Letter from Dr. Abdul Kalam (my favourite former President of India)

Why is the media here so negative?

Dr. Abdul Kalam letter....

Why are we in India so embarrassed to recognize our own strengths, our

achievements?

We are such a great nation. We have so many amazing success stories but we

refuse to acknowledge them. Why?

We are the first in milk production..

We are number one in Remote sensing satellites.

We are the second largest producer of wheat.

We are the second largest producer of rice.

Look at Dr. Sudarshan , he has transferred the tribal village into a self-sustaining, self-driving unit. There are millions of such achievements but our media is only obsessed in the bad news and failures and disasters.

I was in Tel Aviv once and I was reading the Israeli newspaper. It was the day after a lot of attacks and bombardments and deaths had taken place. The Hamas had struck. But the front page of the newspaper had the picture of a Jewish gentleman who in five years had transformed his desert into an orchid and a granary. It was this inspiring picture that everyone woke up to. The gory details of killings, bombardments, deaths, were inside in the newspaper, buried among other news.

In India we only read about death, sickness, terrorism, crime.. Why are we so NEGATIVE? Another question: Why are we, as a nation so obsessed with foreign things? We want foreign T.Vs, we want foreign shirts. We want foreign technology. Why this obsession with everything imported. Do we not realize that self-respect comes with self-reliance? I was in Hyderabad giving this lecture, when a 14 year old girl asked me for my autograph. I asked her what her goal in life is. She replied: I want to live in a developed India . For her, you and I will have to build this developed India . You must proclaim. India is not an under-developed nation; it is a highly developed nation.

YOU say that our government is inefficient.

YOU say that our laws are too old.

YOU say that the municipality does not pick up the garbage.

YOU say that the phones don't work, the railways are a joke. The airline is the worst in the world, mails never reach their destination.

YOU say that our country has been fed to the dogs and is the absolute pits.

YOU say, say and say. What do YOU do about it?

Take a person on his way to Singapore . Give him a name - 'YOURS'. Give him a face - 'YOURS'. YOU walk out of the airport and you are at your International best. In Singapore you don't throw cigarette butts on the roads or eat in the stores. YOU are as proud of their Underground links as they are.. You pay $5 (approx.. Rs. 60) to drive through Orchard Road (equivalent of Mahim Causeway or Pedder Road) between 5 PM and 8 PM. YOU come back to the parking lot to punch your parking ticket if you have over stayed in a restaurant or a shopping mall irrespective of your status identity… In Singapore you don't say anything, DO YOU?

YOU wouldn't dare to eat in public during Ramadan, in Dubai .. YOU would not dare to go out without your head covered in Jeddah.

YOU would not dare to buy an employee of the telephone exchange in London at 10 pounds (Rs.650) a month to, 'see to it that my STD and ISD calls are billed to someone else.

YOU would not dare to speed beyond 55 mph (88 km/h) in Washington and then tell the traffic cop, 'Jaanta hai main kaun hoon (Do you know who I am?). I am so and so's son. Take your two bucks and get lost.'

YOU wouldn't chuck an empty coconut shell anywhere other than the garbage pail on the beaches in Australia and New Zealand .

Why don't YOU spit Paan on the streets of Tokyo?

Why don't YOU use examination jockeys or buy fake certificates in Boston ???

We are still talking of the same YOU.

YOU who can respect and conform to a foreign system in other countries but cannot in your own.

You who will throw papers and cigarettes on the road the moment you touch Indian ground.

If you can be an involved and appreciative citizen in an alien country, why cannot you be the same here in India ?

In America every dog owner has to clean up after his pet has done the job. Same in Japan.

Will the Indian citizen do that here?'

He's right. We go to the polls to choose a government and after that forfeit all responsibility.

We sit back wanting to be pampered and expect the government to do everything for us whilst our contribution is totally negative. We expect the government to clean up but we are not going to stop chucking garbage all over the place nor are we going to stop to pick up a stray piece of paper and throw it in the bin. We expect the railways to provide clean bathrooms but we are not going to learn the proper use of bathrooms.

We want Indian Airlines and Air India to provide the best of food and toiletries but we are not going to stop pilfering at the least opportunity.

This applies even to the staff who is known not to pass on the service to the public.

When it comes to burning social issues like those related to women, dowry, girl child and others, we make loud drawing room protestations and continue to do the reverse at home. Our excuse? 'It's the whole system which has to change, how will it matter if I alone forego my sons' rights to a dowry.' So who's going to change the system?

What does a system consist of? Very conveniently for us it consists of our neighbours, other households, other cities, other communities and the government. But definitely not me and YOU. When it comes to us actually making a positive contribution to the system we lock ourselves along with our families into a safe cocoon and look into the distance at countries far away and wait for a Mr. Clean to come along & work miracles for us with a majestic sweep of his hand or we leave the country and run away.

