Fake eyewitness

Today one of my colleagues forwarded me a news link which claims that Mahisasur (the daemon king) is worshipped in South India. When I told him that, "I have been to Mysore and lived in Bangalore for one year and never saw anyone worshiping Mahisasur. I did not even hear that Mahisasur being worshiped anywhere at all. I had many Dravidian friends and no one told me that they have any respect for Mahisasur." he told me that he had been to Chennai and he saw people worshiping Mahisasur. When I asked him to give details of location in Chennai where he saw people worshiping Mahisasur he was not able to give it. He later told me that he saw it in Begampet, which he later retracted and said that Begampet is in Hydrabad and not in Chennai.

The interesting question is that did he saw someone worshiping Mahisasur in Chennai or he is making false stories based on the news article? Anyone who has not been to south India can believe in this story if someone says that he had been to south India and himself saw Mahisasur being worshiped there by his own eyes. But this might very well be a work of fiction based on a news article to impress his friends about his knowledge (false knowledge). Today I came to know that you should not trust so called eyewitness because their version can be based on a false news item rather than being based on their own personal experience.  

Following is part of news item first published in Telegraph and later published by abplive.com . This news article is based on Smriti Irani (Human Resources Development Minister, Government of India)'s speech in parliament.

MAHISHASUR

Irani referred to celebrations of Mahishasur — the demon slayed by Goddess Durga — in JNU, and wondered whether that would be tolerated in Calcutta.

Fact check: The “demon” is celebrated in many parts of southern India, and some scholars have suggested his popular, dark-skinned depiction in contrast to the fair-skinned Durga is a pointer to an Aryan-Dravidian divide. Mysore, Karnataka’s second-largest city, is an anglicised version of Mahishuru — which means the “abode of Mahishasura” in Kannada.

Based on this news item my colleague constructed story of him seeing worship of Mahisasur by his own eyes. These kinds of eyewitness are real culprit of dividing the nation. These people spread rumors which divide the country. We need to be careful of these kinds of people.

I again confirmed with one of my south Indian friend if Mahisasur is worshiped in south India. He told me that south India is big area and he can't deny if in some remote area a few people worship Mahisasur but as far as his knowledge about south India the answer is No, south Indian people don't worship Mahisasur or Ravana.

At the following link one person analysed telegraph's post in detail.

http://www.opindia.com/2016/02/a-fact-check-on-the-telegraphs-fact-check/

Haryana burning in fire of reservation

Past few days Haryana is seeing violent protest by Jat community demanding reservation in government educational institutions and government jobs. These kinds of reservations are against right of equal opportunities granted by constitution. Some people are showing their power to blackmail the government and killing meritocracy.

I accept all this arguments but want to remind you about management quotas in private educational institutions. Private educational institutions produce 75% of total doctors produced in India. 50% of these seats are reserved for relatives of management committee. This reservation for rich people is approved by government and judiciary. This reservation is hitting meritocracy harder than cast based reservation in government collages and jobs. Why government and judiciary fail to take any action when rich people show their power and demand 50% reservation for their children in schools and colleges? Why no one express unhappiness on this sorry state of affairs? Why this reservation for rich people allowed in name of freedom to run private business?

No private business must be allowed to discriminate between customers. If someone opens an insurance company or a bank, can we allow him/her to charge different premium or interest rates based on cast of the customer? The answer is no because right to run private business don't allow anyone to discriminate between people. Similarly private educational institutions must be prevented from discriminating students based on management seats and public seats. When general seat students fail to get admission at 95% marks, management seat student get admission at 55% marks. These management seat students produce incompetent doctors and engineers and we have to bear with these incompetent people. Government and Judiciary need to rise up to task to restoring true meritocracy in India where no seats are reserved to rich people and education is provided to every talented and hardworking person of India irrespective of financial condition of his/her parents.

