…to sign the surrender sheet and close down the Unified Andhra project which they have created and dominated so far. The million dollar question going forward is of course- how Shudra really are the Reddys? After all the Marathas (power players in Maharashtra) have spoken- “forget past glory, give Marathas OBC status.” I am sure the Reddys will also learn from this and adapt- they have the Brahmins of the past- who else- to help fight their (just) cause.

[Ref wiki] The Brahmins, on top of the hierarchical social order, viewed the ruling castes of the south like the Reddys, Nairs and Vellalars as sat-Shudras meaning shudras of “true being”. Sat-shudras are also known as clean shudras, upper shudras, pure or high-caste shudras. This classification and the four-tier varna concept was never accepted by the ruling castes and the latter challenged the authority of the Brahmins who described them as shudras.

If partition does happen (and is likely at this point) it is likely that the REAL-OBCs (BP certificates available, accepted worldwide) will get their (well deserved) place(s) under the sun:

(1) Dominant castes Reddys and Kammas form 8 per cent and 4-5 per cent of the population in present-day Andhra Pradesh…United Andhra makes Reddys stronger because they are split between the Andhra and Telangana regions. Feudal dominance continues in Telangana….Kammas want a united AP as business interests in cinema, industry, IT, real estate lie in Hyderabad, which is in Telangana

(2) In a divided state, the regions will throw up new influential political groups. In Andhra, Kapus (10-15%) and Malas (15-20%); in Telangana: Velamas (8%), Madigas (20%), Malas (15%).

(3) In a separate Andhra state, Reddy and Kamma CMs will get replaced by either Kapu (Chiranjeevi) or a Mala (Panabaka Laxmi/J.D. Seelam). In Telangana, it could be a Velama Dora (KCR) with Madiga dy CM.

So how robust has been the Reddy rule in AP? Nothing short of astonishing

Continue reading →

In India there seems to be a plethora of national parties- speaking for this or that interest all the way from Ladakh to Lakshadweep and Kutch to Kumki. Of course we have the INC which claims to speak for all secular Indians and the BJP which presumably has a soft spot (and high chairs) for Hindus and Brothers (of co/derived faiths). Then we have the Marxists speaking for the working class everywhere and the Muslim league(s).

So who speaks for the Dalits nation-wide? Right now Mayawati is unquestionably the tallest leader amongst Dalits even though the Ramdas Athawale/Prakash Ambedkar branches are well organized in Maharashtra. How about the tribals though? If/when Maoists join the mainstream then we will have (hopefully an FC) a power leader. For now we have to be satisfied with PA Sangma and the National People’s Party, which is aligned with the NDA/BJP for sentimental/practical reasons. The NPP just won four assembly seats in Rajasthan ahead of the BSP (3) under the local leadership of Kirori Lal Meena. The party has broad ambitions- it would like to contest elections in the tribal constituencies of Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, north West Bengal and the Northeast India [wiki]. For 2014 it will be of interest to see if the NPP can pick up a few seats in the NE where BJP is on a sticky wicket.

The National Unionist Zamindara Party won 2 assembly seats in Rajasthan and seems to be a Farmers United party. The billionaire president BD Agarwal grows guar gum which is quoted (10/12) at 1 Lakh Rs/Quintal (use up all holy swear names here).

After turning around the fortunes of farmers in north Rajasthan, the flourishing guar gum crop is now giving wings to their political dreams. The farmers plan to contest the next assembly elections on all 200 seats in the state under the banner of the Zamindara party.

Guar gum is produced in Sriganganagar and Hanumangarh districts and is exported to over 30 countries. The crop is extensively used for natural gas extraction besides other industries like pharmaceuticals and textiles. India is the world’s largest producer of guar gum.

Agarwal flayed the existing political parties for not taking care of farmers’ interests properly. “A few years ago, the debt burden on Indian farmers was Rs 3lakh crore, which has now increased to Rs 4.5lakh crore. The government is ready to give more loans. But, this would only increase the burden . As per a report many farmers want to quit farming ,” Agarwal said. He said that their aim is to help the farmers get the best possible prices for their crops as per the World Trade Organization’s prices.

