monsoon 2009 - baarish gul

i followed the 2008 monsoon over maharashtra reasonably closely.
not this year.
so remedying the situation.
'worst drought since 1972' screams TOI.
the india monsoon map tells the story (courtesy - IMD, Mumbai):
22% less than normal.
22/36 divisions are reporting 'deficient' rainfall


















but the most striking statistic is the normal rainfall expected in each region.
the lowest is west rajasthan (256.8 mm per year)...quite obvious na, desert and all that.
but next is tamilnadu (285.2 mm per year). mind you that TN gets most of its rain from the north east monsoon, but this figure is still quite remarkable considering that kerala - a stone's throw away - gets a whopping 2071.2 mm a year.
the western ghats do a bloody swell job.

impending civil war!?

tehelka reports that we are at a warlike situation.
this war is against the maoists aka naxalites aka 'terrorists'.
these people are supposed to have resorted to excessive violence against the state to stake their claim/people's claim.
their main geography cover some states in central india - MP, Chattisgarh, Maharashtra, AP, WB, Bihar, Jharkhand, Orissa. the government has made a monumental blunder by raising the Salwa Judum to counter the naxal violence.
people (with guns) against people (with guns) has never worked.

some simple nice people/orgs (like binayak sen/PUCL) have been accused of being naxalites/sympathisers.

coming back to the tehelka story which stung me:

Over this past year, the Home Ministry has been planning a major armed offensive against the Naxals, particularly in Chhattisgarh. According to reports, the plan involves stationing around 75,000 troops in the heartland of India — including special CRPF commandos, the ITBP and the BSF. Scattered newspaper accounts have spoken of forces being withdrawn from Jammu and Kashmir and the Northeast; there is also talk of bringing in the feared Rashtriya Rifles — a battalion created specially for counter-insurgency work — and the purchase of bomb trucks, bomb blankets, bomb baskets, and sophisticated new weaponry. Minister Chidambaram has also said that if necessity dictates, he will bring in the special forces of the army.

why is it a scary thought?

The decision to launch such a massive armed operation on home ground — due to start this November — should have triggered animated political, civil society and media debate. But Operation Green Hunt — as the offensive is being termed — has been gathering force in almost complete silence. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Home Minister Chidambaram have variously called Naxals — or “Maoists” — “the gravest threat to India’s internal security.” Perhaps a military offensive against them is the answer, but is it the only answer? Is it the best answer? Will it provide a solution? Who will be impacted by this offensive? What will be its repercussions? Who are we really declaring war on? What are we declaring war on? Are we going into this with eyes wide open? Is there anything we should have learned from the seemingly irreparable psychological mess in Kashmir and the Northeast? These are the questions a democratic society should be asking.

himanshu kumar needs to be heard.

As Himanshu Kumar, a Gandhian and the only human rights activist on ground zero in faraway Dantewada where Operation Green Hunt is to be launched, says, “We can all be agreed on the premise that Naxalism is a problem, but why are these poor people attracted to a politics that will end in death? Have we created such a heinous system that death is more attractive than the deprivations and humiliations this system doles out? If that is so, why should I defend this system? All that these people want is food, health care, school, clothes and their legitimate right over their land. Yet, instead of weaning them away by strengthening the democratic process, if we are going to run our democracy only on the strength of weapons, I fear we are entering a dangerous and irrepairable state. We are headed for civil war.”

i am seriously worried.

