I Congratulate Sachin Tendulkar on Getting Padma Vibhushan

He is diminutive, he is great, he is awesome and he is a star, he is a Superstar....I congratulate my Superstar Sachin Tendulkar on getting India's second highest civilian honour - Padma Vibhushan....He has caught the imagination of the Indians, especially the youth, for the past two decades like noone else and it is only befitting that he is honoured with Padma Vibhushan...Let us utilize this occasion to hail this great son of India.....We are proud of you, Sachin.....

Bhabhiji of Chennai

Last night a name that I heard,
Prompted me to turn back pages,
Of my memoir, written in Chennai,
Short, compact, yet eloquently vivid,
And still in my minds eye, I recollect,
That lady, I reverently called Bhabhi,
For, on her face she wore a grace,
So subtly pure, so gracefully benign.

But she, as the great Irish poet said -
“Loved long and long and grew to be out of fashion,
Like an old song" - pale and thin,
And fell victim to her tumultuous life,
For, her beloved, the destiny’s hapless child,
Had unappeasable kin – impervious and rude,
And scarcely had courage to subdue,
Venomous, hostile thoughts of his kin.

He bade her adieu, with sombre mind,
And put her ruefully to bitter oblivion,
Alas ! Now she is on a long meander,
Through strange paths, to strange destinations,
But as I behold her tread to reclusion,
My conscience inspires me to tell her -
'I trust you as I trust my mother,
Albeit, this whole world might denounce.'

I Support Barrack Obama - But Alas ! My Vote Won't Count

Caucuses and Primaries at Iowa and New Hampshire are over and we have some more of them at places like South Carolina, Florida, Maine and at some other places. Even after spending some time to understand the intricacies of caucuses and primaries, I must confess that I am still all at sea about knowing the facts about them. Again that is none of my business, but what certainly my business is and should be the business of a lot of people around the world is to closely watch and follow the candidates for the American Presidential election as it holds a lot of ramifications for the world that we are living in. There is a common perception around the world that there is going to be change in the US government with the incumbent Republican party being replaced by a Democratic government and therefore it is very important for us to know who the democratic candidate is going to be for the Presidential election to be held on 4 November 2008. For me, the ideal candidate would be the Illinois senator,Barrack Obama and not the 'Comeback Kid II', Hillary Rodham Clinton, the New York Senator.

Mr.Obama, if elected, would become the nation's first African-American President. The 46 year old civil rights lawyer is perhaps the most unassuming US Presidential candidate that I have ever seen and he hardly looks in the mould that we Asian would imagine an American President to be. The tall Democrat, with less aesthetic grandeur but great vocal magnificence, appears to be a man of integrity and the policies that he claims he'll pursue, if selected the most powerful man on earth, are certainly quite impressive. Obama's election slogan is "Change, we can believe in" and that is what we all want and hope, a change from the long treaded path of the American Government - of imperialism, world policing and international hegemony. But as John Kerry had said on Thursday, it is sometimes the hardest thing to make a clean break with the past, to readily embrace new thinking and new beginning and therefore it is going to be a real challenge for Mr.Obama to break the status quo and stride to a new path which would restore America's lost credibility and moral authority. A close perusal of his policy plans bring out a real paradigm shift that he intends to bring from the way American decision makers are behaving and governing in the present day under the Presidency of the Republican George Bush.

Foreign Policy
His major foreign policy decisions would be to bring back the US troops from Iraq as soon as possible, press Iraq's leaders to reconcile, aggressive diplomacy to bring back normalcy in Iraq and the Middle East, direct Presidential diplomacy with Iran without preconditions and the humanitarian initiative to confront the grave humanitarian crisis in Iraq, as he believes that America has the moral and security responsibility to do so. Mr.Obama has always been a strong believer that the US troops are fighting a lost battle at Iraq and hence he always wanted to bring back the troops without any more casualties. His plan to have a diplomatic effort towards defusing tensions with Iran, without any preconditions is a real gutsy decision and have to be appreciated and this certainly shows how young minds, which Mr.Obama truly represent, can overcome absurd and preposterous decisions taken by the experienced lot at times.

Civil Rights
Mr.Obama, a civil rights lawyers himself, has been at the forefront in his country's pursuance of promoting civil rights and criminal justice system. He plans to make laws to bring a condition where women will get equal pay for equal work and will also work to overturn Supreme Court's ruling that curtails racial minorities' and women's ability to challenge pay discrimination .

