M.J. Akbar - The Sunday Guardian - India Today - Headlines Today

M.J. Akbar - The Sunday Guardian - India Today - Headlines TodayObjectivist Mantra

Ideas cannot be fought except by means of better ideas. The battle consists not of opposing, but of exposing; not of denouncing, but of disproving; not of evading, but of boldly proclaiming a full, consistent and radical alternative.... Ayn Rand
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Environmental Hypocrisy
The hypocrisy of the environmental elite is completely nauseating. They preach green living while living in plush bungalows spread across acres of prime land, driving Porsches and clocking up the air miles in first class. Phelim McAleer has made some really good videos to expose the eco-hypocrisy of the environmental elite. The elite stands accused of failing to practise the environmentalism that they so vehemently preach.

It is time some one made videos on the lifestyles of India’s politicians and NGO activists. These guys are always flying around, and they live like ancient maharajas, and yet they try to palm themselves off as friends of environment and the poor. They act as a stumbling block in every new industrial or infrastructure related project in the country. If these activists have their way, India would remain a backward country forever. The Posco project in Orissa has still not been fully cleared primarily because the country is shackled with a powerful activist minister.

Here is Phelim McAleer’s video on James Cameron



This is the link to the Robert Redford video



I wonder when we will have such YouTube videos on our super-rich political connected environmental elite.
Posted by Anoop Verma at 10:42 AM 0 comments
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Tuesday, May 3, 2011
The best conspiracy theory - Osama bin Laden Is Dead Again?
I am a big fan of The Daily Bell. They are publishing some of the most thought provoking articles. Within hours of Osama’s death being announced we had an article on The Daily Bell. It is not exactly a conspiracy theory, but it does manage to present us with a very interesting way of looking at this development. This is how the article goes:

America's number one enemy is dead. "I can report to the American people and to the world that the United States has conducted an operation that killed Osama bin Laden, the leader of al-Qaeda and a terrorist who is responsible for the murder of thousands of innocent men, women and children," US President Barack Obama said during a statement from the White House Sunday evening.

This is actually the second time a high-ranking official has made such an announcement. On YouTube, you may find a video available online with over 1.6 million views of Benazir Bhutto explaining to David Frost that Osama bin Laden was murdered in the early 2000s. We carry it in our video archive and you can view it here: Benazir Bhutto: Bin Laden was murdered.

According to the video caption, the BBC censored the clip, then reinstated it and claimed they had not censored it after all. The program aired on 2nd November 2007, before Bhutto was assassinated, and David Frost the presenter "did not challenge her on her assertion (at 2:14 on the clip) that Bin Laden was murdered. It would make sense that the West would cover up such a truth, as Bin Laden was needed as a "bogeyman" to continue the farcical "War on Terror."

There are other reports that bin Laden died of kidney failure even earlier than Bhutto claimed. But he has probably been dead for years. Apparently the last confirmable sightings of bin Laden came when he was traveling around Los Angeles back in the 1990s under the name "Tim Osman." He was meeting with his CIA handlers presumably. Later on he would show up in France (just before 9/11) for kidney treatment. He had bad kidneys.

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Posted by Anoop Verma at 11:32 AM 0 comments
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Monday, May 2, 2011
The villains in Ayn Rand’s novels eerily resemble India’s socialist elite
The villains in Ayn Rand’s novels like Atlas Shrugged and Fountainhead have a lot in common with India’s socialist elite. The description of lobbyists, celebrities, and politicians in Rand’s novels is prophetic. It almost seems she is talking about India as it has always been. Politicians, educationists, media bosses, business tycoon, and so-called social servants are talking about helping the poor, but behind closed doors they are always conspiring to retain and expand their power base.

In regular press conferences and campaign speeches they attempt to convince everyone that even more legislation is needed to control private companies and safeguard the population. There is talk about “right to education,” “right to healthcare,” “right to food,” “right to job,” etc. The thing is that education, healthcare, food or jobs don’t occur naturally. Someone has to make an investment and do the hard work before someone else can have access to such facilities.

