April 27, 2014 – Brown Pundits

(brown) Silicon Superman crushed by racism

You receive a minor wrist-slap for brutalizing another human being. As a brown super-man who conquered the commanding heights of Silicon Valley, you are still entitled to cry “racism.”

Justice (poetic) was finally
done when Gurbaksh Chahal was ejected from the board of RadiumOne as a
result of “twitter backlash”. But lot of questions remain unanswered.
Why did the police behave so stupidly? Why did the girl turn hostile?
Did it matter that this guy is a big-time Obama donor? Our fear is that if he escapes now, the next victim may not wake up to tell the story.

The nightmare that women in India face on a daily basis is well known. Even three year old babies are not spared. Women (victims) are frequently blamed for the actions of the perps, often community pressure is exerted in such a brutal fashion that the woman feels compelled to commit suicide.

In contrast America is the place where one can expect justice regardless of family connections, wealth, gender, race….most of the time. It seems to be the case however if you are rich and powerful enough (and a big-time donor to the President of the USA) then you can get awarded community service for the privilege of having knocked your girl-friend unconscious (and brutalizing her 117 times). This is because men are entitled to be angry if they think that the woman has not been faithful enough.
……..
An
India-born Silicon Valley serial entrepreneur has been fired as CEO of
company he founded by the company’s board following charges of battering
his girlfriend, even as he alleged that racial bias has colored the
case.

According to reports in the tech media, the board of
RadiumOne, an internet advertising platform founded by Gurbaksh Chahal,
has fired him over a case relating to his conviction for battery and
domestic violence. Chahal, a Tarn Taran-born school dropout who founded
and sold two advertising companies for $340 million before he was 25,
reportedly kicked and battered his American girlfriend over a domestic
argument concerning her alleged infidelity.

Chahal, 31, pleaded
guilty to misdemeanor domestic violence and battery charges last week,
dodging 45 felony counts for the beating that was captured on
videotaped. The video was ruled to be inadmissible in court because of
the nature of the way in which the police obtained it, and the victim
later declined to testify and cooperate with prosecutors.

However, in a controversial ruling, Chahal was sentenced to three years’
probation, 52 weeks in a domestic violence training program, and 25
hours of community service, but was spared jail time.

Since
then Chahal has taken to social media to protest his innocence even as
pressure mounted on the board of RadiumOne to sack him. In a lengthy
rant on his blog on Sunday — under the headline “Can you handle the
truth?” — Chahal said he has been the “recipient of death threats and
hateful language aimed not just at what I was accused of, but attacking
me for my ethnicity, my social class, and even my gender. Many would
gladly lynch me based because of my origin-and not the facts of my
case.”

“I fully understand the outrage of those who believe I
got off ‘lightly’ as asserted by numerous postings on social media
sites. But the $500 fine I agreed to pay, the equivalent of a speeding
ticket, is simply what those misdemeanors require, and in no way
reflects the toll that this ordeal has exacted on me,” he explained.

Virtually calling his girlfriend a prostitute, Chahal alleged that the
situation that resulted in his legal case began when he “discovered that
my girlfriend was having unprotected sex for money with other people”
which he claimed she testified to in her interviews with the cops.

“When I discovered this fact and confronted my girlfriend, we had a
normal argument. She called 9-11 after I told her I was going to contact
her father regarding her activities. And yes, I lost my temper. I
understand, accept full responsibility and sincerely apologize from the
bottom of my heart for that,” he said, adding that it was all “overblown
drama because it generates huge volumes of page views for the media
given what I have accomplished in the valley.”

……
Link (1): http://recode.net/2014/04/27/here-is-the-radiumone-ceo-firing-statement/
Link (2): http://finance.fortune.cnn.com/2014/04/25/its-time-for-radiumone-to-fire-its-abusive-ceo/
……
regards

“When she awoke, her brother was gone”

The (true) story of Mhd. Husein (15 years) and Senwara Begum (9 years) facing the horrors of the actual sea (and also a sea of inhumanity), separated from their parents…..perhaps forever.

So…we are experiencing in real-time the impact of yet another 2 nation policy…this time by devotees of a Great Soul who instructed that even plants and animals are to be treated with kindness.

It is perhaps churlish to ask at such a sad moment, but when will the history of children displaced by the partitions in South Asia be written, many of whom are still rotting away in so many slums? If we the browns will not take responsibility, will the white man (Associated Press) launch an investigation and write the report? The theories of competitive grievances tend to drown out the reality of all the grief and misery.

The powerful epigraph in Jyoti Grewal’s book on the Sikh riot victims (1984) comes to mind: ‘I write so I am not written out; I write so I am not written about.’
….
Their
small boat was packed with 63 people, including 14 children and 10
women. They baked in the sun and vomited from the waves. Nearly two
weeks passed, and then a boat with at least a dozen Myanmar soldiers
approached. They kicked and bludgeoned the Rohingya men with wooden
planks and iron rods, several passengers said.
They
tied Mohamad’s hands and lit a match, laughing as the smell of burnt
flesh wafted from his blistering arm. Senwara watched helplessly. The
beatings finally stopped after Mohamad suspected money changed hands,
and the soldiers ordered the boat to leave. The government said the Navy
denied seizing any ships during that period.

