Death by chocolate

Australian scientists have confirmed what many chocoholics already know, that "comfort food" can reduce stress. Eating foods rich in fat and sugar can alter the chemical composition of the brain and reduce anxiety.

But, as we all know, eating foods rich in fat and sugar can lead to clogged arteries and death.

So, you can either deny yourself the comfort food and live long, though anxiously; or indulge in these goodies and die early but happily. Which do you prefer?

Mr Shadow.

At the end of the first day’s play against Sri Lanka,

“The in-form Rahul Dravid was on a serene unbeaten 85 of pleasing drives. Maestro Tendulkar is on 20” reports The Hindu

“Dravid needs just 15 runs to complete his 28th century while Master Blaster will look forward to notch up his 44th ton” reports the Times of India.

Notice the epithets Maestro and Master Blaster for Tendulkar, while Dravid gets a clinical description of ‘in-form’. Also, even when Tendulkar is on 20, he is already well on his way to his 44th ton.

Siddhartha Mishra wrote a piece titled, “ The curse of being Rahul Dravid”, in the Indian Express, in which he asked:

"This batsman for all seasons presents an inarguable claim to greatness. And yet the acclaim accorded to Rahul Dravid has, more often than not, been restrained rather than spontaneous, limited rather than overwhelming. Why?

Juxtaposition of the ‘titles’ so generously used to glorify the leading Indian batsmen of this generation further accentuates the ‘great divide’. Tendulkar is ‘Master Blaster’ or ‘Tondulkar’; Sehwag is ‘Nawab of Najafgarh’; Ganguly is ‘Prince of Kolkata’; Laxman is ‘Very Very Special’; and attendant upon Yuvraj Singh and MS Dhoni are nicknames ringing with mass affection — Yuvi and Mahi. In Dravid’s case, the unvarying descriptions used — ‘The Wall’ and ‘Mr Dependable’ — seek to stereotype rather than highlight the batsman’s unique range and reek of condescension.

In the Indian context, there is inescapable evidence that cricket is religion and Tendulkar is god. But few human beings have reached Dravid’s levels of accomplishment. Is only a certain type of batsman worthy of mass adulation? Is hero-worship to be denied to Dravid because it has been his destiny to play in the same era, the same team as another great batsman?"

The answer actually lies in the fact that much of the English media is concentrated in Mumbai and Delhi. And it is not unnatural that those achievers who are based in these cities when they are off-duty tend to get the highest visibility. If you are successful and based in Mumbai, you can’t remain aloof. You will soon get drawn into the circuit, however introverted you might be. And where celebrities tend to show up, can the media be far behind?. It is a symbiotic relationship.

One would think that with their large fleet of vehicles, a slew of reporters and a network that spans the entire country, the TV channels can access any personality in any city in a jiffy. Surprisingly, the channels take the path of least resistance and focus on stories that unfold within a radius of 20 km from their studios in Mumbai or Delhi. That's why a Lata Mangeshkar completing 50 years of singing, 80 years of age, 50000 songs, etc will get enormous publicity, while an equally prolific S.P.Balasubramanian completing 40 years in filmdom and 40000 songs ( I am just rattling out a number; don’t check this somewhere and hang me) will not even get a passing mention. The TV channel can ask a reporter to hop across to Lata’s residence and interview her, whereas reaching SPB in Chennai is far too much of a hassle.

Every day, Tendulkar will be shown crossing and celebrating some milestone or another ( 13000 runs in Test cricket, 30000 runs in either form of cricket, 20 years of Test cricket, 150 test matches, 600 matches in all, 34th birthday, 35th birthday, 36th birthday, etc. While Dravid will be left severely alone. Maybe he prefers it this way too.

Update 26/11/09 : The 2nd day started with Dravid on 85 and Tendulkar on 20. This is how the TOI reports in today's edition:

There was a big crowd anticipating greater deeds from Sachin Tendulkar. But the little master did not oblige them and departed after making 40. Luckily for them, Dravid was there to provide the entertainment as he not only went past Allan Border's mark of 11,174 to become the fourth-highest run-getter in Tests, but also collected his 28th century.

So, even when Dravid is only 15 runs away from his century, the crowd is supposed to be anticipating only Tendulkar's century which is a mere 80 runs away. And when he gets out on 40, it is reported that "Little Master did not oblige them".

India, the richest country on 31-12-09

If you can stick around till the year 2109, you can have the satisfaction of seeing India occupy the No. 1 slot in terms of GDP, surpassing that of China's and that of the USA.

Scott Sumner makes out a compelling case for India in his post, a response to Tyler Cowen’s request to state his most absurd belief. . “Don’t let images of Mother Theresa and Slumdog Millionaire cloud your judgment” he urges. “ The Indian economy has a lot of growth ahead of it”

Way to go, India.

Get a life

“Normal is getting dressed in clothes that you buy for work and driving through traffic in a car that you are still paying for - in order to get to the job you need to pay for the clothes and the car, and the house you leave vacant all day so you can afford to live in it” observed Ellen Goodman.

That’s the quote that I remembered when I read this interview with an ‘economist and a work-life balance expert”, in Business.in.com:

“Back in 2006 – a time of boom and ebullient profits -- we completed a study of what we call ‘extreme jobs’: high-echelon jobs that have gargantuan demands but also gargantuan rewards. At the time, there was a kind of equilibrium in place, because these ‘extreme workers’ were working really hard – on average 73 hours per week -- but at the same time, they were being extremely well paid. They also had lot of status and power, which can be very appealing, and often they were very stimulated and kind of ‘turned on’ by the challenges of their work. Whether they were developing a new video game, running an oil rig or developing a new derivatives product, the odds are that today’s knowledge workers are very self-actualized through their work. So despite the massive time commitment, the rewards of these jobs very much outweighed the burdens. As a result, people were opting into these jobs and enjoying them.

Fast forward to 2008 and many of the ‘extreme’ burdens have actually increased: people may be working even longer hours, dealing with even more responsibility and a depleted team, but on the other hand, there is no bonus coming their way and they have to face job insecurity. The cost-benefit calculation has totally shifted around these jobs in the last two years, leading to what we call a ‘dysfunctional talent model’."

So, what this expert is telling us is that working 73 hours or longer is quite normal. It gets dysfunctional and stressful only when you don’t get proportionate rewards.

Working 80 hours a week means 11.5 hours a day if you count Sundays or 13.5 hours a day, if you don’t work on Sundays. There are many who have to work this hard to eke out a living, but if someone chooses to work such long hours on a sustained basis so as to grab a fat bonus, he/she would do well to read Ellen Goodman’s quote again before he/she drops dead.

The basic question one needs to ask is: “Is ‘work’ the sole purpose of one’s existence? Or is ‘work’ a means to lead a more comfortable and satisfying life outside working hours? Or is there no distinction between the two, they being intertwined?

In one of his travel stories called. “ The crocodiles of Yamoussoukra”, V.S.Naipaul decribes life in a village deep in the wet forests of Ivory Coast, where European customs brought in by expatriates interfered with local tribal beliefs and convictions. But several Africans had learnt to live with the duality, There was the world of the night and the world of the day. The world of the night consisted of rituals, dancing, witchdoctors, drums, etc. The world of the day could involve work in a European setting – hotels, factories, etc. For the African, observes Naipaul, the world of the day was an artificial and restrictive one. The true life was there in the mysteries of the village at night. The work during the day with all its false, arbitrary rituals was the charade. So, an African who could be a senior executive in a big company, would be longing to get back into the 'real world of night" and could slip into it comfortably.

That’s what we need to ask ourselves. Which is the ‘real’ part of our lives and which is the charade? There has to be a dividing line. If spending 80 hours a week at ‘work’ is the ‘real purpose’ of our existence, then the rest of what life offers us is only a charade. Conversely, you can have a real life outside working hours, if you can view the time spent at work as an elaborate charade.

Appreciating art

What is it about M.F.Husain’s art that enables him to rake in millions? I can’t make out head or tail of his paintings and pull my hair trying to figure out what he is trying to portray. I recall that R.K.Narayan too had had some difficulty in understanding this artist. In one of his articles after his visit to the USA, Narayan had written:

“My next halt was at the Indian consulate where M.F.Husain was exhibiting his latest paintings among which a portrait of myself was included. I had given him a sitting the previous week, but when I saw the portrait, I remarked that I didn’t look like myself. He had smiled at my lack of taste and replied that I wouldn’t know my real self. I left it at that.."

I decided to do some reading on ‘abstract art’ and learn some fundas. Here is a site that provides a fair bit of history and information.

“Why do we create art? “asks Harley Hahn and then proceeds to answer the question.

There are a number of straightforward reasons why human beings create art: to make a decoration, to tell a story, to capture or preserve an image, or to illustrate an idea. However, there is another, more subtle, but far more important reason why art is important to us.

The need to reach inside ourselves and manipulate our unconscious feelings is universal. We all do it to some degree, although most of the time we are blind to what we are doing.

That is where art comes in.

One of the purposes of art is to allow us indirect access to our inner psyche. Great art affords a way to get in touch with the unconscious part of our existence, even if we don't realize what we are doing. In this sense, the role of the artist is to create something that, when viewed by an observer, evokes unconscious feelings and emotions.

The reason abstract art has the potential to be so powerful is that it keeps the conscious distractions to a minimum. When you look at, say, the apples and pears of Cézanne, your mental energy mostly goes to processing the images: the fruit, the plate, the table, and the background. However, when you look at "Lavender Mist", you are not distracted by meaningful images, so virtually all of your brain power is devoted to feeling. You can open yourself, let in the energy and spirit of the painting, and allow it to dance with your psyche.

Of course, this only works if you cooperate with the artist. His job is to create a painting that is rendered so skillfully that, when you look at it, what you see actually changes what you feel at an unconscious level. Your job is to clear your conscious mind of thoughts and preconceptions in order to allow yourself to be influenced by what you are seeing. This means that, if you are to truly appreciate a work of art, you must be willing to let yourself go, to put yourself in the hands of the artist, so to speak, and let him take you wherever he wants.

Much of the time, this partnership fails, sometimes because the artist is simply not skillful enough; often because the person looking at the painting does not know how to truly appreciate it.

