Sidin Vadukut's Blog, page 5

Olympics and other things.

Hello there. It has been a while. And I have so much to tell you. 

Kind of.

1. I am a tireless optimist. I don’t really know why. I think I get it from my mother. Her general approach in life was to assume everything will turn out well. Not in a karmic, ‘if destiny wills it, you will win a medal in the chariot race Sidin’ kind of way. But in a ‘take life by the scruff of its neck and waggle it about till something worthwhile pops out’ kind of way. This has rubbed off me on copiously. You couldn’t wash the smell of neck scruff out of my hands with a thousand hand sanitisers.

But this tends to drive people insane. And it often makes me look like a fool.

Around four years ago you wouldn’t have found a bigger believer in the Commonwealth Games 2010 than moi. I truly believed that the event would finally prove to the world that when India–mostly Delhi–puts its mind to something it can get it done. Even when some of the most reasonable people I know warned me that the event was going to be a stinking heap of epic fail. For instance there is the missus’s maternal uncle. Uncle is a wonderful man with the demeanour of a gentle saint but the wisdom of a man who has mysterious facial scarring. Uncle was not only convinced that the whole thing was a waste of time, but also a waste of money. He predicted, perfectly, what was going to eventually happen: thieving and douchebaggery.

But I persisted. All that is ok uncle, I said. But at least it could get people in Delhi playing sports, it could upgrade our infrastructure and it could leave a great legacy. He smiled at my naiveté and passed a small plate of Frontier atta biscuits.

He was perfectly right of course. Feel free to Google the state of the velodrome in Delhi, for instance. Utterly heartbreaking.

2. So what did I do four years later when the Olympics was due? Refusing to learn any of life’s lessons I bubbled with optimism. The Olympics were going to be awesome!

There is a reason why Monty Python’s best known song is “Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life”. England, and London in particular, is astoundingly pessimistic about things. Especially when the weather is cold and grey and awful. So in the six months or so leading up to the Olympics the papers and TV shows dripped with negativity and cynicism. The Olympics were going to be rubbish, they said. The Underground will fail, the roads will clog, the airports will collapse, the terrorists will blow up things, the weather will be shit and the events will be a shambles.

My desi friends were convinced 100% that this would be the case. Which, of course, is the recommended desi approach to large complicated projects. Where there is less faith in the collective there is more excuse for the individual.

The locals were convinced too. But there is, I feel, a slight difference between the two schools of its-all-going-to-dogs-ery. This is a personal opinion. So please don’t quote scripture or something to me prove me wrong. The approach I saw in Delhi in 2009-2010 was “It’s all going to be a massive international sham, so what is the point of it all.”  The approach I saw in London over the last 3-6 months was “It’s going to blow up in our face and expose us for the shitty little country we are, but don’t let anybody say we didn’t try.”

So they tried. And they tried splendidly. “England expects that each man will do his duty but goddamn why do we have to follow Beijing.”

Now I am not saying that the British are in way inherently capable of doing things better than Indians or Brazilians or anybody else. People, I suppose, are people. The vast majority of people I meet here just want to be left alone to get on with their lives and cope with the economic malaise. And only a few of them stroll around with walking sticks and pipes, lamenting the eclipse of empire. Exactly like back home in Thrissur.

But what I do see less of here on a day to day basis is bare-faced, inhumane assholery. Less of this than in Mumbai and Delhi, I mean. Over the last two years I’ve travelled to every major part of the British Isles except Wales. And everywhere, even in the less savoury parts of the country where they double-take on seeing a brown guy, there is a line of behaviour that the general public won’t cross. They perhaps want to deport me immediately, in their minds. But it doesn’t usually translate into action.

Maybe that is why the Olympics got along fine anyway. Because a lot of private and public people decided not to be assholes about it and pulled together. I mean volunteers were smiling all day, a heinous capital offence for a Londoner.

I thoroughly enjoyed the Olympics. Great fun to watch on TV. Great fun to watch live. When things roll out as pleasantly as it did in London it truly is a celebration of the species.

3. When did I start writing for a living? Let me see. I think it was sometime in early 2006. At the time I remember someone warning me of the repercussions of my career choices. Remember Sidin, they said, you will now play an eternal game of catch-up with your batch mates. They will make more money, see more places, eat better food and live in better homes than you. Can you deal with that?

I said yes at the time. But I really meant “Too late! Damn!”

Well I can tell you with great delight that that person was utterly and completely wrong. About most things.

I don’t make a lot of money or anything. But I earn enough to split bills with banker friends when we have dinners on the weekends.

But I have seen the Olympics and the World Badminton Championships. I have interviewed Aakash Chopra, Harsha Bhogle, Michael Phelps, Steve Waugh, Edwin Moses, Boris Becker, Nadia Comaneci and Frankie Fredericks. I have had dinner with Vijay Amritraj and Martin Scorsese. I have once carried 300 carats worth of diamonds in my hand. I have travelled to Malaysia, Northern Ireland, Republic of Ireland, Scotland, Germany, Holland, France, Italy, Switzerland, Turkey and the United States. I have flown in a modern jet fighter and in a world war 2 trainer aircraft. I have been taken on a guided tour of the Louis Vuitton manufacturing facility. I have been to the Lonar crater in Maharashtra, and listened to Leo Pinto tell me all about winning the Hockey gold medal in 1948.

And I’ve eaten at 7 restaurants with at least one Michelin star.

I say all this not just so that someone will update my Wikipedia profile. Or to boast. But to just tell you that doing what you want to do in life is not always a compromise of some kind. With some hard graft and some good luck things can turn out fabulously. Don’t let people sell you that “life will be rubbish but at least you’re doing what you want to” canard. Be optimistic.

4. Of course like everybody else I have a few dozens things that India must do immediately to win gold medals at Rio 2016. Start by bribing the boxing people!

I kid. Just.

Now over the last week or so I’ve read several articles about in newspapers and on blogs about how/why/why not/when India will/will not win medals at the Olympics. Many of the guys who write these articles probably know sport much better than I do. Most of them feel about this more strongly than I do. So you should almost certainly ignore my thoughts about this.

But since you’ve come this far.

Why are we overcomplicating this issue of medals with GDP, HDI, per capita and all these other statistics? Can India afford to spend money on Olympic medals? Probably not. Can India afford to spend money on a mission to Mars? Probably not. Can India afford to spend money on cleaning up rivers or preserving our wildlife? Probably not. Will spending money on any of these things improve life in the country? Maybe.

Should India invest in these things? Absolutely. Not just because a nation needs to have something to aspire to, but because we can actually afford to.

Think about it. The mission to Mars is going to cost us Rs450 Crores. Kolkata Knight Riders is believed to have spent approximately Rs.100 crores in 2012. For just four times the cost of running KKR you can send a mission to Mars. In fact throw in a little extra money and you can send the bloody team to Mars, and replace them with Kochi.

But I digress.

Can we afford an Olympic program?

