Some people astonish us. So do some numbers. Take the case of Shashi Tharoor. When his candidature to the Lok Sabha election was announced in March 2009, lots of Indians were surprised. Many (inlcuding me) hoped for a different type of politician.

Many of them wrote him off saying that he is too sophisticated for politics and will not be able to handle the rough and tough of politics. He walked out of a political debate before the elections. This was telecast live and he had to draw a lot of flak for that. This only added to the perception that he cannot handle criticism. But he astonished us all with his landslide victory with a margin of close to 1 Lakh votes. Then again, he surprised us again by becoming the MoS for External Affairs.

Now, he has astonished us again with some “astonishing” numbers. I am talking about his number of followers in Twitter. He started to tweet on March 17, 2009 as part of his election campaign. As of June 2, 2009, his Twitter followers had grown to around 4500+. (I don’t remember exactly, but I was his Twitter follower number 2700 ( or so). By the end of that month, June 2009, his number of followers crossed 10,000.

He got a new title as he himself tweeted on June 24, 2009 “In Dubai my old friend Sheikha Lubna, UAE foreign trade minister, hosted a friendly lunch at which she greeted me as ‘Minister Twitter’!”

The progression from that point was quite interesting. Jacob Joseph, Tharoor’s Secretary, has been tweeting about the number of followers. Here is a sample of his tweets.

August 4, 2009 – Shashi Tharoor (@shashitharoor) has crossed 20,000 followers

August 5, 2009 – @priyankachopra has overtaken @shashitharoor

(Priyanka Chopra apparently had the most number of followers among Indian celebrities at that time and there was a race for the top spot)

August 22, 2009 – Pic of Dr. Shashi Tharoor (@shashitharoor) tweeting from the boat race http://myloc.me/p8rs

August 26, 2009 – Shashi Tharoor (@shashitharoor) adds 3000+ followers overnight on twitter

August 27, 2009 – Shashi Tharoor (@shashitharoor) crosses 36,000 followers on twitter!

August 29, 2009 – Shashi Tharoor (@shashitharoor) crossed 50,000 followers on twitter.

September 6, 2009 – RT @keralafarmer: 1 lakh followers @ShashiTharoor http://bit.ly/bl6ii

Astonishing isn’t it?

The secret of these numbers is that his untiring commitment to tweeting. His tweets are informative, witty and lively. He has tweeted 1235 times(as of September 7, 2009) at an average of 200 per month.

No wonder he is able to get such a fan following. What is next? 5 Lakh by the end of this year?

Will he ever overtake Barack Obama(20 Lakh + followers)? Or is it question of when and not “will he”?

Image Credit: Stuti

Popularity: 10%

Last couple of weeks, two multimillion dollar news/ reviews caught my attention – Multimillion dollar stories of a dog, a shoe and the many games people play.

One was of course of “The Bush Shoe” and the other was the latest movie going the rounds- Slum Dog Millionaire

US President George Bush was attacked with a shoe by a Cairo based Iraqi TV reporter Muntadar Al-Zeidi. The shoe has gained tremendous popularity – in the middle eastern world and the western world. Although shoe throwing is considered as an insult in many parts of the Middle East, this particular incident was an exception of sort. There was allround praise for Mr.Zeidi. In fact I even heard the news of a Saudi man willing to give $ 10 Mln to get his hands to those “Godly” shoes

In his last days as President, Mr. Bush has certainly earned the respect from his followers so much so that it took a shoe for all the talking. Apparently the Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Al- Maliki had clearly heard the thrower’s accompanying cry of “This is a goodbye kiss, you dog”

Check out the many shoe games that has come to the market post this incident. There are many, here are the top five

1. Sock And Awe

2. Bush Bash

3. Flying Babush

4. Bush’s Boot Camp

5. Can You Throw a Shoe at Bush ?

What a mess indeed, huh ?

Talking of dog and of course the million dollars, it seems Slumdog Millionaire has caught its viewers by surprise.

Slumdog Millionaire is a story of a Mumbai Boy who won the Hindi version of famous reality show “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire”. The film is directed by Danny Boyle and written by Simon Beaufoy and is based on the book Q and A by Vikas Swarup.