It is unfortunate that when I look at M.F.Husain’s painting, I don’t know how to truly appreciate it. From RKN’s admission, I can, at least, take solace in the fact that I am in illustrious company. I think both of us are too cynical and refuse to let the artist penetrate our inner selves and manipulate our unconscious feelings. I need to let myself go, put myself in the hands of the artist and let him take me wherever he wants.

Meat without killing

Is fish to be considered as meat? If not, why not? Why do Catholics permit fish but not chicken or red meat during Lent?

(As a Bengali friend,who is a piscivorous vegetarian, explained to me, “Cows, chicken and lamb, you need to kill. Fish, you don’t kill. Take it out of the water and it will die by itself !)

Now comes a report that it might be possible to produce meat without any livestock. Technology will soon advance to the point where it will be possible to grow meat inside labs, without the need for the actual living things that wear it for some time before being killed for it, say scientists. ( Source).

So, tell me, can vegetarians be convinced to eat this form of grown meat? After all there is no killing involved.

Vacuous and Verbose-8

"The President quoting the emphasis on the rural development by the father of nation Mahatma Gandhi said he also gave priority for the spread of awareness among the villagers about the importance of Sanitation…. Highlighting the need of toilet facilities in schools, anganwadies, the President said the need of the hour was to give prominence to the role of women in villages….. Since more than 70% of our countrymen resides in rural areas, it becomes important to better their lives, make them aware about sanitation, arrange for their education, Health, clean drinking water, provision of electricity, informing them for the eradication of evil practices and to make the environment pollution free as the key to all round rural development (Source).

A speech solemnly begun by invoking the name of Gandhi, solemnly delivered, solemnly heard and solemnly reported in the papers the next morning. The President puts up an impressive wish list – good health, clean drinking water, electricity, pollution free environment, women empowerment – that would result in rural development, but does not feel it necessary to state how all these will be achieved, by who and by when.

Hundreds of such news items appear every day, each filled with such platitudes and clichés , and blowing out hot air. What purpose they serve, nobody knows.

Update 19/11/09 : The President inaugurates the silver jubilee celebrations of Indira Gandhi Open University and releases this hot air balloon:

The importance of education cannot be over emphasized. It is a very powerful tool for empowering people and for giving them self-dignity. It becomes even more important for a nation like ours that is in the process of harnessing its human resources for rapid economic growth. Today, we need more children in school and more of them to go on to higher education. Proper training, provisioning of skills sets and capacity building of its population are tools which shall make our human resources competent and confident to face the new set of challenges of a fast changing world…..

….While broadbasing access to education is important, one must not lose sight of the utmost importance which should be paid to the quality of education being given to students and the need for equity. This should start from the primary level itself. Government has been, therefore, emphasizing and is committed to providing good quality education to all students, especially those from the underprivileged sections. The spread of education amongst women is also very important. By spreading education amongst them, not only is an individual educated, but rather the seeds of progress of the next generation are planted.

Banana, I have wronged thee.

In an earlier post, I had, quite uncharitably, described the banana as a rather ‘pedestrian’ and unexciting fruit and, for good measure, had also quoted Robert Lynd as saying that “we eat bananas not because we like them, but because they give us less trouble than any other fruit.”.

Vikram Doctor, in an article in The Economic Times, narrates how, soon after the Wall fell in 1989, it was the lowly banana that sent East German kids into ecstasy when they sighted the fruit for the first time in their lives. Their West German brethren had been splurging on the fruit in the Wirtschaftwunder (economic miracle) years of the 50s and 60s. So it’s not surprising then that when the Wall fell, bananas were a sign of victory. A popular bumper sticker of the time had two bananas forming a D for a united Deutschland.

Note to self: Don’t ever ridicule the banana again.

Vacuous and Verbose-7

"How confident is Pooja Chopra about winning the Miss World crown? “I believe in destiny. I have done my best, and I will put my best foot forward. Plus, I believe a lot in prayers and blessings. A lot of people are praying for me, even people who don’t know me directly, as they want the crown to come back to India. So, with 1.2 billion people putting pressure on God, I think it should work,” says Pooja. (source)."

How preposterously presumptuous of this lady to believe that 1.2 billion people in India desperately want the Miss World crown to come back to India and will collectively pray for that to happen!

Pyche Rajah

While reading the review of the movie, “Pazhassi Raja”, I was convinced that this was yet another pathetic attempt to glorify some nondescript ruler in a far-flung outpost of British India, as movies such as Veerapandiya Kattabomman have done before. In that Tamil movie, Sivaji Ganesan’s histrionics and delivery of dialogues had helped popularise the legend of Kattabomman. The impression the movie left one with was that Kattabomman was a fearsome firebrand who single-handedly held out against the tyranny of the British. The character of Kattabomman is, even today, held up as an outstanding example of Tamil valour and bravery.

In their despatches and records ( as an example, read pages 288-292 of “ A view of the English interests in India, and an account of the military, by Colonel William Fullerton) the British don’t sound too impressed or concerned about Kattabomman(or Catabomanaig as they referred to him). In fact, the British had a far more serious problem on their hands in the form of Tipu Sultan at that time and were more intent of getting the latter out of way.

Catabomanaig was one of the Polygars ( derived from the Tamil term Palaiyakarar, or care-taker of a Palayam) or chieftains in the area that was administered earlier by the Nayaks. The territory had passed on to the Nawab of Arcot, who unable to return a loan provided by the British, had instead granted them the right to collect taxes from the 72 palayams. Catabomanaig and a few other Polygars refused to cough up the money. The British moved in and ruthlessly knocked off the Polygars. Catabomanaig was captured later and hanged. As far as the British was concerned, he was a minor irritant and a nuisance. For them it was business-as-usual to stamp out these sporadic resistances.

But not so with Tipu Sultan and Pazhassi Raja. They were far more formidable opponents, as British records acknowledge. In his despatches, Arthur Wellesley (later to become the Duke of Wellington) refers to Pyche Rajah frequently and in a less condescending tone. From the military manoeuvres that are elaborated in great detail, it is amply evident that the British did not take the Pyche Rajah lightly or just as a minor pin-prick. Elaborate planning had to be done to counter the Rajah’s guile and guerrilla methods. One such missive from Arthur Wellesley ( Source : Page 301, Supplementary Despatches and Memoranda of Field Marshal Arthur Wellesley) goes as follows ( a longish one, but worth the read)

Bangalore 5th December 1800

To: The Commissioners in Malabar

I have to state to you the force which will be employed in this country against the Pyche Rajah, and the general plan of operations which I have recommended to Colonel Stevenson.

The force will be the 19th dragoons, the 2nd regiment of cavalry, five companies of the 12th, the 77th regiment, two battalions of Coast and two battalions of Bombay sepoys, with 14 pieces of cannon, with Bengal, Coast, and Bombay artillerymen in proportion, besides the guns attached to the two regiments of cavalry.

This force will be amply supplied with stores; and I have given orders at Seringapatam to prepare for it four small mortars with their stores, which I imagine will be found useful. It is already supplied with grain and provisions to any extent that may be required.

The plan of operations, according to which I have proposed that the Pyche Rajah should be attacked on both sides from Malabar and Mysore, is as follows. It appears now that at least we shall be able to hold our ground in Cotiote, if we should not have it in our power to do more. But when the Pyche Rajah will be pressed in Wynaad, it is probable that he will withdraw his people from Cotiote, and in that case it may be possible to push forward the roads and posts to Pereweil, and to have everything prepared for a communication with the Mysore troops in the Wynaad country as soon as these shall be sufficiently advanced. I should propose that this communication should be by the Peria Pass, as being upon the whole the most convenient and nearest to the posts in the lower country, as well as to the Rajah's colgums in Wynaad, which it will be necessary to attack.

I have proposed that the 19th dragoons and 2nd regiment of Native cavalry should be sent into the southern division of Malabar, by Coimbatoor and Paulghaut, in order to awe the rebels in that quarter, and to prevent any co-operation between them and the Pyche Rajah, which might disturb the arrangements made for his destruction.

I have given much consideration to the propositions which have been made by the different Nairs whose opinions have been taken regarding the mode of attacking the Pyche Rajah in Wynaad. It would certainly be desirable to attack him, as" they propose, on four sides at the same time, besides'the attack from Cotiote, viz., from the Tambercherry Pass, from Koorg, from Cancancottah, and from Edatera. But even if it were possible to spare a battalion from the force now in Malabar for the operations in the Tambercherry Pass, which I doubt, it would not, in my opinion, be proper to subdivide the Mysore army, whose force I have above stated, as proposed, to make the three attacks by Koorg, by Cancancottah, and by Edatera.

It must be recollected that each division would be, in fact, a separate army, and it would be necessary to provide it with a separate establishment of stores and provisions. This, if it could be supposed that each division would be in itself sufficiently strong, would take much time, and much of the season would elapse before the attack could be made.

But as there could be no concert or co-operation, and as one division would be liable to be attacked or opposed by the whole force of the Rajah, without the chance of receiving assistance from the others, I am of opinion that a third, or even half, of the army proposed for this service would in that case be exposed to the risk of being cut off. I have recommended to Colonel Stevenson, therefore, not to divide his army until he is better acquainted with the nature of the Wynaad country, with the force of the enemy, and his mode of warfare, than I have been able to make him.

Having decided then that the army should not be divided, the next question is, on what line it should advance into the country, as proposed, in one body. I have recommended to Colonel Stevenson to throw a post into Cancancottah, and proceed from thence to Edatera. I have preferred this line to the former, and to that by Koorg, although that by Cancancottah leads more directly to the seat of the Rajah's government and to his principal colgum, because I perceive by all accounts that the possession of this colgum would not give us any great advantages, nor would not deprive the Rajah of any of his means or resources for carrying on the war.

The road from Edatera to the Tambercherry Ghaut is more open, and better than that from Cancancottah; and the possession of that road by the posts which will be established on it will cut off the Rajah from the southern districts of Wynaad, and from his friends in the southern division in Malabar, and will give confidence to the friends of Yeman Nair, whose influence, it appears, is most prevalent in the districts to the southward of the great road to Tambercherry.

I have recommended that a post may be established at Edatera, and one at Lakerycotta, or in such other situation on the Tambercherry Ghaut as may be preferred. Thus the communication between the army and Calicut will be kept open, and that of the Pyche Rajah with Goorkul impeded.

