GETTING OLD

kawcaw

Getting Old

When I was a young stripling, my birthday was celebrated with great éclat. The family was still in Srinagar. The Maharaja was on the throne. Shevur Bayu was our family priest and he used to come to our house in Mallapora, Bana Mohalla.

The Janamdin Pooja was a long drawn out affair. The climax came when Shevur Bayu took out a new Janeyu from his bag and put it around my neck while reciting the Gayatri Mantra. At the end he blessed me with long life. The words were “Jeevo tvam sharadam shatam” (May you live for a hundred years!)

At that time I was innocent and hundred years seemed to be a reasonable span of life. One did not see many centenarians around and a century appeared to be just the right age for exiting from this life.

Now that I am seventy three, and victim of the multitudinous maladies that the metropolitan flesh is prey to, a span of 100 years appears to be too long. Even the smallest task has become burdensome.

Can there be anything simpler than making water? An enlarged prostrate renders even this puny chore irksome and fraught with dangers.

The other day I was returning home from a public meeting. I should have reached home in twenty minutes. Unfortunately we were caught in a traffic jam. One hour and   we had just reached Niti Bagh. Meanwhile, the bladder had started pressing the panic button.

What to do? The Prime Minister may exhort this nation of 125 crores to bring about a Swachch Bharat. The youthful Aamir Khan might berate the persons pissing by the roadside. But if the municipality does not build urinals at 15 minute intervals by the roadside, what is the old man with his swollen bladder to do?

The problem becomes even more acute if you are travelling in a posh colony like Greater Kailash. There are uniformed guards outside each bungalow, whose main occupation seems to be to protect their owners’ property from urinary attacks. You hope and pray for a house under construction with lot of building material strewn around and no bright flood-lights.

The matter does not end there. I recently participated in a half-an-hour discussion on this crucial subject in the pensioners’ corner of our Ornamental Park. Speaker after speaker described the great travails they are subjected to even when they have secured access to a toilet.

In old age, and especially in winter, the chief instrument of action is shrivelled and shrunk to a pale shadow of his youthful self. Your hand searches and seeks but all in vain. Even when this non-performing asset  is located, he refuses to open up. He has to be persuaded and cajoled into assuming his active form.

When  at long   last the stream trickles out in a thin yellow streak, it does not make a positive forthright statement, but comes out in multiple sprinkles and droplets, some curving inside to wet your trousers, others besmirching the toilet floor. There is lot of humming and hawing . At the end, when the lad has ostensibly finished his oration, there are some last minute addenda.

 As the poet has said,

“Howsoever you may shiver, jiggle and shake,

 Some drops are bound to wet your innerwear make.”

That is the tragedy of old age.

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The Greatgrandmother Superior

Kawcaw
                     
            The great-grandmother superior



           There are four generations living under a single roof in our house. The youngest members are my two grandsons. The second level is represented by my son and daughter-in-law. The third tier is occupied by my wife and me. And at the apex of the pyramid is my mother, who is knocking at the door of nonagenarianism.

         My siblings and I call her Mummy or Appi and other members of the family address her as Mataji. She started life as Prabha and became Somawati after her marriage. When  my uncles got married, she became Badi Bhabhi.

         She got married at the tender age of eleven and a half. She was a frail little girl with slim arms and legs and initially had to fetch water from a distance. Her father saw his daughter performing this arduous chore with great difficulty and financed the installation of a tap in the courtyard of the Kaw household.

        When she was fifteen and a half, I arrived. The Second World War was on and sugar had disappeared from the market. But I was the oldest child of the oldest son. So honey was used in place of sugar and kehva was served to all visitors who came to congratulate.

At age 21 she delivered another male child, a bonny baby who was tentatively christened Jang Bahadur. The poor fellow lost his battle against pneumonia when he was just fifteen days old, leaving behind a disconsolate household.

Soon thereafter, at 23, mother gave birth to Kakaji who later grew to be the famous scientist Dr. Predhiman Krishen Kaw.

