INDIAN WAR AGAINST CORRUPTION

Corruption and black money menace has been the biggest stumbling block in the Indian march to the status of a global economic superpower and it is in fact corruption and corruption alone which is blowing away Indian dream of getting prosperous. This fact is very well known to all citizens of the country endowed with even an iota of common sense but somehow or the other has been escaping the attention of the ruling class because of their selfish hidden agenda, for

• War against corruption is a war against their own prosperity
• War against corruption is the first and last nail in the coffin of the polity's capability to win elections and grab power
• War against corruption is perhaps the antidote to all the baser human instincts like wine, woman, money power, criminality etc which sadly form the foundations of governments and governing process in the country.

During the last few years some constitutional bodies like Election Commission, Comptroller and Auditor General and the Judiciary have taken upon themselves the task of cleansing the election process, legislature, governance and policy making much to the chagrin of rulers of the country who see these as means of transforming them into servants of people as envisaged in a democracy. They see in all these an end to  their illegally assumed role of masters of general masses and are resisting the change tooth and nail.
During the last few days, supreme court has announced two landmark judgments which can have a far reaching effect on the country's war against corruption. In the first judgment on Wednesday that could cleanse the Indian political system from criminal elements, the Supreme Court held that if a sitting member of either House of Parliament or a state legislature is convicted, the member would be immediately disqualified. And in the second delivered on Thursday, a person, who is in jail or in police custody, cannot contest election to legislative bodies, bringing to an end an era of under trial politicians fighting polls from behind bars.The court, however, made it clear that disqualification would not be applicable to person subjected to preventive detention under any law.

Though the decisions have been welcomed by the common man, the politicians of all hues gifted with their wonderful gift of gab and an extraordinary ability of resorting to all kinds of logic that can put an end to the cleansing process initiated by the above mentioned agencies. It is a pity that the polity and rulers instead of working for what is best for the country devote all their time, energy and wisdom on promoting everything that is harmful for the nation through political manipulations and distorted logic.The nation is always reminded by clever, wily and self centered Indian polity about the basic postulate of jurisprudence that let thousands of guilty men go free  but no innocent man should be imprisoned. And as per the ethics of polity these thousands of guilty men who simply went free for lack of evidence or some flimsy technical grounds are all entitled to most lucrative and rewarding positions in legislature and legislative executive. For these men who have been elected to rule the country, the word doubtful integrity has no meaning and is in fact as good as having integrity beyond doubt. 

THE HOAX OF ELECTION PROMISES

Come elections in India and it is a free for all in the shape of corrupt practices  to woo/buy voters and votes to grab power. The hoax of election promises comes into play right from the process of formulation of election manifesto which is an exercise of elucidating the ideals for becoming a model prosperous country as has been done in the directive principles of state policy in the constitution. There is neither a blue print provided nor a time frame given. And the irony is that election after election the masses are fed the same hogwash without any impact on the poverty and miseries of common man and the rulers are simply making merry, enjoying perks and power without any accountability. The polity tells you that they are accountable to the voters who can throw them out of power in subsequent elections if not satisfied. But is this justice of any kind? Can the nation not demand from its rulers and would be rulers to quantify every welfare measure along with a definite time frame and false and misleading promises should be termed as fraudulent practices.
A few of the master piece  vague promises in the election manifesto of all major national and regional parties.
Work for all, education for all, food for all, health security for all, drinking water for all, a house  for all and the results of 65 years of so called concerted and sincere efforts of country's polity are there for every body to see even in the case of providing basic needs of human existence. With this picture of reality,talking of prosperity, comforts and conveniences of life is simply criminal. Let polity refrain from talking in terms of absolute numbers. Instead let them inform the voter, the likely percentage  to benefit in next five years and the number of years required to cover whole of population. It is only then the voter can decide whether he wants to wait till eternity for even these basic needs or he wants a revolutionary approach to his basic problems.
After having set these vague goals to fool the hapless citizenry of the country, money power and muscle power come to the fore and invariably decide the fate of these elections. While giving cash or booze to allure the voter by the candidates/parties is considered a bribe or corrupt practice, election commission is finding it very hard to control this menace. But promising doles and freebies out of the state exchequer in the garb of policy has been going on unchecked all these years. Some recent examples listed below show that all political parties are game for this, though to an
                                                                                                                                       unbiased observer, this is nothing but a Ponzi scheme in a limited sense wherein payments/doles/freebies are offered to the voters from the exchequer, which is nothing but voters' own money. The supreme court taking an exception to this is a welcome step even though in its opinion, legally it can not be construed as corrupt practice under the Representation of People's Act. But all the same the apex court has taken cognizance of the fact that such actions shake the roots of free and fair elections to a great degree and has instructed Election Commission to frame necessary guidelines in this regard.

