INSPIRING THOUGHTS.

• What do we live for, if not to make life less difficult for each other. (George Eliot).
• I have a simple philosophy: Fill what's empty. Empty what's full. Scratch where it itches. (Alice Roosevelt Longworth).
• Life is a mirror and will reflect back to the thinker what he thinks into it. (Ernest Holmes).
• I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. (Henry David Thoreau). 
• The purpose of our lives is to be happy. (Dalai Lama).
• Peace cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved by understanding. (Albert Einstein).
• Sleep is the best meditation. (The XIV Dalai Lama).
• Every experience in life has something to teach us, if only we are ready to understand its importance. (Sreeram Manoj Kumar).
• Liberty and Equality are incompatible with each other. Liberty leads to competitive individualism, and therefore breeds inequality. (Mah Kumar). 
• Liberty , Equality and Fraternity is an ideal set out by all evolved and noble souls, but common mortals have to work at it. How much we actually achieve depends on how much sincerity and honesty go into our efforts. (Prem Lal).
• Ancient wisdom proclaims, 'Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam' or the whole world is one big family. What happened to this dream? (Vidya Babla).
• It is true that the world is based on brotherhood. But brotherhood needs sacrifice, and thoughts of doing good for others, unconditionally and selflessly. Brotherhood brings peace and harmony in society and is of a divine nature. (Sanjay Teotia).
• Without a community, we cannot go very far. (Thich Nhat Hanh).
• A man is called selfish not for pursuing his own good, but for neglecting his neighbour's. (Richard Whately).
• Love one another but make not a bond of love: let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls. (Kahlil Gibran).
• I like it when a flower or a tuft of grass grows through a crack in the concrete. It's so heroic. (George Carlin).
• Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one. (Marcus Aurelius).
• Until one has loved an animal, a part of one's soul remains unawakened. (Anatole France).
• Open your thoughts to the probability that you are more intuitive than you realise. (Sylvia Clare).
• Open your eyes, look within. Are you satisfied with the life you are living? (Bob Marley).
• Yesterday is a cancelled cheque. Today is cash on line. Tomorrow is a promisory note. (Hank Stream).
• Mothers love their children, but after marriage when the son starts caring for his wife, the mother does not relish the idea. This is when her true love turns into attachment. The wife loves her husband, but when the husband seemingly cares more for his mother, the wife becomes agitated. This is love turning into possessiveness. Pure love does not have any hint of possessiveness, attachment or jealousy and is without expectation. (Krishnan).
• Love for the Self and love for God is the only thing in this world which will not make you weak at any time. (Sandhya Singh).
• everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves. (Carl Jung).
• It is impossible to persuade a man who does not disagree, but smiles. (Muriel Spark).
• Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact. (William James).
• Instead of loving your enemies, treat your friends a little better. (E.W. Howe).
• There is only one success - to be able to spend your life in your own way. (Christopher Morley).
• You make mistakes. Mistakes don't make you. (Maxwell Maltz).
• The first rule of education, in all lands is never to say anything offensive to anyone. (Voltaire).
• The first step to knowledge is to know that we are ignorant. (Richard Cecil).
• Education is a progressive discovery of our ignorance. (Will Durant).
• Knowledge is not given but earned, and character is not granted but cultivated. (Swami Vivekananda).
• Let us always meet each other with a smile, for the smile is beginning of love. (Mother Teresa).
• Faith is taking the first step even when you don't see the whole staircase. (Martin Luther King, Jr.).
• Yesterday is but today's memory, and tomorrow is today's dream. (Kahlil Gibran).
• It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it. (Aristotle).
• Time is what we want most, but what we use worst. (William Penn).
• Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact. (William James).
• Tears of joy are like the summer raindrops pierced by sunbeams. (Hosea Ballou).
• Time you enjoyed wasting was not wasted. (John Lennon). 
• Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value. (Albert Einstein).
• A flower cannot blossom without sunshine, and man cannot live without love. (Max Muller).
• What is right to be done cannot be done too soon. (Jane Austen).
• He whose head is in heaven need not fear to put his feet into the grave. (Matthew Henry).
• I think cinema, movies and magic have always been closely associated. The very earliest people who made film were magicians...A movie is really like a question and when you make it, you get the answer. (Francis Coppola). 
• Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself. (Leo Tolstoy).
• If you love life, don't waste time, for time is what life is made up of. (Bruce Lee).
• The more people that meet each other, the better it is for all of them. (Fletcher Pratt).
• The first recipe for happiness: avoid too lengthy meditation on the past. (Andre Maurois).
• Dare to reach out your hand into the darkness, to pull another hand into the light. (Norman B. Rice).
• I only went out for a walk, and finally concluded to stay out till sundown, for going out, I found, was really going in. (John Muir).
• Relax your body, and the rest of you will lighten up. (Haruki Murakami).
• In the beginning there was nothing, which exploded. (Terry Pratchet).
• The real problem is not whether machines think, but whether men do. (B.F. Skinner).
• We live with three thought processes: blind faith, devotion and spirituality. (Siddharth Chandra).
• I am confused when people say, God is everywhere; is omnipresent. I wonder then why we do have to go to temples, mosques, churches and Gurdwaras. (Ved Guliani).
• There is nothing more beautiful than a person whose heart is broken, but still believes in love. (Priya Kumari).
• The roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet. (Aristotle).
• You never know what is enough unless you know what is more than enough. (William Blake).
• As the web issues out of the spider and is withdrawn; as hair grows from the body - even so, the sages say, this universe springs from the deathless Self, the source of life. (Mundaka Upanishad). 
• The natural world is the larger sacred community to which we belong. To be alienated from this community is to become destitute in all that makes us human. To damage this community is to diminish our own existence. (Father Thomas Berry, eco-theologian). 
• Forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair. (Kahlil Gibran).
• If you don't believe that the world has a heart, then you won't hear it beating, you won't think it's alive and you won't consider what you are doing to it. (Charles de Lint).  
• Life isn't about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself. (George Bernard Shaw).
• There is more to life than increasing its speed. (Gandhiji).
• We do not remember days, we remember moments. (Cesare Pavese).
• Life is a song - sing it. Life is a game - play it. Life is a challenge - meet it. Life is a dream - relaise it. Life is a sacrifice - offer it. Life is love - enjoy it. (Sai Baba).
• This life, which had been the tomb of his virtue and of his honour, is but a walking shadow; a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more; it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. (Shakespeare).
• Most people have never learned that one of the main aims in life is to enjoy it. (Samuel Butler).