WTF - chate gores carroll

the TOI (dassera edition - 28th Sep 2009) of today has a 4 page supplement of Chate classes. they run a behemoth of a tuition academy.
it is headed by a Prof Matchindra Chate (btw - all tuition center teachers are called 'professor' or XYZ 'sir'). i think he is a charlatan of the nth order.
in page 4 of the supplement is his personal letter to students (this was covered by dcubed couple of months ago), he writes:

In Ravindranath Tagore's poem, 'Alice in Wonderland': Alice soaks beauty of the nature while merrily wandering. She abruptly stops at some distance, since there are two pathways in two different direc-tions. She is confused to choose the correct path. Suddenly a cat arrives. She asks the cat the query she has. "Which way you want to lead?" the cat asks. Alice says, "I haven't yet decided." The cat reply's "Then follow any way, it doesn't make any difference."

and so it continues in manner which is more fantastical than lewis carroll ever imagined his wonderland to be.
it is remarkably WTF that Chate and his outstanding team at Chate classes is unable to track down such an elementary gaffe.

getting off the grid

the grid is the one that supplies a home with water, electricity, gas, sewerage.
in mumbai, the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai, Mahanagar Gas limited and BEST Undertaking form the grid.

getting off the grid would then mean to be able to live without external provisions of these facilities and utilities. implying self generation and usage minimisation.
i got introduced to this concept indirectly through the beautiful story of dhirendra and smita, evocatively chronicled by nipun.

treehugger interviews abe and josie, who have moved off the grid. their website chronicles their experiment. with a lot of pointers to aspiring 'off the gridders'.

we hope to get there soon.

city farming workshop

this sunday, we are attending a city farming workshop.
the natueco city famring blog should become an important part of the mumbai webspace. and of course, the concept should become an important part of the mumbai space.

this mail which i got yesterday, assures me that it will be a wonderful workshop:

We would also like to reduce garbage generated at the premises and so request you to carry your own plate, a glass and a spoon for breakfast/lunch and herbal tea. MNP (Maharashtra nature Park, Dharavi) has the facility for you to be able to wash these. Please also carry your own drinking water so as to avoid "buying' the same.

Kindly bring a notepad and pen for taking notes, we will be providing you our booklet on natueco farming.You may also need napkin post the hands-on session.

this is a lesson to carry our own things wherever we go. simple and elegant.

won't stop fighting

one of the most beautiful songs depicting the fight of the tribals and adivasis against the tsunami of 'development'.
गाँव छोड़ब नहीं (gaon chodab nahin).
watch and enjoy.

fasting

yesterday (friday 18th sept 2009) was alvida jumma (अलविदा जुम्मा).
it is the last friday in the holy month on ramzan.
it is a very special day as it also indicates that Id-ul-fitr (ramzan-id) is around the corner.

on the suggestion of one of my friends, i kept a fast (रोज़ा) from dawn to dusk.
this was my first time ever. to stay over 14 hours without food was going to be quite manageable, but i was not sure about staying thirsty for the same time. it goes against my standard 2-3 liters of water/day.
so i decided to stay in the office the whole day (in air-conditioned environments) so as to prevent loss of water by sweating.
so i had a full stomach of water and a cup of coffee in the morning and that lasted me through the day quite well.
i could observe that life and time seemed to have slowed down. i kept looking at the time more frequently than before.

the breaking of the fast (रोज़ा खोलना) aka Iftaar (इफ्तार) is a pretty process.
we had gone shopping to Md Ali Road, which is a remarkable place most of the year, but during Ramzan, it is just moves up many notches.
if you can stand crowds (mumbai trains its citizens well in this regard), this is a must see. especially on alvida jumma.

i am considering fasting right through ramzan next year. but that's 11 months away.

now i wait for Id.

changing names

marriage, numerology, weird names, and a few other misc reasons are why people change their names.
as per the rules, one needs to apply for this name change with the appropriate government department and after a period of time, the name change is notified in a gazette.
also the name changers are supposed to advertise this name change in the newspapers.

so here are a few interesting ones i read on way to pune yesterday.
"i have changed my name from Banarasi Abdullah Banarasi Bismillah Baba to Khan Mohammed Kasim Bismillah Baba".

"i have changed my name from Mohammad Naushad Mohammad Aqil and Shaikh Naushad Akil to Shaikh Mohammad Naushad Mohammad Aqil".