In the 15 years since Atlanta, when Team GB bombed, the British government began a series of focussed targeted investments on winning medals. Not on developing sports mind you. There was a separate budget for that. But just on winning medals. Pure and simple. They spent £740 million over 15 years. Let us do some rough math. Team GB had 554 athletes at the 2012 Olympics. Let us assume that the targeted medals program dealt with many more athletes. India trained 58 boxers to finally get 8 berths at London. A yield of approximately 1:7. So let us assume that Team GB dealt with 5 times as many, i.e. 2800 athletes

This means on average they spent around £17,700 per athlete per year. This includes everything: performance centres, coaches, support staff, supplies, overseas training. The lot. This amounts to approximately Rs15 lakhs per sportsperson per year. (Yes I am mixing capex and opex. Piss off!) In the 12 months leading up to the Olympics India spent Rs.3.57 crores on training 58 boxers. An average of Rs. 6.2 lakhs per boxer for a period of 12 months. Not bad eh?

Some points need noting. First most of the athletes who won medals for Team GB started very young. Some only picked up their sport four years ago. But let us assume that that at any given time around 2800 athletes were in the program. Also it is highly likely that the athletes had access to public sports facilities before they were identified in schools for high performance programs. And often later. However these facilities may not have been very good. As two-thirds of the medalists, when I last checked, did not go to posh public schools. Also we haven’t accounted for purchasing power parity between India and the UK. Which could change things a fair bit.

What I am trying to say is that while an Olympics program is expensive, it is by no mean unaffordable. Considering that a BCCI Grade C player already gets an annual salary of Rs25 lakhs, before other match-based fees, there are funds. There are funds aplenty.

And there is infrastructure. Delhi is brimming with facilities after the CWG. Plenty to train an elite squad of medal potentials. (Though many are almost unusable now.) The problem is not that we are poor or can’t afford it. Far, far from it. And anyone who tells you Olympics medals are only for rich countries are truly blowing smoke up your repechage.

The problem is that the system is infested with assholes with massive conflicts of interests who feed off it like leeches. From school to national level they ensure a rigid septic structure. And then conveniently use poverty and lack of funds to cover up their malice or incompetence. In fact the situation is reflective of our politics. Good people won’t join. Bad people won’t die or leave.

Unlike government, thankfully, sports does offer private initiatives.

5. Many people have told me good things about Olympic Gold Quest over the last few weeks. Not least Ayaz Memon and some other Indian journalists. Two days ago I had an idea. And had a quick chat with Viren Rasquinha and his team at OGQ. 

On Monday I completed the first draft of my third and final Dork novel. Called “Who Let The Dork Out?”, the book touches upon the goings on at a tiny little Ministry in Delhi, during a certain multinational sporting event, that is in a shambles. And who swoops in to help it but Robin ‘Einstein’ Varghese! The manuscript is being edited right now and should be out in stores by the end of this year.

But I began wondering. Given how much I tweet about the Olympics and Indian sport and bug poor Ajay Maken online, maybe I should put my money where my mouth is.

So 20% of all my proceeds from Dork 3 go to Olympic Gold Quest. Viren and team were happy to accept my small contribution. This isn’t a lot of money of course. Otherwise I would be owning Rolexes and not reviewing them. But it makes me feel nice, and hopefully it will inspire more able people with deeper pockets to chip in.

6. Why does India need a medal at all?

Because we love winners. We love successful people and forgive all their faults if they do it for the country. This is why while we know plenty about the medal possibilities at the Olympics we know nearly nothing about the also-rans who participated for India. Where do they come from? Did they have tough upbringings? Are they…gasp…from the north-east? Who is Tintu? Who is Karmakar?

We are not cricket fans. We are cricket victory fans. 

So we need winners. We need people with medals who will give our young people something to aspire to. And our parents a source of some relief when the kids come back with broken limbs and loose teeth and a C grade in biology. We need medals of all shapes and colours so that we can rise from this tendency to wallow in our misery and look up. And all the money and infrastructure in the world is nothing if nobody wants to win anything.

My point is, not a single person in the country will be worse off if you create those winners. Not one. 

But then I am an optimist.

Arrey do a good thing no?

Have you ever met me? No? You should.

Tee hee.

Sorry. So what I mean to say is that if you’ve ever met me you know that I am the kind of person Punjabi parents say “is from a very prosperous family” and also “can we find a slightly slimmer boy for our daughter?” So I am slightly fleshy in some regions but remarkably taut in others.

But overall the effect is one of jollity and butter nan.

So in January this year I wondered what it would take me to lose a little weight and get a little exercise. Some time in late 2011 I’d started talking to a Twitter friend who studies in the US and is one of those bizarre people who run marathons “for the fun of it” and look natural in hot pants. This friend suggested that I try running for some 20 minutes at a time, three or four times a week till I began to enjoy it. And so I started, very slowly, in fits and starts. It was very hard in the beginning. I would routinely collapse after 500m or 5 minutes whichever came first.

And then one day Pastrami’s missus, the posh Soubhagyavathi, sent me an email about running in the British 10K in July 2012. She had recently started working for Pratham UK and wanted to know if I was prepared to run to raise money for a good cause. I immediately did some research. (Due to a previous life as a management consultant I am somewhat aware of charities that raise tremendous amount of money only to spend most of in ways that would make Rajat Gupta blush.) But Pratham UK is the 100% authentic real deal.

Pratham’s flagship program, Read India, aims to improve the reading and basic arithmetic skills of the children in the age group of 6-14 years in rural India. At its peak, in 2008-09, the campaign reached 33 million children across 19 states. It covered 305,000 out of the 600,000 villages of India and mobilized 450,000 volunteers. Over 600,000 teachers/ officials/ government workers have been trained in accelerated learning methodologies. Where the government and Pratham have come together, we have seen the learning levels of all children in the state jump at least 20 percentage points.  24 states have taken up learning improvement programs. Read India was a response to the shocking results of the first Annual Status of Education Report (ASER), which showed that 50% of India’s school going children could not read. ASER is a survey of learning levels on the 6-14 age group, facilitated by Pratham, and conducted by 32,000 volunteers sampling 704,000 children.  As many as 13 states are using ASER like tools to measure the progress in reading and arithmetic.

You can read more here.

How can you possibly not impressed by those numbers? No you tell me. How can you not? Imagine what could happen if Pratham was supported more broadly and eventually got all the children to read more thereby by eventually becoming potential future buyers of all MY DORK BOOKS BUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA…

I kid.

But I was impressed. These guys genuinely seemed like people who cared enough to make not just chota mota difference, but large scale big bang changes. Which is more than what I do with my daily typing. And more than what most of you do with your typing and trading and tweeting and all that. (Also Soubhagyavahthi is the most upright, honest person I know. She would never work with anything but a white-dove-pure NGO.)

But now there was only one problem with running the British 10K. Running the British 10K. So after much googling I started on a plan called the Couch to 5K program that gets you from  nowhere, to running 5 kilometres comfortably three or four times a week. I’ve never enjoyed physical activity more in my entire life. Not only did I blast through the 9-week program, but last weekend I managed this:

Those are in kilometres boss.

I know won’t be participating in any Olympics with these timings, but hey I am trying. (And who knows what political intrigue will happen to the Indian Athletic squad for the London 2012 Olympics?)

So now if everything goes according to plan I will be running in the British 10K on the 8th of July. It will be long, hard and I will most probably stop many times in between when I run out of horsepower. But I. Will. Finish it.

