Coming to the end of my 3rd Corona Surge…and hopefully the last. Thank god, I’m tired of waking up to a slow-motion bloodbath every day. This surge was the worst by far, because I did it in a Red State, with a lot of nasty patients who would do things like rage, refuse treatments, threaten to leave randomly, demand Ivermectin, etc.
There is no country on the planet that has failed as completely and utterly against the virus as America. Biomedical technology is all well and good, but the technology that matters is what binds hearts together.
I just checked numbers on Hindustan News and CovidActNow, looks like the wealthy, lawful land of BIHAR has soundly surpassed my southern county in vaccination rate.
Being Hindu in Bangladesh, and Jogen Mandal’s inglorious legacy | View
Pakistan’s first law and labour minister, Jogendra Nath Mandal, saw the carnage Hindus in Bangladesh are seeing today. He escaped to India. Bangladesh’s Hindus have nowhere to go.
We should go for a population exchange of Malda division with Bangladesh. Infact what I found funny is Bengali kulin brahmin chief minister of WB is “silent” on the carnage. It’s a shame the Indian Hindu politics has come down to such stupidity. Our own “hindu hriday samrat” is silent on the issue.
Again why should the “hindu hriday samrat” say anything, when there is hardly a peep from ‘Bengali kulin brahmin’? Can;t bear the cross of H-folks of other region. Glad Modi govt has wizened up somewhat..
The bhadralok who has a view of everything all and sundry is curiously silent. You get the “hindu hriday samrat”, which one deserves, and one votes for. And seems like Bengalis got what they voted for..
Bengalis, Tamils, Malayalis can never count on Modi or North Indian Hindus or West Indian Hindus for any help. They consider us to be racially inferior and they deem us as non-Hindus. They share the same mentality that West Pakistanis had when they went to commit genocide on Bengalis, with an express intent to conduct mass rapes to improve the genetic stock of the Bengalis. They, too, viewed Bengalis as ‘less Muslim’, because of the script their language uses, and their physical appearance. It’s no different among North/West Hindus in India today, who daily spew extremist hateful rhetoric about Bengalis, Tamils, Malayalis.
Far more likely that North Indian Hindus and West Indian Hindus help Bangladesh slaughter more Bengali Hindus, just like they helped Sri Lanka slaughter Tamil Hindus. They hate the Hindus of Bengal, Tamil Nadu, and Kerala more than members of other religions inside India or outside of it.
Far more likely that North Indian Hindus helped Sri Lanka slaughter Tamil Hindus. They hate the Hindus of Bengal, Tamil Nadu, and Kerala
The North Indians funded and trained the Tamil LTTE terrorists in Tamil Nadu camps. For decades the Tamil LTTE terrorists operated from Tamil Nadu, even after the murder of Rajiv Gandhi. When the Tamil terrorist were about to be defeated at Vadamaratchi in 1987, the Indians came to the rescue of the Tamil Terrorist, Then forced a defacto separate state change to the Sri Lankan constitution.
The war against the Tamil Terrorist was won with Chinese funding and arms.
Aggression from Hindus against Buddhist Sri Lanka has gone on for centuries.
In the 12th century Magha of Kalinga with Kerala mercenaries completely destroyed the Rajarata (North Central province). The Rajarata was the center of Buddhist Civilization and after its destruction, the Buddhist civilization never recovered. With that the North became a Tamil Hindu kingdom.(reference in next post)
Then in 15th Century, Tamil Hindu Sankili I chased out the Sinhalese Buddhist and Javanese from the north. (reference in next post).
Hoju, do you think the Sinhalese will allow any form of a separate Hindu Tamil state in Sri Lanka. It would just be a stepping stone for Hindu Tamil/Indian invasion of Sri Lanka.
Talk to Indranil Roy @Indrani1_Roy on Twitter who might be able to give specifics of what might be feasible from an Indian startup pov. He is bakchod and biased but well informed and accessible. Maybe your company’s battery packs might be useful to some small airplane manufacturer, who knows?
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Random thoughts on railways, my reply didn’t show up in last thread:
1) The commute problem is real I had not considered that bit in counting costs. It used to take less time for me to fly from Delhi to Kolkata than to reach Howrah station from Kolkata Airport. Bangalore Bullet train would be quite feasible for the same reason. I think Mumbai-Delhi and even Delhi-Kolkata would be feasible too due to sheer demand.
2) Someone I know went to bid for some railway coach parts and found out that it is impossible to make any money from doing it. Maybe with bullet trains more manufacturing opportunities would come up.
While watching the video, I noticed that all the vtols had side windows. They (people in the video) were wondering if people would be willing to ride in an autonomous flying vehicle, one thought that came to me was that the companies should get rid of the windows. They can make the roof transparent to get natural lighting but if the people can’t look below then they won’t be afraid as much ( but people get into things like ropeways willingly so riders being uncomfortable with autonomous vehicles shouldn’t be a big hurdle)
Windows add to a good flying experience in small Cessna so I don’t know if removing them would be good. The supersonic jets people are planning on removing windows and replacing them with digital screens with outside view for structural reasons.
Integrating autonomous aerial vehicles into airspace will happen with Reliable, Xwing and others like them not with vtols. For now even Joby will have a pilot.
The shitty bit about aviation is everyone talks but no one has the money so opinions and wishes don’t really matter. From VLJs to Piaggio Avanti to Beech Starship general aviation is chock full of brave ambitious men failing to see the world does not deserve or need so much innovation. Dozens of great companies like Mooney have gone bankrupt because people sue them for millions of dollars when one plane crashes, Mahindra lost USD 100 million on GippsAero despite taking all precautions (some of the best test pilots in the world crashed their prototype!), one stupid gasket, one faulty wire, one bad day, one structural crack, one bird strike and it is game over.
On the other hand you have clever people like Quest Aircraft or Carbon Cub people or Pilatus or TBM or on the big side ATR who build moats that last 50 years. But it is difficult to see what works, looks at diamond aircraft, awesome company better than anything Indians can ever come up with but got bought over by the Chinese. We need a clever sales guy to figure out what would work for an Indian startup. NAL is wasting the country’s hard earned money. If Saab or BAe or Fokker can’t do it NAL or HAL sure can’t either.
There isnt going to be much of an aviation industry without business travel. Air travel has always been a luxury, with the uber wealthy business class types subsidizing vacation travel for middle-class folks. In general, the time savings offered by air travel matter a lot less since people can work on their laptops whether they are on a train or even a ship. Also, the government used to subsidize pilot training via the training of air force pilots, many of whom would join the airlines after retirement. This has tapered off significantly. Autonomy can help but full autonomy from taxi to takeoff to landing is quite a ways off.
India is lucky that we have a dense railway network. The US will have a much harder time without coast to coast travel in 6 hours.
“There isnt going to be much of an aviation industry without business travel.”
For General Aviation this is true. Indigo is the biggest buyer of Airbus 320s. Indian Airlines have bought ~10% of all A320s ever produced since 1986 despite being late entrants. Some arm twisting could possibly get us our own assembly Airbus plant like the US and China did.
“Air travel has always been a luxury, with the uber wealthy business class types subsidizing vacation travel for middle-class folks. In general, the time savings offered by air travel matter a lot less since people can work on their laptops whether they are on a train or even a ship.”
Planes have smaller sunk cost, can be sold off, don’t require much infrastructure. Only recently under Modi have the logjams of land acquisition begun to reduce.
“Also, the government used to subsidize pilot training via the training of air force pilots, many of whom would join the airlines after retirement. This has tapered off significantly.”
This used to be especially true for America. The problem there is the 1500 flight hour ATPL requirement to become even a first officer. Someone in India can become a first officer with just 250 flight hours CPL. American levels of safety comes at a price that trainee pilots are (rightly) not willing to bear hence there was some shortage. But like all ‘cool’ careers bakraa after bakraa will keep lining up to become pilots no matter how bad the benefits/cost.
“Autonomy can help but full autonomy from taxi to takeoff to landing is quite a ways off.”
Naa bhai, Xwing and Reliable Robotics and a few others are making hundreds of millions of $ each from VC money doing this.
“India is lucky that we have a dense railway network. The US will have a much harder time without coast to coast travel in 6 hours.”
India’s rail network especially the Punjab to Bengal bit is woefully inadequate to satisfy the demand.
Kaunsa liya hai? I have seen people flying with FPV drone goggles, looks super cool.
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DJI Mavic udaya tha mainse usmein toh kuch karna bhi nai padta, sata-sat chalta hai woh ekdum smooth, panic button click karo toh khud safely land bhi karta hai, panoramic shots leta hai, sab kuch khud kar leta hai, anti-collision bhi hai. Khatam kar diya hai competition ko DJI ne. Chini abhiyanta jindabaad!
Arvind Subramanian & Raghuram Rajan (Discussant) – Is the Indian Economy Back?
Seems like Rajan has booked a spot in the next minister ship of UPA. While our ‘World Bank’ economist (who had hoped to get the spot) seems to have do with tweeting pictures of Kolkata…
Ravan was always considered a great scholar and a devotee of Shiva who had lost his way. People used to have the maturity to understand that despite him being the villain, he had some redeeming attributes.
Now they just use these characters to shove latest ideological fads.
In a way it’s good. Better they use Ravan to counter Ram than George Floyd or some other random western unfortunate.
Indian healthcare is missing out on talents not inclined to join medical profession
Long training period, lack of commensurate remuneration and shortage of opportunities for professional growth are hampering student entry into the medical field. Here’s the way out.
Jim Crow Hindutva
Ashutosh Varshney writes: The politics of Hindu nationalists is threatening to create a Jim Crow India in BJP-ruled territories. What race was to the American South, ethnicised religion is to Hindu nationalists
Don’t they ever get tired of copypasting the same column for years on end?
At least the copypastas in Twitch gaming streams had originality.
Brown
2 years ago
with continuing islamic radicalisation of bangladesh, and if hindus still survive for few more decades, an autonomous homeland for them ( as in former yugoslavia) might happen.
i feel some thing similar will happen to the kasmiri pandits.
Nah, nothing will happen on that front. Most likely Bangaldeshi Hindus, whoever can, will try to move to Bengal, since Assam and Tripura are out of question. Same modus operandi from what happened from 1947-1971.
But much of it depends on what happens post Hasina.
Hoju
2 years ago
What’s happening in Bangladesh is a travesty.
It’s especially sad because diaspora Bangladeshis seem to have little capacity for self-reflection. They’ve almost all been brainwashed into chanting the mantra that Muslims are unsafe in India, that they cannot even walk around without fear, that Bangladesh is different, etc. They now think Bangladesh is the only secular state in South Asia, a beacon for the religiously hateful India and Pakistan to follow.
It’s crazy how so many desi Muslims have been so quickly indoctrinated into the Modi = Hitler, Hindus use swastika because they are Nazis, etc., bullshit.
Then why the fuck do so many Bangladeshi Muslims illegally go to India?
Why has the Hindu population in Bangladesh precipitously plummeted from 22% in 1951 to 9% today?
Nobody cares about Bangladesh or Hindus, so all this stuff just gets swept under the rug. Bangladesh is an Islamist supremacist society that has slowly but surely killed off its Hindu population. India is a country where the Muslim population continues to soar, aided in part by illegal Bangladeshi Muslims, who are so fearful of Muslim persecution in India that they move to India by hook or crook.
There is little difference between Pakistan and Bangladesh. And yes, there is a difference between India and those two countries, at least for now although there are signs of India devolving into the same hateful bullshit.
The diaspora reaction has also been pathetic. All those ‘South Asian’ wokeists who chomp at the bit to sensationalize the plight of Muslims in India have not said a word. Where is Kamala’s stupid sister Mina? Where is that cunt Menendez? UNHCR? USCRIF?
