Chidambaram's Letter

Home minister P.Chidambaram’s letter that’s yet to reach Chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacherjee is no shot in the arm of Trinomool as construed upon in some political circles. Some, however, challenge the veracity of the letter as it’s not reached CM even after three days and the language used in the letter particularly ‘Harmads’ does not fit in with Chidambaram’s perfectly gentlemanly style of writing. However, even if the letter is written by Chidambaram, it’s the political compulsion that prompted him to write it. The threat of Mamata Banerjee to quit UPA in the event Central govt continues to ignore their complaints repeatedly made against state govt regarding law and order problem and misuse of joint forces at Jungalmahal has worried Chidambaram a lot particularly when Center is not very comfortable in the face abnormal price hike through out the country and one mind-boggling scam after another unfolding itself almost each day. To pacify TMC supremo who has constituted the second largest ally of UPA govt Chidambaram has perhaps written such a letter to CM.But whatever be the content and tone of the letter home minister is unlikely to take any action against the state govt as it’s neither politically prudent nor constitutionally viable for Center to embark upon any such step particularly when the assembly elections are near at hand.

Shrugging off stigma!

Homeopathy: Staunch critics of Homeopathy often say ‘Who has nowhere to go, goes to an homeopath’. They mean when a man can’t afford any other treatment, try their luck with an homeopath. Perhaps homeopathy has to suffer such humiliation or adverse criticism because modern sciences can’t explain how it works. But in practice it’s found to cure many diseases that can’t be even cured by other conventional therapies. Many times it works wonder. Still critics don’t relent. Some even call it faith healing. In many developed countries practice of homeopathy has been banned. But is it the fault of the this therapy that tenets of modern sciences can’t explain how it works? Or isn’t it the other way round? It’s the limitations of modern sciences that it can’t explain the working principle of homeopathy?

One argument is often put forward against homeopathy is that here medicines are potentised by dilution and in an extremely dilute solution starting material is expected to remain virtually absent. So then how can the medicine work? But recently Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay has established homeopathy medicines work on the basis of nanotechnology. Here researchers have shown even extremely diluted solution of homeopathic remedies contains measurable amounts of starting material. So now homeopathy can shrug off its stigma that its working principle can’t be interpreted by modern sciences.

La Miserable!

The whole episode seems unbelievable.Can a teacher ask for a laptop from his pupil to promote him to higher class? Yes it did happen in no less an elite school than La Martiniere for boys at Kolkata.Sanjay Smart, class teacher of 11-yr old Srijan Banerjee allegedly asked his father for a laptop to promote him to class V. Sujan’s father did not oblige Smart and as a result the boy was expelled from school.Sujan’s father is not a man to surrender to such black mail. He dragged the matter to court and high court gave verdict in favour of Sujan. It asked La Mart to take back Sujan to school and promote him to class V.Unfazed school authority contested the HC order at Supreme court. The apex court upheld the HC’s verdict and asked La Mart to lift expulsion order and promote Sujan to higher class. School did implement SC’s order.

The above episode might raise many unsavoury questions in people’s mind. Is it a common practice in many elite schools to bribe teachers for promotion of their wards? If not, why did school authority punish Sujan in stead of the teacher who allegedly asked for bribe from the boy’s father. School authority could have at least initiated an enquiry into this matter. On the other hand authority went to the extent of going to the apex court to defend the errant teacher. Such an instance is bound to send shock wave to the teaching and students’ community as well.

A Withering State

Perhaps now West Bengal stands out as the most unfortunate state in our country. Despite resources and opportunities Bengal is gradually lagging behind . This setback can be attributed to unique political scenario prevailing here. To start with the ruling party made serious efforts to advance the state through industrialization which is in fact the need of the hour for employment generation. There was nothing wrong in it. But what stood in the way was the govt’s unnecessary hurriedness to bring about the change and not to take the opposition in to confidence in this regard. It did it as it enjoyed the brute majority reducing the opposition to microscopic minority. It tried to go alone as if opposition was a non-entity.

