Rains, Dengue and Games

Delhi is wet and getting wetter everyday. It has not rained like this for over a decade. More rains are to follow. The Met department says that September could be the wettest. You walk anywhere in Delhi, pools of water will be there for you to negotiate. They are also the breeding ground for dengue larvae. More than 1200 people are in hospitals, many of whom do not have reserve blood platelets for the patients. Delhi is also dug out, as government and various other agencies keep clueless how to get their hands off to the unfinished Commonwealth Games projects. A diseased city awaits the Games in less than a month to rejoice in the splendour of going to host the mega sporting events, which will make the nation proud.

Dengue outbreak had kept the city on nerves in 2006 also when 36 people had lost their lives. This year dengue outbreak has nerved the people the most. So much so that the people are just praying that they are not the next in the daily count of new patients. Delhi government says that the dengue this year is not virulent and hospitals have enough blood platelets. The government was hardly seen so openly lying.

A day before I went to donate blood platelets to a Delhi government hospital, Institute of Liver and Billiary Sciences, where brother of a friend was admitted. He was admitted there after the AIIMS, Max and Fortis said they had no beds. This hospital hardly had any bank of blood platelets, while it was also stated to be full with patients. Approach to this hospital, including its uncovered premises, was all littered with pools of water with mosquitoes buzzing enough to scare the people.

Delhi should have celebrated rains. But not as it has been raining diseases. It will be utterly wrong to blame the rains for diseases, as the buck stops with the government agencies who forgot what their jobs are and remained dug out in the quagmire of the Games preparations. Apparently Rs 40,000 crores have been spent but there are no signs that the mega sporting events would bring any pride for the nation. Those in charge of organising the events and putting up infrastructure are at best busy in ensuring that they are not caught with their pants down.

It was a surprise to see the municipal workers finally fogging and spraying chemicals on pools of water to destroy dengue larvae. This was a pleasant surprise as they were hardly seen so far. If the municipal safai karamcharis were also put on their jobs, Delhi would have hardly seen so much of water lying everywhere. But they are seldom seen, though they number quite large to the extent of more than 60,000.

India is applauded world over for making plans and slammed in equal intensity for shoddy implementation. The Games alas is heading for one of the worst managed sporting events. Hopefully, accountability will be fixed once the Games are over. But it appears that we have not only lost an opportunity but also played with the lives of hundreds of people. Hope the cost is not too high, though it has already been very high. 

Killer husbands, wives in wrap of murderous laws

Reading the first report on murder of Priyanka Gupta, wife of an Infosys staffer in Bangalore, had given enough hints that she might have been murdered by her husband. A week later, another report on the murder case confirmed that she was really murdered by her husband, Satish Kumar Gupta. Nothing exceptional in this murder case to warrant a blog piece, but it's part of a larger crisis. Husbands are killing their wives and vice-versa.

The laws dealing with Indian marriages have become more murderous. The social change mostly brought in by soap operas on TV channels have emerged marriage destroyers. And to top all, the transition that India is making economically, by which a large number of people are migrating from one economic class to another, has left the young people clueless where to draw the lines.

The one who had earlier anticipated the social crisis and who sought dissolution of marriage was the one whom his disciples call "Osho". In his books on "Concept of Man" and "Concept of Woman", Osho discusses radical ideas of dissolution of marriage on the grounds that this binds man and woman into slavery of each other, while they would love to kill each other if given a chance. Though the gist of his analysis was sexual in nature, he may find justification in the way the marriages are getting dissolved not only in big cities but also in smaller towns.

The reported confession of Sathish in Priyanka's murder case can be stated for all the husbands of his likes. The wife scheming to snap off her husband's relations with his parents, change of place, refusing to adapt in the roles of daughter-in-law and so on. The husband too takes revenge and does the same with his in-laws. The result is a chain reaction, with the end result being that of the marriage giving births of a score of enemies on both the sides.

