Thursday, April 30, 2015

Marriage is Sacred: So marital rape is allowed in India!!!!

Sometimes I wonder, if our politicians have any grey matter let in the skull.... They across all political parties have big heads - but I suppose it is filled with hot air!


The concept of marital rape does not apply in India as marriage is treated as sacred here, the government said in Parliament today.
"It is considered that the concept of marital rape, as understood internationally, cannot be suitably applied in the Indian context due to various factors, including level of education, illiteracy, poverty, myriad social customs and values, religious beliefs, mindset of the society to treat marriage as a sacrament," Minister of State for Home, Haribhai Parathibhai Chaudhary said in the Rajya Sabha.


How do we even come up with such regressive silliness. How can one quote culture and religion to defend rape? 

Monday, April 27, 2015

India- Origin.... ?

I read an article....

"An Indian-origin scientist at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who has developed artificial human microlivers for drug testing, has won a prestigious... "
How we love reporting such things here...
  • Indian origin boy wins Nat Geo Bee Contest...
  • Indian-origin scientist wins $500,000 research award...
  • Indian-origin schoolboy in UK wins major physics prize ...
  • Indian origin musician Ricky Kej wins Grammy...
  • Indian-origin lecturer wins top nursing award


and the list goes on ... and on .... and on...
Then I read this
37-year-old Padmni Ray Murray, who is an Overseas Citizen of India or OCI card holder, is a lecturer from Bengaluru. She and her colleague Indira Chowdhury were visiting Nepal for a conference. The two were at Kathmandu airport at 5.30 this morning, queuing up to board a relief flight. But when it was her turn to board, Ms Murray says, she was stopped because of her British passport.

And few comments I read to this was as follows...
Srinivas | 20 hours ago
Isn't it opportunism to keep a British passport and then claim that she is India. If so, why do people don't want to just keep their identity limited to being a Indian national. The central government has been continuously doing good work, first in Iraq, Yemen and now in Nepal and the media seems to always look for TRP by highlighting such issues which is not a true representation. Hope the media learns to highlight what is appropriate to the level it is required.

  • Anonymous | 20 hours ago
    You are are a Brit, kindly accept the fact and except help from Britain not India..Indians should be aced first and be happy with your British passport if that helps you ..you guys become Indians when you need Indian help but in other case you are a Brit paying council taxes there ..enough of your double standards ...it's just OCI card which gives you only 6 months to stay in India nothing else
.....

and many such comments..... 

We enjoy the fame they bring when they succeed abroad... we enjoy the money they send, by their hard work abroad...

Hypocrisy .... thy name is pseudo-nationalism!


Making in India

India garment, leather, handicraft, and gems and jewellery exporters have watched helplessly as the rupee has appreciated by a quarter against Europe's common currency over the past 12 months. The result has been India's worst export performance since the global slump of 2009.

Making in India not bearing expected fruits?

Wednesday, April 22, 2015

India's Poverty is Social Violence - Harsh Mander

The annual number of India's hidden, avoidable deaths dwarfs the annual loss of human life resulting from all natural disasters globally, estimated at about 300,000.

The reason why the preventable deaths of these many millions year after year is not 'considered exceptional, a tragedy and a disgrace', according to Gupta, is the normalization of poverty.

Indeed, for most people in India, just as there are hills, valleys, deserts, rivers and forests in this teeming, ancient country, there is also poverty. There has been poverty in the past, it exists in the present, and it will endure long into the foreseeable future. The social acceptability of letting people stay poor, therefore, is not considered problematic. Not providing food, clothing, shelter and healthcare to people in dire need is not seen as killing them. This social violence is rendered invisible so that poverty does not constitute a scandal, and the preventable deaths of masses of the poor do not provoke soul-searching or public outrage.


The challenges of inequality in India are compounded by the powerful revival of the politics of difference, a new conservatism, and the evidence of active social and state hostility towards minority groups and communities, reflected in grossly under-provisioned Muslim ghettoes, religious profiling in both terror-related and other crimes, and the extra-judicial killings of tribals, Muslims and Dalits. There is a growing appeal among the middle classes of right-wing politics that often combines market fundamentalism with hostility towards minorities and India's neighbours. In the general elections of 2014, this mood was best represented by Narendra Modi, who fought a blistering electoral battle deploying 'shock and awe' tactics against his adversaries-including liberals, socialists, 'secularists' and minorities - whom he felled decisively to become India's sixteenth prime minister.

..........  Modi offered a combination of three fundamentalisms. First, a market orthodoxy, which guarantees unprecedented levels of subsidies to big business in the form of long tax holidays, soft loans, cheap land and electricity, at the expense of public expenditure on education, health, social protection and public infrastructure. Next was communal fundamentalism, constituting barely -disguised hostility towards religious minorities, especially Muslims, which was the main rallying agenda on the ground in electorally-crucial states like Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. And the third was a militarist fundamentalism, envisioning an aggressive foreign policy, including war with Pakistan.