Corridors Of Contemplation

SIBAL-ISM

2009-10-19T20:31:00.000-07:00

Recent so called reforms in the Indian education system by the HRD Minister Mr Kapil Sibal does bring out the highlight about the Indian education. Indian Education, perhaps the most competitive in the world and which some times takes the competitions to the ridiculous levels :).

There has be two recent significant changes advised and which are yet to be implemented. First, making the 10th Class examination as optional for the CBSE students. Second increasing the cut-off from 60% to 80% in 12th Class for students appearing for IIT-JEE.

To me the second one makes sense, the first does not. I understand that many people in India are not in favor of this level of competition among students in the school. Many students have succumbed to this pressure. But do we have to blame the system for this, do we not blame the parents who sometimes put way too much pressure on their children to get that "Prestigious" 95% (For some even this is not enough :D ) in the 10th and 12th?

According to me where ever we have reached today, in this age of globalization is because of this "Ridiculous" competition from the day we have set foot in the school. I don't say its good, but we need to take a rational decision on this. We need to think whether by making class 10th examinations as optional are we doing any harm to that competitive edge we have? I dont think anywhere in the world the schools are so academically competitive as they are in India.

I do agree that we need reforms in the Indian education system but not by making examinations optional. We teach History in school which has been fabricated today to such an extent for the successive governments that it has become a great work of fiction. Man if we had politicians who loved the work of JRR Tolkien, then we would have chapters in History with Bilbo Baggin and Frodo Baggins as the "Great Liberators" of humanity. What exactly is the point in reading such history which is not true? I think we need to modernize the entire school curriculum, give more importance to Math, Science and Social (We are already pretty good with English ;) ).
Most important here would to make Math more interesting, make it more innovative. The future is Math and science today even though other subjects are equally important. Improvise education system by giving more importance to Sports (why the hell do we not have enough Olympic Medals??). Mr Minister please wake up!!! smell the coffee.

Though I do agree with increasing the cut-off from 60% to 80% in Class 12th for the IIT-JEE. But then again this is taking into account only Physics, Math and Chemistry. It would be really stupid to include Biology and Languages as the selection criteria to get an admission into IITs.
Then again come to think of it in the real time, I doubt any IITian has below 85-90% in their 12th PCM :). But then again the problem would be how do take care of the drastic difference among various education boards in assigning marks?? Thats one tough problem to crack for the government and IIT Board. But I think increasing cut-off automatically adds another filter for getting admission into IITs which is good.

TOI wrote their point of view as "However, we can’t agree with him that the qualifying marks in the board exams should be hiked to such a level. The minister has himself in the past argued for de-stressing students. Putting an additional hurdle in the paths of those trying to enter IITs — getting a minimum of 80% in the boards apart from clearing JEE "

which is pretty stupid and expected from them. When they say qualifying marks for getting into IIT should not be to such a High Level. Either they do not understand how difficult it is to get into such institutes or they dont know today 80% is not that high a level in India :).
Putting more hurdles for getting into IIT is good, its just a better filtering mechanism, And do what ever you want cannot reduce the stress levels of the students vying for Top and Prestigious Colleges or Schools. Its just natural!!!

Women’s Reservation Bill - 33% Is that enough??

2009-10-07T23:03:00.000-07:00

The bill proposed in the parliament for legal provisions for making the reservation for Women in the parliament and assembly is underway in the current UPA government, this idea was actually initiated in 1992 by the then Government of India.

In its current form the bill envisages reserving ~33% seats in the parliament, which has its supporters in the Govt, opposition etc. The sole opposition time being comes from the Mulayam Singh Yadav's Samajwadi Party. You may be surprised, but I actually support his opposition to the bill. Women empowerment in India is a requirement but the government with this bill is actually going the wrong way and not going to do any good to women in India.

Reserving almost 180+ seats in the parliament for Women is just too big a number. And this reservation will add no value to the very cause of Social Equality for women in India and niether do we need Women Political Empowerment in India (I will elaborate more on this in some time).

Politics in India is a very tricky profession. This very idea of Women's reservation bill has two very serious flaws.

First, the question is will the Women Reservation Bill add any value to the cause of Social inclusion, equality for Women in this country? I think not, because once the law of reservation comes into action the very constituencies reserved for women will have wives, sisters, daughters or some times the daughters-in-law of the former parliamentarians and/or influential (today this list not only include the politicians but also industrialists, XXXXX barons etc) "MALES", which will eventually make them the DEFACTO parliamentarians.

