I think it’s just a fad that people get into to show they care for the globe, there are so many other things one can do, like go into the slums and educate the kids there, have a cleaning up drive and follow it up every day. We get to hear about this Batti Bandh thing only a week before the day and then we will not hear about it for another year. And they never even publish the figures the day after I mean come on how am I supposed to just believe that this thing works without any proof or evidence of it.

And it’s funny how everyone just follows this band wagon all the radio channels, I’m seeing tweets as well about it, it was in the papers but not one person asked them to show us how it works.

In the 60s people were afraid of global cooling and now everyones afraid of global warming there’s this whole chapter in this book called Superfreakonomics written by Steven D Levitt and Stephen j Dubner called What do Al Gore and Mount Pinatubo have in common?  This chapter gives us the reasons for global warming and also how we can sort the problem out. Just to give a gist of the chapter it says that in the 90s Mount Pinatubo which is a volcano erupted and emitted a lot of sulphur into the atmosphere, this sulphur formed a blanket around the earth and blocked the sun rays, thus decreasing the global temperature by 2 degrees. So what this group of scientists want to do is introduce sulphur into the atmosphere so as to cool the earth down thereby reversing the global warming issue. But the problem is that Al Gore and his ilk don’t buy this explanation cause how can we stop this by polluting the atmosphere well that’s the main problem with the authorities all over the world that they just don’t want to think outside the box.

So if anyone can send me the research material and evidence that we are actually protecting the earth by this Batti Bandh I will happily switch my lights and other electrical appliances off. But not this saturday cause India is playing a T20 match and how can we miss the last 10 overs of the game. Maybe next year.

Now lets further examine this statement, it’s so ambiguous someone somewhere so technically it could be anyone, it could be a 90 year old man in an african village or a new born baby in argentina. How do we just assume that the statement refers to a person of  the opposite sex who lives in your town or city and is also around your age?? The perfect person for you could be your grandmother or grandfather or a niece/nephew.

Not only do we assume the things just mentioned but we also assume that this someone is going to be from the same caste, community, race, religion, etc. This brings me to the bigger question aren’t we all just bigots in this country?

I still remember the huge hue and cry that the media and public made when the aussies called harbhajan singh a racist, all of us became defensive saying we are not racists, how can people hailing from the land of the Mahatma be racist? Well it’s time to take a look in the mirror India is one of the most racist countries in the world. We discriminate on every possible level whether its religion, caste, region, sex, etc. 

How many inter caste or inter religion marriages do we see in this country?? Lets move out of the big cities and into the smaller ones , there are a million cases of honour killings that go on but the police don’t do anything cause even they believe that one should not look for love outside of ones caste. I’ve read of reports in UP and Bihar where villages have gone to war cause a son from one and daughter from another have run away together. In Gujarat a landlord stripped the boys family and made them walk naked in the entire village cause their son had runaway with his daughter.

Lets come back into the cities, I know of so many people who try to show they are modern or open minded but when it comes down to their own children falling in love with someone outside their caste or religion all hell breaks loose. No marrying a muslim, no marrying a south indian, no marrying a hindu, no marrying a christian when are we going to stop this and treat everyone like human beings. We are all the same .

What has love got to do with caste, religion, sex, race, fairness, age????? If only we move past all our superficial differences and actually see that we are all the same the world will become a much better place.

As John Lennon said “All you need is love”.

In India there’s no two party system like the United States, we have an unlimited party system. Now i’m going to illustrate the conundrum we the voters in this country face, lets start with the congress party, back in the 90′s the congress decided to make Sonia Gandhi (an italian citizen) the president of their party. there was a lot of opposition to this move by some congress members namely Sharad Pawar , who was so against the idea of Sonia Gandhi being the president that he quit the party and set up his own which was christened Nationalist Congress Party or the NCP. But alas in the elections he couldn’t get a clear majority for his party and there fore today is one the biggest allies of the Congress party when it comes to forming state governments as well as at the centre.  

There a tons of other instances if you take the Shiv Sena for example a lot of their stalwarts have left for the congress and most recently the nephew set up his own party which has gone about creating havoc in the city of Mumbai (more on that in another post).

So now you see the problem before every election there is this horse trading where people from one political party leave and join another more lucrative one, so how does one decide which party to vote for because obviously they have no policies or agenda that can be voted for. They fight elections by buying votes, and fighting on non issues like marathi power and such.

No politician in this country has ever been convicted of a crime, which brings us to the legal system in this country. It takes a minimum of 20 years for any verdict to be reached in this country. The law is very subjective if you have the money and power you can get away with murder here. Even judges can be bought for the right price.

More than 60% of this country is living below the poverty line but we boast about having the most number of billionaires in asia here, so then why this economic disparity.  Proper infrastructure is not provided by the government , government schools are badly managed, teachers underpaid or not paid at all. Most government hospitals don’t have proper trained staff, some don’t even have doctors. Till the time the government doesn’t provide its citizens with the basics how can we bring them out of their poverty? 

And I don’t buy this whole concept of survival of the fittest because we don’t live in the jungle, and no government can act like a private corporation and abandon citizens who have unfortunately fallen through the cracks.

The level of corruption in this country is mind boggling, it’s probably the only country where one has to bribe to get legal work done. I can understand if I am a gangster or drug peddler and have to bribe the cops but to get them to verify my passport. Why should i pay my taxes if I have to bribe every possible government agency to do their jobs?? And these days there’s no shame in asking for bribes, earlier they used to at least do it under the table now its like they have a rate list for every thing one needs. 

So honestly what is it that we are so proud of in this democracy, is it freedom of speech well we’ve seen what the shiv sainiks did to the IBN Lokmat office. I keep hearing all these anchors saying go out and vote, but why should I vote when I know that no matter which party comes into power they are not going to be able to protect me from a terrorist, they are not going to provide proper infrastructure for me all they are going to do is fill their pockets and screw us over time and again. Look at Madhu Kode, RR Patil, Chagan Bhujbal, Vilasrao Deshmukh just to name a few, everyones forgotten the telgi scam bhujbal was involved with, RR Patil was removed as home minister but brought back to the same post within a year, Vilasrao made a cabinet minister within a few months. So honestly what is the point of voting??

Wouldn’t you rather have them deliver on their promises and give up the right to vote, if they provide us with the infrastructure, drinking water, electricity, hospitals, schools, security,etcetera. I know I would give up my right to vote if they could just deliver for once.