Jacob Bronowski (1908-1974)

Just a few days over a century ago Jacob Bronowski was born in Poland. Among the people whose sojourn on this material plane overlapped mine and whom I admire, Bruno (as his friends and family called him) is up there with a select few. I consider him to be one of my spiritual teachers in the sense that his work has nourished my spirit over the years since I first read his words and then later watched his BBC production of The Ascent of Man. I still have the tattered book with me which I had acquired about 25 years ago and every now and then re-read to enrich the soul and receive solace after a long immersion in the dismal science.

Links: Secular Road to Hell

Arvind Lavakare’s piece in sify titled “Let us all salute Narendra Modi” includes a quote from a letter that K M Munshi wrote to Jawaharlal Nehru:

In secularism’s name, politicians adopt a strange attitude which, while it condones the susceptibilities, religious and social, of the minorities, it is too ready to brand similar susceptibilities in the majority community as communalistic and reactionary. How secularism sometimes becomes allergic to Hinduism will be apparent from certain episodes relating to the reconstruction of the Somnath Temple…These unfortunate postures have been creating a sense of frustration in the majority community. If, however, the misuse of the term ‘secularism’ continues,…if every time there is an inter-community conflict, the majority is blamed regardless of the merits of the question, the springs of traditional tolerance will dry up. While the majority exercises patience and tolerance, the minorities should adjust themselves to the majority. Otherwise, the future is uncertain and an explosion cannot be avoided.

The Congress’s “divide the country along religious and caste lines and rule” policy will bear very bitter fruits indeed. People are waking up. The springs of traditional tolerance are drying up, as Munshi warned generations ago. Slowly but surely. You see the signs on the internet now and soon it will migrate to the hard copy press.

The Secular Road to Hell by Ramananda Sengupta, chief editor of Sify.

Here’s Shobha Warrier in rediffiland: Modi, a hero.

Open Thread

Go ahead. Speak your mind. Stop lurking if that is what you have been doing. Bouquets and brickbats. Whatever it is, just say it. This is an open thread but like all other posts, the comments close after 21 days.

By the by, I am in Mumbai tomorrow at at panel which is discussing “Inclusive Growth.”

World Bank Complicit in Indian Corruption

A recent Wall Street Journal article, World Bank Disgrace, (hat tip: Prakash Advani) reports that an internal review of five WB health projects in India totaling US$ 569 million in loans shows major corruption. The report begins with

Credit Robert Zoellick for knowing how to put the best face on a profound embarrassment. On Friday, the World Bank president announced in a press release that the bank had “joined forces” with the government of India to “fight fraud and corruption” in that country’s health sector. This is happening at the same time that Mr. Zoellick’s colleagues are hounding bank anticorruption chief Suzanne Rich Folsom, the person primarily responsible for bringing the scandals to light.

Joining forces with the government of India to fight corruption is reminiscent of joining forces with General Musharraf to fight terrorism. One bank managing directed is reported as saying that she is “encouraged by the Indian government’s “strong resolve” to deal with corruption.” Exactly like the strong resolve of the fox in guarding the hen house. We can now all sleep soundly since the Indian government has resolved to . . . whatever.

If your corrupt government is strongly resolved to deal with corruption, you might be a third world country.

PS: Let’s remember that all the stolen money is a WB loan to India. That means, we, the tax-payers in India, have to ultimately pay back all the embezzled funds.

Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid — The US edition

From The Straight Dope, a great piece of satire: Fifty years later, does America need a stupider motto?

Seriously though, the US is showing signs of serious trouble. Huckabee is raving lunatic, as Pharyngula reports.

PS: My favorite bit in that satire bit is “… and Mexicans continue to occur.” ROTFL with the idea of Mexicans occurring like some periodic drought or infestation.

The Tata Nano — Part 2

In the previous post I claimed (not unlike some other observers) that the Nano is game-changing. The Nano has to be seen not just in the Indian context but in the bigger global context. That is why I made the point that it can be seen as the “Peopes’ car” and not “Indian People’s Car.”

The Tata Nano

In the image above, you see Ratan Tata in the Tata Nano. What a priceless shot. Notice that it says “Peoples’ Car” and not “People’s Car” — it is a car meant not just some people but for a varied group of people. It is a car for the various peoples of the world. I am not sure that that is what those who put up that sign meant. Maybe it is just a mistake. But that mistake speaks to a larger truth.

I also think it is interesting that “The People’s Car” translates to “Volkswagen” in German. The Volkswagen Beetle was built upon the express dictate of Adolf Hitler. Curious that we have Mr Ratan Tata as the promoter of India’s people’s car. In any event, Tata Motors is making a game-changing move and I am proud that an Indian corporation is doing so. Way to go, Mr Ratan Tata. May you succeed beyond your wildest dreams.

[For follow up to this post and its comments, see “Tata Nano — Part 2“.]

Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid

Just over a month ago, I wrote about Prof C N R Rao’s take on what ails Bangalore. A respected academician and an adviser to the Prime Minister of India, I considered Prof Rao’s opinion to be extremely misguided and wrong. He is at the very least at the top of the heap of educated Indians and should know better, I thought. Worrisome though it is that someone as accomplished as him is so starkly mistaken, what is more distressing is that lower down the pyramid of minds, you find it occupied by minds that are equally if not more confused. A comment from a young lady to a blog post reads:

lol…that was funny wat all mr rao has to say….with leaders like him d country sure is doomed!
its IT whoz saving us!

I don’t know which is more terrible: Dr CNR Rao’s idiotic rant or the response by an “educated” person. She does not even bother to use standard spelling. Perhaps she does not know, or perhaps she does not care.

What matters is that she does not know that IT is not what’s saving the country or what can save the country. If she is the end product of our Indian education system, then it is failing and failing miserably. Not only does she not know the facts or even appears to care for facts, but she is unable to reason.

The country sure is doomed. She better look into the mirror one of these days to understand the real reasons.

Be afraid. Be very afraid.

The Problem with Atheism

And now for something entirely different.

Well, not really. I mean that in the Monty Pythonesque sense. If you are familiar with Monty Python, you know upon hearing that line that what was going to follow was more of the same absurd insanely humorous ridiculous nonsense that considers nothing sacred. Perhaps nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition but you’d be crazy to expect something entirely different from Monty Python. In much the same way, despite my claim above, you are not likely to find anything entirely different from the usual fare on my blog. Every topic that I touch upon ultimately converges upon the questions of what is development, why is India not developed, and what can be done to make India developed.

[This is a rather long post — consider yourself warned.]

The AN-WWTSD-MFGTT

Why is the US so Cheap? – Part 2

This is a response to the comments on the last post “Why is the US so Cheap?” I had argued that the US is more efficient in producing stuff compared to India. The people in the US are more productive because they don’t face as many hurdles – they have bigger and better machines, they use more energy, they have more economic freedom, and so on.

Economic freedom is a matter of policy. Policy is made by people who are entrusted to do so. Determining who the policymakers are in an economy is part of the political process. The political system evolved as a historical process from a set of initial conditions which are to a large extent a random draw. Smart people figured out the set of rules that the economy would play under. It is my belief that differences in the performances of economies arise from the differing set of rules that economies adopt. One set of rules may allow greater economic freedom to the people relative to the government; another set may allow the government control over most of what an individual is allowed to do. I believe that the US is successful (to the extent that it is) primarily because it got the rules worked out better (not perfectly, though) than the others.