USCIRF
@USCIRF
USCIRF
@CommrBhargava
: “USCIRF is disturbed by violent attacks on Durga Puja festivities where #Hindu idols were vandalized & dozens of worshippers hurt. We urge the #Bangladeshi gov to safeguard religious communities & hold perpetrators responsible.”
But F the UNHCR, don’t care for the UN as they have become more and more ridiculous and obsolete, but as an american ( I think you are too) I care more about our country, the United States noticing:
I am with you brother, this is despicable and F’ed up! It is ridiculous how atrocities against non-muslim minorites are regularly ignored, A great example is when 2 atrocities that occurred so close together: Sri Lanka, remember the 300 “Easter” worshipers that were killed? Obama, Hilary Clinton, and other US left of center politicians couldn’t bring themselves to say Christians, but had no problem saying the victims of the New Zealand shooting were Muslims and threw around words like Islamophobia very generously, I have yet to hear any of the far leftists use Christianophobia, or Hinduophobia, Buddhistophobia, Bahaiophobia, etc.. for all the attacks and murders of non-muslims. To their credit, if they do it, I will applaud the Bangladesh government going secular, but atrocities can’t be overlooked, citizens of their own land shouldn’t live in fear of organized terror groups coming after them. I am not fan of the hindutva government in control of India right now, but I fully support if they tried to increase control of India’s borders more effectively and simultaneously rescue Hindus from Pakistan and Bangladesh and anywhere else. Disclaimer though, I am against the attacks against the muslim civilians living a peaceful life in their respective countries and condemn attacks against them as well, but they fortunately have plenty of defenders in the West on the left.
“All those ‘South Asian’ wokeists who chomp at the bit to sensationalize the plight of Muslims in India have not said a word. Where is Kamala’s stupid sister Mina? Where is that cunt Menendez? UNHCR? USCRIF?”
Lots of interesting numbers on India’s income inequality. As always, one has to be cautious due to large amounts of black money income, but still, the general contours are surely correct.
India’s gini index is 35, close to that of the UK. The fact that 2/3rd of the country is rural and pays no monthly rent/mortgage obscures things a lot. The cities are highly unequal though, perhaps as bad as South Africa and Latin America without the high levels of crime.
principia
2 years ago
On Bangladesh: I’ve read quite a number of copes in recent days that the violence is instigated by “outside elements” to sabotage BDL-IND relations. I don’t buy it. The attacks and subsequent murders against atheist bloggers was merely the prequel to what we are seeing now.
In light of these mass attacks, it is hard to argue that Hindu nationalism is illegitimate.
Amend CAA to protect Bangladeshi Hindus: Congress leader Milind Deora
phyecon1
2 years ago
I have gone through twitter handles of some ex muslim atheist types, armin navabi, atheist republic, tweeted on violence in bangladesh, razib khan, omarali did as well. haris sultan did not, abdul sameer did not, ali rizvi did not, yasmeen mohammad, sara haider did not. I do not care for atheism for a reason, it was clear to me that lot on the left were atheists as well and we know what they say. What is important though is free speech. Indian govt should speak its mind, if what it says causes issues, then it already is a lost cause. Hence I believe community is the atom of society, you trust community, not individuals who look around ,check their bank balance, look for perks and incentives and only then talk.
Community on the other hand talks even if incentives are all misaligned. I only want to know, how many caa protestors are marching on the streets?. Hence I respectfully dont buy gaurav’s article. His reasons for why something is the issue need not be the real reason why something actually happens. Far greater horrors are taking place from afghanistan to bangladesh and they are quiet.
In my view its a futile attempt by non BJP parties to try to reclaim the nationalistic space. Especially if you are a center left party like Congress or AAP. I think in the short term the BJP might be propping up AAP so as to undercut the Congress, and will bring the hammer down once AAP is a real threat.
“United States through IMF, FATF and other means is making it unsustainable for #Pakistan to maintain a geostrategic partnership with Beijing. They’re creating a horrible example out of Pakistan to warn other regional countries against forming alliances with China.”
https://twitter.com/sarkar_swati/status/1450505991494189064
Clear ideological statement on the crisis faced by Hindus in BD & beyond by WB LoP Suvendu Adhikari. BD depends on WB for water (Farakka) & goods (Petropole, Hili border). India is the only civilizational land 4 Hindus #Hindus_Attacked_In_Bangladesh #BangladeshHinduGenocide
Very clever tactic . Vote for Party X. But expectations from Party Y. Similar to Tamils. Vote for Dravidian parties, but expectation from BJP to do something for SL tamils.
H. M. Brough
2 years ago
Right.
But I think the worst takes are the ones that claim Ravan was a champion of Dalits or something, when he was literally the son of a prominent sage.
That shall too pass. When the less-Hindu/commies realize , sooner than later, that they do not posses enough ‘Hindu’ credentials to pit one Hindu figure against another, they will revert back to their whole international George Floyd thing as Prats described.
For all the Mahisasura (against Durga) or Mahabali (in Kerala) championing, they havnt become any champion of any subaltern identity, of any wider region. Same will happen with Ravana too.
Sumit
2 years ago
Out of the loop on the whole Bangladesh Hindu persecution thing, but it has come to my attention that Twitter has banned two mainstream accounts one of ISKON Bangladesh (whose temple was attacked) and one of the Bangladesh Hindu council.
This is why the Chinese decision to ban US social media platforms and not allow them to take root seems prescient.
India unfortunately lacks the state capacity to implement this sort of ban without shooting themselves in the foot.
So the best approach might be decentralized uncensorable alternatives which I think are coming in a few years.
The other thing is that we’re in a coalition with the American Regime, and Twitter is one of its organs. Moving against Twitter, especially in the hamfisted way that the Indian government is wont to do, would blowback on us in a way that it wouldn’t on Nigeria (that recently did move against it).
> The other thing is that we’re in a coalition with the American Regime, and Twitter is one of its organs.
The spinelessness of Modi and his idiotic embrace of a regime which seeks to topple the ideological movement he belongs to never ceases to amaze me. That is why Twitter dares to do what it does. They know the guy supposedly running the country is a wimp and a coward.
The Spinelessness is primarily due to the corruption because the moneys from tax havens is currently invested in the stock market and the political class wants to maximize the wind fall gains. Currently, top Indian firms have roughly 20-30%”Foreign investment” which is artificially inflating the stock markets. The American technocrats have heavily invested in the Indian stock market. Now a collusion between Indian businesses and investers is the main reason why Modi won’t do shit. On the other hand he knows that flight of foreign capital will push India into a deep crisis since the banks have again lent recklessly ( ex:- Households taking personal loans and putting it in the Stock market which is technically illegal). If he takes any harsh steps, both the geniune business, cronies, politician and Households suffer due to flight of foreign capital. I really don’t think anyone has the guts to pull the plug.
There are ways to deal with twitter’s monopoly without an outright ban. For eg you can throttle traffic to the twitter servers, to make their website and app very slow when they take egregious actions.
Communicate dissatisfaction and then do a temporary soft ban. Gradually increase these soft bans if they continue to misbehave. You have plausible deniability at an international politics level.
And Indian users become slowly frustrated with the unreliability of twitter and this allows more pliant competitors to gain popularity.
This is not hard to do at all. However I don’t think India has built up any meaningful competence in this area at the state level to pull this off. My only hope is decentralized social networks.
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Also yes I don’t know what people are comparing with. Modi government takes too much bold but dumb action sometimes (demonetization) but hardly spineless compared to the previous governments.
They banned tiktok so that was one positive thing. Also they did some smart thing with cellphone import tariffs which forced cell phone assembly to move to India. (generally I think import tariffs are bad except for the manufacturing complexity tier immediately ahead of India’s current level of global competitiveness)
Basically a Muslim girl fails a CS exam and then alleges that the professor discriminated against her and was a RSS member (he wasn’t). He was found not responsible, but I fear stuff like this will continue.
FWIW the worst cases of professor discrimination I saw here were the result of African ethnic rivalries: specifically Igbo-Yoruba and Amhara-Tigray. Not seen much on the Indian front, just a few devout Muslims that play favorites with other Muslims and have an animus towards Christians, Atheists, Hindus, and lapsed Muslims.
thewarlock
2 years ago
Like I have said, radical islam and leftists are in an unholy alliance. Is anyone surprised when their union produces demons? Omar, Talib, and Cortez are one
The Squad>>> The “Quad”
Saurav
2 years ago
None of this will be of any effect till there is house cleaning. Till you don’t deal with the heretics, you will always find willing accomplices within your fold.
“Pity to see such cowardice from the granddaughter of Tiger Pataudi..
Also her grandmother Sharmila Tagore has her family roots in Rabindranath Tagore, the man who imagined a world ‘where the mind is without fear and the head is held high’..
Tch… Tch..”
Sara Ali Khan seems more Hindu-philic than warranted. Anyhow i like how the family is covering all bases…
Pakistani tax dept finds that a beggar had millions in a bank account and sent his kids to the most expensive private schools. Pretty hilarious, yet true, story. Probably has parallels across many developing countries.
This is a book written by people from the American foreign policy establishment and directed at an educated layperson audience. It’s not bad, and I think people here should read it and compare the challenges and experiences of Nigeria against those of India, both countries being diverse, developing giants of their regions.
—
There is an argument on the Indian Left, made by everyone from T Ninan (financial journalist) to M Junaid (ARoy wannabe) that India is an essentially artificial country with little-to-no nationhood to speak of. I was always skeptical of that argument. But after reading this book I think it’s nonsense, because Nigeria shows us what a truly artificial country looks like.
Basically the British strapped a few tribal statelets to an dead slaver empire and called it good. Unfortunately the constituent parts of Nigeria have nothing in common. That’s why its independence movement consisted of just a few elites in Lagos that didn’t do much, why it had a gruesome civil war within a few years, why ethnic loyalties largely overshadow a national identity that remains weak to this day, and why it’s facing multiple large-scale insurgencies.
You compare this to India, which had a broad-based independence movement and Hindu ethno-religious movements since the 19th century, whose national identity is much stronger, and who only faces peripheral insurgencies on its borders…we got it pretty good.
“With 1.8 million registered members, online forum Nairaland remains popular, even though it has earned the nickname “Angryland” for its insult laced political discussion threads.”
On the other hand, they’re EXACTLY like Indians in other ways!
“ There is an argument on the Indian Left, made by everyone from T Ninan (financial journalist) to M Junaid (ARoy wannabe) that India is an essentially artificial country with little-to-no nationhood to speak of. “
It’s not their fault. They come from regions which have the lowest asabiya within india. If u ask someone from north east of india if india is a country, they would share their experience and say it isn’t. Or atleast they don’t share the same asabiya.
Similarly the Hindu ethno religious movement is mostly a North Indian sentiment. It has only been in last few decades that “indian-ism” has percolated to other regions of india, which now is on par with regional-ism.
I think a lot of people view North Indian ‘Indian-ism’ as a sort of regionalism as well. Albeit one with a culturally hegemonic imposition.
I think there are multiple layers of tension and hegemony:
1. Subregional groups like Kathiawadis or Maithilis or Konkanis getting subsumed into the hegemonic regional / state level culture.
2. Regional / state level groups getting subsumed into the hegemonic national i.e. Hindi culture
3. Indian nationals esp. elites getting subsumed into the hegemonic global Anglo-sphere / western culture.
At its core, I agree N-Indian ‘Indian-ism’ as a regionalism as well . Hindi-Hindu-Hindustan. But you need to have a base , a foil to understand regionalism. Its like saying Pakistan is Punjabi regionalism. Which is both true and untrue to some extent.
But even if we grant that argument, India still comes out far ahead of Nigeria on that front. According to the book, Nigerian nationalism is *now* a nascent phenomenon among some people in the Lagos-Ibadan corridor, and some people affiliated with the central government.
“North India” is a much greater part of India than “Lagos-Ibadan Corridor” is of Nigeria.
