I Too Want a Padma

I am not speaking about my good looking neighbour but the Padma awards which are here to grab for all and sundry. The UPA govt has done it once again, in 2005 Graham Satines' widow recieved the padma shri award for no good reason(well you may argue that sonia gandhi is the head of UPA, and that is enough to justify it) and now it is Sant Chatwal. Its an open secret that he is not a sant(saint) and dont need to be one to get national awards in India. Thanks to the media campaign the government has decided to rethink on its decision

On a lighter note I have few suggestions on who should get these awards

1.First and foremost my friend named Padmakar, just because it sounds good to hear "padmashree sri padmakar" :-)

2.Rakhi Sawant for her innvoative ideas to get publicity from a smooch to geting married on screen, the only thing remaining for her after swayamwar is suhag raat on screen

3.Our honarable president pratibha patil, who was first the honarable president of a co-operative bank which duped poor people of their hard earned money

4.Shivraj Patil for sucessfully uniting the opinion of all the people in country against Pakistan by failing to prevent 26/11(unfortunately it did not last long, for example people like shah rukh khan have already started saying that we should treat people from pakistan fairly)

5.Madhu Koda for strengthening India's influence far in africa by buying coal mines in Liberia also in south east asia by owning a hotel in Thailand

6.Ramalinga Raju, how can this genuis be missed he is the maker of Indian Enron.

Please send in your suggestion, I am planning to send the list to PMO :-)

P.S: Most of the people who are receiving these awards well deserve them and I have utmost respect for them. People like Chatwal bring disgrace to Padma awards and also to the people who truly deserve them.

Naxals, Maoist and Menace

It all started with a bizarre incident of attacking the land lords at a small village in west benagl called naxalbari, a moment was born and the people associated with it were called naxals. It was a moment for poor against the atrocities of the "Government", a government supposed to be a collective efforts of rich and poor but unfortunately did not involve poor and tribals. Although the cause of naxals was angelic but the way employed by them was undemocratic and barbaric. Justifying naxals is like justifying phoolan devi for killing the thakurs.

The Maoist/naxal menace is increasingly becoming a big headache for the Indian government.Sometimes I feel that my country is envied by the gods, on one side we have Pakistan and on other side we have china, as if this was not enough the internal naxal problem which tantamount to terrorism is growing. The naxals are becoming bolder and determined every day.

The society usually looks up to its intellectuals for guidance, but in India the Intellectuals are always caught on a wrong foot, either it is the matter of hanging a terrorist, constructing a dam, testing nuclear weapons or the naxal violence. They always seems to be supporting the wrong side to be more precise always anti-government. I agree that the government has failed on many fronts and there are flaws in the system of democracy but it’s not beyond repair. The growing violence of naxals is a direct message to the government to start thinking about the tribals and poor people, building roads in Gadchiroli is as important as building a sea link in mumbai. Why is that the government always requires naxal attack to realize that the region lacks development, the government has become like a police force of hindi films, reaching the place after the actual action has taken place.

Naxals call themselves people's representatives but never hesitate to kill their own people if they violate their commands, they claim to struggle for the common man but take pride in beheading a cop who is also an another common man doing his duty and following the orders given to him. Naxals, Moists and Menace have become the synonyms of present times. Naxals should never forget that unlike Mao the greatest revolutionary Gandhi never used GUN to WIN.

FREEDOM IS NOT FREE

When I woke up on the afternoon of 15th august the flag was already hoisted at red fort, the national anthem already sung and host of patriotic movies were being screened on different channels. When I saw the video on a news channel I saw a smile on our prime minister's face when he was hoisting the flag, I'm not sure if he is happy because "HE" is hoisting the flag or because Indian flag is flying high, I am not questioning his patriotism but I am just thinking how many of us think in the second way. When Nehru hoisted the tricolour on 15th of august 1947 he was happy because the tricolour is being hoisted, but not because he was doing it. Our ancestors have given life and blood to see this day, few were unlucky and a few remained to see this day, the start point of we becoming our own masters. Its hard to imagine of those people who refused to hurt anyone to achieve their goal but in turn lost their life, its hard to imagine about a man who led these people, the man who started an experiment of non violence and was successful in it , a man whose words made millions to stand against a mighty empire. They all had had to pay a big prize, they did it only because they wanted us to breathe freely .

Today we are free to vote for any one and ironically our freedom is far stretched so the person who is voted to power is also free to work or abstain from working. We are free to defecate anywhere so millions of them use rail tracks as their toilets, we are free to sleep anywhere so millions of them sleep on footpath and authorities are free to rehabilitate them or to let them rot on footpath. The western world which once looked down upon India has become role model for many of us, I do believe that we need to learn a lot from the western world in terms of development but many of us blindly believe that westernization is modernization. We are blindly obsessed with western culture, a man in jeans is more respected than a man wearing dhoti, we have forgotten that mahatma used to wear just a dhoti, a journalist like Barkha Dutt is more interested in Obama's beer party than iftar party hosted by Vajpayee. People are coming in support of the gay rights just because western world has adopted it, people who are supporting gay rights say "look at canada, gay marriages are legal over there", I say look at Canada they have such a good economy and health care facilities why don't we debate on such a matter rather than debating on gay rights which is not natural and utter waste of time.More and more parents are speaking in English with their sons and daughters, a day might come when there will be no one left to speak Indian languages. The culture and tradition which was once our country's pride is vanishing just like the ice in Antartica,We are misusing the hard earned freedom, the freedom for which hundred's of Indian's have lost their lives, if we don't correct ourselves we will have to pay a bigger prize this time cause FREEDOM IS NOT FREE