At this stage, our nuclear family got its first chance to live separately as a unit when my father was posted to Jammu. But this charming escapade did not last long. The cities of the Indo-Gangetic plain sent their bewitching messages about high salaries and my father shifted to Delhi, following the footsteps of his two younger brothers.

In Delhi, Mummy had to change over from the hearth to an angithi fired by hard coal. As our financial situation improved, we moved on to kerosene stove, Janata wick stove and later to cooking gas.Her preponderant memories of this decade of joint family life in Delhi is that of having to bake dozens of chapatis for the large household.

We used to feel quite hungry in those days. Today, when my grandchildren balk at having their third chapati, I have to remind them that at their age I used to take six chapatis and large ones at that.
It was in this crowded milieu that sister Asha, the future Chief Secretary of Himachal Pradesh, was born. Other daughters-in-law also had children. Things started hotting up, with grandma Yemberzal alias Dyed enforcing discipline. When Mummy was 36, my father and his two brothers got Govt. quarters. So we separated into nuclear families. Four years later, Dyed bade us goodbye and grandpa followed two years later.

When my mother was 42, I got married.Six years later, my brother followed. And Asha got married when Mummy was 50. Grandchildren came naturally in quick succession and they numbered seven.

Before you could say Jack Robinson, the grandchildren also entered the holy state of matrimony and had kids of their own. Except for my son’s family, the rest are strewn all over the globe.

These days Mummy is sleeping most of the time. When she wakes up, she keeps us busy answering her limited set of questions.

Her preeminent concern is for security. ”Is the door bolted?” she enquires several times. “Did you bolt it after the maid left?” she wants to know.

The second concern is for the greatgrandchildren.There are two of them living with us. They stay with their parents on the first floor. ”Where is Achu?”she asks. If we reply, “I don’t know” she is not satisfied. If we say ”He is upstairs”: she may gulp it temporarily. Soon she is back with more questions. “ Have the parents come back from office?”

She will then suddenly change tack and shift to the younger boy Amrit.”Where is Aamu?’she will ask. Suppose we falter and tell her the truth, “ He has gone to the Park to play football,” she will have numerous concerns and observations. How did he go at this late hour? How did you permit him to go when it is so dark? Who has accompanied him? Where is his mother? How can the parents be so careless? Etcetra etcetra.

The winter has set in. These days she is averse to taking a bath. So the day starts with a query, ”Do I take a bath?” My wife says yes. She expresses her reluctance. Finally after much consideration she defers the event to the morrow.

And so it goes. The best is when she enquires about my whereabouts.I am mostly at the computer or in the drawing room with a magazine or a book or a visitor. Every half an hour she wants to update my GPS coordinates. It is good that I am retired and remain mostly at home. So she does not have to worry too much.

Am I making fun of my mother? Her father used to say with a smile,”Asun laayakh nayi gacchhiham” ( If I had not become an object of ridicule). When someone in the family loses his or her cool, I warn them that we are all getting old. Do we know what we are going to become if we live to be her age? There is Alzheimer’s. There is Parkinson’s. There is the vegetable state. There are a host of other strange phenomena just waiting around the corner.

You mock her at your own risk!



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TheTruth about Nehru

                     
                     The Truth About Nehru


                      The Indian National Congress is in terminal decline. Even if we take a charitable view and hope for a miraculous revival at some stage, it is definitely in a temporary state of debilitation. These are testing times and challenge the loyalty of the faithful to the hilt. The easiest targets are the leaders, whose policies and performance can today be adjudged with the wisdom born out of hindsight.

                    Nehru is a specially vulnerable victim. He is seen to be a latter-day Babar, a founder of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty. He is visualized as a 20th century Porus who suffered an ignominious defeat at the hands of China. He is portrayed as a greedy villain who conspired with Mahatma Gandhi to stab Valabhbhai Patel in the back, in order to become the first Prime Minister of independent India. He is depicted as a namby pamby peacenik who allowed the UN to unnecessarily intervene in the Kashmir dispute. He proved his “secular” credentials by lightly trifling with the Hindu law enshrined in the Manusmriti in the teeth of severe opposition from Hindu leaders, while not daring to impose a uniform civil code on the Muslims. He inflicted the Soviet model of centralised planning with its public sector behemoths which resulted in the Hindu rate of growth, possibly the only “Hindu” element in Nehru’s attainments. And above all, he is represented to be a lecherous widower who engaged in lusty affairs with sundry Edwinas and Padmajas.

