"Sāre jahāñ se acchā hindostāñ hamārā.."

“Sara Jahan se acha…”, is one of my favorite songs, first two lines of this poem will always comes to my mind, in fact this may be one of the many two lines which will always remain in the lips of millions of Indians. This poem (one of the most popular poems in India) is written in Urdu, by Muhammed Iqbal (later become the national poet of Pakistan) was first published in 1904.

Lyrics:

sāre jahāñ se acchā hindostāñ hamārā
ham bulbuleñ haiñ us kī vuh gulsitāñ hamārā
ġhurbat meñ hoñ agar ham, rahtā hai dil vatan meñ
samjho vuhīñ hameñ bhī dil ho jahāñ hamārā
parbat vuh sab se ūñchā, hamsāyah āsmāñ kā
vuh santarī hamārā, vuh pāsbāñ hamārā
godī meñ kheltī haiñ us kī hazāroñ nadiyāñ
gulshan hai jin ke dam se rashk-e janāñ hamārā
ay āb-rūd-e gangā! vuh din haiñ yād tujh ko?
utarā tire kināre jab kāravāñ hamārā
mażhab nahīñ sikhātā āpas meñ bair rakhnā
hindī haiñ ham, vatan hai hindostāñ hamārā
yūnān-o-miṣr-o-rumā sab miṭ gaye jahāñ se
ab tak magar hai bāqī nām-o-nishāñ hamārā
kuchh bāt hai kih hastī miṭtī nahīñ hamārī
sadiyoñ rahā hai dushman daur-e zamāñ hamārā
iqbāl! koī meharam apnā nahīñ jahāñ meñ
m’alūm kyā kisī ko dard-e nihāñ hamārā!

English Translation:

Better than the entire world, is our Hindustan,
We are its nightingales, and it (is) our garden abode
If we are in an alien place, the heart remains in the homeland,
Know us to be only there where our heart is.
That tallest mountain, that shade-sharer of the sky,
It (is) our sentry, it (is) our watchman
In its lap frolic those thousands of rivers,
Whose vitality makes our garden the envy of Paradise.
O the flowing waters of the Ganges, do you remember that day
When our caravan first disembarked on your waterfront?
Religion does not teach us to bear ill-will among ourselves
We are of Hind, our homeland is Hindustan.
In a world in which ancient Greece, Egypt, and Rome have all vanished without trace
Our own attributes (name and sign) live on today.
Such is our existence that it cannot be erased
Even though, for centuries, the cycle of time has been our enemy.
Iqbal! We have no confidant in this world
What does any one know of our hidden pain?

Regards,
Sajeev.

English translation is copied from Wikipedia.

Electric Cars are Back in Action

Nissan Leaf - Photo Courtesy - Nissan Japan

There was a time when the countries were forced to reduce their expenses and stock markets crashed whenever the ‘horrible’ news of oil price rise comes to the market. For decades oil and gas remained as the most important item in the exports basket of many countries - which resulted in rapid development in some countries and in many others it become an oil curse - and important import item for many other countries. Even now these facts remain the same. World still can’t suffer another oil shock.

One of the prime consumers of the oil is transportation industry. Both private and public transportation and utility vehicles still use oil as its primary fuel. It was and still is a curios question in front of us - why world is heavily dependent on oil and gas? Why not it’s replacing oil with electricity? If a handful of laboratories in US can overcome many critical challenges in Science and engineering during the development of Atom Bomb in record time, it will not be a mistake to think that, root cause of the problem lies more in the absence of a strong political will than scientific and technological barriers.

Any one saw the 1996 documentary "Who Killed the Electric Car?”

