Stop Minority (non-Hindu) Quota

This is a very good decision which has exposed Congress for it was indulging in such vote bank politics.

Next, we should repeal Minority Quota in all states, forever, because it is against the spirits of our constitution.

EC halts minorities sub-quota in five poll-bound States

The Election Commission on Wednesday ordered the Union Ministry of Personnel not to give effect to the December 22, 2011 office memorandum, providing a 4.5 per cent sub-quota for minorities within the 27 per cent reservation for the Other Backward Classes in Central government jobs and educational institutions, in the five poll-bound States.

The direction will be applicable until after the completion of the Assembly election process in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Punjab, Goa and Manipur.

The EC took into account the fact that the decision on sub-quota was announced by the Centre on December 22, before the model code came into force, i.e. on December 24, when the poll schedule was announced.

The EC said it was brought to its notice that the order had been issued in violation of the model code, and that it took the decision to ensure a free and fair poll.

Sources in the EC drew attention to the Sections in the model code relating to parties, candidates and the State/Central governments. Para 1(3): There shall be no appeal to caste or communal feelings for securing votes.

Many parties, particularly the BJP, had strongly opposed the Cabinet decision and said the announcement was made as an inducement to Muslims, who are in sizable numbers in Uttar Pradesh.

Minority Quota

Our Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh said the following:

He warned that “no entity should be created inconsistent with our Constitutional framework and charged with onerous executive responsibilities without any accountability… Let us not create something that will destroy all that we cherish…all in the name of combating corruption. Let us remember that the road to hell is paved with good intentions.”

https://www.expressindia.com/latest-news/Lokpal-Bill-UPA-wins-one-loses-one/892877/ 

But this leaf from his speech was on his opposition of bringing CBI under Lokpal…

If you read his statements again, thinking about the communal (Muslim) reservations inside Lokpal, you would agree that on the same grounds, communal quota should have never been passed by the parliament.

Indian constitution doesn’t allow reservations on the basis of one’s faith. But our government has not only decided to make 50% quota for some castes and for minority religions, they have also announced 4.5% reservations for minorities (Muslims and Christians), on the basis of their faith! In my opinion, this is completely against our constitution, and all of us should oppose this. So far I see only BJP has been opposing this, but I think the responsibility is on each one of us.

Say no to communal politics in the name of Lokpal! Say no to minority quota!

Gender Biased Media

A few years ago, I got too infuriated with the Times of India (TOI), due to the way it handled a news report. Some policemen had misbehaved with some women-protesters in Punjab, and the newspaper chose to show the face of the woman being harassed, her horrified friend’s face, but the camera angle made sure that policeman’s face would remain unclear and unidentified. It happened in both the two pictures it printed while reporting the news. That was a wretched show of journalism and my dislike of TOI reached a pinnacle with that incident (but many more cases had to follow).
 

Now a day, especially when I am in office, I browse through news.google.com to keep track of the latest happenings around the world. With time I started getting surprised as to why even Google News props up images of women in unrelated news, at the slightest opportunity. One day I just scrolled down the page and found that pictures of women were dominating the news page unnecessarily and almost unjustifiably. Since news hosted on google news is coming from various sources, and each source has multiple images on it, google news should have some logic to select which image to prop up on its main page. Was there a gender bias even in this expectedly gender-neutral programming?
 

I look at this page which is from any normal day.
 

With the news item titled “OBC admission: Supreme Court upholds HC order”, there are lady students featured alongside. So if the media has to post a picture of some students, it will be girl-students in most cases.

Second item is on rains and calamities. News titled “Heavy rains in UP, Bengal, Meghalaya; 12 dead” Here too, we can see a group of five women joining their umbrellas and captured in the camera. So if some people die out of heavy rains, our newspapers will show the pictures of some women commuters walking or suffering in the rains.

This kind of gender bias in the media is disappointing, and even offensive in a way. Such a practice keeps positioning women as an object and material, whose bodies would be for “display” to generate more eyeballs and raise some TRPs when it comes for the media. Advisers have historically used women (women’s beauty) to create a buzz around their products and services to an extent that we have stopped seeing any wrong in it. But it is surprising to me that even online portals running by unbiased search logic are selecting images of women only, for display.

OBC creamy layer ceiling raised to Rs 12 Lakh

Indian democracy becomes a joke when we talk about equality of all castes and religions. What our politicians actually practice is “vote bank politics”. Any group, be it a caste, religion, or gang, can demand and get anything and everything, if they are united and ready to “vote en mass” for or against any political party or leader. Caste based reservations, or popularly called Quota, are an example of this.
 

