India First

My Memories of Emergency – The Darkest Period in Independent India’s History As decades tick on in our lives, some memories, good or otherwise, stay on top of all others. Being the son of a journalist who was also closely associated with Indian politics for over 50 years, my most vivid memories are of developments in Indian politics over the decades. I remember the outcome of each Lok Sabha (lower house of Indian parliament) election, right from 1977. And then there are memories of the 1990s being overcrowded with Lok Sabha elections, of coalition governments that lasted and those that didn’t, the nuclear tests conducted in 1998, and many others. But the most unforgettable of my memories – also the oldest – are of the Emergency (25-Jun 1975 till 21-Mar 1977) declared in India.  Although there was growing resentment towards the Indira Gandhi-led Congress government in the mid-seventies, the immediate trigger for her imposing Emergency was the Allahabad High Court verdict , decla...

Social impacts of technological advancements, and what governments could do about them Technology has transformed our lives irreversibly. Be it trains, automobiles, aeroplanes, computers and so much more, for much of the world’s population surviving without technology is literally unimaginable. The last few decades have made transformative technology available to large percentages of populations across the world. What were fascinating concepts a few decades ago have been commercialised and are available today, not necessarily expensively. Much as technologies that surround us amaze and delight us, creating desires and demands where none may have existed some years ago, several comforts offered by technology come at prices we are paying and will pay more individually and collectively as societies and nations. Ordering books online reduces the need for bookshops and their sales people, even as it creates a few new professions. Driverless car technology, once it becomes more rob...

A Waste of Public Money, and More After the most recent assembly elections in India gave impressive wins for the Bharatiya Janata Party, it led to the unusual accusations by the usual suspects – that the electronic voting machines (EVMs) used in Uttar Pradesh and elsewhere had been tampered with by the ruling party to benefit them, or simply ensure their victory. Chief among those were politicians who were impacted the most. Mayawati was quick to call a press conference right after election results were declared, and accuse the central govt of having tampered with the EVMs. In Delhi, its Chief Minister, who’s political fortunes, after having soared impressively in the first two years of his entry in politics, have been in a downward spiral since he became the Chief Minister a second time, began his usual blame Modi rant, and sustained it for weeks. The accusations of these two characters, and many other insecure politicians, have literally no basis. No complaints have been ...

This is terrific. A partnership between Ministry for Rural Development and Indian Space Research Organisation will reduce corruption, increase transparency on various aspect and reduce over all costs. Robust technology infrastructure, complimented by wel-designed processes, can be a strong control against challenges such as dishonesty and inefficiency, posed by human nature. :-) https://swarajyamag.com/economy/bye-bye-mnrega-leakages-one-crore-assets-successfully-geotagged

It’s not EVMs that are tampered, it’s the exclusive club that’s under threat Perhaps because of its stunning diversity across the country’s length and breadth, India’s electorate tends to surprise many of us fairly often, with its collective decision. The unprecedented mandate given to the Congress in the Lok Sabha election of 1984 comes to mind. Another one was the shock defeat of BJP and NDA in the 2004 election. The clear majority it awarded BJP in 2014 too was entirely unexpected. The near clean sweep by AAP in the most recent Delhi assembly election was nothing short of shocking. The BJP too probably performed better collectively in the recently concluded assembly elections that most observers expected. There have been unconvincing protests by losing parties in the past on the unreliability of using electronic voting machines. BJP too has raised this issue a few years ago, which barely received publicity. However, what we have witnessed in the last few weeks after BJ...

Income Tax Act in the Finance Bill for 2017 has some unexpected changes. One of those is that officials of Income Tax Department can search an assessee’s property without disclosing the reason for doing so. This is not just unexpected, it brings memories of the dreaded Emergency of 1975. The unholy nexus between corporates and politicians has existed since long. It’s also probably inevitable in a democracy. How else would political parties contest elections and even maintain offices and staff? Still, there should be limits to and transparency in all political donations. Reforms that limit corporate funding and ensure transparency about donors are the way to go. But one proposal in the Finance Bill removes the existing requirement for corporate donors to declare which party they have donated to. Why has transparency been thrown out the window on such an important matter? Even a party as opaque as the Congress has questioned this move. What an embarrassment for the NDA and ...

Technology - The Double-Edged Sword The pervasiveness of technology in our lives is greater than it ever has been. Over the last century, technology has transformed our lives irreversibly. Be it simple comforts like refrigerators or modern transport, to formidable computer computer power, lives of much of the human race are literally impossible without technology. In the last several years technology seems to be progressing by leaps and bounds. It already has reduced the requirement for some low-skilled professions. But what does artificial intelligence have in store for us? It'll impact highly skilled and well-regarded professions like legal and medical ones. What can we expect from such terrific advances? For sure it'll make lives simpler. As this report suggests, it'll be of medical assistance, offering speed and accuracy skilled medical professionals will not be able to match. Day to day life will be come easier in some respects. But what will be the side effe...