But the necessity for embracing green technology and reducing carbon footprint the concept of electric cars are back again. In a recent announcement the cash strapped UK government is ready to offer subsidies of up 5000($7935) for nine selected electric cars models (Mitsubushi iMiEV, Daimler Smart, Peugeot iON, Citroen's CZero, Nissan Leaf, Tata Vista, Toyota Prius, Vauxhall's Ampera and GM Chevrolet's Volt) under low carbon transport plan. Along with these companies other majors like BMW, Chrysler, Ford etc. are also on the race to capture the electric car market. GM alone spends around $700mn for ‘Volt’ excluding its R & D Cost.

But still the price for the batteries, not so abundant plug in points (In US there is only around 1000 charging points - this may increase once electric car become popular) raise the range anxiety problems among customers like; when it will stop? Viability of long drives etc. Long charging hours is another turn off for these cars. Range is slowly improving, the new battery powered Nissan Leaf has an EPA certified battery only range of 120 km (Leaf will cost you around $33,000, tax credits may bring down the cost).

In the coming days as world is more eager on cutting the emissions, there may be more investments in this sector along with future technologies like Hydrogen fuel cells, electrically powered heavy vehicles etc. Until then we have to adjust ourselves with the rising costs of Oil & Gas, pollution etc. Other viable alternatives like bio fuels may sounds interesting. But the problem here is, if bio fuels become the primary source of fuel then large swaths of lands will switch their crops from edible food items to that of bio fuels. Which may results in lower per capita food availability.

Once electric cars become popular then it may not take much years to implement the same in heavy vehicles. Governments can bring down the cost by giving initial subsidies on tax to these vehicles or giving incentives to the companies who are ready to spend money on environment friendly vehicles. But the million dollar question is will the automobile companies and governments show continuous interest in these areas? What is waiting for them in the future, a market domination or premature death?

Sajeev.

A 'War' over Nobel 'Peace' Price - China Vs the Rest

Past weeks were really excellent, full of news and thrillers just like watching the next version of "Pirate of The Caribbean". When the hangover of 1.76 lack crore Spectrum scam was over, we got 35,000 crore UP Food Grain Scam (low in numbers but still Indians may be able to adjust with this - Any way next scam will not take much time to come to surface). Reporters may be wondering what they will call for the new scam as many of the heavy weight words are already used. Adopting some practices from history many not be a bad idea like naming the scams like Spectrum Scam II, Fodder Scam II, Telecom scam II etc. When the chilling effect of Radia tapes was over we got the boxing letters of Rajeev Chandrashekhar Vs Ratan Tata. And of course the now famous Cablegage.

Apart from this one more interesting drama is playing in the half closed streets of International diplomacy and economic muscle flexing. This drama started with the announcement of Nobel peace prize- 2010 to Liu Xiaobo. According to Nobel prize committee this prize is awarded to him "for his long and non-violent struggle for fundamental human rights in China", but the Chinese version is entirely opposite. This is already proved to be a action which the new resurgent China can no longer digest.

As December 10(day for distributing the Nobel peace Prize) is approaching, matters are becoming more and more complex. Usually invitations to attend the Nobel price distribution ceremony will be sent to 65 nations who have embassies in Oslo. As China is taken this years ceremony as a prestigious issue, there attempt is to create as much vacant seats in the distribution ceremony. As of Thursday 45 countries had notified the Nobel committee that they will be sending representatives(This includes India also) and 19 countries will not send their representatives (Other than China the list includes Afghanistan, Colombia, Cuba, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Morocco, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Sudan, Tunisia, Venezuela, Vietnam etc).

It is already reported that foreign television broadcasts in China have repeatedly gone dark when some thing related to Nobel Peace Price comes up in these channels. Chinese also introduced their own peace price and declared Lien Chan as the winner (A China friendly Taiwanese politician) - it is another matter that this person didn't turned up during the ceremony and prize committee finally gave it to a young girl.

What China is trying to achieve by these actions? As long as they remain as an economic and military power, it may not be a difficult thing to bend other nations views and make them fall in line. It is an open secret that unlike in the west, Asian and other countries usually don't will not mix human rights with that of Diplomacy -  unless these activities are a source of fear for them.