After Colonel Stevenson will have got possession of the great road to Tambercherry, and the friendly Nairs will have commenced their operations to the southward, I have recommended that he should push forward to the seat of the Rajah's government, or to his colgum, in as many divisions as he may think proper, upon a consideration of the nature of the country through which he will have to pass, the opposition made to him, and a review of the effect which his operations may have produced. I have strongly recommended it to him, however, to beware of breaking up his force, and particularly not to send out detachments of troops with baggage till he is well acquainted with the strength of the enemy.

I have desired him to open a road of communication between the posts of Wynaad and those below the Ghauts as soon as that measure will be practicable.

These are the outlines of the'plan which I have recommended to Colonel Stevenson, and the grounds upon which I have formed my opinion.


Arthur Wellesley.

I haven’t seen the movie. “Pazhassi Raja”, nor do I intend seeing it, but let me admit that my presumption about the disproportionate glorification of the Raja was wrong. His story ( as I have made out through my armchair research on Google Books) is indeed worth telling.

Vacuous and Verbose-6

A self-confessed Tendulkar fan, Ms. Mangeshkar said she wants the veteran right-hander to win the 2011 World Cup for India. (source)

“I want Sachin to win the 2011 World Cup. Not only that, I wish he continues as long as he is playing well, hopefully at least for the next 10 years. He has a lot of cricket left in him,” said the Bharat Ratna recipient.

Ms. Mangeshkar said she gets upset every time there is speculation about Tendulkar’s retirement.

“I don’t know why people start talking about his retirement despite the fact that he is playing so well. I don’t like any criticism directed at Sachin. People go after him if he fails to score once in a while. Even I sometimes sing songs which don’t do well, does that mean I should retire?” she asked.

No less a cricket expert than Ms. Mangeshkar has now certified that Sachin has a lot of cricket left in him. Now, if no less a music expert than Sachin would kindly return the compliments and certify that Ms Mangeshkar has a lot of singing left in her, then the circuit will be complete.

Fishermen, don't venture into the sea

The Govt of Tamilnadu, I understand, has cautioned fishermen not to venture into the sea, in view of the inclement weather.

Ever since I can remember, issuing this statement is the first and often the only piece of action from the government whenever a low-pressure area forms in the Bay of Bengal. The government, after all, has to demonstrate that it is alert to any danger and needs to make appropriate announcements to show that it is in full administrative control. And, as per standard operating procedure, it immediately asks fishermen not to venture into the sea. Once this is done, it feels that it has discharged its full duty.

To be honest, I haven’t seen evidence of the government or a bureaucrat actually telling the fishermen not to venture into the sea. I am going only by what the papers tell me. In fact I suspect that the government doesn’t even issue such a statement. Why it gets reported thus is perhaps because the newspapers strongly believe that, whenever there is a storm brewing, the readers would expect to be informed that fishermen have been asked not to venture into the sea. The readers don’t care if the fishermen have actually been warned not to venture into the sea, but they feel that the newspapers ought to tell them so. This is a long unbroken tradition that is solemnly followed and respected by the newspapers and the readers.

In fact, if newspapers fail to report that fishermen have been asked not to venture into the sea, nobody would believe that it is raining , even when there is a cyclonic storm lashing. It can’t be raining, the reader would assert. Where is the news item that fishermen have been asked not to venture into the sea?

Conversely, when there is bright sunshine, if a mischievous reporter were to plant a story that the government had asked fishermen not to venture into the sea, the readers would, in a Pavlovian response, stay at home convinced that there was heavy rain outside.

The fishermen, oblivious to this drama, use their own judgement to decide whether they should venture into the sea or not. If they sense that it is going to rain, they don’t venture into the sea, not because the government has asked them not to, but because they feel that the public will not visit the fish market believing that there will not be any fresh catch, as newspapers had reported that fishermen had been asked not to venture into the sea.

Update 13/11/09 : Usha has forwarded this story:

"The Blackfeet asked their Chief in autumn, if the winter was going to be cold or not. Not really knowing the answer, the chief replies that the winter was going to be cold and that the members of the village were to collect wood to be prepared.

Being a good leader, he then went to the nearest phone booth and called the National Weather Service and asked, "Is this winter to be cold?"

The man on the phone responded, "This winter was going to be quite cold indeed."

So the Chief went back to speed up his people to collect even more wood to be prepared.

A week later he called the National Weather Service again, "Is it going to be a very cold winter?"

"Yes," the man replied, "its going to be a very cold winter."

So the Chief goes back to his people and orders them to go and find
every scrap of wood they can find. Two weeks later he calls the National Weather Service again and asks "Are you absolutely sure, that the winter is going to be very cold?"

"Absolutely" the man replies, "the Blackfeet are collecting wood like crazy!"

Operation Opera

Complete the following sentence:

"If India wants to enter the league of civilised nations, it must ……….."

Chances are that you filled in the words, “ ensure drinking water for all its citizens” or “ build good roads”, or “ provide reliable power supply in all parts of the country” or “ aim at 100% literacy” and so on.

I am sorry to be the one to break the news that even if we miraculously managed to achieve all these, we still will not make it to the big league. According to Marat Bisengaliev, a man from Kazakhstan, here is what it takes to be counted right up there (source):

"If India wants to be perceived as one of the civilised big powers, they have to have other attributes of a big, global economy—an opera house, a symphony orchestra, a ballet troupe, schools for classical music and dance. We have to find ways to make it possible"

The good news is that Bisengaliev is already in Mumbai with the objective of creating the first Indian professional symphony orchestra. Once he accomplishes that, he will give each one of us a badge that will say that we are citizens of a big, civilised country. Keep some space on your sleeve. And watch this space for more such insights.

The angry young man

Have I suddenly turned more intelligent this weekend, or has the entire world turned more stupid? I seem to find some stupidity in every article that I have been reading.

Here, for instance, is Bobilli Vijay Kumar writing in the sports section of the TOI:

"How many times has Sachin Tendulkar played second fiddle to his emotions on the cricket field? How many times has he allowed his anger to sneak into your sitting room during the course of a match? Probably never.

On Thursday night, in front of a packed stadium in Hyderabad, however, he showed that he was human too: after diving forward to catch Cameron White, off the last ball of Australia's innings, he slammed the ball into the ground and walked away in a huff.

Instantly, you knew that somebody was going to be at the receiving end that night; that something special was cooking in his ageing willow."

It is clear that this Bobilli Vijay Kumar has been fed a staple diet of a particular genre of Hindi movies ( titles such as Deewar, Zanjeer, Sholay come instantly to mind) that glorifies the angry young man. According to this genre, once the spark of anger is lit, as when one’s sister has been molested, no power on earth can stop the said angry young man from extracting his revenge. Single-mindedly and single-handedly he can take on an entire army of thugs and villains who are equipped with guns, grenades and tanks. Yes, his terrible anger is enough to cause him to carry out fantastic feats.

So, when Tendulkar looked angry, Bobilli knew instantly that the Aussies were going to be slaughtered that night. A terrible fate awaited them, for Hell hath no fury like a Sachin angered.

Will someone known to Bobbili ( I am hoping that the theory of six degrees of separation is true and he can be reached) din it into his head that anger is the last emotion a batsman wants to be in the grip of while going out to bat, and is exactly the emotion your opponent wants you to be in the grip of? Losing one’s cool can be a brief and momentary episode, but a good sportsman has to quickly regain his composure. Anger affects one’s concentration and makes him do foolish things. And Sachin has not amassed 17000 runs without knowing this simple truth.

In fact I was so angry with Bobilli for insulting Sachin in this manner that I knew instantly that he was going to be at the receiving end of my post today. Take that, Bobilli.

Desiartist

In her regular column in the Times of India, Shobhaa De writes:

"Today, the 94-year-old Mumbaikar ( M.F.Husain) wants to come home. The same home he was forced to flee four years ago. He has been living in exile, tormented by the thought he may never set foot in the land of his birth again. Isn't it time we showed enough grace, courage, courtesy... just plain and simple 'tameez'... by welcoming him back to his motherland? Yes, the very same 'Bharatmata' he stands accused of having desecrated?

….the prolific artist graduated from painting film hoardings to putting India on the international map as its foremost contemporary artist. His horses galloped across the world, breaking records and he himself became the desi art world's most powerful brand.

…What did he have to gain by inviting trouble - big trouble? He has been hugely successful for decades, he doesn't need publicity stunts to sell his works. Nor is he dumb enough to offend people deliberately and not be aware of the consequences."

In my regular column in Plus Ultra, I make the following observations now:

1) If M.F.Husain says he is returning to his Bharatmata, he will pacify the Hindu fundamentalists, but will invite the provisions of the Islamic fatwa that says that reference to nation as mother is unIslamic. Hussain would do well to ponder over this fire- frying pan equation.

2) By what stretch of imagination can one describe Hussain’s art as desi art? He has developed his own individual style that has found acceptance. Good for him.

3) It did not require Hussain to put India on the international map. I distinctly remember seeing India on a world map in one of my geography lessons in the 7th standard, many decades back.

4) When his nude horses galloped across the world, there were no protests at all. Only when nude goddesses figured in his art, there were howls of protest. This distinction must be clear.

5) If my memory serves me right, Husain was not banished from the country by the Govt. He made his own assessment of the risks of staying here and chose to move to Dubai. And he is not exactly holed out in a desert there or moving around in a camel. Why should I be burdened by the guilt of keeping an old man from his humble home?

6) Husain may be hugely successful, but that doesn’t mean that he does not need to resort to publicity stunts. Any book, movie or piece of art (or blog) has to ‘provoke’ to be noticed, and authors/directors/artists constantly test the frontiers. The line between freedom of expression and its misuse is a hazy one. The artist may want an unqualified licence, while the Bajrang Dal may have zero tolerance. Only the Court can decide if that line has been crossed or not.

The simple point that needs to be made is that as an Indian citizen, Husain has a right to stay here and if there is a threat to his life, enjoy the protection of law. But if some aggrieved person follows the right legal process and brings charges of defamation, Husain has to face those charges and defend himself. He cannot seek immunity or cry foul. Nor should Shobhaa De.

Not that either of them is obliged to follow my advice.