Are you prepared to do yours soldier?

I humbly request you, my dear readers, to donate generously to the Pratham cause. In return I promise to somehow, someway complete the 10K circuit.

But there is more. Besides the fact that £10 (Around Rs880) can keep a child in school in India for a whole year, which is reward in itself, I am prepared to sweeten things even further. Spare a little change for a good cause and I’ll do what little I can to incentivise you. As follows:

For every £10: I will send you a signed copy of one of my books with intensely personalised, borderline pornographic messages.

For every £25: I will send you a signed copy of both of my books PLUS put you on the list to get a signed copy of the third book the very moment it comes off the press. Not to mention a a printed copy of the original, pre-edited Dork 3 manuscript signed and in a proper yellow envelope.

For every £100: I will make you, an individual, a character in my third book. You give me your name. And I decide how I put you in there. In a nice way of course. (What an excellent gift for a friend or lover!)

For every £200: I will put your company in my third book. And tweet about this fact on my Twitter handle. Thereby giving you temporary and permanent fame. WHAT MADNESS OF A GREAT OFFER IS THIS??? (However please check with me before you donate. Just in case you are a business school with free-laptop-tendencies or your company name rhymes with ‘Dovernment of Dreece’. Contact form link above.)

Any combination of these offers are also possible. So you can donate £200 and ask for two Dork characters. GASP! Also they are valid anywhere in the world.

But if you’d rather just do this from the goodness of your heart, that is also ok. Donate as much or as little as you can to help a charity organisation that actually works. And I will make sure to run my ass off to make it worthwhile for you. Remember six months ago I couldn’t run 500m. And today I am running 10 kilometres. Only for you and the children.

Deal? Deal!

Just go here to donate. Please? All of you fellows are so well off no? Some of you have family businesses also. Then? Click below urgently.

 

 P.S. After donating just make sure to choose the “share email address with Sidin” option. This should appear after the option to leave a message on the message board. And I will be in touch with you for the formalities.

Sneak Peek #2

October/November 2012. Stay tuned.

The End Is Nigh

As you may have noticed, I usually don’t post up links to my columns or articles here on the blog. I already pimp them enough on Twitter.

But this one is kind of close to my heart. And personal.

And I enjoy the occasional long posts about home:

An hour away from Thrissur, in central Kerala, lies a little town that, to use a popular Indian usage, I call “my native place.” The town of Pavaratty is best known for the massive warehouse-like shrine of St. Joseph, a bustling local pilgrimage centre. The shrine looms over the town with a population of about 11 000, emotionally, geographically and architecturally. Distances are measured from the shrine. Events are remembered in reference to the shrine’s calendar of feasts and festivals. In Pavaratty the shrine is pole star, magnetic north, prime meridian and equator all rolled into one. This pivotal presence of the shrine imparts a certain intensity to the religion of the local Christians.

It is not a hostile intensity – the kind that leads to xenophobia or agitation. Quite the opposite. It is the benign intensity of Star Trek or Star Wars fans who, while acknowledging the unassailable superiority of their own beliefs, are quite happy to play along with your own under-educated biases. So while my grandfather had no doubt that Christians were God’s chosen people, he still believed that the great Hindu temple at Guruvayoor, 30 minutes away, was a source of divinity and power.

There is also a thick syncretic vein that runs through the Christianity of the region. Over the centuries, customs and rituals have changed hands between religions more times than many like to admit. For instance, each year before the shrine’s major annual feast on the third Sunday after Easter, a flag is hoisted up the pole in front of the church. The flagpole lines up almost exactly with the crucifix above the altar inside. But is slightly shifted to one side, out of deference to the deity.

Temples in the region do the exact same thing before their festivals. Flags are hoisted on flagpoles placed in the temple courtyard that line up almost exactly with the idol in the sanctum sanctorum, but not quite. Out of deference.

And all this intensity, devotion and syncretism came together in the winter of 1999 when we began to prepare for the impending end. In the last few months of that year there was a kind of apocalyptic frenzy among some of the terribly Catholic, god-fearing, and all round well-meaning inhabitants of Pavaratty.

Read the rest of the piece, and see the remarkable illustrations on the Motherland magazine website here.

Sticky bomb bomb, sticky bomb bomb

Like most other Indians, my opinion of my government and its various agencies is very poor indeed. It is one of the wonders of the modern age how this nation gets by while the guys in charge mess up financial data, forget which country they represent at the UN, and in every other way get by in a thick, stinking haze of moronic incompetence.

Delhi Police, I am glad to say, is no different. If they are the first line of defence that the capital against law and order problems then Delhi–women, childern and all–is screwed. Kindly peruse the following story from the Times of India website. And weep.

Idiots run this country.

Delhi cops find 'sticky bomb' in game?

NEW DELHI: On Tuesday, police commissioner B K Gupta told reporters he had spent hours researching sticky bombs. Officers then distributed printouts which ostensibly explained what a sticky bomb is. 

The printout stated, "Sticky bombs are a type of explosives crafted from one Bomb and 5 Gel. At point blank range, it can cause a total of 100 damage to mobs and 200 to the player". It also listed 'Statistics' as: Damage 100, Max Stack 50, Shoot Speed 5, Use Time 24, Sell 1. 

These seem unusual ingredients for making a bomb. A net search showed the matter seemed to have been downloaded from Terraria Wiki, used by gamers who play online game Terraria.

I don't know what to say. I really don't.

Hours researching sticky bombs? Wanker.

If you live in Delhi, I hope you feel safe knowing that your police force is infested with imbeciles.

India Broadband Forum has a fitting GIF for the occasion.

Choicest online feedback. Episode 1: Original Tamilan with chest, mustache and all

I was malingering on Twitter just now when fellow Cricket enthusiast and broadcaster @thecricketcouch pointed to this astoundingly entertaining piece of feedback on, what else machaan, Rediff.com. This choicest comment was posted by a reader in April 2005 in response to, I think, Prem Panicker's online commentary during an India-Pakistan cricket match. Perhaps during this tour.

I am 50% sure this is a hoax comment. And 50% certain it is someone who has painstakingly translated their thoughts on the run from Tamil to English. I don't care. It is so bloody funny.

Click to the page here. And search for the comment by Perumselva Pandiyan.

I reproduce it here in full. Enjoy.

***

Panicker saar: You are telling Pakistan is not having skin and India will bat out Pakistan skin and chase match for winning.

How India can chase Pakistan skin? Like that nonsense why you are telling public type of commentary? You are telling cricket commentary means you tell cricket commentary – why you are telling about skin and all? India also is not having skin because it is getting defeat in three times from Pakistan.

Also Tendulkar is Oozing, Balaji is Oozing and all India fellow is Oozing – bit Mohammed Kafi is not oozing because he is not brinjal eating fellow. But also I am putting open bet on you – you are having mustache means you take bet. I am telling starting for straight and putting bet: India will not win saar. If India win means I will wear komanam and run around your house and I will not keep mustache. If India is getting defeat means you except that Pakistan is super type of fellows and India name is in public toilet. Also please don't keep mustache. Mustache is for male type of fellow. You are male type of fellow means you keep open bet.

