Lokpal Bill

In response to DNA's front page analysis of the Lokpal Bill <<http://epaper.dnaindia.com/newsview.aspx?eddate=4%2F7%2F2011&pageno=1&edition=9&prntid=138070&bxid=30505460&pgno=1>>:

Dear Mr. Rao,

In your "analysis" of the current situation regarding the Lokpal Bill, you correctly state that "corruption thrives in the country because there is little or no implementation of the existing laws" and yet you go on to discredit the very bill that aims to ensure implementation.

You proceed to write "It is naive and even stupid to believe that laws can make men honest...But you need honest and good people to make them effective". I agree that we need honest and good people in “the right places” but the reality is that we cannot always guarantee it. Rising food prices and tuition fees alone can make the most honest men go askew in search of a worthy life. And hence, to use your own words, we need more accountable laws to act as a “deterrent”. Even our constitution addresses the plague of corruption and the opposition is empowered to keep a check on the governing party: a reason why seemingly honest politicians and businessmen have been uncovered in serious scams.

Your qualifications far exceed mine but I hope I can take the liberty to point out that your remark on honest people is unfitting of the debate on the Lokpal Bill. I believe I am an honest citizen. I would be enthralled to be part of shaping modern India but it is not going into the masses and winning them over that deters me, but the fear of having to sacrifice my morals en-route. Even the Pandavas had to reduce themselves to deceit and treachery to compete against the corrupt practices of the Kauravas to win the war.

While I agree with you that the Lokpal bill undermines the ability of the current democratic channels, the system of checks that the Lokpal bill proposes far transcends the needs with which the current democratic institutions were built. The Ombudsan system inspired Lokpal bill is a new and emerging need where I, as a citizen, can demand to know why the newly constructed road in Worli feels six monsoons old and have it addressed as a part of a larger issue of tax payer money not being used effectively.

I do think that the Lokpal bill needs certain reforms to ensure corruption-free and transparent functioning like other independent bodies, the Supreme Court and the Election Commission, that it seeks to mimic. But I think it is a fine step to take to mobilize the nation to think actively on this issue just as Gandhi’s movement stirred up a nationwide quest for independence and that too for a nation that till that point had never been independent. Anna Hazare is making the masses aware of what they can ask for and then helping them achieve it. I believe that’s exactly what Gandhi did.

By proposing, “If Anna Hazare and his band are willing to pick up the gauntlet and challenge corrupt politicians in elections, people will vote with their feet.” you are essentially proposing another political party instead of cleaning the ones that already exist. It could be a next step but the one he has chosen is extremely shrewd. It asks for a more sustainable solution that may hold in a world in which he may not exist.

I hope you will extend the Lokpal Bill your constructive criticism from which it may benefit but not undermine the efforts of a man, however small it may be, to effect change.


Sincerely,
Priyanka Agarwal

Have you heard? Patris are the new Black

             There is a new trend in town: Patris. No, I am not talking about a new style of trousers.

I am a trendsetter

             Patris are astrological charts made in accordance with a person’s time of birth. The ascendancy of specific planets determine your character, the kind of family you will have, their influence on you, your spouse, your progeny, your career, your health - everything. It can answer all those questions you struggle with as a teenager: it can tell you who you should be, who you should marry, whether you should have good relations with your parents and siblings, which fields of work you should choose (beat ya Myers-Briggs test!) and which health conditions you can start preventive care for (insurance companies, you’ve met your match).
             The part that has swept the city of Mumbai off its feet is the matchmaking aspect of it otherwise known as ‘Gun Milan’. This is a numerical matching of characteristics that calculates whether couples will have love, children, money etc. The gun Milan is split into 8 criteria and each criterion has a relevancy and a score attached to it. The total score is 36 and a score of 18 or more is considered a good match, anything below that is a strict no-no.
             What caught me completely off guard about it was the great amount of weight given to it by the Ivy-League-variety graduates (yay to no Northwestern people joining that list yet) we hail as the future of India. On the other hand, when I discussed it with my parents, I realized that no one in their generation (or in my grandparents’ for that matter) in my rather large family had got married on the basis of patris or gun milans.
            It is not that I am against birth charts but I am unable to conceptualize how a numbering system can tell two people whether they will be compatible or the effect they would have on each other. This led me to further delve into the intricacies of this ancient tradition. Below I bring you a simplified version of my first hand research. It aims to highlight the redundancy of the methodology and the need to revamp it to fit the modern context.