A farmer Rajendra Kumar Jani said, “Over the last one and a half year, the guar gum has turned the fortunes of the farmers. The guar gum was sold at Rs10,000 per quintal last year but it crossed Rs1lakh per quintal mark. I purchased new tractor after selling my crops and various other electronic equipment for my house. There are a huge number of farmers whose lives have changed completely because of guar gum prices.”

Guar gum growers of India all united under the NUZP banner!!!  I am sure Mr Amitabh Harivansh Bachhan who is also a noted farmer in UP (thanks to BSP!!!) and in Maharashtra will join Mr BD Agarwal in wishing farmer communities all the (political, electrical) power they can grab on to as they join hands from Ladakh to Lak…..

regards

Guess who suddenly learnt that creating hysteria and mouthing hyperbole is not the right way to go about correcting wrongs.

Arundhati Roy in the latest interview here to the BBC clearly has grown a lot mentally since the Tejpal phenomenon. I have never heard her say anything so very calm and composed.

Q: What was your reaction when you first heard about the accusations against Tarun Tejpal, as someone who knows him and is familiar with Tehelka?

A: Heartbreak. I think all of us are already braced for what we know is going to be mass hysteria in the media in which everybody is just not given time or place to think.

The fact is that what has been alleged against him is a pretty serious crime and you do have to admire the fact that a young colleague did have the courage to stand up and say what happened to her which isn’t normally the case.

Yet, because of what happened in the [Delhi] gang rape last December, there is a lynch mob that is howling in a maximalist way. I think what we miss is a real addressing of the problem. On the one hand we are talking about sexual harassment, molestation and rape being a phenomenon which very many women go through. Is this media hysteria going to address the problem?

 

….

 

Women have fought for the expansion of the legal definition of rape and I think that is a work in progress.

It is an un-nuanced law – some parts are good and some are draconian.

By expanding the law and cranking up the punishment what you are getting is a lynch mob after a few high-profile cases – but the phenomenon is not being addressed.

Q: Are you suggesting that this is an issue that the law cannot completely address?

A: I’m partly suggesting that. There has to be an institutionalised way of addressing this which cannot just be crude. Everyone cannot be sentenced to death or life in prison or hounded in the public eye. We need to calibrate our responses, calm down and think about it a bit.

It seems as if she has also developed a new found respect for the Indian legal system.

Q: How do you think you can do this while also delivering justice to a victim?

A: If we could put these systems in place then victims can also make their own decisions to a great extent of whether they want to go to a court of law or address it in a different way. The building blocks are in place but need to be more civilised.

Arvind Kejriwal is a giant killer, he ensures a spectacular (personal, team) defeat for Sheila Dixit as the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) is projected to win 28 seats (BJP 31, Congress 8, Others 3) in Delhi. BJP fails to get an outright majority (even with presumed support of independents).

Corruption in politics is supposed to be a great leveler, “they all do it”, “it is not our fault that we have corrupt (coalition) partners” and “my corruption good, yours bad” are popular excuses (which sometimes even reflects the truth). However this is a rare occasion that a party formed out of nothing goes somewhere so fast. The things to watch are a) does AAP have any lasting power (anti-corruption is pro-poor but not in an obvious manner),  b) will AAP eventually (and inevitably) get stained in  order to remain viable, and c) status of the Jan Lokpal (corruption ombudsman) bill that is currently stalled in the Parliament.

I hesitate to say that this is an (almost) victory for the “middle class non-sectarian left” but IMO this is a landmark event in Indian politics. A few other milestones (no equivalence presumed) that come to mind are the Telugu Desam victory under the baton of NT Rama Rao, the coming to power of Mayawati in UP and the defeat of the Marxists in West Bengal.

regards

The thread with my friend Arjun Mehta is here: https://www.facebook.com/arjun.arjun.arjun/posts/10151884197867423

I’ve begun to anonymise these conversations since they could be sensitive. My gut feeling is that Dynastic Parties (Congress, PPP, PML-N, BNP, Awami League) are now playing the long-term game. They can lose the next election but in South Asian countries where multi-party coalitions are beginning to emerge (India, Pakistan & SL are states of nations) these dynasties are the only ones with the “star power” to emerge as national champions.