• You have enemies? Good. That means you have stood up for something, sometime in your life. (Winston Churchill).
• Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don't resist them - that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like. (Lao Tzu).
• A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives. (Jackie Robinson).
• The most important thing is to enjoy your life - to be happy - it's all that matters. (Audrey Hepburn).
• Life is a dream for the wise, a game for the fool, a comedy for the rich, a tragedy for the poor. (Sholom Aleichem).
• The truth is you don't know what is going to happen tomorrow. Life is a crazy ride, and nothing is guaranteed. (Eminem).
• Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment. (Buddha). 
• Life's most persistent and urgent question is, 'What are you doing for others'? (Martin Luther King, Jr.).
• Once you bring life into the world, you must protect it. We must protect it by changing the world. (Elie Wiesel).
• Our prime purpose in this life is to help others. And if you can't help them, at least don't hurt them. (Dalai Lama).
• One way to get the most out of life is to look upon it as an adventure. (William Feather).
• Life is really simple; but we insist on making it complicated. (Confucius).
• In the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years. (Abraham Lincoln).
• Throughout life, people will make you mad, disrespect you and treat you bad. Let God deal with things they do, cause hate in your heart will consume you too. (Will Smith).
• If you live long enough, you will make mistakes. But if you learn from them, you will be a better person. It's how you handle adversity, not how it affects you. The main thing is never quit, never quit, never quit. (William J. Clinton).
• I have found that if you love life, life will love you back. (Arthur Rubinstein).
• The privilege of a lifetime is being who you are. (Joseph Campbell).
• The true secret of happiness lies in taking a genuine interest in all the details of daily life. (William Morris).
• The personal life deeply lived always expands into truths beyond itself. (Anais Nin).
• My life is my message. (Gandhiji).
• You will never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of. You will never live if you are looking for the meaning of life. (Albert Camus).
• We need to give each other the space to grow, to be ourselves, to exercise our diversity. We need to give each other space so that we may both give and receive such beautiful things as ideas, openness, dignity, joy, healing and inclusion. (Max de Pree).
• If you love life, don't waste time, for time is what life is made up of. (Bruce Lee).
• A man who dares to waste one hour of time has not discovered the value of life. (Charles Darwin).
• A life spent making mistakes is not only more honourable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing. (G.B. Shaw).
• Life is like dancing. If we have a big floor, many people will dance. Some will get angry when the rhythm changes. But life is changing all the time. (Miguel Angel Ruiz).
• The story of life is quicker than the blink of an eye, the story of love is hello, goodbye. (Jimi Hendrex).
• How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the striving and tolerant of the weak and strong. Because someday in your life, you will have been all of these. (George Washington Carver).
• Life isn't a matter of milestones, but of moments. (Rose Kennedy).
• Maybe that's what life is... a wink of the eye and winking stars. (Jack Kerouac).
• Open your eyes, look within. Are you satisfied with the life that you are living. (Bob Marley).
• You are only here for a short visit. Don't hurry, don't worry. And be sure to smell the flowers along the way. (Walter Hagen).
• Our life always expresses the result of our dominant thoughts. (Soren Kierkegaard). 
• Beware the barrenness of a busy life. (Socrates).
• Life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced. (Soren Kierkegaard).
• What if you gave someone a gift, and they neglected to thank you for it - would you be likely to give them another? Life is the same way. In order to attract more of the blessings that life has to offer, you must truly appreciate what you already have. (Ralph Marston).
• Life itself is the most wonderful fairy tale. (Hans Christian Andersen).
• Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less. (Marie Curie).
• When I stand before God at the end of my lie, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent left, and could say, "I used everything you gave me". (Erma Bombeck).
• Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans. (John Lennon).
• Don't go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first. (Mark Twain).
• It's all about quality of life and finding a happy balance between work and friends and family. (Philip Green).
• The only disability in life is a bad attitude. (Scott Hamilton).
• I slept and dreamt that life was joy. I awoke and saw that life was service. I acted and behold, service was joy. (Rabindranath Tagore).
• Life would be tragic if it weren't funny. (Stephen Hawking).
• Life is a succession of moments, to live each one is to succeed. (Corita Kent).
• I decided, very early on, just to accept life unconditionally; I never expected it to do anything special for me, yet I seemed to accomplish far more than I had ever hoped. Most of the time it just happened to me without my ever seeking it. (Audrey Hepburn).
• There are three constants in life...Change, Choice and Principles. (Stephen Covey).
• It's only when we truly know and understand that we have a limited time on earth - and that we have no way of knowing when our time is up, we will then begin to live each day to the fullest, as it was the only one we had. (Elisabeth Kubler - Ross). 
• Life is ten percent what happens to you and ninety percent how you respond to it. (Lou Holtz). 
• The greatest trap in our life is not success, popularity or power, but self-rejection. (Henri Nouwen).
• Never be bullied into silence. Never allow yourself to be made a victim. Accept no one's definition of your life; define yourself. (Harvey Fierstein).
• To live is to change, and to be perfect is to have changed often. (John Henry Newman).
• A well-spent day brings happy sleep. (Leonardo da Vinci).
• The true object of all human life is play. Earth is a task garden; heaven is a playground. (Gilbert K. Chesterton). 
• Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood. (Helen Keller).
• When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent left, and could say, 'I used everything you gave me'. (Erna Bombeck).
• Good friends, good books and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life. (Mark Twain).
• Into each life some rain must fall. (Henry Wadsworth Longfellow).
• Life is short and we have never too much time for gladdening the hearts of those who are travelling the dark journey with us. Oh be swift to love, make haste to be kind. (Henri Frederic Amiel).
• The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge. (Bertrand Russell).
• Get correct views of life, and learn to see the world in its true light. It will enable you to live pleasantly, to do good, and, when summed away, to leave without regret. (Robert E Lee). 
• A baby is God's opinion that life should go on. (Carl Sandburg).
• Nobody got where they are today by living for tomorrow. (Tom Wilson).
• Life would be infinitely happier if we could only be born at the age of eighty and gradually approach eighteen. (Mark Twain).
• We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us. (E.M. Forster).
• He who has a why to live can bear almost any how. (Friedrich Nietzsche).
• May you live all the days of your life. (Jonathan Swift).
• Life is a lot like jazz...it's best when you improvise. (George Gershwin).
• The chief danger in life is that you may take too many precautions. (Alfred Adler).

