action in urgent issues. People turned up in thousands forcing the authorities to take away all ministers. It was a pretty bad management all together as Bihar CM Nitish Kumar has been doing Janata Darbars in an appreciable way for quite a sometime now and the Public interaction scheme of Modi in Gujrat is also very successful where he connects to people of the state by video conferencing joined by all top level officers for quick on the spot decisions and grievance redressal. The worse part was that AK scrapped the plan altogether by providing an helpline number instead for future! Annoying decision when other CMs have already succeeded in this scheme. This points towards another MISS i.e ARROGANCE.

ARROGANCE- AK made us feel as if he is a dictator by the dharna(protest) he did threatning republic day celebrations. First time a Chief minister sat on dharna and first time republic day was threatened! It was just a bizarre clash of egos although AAP justified the dharna saying that police should come under their control. AK demanded suspensions of 3 policemen who didn't listen to law minister Somnath Bharti's order to raid without warrant!. All heights of arrogance crossed when AK openly backed his law minister's illegal deeds like racist comments against African nationals. AAP wanted delhi police to come under state control but in most countries capital's police is under central control. The controversial law minister named a rape victim, ordered police to carry on raids without warrants, led people to forcefully take African women to test for drugs although it was found that they were clean. The women alleged that the mob led by Mr Bharti misbehaved, racially abused, forcefully took to hospital for blood and urine tests and were labelled as prostitutes who are facing the taunts of people repeatedly now. Still AK backs this law minister who has no respect for law. He also skipped Women commission's summon by sending a lawyer instead.

Cracks in the party : A rebel AAP MLA openly alleged APP and it's leaders of cheating people and of being anti-democratic but AAP top boss labelled him as BJP agent too ! OMG!  Till today they used to question every government but when they are at the other end today every person raising question against them is BJP agent ! That's dictatorship traits and lethal for democracy.

After disruption of section 144 by CM and ministers, illegal activities of LAW minister I seriously don't know how is AK upholding the constitution but AAPtards still be like ' Give him some time at least they are doing something good'. What if they make billions in scams and loot the country of all it's wealth. Did we get a hint when congress did all the high profile scams? What if these 'GOOD-Doers' have separatist ideolody or communist intentions to ruin the country? Till when will we keep praising their good intentions? Even Manmohan Singh had good intentions accoriding to us back in 2004. Look what he did. All these should be thought off.  ALL THESE WERE MY OWN VIEWS AND EVERYONE IS FREE TO AGREE/ DISAGREE.




ADDITIONAL Analysis : This guy seems to take my view quite forward in his analysis: (FROM HIS BLOG) 


Suyash Bhardwaj (IIM - Calcutta 2011 Batch) has written an excellent piece on Aam Aadmi Party:

Aam Aadmi Party has created a lot of waves among the masses as well as classes. This debutant party has shaken the foundations of existing Congress and the BJP. Many people see in it, the much needed agent of change, which the city of Delhi and perhaps the whole country needs. Will the AAP change the way politics is done in India? There are many good things (some extremely good) and many bad things (some extremely bad) talked about this party. I would select a few points to show that the much hyped ‘Change’ this party is offering is only in the minds of its supporters.

1. Claim - AAP/@Arvind Arvind Kejriwal are Completely clean and honest

Reason - The foremost explanation given is AAP declares its Donors list and Kejriwal has ‘clean image’, and that he could have earned crores in his government job (IRS) if he wanted to earn just money. This narrative further changed over time and translated to “Atleast he is cleaner than Congress & BJP”

