Have we lost a sense of propotion ?

Here is a snip picked from Economic Times



We seem to creating a ruckus about 27 Cr that Mayawati is planning to waste & nothing about the 10,000+ Crores that the Delhi Govt is planning to waste?

Should we prepare for a 70s rerun ?

The present government has successfully moved India back to the nineties.

• The era of shortages is back ( diesel/power/LPG)
• Rupee is nosediving
• Fiscal deficit is alarming
• Inflation is back in double digits & continues to remain there
• Kashmir is back in the political centre stage

Would the next government takes us back to the seventies ? By that I mean

• Will our taxes sky rocket ?( Marginal Tax rate was as high as 97.5% in 1971 !)
  
• Will ULCA, FERA and other such acts make a comeback ?
  
• Will banks be nationalized once more ?
• Will Gold controls be reimposed ( I know it is a late 60s act rather than a 70s one )
• Will possessing 1000 rupee notes become illegal again ?

Whether we move back to the seventies or bounce back to the noughties would depend on who comes to power. My guess would be

• A Congress/Left would push us back to the seventies,
• A Congress/Riff Raff would slowly move us in the direction of the noughties
• A Congress majority would put us clearly in the noughties
• A BJP/Riff Raff combo would also move us in the noughties direction
• A BJP majority would put us clearly in the noughties
• A Riff Raff with outside support from either the Congress/BJP would leave us in status quo ( i.e stuck firmly in the nineties)
• A Riff Raff/Left combo could even take us back to the seventies in double quick time

Just my opinion. As usual feel free to disagree.

Bangalore is still under represented

Bangalore now sends 28 representatives to the Karnataka assembly ( Up from 16 after the recent delimitation exercise). Even after this massive increase in the number of MLAs it sends, Bangalore is still under represented by 8 to 9 MLAs. Imagine having 36-37 MLAs for Bangalore. The whole political landscape changes even more dramatically than what has happened in the 2008 elections

Here is the analysis based on the data supplied by the Election Commission

Average Number of Voters per constituency = 179336
Total Deviation for Greater Bangalore = 1552437
Under Representation = 1552437/179336 = 8.66

AC_NAME	TOTALELECTORS	Deviation
Yelahanka	241439	62103
K.R. Pura	308339	129003
Byatarayanapura	265952	86616
Yeshvanthapura	265174	85838
Rajarajeshwarinagar	301531	122195
Dasarahalli	291000	111664
Mahalakshmi Layout	218552	39216
Malleshwaram	194147	14811
Hebbal	100986	-78350
Pulakeshinagar	184980	5644
Sarvagnanagar	301976	122640
C.V. Raman Nagar	219663	40327
Shivajinagar	166829	-12507
Shanti Nagar	184138	4802
Gandhi Nagar	222144	42808
Rajaji Nagar	183301	3965
Govindraj Nagar	246476	67140
Vijay Nagar	253321	73985
Chamrajpet	214503	35167
Chickpet	207906	28570
Basavanagudi	226320	46984
Padmanaba Nagar	219637	40301
B.T.M. Layout	212808	33472
Jayanagar	189232	9896
Mahadevapura	275328	95992
Bommanahalli	261058	81722
Bangalore South	379115	199779
Anekal	237990	58654

Here is the data for all constituencies

Fund of Funds & Poll of Polls

Long long ago unsophisticated investors were guided to invest in mutual funds. They were told that since they did not have either the expertise or the time to select individual stocks, they should leave it to a professional to manage their stock investment. In those days selecting a fund was easy. You had about 20-25 odd funds and you just had to pick a few of them to invest in and you were done. Then thousands of funds bloomed (OK I exaggerate , only hundreds of funds bloomed) and each had varying risks and return profile. Selecting which fund to invest in became a nightmare. The unsophisticated investor was then guided to a fund of funds ( i.e a mutual fund that would select the best funds to invest in, and these selected funds would in turn invest in individual stocks etc ).

The same seems to be playing out in the exit poll field. The exit polls for Karnataka has thrown up so many possibilities, that one probably needs a poll of these polls to decide which way the election results would go. I am sure some astute pollster will come up with this idea and hopefully exit polls can go back to being one number that is at least expected to be right in theory if not in practice.

Callous leaders -2

From The Telegraph

“I told them I had been invited to come here and I should be given a chance to speak,” she told The Telegraph later. “The event is held each year to honour the men who saved Parliament, but no minister has the time to even speak to us. What is the point of calling us all this way, if they don’t even want to ask us how we are?”