What is the veracity of the allegations? Let us examine these in seriatim.

Did he found a dynasty? If he had wished to do that, he would have steered the top leadership of the Congress towards the fulfilment of this objective. He did not die suddenly. He had a paralytic stroke and he remained conscious to the end. Had he wished to ensure that Indira succeeded him to the throne, he would have elevated her to Deputy Prime Ministership; or declared her to be the senior most Cabinet Minister after him. He would have made her chair meetings of the Cabinet and its important committees. He did none of these. He merely appointed her as Minister for Information and Broadcasting, hardly a portfolio to give her either clout or stature.

That is Humayun’s position .As far as Akbar and Jahangir are concerned, they were toddlers in Nehru’s time. And Shahjahan had not yet been born.  So how did Nehru found a dynasty?

Also, witness the course of events as it actually transpired after Nehru died. He was succeeded immediately by Gulzari Lal Nanda and later by Lal Bahadur Shastri. Shastri was Nehru’s favourite. He had scaled new heights by his resignation as Railway Minister just because there was a railway accident. He had a most successful tenure and he proved conclusively that the apprehension expressed in a section of the media around the theme “After Nehru who?” was misplaced. Had Shastri not suddenly died at Tashkent he would have stayed in office for at least ten years.

It is no one’s case that Nehru got Shastri killed at Tashkent. So how did Nehru found a dynasty?

Let us now come to Alexander’s invasion. Nehru was not a warmonger nor did he build a huge arsenal to overawe his neighbours. He was a genuine votary of peace and harmony. His spiritual guru was Mahatma Gandhi, who was a veritable apostle of non-violence. Gandhi followed the advice of Jesus Christ literally. And Jesus had advised his followers thus:

“That ye resist not evil; but whosever smiteth thee on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.” 

Gandhi had gone to the extent of seriously advising Nehru to disband the army. It was a good thing that Nehru did not take him literally. God forbid, if he had done so, we would today be a province of South China and you would be reading this article in Mandarin Chinese.

So when the Bandung conference was held and the principles of Panch Shila were enunciated by Nehru and accepted most vociferously by all countries, Nehru did not feel like Porus. If a historical analogy was required, he would much rather ape Asoka the Great with his Shilalekh (rock sculptures), advertising the lofty thoughts of Gautama the Buddha.

Unfortunately for him Chou en Lai played foul. After shouting slogans of “Hindi-Chini Bhai Bhai! ”with exemplary vociferousness, he sent in his troops into Indian territory. Had Nehru been a normal politician, he would have bided his time, built up his armed strength , and when he was good and ready, he would have repulsed the attack and won a memorable victory, just as his daughter did nine years later against Pakistan.

So what did Nehru do? Did he turn the other cheek as Jesus taught? Did he put himself in a state of readiness and give the enemy a drubbing he would remember? He did neither.. Like a confirmed pacifist, he went to neither extreme of Christian non-violence nor the other extreme of Alexander-like war-mongering. Least of all did he behave like Porus, defend his territory with might and main, and although technically defeated, give such a fright to Alexander and his cohorts that they slunk away in the general direction of Macedonia with fear writ large in their hearts.

He acted as a confused pacifist would normally do. He tried to look brave and made a casual offhand remark, “I have asked the army to throw the infiltrators out.”That showed his Hamlet like indecision—“To fight or not to fight, that is the question.”

Next allegation is that Nehru was a greedy villain who conspired with Gandhiji to deprive Patel of the prime ministership. Short answer: both men were incapable of conspiracy.

                   .Contemporary accounts show that Nehru came close to the Mahatma right in 1915 when he collected funds for Gandhi’s struggle in South Africa. He was so overwhelmed by Gandhi’s personality that he got converted from an Anglicised drawing-room orator to a khadi-clad man of the masses who plunged heart and soul into the various movements that Gandhi launched. He was a truly secular person who genuinely felt for the minorities. Gandhi had certain reservations about Patel’s secular credentials, although he admired him greatly for his administrative acumen. Three times he had to choose between Nehru and Patel. Each time, he selected Nehru.

