What is so local about it!!!

A lot has been said and written about this issue. It has been a while since I though I should put down my opinion on it.

Now the question – should locals be given preference in their native states for jobs. My answer both YES and NO.

Broadly I would like to divide the jobs into two sections. The first section – the professionals – IT, banking, management, consultants, etc, basically people with a professional degree. The second section – what you call the blue collar jobs, which includes manufacturing, construction, sales people in malls, security staff, house keeping staff, etc.

People who qualify for the first section of jobs are well educated and also the jobs in this section are very demanding. Competition should be the order of the day for these jobs. For this category there should absolutely be no preference given to the any category of people. As David Sarnoff (the founder of NBC) said “Competition brings out the best in products and the worst in people”. Only the fittest should survive. There should be no discrimination here.

The second section is the mass jobs sections. It is absolutely necessary to have some sort of reservation for the locals here. Taking a broader view – not doing this will lead to many social problems (Did someone mention about naxalism spreading rapidly in South India?). The jobs in this section do not require high degree of skills and even if they do need, it can be met with some basic training. The people who qualify for this section generally belong to the lower class of the society as CK Prahalad puts it – people from the “bottom of the pyramid”. They are the people who form the majority of any society. The welfare of these people should be the main concern of any government (obviously they also form the biggest vote bank).

Certain state governments have done better than others in attracting investments into their state. They have worked harder at providing facilities to companies than other states. They have acquired lands from people in their state to give it to these companies, in the hope that these companies generate large employment opportunities. They have provided water and electricity at subsidized rates (as a result the whole state pays extra to offset this) to these companies. They have invested large portion of the state revenues to develop infrastructure (though they are not sufficient). Having been part of all the sacrifices what is wrong when people from these progressive state demand some preference in jobs. These people should have the first right to the fruit of success of their states.

Why should the people of these progressive states pay for the mistakes of the governments of these non progressive states? Sprit of nationhood should exist but that not at the cost of the well fare of the local population. I am surprised to see the politicians from these non progressive states reading out rules from the constitution regarding equality (Opps I am just wondering if they ever had opened this book ever before!!!). Had they followed this very constitution properly in their states, their people would not have come to other states in search of livelihood. These politicians should get their priorities right before they do anything else. Rather than shouting their hearts out, they should look at emulating the progress of other states in their own states.

Is it a coincidence that a larger percentage of Biharis are getting the railway jobs? Is it a coincidence that more and more trains are being introduced to Bihar (from all over the country)? Bullshit – shamelessly they talk of the spirit of nationhood.

Having said all this, do I approve of the kind of tactics that Raj Thakre employ? – NO.

It was sad to see, the extents to which people go to promote ones own political ambitions. These people are more interesting in publicity rather than the welfare of their own people.

If regional parties like our very own KRV are really concerned about the local population then they should –

• Lobby with the governments to open more ITIs (industrial training institutes). These are the institutes that impart training to people for manufacturing, construction, etc. They do wonders to the economy of any state. Provide a larger pool of skilled workers. This will attract more companies. It’s a vicious circle.
• Stop opposing English as a medium of instruction. Kannada or the local language should be made compulsory, but there is no point in opposing English. It is this language that will finally decide if someone gets a job or not.
• Open more finishing schools. These schools (similar to the ITIs) provide essential industry specific skills for people who wish to join the retails industry, call center jobs, etc. IIIT Bangalore opened recently opened one such school to help local IT graduates.
• Lobby with the government to see to that companies that handle large infrastructure projects in the state hire people locally rather than people from outside. I have seen a few infrastructure companies from AP getting people from AP to do jobs here. For all government jobs, the companies should be forced to use local labors.
  
• Instead of targeting IT companies for reservation in IT jobs, they should focus their energies on large retail and construction companies, house keeping companies, textile companies to hire local people.
  

But taking up these issues wont provide the regional parties with instant publicity and fame that they want, they wont get the TV coverage like what they get when they attack IT companies or outside people.

Mr Narayana Gowdare its time to rethink your game plans, having a non violent stance will legitimize your demands and also help you win over more people. You cause seams to be good, but the way you want to achieve it does not.

Mockery of Democracy

A common phrase that people so proudly use when talking about India society is “The world’s largest democracy”. Yes, we do have elections, we select are representatives. But are we really a functioning democracy?

“Democracy”

1 a form of government in which the people have a voice in the exercise of power, typically through elected representatives. 2 a state governed in such a way. 3 control of a group by the majority of its members.

This is the oxford definition of the word of Greek origin. Of the three definitions, in the Indian context, only the 3^rd one makes some sense. Fine, we do elect our representatives, but do these representatives actually represent our voice? NO. I have a lot of issues concerning the type of democracy that we have in our country. But my concern for now is about the representation of voice.