We have seen this happening in india a million times, in Bihar (The CM issue by You know who...), in Karnataka (Constituencies vacated by husband to contest parliament was later won by his wife :) ) and there are many such examples which I need not elaborate. In conclusion this will just lead to more relatives of the existing politicians in the "So called Active" politics and will add absolutely zilch value to the Woman's Social Equality.

Second, Do we really need Woman's political empowerment in India? President of India (Head of the state), Chief of the Ruling party INC (& of course the defacto Prime Minister ;) ), CM of Delhi (Capital of India and Heart of Indian politics), CM of Uttar Pradesh (Most populous and largest state of India with 80 Parliament seats) and many powerful "ex and future" CM's (Tamil Nadu, Rajhisthan, Madya Pradesh etc) are all Women. The funny things is the power ratio actually tilts in favour of Women.

If you need Women empowerment than you need to do something else and not reserve seats for the Wives of the existing politicians. First, the education of the girls should be of the foremost importance in india. Educate girl child, make it compulsory, make the education for girls cheap or if possible free. This will eventually lead to more litracy in india.

If you want to empower women, then encourage women employment. The idea is to make women financially independent. Today in india more than 80% of women in the age group of 20+ years are financially dependent on either their fathers or after the marriage, on their husbands, who actually guide their entire future and in fact their entire life according to their own "Male" understanding without any regard to the individual in question.

So according to me this is where we need to work & unless our very "so called" values and idea of "male chauvinism" doesn't end, "Women Empowerment and Equality" will never see the light of the day even by reserving 90% of the parliament seats. The defacto rulers will be the male relatives of those women and even if those women politicians are independent and strong (As currently many are!!!) this bill will do absolutely no good for Women empowerment in India.

A WORLD... SO DIFFERENT

2009-10-07T02:01:00.000-07:00

Mr. President has a habit of dropping bombs in the Middle East and nearby places. Why??
Because Mr. President think he has the right to kill the people who does not live in air conditioned homes, neither drive fancy cars, nor wear designer clothes, their only crime is they live on a land which produces humongous amount of oil.

They call the man sitting in the white house the BIG BROTHER of the world; He kills numerous civilians trying to destroy the WMD that are "SUPPOSED" to be developed by another psycho called Saddam Hussein. Result of this, Iraq is in complete chaos, people die everyday, He killed Saddam and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis but found no WMD.

A militant group kidnaps two well armed soldiers across the borders and the whole world is up in arms. The same army to which those kidnapped soldiers belonged to have been killing civilians for decades and the world ignores.
Invading soldiers are guilty of raping a innocent Iraqi girl and killing her whole family and the world ignores!!
Israeli soldiers die in a combat and every single news paper print their names and the world mourns, the same Israeli army kills 10 members of a family most of which were children and the world ignores!! PREPOSTEROUS isn’t it ?

I ask why the life of a ten year old Palestinian kid is less important than an Israeli or an American.

Not everyone denies holocaust, not everyone is anti-Semite, holocaust is and will remain one of the worst crimes but does this give the Zionists the right to kill Palestinians and Lebanese, keep them in prisons away from their loved ones as long as possible, does it give them the excuse to kill kids throwing stones at their military tankers ?

Why is the world so indifferent to these crimes? Why no one says anything about the men being kept in the Guantanamo bay prison for more than 5 years without being charged for anything, why are they being denied the basic human right to challenge their illegitimate detention, where the hell is the world now which starts crying for the smallest possible issues?

Why the world doesn’t mourn the death hundreds of innocent kids in afghan, in Iraq? Why not light a candle for them, remember those unknown names and faces? Why their death is justified as the consequence of war?

What did Kofi Annan do and what is Ban Ki Moon going to do? Mere puppets in the hands of United States, Can we now not question the very existence of United Nations?
I wholeheartedly applaud the American voters for showing the doors to these war mongering republicans in the mid-term polls and hope they are thrown out of the office in the next presidential election, but is it going to change the attitude of White House towards Palestinians, Iraqis, will they stop killing for their own gains ?

Killing innocent people cannot be justified whether the bomb is dropped on WTC in NY or if it’s dropped on kids playing on the beach in Palestine. Murder cannot be justified as war.

Now I sit alone and think there are two kinds of world around me, one where there is death, chaos, poverty, tears, and plenty of oil and another one with tall buildings, Ferraris, Mc Donald’s and Burger Kings.