            Firstly, (1) the gun milan was devised as a quick fix for the poor in the olden times. The task of matching all the natal stars was expensive and cumbersome. Gun milan was a cost friendly alternative based only on a single natal star to prevent the poor from getting ripped off by self-righteous brahmins. (2) it was devised at a time when children got married before the age of 13 aka puberty. It was to see what kind of people they might turn out to be when they grow up. At 18, 22, 24, 26 – you are already the person you will be although your outlook may change with time and experience.
            Secondly, the gun milan is essentially a statistical analysis.  It uses instances from the past to determine the probability of a match being successful. For eg: if x star in person A’s profile and y star in person B’s profile come together, there is a higher probability of pqr happening. In a normal analysis, the study group considered is relevant to the general mass using the analysis but the gun milan draws the focus groups from mythological instances and on the basis of community life 3000 years ago. Many of the research documents I read strongly emphasized the need to read the patris in the context of modern life, but people repeatedly fail to do so. One website used the marriage between Bhim and his demon wife Hidimbi in the Mahabharata to explain separative tendencies in couples. Umm, he was the son of God and a prince, she was the queen of demons (the equivalent of Adivasis/Natives), they met while he was on exile in a forest, she chose to stay behind, he employed her counsel many a times, she sacrificed her son in her husband’s fruitless war and guys, lest we forget, this was all set in mythological Hastinapur. Explain to me how their story is applicable to the common man from any century, forget us in the modern ages. This brings me to my third and last concern: the criterias and the point system in the gun milan.
             Gun milan was conceived keeping in mind the community structure 3000 years ago. At that time: we had a caste system, a strong woman was considered a burden worse than three generational debt and medicine had not evolved to the degree it has today. Where am I getting at with this? Of the 8 criteria on which the gun milan is scored, the first is the varna or the caste. 3000 years ago, a kshatriya (warrior) girl marrying a shudra (service) boy would have spelt disaster. They would probably have been ostracized from society and if not that, the limited opportunities available to him for financial progress would have created a major shift in lifestyle for her. This is the same as people marrying across socio-economic stratas today but the caste referred to in the patri can no longer accurately judge this.
             Compound this to the criterion: whenever a girl has a higher placement than the boy in a category, the score for that section is automatically a zero. I think today more than ever, we can establish with assurance that a stronger woman is a boon for any man. I personally look up to women who can handle their personal and professional life with equal elan and I have seen them prove to be an asset to their husbands time and again. A woman with a thinking mind can get you out of the stickiest situations and can be your right hand when there is no one left to trust. That again doesn’t mean that she can’t manage the home space – she can probably do it better and more efficiently than anyone else.
             The last criterion in the gun milan tells you whether your individual body make-up’s will work together to bear you progeny or not. I haven’t figured out how they calculate this yet but the theory is simple: take for example, two bodies more inclined to have similar acidic frameworks may find it difficult to procreate. But to take this seriously and to think it is irreversible would be to demerit science’s most famous invention – diets!
            