Government taxes private individuals and enterprises to death in order to fund these meaningless rights, which instead of helping the poor, serve the purpose of enhancing the power of the political elite. What we are seeing in India today is game of increased regulations and rising taxes that many failed regimes around the world are engaged in playing. The meaningless rights and subsidies are not helping people at all, and this is exposing our socialist elite as nothing but a gang of self-serving villains.

The problem is that majority of Indians are of the socialist mindset. I have met very few people who actually believe that economic liberalisation can be helpful in alleviating poverty. The famous economic reforms of 1990s happened in an intellectual vacuum. Since then the socialist intellectuals have crept back into the vacuum and they have been coming up with an orgy of regulations to stifle the spirit of private enterprise in the country. The socialists have already been defeated through empirical evidence, but they continue to wreck havoc as “Un-dead” intellectuals.
Posted by Anoop Verma at 11:11 AM 0 comments
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Sunday, May 1, 2011
Lack of economic development is a more important issue than corruption
The biggest issue that this country faces is – how do we get the economy rolling again. The UPA government is making a big political mistake by focussing solely on the issue of corruption. Perhaps it is a strategy of the UPA’s political opponents to make this government so entangled with allegations of corruption, that they have no time left to pay heed to economic matters. The issue of corruption has now become like a quicksand in which the UPA is caught, the more it tries to free itself from it, the deeper it sinks.

The best thing that the honourable members of the government can do at this point of time is that they should turn their gaze elsewhere. FORGET corruption, let the law take its own course. Concentrate on getting the economy back on the tracks. If the economy takes off, the prices of essential commodities start coming down, the public might be tempted to forgive the few sins that have been committed in the past. The government must chase higher employment figures while stomping down hard on inflation. Right now the government seems to be doing the opposite thing.

It seems as if the government is intent on following a deliberate policy of inflationism, under which the prices will keep rising forever. Every economic indicator has started showing that the Indian economy is now in a deep mess. But the government is slumbering on the economic issues. All their social sector schemes like the NREGA are an unmitigated big disaster. Under the guise of stopping corruption, the nefarious license-quota raj is back.

There’s a sense in the land that the UPA is anti-reform and anti business. This government seems to have taken the policy decision to stand in the way of India’s economic recovery. Case in point is the takeover of Cairn India’s assets by the Vedanta group. Why is the government coming in way of this business deal! This unprecedented interference in the private sector rings alarm bells. The presence of an activist environment minister is also creating lot of problems. All this exposes the anti-private investment attitude of our government.

The telecom industry is similarly being shackled with new rounds of red tape, as a result of which now the tariffs have started going up instead of coming down. Hardly anyone can afford to go in for a new 3G connection. As long as Mr. Kapil Sibal is the telecom minister, I don’t think the price of 3G services are ever going to come down. He is too busy issuing character certificates to 2G scam accused, and he has no time to come up with policies that can bring some relief to India’s telecom industry.

At the time of elections, Shri Manmohan Singh had won over the urban voters, by presenting a pro-reform image, but the ministers that he has placed in charge of various ministries turn out to be virulently pro-red tape, pro-environmental and anti-business. It is time the government started recognising the “objective reality.” The economic issues can only be dealt through a process of reform. The NAC should be disbanded. The policies that have been implemented at the behest of NAC till now have proved to be very bad for the nation’s economy. The NAC seems to be functioning like a communist politburo.

Meaningless rights such as “right to job,” “right to education,” or right to food,” are a hallmark of Soviet Union styled dictatorships. Such meaningless rights ultimately lead to more poverty and starvation. History is proof of this fact. In a democratic and liberal country like India such rights have no meaning. Such rights must be consigned to the nearest garbage dump.What India needs is a set of "objective rights and laws."
Posted by Anoop Verma at 12:23 PM 0 comments
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Saturday, April 30, 2011
Shekhar Gupta's new article - The Great Letdown
The cities and towns continue to remain entangled in a dense web or red tape that the hapless inhabitants must navigate on a daily basis. You can’t have the smallest work done without being forced to pay a small bribe. Instead of economic reforms, we were confronted with power-seeking politicians, and skyrocketing prices. Thankfully, we have not reached the stage where there is censorship of ideas. So we can talk freely on blogs, and other channels of the media.