Also Agarkar is useless only. Also Kumaran is best bowler for India why he is not getting chance? Also peoples are always telling that Aktha is putting 150 meter per second his balls, also Bert Lee is putting 150 meter per second in his balls. Kumara is bowling 200 meter per second in his balls. But Kumaran is not getting chance. Why you are not telling for Kumaran getting chance? Can you tell in open type of way? Are you seeing Kumaran's balls in Ranji match and Test match in Australia? Even Steve Waugh [ Images ] is seeing Kumaran's balls and getting afraid of his balls swinging and reverse cutting.

Kumaran is Tamilan and Dravidan man. He is not false Dravid like Dravid and he is also not false Tamilan like Balaji and all. Kumaran is clean Tamilian. Give Kumran chance also for showing reverse balls.

Yours Faithfully

Also Kumaran is original Tamilan with chest, mustache and all.

***

Woods. Trees.

I've only ever been to the Jaipur Literary Festival once. That was two years ago when my first book was just about to be launched. By some odd twist of fate the first retail copies of Dork went on sale at the little bookshop that runs at JLF each year. There was no larger purpose in scheduling it thus. I did not have a reading or signing or anything of that sort planned at JLF.

But I'd pestered the Penguin people for weeks and I suppose cracking open a box at Jaipur seemed ceremonial enough. The guys who ran the shop, the same guys who run the Full Circle outlet at Khan Market in New Delhi, promptly took a stack of fresh Dork copies and dumped them on the lowest rack of a bookshelf, next to Shoba De and Sidney Sheldon.

As the day progressed the stack receded farther and farther into the dark nether regions of the bookshelf while, in more prominent positions, books by Geoff Dyer and William Dalrymple literally vaporised by the stackfulls. Still I was most thrilled. Every few hours I'd pop in and check on status. And the Dork stack would cough and wheeze and splutter and shorten itself one comforting copy at a time.

Very quickly, however, I was engrossed in the festival itself. Sure, I spent hours agonising over what those early buyers thought of my book. Things were not helped by Samit Basu's motivating quip one morning that he had started reading the book, but had fallen asleep after a few pages. (A terrible cameo awaits him in book three.)

Jitters apart, I was truly enjoying the festival. In many different ways.

Now when I went to Jaipur I had no idea who the organisers or founders of the event were. I knew Dalrymple was involved in some capacity. I had no idea what their ulterior motives were, what their political or ideological agenda were and whether they cared about other Indian languages. (I say 'other' because it is ludicrous to think English isn't an Indian language.)

I also did not know what their criteria for inviting authors were. Was I jealous of some of the invitees? Of course. Did I want to be invited one day? Of course. I still do. The appreciation of your peers is highly valued in any profession, not least in a creative and particularly criticism-prone one like writing.

Also at no point was I thinking to myself "What does this festival achieve for the nation as a whole?"

When I was at Jaipur the only things playing on my mind were: Which are the good sessions? Which authors should I be listening to? As a young author coming to grips with this vocation, who should I talk to, what advice should I be asking for and what lessons did these fabulous writers have for me?

And my experience was absolutely fascinating. And very fulfilling. Lawrence Wright's bag of tricks and tips for reporters I will never forget as long as my messenger bag includes an audio recorder. The session on travel writing was both amusing and informative.

A remarkable session on terrorism and the Middle East involving Wright and Steve Coll exposed me to nuance on a subject that is often analysed with staggering, stifling polarity. That session led me to buy and read several books.

I also met a few people at Jaipur who have remained friends and twitter-buddies since.

All in all, I had the time of my life.

I say all this because this year JLF has been the cynosure of attention for many reasons, most of them negative. There was that Rushdie imbroglio that overshadowed everything else. Then there were the readings of the Satanic Verses, the assassins, the quotable quotes, the outrage and, most distressing for me personally, the reams of punditry condemning the festival as pointless, irrelevant or a schmoozefest.

Most of that is perhaps true. But my point is: so what man?

Tell me this: what can possibly make a literary festival vital? At what point in a society's evolution does a literary festival assume a position of critical importance? Which nation in the world can standup and say: "Look, we've solved all our critical problems. All our vital shortcomings have been alleviated. Now we start with our frivolous shortcomings. And top on that list is a thumping huge literary festival."

I don't think even one. Even Norway, with all that HDI and GDP, has to deal with insane gunmen and Indian parenting quirks.

In fact, when you think about it, literature and literary festivals are perhaps important precisely because they are not vital. They distance–some would even say elevate–us from the brutal and mundane that frustrate us in our daily lives. Why do you come home after work and see a rerun of Friends? Because you identify with the moral rectitude of Matt Le Blanc and Courtney Cox? Because you are 100% certain that the producers of the show don't have some ulterior political motive in their scripts?

Who knows? More importantly, who cares?

Then why demand of literary festivals, organisers, participants or even audiences the morality, clarity of purpose, sanctity of intentions and social relevance that we demand of hardly anybody or anything else. And especially so of a privately organised literary event where the public is allowed to visit freely.

Can you spend the whole week schmoozing at Jaipur? Of course. Can you spend the whole week stalking celebrities or sucking up to the clique-ish publishing industry? Certainly. Can you spend the week in the midst of a few wonderful authors and artists enjoying discussions, debates and perspectives? Yes you can, even if the quality of sessions can be very uneven and often helmed by bizarre moderators. But hey, it is free and you can vote with your feet. Bad JLF this year? Don't go next year.

Disagree with the mandates of the festival? Want to focus more on translated fiction, Marathi poetry or Malayalam travel writing? By all means organise your own festival. JLF does not have an exclusive national license on literary festivals.

If anything we need plenty more festivals all over the country. As any Chetan Bhagat event in a small town shows, there are readers everywhere in this country. And they love meeting and talking to authors. There are more languages, topics and issues than can be handled by a dozen large Indian festivals. But chances are that any such festival will be tinged by controversy. We are not a country famed for our ability to get along with each other. Or for our restraint when it comes to putting public figure on pedestals.

You are welcome to try to organise a literary festival that will condemn any kind of schmoozing, celebrity worship, low brow conversation, political partisanship, NRI fixations or ideological leanings. Feel free. But literary festivals can seldom be less polarising than literature itself.

However a lot of the analysis I see right now is saddening. It is akin to saying let us burn down cinema theatres because too many people watch crap movies.

No screens. No crap movies. No movies at all. Victory for good cinema?

Hardly.

***

p.s. No. I am not trying to get an invitation. Why would you think like that?

p.p.s. I am getting old.

Don’t make me put it up on eBay

What better way to start a blogpost than with a disclaimer. Yes, it has been MONTHS since I posted anything. Yes, I should be ashamed of how I am neglecting this blog. And no it is not because all this book-writing and column-copy-pasting business is going to my head. No. Not at all. I am sorry you feel that way. But no. The stentorian silence here is because there is really only so many words I have inside me on a weekly basis. Professional commitments tend to use up most of them. And I don’t want to publish some rubbish for the heck of it. We are all about quality over quantity here at Whatay. Mostly.

And also where is the time after all the Twittering and cooking and posting photos of food?

But here I am. Here you are. *Platonic hugs for the men.* *Platonic pecks on the cheek for the ladies.*

We are all good again.