After land reform in Bengal small land owners who once tilled in other’s lands developed emotional attachment to land. This attachment was much intense with those who’ve multicrop land in particular. For them to lose land is as good as losing near and dear ones.Incidentally, in Bengal most of the land is cultivable. Govt failed to understand procurement of land was a very sensitive issue. It requires time and patience to convince the farmers that they’d be ultimately benefited if they part with their land.Govt, however, could not afford to spend that amount of time lest the delay could help the other states to attract the entrepreneurs. So in many cases land was forcefully procured against the will of the farmers. Land thus procured included multi crop land also. The opposition, particularly Trinomool Congress made this acquisition of land against the farmers’ will a big issue and started anti-land acquisition movement in a big way. The land movement awarded TMC unexpected popular support. They got back sufficiently firm land under their feet to stand on and threw challenge to the govt against land acquisition. Enthused by their unbelievable success TMC devoted whole heartedly to organize farmers against acquisition of land, whatever be the purpose of acquisition . So all developmental activities that needed land did grind to a halt. What’s most unfortunate Tatas shifted its automobile factory from Singur to Gujarat in the face of political turmoil even after near completion of the project. What’s worse TMC embarked upon policy of non-cooperation with the govt and they were not on speaking terms with any member of the ruling party. Perhaps such a situation has never cropped up in any state of our country.

Now opposition has directed its attention to Rajarhat Newtown, recently named Jyoti Basu Nagar.TMC’s started movement in the same fashion as in Singur and Nandigram.Their bone of contention is that land has been forcefully grabbed from poor people at Rajarhat at unjustified price to make the township. Now at Rajarhat IT hub Wipro is going to establish its second unit after one at Salt Lake City and Infosysis has been allotted land to open their unit. These new establishments would generate a large number of employments. One might fear such political agitations would stand in the IT giants’ way of establishing their units as it happened with Tatas at Singur.What’s unfortunate the opposition could have sorted out their grievances simply by negotiation with the govt in stead of launching agitation. This land acquisition issue has in fact stalled all developmental work in the state. It’s not spared the TMC supremo too. At Sankrail, Howrah construction of a railway factory has halted in the face of anti land procurement movement by her own party. In the event TMC comes to power and the Left parties resist procurement of land at each and every step, where would this poor state go? It’s high time all parties could pause and ponder over this issue and behave sensibly at least in the interest of the state.

Corruption begins at home!

To indulge in corrupt practices has been the way of our life. Perhaps no body brothers about it now a days. For people at all places corruption is their prerogative. Majority of our MPs are corepaties and their declared assets enhance many fold in each election compared to earlier one. No body questions how their wealth burgeons in such unusual way. Nor they care to hide their wealth. On the contrary they vie with others in flaunting wealth. Recently an MP hired an entire train for carrying invitees to the marriage party of his son. Administration won’t bother to enquire how the MP concerned has amassed so much of money. In majority of cases people in power have wealth which is glaringly disproportionate with their income. A minor scrutiny might unearth their dubious source of income. But who’ll do this precious job? There prevails an unholy nexus among the custodians of law and justice and perpetrators of malpractices. So corruption has pervaded all strata of our society. Imagine a professor of IIT Kharagpur who happens to be the chief of the vigilance committee too was running a parallel institute for years at the campus illegally and was fleecing unsuspecting students hefty fees. It’s been also revealed other reputed teachers of the institute also joined the fray. The main accused is now suspended and an enquiry is going on. Recently a renowned doctor heading the inspection team awarded affiliation to a substandard medical college at the cost of 2 crores of rupees. The doctor is also suspended and enquiry has been initiated. These are only a handful of cases where probe is being made and in other cases wrong doers generally get scot free. Big scam involving mind boggling amount of money is unfolded almost every day. Scam in miniature form starts at grass root levels and at later stage it ramifies and take dreadful proportion. So miniscams at lower levels must not be ignored to ensure minimizing corruptions at higher levels. Now corruptions have been so very rampant, who will stem the rot?

