Musings of Hrridaysh

High School Reform

2009-02-24T20:44:00.000-08:00

High School Reform

School-to-Career Programs with

Diploma at the end of High-School Education

For too many students, our high schools are not working. Many drop out. Others stick it out for the diploma, but feel that they are just marking time. Too many emerge without the high-level academic skills we say all should have and without adequate preparation for further education and successful careers. This is the unfortunate but natural product of a century old high school system based on the premise that only some students can learn to high standards.

Vocational education in particular has long been criticized for channelling some students -- particularly low-income and minority students -- away from academic achievement in return for a promise of specific technical skills that too often are rendered obsolete by rapid changes in labor markets, job requirements, and youths' career goals. Moreover, in low-income communities, the problem is not just inadequate skills but insufficient jobs that use those skills. On the other hand, if infused with high academic content, vocational education and school-to-career programs have a great deal to offer schools. Teaching methods traditionally used in vocational education -- active learning, students' demonstration of skills through a project, and coaching relationships, for example -- are at the heart of what we now know, from educational research, is good academic instruction for students.

Implications for Career-Related Learning in High School

The start of the 21st century will signal the beginning of wide-scale consideration of competency- or proficiency-based assessment systems in education. While new initiatives have been debated in the policy arena for the past decade, these types of assessments continue to gather support for many reasons. First, proficiency-based assessments are more in alignment with constructivist approaches to learning which are growing in popularity at the high school level. Second, the general public, employers, and college admissions officers continue to express distress at the lack of knowledge and skills that high school graduates demonstrate based on national and international measures of learning and achievement. The global economy has shifted the dialogue from concern about students' performance on norm-referenced, conventional paper-and-pencil assessments to criterion-referenced measures of a set of "new basics" that include students' use of technologies and soft skills such as problem solving, teamwork, and effective interpersonal communications. Finally, the widespread acceptance of student learning outcomes as the core measures of educational quality suggests that proficiency-oriented assessment will be central to policy and program improvement efforts.

When we try to move toward competency- or proficiency-based assessments, alignment issues are fundamentally important yet highly problematic. Educational standards or competencies must be both vertically and horizontally aligned. The central concern of the curriculum articulation dimension (vertical integration) is the degree to which standards and performance benchmarks for graduation from high school are similar to admission requirements for college. There is widespread agreement that high schools need to prepare all students for some form of postsecondary education, yet the extent to which high school certificates and college admissions portfolios should portray similar or dissimilar competencies and / or performance benchmarks remains an open question.

Integrating Vocational and Academic Education

In high school education, preparation for work immediately after high school and preparation for post-secondary education have traditionally been viewed as incompatible. Work-bound high-school students end up in vocational education tracks, where courses usually emphasize specific skills with little attention to underlying theoretical and conceptual foundations. College-bound students proceed through traditional academic discipline-based courses, where they learn English, history, science, mathematics, and languages, with only weak and often contrived references to applications of these skills in the workplace or in the community outside the school. To be sure, many vocational teachers do teach underlying concepts, and many academic teachers motivate their lessons with examples and references to the world outside the classroom. But these enrichments are mostly frills, not central to either the content or pedagogy of secondary school education.

Traditional schooling has tended to isolate skills and teaching. An extremely solid barrier has often separated academic from vocational courses. We explicitly propose that schools should fully integrate vocational and academic education.

Integration is a powerful tool to help students gain advanced academic competencies by showing them how academic ideas work in the real world and why they are important. It enables students to understand many different types of information and to use that information to solve problems and make decisions. It is also vital to ensuring that vocational education does not serve as a second-class track within schools, and within society. When vocational students come out of programs with basic and advanced academic skills, they can choose from a much wider array of education and work opportunities.

The key features of integration are:

• encompassing all of the academic areas -- math, reading, writing, science, and social studies,

• including both basic and advanced skills in each of those academic areas, and

• teaching academic knowledge and skills in a vocational context, not just in a vocational education class.

Integration is not reached by simply identifying what academic competencies are already addressed in a vocational program. Nor is it accomplished by teaching one or two competencies from each academic area. It requires taking the content of academic and vocational curricula and developing methods to align, sequence, and mutually reinforce academic and vocational concepts and skills.

The ultimate goal is to achieve full integration of the entire vocational curriculum with the entire academic curriculum. Integration should be through a sequential course of study leading to both academic and occupational competencies.

Successful integration of academic and vocational education is very closely related to, and aided by, strong instruction in all aspects of an industry. Focusing on all aspects of an industry provides a very rich and open-ended framework for bringing in the full range of academics in exploring all the issues that have confronted that industry. It helps avoid the danger of seeing integration as a form of "dumbing down" academics to teach only the academic skills needed to prepare students for a very narrowly defined occupation.

All Aspects of the Industry

It is proposed that students be given a comprehensive perspective and range of skills across an industry. It is required that school curriculum "provide students with strong experience in and understanding of all aspects of the industry students are preparing to enter", and identify eight aspects in particular (which can encompass the following types of knowledge and skills):

"planning" (e.g., examined both at the industry level and at the firm level; various forms of ownership, including cooperatives and worker ownership; relationship of the industry to economic, political, and social context).

"management" (e.g., methods typically used to manage enterprises over time within the industry; methods for expanding and diversifying workers' tasks and broadening worker involvement in decisions).

"finance" (e.g., ongoing accounting and financial decisions; different methods for raising capital to start or expand enterprises).

"technical and production skills" (e.g., specific production techniques; alternative methods for organizing the production work, including methods which diversify and rotate workers' jobs).

"underlying principles of technology" (e.g., integrated study across the curriculum of the mathematical, scientific, social, and economic principles that underlie the technology).