I think about the choices the life has given me, whether to voice my concerns about those innocent people dying everyday, where mothers are scared to let their children go away from home because they not sure if they will ever return, where kids have forgotten to play, to laugh.
Or like the most of the world I sit here in the comfy of my air conditioned room with a laptop and some cool music playing and ignore the other side of the world which is so different from mine ? Ignore their misery, their sufferings.
To me just like almost everyone the *latter* choice looks pretty easy. May be i might feel guilty for some time, but then I forget about the whole thing and continue to live my life.

All I can say is I do feel sad for the people who lost their loved ones in WTC attack, I mourn the death of people who lost their lives during 7/7 bombing, but unlike many in the ignorant world I also cry over the death of hundreds and thousands of innocent Palestinians, Lebanese, Afghanis killed by the illegitimate invading armies, I shed a tear for Iraqis killed every day for the benefit of few politicians, for oil, in the name of creating a democracy. These are just my sorrows, just my feelings which are going to change nothing in this world, but I still cry.

I wish I could ask Mr. President if he made this world a safer place to live in or he created more chaos, caused more deaths, more widows and more orphans?
I want to ask him if he gets sleep at night, does he not hear the cries of those killed on his orders, does he not hear the screams of those women whose husbands and children he killed.

I wish I could put some sense into the people from both sides, tell them nobody wins in a war ...... everyone loses!! There is nothing impressive about death; there is no justification in killing innocent people from any part of the world.

Some say that *MIGHT IS RIGHT*, now I wonder if it is true.

Hopefully one morning I will wake up to safer and a much happier world, a world without sufferings, world with full of laughter of kids, elderly men and women sitting and sipping coffee and cherishing their memories, a world where we all be able to appreciate *LIFE* the beauty and wonder of nature.

CURSED TO BE A PALESTINIAN

2009-10-07T01:59:00.001-07:00

Once upon a time there was a state called Palestine. A place just like any other country, which had the schools, cafes, homes with gardens, gardens with swings on which little girls laughing and playing, grounds in which kids played soccer. Young men and women getting ready to go to work.

Palestinians were just like us, they had emotions like ours, needs like ours, dreams just like ours. Then you might ask me if they were just like us, what happened to them now ? Where are they, what do they do now?

Well they are still there... though searching for their lost identity. They are refugees in their own lands. The very meaning of their life was snatched from them, they were displaced from their own lands.

In 1948 the britain decided to place all the displaced european jews in the middle east. Is it not wierd that Great Britain (A "european" nation) decides that all the displaced "european" jews being persecuted by a "european" dictator in the entire "europe" should create their own land (supposedly promised by GOD!!!) in middle east by displacing the current occupants of the palestine.. Well this is what the British Palestine mandate sounds to the common man.

Would you call this justice? Making the very people of that land refugees in their own land, snatching away the very right of LIFE from them?As it is famously said "Their past is a tragedy, present is chaos and .... fortunately or unfortunately can't see much of the future."

This statment's conclusion might become true if some thing is not done about it. They have a right to live as much as we do in their own free country.

A World... So Different

2007-04-14T08:41:00.001-07:00

Mr President have a habit of dropping bombs in the middle east and nearby places. why ?? Because Mr President think he has the right to kill the people who does not live in air conditioned homes, neither drive fancy cars, nor wear designer clothes, their only crime is they live on a land which produces humongous amount of oil.

They call the man sitting in the white house the BIG BROTHER of the world, He kills numerous civilians trying to destroy the WMD that are "SUPPOSED" to be developed by another similar character named Saddam Hussien. Result of this, Iraq is in complete chaos, people die everyday, He killed saddam and hundreds of thousands of iraqis but found no WMD.

A militant rebel group kidnaps two well armed soldiers across the border and the whole world is up in arms. The same army to which those kidnapped soldiers belonged to, have been killing civilians for decades and the world ignores!!
Invading soldiers are guilty of raping an innocent iraqi girl and killing her whole family and the world ignores !!
Israeli soldiers die in a combat and every single news paper print their names and the world mourns, the same israeli army kills 10 members of a family most of which were children and the world ignores !! PREPOSTEROUS isin't it ?

I ask why is the life of a ten year old palestinian kid less important than an israeli or an american ? Not everyone denies holocaust, not everyone is anti semite, holocaust is and will remain one of the worst crimes but does this give the zionists the right to kill palestinians and lebanese, keep them in prisons away from their loved ones as long as possible, does it give them the excuse to kill kids throwing stones at their military tankers ?

