Reflections of Rajaram Bojji

A story keeps you reflecting up on for quite some time..

2012-02-01T05:04:00.000-08:00

How CBI vs a senior bureaucrat arrested for inquiry interact- a fictitious visualisation:

The official of CBI generally a Dy SP from normal police service; let us call CBI (O) and the accused white collar criminal may be of a rank of Secretary, equal to DGP ; let us call WCC:

CBI(o): Sir, why did u write the note at file page number so and so?

WCC: Which file and which page and what note?

CBI(o): Do not act funny, Sir. You know it.

WCC: Look I handle thousands of files in service, and cannot remember all the files. The reasons why I write anything is already recorded there and and have nothing to add now.

CBI(o): But, Sir, tell if you have some secret resons, or you received some gratification for what you have written?

WCC: I am an honest man. Why don't you check if I have assets disproportionate to my earnings. I write purely based on facts available at that time on file, and based on the policy of that time.I deny doing anything under duress or for gratification. I believed that I was acting in public interest.

CBI(o): But the result shows because of the scam, government lost thousands of crores. Are you not responsible?

WCC: I do not think so. I only processed the case asp er extant policies and in good faith that i am serving my nation. If distortions were taking place , the concerned monitoring and inspection wings must be investigated.

CBI(o): You are not cooperative. if you refuse like this, we will have to extend the remand for another week. SO better cooperate and tell us how you caused this scam?

WCC: I am cooperating and all the files and documents are with you. I do not keep separate documentation for my work nor a diary of events. The file is the basis. That you have. What do you expect me to to give anything new not contained already in the files and papers with you?

CBI(o): SO today you are refusing to help. Will report to Judge that you are further required for more questioning.

WCC: I have no special information and what is the point in keeping me in remand. I told you whatever I can.

CBI(o): No way- if we leave you, you are likely to tamper the evidence and witnesses.

WCC: Look, the evidence is already documented and files are with you and I cannot change the files even if I am out of jail. Then question of witness does not arise, because any thing to the contrary to what is contained in the file, does not have value; because it lacks supporting recorded documents. SO it is not like a murder case where threats can influence an eye witness to go back on his statement. My oral statement has no value. The file speaks for every one. You also know that. It is injustice to harass me like this. I am not well too.

CBI(o): Unless you cooperate and admit you caused this scam, we will have to keep in custody to question you for another week days or more. Our government doctor will examine and certify for your health, Sir. Nothing to worry.

Dy SP really enjoys this opportunity to take on the senior guy whom they had to salute earlier!!!

This cycle of conversation continues for months with the same answers. Meantime, the media is happy getting the shots of the VIP bureaucrats, being taken in and out of the jail to court for disposal of bail application.

Meantime Dr Swamy, without such interrogation techniques, nor custody of the alleged culprit, is able to pin down the criminal in a court of law, by intelligent analysis and research of few available documents. Perhaps for white collar crimes that is the effective way.

It is not necessary to conduct the media show of arrests and jailing and interrogation when solid written evidence is already there.

How do we get justice?

Where files and documents only are valid evidence, why arrest and harass without first filing detailed charge sheet and proving case ina court of law?

2012-01-31T00:34:00.000-08:00

The difference between white collar crimes involving finance and assets , and other criminal acts like murder /assault / rape etc, is that, the former are all leaving audit trail in files and documents and once those are seized after a raid , that will be the only evidence admissible in a court of law and nothing else. Any oral statements of any one involved claiming innocence or some one forcing to make them do what they did, do not carry any weightage in the eyes of law. So in the name of inquiry using the provisions of Cr.PC arresting and spending thousands of hours putting questions to an alleged white collar criminal , to my mind has no meaning. It has only a harassment value. I do not think that is the spirit of the law.
Then I find it hard to believe, the bail getting refused, routinely in the name of the alleged accused may tamper with evidence or threaten witnesses. It may be true for hard core murderers with large number of cases. But not for white collar crimes. Because it is based on documents and not on oral evidences of witnesses etc.
Time to reconsider the way the provisions of conferring vast powers on the inquiry officer under Cr PC, in case of white collar crimes. To me it appears brute force taking the place of intelligent investigation by research and making a case. Sri Swamy is doing it.

Brute force of arrest and jailing for interrogation may work other criminal cases like murder, rape but it has no meaning for cases where files and documents only stand as valid proof. It is a matter of inteligence and fine research and analysis!!

Twitter Bigbattle Debate-my summary 12 Jan 2012

2012-01-12T18:34:00.000-08:00

Engr. B. Rajaram ;Inventor ACD/SkybusJan 12, 2012 06:23 PM
This is truly impressive. Even minutes of the meeting available. The technology has made this possible.Why Governance cannot be done using the technology tools- economically and decision along with work flow is made visible to every citizen?

As MD of KR, I did implement open visibility for workflow and file notings, even for audit to watch in real time.You will be surprised how a Minister stared at me, when I told him that when he wants to give any order that would straight away appear in my work flow scheme for all to see. Then he backed off! Actually it is the bureaucrat who has the power of declaring a file secret or open. Even what Railway Board's communication marked confidential, I used to declare as open, by posting reply on the servers, if it is not involving any individual's private concerns , and public are the stake holders.

There is no constitutional provision to hide the workflow of governance. The secrecy is loosely enforced under the Official Secrets Act, arbitrarily. Why a Cabinet proceedings & decision shd be secret? So long as national security interests or crime investigation issues are not involved, every thought of the government should be visible to the ultimate boss- the CITIZEN, in a republic. Time we move Supreme Court to remove arbitrary application of the Official Secrets ACt, and lay down norms.

Actually RTI was "granted" to misdirect and mislead us, and get bogged down with more and more babus filtering, build up back logs, then ask for more and more staff, a typical successful game played by the babudom Please do not fall in this trap. RTI created so many more red-light topped cars going around!We are further asking for more of them!We think we are "heros" when we get a small crumb thrown at us! But actually we are getting humiliated daily, is what I feel.

We should move Supreme Court to fill to get the arbitrary way files and governance kept secret from us by the babus and the Ministers to provide the dark alleys, to do nefarious activities. They hate bright sunlight of honesty. It is even more surprising for the government to say, honest officers need secrecy to fearlessly make their point. Absolute nonsense. Honest officer need not fear public scrutiny. It is the dishonest who has to fear.

Please go to Supreme Court to get norms laid on how the Official Secrets ACt has to be used- get the arbitrariness removed. I did use the same arbitrary power in my hand, to remove secrecy to the discomfort of the Minister and my seniors, being Head of the institution.Frankly it made my life easy. More important is proof that we can govern without secrecy.

Whither patriotism?

2012-01-10T18:12:00.000-08:00

In the year 1986-87 , strategic technology renewal cycle every 5 years, after the first import of technology along with technology transfer, I had proposed in my capacity as Jt Director Research and taking care of the Secretariat of the Central Board of Railway Research. What I proposed was that the second generation of technology advance should occur in India, and we export the product. This can be done only if softskills and industry backbone get closely integrated with the technology import- where universities also get nominated for particulalr sectors. China followed this policy.

But the favourite pastime of India is to buy off the shelf every time new generation of equipment is produced again from abroad.

Even in case of technology transfer clause, it is observed more in letter but not really in spirit. The soft-skills needed are not nurtured and the basic industry backbone coupled with academic support from centers of excellence in Universities never get developed. So we continue to keep importing from one country or the other : of course the tendering, manipulations of specifications etc are carefully managed, so that CVC or CBI cannot fault.

In all cases where technology was not denied by the international bodies, we remained pure importers.

Only in case of nuclear and space technologies, where technology was denied, persons who never went abroad developed the space launchers and designed from scratch the entire Sriharikota facility. The man who did happened to be my classmate, unrecognised, unsung, retired quietly. But we proved to be in noway inferior to
any advanced country in the matter advanced technologies, so long as our import lobby cannot operate.

Way forward? Frankly old fashioned patriotism is what is missing today at top echelons.

I and Satyam

2012-01-06T19:25:00.000-08:00

What I understand is when one loses the "moham" even for "moksha", gets over "mind" and its tricks, becomes part of the "kreeda" vishesha lakshanam of the creator, & like HIM, remains eternally in "jnana aananda" perhaps he becomes paramahamsa..is my take on the complex issue.Ultimately it is what one is within-external appearance is deceptive.
I personally feel each one of us through Matsya avatara to current time- existed after being brought out from the Lord's protective "udaram" , not a fraction of second separated from His protection, while passing through many shapes and lives(84 lac species), constantly driven by urge to understand why and how we are here and who are we.

As permanent as the Lord Himself, each one of us constantly enjoy His loving care. A birth or death makes no difference . Millions of transformations keep occurring. Purpose? Lord Himself truly has no use.

But the journey on the path of our effort to realise self is the opportunity created- and if urge is there to seek the "satyam", slowly, steadily but surely it will get revealed by HIS grace only.

I am just like any one else a fellow traveler, who is as much the light speck of the Lord Krishna as I am, and so deserves to be respected, trying to share with humility whatever I can ,and seeking and learning humbly from every one I meet or hear, with the same urge to realise the "Satyam" by meditating and contemplating, while serving the fellow specks of Lord Krishna, around us, with whatever competencies granted to us by HIM, to provide "jnana" or material help to the needy, again as a matter of His will only.

The truth is revealed only through meditation and internal purification getting over our mind and the judgmental intellect and avoiding the fog of blind superstitious ignorance.

Sri Krishnaarpanamastu!

Fountainhead of corruption-systemic correction

2012-01-06T06:34:00.000-08:00

Why humans like a kind of negative thinking..allow systems to be corrupt and then put in place systems of policing to "investigate" and capture, enacting police-thief games.

Instead if we make a few tweaks to the system, such that even not so good a man in power finds it hard to take that first step of acting bad. The system should have built in safeguard against taking corrupt step.

The tweak needed is every file with govt. order shd be made public on web, for citizens of Republic to know how the govt. is working. Once the order is issued, there is absolutely no need to keep the file secret from public view.This negates the concept of a Republic. Government servants are public servants and do not have right to work secretly in matters of public affairs.

We are not talking of national security issues or investigations in to criminal activities. We are talking for normal executive functioning of the government in matters of dealing with public property and distribution of largess from the govt. funds.These are not national security issues.

Once the file also become public at the time of issue of order, then we have a chance to correct the wrong step because the entire needed documents are available for getting a court order to stay the same if it was violating public interest.

The need for post damage investigation, loss of lives of activists under RTI are all a sham of the first order.

Somehow the same British concept of keeping the working of govt. secret from the "natives" is waht is allowing the bureaucrats and the political class abuse their delegated power of people merrily for self-benefit.

It is very unfair for Kiran Bedi and Kejriwal who know the power of this secrecy of file, but are not coming out to say openly and as forcefully as they demand for policing, that the secrecy of file, post an order is uncalled for, and the file be made public.

Once the file is known to be going to be public then political and bureaucratic class will be stopped in tracks to take unfair decisions. All the scams which occurred till now would never have happened.

Inability to distribute largess to own kith and kin and for own benefit, will naturally makes the political posts of Ministers not very attractive and soon the corruption in poll process too for votes dries out.

Actually the fountainhead of corruption will lose the very systemic support that enjoys today.

It is truly sad that instead of cutting at the root of the evil, all sorts of complex laws and authorities are sought to be created.

Our constitution is good. There is balance between legislators, the executive and the judicial systems.

What is vitiating the system is the cloak of secrecy under which bureaucrats and political class along with corporate giants, exploit the citizens of the Republic.
Knowing this fact but still, refusing to address this one single problem, while forcefully pursuing the creation of another possible fascist police state is not fair for Kiran Bedi et al. Who can certify for the purity of a person to be Lokpal?
Every day some needle of suspicion gets found for Shanti Bhushan, Kiran Bedi or Kejriwal in their day to day life. Imagine similar situation for the chosen Lokpal members. Till investigated and proven innocent,the Lokpal cannot sit on any judgement.

We need system correction which is practical. Not purest of pure human being, which is impractical.

To my young railway officers!

2011-12-21T06:33:00.000-08:00

Dear my young friends in railway service,

I did not want to write first but after reading the anguish filled self-questioning coupled with seeking constitutional institution based protections etc in the letters posted by young officers, at the google site, felt it is necessary to contribute in the interest of the youngsters, in whose place I was decades ago and equally angry with the system.

The only difference is while many a senior cooled down from hot lava state to simple cold wax state after 30 years of "service", I remained same hot angry man in the year of my retirement, as Cabinet Secretary himself mentioned in a personal one to one meeting at the Rashtrapathi Bhavan in 2004, called because of my letter to the Prime Minister as a lowly MD of a PSU. I must have been the singular exception of a serving officer filing to CBI a complaint against a Ministry!

How did I survive? Why the system allowed me to pass through? Or did it?

Let me admit frankly, without concern either for my family or my posting, I was acting, but I must say except for one senior, the rest of the seniors through the 35 years of my life, were too gracious and tolerated and did not make it a point to be vindictive to me. Starting from first year in service, when motivated vigilane inspector was dispatched in 1971 by HQrs to "fix" me. Why?

In my first week of service, I inspected and rejected about 100 plus stacks of over-sized & muck filled ballast, as well as the "envelop" very politely and respectfully, belonging to a contractor closely linked to the then Minister of Railways.

That is one thing ..never get angry because you are right and the other person is wrong. Particularly with public, and those who do not belong to your service class, and those who are junior to you, be patient and show respect. Yes with seniors, while being respectful, I freely fought angrily. For some reason, I never hesitated. It does have consequences, but more often than not, remember our service is one of the best in the world.

SO coming back to that first incident in my service life, when the IOW who was the Vigilance Inspector came late in night without notice, within 48 hours of my rejection of ballast, and wanted me to go along with him for ballast inspection, I respected his authority as Vigilance Representative, and went on push trolley next day early morning for inspection of the rejected stacks. The complaint was that I purposely rejected excellent material to harass the good contractor as per Minister's view!

When the Vigilance brought their own sieves and started checking and the reason of my rejecting based on over size was found to be incorrect at site!! Then when he checked for size below 10mm too his results were found to be far better than my check! At first it was surprising but I quickly recovered, and wanted the sieves with Vigilance branch [ they carried Vigilance branch marking!] to be checked at site. The Vigilance Inspector took objection and told me their sieves were not to be checked by us. But I ordered the PWI to bring a tape and we checked for the sizes. Well the sieve had all larger holes for the over size and smaller holes for undersize and by almost 20%!! The inspector was protesting but I got the results of measurement of the sieves recorded and jointly signed by PWI and APWI and asked the Inspector also to sign and got a photograph taken. I used to carry a camera more as hobby. Then I told the Vigilance man in the name of President of India, I was placing him under suspension!!

Well from the day one of service, I took it seriously that I represent President of India!

Imagine what happens? I reported in writing to HQrs as well as Division bosses- and the CVO himself spoke finally to me apologising for what happened.

This type of incident then makes sure that your path is now like walking on the knife's edge. One step you miss, mercilessly you are cut in to half. Yes , Sir, courage and standing by your values and conviction leads you on the right path but not comfortable path.

I was finally shunted out to RDSO and well it is all a different story.

The point I make is we have a choice to choose our path.

But recognise the system is stronger and much mightier than you. No one in the organisation starting from Railway Board, comes to your help when in trouble.

Even as MD Konkan Railway , can you believe, I and my Director FInance had to make surreptitious escape from our chambers in Navi Mumbai, from Punjab Police who came with arrest warrants at the instance of son-in-law of CM Punjab. The crime? My junior finance officer under delegation of authority from me, invested in to Punjab Govt owned PSU loan instrument, duly rated as per norms , but when they failed to repay and issued cheques which kept on bouncing, filed case in court which issued non-bailable warrants against the concerned IAS offcier who was related to CM and also Director for the company. They fixed a case against us that we gave loan to take kick back!!

Mumbai High court allowed us 24 hours to go to the Punjab court and present ourselves!! My calls to CRB and members elicited luke warm response. Then what happens? I spoke to some one in PMO, a friend in RAW came to know, and then the DGP Punjab hosted breakfast to me before I left for court, and the SP was suitably chided for what he did. The Judge himself after seeing me just said sorry and let me off.

In this incident who helped? The Dharma of keep on doing what you think right helps. At the same time, consequences do follow your actions.

We cannot change the system But we certainly can change life for the small microcosm of world we are given to control.

As class I officers, we are given a great opportunity to exercise power of the President. So long as you view it as Power of taking responsibility, there is no limit to what you can do.

That is what I did. When I hated to see as a simple AEN in my first year, the head carriage of night soil from the colony from hundreds of K type quarters in 1971, the rules said I couldnot replace them. There was no budget. The work is pending for sanction for previous 5 years !!

But I wanted to change. IOW was shocked, how? By brute force? No. Never try to fire your gun using a junior's shoulder. Sat down made & gave written orders taking responsibility, that all cement droppings shall be carefully collected for casting the cement pans, scrap twin tar drums to be used as septic chambers, and contract for excavation awarded under my powers for improving drainage of the colony. Design and drawing from my side, duly signed so that IOW will never be under problem. Note never initiated from IOW. I issued the note and directions.

That is it, once relieved of fear of getting punished, the IOW finished the work within 3 months- 250 units.

The Officer must take responsibility for actions. Consequences one should be prepared to face. Unions in Division and HQrs were in uproar-if an AEN can do what he did, why for all these years the same was not done earlier in 600 other units spread over the division? Of course, I was accused of mis-allocation misleading the administration and abuse of power etc etc.. but the good will prevailed, the purpose won, and the GM smiled at the entire episode. Well, we have a beautiful service, and perhaps we are the only service, where we can always mark advance copy of our communication to our superior & to his superior, for information, pending processing through proper channel.

My young friends in service, these are but a few stories, but that is how we manage and survive with dignity while serving and enjoy too.

It is useless to go on head on confrontation with administration. You lose. Count on your intelligence. Anticipate the crisis before it arises and take all mitigative steps ahead. Just because you are right, do not assume you get support.

Appreciate human weakness of ego massaging they seek, particularly Ministers. Let me give you an incident.

Whenever MR arrives in Mumbai all the GMs there must stand in attention at airport and receive and MD Konkan Railway also was required. I did once or twice. Then thought to myself why?

I had two options-just follow the practice and be peaceful Or just do not go and then create some unpleasantness which I do not know.

But I chose the middle path. During next visit of MR, I told him, that I am very busy doing his work only, and unless, he thinks my presence is essential, I propose that MD Konkan Railway need not come to the airport to receive him as a matter of protocol. That time I spend in traveling all the way and waiting, I can as well utilise to do his work!! He looked in to my eyes, for a few seconds, thought over, then with a smile, just placed a hand on shoulder, and said , it was fine with him and that a special message would be sent in case He wanted me.

That saved me umpteen hours of journey time to airport on protocol duties!!

Well, why I give these small examples? It could have been that MR did not like and told me, no,no, I should come, because he might suddenly get some idea on seeing me!! Well, one has to take that calculated risk. Anyway it matters little. You continue to go to the airport. Nothing worse happens.

Same with deciding tenders worth hundreds and thousand crores. Move fast- acceptances issued before the Minister knows. Well yes, even in my year of retirement, Vigilance was asked to confiscate files to fix a case, but Supreme Court upheld my detailed written reasoned order. Saved again.

Interesting that both at the beginning and end of my service, Vigilance was sought to be abused to set right an "erring" officer.

And then there are some who got so upset with the system, that they choose to resign in anger. This I do not support. In fact I did tell some IAS young officers who resigned in anger and started own NGO initiatives quite successfully that they did a mistake. We should stay within and take opportunity to use the very system to meet our objectives.By being inside our strength is hundred times more.

Matters like reservations etc for minister's people, has to be organised in such a way that the system takes care. Minor issues should not allow you to be placed in confrontational position.

Projects- yes as one experienced Member of Railway Board, was telling me, that was price of democracy! He had a theory. Keep sanctioning projects, but funds allocation anyway would not allow any to progress, but some additional posts help the service and inaugural foundation stones etc please the political class. No one is serious about the project itself. SO financial viability matters little. Well, that is also a point of view.

Then hunger among youngsters to see our railway should be modern and compare with other world railways!

Yes. I too nurtured the same and walked the path. Perhaps many may not be aware that my research paper in International J. [ rejected in RDSO] IRCA , A new Theory for Rail-wheel interaction, was getting cited for dynamic augment estimates for speeds of 250 kmph plus , in the year 1984!

How many are aware that the simple non-signal innovation ACD actually is forerunner for eliminating all fixed signals in its third version with SIL 4 level functionality? Yes the western technology developers and our own professionals in that area are aware.

Why RDSO is failing to produce any new technology? Yes I did write the report on Restructuring RDSO to make it an autonomous technology oriented organisation, with facilities and incentives like one gets in Hitachi research centers.Accepted, partly implemented, then abused the freedoms given, losing the same within two years!! We collectively are one part of the problem.

Finally we become procurement brokers. How can you be modern? As reviewer of ASCE papers sent for publication in US, I had opportunity to judge a few papers received from China on their high speed infrastructure from Chinese Universities. As technology was flowing in to the country, they systematically attached universities
to absorb and analyze and make it their own. We never made such attempt. Knowledge at staff level is the case of RDSO- file based and moving files with precedence taking top slot, in RDSO. Officers roll in and roll out warming the seats, and are forced to act as knowledgeable. We accuse political class, but we department wise fight worse than political parties. A divided railway house we run.

Well, here young officers face the same problems- what Anna Hazare is focusing on. Our country does suffer immense losses and intellectual corruption and manipulation of the system for self-benefit is rampant among services too. Actually political class are not professionally literate. The literate have let down the country over my generations.

Hope lies in younger generations. When simple survival is a challenge and whole time occupation to save skin for honest thinking and sincere working officers for public good, either in Civil Services, or in Railway Services
what can we expect?

Intelligence is a double edged weapon. Use for good, or abuse for self-benefit.

The anguish expressed by the young officers I appreciate. But we our selves , many amongst us, also lost bearings and are drifting while a few motivated ones join the self-centered currying favours and climbing the ladder of ambition.

Can we make a beginning to resolve to be intelligent with integrity and cooperate with each other to use the same system to serve the good of country?

I do not claim to have succeeded. In fact there are more failures only even though a few unique world class moments of happiness of success also were granted to me.

One must train oneself not to expect praise nor work seeking praise. It is difficult but needed to keep your spirit fresh. But never forget to praise others when they good work!!

But I kept my spirit pure and clean and happily continue with my journey wandering at frontiers of knowledge, on date.

My sincere thought for my young friends is it is finally up to you either

1. to make your life miserable having direct fight with the formidable unconqerable administration, or

2. seek happiness in servility killing your spirit, or

3. find the middle path to do as much good as you can within the constraints of the system to your own satisfaction-- overlook trivial issues but address core issues leveraging strength of the system

Let me tell you, Railway Board is one of the best institutional protective structure to us , which is very powerful in reality, but in practice, individuals occupying the seats, practically disabled the effectiveness in controlling the political class.

Please remember constraints are natural way of stabilising any system in the universe. There is no unconstrained universe.

Every Class I officer is highly intelligent and ambitious of course. The path you chose is your choice and please do not blame others or seek to justify your choices pointing fingers at others.

Courage and character mark you out as an officer and a leader.

Our time is over. It is for you youngsters to take the country forward. Make use of all opportunities.

May God Bless all my young friends!

Mario Miranda

2011-12-11T17:35:00.000-08:00

He passed away at 85years of age today. Memorries of evenings I spent at his ancestral home on beachfront in Loutolim village with his graceful wife hosting flood my mind.

Such a gentle person and saw humour in the way we think and live. I think finally that is the way God sees in whatever we do struggling to prevail over one another.

I got him to travel throughout Konkan Railway and provide me with illustrations of various scenes for a cultural integration of the entry of Konkan Railway in to Goan life and I am happy the book Konkan Nama published by Konkan Railway received special welcome by tourists in Goa.

His illustrations were reproduced on walls of Margao station too.

Unassuming and graceful couple I recall fondly. My condolences to family who will miss him & his typical comments in conversation on everything we see around.

May his soul rest in peace.