The best thing that the citizens of urban India can do is to break all relationships with the political culture. Each and every political idea that is dominant today must be discarded. The entire cultural philosophy of the ruling class is flawed and needs to be rejected.

Shekhar Gupta has accurately summarised the frustration of many urban Indians in the article that has been published in The Indian Express today. Click Here. I am not fan of this Jantar Mantar team of social activists who claim that the problem of corruption can be solved by creating even more red tape in the form of a new Lok Pal department. The corruption that we have in India is a direct fallout government's myriad interventions in the economy. The market is not being allowed to function independently and that is leading to distortions, which manifest themselves in the form of corruption, wastage and inefficiency.

Yesterday's post on the Antidote blog had shocking information on the top leader of the Civil Society. This guy seems like a dictator.Why should anyone have the power to enforce their teetotaller-agenda?
Posted by Anoop Verma at 11:49 AM 0 comments
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Friday, April 29, 2011
Telecom ministry’s policies are leading to high mobile and broadband tariffs
Many people had been planning to upgrade to 3G services, but they still can’t afford to do so. The 3G services cost a bomb. Checking emails or browsing the net on 3G devices can denude your wallet of anything between 1000 to 2000 rupees. This is way to high. I simply can’t afford to spend this much every month. Since Mr. Kapil Sibal took over as telecom minister, he has been so deeply obsessed with managing the fallout of the 2G scam that he has no time at all for conceiving consumer friendly policies.

New directives are being issued from the ministry on a regular basis and there is so much confusion in the telecom industry that none of the major players can afford to lower their tariffs. The industry seems to have entered into a state of coma. The worst sufferers in this situation are the middle class consumers. I don’t remember ever seeing Mr. Kapil Sibal talk about lowering tariffs. In his TV appearances all he does is make a case for his government’s innocence in the 2G scam. Instead of behaving like a minister, he is behaving like a lawyer making a case on behalf of his client.

What is the use of having a so-called honest minister heading the telecom ministry, if his policies lead to extremely high tariffs for 3G and 2G services?

The thing is that now the telecom ministry has started exercising such draconian control over the entire telecom sector that the normal market mechanism has stopped working. The 2G scam was caused only because the sale of spectrum and the telecom industry were too heavily regulated. Instead of giving freedom to the telecom industry, Mr. Kapil Sibal seems devoted to spinning an even denser web of red tape. This will only lead to higher tariffs and more scams in future.

While every ministry in the UPA2 is engaged in controlling the fallout of myriad scams, the prices of essential commodities continue to rise. Foreign direct investment has dried up to a trickle. The process of building new infrastructure seems to have come to a standstill. The only entity whose prices are not rising is that of the shares of Indian companies listed on NSE and BSE. It is frightening to think that this kind of non-governance might carry on for another 2 or 3 years.

The top leaders of UPA2 need to wake up to the fact that corruption is not the only issue of importance to the people of this country. The aam admi also yearns for lower prices and better infrastructure. This can only come through a bold push towards economic liberalisation.
Posted by Anoop Verma at 10:47 AM 0 comments
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Thursday, April 28, 2011
Every atheist is not rational


It is not necessary that every atheist should be rational. Atheism means disbelief in God or religion. But that leads you to the next question, if someone does not believe in God then what does he believe in? A man can be an atheist and still be completely irrational. Instead of believing in the dictatorship of any supreme God, he might believe in the dictatorship of the proletariat led by someone like Josef Stalin. He might be a follower of some leftist organisation or any other cult. Instead of prostrating before an idol demigod, he might be prostrating before a false political ideology.

In the media we have been treating these self-proclaimed atheists with a fairly long rope. Somehow we take it for granted everyone who claims to be an atheist must be a rational and scientifically minded human being. The truth is that many of these atheists are even more irrational than the believers of religion. Atheism is a negative quality in the sense that it only refers to non-existence of belief in God, and hence it cannot serve as a serious criterion for judging an individual. In order to be judged, a man must clarify what he actually believes in, instead of what he does not believe in.