She levelled a graver — but not unusual — charge. “There were ministers who were laughing during the function. How can they do that? This is about dignity.”

Is too much to expect that these folks will behave in a dignified manner? I thought the example on my blog was an one off. Apparently it isn't. And of course none of the national newspapers reported any one laughing.

From Times of India

Petroleum Minister Murli Deora was quoted as saying that the retail outlet allotted to Ganga Devi was commissioned on January 25, 2007. In the statement, Deora said that the "outlet is functioning smoothly...and the allottees has not approached BPCL (Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd) officials with any problem so far.''

Insisting that the government had given "top priority'' in providing relief to the families of the victims, Deora said out of nine cases, three retail outlets were commissioned in 2003, one in 2006 and four in 2007.

Why does it take the government 5+years to allot a petrol pump? BTW who among these nine "cases" has not yet been provided relief ? and why ?

Erosion of core constituency ?

How much the CPI(M)/CPI's core constituency has been eroded can possibly be gauged from the JNU elections . Its student wing ( SFI-AISF) supported candidates finished 3rd in three of the four central panel posts and just about managed to cling on to second position in the other post. JNU has always considered a bastion for SFI, with both Prakash Karat & Sitaram Yechury being past presidents of the JNU students union. Does this election provide a pointer to the direction in which the wind is blowing ?

Mr Prime Minister, Did you sleep well last night ?

Mr Prime Minster,
Did you sleep well last night ? If you did , was it because you stopped watching television? Was it because the Indian media chose not to highlight the plight of families of over 4000 workers detained in Dubai ? Was it because these 4000 odd people were not accused of terrorism and therefore did not deserve to have their share of your sleepless nights ? Was it because these poor workers had no articulate English speaking wives, to explain their viewpoint to media?


ps : Is it surprising to see that the BBC does not seem to report that any one was detained. It has a bland news item. What a contrast to its coverage of the Gurgaon Honda Strike

Callous leaders ?

How callous can our leaders get ?

Here is an illustration. From Deccan Chronicle - epaper : Page 4


This comes a couple days after the bomb blast in Hyderabad. It was in a all party meeting to discuss the blast. Wonder if the Chief Minister & his colleagues would be laughing so loud if their friends/family had been victims?

Regional Parties Bachao Front

There has been a call from the highest level for a two party system in the country. This has set alarm bells ringing in the head quarters of the regional parties. They have now united under a single banner to safe guard their interest.

The Regional Parties Bachao Front ( RPBF) have been strongly opposed to the unrestricted entry of national parties in elections. Meanwhile several national parties have entered the election frey and are expanding their operations aggressively. These developments in the regional politics are having an adverse impact on a large section of people who are represented by regional parties across the country. In this backdrop the Regional Parties Bachao Front is putting forward a proposal to adopt stringent regulations on the entry on national parties in various states.

• The RPBF proposes that a system of licensing should be introduced for national parties. Any national party contesting more that a specified number of seats needs a license from local licensing board.
• A dedicated committee/board/department should be set up by the local bodies, with representation from regional parties, which should be empowered to grant licenses to national parties.
• Licenses should be given on the basis of a population criterion, i.e. not more than X number of national party candidates per Y population. The criteria may vary between states and cities depending upon the nature of the elections and the votes needs.
• Besides a system of licensing for national parties, a number of steps need to be taken by the Government to prevent the emergence of monopolies of national parties in elections. A single national party should not be allowed to capture a large vote share share. For this it is important to restrict the number of candidates that a single party can field in a city, state as well as region.
• In order to prevent the development of big national party monopolies, it is also important for the Government to ensure its presence in the elections. Several regional parties have become defunct , which need to be revived. Government should fund these parties. Partnerships between existing regional parties can also be considered, in areas where synergies exist.

I can already hear screams from my fellow country men that this restricts the choice that our voters will have. My fellow country men would also argue that the intelligent Indian voter can be trusted to keep the regional parties alive, just to keep the national parties in check etc.

So my question to my fellow country men is, if the above proposal sounds ridiculous from the voters view point why is not this proposal ridiculous?. This restricts the voters ( and non voters) economic choice. Why are we slow to condemn proposals that restrict choice in the economic space, but are quick to condemn restrictions of choice in the political space?

We the people need some answers

The image below says it all. We would like to hear from our candidate what she has to say about these allegation. If they are a part of a smear campaign, let her say so. We do not want to hear from spin masters Jayanthi Natarajan, Abhishek Singhvi etc . Let the candidate speak !

