A fortnight later

Last week I met a professor from Cornell Unversity. Actually I didnt know him, I was having my lunch and he just came and sat at my table. As I finished my lunch and he was waiting for his we started with “hi”s and introduction. As soon as he heard that I am from Mumbai, a “Ohhh!!!” came out from his voice and the discussion turned to Mumbai terrorrist attacks and how unfortunate it is to see such bloodshed in the name of religion.

He was working on research related to various cultures of Middle-east, Indian sub-continent and Southeast Asia and had stayed at each of these places for 3-4 years. Our discussion left me thinking what is the solution, how do we make sure this never happens again?

The reaction from world leaders was on expected lines, “We hope pakistan will act.”
“India and Pakistan need to show restraint”
“We need to work together to solve this problem”

As expected there was lots of lip-service but no action. UN sanctioned JuD, but Pakistan decided its a charitable organisation without any support to terrorist organisations. What is the solution for india, whats the path going forward, what are our options?

First thing India needs to accept is it HAS TO act (alone, if necessary). No one will come forward and fight for India or Indians. I may sound more like a war monger here, but trust me it is better to fight and die once and for all rather than bleed to death with thousand cuts. If this means we play right into the hands of Jihadis, then lets do that, lets see if the Jihadi’s and Pakistani army together can counter Indian force.

Strategic Analysis:
I – All out attack
India attacks Pakistan, Pakistan retaliates. By itself Pakistan should not be a problem, they are low on fuel, wouldnt be able to run the war for long. A brief war with immediate objective of capturing as much territory as possible within 2 weeks or so. Problem comes when Pakistan takes help from its all weather ally China. This is where Indian diplomacy needs its full force, to use USA and Russian support against China. China would not want to antagonise both at the same time.

II – Surgical strikes inside Pakistan
india makes surgical strikes inside PoK terrorist training camps. Stop before this leads to a full blown war. Take rest for few days or weeks, once international pressure subsides redo once again. more surgical strikes. This may antagonise international commnity(no one will come forward and say yes we understand why you did this) but isnt this what pakistan doing in disguise, all promises but no action??? someone has to take action and if pak does not act on its own, india will take action to safe guard its interests.

III – Worst case scenario
Any of the above scenario leads to a full blown war, international peace efforts fail. Pakistan pulls the plug and explodes nuclear device in india. First thing in case of escalation for india is to work with israeli secret service to obtain info on Pakistani nuclear establishment. With close association between USA and israel, israelis shud be able to help and pinpoint (remember they wanted to destroy pak nuclear plants so as to kill islamic nuclear device in its nascent stage but india got the cold feet at last moment). So take help and destroy the nuclear plants, bombard the place. Trifurcate the country into NWFP and FATA which will be controlled and managed by NATO. This should help stop Taliban attacks on Afgahnistan. Second part being Balochistan, which is currently fighting for independence, india can buy oil and help baloch become masters of their own land. Leave the rest as Pakistan without military strength. Well out of control army, nuclear blackmail, terrorst infrastructure is hardly an advt of a responsible state.

I am no professional strategic analyst, but i do believe there is time and place for everything. And the time is right now.

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On completely diff note, I am happy for them, to be honest not sure if I wud have done the same in their place:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Shot_at_CST_girl_gets_married_with_shrapnel_in_head/articleshow/3815977.cms

Mumbai Under Attack

More than hundred dead and hundreds more injured….Another attack…..

Well, there is no doubt that Mumbai’s sprit and defiance is not dwindling in the wake of these terrorist attacks as Julio Rebeiro put it, “Mumbai will back to work tomorrow morning”. But for how long? and how many times? Mumbai has to suffer. Who is to be blamed, our neighbor as usual? OR should the politicians take the blame for all their unwillingness to have better and more stringent laws against terror suspects and supporters.

It’s been more than 24 hours, with no end in sight as of now.

This city where I was born, where I studied and grew up, where my family resides, the city which is 1000 miles away from where I am right now but still closest to my heart, I have full confidence will bounce back as it did after 1993 blasts, 2005 floods, 2006 train bombings. But the anger, the frustration at authorities will remain. Once a friend told me, always forgive but never forget. And this will remain etched in memory for a long long time.

I hope all this ends soon, and pray for the safety of hostages.

My deepest condolences to the families of Hemant Karkare, Vijay Salaskar, Ashok Kamte and other policemen and civilians who lost their lives.

P.S. If you need any help, contact nos., check this out: http://mumbaihelp.blogspot.com/

Bolt of Lightning

Today was one of the most memorable moments in Olympics 2008. If you are thinking about Michael Phelps winning 7 golds, then sorry to disappoint I am not talking about that. It was a given fact that Phelps will be the one to break that record.

I am talking about Jamaican Usain Bolt’s new world record 100m run in the finals. He not only broke world record by Asafa Powell and 12yr old Olympic record by Donovan Bailley, but broke it with such ease almost as if teasing the other runners and previous record holders and saying “Piece of cake”. The last 30m he was literally jumping, thumping, looking back at other runners and winning the race hands down. There was no competition, none at all.

Even though Bolt ran an excellent race in semi-finals, Asafa Powel was a formidable challenge or so it seemed. With all his antics before the start of final race I was a bit sceptical about Bolt winning. But it was his day or rather night. He will be a hot commodity for the advt and media companies now after this race, with all his comfort and ease around camera I am sure we’ll next see him selling us some energy drink like Gatorade or xyz. But mind you people, I hear Bolt is more of a 200m man, so lets see if some more records tumble with his antics.

Talking about hot, there are some hot gals in beijing. Some of the athletes should be participating in Miss world Pagaent. Apart form the usual suspects like Maria Sharapova, Tatiana Golovin there are some unsual suspects as well.