We, the Giving.

If she drowns, she's a refugee. If she floats, she's an economic migrant. A friend from New York sent me this chilling cartoon and I thought to myself, I could apply as easily to India and our deplorable treatment of migrants / refugees. We have always been shockingly callous towards the plight of our own people. Imagine, then, what our response would behave been if boatloads of Syrians, fleeing tyranny, starvation and death, had arrived on our shores seeking refuge. Look at our indifference to the high number of farmer suicides in Marathwada. Apart from television reporters, and a few print journos / photographers who have taken the trouble to go there themselves, nor offered any relief. Without water or food to last more than a few more weeks, the precarious condition of our farmers is heart-breaking. And here we have fat cat sugar barons from other parts of the state (millionaires many times over) who are sitting pretty, and not lifting a finger to help their brothers. They too have turned a blind eye to the disaster, as has the state government, which should have considered declaring an emergency to rush aid to Maharashtra's farmers, some of whom own just an acre or two of land, and are unable to pay back debts amounting to less than Rs. 1 lakh! 

We continue to ignore the tragedy of a man taking his own life, and leaving behind helpless families to cope with hunger and debt. His story is getting lost in an overcrowded media field far more interested in giving extensive coverage to murder and rapes. It is also being asked how come so many Indians have reacted to that heartbreaking image of the drowned Syrian toddler clicked on a distant shore, and not cared a damn about equally disturbing pictures closer to home. It is a good question which I have been struggling to find answers to, myself. I still can't bear to see that little boy's tiny body washed up on a beach like a dead porpoise. I turned my eyes away, haunted by thoughts of what his father must have gone through as he lost his hold over his wife and kids and helplessly watched them drown. It is this single image that influenced world opinion and led to a major re-think, spearheaded by German Chancellor Angela Merkel. We have equally moving photographs right here - but we have stopped seeing them. We no longer react to our own human crises, possibly because if there is one thing there is no shortage of in India, it is catastrophes. We have multiple catastrophes. There is an overload of catastrophes. Our systems have crashed and nothing registers - not even the heart-rending sight of a poverty-stricken family, sitting on a parched patch of land, bodies reduced to skin and bones, as they wait for deliverance... or death. We see the desperation in their eyes, and do nothing. Well, there are exceptions, of course. People like Nana Patekar whose NGO called "Naam" has launched a simple initiative that involves donations of just Rs. 15,000/- per family of affected farmers. The entire process is painless and smooth, making it convenient for individuals to contribute directly to this worthy cause.

We are not a generous nation. On the contrary - we are nauseatingly mean spirited when it comes to helping the needy. Poverty do not move us to the extent they should. May be we take both for granted - as if it's our fate to remain hungry forever. Even the most pathetic stories of dengue deaths in Delhi do not engage us sufficiently. We brush off confronting the abject state of our public hospitals, the neglect of health issues by authorities and the baffling absence of accountability! We shrug away these preventable deaths like it is normal in this day and age for people to die of dengue. No, it is not normal. And we should bloody well be bothered. But at least one positive aspect has emerged during the dengue disaster and that is the increased awareness of our despicably low sanitary standards, combined with the urgent need to clean up filthy neighbourhoods and tackle the problem of stagnant water. It's a small step - but an important one.

Epidemics come and go. We have coped with them in our own clumsy way in the past and moved on. The trouble is, till such time as dengue creeps into your locality and directly affects our lives, it will be considered a Delhi disease - nothing to do with the rest of India! The argumentative India, it would seem, is also an intensely unfeeling Indian. So here we are tut-tutting over the Syrian refugees / immigrants, and saying how magnanimous the German people are to accept so many asylum seekers, and lead the way for other European countries to follow. We have monumental problems of our own to deal with, but what do you think our response would be if we were asked to accommodate a few thousand Syrians (those crazy enough to want to start a new life in India)? I guarantee it will be far from compassionate or positive. Living is expensive in India. But life has always been dirt cheap.