26/11 : it does hurt

2011-11-26T02:39:00.001-08:00

When we have an accident in railways, we have to stand without rest or sleep day and night, till the injured are taken care of and the line is restored back to safety. We cannot say, we have to adjourn the activities for a day or two days later availing week end etc.

A doctor on emergency duty cannot leave the patient on operating table and go for a break.

But why our courts need all kinds of breaks and try to remain blind folded to delay justice as much as possible- particulalrly in case of 26/11 terrorist case.

How procedure has become more important then the substance is what is wonderful.

On 27/11 all evidence was readily available, the court comprising of three judges ordered on emergency basis should be mobile and visit with cameras recording the audio-visual evidence, allowing the so nominated defence lawyer as well as the prosecution too to present their oral presentation in real time, move in a mobile media cum recording van, interview also the culprit in jail in full video recording, take his staement, get him cross examined too, everything on video-audio , with fresh evidence marks all available at site and the weapons used too, truth shining at its best and fresh. Hour by hour this work should be completed, giving the chance as required under law, an opportunity to present his case, then and there, not as an after thought, till the pronouncement of sentence is completed within 48 hours.

A medial team and forensic team also form part of this entourage.

All these are prenominated and when 26/11 like issue arises, the entire set up gets automatically mobilised.

The transcriptions of the audio recordings will also be completed in another mobile van all moving in convoy, with police protection.

Once the sentence is pronounced after taking in to account all the field evidence and statements of witnesses, all recorded in the mobile court with live video uplink for all public to witness, the courts are closed.

Then on the third day, the superior court will sit for next 48 hours, examine all the audio-visual evidence, the reasoning of the judges and confirm the sentence or modify.

Thus the ends of justice are met within 5 days.

The culprit is medically attended and then the punishment awarded with two weeks of the incident.

The public memory is fresh and the deterrent punishment awarded quickly has a meaning and serves the intended purpose.

Now we allow evidence to become old and get buried under piles of documents, convoluted statements by advocates, followed by repeated adjournments of holidays and vacations.

Three years, a decade without any actions, has lost meaning of justice being done. Actually injustice is dispensed to the victims of terrorism rather than justice.

Why we cannot do this? When others work 24/7 to do duty in emergency , why not courts too in cases like terrorist attack when culprits are captured, with security forces losing lives too?

ADHAR & ACD

2011-11-19T00:16:00.000-08:00

ADHAR and ACD:
On return from US sought from internet how to get ADHAR in Hyderabad. Sent an email to some nodal guy ans was pleasantly surprised it was responded to. Generally emails are ignored. EVen more surprising that as I was struggling with their so called help line, a call is made directly to my mobile, if I find some problem, to come directly to their headquarters and the needful will be organised. Even more surprised. I only sent my passport images in the email earlier and my ex-govt or railway connections were no where mentioned. Was surprised that as a common citizen so much attention was given.

Well, I and my wife took an auto , made the trip, costed us Rs 250 but ok. Patiently our pictures, the finger prints etc were recorded, verified against our passports and we left the premises, with good feelings.

But still wondered at the unusual treatment we received by the young man who met us and did everything needed, a stranger for us.

While we were still wondering why some stranger, without knowing us, helped us so much.As we opened doors our home and entered after the long bumpy ride in auto, a SMS arrives on mobile, which reads as so happy and privileged to meet a person like me who did self-less service to improve railway safety, and that now a days he does not find any who can inspire as I did with my work for the country, giving Anti-collision Device.

Well, did not know how to respond, but it suddenly, made eyes filled to brim, that some stranger to me was so kind & graceful to be of assistance to this old citizen, and took care of us without saying why he was doing so.

The greatness belongs to young men like him. Suddenly my life made a meaning to me. How can I describe the happiness!

I sincerely salute this young man who made me see I did not live uselessly.

Fukushima and Koodunkulam

2011-11-08T00:44:00.000-08:00

Rajaram Bojji

1:53 PM (18 minutes ago)

to Devasahayam, Udayakumar, ramarao, eassarma, Gopala, prabhu, Prabhu, neerja_chowdhu., sg, suchetadalal, krishnamoorty, tca, VASU, biprasarma, HINDU, iscrmohan, readerseditor, Ram, Ravi, Businesss, bgverghese, editor, EENADU, afhd, Kingshuk, Sreejay

Dear Sir,

It was in 1988 that I saw in Austria a huge beautiful nuclear plant facility, completed in all respects for the precious 5 or 7 years, but nicely locked up without getting commissioned.

The people did not agree.

After Chernobyl, case much later, the Austrians felt very much redeemed .

After Fukushima, many countries have practically slowed down on the initiative to go on fast track with nuclear energy.

USA too the debates have hotted up. Germany and Europe are making plans to gradually shut down the nuclear facilities.

Even France is now rethinking the policy.

It will be the greatest disservice to the nation and the height of moral turpitude on the part of scientists now to tell lies and get this plant commissioned.

Rs 13000 cr is down the drain and so be it. We can afford that. No more projects for India. We shd have the courage.

It is false to say we do not have any alternative. At the definite risk of being labled arrogant, I do challenge the scientific and engineering community of my country as anothe patriotic Indian engineer, to give me clearance and approval to prove the generation of power from the sea waters, at Rs 5 cr capital cost per MW.and later practically maintenance free and no raw material input, but eternal power , constant steady rate, is possible.

With only 30% of the coast line of India, we get 100GW of power at an investment of Rs 5 lac croes.

The Planning Commission of India, got my letter and outline paper, and Dr Kasturi Rangan wrote to me agreeing that scientifically it is sound and engineering challenge is to be addressed, and forwarded the same to President of INAE.

The paper I sent was preliminary without engineering designs but since then, I completed the designs.

The letter of policy initiative needed by the government I enclose. It also describes the technology and how it appears in reality describing the environmental impact issues too.

Just give me the policy letter of clearance for setting up such facility. I will arrange the funds and put up a 200 MW plant., after proving the one MW pilot plant.

Now time frame needed is just 6 months. There is an alternative to nuclear power. It is economical and cheaper than nuclear power and comparable in cost to thermal power.This I told in my Paris conference while presenting my peer reviewed paper in May 2011.

The only argument is it does not exist in the world. It has to be proven, If that is so why Government of India has the courage to approve the Ratnagiri nuclear energy plant? An unproven technology and Netherlands has given statement that the French technology is still not delivered as promised and expressed serious doubts if it works. But still more than Rs 20,000 cr are committed and government is forcing the issue on Ratnagiri.

It is a question of honesty and ethics. I do challenge the committee to get the policy clearance. I will prove the technology with funds raised by myself. I do not want government funds too.

DO not demand I should first make a presentation to satisfy you. Entirely Indian industry will be involved and without import content I will set up the plant. Just to give the policy clearance, I do not have to prove the technology beforehand, when I do not seek government funds.

If there is no private agenda, this clearance can be given based on the letter I signed and sent.

I am glad your good-self chose to write this email Now I offer alternative. Let me see, if there is courage left in the country to take up what I offer.

One most common response is indifference.

As a Fellow of National Academy of Engineering, I do believe, the scientific community owes an honest response to me.

For me Fukushima is real. My countrymen should not be forced to be exposed another nuclear disaster.

With kind regards,

Why RTI activists should die?

2011-09-23T09:48:00.000-07:00

Why a citizen should risk his life to do public service? To merely collect information, if one seeks to use the RTI, so long as it is well sanitised, the government releases the same. You do not know what you did not get.Really sensitive information will be hidden. If too much pressure arises, then life itself is taken.

There are cases when really damaging information comes out under two sets of circumstances:

1. When a group of persons or an organisation operates through some court process and some one in the government is willing to cooperate

2. When the government itself in a planned pre-meditated manner, create such document duly marked secret, but release at the right time under RTI to achieve own internal agenda of setting right a rogue political colleague, whom they are otherwise unable to handle.

So RTI is either misused or abused.

The basic lacuna in the ACT is you do not what to ask for , and do not know how much more the government is hiding while giving some information. It could be a misleading information carefully worded, as normally done for answers to questions in parliament.

Solution actually is simple. The government should publish the full file along with the order.

While the file is in the process, it has to remain within the domain of the government. But once the order is made public, the entire file with noting has to be made public. There is absolutely no reason to hold the file as exclusive preserve of the government. It should become public property. We are paying for it with our taxes! We appointed these public servants, not Queen of England.

During British days we were subjects. We were ruled. But now we rule ourselves. What is the meaning of this, if citizens must fight with lives for information leading to a particular order being issued?

The government may find it inconvenient and come up with possible two excuses:

1.Millions of pages of files are created and hence it is not feasible to publish or make available the papers. Even for RTI they some times say you pay for xerox costs or say not possible to collect information.

2. The government servants should have full freedom to write whatever they feel, without fear of public pressure or fear of getting targeted by vested interests. SO if the file is fully in public domain, the government servant may not act true to the oath taken by him to act fearlessly in favour of truth.

The answers are simple again.

Millions of pages they produce but the the final order file will contain the most critical documents and noting related to the order issued on the noting side, which when web-posted as compressed image files on central servers will suffice our purpose. Modern technology makes this simple to scan and post compressed images. Assange demonstrated this.

Then for the free and fearless opinions: The honest obviously will not have problems. He will be able to write true to his oath taken to stick to truth. The problem is with the dishonest who want to manipulate the system to serve not public but some other vested interest. In fact the current method of keeping the file secret, helps the vested interests to threaten the honest and force them to comply because, the honest have no place to go and have to depend on the job.

The truth is keeping the file away from the public domain is the one thing the government will do everything in its power. Yes they will give you RTI knowing well that they can play with time and quality of information.

You may get a Lok Pal but again the same problem of time taking investigations just to get information. Files go missing or sudden fire destroys the critical ones.

Innocently citizens are getting misled by the government.

But then what happened to the civil society activists? I had been writing to Kiran Bedi, Kejriwal, and Anna too.. why are you not demanding this one single Executive Order, if the Government claims to be honest, to be issued. This is more powerful than the complicated acts and again an elaborate bureaucracy to run the same. RTI produced lot of commissioners and offices, for sure.

But unfortunately just like the government, they too are not responding to mails!!!

What is the advantage of this step-publish-file-with-order?

Suddenly being in public domain, you save months and years of slogging to know what is the file, which after all belongs to you as the citizen of Democratic Republic of India.

Now if the order is not found sound or serving vested interests, it is so easy to move a court of law, with all the down laded documents for relief. May be even before damage is done, we can stop it.

Adarsh , 2G scams would never have occured with this system in place. Just think over.

The government encouraging playing the standard cop-thief-chase game is understandable, I am not able to understand the reluctance of Anna, Kejriwal and Kiran bedi too encouraging the same cop-thief-chase systems. Why do they refuse even to demand from the government our right to have our files with us?

We are masters. We are not slaves. We delegated power to do a job and after doing thei bit, we do like to have the file and the order available in public domain for us to take any action deemed necessary.

Secret orders of the government which are not made public , obviously will not come in public domain. But every other decision and order of the government made public should follow the dictum: order with file to be made public. Then honest prevail & dishonest fear.

We should stop this nonsense of sacrificing our lives for our servants who misbehave with us. RTI activists who died , did so in vain, if we don't wake up even now.

Is poverty a patented feature of any religion?

2011-09-22T09:12:00.000-07:00

[ In reply to a senior respected person]

Sir,

I do not know if only muslims live in ghettos. Others too do.

In my childhood, I lived with muslim class mates who were my close friends in as much as some class mates going through the evening RSS classes, but all of us were living well and also in engineering college and in IIT too. Never had any inkling that they were poor or living in ghettos. That way as many or even more non-muslims too live in ghettos. That includes brahmins .

For example AR Rehman had become Muslim by choice, though he belonged to the Iyer community, one of the most revered brahmin community in Tamil Nadu. The poverty and the inability to look after parents and family attracted him to adopt. But I respect and enjoy his music. We similarly honour Bismillah Khan. We do not have any prejudices in reality.

Poverty does not favour one religion. Actually in my home town , the richness of muslims increased manyfold, with money flowing from Dubai. The Hindu businessmen for survival even adopt the green color as the external painting for the establishment. But let me give credit to the grace shown by the neo-rich muslim neighbors. They are good. OK, we have to listen till midnight some times the lectures delivered in the junction of roads blocked, regarding the goodness of following the Islam and also in chaste telugu, the many similarities of ancient Hindu culture and Isalm's tenets! Surprisingly the Imam did an excellent job of studying some parts of Veda too.Very intelligent and convincing lectures.

Actually enemies for both Islam and Hindus or for that any matter any religion are from within, who first lack respect for own faith, because of their blissful ignorance of their own faith. Then to add insult to injury act in a hypocritical manner merely to self-serve, adopting any hue as convenient, and some even belittle own faith to gain credibility.

We have fractured our society, Justice is more seen to be done, but actually sector wise, we are getting duped by the leaders who lack sincerity.

Unwittingly we fall prey to these machinations .

Well, Sir, what next? I believe, finally the critical mass will be reached for this charade, when the current crop of leaders and their tactics will have to suffer the implosion triggered by own self-goals caused by unfettered arrogance of power derived by the evil manipulation of a sound society.

With sadness in heart I write.

My personal experience in Kashmir with the Kashmir engineering boys and their happiness during training on Konkan Railway, in which I was giving them web-cast lectures with open interactions, from Mumbai while they were sitting in a class in Mangalore, only reinforces my belief.

Respect & trust they seek but our leaders offer appeasement and doles.

We are a wonderful country, Sir! In 60 years, we destroyed the fabric, what centuries of rule by others could not do. That is the achievement of our political and intellectual class in the name of democracy.

With warm regards,

Barbarians vs Civil societies

2011-09-21T04:46:00.000-07:00

It is a historical fact: barbarians start as barbarians to win over soft civilised societies, weakened by own civil and high thinking and living habits, and then once pinnacle is reached, they themselves become civil, soft and start high thinking and high living, become ripe for another emerging barbarian groups to attack leveraging the civil behaviour of the opponent to own advantage. The in built tolerance of the civil society itself is used by these forces to survive and destroy the civil society.

Perhaps the only exception to that cycle is , may be Afghanistan. After Genghis Khan winning all over, still, the country continued to live in highly volatile manner. Not becoming civil could be the best stable option?

Kurukshetra war is a symbol of that need for good people ultimately to pick up the weapons of destruction to establish back civil society.

The new barbaric groups amongst Islam , can cause doom to the societies in a similar manner, if they continue to apply their civic laws to deal with them. More than 80% of the world is now living in fear, daily scanning each other for hidden weapons!!

Signs of refusing to do so, are slowly appearing in Europe and Australia.

I was happy Modi did not act like the standard hypocritical politicians, by refusing publicly the gift of skull cap to be worn on stage but insisted on a shawl. The English media went agog shouting at Modi for not showing respect to other religion. But I like his strength of character.

Not being true to own religion and then aping is not the way you respect another religion.

Political correctness will kill the truth.

The dangerous times of fiscal instability ahead..

2011-09-19T10:09:00.001-07:00

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe--bilmes-war-cost-20110918,0,1598244.story?track=rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+MostEmailed+%28L.A.+Times+-+Most+E-mailed+Stories%29

"Ten years into the war on terror, the U.S. has largely succeeded in its attempts to destabilize Al Qaeda and eliminate its leaders. But the cost has been enormous, and our decisions about how to finance it have profoundly damaged the U.S. economy.

Many of these costs were unnecessary. We chose to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan with a small, all-volunteer force, and we supplemented the military presence with a heavy reliance on civilian contractors. These decisions not only placed enormous strain on the troops but dramatically pushed up costs. Recent congressional investigations have shown that roughly 1 of every 4 dollars spent on wartime contracting was wasted or misspent.

To date, the United States has spent more than $2.5 trillion on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Pentagon spending spree that accompanied it and a battery of new homeland security measures instituted after Sept. 11."

My reflection:

With hindsight can we say after all Saddam Hussein was right... the attack on his country without reason would lead to "mother of all battles" --- not the ground based physical one, but in terms of complete disruption of financial stability of the world.

Osama also achieved his object making citizens of the most powerful nation daily live in fear.You can see it visible in airport security. Spending your own money this guy has achieved what he set out to do. It is almost like daily dying with fear.

The oil prices, we all are paying for it too. Our basic incompetence has not allowed to splurge money on securing our nation against terror. May be that is why the economy is still holding. Should we say, our approach is right.

Ultimately the money did go some where. To private contractors. That is why the wealthy in US became richer at the end of all this turmoil.

Hundreds of thousands of young men and women will suffer traumatic life with lost limbs. Those dead, one way, got liberated.

Millions are scraping and living on doles of weekly support, with no jobs.

No fiscal or monetary tools of correction are available to the government. Truly what a state of affairs for a sound and healthy nation!!!

Could any one predict or imagine some thing like this a decade earlier?

But a few wise men did caution. As usual the voice of good men remains weak, like our own conscience telling us gently, when we indulge in those deviations from straight and narrow path in life.

Humans prove themselves to be the stupids of the first order but never learn too from their mistakes.

Only pain and harsh life brings back sense. Will it be too late? The sad part is the rich always escape. The poor and the meek only suffer. The latter are supposed to inherit the earth.

May be the 6 ft of it.

Cockroach, ACD and Indian Railways

2011-09-15T09:30:00.000-07:00

Of late I have started watching old Vithalacharya movies ( 40-50 years old), telling stories of cruel wizards kidnapping beautiful princess and then a brave prince rescuing after a fight over two hours after realising I am after all expected to live like a simple cockroach and attempt no serious heroics. Without any opinion from my side the various stages verifiable by records of railways, let me narrate the story of ACD.Only matters of fact I would list below, how ACD arrived in railways and seems to be creating needless problems to the Ministry.

1. March 1999- A single page concept paper I sent to Board while grieving hundreds of lives lost in quick succession on railway collisions and level crossing collisions.

2. Shri SM Vaish (Member Khanna Safety Commission) said spend some money and demonstrate a prototype.

3. First prototype demonstrated to Shri VK Agarwal CRB on 15th Oct 1999.

4. First filed runs demonstrated to Members Khanna Safety Commission, Expert team from RDSOcomprising of Mech, Signal etc departments Dec 1999.in Goa.

5.First ride of Minister of Railway Mamata Banerjee on lcocs fitted with devices, and physical demonstration of how trains stop Dec/Jan 1999/2000.

6. Data collection over three months on deviation count theory at Goa to satisfy RDSO Jan - April 2000.

7. Intense debates and fights in Board Jan to March and Minister including the ACD project at Rs 50 cr for implementation on NF Railway Feb 2000.

8. RDSO clears the specifications and lays down all the requirements, combined Board /RDSO/KR sign off on Jalandhar-Amritsar field trials.

9. I am not remembering the exact dates but by 2001-2002 trial results, jointly monitored by RDSO and NR RLy met the requirements as announced by Railway Board and cleared for wide scale implementation on NF Railway as already sanctioned in year 2000.

10. RDSO laid down the norms for success and a high level team of Railway Board monitored the trials of NF Railway over 1500 km.

11. I retired in Jan 2005. The implementation was going on in 2004 when I left. But by that time I had completed implementation on Konkan Railway and also widely used the system to protect Konkan Railway trains against collision with rock falls too. All this was done under the Railway Board sanctions and clearances.

12 In Dec 2003 the 150 kmph test train load of 6 coaches, GM locomotive, Konkan Railway ran using the ACDs to give cab signals covering distance from Margaon to Roha( Konkan Railway portion at average speed of 145 km. CRS and RDSO osccillograph team on Board. But for the support of Shri Dasarathy and Shri RK Singh and the CRB I could not have done this. Yes, I rode up front in the loco.

13.Parliament was advised at every stage of Jalandhar trials as well as NF Railway trials that the system works satisfactorily. Annual budget speeches of the Ministry specially mentioned the success of ACD starting from 2003. It was included in the Corporate Safety Plan of Indian Railways. ACD rights belonged to Indian Railways--not to inventor.

14. Since I was out of railway when the final clearance for ACD was to be given post NF tests I can only go by independent reports of RDSO and the Lloyds(UK) as well as GM's summary reports. All the laid dowm expectations and parameters needed to be satisfied were reported as met. The GM ( a very respected Mechanical Officer of impeccable integrity) wrote also a detailed letter approving the ACD , addressing the Railway Board. Lloyds independent verification report also confirmed and the RDSO also had to reluctantly sign the all the fact sheets meeting the requirements as prescribed norms as having met, satisfactorily. After this ACD was to be extended all over the railways. (Year 2005-2006.)

15. Then Lalu Ji ordered an inquiry in 2005, as to how the ACD developmet was done from 1999 and to fix responsibility for wrong doing. The high level inquiry report with even Members of Board required to make their detailed remarks, post my retirement, fortunately exonerated me and it was established that Ministry only cleared every step.And nothing was done under the table.

16. With a sigh of relief, I have resumed my role of being a simple cockroach and now watch B Vitthalacharya movies and enjoying myself in the safe imaginary world.

But still tears I do shed when I see lives lost and passengers with broken limbs in railway collisions. Dead are lucky. No need to ride the train again. But their dependents and the persons who lost limbs suffer for life, and then shudder every time to board the train. I cry for them.

I believe the Railway Board is wiser than a mere mortal like me.

The august Railways must be having reasons to keep thinking whether they should implement ACD or not after decade of dealing with the system and telling the Parliament annually over a decade, that ACD trials were successful and would be implemented all over railways.

Mean time I have only tears and fears, scurrying around like a cockroach with that unmatched survival instinct.

A friend sent me the story of how Anna Cap made a difference in Delhi!

2011-09-13T08:56:00.000-07:00

You may have read about the experience of the retired army officer who met a lot of people at Ram Lila Maidan where Anna Hazare was on fast. Here is something experienced by my cousin who happened to be in Delhi that time. "I was in Delhi to attend a meeting in the Planning Commission's Office. When I got out of Delhi airport, some youngster approached me and gave me a small national flag to pin on my shirt. This is something which I could obviously not refuse. Then they gave me a white cap with "I am Anna Hazare" written printed it in. I decided to wear the cap, got into a taxi and told him to take me to my lodging. On the way there was a police check point, and the cop peeped into the taxi and waved us on. The cabbie seemed to be happy. and said "Aap ki wajah se bach gaye" (Escaped, thanks to you). When I asked what I had doen to save him, he said 'Every day, these police guys make us pay 100 rupees to pass this point, and if someone does not pay he is held up for hours. He saw you Anna Hazare cap and let us go without extorting money"

I kept my cap on even as I entered Planning Commission Office. The peons and sundry staff, who normally keep gossiping in the corridors or block your way, all melted away or stood out of the way with heads bowed down. I kept my cap on even during the meeting. After it was over, the clerk came to me and asked for my journey ticket and other documents. A bit surprised, I asked him why he wanted these. His answer "Sahab, sab kuchh aaj hi dena hai" i.e. my fare, lodging bills and sitting fees for the meeting were all to be reimbursed today itself. Lo and behold, I got the cheque 15 minutes later. Normally it takes about 3 months!!

I went back to airport to catch my return flight. Everyone, including the security staff at the gate was staring at me, but politely stood aside. Since this trip was on government expense, I had to travel by the famed Air India. But my magic cap resulted in very polite treatment from the check-in counter staff,

the x-ray machine crew and all other. While waiting for the flight, I went to one of the shops and bought two books. People were staring at me. The shop assistant took my credit card, got my sign on the slip, and gave the books to me in a packet. As I left the shop he came running after me 'Sir, your bill" and gave it to me.

Next I went to the cafe for some snacks. The young man at the counter was very eager to speak to me. The boy would not accept payment from me for the snacks, till I said that 'Not paying for my snacks will amount to corruption" He asked me a a dozen questions, including my connection with Anna Hazare. Although I have known Anna for years, I feigned to be unconnected, and said I was only supporting him.

On my way home from airport at Pune I ran into a group of villagers, who were all planning to go to Ralegan Siddhi. seeing my cap they waved and requested the driver to stop the taxi. I got down to speak to them. On learning that I had just returned from Delhi, some of them hugged me asked me about Anna's health, the progress of his movement and so on. Two days later, I ran into a procession of students, all wearing Anna Hazare caps (I was not wearing one). I parked my car by the side and chatted with them. I asked them "You are all students, how are you affected by corruption?" On boy, son of an auto-rickshaw driver said "Sir, when my mother sends me to get a gas cylinder replacement, the fellow tells me to come after 10 days.