"labor issues" (e.g., worker rights and responsibilities; labor unions and labor history; methods for expanding workers' roles).

"community issues" (e.g., the impact of the enterprise and the industry on the community, and the community's impact on and involvement with the enterprise).

"Health, safety, and environmental issues" (e.g., in relation to both the workers and the larger community).

Approach

There could be many possibilities to use work-related applications both to teach academic skills and to prepare students for college. One approach is to organize high school programs around broad industrial or occupational areas, such as health, agriculture, commerce, hospitality, manufacturing, transportation, or the arts. These broad areas offer many opportunities for wide-ranging curricula in all academic disciplines. They also offer opportunities for collaborative work among teachers from different disciplines. Specific skills can still be taught in this format but in such a way as to motivate broader academic and theoretical themes.

Problem

Despite the many possibilities of innovative initiatives that suggest the potential for an integrated view, the legacy of the duality between vocational and academic education and the low status of work-related studies in high school may continue to influence education and education reform. In general, programs that deviate from traditional organization and format may still be viewed with suspicion by parents and teachers focused on three-year / four-year college.

Final Solution

After discussing the afore given facts and status of secondary school education in India , we conclude with final suggestions to tackle

• We need to vocatinalize the curriculum from 8'Th standard onwards with a combination of traditional subjects taught in an integrated fashion and vocational subjects.

• All the vocational subjects should be designed to recognize skills used in the workplace. They should show that someone can actually do a job, and not simply that they know how to do it in theory.

• Depending on various situations, student should have different qualification and training needs. The qualifications are proposed at 5 levels, starting from 8'Th standard onwards till 12'Th standard. The following explanations may give a general idea of the level of qualification proposed:

o Level 1 qualification – 8'Th Standard: This is an introductory award for those new to the area and cover routine tasks or basic knowledge and understanding.

o Level 2 – 9'Th Standard qualifications are for those with some knowledge of and ability in the area and acknowledge individual responsibility.

o Level 3 – 10'Th Standard qualifications recognize complex work involving supervisory ability.

o Level 4 – 11'Th Standard demands specialist or technical expertise.

o Level 5 – 12'Th Standard requires the application of complex principles and techniques involving responsibility for human and material resources.

• Some of the representative areas of expertise in which the qualifications could be offered are as follows:

1. Agriculture, horticulture and animal c are

2. Business, administration, commerce and management

3. Catering and hospitality

4. Construction

5. Creative crafts

6. Customer service and security

7. Education, training and development

8. Electrical and electronic engineering

9. Furniture

10. Gas, electricity, water industries

11. Hairdressing and beauty

12. Health, Care, Early Years and Community Services

13. Information technology

14. Manufacturing

15. Media and photography

16. Motor vehicle servicing and repair

17. Process Industries

18. Production and maintenance engineering

19. Retail and distribution

20. Sport and recreation

21. Textiles, clothing and footwear

22. Travel and tourism

• The core idea is that Diploma in Engineering, ITI qualifications are abolished, instead they are built into the school education till higher secondary.

• Those students who wish to branch out can branch out at any level starting 8'Th standard onwards at any level starting level being 1.

• Those students who wish to pursue college education can do so without having to face any problems.

• In this scheme of things there are a few basic provisions which should remain to gain the full advantage of this scheme

• From level 1 to level 3 the choice of area of expertise should not change.

• The choice of level can change at level 4 and should not change till level 5

• However, while admitting the students to further course of studies, the students' choice of area of expertise should not become a limiting factor.

• The student should be able to choose any branch of study after finishing standard 12'Th.

Benefits

There are several benefits expected from this scheme of things

• Every student learning in high schools will be equipped with practical education, which can help him / her to earn a decent living, in case they cannot continue to study further.

• If successfully implemented, this scheme will reduce the load on higher education, as the students will be gainfully employed or self employed by the time they finish there 12'th standard education. Hence, the quality of higher education may also improve.

• All the ITI's and Diploma colleges in the state may start offering education from 8'Th standard till 12'th standard instead of offering ITI or Diploma. This way the intake of these colleges / institutions may improve, which otherwise currently is suffering. This will also make available several additional institutions for school education, with ready infrastructure in one stroke.

• In earlier efforts of vocationalization of education in the state of Maharashtra the efforts fell flat, as they were exclusive efforts to either vocational education or academic oriented education. In this scheme of things this anomaly is removed which itself is a major benefit.

Welcome to 2009

2008-12-24T22:16:00.000-08:00

I would like the New Year to be a year of “Creativity and Innovation” for it is precisely in dark times like this that there is need to assert the human spirit, man’s ability to endure and prevail. Hard times are an opportunity for creativity, for imagination and innovation. Let us take a moment to recall the spirit of the season, and wish each other peace and good will.

Meaning has to be created in life, meaning is not given already. We are given freedom, we are given creativity, and we are given life. Let’s be creative and become more divine. All the religions of the world have said: God is the Creator.

In this New Year, we at Elephantversity reaffirm our commitment to transform India into a nation of innovators by educating future generation of innovators, of course with your support and good will.

I look forward to gratifying relationship with you. May the coming year be filled with hope and happiness. May the New Year bring new challenges, new achievements and new satisfaction to you and your family. May enemies find peace and friends find new joy with each other.

Once again I wish you a creative and innovative New Year.

With warm and sincere regards!

Hrridaysh

10 Revelations from the Movie Fashion

2008-11-10T21:10:00.000-08:00

I saw the movie Fashion directed by Madhur Bhandarkar on Sunday. I tried very hard to like it, but could not. However there were some revelations that came through based on the movie that I am sharing.