Elections are around the corner in this part of the country (hmm.. who knows we could also have general elections soon). This is the time when political parties start making promises, and release manifestos. For most public, these promises and manifestoes form a significant factor that help them to decide whom to vote for. Obviously there are many other issues – caste, money, liquor, etc., that could have even more effect on certain sections of the society. When I say most public, I mean to refer to citizens for who development issues rather than other issues form the basis while selecting their representatives.

In most cases the public’s voice is what, which forms the part of the political promises and manifestos. Like poverty eradication, electricity, education, social security, infrastructure, etc. The parties promise many things in their public meetings and manifestos, depending on which people decide which party to vote for. But once these parties are in power, do they care to implement these promises? Forget implementing these promises, many times the governments do exactly the opposite.

Don’t we need a proper mechanism where political parties are penalized if their election promises are not implemented? Not implementing these policies certainly amounts to cheating the society. Is this not a criminal offense? A party wining an election and not honoring its promises is a breach of mutual agreement between the representatives and the society. There cannot be a greater crime that this in a democracy. There is an urgent need for some regulatory mechanism to over see this; this will not only deter the political parties from making false and opportunistic promises and duping the public.

Nandigram – this is the reason I am writing this. I would be surprised if any of the pro capitalist governments would even think of trying to do something that the communists did there. They did the exact opposite of what they were preaching for the last 30 years there. All of a sudden they woke up to development and decided that they had to give land to capitalists.

Karnataka – how can I forget this? As long as they had power it didn’t matter to them about any of the promises to the public. All they wanted was power. It was the dirtiest dance of democracy anybody could have witnessed. How a hand full of people played their games with the hopes of 50 million people of this state. Bond papers and ministries were more important to them, than the interest of the general public.

What ever democracy that we have at present is the worst form of democracy. People are displaced from the ancestral lands without proper compensations, women are striped and beaten brutally because someone does not like what she asks for, another lady is made to run from city to city because someone did like what she writes, natural resources are illegally mined and exported to other countries, the list goes on and on….

Do we have any hope? The only thing that can force a government to do its job rightfully is the civil society. But how strong is this society whose stake holders are me, you and every citizen? We are more concerned about our self well being, than about the collective good.

Do we have a solution? Is our system the worst form of democracy?

Turkeys in "Frying Pan Park"

Thanksgiving day is celebrated on the 4th Thursday of November in US, is similar to the Sankranthi festival celebrated in India - thanking god for a good harvest.

For this day more than 50 million turkeys are slaughtered and processed to fed America. But there is one lucky turkey (hmm..). Every year the the National Turkey Federation presents the US president with a turkey (specially trained to interact with him and the other VIPs) as a thanksgiving gesture. As a show of kindness, this turkey is granted the presidential pardoned and sent to (oops!!!) "Frying Pan Park" or to (wow!!!) Disneyland to spend the rest of its life.

I guess the fate of this bird is much better than the people of Iraq and Afghanistan where every day his army kills countless number of innocent people.

Images That Changed The World

An amazing collection of photographs. I am shocked at the intensity of these pictures.

Pseudo Women Empowerment

"This is a victory for the principles which our Indian people uphold" – President Prathiba Patil.

I am a bit worried about what principles she is actually talking off. Now that she is the President, all we can hope is she keeps up the values that our outgoing President Dr APJ Kalam had brought to this office.

Political parties specially the UPA alliance has been talking about this as a victory for women’s right. I am indeed very happy to have a lady President. But if a lady President was selected on the basis of principles, contributions to the society, rather than loyalty to some person or family, I would have been happier.

All this apart two other incidents concerning women in India, happened this week

• Discovery of more than 30 female fetuses dumped in wells

• Kiran Bedi not being offered the post of Delhi’s commissioner

More than 30 female fetuses each packed in polythene bags were found in Orissa. A reminder of how female infanticide is still so persistent in India, even after having so many laws against the same. I am really shocked to write anything about this. Probably dowry is the single most import cause for this epidemic (if I can say so). Will we ever see an end to this horrific practice? I am certainly not prepared to read one more article by some council in UK about 20 million girl children being killed by Indian parents.

Kiran Bedi, India’s first IPS office, a person with impeccable character and background, recognized and honored internationally, an excellent reformer, was denied the post of the Commissioner of Delhi Police. Another example of male domination or just that other “babus” believed that they couldn’t handle her. Mrs Bedi was over looked though she was the senior most person for the post. Certain newspapers even reported statements by the people in the government stating that she was too radical and out spoken for the post.

On one side UPA talks of women empowerment by electing females to ceremonial posts and steps back when actual empowerment is considered. Female infanticide can lead to a lot of social problems; a skewed sex ratio will lead to a lot of social unrest and increase atrocities and crime against women. The issue of 33% reservation for women has also had a silent death.