Sachin Tendulkar's Rajya Sabha Trouble

Hairsplitting began as soon as Sachin Tendulkar got nominated to Rajya Sabha. Television, newspapers and internet haven't got tired of filling their time, paper and bytes on this topic. Of course, most of these discussions are full of questions marks- 'why Sachin?', 'why without any political or social issue track record?', 'why not Saurav Ganguly?', 'does he even know that Rajya Sabha is not another IPL team?', 'what issues will he take up?', 'will he support anti-corruption movement or not?' 'was he pressurised by congress?', 'is a he being played by corrupt congress to improve it's image?' Questions, questions, question. Shut up people!! 

The man is just nominated to Rajya Sabha and that too under Article 80 (3) of the Constitution of India which calls for nomination of people 'who special knowledge or practical experience in respect of such matters as the following, namely:-Literature, science, art and social service'. Till recently, everyone in the country has been shouting why cant they include sports in the list. Perhaps, they clubbed the sports with Art and hence Sachin could enter the upper house. I don't see that anyone will question that Sachin has has 'special knowledge' and 'practical experience' in his field. So I don't see why should there be any screaming and shouting about 'he does not have political  background', 'he has not taken stand on social issues'. People, let us get clear on this- social or political work is NOT NECESSARY HERE! He is going to Rajya Sabha for his special knowledge and practical experience in HIS OWN FIELD! We want people who understand sports as it happens in the field so that they can give some real practical suggestions about policy making about sports and it is not left to the mercy of Sharad Pawars and Suresh Kalmadis who have not held a bat in their hand after age 15 to decide what is to happen to sports in India. 

Some people have questioned whether Sachin knows anything about functioning of the parliament. Some people have even sank to the level of questioning if he knows that Rajya Sabha is not another IPL team (according to Jug Suraiya, this is supposed to be funny and we are supposed to laugh at it). To me it sounds outright condescending. I am sure that out our 1.21 billion population, it would be less than 5 lac people (that too would be an extremely liberal guess) who know, in and out of how parliament functions. Rest of the people know just the basic that we learn in our civics books. So please do not expect Sachin or anyone who enters to parliament to start referring to footnotes of rule books. He will learn like as so many others have. 

Ramdev Baba (people still write about him in the papers) has been worried if Sachin was pressurised by Congress and he also wants to find out if he would be able take a stand on anti-corruption movement. Considering the money and popularity Sachin enjoys, I am sure he cannot be pressurised by anyone to accept Rajya Sabha membership. He has been pressurised to stop doing something which he loves the most- playing cricket, and he came fighting out of the corner and stood firm on his stand that he will retire when he wants to retire. This man has his own mind. In the same breath one can say that, he will take a stand on corruption or any other issue if he wants to take it. Leave it to him. And as an afterthought  I can also say that, if Baba Ramdev did not have this stupid and illusiory idea of him becoming prime minister of India, he could have also been nominated to Rajya Sabha! But unfortunately some people have a grandiose self image and that spells a doom for their public career. 

I heard some lamenting about 'Sachin joining a corrupt party' i.e. Congress. First of all, president's nominees don't have to join the ruling party. Congress is corrupt, so is BJP, so is third front. Does that mean we should stop the system of nominating people to Rajya Sabha through the President? Secondly, even if Sachin joins Congress Party eventually, as far as I know no political party has mandated that the new entrant has to sign an declaration saying that he or she will indulge in corruption. So let that argument rest. 

The funniest comment was by the Communist Party of India, MP, Gurudas Dasgupta- Why Sourav was not offered Rajya Sabha membership? Now that is like making it very regionalistic. Why Maharashtrian, and why not Bengali. So he was asked if he was upset because it was not a Bengali, he said 'I am not Bengali, I am Indian'. Well Mr. Dasgupta, then why could you not think of so many other 'Indian' sports persons like Kapil Dev, Sunil Gavaskar, Rahul Dravid etc. etc.??? Why only Sourav. Perhaps CPI now wants to woo the Bengali Manush by stoking regionalistic feelings. Should we take it as their new strategy against Mamata Bannerjee? Learning from Thackerays, are you?

Nevertheless, coming back to the main issue- Sachin has got Rajya Sabha membership as a president's nominee. If one looks at the history, most nominated members have not left a very lasting (or any) impact on the parliament (leaving aside a few like Javed Akhtar who really worked hard for his professional fraternity). To me it will be unfair to expect that Sachin will take historical stands on the burning issues of the country. I am just hoping that he would get an opportunity to do something for the development of sports in India and am confident that he will do a good job within his capacity. So people stop your ideas going wild on Rajya Sabha nominations let the man enjoy the honour that he has got. 

PS- In the whole Sachin Tendulkar discussion people forgot to notice that Film actress Rekha has also been nominated to Rajya Sabha. Considering our Bollywood obsession about Amitabh and Rekha, I thought there would be much spicy discussion about Rekha and Jaya Bacchan coming face to face in the upper house :) 

Maoists and the kidnappings

Indian Maoists are basically people, whose teenage Robin Hood fantasy has gone out of control. The wish to be like Indian version of hot looking Che Guevara and Fidel Castro has been taken to an extreme level by a few people. Unfortunately,  Mao, whose name they use rather proudly was not particularly attractive looking, and their activities too have gone in the path of becoming uglier and more and more unattractive in past few years, and especially past few months with all those civilian kidnappings.