Why is the world so indifferent to these crimes ? why no one says anything about the men being kept in the guantanamo bay detention camp for more than 5 years without being charged for anything, why are they being denied the basic human right to challenge their illegitimate detention, where the hell is the world now which starts crying for the smallest possible animal rights issue ?

Why doesn't the world mourns the death hundreds of innocent kids in afghan, in iraq ? Why not light a candle for them, remember those unknown names and faces. Why their death is justified as the consequence of war ?

What did Kofi Annan do and what is Ban Ki Moon going to do ? Mere puppets in the hands of goverment of United States, Can we now not question the very existence of United Nations ?
I applaud the american voters for showing the doors to these war mongering republicans in the mid-term polls and hope they are thrown out of the office in the next presidential election, but is it going to change the attitude of White House towards palestenians, iraqis, will they stop killing for their own gains ?

Killing innocent people cannot be justified whether the bomb is dropped on WTC in NY or if its dropped on kids playing on the beach in palestine. Murder cannot be justfied as war.

Now I sit alone and think there are two kinds of world around me, one where there is death, chaos, poverty, tears, and plenty of oil and another one with tall sophisticated buildings, Ferraris, Mc Donalds and Burger Kings.

I think about the choices the life has given me, whether to voice my concerns about those innocent people dying everyday, where mothers are scared to let their children go away from home because they not sure if they will ever return, where kids have forgotten to play, to laugh, forgotten to be like kids.
Or like the most of the world I sit here in the comfy of my air conditioned room with a laptop and some cool music playing and ignore the other side of the world which is so different from mine. Ignore their misery, thier sufferings. To me just like almost everyone the *latter* choice looks very easy to make. May be i might feel guilty for some time, but then I forget about the whole thing and continue to live my life.

All I can say is I do feel sad for the people who lost their loved ones in WTC attack, I mourn the death of people who lost their lives during 7/7 bombing, but unlike many in the ignorant world I also cry over the death of hundreds and thousands of innocent palestinians, lebanese, afghanis killed by the illegitimate invading armies, I shed a tear for iraqis killed every day for the benifit of few politicians, for oil , in the name of creating a democracy. These are just my sorrows, just my feelings which are going to change nothing in this world, but I still cry.

I wish I could ask Mr President if he made this world a safer place to live in or he created more chaos, caused more deaths, more widows and more orphans ? I want to ask him if he gets sleep at night, does he not hear the cries of those killed on his orders, does he not hear the screams of those women whose husbands and childern he killed.

I wish I could put some sense into the people from both sides, tell them nobody wins in a war ...... everyone loses !! Why don't they understand there is nothing impressive about death, there is no justification in killing innocent people from any part of the world.

Some say that *MIGHT IS RIGHT*, I wonder if it is true.

Hopefully one morning I will wake up to safer and a much happier world, a world without sufferings, world with full of laughter of kids, elderly men and women sitting and sipping coffee and cherishing their memories. A world in which we all would be able to appreciate LIFE, the beauty and wonder of nature.

PS: This is just what I feel about the world today, comments are most welcome.

Cricket ... Cricket !!

2007-04-13T10:25:00.000-07:00

Indian cricket team's shocking exit from the wold cup was one of the most disappointing day of any indian fan this year. We started of as almost the favorites after australia and ended up on the flight with Pakis.

Everybody started shouting to axe all the senior players because india lost in the very first round.

Sachin Tendulkar once regarded as the greatest by the indians and the world alike, sachin who has created every possible batting record and the india wants him to retire from cricket. Can we justfy our behavoir ? Are we right in blaming the greatest batsmen ever ? Is this the end of Sachin Tendulkar ?

I don't think so, If you wanna replace a batsmen like sachin whom will you replace him with in the first place or for that matter Saurav and Dravid one of the best bestmen of all time. Does it make sense to axe all the the current players and get a new team ? Nope.

Also another problem as Pataudi puts it 'who has the guts to sack sachin tendulkar'.

I believe the team that was selected for the world cup was one of the best indian team ever, its just that they didn't play like a team that day. Its a game it happens.

On the other hand half the fans are after Chappell's life and he was smart enough to resign and leave, smart bloke ain't he ?? especially after what happened to Bob. Now he realised first hand what is cricket like in sub continent :)) .

Indian fans say Gregie made the team very unstable and experimented way too much with the team, Well I agree a little with them as definitely some of our players got screwed, for instance Pathan, what happened to him ? he tried to concentrate on batting hit some real big scores and bowling went for a complete toss, now he bowls slower than Kumble *LOL*.