Analysis – In Politics as we have seen through 2G, CWG, CG etc, 1 can earn billions of dollars, not just Crores of rupees. Therefore the reason that he ‘sacrificed’ everything is meaningless. A corrupt traffic policeman would earn a few thousand rupees, a corrupt politician would earn billions, is it fair to say Policeman is more honest or less corrupt? NO! Simply because he didn't get enough chance to loot public money. So the real test should be on whether a person has looted money when he has got the chance to do so. Kejriwal took home salary as an IRS officer for years, even while he was on vacation. He later returned the money when the Congress govt. caught his act. In the Sting video (howsoever politically motivated 1 may call it). Kumar Vishwas says that he is ready to take money from an MLA, for doing a show, without knowing who the MLA is, i.e what the sources of his funding is (Money laundering). It shows Top AAP leaders have taken advantage of situations as and when they have got it. Why would they not gobble up billions once they get a chance to do so? On Donors list, one does not know if it is complete & exhaustive, who has verified their claims? Has it been audited by a 3rd party? That way anyone can put up random list. In short AAP is making a lot of noise only because it has lesser stake, once it gets more entrenched, it would show the same, if not more, level of dirt as Congress

2. Claim - Arvind is highly efficient and can solve any problem

Reason – Arvind’s educational background. He is an IIT Graduate. He is a former IRS officer which is tough to qualify. SO because of his impressive educational background he should be able to solve everything

Analysis – 1 can only ask for Arvind’s achievements in his life before IAC activism and forming AAP. As an IRS officer, how many corrupt politicians did he bust (Note the word bust and not extorted)? What were his other achievements? If it is about educational qualification, is our esteemed PM Dr. Manmohan Singh any less educated? He is perhaps the most educated politicians not just in the country but the whole world and what a mess he has turned the country into? I did have the privilege to study from a very good educational institute where people from quite impressive background (including the IITs) also studied. With my experience I can easily say being from IIT is no certification that the person even possesses a common sense. Bottom line, there are enough and many people from the IITs/IIMs who are Dumbos (not talking of myself) and there are enough and many people from average backgrounds who are geniuses.

3. Claim - AAP is a True Blue Secular party

Reason – AAP Thinks only about Indians and not about Hindus, Muslims etc

Analysis –The very 1st thing AAP did after its formation was build exclusive political cells for Muslims, Sikhs etc. How is it different from any other 'Secular' party? Later on it indulged in writing separate letters for each religion, the standout being a letter to Muslims where Kejriwal said court convicted terrorists were innocent. Later on, he went to meet Maulana Taqueer Raza of the Samajwadi party so that he could use his influence to garner votes on religious lines, the same way Congress or Samajwadi Party does. In their election manifesto, they have mentioned that Muslims youth’s fake encounter would be prevented. SO they are completely ok if the ones encountered are Hindus? Such divisive politics is already existent in a large scale and I am sure people are not looking for AAP’s version of change

4. Claim – AAP is a Fully Democratic party

Reason – All the candidates have been selected through a democratic process, similar to USA primaries elections

Analysis – The truth is some of AAP (NOT all) were pre decided as accepted by former prominent AAP members. They also changed candidates based on unknown reasons. Like the candidate for Kalkaji was changed, despite the former winning the ‘primary’. In-fact AAP is a 4 man party which revolves around Arvind Kejriwal and his Inner Circle of a few members, who run the party in an autocratic fashion. Plethora of resignations from the party, barely within months of its formation testify this

5. Claim – AAP supports RTI/RTR/RTr

Reason – AAP volunteers say so. Kejriwal says so

Analysis – So far AAP has not responded to RTI filed by some Social Activists. Their candidate from Uttam Nagar was rejected by local Volunteers of AAP. A huge majority of Uttam Nagar AAP volunteers wanted the candidate to be rejected and replaced with a new one. They even sat for weeks of Anshan (fast). Result – AAP did not allow Right to Reject (RTR) which it preached about

6. AAP has only clean candidates

Reason – Kejriwal says so. AAP volunteers say so

Analysis – AAP raised a Lot of hue and cry over how Congress, BJP etc had ‘tainted’ candidates. But AAP itself has 5 or 6 tainted candidates. Arvind himself has 9 FIRs on him. Maybe those FIRs are fake, maybe not, courts will decide, but shouldn't the same yardstick then apply to other parties? Or atleast if he took that Moral High Ground, should he not set an example by removing those tainted candidates including himself?