Aadhaar, the backbone of big data for the Government of India The UPA’s highly ambitious initiative Aadhaar was launched in 2009. It is to assign a unique number to every Indian resident. As part of the unique identity, the initiative captures each resident’s biometric data, and other personally identifiable information such as name, sex and date of birth. We are a country of 125 crore people, and there is great inherent diversity in our society. Our society’s major attributes are caste, sub-caste, religion, culture and language. In addition, we have political demarcations of regions and states. Another important metric is literacy and level of education. Yet another is employment. We also have a very wide variety of levels of income. It is expected of a government to provide for society at multiple levels and in multiple directions. Any government needs to provide schools and colleges directly or indirectly as a necessary social and economic investment. We also expect the...

Can a Religious Leader Delivery as Chief Minister? On Sunday morning I was very surprised to hear of BJP’s choice for Chief Minister for UP. Honestly, I can’t recall any of Yogi Adityanath’s statements that contribute to his present negative image among urban Indians. At the same time, even for BJP supporters there is some negativity associated with our impression of him. One associates UP with social backwardness (to put it mildly), social divisions along religious lines (for those who love to hate BJP, let’s not forget the contribution of our “secular” parties in having achieved so), high crime rate, and I’m sure it’s pretty backward economically too. The govt of such a large and problem-ridden state would need to plan and perform along multiple dimensions for a decade before social and economic reforms begin to show. But parties are lucky to have more than five years! Why then, would a firebrand religious leader be chosen? He has no experience in administration. We can’t ...

Can't be an easy journey from Yogi to Chief Minister of India's largest, very complex state Politics divorced from sound economics is disastrous for society. At the same time, running a state or country like a corporate doesn't work in politics. Sound economic policies, along with appropriate (dynamic) social investment and even concessions, are inevitable in the journey of running a state or country. Little is known about Yogi Adityanath other than his trademark attire and provocative statements. Again, one could argue that this is known to urban India because this is what English media wants us to know about him! Still, the journey from one of 543 MPs even with five successful elections cannot be the same as Chief Minister of India's largest state, which comes with acute social problems, not to mention poor economic health. How will the Yogi perform? How will negative social factors be addressed? How will employment be addressed? Will he depend a lot on the Cen...

Very well-balanced argument in favour of the digital landscape the Union govt is constructing as an enabler for both social and economic reform. Digital platforms and tools on a nation-wide scale will bring corruption and inefficiency to very low levels, and will save govts HUGE amounts of money, making it available for a whole lot of avenues where India desperately needs to invest. Along with the investment in Digital India, Aadhaar, and other revolutionary digital enablers, the govt needs to strengthen laws to ensure information sharing happens for legitimate purposes only and it's illegal to sell personal information. http://www.asianage.com/opinion/oped/170317/data-privacy-needs-much-better-safeguards.html

Politics For a Purpose In a democracy the primary purpose of a political party is to come to power to serve the people of the country. Moving closer to the real world, raw power associated with top constitutional positions intoxicates like few other human experiences. Often we see that achievement of a constitutional position is viewed as a goal, when in reality, it’s just a means to achieve the noble goal of serving one’s country selflessly. Somewhere along the journey of securing freedom from the British, to running independant India for nearly 60 years, India’s oldest party Indian National Congress seems to have lost purpose. As is inevitable with human nature, politicians across parties and across democracies, seek powerful positions. But how well do all of them utilise those positions of power for which we have elected them? The negative aspects of human nature – like greed and ego – prevail more often than we voters would like! But the Congress seems to be a step wors...

Thoughts on Widespread Unemployment and what the Indian Government Could Do About it - Views Not Based on Statistical Analysis! During a recent conversation, a friend mentioned that his car had the automated parking feature. I wasn’t aware that any aspect of driverless technology had been commercialised, which is what led me to have the discussion with both of them. We all must’ve read about Uber testing driverless taxis in Singapore and elsewhere a few months ago. We’ve seen how technology is making inroads in aspects of our lives that we wouldn’t have imagined a few decades ago. I mentioned to both that this could mean widespread shrinking in entire professions, or their elimination. I related it to a book my father had read in the nineties, in which the futurist (I can’t recall if it was Alvin Toffler or someone else) predicted that with increasing advancement in technology, in this century employment will exist for only 20% of the world’s population, while the remaining 80% w...

On Pakistani Actors featuring in Indian Movies (Originally published on FaceBook in Oct-16) In recent weeks much has been spoken, shouted, written and done (in the form of physical action) over banning/boycotting employment of Pakistani actors, and their movies in India. There are compulsions as well as wrongs on both sides – the Pakistani actors and movie making Indians. The issue has been “resolved” after a Constitutional authority had to negotiate it simply to avoid violence in his state. Here are a few thoughts… Firstly, let’s look at Pakistani’s unwritten policy towards India. Four wars on India by them have made it amply clear to them that they cannot defeat India in conventional warfare, in wars they have declared on us. So, decades ago the Pakistan Army decided to make export of mass murder a state policy. Since my childhood days to now, Indians have been killed – by bullets and bombs – in accordance with the policy of bleeding India with a “thousand cuts”. India being ...