But if china continues to force other nations to take decisions in China's favour this may not be the case. As China become more and more assertive temperature is rising in its borders not only with India, but also with Japan, Vietnam etc. Moreover Chinese economy is an export oriented one - producing much more than they could actually consume, in other words they need other countries to buy them up. In a globalized world countries are interdependent on one another. An economic stimulus to over come the recession may work in the short term but it have its own limits and no country can grow at the rate 10% for ever.

There is also a pre-planned leadership change in China in 2012. If this incident is a litmus test of the coming leader ship then we can anticipate a lot more fire works. A sustained economic growth may act as a complimentary for democracy in short term but it will not offer any long term guarantee.

Instead of forcing other nations to boycott the Nobel peace Prize ceremony, by putting the bilateral relation in between - its high time for Chinese leadership to sit down and think about the future to draw a growth path for Middle Kingdom which includes - human rights and Democracy. We can only hope that this will happen.

Sajeev.

Sudan Referendum - for peace or for another Civil war?

World war two made it difficult for the colonial powers of the old world to hold their international possessions together. Powerful national movements in the colonies, international consensus against colonialism, poor economic condition in Europe after the war etc lead to the independence of colonies.

Even if sun finally set in the British empire, sun never raised (or raised for a brief moment) in many of the new countries. Sudan falls in this category. After gaining independence from Egypt and UK in 1956, Sudan suffered 17 years long civil war which ended in 1972. As if this was not enough another civil war was followed by ethnic, religious conflicts between Northern Sudanese (Arab and Nubian) and Christian and Animist Nilotes of South in 1983. This data is enough for the reader to think about the independence Sudanese got in 1956.

Sudan is also a good example for the 'Curse of Oil'. Sudan's rich natural resources - Petroleum and Oil exports -didn't help the common Sudanese to kill their hunger. According to CIA Fact book - "The second war and famine-related effects resulted in more than four million people displaced and, according to rebel estimates, more than two million deaths over a period of two decades".

After the long civil 'North-South Comprehensive Peace Treatment'(CPA) was signed in January 2005. CPA gave an autonomy of six years for the southern region. After six years(that is in 2011) a referendum will be held to decide the autonomy of southern region.

As if all these conflict related deaths are not enough, a separate crisis was unfolded in Darfar in 2003, (Then US Secretary of state Collin Powell termed Darfur conflict as genocide) which resulted in the displacement of more than 2 million people and death of 2,00,000 to 4,00,000 people - CIA Fact book. The number of Internally Displaced People (IDP) currently living in Sudan is around 5.3 to 6.2 million. A staggering figure as the entire population of Sudan is just 44 million(approx).

It is in this situation Sudan is heading for referendum the first month of next year. How far it will be a success is yet to see. In fact its still not sure whether it will happen in the correct date and whether the waring faction will agree on the results. Even if Southern Sudan got independence after referendum will the people get a stable government? or will the south again split to various faction and continue their wars? It is rater ironic to note that - while 40% of the people live below the poverty line, there seems to be no deficiency in arms production and use. At this point of time what International community can do is to use everything at their disposal to ensure fair referendum in 2011 and substantially increase the number of peacekeeping force to check the possible violence at the time of referendum.

Sajeev.

2G Spectrum, flow of money and Government Exchequer

Indian Currency

It many not be possible even for a good journalist, who is covering politics for last two decades to name all the scams in the last twenty years after liberalization. As the years passed, amount involved in these events exponentially raised to mind blowing figures. For example, how many of you can count the number of zeros in 1.76 lack crore(recent 2G scam) in one minute? And for our bad luck, there is no tendency of a decline in corruption, in fact the number of corruption cases and the amount involved in it are multiplying manifold in year after year.

