Family and Friends

It's that time of the year when the world and its uncle comes down to India for their yearly vacations. Most of my extended family and my sister are coming down, as it happens from the promised land:). For starters they're gonna be in for a rude shock - it is still summer in Bombay! We might as well have been in the Southern Hemisphere, its that bad. Probably warmer than there. The hope is there'll be a semblance of winter on New Year's Eve. Let's see how it goes.

Now with all these relatives here, there is going to be a lot of socialising, something I'm looking forward to. I hope to meet all my cousins (or at least most of them), some after years. I've noticed my generation of the family kind of drifting away from each other. My parents' generation still keeps in touch. What also helps is the fact that most of them are in Bombay, so phone calls are common. With us cousins though, we are all spread out. So for the most time, there was minimal contact, till of course the advent of Orkut and now Facebook! So to be fair we keep in touch as well:).

One thing I'm excited about is the karaoke machine we purchased recently. We'll put it through its paces in the next few days. Also my sister sings really well, so hope to listen to her sing karaoke. I tried my hand at singing and it was enjoyable. I managed a 90+ score on one of the songs. What helps is one's familiarity with the song. It can also be embarrassing at the start, but I guess it gets  better as one proceeds.

Speaking of friends, a couple of them are coming down this year. One who is a former roommate from college and the other a friend from college. Ashish and me were good friends in the first year at college. After that we went our own way, being in different branches. We got in touch after all these years, thanks to Orkut (what else!) and gmail. Its been great to find an old friend again and I look forward to meeting him on his trip here.

Yogesh, my roommate, is already here and is getting married in the next few days. I probably wont be able to attend the wedding as it is in Nasik and am loathe to travel.

Speaking of marriage, last year and this have seen most of my friends tying the knot. Gautam and me are the ones holding out. I'm not sure whether it is as a result of them getting married, but our correspondence has really dipped. Maybe it's them getting busy with their new lives. Does not make marriage enticing:).

I've "rambled on" quite a bit today. The Led Zeppelin song plays in my head. Guess I'll listen to them now. See you.

Mumbai 26/11 and my reactions to it.

This is an article I was sent by a friend in the aftermath of the terror attacks. What follows after the article is my correspondence with my friend.

 

LETTER OF EDITOR OF TIMES OF INDIA TO PRIME MINISTER

Dear Mr. Prime minister,I am a typical mouse from Mumbai. In the local trainCompartment which has capacity of 100 persons, I travel with 500 more mouse.Mouse at least squeak but we don't even do that.Today I heard your speech. In which you said 'NO BODY WOULD BE SPARED'.I would like to remind you that fourteen years has passed since serial bomb blast in Mumbai took place.Dawood was the main conspirator. Till today he is not caught.All our Bollywood actors, our Builders, our Gutka king meets him but your Government can not catch him.Reason is simple;All your ministers are hand in glove with him. If anyattempt is made to catch him everybody will be exposed. Your statement' NOBODY WOULD BE SPARED' is nothing but a cruel joke on this unfortunate people of India.Enough is enough. As such after seeing terrorist attack carried out by about a dozen young boys I realize that if same thingcontinues days are not away when terrorist will attack by air, destroy our nuclear reactor and there will be one more Hiroshima.We the people are left with only one mantra. Womb to Bomb to Tomb.You promised Mumbaikar Shanghai what you have given us is Jalianwala Baug.Today only your home minister resigned. What took you so long to kick out this joker?Only reason was that he was loyal to Gandhi family.Loyalty to Gandhi family is more important than blood of innocent people, isn't it?I am born and bought up in Mumbai for last fifty eightyears. Believe me corruption in Maharashtra is worse than that in Bihar. Look at all the politician,Sharad Pawar, Chagan Bhujbal, Narayan Rane, Bal Thackray , Gopinath Munde, Raj Thackray, Vilasrao Deshmukhall are Rolling in money.Vilasrao Deshmukh is one of the worst Chief minister I have seen.His only business is to increase the FSI every other day, make money and send it to Delhi so Congress can fight next election.Now the clown has found new way and will increase FSI for fisherman so they can build concrete house right on sea shore.Next time terrorist can comfortably live in those house , enjoy the beauty of sea and then attack the Mumbai at their will.Recently I had to purchase house in Mumbai. I met about two dozen builders. Everybody wanted about 30% in black.A common person like me knows this and with all your intelligent agency & CBI you and your finance minister are not aware of it.Where all the black money goes?To the underworld isn't it?Our politicians take help of these goondas to vacate people by force. I myself was victim of it.If you have time please come to me, I will tell you everything.If this has been land of fools, idiots then I would not have ever cared to write you this letter. Just see the tragedy, on one sidewe are reaching moon, people are so intelligent and on other side you politician has converted nectar into deadly poison.I am everything Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Schedule caste, OBC, Muslim OBC, ChristianSchedule caste, Creamy Schedule caste only what I am not is INDIAN.You politician have raped every part of mother India by your policy of divide and rule.Take example of former president Abdul Kalam. Such an Intelligent person, such a fine human being.You politician didn't even spare him. Your party along with opposition joined the hands, becausepolitician feels they are supreme and there is no place for good person.Dear Mr. Prime minister you are one of the most intelligent person, most learned person. Just wake up, be a real SARDAR.First and foremost expose all selfish politicians. Ask Swiss bank to give name of all Indian account holders.Give reins of CBI to independent agency.Let them find wolf among us.There will be political upheaval but that will better than dance of death which we are witnessing every day.Just give us ambience where we can work honestly and without fear. Let there be rule of law.Everything else will be taken care of.Choice is yours Mr. Prime Minister SirDo you want to be lead by one person or you want to lead the nation of 100 Crore people?

