Month: September 2012

Anna and Arvind part ways

Posted on by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

Anna Hazare and Arvind Kejriwal have parted ways. The issue was political formation. Many in IAC wanted to form a political party to fight corruption. Anna Hazare, Kiran Bedi and some others were opposed to it. The meeting on 19/9/2012 lasted nine hours. Yogendra Yadav was the moderator. Anna Hazare said those who want to form a political party can go ahead with it but should not use his name or photograph. Arvind Kejriwal said Anna Hazare’s decision was shocking, unbelievable and sad.

Baba Ramdev and some other people wanted a split between Anna Hazare and Arvind Kejriwal. Arvind Kejriwal was opposed to all political parties. Kiran Bedi was in favour of BJP. Arvind Kejriwal did not want to join with Baba Ramdev as there were tax evasion cases against him. RSS people wanted to use IAC against Congress. Industrialist Sitaram Jindal had a role in arranging meetings of Anna Hazare with people opposed to Arvind Kejriwal.

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TMC quits UPA

Posted on by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

Mamata Banerjee was unhappy with diesel price rise, cap on LPG cylinders with subsidy at six per year per family, and FDI in multi-brand retail. Most people are unhappy with diesel price rise as it will lead to other price rises. Cap on LPG cylinders will not affect most families as they do not use for than six cylinders per year. FDI in multi-brand retail is beneficial to farmers while small shop owners will lose.

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Judges as information commissioners

Posted on by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

The Supreme Court judgment on the composition of information commissions is a new milestone in judicial overreach. The judges have said information commissions are judicial tribunals, only retired or serving justices of Supreme Court or chief justices of High Courts can head information commissions. The benches of information commissions should have two members, one of them a judicial member. Lawyers with 20 years experience are also eligible as judicial members. The bench comprising Justices A. K. Patnaik and Swatanter Kumar directed the central government to amend the RTI Act. Some busybody had challenged the qualifications in RTI Act. The judges qualified themselves.

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Deccan Chargers for sale

Posted on by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

There is the story of an emperor who wore just an underwear and was riding a horse. The people could see that but everybody said the emperor was clothed in a fine robe and were praising the qualities of the robe. Then one boy said “The emperor is naked.” After that everybody said the emperor is naked.

Similar is the story of IPL. There was lot of hype and hoopla about it. Many said it was a great brand. The franchisees were not making profit. Some of them thrived on thousands of crores of rupees they borrowed from public sector banks which they did not return. They went for corporate debt restructuring (CDR). That meant they got more time to pay. Debts were converted into shares at higher than market value.

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Cartoonists in demand

Posted on by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

Aseem Trivedi got his chance to be hero and he grabbed it with both hands. He did not wait for police to come and pick him up in Kanpur. He came to Bombay and surrendered. When the police said in court they did not want him for investigation or questioning, he did not apply for bail. He imitated Anna Hazare. He was happy to be in jail. He was the talking point on TV channels. He did well considering the competition from protestors in Madhya Pradesh and Koodankulam. Somebody filed a PIL and got him bail.

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Turning tracks

Posted on by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

India won Test series against New Zealand 2-0. After winning the first Test at Hyderabad by an Innings and 115 runs Mahendra Singh Dhoni said the wicket was not turning enough. Spinners had got 18 wickets out of 20. R. Ashwin got 6/31 and 6/54, total 12/85. About Bangalore wicket he said it was like that of Napier. The curator said the wicket will be sporting one with equal chances to all. India won the Bangalore Test by five wickets.

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Pistorius in Paralympics

Posted on by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

Oscar Pistorius of South Africa had taken part in 2004 and 2008 Paralympics and won gold medal in 200 metres race. In 2012 he wanted to take part in Olympics. IOC officials did not want him in Olympics. Pistorius argued that prosthetics did not offer him advantage over normal athletes and was allowed to take part in Olympics. In one relay event his team did not complete the run because one athlete fell down and did not hand over the baton to Pistorius but the fall was blamed on an athlete of another team and Pistorius’ team was allowed to proceed to the next round.

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Hitler Store

Posted on by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

Israeli Consul General Orna Sagiv was in Ahmedabad on 3/9/2012. Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) had received many e-mails demanding a change of name. Employees of AMC visited the shop and showed the copies of e-mails to proprietors. Proprietors used to get at least 10 calls daily from USA, UK, Dubai, Germany and Israel, many at odd hours.

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Goa for Goans

Posted on by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

Manohar Parrikar said Goa is for Goans. Goans outside Goa are many times the number of Goans in Goa. Over the centuries Goans have migrated to many cities in India and to many countries. UK MP Keith Vaz is a Goan. Rajdeep Sardesai of CNN-IBN is a Goan. Lata Mangeshkar and Asha Bhosle are Goans. Goa is smaller than many districts of other states of India. It is smaller than Coorg in Karnataka.

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Unmukt Chand controversy

Posted on by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

All students are equal. Students who are sportspersons are more equal. A student who is the captain of a cricket team that wins U-19 World Cup is the most equal.

That is the view of Ajay Maken, Kapil Sibal, Rajeev Shukla, Kirti Azad, Arnab Goswami and many others who live in a world that is worse than George Orwell’s Animal Farm.

Valson Thampu, principal of St. Stephen’s College, appeared on many channels on 30/8/2012. He faced hostile questioning on Times Now.

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