INDIA CRYING FOR SINCERE AND HONEST POLITY

What a big ask for a country on the threshold of becoming an economic global super power? Sixty five years after independence and still election after election the basic agenda is 'Garibi Hatao', 'Roti, Kapda, aur Makan', Clean drinking water and clean living environment, basic healthcare, basic education, unemployment etc etc and the unending list goes on and on. The biggest achievement of India's so called sincere and honest polity over these decades have been that they have managed to retain all these bare essentials/needs of human living/existence as burning problems of the Indian nation. The helpless millions are left with no choice or alternative but to accept small freebies/doles/ bribes out of national wealth or the illegally earned heaps of wealth of the political masters, their cronies, near and dear ones and those who subscribe to the principle of  "you scratch my back, I will scratch yours". In return for these crumbs, these millions through their valuable vote offer power to these leeches, the leeches who are solely surviving on their blood sucking prowess, a prowess to fool the nation of billion plus citizens into accepting prosperity of a chosen few as willed by God or destiny.

Sisters and brothers of India, whether from villages or cities, from  any religion, caste or creed,rich or poor, this is not the truth. You are born in a country which has been endowed by nature with all the riches except sincere and honest rulers. Indian rulers are working overtime for enhancing the tenures of their tryst with prosperity and power wielding through manipulations of vote dynamics in the name of divisive rhetoric of cast, creed, religion etc..
These politicians have been boastfully talking about the reservations for dalits (SC's), scheduled tribes (ST's), other backward classes (OBC's) and reaping rich dividends in the form of prosperity and power for their cronies and relatives at the expense of even your basic needs of bare existence. Did the constitution mandate that welfare of the poor will be limited only to a couple of thousand  jobs per year in the government sector. At this rate the exploitation and injustice meted out to the poor and deprived classes for thousands of years will be mitigated perhaps in tens of thousands of years. It is strange that all politicians of this country irrespective of their caste, creed or religion are firm believers of this exploitation and have kept self, self interests and all baser instincts of humanity much ahead of the nation and its teeming helpless millions.
How long will you let yourselves be subject to this exploitation  and allow yourselves be bled to near non human existence. Don't be taken in by any of the tricks of politicians, for end of corrupt people  and corruption will be the end of your poverty and miseries. It is a war between your existence and their existence. Your poverty is a direct result of  corruption  by  those in authority and power. And this is something no politician of India seems to be concerned about. That is why

•  No LOK PAL, 
• No action against Black Money Generation, 
• Nothing to stop Graft, Bribe and corruption, 
• Non applicability of Right to information (RTI) to political parties, 
• Objections to any institution asking for accountability of actions of the polity such as Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) and Judiciary.
• Government Stranglehold on the investigating agencies 

After all they are wise enough not to do Kalidasa act of cutting the same branch of tree on which they have been prospering and will continue to prosper for all their future generations. Corruption and corrupt practices are the sole lifeline of their very existence in politics and their capability of ruling India. So work hard in all earnest to cut this lifeline of politicians. It requires no gun, no sword.  Democracy has given you the right to achieve this just by giving your vote to the right man, the man who will utilise country's wealth for bringing in growth and prosperity  through more jobs, better wages, improved living conditions, providing basic healthcare and education to impart value addition to your earning power in a time bound manner rather than converting you into beggars and slaves by giving doles, freebies and subsidies in the same manner as was provided by the old feudal lords to maintain their status of masters vis a vis slaves for centuries.

AND NOW GAS AT 8.4 $/ mmBTU - WHAT FOR????

And now the gas at 8.4$/mmBTU. The Indian government bites the bullet on gas pricing, so go the headlines in Indian press. What for and to whose advantage? The gullible, ploy-able intelligentsia with unabashed commitment to anything  pro establishment has not even bothered to look into the nitty - gritty of the policy pronouncement before singing praises of the action of raising the gas price to nearly double the present day price.This only means that the subsidies to power and fertilizer plants as also to cooking gas sector will have to go up substantially and the public sector companies provide for these subsidies. The end result of this exercise for public sector companies which hold majority of gas reserves of the country is going to be diluted drastically.It is only the private sector companies who are going to hog fully the benefits of this windfall.