RSVP!

English people earlier posted an abbreviation RSVP at the end of invitation letter.RSVP is in fact an abbreviated form of French words which in simple English mean reply if you please.RSVP is supposed to serve a very useful purpose if the guests cooperate with the host by informing him if he’d be able to attend the party. It helps the host make almost exact head count and make arrangement of food accordingly.It’d also minimize wastage of food due to guests’ failure to attend the function. In Indian culture , of course, guests are only cordially invited to the party and never are they asked to speak their mind if they’d be able to be present at the party. In fact, it’s feared the guest might take exception if such a question is put to him. However, some people on their own spell out their inability to attend the party on the appointed day for some reason or other. But majority of the invited guests remain silent in this regard or think it not proper to say their ‘inability’ to the face of the guests. However, sometimes the host can read the invitees’ mind from body language .In general, the guests need to speculate how many invitees would attend the function .The more precise is the speculation, the less will be the wastage of food or hassles to preserve the surplus food for distribution among the next door neighours.Some times food rots and it has to be thrown in the dustbin. It’s really a criminal offence to waste food in this manner in a country where the majority of people can’t make both ends meet. That apart, it means wastage of money for the host. Sometimes loss of money runs into thousands. I know, in a wedding feast 400 people were invited but only 200 odd guests attended the party. Now imagine the predicament of the host. Only way to wriggle out of such intriguing situation is to launch a social campaign to motivate invitees to let the host know if they’d be able to attend the party so that host could have a rough estimate of food he should keep ready for the guests to avoid wastage.

Protocol

It’s controversy hovering around acquisition of land that has given Mamata a secured and firm land to stand on in politics. So Mamata can’t afford to let any opportunity on land issue that might pay her dividend go wasted. Hence after spectacular successes in Singer and Nandigram she turned her attention to Rajarhat township, now christened Jyoti Basu Nagar.The township is based on vast tract of land. So it’s not difficult to allege even off the cuff that at this township in many cases land was acquired forcefully or by other dubious means as in Singer or Nandigram.There might be many takers of such arbitrary allegations and the administration could be put on the spot. But Mamata’s allegations were strongly challenged by the housing minister Goutam Dev himself and refuted many of them with relevant documents. He also asked Mamata to answer some of his questions and kept the ball rolling in her court. Here happened a very interesting thing that people never came across in our state.Mamata refused to answer Goutam’s queries on the ground that she belongs to ‘ grade’ that is superior to his in administration. Perhaps now on TMC supremo would ask his men to strictly follow ‘gradation’ system introduced by her while giving answer to some one in ruling party or even in her ally. Mercifully, this newly initiated protocol won’t work in direct conversation between the ruling and opposition parties as they’re not on speaking terms with each other. It’ll come into effect only in answering allegations and counter allegations only. For cadres, however, it’s hand that speaks more than tongue.

Unwarranted Critcism Of Mayor

Opposition unnecessarily grudge Mayor for having 5 cars.In fact the number is much fewer than necessary.Our Mayor is the most democratic one the KMC has ever had.He's 100-odd advisers who're mostly City's luminiaries in their respective spheres.Mayor infact run the civic administration acting upon their valued advice and blessings.He's to engage the cars to bring these celebreties to KMC for interaction whenever necessary.So imagine how many cars he actually needs for this precious job.We should rather thank him for manging the work of such magnitude with only 5 cars to save KMC's money.