The story sound simple – Jamal Malik  goes into the Hindi version of Who Wants to be a Millionaire and wins it. How can the illiterate boy from the slum with zero knowledge win such a prestigious show ? Things get complicated when the producers of the show do not believe that the boy indeed won it fairly.

Will that deter the boy from reaching his ultimate goal ? What is his ultimate goal ?

He loves a girl from his childhood days and has lost touch with her. Now he wants to get reunited with her. He knows for a fact knows that she watches every episode. Inorder to find her he goes to the show and wins it.  What mattered to him was the girl and not the million dollars that were waiting to be taken.

The Director Danny Boyle revealed on MTV Movies Blog that it is a true story. The movie stars Dev Patel, Freida Pinto, Anil Kapoor, Irrfan Khan. Music is by A R Rahman.

I browsed around to get see what others are talking about the movie. And here are few of those ketch ups

1. Although set in India, Film’s appeal are universal

2. It is a Crowd Pleaser

3. One of the most dynamic and exuberant underdog stories

If you are keen to take a sneek peak, watch the theatrical trailer here.

Image Credit: Wikimedia

Popularity: 21%

There’s more to the Antulay story than the man himself

Minority affairs minister Abdul Rehman Antulay added his name to a growing list of anti-India Indians living and breeding on Indian soil by considerable vainglory and style with his contemptuous remarks on Hemant Karkare’s death.

The irrational statements, coming directly from a Union cabinet minister’s mouth, have hence opened the door for not only self-styled Pakistani analysts and self-proclaimed observers of the “real India” but also our very own pseudo-secularist intellectuals and others of the type to create a ripple effect at a time when the country was chasing a dreaded and proven enemy on the other side of the border with some consistency.

But Antulay’s story is interwoven with more than what “meets the eye”, so to speak in the man’s own words. Why blame him alone, as many in his band of anti-Indians would say. Antulay and his band of the eternally “oppressed” have not only provided fodder for our neighbors to feed on India’s self-created divisions with giggles and chuckles and high-fives but have confirmed in all retrospect as to where their true loyalties lie. Not in aiding Pakistan’s so-called “Hindu Zionist” campaign. Not in the progress of the “oppressed” who’s cause they so passionately have picked up. It lies in their firm fundamentalist mindset, where the right wing is the mother of all evils and the cause of so much pain and agony in our lives. Not just so much. In fact, all of it does.

In no other free-minded democracy does the base of the system itself prove so costly – the freedom. Freedom in India is reaching intolerable levels and most terror attacks or so-called anti-minority actions are followed up with all sorts of abuse by the leftist intellectuals.

Arundhati Roy articulately calls Islamic terrorism a deserving return-shot from the oppressed and asks India to look thoughtfully at the reasons for which jehad is being waged. Barkha Dutt proceeds to divide India on communal lines herself by indicating that Antulay’s remarks have embarrassed the Indian Muslim, clearly giving belief to the thought that India is divided from within. Pankaj Mishra, Vinod Mehta, Teesta Setalvad, Rajdeep Sardesai, Sagarika Ghose and so many like-minded “scholars” feed on India’s gullible freedom like bedbugs not letting you sleep, pests screwing your crop and lice biting away on sensitive areas.

Left-liberalism is reaching unseen heights in India. Their hatred for all things Indian is not only increasingly evident but even unchanging. These sympathizers of the distressed challenge the Indian state each and every day with their uttering and hysteria-driven pedagogy.

How dare they even claim to be Indians. How dare they apply for a passport and travel abroad and preach hatred towards India. How dare they call themselves concerned “human rights” activists with a natural belief that Indians are not humans, but only abusers of human rights. How dare they speak and speak and speak without any sense of responsibility.

This dreaded brand of terrorists has their “terror camps” in the mainland. They sleep, preach and breathe anti-Indian sentiments every passing day, from our own soil. They operate abroad with their weapons (ink pens and A4-size sheets) and know that they can take refuge in their freedom that always forgives and mutter any nonsense that will always find readers because intellect is admired by many, no matter how much the nonsense ingrained within it – an intellect which is actually pseudo-intellect.