Economy
One of the most serious issues of present day America is the wrong economic position that they are finding themselves in. There are a lot of disparities in the tax regime and Mr.Obama plans to provide tax relief to middle class Americans. He will also try to strengthen the trade position with other countries and will try to create more jobs for the Americans. He will also increase minimum wages and will index it to inflation to ensure it rises every year.

Energy and Environment
Obama supports implementation of market-based cap-and-trade system to reduce the carbon emissions by the amount scientists say is necessary. he will invest in clean energy future, support next generation biofuels, will set America to path of oil independence and will restore US leadership on climate change.

Health care
Health care issues and the opposition against incompetent health insurance system in America are quite vociferous this time around as well. Mr.Obama is having a comprehensive plan for the bringing the health care sector back on track. Obama will bring new national health insurance plan to all Americans, including self employed and small businesses, help individuals to purchase private insurance plan, provide mandatory coverage for children, lower cost by modernising the US health care system, bring in new initiatives and will fight AIDS world wide.

When the lanky Illinois Senator stands for the election, with unique vision, uncompromised ethics and unchallenged integrity, for becoming the first African-American President of the United States, I support him unconditionally and with much hope that he would bring a sea change in the way in which the Americans would look upon the rest of the world and vice versa. But obviously, my support and vote for Mr.Obama won't get counted, sadly.

(With inputs from Barrack Obama's official website for 2008 Presidential Campaign)

Umpiring, Refereeing and the Aussie Behaviour, an Absolute 'Bullshit'

Though it is obvious that using the word 'Bullshit' in any Public space, leave alone a public blog, is not fair and is absolutely ridiculous, it seems that it is the only word that suits to describe what happened at the SCG last Sunday. Here there was a test match which was farcical, satirical and nonsensical and above all, grossly biased. There were 11 Aussie players, all garbed in gentlemen dress playing a gentleman's game with utmost disregard for honesty, purity, virtue, decency, morality and integrity. They say that a team always takes the personality of the captain and this is very much evident in the current Australian team where the whole team takes on the boorish personality of their captain, the boorish and vulgar Ponting. Mr.Ponting on a cricket field looks less like a captain leading a cricket team and more like a thug heading a group of ruffians constantly abusing the opposition, bullying the opponents and intimidating the umpires.

The team of liars and their cheat captain, Ponting were interested only in winning the match by hook or by crook to equal the most consecutive test match wins by a team and therefore for that, they blatantly told lies, did on-field cheating and virtually bullied the incompetent umpires to give decisions in favour of them and thereby manoeuver a pretty much unlikely test match win for them. It is a shame that a champion team like Australia has to resort to such disgraceful deeds to overcome a team while playing a hard game of test match cricket. We all are pretty sure that Harbhajan's "bunny", Mr.Ponting is using Symonds' allegation of racial slur on Harbhajan to see the back of him as Bhajji has started taking Ponting's wicket at his will. The Aussie captain is afraid of the canny off spinner and is using this issue to demoralize him or to 'mentally disintegrate' him, to use Steve Waugh's terminology. Mr.Ponting is not having the slightest of integrity left in him as was evident on Sunday when he was making some of the most ludicrous claims of taking a catch. In one instance he was very vociferous in his appeal against MS Dhoni when he had actually grassed the catch.

One of the most obvious truths about the Australian team, which is not often referred about, is that they are not at all suited to play the gentlemen game and the Australian cricket board would do good if they would take some steps to put these Aussie "kids" back to school so that they can learn some manners and then come back to play cricket. The Australians are so arrogant about their cricket acumen that they have long forgotten that more than winning, what is important is to play a game in the right spirit of the game. It was so shocking to see Adam Gilchrist, the Aussie who walks, and Michael Clark, the captain-to-be, also involved in such ridiculous attempts of bad sportsmanship.