Prakash B. Bajaj

Editor Mumbai-Times of India

My Response -

What is the purpose of this article? What doe it hope to achieve?

Friend's response - 

 

It seeks to achieve that Indian Government stops mouthing pedestrians platitudes and actually do something (such as takeout terrorist training camps in Pakistan, immediately). As far as reaction to this is concerned, anyway guys like Musharraf attack India militarily (and get away with it) and guys like the ones who attacked Mumbai will also continue attacking with the same vigor and sick predictability.

 

As far as hoping to achieve goes, I guess it is zilch, nada, nothing. If something is done, that would be a surprise. After all we have a spineless government with a backseat lady driver who is as obsessed with keeping Congress in power as her mom-in-law was (of course the rest of the country can get butchered for all she cares). 

 

Peace is easy to preach as long as the ones who died were not your near and dear. Give me one peacenik who actually lost someone close to them.

 

My Response -

I agree with your sentiment about the government doing nothing but mouthing platitudes. 

It is time to take the bull by the horns and tackle Pakistan on the terrorism issue. I disagree with your suggestion to take out camps in Pakistan. That should be the last option available to us. In my opinion we haven't fully explored the diplomatic angle to pressurising Pakistan.

 

Why do we need to have peace overtures towards them when they stonewall our every suggestion for tackling terrorism? Are the Samjhauta Express, Delhi Lahore bus service, Indo - Pak cricket, et al more important than the safety of our people? 

 

I know its easier said than done, but why cant we stop importing from Pakistan? We import about 300M$ worth and export about 1.3Billion $ worth. Surely we can procure what we get from them from another country as well. Maybe at a higher price, but isn't it possible? Maybe they will retaliate by stopping imports from us. So be it. We'll have to find newer markets for our exporters.

 

Why have successive governments let Pakistan get away with harbouring Dawood Ibrahim? Isn't there enough evidence against him to try him in an international court, if not an Indian one?

 

There are two aspects to the problem India faces today - how do we stub terrorism out at its roots and how do we defend ourselves against such attacks if they do happen?

 

Of these two I feel defence against such attacks is completely in our hands. Why can't we beef up our internal and external security? The government's response of creating more NSG hubs is a classic case of being reactive to situations. They have totally ignored the fact that our maritime borders are porous and if at all these and the agencies manning them should be strengthened first.

 

From a Bombay point of view, the suburban stations are woefully lacking in security. Contrast this with the Delhi Metro, which has world class security. Why can't there be equally good security at the Bombay stations? Are we waiting for yet another blast and hundreds of lost lives to install such security?

 

What do you have to say about the complete lack of political maturity shown across board? All parties bar none have put their feet in their mouths. You castigate the present government. Nirmal and Arvind castigated the BJP and its allies. If we as citizens are so divided at this stage, what more can we expect from our politicians? How different are we from our politicians then? Do we then have the moral right to complain about them? Aren't they only a reflection of the mindset of our society?

 

Don't we owe it to ourselves as citizens to rise above our political differences and work towards bringing about a change?

 

Why can't we tell our leaders in no uncertain terms that we reject the politicisation of these events in the run up to the General Elections?

 

My question to you is this - Would another government at the center have done any better? I think not. Correct me if you think otherwise. All parties are busy catering to their vote banks. No party has the country in its interests. They are all the same. Does one then reject all political parties? There was talk about boycotting the elections. What purpose does that serve? Are we, the common people ready to enter politics? No. For better or for worse we are saddled with the politicians we elect. 

 

The way forward imo is to push for police reforms, actively lobby for our security. Why can't the commuters of Bombay be part of a signature campaign which demands bolstering of the security at stations? Why can't we aim to remove the desensitisation of the people to deaths from terrorist attacks? Why can't we have a memorial for the dead? For the people in uniform? So we are reminded every day of the senseless deaths and the sacrifices made by them.

 

What are your thoughts on this? Mihir

And you reader, what are your thoughts? What do you think is the way forward?