Scams Galore

The public representatives who handle public exchequer are obviously answerable to public. They need to explain how the money is utilized to appropriate authority. Despite these checks and balances rampant corruption s are going on in public life. What’s most unfortunate, these malpractices are rising leaps and bounds. One scam after another is unfolding almost every day. Many of the scams are mind-boggling and they involve cores of rupees. Sometime it reaches astronomical figures. These are all our moneys and a large portion comes from poor people who dominate the economic scenario of our country. What’s most interesting people in high places who play ducks and drakes with public money are hardly brought under scanner. Most of them escape unnoticed and unscathed with their booties and only an unfortunate few come to the glare of media for their misdeeds.Thanks to media, for their investigative reporting and sometimes very risky and courageous sting operation scams of big magnitude come to light. In most of the cases CBI enquiries are initiated but results of the enquiries are not made public though it’s public money that the scam is all about. So one can hardly remember how many public figures have been so far brought to book for their financial irregularities. In fact the network of the scamsters are so well knit and well organized, it’s difficult to lay hands on them. These are very shocking stories for our society but perhaps we’ve nothing to do but to be shock-proof.

A Controversial Politician

Siddharta Sanker Ray Passes Away!
Let us condole the death of Shri Siddhartha Shanker Ray,a successful barrister,an able administrator,the most controversial politician, a ruthless supressor of Naxal and Khalisthani movements.Though he died at ripe old age but every death is sad and painful.We pray, may his soul rest in piece.

Ray in fact lost relevance in national and state politics long since.He tried time and again to assume a meaningful role in state political scenario but he failed to achieve acceptance from any fraction of Cong,nor from Trinamool either.Some times he dished out uncalled for advice to politicians of his party, but they were more ignored than observed.Normally, he seemed to have assumed political renunciation, but old habit dies hard.He came out of hibernation to make her presence felt with some remark castigating the Left or eulogizing Congress.


Reportedly,his advice to Ms. Indira Gandhi to promulgate emergency and making draft of emergency proclamation goes down in the history of Indian democracy as the shabbiest work ever done by a politician. What's more he shrugged off the responsibility of the misdeeds and passed the buck to Ms. Gandhi while deposing before Shah Commission to come clean.Sadly it makes the darkest chapter of the world's largest democracy.

Every man has weakness and stenghth.He'd also many good qualities too. However, though Trinommol and Congress are vying with each other to highlight their proximity with Ray for political mileage, it's a futile exercise as there's nothing to cash in on Ray's death.

Let us pray again that his soul may rest in peace.

Looking For Largesse

We're really proud of our boys and girls for their brilliant performances in different events in CWG.But when they clamour for largesse from the government in return for their success, perhaps they belittle their position in the estimation of public.They're sports persons,sports and games are their passion.They should demand to make better facilities available to them for their better performance in future.State should also see to the fact that financial constraints don't any way hamper their ability to perform.It doesnot necessarily mean they should be given land free or at throw-away price or lump sum money or other largesse as reward.Incidentally, state govt has made such precedence like giving away land to people who have made their mark not only in sports and games but in any other field also.It has now been the matter of right for any successful person in any sphere of life to claim land from the state govt.It's really unfortunate.

Seditious Statement

Freedom of speech is enshrined in our constitution.But it does not necessarily mean you'd say any thing you like - anything that's prejudicial to the interest of your country and nation.Pakistan has been wrongly claiming since its inception that Kashmir is its part and the writer Arundhuti Ray too now echoes the same demand supporting Pakistan.May be, she's doing it to draw public attention to her but it merits a case of sedition that warrants her immediate detention.Were she born in any other country(say in Pakistan) she would have definitely been behind the bar by now. As here law is much liberal and people are much tolerant she has been still getting away after making such a seditious statement.It's high time aministration could pull her up otherwise many of her followers and admirers would follow suit.

Sharing decision,opposing implementation!