             Don’t think for a minute, that I do not believe in the occult sciences. All my life I have religiously checked my horoscope in the mornings (and that horoscope I shared with 1/12th of the world’s population) and was always the first to pop a squat when I saw a palmist but I never chose to live with what I was told. It was used more as a reassurance that a wonderful day or life lay ahead (a bad horoscope was quickly dismissed). Once I started reading about the patri,  I was actually extremely fascinated and found myself agreeing with everything I read about myself but then something happened: It turned out that the hour of birth I was following was completely incorrect and when I looked up the new patri, I found myself agreeing with everything that it said too! It was at this point that I realized that it was not the patri I was agreeing with in both cases, I was configuring it in my head to make them applicable to me and using the positive assurances guaranteed so vehemently by the birth charts as a sooth-sayer. When I looked it up, I found many prominent world astrologers grappling with the same issue.  Rudolf Smit, a once prominent astrologer conducted world wide studies to ratify his belief and became a “turncoat” on this very basis (Look up his study here). 

Patris: Elevator to the TOP?

             It is here that I realized that it is not the patris we believe in, it is the future we are scared of. As a friend once asked me, 'why is it that humans gravitate to worship anything with only a slightly higher probability of being right?' In an over-competitive world where everyone seems to be on intelligence steroid and ambition comes in no small doses, the man who has experienced even one single setback needs assurance. He needs someone to tell him that everything will be fine and that he will accomplish all that his heart desires; if that assurance comes on a piece of paper, even better. Sometimes that paper becomes your safety blanket. You don’t fear the boat rocking anymore, you fight to keep it steady knowing that calmer waters lie ahead because you were told so. If the patri had disagreed with your actions, you may see the boat rocking and just jump out thinking that the predicted doomsday has arrived. What you are basing your decisions on and drawing your confidence from eventually becomes your crutch. So somewhere you stop believing in yourself and start believing in something else. Where will that leave you when the patri deserts you? Will you not then live in regret of the decisions you once made against your intuition? How will you then find the courage to carry on with your dreams?          
             Even if you choose to believe, the patris must serve only as guidance. The decisions should be yours. My father, Dhirubai Ambani, JRD Tata, Bill Gates, A Carnegie, John Wood, Lee Iacocca, Jawaharlal Nehru, Nelson Mandela… they only had their conviction when they started to build their respective dreams, empires and nations. They also only had their conviction when they decided to take on the risks that they were repeatedly advised against. They also only had their convictions to guide them when they fell in love. So the way I see it: even if you achieve everything you ever wanted to by following the written word, without conviction you will never have ownership of your success.
             I'd conclude by just saying: don’t make decisions based on incomplete knowledge, don’t let the land of the unknown (future) chain you in an endless rut of rituals and if you love fashion, pick up a Vogue instead.

***Disclaimers****
1. Beliefs are so subjective that they can be debated without conclusion. This is my belief as it stands on Sept 16, 2010 and is not an indication of right or wrong, it’s simply a belief based on my experiences and research.
 2. There is a lot more to the background behind Patris but I have attempted to simplify the research for the purpose of this blog.
3. There are many facets of Patris which I still find inexplicable that constrain my belief in it: What happens in the case of twins? Why can’t they predict the exact time of death? Why cant we alter the future if we know which choice leads us where? If its all pre-destined then why need a guide in the first place?

A Short Story: Because the stars say so!

Because the stars said so

A lovely punditji has been coming to our house every morning for several years. He spends thirty minutes in our temple quietly praying for the happiness and success of our family. Initially, I wondered how we would ensure that he was praying for us or that he was in fact praying at all. Over the years, I laid my skepticism to rest as I realized that in our success and happiness lays his job security. But more importantly, I got to know him as a sincere man who did not make a big show of his knowledge or impose rituals on us. For years he never missed a day, come sun, rain, hail or snow (ok maybe he would skip if it ever snowed in Bombay) but suddenly three weeks ago he went amiss for two days. When he turned up the third morning, he explained to us that he has had gastronomical disorders that my mother (a prominent degree-less doctor) zeroed down as acidity. We offered him access to our family doctor and medicine, both of which he vehemently refused. He explained, with the innocence of an angel, that his ‘Sadi Sati’ had begun and that his health was now prone to seven years of bad luck. He went on to explain how the only thing that could help abate the effect was this specific puja but the cost was too high. Finally my mother caved in and told him to follow her prescribed diet and medicines for two weeks and if he didn’t feel better by then, she would personally front the cost for this puja. Regardless to say, he hasn’t skipped a day since or brought up the prospect of the puja.