Thanks to multitudes of soap operas on TV channels to which the women remain glues all the times and changing lifestyle, which has already made the concept of neighbourhood redundant, the marriages are mostly stressed out. It must also be noted that the youth of this generation is under tremendous stress, again thanks to a score of region. Most often in a troubled marriage, there is a basic breach of trust. Husband spying on wife and vice-versa, with the mobile phone playing havoc in their relations is just a new phenomenon.

A recent visit to GB Pant Hospital to seek a second opinion for a distant relative suffering from brain tumour turned out to be interesting. The head of the neurology department of the hospital was in the mood to talk a lot and went on to share that if married couples in strained relations just started seeking counselling of trained psychiatrists 80 per cent of the lawyers would lose their jobs. "Husbands think that their wives are sleeping with others and vice-versa. In 80 per cent of strained marital relations, the reason is psychological disorder of one of the partner. This is treatable with simple medicine. Alas, people hardly consult psychiatrists in India," he stated.

Indian law makers are the worst in the world when it comes to framing new laws. Most often Indian laws are drafted by bureaucrats for whom just one word is enough to depict them, which is "arrogant". The Indian politicians are mostly lazy. They most often are ready to nod to what the bureaucrats says. The result is a plethora of laws, which have only prisoned the people. 

Indian laws dealing with strained marriages like the dowry act and others could emerge as one of a significant killers of people if a real assessment is made out. To top to all the madness is the police and the dirty lawyers who fleece the victims of such laws to the extreme, leaving them for no use at all. Only an idiot will confront elders for the misdeeds of their adult children, but unfortunately in India the parents of grown up boys and girls are the most harassed lot for committing the crime of being their "parents".

Live-in relations may just find India the most receptive country, as marriages prove to be great tormentor to the people. The day the people find an answer to bring a new soul to the world without social ostracizing, they will rush to give marriage a final burial.   

Junta's state managed Myanmar polls

World history is a testimony to the fact that the military rulers’ craving for power never allows democracy to take deep roots. Sadly, Myanmar is no exception. The democratic voices across the world rightly wanted Myanmar, also known as Burma, to look at India, the largest democracy, as a model as it unfolded its roadmap for elections. But to the discomfort of all pro-democracy voices, the military rulers of Myanmar chose to look at its giant eastern neighbor, China, for inspiration in place of its eastern neighbor, India. The world wants the military junta of Myanmar to free all political prisoners, who number more than 2000 before the November 7, 2010 elections and ensure their participation. However, the junta remains unmoved and is adamant to hold elections under an oppressive law, which bars all those convicted by courts from contesting the elections. If this was not enough, the military junta left the pro-democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi led National League for Democracy party with no option but to boycott the elections. Critics have rightly called the November 7 elections a sham designed to cement the military rule.

It was exactly 20 years that the people had overwhelmingly voted in favour of Suu Kyi led National League for Democracy party in 1990. However, people’s mandate was subverted and the military usurped the power. The military junta has kept Suu Kyi under house arrest for more than 14 years. The Myanmar elections can not gain legitimacy without the participation of Suu Kyi, whose term for house arrest is expiring

on November 13, few days after the elections. It is rightly a big asking from the military junta to expect the world to give their stamp of approval to elections without the participation of Suu Kyi and her party.

A brief mention of the oppressive Political Parties Registration Law, which is exclusive in nature, will explain why the world community is livid at the military junta. This law excludes electoral participation by any member of a political party who has been convicted in court. This law called for Suu Kyi's party, NLD, to choose between honoring her as its leader and risking the party being declared illegal, or removing her from the party and contesting the elections. Naturally, the party chose to boycott the elections. Further, a 2008 constitution adopted under the junta's roadmap reserves 25 percent of parliamentary seats for the military and says more than 75 percent of the lawmakers must approve any amendments to the charter. Also, members of religious orders are barred from taking part in the elections. If they were not enough, tight rules have been laid down for campaigning, thus prohibiting parties from chanting, marching or saying anything at rallies that could tarnish the country's image. The critics have rightly pointed out that free and fair elections can not take place without a free media and expression.