Revelation No. 1 – Fashion Industry is controlled by one man, one company. Every sits down and gets up when he says so. For him carnal sense is more important than business sense.

Revelation No. 2 – It is not clear whether the movie is a fact or fiction, as it fails on both counts.

Revelation No. 3 – Priyanka Chopra is not beautiful. She is dual tone color with three shades. Face is fair, torso is brown and legs are dark brown. Her lips filled in the entire cinema screen in close-ups.

Revelation No. 4 – Kangana Ranaut is a lunatic. She looks like one and acts like one. Somebody said she is an actress.

Revelation No. 5 – Cinematography is average. It even does not serve the purpose of looking at beautiful models. It does not even hide the waist line of Priyanka Chopra.

Revelation No. 6 – One can stoop to any level to become successful. Then even if it is a lingerie ad, it does not matter.

Revelation No. 7 – One should project to be naïve to become successful, so much so that even if you are hired to be an eye candy you don’t know.

Revelation No. 8 – One should not take responsibility on their own act and you light up a cigarette when responsibility of a decision stares in your face.

Revelation No. 9 – Before rising again, one should fall so much that sleeping with anyone is also OK.

Revelation No. 10 – Rising again requires an example of failure and you keep the living representation of failure with you, not for any empathy, but to realize that you could become like that.

If all of you were wondering about the series of compromises that the heroine makes to make it big in Paris, wait for Fashion 2.0 the sequel to this one. More revelations expected there.

Finally we learn from the movie that success is not got through hard work, determination to succeed. Success is got through being arrogant, having attitude, sleeping with everyone who gives opportunity, by being slave to one man. In moments of distress, the movie teaches us to smoke, drink and use drugs. The movie also advertises that drinking Vodka is good compared to other drinks.

It also informs us that fashion career is a journey from Bed to Heaven. From floor, you reach the bed, then you touch the sky and finally you land up in hell thinking it to be heaven.

Isn’t all this a revelation of Madhur Bhandarkar’s latest direction attempt.

Shri Advaniji's speech Rambhau Mhalgi Prabodhini seminar on Terrorism 4.October.2008

2008-10-07T04:55:00.001-07:00

Speech by

Shri L.K. Advani

Leader of the Opposition (Lok Sabha)

Inauguration of National Seminar on Terrorism

Organised by Rambhau Mhalgi Prabodhini

New Delhi – 4 October 2008

- - - - -

Our commitment: To make India terror-free

è POTA will be re-enacted; Strong action will be taken to bust terrorist cells that have mushroomed in different parts of India.

è The contrast is between NDA and UPA is that one alliance cares for India and the other cares only for its vote-bank.

è Stigmatising any faith or community in the fight against terror is wrong.

è Maligning of security forces is a dangerous new trend.

è Obnoxious propaganda by the likes of Arundhati Roy must be firmly countered.

è Our vision is not limited by the considerations of where will our Party be after the next elections. Rather, it extends to caring about whether India will be united and strong after a hundred years, after a thousand years.

- - - - -

It gives me great pleasure to be with all of you this morning. My hearty congratulations to Shri Gopinath Munde, Prof. Bal Apte, Shri Vinay Sahasrabuddhe and others at the Rambhau Mhalgi Prabodhini firstly for organizing this seminar and, secondly, for organizing it in New Delhi. The Prabodhini regularly holds seminars and training workshops on important topics for social and political activists at its beautiful campus near Mumbai. This is perhaps for the first that it is holding a major event in the national capital. I look forward to the day when the Prabodhini can have a full-fledged centre operating in Delhi.

India is the worst victim of terrorism in the world

The subject of this seminar is highly topical. Over-familiarity with a problem sometimes lulls one’s awareness about its seriousness. Therefore, it may surprise many to know that the problem of terrorism has persisted for nearly half the period of the life of independent India. Since the closing yeas of the 1970s, India has been in the vortex of foreign-sponsored terrorism, which has claimed nearly 80,000 lives, both civilian and of security forces — in Punjab, Jammu & Kashmir, North-Eastern states and in the rest of India. There is no country in the world which has been a victim of terrorist onslaught for so long, and which has suffered such enormous loss.

If a menace has continued for so long, it means that its perpetrators have a definite purpose, a definite goal. We in the BJP had correctly assessed right in the beginning that the goal of terrorists and their patrons abroad was not only to threaten the common man and the civil society, not just to create ordinary law and order disturbances , but to endanger the very unity and security of the nation. What is happening in India today has vindicated our assessment.

History will not pardon us if we fail

In the history of nations, it is important to know what challenges they face. But it is far more important to know how they respond to these challenges. Nations oblivious to the threats that eat into their vitals run an imminent danger of losing their ability to protect themselves. The warning bells are loud and clear that, even though the nation’s internal security today stands seriously threatened, our response lacks political will. India does not have a seamlessly integrated counter-terrorism strategy backed by resolute operational capabilities.

There is one more thing to be said about internal security challenges. These do not manifest suddenly, nor do they mature overnight. The ominous signals they send over a prolonged period of time can be noticed unmistakably. However, if we choose not to notice them, or are incapable of taking self-protective action, history will not absolve us. It is our charge against the Congress party that it is keeping its eyes wide shut, choosing not to see, nor to strike, all for the fear of losing its vote-bank.

As far as the BJP is concerned, let me make it absolutely clear that we shall never conduct ourselves in such a short-sighted way that history would hold us guilty of not doing our duty at the right time and in the right manner. We are prepared to make any sacrifices for defending the unity and ensuring the security of our Motherland. Our vision is not limited by the considerations of where will our Party be after the next elections. Rather, it extends to caring about whether India will be united and strong after a hundred years, after a thousand years.