By Indians, who are actually pseudo-Indians.

Article Credit: Jay Maniyar

Image Credit: Carter Comics

Popularity: 14%

The I&B ministry is planning to set in guidelines for the TV news channels hoping terrorist attacks will be covered with more sensitivity next time around. Does that somehow seem utopian?

Ever since the rise of television from the mid-90s, television news channels have covered everything thrown at them with an aim to cover all the denominators of the pluralistic Indian society. Somewhere, it got aspirational and so stories on village rapes and Dalit feuds got replaced with health shows and size-zero stories.

In recent times, apart from the story of Prince falling in a bore well, there has been no attempt to understand why news channels have leapfrogged to classism than consumerism, considering that a vast majority of Indians belong to the masses, not classes. This could be because the terror attack in Mumbai was aimed at the classes, what with foreign nationals and two of Mumbai’s biggest hotels under attack.

This meant that news channels instinctively picked up that they could target the upper class with relentless coverage and keep the masses involved by showing the destruction of an aspirational society with its utter helplessness and great-leveller style of talking to the audience.

This means, while English news channels went all out and actually created the rage against the system (and jingoism, by way of Barkha Dutt, Rajdeep Sardesai and Arnab) seen across the world today, Hindi news channels showed how the attack made even the motley group of rich people in the country as vulnerable to an attack as any of them.

Forming any guidelines has to walk the tightrope of ensuring that democratic rights of the fourth estate are not trampled upon even as the rules should ensure that news channels do not give out sensitive information to aid terrorists and broadcast insensitive videos of traumatized and brutalized victims.

The guidelines should also have enough bite to ensure proper coverage along the lines of BBC (especially in the immediate aftermath of the 7/7 attacks) as well as pass muster amongst democrat hawks to ensure that it doesn’t make an error such as the Broadcasting Bill. Ideally, the Press Council should call up errant channels and hand out guidelines and submit a copy to the I&B ministry. But of course, our ministers like to put their hands where they are never required than put it to work in the way it should work.

In this age of glocalization, everyone’s eyes will be on what the guidelines will be, which of course will be broadcast from our TV networks.

Popularity: 13%

After the terrorist attacks on Mumbai, pressure is building up on Pakistan to take action against the terror camps operating from its land. Investigations carried out by Indian, US, British and Israeli officials proved that the attacks were planned by the Lashkar-e-Taiba   supported by ISI .

In spite of Pakistani denials (just for giving the impression that Pakistani Government doesn’t give in under pressure), United States, and other countries have applied a lot of pressure, and have urged Pak to take action failing which they will act.

Now what should be the course of action?  How should we respond?  Can we trust Pak when it says it will take action against any terror outfits operating from its land.

What should be done ?

Our politicians are highly gullible.  Even after it was proved that the terrorists are Pakistanis, what did they do? They spoke to Mr Zardari and asked the ISI chief to come to India.

For what?

If at all we want to call anyone we could have called the CIA, a few investigators from Britain and Israel who can give us credible evidence that this was masterminded by terrorists from Pakistan. They would have substantiated it as an act of war (they are very good at it and we all know that).  Mr Zardari promised to send ISI Chief to India to help investigation but took an about turn overnight.

Can we trust such a man?

Time has come for India to take strict action.  Resignation of Shivraj Patil or others is meaningless and a political stunt.  It’s the Government and Prime Minister’s actions that will speak on India’s position and strength in the International community.  Since we have proof that this was sponsored by Pakistan,  the Ambassadors of USA, UK and Israel should be summoned and presented with these.

India should make it clear that we take this as an act of war by Pakistan against India and we would deal with it in a similar way US or UK has dealt with.  As far as US, UK and Israel are concerned their citizens were specifically picked up by the terrorists and they should take it as an act of terrorism against them.  This would have forced them to declare Pakistan as a Terrorist State and deal with it accordingly.

“Give thousand chances to your enemy to become your friend, but don’t give a single chance to your friend to become your enemy”. This doesn’t hold well with Pakistan.

In 1974 Israeli athletes were killed by Palestinian terrorists during Munich Olympics.

What did Israel do?

