Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Our intent

WHY this Blog?

'Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world...
The best lack all conviction, while
The worst are full of passionate intensity.'--W B Yeats

The above lines, composed 70 years ago ,still hold good for the Indian predicament while the country is faced with a Lok Sabha poll and power-obsessed politicians lay bare the worst inside them. Leadership tends to degenerate into populism, governance into corrupt status quo, media into hype and hysteria, discourse into cacophony, radicalism into compromise (sleeping with the enemy ?). Intolerance, regionalism, nursing narrow identities hold the people and the system (such as it is) to ransom at almost without notice.

The democratic Tantra has been mastered to (im)perfection, while the mantra is lost.

Do we really deserve all this ? Should we have allowed the present politicians and their chamchas to hijack the agenda for a new, vibrant,secular,democratic and liberal India. Is it not high time that we came out of our self-imposed helplessness and applied, committed ourselves to the task of defining the agenda and taking it to the people so that elections will cease to be an expensive rigmarole of
replacing one incompetent coalition by another?

Politics has to be taken to the real issues of the people - poverty, disparity, unemployment, ill-health, illiteracy,lack of opportunity and subjugation to the touts and brokers of the establishment. For this the entire political economy has to be redrafted. The key fields of agriculture, industry,trade, communications,infrastructure development, energy, education have to be properly studied and rejuvenated with practical innovations.

Aping the so-called developed societies should stop forthwith; so should cease the glorification of images from the past. We need not look far behind; nor need we look far ahead; we must look discretely into the' here and now' and come up with practical, creative solutions to the problems of India.

I am launching SEARCH for SOLUTIONS-INDIA as a humble beginning to end the isolation of intelligentsia from the steering of the country.

HOW?


Let us start with sharing our ideas,observations,our perceptions of state policy in the respective fields we work in. Let us not separate this exercise from our livelihood or our liking--because we have to start the reassessment of the system at the point of our interaction.

Use this blog space to communicate with like-minded ,restless members of your profession so that over a period of time (hopefully not too long) a comprehensive critique of the policy will emerge and pave way to the draft of a new policy which can then be taken to the people with the help of the various media.

If we do this exercise for a period of three to six months, we may
presumably have a separete blog for each field -searchforsolutionsindiaagriculture- for example.

There are no conditions to the membership. Experience, knowledge, an analytical mindset, brevity and lucidity of expression should suffice.

A positive outlook and a strong belief that the search for solutions
exercise is certain to succeed is a must--though skeptics are also
welcome as they will always help to raise the standard of ideation.

Let us start the march to ensure a FUTURE for ALL.

15 comments:

  1. uh oh! Did someone trick you into this?! (wrt internet).
    PS AviDa is already on the Youtube!
    PPS I was reading poems from Mr. Mardhekar the other day & could now relate to your lectures I accidently happend to attend many years back on the same subject...

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  2. Hello everyone, please identify yourself when you respond with name, age, profession & special interests, if any; Pictures welcome.

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  3. What is the “Indian Dream”? Can it be “Pursuit of Prosperity”?

    This pursuit, if channelled and fomented, focussed in a structured manner, can be a base for other standard dreams – “Pursuit of Happiness” for example.

    India needs more centres of economic activity. Mumbai, Navi Mumbai, Pune, NCR Delhi, Chennai etc. are fine.

    But we need newer centres (ahem - planned cities - not like Tirupur, which is a case in point for town-(not)planning). NOIDA is an excellent example in terms if it’s acceptance and efficacy.

    The golden-quadrilateral which aims at connecting the 4 corners, makes this simpler - logistically.

    The rhetoric of "population is a advantage" turns sour without work for those millions -unless we plan to export them to other countries - legally or illegally!

    There are no boot-strap strategies – at least in India. But with a more prosperous populace, in more than say 100 locations across the geography, meaning more money in the pockets of many millions, life can be simpler fighting other “priorities”.

    Unless the “Political Union” transforms into a consistent and well distributed “Economic Union”, it is difficult to unravel the complex “problems” that India faces.

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  4. One staying the Germany, other in Obamaland, a third in Spain and Hemant in Pune, it is not a bad beginning to the web-log!

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  5. Hello, this is Rajeev Basargekar from Navi Mumbai. Searching for solutions is a welcome activity. We all should begin by posting questions for which we do not have answers and feel that we should have solutions. My own question is what udyog should be done by all pseudo employed persons in India and how can these persons get motivated to follow the udyog ? The pseudoemployed may be formally employed gettting good salary or employed not getting any salary or who are acknowledged as dependant on agriculture but not doing anything.

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  6. http://www.indiapoised.com/anthem.htm

    This is a nice one. I am Manish Hiremath (from Vile Parle) based in Madrid for the time being.