How serious is the charge that Nehru mishandled the Kashmir problem? Cabinet minutes show that the decision on Kashmir was taken by the Cabinet when Patel was present. Mountbatten also played a role by persuading the Maharaja to sign the instrument of accession. At the same time, he dissuaded Jinnah from sending in reinforcements in the form of regular troops of the Pakistan army to assist the raiders. Kashmir was indeed a complicated issue, for which Nehru alone cannot be singled out for blame.

About the amendments in Hindu law, the experience of the last sixty years amply bear out Nehru’s vision of a modern Hindu society with full gender parity and a balanced approach towards divorce. If the Indian Muslims wish to stick on to outdated practices like triple talaq which all other Muslim countries have forsaken, they are themselves to blame.

The most uncharitable criticism is levelled at Nehru’s economic policies. People tend to forget that radical land reforms were a necessary prelude to the green revolution. They suffer from amnesia with regard to the absence of basic industries like chemicals, machine tools, steel, fertilisers, rail coaches, transport vehicles, power plants, heavy electricals and so on. It was only when Nehru gave a kick-start to these critical industries that the way was smoothened for the private sector. In that sense what Nehru did was an inevitable precondition for the emergence of private initiatives in industrial development.

The last charge against Jawaharlal Nehru was that he carried on affairs with various women. He was a famous man and a widower. He had a charming personality. Such men always attract persons of the  other sex. Whether such relations were intellectual, platonic or physical is a deeply personal matter into which we need not and should not delve.

This year when we celebrate the 125th birth centenary of this great intellectual, patriot, pacifist, freedom fighter, writer and a true blend of the nationalist and the internationalist, let us remember the radiant personality of Jawaharlal. Let us recall Chacha Nehru with his love for children. Let us see the handsome Kashmiri wearing an achkan and churidar with a rose in his lapel.

Memorandum to the Seventh Central Pay Commission

Memorandum to the Seventh Central Pay Commission

                  This memorandum is being presented to the Seventh Pay Commission by the IC Centre for Governance which has indefatigably worked on governance issues for the last more than a decade.

                  According to the terms of reference, the Seventh Pay Commission is “to work out a framework for an emoluments structure linked with the need to attract the most suitable talent to Govt. service and foster excellence in the governance system to respond to complex challenges of modern administration and to recommend appropriate training and capacity building through a competency-based framework.”

Rightsizing the bureaucracy

                         The Fifth Central Pay Commission (5^th CPC) had recommended a massive rightsizing of the bureaucracy. This involved not filling    up 3.5 lakh posts that were vacant at that time and a reduction in manpower by 30% over the next 10 years. No retrenchment was suggested; mere non-filling of the vacancies as they arose would have achieved the result.

                              Half-hearted measures were taken to implement this recommendation, but nothing concrete was achieved due to the opposition by the staff side.

                        We recommend that the 7^th CPC take up this question once more and make a forceful recommendation in this regard. A bloated bureaucracy is an unnecessary burden on the exchequer

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Rationalisation in the working of the Central Govt.

                         There has been a repeated onslaught on the efficiency of the Central Govt by creating additional ministries and departments. This has been done in order to accommodate disgruntled politicians and coalition partners. Luckily this kind of limitation does not apply to the present Govt. The BJP has been able to secure an absolute majority in the Lok Sabha.

The Govt. has also decided to abolish the Planning Commission in its role as fund giver to the States. This would necessitate the creation of mega-ministries in order to coordinate the functioning of subject-matter ministries.

