The political scenario of a country in 2003 was as follows:
The President is a Muslim
The Prime Minister is a Hindu
The Defense Minister is a Christian
The Leader of Opposition is a Christian
Four years later, the political scenario in the same country today is as follows:
The President is a Hindu
The Prime Minister is a Sikh
The Vice President is a Muslim
The Leader of Opposition is a Hindu
The Leader of ruling party is a Christian
Where else can you expect this beauty? It happens only in India
Ok, another general knowledge question.
Give a reason that resulted in America being introduced to the rest of the world.
Again, the answer is India!
Flash back
Till about 5-6 centuries back the entire continent of America was unknown to the modern world.
The world then was primarily divided into Europe, India and China.
China then depended on India primarily for spiritual guidance in the form of Buddhism, the introduction of Martial arts , etc. As Hu Shih, Former Chinese ambassador to USA, once said India conquered and dominated China culturally for 20 centuries without ever having to send a single soldier across her border , referring to the entry of Buddhism into China.
On the other hand, Entire Europe in those days depended on India for trade. All spices, silk, diamonds, etc arrived to Europe from India. Also, a great amount of knowledge (including Mathematics ) was being learnt from India by Greek and other European scholars ever since 300 BCE. Wheels of entire Europe were running on the Indian fuel. Till about two centuries back, India was the only source of diamonds to the whole world!
Peter the Great, of Russia had then clearly stated, Bear in mind that the commerce of India is the commerce of the world and he who can exclusively command it is the dictator of Europe.
While everything was going fine for the Europeans in terms of their trade with India, in 1453 Ottoman turks captured Constantinople and blocked the land based trade route between Indian and Europe! This came as a major blow for the European trade with India. India then was the most prosperous area on this planet, a self sufficient place, and didn’t worry much about the blockage of the trade route. But Europeans relied heavily on their trade with India.
The outcome was that all European countries started looking out for alternate sea based routes to India for trade. Portuguese sailors suggested traveling south in the sea around Africa to India. Vasco Da Gama was the first who achieved this goal of finding a sea route to India in 1498.
But a few years before him, Columbus, funded by Spanish Queen Isabella in 1492, came up with another idea. Unlike most other Europeans who then believed that earth was flat, he was almost convinced that earth was round and hence he thought that taking a west bound journey via the Atlantic Ocean should bring him directly to the eastern shores of India on the other side!! Brilliant idea it was, expecting to save a lot of time required to go all around africa, expect for that fact that he was not aware of another continent he would meet on the way called America!
During the era of Columbus, the entire South Asia and East Asia was called India/Indies.
The ocean in this region is called Indian Ocean, the only ocean named after a country.
The rest is history. Columbus ended up in America, entered the main land of America on his third visit to the place. He in fact thought that he had reached the eastern shores of India via his western route! Which is why you find so many Indian names in and around America today like West Indies, Indiana, Red Indians etc. All these names were given by Columbus and his followers.
So finally, thanks to the European quest to search a sea route to India, the American continent was introduced to the rest of the world. Then the Europeans colonized America, fought wars with natives, who are called Indians (or American Indians), and then America became independent of its British rule, American Indian (i.e native American) territories were taken over by Americans, and then Indian Citizenship Act was passed in 1924 in America to give US citizenship to Native Americans, etc.
The real India in the mean time, which has nothing to do with the American Indians except for the same terminology, continued and continues its journey towards excellence in its own way .
Apollonius Tyanaeus, Greek Traveller of 1st Century AD who visited India said In India I found a race of mortals living upon the Earth. but not adhering to it. Inhabiting cities, but not being fixed to them, possessing everything but possessed by nothing.
Or otherwise simply put, East or West, India is the Best
Amazing slide show.. a great effort.. worth to be mentioned in a separate blog article. Thanks a lot for that.
Hope this slide show on India Truth Alone Triumphs supports the discussed points.
Yes.. and the simplest and most cost effective solution would be online voting through secure channels.
For that we need to have online IDs for all Indian voters.. or probably we can use their national identity cards as swipe cards which they can use to cast their vote online, like how we use ATM cards.
National ID cards should be used like Debit/Credit Cards for all government related transactions like paying tax, casting votes, applying for licenses, as a PAN card, ration card, voter ID card, identity proof, to submit personal info, as birth proof, residence proof, etc
We need to have ID Card centers like ATM centers set up all across the country where the citizens can carry all above mentioned transactions including casting their votes!
Okay, but we should aim at the reduction of election expenditure to achieve reduction in influence of money power in governance.
Not really. You can have referendums alongside voting for next candidate during elections. In other words, when voters go to cast their vote to elect a new candidate, at the same time they can also cast their vote to say whether they are happy about the performance of their current candidate or not!
Not really. You can have referendums alongside voting for next candidate during elections. In other words, when voters go to cast their vote to elect a new candidate, at the same time they can also cast their vote to say whether they are happy about the performance of their previous candidate or not!