I have written this small piece in context of the large number of columns that I read in newspapers and magazines ever since the Sathya Sai Baba died in south India. A vast majority of the columnists have said that they are atheists unlike the deluded devotees. It would have been better if they had clarified what they actually believed in instead of just relying on the word “atheist.” It is easy to poke fun at the belief of others, but it so difficult to sit in judgement over one’s own mind. Many of these celebrity atheists are leftist intellectuals, and their atheism has a nefarious political agenda. Somehow in the modern world, atheism has become the second name for Marxism and Stalinism.

By the way I am not the follower of any religious or political cult.
Posted by Anoop Verma at 10:50 AM 0 comments
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Wednesday, April 27, 2011
Price rise is a bigger issue than corruption
So Suresh Kalmadi has now become a political non-entity. This is purely a case of too little too late. Who cares about him any more! The loot and wastage of more than 70,000 crore in the CWG games has already happened. That money is gone forever. In any case, the biggest issue that this country faces is that of price rise. The markets are on FIRE. People are being robbed of their hard earned money on a daily basis due to hyper inflation, which is being caused by faulty government policies. Since coming to power the UPA2 has indulged in record-level social spending programs. Our ministers claim that such spending are absolutely necessary, even though there is sufficient evidence to indicate that their social programs are failing to achieve the promised results.

For instance, there is NREGA, which purportedly provides those ditch digging jobs to few lakh people in the rural areas. Till now we don’t know what is the administrative cost of NREGA. For every 100 Rupees that gets doled out to laborers, how much does the government have to spend! There has to be some clarity on how much this project is really costing. According to media reports, thousands of crores of rupees are being spent on implementing NREGA programs in different parts of the country. Our government is simply spending the money that it does not have. This rampant expenditure is causing price rise and making the life difficult for many crores of Indians who live in cities and towns. What is the use of NREGA when we are not creating any worthwhile infrastructure?

The government seems to be so deeply mired in its own socialist ideology that they have stopped listening to the people. Whenever anyone questions these programs, he is promptly labelled as a cruel megaphone for the wealthy. This is the familiar tactic of the supporters of big government. The government needs to wake up to the reality of today’s India. Majority of Indians today live in the cities and towns, and most of them are finding it difficult to make ends meet. Instead of wasting thousands of crores on useless schemes, the government should concentrate on controlling its budget, so that the prices can come down. Our politicians should realise that their political future is directly linked to the quality of governance that they can provide.

Question of the day: The Government has arrested Suresh Kalmadi, will it also be able to arrest price rise?
Posted by Anoop Verma at 11:51 AM 0 comments
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Tuesday, April 26, 2011
The Radicalness of Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged"

Fox News has published this interesting article by OnkarGhate.


If you’ve seen the new "Atlas Shrugged" movie but haven’t yet read the book, you may be wondering what the novel itself has to offer.

For most people, reading "Atlas Shrugged" is an unforgettable experience. The story is gripping, involving numerous mysteries and unexpected but logical plot twists. The characters are unique--what other book features a philosopher turned pirate? And the writing is that rarest of combinations: at once clear and deep. But for many readers, "Atlas" is even more: it's life-changing.

How can a novel exert this powerful an effect? Because in its pages Ayn Rand forces you to look at the world anew.

To give a taste of its radicalness, consider that today it's taken for granted that the man of virtue is Mother Teresa-like; he selflessly lives to serve others and demands that you do the same. The man of vice is selfish; he pursues his own interests and demands that his actions bring him a profit. Whenever a television show or movie needs a stock villain, one whose evil motivation will require no setup, you can be sure a businessman erecting an office building on treed land or a corporation testing an experimental drug will be written in. Simply to point out that they are pursuing profit is sufficient to damn them. Judging from my experience, more murders on television are committed by businessmen than by mobsters.

It is this entire viewpoint, entrenched for centuries by religious and secular thinkers alike, that "Atlas Shrugged" challenges. What emerges from its pages is that the moral man is in fact truly selfish: he chooses to embrace his own life by choosing to purposefully, systematically, and unwaveringly do the thinking and take the actions necessary for his own happiness.