To say that the umpiring in the Sydney test was farcical would be an understatement. The incompetent umpires - Steve Bucknor and Mark Benson had ruined a much awaited test match. Mr.Bucknor, already under the scanner for giving a lot of decisions against the Indians were at the forefront to knit sinister designs to undermine Indian players' efforts on the field. His decision to give not out to Symonds when he was caught behind while he was just 30 runs had turned out to be a series deciding decision. He also failed to refer the third umpire in one such shocking incidence when Symonds was out of the crease and Dhoni stumped him on the bowling of Harbhajan Singh. The third and most atrocious decision came when he adjudged Rahul Dravid caught behind in the second innings when his bat was way away from the ball and this decision was fatal for the Indians as they were looking forward to that wonderful partnership between Dravid and Ganguly to save the game. But the liars, Ponting and Co., connived with Mr.Bucknor in successfully sabotaging India's efforts with their malicious "play-ground" like appealing demeanor. The other on field umpire, Mark Benson was equally inept and incompetent where he was not able to hear the knick that Ponting made while he was leg glancing Ganguly in the first innings and was stupid and outrageously funny when he asked Mr.Ponting and not the third umpire, whether Michael Clark had taken Ganguly's catch cleanly or had he grassed it in the final day. Even a mere thought of the third umpire, Mr.Bruce Oxenford brings disgust, loathe and nauseation as that dumb buffoon, who is infact the Director of a furniture showroom at Brisbane, had made a mockery of the usage of technology in umpiring decisions. His atrocious act of giving Symonds not out, when he was stumped by Dhoni off Kumble while the television replays made it clear that his foot was not grounded, was awful and appalling and made it clear that he would be good enough only to sell wood and should be considered an absolute outcast in a cricket field. Cricket Australia would do a big service to the game of cricket if they would fire this abominable clown from taking part in any aspect of the game.

Refereeing by Mike Proctor in the Sydney test match was biased to say the least. Only Mr.Proctor knows what hell on this earth has prompted him to declare that Harbhajan has committed racial abuse when he himself had said on record that the evidences against Harbhajan are inconclusive. There were no audio or video evidences against him and the umpires had testified that they haven't heard anything either. So he was making his judgment only on hearing what the knave Clarke and Hayden had said and turned a Nelson's eye to what Tendulkar had testified. This was taking the word of one person over another and this is tantamount to saying that he doubts the integrity of the Indians while he has absolute trust on the words of the Australians. This is an insult to India and all Indians and is a scathing remark by a Whiteman against the Indians and hence is a racist outpouring. Let Mr.Procter make the evidences public on which he has convicted Harbhajan, let him come clean and if you have any guts Mr.Procter, come up with your damn evidences and then we'll decide who is guilty and who is not, but not before that.

Some quarters of the Australian press and majority of Australians are furious that the Indians are speaking against the three test ban on Harbhajan. They themselves presume that Harbhajan is guilty of racial slur and need no hard evidences to accuse Harbhajan and interestingly find that India has no moral right to appeal against the verdict. Hey you Aussies, is this the way legal matters work in your country ? Do your legal system hear only the evidences provided by the accuser and his friends and make judgments against the accused ? If this is how it works there, then I am sorry to say that the legal system in your country is as sick as your cricket players are and is bound to be damned.

There is absolutely no point in continuing playing like this at a place where we Indians are sure that we wont get justice.The biased umpires, the opinionated match referee and an opposition that would go to any ludicrous extend to win a match are not the people from whom we can expect good demeanor.So stand up guys, because here our national pride is at stake and we are a proud country with a great history and a great civilization. The BCCI should jettison its pusillanimity and should flex its political and economic muscle to make the ICC bow down and bring justice to all Indians in general and Harbhajan Singh in particular. We want order and natural justice to prevail and should not back off until absolute justice is attained.

Benazir Bhutto and Pakistan After Her Demise

It has been one week since one of the greatest tragedies of our era has happened - The martyrdom of Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto. The repercussions and implications of the event are yet to get completely unfolded. The immediate results are the postponement of the election date at Pakistan from 8th January to 18th February, and more importantly the anointment of the young Bilawal Bhutto Sardari, son of Benazir Bhutto, as the Chairman of the Pakistan People's Party (PPP), the most popular political party in Pakistan.