My hot list:
Margherita Granbassi – Ita
Ana Ivanovic – Serb:
Lauren Jackson – Aus
Polish Girls Volleyball team

Change………the only constant.

No, I am not switching my blog again.

Last week I resigned from my job and joined another company. Life was good in my previous company, even though the bank for which I worked was in a big mess due to the US sub-prime losses, but my job was secure since I was part of Technology division and my position was based in Asia where the banks operations are still expanding with huge profits. It was so easy for me to have stayed there and do the work that I did. It was all planned out for me, I just had to be there for another year and I would have got a promotion and a better role, atleast the project director said so. I even won an award for my work. I leave with some mixed feelings.

But inspite of all this I decided to quit and join a new place, where I have to make a fresh start, work hard & once again prove myself. There is no explanation why I went for this change. In the words of one of my friend, “There is barely any hike, there is no change in your position and to top it all you will have to work harder”. I guess theres my reason, not only will I have to work harder but it will be better or so I hope. After 2years or so at the bank, it was like a monotonous job, I knew the business inside out, I knew their system. It was so boring, like reading your own book every day.

Sometimes I wonder if we(humans) are afraid of a simplicity in life, we want things to be complex, to be challenging.

On a completely different note, recently there have been 7 bomb blasts in Bangalore, India. I was discussing this with a senior office colleague who is from a different country and he mentioned that world has changed so much in recent times, its no longer the place it used to be. But IMHO the world has always been like this, only the actors and their methods have changed. World was never a peaceful place, it was never a bed of roses. 20th century saw two world wars, 19th century saw the american civil war and european powers struggle and fight for supremacy in asia and africa, 18th century saw the french revolution and rise of Russian empire. Be it the bloody wars of Genghis Khan in 13th century or Alexander’s great conquest from Europe to Middle East leading to the doors of India and Ashoka the great killing his step-brothers to become king of India and leading a bloody conquest to unite all of India under one rule, world has always been like this. It is hard to distinguish between the good and the bad, just like George W. Bush’s War on Terror, hard to say who is wrong and who is right.

But life goes on. It has a way surviving in worst of conditions and most dagerous of situations. Only to end…..but not before it is the end.

Whatever is LEFT of it…

I was browsing internet for information on history of communism, communism in China, which led me to some links for  Communist Party of India, communist support for china in Indo-China 1962 war, the split in 1965, and subsequent emergence of CPI-M . It was an interesting read.

Leftist in India follow Socialism and Communism in more traditional sense than their Chinese communists, Or so I thought, but  recent events have left me completely clueless as to the direction of the CPI-M and other leftist parties in India. Leftist  are behaving more as the class bully when they should be the class monitors. Completely oppressing any opposition views and  news. They have completely forgotten the land reform movement on which they rode to power in WB, and are busy distributing farmers land for privitisation. In the long rule of more than 40yrs in WB they seem to have forgotten that the movement that  got them the power can also bring them down to earth.

The Leftists in India have modeled their ideologies based on success of Chinese communist rule. But they forgot one basic  difference between India and China, in China military, state government, state bureaucracy, local government and public is  answerable to the Communist Party of China, whereas in India, government, military, all political parties are answerable to  the Indian public. IMHO China is more of a military dictatorship where the dictator is more capitalism inclined rather than a communist country. But the fact that similar logic cannot be applied to India seems to be completely overlooked by the  Leftists in their quest to recreate Chinese success in India.

Infact in this quest they have even surpassed Chinese communist >
Amnesty Report on Nandigram
http://www.amnestyusa.org/document.php?lang=e&id=ENGASA200012008

See details of a very similar protest in China >
Nandigram in China
http://hrichina.org/public/PDFs/CRF.3.2007/CRF-2007-3_Xiamen.pdf

Whatever happened to communist land revolution of 1960s: 2007 Nandigram
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/News/PoliticsNation/Clashes_continue_in_Nandigram_4_BUPC_workers_injured/articleshow/3019016.cms

There is a stark contrast in the way Chinese handled industrialisation related protests and the way CPI-M conducted itself  during the Nandigram issue. Nandigram seems to be Tiananmen Square revisited in India. Infact in 2007, China has had record  number of protest and public demonstrations more than any other country in the world, but comparatively less violence.

Infact Left’s Chinese obsession has reached such heights that they have taken it unto themselves to help Chinese communists  in any way they can ….
Creating jobs in China:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Curbs_on_Chinese_power_sector_may_hit_ties/articleshow/3019696.cms

…completely oblivious to the fact that self-dependence is the basic governing principle of a Socialist, communist  society.

I always believed that Communists were the more literate intelligentsia, based on the fact that Left is most powerful in  Kerala(most literate state in India with more than 90% literacy level) and West Bengal(near unanimous support by Bhadralok  for 40yrs). But it seems more and more as dictator who believes in only one thing “My way or Highway”.

WB: Governor orders power cut in Raj Bhavan
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/News/PoliticsNation/CPM_enraged_as_governor_shows_solidarity_with_people/articleshow/3020295.cms
Dr. Ashok Mitra, a veteran CPI(M) leader criticized the West Bengal government and his party stating that till death he will  remain guilty to his conscience if he keeps mum on the happenings in Nandigram. He states that the CPI(M) leadership is blind  of hubris and the party has turned into a wide open field of flatterers and court jesters dominated by ‘anti-socials’.

For once I completely agree with a CPI-M leader.
P.S. Wonder why the leftists have never used their leverage with Chinese communisits to resolve border issues, when the Chinese Communists have used their contacts with Indian Communists to stall many development initiatives.

Getting Bored

hmmmmm….so lets see….where should I start. Should start where I left sometime ago,or should I make a new start. I guess since this is a new blog, makes sense to make a fresh start.

So here I am, trying my hand writing, once again.