Mamata is harping on withdrawal of joint forces from Jungalmahal and the Center’s rightly turning a deaf ear to her. Operation of joint forces at Maoist infested states is a decision taken at Central cabinet in presence of Mamata.She didn’t register note of dissent on the issue, nor did she stage a walk-out in protest. But she started clamoring against the presence of joint forces in Bengal. She now demands deployment of only Central forces to contain the Naxals as per report of TOI. However if it’s true, it’s only to show that she’s no rapport with the Naxals, though in many instances she betrayed her connections with them. She, in fact, says different things at different times. For instance, she claimed there were no Naxals at Jungalmahal.She’s recently said all Naxals are behind the bar in Jungalmahal,CPM are playing the dual roles of Naxals and CPM.She even claimed Naxal leader Azad was murdered and not killed in encounter as reported by home ministry. She never blames Naxals for railway sabotage despite ample proofs of their sabotaging activities. On the contrary she passes the buck to the ruling party. In fact, what she’s looking for is to bag a few seats from Jungalmahal in assembly polls with the help of PCPA, a frontal organization of Naxals.What remains to be seen is what stance she’d take about Naxals and joint forces if she happens to come to power and how Naxals would behave in her regime.

Metro Diary!

Metro derailment in the tunnelTo day's metro derailment could have been the worst-ever disaster in the history of metro rail.Since metro services were extended not a single day has passed without snag.Metro was extended to play to the gallery by the railway minister without considering if the existing infrastructure was adequate enough to bear the brunt of extra load.So metro which was once our pride now has become our nightmare.What's unfortunate, the railway minister seems to take very casually what is happening with metro and pass the buck to CPM for engeneering sabotage.But her sabotge or conpiracy theory has unfortunately failed to click and people now know it's her indifference,negligence, lack of proper planning and above all her populist politics have brought the things to such a pass.So it's high time to pause and ponder over safety of Metro.For this purpose metro services shoud be reduced as before till infrastructure is available to ensure metro services over entire stretch.Other wise luck might elude us and a big disater incurring loss of many lives might happen.

CWG Enquiry!

Prime minister has rightly called for investigation into alleged corruptions in just concluded Commonwealth games immediately after the games are over.Instances of malpractices those were reported in media were mind boggling and apparently unimaginable.They might be the tip of the ice berg.CWG was a mega event with which huge number of people were associated and amount of money handled was also almost in astronomical figure.Hence it might take time to scrutinize the account.So tenure of OC has been extended for some time more.If OC is now dissolved, it might prove difficult to track down the culprits after the enquiry is over.

What's one afraid of is results of such inquiries are never known to public and the guilty go scot free or unusally long time is taken in investigation so that people ultimately forget the matter and the issue is selved.But this time, however,the Prime minister himself has taken the initiative and so the guilty are expected to be punished.

Feed back

Star Ananda,Puja coverage!
I normally have my TV set shut down during puja days till immersion.Not that I'm a puja reveller or a pandal hopper.I refrain from viewing because it's the same thing beamed year after year without any novelty or innovation,whatsoever.It's the same head counting at pandals and asking silly questions the pandal hoppers.It seems you're rerunning the cassettes of previous years.Quality of 'adda' programs have so deteriorated that they're not worth seeing.However,I chanced upon some of your programs telecast recorded or alive from London and they're worth seing.The 'walk the talk' or 'sit and talk' interviews are particularly enjoyable.However,in near future you need not have the hassles of going to telecast these programs from London as our Kolkata would be London in days to come.

Puja days over, politicians will swing back into actions.Turmoils and terbulence will take sway.Try to analyse events in their right perspective without being biased, though it's a difficult proposition now days as TV channels are also politically polarised.Any way, tough days are ahead.Do justice to your profession and people you serve with news and views..Please excuse me for intrusive or uncalled-for advice.Take heartiest Vijaya Greetings.Thank you.