The life of Benazir Bhutto is in itself the tale of the troubled history of Pakistan, a country mired with Islamic extremism, xenophobia towards Indians and India, high handedness of the military, military coups, and clumsy economic development. Benazir, which means without comparison/unique in Urdu, was born in a very affluent landowning family in the Sindh province of Pakistan in 1953 and her father Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto had served as the President and Prime Minister of Pakistan. She had a privileged childhood with her school education from the Jesus and Mary Convent School in the Punjab province and her college education from the Harvard University and the Oxford University. During her days at Oxford she was known for her oratory skills and was a regular participant in the debating competitions and was also the first Asian woman President of the Oxford union. After her studies she returned to Pakistan in 1977 to pursue a career in the foreign services, but fate had something else in store for her. In 1979, Zulfiqer Ali Bhutto was executed by Gen.Zia-ul-Hag who had usurped the power from Mr.Bhutto through a military coup. Benazir was also arrested and was put into house arrest and then into jail. She was released in 1984 but she went to exile in Britain and later came back in 1986 after the martial law was lifted in Pakistan. She organized civil disobedience movements against the General and came to power in the general elections of 1988 after the death of General Zia-ul-Haq. After that she had been the Prime Minster of Pakistan for two times and both times her ministry had been dismissed by the President using the controversial powers vested on him by the article 58-2 B of the Pakistan constitution. Again she went into self imposed exile in 1999 and came back to Pakistan in October 2007 and was killed in December 2007.

There are conflicting and contrasting opinions on the attitude Ms.Bhutto had on India and how she handled the Islamic extremists and the ISI which were always against India. And there were always criticism against her on corruption and her husband Mr.Asif Ali Zardari was notoriously called Mr.10 percent for his alleged skimming off commissions for all Government projects. And it was always these allegations of corruption which had resulted in her downfall from the post of Prime Minister both times when she held that position. But what should interest us is not what her flaws were, but what legacy she had left behind for Muslim women, political leaders, human rights activists and the general public at large.

One can only get amazed on the bravery this woman politician had shown to come back to Pakistan under such a chaotic situation, particularly so when we compare her with other of her contemporary politicians. There are some odd views that she had risked her life and came back to Pakistan for the love of power, for the confidence that she can make it big this time in the elections and thus regain her political power back from the General (Retd) Pervez Musharraf. But the bravery and audacity that she showed to risk her life for uplifting the values of democracy, has to be appreciated. Whatever may be the political situation in Pakistan, one cant help but say that Ms.Bhutto would have been the best bet for Pakistan and the international community, as the Prime Minister. This is strictly because of her undoubted belief in the tenets of democracy, irrefutable hostility towards extremism, her unusual political will and her strong conviction on economic justice as the sole factor behind the socio-economic development of a nation.

She had always been the target of the extremists and the military backed ISI and they always took umbrage at her deeds because she had the political will to make moves against them and the courage to challenge the very fanatic idealogy which represented them. Ms.Bhutto would have been an ideal person to counter the terrorism pronounced by the extremists and the covert attempts of the ISI to scuttle the peace and tranquility of India and other nations facing the military backed religious extremism emerging out of Pakistan. No wonder why the United States was so much interested in manipulating a deal between Musharraf, their long time non-NATO ally on the war on terror and Ms.Bhutto, whom they consider the only populist liberal leader of the second largest Muslim country in the world.

Ms.Benazir Bhutto was a pretty much a complex human being with enormous bravery born out of her intriguingly complex life which witnessed unusual deaths of her father and two younger brothers. Her political background, made strong by her all powerful second name 'Bhutto', her oratory skills, which she cultivated during her stay at Harvard and Oxford and her striking appearance gave her a larger than life image and a mass appeal among the people of Pakistan. She was the only person who would have given the Pakistan the right path towards democracy, where there is less intervention of the military, where there is social justice and economic development and above all a peaceful co-existence with the international community jettisoning the tag of being the "most dangerous place on earth." But now, with her demise Pakistan's worst fears are here to stay and it would be still in political turmoil, economic backwardness, human rights desertion and be the devil's own land of Islamic extremism and lunatic terrorism endangered by the senseless military and the rogue intelligence services.

It is the greatness of the gallant, though flawed Ms.Bhutto that the fate and fortune of her country is very much in association with her own fate and fortune and now it is up to the Pakistanis to work towards upholding Mohtarma's vision of a democratic Pakistan by participating in the election en masse and putting Pervez Musharaff and his autocratic, outrageous rule into distant oblivion and dumping his King's Party, the PML(Q) into the debris of forgettable history . One can only hope with good heart that her country would not face the tragic end that she had faced in the hands of the enemies of mankind who are the merchants of death, destruction, carnage and utter chaos. (Here, I sincerely thank Ms.Sonia Gandhi for providing us with the expression "merchant of death" which I've used here with her unconditional generosity and largesse.)

Long Live Mohtarma Benazir's aspirations of true democracy.