Ten Issues - 1

The first step in solving any issue is accepting the presence of the problem. A man convinced against will is of the same opinion still. So let us broadened our opinions about issues here -

1- Before the home ministry raises new paramilitary battalions, it needs to ask why the old ones are quitting in droves. raman kirpal reports on a brewing crisis : Soldiers of Misfortune .

2- Taking offense an be a competitive sport. Islam is forefront runner in this game : Not Even in South Park?

3- Opposition to reservations for women in Parliament have centred on at least four points. Step by step Vaijayanti Gupta rebuts the arguments and re-iterates the case for reservations. Women’s reservation Bill – the 2010 story .

4- Need tribal voices for their rights to counter corporate propagandist nationalism. The Fall Out Of Dantewada By Vidya Bhushan Rawat.

5- David Mumford reviews Kim Plofker's Mathematics in India ;

6- In this interesting paper [PDF], Lant Pritchett argues that India, despite its economic strides and democracy, is a "flailing" state:

7- Micro-foundations of Inclusive Growth [PDF]: The aim of this chapter is to go beyond these short-term and sector-specific concerns to broader questions of policy making in India and, at the same time, to focus on the relatively neglected subject of the micro-foundations of macroeconomic policy.

8- Remedial Education : Research by J-PAL affiliates has shown that providing remedial tutoring for children who have fallen behind academically can improve learning outcomes. Evidence from their study has contributed to the scale-up of NGO Pratham's Read India program in 19 states in India. In 2008-09, 33 million children benefited from remedial education through the Read India program.

9- Dropout engineering a hundred orphan dreams. Society needs person like Rajesh Singh as their role model. Thanks Vivek Padmanabham for the weblink.

10- Selections from Dalit Writing ; Let me close 10th section with an old Indian tale which maybe has some insights. A father used to read his child bedtime stories. One day the child asked the father, ‘Dad, how come in all the stories you read, the hunter always bags the tiger.’ The father thought for a moment and replied, ‘When the tiger learns to write you will hear that story.’

Thought of the Day: Conversations have three levels : people, incidents and ideas. The lowest form of conversation is about people. When we go up one rung we reach incidents which have a slightly larger spectrum than talking about people. But the conversation which really matters is when we talk about ideas, because they are universal and live beyond time and space. - Javed Akhtar

Quarantined by a poem :(

GetUp-->Office-->Home-->Sleep-->

This is not the life that I want to achieve. The circular and monotonous loop goes on and on. Is routine work just enough for mine existence ? Is this post written in sheer frustration or addiction ? Several choices and questions, don't have guts to answer. I forget what was in my mind.

What I fail to see in my observation becomes most critical or taken as an obvious for others. May be my ego comes in between obvious and me. Life contains paradox, that's why there is nothing like truth. Search for absolute truth is extremism. Nothng absolue exist in the nature.

There is this arbit theory of world peace attained by pure rationalisation fails to understand. The world peace can't exist without war. Duality is here and will stay; Human nature is forged of both faith and reason while dominance of one let to the extremism. Duality of human nature is not considered. Man- Woman, Nirakaar - Saakar, etc; When good arises, the evil rises too. Beauty- Ugliness are just two sides of same coin. For every choice, duality will appear. That's why religion put God as one.

I raise my voice for rationalism but I am not against humanity. I have unbound love for the human life. I am not bounded by moral code of conduct or command of the book. I am free.

Many times, this struggle against brutal force for equality appears futile. When I find love and affection for me in eyes of others, the flame re-ignites. You know all about love when you feel it. I believe that love transcends all still history is against me.

Thanks for going through this bizarre post. I have edited this post more than 20 time to bring order in this chaos. Nothing works. And poem that inspired me for writing in middle of night : Safe written by Dear Rajjo.

Quotes for Refreshing mood:

It is myth, not a mandate; fable, not a logic; and symbol, rather than a reason, by which men are moved. – Irwin Edman

There is no hunting like the hunting of man, and those who have hunted armed men long enough and liked it, never care for anything else thereafter. - E Hemingway

Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense. - Buddha

Nothing to write, much to say...

1- Have anyone watched or know about Iranian, Chinese or Russian cinema ? If yes, then you will know about the struggles of the director with state or clergy to express his thoughts in public. I wrote below paragraph after watching the movie Marmoulak :

Artists are born in the environment of suppression. The more the external suppression, the greater is the degree and urge for expression. Sometimes in their life, they met beloved one/ones and there art touches the crust. More the design and glamour in the expression comes from the dream or psychedelic effects. Drugs, weeds and alcohol are compatriot of artist. What lies hidden is the supreme desire of not being general masses. The expression disturbs the stable order of the society and creates ripples in the youth minds. And as the age takes toil on the youth, the rebel expression is submerged into the abyss of social mind. The rebel of art lies in an unfathomed corner of the the underground movements, far away from the burden of the tradition. The struggle in the conscious blossom in the works of them. And the hidden emotions are unbounded by their compassion to share themselves for others.

2- History, experience, reason help us in expanding our sense of justice and morals. With the natural progress of human sentiments, we start seeing justice and truth is the same light. I wrote these words about truth here in the flash one day : Truth can't be expressed in one liners. Truth isn't linear. Its circular in nature containing paradoxes. Such is the mystery of the nature... What we fail to feel, capture on the broken mirror of mind. And those deceitful memories gives you illusions. Mind helps in ejaculation of the thoughts through memories. Spontaneous releases the truer part and even feelings become muddled up with time.

3- Here it is summary on the creative people edited from a viewer's comment on the movie Five Easy Pieces (1970) : The film is an intense character study of an alienated, misfit drifter who seems to have no specific direction or place in life. Psychologists who study creativity have found that generally creative people contain a number of specific personality characteristics. One of the main characteristics of creative people is 'alienation'. In essence, he is a nowhere type of man. Creative people tend to be quite impulsive and open to emotional display, and are quite often labeled as temperamental. Many great creators have doubts about the quality of their product and the authenticity of their talent, hence the notion that creative people are never satisfied.

I will end the scribblings for today here with a couplet of Faiz-

निसार मैं तेरी गलियों के अए वतन, कि जहाँ, चली है रस्म कि कोई न सर उठा के चले
जो कोई चाहनेवाला तवाफ़ को निकले, नज़र चुरा के चले, जिस्म-ओ-जाँ बचा के चले
---फ़ैज़ अहमद फ़ैज़