In the current setup, referendums will be equally expensive as elections.
Yes, call back is something that is very important and not only call back, even after the completion of a term ppl should vote to say whether they were satisfied with their representative and majority of ppl are unsatisfied then the candidate should be jailed for the next term.
This will guarantee accountability and representatives cannot take their power for granted. Representation is not a joke, if they dont perform then 5 precious years of the country and their constituency is wasted, and also it is a fraud committed on their voters for 5 years by assuring something and not keeping up to it!
See http://hitxp.wordpress.com/2007/07/26/the-need-for-political-accountability/
See Link http://bharatnamaskar.blogspot.com/2007/06/two-tier-representation-can-reduce.html
Then there comes the lack of political will to a large extent, even though there are exceptions,
More importantly there is a lack of inspiring young leadership who can guide the country?s massive youth resource by clearly defining the goals. This has to be a inspiring political leadership which will clearly define the long terms goals of the country.
A revamp of political setup / system of governance is required for faster results. We should go for a Two tier system of governance with call back provision for elected representatives.
Oh yes, despite surplus resource we have been slow after independence and this has more to do with the need of addressing other issues related to ideological diversity, linguistic diversity, religious diversity, cultural diversity, geographical diversity, etc.
In other words, the biggest success has been keeping together India as a country, and the slow democratic process which is always inclusive in terms of growth, etc
Then there comes the lack of political will to a large extent, even though there are exceptions, and off late the picture is getting even more better in states and at a local level.
More importantly there is a lack of inspiring young leadership who can guide the country’s massive youth resource by clearly defining the goals. This has to be a inspiring political leadership which will clearly define the long terms goals of the country.
Btw, Thanks for the link, nice one.
Oops the link India news… the good news! http://goodnewsindia.com/index.php/gni
There is a difference between small countries like Singapore,
My point was those countries having little resources have excelled in different fronts, but we have surplus resources which are either unutilised or spoiled (like pollution of water bodies).
But it would be incorrect to say that nothing is happening.
I don?t disagree.
Many of us are simply not informed about the great progresses that are being made in the rural India
Read India news… the good news! :)
Its not resting on past laurels.
To be confident about your future first you need to be proud of your past. A sense of pride is what is missing from most youth today, which makes them think that India was always like this and nothing could be done about it. When this thought is replaced with a sense of past glory that India was a lot more better than what it is today, in fact one of the best places on this planet in the past, the youth will have more confidence about the potential of the country.
There is a difference between small countries like Singapore, Malaysia, etc where some 2-3 hours of drive from the country’s center will get you to the country’s border!
India is a vast country and there are obviously improvements required on many fronts, there is no denying of those facts. But it would be incorrect to say that nothing is happening. Government might be doing very little compared to what it should be actually doing, but then there are people’s initiatives in lots of places which have shown significant improvements in the living standards.
Below list is just a small example
http://www.rainwaterharvesting.org/Rural/Bhaonta-Kolyala.htm
http://www.rainwaterharvesting.org/Rural/Balisana1.htm
http://www.rainwaterharvesting.org/Rural/Darewadi-village.htm
and many more examples at http://www.rainwaterharvesting.org/Rural/Balisana.htm
Thanks to the efforts of NGOs like SCESA more than 60 villages (30000 people) of Raigad in Maharashtra today are free of water scarcity due to implementation of Rain Water Harvesting. These are very small examples of ‘Walk the Talk’ instead of complaining about the lack of facilities. In fact, the entire labor required for the projects of SCESA was provided by the villagers themselves!
In many of Indian villages today the villagers with the help of NGOs have proved that that even during peak scarcity of water in other places, during severe drought, plenty of water still flows in their villages, they can grow crops as usual, not only drink water as much as they need but also bath everyday!
Read more at http://lists.goanet.org/pipermail/goanet-goanet.org/2003-May/002173.html
Many of us are simply not informed about the great progresses that are being made in the rural India, thats all :)
Even metro cities like Chennai are implementing Water harvesting techniques. The future is definitely bright and promising.
This is just the tip of the iceberg!
We can’t rest on past laurels.
India has all resources, but we are far behind in utilising them properly.
Take for example, water.
Singapore imports water from Malaysia to meet half of its requirements, and the rest is got from rain water collected on reservoirs. Any how, water is available 24/7 for the inhabitants.
UAE gets water from the sea through desalination. They are building gardens and even forests in the desert. There also water is available 24/7 for the residents.
In India, we have fresh water available in plenty, but we are competing with each other to pollute the water bodies and hardly anybody gets pure water.
The reasons are many, but we have to overcome them all.
;) thanks
I am suprised no one commented on this. I think you re attracting only Pak readers to your blogs now. ;) Anyway, needless to say, great & informative post