In the last millennium, India suffered many a blow. In the last century, India suffered blood-soaked Partition on account of a pernicious ideology. Therefore, all political parties and all sections of our society should so conduct themselves that no evil power, external or internal, can set its eyes on destabilizing, debilitating and dividing India.

Terrorism: Invisible enemy’s low-cost, asymmetrical war

For such strong protective force to emerge, it is necessary to know that in today’s world, failure to protect internal security has emerged as the most potent threat to the unity and integrity of nations, to the stability of their polity and to the protection their Constitutional values. In post-World War period, failure to deal with internal security challenges, as opposed to foreign aggressions, has been responsible for the degradation of a large number of nation-states. Most states when confronted with serious internal threats thought it to be a passing phase and allowed the drift to reach a point where retrieval was no longer possible.

Quite often, the adversarial forces won not because of their own strength but because of the weaknesses and mistakes of the regimes that were hit. Thus, history has a big lesson for us and it would be tragic if we failed to learn from past mistakes, both of our own and of others.

An important lesson that we in India should learn — this lesson is indeed globally relevant — is that conventional wars are becoming increasingly cost-ineffective. As instruments of achieving political and strategic objectives, their outcome is unpredictable — and often, counter-productive. Hence, foreign aggressions today come disguised as proxy wars in the form of terrorism and other forms of violence. The enemy targets internal fault-lines for furthering his strategic and political objectives. Even less powerful nations are able to exercise this low-cost sustainable option, giving rise to the new doctrine of asymmetric warfare.

We can see this clearly from what both Pakistan and Bangladesh have been doing to us. Neither can match India’s military strength. Yet, both have been threatening India with cross-border terrorism.

This warfare is waged by an invisible enemy, for whom the civil society is both a source of sustenance and the target. The enemy exploits the liberties, freedom, technological facilities and infrastructure to his advantage, making even the more powerful, better equipped security agencies feel helpless.

Maligning of security forces: A dangerous new trend

Maligning the security forces is often a deliberate ploy employed by the civil society supporters of terrorist outfits. Unfortunately, it sometimes influences the thinking of even well-meaning human rights activists. However, it should not be forgotten that our security forces work under extremely difficult circumstances. The rest of society can sleep peacefully only because of the diligent service rendered by our police, paramilitary and Armed Forces. I fully agree that innocent persons should not be harassed and penalised. But let us spare a thought for this question: What will happen to our society, to our Nation, if the morale of our security forces is allowed to be weakened?

Sadly, this is precisely what has happened in recent times. What is sadder is that leaders of the Congress party and the UPA Government have allowed this denigration of our security forces to take place in the mistaken belief that those who are targeting our uniformed forces are defenders of “secularism”. Their thinking about secularism has become so warped that anybody who targets the BJP becomes their friend.

For example, there is this book 'Khaki and the Ethnic Violence in India' by Omar Khalidi, an Indian scholar based in America, which provided the inspiration for the Sachar Committee to seek a communal census in the Armed Forces.

Another example is a book by Arundhati Roy, a well-known author, on the terrorist attack on the Indian Parliament on 13 December 2001. The book argues, quite nonsensically, that the attack was not carried out by terrorists but orchestrated by the security forces themselves with prior knowledge of the leadership of the NDA Government. Her recent statement that “India needs Azadi from Kashmir as much as Kashmir needs azadi from India” is seditious. The intellectual and literary community should strongly condemn such anti-national pronouncements, which are being given legitimacy by pseudo-secularists.

Minorityism has gripped the Congress mindset

Here is yet another example of how the UPA Government has chosen to be influenced by the sinister and sustained campaign launched by such people. In spite of a Supreme Court verdict, it has not carried out the death sentence on Afzal Guru, who has been convicted for his role in the terrorist attack on Parliament. His was no ordinary crime. It was an offence of hitting at the country’s legislature, the highest seat of India’s Constitutional authority, which symbolizes its sovereignty and democratic polity. Not even the national outrage on this issue has dented the UPA Government’s apathy. Not even the extraordinary decision of the families of the martyred security personnel to return the gallantry awards has made it act. Such indeed is the grip of minorityism on the Congress mindset today.

The same mindset has dictated the Congress party’s anti-national response to the issue of unchecked infiltration of Bangladeshis into Assam and other parts of the country. I was in Guwahati last week, where, among others, I met Shri Jaideep Saikia, an eminent Assamese scholar who has written a widely acclaimed book ‘Terror Sans Frontiers: Islamist Militancy in North East India’. The book is indeed an eye-opener, a strong warning against a problem which the Supreme Court itself, while striking down the IMDT Act as unconstitutional, has described as “external aggression”. The UPA Government’s response to this external aggression is simply to turn a blind eye.

Once again, the same mindset has dictated the UPA Government’s decision not to give approval to the anti-terror laws passed by the Assemblies of Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan, on the lines of an identical Act that exists in Maharashtra.

I can understand a government not succeeding despite making its best efforts. But I cannot but strongly indict that government which does not take even a single positive step at the legislative, political, administrative or operational levels to a counter threat which is so profusely bleeding the nation.

Stigmatising any faith in the fight against terror is wrong

Friends, no campaign of terrorism that has continued for so long can be without an ideological motive. Recognising the anti-India ideological driving force behind terrorism, and evolving a proper nationalist ideological response to it, is critical to achieving long-term success. Here I would like to state two things emphatically. Firstly, no religion and no religious community can and should be blamed for the criminal acts of some individuals belonging to that community. Stigmatising any community in the fight against terrorism is wrong, counter-productive, and must be condemned.