7. AAP has very good, clean, competent candidates & their ‘Swaraj’ model will CHANGE everything

Reason – Kejriwal says so. AAP volunteers say so

Analysis – Cannot verify if all are clean but assuming they are, what of their competence. Are they good enough? Some of the candidates are so naive that for every problem, their solution is Swaraj and Lokpal. They seem to be out of the world. Swaraj Model in itself is 1 flawed concept. It talks of decentralization of power and providing autonomy at a regional level. How will this be achieved? No clarity on that.

8. AAP has massive support across the countries. Many volunteers work for it for free

Reason – Kejriwal says so. AAP volunteers say so

Analysis – In their own website, AAP has shown that the Volunteers expenditure monthly is somewhere between 5 Lakhs and 10 Lakhs, apart from other Network/Social Media expenses. This goes on to show that AAP has an Army of Paid Volunteers who work for it to spread its propaganda in Social Media as well as Ground. There are people who have also left Jobs to campaign for AAP, but that doesn't nullify existence of an active Paid Army

9. AAP is a Pro Youth, pro Middle Class party

Reason – Kejriwal says so. AAP volunteers say so

Analysis – If you read AAP manifesto carefully, it would be clear that AAP has a Socialist agenda, which is to cripple the industries and strengthen the culture of Freebies (Doling out gifts like Laptops, TVs etc). Despite the bleeding Economy they have offered to lower electricity bills by 50%, free water upto 700 litres for a family. These are just socialist schemes which would lead to lower jobs in the economy, thereby increasing the UNEMPLOYMENT rate among the youth. State will get into a bigger debt trap. The party aims at Poverty alleviation and not Wealth Creation, like any other socialist party such as Congress, DMK, NCP etc.

I can go on and on but I am not even getting into how some Top leaders of AAP have ridiculously blamed Indian Army, praised dangerous terrorist organizations like SIMI, talked of possibility of gifting Kashmir to Pak, including a Convicted dreaded Naxalite in their Core reforms team, fought cases for deadly terrorists/suicide bombers to ensure they get free and kill more people, run mercy plea campaigns for these terrorists or how they have formed alleged collusion with certain political parties or how Yogendra Yadav said that Janlokpal movement was only for Hindus and not Muslims. AAP has just finished 1 year of its formation and already shown signs of dirt running deep into its system. Once it gets older and gets more powers (responsibilities), it will show more of this dirt.

I am definitely not saying that one should not be hopeful or should avoid voting, for not voting is a social crime. What I am saying is we need a change, a LOT of change, change in the way how court drags cases for decades, change in a lot of systems, change in red tapism in Babugiri, but Aam Aadmi Party is not that agent of change because it is nothing but an old wine (and a rotten one) in a new bottle. AAP has possibly picked all the bad points of different political party. AAP has been hijacked by the Leftist Mafia, same one which dictates the many of the other political parties including the Congress and the BJP. It is a HOAX and one of the biggest Hoaxes to have hit us in the recent times.

PSEUDO Healthcare in India

The prefix ‘Pseudo’ in the title serves two purposes here. First it is to take our attention towards the condition of healthcare in India which is often termed one of the best in the world by our leaders. Secondly when read like “‘PSEUDO’ healthcare in India” it means this post is not only about Indian healthcare but it has a political twist too. Obviously our medical facilities are not of good quality that is why Mrs Gandhi visits US every year for health checkups spending crores of taxpayer’s money. The irony is out of 65 years of independence congress was in power for more than 49 years headed by Gandhi family. Still can’t make a world class hospital? I wonder why. This post tries to explain how petty politics have so far reduced the quality of healthcare in India despite having largest number of doctors in the world. So if you hate politics go ahead and close this post, be happy and keep suffering helplessly ignoring the facts about administration and political class who in the first place are responsible for those sufferings. 