Also interesting how the authors cover communal violence events in Nigeria. They contend that the causes are usually fairly prosaic, involving a land, water, resource, or patronage dispute that escalates and takes on a religious or tribal valence. They also contend that media organs broadly prefer the tribal or religious angles and underplay the rest of the issues.
Interesting comparison to how communal violence events get covered in India, with “the evil BJP genociding everything!!!”
(It is possible that most Indian events are qualitatively different than Nigerian events. In any case, I find that in wrt India, Westerners have surprisingly little interest in sober analysis of events, preferring to instead create a grand narrative with its own heroes and villains.)
Ethnic unity can help, but political design matters more. Arab countries like Lebanon, Syria and Jordan are not forming a politically unified state despite strong cultural and religious similarities. Until democratic norms are firmly established, politics is firmly a surplus activity engaged in by the elite for their benefits.
The Indian elite let South India have a disproportionately higher political voice at a critical juncture. Perhaps this was due to the fear of Pakistan, perhaps visionary leadership or just plain luck. This let the country form a unified state, and with a deepening of democratic norms, politics is much more about redistribution than elite objectives.
“But the emergence of the Muslim League in India as a serious secessionist movement soon shattered the myth of unity in the Indian model. A new word entered the vocabulary of West African nationalism – the word was ‘pakistanism’.”
Well hold on. To your example, there were 6 serious attempts to create a pan-Arab state in the late-20th century. Pan-Arabism was definitely a potent idea, but it faltered due to various reasons (coups, loss-averse local/national elites, national rivalries, etc).
Last post on the book. I found their description of a “unlikely but possible” worst-case scenario of Nigeria interesting. Doubt it will happen given the recent spike in crude oil prices, but this book was also written before Coronavirus…so who knows.
“A series of badly flawed elections yields successive governments that are little more than criminal enterprises. The modus operandi of senior government officials centers on corruption and abuse of power. Ethnic and religious political fault lines widen. Nigeria becomes an international pariah, as it was under the Abacha regime or as South Sudan is in 2017. While always corruption prone, Nigeria’s judiciary and legislature become mere rubber stamps on executive power.
Global crude prices stay stuck below $50 per barrel for over a decade. Nigeria’s economy contracts as poor governance and insecurity repel foreign investment and undercut domestic entrepreneurs. National and subnational debt balloons, putting Nigeria at risk of default. Fiscal mismanagement sends the naira into a tailspin, triggering Zimbabwe-like hyperinflation. Once middle-class Nigerians struggle to make ends meet.
Large sections of Nigeria’s main road arteries become impassable during the rainy season, and some major bridges collapse in disrepair.
Nigerians dependent on subsistence agriculture are unable to cope with fluctuating environmental conditions. Areas of northern Nigeria become virtually uninhabitable, sparking mass migration. Nigerians come to make up the largest share of African migrants making the risky journey to Europe. At the same time, Nigeria experiences a pollution crisis. Aging oil infrastructure, artisanal mines, and unregulated industries dump toxic chemicals into rivers. Due to government failures to invest in clean energy sources, most Nigerians still rely on diesel generators and firewood.
In response to deteriorating socioeconomic conditions, Nigeria’s birth rate spikes. As the birth rate climbs above 3 percent, Nigeria is on track to overtake the United States as the third most populated country by 2040—instead of by 2050, as predicted in 2015. Child and maternal mortality rates, particularly in northern Nigeria, worsen as a result of government failure to invest in basic health and sanitation infrastructure.”
There’s a decent article on Nigeria published this month which goes through the severe security difficulties straining the country. As been stated before in this thread, Nigeria is simply not at all comparable to India. It is much more fragile, with roads being so dangerous that politicians are lobbying for airlines to add more flights so that they can avoid them altogether due to very high levels of kidnapping/banditry.
“…monstrosity of a law that not only laid down the burden of innocence on the accused, but also a mandatory death sentence for possessing larger amounts (yes, a mandatory death sentence, like Singapore or Iran), leaving the judge no option.”
Didn’t know India’s drug laws were this harsh (mandatory death sentence was only removed in 2014)
People worry about critical military supply chains, but hearts and minds are equally important.
If this is how they deal with domestic disagreements, understand how ruthlessly they will manipulate foreign aimed propaganda.
It is imperative that India weans itself off dependence on US social media platforms or it risks having its local narrative controlled by a foreign power over the next 20 – 30 years.
Yeah it’s the same fucking language in the end. Just two diff registers. People need to move on to more important things. Hindu Right has to focus on current Bangladesh atrocities against Hindus, rent seeking protests in the NW, Naxals, kashmiri terrorists, and an ever more aggressive China. Hindi Urdu is a waste of time at best.
It’s the same language masquerading as two different communal langauges..And like a Trojan horse too. Because it makes it very potent at spreading; if a lanagauge is related to religion and not ethnicity or geography, then it can spread far an wide because people will willingly adopt it due to religion.
I do think Urdu popularity in india atleast has less to do with sameness with hindi or others coherent factors.
It’s just that it had the first mover advantage in Bollywood which Hindi writers shunned as being debased. Much of latter hindi popularity to become a mass language in wider north India was due to same fact as well.
Sooner rather than later when a new generation of Hindi writers dominate, Urdu will eventually fade away to being a still elite-but-not-spoken-enough type of language.
I thought Hindi writers had already taken over last 20 years since there is a marked decline in pure Urdu in bollywood.
Although, its still like 90% intelligible. I was watching Indian news media and cricket talk shows in Hindi today and most Indian guests (ex cricketers, journos etc) while analysis were casually speaking Hindi that can easily pass off as Urdu. So it’s not just bollywood.
It happening but you have to keep in mind that the generation of writers who came after Urdu writers were trained by the Urdu writers themselves. So what we have now is still the new age hindi writers with a mix of fading Urdu writers. Someone like varun Grover ( writer of sacred games) is an example where even though he might want to write in more urdu he can’t, since he wasn’t trained in that. Which someone like gulzar was.
Also whether it’s indian cricket or tv shows, or in real life, Bollywood impacts all and sundry in north India, so of course the way they speak in Hindi is influenced by it. If you watch the movies pictured on small towns india, u will find a curious mix of hindi+local dialect now emerging. A bit like mumbaiya hindi used in gangester movies.
Article is on point? Why because “Shoiab Danyal” is writing it or because the article made any sense? Somehow the stupidity is being pushed on Hindus for rejecting urdu when Syed Ahmed Khan himself in a speech he delivered in 1887 and till his death he emphasized the “two distinct communities based on Language culture and ethnicity”. bringing pandit Malviya’s statements regarding Hindi and Urdu clearly shows how shallow the author is as he didn’t put forth the arguments of the Muslim elites even though RC Majumdar in his book History of Freedom Movement 3rd Volume states that the change for Official language was based on the demand of Hindus. Christopher’s arguments regarding the Hindi language being unintelligible to Hindus is based on a pretext that people weren’t able to “read” well guess what, literacy rate was 8%-10% in 1881 census implying Urdu was also unintelligible to Hindus and lower caste Muslims alike and such arguments are never made rather a “Confirmation bias” is presented which is far away from the reality.And what about “Jashn-e-Rivaz” called for Diwali? Is anyone changing the name of “Eid” in Sanskrit in any of the advertisment?The post also misses a point that in the year 2019 a man was beheaded in Bijnor district primarily because he didn’t say “SAW” while talking about Prophet. A community that is so Intolerant and resistant to the change shouldn’t raise fingers on other communities. India has 4.33% Native Urdu speakers while 43% Hindi speakers. Now far south, Tamil Nadu Government has recognised Urdu for official work in “few districts” while the state has 5% Muslim population. Hindi is still considered “foreign” in such states which is not being discussed by the author because again Urdu has to be defended by any means even by making stupid claims like Christopher king’s book, blah blah. Urdu is spoken in Kashmir by 0.19% people as mother tongue. While 52% speak kashmiri and 34% speak Dogri. Every language is unique and should be protected according to constitution. This asshole didn’t point out that Assamese and Bengali are also similar languages as Hindi and Urdu. Marathi and Gujarati are also similar. Telugu and Kannada are also similar but when a local kannada festival’s collection advertisements don’t use Telugu to define the collection. Onam is a Malayali festival which is “ONAM” in all script is not changed but Diwali which is a Pan Indian festival with vivid and unique traditions of the region converging into one tradition and no region complains regarding the “name” whether tamil telugu individual has to be renamed into “Jashn e rivaz” because a “small minority” doesn’t want to acknowledge the traditional heritage of India. Ironically, Sanskrit which is supposed to be a “Brahminical language” is not even spoken by more than 1000 people which may go extinct in the next 20 years is absolutely OK for Daniyal.
The ultimate downfall of Hindutva will be because its mid and low level operatives are a bunch of idiots.
These people are jumping more than is their aukaat. When Modi is no longer around to win them votes these people will be swatted like flies by Congress and co.
“ When Modi is no longer around to win them votes these people will be swatted like flies by Congress and co.“
Exactly , especially the ones who think that modi is spineless or “modi has gone soft” type of folks will be the first to bolt. The whole yogiji roxxxx and virat Hindu susu Swamy type guys.
They don’t get that the whole edifice is being built on modi.
Modi is more free market and willing to stand up to tribal identities. That is the biggest point in his favor. He uses pan Hindu identity to do this. That is what keeps him in power. The opposition is a conglomeration of feudal lords who use “liberalism” as their collective disguise. Everyone seems through it. But if Mod isn’t careful with how fast he goes, he loses enough of the tribalists and there goes his plan.
I think Modi has made the BJP as powerful as the Congress party. What I mean by that is that the BJP’s floor of support is the same as Congress’s now. Before it wasn’t the case. Specifically, Congress is currently in the doldrums and still gets 20% of the popular vote. Modi has made it so that BJP will get that share at minimum for at least this generation. The ceiling of support is around 40%. Modi keeps things at around 35% no matter what. I think after him it will be hard to keep it that high, at least at first. I am not sure if we will get a leader as popular as him.
Seems like a lazy and self-defeating strategy on the BJP’s part to me. Modi is going to croak soon. That is a statement of fact. They’ve had years to think about what comes next, and they apparently haven’t.
What helps the BJP is that since its still a somewhat winners-take-all party instead of son-takes-all (like every other party) , there is a realistic chance that there will be a successor, once Modi’s era is over.
Though not before Congress+Left takes power for a decade in the meantime and hopefully knock some sense into our proud Hindu Boyzz, Arun Shourie and Susu swamy fan boys and Lobetarian gang.
This article doesn’t make sense…he asks how a (religious) festival could be associated with language, before writing about how the Hindi language movement was a movement of Hindus. Uh…
Unsurprisingly, Daniyal misrepresented the controversy. The Fabindia ad pointedly didn’t mention Diwali by Hindi name, and then brought up these odd Persianized words. It would be one thing to send out this collection at a random time, but in this context it can only be seen as a deliberate provocation.
(It probably was a deliberate provocation, and I wouldn’t be surprised if this whole thing was just stealth marketing. On the other hand, it’s good for Hindus to show they won’t be bullied or slighted.)
what will happen if many ‘foreign’ teams start taking’the knee’ against india for its so called caste discrimination? there should be a limit for imitating white foreigners.
Irony is the people at the us state department who like to meddle in India’s internal affairs are largely pro-blm and would appreciate the show of support …
H.M. Brough
2 years ago
Man you guys care almost as much about cricket as southerners care about college football.
Something is happening which I never thought could happen. Is the EPL-fication of india team. More and more national team will matter less and as long as a player performs for his IPL team he will be heralded as the next big thing.
Though there are not many national teams who play cricket as they play soccer. So India is not in any danger of becoming england of international cricket.
India lacks an international quality T20 squad because the BCCI wont let Indian players play in T20 leagues abroad. Just had a look at the groups and it looks like the ICC knows this as well. However, Pakistan’s total win is the canary in the coal mine, which will give New Zealand and Afghanistan the confidence that they can beat India as well.