At the same time, it is equally important to recognize that religious extremism of a certain kind provides the ideological fervour and outward justification for terrorism and separatism. After all, religion was indeed misinterpreted and misused to construct the Two-Nation theory, which had disastrous consequences for India, for both Hindus and Muslims. The ideology behind the ongoing war of terrorism against India is a continuation of the separatist ideology that created Pakistan. Which is why, the anti-India forces in Pakistan have sponsored cross-border terrorism as a deliberate policy to achieve Kashmir’s secession from India, and also to weaken India in many different ways.

In recent years, an important new experiment has been introduced into this policy of cross-border terrorism. A section of Indian youth, misguided and exploited by their mentors abroad and radicalized by an interpretation of Islam that is propagated by Al Qaeda, have been inveigled into the vortex of terrorism. SIMI and Indian Mujahideen have emerged as the face of indigenized terror. Their literature speaks volumes about their aversion for the very Idea of a secular, plural and democratic India, and also about their resolve to destroy India as we know it.

Contrast between NDA and UPA Governments

How did the NDA Government deal with SIMI? And how has the UPA Government dealt with it? I shall not go into all the well-known details, except to say that the contrast is stark. The contrast is between one alliance that cares for India and the other that cares only for its vote-bank. So much so that two Cabinet ministers in the UPA Government had the audacity to publicly defend SIMI, which is banned as a terrorist organization, and the Prime Minister did not even upbraid them!

This contrast is also evident in the manner in which the two alliances have dealt with the issue of a strong anti-terrorism law. In a country that has suffered so much due to terrorism with international operational and financial linkages, the need for an effective anti-terrorism law ought to be so self-evident as to preclude any divisive debate over it. After all, the BJP supported the TADA Bill when Rajiv Gandhi’s Government introduced it in Parliament. Without TADA, some of the culprits in Rajiv Gandhi’s murder case could not have been chargesheeted. When the NDA Government assumed office, TADA had already ceased to exist. Therefore, we legislated POTA.

One of the first acts of the UPA Government in 2004 was to repeal POTA. As a matter of fact, the war against terror figured very low in UPA’s Common Minimum Programme. The CMP did not mention a single step to check trans-border infiltration, choking terror’s sources of funding, and smuggling of weapons and explosives, etc. The Government’s weak-kneed approach, as was inevitable, proved fatal in course of time. It not only emboldened the extremists groups, but also brought down the efficacy of country’s security apparatus. The momentum generated by the series of initiatives taken by the NDA government to strengthen national security, particularly the internal security, was lost within a year.

During the first year in office, the UPA Government enjoyed the fruits of the efforts of the previous Government and, as a result, not a single incident of terrorism occurred outside J&K. But in the last three years the country has been brought to a pass where the terrorists are bleeding it with the frequency, place and time of their choice. There is mushrooming of sleeper cells and subversive modules of terrorists, both indigenous and foreign, in different parts of the country. As a result, every citizen of the country from Kashmir to Kanyakumari today feels insecure about his safety.

POTA remained in existence from September 2001 till December 2004. During this period, only eight incidents of terrorist violence, including the attack on Parliament and on Akshardham Temple in Gandhingar, took place in India’s hinterland, leading to 119 deaths. Contrast it with what happened after POTA was repealed: The footprint of terrorism has grown alarmingly larger in the past four years. Jammu, Ayodhya, Varanasi, Samjhauta Express in Haryana, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Malegaon, Jaipur, Bangalore, Ahmedabad, Delhi …and, in the latest attack, serial blasts rocked Agartala in Tripura just two days ago. During this period, 625 persons have been killed and 2,011 injured, depicting a five fold increase in those killed and injured. It is the same country, same people, same police and same intelligence agencies; what then explains this unprecedented increase? The answer is very simple: Weak laws have emboldened the terrorists and appeasement has failed to change their intentions.

Congress cacophony about anti-terror law

Since the serial bomb blasts in New Delhi on 13 September 2008, people’s pressure on the Government to enact a strong anti-terror law has greatly intensified. But the manner in which senior leaders of the UPA Government and the Congress party have responded to this demand is pathetic.

On 17^th September, Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh, while addressing the Governor’s Conference, said: "We are actively considering legislation to further strengthen the substantive anti-terrorism law in line with the global consensus on the fight against terrorism."

· Earlier, The Hindu reported on 13^th September: “In what is seen as the UPA government speaking with different voices over the need for States enacting tough anti-terror laws, the Union Home Ministry has not taken kindly to the suggestion of the National Security Adviser M.K. Narayanan favouring the Gujarat government’s proposal to have its own law to deal with terrorist activities and organised crime. The NSA’s suggestion was contained in a letter which he recently wrote to the Home Ministry. He reportedly saw no reason to turn down the request of the Gujarat government to have an anti-terror law. He also reportedly cited demands by a number of senior police officers both at the Central and State levels for enacting a comprehensive, tough anti-terror law. Mr. Narayanan did not see anything wrong in supporting such a demand.”

· The Administrative Reforms Commission, appointed by the Government under the chairmanship of senior Congress leader Shri Veerappa Moily, strongly supported the need for stringent anti-terrorist law. Speaking to the media on 17^th September, he said that “a strong anti-terror law with equally strong safeguards to prevent its misuse is needed.”

On 24^th September, Congress general secretary Shri Rahul Gandhi said, “There should be a strong law to deal with terror. A powerful law, not a failed law. POTA is a failed law.”

In spite of these pronouncements, what is the net result? “No, no, we do not need a new law. Existing laws, if strengthened, are enough to fight terror.”

How can India be safe under a Government that has no mind of its own, that speaks in so many voices, and that is led by a Prime Minister who has an office but no authority? It is difficult to find out who runs this Government and who takes the decisions.