The nation was once again fed on the often repeated talk about country's need for energy giving fossil fuels like gas, coal etc to fulfill its huge requirements of power generation to give impetus to its sagging growth rates.What is surprising is that the solutions to increasing production of coal and gas has been diametrically opposed to each other. In case of boosting of coal production and power generation subsequently it was suggested that coal allocations should be done almost free of charge to provide incentives to enhance coal production and produce cheap power for rapid industrialization of the nation. And now for increasing gas production, the decision is to double the cost of gas while the aims are the same i.e. quick additions to gas capacity and providing cheap power for rapid industrialization. Now we are being told that higher cost realizations by the vendors will be value additive to the government exchequer. Could any of these buffoons in Khadi belonging to the ruling polity make the nation wiser as to how a similar action in coal allocation could have been value depletive to the exchequer.

Why such a bright game changing idea was kept on hold for all these years and has been brought in just before the elections. Equally surprising is the fact that this long term measure to boost the investor confidence and alluring multinational companies to make investments into this sector of prime importance with an open and coherent pricing policy is valid only for five years and again has to be reviewed before the next elections.

For what? Your guess is as good as mine. and again what a game changer!!! These wise men with all their theories and thinking expect that exploration to exploitation to value addition will all fructify in a span of five long years both for the investor and the nation and an investor who spends his own money will bite the bullet on their face value.Heard from many of them that they are finding it difficult to convince the investors to flock to India and participate in the Indian growth story. Yes the investor who has to pump in his own hard earned money is not convinced about the sincerity and long term vision and coherence of Indian policies. The Indian polity is capable of sacrificing everything at the altar of vote politics and self.

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BENEFITS OF ENERGY SECURITY THROUGH CLEAN RENEWABLES

It is not for nothing that a large number of philosophers and analysts are raising their voice for achieving energy security on our globe through use of Renewable clean energy sources. The seeds of this idea were sowed as early as 1931 by none other than Thomas Alva Edison, the father of the electricity revolution.

Up to the nineties of the last century this idea appeared to be a fantasy of some philosophical brains and was almost dubbed as Utopian by the technologists and analysts working in the field of energy. With the dawning of the fact that all fuel reserves are finite and mankind will run out of them sooner than later,the researches and technologies started gathering steam so much so that today wise men have started talking of energy security through 100% renewable clean energies as early as 2030.

Why so much of concern for the route to energy security? The switch over to clean renewable energy sources is beneficial on all fronts.

• The first and the foremost is the fact that the very existence of earth as a planet of life is in danger because of man's quest to harness more and more comforts for himself through energy. This is quite obvious when we sift through the data on global warming which is on one hand resulting in more and more pressures on energy requirements and on the other resulting in a receding snowline and depleting water tables. In fact the policies on energy security are leading to disturbances in the natural food chain, carbon cycle, hydrology or water cycle and are taking mankind to a path of self destruction. All clean renewable energy sources contribute little to no global warming emissions during all life cycle activity of manufacturing, installation, operation and maintenance, and dismantling and decommissioning. Surprisingly the much touted clean nuclear power  results in up to 25 times more carbon emissions than wind energy, when reactor construction and uranium refining and transport are considered.
• The next major benefit of clean renewable energy technologies is improved public health and environment quality resulting in lesser load and expenditure on health services. Additionally the overall water requirements of the society will also be reduced drastically. They reduce deaths due to air pollution
• Solar, wind, tide etc are vast, inexhaustible and eternal sources of energy and harnessing them for energy security could easily qualify to be invention of the human civilization,  far too bigger and revolutionizing than the invention of wheel perhaps.
• Clean renewable energy technologies are labour intensive and provide far more jobs per KWatt than the heavily mechanized and automated technologies based on all types of fuels.
• The energy from renewable sources has traversed its path from birth to infancy to childhood and have become viable and competitive  with conventional energy sources. The prices will keep on coming down as these technologies graduate from childhood to adolescence to adulthood. And mark my words, the old age and death are never going to come! So with clean renewables we are in for an era of stable energy prices.
• Over and above all, the two hottest technologies i.e. wind and solar provide far too safe, reliable and resilient power generation system because of their suitability in standalone, micro, mini and large scale requirements and intrinsic nature of being modular. They are less prone to large scale failures in the event of extreme weather conditions and calamities such as storms as is borne by the facts emerging after Hurricane Sandy 2012. Similarly even in the eventuality of a drought they will keep on working because of negligible water requirements for their functioning.
• Energy sources have been one of the biggest bone of contention among nations and have wrought in many a wars and political manipulations leading to global upheavals. Since wind and solar are available with all nations in reasonably abundant quantities enough to match their requirements, may be with one major bone of contention removed, we will see a peaceful and tension free world in the coming years.