"i have changed my name from Vilas Karamanbhai Domania to Vaishali Ashwin Kumar Panchali".
i maybe forgot to add sex-change as one of the reasons.

Common School System - some exchanges

i had started endorsing the CSS since i read about it a couple of months ago.
first post was here and then a full fledged endorsement here.

in this week alone, i have had 2 chances to engage in direct discussions with groups in defense on CSS. one was initiated by purvsoutlet and the other was over email.

the obvious exchanges over free markets, parents choice, egalitarian society, etc. were thrown around and in a healthy spirit, the discussion ended without any judgment.

the email exchange, however, went into uncharted areas.
the critical points from the exchanges follows:

nm said

So I am feeling pretty confident that the high school agenda will come back with a bang. Also, there is a popular backing for it. There is a huge unemployed rural middle-class, middle caste youth, which will die to become govt. teachers – unlike upper caste, upper class doctors who don’t want to work in govt service. These guys can mobilise votes too.

csm response

I would like to believe that, if they did not press ahead with the RTE bill in its form. The speed at which Sibal pushed it through, is clearly an indicator of him getting major brownie points with MMS (which he has got in truckloads).

I believe that their social sector thrust will rest with the NREGA and stuff around those lines. I don’t believe that it will traverse to the main social sectors of health and education.

nm said

About the common school system. Come to Jharkhand – you can’t find a school, common or otherwise, in most of the villages there. The private sector is dominating the metros and the small cities, maybe. But where the law will really matters, there is nothing much and nothing at all but govt. I think, in principle, a common school is a good idea. But there is a history of progressive groups of the oppressed opting out of the common school system because they found it discriminatory – think of the Dravidian movement or the Dalit movement in Mah or the progressive Muslim groups in the Deccan and South. It will be hard to win these people over to a system which promises homogeneity, but not necessarily equality. Typical leftist problem of being unable to understand caste, culture – or see it as divisive and some kind of ‘false consciousness’.

csm response

The CSS goes hand in hand with local ownership. The latter has to be the lynchpin around which the CSS will evolve.

The govt school system in the villages have primarily failed due to this factor. As long as the government is “mai-baap” of society, no system will work.

Of course, it has to break through the rigid application of caste hierarchies. And I surrender that the last 60 years has not been able to dent this structure.

The progressive groups have moved out of the system and found their niches and school-ghettos. It has helped their social/economic progression, I agree completely. But it has further wedged apart society. If that’s the way it will be, I will not be any part of it.

To economically equalise society, the rich will have to give up their riches, along with the pulling up of the poor. In the very same manner, the upper castes have to get off their high horse.

I have direct experience in the former but zilch in the latter and hence am doing simple extrapolation.

And so far as all education continues to divide society on the basis of labour (in other words, demean manual labour), no system will eventually work.

definition of rich

in this article, gary north explains 'rich' as follows:

I have a peculiar definition of "rich." It is easy to understand. I know almost no one who has achieved it.

"You are rich when you quit your wage-earning job and pursue your life's top goal without ever drawing a paycheck again."

Note: I did not say "when you can afford to quit." I know lots of people who are rich by that definition. But they don't quit. This includes me.

The proof of the pudding is in the eating. The proof of riches is to unlock the golden handcuffs, hand them back to their owner, and walk away.

But what if you love your job? It pays a lot, you say, but you would be willing to do it for free.

Then do it for free.

Why?

To get rid of the golden handcuffs. Do not depend on them.

success versus significance

When men reach middle age, they face a decision point: success vs. significance.

If a man defines success as being different from significance, this decision point is a big one. Mid-life crisis is associated with it.

If he regards success as significance, he may have to make a career change. Most men's careers are not geared to significance.

The larger your allocation of time to significance, the better. The earlier you begin, the better. The justification for focusing on money rather than significance is that you need to accumulate a lot of money to finance your significance. When you reach your goal, turn in the golden handcuffs.

unlike gary north, i know a few people who are rich :-)
many write on this blog and many are somewhere in the fields of rural india.

flaws in understanding the planet situation

i say "planet situation" instead of "planet crisis" as my understanding grows.
and this commentary accuses a lot of us (including obama) of not understanding this situation correctly.