Our commitment: To make India terror-free

Friends, there is no point any longer in demanding anything from this spineless and visionless Government. As they say in Hindi, the ulti ginati of this Government (reverse counting of its days in office) has begun. The people of India will dethrone the UPA rulers whenever the next Parliamentary elections are held.

However, this seminar is certainly a proper occasion for me to present some of our concrete promises, commitments and ideas to make India safe from terror.

1. If voted to power, the NDA will re-enact POTA. The critics of POTA have so far been unable to show a single shortcoming in it. Therefore, the least we expect from our friends in the Congress party is that, now that many of its senior functionaries have spoken in favour of a strong anti-terror law, they should support re-enactment of POTA in the 15^th Lok Sabha.

I am saying this because the time has come to treat the fight against terrorism as a national issue requiring broad national consensus. It is in this spirit that I recently I wrote to former President Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, wholeheartedly supporting his suggestion for a bipartisan approach to combat terrorism.

2. The BJP favours setting up a federal anti-terror agency, which has become absolutely necessary for evolving effective coordination between the Centre and the States — and also among States themselves — in intelligence gathering, intelligence exchange, action, investigation, prosecution and planning and execution of preventive operations.

The Vajpayee government, for the first time since Independence, had formulated an integrated policy for national security. A Group of Ministers, supported by experts’ task forces (I had the privilege of heading this GoM), had made nearly 300 comprehensive recommendations for completely overhauling India’s security apparatus and management in the areas of Defence, Intelligence, Internal Security and Border Management. The UPA Government has shown callous neglect towards implementation of these recommendations. The next NDA Government will take up this task with the highest priority.

Implementation of the recommendations of the Malimath Committee on overhauling the Criminal Justice System will be done in a timebound manner.

The chain of India’s anti-terrorism apparatus can be only as strong as its weakest link. Today one of its weakest links is the local police station and its intelligence gathering capabilities. Therefore, modernization of the police force with adequate Central assistance, which had been started by the NDA Government, will be rapidly intensified.

Finally, I wish to make a fervent appeal to all sections of our society and polity: Let us not communalise the fight against terrorism. Terrorists have no religion. They are enemies of the nation and of humanity as a whole. Let us not imperil the security of India — and, going further, the very unity of India — by going soft in the war against these enemies. This is not a war that any a single party or any single community can win. It is a battle for the survival of India, in which all communities and all political parties are equal stake holders. We wanted to extend our whole-hearted support to the incumbent government for any positive action that it is prepared to take to combat terrorism. Unfortunately, it has not taken even a single initiative in this direction to which we could extend our support.

While enemies of the nation are uniting and coordinating their actions, it is sad that narrow electoral considerations are standing in the way of political parties and governments giving a concerted fight to the menace of terrorism. I do hope that the public opinion in this country will create required pressure for political parties and their leaders to think beyond electoral considerations and fight terrorism with single-minded determination.

One last point. The Navaratri festival has begun. It will conclude on Vijaya Dashami, which symbolizes the victory of Good over Evil. I suggest that, in addition to Ravan Dahan (burning of the effigy of Ravan), let Navaratri pandals all over the country also do Atankvaad Dahan (burning the effigy of the Demon of Terrorism). Let it symbolize our collective resolve to make India terror-free.

With these words, I declare the seminar open and wish it all success.

In 2008, stampedes have killed 360, blasts 156 - Who is to blame?

2008-09-30T22:49:00.000-07:00

The news report investigates the causes of this kind of incidences.

Unfortunately the pendulum of responsibility shifts most of the times towards the administration of the temple or towards the Government. Both of which in my opinion is wrong.

In my opinion it is the people who are responsible for the kind of situation that emerged. Though it is sad, it should not be let off by passing the buck at the administration.

The sole reason is that people in India do not have patience and are always wanting to get ahead in the line. They always want to be one up the other. Even though they are Gods house there worry is how to get in fast and how to get out fast.

I can state this from the example at Shirdi. Shirdi is a place where everyday lakhs of devotees converge. The number is very high on holidays or special days. Once I read there were 5 lakh people in Shirdi on a given day.

The Shirdi Sansthan has made excellent arrangements for people. The total area where lines for darshan are formed are covered with adequate lighting and ventilation. There is arrangement of toilets and drinking water. The separators are quite wide for two people to stand side by side. Seating is provided. In my opinion there cannot be better arrangement than this. All these arrangements are made with a view that devotees should be able to sit, relax and wait for their turn when they come for darshan.

Now let us see what happens in actual. In spite of these wonderful arrangements the people are cramped for space. Even though seating is provided, there is no way one can sit because in the divider space there are often two people standing so seating is impossible. If you sit, others will go ahead of you with scant disregard to you. You cannot use the toilet or go to drink water as getting back after wards is challenging.

In the game of one up man ship even in the house of God, people ensure that the facilities created for them are not used. The so called devotees act like demons when they are in the line for a darshan, not only at Shirdi but anywhere else as well. They forget that the crowd also include young children, old men and women, etc.

This scene as stated above is a everyday, every time occurrence. Who will teach these devotees that it is not a bus or train that will miss? Who will tell them to take advantage of the facility and not to cramp up spaces?

The point is that even if facilities are made available are we worthy of using these facilities? Do we really deserve the facilities that are created for us. These are the questions that need answers and not what the administration of the temple or Government can do in this situation. Of course they have a role to play, a very important role, but it is finally the people who are going to make or break the things designed for the,

In summary it is the crowds, the people, and the devotees who are responsible.

Finally it is also true that people remember God only on special days, so there is crowd.