Let me explain how politics have ruined our opportunity to be a medical superpower. World class healthcare demands four main things: 

Doctors . (India has the largest population of doctors both here and abroad.)

Medical staff. ( India have the largest pool of youthful citizens who if trained skilfully can rise up to the occasion )

Infrastructure. ( India has largest population of Civil engineers, IT professionals and MBAs who if coordinated properly can easily create world class infrastructure)

Political will. ( The only thing India, the world’s LARGEST democracy doesn’t have in this field even after  65 years of independence)

So despite having everything in abundance why is Mrs Gandhi going to US for treatment? Why do film stars rush to Singapore for treatment? Why members of parliament and top beaurocrats spend large sum of taxpayer’s money for their treatments abroad?

Singapore is smaller than average Indian city so it is much easier to develop it. This might be an excuse to justify our weakness but what about US, Canada, China? All of them have one or more shortages of the above 4 points still why are they medical superpowers? Because the fourth point is the main point and should be kept at first necessity. Political will is what those countries have and we lack. They have health as one of their main priorities. Health checkups are compulsory in many of those countries, Doctors are regularly supervised, wrongdoers are punished, med schools are regulated efficiently and corruption is kept at minimum.

So coming directly to the fourth point, Health and Education are not even in the top 3 priorities in our budget. Instead MILITARY, INDUSTRY and AGRICULTURE are given highest shares of GDP spending. Whatever mere expenditure happens in education and health is further filtered into the pockets of officials at every level due to largely unearthed corruption in these two sectors. Finally 20 to 30 percent of the sanctioned money goes into ground work and for decades now healthcare is running like this.

 Once I congratulated my 9^th grade English teacher after I saw in news that central budget has introduced a scheme to give laptops to all government high school teachers for better standards of teaching. He started laughing and I failed to understand why he was laughing after I Said ‘Sir now you will be able to refer to internet or power point presentations while teaching us’. So I asked him the reason for laughing and he explained ‘Kid you say they have promised a laptop? Just wait and watch it’s a matter of time we will witness for ourselves if we can even get the laptop’s outer skeleton!’ I understood that he was referring to governmental delays in India to carry on schemes which are targeted only for media as a poll gimmick but I still asked him why he says he won’t get the laptop and is not expecting even the laptop’s outer skin. He explained that the laptop will surely start its journey from New Delhi but it will deteriorate at every level. The central officials will keep the mother board, the state officials will keep the hard drive, the education board officials will take their share and finally we are not sure what the teacher will get actually at the end of this. Metaphorically he explained how money sanctioned to various schemes go into the pockets of beaurocrats and officers at each level. This is the primary reason why our healthcare and education sectors are in dilapidated state.

A recent report by an UK journal showed that in the last five years more than 1500 UK doctors were barred from practicing medicine due to the cases of medical negligence but strangely NOT A SINGLE INDIAN DOCTOR IS EVER BARRED FROM PRACTICING BY the Medical Council Of India who receive thousands of complaints on a daily basis. They temporarily suspended few doctors with serious charges like female foeticide but never have permanently barred any doctor. That’s really strange and any sane mind will be out of explanations for this. Either UK doctors are so bad, Indian doctors are so good OR the MCI doesn’t have proper powers like many other toothless Indian laws! Whatever it may be it is giving a free hand to people running malpractices in medicine (wrong to call them doctors). A report based on a survey in Delhi showed many practicing doctors there did not even know the spelling of Paracetamol still their complaint files are stashed untouched in MCI office. And innocent people flock their clinics daily unaware of the consequences. For these reasons an average middle class Indian can’t even think of going to govt. Hospitals. He would rather borrow money but will go to a private hospital with a good record for the sake of safety and better service to his family.  