                          Hence, the present appears to be the most opportune time to rationalize the division of work in the Central Govt. To give a few examples:

i)                    The Ministry of Human Resource Development could encompass the subjects of Culture, Youth Affairs, Sports and Women and Child Development.

ii)                The Ministry of Industrial Development could include the subjects of Heavy Industries, Public Enterprises, Industrial Policy and Promotion, Small, Medium and Tiny Industries, Agro-based Industries and Food Processing.

iii)              Ministry of Rural Development could cover the subjects of Agriculture, Animal Husbandry, Fisheries, Panchayati Raj and Cooperation.

      iv)   Ministry of Power could deal with Petroleum and Natural Gas, Coal, Nuclear Power, Non-Conventional Energy Sources and so on.

v)                Ministry of Infrastructure Development could include the subjects of Roads, Surface Transport, Inland Water Transport, Shipping and Ports and Civil Aviation.

Agencification and disinvestment:

Another method of reduction in the role and size of the Central Govt. could be the disinvestment of the central Govt’s share in the share capital of selected PSUs and the farming out of certain activities to independent agencies.

Parameters for restructuring:

Some of the parameters that could be kept in view while restructuring the Central Govt. could be the following:

Ø The total number of ministries should be reduced to fifty. Each Ministry should be headed by a single Secretary, so that decision-making can be kept within the ministry and matters of administrative coordination do not go to the level of the Minister.

Ø Important subjects could be headed by Special and Additional Secretaries.

Ø Subjects that do not fall in the sovereign functions of the Central Govt. should be handed over to independent and semi-autonomous agencies.

Ø Suitable subjects could be covered by public-private partnership.

Restructuring the cadres in the central secretariat:

                             The 5^th CPC had suggested certain basic changes in the supporting cadres in the Central Secretariat. These included the following:

•                      There could be massive rightsizing of Group D officials.
•                   All clerical and stenographic cadres could be merged into a multi-purpose cadre of Executive Assistants.
•                  All working could be based on the Desk Officer system.
•        It could be laid down that no file should have to travel to more than 3 levels for a decision.

Number of pay bands:

                              The 6th CPC reduced the number of grades to twenty, as compared to the 35 grades suggested by the 5^th CPC. There does not seem to be any justification for further reduction.

Ratio between lowest and highest salaries:

                          The 5^th CPC had kept the ratio at 1:10.67.This was modified by the 6^th CPC to 1:12. If we have to learn lessons from the private sector, the salaries at the highest level should be raised substantially while the salaries at the lowest level should be pegged down. The financial implications of even small increases in the lowest salaries are colossal, due to the large numbers involved.

                            It is, therefore, recommended that the ratio may be changed to 1:15.

Highest salary:

                           The highest salary for a Secretary to GOI was fixed by the 5^th CPC at Rs. 28,000. In the 6^th CPC it rose to Rs.80, 000. It is recommended that it should now be fixed at Rs. 3, 00,000.

                            If the ratio is to be kept as 1:15, the lowest salary would then be Rs. 20,000.

Merger of DA with pay:

                             The 5^th CPC had suggested that as and when Dearness Allowance reached a level of 50%, it should be merged with the basic pay for all purposes. The 6^th CPC did not repeat this recommendation. As a result, it is currently not being merged. As the cost of living index   rises very fast, the denial of the benefit recommended by 5^th CPC upsets the domestic budget of the employees very substantially.

                             It is, therefore, recommended that the suggestion given by the 5^th CPC be implemented.

Age of superannuation:

                            The 5^th CPC had recommended that the age of superannuation be raised by two years from 58 to 60 years. This recommendation was accepted. The 6^th CPC did not recommend any further increase.

                             Two decades have passed since the 5^th CPC submitted its report. Since then the medical services in the country have improved and longevity has substantially increased. No doubt, an enhancement in the age of superannuation leads to diminished possibilities of recruitment and promotion to the younger people. But we have to take a balanced view.

Accordingly, we propose a modest increase in the age of superannuation to 62 years.

Protection of integrity:

There are a number of ways in which the integrity of officers approaching the age of superannuation can be subverted. If we desire a bureaucracy that can tender objective and fearless advice, we should take the following steps:

  The provision regarding grant of extension in service should be deleted from the FRs. It was so done after the 5^th CPC submitted its report, but a way around was soon discovered.

  Posts in PSUs, Corporations, Authorities, and Gongoes etc. should be filled up by serving officers.

  Retired officers should not be eligible for appointment as Governors, Ambassadors or Consultants.