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  7. Hi, I am Vishwesh Pandit from Mumbai here. I have number of questions which I would like to put forth.
    The first is , how this intellectual questioneering will get to a focussed point. I bieng a technologists and a teacher has always tried to combine the science with needs in teaching, research and consultancy. Should we not try to strive to do the best in our respective fields of expertise and contribute meaningfully rather than start a new topic?
    Will put the next question next week after getting some responses.

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  8. I have been thinking of how to involve fresh members in this endeavour. At present, 10 out of the 12 members are already known to meand only half have responded by posting a comment. Anya and Maneesh have joined but, as welcome them, I would like to know them better. Otersarequested to suggest our blog to other suitable persons so that we may have a wide spectrum of isuesand ideas to share.-Vinay

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  9. DEAR Friends,
    Out of the 12 to join so far, 10 are already known to me and welcome.But we must attract fresh people from various fields to have a wide base of isues and ideas. Also ,I would like to know more about Anya and Maneesh.Warm regards,--Vinay

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  10. I have always wondered why the government is never concerned about making india a low cost high quality country ?

    Public transport is a no-brainer solution for India. It saves capital (Rs 30,000 crores go into buying cars every year), saves our forex ( blessed as we are, one of the things we dont have is oil).. but no government is serious about this. At best they want a metro. (for all the wrong reasons - corner land and take the metro into your land)

    My feeling is that the government is happy with the current transport mess. So I wondered why and decided to look at the money trail !

    Too much of our tax system is dependent on taxes on oil products, taxes on sale of vehicles, road taxes? My estimate is the government makes Rs 200,000 to 300,000 crores from this out of a consolidated tax revenue of centre and states of 12,00,000 crores+ ! Thus this giant re-distributer benefits from the current method of transport.

    If cities were designed so that people could have high quality life without cars and private ownership of motorized vehicles, the cost of living would be much lower and the quality of life would be much higher but governments would have much less revenues ie the cat would not be able to divide the cake

    The investments in public transport are coming because of clogging and strangling of city life not to create a low cost high quality city.


    How do we create conditions to change this approach to transport policy ? It makes financial, environmental, social, economic and geo-political sense.

    It makes no sense only to politics of freebies.

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  11. Hi Vinay and others,
    I apologize for this delayed response. I am Aniruddha Belsare, based in Columbia, Missouri at present and pursuing a PhD in Wildilfe Diseases. I have enjoyed several discussions on a variety of topics with Vinay in the past(must be the same with many of you), and welcome this opportunity to continue the interaction. Thanks Vinay, for this opportunity, especially for not being very demanding:'There are no conditions to the membership. Experience, knowledge, an analytical mindset, brevity and lucidity of expression should suffice.'!!
    The intent of 'ending the isolation of intelligentsia' is appreciated, but in my opinion, the ignorance of intelligentsia is a greater concern. This ignorance can be attributed to a very urban-centric, and thus narrow outlook, which is further nurtured by a generally irresponsible media. A common knee-jerk reaction on the part of the 'intelligentsia' is therefore limited to criticizing the government. Can we post-pone the criticism, and albeit subjectively, begin with reassessment of the system and prioritizing 'real issues'?

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  12. Namaskar Vinayji,
    Hope you will remember me! I'm currently working with Microsoft and am based out of Hyderabad, AP. I used to be a journalist till 2004 and then moved to corporate communication.
    I'm seriously considering getting in to agriculture and currently studying various aspects of it. I've realized the agriculture policy (and policy-induced practices amongst small farmers) have a great scope for improvement and change. I need some more time to understand it better, before I can make any comment about it on a public platform like this.
    Vinayji, can you please share your contact details with me? I'm looking forward to reconnect with you.
    Namaskar.
    Shashank Mhasawade
    (shashank.mhasawade@gmail.com, +91 9885656161)

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  13. Sir ,
    While I have blogged in based on your sms ,the task looks to be daunting...
    To have meaningful exchange [and which must be followed up by ACTION]a critical mass [number of participants] is a must ....
    So I feel first task is to get them on board before we start our journey..
    Your journalist fraternity may come to your help..
    By the way why do you wish to end isolation of intelligentsia?They are better there or otherwise their craft of confusion will leave us immobilize.
    While we may keep waiting for Big Bang Solutions [which is one more reason for inaction] lets start ,as pointed out by few here , with one or two actionable activities.

    Abhay Kher [+919422319711]

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  14. what about farmers issue? Gagadhar Mute
    gangadharmute@gmail.com
    9730582004
    gangadharmute.blogspot.com

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  15. Why is the intelligenstsia isolated ?

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