Month: July 2010

WikiLeaks and India

America, General, India, Pakistan, World
Comments

WikiLeaks on 26/7/2010 made public many secret documents dealing with Afghan War. Some of them have relevance to India.

ISI played a role in terrorist activities against Indians. ISI paid the Taliban and Haqqani network to target Indians, Indian Embassy, Indian Consulate in Kandahar and other places. Indians have died. India has suffered loss of property.

It is futile to expect Pakistan to act against ISI or USA to do anything significant. India has to act on its own.

India should file chargesheets in Indian courts relating to attacks on Indians. ISI persons and their collaborators should be named in the chargesheets and should be summoned for interrogations. If they fail to turn up they should be declared persons Wanted Dead or Alive and rewards should be announced for persons who hand over wanted persons dead or alive. Ashfaq Kayani was head of ISI for three years. His term as army chief was to end in November 2010 has been extended by three years which reflects poorly on Pakistani army. Hamid Gul, former chief of ISI, played a role. Their names must be included.

Obama administration claims the documents relate to the period before he became president but he has continued the policy of previous administration. Afghan War is not popular in USA.

The documents show drones used by USA are not effective as they are not made out to be and crash many times. India should develop drones that do not crash.

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Commonwealth Games

India
Comments

India should have quit Commonwealth when it became a republic. It continued in Commonwealth.

Commonwealth Games are to be held in Delhi in October 2010. Mani Shankar Aiyar wants the games to flop so that India does not bid for Asian Games and Olympics and waste its money. He has said that India paid one lakh dollars in bribes to each delegate to get votes for staging Commonwealth Games. He was Sports Minister and foresaw that the games will be a disaster due to the functioning of Indian Olympic Association (IOA). His predecessor Sunil Dutt had a tough time and he died. IOA officials did not want to interact with Mani Shankar Aiyar and they told him to send Sports Secretary and he also died. Mani Shankar Aiyar wanted a special committee be set up to oversee the preparations for Commonwealth Games as India did for Asian Games 1982 but that did not happen. In 2006 Commonwealth Games Federation chief had expressed concern in private that IOA was lagging behind in preparation. In March 2009 it was public. After that various deadlines were set to be extended further. Now just around 60 days are left for games. Stadia are not ready and rains have exposed the shoddy construction.

Swapan Dasgupta agrees with Mani Shankar Aiyar. There is disconnect between people who think holding the games as national pride and other people. He did not say he wants the games to flop but if Mani Shankar Aiyar is anti-national so is he.

Crores of rupees are to be spent on opening and closing ceremonies. The Group of Ministers had a preview of the ceremonies and they want Islamic culture to be added to it. Islam is a religion and not a culture. Muslims have different cultures. The culture of Muslims of Kerala is different from the culture of Muslims of Uttar Pradesh. Too bad our ministers don’t know such things.

IOA is not answerable to government. Sports Ministers Mohinder Singh Gill’s attempts to regulate the terms of office bearers of IOA and its affiliates have failed. Athletes have talked of sexual harassment.

IOA has a contract with an Australian company for sponsorship deals for Commonwealth Games. The company gets 10%-20% commission of all sponsorships IOA gets whether they come through the company or not. The company did not get many sponsorships. Now Public Undertakings are asked to sponsor the games and the company will get commission.

India took it upon itself to host Commonwealth Games so it has to fulfil its obligation but quit Commonwealth after the games. Since the Indian government has no say in the functioning of IOA it should stop financing IOA and get back stadia, buildings and whatever else is given to them. What India has achieved in Olympics is mostly in spite of IOA. IOA should finance itself like BCCI.

There are reports of cost overruns and corruption in the construction of stadia and flyovers. CNN-IBN has referred to Commonwealth Games as Corruption Wealth Games.

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Sending man to Moon is waste of money

India
Comments

India has a plan to send man to moon. It is better to scrap that plan.

USA had seven missions to Moon. It did not proceed with missions as there was nothing to gain.

Sending man to moon is an expensive proposition. It will cost at least 10,000 crore rupees. At the end you have two men who will spend some time on the Moon and return with something that is not of much use and can be brought by unmanned vehicle as Chandrayaan did.

Science has to be for benefit of people. Individuals may spend their personal wealth on projects that do not benefit humanity but it is not right for governments to spend money on such projects.

India has many problems. Drinking water is a problem in many villages and cities. Bad roads, lack of power, malnourishment are some of the problems. Money should be spent for roads, electricity, education and proper storage of food grains. Care should be taken that it is not siphoned off. Electricity supply for farmers or others should not be free. Those who use it should pay for it. Those who steal electricity should be caught and punished. It is wrong to pass on the amount to other consumers. Money should be spent on primary schools. Money should be spent to ensure speedy justice. All courts should have computers so that when the judgment is delivered copy of the judgement is available. Money should be spent on turning Thar desert into a fertile land. Money should be spent on turning barren lands into forests.

Money can be spent on building bridges, high schools, colleges, institutes of technology and management. Jails are overcrowded. Money can be spent on building jails.

Money can be spent on solar panels for government buildings. Money can be spent on rainwater harvesting.
Money can be spent on walls along the nation’s borders so that there is no illegal immigration and terrorists do not get in.

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