Observation

2008-09-26T22:11:00.000-07:00

It is said that the young generation likes variety, they like newness, they are bored of following the routine, they revolt against impositions. I wonder if it is true.

Listening to FM Radio is an indicator enough. They play the same songs day in and day out. The vocabulary of the Radio Jockeys is the same. The Radio channel will not play it if people do not like it. Even during Ganpati, or Janmashtami or Navratri the same songs are played again and again. The mandals will not play it if it is not demanded by the people. In fact one of the methods of popularizing a song / music now a days is to relay it numerous time, so automatically people start liking it.

If young people are what they say, they feel, they show they are, they should be seeking for different songs all the time. They should feel bored with the same songs in a short time.

Marathi Manus

2008-09-23T00:15:00.000-07:00

Recently a friend of mine sent me a presentation titled “Marathi Manus Jaga ho”. This presentation is an extremely nice presentation about how Marathi people are un represented in the bureaucracy and even in our own state we have a bureaucracy which is from other states. Though no views, comments were not expected, I sent him the following answer.

I agree with your proposition and the proposition made in the presentation. However we cannot calculate the success of Marathi Manus by just seeing the number of positions in Public Service. Let us remember that Maharashtra has been at the forefront of industrial revolution since decades. Other states just started to catch up. As a result the jobs were available aplenty in Maharashtra which people took up. They never looked towards sarkari naukri as being their only option. Reserve is true for people from other states. For them as there are no jobs in the private sector, the only option for them is to try for Sarkari Naukri and hence they apply for UPSC exams. Purely by law of population and them applying for it, they are there more in numbers. This is one of the explanations. There are several more reasons. Marathi manus has succeeded in areas which the people from other states cannot even dream off.

Marathi manus has also been more of an intellectual. Most of the social movements, freedom movements had marathi manus as their originator. It is in Maharashtra that the semblance of culture is alive, be it Classical music, classical dances, literature, etc. There are writers, creators, and so is the audiences and readers. Let us not forget our intellectual, cultural heritage is the most important thing. Let us not compare ourselves with people from other states because I think we Maharashtrians are much better off than them in more ways than one of our representation in civil services.

He wrote back with new concerns. His concerns were
“However, if our rulers are not from our state, we loose to great extent. But the population of Industry owners in Maharashtra are no Marathi, a fact should not be forgotten”. I again wrote to him as follows:

I do not mean that we should not progress. Wherever we as Marathi people have short falls, weaknesses, the answer lies within us. It is up to all of us to teach our children to read Marathi Sahitya, to listen to Marathi music (not Ashwini ye na only, but the rich natya sangeet that we have), to see Marathi films (good ones from today and yester years). We should not see a paradox of sending children to learn in English schools and insisting on Marathi. We should rather do both. Send our children to the best schools and also conduct sanskar on them of our Marathi heritage. I am one example of that. I studied in Uttar Pradesh all my life. To be precise at Jhansi where my father was posted. Yet it is due to him that I still retained my taste in everything of our grand heritage. Same is true about entrepreneurship and civil service occupations. We need to educate our children on these options and provide them the framework for the same.

Let us understand that the negativity can bring together some people together for some time, but not all the people, forever. We need to build a positive message for all people to come on board and for it to have an ever lasting effect.

My comments on your point on Industry owners in Maharashtra being non Marathi is as follows:

# In the entire country, the majority of businesses starting with Kolkata (Calcutta) to now Maharashtra are owned by a Marwari community. The other community which has been business savvy has been Gujarati’s, Punjabis and Sindhis. Except these three communities in the entire country, you will find that representation of businessmen is very less, miniscule. One you can credit the genes of these community members and second you can attribute this to their tradition. The son follows the father and so on and so forth. Hence we cannot say that only we as Maharashtrians lack in owning businesses.

# If you trace the genesis of at least the Marwari community you will realize that they originally belong to a region which is very tough. Nothing grows, no water, no industry, nothing. Everyday survival is an issue. They came out of that region in search of other sources of livelihood and scattered in different parts of the country. As they had no qualifications / education to get into a job they started businesses, in a small way. The conserved in a way which we cannot imagine. The built their wealth. The reinvested it. And here they are. There are other explanations for other communities.

# Compare this to our situation. Thanks to the social reformers Maharashtra has seen, most of us had decent education. Except for some regions of Maharashtra the land is cultivatable. Mumbai was there always with its Mills. So for us the going was not as tough. The easy options were available. As it is in human nature, we all tend to take an easy approach, provided it is available.

# We need to learn from these communities and try and sow seeds of the same DNA in our future generations. We need to learn from a Marwari family running a Kirana store. They stay in the shop. They invest the money they have in the shop and not for the house. They start business, flourish. We should try and see the hardship they go through and learn from them that things are easy if we are to build our businesses.

As regards your point of us being ruled by people who are not from our state and because of that we loose, I disagree. I think in the quest of our regional identity we should not overlook nationality. All these people are after all Indians. Hence the notion of we being ruled by outsiders is not agreeable. Regionalism is good enough for preserving heritage and identity. It is like the region being our mother from whom we learn everything and the country being our father through whom we get our surname, the umbrella of security and being a part of something. We cannot ignore anyone. We cannot displease anyone. We cannot disobey anyone. Both are equally sacrosanct and sacred.

In a democracy the true rulers are the people we elect. Again choosing our rulers is in our hands. If we choose an outsider through an electoral process, the person to blame is not the one got elected. The blame is on the people who elected him / her.