Note: The article has been reproduced from The Times of India dated 20th September, 2015. It has been written by Shoba De. She can be contacted on www.shobhade.blogspot.com.

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C.S. Chakravarthy

H. No. 12-13-301, St. No. 9,

Lane. No. 1, Flat. No. 203,

Satya Classic, Tarnaka,

Secunderabad- 500 017,

Telangana State, India.

e-mail: chakkuresearchscholar13@gmail.com

Cell: 9985732397

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Codes and Conduct

The responsibility of superintendence, direction, control and the conduct of all elections (to Parliament and to the Legislature of every state and the elections to the offices of the President and Vice-President) shall vest in the Election Commission of India. The quoted expression in Article. 324 of the Constitution of India remained just another set of lifeless words from January 1950, when the Constitution came into force, to December 1977, when the Supreme Court infused life into them through the case of Mohinder Singh Gill. Gill's case arose out of election to the Lok Sabha held on 16th March, 1977. Counting took place as scheduled, on 20th March, 1977, in five Assembly segments peacefully. However, the balance of the counting on the next day was halted by violence acts allegedly by the Akali Dal candidate. On a report from the returning officer, the Election Commission of India ordered cancellation of polls in the entire constituency - as was the wish of the Akalis - and directed fresh elections.

Gill, while conceding recount, challenged re-poll before the Punjab High Court and the case eventually landed before a five-judge constitution bench of the Supreme Court. In the course of upholding the decision of the EC, Justice V.R. Krishna Iyer, speaking on behalf of the Bench, held: "...situations may arise which enacted law has not provided for. Legislators are not prophets but pragmatists. So it is that the Constitution has made comprehensive provision in Article. 324 to take care of surprise situations. That power itself has to be exercised, not mindlessly nor malafide, not arbitrarily nor with partiality but in keeping with the guidelines of the rule of law and not stultifying the presidential notification nor existing legislation. More is not necessary to specify; less is insufficient to leave unsaid. Article. 324, in our view, operates in areas left unoccupied by legislation and the words 'superintendence, direction and control', as well as 'conduct of all elections', are the broadest terms. Myriad maybes, too mystic to be precisely presaged, may call for prompt action to reach the goal of free and fair election".

Dealing with the objection that this will create a constitutional despot beyond the pale of accountability, a Frankenstein's monster who may manipulate the system into elected despotism, the bench's answer was that the judicial bench, at the appropriate stage, can "call the bluff, quash the action and bring order into the process". Thus, the concept of "free and fair election" was read into Article. 324 - a phrase that became the goal of that Article. And eventually the Article became the fountainhead of the EC's powers to meet the "myriad maybe" situations. The election manual and the official website of the EC contain hundreds of instructions and guidelines, all claiming parentage to Article. 324. The model code of conduct is a unique document in as much as it has evolved with the consensus of political parties themselves. It has no statutory backing and many of its provisions are not legally enforceable. Public opinion is the moral sanction for its enforcement. It was first conceived in 1960 in Kerala - a state that has turned coalition politics into a fine art. The EC issued a revised model code of conduct on 01st January, 1974, which was further modified and the model conduct as is prevalent now was re-issued in January, 1991 - all on the basis of consensus of political parties.

The parties, thus, reached an understanding that they would play the game of elections in accordance with the model code of conduct. The EC is like the umpire in a game of cricket. It has no police force of its own to bodily throw out an offending player - like the umpire, it only signals. So far the code has worked - in the sense that no one has openly defied the EC whenever infraction has been pointed out. The alleged offender has either denied the allegation or offered an explanation. Frequent appeals for LBW verdicts even from a fielder on the mid-wicket boundary are not uncommon. In affidavits furnishing information regarding own criminal antecedents, truth was often a regular casualty. Therefore, the Parliament in 2002 had to amend the 1951 Act and make filing of a false affidavit or concealing the truth of an offence. Demands for inclusion of more of the code in the already bulky statute book have mostly been ignored, and rightly so. However, the experience of post-2002 amendment does not encourage making of more laws. The code comes into force from the date of official announcement of election schedule. It applies only to elections to the lower houses - Lok Sabha and the Vidhan Sabhas - where voters directly elect the members. And it comes to an end with the declaration of the results.

It generally prescribes good behaviour for the political parties and candidates, thus making it amply clear that politicians are fully aware of what is good. However, the meat of the code lies in the last part that prescribes "dos and don'ts" for the governments in office. State governments have to obey them only during the general elections and elections to the assembly of that state. However, the Central government has to be watchful not only during the general elections, but also during the elections to one or the other state assemblies, which keep occurring periodically, thus hindering its normal functioning frequently. Once the schedule of elections is announced, the EC is the boss. It can do anything that is not prohibited by any statute - all in the name of free and fair elections. Curbing the influence of black money in the elections is a major concern of the EC. In this regard, there are nearly hundred written instructions from the EC. One such instruction prohibits carrying large amounts of cash. It was under this provision that the former Bihar Chief Minister Jitan Ram Manjhi's son with Rs. 4.6 lakh in cash was questioned. 

Does the Prime Minister offend the code by continuing with his Mann Ki Baat on All India Radio? The EC has answered this question when it said you can speak all that you can at rally. May be, the EC should permit the use of radio for all concerned, without the obligation to supply the audience.