Increasing the availability of Govt.institutions for citizens:

                         In order to have governance that is fully responsive to the needs of citizens, Govt. institutions and employees have to be available for longer periods. The following recommendations are made to meet these objectives:

v Govt. should revert back to the six day week.

v There should be only three gazetted holidays—Republic Day, Independence Day and Gandhiji’s birthday.

v  Number of restricted holidays should be raised to six in a year.

v The concept of extended vacations in institutions like judiciary and academia should be given up.

v Tea should be served at the table of each employee.

v Mobile phones should be allowed to be used only during lunch hour.

v Employees should punch their times of entry and exit in a biometric time clock and wear a geo-positioning device.

                                                          ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

The Inimitable Prime Minister

               The Inimitable Prime Minister



                 Like many of my compatriots I have seen and judged Narinder Modi from widely different perspectives. There was a time when I saw him as a mass murderer who had engineered or, at the very least, permitted the anti-Muslim riots. He was portrayed by some as a lackey of the Adanis and the Ambanis, ready to oblige them out of the way and then travel in executive jets for his election campaign at their expense. He was labelled as a dictator who treated his ministers with contempt and was an incipient Hitler.

                     Today many of us have a revised version in our hearts. The new Modi is a person risen from  a less affluent background ,who forsook the pleasures of  family life and spent decades as a Vivekananda- style parivrajak and an RSS pracharak. A man driven by a passionate vision of his beloved country, which he wants to establish as the jagadguru of the world as in days of yore, a work alcoholic who slogs day and night without fatigue, a Prime Minister who is bubbling with ideas on how to improve the quality of life of billions of Indians and a leader who interprets Hindutva not in the parochial sense of anti -minorityism but the efflorescence of  a perennial philosophy that gave tolerance and equidistance from all faiths to the Vedic rishis and made India the broadhearted land giving  shelter to the oppressed of all nations.

                         How has Modi wrought this miracle? I think the magic began when Mani Shankar Aiyar lampooned him as a chaiwala during the election campaign. Another person might have taken offence or hit back at the Stephenian arrogance of this nose-in-the-air ex-diplomat. Modi playfully launched a chai chaupal across the country and invited his countrymen to enjoy a cup of tea at his expense and gossip about this and that with him. He has since used the chaiwala tag frequently to define his humble origins and made political capital of his ability to raise himself to the highest post in the country!
                         He got transformed in many hearts when he called Nawaz Sharief’s bluff and cancelled the talks at the foreign secretaries’ level because Pakistan  tried to be oversmart and asked  its High Commissioner to go ahead with his tea party to the Hurriyat leaders. We warmed up to Modi when he ordered the para-military forces to give a befitting and punishing reply  to the indiscriminate shelling by the Pakis.

                      All of a sudden, India’s Kashmir policy, Pakistan policy and Muslim policy acquired  new definitions.

                      Modi has already fired the first salvoes of the new dispensation. His prime confidant Amit Shah has declared that the strategy this time is to form a BJP-led coalition in J&K. Many observers feel that he will be able to do so. Even the calamity of the unprecedented floods is working to BJP’s advantage, as the flurry of activity in the central forces is contrasted with the somnolence of the local administration. This would  represent a tectonic shift and effectively counter the pro-Muslim bias that has infused the State Govt. policy ever since the State acceded to India in 1948.

                                     Compare and contrast the Vajpayee-led NDA Govt which tried to start a conference of the Central Advisory Board of Education with Vande Mataram and faced a walkout by the education ministers of Congress-ruled States, with Modi who ended his Independence Day speech with Vande Mataram, thus forcing children of all faiths to repeat this slogan without recourse to any overt melodrama.

                       Modi’s Muslim policy is not yet clearly enunciated. Yet one can discern an emerging pattern. He seems to be moving inexorably towards the Australian model of a policy towards Muslims.  Two Australian Prime Ministers have made national broadcasts on the TV, asking the Muslims to behave or else leave . They had not invited the Muslims to come and settle down in Australia. The Muslims had come of their own volition and so they would have to follow the Australian laws like the rest of the population. Their children would have to attend Govt. schools and sing the prayers laid down for all students.