However, the November 7 elections are all set to see a limited participation of political parties, which mostly belong to ethnic groups in the country. Forty political parties have registered to contest the elections, and six others are awaiting approval. Several of the parties are also linked to the military. A breakaway faction of the Suu Kyi led NLD has registered itself as a new party under the name “National Democratic Force” with Khin Maung Swe as its leader. Ironically, this party has adopted the symbol of a “Bamboo Hat”, which was the symbol of the NLD in the 1990 elections, though with a minor addition of two stars above the hat. However, Suu Kyi has expressed dissatisfaction through her lawyer with the breakaway party.

The world leaders have been exerting pressure on the South-east Asian grouping ASEAN to persuade Myanmar, a member country, to ensure free and fair elections. It is under this context that despite the sfated

policy of ASEAN not to intervene in the domestic affairs of the member countries, Vietnam, who chairs the group this year, issues a statement stating that the ASEAN encourages Myanmar to further accelerate progress in the implementation of the roadmap for national reconciliation and democracy.

The foregone conclusion is that the November 7 elections will be dominated by the USDP under the leadership of Prime Minister Thein Sein, who has relinquished his army rank. It is important here to mention that the junta’s powerful mass movement, the USDA (union solidarity and development association), has now been disbanded and its assets transferred to the USDP, having the manpower of 24 million.

The western world has been unreasonably looking upon India to exert pressure on Myanmar to hold free and fair elections. Such an expectation was raised again when Myanmar’s Head of State, Senior General Than Shwe, visited India from 25 to 29 July 2010. However, it is important to point out that such an expectation is unreasonable, given the kind of role being played by China in perpetuating the military rule in Myanmar.

Barking idiot box

Being a print journalist, I have long avoided to comment on TV news channels. Though I stopped watching them long back, I tested if I could find some interests in them regularly, and have always turned against them more bitter.

This Friday, I reached home a bit earlier and thought of watching Zee TV for the Dance India dance Little Masters but was disappointed as the grand finale was in Saturday. I must add here that the talent of little boys and girls are just unbelievable. So, scrolled down and stayed with Times Now to see what it was saying on Commonwealth Games. What I saw left me with wonder how its anchor, Arnab Goswami, got a Journalism award from the Indian Express. I always had suspicions about such awards, and now I have more.

What did I saw was that Goswami was parroting Times Now expose for everything, that he was asking the man already in dock for a long time, the Commonwealth Games Organising Committee chairman, Suresh Kalmadi. The way he was haggled in the so called interview by this TV channel, I found myself sympathising Kalmadi. Any budding journalist shall better watch out Goswami to learn how not to conduct interviews.

Then followed a short talk show, which the anchor must be regretting, after Kirti Azad tore into him. The poor chap did not get any support from the three other panelists as well, while he kept demanding from them that Kalmadi be executed right there. Watching this great barking tamasha, I recalled how Mani Shankar Aiyer had blasted the same anchor when he matched his shrillness by telling him on his face "you are a good prosecutor, but a terrible diplomat". This comment came when this anchor wanted to pass an instant judgement within seconds of the conclusion of the Islamabad Press Conference of Indian and Pakistani foreign ministers. 

Then tired of shrillness, which could even induce blood pressure among the viewers, I scrolled down further and found Nidhi Razdan on NDTV, who was nothing but completely at a loss of ideas in the company of Manish Tiwari, Swapan Dasgupta. Though she looked quite graceful, her show appeared nothing but a filler. 

  

I did not waste any more minutes to switch off the idiot box to take up a book "The Palace of Desire"  to read before I went for sleep. However, I felt a kind of headache, which I took some time to come out of to find myself engrossed in the book. In the meantime, I recalled a comment of a retired diplomat who refused to give a sound byte to an EEnglish News Channel by stating: "I will give you byte the day your channel comes anywhere near the BBC but seeing the current state it will take more than 100 years."