But if someone shows a twenty rupee note, a cylinder is available immediately. Is this not corruption?" Another boy whose father owns a scooter repair shop, said "Sir, they are passing us up to 8th class without studying. Then in 9th and 10th we are given grace marks and allowed to pass. After that when we take admission to any course, we find it beyond our capability. All these 'pass everyone' rules are causing terrible harm to our careers. We have to fight to correct the system, else our lives will be ruined"
This was a real eye opener!! Anna has not just attacked corruption, he has unleashed youth power."

Reflecting on Chris Hedges: A decade after 9/11: What we loathe

2011-09-13T08:32:00.000-07:00

Requires courage to write such an article. But for some reason he is not willing to consider the entire spectrum.(Ref: Write up attached below).

Had US taken to the alternative route of diplomacy, would Afghanisatan under Taliban at that time cooperate?

While the war on Iraq was totally uncalled for, focused change of regime to facilitate capture of the culprits in Afghanistan would have served the purpose.

Iraq even to day daily loses double digit lives with the way the society is fractured.

Of course entire Arab world is in a state of destabilisation.

SO is the world economic order too. What is a the root of all these events occurring in a quick succession too in the last decade?

The 9/11 triggered more than what meets the eye.

Nostradamus prediction that a man in green makes fire come on New York like city has proven right?

We can only conjecture but nevertheless, the suffering is real when the incidents really happen.

India did not go and attack like US nor indulge in any violence against Arab world --- kept a distance. But still we have become victims. WHY?

It is the US ally and protected by US, the Saudi Arabia who has been funding the Wahabi sects preaching violence as a weapon to set right the humanity, paradoxically. One can say the fountain head is well protected by US troops stationed there.

The Bahrain regime , a US base, successfully seems to have tackled the Jasmine revolution with Saudi troops, while Egypt,Libya, Syria and other Arab/North African states following Islamic tenets , are unable to cope. Iran has been holding strong, proving a tough nut.

What is the truth? Does this journalist wantonly avoid these points?

But the reality is the US has now acquired an empire of information monitoring and control all over the world except perhaps China, Russia and Iran. Even Assange could be another US tool in this highly sophisticated war games. One never knows, because, the very process of knowing the truth is now compromised.

The weapons seem to be going through testing phases in different environments and societies with different cultural backgrounds and the feed back used to fine tune the various contours.

But the old Sherlock Holmes way of detective checking who gets the benefit of an event, may lead to the perpetrator behind the event.

In the new world order information is the weapon of war, I believe. The new wars will be based on driving the perceptions of large masses with information bombs dropped by new generation stealth jets.

It is more cost effective, than physical wars. But the only down side is the tools to contain the spread of this new weaponry, is not well established, and there is a danger that it can turn round and adversely affect even USA! When I hear the Tea Party debates, this is obvious. We have also witnessed the historic down grade of US debt. Unbelievable? But happened.

Published on Sunday, September 11, 2011 by TruthDig
A Decade After 9/11: We Are What We Loathe
by Chris Hedges

I arrived in Times Square around 9:30 on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001. A large crowd was transfixed by
the huge Jumbotron screens. Billows of smoke could be seen on the screens above us, pouring out of the
two World Trade towers. Two planes, I was told by people in the crowd, had plowed into the towers. I walked
quickly into the New York Times newsroom at 229 W. 43rd St., grabbed a handful of reporter’s notebooks,
slipped my NYPD press card, which would let me through police roadblocks, around my neck, and started
down the West Side Highway to the World Trade Center. The highway was closed to traffic. I walked
through knots of emergency workers, police and firemen. Fire trucks, emergency vehicles, ambulances,
police cars and rescue trucks idled on the asphalt.

The south tower went down around 10 a.m. with a guttural roar. Huge rolling gray clouds of noxious smoke,
dust, gas, pulverized concrete, gypsum and the grit of human remains enveloped lower Manhattan. The sun
was obscured. The north tower collapsed about 30 minutes later. The dust hung like a shroud over Manhattan.

I headed toward the spot where the towers once stood, passing dazed, ashen and speechless groups of police
officers and firefighters. I would pull out a notebook to ask questions and no sounds would come out of their
mouths. They forlornly shook their heads and warded me away gently with their hands. By the time I arrived
at Ground Zero it was a moonscape; whole floors of the towers had collapsed like an accordion. I pulled out
pieces of paper from one floor, and a few feet below were papers from 30 floors away. Small bits of human
bodies—a foot in a woman’s shoe, a bit of a leg, part of a torso—lay scattered amid the wreckage.

Scores of people, perhaps more than 200, pushed through the smoke and heat to jump to their deaths from
windows that had broken or they had smashed. Sometimes they did this alone, sometimes in pairs. But it seems
they took turns, one body cascading downward followed by another. The last acts of individuality. They fell for
about 10 seconds, many flailing or replicating the motion of swimmers, reaching 150 miles an hour. Their clothes
and, in a few cases, their improvised parachutes made from drapes or tablecloths shredded. They smashed into
the pavement with unnerving, sickening thuds. Thump. Thump. Thump. Those who witnessed it were particularly
shaken by the sounds the bodies made on impact.

The images of the “jumpers” proved too gruesome for the TV networks. Even before the towers collapsed, the falling
men and women were censored from live broadcasts. Isolated pictures appeared the next day in papers, including
The New York Times, and then were banished. The mass suicide, one of the most pivotal and important elements in
the narrative of 9/11, was expunged. It remains expunged from public consciousness.

The “jumpers” did not fit into the myth the nation demanded. The fate of the “jumpers” said something so
profound, so disturbing, about our own fate, smallness in the universe and fragility that it had to be banned.
The “jumpers” illustrated that there are thresholds of suffering that elicit a willing embrace of death. The
“jumpers” reminded us that there will come, to all of us, final moments when the only choice will be, at best,
how we will choose to die, not how we are going to live. And we can die before we physically expire.

The shock of 9/11, however, demanded images and stories of resilience, redemption, heroism, courage, self-sacrifice
and generosity, not collective suicide in the face of overwhelming hopelessness and despair.

Reporters in moments of crisis become clinicians. They collect data, facts, descriptions, basic information, and carry
out interviews as swiftly as possible. We make these facts fit into familiar narratives. We do not create facts but we
manipulate them. We make facts conform to our perceptions of ourselves as Americans and human beings. We
work within the confines of national myth. We make journalism and history a refuge from memory. The pretense
that mass murder and suicide can be transformed into a tribute to the victory of the human spirit was the lie we all
told to the public that day and have been telling ever since. We make sense of the present only through the lens
of the past, as the French philosopher Maurice Halbwachs pointed out, recognizing that “our conceptions of the
past are affected by the mental images we employ to solve present problems, so that collective memory is essentially
a reconstruction of the past in the light of the present. … Memory needs continuous feeding from collective sources
and is sustained by social and moral props.”

I returned that night to the newsroom hacking from the fumes released by the burning asbestos, jet fuel, lead,
mercury, cellulose and construction debris. I sat at my computer, my thin paper mask still hanging from my neck,
trying to write and catch my breath. All who had been at the site that day were noticeable in the newsroom
because they were struggling for air. Most of us were convulsed by shock and grief.

There would soon, however, be another reaction. Those of us who were close to the epicenters of the 9/11 attacks
would primarily grieve and mourn. Those who had some distance would indulge in the growing nationalist cant and
calls for blood that would soon triumph over reason and sanity. Nationalism was a disease I knew intimately as a
war correspondent. It is anti-thought. It is primarily about self-exaltation. The flip side of nationalism is always racism,
the dehumanization of the enemy and all who appear to question the cause. The plague of nationalism began almost
immediately. My son, who was 11, asked me what the difference was between cars flying small American flags and
cars flying large American flags.

“The people with the really big flags are the really big assholes,” I told him.

The dead in the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a field
in Pennsylvania were used to sanctify the state’s lust for war.
To question the rush to war became to dishonor our martyrs.
Those of us who knew that the attacks were rooted in the
long night of humiliation and suffering inflicted by Israel on
the Palestinians, the imposition of our military bases in the
Middle East and in the brutal Arab dictatorships that we funded
and supported became apostates. We became defenders
of the indefensible. We were apologists, as Christopher Hitchens
shouted at me on a stage in Berkeley, “for suicide bombers.”

Because few cared to examine our activities in the Muslim world, the attacks became certified as incomprehensible
by the state and its lap dogs, the press. Those who carried out the attacks were branded as rising out of a culture
and religion that was at best primitive and probably evil. The Quran—although it forbids suicide as well as the murder
of women and children—was painted as a manual for fanaticism and terror. The attackers embodied the titanic clash
of civilizations, the cosmic battle under way between good and evil, the forces of light and darkness. Images of the
planes crashing into the towers and heroic rescuers emerging from the rubble were played and replayed. We were
deluged with painful stories of the survivors and victims. The deaths and falling towers became iconographic. The
ceremonies of remembrance were skillfully hijacked by the purveyors of war and hatred. They became vehicles to
justify doing to others what had been done to us. And as innocents died here, soon other innocents began to die
in the Muslim world. A life for a life. Murder for murder. Death for death. Terror for terror.

What was played out in the weeks after the attacks was the old, familiar battle between force and human
imagination, between the crude instruments of violence and the capacity for empathy and understanding.
Human imagination lost. Coldblooded reason, which does not speak the language of the imagination, won.
We began to speak and think in the empty, mindless nationalist clichés about terror that the state handed
to us. We became what we abhorred. The deaths were used to justify pre-emptive war, invasion,
Shock and Awe, prolonged occupation, targeted assassinations, torture, offshore penal colonies, gunning
down families at checkpoints, massive aerial bombardments, drone attacks, missile strikes and the killing of
dozens and soon hundreds and then thousands and later tens of thousands and finally hundreds of thousands
of innocent people. We produced piles of corpses in Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan, and extended the reach
of our killing machine to Yemen and Somalia. And by beatifying our dead, by cementing into the national psyche
fear and the imperative of permanent war, and by stoking our collective humiliation, the state carried out
crimes, atrocities and killings that dwarfed anything carried out against us on 9/11. The best that force can
do is impose order. It can never elicit harmony. And force was justified, and is still justified, by the first dead.
Ten years later these dead haunt us like Banquo’s ghost.

“It is the first death which infects everyone with the feelings of being threatened,” wrote Elias Canetti. “It is
impossible to overrate the part played by the first dead man in the kindling of wars. Rulers who want to
unleash war know very well that they must procure or invent a first victim. It needs not be anyone of
particular importance, and can even be someone quite unknown. Nothing matters except his death; and
it must be believed that the enemy is responsible for this. Every possible cause of his death is suppressed
except one: his membership of the group to which one belongs oneself.”

We were unable to accept the reality of this anonymous slaughter. We were unable because it exposed the
awful truth that we live in a morally neutral universe where human life, including our life, can be snuffed out
in senseless and random violence. It showed us that there is no protection, not from God, fate, luck, omens
or the state.

We have still not woken up to whom we have become, to the fatal erosion of domestic and international law
and the senseless waste of lives, resources and trillions of dollars to wage wars that ultimately we can never win.
We do not see that our own faces have become as contorted as the faces of the demented hijackers who seized
the three commercial jetliners a decade ago. We do not grasp that Osama bin Laden’s twisted vision of a world
of indiscriminate violence and terror has triumphed. The attacks turned us into monsters, grotesque ghouls,
sadists and killers who drop bombs on village children and waterboard those we kidnap, strip of their rights and
hold for years without due process. We acted before we were able to think. And it is the satanic lust of violence
that has us locked in its grip.

As Wordsworth wrote:

Action is transitory—a step, a blow,
The motion of a muscle—this way or that—
’Tis done; and in the after-vacancy
We wonder at ourselves like men betrayed:
Suffering is permanent, obscure and dark,
And has the nature of infinity.

We could have gone another route. We could have built on the profound sympathy and empathy that
swept through the world following the attacks. The revulsion over the crimes that took place 10 years ago,
including in the Muslim world, where I was working in the weeks and months after 9/11, was nearly
universal. The attacks, if we had turned them over to intelligence agencies and diplomats, might have
opened possibilities not of war and death but ultimately reconciliation and communication, of redressing
the wrongs that we commit in the Middle East and that are committed by Israel with our blessing. It was
a moment we squandered. Our brutality and triumphalism, the byproducts of nationalism and our infantile
pride, revived the jihadist movement. We became the radical Islamist movement’s most effective recruiting
tool. We descended to its barbarity. We became terrorists too. The sad legacy of 9/11 is that the assholes,
on each side, won.

© 2011 Chris Hedges
Chris Hedges writes a regular column for Truthdig.com. Hedges graduated from Harvard Divinity School
and was for nearly two decades a foreign correspondent for The New York Times. He is the author of many
books, including: War Is A Force That Gives Us Meaning, What Every Person Should Know About War,
and American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America. His most recent book is Empire of Illusion:
The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle.

Similalrly for all the ills in India. only the 500 odd MPs should be punished?

2011-09-09T11:02:00.001-07:00

Charley Reese's Final column!

A very interesting column.. COMPLETELY NEUTRAL
Be sure to Read the Poem at the end.

Charley Reese's final column for the Orlando Sentinel...
He has been a journalist for 49 years.
He is retiring and this is HIS LAST COLUMN.

Be sure to read the Tax List at the end.

This is about as clear and easy to understand as it can be. The article below is completely neutral, neither anti-republican or democrat. Charlie Reese, a retired reporter for the Orlando Sentinel, has hit the nail directly on the head, defining clearly who it is that in the final analysis must assume responsibility for the judgments made that impact each one of us every day. It's a short but good read. Worth the time. Worth remembering!

545 vs. 300,000,000 People
-By Charlie Reese

Politicians are the only people in the world who create problems and then campaign against them.

Have you ever wondered, if both the Democrats and the Republicans are against deficits, WHY do we have deficits?

Have you ever wondered, if all the politicians are against inflation and high taxes, WHY do we have inflation and high taxes?

You and I don't propose a federal budget. The President does.

You and I don't have the Constitutional authority to vote on appropriations. The House of Representatives does.

You and I don't write the tax code, Congress does.

You and I don't set fiscal policy, Congress does.

You and I don't control monetary policy, the Federal Reserve Bank does.

One hundred senators, 435 congressmen, one President, and nine Supreme Court justices equates to 545 human beings out of the 300 million are directly, legally, morally, and individually responsible for the domestic problems that plague this country.

I excluded the members of the Federal Reserve Board because that problem was created by the Congress. In 1913, Congress delegated its Constitutional duty to provide a sound currency to a federally chartered, but private, central bank.

I excluded all the special interests and lobbyists for a sound reason. They have no legal authority. They have no ability to coerce a senator, a congressman, or a President to do one cotton-picking thing. I don't care if they offer a politician $1 million dollars in cash. The politician has the power to accept or reject it. No matter what the lobbyist promises, it is the legislator's responsibility to determine how he votes.

Those 545 human beings spend much of their energy convincing you that what they did is not their fault. They cooperate in this common con regardless of party.

What separates a politician from a normal human being is an excessive amount of gall. No normal human being would have the gall of a Speaker, who stood up and criticized the President for creating deficits.. The President can only propose a budget. He cannot force the Congress to accept it.

The Constitution, which is the supreme law of the land, gives sole responsibility to the House of Representatives for originating and approving appropriations and taxes. Who is the speaker of the House now? He is the leader of the majority party. He and fellow House members, not the President, can approve any budget they want. If the President vetoes it, they can pass it over his veto if they agree to.

It seems inconceivable to me that a nation of 300 million cannot replace 545 people who stand convicted -- by present facts -- of incompetence and irresponsibility. I can't think of a single domestic problem that is not traceable directly to those 545 people. When you fully grasp the plain truth that 545 people exercise the power of the federal government, then it must follow that what exists is what they want to exist.

If the tax code is unfair, it's because they want it unfair.

If the budget is in the red, it's because they want it in the red.

If the Army & Marines are in Iraq and Afghanistan it's because they want them in Iraq and Afghanistan ...

If they do not receive social security but are on an elite retirement plan not available to the people, it's because they want it that way.

There are no insoluble government problems.

Do not let these 545 people shift the blame to bureaucrats, whom they hire and whose jobs they can abolish; to lobbyists, whose gifts and advice they can reject; to regulators, to whom they give the power to regulate and from whom they can take this power. Above all, do not let them con you into the belief that there exists disembodied mystical forces like "the economy," "inflation," or "politics" that prevent them from doing what they take an oath to do.

Those 545 people, and they alone, are responsible.

They, and they alone, have the power.

They, and they alone, should be held accountable by the people who are their bosses. Provided the voters have the gumption to manage their own employees...

We should vote all of them out of office and clean up their mess!

What you do with this article now that you have read it... is up to you.
This might be funny if it weren't so true.
Be sure to read all the way to the end:

Tax his land,
Tax his bed,
Tax the table,
At which he's fed.

Tax his tractor,
Tax his mule,
Teach him taxes
Are the rule.

Tax his work,
Tax his pay,
He works for
peanuts anyway!

Tax his cow,
Tax his goat,
Tax his pants,
Tax his coat.

Tax his ties,
Tax his shirt,
Tax his work,
Tax his dirt.

Tax his tobacco,
Tax his drink,
Tax him if he
Tries to think.

Tax his cigars,
Tax his beers,
If he cries
Tax his tears.

Tax his car,
Tax his gas,
Find other ways
To tax his ass.

Tax all he has
Then let him know
That you won't be done
Till he has no dough.

When he screams and hollers;
Then tax him some more,
Tax him till
He's good and sore.

Then tax his coffin,
Tax his grave,
Tax the sod in
Which he's laid...

Put these words
Upon his tomb,
'Taxes drove me
to my doom....'

When he's gone,
Do not relax,
Its time to apply
The inheritance tax.

Accounts Receivable Tax
Building Permit Tax
CDL license Tax
Cigarette Tax
Corporate Income Tax
Dog License Tax
Excise Taxes
Federal Income Tax
Federal Unemployment Tax (FUTA)
Fishing License Tax
Food License Tax
Fuel Permit Tax
Gasoline Tax (currently 44.75 cents per gallon)
Gross Receipts Tax
Hunting License Tax
Inheritance Tax
Inventory Tax
IRS Interest Charges IRS Penalties (tax on top of tax)
Liquor Tax
Luxury Taxes
Marriage License Tax
Medicare Tax
Personal Property Tax
Property Tax
Real Estate Tax
Service Charge Tax
Social Security Tax
Road Usage Tax
Recreational Vehicle Tax
Sales Tax
School Tax
State Income Tax
State Unemployment Tax (SUTA)
Telephone Federal Excise Tax
Telephone Federal Universal Service Fee Tax
Telephone Federal, State and Local Surcharge Taxes
Telephone Minimum Usage Surcharge Tax
Telephone Recurring and Nonrecurring Charges Tax
Telephone State and Local Tax
Telephone Usage Charge Tax
Utility Taxes
Vehicle License Registration Tax
Vehicle Sales Tax
Watercraft Registration Tax
Well Permit Tax
Workers Compensation Tax

STILL THINK THIS IS FUNNY?
Not one of these taxes existed 100 years ago, & our nation was the most prosperous in the world.
We had absolutely no national debt, had the largest middle class in the world, and Mom, if agreed, stayed home to raise the kids.

What in the heck happened? Can you spell 'politicians?'

I hope this goes around THE USA at least 545 times!!! YOU can help it get there!!!

GO AHEAD. . . BE AN AMERICAN!!

Ammonium Nitrate and Delhi Blasts

2011-09-08T04:41:00.000-07:00

I do not understand the uncalled for confidence that, we, by issue of order or making a severe law can make some event stop. Somehow our respected IAS and many intellectuals think that it is lack of a law that allows bad things to happen. Typically delay in issue of rules is being pointed out for some one to keep a watch on ammonium nitrate.

The moment it is declared as an explosive...what other rules one needs to act? The rules applicable to explosives all of us know. They are there. Why again wait for issue of fresh rules

A District Collector does not need any new rules specially for Ammonium Nitrate because it is an explosive of a particular class under the explosive act. All the existing rules kick in.

The district collectors and the explosive inspectors merely give this kind of excuse to avoid accountability.

Even carriage by ship in to Vizag in huge quantities becomes a case of violating the ACt, under the existing Act and rules available for explosives mutatis mutandis for Ammonium Nitrate.

How practical is to implement this rule and why the government hesitated to declare the Ammonium Nitrate as an explosive must be understood.

A widely used substance for normal civil use, suddenly being declared as an explosive, has quite a handful of practical implementation problems for the administrators.

Terrorists have used many a commonly used substances to create explosives and internet does give the methods.

With high level of construction activities, explosives and use of the Ammonium Nitrate to enhance at reduced cost the effect a gelatin, is prevalent. The administrators turn a blind eye routinely for this activity.

The problem with us is that, we by issuing an instruction or enacting a law, feel as if we have done our bit and sit back, avoiding the emotional guilt.

But the real crux of the problem lies in execution and simply putting laws on statutes do not make any difference.

Machinery, willingness to actually believe and execute honestly the provisions, a responsible civic society who think they are part of the government for delivery of safe and joyous society, a government which is seen to be serving people and not act as super masters, are all necessary components.

But we get uncaring government which at every point of interaction hurts self-esteem of an average citizen, looks uninviting and harsh in approach, and frightens the citizen to submit with payment of extra cash or in kind to facilitate to get his interaction with the government to be a little pleasant and fruitful.

The incompetence of our administration to catch criminals is only matched by the fury with which power of all rules and laws are unleashed against honest and weak citizens who do not fall in line. Abuse is more common than use of the power granted under the law of the land.

In such an environment of corruption gnawing away at the vitals of our systems, a terror strike is certainly the easiest act. No Act or rule can stop it.

But a silver lining of hope still is indicated by a simple common citizen who went to Juhu beach for his morning walk. He found a huge 2000 t ship happily grounded on the beach. He believed in the Police .

He did not presume that may be the ship has officially arrived what with three layers of security protecting Mumbai sea, navy. coast guard, and then coast guard police too all with their sophisticated boats and equipment relentlessly patrol and watch with advanced radars.

As a matter of just abundant precaution, he rang up the police station and woke up a constable, who honestly took the case to superiors and all our security agencies then also woke up to find that the huge ship floated quietly without obstruction from some where in gulf all the way, with no crew but left abandoned because engine room got a little flooded. She was carrying some oil too in tanker.

But it is left to a simple innocent citizen who went for morning walk to discover.

Then what happens? No one cares to explain why all the money we spent and special laws we made for Coast guard did not work.

Why Amminuim nitrate? This ship could have been sent adrift with 5000 kg of RDX and added with sharpenel and ammonium nitrate too-- and Mumbai would have vanished.

We actually are living just because we pray and the terrorists are still compassionate or as incompetent as others, the latter being more likely.

Hare Krishna!

My first days in railway service!

2011-08-28T04:46:00.000-07:00

Ha Ha !

Was suddenly lifted back in memory to 1972 and my first line box at Shahabad. That Box I preserved. My wife just 20 yrs of age , found it very intriguing just as much I did, but I had more experience of seeing the seniors' boxes and , of course the trolley-man with his red turban in place, always gently guided.

From 1970 to 72 it used to be food from line boxes of my seniors which kept me on track!

What a wonderful tradition we had..the senior should always feed and take care of the junior!

My CE used to make sure that I get my cup of tea from his saloon! This tradition we followed throughout our service.

Yes, it is difficult not to get emotional and deeply miss my colleagues, innocent gang men I spent time with in railways.

I am truly grateful for this article

the HINDU, Open Page
the HINDU, Sunday OPEN PAGE, August 28, 2011
We went online much before the computers came
Mrs. Prema Ramakrishnan

The Hindu

The phrase “being online” is very much in vogue today in this age of computers. If you are at work on your computer, you are online. But
I can tell you it was very much part of the railway parlance at a time
when nobody had even heard of computers !

Our husbands were right ‘on track' when we used the phrase. That is
they were travelling on train on work. When people visited us or called
on the phone to speak to them, we said they were ‘on line !' In the railways, everybody understood.

It strikes me as funny how the more things change, the more they
are the same!