It hunted down each and every one of them.  It showed the world that nobody can escape by attacking Israel.

Now look at what have we done – engage in a dialogue with our neighbor!  Discussions will not provide any solution with Pakistan. If it did, it would have provided long ago.  Pak has neither neighbors nor friends; they just use the situation and time to act.

They are one of the best friends of America and in another way they are the biggest threat as well. They are damn smart. Remember they have used Americans to act against America.

So with such a country how long will you keep discussing?  How many more blood baths will we have to face to learn?  Indian politicians and media have to change their mindset. Media is getting worse than the politicians.  Every news channel / paper seems to be backed up by one or the other political party.

In Pakistan democracy is nothing but a proxy of the military.  Military always holds the reins of that country and it is not possible to delink both.  It was born after a bloodbath, it is continuing the same way even now.  Army, Islamic Radical Groups,  ISI,  Elected Government,  Taliban – every group is a power centre. No one is responsible for anyone.

Everyone has their own beliefs, system, and agenda.  Terrorism is a business for them.  Look at the amount of aid they got from US for fighting against terrorism which was created by them.

We must step up pressure on Mr. Zardari until the following things are done by Pakistan;

1. Handover the terror suspects to India including Dawood Ibrahim,  Masood Azhar who was left free in exchange of Kandahar  passengers.

2. Stop financial and moral support to radical fundamentalists who propagate hatred against non Muslims.

3. Change the think tank of ISI

4. Stop training Islamic militants

5. Stop inducing venom into Muslims in India.

Pakistan knows for sure that in an open offensive against India they will be wiped off. Hence they continue this proxy war. They will never stop till we wipe out terror camps that are running in POK and in Afghan borders.  Time has come to say “Enough is Enough”.

Mr Prime Minister – Don’t just give statements.  Let’s get on with this war and finish off before this proxy war finishes us.  At least let our future generations live in a peaceful India.

Image Credit: Sameer5678in

Popularity: 28%

Where the mind is without fear and the head held high;
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls;
Where words come out from the depth of truth;
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit;
Where the mind is led forward by Thee into ever-widening thought and action;
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake

                                                                                                by Rabindranath Tagore

Life will be a peaceful journey if we are able to face difficulties without fear, swallow the bitterness of tragedy, enjoy the happiness, and love that life showers on us.  Such lovely life is being crushed to death by the ruthless terrorism in a fraction of second right in front of our eyes.  In the journey of life death is appearing everywhere in today’s world. 

Parliament, temples, malls, shops, local trains, on streets, in star hotels, in air, on land or in water – everywhere terrorists are hunting down innocent people.

Recent attacks in Mumbai with are a direct war waged by terrorists on India.  Every time something like this happens I see a regular drama and it always has the below statements:

“We will destroy the very roots of terrorism and make our country a safe place again”

“I appreciate the people for the courage they have shown in this hour of crisis”

“We will not bow down before terrorism”

I think by now you would have guessed the people who make these statements.  These are our Netas.  When terrorist beasts are killing people mercilessly, what is the assurance being given these leaders,:

 “Incidents like these are happening all over the world and it is difficult to predict these incidents”

 “In a big city like Mumbai it is not possible to keep an eye on every person who comes in”

This is nothing but escapism and gross irresponsibility of the leaders.  They don’t even feel ashamed for making such statements. First time when terrorists killed people, I hated terrorists.

But then they repeatedly killed people, I started hating our politicians and law makers more than I hated terrorists for giving them a license to kill. 

10 to 12 terrorists who have entered Mumbai via sea  were able to hold the entire nation as hostage for 3 days. This clearly shows how incompetent our leaders, our policies, and our intelligence are. 

As if a sudden realization has dawned, Shivraj Patil resigned form his post. 

But it took a nation to loose 200 lives of civilians, 24 police officers, and soldiers to remind the Home minister of his “Moral Responsibility”.  After the UPA government came to power the number of attacks by terrorists have increased manifold and nothing was done politically to tackle this issue.  With all their concern for the terrorism they got POTA abolished. 

These leaders who can’t even step out without a dozen commandos around them say “people here are very courageous”.  They don’t have to certify our courage.  People of this nation are always more courageous than the leaders.  Though we know that our lives are not safe every time we step out, we still walk on the street without any fear.