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C.S. Chakravarthy

H. No. 12-13-301, St. No. 9,

Lane. No. 1, Flat. No. 203,

Satya Classic, Tarnaka, 

Secunderabad- 500 017,

Telangana State.

email id: chakkuresearchscholar13@gmail.com

Cell: 9985732397.

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EYES LEFT. EYES RIGHT. DEBATE.

While travelling in the US over a seven week period in 2014, I was amazed by the animosity in their public debates. The so-called 'Left' and 'Right' commentators hold pre-decided positions on most issues. Their job: garner support for their side. Convinced that theirs is the Absolute Truth and the other side is 'pure evil' (I heard such phrases), they do not aim to find common ground. This debating style has, of late, stormed into the Indian media space. Earlier, there was no public acrimony, because the Left dominated academic and communication platforms. Monopolies oftentimes drown out acrimony along with competition! 

The rise of the Right has energised debate; that's the good news. This manthan of points of view will lead to much needed nuance. However, emulating the antagonistic American approach will derail the possibility of a common ground emerging. I propose re-adoption of the principles of debate drawn from many ancient cultures (including our own), whose underlying premise was: nobody can know the Absolute Truth. Modern science gave this esoteric idea, that your values and expectations impact your perception of 'facts', a cool term - observer bias. Even physicists factor it into their conclusions. 

Accepting this can instil humility, thus opening the possibility of listening to another point of view. Approaching even political events in the light of this prism-setting leads to interesting insights. For example, judging by journalists I have encountered, the Western media (New York Times, Economist, etc.) often sees itself as a force for Moral Good, readily pronouncing judgments and marketing 'universal values' in the world at large. However, the unfortunate Arabs in Iraq, Libya and Syria see them differently. Western media predominantly cheered the invasions / bombings of these ill-fated countries, which have led to over one million Arab deaths. Yes, I underline, over one million deaths. An Arab friend remarked that he 'holds Western media too responsible for these lives; it cheered these invasions repeatedly. It's either colossally stupid or pure evil'.

However, one cannot deny that Western media has done some good, at least in their own societies. Perhaps if you accept the reality of observer bias, you may realise that the subtle truth, whatever it may be, lies somewhere in the much ignored middle. Also, it's perhaps wise to be wary of the 'investigative skills' of Western media in non-Western countries. The second suggestion is also based on the ancient world view. Absolute Truth was elusive in all fields, except one: mathematics, also called 'language of the universe'. To make arguments a little more 'truthful', use numbers in support of your proposition. In other words: use data.

Recently, there's been a raging debate on rising intolerance in India, based on a few horrific incidents and some intemperate words. Every single life lost in violence, or in any other unnatural form, is tragic. But does the data reflect that religious violence is high or has ever been high in the last fifty years, compared to other forms of unnatural deaths in India? No. More women are killed in all religious violence cumulatively in the last fifty years. Consider this: if you could stop all female foeticide for just a fortnight, you would have saved more than if you did prevented every single religious rite / violent incident of the last fifty years.

Some more data...more Indian children die of diarrhoea every 45 days and more Indians are killed in road accidents every month than the total number killed in all religious violence cumulatively in the last fifty years. Moreover, the numbers also show that religious violence has reduced considerably from its peak (the peak of post-independence religious violence was from the 1960s to early 1990s). We know where our efforts, even our noise decibels, need to be directed. Data lends perspective. Lastly, I propose we approach serious issues with a calm mind. We should wait for investigations to be completed before passing judgments and conducting media trials. In the matter of the 'church attack incidents' of early 2015, it later emerged that many of them didn't have any religious angle at all. Some were plain robbery, one even attributed to the anger of a jilted non-Hindu lover. 

Also, at the time that four Delhi churches were vandalised, 200 temples, 30 gurudwaras and 15 mosques were also vandalised. This suggests a state of general lawlessness rather than any religious persecution. Even the Christian nun rape case of West Bengal (some in the media instantly held right-wing Hindus responsible) was actually perpetrated by Bangladeshi Muslim illegal immigrants. Before someone imputes any crusade-jihad angle on this case, let me also clarify that investigations blamed a money dispute. I am not suggesting that there are no religious fundamentalists or that there's no religious violence in India. But fortunately, the data reveals, relative to our population, it's in smaller numbers. India cannot be called misogynist. Or uncaring about hygiene or road-traffic rules. If Indians debating in the public square can accept observer bias, develop the ability to listen, use data and most importantly, stay calm, we may just avoid the American spectacle where debates have degenerated to gladiatorial matches rather than an attempt to develop collective thought that is sophisticated, nuanced and productive.

Note: This is an article written by Mr. Amish, a best selling author, published in 'The Tines of India' dated 21st, November, 2015 (Saturday).

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C.S. Chakravarthy

H. No. 12-13-301, St. No. 9,

Lane. No. 1, Flat. No. 203,

Satya Classic Apartments,

Tarnaka, Secunderabad- 500 017,

Telangana State, India.

e-mail id: chakkuresearchscholar13@gmail.com

Cell: 09985732397.

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WHAT YOU BELIEVE IS WHAT YOU SEE.

Little Billu was wide awake and was staring at the artificial stars and the moon on his ceiling. He could not sleep that night as the excitement over his grandpa's visit was still lingering in his little heart. His grandpa had got him lots of toys that day, but even before he could play with them,mummy had asked Billu to go to bed early. He loved his grandpa and wished he could spend more time with him. The voices outside the bedroom were so clear and Billu's heart ached to be a part of those voices. Just then, the voices grew louder and Billu realised that they were nearing the bedroom. As the lights were switched on, Billu jumped out of bed and hugged his grandpa. He knew that his grandpa would sleep with him.