Turn honest when you write your memoirs

Prem Panicker links to an extract from Agassi’s book, “Open” and exclaims,

"(This) is an example of the sort of searing honesty that is so rare in the self-serving hagiographies that take up so much space on the shelves. Read, again, the passages headlined 1977 and ask yourselves this: Could you have gone through that experience and not been broken by it? Could you have survived, let alone triumphed? And then, when there really is no need for you to do it – could you have viewed your past life with such blinding clarity and painful honesty?"

He also quotes from an article by his friend, Rohit Brijnath, who has pretty much said the same thing:

"His book is a mea culpa, yes, an admission of guilt about recreational drug-taking in 1997 and lies to the tennis authorities. His game then was disintegrating — at one point he played eight events and won a single match. Was the drug an indulgence, an escape? Make your choice, but his honesty deserves respect. We cannot understand sport unless its heroes reveal its insides to us."

The point being made by both the writers is that Agassi being a super-rich guy did not have the need to resort to any ‘sales gimmick’ to increase the sale of his book. And nobody would have come to know about his murky past had he chosen to remain silent.. It takes a lot of courage to reveal something that can tarnish your reputation forever. That he still came out with a confession on his own shows that he is extremely honest. QED.

I find this argument extremely stupid. Calling Agassi honest because he has chosen to reveal all on his own now is like saying that Ramalinga Raju was a paragon of virtue because he confessed voluntarily and owned up to his misdeeds.

Agassi’s troubled childhood may explain why he took to drugs. But that can’t be used as an extenuating factor to justify his dishonesty or to evoke sympathy.

If we glorify this belated act of confession, the moral of the story will be that we are allowed to indulge in all kinds of dishonest acts till the age of 40. We can always wipe the slate clean, at the age of 50, by revealing all in our memoirs.

Vacuous and Verbose-5

"One cannot go by statistics alone. No ground is good or bad. We have to play to our potential and the results will come along," Dhoni said

With the series tantalisingly poised 2-2, Dhoni said every match was important for the outcome of the series. "When it became 1-1, I said it's like a five-game series. Now we can see it as a three-game series. Every game is important now. It's important not to have an off day.

It's not about targeting a bowler. We have to see which bowler is bowling well and do accordingly," (Dhoni) said. "For us it's more about what we can do and achieve rather than target a bowler," he added.

India captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni blamed his batsmen for their four-run loss to Australia in the opening One-Day International cricket match, but said they will bounce back in the seven-match series. "We have to work a bit on our bowling but our batsmen need to bat.”

So, ladies and gentlemen, revealed here for the first time is the amazing Dhoni formula for winning matches. "Our batsmen must bat, our bowlers must bowl, our fielders must field and our wicket-keeper must keep wickets."

Ban on kites

“Kite-flying in Chennai is now a non-bailable offence” reported the media last week, leading to speculation if the Taliban had made inroads into this part of the world. Thankfully, today’s TOI reports “After the Chennai Kite Manufacturers and Sellers Association (CKMSA) moved the Madras high court, the city police have clarified that they will not prevent anyone from selling kites. "Action will only be taken against those selling or flying kites with maanja (thread covered with ground glass)," the police said.

On the FM radio this morning, I heard a strong protest from one of the panellists that many of the simple pleasures in life such as kite flying, bursting crackers, playing cricket on the beach are being wiped out of existence on grounds of public safety, while activities that are far more dangerous to public health and sanity face no discouragement at all. He recalled how he had spent so many of his childhood days flying kites and how he still cherishes those memories.

What is it about kite flying that evokes strong emotions? In an earlier post, I had extracted a conversation from one of Somerset Maugham’s short stories, in which two characters would try to figure out why a third character was so madly addicted to kite flying:

“What do you suppose there is in kite flying that makes the damned fool so mad about it?”

“I don’t know”, “Perhaps it gives him a sense of power as he watches it soaring towards the clouds and of mastery over the elements as he seems to bend the winds of heaven to his will. It may be that in some queer way he identifies himself with the kite flying so free and high above him, and it’s as if it were an escape from the monotony of life. It may be that in some dim, confused way it represents an ideal of freedom and adventure. And you know, when a man once gets bitten with the virus of the ideal, not all the king’s doctors and not all the king’s surgeons can rid him of it.”

Perhaps that explains.

Vacuous and Verbose-4

(A random compilation of jargon, motherhood statements and high-sounding nonsense)

"Experts from the tiger range countries have called for a collective political commitment from all levels of the government to save the animals and enhancing the capacity of the Interpol and other international agencies and enforcement networks to combat illegal trade in wildlife.

…the experts gave a clarion call for strict protection of the beast and its core breeding areas. They asked the tiger range countries to stop infrastructure projects in core breeding areas and appealed to financial institutions to avoid financing development projects that adversely affect critical habitats.

They recommended conservation and management of buffer zones and corridors that connect core breeding areas in tiger landscapes, empowering local communities in and around the landscapes with sustainable economic incentives, and appropriate technologies to minimise human-tiger conflict. Making core/critical habitats truly inviolate with incentive-driven, generous, participatory and voluntary relocation was also suggested."

( Source)

When you come across a long report such as this, you cannot but get impressed. Experts have met in a workshop, deliberated for four full days and come up with a clarion call and a set of recommendations to save the tiger.

Nobody can find fault with any of the recommendations. I mean, would you dare question the need to introduce “appropriate technologies to minimize human-tiger conflict? But when you read through the entire report, you realise that it is a lot of hot air. It doesn’t require experts to state these points. Any idiot can.

Or maybe the job of the expert is to come up with these general banalities ( or banal generalities). A small set of committed workers have to then do the detailing and solve the problem on the field.

The Dinner table pep talk

“INDIA SNUBS CHINA”, screamed the TV headlines in Font size 72. By way of explanation, it added in slightly smaller font size, “PM tells Chinese Premier that Dalai Lama is our honoured guest and free to travel anywhere in India”.

I don’t know about you, but whenever I see such headlines, I have this tendency to form quick mental images. The one that I formed in this instance was of our PM barging into Mr Wen Jiabao’s room in the middle of the night, shaking him by the collar, pushing the muzzle of his gun into the latter’s nose, and yelling into his ears in FONT size 72, “ THE DALAI LAMA IS OUR HONOURED GUEST. HE IS FREE TO TRAVEL TO AP, ANDHRA OR ARUNACHAL, GOT IT?”. And of a terrified Mr Jiabao nodding his head to convey surrender.

On calmer reflection, I realised that our PM was too gentle a person to attempt such heroics. Perhaps there was a better explanation.

There was. The morning newspapers quoted the PM as saying that he had sat next to Mr Jiabao during the dinner, in the course of which he had passed on this message concerning the Dalai Lama.

As nobody overheard this conversation, and as there were no interpreters sitting in between the two, we have only our PM’s version that such a conversation took place. We will never come to know the Chinese version.

As our PM is far too honest a person to claim that he had uttered something that he had not, the only explanation is that he must have done an “Aswathama’. As the Wonton soup was being served to all, and in the general noise of soups spoons hitting the sides of the bowls, and soya sauce and vinegar bottles being passed around, our PM must have slipped in the sentence in Font size 8 italics and in his muffled tone, “The Dalai Lama is our honoured guest. He is free to go to any corner of the country, by train, air or by foot”. Mr Jiabao must have heard only the last word and to continue the polite conversation, would have asked the PM, “ Did you try the foot massage here?”, which our PM would have interpreted as “ Yes, I get the message”.

On such exchanges and conversations are TV headlines and Govt press releases made.

Cheers!

How did the custom of ‘raising a toast” originate? Why is it called a ‘toast’? What is the significance of the ritual of the ‘clinking’ of the glasses?

It all began with the fear of being poisoned as Joe Kissel explains.

The Phrase Finder adds a few more details on the ritual.

Vacuous and Verbose- 3

(A random compilation of jargon, motherhood statements and high-sounding nonsense)

"Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee today reviewed the safety measures in railway operations with the entire Railway Board here today. In the meeting, she categorically stated that the safety of the passengers should continue to be given top priority as safety never sleeps. She said that there should be no compromise on safety matters and any laxity on this will not be tolerated. She further pointed out that anyone found wanting on this vital aspect of railway operation will not be spared and stern action will be taken against those playing with the lives of passengers. She directed Railway Board to closely monitor all spheres of railway operations connected with the safety and hold periodical reviews on this subject." (Source).

Now that Ms Mamata has issued this stern statement, we can breathe easy. Railways will no longer compromise on the vital aspect of safety or play with the lives of passengers.

Vacuous and Verbose- 2

(A random compilation of jargon, motherhood statements and high-sounding nonsense)

Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, on the eve of his departure to Thailand for the ASEAN Summit issued the following statement:

"In pursuance of the theme of the ASEAN Summit of “Enhancing Connectivity, Empowering Peoples”, I will discuss with the ASEAN leaders new initiatives to accelerate the process of our engagement in areas such as greater economic integration, people-to-people contacts, agriculture, human resource development, education, science and technology and information and communications technology."

Is there any area left out?

Vacuous and Verbose- 1

(Beginning a new series that will provide a random selection of jargon, motherhood statements and high-sounding nonsense.. Editor)

"The fight against international terrorism cannot be successful by doing deals with terror groups for short term gains, India has said, as it asked for a comprehensive global movement against the menace. "

(Source)

Nobel Prize and Noble values

Responding to reports that the Nobel Prize winner Mr Venkatraman Ramakrishnan had ‘expressed disgust at the outpouring of fan mail received by him from India, especially from Tamil Nadu, after the conferment of the Nobel’, Mr Abhishek Singhvi writes in his opinion piece in The Times of India of October 20th.

….What is deplorable is Ramakrishnan's equation and linkage of something as lofty and noble as patriotism and nationalism with something as banal and ridiculous as the clogging of his e-mail accounts and a general disgust at being troubled by his countrymen.

… Patriotism, at its core, has an intersection of noble values. … These are the values of link and affinity with a culture, a people, a territory and a national identity. It is his sentiment alone which connects India and Indians, despite this country being the greatest aggregation of diversities on this planet."

Once the old chestnuts of patriotism and nationalism are pulled out, it is impossible to argue further. From this self-righteous pedestal, the ‘patriot’ will dismiss or paint anyone who has even a remotely contradictory view as a treacherous traitor who is ungrateful to his/her mother/fatherland.

In fact, I face the risk of being branded a traitor because I referred to noble values such as patriotism and nationalism as ‘old chestnuts’.