Sir are you ready to place your order? Yes, I will have a Jain building with a temple please.

             Till about a month ago: as you drove up the slope to Walkeshwar, a billboard placed in a prime position grabbed your attention towards a state-of-the-art new building. The USP (unique selling point) of this building was that it was all vegetarian.  As our car meandered through the post-office traffic, I had to double take to check if I had seen right – yes, there was really a bubble flashing out of the billboard highlighting its ‘all-vegetarian’ feature complete with the green square vegetarian sign.
             My first reaction was to laugh, was this guy serious? And then the sad reality of the most cosmopolitan city in India dawned on me. The vegetarianism is only a façade for a bias rooted in cast and religion. And it almost feels rhetorical for me to state it.
             The idea of vegetarians not feeling comfortable sharing a house with someone who cooks meat or vice-versa – I can understand and endorse, but sharing a building? This is Mumbai, when was the last time you even talked to your neighbor (except to avoid the uncomfortable elevator silence) to find out about his health, forget his favorite dish. The denial of property because of origin is unconstitutional but finding the loophole in culinary preference is a genius of its own kind.
             Walkeshwar and Malabar Hill have slowly become predominated by the Marwari and Gujarati communities and the real estate developers (“builders”) are pegging at keeping it that way, sometimes when they themselves don’t fit the bill. Added attractions, like temples have been erected to increase interest and community-stake. Coincidentally, Malabar Hill is where Jinnah House, the abode of the founding father of Pakistan is located. It is also where we house our ministers of state who are selected (hopefully) on the basis of their skills and not simply because their origin fits squarely with that of the multitudes on Malabar Hill.
             Community-centric living itself is not a recent phenomena: Mira Bazaar is predominantly Muslim, Bandra – Christian, Matunga – South Indian but it was mostly curtailed to the lower classes where they used these community settings to share common business interests and infrastructures. But now, it has quickly spread to the upper strata of society where the bid to keep areas centric to a certain community has become the norm. The regressive progression in tolerance is almost startling.
              When I spoke to some of my friends who are in real estate, they suspended my inquiries and shrugged that ‘that’s the way it is done’. Mind you, these are not your regular run-of-the-mill potbellied paan-chewing builder variety. These are the next-gen, schooled-abroad kind. It is not their fault either -for them, it’s nothing personal. It is just easier for them to sell spaces in a building if they can promise the buyers that they will all be able to pray collectively with the other residents and ensure the glitch-less timely arrival of Goddess Laxmi.

             Even if I bar myself from thinking about the issue of secular inclusion emotionally, the issue makes limited sense from a practical point of view. The laws governing Co-operative Societies and Ownership Flat Acts were devised to deem discrimination on basis of origin, cast, religion etc as illegal. They also imply:
1) as a capitalist economy – let the free market decide who will take ownership of what (isn’t it all about profits in the end?)
2) we abolished the caste system – barring people from other communities in an allotted area implies that in this sphere one community is superior to others
3) intermingling will open your mind – interacting with different ideas, people and cultures not only helps open your mind but helps attune your understanding of your own ancestry (my Muslim roommate and Jewish floor mate found a lot in common in their cultures living together)
4) when one sunki politician decides to spark off a communal riot, how much more tough would his job be if each housing society/complex had a mix of communities living together. When Lee Kwan Yew (my personal favorite politician) formed Singapore, he kept this very issue in mind while devising the law that each housing society had to have a specific percentage of Chinese, Indians, Malays etc represented. I am a huge proponent of devising a similar law for India.

             Leave you with that food for thought (pun intended) as I close my eyes, sip on my lassi and enjoy the din of pure Gujarati banter in the Jain building I just ordered.