Billu got onto the bed quickly and was waiting for his grandpa to finish his prayer. Grandpa winked at Billu after finishing his prayer and got into bed. "Story! Story! Story?" little Billu demanded and Grandpa read him a story from a book:

Once upon a time, there was a well-educated man who announced to his friends that he would not believe in the existence of God! He said that he would never believe anything,which he could not understand.

An old farmer overheard the remark,turned to the young man and said,"As I went into town today, I passed a field where some sheep were feeding. Do you believe that?"

"Yes", said the young man."Not far away from the sheep some cows were also grazing. Do you believe that?"

"Yes", was the reply! "Not far from the cows were some pigs eating grass. Do you believe that?"

"Yes", "All right, now you listen to this", said the farmer."The grass the sheep ate turned into hair. The grass the pigs ate turned into bristles. The grass seeds that the chickens eat turn into feathers. Do you believe that?"

"Yes", the young man said."Do you understand it?"

"No", admitted the young man. "Young man", said the farmer."if you live long, you will find that there are a good many things which you believe without understanding. God is one of them".

Billu smiled and slept peacefully in the cosy arms of his Grandpa.

Next day morning Billu could not spend time with Grandpa and left for school with a longing heart. But when he returned, he was in for a pleasant surprise. His Grandpa has arranged for a small picnic and away he went, along with his parents to a beach resort. After spending a lot of time in the beach the family sat together for dinner. Grandpa started talking about his next book: "On Belief and God!" But, daddy didn't seem too interested in it. Daddy quickly finished his dinner and commented, "I will not believe in the imaginary God. I believe only in things that I see, hear and understand". Grandpa just smiled, he did not answer. Instead he asked Billu to tell everyone a story. Billu got excited and narrated Grandpa's latest story without skipping a beat. Daddy stood up and said, "I don't understand how the same grass changes into hair, wool, bristles or feathers, but I do see it. I believe it because I see it. I can now understand it with science. So, it again comes back to my belief on things that I see and hear. What I see and hear is what I believe. I don't want to understand everything, but I need to see or hear to believe in something. So I don't believe in God! I have never seen him or heard his voice".

Grandpa was silent. He again had an 'all-knowing smile' on his lips. After helping mummy set all things right, Grandpa invited Daddy for a walk. Billu understood that his Daddy has won the argument, but he did not want his Grandpa to lose. He knew that Grandpa was taking Daddy out to talk more on this. Billu stayed back indoors for a minute, he knelt down and prayed. He then jumped up and ran out to catch up with Grandpa.

Grandpa walked slowly and was waiting for Daddy to complete his call on his mobile. After the call got over Grandpa asked Daddy, "Imagine if I gather a motley crowd and utter the word 'cell' and ask them what I was referring to, what do you think they would answer?" Daddy thought over it answered, "They would definitely tell that you were referring to a cell phone", Grandpa looked at Daddy in the eye and smiled. Daddy started thinking again and said, "Well, it could have also been a 'battery cell' or to 'sell a product'. Grandpa said, "It could have also been perceived as a 'bacterial cell' or as a 'prison cell', right?" Daddy nodded.

"But why were you so confident when you said I was referring to a cell phone?" Grandpa enquired. Daddy said, "That's because I thought that you were referring to the cell phone". Grandpa nodded. Daddy added, "The context in which the word was spoken also matters and in the current context I believe you spoke about the cell phone".

Daddy was sporting a victorious smile as he sat down on the shore of the beach. Grandpa sat next to him and said, "Son, have you ever wondered why two different people see an elephant and a mouse in the same shapeless cloud?" Daddy said, "It depends on their perception as to what they think the cloud looks like". "Exactly!" affirmed as he stood up. He continued, "See son, the act of seeing and hearing when understood deeply will reveal you the truth. You told me that you will believe only things that you hear, but did you know that you only hear what you believed you heard? The act of seeing is coordination between your eye and your mind. The eye presents the picture and the mind attributes a meaning to it. This attributed meaning is what you see. Your belief system pre-programs your mind and this directly is responsible for your perception and the context you are referring to. So, your belief is the base. If my mind is pre-programmed with 'fullness', I will see a half-filled water bottle; but if my mind is pre-programmed with 'emptiness', I will see the same water bottle as a half-empty bottle".

"When I asked you what will people perceive when I say 'cell', you were very sure that everyone will perceive it as a cell phone. You claim that in this context this was applicable. But if I had asked the same question in the same situation to a school goer, he would have heard it as a 'bacterial cell'. A shop-keeper would have heard it as 'sell' and a jail warden would have perceived it as a 'Prison cell'. So don't you realise that there is something deeper than a context or a situation?" the Grandpa enquired. 

Daddy just blinked. Grandpa continued, "You need not accept my view now, but think over it. You will understand that beliefs drive you. So the fact is: What You Believe Is What You See and What You Believe Is What You Hear".

"Son, I believe God created everything and so I am able to see God's hand in everything. You believe that everything has a scientific tint to it and you are able to see it. On a larger scale, this is exactly what al religious doctrines tell us: Believe and you shall see".

Daddy looked up and smiled. His smile was his affirmation. Billu did not understand anything that was going on. But he understood that Grandpa has won the discussion. Billu believed his Grandpa would win, and he saw what he believed in.

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C.S. Chakravarthy

H. No. 12-13-302, St. No. 9, 

Lane. No. 1, Flat. No. 203,

Satya Classic, Tarnaka,

Secunderabad- 500 017,

Telangana State.