Also, no. This is not about the second Dork book. I have been very tardy with the promotion of that masterpiece. But then sales are not bad at all. And I am not complaining. So we shall do the shameless marketing later.

Today, instead, I would like to talk about some politics. Now as you may know India should be going to the polls to elect the next Lok Sabha latest by 2014. Some people, who have much greater granular knowledge of such things, tell me that depending on how the UP state elections turn out the UPA may be forced to seek a fresh mandate even before that. Which is very well. Anything, I say, to get rid of the putrid, paralysed, populist panjandrums currently running things into the ground.

But what bothers me is this: what next? What happens when the country goes to polls again? Who do you vote for? Who do I vote for? Why do I vote for them?

Ever since I’ve been old enough to vote in elections I’ve voted in a combined total of three panchayat, state and national polls. This is not for want of trying. But in most cases the legacy NRI status, the constant movement between cities every few years, and a variety of permutations and combinations of the name ‘Sidin Sunny Vadukut’ has left me with a trail of horrible documentation. As some of you may know my passport, school certificate, taxation records, bank account, PGDM diploma all have different versions of that name. Which is why, to make things simple and for international tax purposes, I write books as both Sidin Vadukut and Haruki Murakami.

Most recently, when it looked like I was finally going to get my name included in the Delhi electoral rolls, I moved to London. (Oddly enough, thanks to a ridiculously simple process and some colonial hangover, I am now registered to be a bonafide voter in the UK. And I have already voted in one referendum. Bizarre.)

Each time I have voted in India I have done so from my ancestral home in Kerala. Back home we are a family of medium-strength Congress supporters with the odd godless Marxist uncle who people crib about secretly. That is not to say that we don’t vote for independents or even Left candidates. We do. We have. Or that we vote along religious, caste or even wealth lines. Mostly, we don’t. In fact I always find it amusing to see how the family gets together post-election day and everyone tries to avoid talking about who they voted for. I think they do this sincerely and because while the elders try to pass some sort of family whip, not everyone listens.

I haven’t been back home in my village during election season in some time. But my memories are always of a healthy, rational atmosphere. There is a lot of the usual alcohol, cash and illegal megaphone usage. And rare bouts of brutal violence. But by and large the process is… sincere. Candidates are evaluated not only for their party affiliations but also for who they are and their track records. Representatives are accessible not just before elections, but after it as well. It is, to put it briefly, not the hackneyed, hopeless process that people tend to generalise elections as. Maybe it has changed now. But those are the feelings I am left with.

Growing up, sporadically, in this politically charged, fairly well-informed environment means that I like to think before voting.

And the more I think about the next Lok Sabha polls the more… I am left thinking.

On the one hand there is the UPA. I was one of those people who thought that the last mandate in 2009 meant that UPA2 could now shrug off coalition politics and get things done. I can still remember that evening in the newsroom when the numbers all came in. Overall, there was optimism. (Note: I conducted a blind-blind survey in the office that evening. Around 60% had voted for the BJP. Just in case you were wondering with your chormedia hat on.)  As you may be aware, things did not turn out well. So far it has been a terribly disappointing government that has not only robbed of us years of progress, but also of years of hope and optimism.

On the other hand there is the BJP. The party has produced moments of brilliance during Parliamentary debates. But I think there is much more to being a meaningful opposition. Personally, with my limited understanding of how these things work, I have found the opposition wanting. It has a crucial role to play in government. A role that cannot be reduced to a simple choice between ‘well-prepared speech’ and ‘walking out’. Time and time again the BJP, I thought, had a chance to step up and make its presence felt. In most cases I thought the opposition let politics rather than policy get the better of them. And in other cases they seemed outmanoeuvred with little effort.

And sorry, but there is a difference between ruling India and ruling Gujarat. I have had a chance to live in Ahmedabad for a couple of years. And the city and state is easily in my top 3 places to live in. Modi has done some remarkable things. But giving BJP the credit for Gujarat is akin to giving BCCI the credit for Tendulkar. I am not convinced of that argument at all. And I am not convinced of that man. (Please try to not spout hatred in the comments.)

Then there is the third front. That has seldom gone well for us.

I am still thinking of all these things. And right now the only reason I have to vote is if the LS candidate in my constituency is a worthy man/woman. From a national perspective I see little clarity.

But if I had to make a decision, I am going to do it on the basis of a wishlist. So here I am going to put out a list of things I’d like to see the next government do. Some of them may be impossible due to constitutional process. And some of them may seem irrelevant to the vast majority of readers. But it is my wishlist. And these are issues that I care about. I am pretty sure not one politician will read this blogpost. But at least the process of writing it down will help me as we get closer to the ballot box. It will help me take a call.

The Whatay Wishlist:

1. I’d like to see the next government write into law that the Prime Minister has to be a member of the Lok Sabha.

2. I’d like to see the Lok Sabha implement a Prime Minister’s Question system akin to the one in the House of Commons. The post of PM is not a ceremonial one but an executive one. The current prime minister has shown a revulsion for saying anything that is not delivered from a pulpit or behind closed doors. This has only compounded the feeling that nobody is in charge. I find this utterly ridiculous.

3. The next government must pledge to implement reform in the judiciary and police systems. It is not enough to parrot out year after year that millions of cases are pending in Indian courts or that “police reforms are very important”. It is incredulous to hear the law minister to say that “something must be done”. Too many discussions I have with people on issues ends with the lament: “but who wants to go to court??”. Again I fail to understand how, in a system that has crores of pending cases, nobody questions the system of vacations for courts. The last time I raised that someone reminded me that the American have vacations too. Fine, but they also have 104 judges per million people. We have 12.4. Much more such depressing data in this PRS data sheet (PDF).

4. The next government must take up the case of Indian NRIs all over the world. The average NRI is not the guy who sashays in on Pravasi Bharatiya Nautanki Divas and delivers a speech with one mouth and an MOU with the other. Thousands of them live in abject conditions, in countries that treat them like second-class citizens. While consulate services have improved from the horror it was when I grew up in the Gulf, they are still far from being adequate to handle the sheer numbers of people working abroad. For instance 12,000 Indian prisoners, according to one estimate, are held in UAE jails. Forget giving these people votes. Give them adequate consular support and welfare services. I could bring up consular services served up by other countries. But baby steps first.

Excerpt from UAE Embassy site:

The Library is housed in the premises of the Indian Embassy Abu Dhabi. It has a well stocked collection and comprises books on Indian History, Culture, Arts, Politics, and Literature. We are in the process of adding content to the library. It is currently not open to the public, however in near future it will be made available to the public.

5. I would like to see the government pledge to a certain benchmark target of work done, hours of business achieved and member attendance in the Lok Sabha. This is meaningless without the opposition signing up too. But one party doing it could force the others.

6. DO. SOMETHING. ABOUT. SCIENCE AND TECH! The growth in broadband in laughably slow. These recent dabblings in low-cost computing are well-intentioned at best, and perhaps a scam at worst. Vilasrao Deshmukh is the Minister for Science And Technology. Kapil Sibal is that for Communications and Information Technology.

We will carry on when you’re done laughing. Done? Ok.