Corruptions in 2010:

Consider the case of 2010; we have good numbers in hand - 2G Spectrum, Adarsh Society, Commonwealth Games 2010, Dubious deals in IPL, Prasarbharti scam, Karnataka Mining scam, LIC Housing Finance scam etc. All these cases involves huge amount of money running into crores of rupees.

The interesting thing is that, in the flood of scams in 2010 we don't even remember the scams of previous years, like Jharkhand mining scam of 2009 - the alleged money involved in this scam itself is around 4000 crore rupees (almost a fifth of the annual budget of Jharkhand).There is no doubt that the amount of money flowing in to the pockets of government officers, tax heaves and secret banking heavens like Switzerland will be a mind blowing figure. May be we need to employee the services of Tianhe-1A of China or Jaguar of Cray, USA(current top 2 supercomputers) to calculate the sum.

Ashoka's Dhamma and the Current Indian society:

Is it shows the current Dhamma of India? The spider net of curroption is slowly covering our society - not only Indian politics but in other fields too. Indian society which once boast of Ashhoka's dhamma and noble eight-fold path now have low rankings in Transparency International's reports. In a free country everyone have the right to hold personal property and accumulate personal wealth, but no where its said that the amounts which (is in/)have to go to public exchequer can be considered as the personal wealth and use it like that.

But from the top to bottom from getting driving license, building a house, to get connections faster, to get a contract, for operating lorries across different states, to run temporary stores in road sides people have to satisfy various hands of government. of course the fault is not fully lies in the hands of various government arms, people are more than willing to pay small or big amounts to make the things faster(so that they can make money more easier), to short circuit the procedures, to cover up what they are cooking.

The main problem here is not the number of corruptions or the amount involved in it but what happens to the amount itself.For example take the case of 2G scam or CWG games, there is a lot of arguments and counter arguments going on in these cases. Cases are registered and its sure that it will run its own course; CBI, CVC, CAG, ED, IT and various other government agencies will enquire it for some time, then another scam will come and attention will shift to that one and people will slowly forget this one. After some years courts may find someone as guilty and give them the prison terms - considering the pace of cases in Indian courts, these cases will run for years.

Recovering the lost amounts:

But What will happen to the amount of money involved in these scandals? Considering the mind blowing amounts of money involved, a reasonable guess suggest that, this many not be the work of a single person or a handful, but will the agencies be able go to the root and unearth everything? Apart from the money we lost, we are again spending huge amounts to investigate the matter.


What is the point of investigating the same thing by 5-10 different government agencies? Over and above opposition wants more probes into the matter. I don't know what difference a JPC can make? The report prepared by JPC is not legally binding, the same case is applicable for any other commissions created by government. Already there are more than enough reports on government coffers which may be enough to provide raw materials for various Indian news papers for one year!!! In such a scenario what is the use of another enquiry commission?

And after all these investigations, will the Republic get her money back? Will the penalty imposed on the preparaters (If and only if anyone of them convicted at all) will be enough to cover the losses of exchequer? Or will it safely land in Swiss bank accounts? or in the form of properties in posh areas? or will come back to Indian as Foreign Direct Investment from abroad?

Lokpal Bil:

This should not be the situation in a country which is aspiring for permanent seat in UNSC. Accountability should be imposed on all levels. Lokpal Bill have to be passed and there is no need to omit important offices like CAG, CJI from its cover. An enhanced Lokpal Bill, which will cover politicians and beaurocrats in the high offices in centre and state, along with the strict implementation of current anti-corruption laws will enable us to curb this menace.

If passed, Lokpal Bil will prove to be another big achievement of Manmohan Singh government, like the Right To Information Act(RTI), Civil Nuclear agreement etc. To overcome the current corruption scandals which shaked Union government and various state governments, government have to implement Lokpal Bil.

Still we didn't lost everything, there are a lot of honest officers in government services and politics.Hope that there will be a day when the publicaton of curroption reports from Transperancy International many not an embrassing event for India.

Sajeev.