Caste based reservations were devised to benefit the poor. The rich, no matter belonging to which caste, are always protected in this world which runs on money. But just like the rich among all castes are basically “rich by caste” – they are another group altogether, their lobbying has resulted in a lot of manipulation of original policies to benefit the rich at the cost of the poor. Creamy layer was a system devised to counter this practice.
 

Creamy layer system was created to pull out the rich and powerful people among the reserved castes, so that the actually deserving candidates who were very poor, could benefit. So far the limit was Rs 4.5 Lakh per annum, which itself was very high given the socio-economic condition prevailing in India. But now, our super efficient government (check which political party is in power) has raised this limit to Rs 12 Lakh p.a. in metro cities and Rs 9 Lakh p.a. in non-metros!
 

Here is the news:
 

OBC creamy layer ceiling raised
 

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics/nation/obc-creamy-layer-ceiling-raised/articleshow/10762780.cms
 

Another shocking reality is the timing of this decision. While the nation is busy fighting corruption and media highlight is on other issues, from the backdoor they have passed this rule thereby benefiting the rich and powerful among the OBC castes!
 

In my opinion, caste-based reservations are totally against our democracy and it mocks the principles of equality which our constitution assures to provide. I believe any right minded Indian would oppose the systems like discrimination based on castes, which indeed this Quota system is!
 

Long live our democracy! Let us remove all caste-based reservations and schemes! Let the poor come up and prosper!

The ‘Mahatma’ Fida Hussain

Ideally, the press and the journalists try to expose what is hidden beneath the rug. Not by peeping into individuals’ lives, for we are a billion people, but it happens particularly with whom we call celebrities. It is a cost to their celebrity-status that they have to undergo a scrutiny by the journalists. But at times, there are more to celebrities than a page-3 party. They get into controversies. The way media works; it ends up choosing its targets. The more interesting the enemy (the more articles can come up on the person), the better. When it comes to the case of the infamous painter MF Hussain Vs his controversial paintings, it was a case of MF Hussain Vs nascent Right-wing protestors, for the media. Who was to generate more news, buzz and gossip? It is an easy guess – the later. So it seems to me that the media chose its sides very smartly. MF Hussain became a hero, and his opponents – the Right-Wing ‘Saffron’ ‘Elements’ – became the villains. But, I think in the middle of this comfortable arrangement, bits of truth became victims.
 

I think not much analysis has been done on many aspects of the ‘MF Hussain Controversy’. His personal life has not been analyzed much – which could have given us some insights on the ways he chose. Demographic Profile – is what I mean. His decision to take up a Self-Imposed Exile was not evaluated enough with what could be the other possible reasons behind the decision to call it quits. I wished to research and write more on this, but I face a time constraint. But I read a very interesting piece by the fearless and reckless all-time famous journalist from India, Khushwant Singh. Let us read what he says here:
 

I got to know him during my stint in Bombay. He had already earned a name for himself as a modern artist and established a personal trade mark going bare-footed and carrying a two-yard long paint brush. He was a tall, well -built, handsome man with a beard. His infatuation for Bollywood stars, particularly Madhuri Dixit were bazaar gossip. By the time I got to know him, he was infatuated with Kamna Prasad. And she with him.
 

When he was invited to visit Pakistan, he persuaded Kamna to come with him. Once there he became very casual towards her. She cut short her visit and returned to Delhi. He sensed he had offended her and asked me to plead with her on his behalf to forgive him. He also added that he would dedicate his autobiography to her. No one knows how his family and six children took his philandering with women because they never spoke about it to outsiders.
 

I am not sure how many of you knew what Khushwant Singh revealed above. At least I didn’t read about this episode anywhere else. Since it’s coming from Khushwant Singh’s pen, I would assume it to be true.
 

Hint of another aspect behind him:

He fled the country and settled down in Qatar. By then each one of his paintings were fetching crores of rupees. He did not know what to do with money. He bought six expensive cars.
 

A man who doesn’t wear a shoe, needs to travel by six expensive cars, right?
 

What do these facts tell you? Doesn’t it give hint about a face of MF Hussain which most of us don’t know about? Has our media examined his other interests, except his flag-bearing act for the ‘right-of-expression’? Has our media showed us his sides where he is not having a ‘halo’ around his head? If not, then how are we expected to make an educated opinion?