Leaders make statements like “we will not be cowed down by terrorism’.  But it’s we the people who show this in action.  Within 3 days of the terror attack, ‘Leopold café’ is opened and people thronged it.  This is testimony to the courage of an Indian.

Mumbai resembled a war zone for 3 days.  Once it’s over people are back on the street not because of the assurances given by our politicians but because of the courage and patriotism shown by the Armed forces. 

Those brave commandoes who have sacrificed themselves to save us gave us the courage to come out and salute them.  Those of us who witnessed their dedication and sacrifice in flushing out the terrorists from Taj, Nariman house and Oberoi can’t forget them in our life time.

Even today we don’t have proper mechanism in place to tackle something like this.  We don’t have the weapons or technology or strategy.  How can you explain bullets piercing the bullet proof jackets of our cops? Our government is not able to stop the inflow of RDX into the country from Pakistan and Afghanistan. 

Our intelligence officers became spectators when the terrorists were equipping themselves with latest weapons.

After the parliament attack in 2001, though the government declared Terrorism as a national issue, nothing was done to beef up internal security.  Though, Prime Minister spoke about setting up of a ‘Federal Investigation Agency’ nothing has materialized.  Look at America, immediately after 9/11 attacks, they have put in place ‘Department of Homeland Security’.

At last Prime Minister woke up and setup a task force to come out with a strategy to counter terrorism in 100 days.  Actually, this should have happened long back.  None of the states in India has plan in place for terrorist attacks.  There is no proper co-ordination between our Police and intelligence.  Attack on Mumbai is an attack on the whole nation. 

Hope at least now our leaders will open their eyes and really take an action to fight terrorism.

Image Credit- Sameer Gupta

Popularity: 27%

“Yet again the communal clashes in the city has left the streets  burning with the flames of hatred killing thousands of people all over “.

This is Naina Sahay reporting live from Mumbai, Kal Tak. 

Naina was a young, flamboyant journalist who had earned herself a lot of accolades for her brave reporting and blunt comments that supported the truth. Her parents passed away when she was barely the age of 12 in an accident leaving behind a lot of responsibilities and a younger brother to take care of.

As she grew up she started working at a very young age in order to give her brother the best of life she could. She gave him love of a mother, father as well as sister. And in the process earned a living through whatever jobs she could lay her hands on. Naina got introduced to the field of journalism through a friend and since then there was no looking back. 

Naina just kept on climbing the success ladder to earn herself a life she truly deserved. From scratch, today she owns a good house, car and everything. But what Naina truly cared for was Armaan, her younger brother. She could never live without him. A slight fever and the girl who could report under waist deep water during Mumbai floods would go paranoid.

A small wound on Armaan would make her go berserk  and a drop of tear from Armaan’s eyes would just make Naina depressed. Probably that’s the reason why Naina was unmarried because she could not live without her brother and would want to give him her undivided attention.

But then one incident shattered her life.

In the year 1993 communal riots broke out in Mumbai .People were behind each other’s lives. Dead bodies were lying on the roads. Injured unattended and bloody and gory sight’s everywhere. People were scared to get out of their houses yet Naina risked her life to deliver news to people.  So many times the bullets must have just missed her but even through such tensed situation she would remain calm and help the injured on the streets. While doing her duty her finger constantly clicked Armaan’s number at the interval of every half an hour to ensure his safety.  

Suddenly one day Naina heard a cry of help. On drawing closer to the sound she realized there was a man badly injured and was probably taking his last breadth. The man in a hushed voice called Naina closer. Naina hesitantly went closer. The man revealed a sensational news that would rock the nation and he also had photo evidence to back his story. Naina was shocked at the evidence. Before Naina could ask him any questions the man closed his eyes forever.

The man said that the current Chief Minister was involved in the clashes of Hindu and Muslim communities and he had started communal rights in order to degrade his political rivalry. Naina had a very important evidence and also the power to stop the future bombings that were planned to kill the leader of the opposition party which would leave the entire city burning and spoil the situation even more.