 Government hospitals in India seem more like refugee camps with people all around doing all household chores in the hospital premises. The floors are an alternative to hospital bed (which are always in shortage be it Mumbai, Delhi or Kolkata). Injections, saline and medications are administered to the patient sitting on floor itself. Maternal and infant mortality is sky rocketing and what more can you expect if delivery takes place on floor. I wonder what would be the situation in the remote villages of eastern India. Irony is that homes and even small offices maintain more hygienic conditions than government hospitals. Patients and relatives make the hospital corridors their newly found homes as the treatment drags on for weeks. Doctors come once a day to give instructions to subordinates to perform all the functions of a doctor and then swiftly moves to his private clinic. In many cases drivers, cleaners and what not have been caught on cam administering injections to infants which in turn resulted in rise in stats of the IMR. Sigh! It is too much of the grim situation analysis right? But reality no matter how harsh should not be ignored.  

Here are few photos in this regard :

an indian govt hospital

UP again in news for such reasons

Uttar pradesh: 3rd such case

2 year old child died after wardboy gave wrong injection.

Its Complicated ! ! !

-An insight to cases of Mass hysteria in India.

Mass hysteria is quite common in the 1.2 billion’s land because of high illiteracy rates and lack of scientific revolution in many parts of the country. Weak administration, fruitless investigations and lack of credible investigating agency are some reasons for such cases in abundance. 'The monkey man of Delhi' grabbed headlines in early 2001 for months and the mystery surrounding it is still intact. Mass hysteria happens when a large class of people show common psychological and emotional stress and anxiety which is sparked of with an event or rumour. Due to high cultural and religious bonding among groups of people, parts of India are prone to such cases of mass hysteria.

One such case happened in the southern state of Tamil Nadu when MGR died. It almost led to a condition of anarchy when people heard the news of M.G Ramachandran's sickness and of him being rushed to US for treatment in 1984. Lakhs of people took to streets of Chennai outside movie theatres where hospitalised MGR’s photos were being shown. People refused to leave the streets for the days MGR stayed in hospital. They were crying and praying at the same time that their god father gets well soon. Over 100 people attempted self-immolation following the news of their beloved actor turned politician’s death who served as TN's chief minister 3 times. The news of his death sparked of a series of unprecedented events in the state ranging from looting, rioting to suicides. Rioters targeted buses, shops, offices, movie theatres and the condition worsened so much that ultimately police issued shoot at sight orders. Similar condition is seen even in modern times there whenever Rajnikanth is hospitalised. People flock the streets and close bus service at the earliest (Rajnikanth was a bus conductor in Chennai before joining acting industry) and experts believe his death will be another such event that will be bigger than all earlier events. It’s sad but there’s no way we can stop it as of now. When I was at Chennai two months ago I was really shocked at MGR’s memorial when I saw people from all religions and caste coming and bowing their heads in front of MGR’s memorial stone. Some were getting down on the ground with joined hands and prayed for few minutes. Such is the crowd everyday there that police have to handle everyone themselves while closing the gates at night as devotees keep coming.

                 

Muh-Nochwa case : Muhnochwa means ‘Face- snatcher’. The name is not the only strange thing in this case which rocked the media in the summers of 2002.

Uttar Pradesh was reeling under drought and there was a grim situation all over the state specially those parts where farming is the main source of income. One of those days villagers started to complain of strange events after evenings when they return from their fields. At first people could not describe anything but strangely they started getting injured and hospitalized. All of them had burnt marks and scratches on their faces as if something had scratched them. It became to be known as muhnochwa all over the state and more and more such reports started to pour in from remote areas of the state. Police did not pay attention to it questioning the authenticity of such attacks. Authorities got into action only when such attacks started to trouble Lucknow residents too. The first hand reports were simple but mysterious as nobody saw any object or person scratching them but only red/green/blue light suddenly and there appears scratch and burn marks all over the face and neck. The sensation troubled the politicians too and they ordered Army and IIT Kanpur to look into the matter since police had conceived defeat. Authorities doubled the electricity to many villages to behold any such event but nothing surfaced except blue/green/red localized light that moves sideways close to the ground. Police even burnt down forests close to the roads where such attacks were reported. People killed many insects, hoppers etc but the attacks remained a mystery. After a month or so the attacks stopped but the fear among people stayed.

