Earlier last week, a friend of mine commented on Facebook about the next CM for Maharashtra being one of two animals – I replied to his comment and paused to stop in my tracks – I was scared of consequences!

Anything that you do in this RASH state can get you into trouble!

• An airline wanted to lay off a few people because they were in deep trouble – They went ahead at their own peril and got into trouble!
• A movie director referred to the capital of this state as Bombay – the old name which this city has held for ages and is world famous for. While everyone knows the city changed its name, the poor director had to apologize for a mistake that he made!
• Supposedly a cosmopolitan city and a city that provides a livelihood for everyone under the sun, folks from other states, especially the north of India were targeted because they lived there and were threatening the livelihood of the local community
• This one takes the cake for me – A Formula One driver is invited to the city to drive on a cordoned off road and gets a 1.4 million fine because he breached speed limits!

Our financial capital continues to amaze me. While I have a lot of friends who swear by the city as the place to be, these bizarre events make me wonder if modern India is in reverse gear!

The business world we live and operate in has changed and changed for ever! There will be business cycles because of which businesses will hire and fire. I’ve seen days when we’ve gone to campus with nearly insane compensation numbers to hire fresh from college grads! If you create an issue when businesses fire people, will you also create an issue when business picks up and hire people?

Movies are a flippin fun thing! There’s everything from sex to crime to fun and song and dance – there’s a censor board that has a role to play in and if they have done their job, who are you to come and throw a spanner into the works?

India grows in cities and now in small towns and villages. This is a reality that people need to accept and live with. If you are truly concerned about people migrating, as administrators, you’ve got to ensure that growth is uniform across cities and states

If you don’t understand what formula one is all about, please don’t call heroes in their own rights home and shame them and make a mockery of yourself!

It’s about time that my RASH state learnt to deal with change better!

PS: Can someone assume me that my IP won’t get tracked and I won’t get attacked? I care a damn – hopefully, I won’t have to live there in a long long time!

Image Credit: Don Carey

Popularity: 6%

With India heading towards its 15th General Elections this year mid, the election fever has been at its peak. All the political parties (parties in the opposition and parties in power) are again playing their cards to woo the voters through traditional channels like commercials through television, campaign rallies etc. But this election we also see another way of promotion through the news media.

For instance when MNS created ruckus in whole of Maharashtra, it was something which was something unconstitutional. Similarly the Mangalore Incidents have been anti-social; with the way the women were treated and molested by the activists. Contrarily these activists belong to a party whose agenda was to “protect Indian Culture”, but they were openly molesting them and beating them

These parties know that they can’t make it big because they lack leaders and money that would be required for this kind of propaganda. So they start early and make sure that by the time elections come in the party becomes known to people. Ironically these kinds of publicity campaigns using anti-social means was started by one of the major political parties by bringing in a flavor of religion into it in the 90s. This party not only succeeded in the dastardly act of holding a whole nation at ransom, but also winning a subsequent election and running this country for sometime.

If these small regional parties are guilty of cheap publicity, so are the Media channels which show these pictures repeatedly. Being a news media channel, they should feel responsible as they can be a vehicle for change in the country, but instead they just go about showing the pictures and video clippings of what transpired repeatedly. By showing these, the parties normally achieve their objective of being able to promote themselves and their propaganda free of cost.

The problem with our country is that no government for past two general elections has got an absolute majority and they end up having a coalition with these small regional parties. Hence they are unable to arrive at a consensus in how to handle these kinds of rouge parties that enjoy some kind of support from these bigger regional who are the part of the national government.

If these are not curbed, then in the future most of the parties, which don’t have any mandate or an agenda, would start doing these anti social and anti national activities and successfully win their elections

Image Credit: Jijy

Popularity: 13%

You can love him or curse him or worship him. But you can never ignore him – The scion of  Senas, the messaiah of the poor, the Robinhood of the chawl, the Kingpin of Maharashtra – Call him whatever you want, he is definitely in the news for all reasons – wrong or right I don’t know. But that’s Raj Thakeray for you.

He moves like a kingpin, his followers are spread across Maharashtra and the country. Opposition is extremely careful in dealing with him. Media loves him as he creates some very important TRP for them. Employees worship him and so is the unemployed.

Centre dubbed him and said “Raj Thakeray is the symbol of regional terrorism“. He does it openly, dares the government and continues to hurl attacks on celebrities, businessmen and politicians alike. Even the civilians are not spared. Explain why, otherwise, innocent people are beaten to death or ransacked or ripped like nobody’s business.

If you have seen Godfather-1,2 or 3, then you don’t need analogies. Raj is to real life what Al Pacino is to reel life.

Wonder if we would have to live in a country where one man decides the fate of a million others. If Bal Thakeray was the abysmal force of the regional jingoism for over three decades in Maharashtra, then Raj is the uncrowned king in current affairs in Maharashtra.

The way things are going, I will not be surprised if there is widespread violence all over the country.

In the last two days, there has been so much of national coverage about his arrest. I read about his arrest on IBNLive on Tuesday and now, I read that within minutes of the news of his arrest, there were hooliganisms across Maharashtra – burning vehicles, ransacked shops, injured civilians etc. Even journalists are not being spared.

And if you thought Police took pride in arresting him, hear this out, as one of the bloggers said.

I have never seen anything like this. The Maharashtra Police has turned the arrest of an upstart of a MNS politician into a media event. They are doing their best to make him into a hero by giving his cohorts and the time to plan, reorganize, and rebuild their strategies in the event of his arrest. It is a tactical blunder and the most stupid thing to do in these circumstances.

I am yet to see a politician or any individual speak up against Raj.

Yes, there have been a few instances of Laloo shouting at the top of his voice or the Bihar CM crying foul from a few thousand miles away.

In Maharashtra, everyone seems to have given it up on Raj. Even the business clan has budged in to this jingoistic trends – How else would you explain a sobbing Naresh Goyal, with pseudo tears in his eyes, welcomed his so-called extended family back to work ? He is ready to lose Rs.20 crores a day but not ready to take head-on with the man who stands between him and bankruptcy.

If a solution is not found immediately, then the India of our dreams will remain a distant dream. There would be widespread violence, regional fights owing to regional jingoism – We have already been divided into 30 odd states.

Now there is an effort to further divide us. Our unity is definitely under threat. We were Indians first and then Biharis, Marathis, Malayalees, Telugus etc. Looks like that order will be reversed soon- thanks to the ever growing regional jingoism.

With every passing day it is seemingly becoming difficult to lead a normal life, added to the woes of the financial crisis, surge in petro prices, increase in realty prices , stock market crash and what not.

Sometimes I wonder – Is it the return of the Jungle Raj ?

For now, take this – Raj goes to jail, gets bail, now ready to hail – All within minutes. Howzzatt ?

Ram Gopal Verma – By the way, are you thinking of Sarkar Raj 3 ?

Popularity: 9%