                              The Indian Muslims have not had anyone talking to them with  similar frankness. On the contrary, they have been treated with kid gloves, they have been mollycoddled and treated like a vote-bank. They are permitted to have their own maktabs and madrassas which breed  youth proficient in mindless intoning of scriptural texts but ignorant of modern languages, science and mathematics.

                           For the present, the strategy seems to be to unleash the extreme right of hindutva and permit  low-grade communal skirmishes, with mild reproofs being administered by lower echelons of the BJP hierarchy. If the lessons are not learnt the soft way, there may have to  be a one- time major confrontation to embed the teaching in the psyche of a whole generation. That is a lesson the Hindus  learnt the hard way when the Khalistan movement was buried at one fell swoop. That is the moral many Hindus  have drawn from the way a stable communal peace has prevailed in Gujarat after the post-Godhra violence

                             A  positive point in Modi’s favour is the neat way he has tied up his foreign policy with the fulfilment of domestic promises. On his recent tour of Japan, not only did he persuade the Japanese to invest heavily in India, he   involved them in his pet projects of bullet trains, revamping of cities, building of a new Varanasi as a blend of the ancient and the modern and even the cleaning of the Ganga.

                          Some of us used to feel apprehensive about Modi’s alleged dictatorial attitude. This notion was strengthened when he seemed to be fashioning the PMO as the fulcrum of his administration. And especially when he appointed his old protege Amit Shah as the party president.
But this negative point has been stood on its head by the positive results that the system seems to be achieving from such centralisation of authority. Decision making has been hastened by the abolition of the cabinet committees which had ceased to be vehicles of coordination and got converted into instrumentalities of delay. A bunch of Ministers and MLAs was not allowed to visit Brazil during the World Cup at State expense. A Minister was seen wearing jeans at the airport and ordered to go home and first change into something more decorous. Maneka Gandhi was quietly chastised for making an uncouth bid for Varun’s political ascendancy by denying him a place in the party top brass. Bureaucrats started receiving calls on the RAX phones from the Prime Minister himself, who incidentally also ensured thereby that they remained in office for the mandated twelve hours. There was a not so oblique hint administered through the grapevine that bureaucrats who played golf on week days would not be preferred.

                            Today most people are saying that India voted for Modi mainly because we wanted a strong leader. So we have no business cribbing about Modi’s strong leadership.Was Lee Kuan Yew not a dictator? Was Deng Xiao-Peng not a dictator?

                            A very important factor in my reassessment of Modi is his tremendous sense of humour.I liked the way he played the flute and beat a drum in Japan (although Rahul the heir-apparent did not). We all relished the replies he gave to school students on Teachers’ Day. His frankness in admitting to his childish pranks was admirable. How he stapled the clothes of gentlemen and ladies standing close to each other in marriage parties. How he and his  class -fellows dangled  mouth-watering tamarind before the shehnai artistes   and forced them to suspend their music .
He made fun of his political opponents by predicting with an impish smile that his presenting a copy of the Bhagwad Gita to the Japanese Emperor would be criticised in India as being an act of promoting Hindutva. And not surprisingly, his secular antagonists promptly fulfilled his prophecy.
Talking of prophecies, I cannot but allude to the prediction supposedly made by Nostradamus, in which he not only foretold the rise of Narendra Modi as the leader of a country surrounded on three sides by water, but he also spoke of his phenomenal emergence as a global leader presiding over the destiny of a superpower. He also talked of Hindu nationalism and the re-emergence of India as a world teacher. Other predictions include the disappearance of Pakistan and the integration of Kashmir by India .

                                But Google also takes you to Ramani’s blog, which claims that research has proved that this whole news is a spoof.

                              Be that as it may, many of us have the feeling that Modi was not joking when he obliquely told a boy on Teachers’ Day that he (Modi) had nothing to fear till 2024. He has hinted even otherwise that he will be there for ten years at least. In 2024 Modi will be 73 , very close to his self-imposed upper age-limit of 75 years for political leaders holding high office. What he will do thereafter  is anybody’s guess!