But if Mr Singhvi would cast aside his super-noble blinkers for a brief moment, he will realise that for a scientist engaged in pursuit of knowledge and truth, it is necessary to look beyond national identities. The research ecosystem has a global base and it is important that you don’t create barriers in your mind while seeking data or in assimilating the results from research carried out in some other corner of the world. Development in one’s field is dependent and closely linked to co-developments in various other fields and various other regions.

So, while Tamilnadu could claim proprietary rights over him because he was born here, or Gujarat could claim him as its own, because he did most of his studying there, Venky could respond in one of following two ways to such exuberance.

1) To come up with a lengthy statement acknowledging the role played by each one of his teachers from kindergarten onwards in shaping him, instilling the scientific spirit, motivating him for higher achievements, etc, and how proud he was to be born an Indian and a Tamilian, etc. Mr Singhvi would have loved it. I would have dismissed his statement as vacuous nonsense, even though it sounds gracious.

2) To tick the Indians off and tell them where they get off. Congratulatory messages are fine, but not ones that solely celebrate the fact of his being born here or hold this fact as being responsible for the Nobel.

He chose the second one. This gave Mr Singhvi the ammunition to shoot off an op-ed to TOI and to flaunt the patriotic badge on his sleeve. And me the material for yet another blog post to display my contrarian streak.

Product promotion

In all the episodes of “American Idol”, the camera repeatedly turns in the direction of the tall red glasses, with the logo of Coca Cola prominently displayed. Every now and then, the judges are shown casually sipping from these glasses. As this Slate article states: “The soft-drink maker is an aggressive sponsor of American Idol, not just via plain old ad time but through paid product placement—it's not a coincidence that Cowell and the other judges are constantly hoisting red Coke cups”. Subliminal advertising of this form, where product promotion is cleverly mixed with the content of the program being sponsored, is quite common.

Apparently, such manipulation happens in films as well. The admirable “Letters of Note” website has published a copy of a letter written in 1983 to actor Sylvester Stallone, on behalf of the (now defunct) tobacco company, Brown and Williamson, agreeing to pay him a sum of $500,000 for “incorporating personal usage’ of their cigarettes in scenes in five of his forthcoming films. Stallone had also conveyed his acceptance of these terms here.

More examples of ‘product placement’ can be found here. Can you think of any Indian examples?

Sacred cows make the best beef.

We may hold cows as sacred (or holy), but that doesn’t stop us from being the 4th largest producer of beef (after the USA, China and Brazil), if we go by the graph provided in this site. 2.7m tons per year. No less. With rise in per capita GDP, our beef production has been steadily going up from 1963.
(via)

Restoration of interactivity

My daughter signed up for a Vodafone Plan that included an allowance of 5000 messages (sms) every month. Why this ridiculously high number, I wondered. Would any sane person be able to send around 170 messages every day?

In the first month, her message score was 4000 and by the second month she had comfortably broken the 5000-barrier. Casual conversation with some of her friends revealed that this really was no big deal.

What kind of idiocy has gripped this generation, I thought. We cannot let new-fangled technologies rule our lives.

Then I came across a link to an article that Douglas Adams had written in 1999 soon after the Internet made its presence felt. Commenting on the view that it was just another silly fad, Adams wrote:

I suppose earlier generations had to sit through all this huffing and puffing with the invention of television, the phone, cinema, radio, the car, the bicycle, printing, the wheel and so on, but you would think we would learn the way these things work, which is this:

1) everything that’s already in the world when you’re born is just normal;
2) anything that gets invented between then and before you turn thirty is incredibly exciting and creative and with any luck you can make a career out of it;
3) anything that gets invented after you’re thirty is against the natural order of things and the beginning of the end of civilisation as we know it until it’s been around for about ten years when it gradually turns out to be alright really.

Apply this list to movies, rock music, word processors and mobile phones to work out how old you are.

And on the specific subject of messaging (the facility had just been introduced on phones in Finland) he wrote:

“Our children, however, are doing something completely different. Risto Linturi, research fellow of the Helsinki Telephone Corporation, quoted in Wired magazine, describes the extraordinary behaviour kids in the streets of Helsinki, all carrying cellphones with messaging capabilities. They are not exchanging important business information, they’re just chattering, staying in touch. "We are herd animals," he says. "These kids are connected to their herd – they always know where it’s moving." Pervasive wireless communication, he believes will "bring us back to behaviour patterns that were natural to us and destroy behaviour patterns that were brought about by the limitations of technology."

Another interesting point that Adams made was that, for much of human history, entertainment had always been interactive (theatre, music, sports...). Twentieth century with its entertainment forms (movies, radio, TV) of the non-interactive variety was actually an aberration. Internet merely restored the interactivity.

Update : Tyler Cowen explains, in an article, that far from reducing our attention span, technologies such as the Internet help in widening it.

Delivery in 30 minutes.

The Dalai Lama is credited with these lines:

"We have bigger houses but smaller families:
We have more degrees but less sense;
more knowledge but less judgements;
more experts but more problems;
more medicines, but less healthiness.
We've been all the way to the moon and back,
but we have trouble crossing the street
to meet the new neighbour.
We build more computers
to hold more information,
to produce more copies than ever,
but we have less communication.
We have become long on quantity
but short on quality.
These are times of fast foods,
but slow digestion;
tall man, but short character;
steep profits, but shallow relationships.
It is time when there is much in the window
but nothing in the room."


I came across another profound piece of Internet wisdom today:

“We live in a society where pizza gets to your house before the police”.

My advice to you would be:

1) Don't eat fast food

2) Don't eat food. Fast.

Good looks or job?

Career coach Marty Nemko writes:

"Hire ugly. All other things being equal, I'd give the nod to an ugly candidate. It’s not charity: They have less value in the marketplace and can be hired less expensively, even though looks have, for most jobs, little or no bearing on job performance. I've found that, on average, ugly people are more likely to be kind and to work harder because they know they're working at a disadvantage. And unattractive people are more likely to stay with me because they tend to have a tough time getting hired, in part because they generally don’t network efficiently. If I treat unattractive employees well, they’re usually very loyal. (source)"

If every employer follows what the good coach says, the candidate will have to confront one of following truths:

1) He/she is beautiful: Sorry, he/she won’t get the job.

2) He/she got the job. Therfore he/she is ugly

Suttee on the Nerbudda

Raja Ram Mohan Roy, the Bengali reformer, has been given a large share of the credit for stopping the practice of women being compelled to commit sati. But most of the widows seem to have voluntarily done so, genuinely believing that they would be reunited with their husbands.

Major Sleeman (he of the Eggs and Thugs fame) in his memoirs, “ Rambles and collections of an Indian official” (page 23) provides an account of a suttee and narrates a poignant tale of an old widow who simply could not be persuaded from being burnt at her husband’s pyre:

"On receiving civil charge of the district (Jubbulpore) in March, 1828, I issued a proclamation prohibiting any one from aiding or assisting in suttee; and distinctly stating, that to bring one ounce of wood for the purpose would be considered as so doing.

...On Tuesday, 24th November, 1829, I had an application from the heads of the most respectable and most extensive family of Brahmans in the district, to suffer this old widow to burn herself with the remains of her husband, Omed Sing Opuddea, who had that morning died upon the banks of the Nerbudda. I threatened to enforce my order, and punish severely any man who assisted; and placed a police guard for the purpose of seeing that no one did so. She remained sitting by the edge of the water without eating or drinking.

...Her sons, grandsons, and some other relations, remained with her, while the rest surrounded my house, the one urging me to allow her to burn, and the other urging her to desist. She remained sitting upon a bare rock in the bed of the Nerbudda, refusing every kind of sustenance, and exposed to the intense heat of the sun by day, and the severe cold of the night, with only a thin sheet thrown over her shoulders. On Thursday, to cut off all hope of her being moved from her purpose, she put on the Dhujja, or coarse red turban, and broke her bracelets in pieces, by which she became dead in law, and for ever excluded from caste. Should she choose to live after this, she could never return to her family.

...On Saturday the 28th, in the morning, I rode out ten miles to the spot, and found the poor old widow sitting with the dhujja round her head, a brass plate before her with undressed rice and flowers, and a cocoa-nut in each hand. She talked very collectedly, telling me, that "she had determined to mix her ashes with those of her departed husband, and should patiently wait my permission to do so, assured that God would enable her to sustain life till that was given, though she dared not eat or drink."

...She held out her arm, and said —" My pulse has long ceased to beat—my spirit has departed—and I have nothing left but a little earth that I wish to mix with the ashes of my husband—I shall suffer nothing in burning; and if you wish proof, order some fire, and you shall see this arm consumed without giving me any pain." I did not attempt to feel her pulse, but some of my people did, and declared that it had ceased to be perceptible.

...Satisfied myself that it would be unavailing to attempt to save her life, I sent for all the principal members of the family, and consented that she should be suffered to burn herself. As she rose up, fire was set to the pile, and it was instantly in a blaze. The distance was about one hundred and fifty yards—she came on with a calm and cheerful countenance—stopped once, and casting her eyes upward said—" Why have they kept me five days from thee, my husband!" On coming to the sentries her supporters stopped—she walked once round the pit, paused a moment; and while muttering a prayer threw some flowers into the fire. She then walked up deliberately and steadily to the brink, stepped into the centre of the flame, sat down, and leaning back in the midst as if reposing upon a couch, was consumed without uttering a shriek or betraying one sign of agony!

...I am persuaded that it was the desire of again being united to her husband in the next world, and the entire confidence that she would be so if she now burned herself, that alone sustained her. From the morning of the day he died, Tuesday, till Wednesday evening, she ate pawns or betel leaves, but nothing else and from Wednesday evening she ceased eating them. She drank no water from Tuesday. She went into the fire with the same cloth about her that she had worn in the bed of the river; but it was made wet, from a persuasion, that even the shadow of any impure thing falling upon her when going to the pile contaminates the woman, unless counteracted by the sheet moistened in the holy stream."

On page 33 of the memoirs, Sleeman records a conversation that took place between him and a native gentleman. The latter provides him with a fascinating justification for the practice of suttee.