This is on point. Virtually none of the rich/upper class people I have come across from rich countries give two hoots about sports. Being into EPL, international cricket seems to be much more an elites of developing world thing.
Test cricket in England is deservedly an exception though.
sameer wankhade is being literally dragged in mud by this nawab guy. all details of sameer’s mother being a muslim, his father a crypto muslim! are out.
yet we don’t see the seculars, print, telegraph, hindu and deccan herald supporting him.
strange.
“Pakistan’s Interior Minister Sheikh Rasheed said the nation’s win against India was a ‘victory for Islam’. Rasheed made the statement soon after Pakistan won the match by 10 wickets.
In the video, which went viral on social media, Sheikh Rasheed said that the sentiments of Muslims from around the world, including in India, were with the Pakistani cricket team during the match.”
A perfect reminder why we need to judge Hindutva in its context. If India had been surrounded by countries like Finland or Canada, it would have been much more liberal. You can only be as liberal as your surroundings allow you to be.
Sheikh Rasheed is clearly trolling by adding fuel to India’s communal fire, but he seems to be right. Firecrackers and celebrations in Kashmir, even in Muslim areas of Delhi (not sure if that video is fake), even Bangladeshis are seen rejoicing..Meanwhile Hindutva’s online army busy threatening Shami and Kohli…
But isn’t that very very harmful towards your “treatment of whatever minorities are left” image. I mean a cabinet minister can’t just exclude the Pakistani Hindus & Christians like this.
Yeah, Rasheed is mostly a place holder for the army. Though i find it amusing that after all these years Pakistan still thinks/hopes that Indian Muslims will ‘rise up’. When Kashmiri muslims are having a hard time in one state where they do form the majority , its odd to expect Muslims of other areas to start rebelling
“I know after last night’s thrashing by the Pakistan team in the cricket match, it’s not a very good time to talk about improving relations with India”
{1}Pak & India match was a classic in so many ways then one, however more than Cricket it also highlighted character of both nations, how different we are & hence the correctness of the “Two Nation Theory”.
Let me explain how ….”
Ek match pe pura geo politics dependent tha. Dekh le Bhim..
“30 Chad students from UP & Bihar beat the shit out of 90 Kashmiri students who were cheering for Pakistan and raising azaadi slogans yesterday after Pak win”
Its hard to believe that RPG group thinks that Lucknow is a good place to base an IPL team. The location of the first eight teams were all correlated with the highest consuming and tax paying metros of the country. Lucknow doesnt come anywhere close. Business sense would have dictated Pune, so there is obvious politics involved here.
I think they are trying to geographically spread it out as possible. Pakistan did the same by giving one team to Quetta, Peshawar and i think Pak-Kashmir.
Also recent IPL seasons have shown that attendance income doesn’t matter as much as telecast rights and advertising.
I don’t think it’s as outlandish a business idea. Lucknow might not be as big a city as Calcutta or Bangalore but UP does have the third highest GDP in the country, with a bunch of major urban centres. It’s certainly a better destination than Jaipur.
It’s not unfathomable that the middle/upper middle classes of Kanpur/Allahabad/Varanasi/Aligarh etc will keep turning up to watch matches.
Plus there’s a sense that UP is finally turning a corner. The state government will also provide a lot of support considering this is going to be a good branding exercise.
It might even turn out to be a good investment for RPG in the long run.
In any case, I am not really sure how much contribution location has in the success of an IPL team.
Is there a breakdown in terms of matchday revenue vs television rights vs commercial revenue for IPL teams?
Local Sponsorhips and matchday revenue make up about 20% of the average IPL team’s earnings. 75% comes from the central pool, which is location agnostic. I expect the local and matchday contributions to increase with time.
Nice article on the Lucknow IPL bid, its actually the same guy who owned the Pune team. The new Ekana stadium in Lucknow might be a big part of why he chose Lucknow.
Also interestingly, the Ahmedabad team is owned by CVC, a European private equity firm, who outbid Adani. I believe they are the first foreign owners of an Indian sports team.
S Qureishi
2 years ago
”Even I was part of #IndvsPak battles on the field where we have lost but never been told to go to Pakistan! I’m talking about Flag of India of few years back. THIS CRAP NEEDS TO STOP. #Shami”
Don’t know how it strengthens Pakistan, unless there was a real threat of Pakistan being undone, just by India being secular. Its not as if there is pro India lobby/group in Pakistan which Hindutva has weakened.
On the Hindu front, Hindutva has foreclosed any ‘peace’ option which non BJP parties could have explored with Pakistan. Which i don’t think is necessarily bad for India. India always had this less Hindu (South/East)+ Punjabi ‘lets talk with Pakistan’ VS more-Hindu North India ‘Cant have peace with Pakistan’ split. Hindutva has just strengthened the latter, stemming India’s earlier oscillating stand.
I usually support Pakistan in India vs Pakistan matches. So congrats, Qureishi bhai, we won!
Though i find it amusing that after all these years Pakistan still thinks/hopes that Indian Muslims will ‘rise up’.
Indian Muslims are never going to ‘rise up’ because the Muslims that matter i.e. north Indian upper caste Ashrafs are totally bought into the idea of the Indian state.
They might oppose the BJP but they know that their bread is buttered because of the opportunities the Indian state provides them. Pretty much like upper caste Hindus.
Upper caste Hindus might crib about their taxes going waste and reservations and all but they know that they need the Indian state more than the other way round. Some of them escape to the west if they can.
I dont think muslims of N-India have bought into the Indian state more than average. It might be actually less. Unlike their South and Eastern counterparts they have less economic and political power. What exactly are they buying into? Plus do Ashrafs of UP really have higher opportunities in India than they would have in Pak punjab, for example. Again i have my doubts.
N-Indian muslims is sufficiently cowered down to fight back. Not surprising when both the ruling and opposition parties don’t want to be associated with them.
Thank you Prats.. although nothing short of T20 WC would bring me satisfaction. That’s a big ask.
I don’t think Pakistani establishment is betting that Indian Muslims would rise up against the state, at least with current status quo. But this is a fault line in India’s internal politics that Pakistan is looking to exploit further. A divided India is a weak India. The video message by Sheikh Rasheed was literally uploaded minutes after the match finished and he mentioned Indian Muslims deliberately, knowing fully that it was be given a lot of traction in Indian RW media, and to be frank, rest of the work was done by online Hindutva lower cadre themselves.
Perhaps Pakistan sees it that way. I dont put too much on the internal cleavages of other countries based on social media behavior. I mean, forget Pakistan, if one has to believe India’s own left leaning social media accounts we are already in middle of a Holocaust. And the country will fall apart come Sunday..
That principle is something, i follow even with whole Baloch and Pasthun insurgency narrative which happens on India social media as well. States are far far stronger and people weak. They relent.
Twitter isn’t always predictive. It was just the case for Afghanistan
Narasingha Deva
2 years ago
The probability of Tejas jets being bought by Malaysia is higher now that JF-17 bid was not given. Has anyone read any theories why it was opted out of the race?
@Razib
Any new comments about this? https://mobile.twitter.com/eshab05/status/1400436257508007938
Not just Canada but now even Australia has a pro-Khalistani bias.
https://www.theweek.in/news/india/2021/10/18/insult-to-sikhs-anger-over-roadshow-for-haryana-youth-deported-from-australia.html
Coming to the end of my 3rd Corona Surge…and hopefully the last. Thank god, I’m tired of waking up to a slow-motion bloodbath every day. This surge was the worst by far, because I did it in a Red State, with a lot of nasty patients who would do things like rage, refuse treatments, threaten to leave randomly, demand Ivermectin, etc.
There is no country on the planet that has failed as completely and utterly against the virus as America. Biomedical technology is all well and good, but the technology that matters is what binds hearts together.
I just checked numbers on Hindustan News and CovidActNow, looks like the wealthy, lawful land of BIHAR has soundly surpassed my southern county in vaccination rate.
This would be comical if it wasn’t so shameful.
Don’t feel bad. Everybody screwed up. Delta was terrible.
https://www.indiatoday.in/news-analysis/story/hindus-in-bangladesh-jogen-mandal-inglorious-legacy-1866236-2021-10-18
Being Hindu in Bangladesh, and Jogen Mandal’s inglorious legacy | View
Pakistan’s first law and labour minister, Jogendra Nath Mandal, saw the carnage Hindus in Bangladesh are seeing today. He escaped to India. Bangladesh’s Hindus have nowhere to go.
We should go for a population exchange of Malda division with Bangladesh. Infact what I found funny is Bengali kulin brahmin chief minister of WB is “silent” on the carnage. It’s a shame the Indian Hindu politics has come down to such stupidity. Our own “hindu hriday samrat” is silent on the issue.
Again why should the “hindu hriday samrat” say anything, when there is hardly a peep from ‘Bengali kulin brahmin’? Can;t bear the cross of H-folks of other region. Glad Modi govt has wizened up somewhat..
The bhadralok who has a view of everything all and sundry is curiously silent. You get the “hindu hriday samrat”, which one deserves, and one votes for. And seems like Bengalis got what they voted for..
Bengalis, Tamils, Malayalis can never count on Modi or North Indian Hindus or West Indian Hindus for any help. They consider us to be racially inferior and they deem us as non-Hindus. They share the same mentality that West Pakistanis had when they went to commit genocide on Bengalis, with an express intent to conduct mass rapes to improve the genetic stock of the Bengalis. They, too, viewed Bengalis as ‘less Muslim’, because of the script their language uses, and their physical appearance. It’s no different among North/West Hindus in India today, who daily spew extremist hateful rhetoric about Bengalis, Tamils, Malayalis.
Far more likely that North Indian Hindus and West Indian Hindus help Bangladesh slaughter more Bengali Hindus, just like they helped Sri Lanka slaughter Tamil Hindus. They hate the Hindus of Bengal, Tamil Nadu, and Kerala more than members of other religions inside India or outside of it.
^Sorry, bit of an overreaction there. No edit button unfortunately.
Far more likely that North Indian Hindus helped Sri Lanka slaughter Tamil Hindus. They hate the Hindus of Bengal, Tamil Nadu, and Kerala
The North Indians funded and trained the Tamil LTTE terrorists in Tamil Nadu camps. For decades the Tamil LTTE terrorists operated from Tamil Nadu, even after the murder of Rajiv Gandhi. When the Tamil terrorist were about to be defeated at Vadamaratchi in 1987, the Indians came to the rescue of the Tamil Terrorist, Then forced a defacto separate state change to the Sri Lankan constitution.
The war against the Tamil Terrorist was won with Chinese funding and arms.
Aggression from Hindus against Buddhist Sri Lanka has gone on for centuries.
In the 12th century Magha of Kalinga with Kerala mercenaries completely destroyed the Rajarata (North Central province). The Rajarata was the center of Buddhist Civilization and after its destruction, the Buddhist civilization never recovered. With that the North became a Tamil Hindu kingdom.(reference in next post)
Then in 15th Century, Tamil Hindu Sankili I chased out the Sinhalese Buddhist and Javanese from the north. (reference in next post).
Hoju, do you think the Sinhalese will allow any form of a separate Hindu Tamil state in Sri Lanka. It would just be a stepping stone for Hindu Tamil/Indian invasion of Sri Lanka.
Magha of Kalinga and Kerala mercenaries destruction of the Rajarata.
https://imgur.com/gallery/rnnfVAX
Sankili I chases out Sinhalese Buddhists
https://imgur.com/gallery/N22BVbY
@Prats
Paul from AVweb on electric airplanes including vtols. Among other questions he asks if a market for urban aerial mobility even exists?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ubH9WdcPZvg
Talk to Indranil Roy @Indrani1_Roy on Twitter who might be able to give specifics of what might be feasible from an Indian startup pov. He is bakchod and biased but well informed and accessible. Maybe your company’s battery packs might be useful to some small airplane manufacturer, who knows?