Another peculiar feature of this on line trip was the line-box —almost
a kind of lifeline, without which nobody set off on a tour. What kind of box was this, you might ask. What were its contents to make it so important? Your brain cells don't have to go into overdrive guessing.
One not only had to think out of the box but eat out of it, too! Yes, it
was the grocery box containing all the ingredients necessary for
one's very survival — a simple dal-chaval meal!

My husband's work entailed inspecting the tracks and bridges, camping
in the middle of nowhere. So the best insurance was to carry all that
was necessary for cooking breakfast and the two meals of the day,
besides the morning coffee or tea. To make sure that nothing was left
out, I had written out the list and pasted it on the kitchen wall, making
it easy for me to pack the box even at a moment's notice which was the case often. The officers travelled in a carriage which had the kitchen equipment, cutlery and crockery.

A new bride had come to visit us and we were chatting happily when
the phone rang from out of the blue. My husband called from office
to say that an accident had happened and that he was leaving right
away and I had to pack his clothes and line-box. The lady wanted to
stay back and take a look at what I was putting in the box!

I first packed his suitcase in the bedroom (for which I had a list in
the cupboard) while she waited in the living room. When I was done,
she followed me to the kitchen to see me working on the line-box.
I opened various tins and bottles on my kitchen shelf and filled
mustard, haldi, salt and masalas in small, Nescafe tins or honey
bottles. The bigger items like atta, oil, rice and dal went into milk
powder tins. All these and a cloth bag containing whatever
vegetables I had — mostly potatoes, onions, brinjal, ginger and
green chillies — went into the box. Sometimes, other officials
would be invited to share a meal. The plucky peons would find
some little market to pick up the vegetables if the stock ran out
and would manage to find the daily quota of milk and if it was
not available, use the milk powder that I had put in. Plastic had
not arrived.

Just when I looked up to check the list, the chap who was to
accompany my husband arrived to take away the things!

After he left, my friend shook her head and said, “Oh! my God!
Do I do this every time in an emergency? I'll go bonkers!”

I assured her. “You will become an expert very soon. We
Railway wives did it, so will you!”

She sat there looking as if the skies had fallen. I told her to cheer up.
As railway people, we had our moments of happiness —travelling,
seeing new places, having fairly comfortable houses to live in and nice neighbours. “When we count our blessings, we begin to see the rainbows.” I finished. She took heart, got up and made her way home
in a very reflective mood.

Now you know what going online meant for us. Living a life on line
from out of a line-box!

(The writer's email id is prema_ramakrishnan@hotmail.com)

To Anna Hazare my gift of One page Lok Pal Bill

2011-08-20T13:36:00.000-07:00

Anna has woken up India. Jan Lok pal Bill is now on the table of the Parliament. While many without examining implications, just do not trust the government any more, and hence blindly believe that the Jan Lok Pal Bill will do wonders for us. Even the authors cannot guarantee the same.

But as some friends of mine say, if thousands of "Lok Payees", the employess/inpsectors of Lok Pal, spread out and start descending on every office, with their vast powers of search and seize practically every government office stops further work. Even routine work gets dislocated.

Our experience of Vigilance shows that it is not always the corrupt gets caught, actually they manage the vigilance too, but truly honest officers became victims of getting in to the case file covers and superior officers lacking courage to say or write on vigilance files allowed the attitude ."let law take its own course" and the time it takes, truly destroyed many an innocent career. I know quite a number of cases.

The CVC with all three members took a deposition from me(2003) on the direction of PM as a result of my long letter on how vigilance was destroying the initiative of the organised services. The CVC agreed with me that a lot of abuse is taking place in the name of vigilance and they did specially mention my own railways.

The result is the safest way to serve is not to serve.

If you want to serve, then better factor in the risk involved, and be extra smart, take care of all the bosses, the wolves to be kept at bay and well, be prepared for the exit in service even without pension but the life after, assured to be comfortable. Of course a rare case. But it did happen to a few.

But quite a few , in fact a large number with tensions managed to work honestly and retire gracefully too. But almost all of them served at mediocre levels as compared to what they can actually deliver considering their intellectual levels. This is what I told the PM. The nation is losing out heavily with the attitude of suspecting the officers with long illustrious careers of decades, suddenly being treated as if they are thieves because they did interpret rules differently than a mere clerk of average intelligence.

If with one Vigilance and a CBI this could happen, imagine the position with Lok Pal in place as they are planning with a huge manpower combining investigation, prosecution and punishment too. All this to happen in fixed time bound manner--how can you achieve some thing like that with batteries of lawyers all round and assuring principles of natural justice too. Just like the Supreme Court it will get just clogged up with cases--some genuine and many fake.

How can you get thousands of people who are totally honest and scrupulous? The power in hand makes a vigilance inspector or the Lok Pal representative at field level vulnerable to the heady feeling of superiority over the fellow beings and unless one cringes before them , he he can simply initiate a case. A corrupt man will take care of him first. Many a honest man will refuse to cringe, and will then face a case file staring at him. Soon honest men will leave the government. In the last decade I personally know at least 4 cases who left railway in disgust at JAG and SAG levels. That is only tip of the ice berg. More cases will happen in all departments in India with Lok Pal.

Then will political guys get caught? The sheer information over load and the case files generated in the system will see to it that LokPals like Supreme Court Judges, will be forced to adjourn cases and it may take a decade before they will be able to decide.

As a friend of mine says, if it is limited to political class alone, then it becomes manageable. It is unimaginable that only political class will allow themselves to be isolated like this. 'Ijjat ka sawal hai". But the political class will fight tooth and nail to see that they are protected. The corrupt actually rule. We have the good ones among them, like Antony. He is a rare spotlessly clean politician.

The definition of honesty is steal money from the public coffers but do not put your own fingers in the till. Pass on to the higher up. Today this is the concept.

But CWG failed to cover their tracks and did the job shabbily not in time. Had they kept up targets and quality, nothing would have been exposed. The spectrum story too was badly handled. Over confidence? Or over zealous CAG? Or the thieves falling out and leaking out some scrap information to media and triggered the domino effect. Else these would have remained unexposed. Ganga would have been flowing quietly.

But corruption is truly eating into the vitals of our nation. The Act itself cannot help. Sheer power to one agency will not solve the problem. It is naive and simplistic , as Nandan Nilekani says.

Then what is the practical solution?

We can see two levels of corruption. One which daily affects us. Taxes, day to day living, registration of property, driving licence, travel tickets, municipal services, power and communication services. The policeman at traffic lights. Let us call this as type A.

Another is industry and business related higher level dealings where public property deals are done. Here higher stakes are involved and oil, land, spectrum, PPP , purchase of technologies, procurement of equipment and similar types of projects approvals and clearances are involved. let us call this as type B.

In the modern era another type of corruption in financial markets and manipulation has arisen: insider trading, regulators over looking Ponzy schemes, money laundering through PN's and off shore investment agencies, launching new and novel innovative derivatives of derivatives trading, creating virtual values out of perceived estimates of increase in values and futures markets--- all well dressed intelligent people playing games, but having serious implications of imploding with serious impact on economy and credit markets. This is a new development, most of the time is not understood by common public but, still we end up paying price by losing wealth in equity valuations. Then you suddenly find Finance Ministry quietly providing for thousands of crores to capitalise the nationalised banks. The NPAs are quietly managed. All this funding is going from our taxes only.Let us call this as type C.

In type A cases. such staff involved in revenue collections like toll gates and licensing authorities like RTOs. and Police stations with jurisdiction on truck movements across borders, do end up making lots of money even at inspector level. But the system are made such that they can make money and then share with superiors. Simple systemic changes can eliminate this problem. In truth compared to the revenue collected by the state from these sources, the leakage could be substantial. This revenue can be made up by direct one time or annual tax collection on line, and dismantle all other physical collection of taxes in cash.

Things like inspection of goods requirement should be exceptional and not routine.

There are some IAS and IPS officers who did make changes in their limited time but they get shifted in no time to human resources or training departments. The political calss and quite a large number of senior rank officers rule the roost.

Electronic collection of taxes, banning cash transactions, eliminating multi-check points did occupy the minds of our officers but will is lacking. The Minister does not want it.

Coming to individual's life, Railways did achieve substantial reduction in corruption in sale of tickets and reservations for travel by computerisation. Yes there are still cases of sophisticated computer based pre-blocking of tickets and trying to make some extra money. Still more than 95% enjoy corruption and hasselfree travel. Shortage of service availability is the root cause. Mostly if this problem is addressed, we are fine.

Communications, earlier suffered from need for bribing the Telecom department. By flooding the market with so many private parites vying for business, our lives have become free from this evil.

Taxes of municipality/electrical bills are now computerised and we are able to pay without harassment in cities like Hyderabad.

Our organised services are doing well in quite a few areas.

But the key is BAN CASH transactions and human discretionary powers. Let on line payments or kiosk payments through computers operated by franchisees take over. That is what Nandan was hinting at. With data links all over the country, it is now possible to eliminate revenue leakage and make lives of normal citizens free from tyranny of of some low level inspector.

Driving license too is simply a matter of streamlining the process through on line tests, followed by adequate number of test and certify agents. Attitudes too make a difference. A pre-conceived notion that without payment nothing happens, makes a willing citizen trying to palm off a note to avoid the boredom and tedious test procedures.

Type A cases , hence can be attended by such systemic changes reducing the work load of the government as well as harassment of the citizen. Extensive computerised systems in position can then eliminate substantial "discretionary" human interface in a large number of services, affecting the day to day life of a citizen.

Coming to Type B cases, where the Corporates greedy for profits and the power dispensers and trustees of the public funds and assets interact we need to take care of two issues: Policy and Execution. Policies are manipulated first to favour some groups and in execution discretionary powers are used to distribute favours in return for compensation. Highest levels of political power and Corporate power come in to play, with substantial influence on the media too and even directing power over the elements of regulatory authorities and CBI and Vigilance. Even selection of Ministers can be influenced by corporate interests. This actually is truly a difficult and complex area where pointing a finger is difficult.

But there is one simple secret. The secret of the combined power of these groups is paradoxically "secrecy". All of them want to appear to be extremely good people and want to appear to be righteous leaders of the society. No one wants to be known as a thief. Honour and image are important. These are people who die if their honour dies. So long as hidden from public scrutiny and no exposure is assured, they blatantly indulge in dog eat dog type vicious play. They will violate any norm or ethic to get what they want. This is the typical psychology of the men for whom success is the ultimate justification for whatever they do. Very ambitious and intelligent people are involved.

Actually Type B and C are in the grip of these persons. In case of Type B political class gets involved more extensively directly, but in type C too, more astute intelligent political class coupled with corporate players play the game.

So the secret power of these people gives us the key too for the solution. If every order of the government is to be issued only with the complete file papers including noting and the process laid and followed, being made available to public on a central document server, we remove this secrecy in working.

We get two pronged protection.

For every sector or group or company which emerges as the beneficiary of the order, there are more than one who did not get the benefit. SO they will act as the scrutinisers for the entire case, and if they find some obvious unfair play or mis-interpretation or wanton wrong interpretation of any policy, they can immediately approach an authority like Lok pal or special court, or regulator, to get the order set aside as bad in law and in spirit. All documents needed for this purpose will be readily available.

Secondly this very fear that the political and bureaucratic class cannot get away issuing a government order to favour some one, by hiding behind secret government files., acts as a serious deterrent to better stick to norms.

Image conscious political class too now gets reined in. They become powerless to be arbitrary and get things done by harassing the bureaucrat.

Now for an authority like Lok pal, the job becomes simpler. There is little investigation needed. All the data in files being available, they can judge whether the order is is fair or not.

It is not people whom we judge first. We judge only the work first. But repeated occurrences will certainly point the needle of suspicion at the people involved. But it is no more a case of bolting the doors after the loot is taken away. Not a post mortem but prevention and benefit is anyway denied.

What could be the objections?

Age old tradition and mind conditioning that we should keep the process of governance a sacred secret. The stupidity or otherwise of the noting by distinguished officers needs to be protected from public scrutiny to preserve the image of the government.

The information of the various companies data must be protected from the rival companies-- as if it is the government's responsibility. Actually once the decision is arrived at it has no meaning.

Another point which very righteously pointed out with stiff upper lip of the British , is that an officer will not be able to write fearlessly his opinion! He may get targeted by vested interests.

If you analyse, the arguments are specious and has no validity.

Let us take one by one. The image of the government is getting badly affected actually by this secrecy. Even genuine and required decisions taken in public interest are believed to be driven by the vested interests today. The trust deficit is dangerously high. Credibility is at the lowest. If at all, this step will restore the transparency in the governance and image of the government will only improve.

To write fearlessly, secrecy is actually a hindrance. The superior uses the secret nature of the file to stifle the honest today. Open visibility actually improves the chances of the honest officer to remain fearless. This openness has another important influence. The fence sitters, will now be forced to fall on the right side of the line. The really bad guys still try to manipulate with intelligent looking arguments, but now they are limited to writing down their opinions but cannot force the issue. If some one still wants to do the wrong thing, he is forced to record his reasons and that is enough record nailing him.This record is now public.

Anyway during the processing of the case, it is necessary to keep the file confidential to avoid interference by outsiders, but once decision is taken and orders are issued, the file need not be secret.

To control intelligent but crooked, there is nothing but open working, with fear of public exposure in real time, which alone is actually effective. Soon they too will be forced to fall in line because, the order will get nullified within 24 hours of issue of such bad orders.

Lok Pal then becomes lean but very mean for the bad operators. Even bad Lok Pal has a problem. The mass of citizens who now have access to information, certainly judge the working of the Lok pal and the case can immediately move to Supreme Court , through an appeal of the affected party or activist in public interest.

We save the needless time required to ferret out information from the government as it is happening today.

The types of B & C can then be effectively check mated.

More important is the over all effect on the country that we mean business and attitude itself will undergo a sea change.

The current thinking of creating Lok Pal as an additional huge parallel government , wishing it to be much purer than the existing government, following the same path of creating secret files, with a hordes of so called honest guys going after so called dishonest guys , is truly a scene from a horror movie.

The country will be brought to a halt unwittingly and life of the citizens will become miserable. More miserable than what it is.

Please understand, we are one nation and it is unfair to to treat an entire group of servants of the public to be useless and dishonest. That includes the politicians. Circumstances we allowed to be created, produced opportunities which some abused. It does not mean we condemn wholesale the entire system We have done well in spite of some bad guys.

I believe if we understand the core problem, then solution is not complex. But if we do not, and still follow old colonial thinking that we need some watchful inspector for every worker and every worker is assumed to be suspect, then suspect the inspector also who is supposed to watch, we end up in a black hole.

Come to think of it, this golden moment created by innocent Anna can become the harbinger of doom for the country , all with good intentions. But this moment can be used to make a little structural changes, and our country can glow.

In summary we do need Lok Pal..how this Lok pal should function is the matter.

Let me draft an outline of the Lok pal Act which I would implement if I have the power.

Quote:

Draft Lok pall Bill Aug 2011.

Not with standing any thing contained in any other Act the following provisions of the Lok pal Act shall apply>

Each and every non-secret government order issued shall be necessarily released as authenticated electronic version along with all the policy background information, the file through which this excutive action is take under the policy, the complete set of documets relied upon. the noting of various levels of government officers/or PSU officers, or officers of the regulatory authority; all this shall be released in public domain on secure central government servers with mirror copies at the servers with the Lok Pals. These documents shall have complete legal validity without further authentication.

A special bench of Supreme Court of three judges at center and three Judges of each High Court shall be constituted by each Chief Justice with a minimum tenure of 2 years for the members, who are sitting judges of the court. These benches are the Lok Pal's for Center and states.

An additional registrar with special facilitation of electronic office with dedicated server with access to central data server which stores government orders and the concerned image files leading to the orders, complete by itself will be available for use of each of the Lok Pal.

Lok Pal will have a panel of experts to advise in each sector if needed.

The Lok Pal is free to initiate a case, suo moto or on appeal by an aggrieved party, or a CAG reference, or a media report with reference to the public data base of the file systems, based on information available on the servers with them, give one chance for the government to add any clarifications to the files already in servers, which also will be public, and then pronounce their judgement which can only be appealed to the central Lok Pal of the Supreme Court. this decision will be final for setting aside the order. But the punishment or other wise of the guilty will not arise at this stage. That is because most probably no damage would have occurred and after all it could be a matter interpretation.

Unless a repetitive or gross wanton misjudgment is detected, prima facie, the Lok Pal will not initiate steps for punishing the Minister or the officer involved.

When such occasion arises, then orders to take the person off the responsibility, and orders to initiate criminal proceedings will be given to the government which follows the normal course that law currently takes. Even here the documentary evidence and the Lok Pal's directive will be weighing factors unfavourably for the person so charged and the Sessions Court Judge will pass the orders for the fit punishment."

Unquote

Practically when Lok pal removes one from the responsibility, which is binding and non-negotiable for the government, the person has died, losing the honour.

In this system, it is very unlikely that any public money is looted by the concerned person because, the action here is preventive and catches the culprit even before any further damage is done.

The major cases of type B and type C only are dealt here under Lok Pal.

The type A is tackled by system over haul and avoiding huma interface at all cash transaction points of the government.

But once you tackle type B and C, you will find a sea change in attitudes leading to a society where one does not expect bribe as a routine matter.

My Lokpal Act hence is no more than one page. It is very much constitutional and is well wthin implementation within 2 months.

Here question does not arise who is under the Lok pal or not. Every government servant irrespective of rank from PM to a Joint Secretary and every competent authority issuing such order will get covered. Mind you the order is covered. regarding what to do with the person arises later.If it happens to be say, Prime Minster, the loss of prestige is sufficient for any reasonable man to resign. Or go back to the parliament and get the law or policy modified and issue revised order will be another option. But discipline of following own policy guidelines will be imposed.

To assess how effective this one page Act will be, just imagine what would have happened in Adarsh. 2G or CWG cases, had such Act been in position.

They would never have happened. Period.

I am deeply worried that what Anna created, we will lose getting lost in writing huge Acts like Jan Lok Pal Act --on the same line as British made for colonial slaves. The difference is in administration British executed the ACt for slaves. But for a Republic such kind of an Act does not work. We have to administer our selves now. Some of us should not place ourseves as the masters and the rest slaves. We are working like that.

Time we wake up from our deep slumber and love our nation and ourselves. Anna has created an opportunity. Let us change our lives now.

Else we will only become more miserable and do things leading us in to an anarchy.

One more dead RTI activist in Bhopal....

2011-08-17T19:44:00.000-07:00

This song and drama show that the Government has imposed on us under the benevolence of granting RTI Act is a sham.

Public has fundamental right to know the process of governance. How it became a secret, unless appealed and applied under some ACT, rationed information will be given out? How our innocent citizens are made to believe that they got some wonderful Act!

I strongly hold to my position that the file noting and proceedings should be equally public as the order that got generated so long as it is public domain order. Any order which is issued in public domain shall necessarily be accompanied by the background file image on a secure web.

There shall not be secrecy. Any secret activity can have secret orders and secret files.

Just like Judiciary or the Parliament cannot act in secrecy. a bureaucrat also should not act in secrecy.

During the process of the file, till issue of the order, things can be kept secret. But not after issue of the final order.

This one single step makes the job of Lok Pal easy. Any aggrieved party can move a case of suspected corruption with readily available files and papers within 24 hrs of issue of the order. The irregularity can be proven then and there. Investigation expenses and time are saved. RTI Act becomes superfluous.

It is cost effective and time saving.

Railwaymen and Carnatic Music

2011-08-16T09:28:00.000-07:00

I agree--Carnatic music is very soothing! One thing one learns early in service is that except self, every one else has the smarter answer and no one actually listens to any one.

Some develop a hobby of gardening, some others specialise in to painting, others in to jogging ,mountain climbing, and yes of course the golf, the royal pursuit apart from closed circles of card game clubs with happy hours.

Intelligent but misunderstood by every one else, quite a few railway officers seek solace in areas external to own service areas.

One of my friends and a batch mate did so much of research in to Carnatic Music that he finally published a much acclaimed treatise by the end of his service!

The point is , as I do advise many a friend, enjoy the wonderful privilege of being a member of an organised service, -- a rare club where 24 hours you are taken care of, provided with games of exchanging meaningless notes, which the country thinks to be very important work, and finally rewarded with privileges of free travel and decent pension as well as respect in other non-railwaymen's perception, by arranging some HQ quota for their emergency travel.

A bonus could be, post retirement, snatch positions of being some advisor to some institution or company struggling with the maze of administrative processing we created on railways, to get the service they needed , by using the networking connections developed over the years.

Not bad at all-- why complain! We have all the reasons to be happy and watch the world go by with contentment.

The Supreme Court did what government failed to do for our brave and noble in Armed Forces !

2011-07-31T09:39:00.000-07:00

The way our Government was hounding and humiliating the Armed Forces is so infuriating for any person with self-esteem ; but the patience and maturity with which our Armed Forces behaved is outstanding and one must be proud of having such leadership, in our Forces.

The bureaucrats with inferiority complex constantly drummed in to the heads of political class that the only way to keep powerful dogs obedient is to tighten the leash and give a good whipping, so that who is boss is never for gotten and political class will enjoy the benefits of democracy unfettered.

The fear psychosis was leveraged smartly by the bureaucrats, to take advantage of the insecure political system, to belittle the Armed Forces no end, and finally make them succumb to their own agendas. Adarsh case would not have happened but for this seductive machination of the bureaucracy and political class.

The Supreme Court with the present Chief Justice has really taken historically momentous decisions, which perhaps, the country will look back as significant milestones, which mark the evolution of our nation in to a well balanced powerful democracy secure and confident.

Railway Accidents

2011-07-28T05:34:00.000-07:00

It is truly impressive that normally quiet respected friends of mine are stirred to come out with their thoughts recently in mails to me.

For a railway man an accident and determination of cause never ceases to provoke and invariably the battle lines are drawn department wise.

Rarely truth is revealed. The technical fights are taken to the hollowed grounds of RDSO too, which is supposed to be a technical body, but there too, the same field attitudes prevail.

Logical updating of Criteria for evaluating safety of track-vehicle interaction and safety certification process by RDSO for a new rolling stock got never done.

The case of CRT wagon which got introduced despite poor oscillation trial results, one cannot forget. The way track engineers too fight not to budge from their poor track standards in earlier years, forced Tandon to introduce BOX-N, to"destroy" tracks, which he told me, with a wink at that time. Then track engineers went about introducing 90UTS rails.

Confrontations, arguments and debates do improve to shake up the system and improve but it is not necessarily to be done at a high cost to the system and with a bad blood.

Frequency domain analysis and advanced mathematical modelling for simulating the conditions which are not possible to cover by the limited few kilometers of tests with limited parametric variations, never got off the ground. Safety case analysis is less than satisfactory by international standards. Resistance was and is phenomenal.

The core problem is that RDSO is trying to function as the technical authority with no training except for the field training, for its incumbents occupying and warming the chairs, thereby becoming experts, who somehow spend time to go back to field to seek the career opportunity. True, none joined service to become Professors or scientists or mathematical geniuses.

The day you wear the hat of a Director, within 24 hours, you hold the power of veto on anything that moves in RDSO, which concerns your department. Inter-disciplinary problems are sought to be solved purely with departmental bias.

Individuals who come there from organised services. are excellent and brilliant but ambitious too , naturally. But their eyes are to reach the positions they desire and aspire to be back in railways.

Meantime, the waiting tenure in RDSO is spent as best as they can-- some learn quite a lot-- some contribute significantly within the limitations- but every one wants to get back.

In restructuring the system to allow for truly technology cycles to take off, it was proposed that the officers who opt to join RDSO, should accept a one way ticket -- that is they do get 30 to 50% higher emoluments, performance based and Scientific cadre grades based, in situ promotions, but first go through a rigorous IIT based one year course leading to a diploma/post graduate qualification in basic mathematical modelling and research tools, losing also the departmental tag, remaining a Railway Man only, without departmental administrative bias, anymore.

The institution should become autonomous body under the control of S&T Ministry, but grants for running the same are given by Railways. This would prevent any further influence of bosses in Railways riding over the work of the RDSO.