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Comments of Chennai Floods, 2015.

Chennai is inundated but the water is not potable. There's no power or mobile connectivity. No newspapers. No essentials whatsoever. People have been dislocated and the damage to property and loss incurred is unaccountable. Daily wage earners have lost their jobs. Over 250 people have lost their lives. It is widely believed that a natural disaster such as the floods in Chennai lead to an inevitable loss of life and property. The rainfall in Chennai and adjoining districts this year has broken a hundred year record. But should the magnitude of rainfall in 2015 have come as a surprise? Chennai. Tiruvallur and Kancheepuram districts are not unfamiliar to heavy rains and cyclones during the north-east monsoon months. Heavy rains during the month of November are a way of life for the people of coastal Tamil Nadu. Therefore, can it be called a disaster? If yes, appropriate preparedness could have been minimised it enormously. The most relevant question therefore is - what was the administrative preparedness for such disasters? What lessons have we learnt from the tsunami of 2004 and a series of cyclones experienced by the state recently? 

For any city to survive the current disaster in Chennai, the fundamentals should be in place. In the present case, these fundamentals were bypassed and deviated from, i.e., the basic infrastructure, especially drainage. If that had been taken care of, the state would have saved such a huge economic loss. This wasn't the case with Chennai and so everyone suffered and paid for the establishment's inefficiency. Isn't this wrong? Geographically, Chennai is actually placed very uniquely and it is a blessing. We have three water-ways, something very few other places can boast of. We have the Cooum river which takes of Central Chennai, the Adyar which caters to the south and kosasthalaiyar running through the north. And then there is the Buckingham Canal which cuts across all three. It is the most fantastic macro drainage system for a city. Unfortunately, these major drainage systems are in a pretty bad shape due to heavy encroachment, reduction of bed-width by more than two-thirds, heavily silt and sludge deposits and formation of heavy sand bars at the mouth of the rivers. In addition to these major drainage systems, there are medium drainage systems. At the moment, it is difficult to trace these medium canals. Indeed, most of Chennai's prided IT corridor on old Mahabalipuram road is situated on the flood plains of Pallikaranai wetlands. And finally, there are the storm water drains constructed by the government which are today heavily clogged because of garbage and so narrow that they cannot even manage if there is persistent rain of one centimetre every hour. Put together, all these networks comprehensively failed to carry water during the recent rains and that is why I state that the city's most important 'fundamentals' have failed.

The Chembarambakkam reservoir overflow is not the only reason for the flooding. Adyar river is fed by 25 other tanks. On the night of 02nd December, 2015 only 30,000 cusecs of water was released from Chembarambakkam, but near Siadapet the river was carrying over 50,000 cusecs. Still, it was less than the river's original carrying capacity of 72,000 cusecs and much less to the flow of 60,000 cusecs in 2005. Then why was there so much damage this time around? Obviously because of the enormous scale of encroachments during the last ten years. Isn't Chennai a man-made disaster then?

The floods in Chennai are certainly part of the larger changing weather patterns across the globe and similar to the Uttarakhand floods, and the floods in Orissa, Mumbai, Copenhagen and, more recently the UK. This is due to the changing weather and climate patterns of the northern hemisphere, largely due to 'developmental activities' undertaken by industrial countries. In the pre-industrial era, the concentration of carbon-dioxide in the atmosphere was only about 240 ppm. But at present, it is at 350-400 ppm. Thus the increase in global temperatures. This rise in temperature is because of larger industrial activity like construction, automobile emissions, thermal power stations, cement industries, glass industries, etc., especially in developed countries. Rapid industrial activity has contributed to the global rise in temperatures, which has resulted in the melting of ice in the Earth's polar regions. And finally, the mismatch between the evaporation and precipitation rates of water in the atmosphere leads to so numerous many complexities visible in the form of climate change.

Post the industrial revolution the atmospheric temperature is increasing day by day and, consequently, oceanic evaporation and precipitation rates are increasing, leading to heavy rains and floods, or severe drought. This will also result in the increase of flies, insects, weeds, reptiles, mosquitoes and other unwanted components of the ecosystem, something we see in abundance in Chennai today. Severe drought and dry weather, always likely to come soon enough after the rains, will be seen. The consequences will be water scarcity which is as capable of causing untold harm as excess of water, though a deluge makes for more compelling visuals in newspapers and on television. We need to restrict our industrial, automobile, thermal power and urban expansion activities if we are to make any difference to our atmosphere. Only if we preserve our forests, our treasured flaura and fauna can we hope to bring the planet's climate back to sustainable levels.

What we are facing today are the consequences of thermal power generation, cement industries, glass, paper industries, port, road, mining, deforestation, reverse coastal management with tourism activities, rapid urbanisation, slum dwellers, population explosion, hydrocarbon industries, unscientific agricultural practices, household instruments and equipments and unscientific waste management, etc. Unless we rein in some of them, there is no way to control the change in the atmosphere. Chennai floods are not exactly a man-made calamity but part of this global phenomenon. It is not a localised problem as many argue it to be. Countries like the US and China most of Europe are the major contributors to global warming through gaseous emissions like carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides and sulphur oxides. This has resulted in a sharp rise in temperatures and we should not blame state and national governments for it. 

Developed countries are exploiting the natural resources of developing countries in Asia to produce commodities consumed in quantities disproportionate to the finite volume of our planet's resources. Despite this knowledge, developed countries are not responding to international agreements and protocols on global warming generously enough. Irrespective of what city administrations do, these extreme weather patterns will continue to cause havoc in cities like Chennai and the world.