All's well that ends well

Commonwealth games
With lesser gloss in concluding ceremony than in inaugural one the much hyped Commonwealth games for disastrous preparations ended with grand success and glorious note. Only a few days left for the games to kick off almost every thing in games village was apparently in a mess apprehending unprecedented mismanagement during the game. But as if the management some how managed to have a wonder lamp of Aladdin, the games took off with a gorgeous spirit through spectacular opening ceremony.It’d not to look back any more and ended with phenomenal success that received compliments from all over the world. What’s more India stood second in gold
medal tally and fared unexpectedly well almost in all the events.

Games management now blames media of their proactive roll to accuse organizers of poor preparations for this mega event. It sent bad signal to all concerned and many renowned athletes pulled out of the games. But media shouldn’t be blamed. It’s media that pointed out the lapses and management took initiative to mend those on war footing. Games management should take this criticism sportingly and in right perspective.

Now charges of mind-boggling financial corruption that media mentioned during preparation of the games should be thoroughly probed and the accused be duly punished. That apart, though CWG has happened to be a spectacular success, management should finish preparation of any mega event well in advance in future so that at the eleventh hour people have not suffer from anxieties and tension along with the organizers.

Invitation from China to Mamata

We're happy and proud that Railway minister Mamata Banerjee has been invited by China to attend a conference on matters related to railways.Many other railway ministers from other countries have also received invites.But it's unfortunate press is trying to give political overtone to this simple and innocent incident.They find CPM to be ill at ease for this invite to Mamata.Mind, Mamata has been invited not as a leader of a political party but as a railway minister of India.Regrettably,to look upon every thing obliquely and give it an uncessary twist and turn to politicalise it is now the common practice of a section of press.We do hope Didi would attend the meet and would participate in the discussion that is primarily focused on how to run high speed train.

China has made tremendous progress in science and technology.It's introduced very fast moving trains with unbelievable speed of 350Km/hr where as Japan and France who have very fast moving trains too have lagged far behind.In India, however, trains move with much slower speed.How far the nature of Indian soil would rev up the speed of trains is difficult to ensure.

Nobel Peace Prize

Perhaps controversy never eludes award of Nobel Peace Prize almost every year. Last year awarding this prestigious award to Barack Obama with in seven months of his assuming office as the President of USA kicked up a row. This year conferment of Nobel Peace prize to human right activist Liu Xiabobo of China who has been sentenced to 11yrs. imprisonment and is now incarcerated. He co-authored charter ’08 claiming political reforms in China that was published in UN’s universal declaration of human rights. Liu participated in Tiananmen protests way back in 1989.China has naturally taken exception to awarding peace prize to one whom it considers a simple ‘criminal’ and takes it as a calculated move and conspiracy by Nobel Committee to embarrass it and belittle its position in the estimation of other nations. China has now the world’s second largest economy and a very powerful nation. It must react vehemently to this seemingly confrontational attitude of the Norwegian Nobel Committee. Perhaps, any other country under the similar circumstances would have reacted this way. It’s well known unlike other Nobel prizes, peace prize is awarded more or less on political considerations and hence it has been devalued over the years. So it’s to run into adverse criticism on most of the occasions. Nobel Committee could have easily averted such an unpleasant outcome by awarding this prize to some other person nominated for this award.

Discourteous!

Renaming Rajarhat township as Jyoti Basu Nagar:
It's heartening Rajarhat township has been named Jyoti Basu Nagar after Shri Jyoti Basu, the longest serving Chief minister of any state in India and the founding member of CPM Politburo who passed away last January.On this occasion a function was held at Rajarhat and it was attended by a large number of people from all sections of the society irrespective of their political faiths and affiliation.What's most unfortunate not a single leader of Trinomool attended the meeting though they were invited.In fact,there's reportedly a standing instruction from the TMC supremo that none of her party would attend any function or meeting organised or convened by the ruling party.What a discourteous stand it is! What would our young generation learn from such leader who aspires to rule the state?Would not they learn to give a go-by to all decency and decorum?This Culture of discourtesy is her contribution to the state which has never seen it before.What's most alarming if such things continue progress of our state will continue to suffer a serious set back as it is doing now.