It may be argued that then it will become another ghost CSIR lab with the same level of zero performance and lots of privileges with easy life. It is possible. But the hope is since with basic field experience of a say a decade, the persons are brought in to the system, the love and commitment built in to the officer, for railway, and the sacrifice he has to make to leave his own service, may all add up to a renewed vigor to push the boundaries of knowledge to contribute to railway working.

Like all things in our country, it is again , we may have to give ourselves a chance.

When your door to return to operational railway is shut and you by attitude choose and excel in work of the advancement of safety and technology improvements, and your advice carries the authority of an autonomous independent body, the truth has a chance.

Truly outstanding officers who want to really improve do get stifled in RDSO. The departmental one up man-ship games each one plays makes it a zero sum game.

We end up producing hot air and safety and technology become victims of product sellers' lobbies.

Where every one believes his own version as the truth, truth dies.

We refuse to allow the CRS reports of accident inquiry to be made public. Why not? A publicly conducted inquiry, if the entire report is public, then we can analyse what led the authority to conclude what he concluded. It is unfair to the authority to take all mud slings, without knowing what exactly was the basis for conclusions drawn. if baseless conclusions are seen to be arrived at, let the stupidity be exposed.

Or some technical base was there, because , always the technical wing of RDSO is consulted by CRS, which forms his basis-- normally they avoid their own conclusions. Like every one else in our system, they also are bureaucrats.

Again the bane of our world is working in secrecy.

Cheers--the world goes on...the Indian Railways too will survive all these ideas.

......

Earnestness in corporate sector, politics, social sector & the government !

2011-07-16T04:34:00.000-07:00

Even when we worked in the government, the inner urge to somehow circumvent the government to do things, we believe to be right and fair, is quite strong.

There are some who confront head on, and the system simply throws him out as anti-bodies.

There are some who get frustrated, and then resign to go out a do things , avoiding the government. Many IAS and IPS officers can be quoted as examples.

But there is a third categoty, who continued in the government, used their smartness, camouflaged the things they want to do to fall within the acceptable limits of the government's perception, and did achieve results.

Earnestness was not abandoned.

The major difference is in private business, there are fewer peer members to be convinced and the over bearing dictatorial owner boss- once convinced , the earnest man gets through his proposals. The spreadsheet works here.

But in the government, the peer group as well as the multi- tiered hierarchy, finally headed by a different class of people, politicians, queer the pitch. The spreadsheets lose their gloss and the communication its effectiveness, colored by many a different filter of perception guided by varying self-interests and as much variable degrees of earnestness, because each has own agenda.

The challenge is truly complex and multi-dimensional. The option of quietly joining the flow is so comfortably welcome.

That is what is happening with almost all persons in the government., and of course, headed by political class with divergent interests.

But earnest persons cannot for long over look the politics which drives finally the system There are spread sheet wielding wizards, who are nowadays joining the political class, to work out the voters profile, what idea appeals, how to manage the perception of different social groups to gain their trust and confidence, and decide what ultimately sells with the objective of getting back to power. The conflict of interest in this game is that earnestness is forced to be compromised with the need to indulge in perception management rather than by actual delivery of services promised earlier. Why?

Again the same complex mechanism of the government comes in the way coupled with political requirements of meeting unfair demands of pressure groups who want to gain what they had set out to gain, through fair or unfair means.

So smart laptop holding crowds work on corporate side to fight the war to gain from the government, while another similar laptop wielding group manages the flow of political power to grant but assuring their bosses objective.

Thus we have a strange scenario where small groups, intelligent and earnest in their own way, keep striving day in and day out working in three focus areas namely corporate world, the political world and the social sector avoiding both the corporate and political class, but the government is an ever present factor for all of them.

Majority in the government just remain indifferent to all the fierce fights going on just as much as majority in the society too remain mere spectators, suffering whatever the consequences.

A letter of welcome to Shri Dinesh Trivedi , the new Minister of Railway

2011-07-13T05:24:00.000-07:00

Shri Dinesh Trivedi ,

Hon'ble Minister of Railway

Rail Bhavan, New Delhi.

Dear Sir,

Rest assured I am not trying to congratulate you, to get any favour or attention from your high office. I served my nation to the best of my abilities and retired and refused to take up any commercial re-employment, except being a ( no salary) member of the Empowered Board of Government of India for delivering the ITER ( the first Fusion Reactor) in France, a multi national effort, for two years.

Though it is unlikely my email would be put up to you, it is still my call of conscience that I should congratulate you for heading the august railway ministry, and share a few thoughts with you on this occasion.

We railway men fall hopelessly in love with our railways. The emotional ties develop too strongly for us- may be because we serve 24/7 for over 35 years, unlike other services where, once they leave office , can go back to family and sleep peacefully.

Welcome to the club Sir!!

You too will now serve 24/7 for the next remaining period of the term of UPA!! It is a tough job.

Being involved operationally all the 24 hours 7 days a week, it leaves little time for introspection and planning for the system to bring in major changes.

In my time I tried my best to correct the system, within my boundaries,even with all the operational burden.

Change management in railway is almost a daunting impossible task burdened with real risks of high order.

I wish you all the best Sir! Being cool is the only solution to the chaotic running around you will face in the new post.

But railwaymen are lovable, dedicated even though some times you find them stubborn.

May God bless you!!

Warm regards,

--
सत्यं परम् धीमही
बी. राजाराम
Rajaram Bojji M.Tech. IRSE (Retd.), FIE, FNAE, AMASCE
Fmr. MD Konkan Railway /Min. of Railways India
www.atrilab.com
834 Spring Knoll Drive Herndon 20170 VA USA Tel: +1 703 796 0225

Sri Padmanabha Swamy , Travancore Royals and the Wealth!

2011-07-08T13:22:00.000-07:00

What a wonderful out of the world experience it is to observe the true Royal behaviour of the Travancore royal family!

For centuries they guarded the wealth much larger than that of Nizam, but never built own personal wealth as done by Nizam, but these royals protected the wealth from the British loot, and never aspired to take advantage of the wealth.

Once I had the privilege of being in the same Temple, along with the royal family members. How simple unassuming but dignified they were, in simple dhoti and no showing off of gold. No signs of royal/rich ostentatious clothes even.

Once their turn is over, they quietly walked away out of the temple, through a special connecting door in to their palace. FOr that half an hour or so, the temple remains exclusive --while public wait in the huge corridors with temple, watching the royal family doing their pooja.

They are distinguished more because the public stood respectfully giving way to them. They do the first morning pooja.

I was contrasting this with the way our TTD Board members, behave arrogantly in Tirumala, as if they have more rights and privileges than original royals who built the basic infrastructure.Then the way our Ministers and senior bureaucrats along with their peons in impressive uniforms, show their power , all dressed in expensive silk clothes, and ladyfolk showing off their heavy gold ornaments, walking "royally" without bothering to look at the tens of thousands of devotees patiently waiting in que. They are made to wait while the important make their special prayers!!! The indifference shown is truly criminal. Add to this the special Security Police protection groups taking their kith and kin with equal disregard to normal pilgrims. My feeling is the time for pilgrims is now reduced because of the increased police all over the place, every one of them forcing their own presence to be felt by conducting special darshans to whom they favour.

Another glaring contrast is the way the AP Ministers camped personally at Prashanti Nilayam, with Baba practically in coma, for over two weeks, got the village barricaded and even used the police to empty the streets and said to run a convoy of vehicles too in and out of the village Puttaparthi. Rumours float naturally, when one sees these strange goings on.

Then the Ministers vanish, and official announcement follows of Baba's departure.

I am glad Kerala state ministers did not land up and tried to take control of the temple at Thiruvananthapuram. It is really a huge temple of course, but no ostentatious gold plating all over, you find.

Hope the same royal family remains trustees and as they desired, rightly, use the wealth to set up world class universities and hospitals in the name of Sri Padmanabha Swamy.

Earnestly , I pray, the Supreme Court takes this decision too.

Printed from

Use temple treasure for hospitals and schools: Royals

AFP | Jul 8, 2011, 07.25pm IST

NEW DELHI: The head of a former royal family renounced on Friday any personal claim to billions of dollars' worth of ancient treasure discovered in a temple in the kingdom his ancestors once ruled.

"The royal family is not claiming anything. No part belongs to the family," said KK Venugopal, a lawyer representing the descendants of the erstwhile rulers of the Travancore princely state in Kerala.

Venugopal made the statement in the Supreme Court in New Delhi, which is driving efforts to establish ownership of the sacks of gold, precious stones and jewellery found last week at the Sree Padmanabhaswamy Temple in Thiruvananthapuram.

Venugopal said the head of the Travancore family, Marthanda Varma, believed the stunning treasure "should be used judiciously for religious and social purposes" such as building hospitals and schools.

"The artifacts may be kept in a museum independent of the temple," he added.

The temple, dedicated to god Vishnu, was built hundreds of years ago by the king of Travancore and donations by devotees have been kept in the temple's vaults ever since.

All but one of the vaults have been opened, with the value of the haul estimated at between 500 billion and one trillion rupees ($11-22 billion).

The discoveries catapulted the shrine, renowned for its intricate sculptures, into the league of India's richest temples.

Since India achieved independence from Britain in 1947, a trust managed by descendants of the Travancore royal family has controlled the temple.

On Friday, the Supreme Court directed that the opening of the final vault be deferred and asked for suggestions from the state government and Varma's family on how the treasure should be secured and preserved.

Why we want to keep governance a secret affair?

2011-07-06T10:56:00.000-07:00

We bureaucrats for some reason are still unable to get out of our well conditioned mind set to keep the right of the government intact to hide files from public.

While the process preceding the final government orders should be secret till the issue of orders, once the order is public, automatically the entire file noting and the documents which led to the competent authority to issue the order, should also lose the protection of secrecy.

Every single government order issued to affect public interest, and is published , should have the supporting documents and noting of bureaucracy and the competent authority, made equally public as the order itself.

Why a citizen should "appeal" to the "master" in the public servant, to get information under the RTI Act?

Please think over. It is a matter of just an executive order which can be issued now, today.

Present technology allows images of the 20 odd critical pages and the noting of the three levels of bureaucrats below the competent authority to be posted as pdf files on central information data base along with the final government order.

Then in case grievance arises, a court of law can be approached with the down loaded authentic documents, from web, for redressal.

This step acts as powerful deterrence to even a bad guy in the system, because of the fear that his action will get exposed along with the order, for a court to intervene.

Imagine under this system the scenarios of Adarsh scam or 2G scam or allocation of oil blocks. None of these would have occurred.

In fact over a period the high level corruption would vanish and the motivation for occupying the exalted Minister's post to do arbitrary favours to kith and kin, would also vanish. The political corruption too would evaporate then.

Only service element will be left in the governance.

We actually do not need the song and dance drama going on for enacting more laws and creating more number of authorities to whom we should appeal.

You are all intelligent and understand how bureaucracy functions. I am surprised why you are fighting shy of demanding this simple but the most effective step, to eliminate even intention of corruption in working.

Citing practical difficulties and need to keep the process secret are specious arguments. I as head of Konkan Railway did practice real time working with audit and vigilance watching the work flow on the web.

It is practical and feasible unless one has a private agenda.

Hope you do not have any.

Had I been the PM, I would have forced the issue against the fellow ministers and the Cab sec and got the orders issued implementing the executive order as cited above.

At least discuss the demand in public and in press.

Paris APM 2011 Presentation 24th May 2011

2011-05-30T04:11:00.000-07:00

Lok Pal Bill- do not subvert the Constitution

2011-05-20T12:06:00.000-07:00

Public administration & governance issues demand not Twitter and Facebook group pressures and inputs but educated inputs from those who truly understand the principles of government, legislation and jurisprudence.

If we do not want to believe in the capability of Prime Minister and Justices if Supreme Court then, what next?

Is it anchors of Times Now and NDTV and few splinter groups vociferous in protests who should be able rewrite constitutional authorities' fate?

The constitution did provide adequate well thought out processes for punishing these highly placed institutions.

Yes, it is a more difficult process than like punishing a peon.

We cannot create parallel subordinate but having superior authority like Lok Pal compared to Supreme Court and Cabinet of the country.

Too much confused misdirected effort is going on.

What is the key contributor for the various cogs in the wheel of governance to deviate from sworn path of honest discharge of duties?

In my opinion the current secretive working with the assurance that a case cannot be framed in any reasonable time against his dereliction of duty and further abuse of office, gives confidence to the wrong doer.

Further the same bureaucratic process can be used to deny or delay data collection.

The simplest step is to make public within 24 hours the entire file leading to the government orders.

Then ready evidence makes it easy to proceed for any public interest organization to use even existing laws, to stop the government even before any damage can be done.

Actually this step puts every one on alert and will not even think of wrong doing.

Instead we are going round chasing own tail.

We can make nuclear reators safer..

2011-04-25T04:42:00.000-07:00

A conceptual outline design of reactor container vessel module set taking in to account the recent incident in Japan.

Engr. B Rajaram M.Tech.,F.I.E., F.N.A.E. IRSE (Retd.)

Disasters are natural and unavoidable. With the best of estimates of risks, still a case may arise as in case of Fukushima Japan in 2011, when extraordinary and unprecedented natural disaster occurs, even the best of human designs can give away. The nuclear reactor case is different from other infrastructure cases.

Normal non-nuclear infrastructure or related equipment like bridges, roads, trains or air craft or a ship can cause damage limited to the event. But in case of nuclear reactor , as is seen the radiation hazard and uncontrollable process melting down the core, create situations leading even to quick abandonment safely of the reactor. The containment of radiation becomes a primary concern. Spread by air/water of the radiation has got to be minimised.

A proposal hence is made to construct the reactor building and vessel in such a way that humans get maximum protection in case of failure. Also the proposal is planned to be relatively economical leveraging the inherent strength of earths crust to provide the needed blast resistance and radiation containment.

A schematic diagram is presented.

We can have multiple domes covering the top of the reactor containment vessel.

The above arrangement of three shaft units for each reactor unit become modular in construction.

Advantages are obvious: all the radio-active units are underground and only the non-radio active steam is allowed out.

Security against air attack and access control too becomes much more effective and sound.

Designers get leverage the natural earth cover to augment strength of the container building.

In the worst case scenario abandoning is faster to seal off the radio active area under the ground.

This is just a conceptual outline. Details have to be worked out by nuclear engineers and a brain storming session of all the concerned is suggested.
.

Cab Sec TSR and Lok Pal Bill

2011-04-19T15:57:00.000-07:00

Cab Sec TSR Subramaniam's Op Ed in New Indian Express...my comments to him.

I respect Shri TSR as another junior brother in service. My take on this subject is a little different. Instead of negativism of fighting corruption with another law which in my opinion is a futile exercise because , laws are compromised willingly by the powerful lobbies, I would suggest a simpler system to PREVENT corruption from occurring.

In public affairs , neither bureaucrat nor the Minister should be afraid or feel shy to write what he honestly feels.

In such a case we are unnecessarily providing a shroud of secrecy hiding government files from public view and on top of it grandly offered RTI Act with a plethora of Commissioners and bureaucratic wrangles to get even a simple fact out of the government.

The Lok Pal will have to first gather evidence. How does he do it? CBI and the story continues.

Instead simply make it mandatory to post the scanned noting three levels prior to the competent authority recording orders of the government, and post them on secure government websites, within 24 hours of issue of the orders.

This does not require any sophisticated computer literacy nor investment in to government servers. We have them already.

Any foul play can then be immediately taken to court with evidence within 48 hours to a High Court Judge specially nominated for the purpose of Lok Pal duty for a State decision, or a Supreme Court Judge for Central Govt. decisions, who can see prima facie the case fit for issue of stay order.

But with such open working, we will hardly get any case!!!

But what we lack is courage and honesty.

We can dismantle the RTI Act and the expensive paraphernalia as well as need not create to heavy a bureaucratic set up

It is not correct to blame only the political class, it is as much the higher echelons of bureaucracy who become part and parcel of the political class doing their bidding.

Remove secrecy. Honesty will automatically prevail.

Ref: http://expressbuzz.com/opinion/op-ed/contours-of-the-lokpal-bill/267040.html

Nehru, Indira and Lok Pal

2011-04-17T08:56:00.000-07:00

I am reminded of a particular letter written to very young Indira by her doting father Nehru, specifically advising her not to do or say some thing ( concerning others) away from public view, if she cannot do the same thing in public.

Verbatim I do not recollect but the spirit is what I recollect.

Somehow that advice stuck in my mind which guided me in my years of public service.

So long as public servants and Ministers are allowed to act in secrecy in affairs relating to public, their weaknesses in character , seduce them to compromise public interests.

We have to give credit to their superior intelligence and street smartness and spirit to succeed at any cost, but once we remove the layer of secrecy and all their acts are subject to public scrutiny within 24 hours of their final decision on file, starting from at least three levels noting prior to decision making, we will see a sea-change in government's working.

An honest officer will finally get credit in service and manipulators will find it hard to make a killing.

The Ministers will have to act true to what they publicly say. This kernel of open governance will have a cascading effect in our society. Actually incentive to become Minister drops and really service oriented efficient persons will opt to become Ministers.

Once political class at the top are good, the bureaucracy will have incentives to steadily improve our systems.

Well.... instead we are busy with making some laws and creating additional parallel posts and worry about laying down their interplay rules.

Identify the problem correctly and apply the right solution.

The dark forces which excel in secrecy seems to be winning. The Lok Pal will be a non-starter. The guy will get some swanky offices and creature comforts but not many cases to handle that too in proper judicial manner. The law will make it difficult to prosecute.

Probably he will again depend on the same CBI unless they create another army of independent investigators!!!

With CVC, CAG, CBI and weak corrupt political bosses, quite a large number of officers down the line have stopped taking decisions for fear of victimisation.

Now we can add LOk Pal too....Only media will get exciting bytes and TRPs but I expect no improvement in governance.

Lok Pal, Anna Hazare and the corrupt--- why not every citizen be a Lok Pal?

2011-04-10T18:33:00.000-07:00

If a Lok Pal has to administer the Act then it will have all the ills associated with CBI and CVC.

The problem is we are still not able to get over the British colonial mind sets. Democracy will become healthier only if we are able to eliminate the dark corners and secretive doors blocking the light to be shed and operatives working behind thick and thin veils.

So long as we refuse to work openly on web based exposure in real time, the public administration and decision making steps, in public domain, visible to all, we have no hope.

When we remove the file covers protecting the bureaucrats, then every citizen becomes Lok Pal. Centralising the power in an individual is a serious mistake. One Lok Pal or a commission of Lok Pals are easily compromised. They will act as hindrance in administration of the Act.

What is the problem in making public administration free from secrecy and open and visible for every citizen? What is there to hide from public view?

Surprisingly the movement has failed to insist on this simple first step, and the Government must have heaved a sigh of relief.

The deterrence of each and every decision process being openly visible to all citizens, is so powerful, that we will not need any further Act.

Like CVC /CBI are used to protect the guilty, the Lok pal will also be reduced to another institutional protection for the corrupt. The principle of many a guilty can escape but not one single innocent shall be punished under the law, will be cynically made use of by the Government to protect their favourite corrupt.

There should be a massive demand first to open up public administration process to public with modern web based technology to cover each and every financial decision and policy initiative.

Do we have the courage to do so, is the moot point.

Earthquake, Japan and Karatani!

2011-04-03T18:54:00.000-07:00

Death of capitalism as desired by the Professor Karatani ( 1), appears a distant dream for me.

Like democracy, capitalism also will enjoy TINA protection. The packaging may be different.But the essence remains: democracy is finally dictatorship of the periodically elected leadership and capitalism too is the same greed to grab by any means more than what one needs, and control using financial instruments , the natural resources, making others servile while at the same time touting that the exploited are being served!

The first sloka of Esopanishad by the first human Swayambhu Manu when we started our business of living, amply and optly describes the path each one should take , if peaceful and happy life for all has to be assured without any bubbles or economic recessions. Over the billions of years, we have proven that we just don't care for that sloka but follow our own creative genius.

The chase of humans to fulfill material needs and desires driven constantly with more and more variety and re-packaging the same old ancient greed and coveting to prevail over other human beings around and then other communities , in different forms, will continue.

Major disasters suddenly halts us in our tracks and a different community attitude is displayed. But soon, the anthropological driving forces, will gain revert back. We are helpless.

The cycles continue. Not that disasters are good for us to get a slap in face once in a way, to mend our ways, but the greedy will soon make an opportunity out of the disaster.

As the stocks fell for the nuclear energy utilities in the exchange, the stocks of construction and infrastructure companies rose by higher order comparatively , foreseeing the massive investments in that sector soon.

We are very smart.

(1)

Earthquake and Japan

Kojin Karatani

(Professor Kojin Karatani is a distinguished Japanese philosopher and

literary critic. This essay, written on March 16, 2011 and translated

into English by Seiji M. Lippit, is published by

The Hindu with the permission of the author.

Professor Karatani's biography is at www.kojinkaratani.com/en/bios/biography.html.)

Marx, Class struggles, knowledge workers and my life!

2011-03-31T19:28:00.000-07:00

[A Primer on Class Struggle

by Michael Schwalbe

Michael Schwalbe is a professor of sociology at North Carolina State University. He can be reached at MLSchwalbe@nc.rr.com.

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/03/31-4]

My thoughts in response:

An excellent erudite perceptive analysis of the hidden class struggle in any given society, influencing our day to day life.

The one difference I observe from what Marx considered in his treatise as well as what Prof. Schwalbe brought out in his competent analysis, is that both of them consider capitalists of Marxist variety and transformed and rechristened as modern Corporates by the author, as well as the working classes represented by trade unions have some kind of unity of purpose among themselves and act in unison.

Corporates too work to get at the throat of each other to strangle while driving the process as described by the author. This factor adds an additional dimension.

Further the new knowledge based service sector which evolved has made the knowledge workers a walking human capital which goes out of gates of factory every evening and the Corporate head goes to bed wondering whether he has done enough to retain the "loyalty" of his working capital and worrying too, whether his counterparts have already stolen his "working capital".

This new trend has taken over almost all sectors of industry with semi-automated robots taking over the production lines even in many a traditional manufacturing industry.

In efforts to retain the working capital, many corporates allocate sweat capital and the workers start owning substantial equity of the company too, transforming themselves in to a new breed of capitalist-workers.

Traditional clear cut divisions of workers and capitalists is further made irrelevant today, with financial institutions controlling finance having tremendous influence in survival of an industry and as uninvolved players, are practically dictating terms of assuring efficiency of their own working capital and returns.

The government too is now has to operate part corporate and part old model god-father for balancing social needs, leveraging the tax incomes and making policy shifts as lobbies want.

The large union bosses are now operating in the changed circumstances more as another corporate honchos than old model leaders caring for the "poor" worker.

The reality is in modern world either you are a well to worker or a job-less guy on the street. There is nothing like "poor" worker.

The unemployed are large in number but remain unorganized to become threat to any one. Long term effect on the politician losing vote looms as threat to the politician to make the necessary policy shift while manging the corporate interests which includes the trade union bosses' interests.

It has become a complex multi-dimensional class interest struggle now, to list a few:

# capitalist-worker

# corporate- where even the CEO is a worker but Board and Stock Exchange control their fate

# the dictating ruthless financial institutions who can shift their financial working capital from an industry without any emotional or fear of getting hurt in return by loss of production or strike action etc

# the walking "working capital" of knowledge workers who may take a flight any time unless motivated constantly

# the government with democratic base and freedom of speech in media

# the job-less reaching a critical mass using tea party politics to change governments

As compared to time of Marx, when only a few thinkers used to worry about society and "think", today there is a well entrenched class of think tanks, centers for policy exposition, thought leaders, opinion leaders, media commentators, fighting for the space to manage the trends of this complex multi-class struggle.

It is no more as simplistic as envisioned by Marx. Russia and China are the living examples of the transformation today.

I wish the Professor who is an expert, takes into account these additional dimensions and writes another article.

But I enjoyed this reading, which made me think.

सत्यं परम् धीमही
बी. राजाराम
Rajaram Bojji M.Tech. IRSE (Retd.), FIE, FNAE, AMASCE
Fmr. MD Konkan Railway /Min. of Railways India
www.atrilab.com
834 Spring Knoll Drive Herndon 20170 VA USA Tel: +1 703 796 0225
+17037452680 +15713455048 Currently @ Hyderabad 9885700007

Cosmos and my cup of coffee!