Describe the sky

Over the course of four years in the 1970s, artist G. C. Haymes sent approximately 500 letters to a wide-ranging selection of high profile people as part of a project entitled Skymail. Enclosed alongside the letters were return postcards, upon which the recipients were asked to 'describe the sky'. Here is a reply received from Isaac Asimov:

An inverted blue (sometimes black) semisphere, in which, when blue, a yellow circle is pasted, and to which, when black, some thousand of tiny sparks are affixed. There is also a dim yellow circle more noticable against the black, but sometimes seen against the blue which changes shape and is sometimes round, sometimes crescent, and sometimes in between. Often the semisphere is obscured by moving white or gray clouds.

Source:

Deadly missile

This news report says: “India on Monday morning successfully test fired one of its most sophisticated missiles, Prithvi II, from Chandipur in Orissa’s Balasore district. The 4.6 tonne missile can carry both conventional as well as nuclear warheads weighing between 500 to 1000 kg and has the ability to hit a target at a distance of 350 km.”

As there is nothing to the east of Chandipur, except the open seas, I carefully examined the map of India to identify cities/towns that could fall within the 350-km striking range of Prithivi-II. I am afraid that Kolkata, Jamshedpur, Rourkela, Bhubaneshwar, Cuttack and Puri are all potential targets that face the grave risk of being nuked out of existence. Let it not be said that they were not warned.

Keep it simple.

In his latest book, “The Greatest Show on Earth”, Richard Dawkins comments on Darwin’s understated writing style:

“Darwin’s treatment of human evolution in his most famous work, 'On the Origin of Species', is limited to twelve portentous words: “Light will be thrown on the origin of man and his history’. That is the wording of the first edition. By the sixth (and last) edition, Darwin allowed himself to stretch a point and the sentence became “Much light will be thrown on the origin of man and his history’. I like to think of his pen, poised over the fifth edition, while the great man judiciously pondered whether to indulge himself in the luxury of “Much’. Even with it, the sentence is a calculated understatement.”

Kurt Vonnegut, in a famous essay called “How to write with style” also dwelt on the need to keep things as simple as possible.

“As for your use of language: Remember that two great masters of language, William Shakespeare and James Joyce, wrote sentences which were almost childlike when their subjects were most profound. “To be or not to be?” asks Shakespeare’s Hamlet. The longest word is three letters long. Joyce, when he was frisky, could put together a sentence as intricate and as glittering as a necklace for Cleopatra, but my favorite sentence in his short story “Eveline” is this one: “She was tired.” At that point in the story, no other words could break the heart of a reader as those three words do.

Simplicity of language is not only reputable, but perhaps even sacred. The Bible opens with a sentence well within the writing skills of a lively fourteen-year-old: “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth”

Fennel satisfied/unhappy/concerned

“Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF) Vice-Patron and Earl of Wessex, Prince Edward visited the Games venues and Games Village in the Capital on Sunday and expressed satisfaction at the infrastructure being developed in preparation for the upcoming international sporting event” reports The Hindu of October 11th.

“Commonwealth Games Federation chief Mike Fennell has warned India's capital Delhi that it faces a major challenge to be ready to host next year's games. Many facilities being built for the event have missed deadlines. Mr Fennell said there could be no more slippages” reports BBC News of October 12th.

Far from being satisfied, a concerned Mr Fennel has appointed a review panel to monitor the progress, as can be inferred from this report.

After reading different versions, what I conclude is that Mr Fennel was completely unhappy about the progress of work ( or the lack of it), but expressed the hope that with a top-level push and with work done at breakneck speed, the deadline may still be met.

This is the problem with news these days. Back in the days when we had just one newspaper to go by, life was quite uncomplicated. You just believed what was written there and carried on blissfully. Now, with multiple options, you are forced to read so many versions and then make a judgemental call.

Unclear tests

How successful were the nuclear tests conducted by India in 1998? So many experts have commented on and analysed the subject ad nauseum in recent weeks; yet we remain unconvinced.

When the tests were reported, in the pre-Internet era, we in India only had access to what the Indian media published. And they were toeing the official line that the tests went off very well and yielded more than satisfactory results.

Luckily, we now have access to the archives of several newspapers abroad and can find out what they had reported on the blasts in May 1998. Not because the ‘foreign’ version is always correct or more accurate. Just that it provides us with one more viewpoint, free of patriotic biases.

The New York Times, dated May 15, 1998,( just 4 days after the blast) carried a report that expressed anxiety that the monitors had picked up only 1 out of the 5 blasts. Presuming that India’s claims were right, the writer’s first conclusion was that the thousands of seismometers around the world had failed to detect the tests, landing a body blow to the international monitoring system set up as part of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. Now countries could conduct tests surreptitiously, secure in the knowledge that they will escape detection.

But later in the article, the author realizes that there could be other reasons why the tests were not detected. He writes:

..Given the lack of independent evidence, the rest of the world only has India's word about the size and scope of most of the announced blasts, or even whether they took place at all.

Certainly India already seems to be exaggerating its achievement. Estimates by Indian seismologists of the explosive energy of Monday's large blast are more than double those of American experts.

For the Monday series, India said one was a ''thermonuclear device,'' meaning it had more force than an atom bomb. And it said the tests on Wednesday were in the ''sub-kiloton range,'' meaning they had a force of less than 1,000 tons of high explosive.

A bizarre twist, given that India and Pakistan are old foes, is that the best seismic data on the Indian blast came from a seismometer in Pakistan, 435 miles from the Indian test site.

The seismogram of a Monday blast, held a hint of what was perhaps another blast signature.

The clue is a tiny ripple in the flat line of the tracing before it zigs and zags wildly as energy from the blast was received and recorded. That tiny blip, he said, might have been caused by an earthquake or a small bomb detonated just before the big one.

…The energy of the large blast appeared to be equal to about 25,000 tons of high explosive, or about half of what Indian scientists have claimed.

This tallies with Mr Santhanam's estimate of the intensity of the blast.

Jugaad

The two New Yorkers, Dave Aur Jenny continue to write about their ‘struggles’ in Delhi. In their latest post, they talk about ‘Jugaad” or “make-do” mentality of the Indians and their ingenuity in the face of adversity.

Some examples being “a homemade vehicle made by cobbling together a wooden cart with the kind of diesel water pump farmers use for irrigation; motorcycles chopped in half and welded to carts to create centaur goods haulers. The way families would fit mother, father, and three kids onto a single scooter. The clever repurposing of used water bottles as cooking oil containers. Rope spun from discarded foil packets. Cricket wickets made from precariously balanced stacks of rocks..

But, the New Yorkers say, jugaad is not just about the clever mechanics. Jugaad is the philosophical outlook necessary to make it work, regardless of what “it” is. It’s about solving problems with what you have, not with what you wish you had…Jugaad is how everyone gets by;…..modern tools and technology are appreciated when they’re there, but they are not cardinal requirements for existence. Technology is a comfort, but not a necessity, and a lack of technology doesn’t change the fact that the job’s got to get done.

The Poms

The Kangaroos beat the Kiwis in the finals of the Champion Trophy. In the semi-finals, they had beaten the Pommies. Cricket correspondents and sub-editors love to use such terms.

One can understand “ kangaroos’ and ‘kiwis’, in reference to the Australians and New Zealanders respectively, and Springboks for the South Africans, but what about “pommies’? Where did that word come from?

There are many explanations: Pom is acronym of Port of Melbourne where British sailors used to land, or it stood for Prisoner of Her Majesty ( POHM) which later got shortened to Pom, etc.

The book, “Ballyhoo, Buckaroo and Spuds – Ingenious tales of words and their origins” by Michael Quinion cites this passage from D.H. Lawrence’s Australian novel, The Kangaroo’ to conclude that the word came from 'pomegranate"

“Pomegrenate, pronounced invariably pommygranate is a near enough rhyme to immigrant, in a naturally rhming country. Furthermore immigrants are known in their first months, before their blood thins down by their round and ruddy cheeks. So we are told. Hence again, pomegranate, and hence pommy. Let etymologists be appeased; it is the authorized derivation”.

Another version is that British sailors often were sent onshore, after the ship docked in Melbourne, to buy and stock up on pomegranates. For a similar reason, Americans referred to British sailors as ‘limeys’ for their habit of stocking up on lemons to avoid scurvy.

I wonder why the media doesn’t use any slang expressions in their headlines to describe Indians, Pakistanis or Sri Lankans?

Monied, but poorer..

John Michael Greer ( or The Grand Archdruid of the Ancient Order of Druids in America (AODA), as he modestly describes himself), has a brilliant post on the confusion between money and wealth. He explains

“For most people in the modern industrial world, the only way to get access to any kind of wealth – that is, any good or service – is to get access to money first, and exchange the money for the wealth. This makes it all too easy to confuse money with wealth, and it also fosters the habit of thought that treats money as the driving force in economic life, and thinks of wealth as a product of money, rather than seeing money as an arbitrary measure of wealth.”.

And adds::

The thought experiment of placing a hundred economists on a desert island with $1 million each but no food or water is a good corrective to this delusion. Unfortunately this same experiment is being tried on a much vaster scale by the world’s industrial economies right now. We have seven billion people on a planet with a finite and dwindling supply of the concentrated energy resources that are keeping most of them alive, and governments and businesses alike are acting as though the only possible difficulty in this situation is coming up with enough money to pay for investments in the energy industry.

And warns:

If economists took a wider view of the history of their discipline than they generally do, they might have noticed that what most of them consider a fundamental feature of all economies worth studying – the centrality of money – is actually a unique feature of an economic era defined by cheap abundant energy. Since the fossil fuels that made that era possible are being extracted at a pace many times the rate at which new supplies are being discovered, current assumptions about the role of money in society may be in for a series of unexpected revisions

.

Eggs and Thugs

While reading an article on the recent discovery of dinosaur eggs in Tamilnadu, I found a reference to a William Sleeman, who had made the first such discovery along the Narmada river, in 1828. The name rang a bell, and sure enough, Wikipedia tells me that it was the same Captain Sleeman who had busted the dreaded gang of the Thugees

In the eighteenth century, several cases of missing travelers, absconding sepoys and vanished money-carriers were reported. But it was generally concluded that the travelers had fallen prey to wild animals or that the money-carriers had cheated the owners. There were rumours of a secret society of murderers and dacoits, but this did not perturb the British officials, or was dismissed as yet another of those native legends.