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Posted by Anoop Verma at 10:37 AM 0 comments
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Monday, April 25, 2011
Crony Socialism is responsible for India's poverty
We hear a lot about the evils of crony capitalism, but why isn’t any one talking about the pernicious effect that “crony socialism” is having on the country! There exists an unholy nexus between the politicians and an elite class of socialist intellectuals, whose sole purpose in life is to provide ideological justification for bloated government, and unsustainable public expenditure. Many of the socialist types (the jholawala economists, and others) enjoy huge amount of influence, even though they have never contested elections and nor are the part of the normal bureaucratic machinery.

The regime takes good care of the intellectuals who support them. So the crony socialists manage get important advisory positions, where they can wield unimaginable power without slightest responsibility. It is time we accepted the fact that the government never creates any wealth. It is the people who create all the nation’s wealth through their hard work and enterprise. The phenomenon of Crony Socialism only serves the purpose of creating new impediments in the path of people who want to do honest labour. Crony Socialists are responsible for the atrocious poverty that exists in this country.

These are the people who are keeping India behind. We need to find new democratic ways for removing these pro-Big Government Crony Socialists from their advisory positions. The way the government makes appointments needs to be rationalised. Both houses of the Parliament should ratify any advisor appointed by the government. This kind of system is there in USA, where it is a norm for Presidential appointees to be vetted by the Congress and the Senate. Indian democracy is now more than 60 years old; we can’t afford to have so many Kitchen Cabinets interfering in matters of governance.
Posted by Anoop Verma at 10:33 AM 0 comments
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Sunday, April 24, 2011
Really funny book - Disorder in the American Courts

This is a really funny book. According to the author this book actually quotes word for word what people have said in American courts. Here is a list of some of the funniest jokes that I could find after a quick read:

ATTORNEY: What was the first thing your husband said to you that morning?
WITNESS: He said, "Where am I, Cathy?"
ATTORNEY: And why did that upset you?
WITNESS: My name is Susan!

ATTORNEY: Now doctor, isn't it true that when a person dies in his sleep, he doesn't know about it until the next morning?
WITNESS: Did you actually pass the bar exam?

ATTORNEY: The youngest son, the twenty-year-old, how old is he?
WITNESS: He's twenty, much like your IQ.

ATTORNEY: Were you present when your picture was taken?
WITNESS: Are you shitting me?

ATTORNEY: She had three children, right?
WITNESS: Yes.
ATTORNEY: How many were boys?
WITNESS: None.
ATTORNEY: Were there any girls?
WITNESS: Your Honor, I think I need a different attorney. Can I get a new attorney?

ATTORNEY: How was your first marriage terminated?
WITNESS: By death.
ATTORNEY: And by whose death was it terminated?
WITNESS: Take a guess.

ATTORNEY: Can you describe the individual?
WITNESS: He was about medium height and had a beard.
ATTORNEY: Was this a male or a female?
WITNESS: Unless the Circus was in town I'm going with male.

ATTORNEY: Is your appearance here this morning pursuant to a deposition notice which I sent to your attorney?
WITNESS: No, this is how I dress when I go to work.

ATTORNEY: Doctor, how many of your autopsies have you performed on dead people?
WITNESS: All of them. The live ones put up too much of a fight.

ATTORNEY: ALL your responses MUST be oral, OK? What school did you go to?
WITNESS: Oral.

ATTORNEY: Do you recall the time that you examined the body?
WITNESS: The autopsy started around 8:30 p.m.
ATTORNEY: And Mr. Denton was dead at the time?
WITNESS: If not, he was by the time I finished.

ATTORNEY: Are you qualified to give a urine sample?
WITNESS: Are you qualified to ask that question?

And the best for last:

ATTORNEY: Doctor, before you performed the autopsy, did you check for a pulse?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: Did you check for blood pressure?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: Did you check for breathing?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: So, then it is possible that the patient was alive when you began the autopsy?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: How can you be so sure, Doctor?
WITNESS: Because his brain was sitting on my desk in a jar.
ATTORNEY: I see, but could the patient have still been alive, nevertheless?
WITNESS: Yes, it is possible that he could have been alive and practising law.