###
Random thoughts on railways, my reply didn’t show up in last thread:
1) The commute problem is real I had not considered that bit in counting costs. It used to take less time for me to fly from Delhi to Kolkata than to reach Howrah station from Kolkata Airport. Bangalore Bullet train would be quite feasible for the same reason. I think Mumbai-Delhi and even Delhi-Kolkata would be feasible too due to sheer demand.
2) Someone I know went to bid for some railway coach parts and found out that it is impossible to make any money from doing it. Maybe with bullet trains more manufacturing opportunities would come up.
“Maybe with bullet trains more manufacturing opportunities would come up.”
First the bullet train has to come up, no?
Yes, Delhi-Mumbai and Delhi-Kolkata will probably happen by early 2030s unless some Tata-Singur type shit happens.
While watching the video, I noticed that all the vtols had side windows. They (people in the video) were wondering if people would be willing to ride in an autonomous flying vehicle, one thought that came to me was that the companies should get rid of the windows. They can make the roof transparent to get natural lighting but if the people can’t look below then they won’t be afraid as much ( but people get into things like ropeways willingly so riders being uncomfortable with autonomous vehicles shouldn’t be a big hurdle)
Windows add to a good flying experience in small Cessna so I don’t know if removing them would be good. The supersonic jets people are planning on removing windows and replacing them with digital screens with outside view for structural reasons.
Integrating autonomous aerial vehicles into airspace will happen with Reliable, Xwing and others like them not with vtols. For now even Joby will have a pilot.
The shitty bit about aviation is everyone talks but no one has the money so opinions and wishes don’t really matter. From VLJs to Piaggio Avanti to Beech Starship general aviation is chock full of brave ambitious men failing to see the world does not deserve or need so much innovation. Dozens of great companies like Mooney have gone bankrupt because people sue them for millions of dollars when one plane crashes, Mahindra lost USD 100 million on GippsAero despite taking all precautions (some of the best test pilots in the world crashed their prototype!), one stupid gasket, one faulty wire, one bad day, one structural crack, one bird strike and it is game over.
On the other hand you have clever people like Quest Aircraft or Carbon Cub people or Pilatus or TBM or on the big side ATR who build moats that last 50 years. But it is difficult to see what works, looks at diamond aircraft, awesome company better than anything Indians can ever come up with but got bought over by the Chinese. We need a clever sales guy to figure out what would work for an Indian startup. NAL is wasting the country’s hard earned money. If Saab or BAe or Fokker can’t do it NAL or HAL sure can’t either.
There isnt going to be much of an aviation industry without business travel. Air travel has always been a luxury, with the uber wealthy business class types subsidizing vacation travel for middle-class folks. In general, the time savings offered by air travel matter a lot less since people can work on their laptops whether they are on a train or even a ship. Also, the government used to subsidize pilot training via the training of air force pilots, many of whom would join the airlines after retirement. This has tapered off significantly. Autonomy can help but full autonomy from taxi to takeoff to landing is quite a ways off.
India is lucky that we have a dense railway network. The US will have a much harder time without coast to coast travel in 6 hours.
“There isnt going to be much of an aviation industry without business travel.”
For General Aviation this is true. Indigo is the biggest buyer of Airbus 320s. Indian Airlines have bought ~10% of all A320s ever produced since 1986 despite being late entrants. Some arm twisting could possibly get us our own assembly Airbus plant like the US and China did.
“Air travel has always been a luxury, with the uber wealthy business class types subsidizing vacation travel for middle-class folks. In general, the time savings offered by air travel matter a lot less since people can work on their laptops whether they are on a train or even a ship.”
Planes have smaller sunk cost, can be sold off, don’t require much infrastructure. Only recently under Modi have the logjams of land acquisition begun to reduce.
“Also, the government used to subsidize pilot training via the training of air force pilots, many of whom would join the airlines after retirement. This has tapered off significantly.”
This used to be especially true for America. The problem there is the 1500 flight hour ATPL requirement to become even a first officer. Someone in India can become a first officer with just 250 flight hours CPL. American levels of safety comes at a price that trainee pilots are (rightly) not willing to bear hence there was some shortage. But like all ‘cool’ careers bakraa after bakraa will keep lining up to become pilots no matter how bad the benefits/cost.
“Autonomy can help but full autonomy from taxi to takeoff to landing is quite a ways off.”
Naa bhai, Xwing and Reliable Robotics and a few others are making hundreds of millions of $ each from VC money doing this.
“India is lucky that we have a dense railway network. The US will have a much harder time without coast to coast travel in 6 hours.”
India’s rail network especially the Punjab to Bengal bit is woefully inadequate to satisfy the demand.
Thanks. I’ll check it out.
Thinking of picking up drone flying as a hobby while I am stuck in Noida.
Kaunsa liya hai? I have seen people flying with FPV drone goggles, looks super cool.
###
DJI Mavic udaya tha mainse usmein toh kuch karna bhi nai padta, sata-sat chalta hai woh ekdum smooth, panic button click karo toh khud safely land bhi karta hai, panoramic shots leta hai, sab kuch khud kar leta hai, anti-collision bhi hai. Khatam kar diya hai competition ko DJI ne. Chini abhiyanta jindabaad!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XVXm57tD7tQ
Arvind Subramanian & Raghuram Rajan (Discussant) – Is the Indian Economy Back?
Seems like Rajan has booked a spot in the next minister ship of UPA. While our ‘World Bank’ economist (who had hoped to get the spot) seems to have do with tweeting pictures of Kolkata…
How is Bangladesh regressing back to Islamism?
https://twitter.com/sohinichat/status/1448940436412723204
Ravan is a scholar and master warrior
He avenged his sister Surpanakha’s humiliation
He understood consent and respected Sita
He did not trick anyone in Ram’s family even though his brother Vibhisana was tricked and persuaded by the other side
#BijoyaDashami
☝️ The more you give less-Hindu space, more heretical beliefs crop up.
Smaller Asabiyah–> Stronger Asabiya, always.
They used to just troll about Mahisasur, now they troll about Ravan?
The Indian Left never ceases to amaze me…
Ravan was always considered a great scholar and a devotee of Shiva who had lost his way. People used to have the maturity to understand that despite him being the villain, he had some redeeming attributes.
Now they just use these characters to shove latest ideological fads.
In a way it’s good. Better they use Ravan to counter Ram than George Floyd or some other random western unfortunate.
https://theprint.in/opinion/indian-healthcare-is-missing-out-on-talents-not-inclined-to-join-medical-profession/752659/
Indian healthcare is missing out on talents not inclined to join medical profession
Long training period, lack of commensurate remuneration and shortage of opportunities for professional growth are hampering student entry into the medical field. Here’s the way out.
https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/jim-crow-hindutva-7577159/
Jim Crow Hindutva
Ashutosh Varshney writes: The politics of Hindu nationalists is threatening to create a Jim Crow India in BJP-ruled territories. What race was to the American South, ethnicised religion is to Hindu nationalists
Blah blah CAA Cow Lynch 370 Blah
Don’t they ever get tired of copypasting the same column for years on end?
At least the copypastas in Twitch gaming streams had originality.
with continuing islamic radicalisation of bangladesh, and if hindus still survive for few more decades, an autonomous homeland for them ( as in former yugoslavia) might happen.
i feel some thing similar will happen to the kasmiri pandits.
Nah, nothing will happen on that front. Most likely Bangaldeshi Hindus, whoever can, will try to move to Bengal, since Assam and Tripura are out of question. Same modus operandi from what happened from 1947-1971.
But much of it depends on what happens post Hasina.
What’s happening in Bangladesh is a travesty.
It’s especially sad because diaspora Bangladeshis seem to have little capacity for self-reflection. They’ve almost all been brainwashed into chanting the mantra that Muslims are unsafe in India, that they cannot even walk around without fear, that Bangladesh is different, etc. They now think Bangladesh is the only secular state in South Asia, a beacon for the religiously hateful India and Pakistan to follow.
It’s crazy how so many desi Muslims have been so quickly indoctrinated into the Modi = Hitler, Hindus use swastika because they are Nazis, etc., bullshit.
Then why the fuck do so many Bangladeshi Muslims illegally go to India?
Why has the Hindu population in Bangladesh precipitously plummeted from 22% in 1951 to 9% today?
Nobody cares about Bangladesh or Hindus, so all this stuff just gets swept under the rug. Bangladesh is an Islamist supremacist society that has slowly but surely killed off its Hindu population. India is a country where the Muslim population continues to soar, aided in part by illegal Bangladeshi Muslims, who are so fearful of Muslim persecution in India that they move to India by hook or crook.
There is little difference between Pakistan and Bangladesh. And yes, there is a difference between India and those two countries, at least for now although there are signs of India devolving into the same hateful bullshit.
The diaspora reaction has also been pathetic. All those ‘South Asian’ wokeists who chomp at the bit to sensationalize the plight of Muslims in India have not said a word. Where is Kamala’s stupid sister Mina? Where is that cunt Menendez? UNHCR? USCRIF?
@ Hoju,
To be fair , USCRIF did notice, a indian american (hindu I’m assuming) commisionar at that: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1449110666888060934
USCIRF
@USCIRF
USCIRF
@CommrBhargava
: “USCIRF is disturbed by violent attacks on Durga Puja festivities where #Hindu idols were vandalized & dozens of worshippers hurt. We urge the #Bangladeshi gov to safeguard religious communities & hold perpetrators responsible.”
But F the UNHCR, don’t care for the UN as they have become more and more ridiculous and obsolete, but as an american ( I think you are too) I care more about our country, the United States noticing:
https://www.firstpost.com/world/us-condemns-reports-of-attacks-on-minority-hindu-community-in-bangladesh-10066561.html
I am with you brother, this is despicable and F’ed up! It is ridiculous how atrocities against non-muslim minorites are regularly ignored, A great example is when 2 atrocities that occurred so close together: Sri Lanka, remember the 300 “Easter” worshipers that were killed? Obama, Hilary Clinton, and other US left of center politicians couldn’t bring themselves to say Christians, but had no problem saying the victims of the New Zealand shooting were Muslims and threw around words like Islamophobia very generously, I have yet to hear any of the far leftists use Christianophobia, or Hinduophobia, Buddhistophobia, Bahaiophobia, etc.. for all the attacks and murders of non-muslims. To their credit, if they do it, I will applaud the Bangladesh government going secular, but atrocities can’t be overlooked, citizens of their own land shouldn’t live in fear of organized terror groups coming after them. I am not fan of the hindutva government in control of India right now, but I fully support if they tried to increase control of India’s borders more effectively and simultaneously rescue Hindus from Pakistan and Bangladesh and anywhere else. Disclaimer though, I am against the attacks against the muslim civilians living a peaceful life in their respective countries and condemn attacks against them as well, but they fortunately have plenty of defenders in the West on the left.
^Sorry, also an overreaction. Feel free to delete. Bad day :/
I have a suggestion. Do read J sai Deepak’s book on “Civilization, coloniality and constitution’ where he discusses some these topics.
“All those ‘South Asian’ wokeists who chomp at the bit to sensationalize the plight of Muslims in India have not said a word. Where is Kamala’s stupid sister Mina? Where is that cunt Menendez? UNHCR? USCRIF?”
They are doing this
https://religiondispatches.org/north-america-has-a-hindu-nationalist-problem-and-scholars-are-on-the-frontlines-of-these-right-wing-attacks/
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.moneycontrol.com/news/technology/auto/this-chinese-electric-scooter-company-will-shift-production-base-to-india-7598611.html/amp
This Chinese electric scooter company will shift production base to India
https://www.ndtv.com/blog/blog-how-to-build-a-feel-good-factor-when-90-dont-feel-it-2580476
Lots of interesting numbers on India’s income inequality. As always, one has to be cautious due to large amounts of black money income, but still, the general contours are surely correct.