Three years later i.e in 2005 IIT Kanpur researchers claimed to have solved the mystery. They suspected it to be a natural phenomenon called Ball Lightning which is frequently reported in Canada and US during drought. Long dry spells alter the conductance of ground significantly and results into formation of charged balls which can give an electric shock of 100 watts at a time. It explains the burn and scratch marks of the victims due to the effects of dense charge coming in contact with skin. These balls are generally blue in colour but due to varied scattering in the atmosphere it may appear red or green to us and they mostly stay close to ground disappearing after few minutes.

Visiting a drought effected area? Think Again.

Lets focus on the third and the most famous case which is still a mystery as even today we don’t know who was behind it. Guessed right we are talking of the monkey-man case that created a havoc in Delhi and areas of close proximity to Delhi like Gaziabad. First reported as a monkey with super athletic skills jumping from one building to another, sometimes stealing food but that’s the behaviour of any monkey right? And Delhi/Haryana residents were always being troubled by army of monkeys since ages. This was not an issue until that super athletic monkey started burglary, stealing diamonds. Now any layman could have guessed that it’s not just a monkey as because what would a monkey know about the value of diamonds? It’s something cherished by humans not by those banana loving creatures. That’s when the thief got a new name ‘monkey-man’ and media played a big and wicked role to spread its terror creating a nation-wide sensation. Soon it became a craze to confess about sightings of monkey man. An old woman jumped from stairs in fear of monkey man and died instantly! Thanks to media. A saint got public beating on street as people thought he was the monkey man in his black attire! Likewise many misunderstandings happened and many people got injured in such mishaps. On the other hand the Kala Bandar (As it was commonly known) continued its stealing from various parts of Delhi. Police could only come up with its sketch which many witnesses didn’t agree to. Many believed it was a big monkey that runs like human while police artist drew it as a monkey wearing helmet and as they say imagination is a whole new universe. Everyone tried to fit him in his/her imagination. Soon monkey man reports stopped and police stopped its investigation (What they could have done anyways, hehe!). Later again monkey-man reports started coming from Gaziabad and parts of Haryana but then again investigation led to nothing. 13 years later we are still unable to know what it was all about. What we do know from latest research is that a monkey can do all that a human can do if he is taught to. So stealing diamonds in a planned way is not a big deal but then again no investigation is going on that case in India so I guess we will never get to know what that was.   

Till then all we have is some bizarre imagination! Man or monkey? Genetically modified monkey-man ?

There are many, many (Trust me) such cases which come up every now and then in this country. The latest I saw in news was the salt crisis hysteria a month ago when vested interests used the social network to spread a rumor of salt shortage in the eastern parts of India. What next? The panic stricken people bought salt night and day in big( bigger) bags thereby actually creating a shortage. Stop laughing! There’s more. Soon salt prices rocketed and police started acting. Many shopkeepers took advantage of the rumor and hid salt bags to charge people extra and to indulge in black marketing. Thanks to some sane and educated minds who pitched in their views that all this was a farce and urged govt to step in. Police arrested the shopkeepers who took advantage of the situation and in a day or two all of this ended and I could peacefully sprinkle some extra salt in my lemonade. Those mischief creators by the way are still not known who used the social media to give wind to the rumor.

I can go on describing more such incidents like Mumbai beach sea water turning sweet case 2006, Tamil Nadu Vampire scare etc but it will get too long and time consuming. Let us leave it for future blogs. Till then stay alert and don’t believe everything you come across in news or social media. Not all blogs are trustworthy like this too, specially the blogs of congress politicians! Haha ! Be Safe!