So is it me, or is there a fundamental problem in the way these ministries are set up? There are some sub-optimalities I see. The Ministry of IT is sitting on a policy mess post-Raja. Solving the mess, increasing the breadth and depth of connectivity, and building a national broadband network are not technology issues as much as policy ones. Let one guy do that full-time. Why is the same chap worried about giving school kids tablet computers? Because he has too much free time?

Next, the Min of S&T’s key mandates includes things such as:

Co-ordination of areas of Science & Technology in which a number of Institutions & Departments have interests and capabilities
Support to basic and applied research in National Institutions

Then why in Mark Knopfler’s name is it de-linked from the department of higher education?

I can hazard an uneducated guess for the legacy behind this disconnect.

We keep moaning about the lack of science research and output and that our young people don’t care for careers in science. One simple chart should explain the problem. This is from the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research’s website:

The website never really explains what this Zionist conspiracy chart is supposed to mean. But I suppose it means that the CSIR coordinates laboratories which are somehow connected with these departments. (Oh look, there is a Dept. of S&T AND a Dept. of Scientific and Industrial Research. Puke.) But the pertinent thing to note is this: the department of higher education figures nowhere in this equation.

In other words the system that processes our young people has NOTHING to do with the system that needs scientists. You make your own inferences.

Someone needs to sit and see the writing on the wall: This is a steaming pile of Department of Suckage.

The next government must stop giving lip service to our problem with research. And do something about it. They can start by cleaning up this mammoth mess of stakeholders. Draw up sensible hierarchies. Marry the education and research processes. This might make a great way to mark the 100th session of the Indian Science Congress. For now we can only point at the website for the 99th Congress, and lament at the fact that one of the top links on the home page is for ‘Best Poster Awards’.

I would like the next government to commit a workable plan that is revolutionary not evolutionary.

7. I would like the next government to commit to improve the plight of our brethren in the north-east. That part of the country has to stop being a national afterthought. In many ways they are like wretched NRIs. Of course it not all a question of neglect as this interesting article (PDF) seems to show. But there is much that can be done in terms of connectivity, commerce and infrastructure. Don’t spout that bullshit about keeping infra poor to prevent Chinese invasion. The People’s Army will lay roads, construct bridges, inaugurate airports and conduct an Olympics in Gangtok before your under-secretary is done with his progress report.

8. I would like whoever is in-charge of the entire passport processing system and the Regional Passport Office network to be shot in public once in front of each RPO in the country. And then he should be thrown out for entering the office without having a token. After which he should be fed to ‘agents’. Surely this great country is capable of building a passport issuance and renewal system that does not involve obliteration of human dignity and towering incompetence.

The new government must overhaul this system as soon as possible. And while they are at it, they could perhaps overhaul the Foreigners Regional Registration Office network as well. That shit is insane yo. That is borderline hate crime. They don’t tell you because then you’ll call them racist.

9. Mobile banking is a fantastic idea. And will genuinely bring financial services to the under-banked. But so far the execution has been hampered by the RBI’s mortal fear that telcos will try to enter the banking sector through the ‘back door’. Now I can understand the RBI’s apprehensions. Indian telcos are as trustworthy as a Samsung employee standing outside an Apple design office. But this unspoken impasse will not solve the problem. If this means preparing a special kind of banking license to enable telcos and banks to better work together, then so be it. Solve the problem, unlock the potential to change lives. The next government must show a willingness to do this.

10. I want a Minister for Freedom of Speech and Expression. Or an ombudsman. Or whatever. Anybody who will stand up to this bizarre trend of threatening to ban ‘offensive’ things. I am afraid many, many people in this country will actually support this kind of ridiculous censorship. Given our propensity to defend the omnipotent, all-powerful and mythological with our mortal little lives, anti-offense will be a popular platform. I want a government who will not only defend our freedoms but also convince critics why this is crucial to our democracy.

11. Yes. We have a problem with our media. However I am not from the school that wants to regulate or shut down all of them. Or think that they need a morality infusion of some kind. The problem, I think, is a combination of immature producers, immature consumers and a market skewed heavily in favour of advertisers as opposed to subscribers. Things will begin to change, I believe, when a media outlet can make money selling high-quality, well-produced content to readers. Someone has to pay. If readers don’t, someone else will.

Recently I went to a business school to give a talk. Afterwards I had an informal chat with a couple of dozen students who had strong views on the media. Ok, I said, name two or three newspaper or magazines you think are top notch. Names like The Caravan and The Hindu came up. Very good, I said, now how many of you subscribe to them? If I recall correctly, the number was zero. Not one. They all subscribe to the same old rags they were most critical of. Good media does not run on goodwill. (But this is a post by itself. More later.)

The government should not be overly regulating media. But it can set an example by cleaning up Doordarshan and All India Radio. In some cases, like Lok Sabha Television, the intentions are great and the programming sounds good on paper but looks terrible on TV. There is no dearth of untold stories in India. Start with one world-class program. Blatantly copy something from the BBC. If it works, it works. It will make the private guys sit up and take notice. If it doesn’t, it doesn’t. We get the media we pay for.

And finally I would like the next government to buy me a Rolex Explorer II 2011 edition. Ahem.

This is by no means an exhaustive list. But these are some issues I write and read about every day, and feel very strongly about. I hope, against all hope, that one of the parties will have views on some of these issues.

Otherwise I am going to put my vote up on eBay and leverage some benefit from it.

By the way, I am sure you disagree with my list of critical issues and have a list of your own. Do write a blogpost or something and send me a link. It will be nice to know your thoughts.

 

Don't make me put it up on eBay

What better way to start a blogpost than with a disclaimer. Yes, it has been MONTHS since I posted anything. Yes, I should be ashamed of how I am neglecting this blog. And no it is not because all this book-writing and column-copy-pasting business is going to my head. No. Not at all. I am sorry you feel that way. But no. The stentorian silence here is because there is really only so many words I have inside me on a weekly basis. Professional commitments tend to use up most of them. And I don't want to publish some rubbish for the heck of it. We are all about quality over quantity here at Whatay. Mostly.

And also where is the time after all the Twittering and cooking and posting photos of food?

But here I am. Here you are. *Platonic hugs for the men.* *Platonic pecks on the cheek for the ladies.*

We are all good again.

Also, no. This is not about the second Dork book. I have been very tardy with the promotion of that masterpiece. But then sales are not bad at all. And I am not complaining. So we shall do the shameless marketing later.

Today, instead, I would like to talk about some politics. Now as you may know India should be going to the polls to elect the next Lok Sabha latest by 2014. Some people, who have much greater granular knowledge of such things, tell me that depending on how the UP state elections turn out the UPA may be forced to seek a fresh mandate even before that. Which is very well. Anything, I say, to get rid of the putrid, paralysed, populist panjandrums currently running things into the ground.

But what bothers me is this: what next? What happens when the country goes to polls again? Who do you vote for? Who do I vote for? Why do I vote for them?

Ever since I've been old enough to vote in elections I've voted in a combined total of three panchayat, state and national polls. This is not for want of trying. But in most cases the legacy NRI status, the constant movement between cities every few years, and a variety of permutations and combinations of the name 'Sidin Sunny Vadukut' has left me with a trail of horrible documentation. As some of you may know my passport, school certificate, taxation records, bank account, PGDM diploma all have different versions of that name. Which is why, to make things simple and for international tax purposes, I write books as both Sidin Vadukut and Haruki Murakami.