(a) It’s us against the environment.

(b) It’s us against other men.

(c) It’s the individual (or the individual company or the individual nation) that matters.

(d) We can have unilateral control over the environment and must strive for that control.

(e) We live within an infinitely expanding ‘frontier’.

(f) Economic determinism is common sense.

(g) Technology will do it for us.

(Source: Gregory Bateson, ‘The Roots of Ecological Crisis’, in Steps to an Ecology of Mind, Ballantine Books, New York 1972)

read it. it is long but wise.

the thing is, i really really...

the two phrases that slightly dumb down spoken language ...
1. the thing is....
2. ...really really...

bangalore bombers

no, it is not a IPL/KPL team.
nor is it LeT's new attack plan.

it is a fantastic group of environmentalists who are bombing the city with seeds....yes with seeds.

Nine Bangaloreans of this group called Samraksha Dharitri are on a mission to make the Garden City green again by throwing seeds balls (see box) over barren lands of the city.

The group meets every Sunday to chalk out a strategy. Stephen Anthony, a techie and president of the group, says, “First we zero in on the location. One Sunday, we decided to go to Bilekahalli. Five sub-groups were formed and they were asked the survey the vacant land where seed balls can be thrown. By afternoon, the sub-groups were back with the report. They had identified 19 roads and 62 vacant plots. We handed over 600 seed balls and asked them to go ahead with the task.”

and our favourite natural farming god, fukuoka, is the inspiration.

Seed balls are a way for distributing and protecting seeds by encasing them in a mixture of clay and compost. Dry organic compost, seeds and clay are mixed together. Just enough water is added to the mixture while stirring to make the concoction bind together. The mixture is then rolled into small round balls and left in the sun for a day or two to dry. Once dry, these balls are ready to be dispersed. Seeds balls are an ancient technique re-introduced by Masanobu Fukuoka, an advocate of natural farming.

courtesy: propoor.org

education announcements - good and not good

kapil sibal coming into heading the MHRD has seen an extended level of noise in the education space. which is good.
and the Right to Free and Compulsory Education Bill 2008 was passed in early august in the midst of all this euphoria. which is not good.

and yesterday, we are bombarded with 3 new announcements:
1. Std 10 board exams optional for CBSE students. which is a great concept but not good (cos i feel that there has been little public debate on this).
2. 7 new IIMs are being planned. which is not good (cos their track record with the new IITs is abysmal)
3. Tamilnadu government to combine the various education boards. which is very good.

weddings - double bill

back to back weddings starting this week. both brothers.
that is 3 days of celebrations with extended families...

budget largesse to the rich

sainath blasts the UPA government over their budget allocations and in the same breath takes on the mainstream media in his excellent Aug 15th 2009 opinion piece in the hindu.

the price rise warning due to impending/ongoing drought...

The price-rise-due-to-drought warning is a fraud. Of course, a drought and major crop failure will push up prices further. But prices were steadily rising for five years since the 2004 elections, long before a drought. Take the years between 2004 and 2008 when you had some good monsoons. And more than one year in which we claimed “record production” of foodgrain. The price of rice went up 46 per cent, of wheat by over 62 per cent, atta 55 per cent, salt 42 per cent and more. By March 2008, the average increase in the prices of such items was already well over 40 per cent. Then, they rose again till a little before the 2009 polls. And have risen dramatically in the past three months.

taking on those who whined over the farm loan waiver on 2008...

Remember the great loan waiver of 2008, that historic write-off of the loans of indebted farmers? Recall the editorials whining about ‘fiscal imprudence?’ That was a one-time, one-off waiver covering countless millions of farmers and was claimed to touch Rs. 70,000 crore. But over Rs. 130,000 crore (in direct taxes) has been doled out in concessions in just two budgets to a tiny gaggle of merchants hogging at the public trough. Without a whimper of protest in the media. Imagine what budget giveaways to corporates since 1991 would total. We’d be talking trillions of rupees.