2011-03-29T08:35:00.000-07:00

Traveling along with thinking and exploring minds is always full of excitement.

Just a passing thought at this moment: any thing solid or living around looks so real even though impermanent and is constantly transforming every second which includes you and me.

Look deeper and deeper with your minds eye, to find smaller and smaller particles reaching invisible state for naked eye. But as we go deeper and see further with deeper jnana or equipments like electron microscopes you will find another strange world.

Still further go closer and closer to molecular atomic and subatomic levels, there is hardly any mass but only vast spaces where gravitational principles too do not operate!!

Gravity is every where as a weak force but depends on huge masses to manifest itself.

But at this subatomic space level we have just space. Go further closer and you find just mass less charges and a frequency domain pervading but just empty and empty universe at the same scale as we find our stars and galactic systems, existing in vast emptiness of space , the space overwhelmingly so vast as compared to matter.

But the most amazing thing for me is to see such vast empty space within us when you reach subatomic level but when put together, all the molecules wonderfully join together either to become the most thinking intelligent being like you or the faithful dog following you or the laptop before you responding to your commands or the cup of coffee you take.

Should I conclude empty space has become a material reality?

Or should I say what you see around is actually a manifestation of the same empty space existing within us and the cosmos and;

there is some way these space can be experienced as one single entity and;

be able to tune in to that world of frequency spectrum to be able to live at a different plane of experience of the true world;

much beyond than what we are experiencing within the narrow band width of frequency allocated for our mortals with our physical senses & brain acting as the cut off filters limiting our awareness.

Just as energy levels of subatomic particles determine their orbits, we need to raise energy levels at conscience levels to modify the cut off filters to broaden the band width of sensitivity of our inner self.

I am a novice. Very little knowledge I have. May be the thoughts could border on foolishness against the standard of very highly respected philosophers who speak in very complex terms.

From complex eleven dimensional string theory to proposals of gravitons , I find we deal with vast empty spaces.

Cheers-thanks for traveling with me in my thought experiment of journey through cosmic space to our inner space at speeds many orders more than the speed of light!

I just finished my cup of coffee too! Have a nice wonderful day!

Fission Nuclear Energy - an irresponsible initiative of scientists and engineers endangering humanity!

2011-03-26T03:13:00.000-07:00

We cannot stop disasters from occurring.

But the post disaster management is the issue. In case a bridge falls, or a building collapses or a flight drops in ocean, the damage is limited to that event only.

Unlike these, the nuclear disaster, is without remedial measures. The radiation troubles go on and on and with only 4% enrichment the uranium once triggered has shown what it can do us. The great nation Japan is humbled. Tap water in Tokyo cannot be consumed.

Further apart from wringing hands and praying all the nuclear experts have left the matter to those brave poor workers who still keep going on to the FUkushima work site....the scientist who designed I see sitting in his offcie and looking quite grim.

Humans when they design, the safety case analysis and clear risk assessment and education to all concerned must be there. Nuclear case is there is no remedy post disaster.

It is said rightly, disasters occur. But here is the glaring case where nuclear experts have thought themselves to be Gods, who can design systems to with stand any disaster! Because disaster is one thing the nuclear engineers do not have solution for.

If disasters are natural, then the consequences should be such that we can mitigate the same. But in case of radio isotopes, we just succumb to them. The collateral damages are irreversible.

Then the spent fuel storage. The governments are secretive where they are hiding all the nuclear waste. You may dig mines to hide them. But having triggered the rods, we continue to have the radiation horror for hundreds of years(?) or more than that. These piles are sealed in huge boxes like treasure boxes and kept away from present generation.

The dangerous muck we are leaving behind for the posterity is irresponsible. Pity those who discover these treasure boxes in their search for discovery of new knowledge or wealth, in future.

I agree science and knowledge should progress to help humanity to improve quality of life. But what is happening is thoughtless and insensitive application of half-baked knowledge with uncontrollable consequences.

Scientists and engineers have failed the humanity in wanton irresponsible implementation of nuclear energy projects.

Any technology shall answer the question of post disaster implications and capacity to protect humans from protracted hundreds of years of irreversible loss of quality of life.

Nuclear disaster is not the same as other infrastructure failures. It needs only some 10 ICBMs to misfire to plunge all of us in to a long night of radiation of horrors, lasting may be a couple of hundreds of years.

- Show quoted text -

--
सत्यं परम् धीमही
बी. राजाराम
Rajaram Bojji M.Tech. IRSE (Retd.), FIE, FNAE, AMASCE

Superstition and Science---matters of perception?

2011-03-13T00:13:00.000-08:00

May be each one of us should do dhyana... as detailed by Lord Krishna in Bhgavad Gita. May be my superstition?

One gets introduced to a different world than what we perceive. But it is useless to present the same in the current

physically bound frameworks of scientific approach and rational limits.

Superstition and blind words are difficult to understand when used together. Superstition means strong and blind belief

in apparently un-connected cause and effect post hoc ergo propter hoc type. Further adding blind is superfluous, I feel.

A computer scientist like Prof Rao, will have a hard time to convince a simple uninitiated illiterate villager , how he is able to remotely through wireless networks and satellite imagery able to see the current status of his fields very far away and tell him a broken dam was flooding his fields just as he is sitting with you and chatting, after making every thing secure for the day , resting after day's hard work. He will not believe until you show the pictures and even then, only if he believes you are right, then would rush.

A blind faith in you is needed.

Else he will call you crazy by his rational standards. But it does not change the fact. But villager certainly thinks you are nuts.

Matters of perception. Then he suffers. First time he may even dismiss it as a fools' word proven right by chance. if he has strong trust in his own knowledge levels.

Repeated success rate of such advices, then makes him re-think, and will develop a superstitious belief in Prof Rao, that his advice be better followed, even though by his level of rational thinking and knowledge, he is unable to understand nor explain why or how it is happening.

Why has remained a question for all our scientific "laws."

An young boy of 7th grade asked me, WHY two bodies attract to exert force on each other? What is gravity? WHY planets should exert forces on each other?

I am yet to answer his questions.

If some one can help me with the answers, please, I am grateful.

ACD : operation success but the pat(i)ent dead? Hope we will not score self-goal!

2011-02-27T23:23:00.000-08:00

My mind started roaming, on hearing about MR's announcement in the Parliament. Insurmountable problems of different kind arise for bureaucracy to deliver now...

Usually, it would take three months for the budget orders to be issued. Then generally the GMs of railways will have to call for offer of rates from the Konkan Railway or the Railway Board may fix a kind of rate contract like DGS & D rate contract type with Konkan Railway. Being a PSU, Ministry has the power and precedent to place such orders particullalry when the product is covered by patent rights and is a proprietary item. Even for construction works Raliway Ministry places single cost plus orders for projects worth Rs 5000 cr on IRCON. The J&K case is one. The idea is the PSU will follow similar processes as the government and is subject to CAG check. Mind you it is cost plus contract! But it is normal practice to help quick decisions and project progress.

But in this case the unit rates get fixed before hand through negotiations and usual checks for reasonableness.

But it is not that simple, as you will see.

Just an idea in patent needs technology inputs dedicated firmware and special dedicated software too to run on the real time operating system. The patent I got was for my algorithm of deviation count unique in the world to automatically detect change in track hardly 5 m away from each other, which otherwise is not detectable by GPS by own software.

But the communication protocols, high strength digital radio modems which can work even when they are clustered as it happens when many locos are in the yard, need quite a few innovative firmware modifications at OEM premises abroad, and dedicated protocols also happen to be a a serious requirement, which only a dedicated private enterprise with commitment and competence can achieve. In this manufacturing technology, the real time operating system, fine tuning various parameters, are not covered by our patents. This remains property of the company.

It is not one time payment and delivery of software in this case, but a constant integrated development process involving both hardware, firmware too.

So choosing technology partner is crucial. A contest I held in 1999 by offering to compensate only up to Rs 5 lacs and within three months to produce a proto-type which can in pairs can communicate with one another and exchange information about status of each other, then indicate action to brake on a screen. Tests in inital stage were on two road based jeeps/sumos/Gypsies etc.

There companies I offered , the Tata Unysis at that time, the Motorola, and the Kernex. Both Kernex and Tata Unysis were working in Konkan Railway at that time for implementing the wide area networked railway application package.

I personally gave the technical directions and on teleconference was the mode and direct clearance to every step was taken by me including guidance to each of the companies. Motorola did not participate finally. But the other two did produce prototypes.

The cost also was a factor. Only Kernex succeeded and their prototypes were successfully demonstrated at Madgaon even to the Minister at the end of the three months, though the system was experimental. But others failed.

But those were very preliminary units but, did work. Then MOUs were signed to be partners with long term stakes sharing risks of failure.

For the portion of software development as directed by the Konkan Railway, the man-hours spent were compensated after justifying on the basis of function point analysis, practically creating an outsourced software development center for Konkan Railway. At the salary compensations needed for software professionals, Konkan Railway PSU scales cannot afford to have direct employment. Turn over risks are high too.

Then the company had to procure suitable hardware and do any firmware changes at their cost while we only pay for the hardware. The intellectual property they create in their firm ware, remained unpaid.

Further the company was persuaded to just cover the costs and not factor in risks of failure of the research project reaching commercial implementation stage,where loss of capital too was involved.

We used to check independently the direct market unit rates for all the components by calling for quotes to cross check what the company is invoicing us. For the software we paid by logged man hours and matched with function point analysis and prevailing industry standards.

So IP rights involved and their in house manufacturing experise in developing the product, was not covered.

Instead we bargained to have full control over their IP rights too, by offering exclusive manufacturing rights, while Konakn Railway controls the marketing rights within the country. We allowed them rights to market the product abroad, but on payment of royalty to Konkan Railway , sum to be mutually agreed upon.

To protect Konkan Railway interest of not to get their technology stolen once proven, even by the Kernex, such conditions were laid down, by denying them rights to sell on their own. Additionally all the software, quality control checks, verified by independent government software testing center at Chennai , has been preserved and stored in a locker with a joint operation condition during the currency of these multiple MOUs governing relations between Konkan Railway and Kernex.

In fact all the capital required to set up the facilities practically dedicated for Konkan Railway use, is not paid for by the Konkan Railway. The risk and cost of this capital was borne by the private company. Only if commercial implementation takes place they have chance of recovering the costs.The public of India who invested in the equity have taken the risk.

This way reasonableness of what we pay was assured while avoiding incurring capital outflow from Konkan Railway while keeping the development costs to Konkan Railway the least possible.

For the Konkan Railway and the Government this is the most advantageous arrangement.

To establish reasonableness of the cost of the product, the Konkan Railway, independently should get quotations from multi-vendors from suppliers of the hardware components from international manufacturers and evaluate the bill of materials going in to manufacture of an ACD, and then add costs of testing, assembly and production of the ACD , add costs of software, and testing to be ready for installation. This exercise should be done totally not taking the data or records of Kernex, so that Konkan Railway will have the real value of the product. Now this can be compared to the cost at which Kernex is offering. This will make it easier and rational for the Konkan Railway to certify for reasonableness of the cost offered.

Further foreseeing a condition of the company being purchased by some MNC and changing the ownership, to steal the technology, a special provision is put in place where, the technology papers stored in the bank locker will become sole property of Konkan railway.

At the same time if there is no commercial implementation by the Ministry, then there is little compensation to the private company. Konkan Railway has nothing to lose nor obliged to compensate.

At the same time if Konkan Railway gets the order, then Kernex certainly has a right to execute on exclusive basis.

Actually the product is a joint product of Konkan Railway and Kernex. One cannot deliver without the other.

Kernex had to go for IPO after proving the viability of the product in Jalandhar trials and based on announcements in the Parliament about extending the ACD to NF Railway, to raise almost Rs 100 cr to create facility to produce minimum of 500 units a month. They did create this infrastructure based on these MOUs. SO it is widely distributed equity and stake holders are people of the country. Initially a few dedicated NRIs from USA supported during the development stage who are idealists to see a new technology developed from our country. They took the risk before the IPO.

SO Konkan Railway Controls all marketing rights and Kernex cannot sell on their own.

The creation of such stakes, I thought will give a fair amount of motivation for both to continue the long winding process of development while patiently handling the trials and tribulations inherent in such technology development.

During my tenure as well as after I retired, inquiries were held as to whether undue favour was shown to a private party.

Foreseeing the same, I had placed on record a technology development policy to unlock value of intellectual property that I donated to the Konkan railway. The patents remain only on paper unless converted as a commercial product.

Intelligent live products combining communication, on board computing & analysis in real time, with requirements being defined and modified by the user region wise and during the operations, changing yards additional yards, and changing rolling stock all add up to a continuous on line service and maintenance of the loaded software of the ACDs.

Railway domain knowledge is specialised and it takes years to absorb for functional requirements in operations to be picked by non-railway private agencies. It is close to impossible to have another agency as in case of a non-live mechanical product. In case of latter, we can have many a supplier with simple licensing.

So it is in Konkan Railway interest as well that of Kernex to protect the technology from poaching by others. It is difficult to have such tight control if multiple players are involved.

After a detailed inquiry , the Railway Board was satisfied and closed the case.( 2005-06) Else attempt was made to throw a few needles of suspicion at my structuring the deal.

So supporting dedicated facility to monitor health of all the ACDs riding on locomotives, the constant vigilance remotely, and provide patches and upgrades to meet any bugs which may arise in some peculiar situations, and then invest in to next generation product for which the road map has already been laid out by me are all requirements only one dedicated partner can provide.

This way an Indian company will finally be able to compete with foreign technology companies which very jealously guard their turf from others. Our country will then be able to export our own solutions.

But I do have some lurking doubts if the lobby in Railway Board will raise the bogey of multiple suppliers etc as is usual for routine non-technology intensive products as per procurement rules under stores code. That is another way to sabotage the technology.

Simple clerical enforcing precedents and rules do win often in our system, creating some vague fears around of misdeeds.

First to deal with proprietary articles covered by patent law of the land, there is special provision for procuring such material. No tenders are needed. The benefit of exclusive right to sell remains for 15 years from the date patent is sealed. It is this exclusive right earned by Konkan Rialway by assigning of my patent, that can be bartered and shared to create a value proposition to rope in private capital and expertise not available with Konkan Railway to take the technology development forward and unlock the value of the patent to make it fit for commercial adoption.

It can be better understood as a typical deemed Public-private participation drawing upon mutual strengths, to develop a sophisticated technologically world's first product in our country.

I did not call it as such earlier, but in principle that is what it is. My experience in railway is that, if you say so, immediately many jump in to the fray saying we first need to make a policy and form a committee etc. But the real working model which I evolved basically took care of public interest while giving the necessary motivation to to the private party, to invest, be committed as stake owner, while taking a major portion of risk.

To Indian Railways it is a typical public-private route of technology development where major portion of risk was transferred to private party but benefits go to a PSU Konkan Railway, while Indian Railways benefit from world class product by roping in private sector's strengths to supplement Railways' domain knowledge.

The ACDs are joint product of Konkan Railway and Kernex and Konkan Railway controls the sale , by giving exclusive right to manufacture to Kernex, who are made to part with their IP rights of manufacture to Konkan Railway, further make all capital investments needed and produce the same to costs to be verified by Konkan Railway so that industry standard return is assured to the widely held equity by people of India.

The way to create multiple vendors has to be laid down too. Once the initial minimum order for supply of the proven product on commercial scale is completed by the Konkan Railway and Kernex, then, they can transfer the technology to different vendors in the country or abroad, while sharing the royalties together. This is because for transfer of technology , both Konkan Railway and Kernex together have to do, and to be frank, role of Kernex will be a major one, and they can accordingly share the royalties proportionate to their contribution. The continuity of the Public private model with Kernex, can proceed further to continuously develop and improve the product finally to reach SIL levels required in future.

The successful development of the world class new technology of ACD by India, vindicates the process adopted. The world's breakthrough technology is active every meter of railway tracks to protect lives and railway property, improving safety levels many orders more, while protecting the investments already made in existing signal systems. We can now build on this to bring out even more advanced product.

Frankly speaking I was lucky that the NRIs who guided the Kernex at development stage, were idealists thinking to make our country a great technology leader, like me, and so allowed the company to take this risky step which is actually loaded very much in favour of Konkan Railway and can hurt the private party badly.

Of course as the time progressed, they were quite a frustrated lot and staring at serious losses because of delays and uncertainties which followed. More than 300 engineers were laid off and many are working with severe cuts in pay!!

The company has been struggling and if they now get this order, then their decade old dedication is worth it. But the financial suffering all these years by this company does have an impact on any fresh private company taking similar risks.

This announcement therefore, is a milestone in our country's first undeclared but successful public-private research and technology development initiative to produce the technology.

But there is one serious hurdle for the Konkan Railway to cross.If Konkan Railway thinks on the line that Kernex is vendor then they have insurmountable problem The MOUs do not provide for that type of classification because it is actually structured as a public-private participation model. They make sense only together but not separately.

But the problem of guidelines of CVC that a PSU cannot deal with only a single vendor without open bids etc., can drive the organisation in to jitters. What if some one accuses the officers of a scam and starts hounding? Why not do nothing and take home pension, could be the natural reaction.

The entire model needs to be properly understood in perspective in the interest of the nation.

Confusing an equal technology partner who has to contributes in technology terms innovating in firmware modifications and adoption, with a simple contractor, who executes your design and specification like a machine part, is a very serious mistake. The CVC guide lines cannot be applied blindly for this research development model.

Best is to send all these papers to CVC as well as CAG now itself, so that you clear the air. Let them scrutinise and be briefed on any clarifications, instead of getting frightened of their probable future adverse appreciation of the case.

Courage to be right and say the right thing openly is how we can assure clean governance.There is nothing secretive about the fair processes to be followed. Best is to work in open transparent manner, which is what I believe.

People underestimate the open and sincerely committed intelligent Indians manning our vigilance and CAG as well as CBI. Actually many executives, try to use their fear in the system, to avoid doing any thing positive, being really lazy and lacking self-confidence to act, and who are sure that acts of commission only are punishable but not acts of omission, under present government rules. Such non-performers are assured of clean records, regular salaries and pension benefits.

A wrong step now can result in serious violations of the agreements and give rise to legal battles with real risk of the Kernex collapsing while taking down Konkan Railway too forcing compensations to be paid as punitive penalties of substantial order, to Kernex. ACDs end up in courts of law.

In the process the hard work of intellectual property created by Konkan railway and Kernex will go down the drain. India is the loser.

The nation will continue to pay heavy cost in terms of losing more lives on the railway tracks in avoidable train collisions, even after joint efforts of public and private expertise produced a technology breakthrough in the world, the intelligence based ACD network struggling over a decade.

Then it is a case of operation success but the pat(i)ent dead.

I hope not.

I am a mere observer and wonder what happens, next. I do not know how Konkan Railway or Kernex or Railway Board will handle themselves now.

My prayer is that better counsel will prevail both in Konkan Railway and Railway Board. Else we can forget about the ACD.

Time only will tell.

Jerry Rao , Audit and Konkan Railway

2011-02-23T06:38:00.000-08:00

Jerry Rao wrote very nicely about Audit and am glad to know about his father Shri Ranga.

Our tamper-resistant institutions.......Jaithirth Rao
jerry.rao@expressindia.com

Many of our independent institutions have been buffeted by crises, and survived. If only we let them"

Very positive and re-assuring article of faith for us.

The respect due to these constitutional institutions like CAG, for enforcing checks and balances in the system, is of late not given by the executives. More often than not they find ways of circumventing them and also find soft ways to seduce them too to turn a blind eye selectively to the executives' actions of commission and omission.

When I was designing and implementing my own dream Railway Applications Package, in Konkan Railway, which has as its motto that every single data entry shall be done only once , but influences various algorithms where the data is required, that is train operation, real time control charts, instructions to station masters regarding train running, drivers's over time or crew change, earnings, track and asset maintenance and ultimately even drawing up the balance sheet of the company.

All the departments' data bases are seamlessly integrated and the system has built in intelligence to think and work out and communicate consequent actions and decisions to the concerned persons, in real time, when one single entry is made some where in one of the 550 odd locations in the 700 km route and offices.

Now the decision process has audit trail available and I wanted the CAG representative sitting in our office, to have the same level of access permission as the highest ranking executive, making it totally transparent for them to read and down load for making their observations. The same thousand and odd( not literally but really) rules and regulations from the Railway Codes only formed the basis of the work flow algorithms.

Surprisingly my executives initially were very reluctant and resisted. In fact it is surprising to see the antipathy towards even from lowest rung of the executives towards the audit officers. Generally they are treated as an obstruction and a brake on their executive freedom of action.

But I held different view even from my days of joining the service at the lowest executive level.

When you want to do rightly, I said , where is the conflict of interest?

Those who resist, have to be considered to be having a private agenda and I will have to treat them with some suspicion, I said.

Then the resistance evaporated. So Audit was all the privileges to log in surf any department , their decision process and expenditure with all accounts too being visible, on the Konkan Railway

It helps all of us. if I could do in a small microcosm like my tiny railway system of 700 km route, the software developed being capable of handling any railway network of any size, ( it is only the server size we have to design), why we cannot replicate in other places?

Surprisingly, it is the higher rung executives who resist such wide area networked open database and administration because of perceived loss of their control on information.

On more than one occasion, I had conversations personally with Jerry Rao. A scintillating brain he has.

Elected representatives and norms to be enforced to protect democracy.

2011-02-22T02:07:00.000-08:00

I think we can do something about our elected representatives.

Those who take the oath to protect the constitution must be made to sign an undertaking with minimum three cardinal norms to be observed: breaking any one should attract automatic disqualification of the member with a 6 year ban on standing for any election.

To my mind the norms which are basic are:

1. I shall not obstruct the proceedings of the Legislative Assembly or the Parliament by disobeying the Speaker's directive or by leaving my allocated chair and rush out to physically gesture and shout down another member's expressing his views with Speaker's permission.

2. I shall not encourage or organise attacks on elected representatives nor peaceful citizens through inciting speeches or my groups loyal to me in case they have different views than mine, but commit to follow the due constitutional process to which I have taken oath to protect and follow.

3.I will only use civil and parliamentary language in expressing my views either in Assembly/or Parliament, or outside in public meetings and in public appearance, and will remain fully committed in spirit and action to the welfare of the people whom I represent in particular and to my country in general.

The proof of a recorded audio-visual clips of parliamentary proceedings or a public TV channel will suffice for the Election Commission to initiate proceedings suo moto and within a week of such incident the election commission shall finalise the decision.

Any citizen of the country can submit the video proof to the Election Office for taking necessary action on the elected representative; the EC is bound to take cognisance and act within a week of such submission.

Appeal lies to Supreme Court alone for the decision handed down by the Election Commission.

Our country needs this kind of check to balance our representatives on whom we are spending thousands of crores all these years since independence.

I am confused and anguished with the current deteriorating quality of life for the common man..

2011-02-21T23:03:00.000-08:00

When a foreign country or a military junta rules giving no right to have a say in the governance, the usual modes of fighting for liberation is through organised underground movements, armed commando sniper attacks on the authority figures, or coming out on streets and blocking the transportation and day to day life and go to jail or get killed by bullets. The killed become martyrs and they further fuel the movement.

But when the country has been liberated, and they have universal voting rights, choose their governments and make their laws and have right to change the government through ballot, and a majority rule is to be gracefully accepted while minorities personal life style is protected, basic human rights are assured through a justice system, where is the place for the old style approaches for changing the governments?

But that is what our leaders and professors and university students are promoting , adopting the methods of British era. Actually the majority is held to ransom by the militant aggressive minority groups in this process.

The weakness of democracy is its respect for the human rights. It is the highest virtue of a human. It is a paradox that a virtue has become a weakness.

So a few humans with own agenda are able to be act inhuman, disrespecting human rights of others, and bully or burn public property while claiming at the same time to be victims of the system, and some even take up arms kidnap authority figures, black mail the government--- all under some perceived injustice, whereas the system we have give ourselves is the best possible for human governance.

