Reflections of Rajaram Bojji

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...

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 expres...

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 gove...

A thought crossed my mind. Why not offer on Design, Finance and administer the society to assure peaceful living with 90% of all the tax income put in an escrow account , assuring a steady income to the private consortium which will run all services, provide infrastructure law and order protection, communications of specified standards? A contract for 33 years is not bad and may be the Governor of each state may remain as the figure head like Queen of England, except that he gets elected, every 3 to 5 years. Google, some other construction and infrastructure companies may form a consortium in US and similarly, Reliance, Birlas, Tatas, GMR type infra companies in India, can certainly form consortium and take over delivery of governance. The government offices can be closed down and golden hand shakes can be organised by the same mega-consortium. Only army is in my scheme kept funded by the 10% of tax revenues and may be some percent of profits of the consortium too. Under control of the...

Nilekani's thoughts are typical all of us who got their education in India, opportunity to serve either through Corporate structure or Government sector like me, sticking to ethical standards both in private and public life. Yes I too feel fulfilled with my 35 years in Indian Railway Service of Engineers my patents/ service as MD Konkan Railway very satisfying with unavoidable internal fights with bosses with different agendas- a normal occurrence in any society. But the price we pay for self interest of quite a few highly placed individuals is too steep. In government sponsored or controlled projects invariably our technology though superior to imported options, get marginalised, with procurers prevailing the decision and policy making corridors of power. Whereas our country could have become wealthier and provide the same riches which the rulers aspire for, but in longer time frame, with making India number one in technology leadership in the world, the third world mentality prev...