P.S All these details are available in the net in trustworthy websites. Every such case is in Wikipedia too so I din't make up anything okay!

Ball lightning phenomenon

A muhnochwa victim

police sketch of monkey man

A news report of Muhnochwa.

To know more of these incidents further reading of the news reports of that time is adviced :) lucks

OLD toddlers : WHO CARES ?

Before I start let me wish " Happy New Year 2014 " Lets face a new year with new challenges with a smile and refined attitude :) SO here it starts :

“My son is currently working with Microsoft posted in California” , “ Ranbir is doing M.Tech at CalTech in Pasedena,US” , “ I have planned my daughter’s higher studies abroad”......

Am sure all of us are familiar with these sentences in our day to day life from the aunty in our neighbourhood or from a distant relative of us boasting about their NRI sons and daughters with pride. Some of us get encouraged hearing these words ad there are many who are jealous of those families too but hardly we see through the pain hidden behind the pride of those parents who sent their wards away from them for their development. The pain of loneliness which haunts them every second, the silent wails that they ignore while constantly living with the fact that hardly anyone will take care of them in their old age, skips our attention completely. Sigh! 

Our high school textbooks gave us the very obvious reason for over-population i.e our ancestors produced more children so that even if few of them die in wars, famines or other calamities then at least the rest can take care of them in their old age. In the quest of modernisation the idea of population control made a cosy place in the minds of city dwellers owing to the high costs of living, lack of jobs and other such reasons. Another such reason is the quality healthcare we have today which can cure majority of those diseases which were termed fatal a century ago. Infant mortality rates have also decreased sharply in developed and most developing economies. The fear of losing children has thus reduced and the slogan “Hum do, Hamare do” (We two and our two children) have gained popularity, much credit to the awareness created. However better living standards and low risk of deaths have not ensured that our senior citizens are taken proper care of. Why ?

Read the first line of this post again and there is the answer hidden. It’s great that more and more people are choosing places abroad for their wards’ higher studies, the main problem starts when the sent off person settles there forgetting their duty to their Parents, Community, and Nation at large. Better job prospects and good lifestyle convinces them to stay there and mint dollars and all their parents get is a sentence to be proud of. “My son xyz is earning this much dollars with this MNC” is said with a nice smile but when asked “ when will he return”, the face turns pale and the attempt to divert the conversation is not good enough to hide the pain, confusion and love. “oh he will come when he gets time” or “don’t know she doesn’t have plans as of now” are few answers I often heard. The few well offs who still have money after this luxurious expense on education can hire a domestic help or two but most will live in loneliness they die. Of course the NRIs return but only to see the worsening condition of parental home, make meagre arrangements and go back to their exotic life. The old are children alike and need support which the solitary home, costly furniture, imported vases won’t provide. The dearth of old age homes add to their miseries as it was their last hope to live with a smile.

Old age homes are scarce in the country in comparison to the population pyramid’s number of grandmas and grandpas in the country. Hardly anyone has time to look into this problem and the lack of support from government is a primary reason for this scarcity. The hope of keeping the senior citizens in an environment of care with people alike them is what many NGO’s are working on but lack of participation is leading to shutting down of such homes rather than creating new ones. Many think that a domestic help is all they need at their home but have you ever thought how such people can make use of the situation to harass the old employer for money or other facilities instead of taking care of them. National crime records indicate that old couples are most vulerable to murders by servants for money and such crimes are increasing rapidly. WE youth must pledge to make the world a much better place of love and care for the old toddlers rather

than leaving them on their fate.

A Different issue under the same heading : 

Another issue worth mentioning here is the brain drain that these people are causing to the country. Government is spending billions on the higher education subsidies for engineering, and other higher studies and instead of returning the country with human resources they work for another economy’s development which is not healthy for any economy. I will be writing another post on this issue in future.  Till then Goodbye, happy new year once again 

*all pics from net.