If one reads the history of their so called movement, and wants to put it in a crisp and rather blunt manner, it reads like this- 'a bunch of middle class/upper middle class youth who wanted to destroy the intellectual and economic hegemony of their own class over the poor. They went to the poorest and the most ignored by the state and told them in the most articulate language that the armed struggle against the government was the only answer to all their problems. It was more like asking them to choose between a ballot paper and a gun. A good number of them did choose the gun because that means immediate power and as a result we have this huge mess called Indian Maoists which is nothing but the brain child of Indian Middle Class, against which it is supposed to work'

Any movement is about how well the movement leaders project themselves to the mass of people they want to utilise to meet their goals. The target group in case of Maoists were poor, ignored and in most cases exploited tribals of India. Imagine the way a tribal would look at the young, soft spoken, educated, city dweller who sits besides him and listens to all his problems with full attention as opposed to the government and forest officials who have nothing but contempt for him. Maoists gave their target group the first thing they wanted the most- attention and respect. In return they got the attention and respect of their target group. Now it was time for Maoists to speak and tribals to listen. They spoke to them about their exploited situation and how they own the forest and the natural resources, and only if they assert their right forcefully they will get it. What they have to do is to get rid those government people from their area and then they become the de facto rulers of their area.

Possibility of use of force against someone is a most alluring thing for human beings. Anyone can fall for it. The tribals did. They did start clearing the area of any government system and it worked. The city dwelling Maoists were proved right and the 'movement' spread.

What was government doing while all this was happening - Government was either sleeping or it was busy raking in or helping business people to rake in money from the forest and land resources. Worst of all, it intensified it's harassment of tribals.

It is important to understand that the Maoists are nothing but another race of power hungry politicians whose main aim is to reach South Block. The crucial difference is that they can kill their opposition much faster and without much immediate consequence than a regular politician can. I prefer the regular politicians to Maoists because I still have a chance to remove the former with the power of my vote and I see a much more stronger chance of improvement in him/her than a soldier like, gun wielding Maoist. So the regular Janata should rethink again if at all they have any sympathy for these Robin Hoods.

The government should WAKE UP! You cannot exploit the natural resources on which people have been sitting for generations by simply shooing them away. They have right to opinion as to what happens to their land and the forest and they should be involved in it. It is time to seriously go back to the cliched 'public participation'. A reformed land acquisition process and sharing of profits with people for sustainable development is something we are already running late on. A serious rethinking of the forest laws and reforming the colonial monster called 'Forest Department' which played an important role in alienating the people from the forest and from the state is necessary.

One thing is sure- the Maoists are on their way out. The movement would die soon but if we don't carry out the reform process mentioned above it would crop up in a different form. It is time to act fast.

Sex Tapes and Abhishek Manu Singhvi

Indians love to act as if they hate sex. Alleged sexapades of public figures are always in the news every now and then. Indians love to talk/write about them (mostly in disgust) - be it Swami Nityananda, Narayan Dutt Tiwari and now Abhishek Manu Singhvi.

The main assumption here is that - 'If you are a public figure you should be asexual'. This has something to do with our religious teaching that unless you conquer your kaam, krodh, moha, mada and matsar you are not good enough to do good to others.

Now let us look at some of these recent cases in consideration.

Swami Nityananda- A healthy looking youth with a supple body. Do you expect him to keep meditating 24 hours while men of his age are supposed to spend eighty per cent of their waking time thinking about sex. I have no idea if he ever claimed to be a celibate man, perhaps he did, as most Indian Guru's do. The mistake lies there. It is impossible for many Indian's to imagine that their spiritual guru has sex. 

I am not big fan of these Guru's nor am I totally against them, as long as you are not outright cheating people by claiming to be what you are not. It is interesting to note that the Indian Gods have full permission to marry (in most cases more than once), and also have sexual affairs outside wedlock, but not Spiritual Gurus. They have to be hundred percent Brahmacharis. The Puranic people were much more liberal as they allowed many gurus to 'fall' from their high pedestal by getting intimate with celestial damsels or even simple fisherwomen.  It is time that there are some spiritual gurus who publicly claim that he/she has sexual urges and he/she satisfies them. That will be a good beginning to clean this sex mess in the Gurudom.

N. D. Tiwari- It was a clear case of an old man, who has lived a life of flamboyance and hires sex workers when perhaps no woman agrees to sleep with him. There are hundreds of  such old men who do it. But the problem for the public was- 'At this age? This is perversion' Arre bhai kyon? Let him satisfy his sexual desires. Please accept that old people are also sexual beings. The other issue was- 'How can he do it in Raj Bhavan'- It is official residence of the governor. He was the governor and it was his residence. A person can have sex at his residence. What is the issue? 

Abhishek Manu Singhvi- Honestly, I have never been a great fan of this guy either. I tend to ignore the existence of  these 'college debate' type of individuals. Keeping that aside, the CD making rounds of the internet shows (allegedly) him having sexual intercourse with a lady lawyer. He is like just another middle aged guy, who is having an extra-marital sexual affair with a colleague and the act happens in his office. The problem here was that his former driver got it recorded and managed to make it public, perhaps after he failed to get any money from Singhvi. The matter is said to have been settled between the two parties. It appears driver made a good amount money. The case here is that of clear blackmailing. Singhvi resigned from the offices that he has been holding because he was the unfortunate one to get caught in an act, which most Indians love to hate. I am sure a score of his colleagues and also many who have been eloquently talking against it do it day in and day out.  

Using sex, to destroy credibility of a person is a very old trick and we have been falling for it from time immemorial. It is not true only of Indians but almost all countries and civiliasations of the world. The only sane thing, that I have been noticing since these three cases are being debated in the public sphere is that, there are a growing number of individuals who would not like to give it much importance. To me that is a welcome change. I am hoping that we would go through this 'desensitisation' process and some day the effort to record and then make such videos public would sound like a futile effort. Perhaps there would be many more such much loved 'scandals' before we reach that stage.