So what do we do now sit and cry and kick all the senior players out and seal off all their bank accounts and make them bankrupt till they win the next world cup ? Well loads of disappointed indian fans will agree with this idea :)

Well I believe we retain the current team and try and resolve the issue and give a bigger role to captain. I still read here and their the 1992 paki players talk about imran khan and they say when imran was there, he is the board of director, he is the coach, he is the mentor and he is the captain. India needs somebody like him. Sachin cannot be made the captain, I don't think rahul is aggressive enough to be a captain, so the only one left I think who can lead india is Ganguly not a imran khan material but a good captain though. But the problem is all these three great will not be there for the next world cup which is gonna be held in the subcontinent.

So lets keep our cool, cheer our team and pressurise the BCCI to keep players in control and keep their salaries performance based and try and win as many tournaments as possible before the next world cup and hopefully win the world cup as well.

Well I must admit I might lose all my interest if Australia wins another world cup. No no, no australia this time. As far as the world cup has gone this time Australia looks ruthless with their opponents :( . They believe in complete destruction of their opponents and they might(hopefully not) end up winning the cup. As for me my bet is on Sri Lanka or Bangaldesh (ha ha High hopes I have !!).

Lets keep our finger crossed. :)

A Fascinating Dream.

2007-04-11T05:46:00.000-07:00

Today we call ourselves developed, Tech Savvy and what not, Why ?? Because we have cell phones, internet, HDTV, PS3's.

Do you think technology has reached its zenith ? We no more need anything else ?
Or do you think there is still a long way to go ? Do you think with the help of technology we can upgrade ourselves ?

Well here are some random thoughts over a not so famous but still a very famous concept. Human Cyborgation ? Cyborg stands for Cybernetic Organism, Well now you must be making a mental picture of Arnold Schwarzenneger with half a metal face and a red glass eye. We have not yet reached a phase where the machines or cyborgs might take over our lives but human cyborgation is infact a reality for quiet some time. Prof. Kevin Warwick of Univ of Reading UK claims to be first Human Cyborg.

Human Cyborgation is a concept of compatibility between human nervous system and a elctronic or mechanical device or a Cyborg can be defined as a person whose physiological functioning is aided by or dependent upon a mechanical or electronic device.

From a very practical point of view it will have tremendous effect on our lives, just imagine a world without disability, world without diseases, world where everybody has a right to live their life to the fullest !!

When I was a kid I was running around with my friends in the neighbourhood and I see another kid looking at us playing, laughing and runnning. He was sitting there on a wheelchair and laughing at our antics but somehow I felt he was not laughing, he was rather having that longing look in his eyes to getup, to stand on his feet and join us in our game. This was the first time in my life I realized that life can be incomplete and not everything will be the way you want it to be. After years of this incident I came across the term Cyborg while on the net and realized that this technology might make these people laugh again, enable them to play and run around, make them independent.

Just imagine if it was this easy for a disabled person to attach a bionic limb or a bionic arm and live life just like a normal one. Well the Bionic arm is a reality today and many people have beniffitted a lot from this technology but still there is a long way to go as this is ridiculously expensive for an ordinary person like the kid in my neighbourhood to afford.

I believe very soon this will become a easy possibility, no one will sit on a wheel chair and stare into the blank future wondering will they ever be able to laugh again, play again or be totally independent. No one will have their eyes open but stare into the blackness of this world, no one will be blind they will see all the colours, they will see the sunlight, they will look at the flowers and appreciate how beautiful they are.

But now I wonder how soon will this be ?

On a fictitious side of this topic, would't it be wonderful to have some ESPs, to have an additional memory chip implanted in you to store important information, to communicate using telepathy instead of same old fashion voice. Just imagine being connected to internet the unlimited source of information every instant of your life. Will it not be great not to carry your passport every time you plan to catch a flight instead have a chip implanted in your body that stores all you information and just swipe in and swipe out of the airport ;) , If you start imagining things then even sky is not the limit.

And now there is no research, no technology that will not hit the Ethical blockade :) same is the case with this. Well fiction or non-fiction will human cyborgation make us seem like playing god ? Does it make us try to complete the nature ? Are we supposed to remain the way we were born. On my way to bangalore I met a priest in the train and he told me the word upgrading humans, changing their physical nature making them more able than they are today is blasphemy.
But does god restrict you in anyway from leading a better life, a fuller life ? I don't think so.

PS: This was least possible information on this topic I gave you... Just the brief. Feel free to leave your comments.