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I just read an interview of M.F. Hussain who turned 94 recently, while in his self-imposed exile on account of the few hundred cases pending against him.
It really makes me want to rant about freedom of speech and expression, which very few people really get. Most rational people think they support freedom of speech and expression, except that they don’t. Still worse, they don’t even know. The topic of M.F. Hussain is the easiest way to expose someone’s hypocrisy.
I shouldn’t really lay the blame on ‘offendees’ here when the constitution itself doesn’t guarantee us free speech. Just the fact that we have laws to entertain ‘offendees’ is the crux of the problem. In a country like the U.S. which protects free speech and expression, both the cases and the ‘offendees’ would be thrown out of the courts.
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I am reminded of a sentence I heard recently (don’t remember the source), “As people we need to realize that the constitution does not give us a right to get offended”.
I am not too optimistic that everyone will get the above sentence.
Here’s an interesting PIL :
The PIL was filed at the Gujarat high court by one Davendra Kumar Trivedi. In his PIL, Trivedi stated that Hindi and Desi songs have been played at garba function for a long time now, and that people have all right to play and listen to such songs during the festival.
The PIL further states that banning of such Desi and Hindi songs during Navratri would amount to curtailing the fundamental rights of the citizens and also hurting the religious sentiments of people.
The PIL was filed at the Gujarat high court by one Davendra Kumar Trivedi. In his PIL, Trivedi stated that Hindi and Desi songs have been played at garba function for a long time now, and that people have all right to play and listen to such songs during the festival.
The PIL further states that banning of such Desi and Hindi songs during Navratri would amount to curtailing the fundamental rights of the citizens and also hurting the religious sentiments of people.
It occurs to me that the main reason why we infringe upon others’ rights and don’t bother about fervently protecting ours, is because we don’t really know what our rights are.
To be fair, neither did the people writing our constitution. Looks like someone really forgot to look up freedom of speech and expression because they had to attend another freedom celebration party.
With reference to the whole Jaswant-Jinnah episode, one thing no one bothered to do is actually read the book. C.M. Naim of Outlook India does that, and now I just feel sorry for him !
I spent 695 good rupees and therefore felt I had to get my money’s worth. However, after a couple of attempts to read the book serially, I decided to cut my losses. I began to read the book in patches—50 pages here, 10 pages there, often letting the book fall open and then reading whatever fate dictated. I feel no shame in saying that the responses I offer below are based only on a partial reading, and resolutely subjective.
My first response: it is an embarrassing book to read. I felt foolish when I found myself trudging through such awful expository prose as this :
“The League had claimed that it was the true upholder of Islam’s ideological authenticity; also of representing a substantive Muslim consensus, therefore, it demanded, rather presupposed, just a single Muslim medium – and asserting its identity as a different conceptual ‘nation’, claimed a separate land for itself which is why this agonizing question continues to grate against our sensibilities: ‘Separate’ from what?”
This part almost made me laugh my head off :
“For one, such an assertion—[Muslims are a separate nation]—though entirely illogical, is fundamentally of an insatiable nature, it will always remain so, forever, as it never can be quenched being born of a peculiar Indian phenomenon ‘minoritism’, endlessly it will continue to give birth to more destructive minoritism, being politically contagious for, Pakistan is doubtless Muslim, but ‘theocentrically’, it is not a ‘theocratic’ state, indeed there is no such state other (sic) perhaps than the Vatican, but then who, other than Gandhi and a few others was to advise caution as we rushed headlong (and unheeding!) down this destructive path.”
All this while, the joke was on the BJP, Congress and everyone who didn’t make anything out of the whole controversy (which naturally excludes the media).
I can only imagine that Jinnah, excitedly opens up his netherworldly e-copy of the book and after a few pages goes, “WTF !”.
Link via Mukta.
Check out this superb talk by Benjamin Zander on classical music and its reach. You can see his passion for classical music as he narrates with the enthusiasm of a little kid, about topics like one-buttock playing, many wives saying , “My husband is tone-deaf” and what makes classical music so special.
There is a bit, where he does an interesting experiment with your thought process as he plays a piece. I am sure you’ll enjoy it as much as I did.
For any kind of music, we, as listeners, must know how to listen to it. It usually takes time and knowledge about the form of music. I can talk about Hindustani and Carnatic music from my experiences. Most people are born with the notion that classical music (Hindustani, Carnatic or otherwise) is boring, and they are fair in their analysis. But any form of classical music is far more deeper than popular forms of music, and it’s only when you make that effort to learn that you being enjoying.
And then, it’s just pure bliss.
Link via Sanjeev N.
From the recent Salman Khan starrer Wanted :
Picture this. Retired cop tied to a chair, ruthless villain trying to talk him out into naming his son. This is how the conversation goes :
Villian : Achcha ek baat bata. Tera mara mooh dekhne ke liye to tera beta aayega na ? Ya darr ke maare chupa rahega ?