Posted by Anoop Verma at 11:11 AM 0 comments
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Saturday, April 23, 2011
Civil Society, Corruption Society & Confusion Society


The aplomb with which the members of the so-called Civil Society come on Prime Time TV shows and declare that the entire country is behind them is not only unnerving, it is also very annoying. By what criteria are they making this statement! YES, almost every Indian is feeling fed up of corruption, shoddy infrastructure and the general lack of development, but that does not mean that each one of us has become blind supporter of the Civil Society’s agenda of having a Lok Pal department in the country.

We do support any fight against corruption. What we don’t support is a Civil Society that is stuck on its demand for having an omnipotent Lok Pal department. The truth is that the Civil Society does not enjoy support across the country. If they enjoyed support, political groups would have started prostrating before them. That is not happening. The political parties have understood the ground reality and they know that despite the media hype the nation is not behind the Civil Society. That is why every political party seems to be trying to distance itself from this Civil Society. Even the BJP sounds rather lukewarm to this project.

Not just politicians, many Indians from all walks of lives have expressed serious reservations about this Lok Pal that is being envisaged. This is a democratic country so how can we have an agency that is capable of overriding the parliament and the courts. Just because we are facing the problem of corruption, it does not mean that we should throw our democratic system into the dustbin and become a dictatorship. The worse thing is that this Civil Society is not ready for any kind of debate. Completely shocking! We can’t run India through a Politburo comprising of self-appointed members of Civil Society.

Whenever anyone dares to express any misgiving about the Lok Pal agenda, the Civil Society members accuse him of being Uncivil and pro-corruption. This is not how you can fight corruption. These people are behaving in such arrogant manner that they have started putting everyone off. Instead of helping Indians battle the scourge of corruption, the Civil Society movement have created too much confusion. Suddenly the focus of the debate has shifted away from the corruption in the political system to all kinds of salacious CDs and documents.

India will certainly survive its politicians, but will it survive its arrogant Civil Society? Suddenly I am not so sure. The members of the esteemed Civil Society organisation should understand that they don't have the monopoly or the copyright on the usage of the world Civil. It is possible for someone to disagree with them and yet be worthy enough of being called Civil.

In today’s edition of The Indian Express, Shekhar Gupta has written one of the most well researched articles on the subject of this Civil Society movement. The title of the article is: We, the thieving people

Shekhar Gupta writes: “So here are some follow-up questions: in that fight against corruption are you willing to reshuffle the great constitutional arrangement of checks and balances, separation of powers and responsibilities within our institutions, Parliament, executive and the judiciary? Will you create an institution that’s a cop-cum-prosecutor-cum-inquisitor-cum-judge at the same time, in a “na appeal, na vakil, na daleel” (the expression made famous during the Emergency) kind of arrangement? Do you want an institution that will override the judiciary and Parliament, have the magisterial powers of search and seizure and, as time passes, will pretty much appoint its own successors and be answerable to none…”

Click here to read more of Shekhar Gupta’s article.

Posted by Anoop Verma at 11:20 AM 0 comments
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Friday, April 22, 2011
Pure time pass - The Cult of Osiris


Title: The Cult of Osiris
Author: Andy McDermott
Publisher: Headline
Pages: 533
Price: Rupees 295

Now that this so-called fight against corruption has started sounding immensely boring and clichéd, it is better to sit down with a lighthearted paperback. The Cult of Osiris turns out to be a rather good option if you wish to waste a few hours. You get drawn into the narrative from the first few pages itself, as you are told in hushed tones that for the first time in history, an archaeological dig is ready to open the Hall of Records, which is the repository of ancient knowledge hidden beneath the giant statue. The baddies are nasty enough to inspire you to keep turning pages.

According to ancient legends, only the Library of Alexandria surpassed the Hall of Records, when it came to the collection of quality and the quantity of the documents and artefacts. Till now most modern archaeologists had been considering it to be a myth. “But a privately funded archaeological dig in Gaza had discovered papyrus pages that described not only the Hall itself, but also how to get to it – through a passage that had once descended between the Sphinx’s paws. When the pages had scientifically confirmed to be over four thousand years old, the Hall had suddenly become one of the hottest topics in archaeology.” So now the race is on for the way to reach the incredible secrets stored for more than 4000 years in the Hall.

