Iski topi uske sar

So Kejriwal wants to rehash a last year story on Vadra and a 2-weeks-old cover story on Maharashtra's irrigation scam to come up with the earth-shattering conclusion that politicians shouldn't collude with businessmen, while he is himself flanked by Mayank Gandhi, accused of a graft in the redevelopment of 30 acres of a South Mumbai property, Prashant Bhushan, whose Kumud Bhushan Educational Society was allowed to buy 4.68 hectares of land in the hill-State of Himachal Pradesh in 2010 where land is a scarce resource and there is an embargo on outsiders buying it without government permission and Anjali Damania, who gallantly wanted the irrigation dam in Maharashtra near her plot to be shifted by 700 metres to save her own 30 acres! The funny part is, Kejriwal screeches his jholla-wallah rhetoric with a GANDHI topi on his head!

On the 10th of January 1927, Gandhi wrote this in a letter to Ghanshyam Das Birla, “My thirst for money is simply unquenchable. I need at least Rs 2,00,000 — for khadi, untouchability and education. The dairy work makes another Rs 50,000. Then there is the Ashram expenditure. No work remains unfinished for want of funds, but God gives after severe trials. This also satisfies me. You can give as you like for whatever work you have faith in.”  

G.D. Birla accompanying Mahatma Gandhi on his stroll from the Birla House, New Delhi

In the late 1920's, when Gandhi was fiercely advocating the use of hand-spun khadi, Birla contested his stand by writing to him, “Do you not think that you are unnecessarily exaggerating the results of the khadi propaganda? You could find this out yourself if you send hawkers with mill-made as well as shuddha khadi who may ask some villagers to select their choice after explaining the latter properly about the quality as well as the price of the cloth, I have not the least doubt that if you made the experiment you will find that 90 per cent of the consumers will pick up the cheaper and more lasting of the two stuffs. Mill khadi is popular because people find it cheap, durable besides it being swadeshi make.”  The mighty warrior that Gandhi was, he chickened out dutifully and replied thus to Birla in 1930, “I am convinced that the boycott will be successful only through khadi. This does not mean that the mills have no place in the scheme at all. The mills can have their deserved place by recognising the worth of khadi. The conception of God envelopes all Gods.” 

While we are at giving our dear departed national i-con a belated jhadu ki jhappi, it would be worth pointing out that Gandhi was a regular resident in the Birla household in Delhi since 1925, and he spent the last 144 days of his life in the erstwhile Birla House, which has now been converted into a Gandhi museum called Gandhi Smriti. Ha-ha-hi-hi-ho-ho.

Recall what the dainty Nightingale of India once tweeted, "It costs a lot to keep Gandhi poor." 

Who was the last ambitious i-con who started his political innings by heaping mud on other politicians? V. P. Singh.

5 old mules

Good afternoon, good morning, good evening- depending on where you are.

The khaps are at it again. Asking women not to venture out without a male escort. And they have found support from politicians as well as a section of the educated illiterate which hides behind the sham label of "common man" while living the lives of callous monsters. 

Let me provide some relevant stats.

A study titled The Role of Women in Agriculture reveals that "women comprise just over 40 percent of the agricultural labour force in the developing world, a figure that has risen slightly since 1980 and ranges from about 20 percent in the Americas to almost 50 percent in Africa. The global average is dominated by Asia. Within Asia, the sub-regional averages range from about 35 percent in South Asia to almost 50 percent in East and Southeast Asia. The Asian average is dominated by China, where the female share of the agricultural labour force has increased slightly during the past three decades. The female share in India has remained steady at just over 30 percent". From the same study: "Information provided to FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) from 86 countries indicates that in 2008, 5.4 million women worked as fishers and fish farmers in the primary sector. This represents 12 percent of the total. In two major producing countries, China and India, women represented a share of 21 percent and 24 percent, respectively, of all fishers and fish farmers". Some facts released by the Indian Government: 48% of India’s self-employed farmers are women. There are 75 million women engaged in dairying as against 15 million men and 20 million in animal husbandry as compared to 1.5 million men.

Another study titled Feminization of India’s agricultural workforce by Anuradha Talwar and Swapan Ganguly states that "amongst rural women, the percentage of 'marginal workers' (defined as working for less than 183 days per year) has increased significantly from 8.1 per cent in 1991 to 14.2 per cent in 2002".