India’s gini index is 35, close to that of the UK. The fact that 2/3rd of the country is rural and pays no monthly rent/mortgage obscures things a lot. The cities are highly unequal though, perhaps as bad as South Africa and Latin America without the high levels of crime.
On Bangladesh: I’ve read quite a number of copes in recent days that the violence is instigated by “outside elements” to sabotage BDL-IND relations. I don’t buy it. The attacks and subsequent murders against atheist bloggers was merely the prequel to what we are seeing now.
In light of these mass attacks, it is hard to argue that Hindu nationalism is illegitimate.
“In light of these mass attacks, it is hard to argue that Hindu nationalism is illegitimate.”
I’d hope the lesson from such carnage is that religious supremacism is not good.
The idea of “religious supremism” is oddly rooted in Hinduism / Sanatana Dharma.
Most other religions just assume their path is the Supreme path to salvation.
If everything depends on one person. That society is already a failed society.
https://indianexpress.com/article/india/bangladesh-hindus-citizenship-amendment-act-milind-deora-7579360/lite/
Amend CAA to protect Bangladeshi Hindus: Congress leader Milind Deora
I have gone through twitter handles of some ex muslim atheist types, armin navabi, atheist republic, tweeted on violence in bangladesh, razib khan, omarali did as well. haris sultan did not, abdul sameer did not, ali rizvi did not, yasmeen mohammad, sara haider did not. I do not care for atheism for a reason, it was clear to me that lot on the left were atheists as well and we know what they say. What is important though is free speech. Indian govt should speak its mind, if what it says causes issues, then it already is a lost cause. Hence I believe community is the atom of society, you trust community, not individuals who look around ,check their bank balance, look for perks and incentives and only then talk.
Community on the other hand talks even if incentives are all misaligned. I only want to know, how many caa protestors are marching on the streets?. Hence I respectfully dont buy gaurav’s article. His reasons for why something is the issue need not be the real reason why something actually happens. Far greater horrors are taking place from afghanistan to bangladesh and they are quiet.
https://swarajyamag.com/news-brief/after-semiconductors-heres-another-billion-dollar-problem-awaiting-the-global-automobile-industry
After Semiconductors, Here’s Another Billion-Dollar Problem Awaiting The Global Automobile Industry
https://indianexpress.com/article/cities/bangalore/karnataka-christians-oppose-survey-of-missionary-works-archbishop-writes-to-cm-7581817/
in my opinion most of the conversion activities are done by new age protestant evangelical groups. it is surprising that the arch bishop of catholic church taking the leadership for all christians.
also if these people are protesting two things are evident: 1. there is active conversion activity going on.
2. they are facing resistance and the government move will make conversions bit more difficult.
https://theprint.in/politics/india-shouldnt-play-against-pakistan-in-t20-world-cup-amid-attacks-in-kashmir-atishi-says/753257/
what is happening to a a p? this is a victory of hindu maha sabha thought. can a a p and others come back to their earlier stance after b j p looses power?
In my view its a futile attempt by non BJP parties to try to reclaim the nationalistic space. Especially if you are a center left party like Congress or AAP. I think in the short term the BJP might be propping up AAP so as to undercut the Congress, and will bring the hammer down once AAP is a real threat.
https://twitter.com/schaheid/status/1450870087699865603
“United States through IMF, FATF and other means is making it unsustainable for #Pakistan to maintain a geostrategic partnership with Beijing. They’re creating a horrible example out of Pakistan to warn other regional countries against forming alliances with China.”
@Bhim, our desi Kissinger is in pain..
Is the same guy who thinks “Pakistan is the zipper of Eurasia” ?
I still think about that line sometimes.
Same guy. No matter how dejected I am about india military, this guy gives me hope.
😄
https://twitter.com/sarkar_swati/status/1450505991494189064
Clear ideological statement on the crisis faced by Hindus in BD & beyond by WB LoP Suvendu Adhikari. BD depends on WB for water (Farakka) & goods (Petropole, Hili border). India is the only civilizational land 4 Hindus #Hindus_Attacked_In_Bangladesh #BangladeshHinduGenocide
Very clever tactic . Vote for Party X. But expectations from Party Y. Similar to Tamils. Vote for Dravidian parties, but expectation from BJP to do something for SL tamils.
Right.
But I think the worst takes are the ones that claim Ravan was a champion of Dalits or something, when he was literally the son of a prominent sage.
That shall too pass. When the less-Hindu/commies realize , sooner than later, that they do not posses enough ‘Hindu’ credentials to pit one Hindu figure against another, they will revert back to their whole international George Floyd thing as Prats described.
For all the Mahisasura (against Durga) or Mahabali (in Kerala) championing, they havnt become any champion of any subaltern identity, of any wider region. Same will happen with Ravana too.
Out of the loop on the whole Bangladesh Hindu persecution thing, but it has come to my attention that Twitter has banned two mainstream accounts one of ISKON Bangladesh (whose temple was attacked) and one of the Bangladesh Hindu council.
This is why the Chinese decision to ban US social media platforms and not allow them to take root seems prescient.
India unfortunately lacks the state capacity to implement this sort of ban without shooting themselves in the foot.
So the best approach might be decentralized uncensorable alternatives which I think are coming in a few years.
https://mobile.twitter.com/RadharamnDas/status/1450653963133480961?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1450653963133480961%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fd-17942681341940949414.ampproject.net%2F2110082201002%2Fframe.html
The other thing is that we’re in a coalition with the American Regime, and Twitter is one of its organs. Moving against Twitter, especially in the hamfisted way that the Indian government is wont to do, would blowback on us in a way that it wouldn’t on Nigeria (that recently did move against it).
> The other thing is that we’re in a coalition with the American Regime, and Twitter is one of its organs.
The spinelessness of Modi and his idiotic embrace of a regime which seeks to topple the ideological movement he belongs to never ceases to amaze me. That is why Twitter dares to do what it does. They know the guy supposedly running the country is a wimp and a coward.
The Spinelessness is primarily due to the corruption because the moneys from tax havens is currently invested in the stock market and the political class wants to maximize the wind fall gains. Currently, top Indian firms have roughly 20-30%”Foreign investment” which is artificially inflating the stock markets. The American technocrats have heavily invested in the Indian stock market. Now a collusion between Indian businesses and investers is the main reason why Modi won’t do shit. On the other hand he knows that flight of foreign capital will push India into a deep crisis since the banks have again lent recklessly ( ex:- Households taking personal loans and putting it in the Stock market which is technically illegal). If he takes any harsh steps, both the geniune business, cronies, politician and Households suffer due to flight of foreign capital. I really don’t think anyone has the guts to pull the plug.
People have short memories. If Modi is spineless, wonder what they thought of previous PMs.
There are ways to deal with twitter’s monopoly without an outright ban. For eg you can throttle traffic to the twitter servers, to make their website and app very slow when they take egregious actions.
Communicate dissatisfaction and then do a temporary soft ban. Gradually increase these soft bans if they continue to misbehave. You have plausible deniability at an international politics level.
And Indian users become slowly frustrated with the unreliability of twitter and this allows more pliant competitors to gain popularity.
This is not hard to do at all. However I don’t think India has built up any meaningful competence in this area at the state level to pull this off. My only hope is decentralized social networks.
—————
Also yes I don’t know what people are comparing with. Modi government takes too much bold but dumb action sometimes (demonetization) but hardly spineless compared to the previous governments.
They banned tiktok so that was one positive thing. Also they did some smart thing with cellphone import tariffs which forced cell phone assembly to move to India. (generally I think import tariffs are bad except for the manufacturing complexity tier immediately ahead of India’s current level of global competitiveness)
https://twitter.com/iamcouncil/status/1450855444826624006?s=21
Indian American Muslim council holding a congressional briefing on persecution of Dalits in india.
Just wow;
I m not at all a fan of thin skinned Hindu activism; but see why its necessary
It gets worse:
https://twitter.com/hinduoncampus/status/1451373144787324931?s=20
Basically a Muslim girl fails a CS exam and then alleges that the professor discriminated against her and was a RSS member (he wasn’t). He was found not responsible, but I fear stuff like this will continue.
FWIW the worst cases of professor discrimination I saw here were the result of African ethnic rivalries: specifically Igbo-Yoruba and Amhara-Tigray. Not seen much on the Indian front, just a few devout Muslims that play favorites with other Muslims and have an animus towards Christians, Atheists, Hindus, and lapsed Muslims.
Like I have said, radical islam and leftists are in an unholy alliance. Is anyone surprised when their union produces demons? Omar, Talib, and Cortez are one
The Squad>>> The “Quad”
None of this will be of any effect till there is house cleaning. Till you don’t deal with the heretics, you will always find willing accomplices within your fold.
https://twitter.com/khanumarfa/status/1451517712027439104
“Pity to see such cowardice from the granddaughter of Tiger Pataudi..
Also her grandmother Sharmila Tagore has her family roots in Rabindranath Tagore, the man who imagined a world ‘where the mind is without fear and the head is held high’..
Tch… Tch..”
Sara Ali Khan seems more Hindu-philic than warranted. Anyhow i like how the family is covering all bases…
https://www.brecorder.com/news/40128303/fbr-serves-notice-to-beggar
Pakistani tax dept finds that a beggar had millions in a bank account and sent his kids to the most expensive private schools. Pretty hilarious, yet true, story. Probably has parallels across many developing countries.
Gadkari;s driver was on board of his companies…
https://www.firstpost.com/politics/gadkaris-purti-group-gets-murkier-driver-is-director-of-six-companies-499380.html
If Rana Ayub were in the US, she would have been jailed for libel a long time ago…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pU0t9Z5VdmE
Good video
I am reading the following book:
https://www.cfr.org/book/nigeria-everyone
This is a book written by people from the American foreign policy establishment and directed at an educated layperson audience. It’s not bad, and I think people here should read it and compare the challenges and experiences of Nigeria against those of India, both countries being diverse, developing giants of their regions.
—
There is an argument on the Indian Left, made by everyone from T Ninan (financial journalist) to M Junaid (ARoy wannabe) that India is an essentially artificial country with little-to-no nationhood to speak of. I was always skeptical of that argument. But after reading this book I think it’s nonsense, because Nigeria shows us what a truly artificial country looks like.
Basically the British strapped a few tribal statelets to an dead slaver empire and called it good. Unfortunately the constituent parts of Nigeria have nothing in common. That’s why its independence movement consisted of just a few elites in Lagos that didn’t do much, why it had a gruesome civil war within a few years, why ethnic loyalties largely overshadow a national identity that remains weak to this day, and why it’s facing multiple large-scale insurgencies.
You compare this to India, which had a broad-based independence movement and Hindu ethno-religious movements since the 19th century, whose national identity is much stronger, and who only faces peripheral insurgencies on its borders…we got it pretty good.
“With 1.8 million registered members, online forum Nairaland remains popular, even though it has earned the nickname “Angryland” for its insult laced political discussion threads.”
On the other hand, they’re EXACTLY like Indians in other ways!
“ There is an argument on the Indian Left, made by everyone from T Ninan (financial journalist) to M Junaid (ARoy wannabe) that India is an essentially artificial country with little-to-no nationhood to speak of. “
It’s not their fault. They come from regions which have the lowest asabiya within india. If u ask someone from north east of india if india is a country, they would share their experience and say it isn’t. Or atleast they don’t share the same asabiya.
Similarly the Hindu ethno religious movement is mostly a North Indian sentiment. It has only been in last few decades that “indian-ism” has percolated to other regions of india, which now is on par with regional-ism.
I think a lot of people view North Indian ‘Indian-ism’ as a sort of regionalism as well. Albeit one with a culturally hegemonic imposition.
I think there are multiple layers of tension and hegemony:
1. Subregional groups like Kathiawadis or Maithilis or Konkanis getting subsumed into the hegemonic regional / state level culture.