Like lazy cowards hounded by our fears we run to America to bask in their glory and praise their system. When New York becomes insecure we run to England . When England experiences unemployment, we take the next flight out to the Gulf. When the Gulf is war struck, we demand to be rescued and brought home by the Indian government. Everybody is out to abuse and rape the country. Nobody thinks of feeding the system. Our conscience is mortgaged to money.

Dear Indians, The article is highly thought inductive, calls for a great deal of introspection and pricks one's conscience too…. I am echoing J. F. Kennedy's words to his fellow Americans to relate to Indians…..

'ASK WHAT WE CAN DO FOR INDIA AND DO WHAT HAS TO BE DONE TO MAKE INDIA WHAT AMERICA AND OTHER WESTERN COUNTRIES ARE TODAY'

Lets do what India needs from us.

Ahoy! Enemy Within

It was in the news that one-sixth of the world’s population of those living below the poverty line are in India.  Is this an achievement?  One-sixth of the world’s population is in India’s State of Uttar Pradesh.  Everybody knows that the only popular industry in the State of Uttar Pradesh is baby production. Baby production due to uncondomed sex as most do not earn more than a square meal or less to even think of purchasing packets of condoms.  Thank the Lord not for the daily bread but libidos.  Now exactly how many are below the poverty line in the State of Uttar Pradesh?  90%? 80%? Please ask the U.N. or is it the statisticians in GOI (government of India) not to give us algebraic variables.  Readers want the facts in plain Queen’s English.

Why should the politicians in the government of India care?  First, they are busy keeping their coalition partners happy by turning a blind eye to their doings.  Then, they are busy with money laundering to survive votes of confidence in the Lok Sabha.  Finally, it is time for re-elections, and the governments at the center and States, especially those run by opposition parties, are busy trying to outdo one another by pushing through populist vote catching government orders for a section of the people.

Should anybody in authority care for an inflation of 14% that is still rising?  Mind you, not at consumer price-index (that would be very embarrassing even for the statisticians in the Ministry of Planning) but at wholesale price-index.  Prices of essential commodities are steadily going beyond the reach of the common household.  In order to control inflation while the Reserve Bank of India is attempting to reduce money supply in the market by tightening bank credit, friends across the borders are running a mint in printing Indian currency and offering at low “profits” to the desperate Indian households.  Our mentioned friends across the border are also able to lend authenticity to their trade by exchange of currency through their friends in banks in India.  They have a lot of friends in the State Bank of India, which is the largest public sector (read government-owned) bank in India.  So what?  The government of India has with one stroke sorted out this matter by making a person liable for persecution for holding such currency even if it has come out of the ATM of their nationalized banks!  There …. A big opportunity for Chinese enterprisers to manufacture low-priced (do not ever attempt to repair) currency notes x-ray scanners for the common man.  Ever-ready to keep the Chinese happy (and forgetful of their favorite pastime of border intrusions), GOI will gladly import the same and subsidize them too.

For a long time I have not read the Unemployment and Underemployment News.  I am quite sure that here too the State of Uttar Pradesh must be winning hands down with the greatest population of Muslims whose only aim is to reduce the Hindus to minority by their baby boom policy via their legalized bigamy.  Sorry Hindus.  The law of India does not allow you to venture in that area.

The GOI is trying to upstage the opposition ruled States by waiving off the bank loans of the farmers.  Wow!  What a lottery for the farmers.  There are plenty of well off farmers who are trying to capitalize on this free-for-all Farmers’ National Lottery.  The amount involved is to the tune of about Rs. 75,000 crores (US$ 20 million).  Nothing stops the farmers to have their debts written off and then re-apply for another until next waiver.

Dr. Manmohan Singh, the Prime Minister of India, a former head of the Ministry of Planning, and an economist, etc. etc. is no politician.  But he too wants to be remembered after he moves out of the limelight.  Having survived the vote of confidence created by the Marxists pulling the plug of support to his party’s coalition, he is pushing his Nuclear energy dream riding in USA “Bushyback” attempting to cross the last hurdle of the Nuclear Suppliers’ Group.

Lucknow Mein Software Park Ki Bukwas

The Mayawati Government has sent a proposal to the Central Government for opening of a Software Park in Lucknow on the lines of that in Chennai and some other centers.  Basically, this is a proposal to attract central government funds for the purpose.  Earlier, such proposals by the previous State government of Gundo Ka Badshah, Mulayam Singh had been trashed for lack of infrastructure.  There is no BPO in Lucknow.  Wipro had opened one about three years ago, but had to close the same for lack of infrastructure in the form of reliable electricity and broadband.  The situation is no different now if not worse.  However, with Lok Sabha elections next year and the Congress Party needing outside/underside support of independent outfits, Mayawati thinks she is in a position to do arm twisting despite the fact that her earlier proposal of Rs. 80,000 crores ($20 billion) for development of U.P. had been cold shouldered as all know that most of it would have been wasted on Ambedkar parks with the statue of her mentor and herself.