A 3rd study, which seeks to point out the benefits of using bio-mass fuel by rural women starts out by pointing: "The overall pattern of time spent on such activities is analyzed for over 5,000 women in rural India. Women spend about 40 minutes per day collecting fuel and almost one hour fetching water. They spend almost two hours pursuing income-earning activities. 64 percent of the surveyed women engage in some kind of income-generating activity".

I spent some time collating census data and found the following % breakup for male and female "Agricultural Laborers" in 4 states of India which are relevant to this discussion: Haryana (56%, 44%- which means that 44% of all female laborers in Haryana are females), Goa (45%, 55%)- this is what happens when males spend their days sipping fenny, Uttar Pradesh (62%, 38%) and Rajasthan (42%, 58%)- 58 PERCENT OF AGRICULTURAL LABORERS IN RAJASTHAN ARE FEMALES. 

If you are still awake, what this implies is that a large proportion of rural women work on the farm, fetch water, catch fish and perform other income-generating activities, which they can't do by staying inside their homes. Moreover, as per a recent FAO report, if women had the same access to productive resources as men they could increase their yields by 20-30 per cent. This would raise total agricultural yields in developing countries between 2.5-4 % and reduce the number of hungry people in the world by 100-150 million. And here we have the glorious khaps asking women to stop doing all of these till the menfolk get rid of their hangover and are ready to escort them. Well, asking women not to go out because the same khaps have done NOTHING to improve the human quotient of the rapists in their villages is like asking people not to buy vehicles because the roads in the villages are only going to get worse, or asking them not to have children because of the high infant mortality rates in the country, or better still, asking villagers not to pass excreta because the sanitation facilities in the villages are inadequate. Whoopsy daisy!

These same khaps pass judgments censuring people from specific castes, issue orders for DIShonor killings and routinely defy the Constitution of the country. Defending them is the same as stating that the Taliban should be respected because they help people in times of earthquakes!!!

Good night and God Save us, wherever you are!!! Btw, God chose not to save Manoj and Babli as 5 old mules in Haryana smoking hukkas brayed and asked for them to be killed. 

Resolutions: piece of cake

I did it. Fulfilled my resolutions for 2011. Every one of them. While you were lolling around procrastinating and finding ways to avoid what you had set out to do, I was my usual focused, committed, diligent, persevering, and unblinking self, blasting anything that came in the way of me and the fulfillment of my resolutions. So it is with great joy, and profound humility, that I present before you my royal conquests.

#	Resolution at the start of the year	Fulfillment
1	Achieve a dramatic turnaround in my body weight and achieve a balance which will aid me in aligning my external and internal persona resulting in a harmonious synergy of body and spirit.	Gained 10.25 kgs.
2	Immerse myself in celebrated works of literary accomplishment to enrich my intellect and leave me throbbing with perspicacity and sagacity.	Read 291 book reviews.
3	Travel to hitherto unknown lands so as to broaden my worldview and assimilate the experiences of diverse cultures thus making me an epitome of syncreticity.	Went to Bhindi Bazaar.
4	Associate myself with meaningful and change-inducing social causes demanding courage which would leave an imprint on the course of the times to come.	Stared back at an auto-wallah.
5	Make a multitude of friends of the opposite sex so as to be able to understand their thought processes better and have a plethora of mutually rewarding and memorable experiences.	Followed Mallika Sherawat, Poonam Pandey and Sherlyn Chopra on twitter.
6	Involve myself with rejuvenating sporting activities so as to increase my energy levels and attain exemplary fitness.	Played Scrabble on facebook.
7	Learn more about the lives of luminaries belonging to different fields so as to attain inspiration to ascend to great heights.	Read a dozen obituaries.
8	Delve deep into the world of cool gadgets.	Learnt how to scroll through a document on a MacBook.
9	Get in touch with old friends and make new ones with the objective of enriching my social life and surrounding myself with invigorating conviviality.	Sent 21 friend requests on facebook, 5 on Netlog, and several others on other forums, the names of which are tough to recall.
10	Invest in art.	Went to The Comedy Store.

Jealous? :D Well, you can do it too.