Most recently, when it looked like I was finally going to get my name included in the Delhi electoral rolls, I moved to London. (Oddly enough, thanks to a ridiculously simple process and some colonial hangover, I am now registered to be a bonafide voter in the UK. And I have already voted in one referendum. Bizarre.)

Each time I have voted in India I have done so from my ancestral home in Kerala. Back home we are a family of medium-strength Congress supporters with the odd godless Marxist uncle who people crib about secretly. That is not to say that we don't vote for independents or even Left candidates. We do. We have. Or that we vote along religious, caste or even wealth lines. Mostly, we don't. In fact I always find it amusing to see how the family gets together post-election day and everyone tries to avoid talking about who they voted for. I think they do this sincerely and because while the elders try to pass some sort of family whip, not everyone listens.

I haven't been back home in my village during election season in some time. But my memories are always of a healthy, rational atmosphere. There is a lot of the usual alcohol, cash and illegal megaphone usage. And rare bouts of brutal violence. But by and large the process is… sincere. Candidates are evaluated not only for their party affiliations but also for who they are and their track records. Representatives are accessible not just before elections, but after it as well. It is, to put it briefly, not the hackneyed, hopeless process that people tend to generalise elections as. Maybe it has changed now. But those are the feelings I am left with.

Growing up, sporadically, in this politically charged, fairly well-informed environment means that I like to think before voting.

And the more I think about the next Lok Sabha polls the more… I am left thinking.

On the one hand there is the UPA. I was one of those people who thought that the last mandate in 2009 meant that UPA2 could now shrug off coalition politics and get things done. I can still remember that evening in the newsroom when the numbers all came in. Overall, there was optimism. (Note: I conducted a blind-blind survey in the office that evening. Around 60% had voted for the BJP. Just in case you were wondering with your chormedia hat on.)  As you may be aware, things did not turn out well. So far it has been a terribly disappointing government that has not only robbed of us years of progress, but also of years of hope and optimism.

On the other hand there is the BJP. The party has produced moments of brilliance during Parliamentary debates. But I think there is much more to being a meaningful opposition. Personally, with my limited understanding of how these things work, I have found the opposition wanting. It has a crucial role to play in government. A role that cannot be reduced to a simple choice between 'well-prepared speech' and 'walking out'. Time and time again the BJP, I thought, had a chance to step up and make its presence felt. In most cases I thought the opposition let politics rather than policy get the better of them. And in other cases they seemed outmanoeuvred with little effort.

And sorry, but there is a difference between ruling India and ruling Gujarat. I have had a chance to live in Ahmedabad for a couple of years. And the city and state is easily in my top 3 places to live in. Modi has done some remarkable things. But giving BJP the credit for Gujarat is akin to giving BCCI the credit for Tendulkar. I am not convinced of that argument at all. And I am not convinced of that man. (Please try to not spout hatred in the comments.)

Then there is the third front. That has seldom gone well for us.

I am still thinking of all these things. And right now the only reason I have to vote is if the LS candidate in my constituency is a worthy man/woman. From a national perspective I see little clarity.

But if I had to make a decision, I am going to do it on the basis of a wishlist. So here I am going to put out a list of things I'd like to see the next government do. Some of them may be impossible due to constitutional process. And some of them may seem irrelevant to the vast majority of readers. But it is my wishlist. And these are issues that I care about. I am pretty sure not one politician will read this blogpost. But at least the process of writing it down will help me as we get closer to the ballot box. It will help me take a call.

The Whatay Wishlist:

1. I'd like to see the next government write into law that the Prime Minister has to be a member of the Lok Sabha.

2. I'd like to see the Lok Sabha implement a Prime Minister's Question system akin to the one in the House of Commons. The post of PM is not a ceremonial one but an executive one. The current prime minister has shown a revulsion for saying anything that is not delivered from a pulpit or behind closed doors. This has only compounded the feeling that nobody is in charge. I find this utterly ridiculous.

3. The next government must pledge to implement reform in the judiciary and police systems. It is not enough to parrot out year after year that millions of cases are pending in Indian courts or that "police reforms are very important". It is incredulous to hear the law minister to say that "something must be done". Too many discussions I have with people on issues ends with the lament: "but who wants to go to court??". Again I fail to understand how, in a system that has crores of pending cases, nobody questions the system of vacations for courts. The last time I raised that someone reminded me that the American have vacations too. Fine, but they also have 104 judges per million people. We have 12.4. Much more such depressing data in this PRS data sheet (PDF).

4. The next government must take up the case of Indian NRIs all over the world. The average NRI is not the guy who sashays in on Pravasi Bharatiya Nautanki Divas and delivers a speech with one mouth and an MOU with the other. Thousands of them live in abject conditions, in countries that treat them like second-class citizens. While consulate services have improved from the horror it was when I grew up in the Gulf, they are still far from being adequate to handle the sheer numbers of people working abroad. For instance 12,000 Indian prisoners, according to one estimate, are held in UAE jails. Forget giving these people votes. Give them adequate consular support and welfare services. I could bring up consular services served up by other countries. But baby steps first.

Excerpt from UAE Embassy site:

The Library is housed in the premises of the Indian Embassy Abu Dhabi. It has a well stocked collection and comprises books on Indian History, Culture, Arts, Politics, and Literature. We are in the process of adding content to the library. It is currently not open to the public, however in near future it will be made available to the public.

5. I would like to see the government pledge to a certain benchmark target of work done, hours of business achieved and member attendance in the Lok Sabha. This is meaningless without the opposition signing up too. But one party doing it could force the others.

6. DO. SOMETHING. ABOUT. SCIENCE AND TECH! The growth in broadband in laughably slow. These recent dabblings in low-cost computing are well-intentioned at best, and perhaps a scam at worst. Vilasrao Deshmukh is the Minister for Science And Technology. Kapil Sibal is that for Communications and Information Technology.

We will carry on when you're done laughing. Done? Ok.

So is it me, or is there a fundamental problem in the way these ministries are set up? There are some sub-optimalities I see. The Ministry of IT is sitting on a policy mess post-Raja. Solving the mess, increasing the breadth and depth of connectivity, and building a national broadband network are not technology issues as much as policy ones. Let one guy do that full-time. Why is the same chap worried about giving school kids tablet computers? Because he has too much free time?

Next, the Min of S&T's key mandates includes things such as:

Co-ordination of areas of Science & Technology in which a number of Institutions & Departments have interests and capabilities
Support to basic and applied research in National Institutions

Then why in Mark Knopfler's name is it de-linked from the department of higher education?

I can hazard an uneducated guess for the legacy behind this disconnect.

We keep moaning about the lack of science research and output and that our young people don't care for careers in science. One simple chart should explain the problem. This is from the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research's website:

The website never really explains what this Zionist conspiracy chart is supposed to mean. But I suppose it means that the CSIR coordinates laboratories which are somehow connected with these departments. (Oh look, there is a Dept. of S&T AND a Dept. of Scientific and Industrial Research. Puke.) But the pertinent thing to note is this: the department of higher education figures nowhere in this equation.