Let us also not forget Maharashtra is the only land which fought the maximum against aggression. It is not only because we are courageous but because we are intelligent. We could understand the difference between freedom and slavery and hence came out the need to fight against it. So we fought. We not only, fought, we fought to win. Shivaji Maharaj fought and won against Mughals. Peshwe fought and won against Mughals and British. Lately people like Tilak, Savarkar fought against British. We have this history. So why can we not fight against an aggression, the new aggression. Fight to win. Only the tools of warfare will have to be different.

Is Pune’s Culture under threat?

2008-09-23T00:05:00.000-07:00

Before we start discussion, it is imperative to understanding what exactly culture is. Then and only then, would it possible for us to comprehend the arguments that we make regarding a specific culture.

Culture has always been interpreted in many ways. More commonly it is considered to be a about music, dance, drama, the way we dress, the way we eat, etc. Edward Taylor defines it in his book Primitive Culture (1871) as "that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, law, morals, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society."

Two other definitions of culture seem appropriate to quote here. "Culture...consists in those patterns relative to behavior and the products of human action which may be inherited, that is, passed on from generation to generation independently of the biological genes" (Parson, T. 1949, “Essays in Sociological Theory”. Glencoe, IL.p. 8). "Culture has been defined in a number of ways, but most simply, as the learned and shared behaviour of a community of interacting human beings" (Useem, J., & Useem, R. 1963 ‘Human Organizations”, p. 169).

There are three layers of culture viz. cultural traditions, sub cultures and universal cultures. The cultural traditions distinguish a specific society. They share language, traditions and beliefs. Sub-cultures happen in a diverse society where the traditions and beliefs are inter mixed giving rise to a new identifiable segment. Here people retain there original cultural traditions, yet become a part of new segment. The universal culture is about those common traits which are pervasive and are not differentiated. These are universal traits.

In our Monday morning meetings, Ashish asked all of us to predict the future. It was a waking up exercise on Monday morning, just before we start work. Some of the people expressed their concern for the culture of Pune. They were saying that with the growth happening in Pune, the city culture will die. One very interesting point came up from a colleague. He comes from a rural background. He said in villages, the number of smart people is 2 to 10. Hence whenever there is a problem, people go to these people and resolve the problem. in contrast in cities, he says the number of smart people is 9.45 of 10. As a result people never come listen to each other as everyone is smart (at least considers themselves to be smart).

I personally do not feel that the culture of Pune city is dying. I would say it is evolving. A number of sub cultures are emerging within the city because of cosmopolitization of the city. However the universal culture of the city is intact and will remain so. In fact it is the universal culture of the city that is drawing more people to the city.

Universal culture is an infectious phenomenon and everyone that comes in contact with it is positively affected by it. It will be worthwhile to understand the traits of this universal culture, which I will try doing some time.

In this globalized world, people are feeling more and more alienated. On one hand you are connected to millions of people and other hand you are completely alone, as if in a no man’s land. It is in this scenario that people start belonging to some culture or other. They look forward to an identity which will differentiate them from others. This can cause tension as well as cohesion. The challenge will always be to reduce the tension and improve cohesion.

Is Capitalism failing?

2008-09-22T23:46:00.000-07:00

Socialism or communism say that everyone is equal. When everyone is born different how can they be equal or how can they be treated equally.

There are numerous examples of nations failing because of following socialist / communist framework. These frameworks after a period of time were rejected by people. It is a different matter that people's voice was kept suppressed. The duration of suppression was the life cycle of these systems.

A fall of an organization cannot be considered in any way as failing of capitalism. Afterall you need to generate capital to distribute it. If there is no capital what will you distribute.

Accumulation is in human nature. Wealth is one many things that we all try to accumulate. So it will be going against our natural behaviour not to allow accumulation or to tax it heavily.

The very fact that we are communicating through this blog in India points that we have come a long way. This way was paved for us by disassociating ourselves with socialism. Shall we even now think of something which have failed us for years. Shall we revisit it as if it brings fond memories. My answer is no. Capitalism is the only way.

While around the world organizations fail, it is time for Indian organizations to lead. This is our time. Let us not have any other thoughts, other than leading the scenario.

Ideal Leadership

2008-09-22T23:37:00.000-07:00

The question was what kind of leader would you think are able to take good care of the financial system, the education system, health system and more importantly the poltical system that will keep everyone sane and not start any kind of war,especially those that could trigger a possible world war.

In India in the good old days of Kingdoms, there was a saying “Yatha Raja Tatha Praja”. It means the people of kingdom are alike the King. In today’s democratic world the saying now has become “Yatha Praja Tatha Raja”. This means our rulers will be the people like us. It is also said in democracy people get the leadership they deserve. This is because we vote and bring ask them to lead us. So if there has to be any ideal kind of leadership the change has to come from all of us. It is not too difficult as it may sound, if we start one at a time.

Now coming to answering your question, the first quality, I feel in an ideal leader will be not to consider the citizens as fools who need the guardianship of their leader. This is the mistake maximum number of leaders commit. All of us who are in the voting age are sane and have a mind of our own.

Second quality I feel is people centred thinking. By this I do not mean the usual rhetoric on the part of the leaders. It really means that the leader understands, at least tries to understand the motivations, aspiration of people. It also means that people are involved in as many stages of policy crafting as possible. It is a tall order considering the mammoth systems we have at the country level, but with technology and pervasive digital platforms does not seem to be an impossible proposition.

Third quality in a leader is empathy. Empathy towards fellow human beings. This is by far the most the important quality, I look forward to.

To look at the other side of the spectrum, we as people should not look towards our leaders for every small problem we have and then blame them for it always. We as people should also consider our leader to be a fellow human being and not a super man who is above everything. We should allow them lee ways and should pardon their human failings. In this kind of an atmosphere of mutual trust, the leaders will not be compelled to hide things and their energies will be invested more productively.