It is a matter to seriously ponder, whether those who act wantonly, even after being literate and understand very well what mischief they are doing undermining the very democratic foundation, should stand to lose their human rights; simply because they ceased to be human. The democratic institutions cannot act as weaklings when lawfully elected state institutions are humiliated and disobeyed. Those who seek protection of the constitution while abusing the same and undermining the institutions under the constituion, shall be punished by provisions in law to be eliminated from such civilised society.

How can we allow uncivilised barbarian behaviour to prevail in a fully democratic society?

The way stupid and thoughtless analysis and mischievous distorted issues are built up , leveraging the electronic media, causing untold hardship to rest of civil society is amazing. It is even more amazing that the democracy is hijacked and the very assembly or parliament gets paralysed by such uncivilised thought less acts.

So we will soon slip in to the maoist kangaroo courts of justice, where old style people's justice of instant justice getting administered 100 years ago, coming back.

Soon the violent mobs rule the streets and rest subjugated slowly losing their democratic rights.

Is that that we want?

Why democracy and good man cannot defend himself? WHose fault it is? Where is the strength of democracy if the duly installed governments either have to become a military junta to survive?

Does it mean we are not fit for democracy even after 60 years?

Surprisingly it is not the villagers nor the poor... but limited to well to do politicos, well educated lawyers, elected honourable MLAs and MPs and literate small band of students constituting less than 1% of the population, who are guilty of such serious misconduct to destroy public property, use uncivil abusive language of communication, throttle any other voice of difference, disrupt the entire state machinery and generally distorting the working of the democracy!!!

The insult to injury is to further to say they are being denied their "democratic rights" to destroy the peace around.

When did we become such gross stupids? The education seems to have destroyed simple wisdom and good behaviour to show respect to each other and live as humans.

Less educated villagers seem to be behaving better by many orders more in comparison.

Probably delayed justice, indifferent governance, lack of commitment for honest and responsive social service in those who serve the government, procedure taking over both time and resources finally defeating the very objective for which the procedure is devised--- nullify the good governance promised in democracy.

Trust deficit is seriously hurting I believe.

But for the present...

Yes, Sir, I am confused and anguished.

Egypt and India

2011-02-13T19:41:00.000-08:00

Freedom carries responsibility and accountability. Democracy implying a knowledge based society, each individual sufficiently educated and can think to decide what is right and what is right, being capable of not falling into herd mentality, seem to be the minimum requirements.

The internet and electronic media seems to have created a substantial group of populations young in age and who cannot think in more than 120 character sentences, just with superficial knowledge lacking maturity have started asserting them selves, and wily old foxes seem to be able manipulate this group to subvert standard democratic processes and insisting on instant result and a kind of belligerent, uncompromising insistence on immediate compliance with what they want. What next is of no concern, This is because their thought is limited by the 120 character requirement of Tweet.

SO Egypt has gone back to Military Regime. They got out of it earlier,with much difficulty and got a constitution and an elected government. Now it is a chaotic state which only Military has to manage; the tents are getting removed and Tahir Square will be cleared ruthlessly of the 10 or 20 thousand odd people --- who do not know in to what they will be walking into.

Hardened governance and pre-planned strategic information control will now start to avoid recurrence of the same gain. The groups will not get another chance to do what they did. Remember Tia min Square story decades ago? China woke up and that is it.

Other administrations watching closely, will now gear up to see that the Jasmine does not give out any more fragrance.

It will take many more decades before another movement for democracy emphasising individual freedom emerges. But individual freedom comes with some strings attached. Irresponsible, abuse of the same finally leads to anarchy and necessarily as dictated by natural laws, order has to be restored by a military type of organised force, when the individual freedom will get denied as a punishment.

The same anarchy is being promoted in AP state and soon in Kashmir. The democratic governments with judicial and political systems very much dependent on the responsible civic behaviour of every citizen and if substantial numbers choose not to be so, then the system cannot correct itself. It causes self-destruction. Only a regime where there is no respect for individual freedom will emerge to bring order back.

It is like slapping an errant child, in this case the society, back to discipline. may be caning too is not ruled out and whipping may follow with a few even losing their lives.

Once the military tastes the power, it becomes a tiger having tasted the blood will not easily let go the unique position of power where voice of the ruled is ruthlessly muted.

Is it necessary evil of having a democratic government? Don't think so. The leaders let down their electorates and relied on bribing groups and divide them on different caste and creed and now regional basis just to hang on to power. The karma is coming back.

The day the parliament allowed the extension of constitutional extension for maintaining the reservations, even after it's expiry, laid the foundation for further encouragement of division of society in to innumerable groups who would like to have preferred privileged living, to the neglect of the poor and down trodden. The tyranny of the well to do amongst the reserved category who benefited from the privilege, not to allow their own poor and down trodden brothers from the same community to get benefit is amazing. The rich amongst them keep the benefit only for own kith and kin.

Over the Sixty years we have lost a golden opportunity to become one nation.

Those who swear by our constitution to come to power show scant respect for the same. We have no provision in criminal procedure code to recognise the violation as congnisable offence punishable by death or loss of citizenship.The freedom of speech too is a boon from the constitution but cannot be used to violate the constitution itself.

The media and the politics in our country make use of this freedom granted under the constitution to openly subvert the authority and power of such constitutionally established agencies.

What is a failed nation? Hope we are not one.

A question answer session with respected Dr Krishnakumar, forcing me to dig my mind !

2011-01-25T23:15:00.000-08:00

Dear Rajaramji,

I have great appreciation for your achievements and your knowledge. I see in some of your blogs a high degree of religious conviction and messages. One of them is the link between science and religion. I have some questions on that interface between science and religion.

As a statistician I believe in the equation Knowledge+Gaussian Error or IGNORANCE =Truth
Our mission is to explore continuously the unknown (error or ignorance) to improve our knowledge about the truth.
Florence Nightingale thus said rightly that the statistical work is the work of God or discovering God, or discovering truth through improved knowledge and reduced ignorance. Florence Nightingale was one of the founding members of the American Statistical Association and her statistical analysis of health surveys of epidemics in India were donated to the American Statistical Association and are kept in their headquarters in Washington DC.

Excellence in any field from cleaning a toilet to cleaning persons heart of jealousy and greed, is divine... matters of study and in any field devoted and sincere effort to reach excellence makes one see the God. Beyond the frontiers of knowledge and beyond the infinity is the face of God. SO Florence is absolutely right. A meat seller had more knowledge to advise a man spending all his time in forests doing dhyana as demonstrated in one of our ancient stories.

Given the above conviction of mine as a scientist I have a few questions regarding science and religion. If you have any suggestions or comments to enlighten me I will appreciate.

1. As David Hawkins says in his book "The God Delusion" people are born into families with a given faith and grow with it and hence religious bias is built into almost every man who believes in a religion. If this is true then religion and science cannot go together, in the true sense that science is objective. But, I can of course argue that science is not as objective as it is projected to be. Scientists may in fact be influenced by religion to choose one approach than another in investigating the unknown-using Nightingale's version.

Yes each one of us do get our cognitive and further framework and bench marks for our "rational" thinking based on the environment in which growth took place. With normalising educational process further molding our thinking and behaviour soon we learn to place blinkers and see things only the way we are expected to see and think and believe in only the processes and logical deduction as taught and accepted by the majority. Deviations are frowned upon and generally get left out of the main stream. This is true whether it is "religion" or "science" as we normally made to understand and quite often made to believe they are mutually exclusive.

Singular points, axioms science accepts.Science accepts the ignorance bounding their known knowledge, but define it in terms of multiple hypotheses, or say further research needed, but frontiers while exciting still stare at face and challenge the scientific approach to arrive at such unified solution or answer to establish cause and effect.

But any one honestly trying to cross this challenging frontier knocking on the door to know what is beyond, is truly no different from the seeker who is not a "scientist" as we define, but keeps on conducting numerous thought experiments trying to analyse the good and bad in society, the anguish in humans, the need to reconcile his lack of happiness and constant need to seek a means to quieten his questioning mind and demanding desires driving him crazy, depressions caused by failures and sadness in failed love, or death of loved ones, why so called "accident" should choose to visit him, why he cannot have eternal desire -free satisfied life etc etc.

Here also one reaches the frontier bounded by ignorance, just like the honest scientist, he too knocks on the door to find his unified single solution to all his questions.

In my view each path is honourable and I find no difference and attempts to condemn one by another is puerile and only indicates that in his own chosen area of specialisation, he has still a long,long way to go. For me the approaches of gaining knowledge, or journey to reach the "truth" can be many ...many paths under science and as many paths under religion , and finally all are coexistent and any attempt to isolate and condemn one path is futile. Where honesty and sincerity is lacking, it is the human who makes a path filled with "superstitions" or too may "singular points" or"axioms".

In my view words said to have been used by Hawkins like"God delusion" is more a marketing gimmick by the sales driving commercial groups but considering the great man's writings, I feel he is not arrogant enough to jump to absolute statements of truth. Because he also is yet to arrive at the truth. If thinks gravity is God, it is OK but if means that gravity itself is God then it is a mistake.Gravity does not have the attributes of jnana wisdom or creative powers nor destructive powers. Neti neti neti...न इति .... what you see, feel or think is not God but God is there in each one of them, is my understanding of this world.

2. You had mentioned that there are so many lacs of species, some not yet discovered, and about the re-incarnatione-that soul moves from one species to another, and that the penultimate (or ultimate depending on whether Godhood is a species or not) species is manhood. Can that soul be observed, measured, traced from one species to another? Or is it a closure axiom, like Zermeleo's axiom in mathematics to complete the logic of Hindu philosophy? This is one of the links between science and Hindu religion that I have not come across.

I do listen to respected Sanskrit Scholars who while giving lectures on Bhagavatha mention this number and some do add "it is said" but do a definite figure of 84 lac species. More than one scholar quoted fron Bhagavatha. I do not know Sanskrit. Then I checked Wikipedia and found that our research has till now established about 2 million or so species but we are still not sure of large tracts of deep sea water where we have not reached fully.Extending my rational thinking, I feel probability of discovering further 2 to 3 million species must be quite high if you consider ocean depths, bacteria, insects and the millions of living bacteria we carry in our own body...not sure how many we classified.

But what is impressive is the number. A number is mentioned. It is true of time scales, the cycle times between creation and destruction... all defined numbers are available in ancient knowledge, I find it hard to call that as religion. rather I consider it as ancient scientific observations and records archived and preserved through transfer from one generation to another through "vaakku" Minds absorbed, stored and transmitted over thousands, or millions of years? Looks plausible to me because the complex models cannot be dismissed as fiction.Too advanced science looks like magic or superstition or magic to uninitiated.

Since we lost our educational links with language of ancient "science" embedded in "Vedas", we either misinterpret or condemn quite arrogantly what we did not study.While I do not believe you should blank your mind and intelligence and accept unquestioningly what ancient scriptures said to have stated, I do trust we should follow the process prescribed as path to understand and become aware of the deeper meanings they tried to convey. Questioning is very fundamental right encouraged by our ancient scriptures.

Soul or Jeeva ... we have problems in correctly translating Sanskrit in to English because Sanskrit is etymologically many orders richer than English...closer to barbarian era depth as compared to Sanskrit too advanced thousands of years earlier. So it is like seeing glorious infinite canvass through a peephole.

If life energy is understood as jeeva, and even this energy being given by the original creator or it is part of that energy only, then it has to remain indestructible and whenever the physical attributes of body get destroyed in attrition of time, gets released, either to get another set of new physical attributes, or remain standalone, or join back the original source energy.... Our ancient scriptures dealt with these alternatives and deep thinkers on the basis of consistent and logical interpretation of the original Vedas and Upanishads as well as other ancient texts offered monistic and dualistic interpretations.

Beauty is arguments are allowed and we have rules of Tarka & Mimasa and debating to logcially prove or disprove each other's points of view and interpretation. This process qualifies our spiritual leaders to be called as no different from scientists.

Just as wearing a cloak and cap to receive a Doctoral degree, is not science, wearing a cloth of saffron colour or some distinguishing marks on the face is not the "religion" nor spiritual knowledge.

3. Thus the one of the main tenets of Hindu religion, the existence of a transcending soul from life to life and species to species, is it a blind faith or is there any scientific evidence for the existence of a soul and its transport from one physical body to another?

Partly I think the previous answer covers this issue. For a very advanced scholar of statistics, Euler and Lagrange as well as mere thought experiments without physical evidence is proof enough to declare a particular result. It is not absolute certainty of the result which guides but relative higher frequency of occurrence which satisfies the scholar that his thinking is fine. Next scholar gets a relatively better correlation and feels he has improved further. But fact remains significant number of deviations do occur though rare.

Proof for souls and migrations in my opinion is extraneous. Blind faith also is not needed. The process of understanding the universe and the structure and the various attributes described by our scriptures one should go through before attempting the thought experiment for prooving. That is the scientific approach. Can one do experiments of the high order without first gaining knowledge of existing work done?

If it takes a decade even to complete the minimum course to enter a graduation course, what to talk of research in spiritual matters with hearsay untutored knowledge base?

Best is to join the class taken by Lord Sri Krishna and he has given the tutorial Bhagavad Gita. Treating it as a guide understand, analyse, question, seek answers within the text, then sit down for dhyana as prescribed and seek with deep introspection the truth. The attributes of Satvic life described by Lord Krishna cannot be contested.

Full freedom exists to surround yourself with dark ajnana ( ignorance) by condemning outright what ever Krishna says. Duryodhana did it. Krishna did not take any action against him. But Duryodhana's Karma took the action.

Without devoting time one cannot learn statistics nor mathematics nor biology. Same with spiritual field.of science. The more you question and examine, the more you become aware of first yourself and seek who you are. Like neti neti neti, you are not the body, you are not the mind, you are not the thinking, then what are you? Forget about God, first we do know who we are.Choice to remain in ignorance arrogantly and glorify the same or humbly seek enlightenment to discover an entirely new world of different dimensions colours and purport , is with each one of us.

Best teaching book available is Bhagavad Gita for this purpose. Ultimately each has to seek his own fulfillment. I cannot become you, you cannot become someone else, nor you can become the God. But each one of us can become fully evolved and poorna, befitting our own swabhava. Blind unquestioned faith is not the way, as told by my Gurus.

Love and faith rising from the fountainhead of true understanding through knowledge the ultimate truth , is what the aparoksha jnani reaches and stays in that state of immaculate ananda which cannot be described in human communication at sensory level but has to be experienced only by a seeker.

If at any moment of my thinking to write what I wrote above, I did out of arrogance to show off my limited understanding, I may kindly be excused. It is a mere introspection arising out of questions raised and am thankful for the questions put. I am acutely aware of my ignorance and I pray that I keep seeking for the truth on the right path with the blessings and guidance of my Guru.

An invitation to brain storm on the image deficit for Indian engineering profession...

2011-01-22T19:11:00.000-08:00

Dear Fellow Prof. Chakraborty,

It is truly wonderful to be remembered by a person of your eminence and achievement. Then it is a great honour that you consider I am of value to contribute to the brain storming session on the image deficit and its correction for our profession.

In my opinion it is members of our own profession who destroyed the pride in our field by being grossly unprofessional. While self-flogging is not a pleasant nor a means of finding a solution, the fact remains and has to be recognised that we need introspection first.

We have reduced our profession to mere tenders, bids, outsourcing to paid consultants, consultants to oversee consultants and another prime consultant having consultants to further advise, finally each of them acting subservient to a programme manager who has no inkling of what is civil engineering.

In the days of the great engineer Shri Viswesarayya , an engineer is considered a man of great integrity, intelligence and capable of thinking originally and produce out of the way solutions which normal administrators cannot think of.

The key word is intelligence and willingness of the engineer to be courageous to walk the new untreaded paths.

But today's famous and respected role models of engineers are vitual brokers, if you excuse my use of the word, to make money for the corrupt in a sophisticated polished manner . It is foolish to think that the society does not notice or know. The effect is they dismiss the engineer and his profession as nothing more than a service which can be purchased at will and manipulated to one's own desire. Does it remind you of that word prostitution?

Sad but true. Engineers who forgot engineering and very poor in principles of engineering physics, but strong in manipulative politics of power structures also become successful consultants and some rise to very powerful leadership positions too. They get top honours as bestowed by the society too. But they are empty shells in my opinion.

So among the walking ghosts of engineers of today, it is futile to seek special image for our profession.

Is there solution? Your anxiety is appreciated. I share your concern. But I am personally deeply hurt with my professional group and feel anguish that I spent more than three and half decades trying to bring honour to my profession and country by walking uncharted path.

It is my own professional group which abused positional authority and acted against the country's interest. It was one man's fight.

Dr Abdul Kalam agreed with me in many a one to one discussions we used to have when he was our President , at Rashtrapathi Bhavan. Can you imagine he told me I did a mistake in not accepting my Maryland Univ seat soon after my graduation as Univ. First in 1966. I should have left the country and had I done what I did outside the country, it would have been implemented and India would have been very proud of an Indian doing such exceptional work! I responded by saying my life time has gone waste with my decision at that time that IIT Kharagpour was our national pride and would rather study there.

Or I should have no regrets. The fight itself was my reward. Though National Geographic and Discovery covered my work and suddenly some remote place in Switzerland a train guard recognises a Konkan Railway name as that engineer of Konkan Railway ( that was me) who stood between colliding trains to make them stop automatically as shown in National Geographic, I should feel happy. he does not know my name. But he respected some other senior officer of Konkan Railway who was traveling there mentioning this.

Well how do you build respect for engineers' profession? They have to do respectable work.

How do you get a good image? One should do outstanding work which speaks for itself.

My dear Professor, being in cess pool can we rise up, is our doubt.

Yes like the proverbial lotus, we can, if we want. Do we really want, is the question. We must liberate first our internal spirit and get back our self-respect.

Self-respect does not mean arrogance about own greatness. The group should have the courage and self-confidence to trust a colleague's integrity and intelligence and capacity to be innovative. The group behaviour in our country particularly abhors innovation.

Envy and feeling that "how can anyone else be better than me" creates antagonist attitude and inimical and indifferent attitude. Soon this herd behaviour forces many an engineer to go mute and fall in line. mediocre men rule. Money takes over.

Where money rules, there can be no professional pride nor image. It is not only engineers but all other scientists too suffer the same fate in our country. Nobel prize is so elusive for a country with such a large scientific community.

We can be comfortable that we we all share the same glum image and trapped in time and space to suffer eternally. One or two who may get agitated to get out of the trap will organise a brain storming and generally it stops with that.

With due respect to you, apart from my above thoughts, I have little to contribute. I am not anxious now a days to attend meetings.

Currently I am trying to make up for my time lost in my loved country, by working overtime to finish my work of finding a new generation Gravity Powered Rail, Road, Waterway, Runway systems. I divide my time between US and India. Paris APM2011 invited me to speak after a peer review of my work That is the difference. I had requested a number of times INAE to review and debate. The deafening silence is amazing. South Korea reviewed and published intheir International Journal. Now US-Europe group has reviewed and asked me to present the case to save 50 to 70% of currently used energy in transportation. Taking my case as a study case, honestly, what should I think?

After all, Dr Abdul Kalam is right.

I do wish you all the best and hope you will find a viable solution which is not innovative. Because if it is innovative your colleagues are likely to kill it.

I regret I cannot take this honour of participating in the session.

May God bless you, my friend!

I am grateful to Moneylife Digital team for the coverage of my work done as duty! Some one notices.so youngsters should keep working to change lives!

2011-01-05T19:24:00.000-08:00

B Rajaram to present paper on Gravity Power Towers at 13th APM-ATS in Paris

January 05, 2011 05:41 PM |

Moneylife Digital Team

http://www.moneylife.in/article/78/12942.html

Our babus continue to ignore his inventions, while the world honours the technology man who patented an anti-collision device, made the Skybus and more recently the Gravity Power Towers

Rajaram Bojji, former chairman of Konkan Railway, never got a chance to implement his revolutionary Skybus project which would have provided inexpensive, air-conditioned mass transport without land acquisition! The idea, backed by 17 patents, was abandoned by Indian authorities despite a successful demonstration in Goa. But Mr Bojji, who is better known as B Rajaram, moved on to new research and has kicked off the new year with a bang.

Automated People Movers and Transit Systems (APM-ATS) has accepted Mr Bojji's work on Gravity Power Towers (GPT) as a peer-reviewed paper to be presented at its 13th International Conference on 24 May 2011. The biannual international meeting is being held in Paris for all those involved in the development of fully-automated people movers and urban transit systems around the world.

This is an honour for the man who invented the anti-collision device (ACD) for the Indian Railways and has already got 17 patents for his inventions. He has assigned the intellectual property (IP) rights of this technology to the president of India, which has the potential to generate additional revenues of between Rs300 crore and Rs400 crore per annum for the Konkan Railway.

In a message to Moneylife, Mr Bojji said, "With the GPT, the world will be benefited by a more economical and nature-friendly transportation system that runs substantially on eternal gravity. With GPT, the carbon emissions can be substantially reduced in the future. This totally automated system neither uses electrical traction motors on the rolling stock nor fixed signal train control systems. All it uses is automated energy control systems from gravity power towers, which can redefine our safety standards and lifestyle as well. It can be even adopted by the existing legacy systems. A dream of mine has taken the first step. Hope humanity benefits."

While, the Indian Railways is still 'thinking' about implementing indigenous technology, one of its technology drivers has moved on to bigger and better things.

Mr Bojji's GPT principle re-directs vertical-acting gravity force in a horizontal direction to create a tractive force on a mass on wheels-either rail or road-to accelerate, then sustain speed, and when decelerating to recover kinetic energy. It is almost like the action of a pendulum.

The recovery on the GPT system can vary from 95% to 70%, depending on the distance of uniform speed-the longer the distance, the lesser the recovery. Hysteresis losses owing to friction cause increased irrecoverable energy loss. GPT has been granted a patent in the US.

Mr Bojji has also presented the outline for a $450 billion scheme to create a cargo transportation network of about 100,000 km to be fully powered by the GPT in the US. The network, fully powered by gravitational force, would save around 97% of energy being utilised currently, and generate 30% surplus after meeting all expenses, while generating a million blog GPT.

It is estimated that gravity power systems could contribute 30-40% of the Earth's total energy needs, taking care of transportation of people and cargo, while attaining speeds of 360 kmph on rail-based systems.

Unfortunately, as the world rewards and awards the Indian innovator, the Indian government has shunned his solutions. The best example is the anti-collision device that he devised and which was given a patent, but the Railways have chosen to ignore it while trying to adopt the European Train Protection Warning System (TPWS) on busy rail routes. (Read, 'Is the anti-collision device system being derailed?' ; 'Why we are denying Raksha Kavach to rail commuters?' )

Mr Bojji's other creation, the 'Skybus', was also left by the wayside by Indian authorities planning mass transit systems. Further, while the anti-collision device was singled out by the World Intellectual Property Office for special coverage, the Skybus Metro Rail System was described in special programmes on National Geographic and Discovery channels.

Mr Bojji was involved with the Konkan Railway project as chief engineer from the beginning of its construction in 1990, then as director for projects and finally as managing director between 1998 and 2005. He was instrumental in delivering more than 100 tunnels (including the Mumbai-Pune Expressway tunnels), about 2,000 bridges and 750 km of live running track through treacherous terrain in Maharashtra's Konkan region.

KARMA, FATE, FREE WILL & LIBERATION

2011-01-02T03:30:00.000-08:00

Do all animals have souls. including insects and

bacteria ?

How does the cycle of rebirths cease when one

attains MOKSHA ?

Detailed descriptions are available in Bhagavata and Bhagavadgita when the process of creation is described.

84 lac species we go through a a jeeva ( soul) and human species is the one we reach as the last one of the 84 lac species. Today science has identified only about 10% of these species.

Jada and living are two categories, and amongst living, the faculty of thinking, discernment, and free will with communicating skills of very high order are gifted to human species while others have to lesser and lesser degrees.

Every living entity hence must have a soul. Trees too live but do no karma. They just serve , serve and serve!!!

The moment you are given intelligence, thinking, desires and physical prowess to deploy, you start karma and the details of karma, akarma, vikarma all are well described in Bhagavadgita.

The same karma depending on the intention, becomes binding or liberating...

All karmas which do not involve indriya's satisfaction will lead to moksha. It is a state of untainted full ananda state, where you become mere observer and just a tool of the cosmic force while remaining totally free from any karma phala.