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A kick to the Rickshaw

                  A   Kick to the Rickshaw

                  It was Shrawan Purnamashi.I had worn two rakhis already, one from my sister Asha and the other from Brahma Kumari Asha, the head of the Brahma Kumari chapter of Delhi who has been sending me a rakhi for almost two decades now. I was waiting for Usha, my sister from Gurgaon, who had promised to come on D-Day to tie the rakhi in person.

          Suddenly, the phone rang. It was Usha.

          “Bhai Sahib! I am sorry. I will probably be too late for lunch. You people carry on.”

          “What happened? Where are you? It is not too late as yet. We can wait.”

          She said, “You know how I travel. I took the metro to Hauz Khas. Now, for the last half an hour, I have been trying to persuade some scooterwallah to take me to Pamposh. They all say that there have been heavy showers in Greater Kailash. The roads are blocked. So they cannot come.”

          “Keep on trying, Usha. I am sure the water must have receded by now and the scooter rickshaws will resume their services. There is no hurry. We shall wait for you,” I replied.

          I had just finished reporting on Usha’s conversation to my wife Raj, when the doorbell rang.

          “That must be Usha,” said my optimistic wife. Although this appeared improbable, it did turn out to be Usha.

          The next one hour flew on the wings of joy and happiness. We partook of the special Barfi from Rewari that Usha had brought from Gurgaon. She put the tilak on my forehead and tied the rakhi. Raj had prepared special dishes and we tasted these with relish.

          When we sat down to a post-prandial gossip session, Usha raised the issue of how the rickshaw-wallahs could be tamed into submission. She suggested that there should be a law so that the rickshaw drivers were prohibited from refusing to offer their services on certain routes.

          I told her that such a law already existed. All we needed was a Modi who would enforce the law.

          I recalled that I had encountered a similar situation a few months ago, when my cousin Rup Krishen Baqaya came to pay me a visit. He is an expert on astrology and I am interested in his predictions. So the time flew on with terrific speed. We did not realise that it was already six p.m. and he had to go all the way to Nirman Vihar.

          Rupji was a pampered bureaucrat who retired as a Chief Commissioner of Income Tax. Every time he came to Delhi, one of his numerous chamchas would send a car with a chauffeur. He was always mobile. This was the first time he was on his own.

          I decided to see him off in a scooter rickshaw. We walked down to Gate No. 1 of Pamposh Enclave. A vacant rickshaw slowed to a halt near us. We told him about Nirman Vihar. His face fell.

          “I would have been happy to take you to Nirman Vihar. But there is a problem. I just received a call on my mobile. My wife has suddenly been taken ill.  Have got to get home. Sorry.”  And he whirred off.

          When the same scene was repeated four-five times with minor variations, Rupji lost his cool. “What is all this? One fellow‘s son has not yet returned from school, another has exhausted the CNG gas and is unable to get a refill from any of the petrol pumps. We have a fellow whose time-span is over and he has to report back at the owner’s house. And so on and so forth.”

          “You must have noticed,” I pointed out, “that no one has as yet refused to go to Nirman Vihar. You see, under the rules, they cannot refuse. And they are very particular that they do not.”

          “I am sick and tired of them. Can we take a taxi?” Rupji said. “Why not”, I replied, “Although it will cost a pretty penny.”

          “How much?” he asked. “Around 400 rupees,” I hazarded.

          We walked down to the Haryana Taxi Service. Rupji asked him about the fare.  “500 rupees,” the driver said. Rupji looked at me. “How about 400 rupees?” I asked. The driver shook his head with an air of finality. “It is very far…across the Jamuna.”

          I told Usha, “At last, we crossed the road and Rupji took a rickshaw up to ITO. ‘Beyond ITO, I shall see ’Rupji said. ‘Either I shall persuade this chap to cross the Jamuna or take another rickshaw’. He boarded the rickshaw and that was the last I saw of him.”

          Raj looked at a portion of the sky visible from our bedroom. “I think, Usha, you better start on your return journey. This sky is threatening to bring about a heavy shower. Get a rickshaw before Greater Kailash gets flooded.”

          Within minutes, Usha was on her way!

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