Dow is a sponsor of London Olympics. Some people want India to boycott London Olympics if Dow continues to be the sponsor because Dow bought Union Carbide which was responsible for Bhopal gas tragedy in 1984. IOC has said Dow is not responsible for Bhopal gas tragedy and Dow sponsorship for Olympics will continue till 2020.
India has not boycotted Olympics any time. In 1980 USA and many countries boycotted Moscow Olympics. In 1984 USSR and some countries boycotted Los Angeles Olympics. In 1976, 22 African countries boycotted Montreal Olympics.
Category: India
Parliament Paralysis
Since 23/11/2011 Parliament is disrupted day after day. MPs do not do work. There is talk of no work, no pay for MPs. No MP has openly opposed it but opposition MPs blame government for disruption and vice versa. Some say cutting 2,000 rupees of daily allowance will not make a difference to MPs as they have other sources and resources.
There are two points. First, it is immaterial whether cutting 2,000 rupees of daily allowance makes a difference to MPs or not. Parliament did not function and they should not get daily allowance.
Hitler Didi should remain
A Jewish group known as Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has objected to the title of a serial Hitler Didi on Zee TV. Some in India support them and say the channel should drop the title and find something else.
It seems there are two standards; one for Jews, one for others. When some people do something like books, cartoons, films, TV serials and paintings, that offends Christians, Hindus and Muslims these people speak freedom of speech and expression. They advocate tolerance and say freedom of speech and expression is meaningless if something that offends someone is excluded. When something offends Jews it must be banned. There is no discussion. There is no talk of freedom of speech and expression, tolerance and the right to offend.
When I first heard Mahmoud Ahmadinejad say in some European countries people can be put in jail for denying Holocaust I thought it was a joke. Later I came to know it was a fact and at least one author was jailed for his book on Holocaust. A journalist who covered White House since 1960 lost her accreditation because she said Jews in Israel and Palestine are outsiders and they should go back to where they came from like America, Russia, Poland and England.
Calcutta Semi Final 1996
Vinod Kambli on 17/11/2011 claimed that Cricket World Cup semi-final in Calcutta in 1996 could have been fixed. The team had decided to bat first if it won toss as in quarter-final against Pakistan it had batted first and won the match. Mohammed Azharuddin had won the toss. Navjot Singh Sidhu had padded up. Mohammed Azharuddin elected to field. Vinod Kambli was stunned. Sri Lanka batted first. India batting second went from 98/1 to 120/8 and there was crowd trouble. Match referee Clive Lloyd stopped the play and awarded the match to Sri Lanka. Vinod Kambli was in tears. Sri Lanka went to final and won the World Cup. India could have won the World Cup. He said he was made a scapegoat, shunned by team members and his career was over.
Cheat the Nation
Once I found Manish Tewari and Ajit Singh on CNN-IBN and Times Now at the same time on what were supposed to be live discussions. I wondered how it could be. I had heard or read about the saints having the gift of bilocation but it was more than that. It was bilocation plus bilocution. Not only people were present on two different places at the same time they were also saying different words at the same time.
Sometimes I found panelists on three channels at the same time. Finding on two channels had become common. It was obvious someone had recorded with some people before and using the footage. No channel disclosed someone was interviewed before the programme except once when Amitabh Revi on NDTV 24×7 said Kiran Bedi was interviewed before.
Kanimozhi bail plea
There were reports that CBI will not oppose Kanimozhi ‘s bail plea. The Supreme Court questioned CBI on the reports and CBI’s lawyer Harin Raval said it would certainly oppose Kanimozhi ‘s bail plea.
Karunanidhi came to Delhi and met Sonia Gandhi and Manmohan Singh on 22/10/2011. On 24/10/2011 CBI did not oppose bail for Kanimozhi, Asif Balwa, Rajiv Aggarwal, Karim Morani and Sharad Kumar. It opposed bail for R. K. Chandolia and Shahid Balwa. On 31/10/2011 Supreme Court judges G. S. Singhvi and H. L. Dattu questioned Harin Raval “Is is true that during the hearing the CBI counsel said that he has no objection to bail for five out of the 14 accused?†and directed him to confirm the next day. On 1/11/2011 Harin Raval confirmed that U. U. Lalit representing CBI had not opposed bail for five accused.
Kingfisher Airlines and loan
Vijay Mallya is known as king of good times. He owns an IPL team. He owns a Formula One team. He constructs a multi-storeyed building beside a road named after his father. He hires models and has photoshoots outside India for his calendar. For all that he has money. He has no money to pay loan taken by Kingfisher Airlines which he owns. The airline has a loan of 6,000 crore rupees and he wants government to bail him out. Civil Aviation Minister Vayalar Ravi is ready to help him. Vayalar Ravi said “The aviation industry is facing crisis. These carriers may be privately owned but are Indian carriers, and the ministry will have to watch out for them.â€
Too much cricket
There is the story of a man who killed the goose that laid golden eggs. Similar is the case with BCCI.
Recent ODI series in India against England witnessed large number of empty seats in Hyderabad, Delhi, Mohali, Bombay and Calcutta. There was drop in television viewing. The law of diminishing returns was at work. Within six months of World Cup interest in cricket had declined. During World Cup there were long queues for tickets for matches played by India and in some cases there was lathi charge. For the past four years there have been Tests, ODIs and T20s one after the other and people were bound to lose interest at some point.
USA and ISI
For long India said ISI was behind terrorist activities in India. USA was quiet. For some years Afghanistan said ISI was behind terrorist activities in Afghanistan. That included Indian Embassy. USA was quiet. When American Embassy was attacked USA spoke. Americans wanted Pakistan to take action against Haqqani group, veritable arm of ISI, or they will act on their own.
Gang of Four
Gang of Four originally meant Jiang Qing, Wang Hongwen, Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan who were powerful during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) in China. Anna Hazare spoke of Gang of Four in UPA government without mentioning names. One of them is P. Chidambaram. Second is likely to be Kapil Sibal. Who are the other two? Some talk of Digvijay Singh and Manish Tewari but they are not ministers.