To my little brain the little I know from this life I tried to put down.

FATE & FREE WILL

Only if one tries to view in absolute terms these words fate and free will conflict with each other and confuse us.The holisitc way to look at in my opinion is this way. This again is explained in detail by Lord Sri Krishna.

Karma is what you do and the result is what you are scripting the future course of forced events in the next janma. The cyle time for drawing the balance sheet for us is multiple births. If all bad karma phalas are grouped and given in one go we just cannot stand it. So from the bag of parabdha karmas, some good and some bad are judiciously combined and the fate is presribed aon those lines. Suddenly we find some good things happen to us without our asking nor seeking, and some times nothing we want happens whatever we strive for.

But the good effort to strive to do good, though apparently is blocked currently from delivering the results, this effort is not going waste... it is adding to the good karma defining the fate for the next birth. The free will is still available for us to do the karma either good or bad, but the result is where the "free will" does not apply. The result cannot be dictated by our will.

But short cycle events like you work hard and improve your running, your knowledge etc always give the immediate results. Similarly, when in difficulty prayer to a local goddess or saint, can give relief for the moment... but this also is part of the larger design to give the short term results. The differentiation is whether it is temporary and lasts only for a short time followed by again the lows or of such permanent nature that you do not have to face the lows again.

Krishna is very clear, it is only the nature or swabhava of a jeeva which gets fixed for the prana or jeeva or soul, but not fate. The fate is written by the jeeva himself. Every karma one does leaves behind the seed for the way fate grows for the jeeva to perceive in his next janma.

All the Gods we see pray around like Indra or Varuna are not independent to grant what they want nor deny what they feel like to a jeeva. They can only obey the larger cosmic law to give what is due for the karma. Ones own karma is what decides. So our well being or otherwise is totally in our hands. There is no magic cure of secretly pleasing Indra or some goddess, to by pass the route and get undue benefits. This is what is taught in Krishna's govardhana parvata lifting and denying pooja to Indra. Krishna emphasised service to cow and the nature of mountain.

There is only one independent or more correctly Sarva swantatntra force... which rises above all these but also resides in all these jagat and viswam and in every sub-atomic part of us and every thing around us , which is powering the entire universe, creating, maintaining and destroying cyclically to create again.

Jeevas , matter remain indistructibe, but transform in to non-manifest but readily available again to start becoming manifest that too not suddenly but gradually spread over long cycles of time.

Krishna insisted on correctly knowing the Bhowtica sastra, Adhyatmica sastra etc almost 8 branches are described in Bhagavadgita and we are hardly doing work in one area and call it as science.

Satya /Jnana are concepts least understood but much maligned by many of modern educated but practically illiterate in our ancient knowledge in its width,breadth and depth.

SO fate is what we experience currently but manufactured by ourselves earlier and we alone are responsible for it. Free will is what we can do and current intention and karma, which manufactures future fate. There is no God's hand in this...but our own. The rules of Dharma are well defined and the need to try hard to do nishkama karma, and karma only to help sustain the universe with least concern to own self, is the key for eternal ananda and liberation from the cycles of births, by destroying the future fate to suffer.

Yoga as described by Lord Krishna demands discipline and abhyasa and it is a matter of choice and free will whether we follow or not.

Om Sri Narayanaya ! He alone drives our Buddhi and I may be pardoned for any show of arrogance in my statements. In all humility I submit Sir, these thoughts as inspired by your questions, are from HIM only..

Human and sub-human worlds coexist in our own time!

2010-12-28T18:57:00.000-08:00

What I find is humans are basically caught intheir own world of making, where greed and pelf and power rule. We ultimately become sub-humans. Recently after commenting on the way we govern ourselves, I realised, I have not understood their world. In their own world of value systems, they think and revel that they are doing fine. may be happy that way. How can you deny that the worm must be enjoying its own world of mud and filth.

Different worlds co-exist even at this time as we can see-in the same space and time, and it is ultimately a matter of choice where we want to be. Taking judgmental views, hence, seems to be pointless.

The karma phala chases and the consequences of actions inexorably drives the events. Certain kinds of joys one gets are so instantaneous and it is followed by deep depression. Again a matter of choice. Some keep doing the same thing to have that instantaneous gratification, suffer the depression and again hanker for the same state of instant bliss.

Best is to choose your world of karma, where you do not get instant gratification, but gain equanimity when you neither get such instantaneous joy followed by depression, but a steady state of appreciating the forces working behind the events occurring around and remain mere observer, and be filled with wonder at the interplay of these forces in creating the different worlds around us.

May be the only action worth an evolved person is to work for uplifting sub-humans to realise true potential of being real humans.

Former Governor of RBI Sri YV Reddy and I

2010-12-18T03:48:00.000-08:00

Former RBI Governor : "PPP in the infrastructure area is private profit at the cost of public expenses"

[News Reports]

Date: Sat, 18 Dec 2010

In a one to one discussion almost 6 years ago when he was in Reserve bank, I argued the same thing and he agreed with me. Same thing about derivatives, and when Government allowed PSUs to also to indulge in interest rate swaps, I was unhappy and he too cautioned me. But dynamism in finance officers to realise the initial cash flow benefits to present a better balance sheet was difficult to rein in. With all precautions, after 4 years of such swaps, we found the going tough, but on longterm it all evened out and I sighed with relief.

Reddy is one single person in the Government, who can be credited to have kept our finance system from a bankruptcy, even when he was goaded to become more relaxed and allow the unbridled derivative market to flourish.

The current PPP projects actually are means to inflate capital costs and benefit to a large extent the private parties with public funding. But the argument is that we get a nice shiny metros etc but the hidden costs are like the scam of telecom; some make undue profits. The telecom revolution in India brought cell phone to every vegetable vendor and auto-ricksha driver and villagers are well connected. So what if Raja or Radia or Tata made some extra bucks?

Similarly the contractors in roadways, power sector and metro construction, within 3 to 5 years rose from turn overs of Rs 10 to 50 cr levels to the Rs 2000 cr and Rs 5000 cr turnover. It is a matter verifiable record.

Wealth and confidence of these individuals is some thing to be seen. They have become so powerful that now a days they just tick off the very officers who made them so rich, with immense arrogance. They offer employment to these officers and throw crumbs, while for their Project Heads, they recruit either an Australian or Malaysian!!!

But why not? Some even shifted from real estate in to advanced telecom 2G license auction and sell off the same at huge profits.

PPP is not bad if you do not worry about the minor irritant of public money getting laundered back to political bosses and the facilitators of the process.

Reddy belongs to old guard and I recollect fondly the time I used to spend with him in Reserve Bank, when I was in Mumbai.

Well time passes and greed now rules. Then rules follow greed!

B Rajaram

What a great sense of fulfillment I have and am grateful for the same to all those who helped me!

2010-12-14T06:49:00.000-08:00

Last fortnight was very hectic moving from one place to another every second day. Covered Kadapa, Mantralayam, Tirumala twice, Bengaluru, Hole Narsipur visiting relatives, friends, powerful soothing sacred divine presence, revered learned and highly respected Gurugalu, Moola Sri Rama Devaru, just to mention a few. It gave me great happiness to see the second generation youngsters taking life in stride and managing the tough competition of modern world with aplomb, cool and collected.

It was so wonderful to meet the noble souls who are proactively promoting the new experiment in education by founding Poornapramathi School to give an allround developmental education, starting from lower KG. The tiny tots in the school look so cheerful and are devoid of fear. We pray for success of this novel experiment where spiritual, emotional development factoring in our ancient wisdom along with modern educational requirements are seamlessly getting integrated.

I and my wife were happy to be taken care of by them. Experienced many a divine grace and some events are truly emotionally redefining my attitude to life and people. Suddenly one starts seeing the world in a different power spectrum of vibrations and colours with an inner understanding so different from what one normally experiences the jagat.

At the same time I kept on typing out my manuscript for submission to APM 2011 Paris Conference, who approved my abstract earlier and invited me to personally present the Gravity Powered Transportation systems for Rail, Road, water and air modes, on May 26th and 28th 2011. I had to meet he dead line of submission on line by 15th Dec 2010.

We returned to Hyderabad only on 13th Dec, and finally today 14th Dec 2010, I successfully uploaded the manuscript for inclusion in the Conference Proceedings.

Well the writing has been an inspired one written in all our holy places.

My earnest prayer is this effort of mine, has some purpose to serve the needs of humanity. This is the first step in reaching the international community and open the forum for discussion and debate. The power and merit of the concept will have to stand the scrutiny and meet the verification and validation requirements.

Yes my four years of hard work will be put to the litmus test of international scrutiny and acceptance.

During this period of delivering the paper, I had to ruthlessly empty my inbox of all mail received and could not devote any time to friends too! Hope they bear with me!

Yes I do have a sense of good feeling one gets, after finishing an intense mentally challenging task having a serious purpose and where you have to defend your work in the harsh uncompromising glare of professional scrutiny of experts in the field of auto mated transportation systems.

It is exciting to pit yourself in professional debate with the best of minds in the world.

Preparation time for me till I face the honoured community in May 2011.

Ram and I

2010-11-20T02:20:00.000-08:00

Frankly I am a bit amused at the way so much debate is taking place on whether Sri Ram was born or whether there is historical proof for the same or whether any evidence to satisfy modern evidence act is available.

A nation wide presence of Ram in the hearts of millions humans, and the literature and songs and love going back to time immemorial , gets dismissed as illiterates' illusion or make believe.

Treta Yuga and Kaliyuga separated by more than a hundred thousands of years, should make one wonder , why we try to be happy to place a time frame of 6 to 7 thousand years ago for the Ramayana.

Cyclical time periods and eras described by ancients are much beyond the concept of single arrow of time and of late only, multi-verse and multiple arrows of time are beginning to become acceptable for the westerners and so to our educated, who in the same breath dismiss our ancients' description of time.

The evidences can only in the form of geological aberrations-- time has a way of destroying many of the man made methods of preserving history in terms of man made structures. So an odd moolika from Himalaya, not belonging to local biological family, found in Lanka gently points one to ponder.Or the geological formation linking Lanka and main land, with stones having some odd floating tendencies.

But shruti, oral tradition of passing on from generation to generation , ancient history has better chance of survival even over hundreds of thousands of years.

We humans are limited with boundaries set by our perceptions dictated by modern education, and arrogant dependence on emerging and evolving western knowledge which is still learning by trial and error methods. With each discovery our knowledge is redefined.

Our knowledge is based on physical sciences totally devoid of non-material world behaviour rules. Attempting to analyse and understand the non-physical world using the nascent laws of physical sciences, is like using a candle to discover the sun.

Awareness , a mental elevation in to a non-physical world of spiritual dimensions, defying the vocabulary we have, is far beyond those who are so proudly blinded by their own so called rational analysis. In fact the excessive faith placed on rules we developed ourselves. makes us equally dogmatic about holding on to our methods of learning like those whom they accuse of blind faith, to the exclusion of accepting there could be alternative approach of human development.

In fact holistic knowledge combining both non-physical and physical world is available in Bhagavad Gita. Then we have our candle to pass righteous judgement and dismiss what we cannot throw light using our candle of knowledge, as dark & irrational. Our judgment in no way lowers the absolute brightness of the sun. It is available for those who seek humbly.

Just closing eyes, consciously saying silently in mind, simple Ram,Ram, without gap and soon one finds the mind cleared off all stray thoughts and an awareness of the other non-physical world controlling emerges.

But most of us live in denial. We believe in the physical world too much to the exclusion of the non-material world. I am not saying the physical world is false. It is real what we live in. But it is important to realise that we are not so blinded by the reality that we disbelieve non-material world surrounding us and it is as much a reality to become aware of.

Most of the time I delete the mails discussing very expertly and passing comments authoritatively on matters they know little. Rama and Ram are too much beyond the understanding of these educated blind.

Sir, it is better to avoid these polluting mails which cast aspersions and disturb one's equanimity.

Wonder if the same experts dare apply the same rational norm and write about other more militant religions which show no tolerance.

In our case it is not religion. It is knowledge and a much superior one at that. So these pot shots taken by ignorants masquerading as knowledgeable , do not matter.

The flickering candles, arrogantly proud of their little flames, pass in time , thinking they have put the sun in its place.

These critics calling themselves rationalists, lack one fundamental human quality-- not sensitive to feelings of others. They think they have right to hurt others. No one is forcing them to accept what a particular group believes and practices, without impinging on other's rights follow their own path. But then why not return the courtesy?

Ram is eternal. The stones and mortar of Ayodhya do not represent Him. Temples are mere man's way of showing his small mind to confine the eternal truth and jnana in to a physical entity for own comfort.

Paradoxically an average human is actually scared of that unrestrained freedom and liberation that comes from entry in to the non-physical spiritual universe. He loves to keep the bonds and remain bonded trapped in to own cage of limited thinking and bounded space and time.

Comfort of known rules and we are happy to rue too !.

Economy, politics & diabetes

2010-11-19T19:03:00.000-08:00

The weakness in pursuing clear cut paths and objectives is rampant in politics. It is the art of possible. So ethics, values and strong positions needed to be taken in war time crisis like situation will be thrown overboard when the going gets tough for the political party in power.

Real war unites a nation and society. But the diabetic like disease, invisible, but deeply debilitating is deceptive and our financial system and economy are in the throes of such debilitating disease. It does not look like the black and white war situation which all can understand. But spreading hunger and depression with more and more joining the ranks of jobless, grievously hurts the society. But the enemy is invisible to the suffering population.

If intellectuals and economists are able to unite and define the parameters in very scientific terms and indices and remedies too in as much clear cut terms, instead of leaving it to some long winding interpretations and widely differing approaches to attack the disease, then like a diabetic patient with incorrect and indifferent treatment, the economy just withers away.

The challenge is how to unite the society going beyond the compulsions of politics and treat economic diseases in a focused professional manner, and adopt the same kind of united approach as a society adopts in case of real physical war.

Sanskrit scholars - a vanishing species?

2010-11-17T07:08:00.000-08:00

To my mind Sanskrit can be preserved more as as historical research facilitation language at some centers of excellence with the best of committed scholars provided with decent compensation and suitable environs with vistas of green and a quiet respectable campus with emphasis on learning and practicing daily the vedic practices.

If it happens to be erudite brahmin families who have to do man this, our secular state should not mind. Support the same as an acivity to preserve an ancient culture and proper balanced true study of original vedic hymns.

Advanced media storage of audio and video in an organised manner, with live webcasts to provide world wide networking among centers of such excellence, and also for on line learning for any one willing to learn, irrespective of caste or creed or nationality with award of diplomas must be planned.

I would imagine India should have 5 such centers , each of about 1000 hectares area, a little away from bustle of urban areas, one in Himalayas, one in Vindhyas, one in South, one in West, and one in East.

We need not be apologetic to preserve thousands of years ancient culture unique to our country.

These live vedic centers will become attractive tourist centers also. We should open up to any one interested in such studies in the world to reside and learn just as we run IITs.

Dress habits, yagnams, classes under tree shades ( we do in Shantiniketan) while we show case as was in vedic culture, modern amenities shall be provided on the campus for living quarters.

The official language on the campus of course is Sanskrit.

Near Udupi/Mangalore /Karnataka we do have villages where the entire village speaks only Sanskrit today. This village should be treated as heritage and nurtured and may be converted as the first such center of excellence for Sanskrit and provide funds for organising the necessary infrastructure.

The total investment for this effort is, in my opinion, is not more than Rs 1000 cr over 5 years.

Obviously Government has to make special constitutional provision declaring the minority community of Vedic Scholars and their families as protected species like we do for tigers, lions and other wild life , in case we do not like to classify them as more civilised than us.

The normal rules of recruitment with reservations and OBC etc will not be applicable here. But for learning all are welcome. No discrimination so long as the student gets the grades as required under the charter for the institution.

How much I dream for my country , a rich one and who can afford to do this, take a view and proceed on a war footing before the last of vedic scholar disappears from the planet, like those Bengal Tigers.

My take on 2G

2010-11-16T19:08:00.000-08:00

What I find is we have crisis of leadership. If you start the serious probe too deep, like Adarsh Society and CWG case, almost every current leader and past leaders who held the positions to dispense favours, willl find places of honour in the list. The money trail will lead to homes of the backstage truly powerful leaders, who put up the puppet show of the so called Central/State Cabinets.

Then we find that even the Supreme Court heads will find place on the honours list. CBI too having been only an extended arm of the PM, will find itself in compromised position.

Over a period of time CAG was marginalised, and no one thought it was important to closely guard and control its functioning. In general perception management made them look like a negative force for dynamic executive style functioning for development.

Actually that seemed to have allowed to work quietly and a person like Ms Rekha Gupta rose to important Dy CAG position. Such a courageous person normally the system tries to filter out at middle level. I did deal with her in my service and truly an outstanding officer.

Now the government will put in position the necessary mechanisms to closely monitor CAG functioning. TIll now CAG was being chosen by the government. Now Dy CAG and other critical positions will also be sought to be controlled, by suitable means.

So we have a scene where the government will become headless if we seriously take corruption as an issue.

The net result is NOTHING will happen after all this hype. More probes, more committees , may be a JPC, a Judicial commission etc etc will take the heat off and business confidence will be restored. After all SENSEX has to be maintained.

You will gradually see the coverage in media will die out in another 2 weeks.

Remember BOFORS. Nothing happened.

The common man who sweats out his daily routine is just happy to get a job and eat his roti. These big issues are beyond his comprehension.

A few intellectuals who are not in the line of power fret and fume and the media show gives vent to them and now we have our email fury going around.

Actually corruption is a smooth pleasant process naturally evolved for those in power to dispense favours and those business men who want to make more money, to interact comfortably and with confidence, saving time in government processing. Mind you the ethics of trust and keeping to promises even without written agreements, is so strong in this process.

Within the group of elite, this ethical and trust based practice of corruption, is part of the governance show put up to public, and the governed , so long as he gets his roti and shelter is really not bothered, because this process is creating jobs. This elite sometimes suffers pin pricks of the archaic law based on middle class morality. Occasional pin prick only adds to the excitement of playing the game expertly.

Cheers!

Science & Religion Two sides of the same coin?

2010-11-09T05:55:00.000-08:00

My friend Madhavan Nair who successfully launched our India's moon probe, visited Balaji before launching. His wife also accompanied.
Religion is personal and let us leave it at that.Matters of faith be respected as the person's own private personality and mutually one may avoid treading on each other's feelings.

Governor Narasimhan and his wife were photographed, doing full pranaamam on ground to Pedda Jiyyar Swamiji at Tirumala.

There is a sense of humility and recognition of one's limitations as to what a human can do.

It is not power that Satya Sai. shows.. it is love for humanity that pervades from him. Each human is capable of this love , if he is able to get own swarupa saashatkara. These are not matters of science which deals with material issues and concerns. The so called laws of science are getting modified or abandoned whenever some new fact is discovered. I feel science and religion are not to be confused with superstitious attitudes of certain practitioners of religion.

Even in science there are enough of such die hard believers and followers of seemingly credible theories and cosmic models, refusing to accept the main stream generally accepted models of explaining the natural phenomena.

At some stage, even science starts having "believers" and non=believers, in certain esoteric theories. The points of singularity amply demonstrates the limitation of scientific thought processes failing to address each and every scenario. One theory or law fails and we patch up with another, and these two do not connect.

While I marvel at what we are able to unravel, the underlying thread of unifying single principle remains still a mystery like holy grail.

We have traveled quite a long distance in half of thousand years but groping still. Religious thoughts and explanations of the creation and the world have history of thousands of years. In fact quantum mechanics concept presenter did admit he got courage and inspiration after getting influenced by the ancient wisdom, At least he admitted.

If you eliminate superstition and fear based marketing of either science or religion, then you will have only pure jnana...quest for truth.

It is eternal. But the journey is what we enjoy.

The controversies trying to say science is threatening religion or religion is stifling science , are more based on certain individuals' own feelings of arrogance of some knowledge of one side of the coin and ignorance of the other side of the coin.

Comparing distorted dimensions of science and religion for arriving which is superior, is the provocative game people play. Those who are deeply knowledgeable, will hesitate to get in to this kind of needless and purposeless confusion of mind.

Humane approach is what humans need for each other. But groups can have time pass with this type of provocative arguments discussing science vs religion. One is material science based on evidence, verification and validation and another is intangible non-material contemplative inquiry. May be comparison of such diverse areas in invidious.

Om Shanti Om Shanti Om Shanti Let us be at peace with ourselves.

Regards

Why can't I live and practice peacefully my religion in India?

2010-11-06T20:47:00.000-07:00

I studied in Loyola and loved the fathers who taught me well and never for once tried to influence me to change my habits of prayer. They were respectful and did not hesitate to declare and give me the Best Student award ; and it was not a Bible they gave me as present, but Gitanjali of Tagore. In my High School as well as in college I had my best friends Sherrif and Abdullah and never felt a religious color in our relationship. We ate together played together.

Even in working life, I was hosted by a Islamic family in Jordan, being land lord of the house we were staying, invited to dine with their families including lady folk . The teenage girls had so many questions about our marriage customs and were continuously giggling. They respected my vegetarian food habits and made sure I get what I need.

In Damascus and Baghdad as MD, too when I delivered my lecture/presentations more than once, the picture which comes on my laptop as the first Screen happens to me Lord Venkateswara used to get projected on the large screen, but did not elicit any negative comments. One Chief Engineer of their's happened to be a lady, later in discussions made a mention to me that that picture must be the image of God I worship and said it was nice!

There was a Saudi infrastructure developer in Damsacus who heard me from a back row, whom I did not know at that time, but later wanted me to send my engineers team to conduct a survey in Medina. But he wanted a muslim to be sent.

Medina, a sacred place where even certain Muslim sect is important to enter. Can you imagine when I expressed my inability to send a Muslim engineer, after one week, he got permission for my engineer Srinivas and his team, to enter Medina to complete the survey for Skybus. We got photos of the beautiful mosques too taken by our people. The military provided protection, and hid them when the call for prayer was given and all had to rush to prayer halls.The streets just empty out in Medina during prayer time.

People did not believe that this also can happen. It is not any greatness of mine. Times of India reported in front page news with a great surprise and some Muslim group leaders in Mumbai met me, asking how it could have happened!

I never felt the religion could be made a divider of people. But our political system seems to achieve this goal over the last half a century.

Then come to my land of the most ancient civilisation. The way intellectuals in a University here, declare that Lord Krishna is a cheat and Narakasura glorified, Mahishasura glorified and Durga condemned, a famous painter feels happy to take liberties with Durga in his paintings making nude pictures, and then intellectuals argue for his right under freedom of speech too. It is so grotesque behaviour I find.

Such insensitivity and indifference to feelings of one particular community, namely Hindus. It looks like being a Hindu means equivalent to being a punch bag, and every one has a free right to punch which ever way they like.

Being a secular state, all religious groups are to be treated on equal footing. There is nothing like any superior rights for the so called majority Hindu religion. Hindus should be treated on par with Muslims, Christians and Buddhists, Sikhs etc. There is nothing like majority or minority. it is also like any other belief and faith.

They also should have the same rights to freely practice what they believe and have a right not to be abused or hurt just a much as other religious groups cannot be hurt or belittled.

Even if it is a professed Christian, who tries to belittle Jesus or Mary, he shall be punishable under the law for hurting feelings of Christians. The same way, even if a declared Hindu tries to hurt feelings of Hindus, joining forces with a person of other faith, then law should punish such activity.

Actually a simple code of conduct to respect feelings and faith of fellow beings under our fundamental rights enshrined in the Constitution, should be declared by all religious groups and their heads to discourage such irresponsible behaviour to take liberties with life and feelings of other groups without any provocation.

Since when abuse of Hindu is justified under freedom of speech but abuse of other religion is treated as offence?

Is it too much to ask, that Hindu also should have the same minority groups' rights?

Indifference and remaining mute is not an acceptable behaviour for the rationalists and intellectuals. Condemning Hindus is a favourite pastime for many an intellectual professing superior knowledge without knowing an iota of ancient vedic sayings. It adds insult to injury.

In my opinion since secularists are in majority, we should declare Hindus who quietly practice their religious practices, should be declared a minority just like Christians and Muslims and afforded the same protection.

Sarveh Janah Sukhino Bhavanthu!