Naina hurried to her house and kept the photograph with Armaan. She went to her Head Office to make arrangement for her breaking news. But what Naina wasn’t aware of was the man who followed her to her house.

While Naina was in the office preparing for the prime event the man entered her house. Armaan heard the noise and went in the front room. The man attacked Armaan, Armaan resisted and tried to fight back but the man just removed a gun and shot down six bullets into Armaan. Armaan’s knees gave away, he fell down and instantly his life was snatched by the cruelty of the world. The man ransacked the entire house and found the photograph and ran away with it.

Naina with her boss returned to her house. Her feet trembled, beads of sweat trickled down her forehead, she collapsed the darkness was’nt only for the moment but for the rest of her life.  Seeing the pool of blood which Armaan was in, disturbed the mental state of Naina.

The news was’nt deliverd but the death of Armaan resulted in the suicide of the courageous self of what Naina used to be. Yet again the politics of our country silenced the truth. She lost her mental balance, she lost her voice and what was left was a silent suicide which was never recorded..

Statistics have shown thousands of people suicide due to different reasons but have we ever thought of the loss of individuality that people suffer at the hands of our ignorance…It is high time we follow the philosophy of LIVE AND LET LIVE… It is high time we understand that we are not divided on the basis of religion, caste, creed or sex but we all belong to a much higher sect that is Humanity.

We all have 2 eyes 2 hands 1 nose 2 feet, so why the heck are we fighting for our so called differences. Let’s all join in this human chain of understanding and love so that we make India, a better place to live in.

Popularity: 31%

In the late 80s and early 90s Narendra Modi  was virtually unknown. He fought very hard to accomplish the tasks given to him by the Senior Leaders of BJP. Towards the later part of the decade, we saw a belligerent Modi moving closer to his political ambition of becoming the Chief Minister of Gujarat.

In 2001, Narendra Modi became the Chief Minister of Gujarat, got promoted to the office at a time his predecessor Kesubhai Patel lost the by-elections. In July 2007, he became the longest serving Chief Minister.  Later the same year, he was re-elected for the third consecutive term as the CM.

In 2001, just when he took office Modi was given the task of rebuilding Gujarat. This was in the wake of the biggest natural calamity India had seen – The Gujarat Earthquake which killed nearly 20000 people and another 170000 injured.  Modi was a man on a mission

In 2002, he faced the biggest test of his life – There was a communal riot in which Hindus and Muslims killed each other following a Godhra train incident. The riot killed nearly 2000 people and about 150000 were displaced.  The entire nation was pitted against him and some even went to the extent of terming the Godhra incident as an attempted genocide, a largescale massacre.

Modi did not sit quiet. What followed was a successful stint – one after the other. In his first term as the Gujarat Chief Minister, the economic growth touched 10%. In 2007, the growth touched a stunning 11.5% reducing the fiscal deficit of the state economy by a stunning 50%.

Other noticeable achievements included infrastructural developments, electrifying rural Gujarat, the Narmada success story etc.

Narendra Modi’s leadership and his extraordinary capabilities made him the darling of media. And soon a brand called Moditva emerged. Modi translated excessive criticisms and a burgeoning popularity into mass votes which made gave him a landslide victory in his third time.

Advani once said about Modi

A leader who, after being subjected to a malicious and prolonged campaign of vilification, has been able to impress even his critics with his determination, single-minded focus, integrity and a wide array of achievements in a relatively short time.

The year 2008 saw Modi take a complete u-turn with industrialists and politicians alike yearning for a piece of the pie in the Gujarat success story. Budha’s pain was Modi’s gain. Under the leadership of Modi, Gujarat opened the doors for Tata and Sanand became the Nanoland.

Modi did not stop there. He continues to woo Bangalore based IT and BPO companies to set up their units in Modiland. 

If this was not enough, Modi surprised all his critics as late as last week. He embarked on a demolition drive of “illegally built temples” in Gujarat including that of a Sai Baba and a Hanuman shrine. Facing the axe are another 161 illegally constructed temples.