It was not as if the methods of the thugs were not known. In 1816, a Dr Sherwood had published an article in the Madras Literary Magazine ( Sleeman has re-produced that report on Page 370 of his book) in which he had provided a chilling account of the murderous ways of the Phansigars in the South and the Thugs in the North. Sherwood had started his narration thus:

"While Europeans have journeyed through the extensive territories subject to the Government of Fort St. George, with a degree of security nowhere surpassed, the path of the native traveller has been beset with perils little known or suspected, into which numbers annually falling, have mysteriously disappeared, the victims of villains as subtle, rapacious and cruel as any who are to be met with in the records of human depravity….Skilled in the arts of deception, Phansigars enter into conversation and insinuate themselves, by obsequious attentions, into the confidence of travellers of all descriptions.... When the Phansigars determine . to attack a traveller, they usually propose to him, under the specious plea of mutual safety or for the sake of society, to travel together . and on arriving at a convenient place and a fit opportunity presenting . one of the gang puts a rope or sash round the neck of the unfortunate persons, while others assist in depriving him of his life."

But it was not till 1830 when Sleeman took charge of the investigations, and one Feringhea ( who was referred to as the Prince of Thugs) accidentally fell into his net, that the scale, intensity and spread of the Thugee operations came to be known. For the next two decades, Sleeman went about systematically to smoke out different thugs from their hideouts, interrogate them, learn their mysterious language ( Ramaseena), anticipate where the next hold-up was planned, nab the killers, put them on trial and have the guilty executed. Sleeman provides a fascinating account in his book, “ Thugs and Phansigars of India” published in 1839. And also in his memoirs, “ Ramblings of an Indian official” that reads like a series of long blog posts.

Dr.Conan Doyle had modeled Sherlock Holmes on his mentor, Dr Joseph Bell, arguing that similar reasoning powers based on deductive methods were called upon in both Medicine and Criminology. In Sleeman’s case, perhaps, the same methodical approach, was used in rooting out Thugee and in discovering the first fossilized eggs in India . He writes here ( page 127) briefly on how he zeroed in on the fossil spot.

Holy cow! Tharoor got it wrong!

In the controversy surrounding Shashi Tharoor’s twitter message, many opinions have been expressed and many have taken strong positions, one way or other. His expression, “holy cows”, some felt, was directed at Sonia Gandhi and other senior Congress leaders.

Prof V.R.Narayanaswamy, who writes a column in The Mint, points out that the use of the phrase ‘holy cow’ was wrong, for a different reason. Tharoor mixed up the phrases “sacred cows” and ‘holy cows’.

“Sacred cow” has its origin in India. It alludes to the veneration for the cow among the Hindus. Kamadhenu, often known as the cow of plenty, grants the wishes of her worshippers. Raja Rao’s short story, Cow of the Barricades, presents the cow as a symbol of Mother India; the cow, Gauri, gives up her own life to avert a conflict between two groups. “Sacred cow” in its metaphorical sense is dated around 1910 and refers to any institution or organization that is above criticism. “Holy cow” as commonly used does not stand for any concept. It is an exclamation of astonishment, delight or dismay. It became popular with its frequent use in the TV film series featuring Batman and his aide Robin. There are several similar oaths, such as holy smoke, holy Moses, holy moley, holy mackerel.

Letters from Stan

Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy have made me laugh the most. As a child, I watched a few of their movies in theatres, but it was with the advent of videotapes that I managed to catch up with their entire output spread over four decades. Even today, when I recall any of the scenes, I can’t suppress my laughter.

Via “Letters of Note’, I was delighted to come across this site that has catalogued letters from Stan Laurel from 1918 to 1964. The letters, claims the site, will serve to ‘better understand his life and celebrate his comedic genius.’

Which means that I have to commit myself to read 874 documents in the archives. Here’s another fine mess the pair has got me into.

Mark Twain and Vishnu Sahasranamam

“The writings of Mark Twain : Vol 6” that I had linked to in my previous post turned out to be a fascinating book and I have spent the last few hours engrossed in it. Some more excerpts, at random:

On the Bird of Birds — the Indian crow. I came to know him well, by and by, and be infatuated with him. I suppose he is the hardest lot that wears feathers. Yes, and the cheerfulest, and the best satisfied with himself. He never arrived at what he is by any careless process, or any sudden one; he is a work of art, and "art is long"; he is the product of immemorial ages, and of deep calculation; one can't make a bird like that in a day. He has been re-incarnated more times than Shiva; and he has kept a sample of each incarnation, and fused it into his constitution….(page 30)

On names and Titles:..The princely titles, the sumptuous titles, the sounding titles,— how good they taste in the mouth! The Nizam of Hyderabad ; the Maharajah of Travancore; the Nabob of Jubbulpore; the Begum of Bhopal; the Nawab of Mysore; the Ranee of Gulnare; the Ahkoond of Swat; the Rao of Rohilkund; the Gaikwar of Baroda. Indeed, it is a country that runs richly to name. The great god Vishnu has 108 — 108 special ones—108 peculiarly holy ones — names just for Sunday use only. I learned the whole of Vishnu's 108 by heart once, but they wouldn't stay; I don't remember any of them now but John W. (page 35)

Were Indians the world’s first germ scientists? …When we went to Agra, by and by, we happened there just in time to be in at the birth of a marvel — a memorable scientific discovery—the discovery that in certain ways the foul and derided Ganges water is the most puissant purifier in the world! This curious fact, as I have said, had just been added to the treasury of modern science.

It had long been noted as a strange thing that while Benares is often afflicted with the cholera she does not spread it beyond her borders. This could not be accounted for. Mr. Henkin, the scientist in the employ of the government of Agra, concluded to examine the water. He went to Benares and made his tests. He got water at the mouths of the sewers where they empty into the river at the bathing ghats; a cubic centimeter of it contained millions of germs; at the end of six hours they were all dead. He caught a floating corpse, towed it to the shore, and from beside it he dipped up water that was swarming with cholera germs; at the end of six hours they were all dead. He added swarm after swarm of cholera germs to this water; within the six hours they always died, to the last sample. Repeatedly, he took pure well water which was barren of animal life, and put into it a few cholera germs; they always began to propagate at once, and always within six hours they swarmed — and were numberable by millions upon millions.

For ages and ages the Hindoos have had absolute faith that the water of the Ganges was absolutely pure, could not be defiled by any contact whatsoever, and infallibly made pure and clean whatsoever thing touched it. They still believe it, and that is why they bathe in it and drink it, caring nothing for its seeming filthiness and the floating corpses. The Hindoos have been laughed at, these many generations, but the laughter will need to modify itself a little from now on. How did they find out the water's secret in those ancient ages? Had they germ-scientists then? We do not know. We only know that they had a civilization long before we emerged from savagery. ( page 194)

The land that all men desire to see.

Mark Twain’s ‘variegated vagabondising’ brought him to India in the year 1895. “The writings of Mark Twain- Vol 6” published a year later, contains these passages and many more:

Bombay! A bewitching place, a bewildering place, an enchanting place — the Arabian Nights come again! It is a vast city; contains about a million inhabitants. Natives, they are, with a slight sprinkling of white people — not enough to have the slightest modifying effect upon the massed dark complexion of the public. It is winter here, yet the weather is the divine weather of June, and the foliage is the fresh and heavenly foliage of June. There is a rank of noble great shade trees across the way from the hotel, and under them sits groups of picturesque natives of both sexes; and the juggler in his turban is there with his snakes and his magic; and all day long the cabs and the multitudinous varieties of costumes flock by. It does not seem as if one could ever get tired of watching this moving show, this shining and shifting spectacle…..

….This is indeed India; the land of dreams and romance, of fabulous wealth and fabulous poverty, of splendor and rags, of palaces and hovels, of famine and pestilence, of genii and giants and Aladdin lamps, of tigers and elephants, the cobra and the jungle, the country of a hundred nations and a hundred tongues, of a thousand religions and two million gods, cradle of the human race, birthplace of human speech, mother of history, grandmother of legend, great-grandmother of tradition, whose yesterdays bear date with the mouldering antiquities of the rest of the nations — the one sole country under the sun that is endowed with an imperishable interest for alien prince and alien peasant, for lettered and ignorant, wise and fool, rich and poor, bond and free, the one land that all men desire to see, and having seen once, by even a glimpse, would not give that glimpse for the shows of all the rest of the globe combined.

….In India your day may be said to begin with the "bearer's" knock on the bedroom door, accompanied by a formula of words — a formula which is intended to mean that the bath is ready. It doesn't really seem to mean anything at all. But that is be cause you are not used to " bearer " English. You will presently understand. Where he gets his English is his own secret. There is nothing like it elsewhere in the earth; or even in paradise, perhaps, but the other place is probably full of it. You hire him as soon as you touch Indian soil; for no matter what your sex is, you cannot do without him. He is messenger, valet, chambermaid, table-waiter, lady's maid, courier — he is everything.

The future be damned.

“If we knew that what we have now would soon be gone, perhaps we could better appreciate what we have today. We might be more concerned about family and friends and what is truly important, instead of worrying about amassing more wealth” writes Gail the Actuary in the Oil Drum.

He then links to an earlier post ‘Life After the Crash: Lessons from Kenya,’ in which he had quoted from an email he had received from a Kenyan reader. The reader had responded to Gail’s presentation that had warned that ‘the need for growth in the future would collide with finite resources’:

"It's the mindset that makes most Kenyans experience a happiness most Westerners would never consider to be possible given realities - as they see and experience them.

In Kenya, we do use electricity (hydro / diesel), if we can. We have constant power cuts. But that's not the only limit. In fact, the vast majority of us, even the so-called middle-class, build our lives around limits. Limits are the basis for every decision we make, business or otherwise. It is, you could say, a way of life that is happy when it is not done in - not unhappy if things go wrong (I am not sure that this makes sense).

People there - including me - celebrate every day that was a good day. And a good day is one where we got by. I would say, for 95% of Kenyans, life there is very much focused on the hour - and hardly ever on the future."

According to Derek, people can be very happy just celebrating each day, and not worrying too much about the future. Even if we knew (or suspected) there was likely to be a crash ahead, we could be happy with what we had each day. There is no real reason to worry about possible future calamities. We can only live one day at a time, anyhow, and we are pretty limited as to what we can do to change things”

So, either learn to live today as if there will be no tomorrow or pre-suppose that it will bring good fortune. As the Arab saying goes, “Bukra fil mish mish” (Tomorrow there will be apricots), No point in living 'today' worrying about possible disasters that can strike you 'tomorrow.'