2. Regional / state level groups getting subsumed into the hegemonic national i.e. Hindi culture
3. Indian nationals esp. elites getting subsumed into the hegemonic global Anglo-sphere / western culture.
At its core, I agree N-Indian ‘Indian-ism’ as a regionalism as well . Hindi-Hindu-Hindustan. But you need to have a base , a foil to understand regionalism. Its like saying Pakistan is Punjabi regionalism. Which is both true and untrue to some extent.
But even if we grant that argument, India still comes out far ahead of Nigeria on that front. According to the book, Nigerian nationalism is *now* a nascent phenomenon among some people in the Lagos-Ibadan corridor, and some people affiliated with the central government.
“North India” is a much greater part of India than “Lagos-Ibadan Corridor” is of Nigeria.
Also interesting how the authors cover communal violence events in Nigeria. They contend that the causes are usually fairly prosaic, involving a land, water, resource, or patronage dispute that escalates and takes on a religious or tribal valence. They also contend that media organs broadly prefer the tribal or religious angles and underplay the rest of the issues.
Interesting comparison to how communal violence events get covered in India, with “the evil BJP genociding everything!!!”
(It is possible that most Indian events are qualitatively different than Nigerian events. In any case, I find that in wrt India, Westerners have surprisingly little interest in sober analysis of events, preferring to instead create a grand narrative with its own heroes and villains.)
Ethnic unity can help, but political design matters more. Arab countries like Lebanon, Syria and Jordan are not forming a politically unified state despite strong cultural and religious similarities. Until democratic norms are firmly established, politics is firmly a surplus activity engaged in by the elite for their benefits.
The Indian elite let South India have a disproportionately higher political voice at a critical juncture. Perhaps this was due to the fear of Pakistan, perhaps visionary leadership or just plain luck. This let the country form a unified state, and with a deepening of democratic norms, politics is much more about redistribution than elite objectives.
On African Pakistan(s):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pakistanism
“But the emergence of the Muslim League in India as a serious secessionist movement soon shattered the myth of unity in the Indian model. A new word entered the vocabulary of West African nationalism – the word was ‘pakistanism’.”
Islam is cancer.
Well hold on. To your example, there were 6 serious attempts to create a pan-Arab state in the late-20th century. Pan-Arabism was definitely a potent idea, but it faltered due to various reasons (coups, loss-averse local/national elites, national rivalries, etc).
So I’d say they both matter.
Last post on the book. I found their description of a “unlikely but possible” worst-case scenario of Nigeria interesting. Doubt it will happen given the recent spike in crude oil prices, but this book was also written before Coronavirus…so who knows.
“A series of badly flawed elections yields successive governments that are little more than criminal enterprises. The modus operandi of senior government officials centers on corruption and abuse of power. Ethnic and religious political fault lines widen. Nigeria becomes an international pariah, as it was under the Abacha regime or as South Sudan is in 2017. While always corruption prone, Nigeria’s judiciary and legislature become mere rubber stamps on executive power.
Global crude prices stay stuck below $50 per barrel for over a decade. Nigeria’s economy contracts as poor governance and insecurity repel foreign investment and undercut domestic entrepreneurs. National and subnational debt balloons, putting Nigeria at risk of default. Fiscal mismanagement sends the naira into a tailspin, triggering Zimbabwe-like hyperinflation. Once middle-class Nigerians struggle to make ends meet.
Large sections of Nigeria’s main road arteries become impassable during the rainy season, and some major bridges collapse in disrepair.
Nigerians dependent on subsistence agriculture are unable to cope with fluctuating environmental conditions. Areas of northern Nigeria become virtually uninhabitable, sparking mass migration. Nigerians come to make up the largest share of African migrants making the risky journey to Europe. At the same time, Nigeria experiences a pollution crisis. Aging oil infrastructure, artisanal mines, and unregulated industries dump toxic chemicals into rivers. Due to government failures to invest in clean energy sources, most Nigerians still rely on diesel generators and firewood.
In response to deteriorating socioeconomic conditions, Nigeria’s birth rate spikes. As the birth rate climbs above 3 percent, Nigeria is on track to overtake the United States as the third most populated country by 2040—instead of by 2050, as predicted in 2015. Child and maternal mortality rates, particularly in northern Nigeria, worsen as a result of government failure to invest in basic health and sanitation infrastructure.”
There’s a decent article on Nigeria published this month which goes through the severe security difficulties straining the country. As been stated before in this thread, Nigeria is simply not at all comparable to India. It is much more fragile, with roads being so dangerous that politicians are lobbying for airlines to add more flights so that they can avoid them altogether due to very high levels of kidnapping/banditry.
https://theprint.in/national-interest/aryan-khan-isnt-a-show-to-enjoy-ndps-is-a-weapon-vengeful-state-could-use-on-you-or-your-kids/755219/
“…monstrosity of a law that not only laid down the burden of innocence on the accused, but also a mandatory death sentence for possessing larger amounts (yes, a mandatory death sentence, like Singapore or Iran), leaving the judge no option.”
Didn’t know India’s drug laws were this harsh (mandatory death sentence was only removed in 2014)
@Saurav
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.tribuneindia.com/news/comment/chinks-in-yogis-armour-ahead-of-up-polls-328220
Youtube bans a song called “lets go brandon”
(which has become a meme meaning fuck joe biden)
The thing is they cited ‘medical misinformation’ to enact the ban.
Here is a discussion…
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28967958
People worry about critical military supply chains, but hearts and minds are equally important.
If this is how they deal with domestic disagreements, understand how ruthlessly they will manipulate foreign aimed propaganda.
It is imperative that India weans itself off dependence on US social media platforms or it risks having its local narrative controlled by a foreign power over the next 20 – 30 years.
https://twitter.com/nailainayat/status/1451957374261006348
Imran Khan is very popular in India. If he holds a rally in Delhi today, it will be a bigger than PM Modi’s: Fawad Chaudhry.
https://scroll.in/article/1008421/from-love-songs-to-kurta-ads-urdu-is-popular-with-indians-why-do-hindutva-backers-hate-it-so-much
A bengali defends Urdu. Life make strange bedfellows.
Well every Bengali diaspora I have met can either speak Urdu (fluent or broken) or at least understand it. So it’s not like they shun it.
Article is on point though..
Yeah it’s the same fucking language in the end. Just two diff registers. People need to move on to more important things. Hindu Right has to focus on current Bangladesh atrocities against Hindus, rent seeking protests in the NW, Naxals, kashmiri terrorists, and an ever more aggressive China. Hindi Urdu is a waste of time at best.
It’s the same language masquerading as two different communal langauges..And like a Trojan horse too. Because it makes it very potent at spreading; if a lanagauge is related to religion and not ethnicity or geography, then it can spread far an wide because people will willingly adopt it due to religion.
I do think Urdu popularity in india atleast has less to do with sameness with hindi or others coherent factors.
It’s just that it had the first mover advantage in Bollywood which Hindi writers shunned as being debased. Much of latter hindi popularity to become a mass language in wider north India was due to same fact as well.
Sooner rather than later when a new generation of Hindi writers dominate, Urdu will eventually fade away to being a still elite-but-not-spoken-enough type of language.
I thought Hindi writers had already taken over last 20 years since there is a marked decline in pure Urdu in bollywood.
Although, its still like 90% intelligible. I was watching Indian news media and cricket talk shows in Hindi today and most Indian guests (ex cricketers, journos etc) while analysis were casually speaking Hindi that can easily pass off as Urdu. So it’s not just bollywood.
It happening but you have to keep in mind that the generation of writers who came after Urdu writers were trained by the Urdu writers themselves. So what we have now is still the new age hindi writers with a mix of fading Urdu writers. Someone like varun Grover ( writer of sacred games) is an example where even though he might want to write in more urdu he can’t, since he wasn’t trained in that. Which someone like gulzar was.
Also whether it’s indian cricket or tv shows, or in real life, Bollywood impacts all and sundry in north India, so of course the way they speak in Hindi is influenced by it. If you watch the movies pictured on small towns india, u will find a curious mix of hindi+local dialect now emerging. A bit like mumbaiya hindi used in gangester movies.
Article is on point? Why because “Shoiab Danyal” is writing it or because the article made any sense? Somehow the stupidity is being pushed on Hindus for rejecting urdu when Syed Ahmed Khan himself in a speech he delivered in 1887 and till his death he emphasized the “two distinct communities based on Language culture and ethnicity”. bringing pandit Malviya’s statements regarding Hindi and Urdu clearly shows how shallow the author is as he didn’t put forth the arguments of the Muslim elites even though RC Majumdar in his book History of Freedom Movement 3rd Volume states that the change for Official language was based on the demand of Hindus. Christopher’s arguments regarding the Hindi language being unintelligible to Hindus is based on a pretext that people weren’t able to “read” well guess what, literacy rate was 8%-10% in 1881 census implying Urdu was also unintelligible to Hindus and lower caste Muslims alike and such arguments are never made rather a “Confirmation bias” is presented which is far away from the reality.And what about “Jashn-e-Rivaz” called for Diwali? Is anyone changing the name of “Eid” in Sanskrit in any of the advertisment?The post also misses a point that in the year 2019 a man was beheaded in Bijnor district primarily because he didn’t say “SAW” while talking about Prophet. A community that is so Intolerant and resistant to the change shouldn’t raise fingers on other communities. India has 4.33% Native Urdu speakers while 43% Hindi speakers. Now far south, Tamil Nadu Government has recognised Urdu for official work in “few districts” while the state has 5% Muslim population. Hindi is still considered “foreign” in such states which is not being discussed by the author because again Urdu has to be defended by any means even by making stupid claims like Christopher king’s book, blah blah. Urdu is spoken in Kashmir by 0.19% people as mother tongue. While 52% speak kashmiri and 34% speak Dogri. Every language is unique and should be protected according to constitution. This asshole didn’t point out that Assamese and Bengali are also similar languages as Hindi and Urdu. Marathi and Gujarati are also similar. Telugu and Kannada are also similar but when a local kannada festival’s collection advertisements don’t use Telugu to define the collection. Onam is a Malayali festival which is “ONAM” in all script is not changed but Diwali which is a Pan Indian festival with vivid and unique traditions of the region converging into one tradition and no region complains regarding the “name” whether tamil telugu individual has to be renamed into “Jashn e rivaz” because a “small minority” doesn’t want to acknowledge the traditional heritage of India. Ironically, Sanskrit which is supposed to be a “Brahminical language” is not even spoken by more than 1000 people which may go extinct in the next 20 years is absolutely OK for Daniyal.
The ultimate downfall of Hindutva will be because its mid and low level operatives are a bunch of idiots.
These people are jumping more than is their aukaat. When Modi is no longer around to win them votes these people will be swatted like flies by Congress and co.
“ When Modi is no longer around to win them votes these people will be swatted like flies by Congress and co.“
Exactly , especially the ones who think that modi is spineless or “modi has gone soft” type of folks will be the first to bolt. The whole yogiji roxxxx and virat Hindu susu Swamy type guys.
They don’t get that the whole edifice is being built on modi.
Modi is more free market and willing to stand up to tribal identities. That is the biggest point in his favor. He uses pan Hindu identity to do this. That is what keeps him in power. The opposition is a conglomeration of feudal lords who use “liberalism” as their collective disguise. Everyone seems through it. But if Mod isn’t careful with how fast he goes, he loses enough of the tribalists and there goes his plan.
Warlock, what do you think of Prashant Kishor’s comment that the BJP is to stay for many decades to come, even if Modi loses the 2024 elections?
@Titania
I think Modi has made the BJP as powerful as the Congress party. What I mean by that is that the BJP’s floor of support is the same as Congress’s now. Before it wasn’t the case. Specifically, Congress is currently in the doldrums and still gets 20% of the popular vote. Modi has made it so that BJP will get that share at minimum for at least this generation. The ceiling of support is around 40%. Modi keeps things at around 35% no matter what. I think after him it will be hard to keep it that high, at least at first. I am not sure if we will get a leader as popular as him.