“Tell us, do you have your Allah?” one Rohingya survivor quoted the soldiers as saying. “There is no Allah!”

The ship plodded on,
but it was falling apart. A sarong stuffed in a hole could not stop
water from bubbling through, and Senwara’s sticky rice and bits of bread
were gone.

When they finally floated ashore in Thailand, she had no
idea where she was.

On shore, Mohamad and
Senwara were given rice and dry fish and then put on another small boat
without an engine. Thai troops pulled them far out to sea, cut the rope
and left them to drift without food or water, survivors said. Senwara
got sick after drinking sea water and eating ground-up wood.

The next day, they spotted a fishing boat. It was from Indonesia.
Once in Indonesia, after nearly a month
at sea, Mohamad and Senwara were transferred to a filthy detention
center with about 300 people, double its capacity.
A riot soon broke out
there between the Rohingya and illegal Buddhist fishermen from Myanmar,
and eight Buddhists were beaten to death.

Senwara slept through the brawl in another area. When she awoke, her brother was gone.

After
a few months in jail with other Rohingya arrested from the fight,
Mohamad was released due to his age and left for neighboring Malaysia. Mohamad
found illegal work as a street sweeper, earning about $70 a month, and
now lives in a tiny hovel with about 17 other Rohingya men. He remains
tortured with guilt for leaving his little sister behind.

Soon
after the detention center riot, Senwara was registered as an asylum
seeker. She was moved to temporary U.N. housing in Medan, Indonesia, and
taken in by a Rohingya woman. She remains hurt and angry for being left
alone, and her heart aches for home.

Senwara’s parents didn’t learn the children were safe until more than eight months after their village was burned. On
that awful night, their mother, Anowar Begum, and father, Mohamad
Idris, fled with two babies into a lake. Later, they searched
frantically and found five more of their nine children. The family ended
up in a squalid camp with tens of thousands of other homeless Rohingya
near Rakhine state’s capital, Sittwe. They had given up hope on Senwara
and Mohamad by the time an unknown Rohingya called from Indonesia to say
the children were safe.

Today, 22 months after their separation,
it’s only through technology that the family, now scattered across three
countries, can remain in touch. Mohamad, in Malaysia, watches a
video clip of his sister playing soccer in Indonesia. Even as he breaks
down, he cannot look away from the little girl on the screen. Back
in Myanmar, Anowar stares at her daughter on a Skype video and sobs
into her headscarf. Senwara wipes away her own tears in Indonesia as her
father’s weathered face trembles.

“I don’t think I will ever be able to see my parents,” she says, softly. “For the rest of my life.”
___
The Associated Press reported the children’s story based on interviews and data from Myanmar, Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand.
…..
Link: http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/desperate-rohingya-kids-flee-alone-by-boat/2014/04/26/5a368008-cd5c-11e3-b81a-6fff56bc591e_print.html
…..
regards

Beautiful people have it the worst

We really should exercise much more care when talking about beautiful people like Nargis Fakhri. The poor girl recently came in for some harsh treatment on the Koffee With Karan (KWK) show (Karan as in Karan Johar, the super-boss of Bollywood).

As she says, people consider her (unfairly) to be just a dumb, pretty face, and she wants to set the record straight…she is a talented, pretty face who hustled hard to find a royal patron who is duly appreciative of her talents (and her beauty).

It is not poor Nargis’s fault that she was born beautiful.
The attention that she has been showered with since childhood must have
been a heavy cross to bear. Also she is really tall (5’9″ !!!) and as
we know tall girls have limited match-up choices. Not for Nargis,
thankfully. She has Bollywood royalty as a boyfriend (Uday Chopra, son of the late legendary producer Yash Chopra).*

All
in all, life is so harsh, so un-yielding for these tall, beautiful, super (wo)men who strive day after day to raise the spirits of the common
(wo)man. Superficial beauty aside, Nargis is one tough lady and she has the
will to win, fighting, scrambling, and hustling till the game is won. No shame in that, only glory. BTW,
she also has a new movie just coming out (Main Tera Hero). Best of luck,
Nargis!!!
……
Link: https://in.lifestyle.yahoo.com/photos/getting-to-know-nargis-fakhri-1398425427-slideshow/lost-kissing-varun-dhawan-unheard-photo-140000225.html
…….
regards
*( If a filmi boss proposes to an upcoming
starlet this is rightfully condemned as a casting couch case. However if
the girl herself manages to hook-up with the boss and jump to the head
of the queue it is admired as a sign of personal initiative)