If Britain & her venerable constitutional monarchy (God save the Queen, if we only we had remained as her subjects as the millions of Desis dreaming of escape to Britain & her Old Commonwealth demonstrate) has taught us is that in multi-national democracies we have two outcomes. One is that we constantly feet about demographics (Israel par excellence) or we can have a dynasty that is able to cohere the state into having a collective consciousness.

Ironically India and Pakistan have both reached deep into their subconscious Ids to uplift a national dynasty that appeals to their national model (Ashoka & the Delhi Sultanate). Indians nominated a Parsi-Italian inflected Kashmiri Pandit UP Brahmin legal-scholarly family into the place of honor whereas Pakistan has Sindhi landlords versus Kashmiri-Punjabi urban industrialists. The latter reflects the fact that because of the Muslim heritage (even now in India Muslims form a higher % of the urban population that coupled with Bollywood, Pakidtan and distinctive dress of lower urban class Muslims contribute to their higher than normal national visibility) and Partition Pakistan has always been a more urban nation than South Asia (maybe with the exception of Sri Lanka).

Arjun Mehta: Haha what a show, BJP! Khangress, in your face!

A.M: They’re (UPA) losing allies mate. All they have is 20-25% votes from the Muslim minorities, but without allies in the center, they won’t win this time. Certainly hope not.

Continuing the theme of female Pakistanis all I can say #ashamedtobepaki.

And a final one: Continue reading →

My weekend here in Kampala starts from Saturday night to Monday morning; 6days work weeks are addictive.

….not quite a century of life (1918-2013) but a great score nonetheless for the cause of humanity.

I extend my heartfelt thanks to the Norwegian Nobel Committee for elevating us to the status of a Nobel Peace Prize winner.

We stand here today as nothing more than a representative of the millions of our people who dared to rise up against a social system whose very essence is war, violence, racism, oppression, repression and the impoverishment of an entire people.

Because of their courage and persistence for many years, we can, today, even set the dates when all humanity will join together to celebrate one of the outstanding human victories of our century. When that moment comes, we shall, together, rejoice in a common victory over racism, apartheid and white minority rule. That triumph will finally bring to a close a history of five hundred years of African colonisation that began with the establishment of the Portuguese empire.

The value of our shared reward will and must be measured by the joyful peace which will triumph, because the common humanity that bonds both black and white into one human race, will have said to each one of us that we shall all live like the children of paradise.

Let the strivings of us all, prove Martin Luther King Jr. to have been correct, when he said that humanity can no longer be tragically bound to the starless midnight of racism and war.

Let the efforts of us all, prove that he was not a mere dreamer when he spoke of the beauty of genuine brotherhood and peace being more precious than diamonds or silver or gold.

Let a new age dawn! Thank you.

It appears that things are not that straight-forward. Africa is still fragile and there are still people with cash and/or machetes intent on fomenting trouble and/or pilfer resources. France, an ex colonizer is now back in a peace-keeping role (but botched the operation in Libya). As long as the basic principle is recognized that Africans need to control their own destiny then some progress has been made.

regards

Forget USA (the old retired cop) and China (the new rising emperor), it is France that is playing (and relishing) the role of the super-cop who is protecting (christian dominated) SSAfrica from getting swamped by Islamist guerillas. First it was Mali and now an SOS from CAR and French soldiers are again on the march.

The CAR has been heading towards sectarian warfare since March when mainly Muslim rebels, aided by mercenaries from Chad and Sudan, seized power in a coup in this predominantly Christian nation.

Former rebels known as the Seleka, accused of numerous atrocities and recruiting child soldiers, clashed with militias called the “anti-balaka” – the name adopted by mainly Christian vigilante groups – amid growing tit-for-tat violence along sectarian lines.

French president François Hollande issued a statement after the UN vote. “The situation in the Central African Republic has become alarming, and even terrifying. Massacres are being committed there at this very moment, even in hospitals,” he said. “Each day women and children are attacked and millions of displaced people are seeking shelter.” He said it was France’s “duty” to act.

He added: “A year ago, in Mali, France was called upon to combat a terrorist invasion. She did so. Today, in very different circumstances, France is expected in order to avoid an humanitarian catastrophe. She will be there.

regards