Dawood Ibrahim's RTI plan

Here is how Dawood Ibrahim should plan his RTI ( Return to India, quite a few NRIs seem to have been bitten by this bug ).

Step 1: Float a party. Use the usual technique of bribes & intimidation (carrot & stick ?) to win a few Lok Sabha seats.
Step 2: Bargain with parties that want your support for Governor posts. Yes that is right, forget bargaining for ministries etc. Since political parties have not much use for Governor's role, they will happily give you as many as you want.
Step 3: Get your self appointed as a Governor.

Now you are done. You can now come to India, run your empire from the hallowed portals of the Raj Bhavan without any fear that any one can stop you or your activities. You cannot be prosecuted for activities in the past too!!. So as long as you are a governor you should be safe.

And here is why you can do it
From Article 361(2) of the Indian Constitution. [ Thanks realitycheck for pointing that out ]

No criminal proceedings whatsoever shall be instituted or continued against the President, or the Governor of a State, in any court during his term of office.

Did our founding fathers envisage such a scenario ? They did not. They expected Presidents & Governors to be above board. They envisaged this more in the context of the Raj Pramukh.


Here is an excerpt from the discussions of the constituent assembly

Shri V.S. Sarwate (Madhya Bharat):

Coming to the Constitution itself I may say that every man residing in Indian State would have been happy if the Rajpramukh had not been linked with the Governor and the President. I am reminded of a jibe at Panini, the Sanskrit Grammarian and in one of the aphorisms he had said:

Shwa yuvam dyonah (original in Devanagari)

He applied the same rule to a dog, to a young man and to God Indra. Something like this has happened in this Constitution. I would refer to article 361. The section says: "No criminal proceedings whatsoever shall be instituted or continued against the President or the Governor or Rajpramukh of a State in any court during his term of office". It was quite all right as far as the President or the Governor was concerned; but the clause does not fit in with the Rajpramukh, whose office terminates only with his life. Take a worse case. Supposing a Rajpramukh commits a murder. There is absolutely no remedy against this in this Constitution.

Shri T.T. Krishnamachari (Madras: General): May I point to my honourable Friend that the Rajpramukh will hold his office only subject to the President allowing him to do so and if he commits a murder, he will be removed from the office

Ps : I think Shibu Soren should fire his legal team & his advisors.. Instead of bargaining for coal ministry he should have asked for post of governorship of some state.

55 Million new jobs and not a whimper

It looks like the OECD report, which concluded that India on an average created over 11 million net new jobs a year between 2000 and 2005, got buried under a ton of debris that passes of as news in India. All major newspapers ( barring the Hindu, which seemed to have ignored this story altogether) ran a story about this in the inside pages. Google blog search throws up very few references to this.
This has triggered my curiosity. 1) Where did OECD get its data from ? 2) Why is the Indian political class ignoring this ?

The answer to the first question is simple.
From Page 30 of the report.

Data reported in the tables and figures are from successive five-yearly rounds of the National Sample Survey – a country-wide survey of households – covering the months of July to June, for the following years: 1987/88, 1993/94, 1999/2000 and 2004/05


So it is from data released some time back. The reports uses the current weekly status as the data to measure unemployment. One could quibble about the specifics, but over all data seems good enough to make estimates


2) The second question is more puzzling. One would have expected our politicians to have been the first to jump in and claim credit for the employment growth. The Congress is understandably hamstrung in claiming this credit. It was in power for very short time during this period and more over it mistakenly believes that it got voted in because the 'aam aadmi' did not see any progress in the early 2000 period. Statistics seems to fly against this belief, but the Congress is unlikely to publicly move away from its belief.

The BJP on the other hand should be jumping in and claiming credit, so why is it not doing so ? Has it also been brainwashed into believing the 'aam aadmi saw no progress' theory peddled by the Congress & the Left ? Can any blogger, who may have an insight into how the BJP thinks, explain this puzzling behaviour by the BJP ?

Arjun SIngh : Time to take a bow

This is my comment in response to offstumped's post on Mayawati's victory

I think we are not giving enough credit where it is due. Arjun Singh should be credited with destroying BJP in UP. His Mandal 2 forced BJP to side either with their traditional upper caste votebank or to pick the emerging OBC votebank. BJP picked the OBC, paving way for Mayawati to run away with the upper caste votes. If this upper caste disenchantment with the BJP spreads to the rest of the North India, BJP may increasing start looking like the Congress, a party in the wilderness.

I will try and elaborate this point in a post in the near future