On the night when the world is going to have the first glimpse of the Hall’s interior, a student called Macy Sharif makes a shocking discovery. A religious cult was already raiding the Hall of Records to find the location of the mythical Pyramid of Osiris. When she tries to expose the conspiracy, corrupt officials frame her. She goes on the run, trying to reach the only people who can save her before she is silenced – permanently. Well, this is how the action in the book takes off. After that it is a rather frenetic chase that takes readers all over Egypt and also to places like New York, Paris and Switzerland. There are car chases, gunfights, punch-ups, booby traps and much else to give you a really great roller coaster ride.

Macy Sharif realizes that her only chance for survival and to bring the truth to the world is by getting in touch with her idol – Dr. Nina Wilde, who as it turns out is newly married and jobless. Her husband is the ex-SAS soldier Eddie Chase. Both of them have lot of issues of their own. Not only are they low on self-esteem and money, bickering and nagging is part and parcel of their everyday routine. At first Nina is sceptical that the myth of Osiris tomb really exists. Macy tries her best to convince her, but does not quite succeed. It is only when both women are almost killed that Eddie, Nina and Macy become a team, and start working for discovering the truth. The book is fast moving, and readers often experience the gigantic hopping routines that take the narrative from New York to the Pyramids of Giza, in a matter of few lines.

There is lot of thrill. One car chase in the middle of New York in which Eddie, Nina and Macy are forced to participate goes on for over 20 pages. Even James Bond will find it difficult to muster stamina for this kind of car-crashing adventure. Even though there are lot of mythological ideas flying around, the fantasy elements are relatively minor. There must be a sequel in the making, as the book ends with a 30-page prologue of what seems like more thrill of the same kind.


Posted by Anoop Verma at 9:46 AM 0 comments
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Thursday, April 21, 2011
The movement against corruption is now a gigantic cliché!

Whose fault is it that the movement against corruption has turned into a gigantic cliché. The Civil Society members are everywhere in the TV proclaiming that they are being victimised by a determined group of corrupt politicians. That might as well be true. But it is also true the movement was bound to fail as it is based on false fundamentals.

I fail to understand why the members of Civil Society decided to claim that the entire country was behind them? There is no empirical evidence to suggest that they enjoy support across the country. In any case, such a support is not required in their case. People can go ahead with fighting against corruption even if they are completely unknown. In fact, lakhs of Indians battle corruption on a daily basis.

Why should fight against corruption be linked to the opinion of majority? Only demagogues try to substantiate their actions on basis of majority support, genuine social activists and statesmen must do their job irrespective of the public support that they may or may not enjoy. Somehow the Civil Society fell into the trap of behaving like an ordinary politician and that is why they made themselves into an easy target.

Another big problem with this movement is that it is stuck on its demand for Jan Lok Pal Bill. They just want to go ahead with increasing the size of the government by creating a new Jan Lok Pal department. Why not consider some other option, like economic reforms! By refusing to consider any other opinion, the Civil Society has antagonised a large section of the intellectual community.

The biggest problem with this movement is the hype associated with it. The Civil Society campaign against corruption seems to be getting better media coverage as compared to the Indian Cricket Team during the World Cup. Many people are being put off by this relentless blitzkrieg in the media. It almost seems as if the movement is a creation of the media-civilian elite and has nothing at all to do with ordinary people, who are the main victims of corruption.

The media hype has also led to a situation where the five top Civil Society members have now become big target for all sorts of vested interests, their integrity is being challenged by just about everyone. Things are only going to get worse for the five members in the days to come and if anyone of them is forced to resign then it might prove extremely difficult to find a replacement.

If the members of Civil Society had arrived on the national stage with a realistic ideology for solving the problem of corruption then they might have been able to convince many people. But all they had was a few stentorian speeches, a hunger strike and the relentless media hype. So it comes as no surprise that this movement has so quickly become a caricature of itself.

The movement against corruption is now as big a cliché as the 2G scam. The biggest loser in this mess is the "aam admi" on behalf of whom everyone, from politicians to Civil Society, promise to fight.

Posted by Anoop Verma at 12:10 PM 0 comments
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