In other words the system that processes our young people has NOTHING to do with the system that needs scientists. You make your own inferences.

Someone needs to sit and see the writing on the wall: This is a steaming pile of Department of Suckage.

The next government must stop giving lip service to our problem with research. And do something about it. They can start by cleaning up this mammoth mess of stakeholders. Draw up sensible hierarchies. Marry the education and research processes. This might make a great way to mark the 100th session of the Indian Science Congress. For now we can only point at the website for the 99th Congress, and lament at the fact that one of the top links on the home page is for 'Best Poster Awards'.

I would like the next government to commit a workable plan that is revolutionary not evolutionary.

7. I would like the next government to commit to improve the plight of our brethren in the north-east. That part of the country has to stop being a national afterthought. In many ways they are like wretched NRIs. Of course it not all a question of neglect as this interesting article (PDF) seems to show. But there is much that can be done in terms of connectivity, commerce and infrastructure. Don't spout that bullshit about keeping infra poor to prevent Chinese invasion. The People's Army will lay roads, construct bridges, inaugurate airports and conduct an Olympics in Gangtok before your under-secretary is done with his progress report.

8. I would like whoever is in-charge of the entire passport processing system and the Regional Passport Office network to be shot in public once in front of each RPO in the country. And then he should be thrown out for entering the office without having a token. After which he should be fed to 'agents'. Surely this great country is capable of building a passport issuance and renewal system that does not involve obliteration of human dignity and towering incompetence.

The new government must overhaul this system as soon as possible. And while they are at it, they could perhaps overhaul the Foreigners Regional Registration Office network as well. That shit is insane yo. That is borderline hate crime. They don't tell you because then you'll call them racist.

9. Mobile banking is a fantastic idea. And will genuinely bring financial services to the under-banked. But so far the execution has been hampered by the RBI's mortal fear that telcos will try to enter the banking sector through the 'back door'. Now I can understand the RBI's apprehensions. Indian telcos are as trustworthy as a Samsung employee standing outside an Apple design office. But this unspoken impasse will not solve the problem. If this means preparing a special kind of banking license to enable telcos and banks to better work together, then so be it. Solve the problem, unlock the potential to change lives. The next government must show a willingness to do this.

10. I want a Minister for Freedom of Speech and Expression. Or an ombudsman. Or whatever. Anybody who will stand up to this bizarre trend of threatening to ban 'offensive' things. I am afraid many, many people in this country will actually support this kind of ridiculous censorship. Given our propensity to defend the omnipotent, all-powerful and mythological with our mortal little lives, anti-offense will be a popular platform. I want a government who will not only defend our freedoms but also convince critics why this is crucial to our democracy.

11. Yes. We have a problem with our media. However I am not from the school that wants to regulate or shut down all of them. Or think that they need a morality infusion of some kind. The problem, I think, is a combination of immature producers, immature consumers and a market skewed heavily in favour of advertisers as opposed to subscribers. Things will begin to change, I believe, when a media outlet can make money selling high-quality, well-produced content to readers. Someone has to pay. If readers don't, someone else will.

Recently I went to a business school to give a talk. Afterwards I had an informal chat with a couple of dozen students who had strong views on the media. Ok, I said, name two or three newspaper or magazines you think are top notch. Names like The Caravan and The Hindu came up. Very good, I said, now how many of you subscribe to them? If I recall correctly, the number was zero. Not one. They all subscribe to the same old rags they were most critical of. Good media does not run on goodwill. (But this is a post by itself. More later.)

The government should not be overly regulating media. But it can set an example by cleaning up Doordarshan and All India Radio. In some cases, like Lok Sabha Television, the intentions are great and the programming sounds good on paper but looks terrible on TV. There is no dearth of untold stories in India. Start with one world-class program. Blatantly copy something from the BBC. If it works, it works. It will make the private guys sit up and take notice. If it doesn't, it doesn't. We get the media we pay for.

And finally I would like the next government to buy me a Rolex Explorer II 2011 edition. Ahem.

This is by no means an exhaustive list. But these are some issues I write and read about every day, and feel very strongly about. I hope, against all hope, that one of the parties will have views on some of these issues.

Otherwise I am going to put my vote up on eBay and leverage some benefit from it.

By the way, I am sure you disagree with my list of critical issues and have a list of your own. Do write a blogpost or something and send me a link. It will be nice to know your thoughts.

 

Sit down. I need to tell you something.

So our building here has a restricted access system that only lets delivery folk in if someone inside unlocks the door for them. There is this video phone access system to do this. As your favourite blogger cum author cum tweeter is usually the only guy in the building during the day, I end up letting in a lot of delivery, courier, flyer, post man type people all the time.

And occasionally they leave deliveries with me in case the recipient is at work or in a pub. In the evening the recipients come back, see a note in their mailbox, and then come over to pick things up. It is a nice arrangement. And it doesn't bother me at all. It is nice to have the occasional human contact when you spend all day in front of a faceless machine. (Albeit the machine is a Mac.)

So earlier this morning a man came and dropped a Kenwood food processor. "Please give it to the people in 12," he said. "Of course machaan," I said. "Don't make me stab you innit," he said.

It was a hoot really.

And then a few minutes ago, five or maybe seven, there was a knock on the door. I sprinted, opened the door and reached for the food processor. (There is now a space in the hall, next to the door, for these deliveries.)

Outside the door was  a rather well-dressed, well made up, tall, slim British-ish woman in a comely lavender dress. There was no doubt at all that she was preparing to go for some kind of high society event. Comprehensive eye make-up was spotted. I am no expert, but I think it was a one-shoulder floor-length dress with a slanted empire waist. Classy indeed.

"There you go," I said, handing over the food processor. I was using small words because I was holding my stomach in.

We both said thanks and then I turned around to close the door. When she asked me if I could help for a second.

"O… K…" I said struggling due to lack of oxygen.

I am not making the rest up.

She placed the food processor on the floor, lifted up her right arm and then said:

"Can you zip me up please. I think it is stuck." She looked tremendously embarassed.

But my embarrassment made her embarrassment look like an amateur weekend embarrassment who practised being embarrassed only for occasional office embarrassment tournaments.

And so it was. A tiny zipper was stuck halfway between her waist and her under-arm, leaving a few inches of her dress open on the side. I sheepishly pulled up the zipper a couple of times. Nothing happened. And then I held the dress and she pulled the zipper. Nothing. Then I pulled down on the zipper in order to do the old "rezip with momentum" trick. Which is when I realised that the zipper went all the way down.

"Oh I am so sorry…" I said when I realised I'd just made her dress gape open even more.

"That is ok," she said unconvincingly.

We kept at it for another ten minutes. Without any luck. The bloody thing would run smoothly till a point and then crunch to a stop.

Eventually we realized that our relationship was going nowhere.

"Maybe I should go find a woman to help me…" she said, opening a whole new can of mental worms.

"I am sorry I am so bad at this…" I said.

And then we parted on amicable terms. She picked up the food processor and left, clutching her dress shut between her arm and the side of her body.

I closed the door and collapsed into the hallway gasping for air.

Moral of the story: Journalism might look like a pointless, underpaid career. But good things happen to those wait.