Retired cop : Mard ka bachcha hai, jaroor aayeja.
Villian (pulls out a gun) : Bang ! Bang ! Bang !
Yeah hard luck ‘dying dude’, but you totally asked for it. Next time, pause and think for a moment before you answer.
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I have no idea why I saw Wanted, and in spite of some unintentionally hilarious moments, it is a fairly engaging watch. It has no theme, a one-dimensional plot, if any, and isn’t intelligent cinema. I am compelled to compare it with Ghajini since both are mindless action movies. I am going to go ahead and say that in that genre, this one might be marginally better (No need to mention, but Rahman’s music wins in Ghajini). I’d want to watch the Telugu version Pokiri though; I believe Mahesh Babu can look and play the protagonist far better than Salman.
If you want to see a politician make a complete fool of himself, look no further than Tom Vadakkan in this debate over Shashi Tharoor’s tweet. In the debate is also Jug Suraiya, Amit Varma and resident judge Arnab Goswami : Link
When asked about why the whole issue over a tweet from his own partyman, Tom Vadakkan says and I (try to) quote :
.. and let me tell you something. I did a little research after you phoned me to find out what is the basic cause of this tweet business and some of the survey reports that I received, was Tweet is a very lonely man and he needs counseling. And I’m sure, you may make light of it, the fact of the matter is, Jug Suraiya may make a cartoon out of it, you may defend it, it’s not that we’ve lost a sense of humour, but let’s face it today. He is a lonely man, it is basically addictive. He [Tharoor] said things which hurts people, and that’s the line we’ve taken.
I kid you not. I absolutely cannot make such stuff up.
Looks like Jug Suraiya doesn’t need to make a cartoon after all.
If only someone can cut his gem of a comment and get it on youtube, I bet it’d be a viral video within no time.
Update : Here it is. Courtesy Sanjeev Naik. I’ll still suggest going through the entire video.
Nitin at The Indian National Interest writes a piece about the irony and joke that is the austerity drive by the government.
Mr Mukherjee’s hypocrisy lies in using taxpayer funds to convey an impression of ‘austerity’ because some parts of India are suffering from a drought. Even this faux austerity is unwarranted and useless even from a symbolic perspective—just like the insistence on wearing khadi. Surely, someone should point out the irony of scale and scope: the UPA government caused immense damage to public finances through gargantuan spending programmes since it first came to power in 2004 and now calls for MPs to give up 20% of their salaries as an austerity measure.
As for the brouhaha over Tharoor and S.M. Krishna staying at 5-star hotels :
[... the question that ought to be asked of Mr Mukherjee and his economist boss is whether the government of India is paying fair market prices for the bungalows and bhavans it occupies in New Delhi? It doesn’t matter that the government actually owns the real-estate—there is an opportunity cost. Can’t all the parliamentarians and high government officials be moved into high-rise complexes somewhere in New Delhi, and their Lutyens’ bungalows be rented out? There are a number of government offices—engineers, commissioners, registrars and post offices—that could be moved out of the most expensive areas into less expensive ones.]
For a government that’s been pouring in thousands of crores in leaky bucket schemes, populist austerity doesn’t really make any sense.Plus the government is really shooting itself in the foot with questions being raised about every small spending from the government. Good luck dealing with that.
Which reminds me, why does Robert Vadra have Z-security ?
Getting my point ?
If austerity needs to be practised, it should really start with the size of the government.
The only positive in this saga is that we have a new word in our vocabulary.
The Shiv Sena has taken to technology in a big way. No one more than their chief, Uddhav Thackeray.
The wing provided Thackeray with an iPhone with state-of-the-art capabilities. “Uddhavji can send messages to at least 3.5 lakh people at a time from this phone.”
Okay I know a tiny little about the iPhone, and I have no clue how this can be done. But hats off to them for cracking this one.
Now for the most hilarious part :
Thackeray’s mobile phone also has an automated answering facility. “If someone calls him, and he is not able to receive the call, a recorded message in his voice saying ‘thanks for calling. I will contact you later’, is automatically generated,” Patil said.
That’s called a voicemail, you #@#$@# !!!
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On a ligher note, I believe Sainiks shall now practise stone throwing on their PSPs. Then they’ll take to junk food too, and grow fat. And one fine day, will be too lazy to riot on the streets.
Okay I might be expecting slightly too much.
Have a look at this headline :
As a hardcore feminist, I am wholeheartedly with the PM on this one. In fact, women need education more than men, so they can read magazines or access the internet in the afternoons. So kudos to this new scheme.
Now I admit that not all women sit idle at home. There’s buying groceries, serving in-laws, cleaning the house and a couple of other things I might be missing here. The point being, in their free time, they can read and write. I assume that is the main purpose of the above scheme.
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But seriously, doesn’t that amount to gender profiling ?
On a related note, whenever Mr. Narendra Modi proudly announced the 3% dropout rate of girls in Gujarat, I am puzzled that no one grilled him on the overall dropout rate.