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C.S. Chakravarthy

H. No. 12-13-302, St. No. 9,

Lane. No. 1, Flat. No. 203,

Satya Classic Apartments,

Tarnaka, Secunderabad- 500 017,

Telangana State, India.

E-mail: chakkuresearchscholar13@gmail.com

Cell: 09985732397.

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THE IMMEDIACY OF LOSS AND AMNESIA AFTER.c

Narratives of disasters are are virtually summoned by the urgency and intensity of the event. They convey the immediacy of the loss, the helplessness and the range of destruction. It is as if the narrative turns from noun to verb,from an act of reflection to an act of doing. Such narratives are dramatic, hurried but often avoid major issues countering on the disaster. The recent description of the Chennai rains shares this predictability. I want to begin by creating a distance to assemble a perspective. One is reminded of a Franz Katka story, probably the only one he wrote in India. It is about a village near a forest which decided to hold a sacrifice. On a full moon day, the village square was decked in wreaths and food. The Brahman priest came out to perform the sacred rituals. when a tiger came and ate the priest. The villagers were undaunted and decided to go ahead with the rituals on the next full moon, but again the tiger ate the priest. This happened on one more occasion and the villagers met to discuss the crisis. Ar the meeting, the village idiot came up with a brilliant solution. He suggested that the tiger's act has to have a theory of man-made causation locating responsibility of different levels.
Legend has it that the village idiot later became a World Bank consultant. The narratives of the Chennai rains have shades of the Katka story. They make the rains sound inevitable,an act of God, a message from nature, but few speculate on the man-made nature of many of these disasters. As a result, the newspapers tell two different stories: one about the Paris talks on sustainability and climate change, and the second on the Chennai rains. There is no sense of connection. Otherwise, the drama would have escalated. Imagine if Prime Minister Narendra Modi had gone to Paris and submitted a Bill for climate change asking the rich countries to pay for Chennai and Uttarakhand.
This one act would have changed the Paris Conference from its stereotyped scripts and made the world sit up. Thinking that such disasters are man-made, let the affluent West get away with its depredations of nature. The new political economy of disasters has to have a theory of man-made causation locating responsibility at different levels. It is not just Western society, our State and our systems of governance have to be analysed in terms of a disaster perspective - the old "3R model" of relief, rescue, rehabilitation with a wider model of responsibility which starts long before a disaster and continues long after. As the political sociologist Chadrika Parmar put it in her essay on the multi hazard state, disasters from flood to cyclone, drought, famine are part of the everyday facts of governance. The old 3R model merely talked of rescue but little of state presence of responsibility in the first parts of a disaster. Disasters completely transform the notions of governance and the evaluation of state competence. The lack of preparedness of the state in handling this calamity was obvious. One,in fact, wishes the critique were more systematic, but the media often handles the Jayalalithaa administration with kid gloves.
What is heartening is not the performace of the state, but the role of civil society of individuals at every level. The word often used is resilience, but resilience is a polysemic. The courage of the ordinary survivor - in the Orissa cyclone of 1999 or the victims of the Chennai 2015 - remarkable. What differentiates them are the different networks that come into play. In fact, when one looked at studies of Gujarat earthquake, Parmer has pointed out that ordinary people suffered but were hard at work, at rescue and relief, without complaint. One must be careful here in creating an ideal of resilience which might be exaggerated. What is impressive is stories of courage, resilience and stoicism.
Yet what worries one is not resilience, which is welcome, but the nature of memory after disasters. Memories tend to be shortsighted and states drift away in indifference. Public policy often becomes an act of amnesia. Disasters narratives often point out to what they call the domain of amnesia. After a bit of acrimony and a touch of nitpicking, society and state settle down to a period of normalcy, as if nothing had happened, as if pain and suffering belonged to a parallel life. There is little follow up, no real attempt to use repair to create reform. It is almost as if amnesia is the preferred state and the only memory one has is a few anecdotes. It is time disasters are linked to development and climate change, otherwise we are guaranteeing the reproduction of such tragedies. The sadness is what we need in policy and planning: a society that cares. Heroism is a desperate answer of a society that cannot plan or think about its future. A caring society may be more humane than a purely heroic one. One is not denying the creativity and power of improvisation. One is enthralled by series of amphibian seeps first used in World War II returning to perform rescue functions during the devastation. The radio, especially FM, was used in a creatively desperate way to send messages about being marooned. Suddenly the radio, which had been suffering from benign neglect as a secondary toy, acquired a new life. The FM radio virtually played the role of a substitute telephone with FM companies organising volunteers to affected areas. Yet the innovation of civil society and the heroism of individuals and the community hid the fact that the state had failed to respond. One saw little of the functionaries of the state or political parties. It was as if they had decided that there was little that was political. Party protest and concerns of the vulnerable behave like two different worlds and even disasters fail to make them meet. 
What one needs now is a civil society audit of the disaster and the evaluation of responses to it. One has to have narratives of lives and livelihoods lost, homes destroyed and the nature of state response. Democracy has to come alive to make disasters a part of the institutional rules of the game. Otherwise, all one adds is a cynical selfishness which does little to minimise suffering.
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C.S. Chakravarthy
H. No. 12-13-301, St.No. 9,
Lane. No. 1, Flat.No. 203,
Satya Classic Apartments, 
Tarnaka, Secunderabad- 500 017,
Telangana State, India.
E-mail: chakkuresearchscholar13@gmail.com
Cell: 09985732397.
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