Puneet > Puneet's Quotes

“Government authority, even if it does suppress private violence, always introduces into the life of men fresh forms of violence, which tend to become greater and greater in proportion to the duration and strength of the government.”
― Leo Tolstoy, The Kingdom of God Is Within You

“tendency of those in power will always be to reduce their subjects to the extreme of weakness, for the weaker the oppressed, the less effort need be made to keep him in subjection.”
― Leo Tolstoy, The Kingdom of God Is Within You

“It is generally supposed that governments strengthen their forces only to defend the state from other states, in oblivion of the fact that armies are necessary, before all things, for the defense of governments from their own oppressed and enslaved subjects.”
― Leo Tolstoy, The Kingdom of God Is Within You

“The despotism of a government always increases with the strength of the army and its external successes, and the aggressiveness of a government increases with its internal despotism.”
― Leo Tolstoy, The Kingdom of God Is Within You

“In our day governments not only fail to encourage, but directly hinder every movement by which people try to work out new forms of life for themselves.”
― Leo Tolstoy, The Kingdom of God Is Within You

“The principle of intervention, like that of healers, is first do no harm (primum non nocere); even more, we will argue, those who don’t take risks should never be involved in making decisions.”
― Nassim Nicholas Taleb, Skin in the Game: Hidden Asymmetries in Daily Life

“Bureaucracy is a construction by which a person is conveniently separated from the consequences of his or her actions.”
― Nassim Nicholas Taleb, Skin in the Game: Hidden Asymmetries in Daily Life

“You will never fully convince”
― Nassim Nicholas Taleb, Skin in the Game: Hidden Asymmetries in Daily Life

“Misery, like beauty, is also probably in the eyes of the beholder.”
― Ajit Harisinghani, One Life To Ride: A Motorcycle Journey To The High Himalayas

“we should periodically put ourselves through some physical discomfort, even disgust, to better appreciate the good things we take for granted in our everyday privileged lives.”
― Ajit Harisinghani, One Life To Ride: A Motorcycle Journey To The High Himalayas

“Come to the edge. We can’t. We’re afraid. Come to the edge. We can’t. We will fall! Come to the edge. And they came. And he pushed them. And they flew. Guillaume Apollinaire, 1880-1918 French poet, philosopher”
― Ajit Harisinghani, One Life To Ride: A Motorcycle Journey To The High Himalayas

“Sirf badan ko wahan le jaana hai. Rooh to wahin rahtee hai.”
― Ajit Harisinghani, One Life To Ride: A Motorcycle Journey To The High Himalayas

“Didn’t someone say that there are as many worlds as there are people? That each of us perceives the same reality differently?”
― Ajit Harisinghani, One Life To Ride: A Motorcycle Journey To The High Himalayas

“For the first time I have understood the soldier’s sacrifice for his country. Paying with his life for those who use nationalism or religion to keep the broth of human misery boiling.”
― Ajit Harisinghani, One Life To Ride: A Motorcycle Journey To The High Himalayas

“An armed struggle almost never works.”
― Farhana Qazi, Secrets of the Kashmir Valley: My journey through the conflict between India and Pakistan

“Within weeks of his stay, Junaid witnessed the polarization of Pakistan and found a country unevenly divided by class, caste, and culture. As an Indian Kashmiri, Junaid was out of place.”
― Farhana Qazi, Secrets of the Kashmir Valley: My journey through the conflict between India and Pakistan

“Even as the country struggled with one domestic crisis after another, the prime minister sought to carve a place for himself on the international stage. He saw himself as the inheritor of Mahatma Gandhi’s non-violent legacy and an elder statesman with a global role to play in the postcolonial era.”
― Kunal Verma, 1962: The War That Wasn't

“With India having scored a self-goal with the highly vaunted Panchsheel Agreement, to save face, Nehru was left with no choice but to keep the flag of Indo-Chinese friendship flying on the world stage leaving the Chinese free to go about the business of further securing Tibet.”
― Kunal Verma, 1962: The War That Wasn't

“Thimayya also advocated that should the Chinese penetrate the Himalayan watershed and enter Indian territory, lightly equipped mobile commandos should be used to harass their lines of communication and the Indian Army should stay away from a conventional conflict.”
― Kunal Verma, 1962: The War That Wasn't

“Not only had Nehru ignored Thimayya’s views on the availability of troops, he also discounted the dominant view in military circles that believed the Indian Army could only fight the PLA after drawing it to the plains—it is highly unlikely that Nehru had even informally consulted the army chief before making this statement.”
― Kunal Verma, 1962: The War That Wasn't

“It should be noted that the Indian Army played its part by distributing emergency packages and directing people to safety.”
― Farhana Qazi, Secrets of the Kashmir Valley: My journey through the conflict between India and Pakistan

“Mao Tse-tung did not want the boundary settled with India for the simple reason that with the passage of time, Chinese claims based on—what it wouldn’t be inaccurate to call—the whims of its leader then would develop a legitimacy of their own.”
― Kunal Verma, 1962: The War That Wasn't

“Johnson took the Kuen Lun Mountains and not the Karakorams as the natural boundary and thus included the barren Aksai Chin desert into the boundaries of Kashmir.”
― Kunal Verma, 1962: The War That Wasn't

“The village and area around Minsar near Manasarovar Lake that was held by the rajas of Ladakh since 1583 was, however, retained by the Dogras. Indeed the Jammu and Kashmir Government regularly received revenue from Minsar that lies hundreds of miles inside Tibet till 1948.”
― Kunal Verma, 1962: The War That Wasn't

“There can be little doubt that China decided to contest the McMahon Line in the east as a bargaining chip to secure Aksai Chin in the west.”
― Kunal Verma, 1962: The War That Wasn't

“should there be a military confrontation with Tibet (or China or Russia), defending the watershed from the south would be a herculean task.”
― Kunal Verma, 1962: The War That Wasn't

“when the Chinese later raised an objection to the Simla Convention, it was only regarding the position of Inner Tibet and had nothing to do with the demarcation of the McMahon Line.”
― Kunal Verma, 1962: The War That Wasn't

“the subsequent border agreement with Burma that was signed in Peking in October 1960, the Chinese government accepted the portion of the same McMahon Line—nearly 200 kilometres—that separated Tibet from Burma.”
― Kunal Verma, 1962: The War That Wasn't

“The map attached to the Simla Convention had been initialled by the British representative, Henry McMahon, and signed by the Chinese delegate, Chen I-fan and the chief Tibetan representative, the Lonchen Shatra, on 27 April 1914.”
― Kunal Verma, 1962: The War That Wasn't

“they were supposed to push the Chinese back up the hill and across the Thagla feature. As per Krishna Menon’s orders, there were no written records maintained, so it is not known who took this incredible decision.”
― Kunal Verma, 1962: The War That Wasn't