West is beautiful

Tyler Cowen’ quoting from a book by Anne Applebaum asks “Where did all the gorgeous Russian women now gracing the covers of Vogue and tennis courts come from? Where were they a decade or two back?”

The answer, as the author explains, is that the beautiful women were there all along. But, they didn’t have the clothes or the cosmetics to enhance their looks, and couldn’t use their faces to launch international careers.

Cowen ( or rather Applebaum) uses this example to make a generalization that ‘open’ and ‘globalised’ markets bring in benefits in all spheres of human activity, just as it brought the beautiful Russian girls to the cover of Vogue.

Unfortunately, what open markets and cosmetics also do is to come up with a single standard of beauty- one that appeals to western sensibilities.

The book “Anthropology matters” ( courtesy : Google Books) points out that Western influence is distorting perceptions completely in Asia and Africa. In Nigeria, where plumpness was considered a sign of prosperity, good health and sexuality, (they even had ‘fattening’ rooms in which teenage girls used to be kept locked), women are under increasing pressure to conform to the thin ideal. Asian women in Korea, China, and Philippines are undergoing cosmetic surgery to remove folds and to create double eye-lids to conform to Western standards of beauty. And, all over the world, when it comes to cosmetics, the major western brands are sought after.

Almost all Bollywood stars follow a Western- and often bizarre- style of dressing and in their use of cosmetics. Anorexia has them all in its vice-like grip. My ode to the plump heroine of yesteryears captured my thoughts on this subject.

A dwarf variety that caused a giant leap

Did Norman Borlaug, deserve the accolades he received for ushering in the so-called “Green Revolution”? Was his work really responsible for saving millions of lives?

Nick Cullather, in a forthcoming book titled, “The Hungry world. Amercia’s encounter with rural Asia” (Link via Marginal Revolution) cites CIA analysts who attributed the bumper crop not so much to the dwarf variety developed by Borlaug, but to a pronounced shift in the weather, a phenomenon later to be called the El Nino cycle. And also to the fact that Indian farmers had till then not invested their resources on growing wheat, due to large scale imports of wheat from the USA. (Note the cause and the effect. Wheat was not imported because there was shortage or poor yield here. Rather, wheat was not cultivated because imports made local farming unviable)

But, he says, Borlaug did much more than prevent an imaginary catastrophe. In the 1960s, the sub-continent was viewed by the USA as a dangerous place. Separatist movements gained momentum drawing strength from the restlessness of peasants. The Rockefeller and the Ford Foundation, with the help of Borlaug, decided to introduce the dwarf wheat which would require the farmers to use methods that required more precision and a more scientific approach. This would change the attitude of the farmers and favourably impact their relationship with their families, leaders and each other.

In short, the dwarf wheat was a mechanical toy given to a naughty child to keep him engaged, quiet and more obedient. The Americans, ever the custodians of world peace and morality, took it upon themselves to rid the third world of its ‘militant attitude’ and decided to ‘move governments’ using the dwarf wheat variety as a red herring.

Commenting on the book extract, Salil Tripathi lists at least seven inaccuracies and wonders why he should buy the book.

Update 20/09/09: Graham Harvey, author of the book, “The carbon fields. How our countryside can save Britain” points out the unintended consequences of Borlaug’s revolution, in an article published in Times online.

“Borlaug intended his methods to be used for the benefit of people across the planet. Instead they were seized on by industrial countries with the wealth to pay for expensive seeds and fertilisers. Where they were used in developing countries, this often came at the cost of a crippling debt burden.

Today Borlaug’s ideas underpin the global food system. Three quarters of the world’s cultivated land is sown to grain crops and oilseeds. Most are dependent on massive amounts of oil energy in the form of nitrate fertilisers, pesticides, diesel fuel and heavy machinery.

Though the Green Revolution has undoubtedly given the world more food, it has brought with it worrying consequences. An investigation into agriculture funded by the World Bank concluded that the benefits have been unevenly distributed. Equally disturbing, the revolution has led to widespread environmental damage that may reduce the planet’s capacity to feed future generations.

Zero % GDP growth

The Oil Drum has an interesting explanation on ‘peasant’ behaviour and mindset. Some excerpts:

“We often think that we have a problem of scarcity of resources. It is not so: scarcity is not absolute. Whether we have enough of something or not depends on our perception of what we need. And, because we seem to think that we never have enough, we tend to use what we have faster than it can be replaced.

But human beings haven’t always been like this. Ancient peasants lived, mostly, in a "zero growth" world and, perhaps, in the future we'll return to a condition in which the finiteness of resources is an obvious fact of life.

Why is it, we may wonder, that the peasants do nothing to better themselves? Some scholars have concluded that they are too desperately poor to have time for social cooperation or for political agitation. Others have attributed the inaction to their being as impassive as their donkeys and oxen. Still others explain that the peasants have been exploited for so long by the upper classes that they would never join their social su­periors in any venture, for fear of being cheated. Each of these statements is true to some extent, but none by itself can account for the peasants' disregard of their own welfare.

Peasants view their total environment as one in which all the good things of life-land, wealth, power, friendship, sex, health, and honor-exist in only lim­ited quantities. As they see it, the limitation exists for two reasons: 'There are more of themselves than there are of good things, and they consider themselves powerless to increase the quantities available. Peasants have unconsciously extended a truth about the limited nature of their arable land to include all aspects of life. Like the land itself, good things can be divided and their ownership changed-but they cannot be increased.

Because not enough good exists to go around, a peasant family can improve its position only at the expense of other families in the community. A family that actively works to improve its lot thus represents a threat; whatever extra good it obtains must inevitably be taken from someone else. Peasants consequently regard modern farming techniques as ways to deprive others of their rightful share of wealth rather than as ways to increase productivity and thus to create new wealth.”

Letters of note

Via Jason Kottke, I came across this site which publishes copies of rare letters written by eminent personalities. There is one written in 1939 by Gandhi to Hitler, urging the latter to drop the idea of war. Another by Charles Darwin, to his friend, written a full 15 years before the publication of his “On the Origin of species”. Yet another written by Winston Churchill with instructions that it be handed over to his wife in the event of his death.

And a crisp, simple ‘thank you’ note from Marilyn Monroe.

The long and the short of it.

This is the sixth story in the Bata Thatha series.

The Walkie-Talkies were on their morning walk at the Marina, discussing the details of the ongoing Test match, at the Chepauk, between India and Australia. The home team, sadly, was getting clobbered.

“Just look at the Australians. They are so big-made and strong. When they pound the ball, it races like a bullet to the fence” observed Polo T-shirt.

“And they are so tall. Take Symonds or Hayden. And compare them with Gambhir or Sehwag, who are barely five and a half feet each” added Nike Shorts.

“I have heard that the Australian coaches go around and identify small babies in their cradles, and make them undergo special surgical procedures and hormone treatment that would make their bones and muscles grow disproportionately” claimed Reebok Wrist-Band.

“Maybe so, but cricket is not basketball. Height isn’t everything in this game. A Tendulkar or a Gavaskar can smash the ball better than any tall batsman.. It is just a question of technique and timing” chipped in Adidas Track-pants.

“Gentlemen, you are forgetting Ishant Sharma” interjected Bata Thatha. He is one of the tallest cricketers around and he is not Australian. I follow his fortunes closely, as I have a grand nephew by that same name.”

“Was your relative a tall cricketer too?” asked Puma Socks.

“No. He never played cricket nor was he tall. Let me tell you more about him”

“My cousin’s grandson, Ishant, (said Bata Thatha) had always been fond of plants. Even as a young boy he had learnt many grafting techniques and, by the time he reached adulthood, had his own collection of bonsai trees. Whether his fascination for bonsai was because he himself was rather short – he was about 4’10” – or because he was born with a skill and keen desire to miniaturise everything, I can’t say. But he was constantly in the company of his bonsai trees.

As he grew up, this hobby turned into a fetish. He wanted to extend the concept beyond the realm of plants and into other areas. He became increasingly convinced that tall human beings were highly inefficient and were draining more resources from this planet than was warranted. No purpose was served by having people taller than 5’, he would argue.

“If adults were shorter and smaller, houses could be more compact,” he would explain. “Planes, trains, cars could have smaller seats and occupy much less space. Office cubicles, workstations, bathrooms, toilet seats, doors, would be more optimally sized. Sizes L, XL and XXL could be eliminated from the range of trousers, shirts, salwars, etc and shelves in shops would be less crammed. All in all, the world would be more efficient, less resource-consuming and more carbon friendly’, he would conclude.

After much thought, he came up with a diabolical plan, one he ominously referred to as “The Final Solution to the Problem of Inefficiency”. He would divide the human race into three distinct categories: unborn, those born and still growing and finally the fully grown. The first category would be taken care through genetic engineering methods that would inhibit growth hormones suitably and restrict the height. The second would be tackled with bonsai methods. A little snipping of the hair and nails, wiring and clamping of the bones here and there, some pruning of the muscles and trimming of the fingers and toes, followed by grafting and de-skinning as necessary. The third category, namely the adults who had already grown beyond 5’, would simply have to be eliminated. Inefficiency must be rooted out, after all.”

The rather enthused manner in which Bata Thatha was narrating the story seemed to suggest that he was fully endorsing Ishant’s scheme. Adidas-trackpants, with a worried expression on his face, asked him, “So, how far has the scheme progressed?”

Bata Thatha said, “Not too far. Just when Ishant was about to roll out his plan, Cupid struck, Yes, he fell madly in love with a girl, Jaya, who from her height of 5’2”simply towered over him. They soon got married.”

“And what about his plans to miniaturise the human race?” asked Nike shorts.

“I am sorry to say” said Bata Thatha, “Jaya put an end to it. Apparently, ever since she had been a small girl, she had been captivated by psychic phenomena. In particular she had closely studied the methods of one, D.D.Home, who had lived in the nineteenth century in London. Home had demonstrated the capacity to elongate his body by a good 11 inches, as if he was being pulled up by his neck. Later he could cause elongation in others. He had written down his methods in great detail. A copy of the manuscript had fallen into Jaya’s possession and she made it clear that she planned to test it out very soon.

“So, would you care to assist me in my research?” asked Jaya

“I shan’t, I shan’t” replied Ishant emphatically.