Happy Republic Day

Republic Day Parade was beautiful. The congratulatory messages on mobile phones, tv channels and newspapers were very inspiring. Our nation has turned 59. Congratulations.

What do we look like at 59?

• The Breaking News on tv channels on Republic Day was - Carla Bruni's Taj Mahal visit - On again, Off again. Thankyou media, our lives would be so color less without you wonderful folks.
• There are 300 years worth of court cases pending in indian courts. Oh come on guys - whats 300 years.. look at the big picture. Be Positive. You indians always think small.. and negative. 300 years is miniscule in the lifetime of this earth you see! And large number of pending court cases is an indication of thriving democracy and freedom; and it guarantees that there are enough black robe jobs going around for next 300 years.
• In Bangaluru (yeah i got that spelling right) it is reported that in many govt. hospitals, the new borns are taken away and hidden from their mothers - and are only handed back when bribe has been paid. Now, is that original? Naah...is that corruption... naaah. Then? Just a practice they saw in Mughal-e-Aazam. The king will throw jewellery at the midwives on receiving the good news, except that nobody is throwing jewellery at the govt. hospital staff anymore - so they decided to hold the parents to ransom. Inspiration.
• What is the best indication of status of sports in a country? If you said - how many medals it wins at Olympics or how good sports facilities are or how much sports is an integral part of society - well you would be Wrong!! The status of sports in a country is indicated by number of Sports Federations that exist, number of Politicians participating in them, amount of money pocketed in the name of sports. Therefore, we are Number One. Whats so great about winning medals anyway? Our thrust has always been on paricipation. In any case the largest contingent, with largest number of officials should have some medals reserved for them. The Olympic committee is discriminating against a developing country - we must fight them - we must go on a dharna, block olympic tracks, chakka jaam them. We know this stuff very well.
• Just 2 days ahead of Republic Day - Govt. Banks are on a strike to protest - merger of bank operations, filling up unfilled vacancies via recruitments, outsourcing of some banking services etc. Unfortunately the private banks did not go on strike - and the sting of the srike was not so hard. These private banks and their employees have no brains really - don't they remember the golden days of banking when customers used to stand in queue begging for their work to be done at bank counters across india. No courtesy, no politeness only arrogance from bank staff - ah those golden days.
• Higher Education - is where we need to spend our energy. And we did. An extremely large (majority) of the private professional colleges in india are owned by politicians! (Yeah, it requires licence to run a college; and profit from it... now come on tell me its the same thing as running a sugarcane factory or a rice mill). Primary Education be damned. Reservations in IITs will benefit the very very big figure of a few hundreds. We can't ignore that and spend our energy educating the teeming masses. No.

Chale Chalo...