Simply put, the corporate world has grabbed concessions in just two years that total more than seven times the ‘fiscally imprudent’ farm loan waiver. In fact, it means that on average we have been feeding the corporate world close to Rs. 700 crore every day in those two years. Imagine calculating what this figure would be, in total, since 1991. (Er.., what’s the word for the bracket above ‘trillion?’) Ask for an expansion of the NREGS, seek universal access to the PDS, plead for more spending on public health and education — and there’s no money. Yet, there’s enough to give away nearly Rs. 30 crore an hour to the corporate world in concessions.

and to his ardent critics who say that he does not offer solutions...

It could launch, among many other things, the pond-in-every-farm programme. It could restructure farm loan schedules. It could start getting the idea of monsoon management into its thinking. It could curb forward trading-linked speculation that was driving one of our worst price rises in history long before the drought was on the horizon. And it could declare universal access to the PDS. That cost could probably be easily covered by, say, cancelling the dessert from the menu of the unending corporate free lunch in this country.

green GDP

this concept is gathering steam across the place in indian media circles.
jairam ramesh says GDP = green domestic product.

tehelka's latest article espouses this concept in detail.

Green GDP seeks to evaluate and place a monetary figure for a country’s environmental resources. Simply put: if you know the cost of something, you will value it. If you don’t have a cost for something, you are happy to throw it away. Says Pavan Sukhdev, founder of the Green Indian States Trust (GIST) and pioneer of the Green GDP concept in India, “The traditional GDP simply does not measure the value of forests in national economy. In that sense, it is not a true reflection of wealth at all. The GDP must be made to to take into account the value of natural capital that is being destroyed — forest losses, degradation, declining water quality, etc. — and the creation of human capital in terms of education.”

on an absolute level, i am averse to putting a cost on anything, let alone forests, etc.
monetary value has become the most easily understood construct in our society.
a sad reflection of how we understand things, i must add.

i had written about david suzuki's explanation of costing the value of the services rendered by our mother earth at USD 33 trillion.

inspiration = gandhi

many reasons, but this preface that accompanies each of his books and writings is a gem of the highest order:

I would like to say to the diligent reader of my writings and to others who are interested in them that I am not at all concerned with appearing to be consistent. In my search after Truth I have discarded many ideas and learnt many new things. Old as I am in age, I have no feeling that I have ceased to grow inwardly or that my growth will stop at the dissolution of the flesh. What I am concerned with is my readiness to obey the call of Truth, my God, from moment to moment, and therefore, when anybody finds any inconsistency between any two writings of mine, if he has still faith in my sanity, he would do well to choose the later of the two on the same subject.

M.K.Gandhi

Harijan. 29-4-'33. p.2

am currently reading the book which transformed gandhi - Unto this last.
thanks to nipun for pointing.

chilling encounter killing

tehelka captures a chilling daylight murder on camera.
the manipur police commandos seem to clearly bump off chongkam sanjit in broad daylight in front of teeming public.
see the photos and read the accompanying police report.

jungle raj are there.
i pray for for sanjit, the commandos who were ordered to pull the trigger and pray that such rage will be countered by the force of love.

tested spine - its holding

almost 2 years since i had a spinal surgery, i put it to its first test yesterday.
a trek from lonavla to rajmachi fort.

we could not make it up all the way to the top of the fort (footwear malfunctions), but we saw superb scenes like this and this. and the famous duke's nose. awesome.
thanks to all the enthu trekkers+bloggers for the photos.

so we covered around 20 kms (8 hours of walking up and down hilly tracks).
and reporting safe, sound and only a little achy-shaky.

thanks dr. rajasekaran of ganga hospital.