Modi invited widespread criticisms for his actions especially from VHP – the erstwhile ideological partner of the BJP. In fact Ashok Singhal, of the VHP compared his government to that of Aurangazeb’s. Modi loyalists however argued that he was painting a picture of a Nationally acceptable, Secular Leader

Read the words once again – “Nationally Acceptable, Secular Leader.” Wow !!!

That made me think a dozen times before I wrote this article.

Is Narendra Modi really trying to lead by example ? Your comments please…

Popularity: 28%

I often wonder when I read about the bailout packages dished out by Governments all around the world to aid banks and other financial institutions that are on the verge of bankruptcy especially the amount of money spent in bailouts in last couple of months is staggering. I am even surprised that there was not a single protest from anywhere and these financial criminals go unpunished. It is the common man who is going to bear the burden of additional tax and increased debt.

Why should tax payer’s money be used for bailing out greedy banks and corporations that have done business only with profit as motive and no concern for morals or ethics and absolutely no concern for the consequences for their acts. Putting public money in corporate coffers is just not acceptable. Financial crisis that has happened is a man made crisis done through substandard policies, deregulation and greed. I can understand putting in public money for natural disasters like earthquakes or folds. Governments all over the world have spent trillions of dollars on bailouts already

This kind of bailout is ABSURD!

We must collectively protest this .This is real money, my money, your money, our money which is hard earned paid in the form of tax.

Why should banks and financial institutions which never cared about the creditworthiness of people who lined up for loans or the soundness of derivatives business be rewarded. We should not allow government to write checks on tax payers’ account. This measure will increase the budget deficit by a significant amount, with no guarantee of recovering the amount and not holding anyone accountable for the misdeeds they have done.

What is the signal you are sending to the corporate world and investors through these bail outs? Do your businesses as you like and we will reward you for the blind errors you might commit. Is this the right way?

As far as I am concerned, there should be a thorough probe into the events that have led to this disaster and every CEO, Executive or Government who were part of this financial carnage should be jailed, their assets sold and put in a bailout fund.

It is time to wake up and realize that greed is the basis for all the financial disasters and find a way, may be strict disclosure norms, increasing the transparency in strategic decision making, making one responsible for his actions and

Few weeks back Finance Ministers of several Asian, Europe and Americas countries met and decided to act rapidly on the financial crisis

And now stock markets are being artificially manipulated by bailouts by governments.

When corporations see that the demand is coming down , it is natural for the stock to take a beating. But every other day we see CRR, SLR rate cuts which means our money is loaned back to us and the market stages a rally of any significance. FIIs and Badla traders slowly and routinely remove their money from our markets to invest elsewhere leaving the retail investor in a fix.

It is certainly not a good thing for a responsible, saving, taxpaying citizen, with no defaulted loans or credit card debt to compensate for the that Wall Street gamblers will go bust on their stupid and greedy bets, over-leveraged and poorly managed businesses with huge losses.

Let me tell you some interesting fact. Lehman has set aside $2.5 billion as bonus for their employees even as they went bankrupt for the great performance they showed in pushing the bank to bankruptcy.

What do you call this?

Popularity: 33%

Dear Dr. Singh,

After the recent blasts in Delhi, there were quite number of terror raids  across the country. In a very high profile shoot out case in Delhi, two terrorists were even killed. There are several others who are in the dock facing terrorism charges  Most of them are students from the northern part of India.

These students have been allegedly picked up by our enemy country and trained in their base camp and sent back to India for masterminding terrorist attacks

In an interesting move Jamia Milia Islamia university has stepped up on its stance in providing legal aid to these alleged masterminds.

And if that is not enough, our HRD minister – Arjun Singh has backed this move. And now Amar Singh. What is going on ?

The message is not clear – Is it that you can commit crime and be protected by the top brass of the country ? Or is it that we don’t think carrying guns, staying in a hideout with the intention of planning another attack is not enough evidence to prosecute them. Or is it that the human resource ministry has stepped up its stature as a human rights activists?

So, what happens to the countless lives that are being lost because of these atrocities, these heinous acts of crime – who is responsible for those ?

For sure, the honorable Minister will have a lot to answer.

Hope you question both the Singhs- Arjun and Amar as I question you, on behalf of India.

Regards

Kandamangalam

Popularity: 9%