Seems like a lazy and self-defeating strategy on the BJP’s part to me. Modi is going to croak soon. That is a statement of fact. They’ve had years to think about what comes next, and they apparently haven’t.
Himanta Biswa Sarma, Fadnavis, Yogi, Piyush Goyal, Dharmendra Pradhan, Mansukh, Sonowal, Prahlad Joshi, … all look decent and work reasonably well.
Modi is a once in a lifetime phenomenon. BJP will only go downhill from here.
No party thinks that far. Not even one.
What helps the BJP is that since its still a somewhat winners-take-all party instead of son-takes-all (like every other party) , there is a realistic chance that there will be a successor, once Modi’s era is over.
Though not before Congress+Left takes power for a decade in the meantime and hopefully knock some sense into our proud Hindu Boyzz, Arun Shourie and Susu swamy fan boys and Lobetarian gang.
This article doesn’t make sense…he asks how a (religious) festival could be associated with language, before writing about how the Hindi language movement was a movement of Hindus. Uh…
Unsurprisingly, Daniyal misrepresented the controversy. The Fabindia ad pointedly didn’t mention Diwali by Hindi name, and then brought up these odd Persianized words. It would be one thing to send out this collection at a random time, but in this context it can only be seen as a deliberate provocation.
(It probably was a deliberate provocation, and I wouldn’t be surprised if this whole thing was just stealth marketing. On the other hand, it’s good for Hindus to show they won’t be bullied or slighted.)
https://swarajyamag.com/ideas/memo-to-amit-shah-how-to-deal-with-islamic-terrorists-killing-civilians-in-jammu-and-kashmir
True
https://m.timesofindia.com/world/pakistan/us-nearing-deal-with-pakistan-on-access-to-afghanistan-in-exchange-for-help-in-managing-relations-with-india/articleshow_comments/87228482.cms
https://thediplomat.com/2021/10/how-south-asias-brand-of-sufi-islam-became-radicalized/
Shaheen should be man of the match. Indian opening batsman are a fucking shame
Indus Gang will revel today lol. Cue racialized gangetic memes
Given that the Indian team apparently took a knee for BLM (seriously what the actual f*ck), perhaps such memes are apropos.
LMFAO. Indians have a special talent for brownnosing without purpose.
I find it funny how it enrages both sides. The right we know why they are enraged. But the wokes seem more enraged. Love it.
what will happen if many ‘foreign’ teams start taking’the knee’ against india for its so called caste discrimination? there should be a limit for imitating white foreigners.
Considering BCCI power, the only country who can imagine doing that would be Pakistan, or perhaps even they wont…
Irony is the people at the us state department who like to meddle in India’s internal affairs are largely pro-blm and would appreciate the show of support …
Man you guys care almost as much about cricket as southerners care about college football.
Something is happening which I never thought could happen. Is the EPL-fication of india team. More and more national team will matter less and as long as a player performs for his IPL team he will be heralded as the next big thing.
Though there are not many national teams who play cricket as they play soccer. So India is not in any danger of becoming england of international cricket.
Pak players had more fire for national pride today. It was obvious. Indian players care more and more about IPL money now
Don’t know. It could be one off. Or a trend. Though the IPL will still produce enough quality for Indian team to dominate or be at top 3 in the world
India lacks an international quality T20 squad because the BCCI wont let Indian players play in T20 leagues abroad. Just had a look at the groups and it looks like the ICC knows this as well. However, Pakistan’s total win is the canary in the coal mine, which will give New Zealand and Afghanistan the confidence that they can beat India as well.
This is on point. Virtually none of the rich/upper class people I have come across from rich countries give two hoots about sports. Being into EPL, international cricket seems to be much more an elites of developing world thing.
Test cricket in England is deservedly an exception though.
https://youtu.be/pYC436oKlnE
Video about India’s high speed rail network
sameer wankhade is being literally dragged in mud by this nawab guy. all details of sameer’s mother being a muslim, his father a crypto muslim! are out.
yet we don’t see the seculars, print, telegraph, hindu and deccan herald supporting him.
strange.
https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/pakistan-s-win-against-india-in-t20-a-victory-of-islam-says-pak-minister-watch-1869067-2021-10-25
“Pakistan’s Interior Minister Sheikh Rasheed said the nation’s win against India was a ‘victory for Islam’. Rasheed made the statement soon after Pakistan won the match by 10 wickets.
In the video, which went viral on social media, Sheikh Rasheed said that the sentiments of Muslims from around the world, including in India, were with the Pakistani cricket team during the match.”
A perfect reminder why we need to judge Hindutva in its context. If India had been surrounded by countries like Finland or Canada, it would have been much more liberal. You can only be as liberal as your surroundings allow you to be.
Sheikh Rasheed is clearly trolling by adding fuel to India’s communal fire, but he seems to be right. Firecrackers and celebrations in Kashmir, even in Muslim areas of Delhi (not sure if that video is fake), even Bangladeshis are seen rejoicing..Meanwhile Hindutva’s online army busy threatening Shami and Kohli…
But isn’t that very very harmful towards your “treatment of whatever minorities are left” image. I mean a cabinet minister can’t just exclude the Pakistani Hindus & Christians like this.
Sheikh Rasheed is an entertainer, he intentionally trolls, sometimes even self deprecating. This is why he is popular on TV talk shows.
Idk He is a national cabinet minister before being an “entertainer”.
Yeah, Rasheed is mostly a place holder for the army. Though i find it amusing that after all these years Pakistan still thinks/hopes that Indian Muslims will ‘rise up’. When Kashmiri muslims are having a hard time in one state where they do form the majority , its odd to expect Muslims of other areas to start rebelling
https://www.dawn.com/news/1653968/not-a-good-time-to-talk-about-improving-pak-india-ties-after-world-cup-thrashing-pm-imran
“I know after last night’s thrashing by the Pakistan team in the cricket match, it’s not a very good time to talk about improving relations with India”
Bakchodi 📈
😂
https://twitter.com/_rsk910/status/1452671271049760771
“Thread: Pak VS India
{1}Pak & India match was a classic in so many ways then one, however more than Cricket it also highlighted character of both nations, how different we are & hence the correctness of the “Two Nation Theory”.
Let me explain how ….”
Ek match pe pura geo politics dependent tha. Dekh le Bhim..
Sab apna samay barbad kar rahe hain. Totally useless.
https://twitter.com/EnemySlayer24_7/status/1452573651589468168
“30 Chad students from UP & Bihar beat the shit out of 90 Kashmiri students who were cheering for Pakistan and raising azaadi slogans yesterday after Pak win”
Lmao. 1:3 ratio
Its hard to believe that RPG group thinks that Lucknow is a good place to base an IPL team. The location of the first eight teams were all correlated with the highest consuming and tax paying metros of the country. Lucknow doesnt come anywhere close. Business sense would have dictated Pune, so there is obvious politics involved here.
I think they are trying to geographically spread it out as possible. Pakistan did the same by giving one team to Quetta, Peshawar and i think Pak-Kashmir.
Also recent IPL seasons have shown that attendance income doesn’t matter as much as telecast rights and advertising.
I don’t think it’s as outlandish a business idea. Lucknow might not be as big a city as Calcutta or Bangalore but UP does have the third highest GDP in the country, with a bunch of major urban centres. It’s certainly a better destination than Jaipur.
It’s not unfathomable that the middle/upper middle classes of Kanpur/Allahabad/Varanasi/Aligarh etc will keep turning up to watch matches.
Plus there’s a sense that UP is finally turning a corner. The state government will also provide a lot of support considering this is going to be a good branding exercise.
It might even turn out to be a good investment for RPG in the long run.
In any case, I am not really sure how much contribution location has in the success of an IPL team.
Is there a breakdown in terms of matchday revenue vs television rights vs commercial revenue for IPL teams?
Local Sponsorhips and matchday revenue make up about 20% of the average IPL team’s earnings. 75% comes from the central pool, which is location agnostic. I expect the local and matchday contributions to increase with time.
Nice article on the Lucknow IPL bid, its actually the same guy who owned the Pune team. The new Ekana stadium in Lucknow might be a big part of why he chose Lucknow.
https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/news/sports/will-sanjiv-goenkas-billion-dollar-ipl-gamble-work/article37176095.ece?homepage=true
Also interestingly, the Ahmedabad team is owned by CVC, a European private equity firm, who outbid Adani. I believe they are the first foreign owners of an Indian sports team.
”Even I was part of #IndvsPak battles on the field where we have lost but never been told to go to Pakistan! I’m talking about Flag of India of few years back. THIS CRAP NEEDS TO STOP. #Shami”
https://twitter.com/IrfanPathan/status/1452578575433945095
Hindutva only strengthens Pakistan, while it’s achievement in uniting Hindus is pretty questionable.
Don’t know how it strengthens Pakistan, unless there was a real threat of Pakistan being undone, just by India being secular. Its not as if there is pro India lobby/group in Pakistan which Hindutva has weakened.
On the Hindu front, Hindutva has foreclosed any ‘peace’ option which non BJP parties could have explored with Pakistan. Which i don’t think is necessarily bad for India. India always had this less Hindu (South/East)+ Punjabi ‘lets talk with Pakistan’ VS more-Hindu North India ‘Cant have peace with Pakistan’ split. Hindutva has just strengthened the latter, stemming India’s earlier oscillating stand.
I usually support Pakistan in India vs Pakistan matches. So congrats, Qureishi bhai, we won!
Though i find it amusing that after all these years Pakistan still thinks/hopes that Indian Muslims will ‘rise up’.
Indian Muslims are never going to ‘rise up’ because the Muslims that matter i.e. north Indian upper caste Ashrafs are totally bought into the idea of the Indian state.
They might oppose the BJP but they know that their bread is buttered because of the opportunities the Indian state provides them. Pretty much like upper caste Hindus.
Upper caste Hindus might crib about their taxes going waste and reservations and all but they know that they need the Indian state more than the other way round. Some of them escape to the west if they can.
I dont think muslims of N-India have bought into the Indian state more than average. It might be actually less. Unlike their South and Eastern counterparts they have less economic and political power. What exactly are they buying into? Plus do Ashrafs of UP really have higher opportunities in India than they would have in Pak punjab, for example. Again i have my doubts.
N-Indian muslims is sufficiently cowered down to fight back. Not surprising when both the ruling and opposition parties don’t want to be associated with them.
Why you support Pak?
Apparently he types like a troll a lot.
Thank you Prats.. although nothing short of T20 WC would bring me satisfaction. That’s a big ask.
I don’t think Pakistani establishment is betting that Indian Muslims would rise up against the state, at least with current status quo. But this is a fault line in India’s internal politics that Pakistan is looking to exploit further. A divided India is a weak India. The video message by Sheikh Rasheed was literally uploaded minutes after the match finished and he mentioned Indian Muslims deliberately, knowing fully that it was be given a lot of traction in Indian RW media, and to be frank, rest of the work was done by online Hindutva lower cadre themselves.
Perhaps Pakistan sees it that way. I dont put too much on the internal cleavages of other countries based on social media behavior. I mean, forget Pakistan, if one has to believe India’s own left leaning social media accounts we are already in middle of a Holocaust. And the country will fall apart come Sunday..
That principle is something, i follow even with whole Baloch and Pasthun insurgency narrative which happens on India social media as well. States are far far stronger and people weak. They relent.
Twitter isn’t always predictive. It was just the case for Afghanistan
The probability of Tejas jets being bought by Malaysia is higher now that JF-17 bid was not given. Has anyone read any theories why it was opted out of the race?
Because China fielded JL-10 (L-15) which is apparently better suited for the requirements.
Koreans will win. But who knows?