I earlier also wrote my opinion in matter earlier also at following link:

http://jasvantsingh.blogspot.in/2016/02/management-quota-in-education.html

Anti India protest in JNU

Few days back there was a protest in support of terrorist Afzal Guru who was hanged in case of attack on Indian parliament. In this protest anti India slogans were raised. Next day ABVP protested against anti-national elements. The teachers of JNU did not support protest against anti-national elements because they did not want to get involved in politics.

Now Delhi police have acted against these anti national elements and booked JNUSU president Kanehya in case of sedition. The same professors who did not want to get into student politics are now protesting in support of anti-national people. Students who are protesting in support of anti-national people are not doing it because they want to do it but because they want to get good grades in their exam and they have to support their professors for that. The problem is not with students but with teachers of JNU. Teachers of JNU are anti-national and getting involved in anti-national activities is a mandatory criterion for scoring good marks.

History of Valentine day

Today I am going to write history of Valentine day. The history of Valentine day is changing very fast. I will document how it has changed over time.

First time I heard about Valentine Day was in 1995. It was time when Valentine day was promoted on large scale in India. TV shows and newspapers were promoting Valentine Day. Times of India published a special supplement of 50 pages to print message of lovers free of cost. That time TV shows and newspaper were saying that history behind valentine day is that once upon a time there was a princess who loved a prince and she was not able to tell him. She told it to her servant Valentine and he suggested her to make a nice card for the prince and write her message in that card. The princess made a card for prince and gave it to him on 14th February. From that date culture of Valentine day started and this day was named after the servant who gave brilliant idea of card.

In 2005 the idea of Saint Valentine was born. The new story says that there was a Christian saint called Valentine and he invented marriage of a man and woman and this day is named after that great saint. Till 2010 wikipedia was saying that there was no historical person called saint Valentine but now in 2016 wikipedia also says that there was saint Valentine and he invented marriage of man and women and this concept was later on adopted by all other civilizations. It looks like that man didn't used to get married to woman. Looks improbable to me because as per my knowledge, in India man used to get married to a women from time immemorial.

Now a day (in 2016) Valentine Day is a big celebration. Boys and girls give card to each other on 14th February.They go out to restaurants and pubs after that drink and dine and do all sorts of immoral things on this day.  This love last till breakup day celebrated on 21st February. On 21st February these new love birds tell each other that it is not working out and start searching for another person. Why this celebration for a love which last only for 7 days?

In India we believe in life long relationship. Not only life long, but a seven life relationship. Love is a commitment for a life time which needs to be honored for whole life. It should not be like you fall in love for most beautiful boy or girl and whenever you see a more beautiful girl or boy you ditch your previous lover and fall in love with a new person. This materialistic attitude can't build a happy society. There are many ups and downs in life of a person. Health, beauty and wealth of a person do not remain constant for whole life. In India if a person loses his health or wealth than his/her partner supports him and not ditch him and find another partner to satisfy their physical need. This kind of culture has led to many suicides and people getting in depression in western countries. Once a person loses his job he loses his wife also. He is left alone without money and family and in this situation many persons commit suicide.

We are emulating west without realizing what we are losing. We don't see the problem west is facing. In west people are talking about loss of family values, every second person is divorced there. If a person fall sick then nobody takes care of him. In India we take care of our parents, husband, wife and children. We need to make sacrifice of our pleasure for that but in return we get an insurance that my family will take care of me if I lose my health and wealth. I don't want materialistic culture of west destroying social values of Indian culture. It takes thousands of years to build a culture of helping each other. It can get destroyed in 10 years or so but can't be restored back in 10 years. It will take thousands of years. It is better to be safe than sorry.    

Management quota in education

The Delhi high court has restored management quota for nursery admission in Delhi private schools. This decision is opposite of Supreme courts stand that their should be no reservation in education because it allow incompetent people to grow and actual talent starved. Court observed that parliamentarian should raise above vote bank politics and scrap quota for weaker sections in education and jobs to let meritocracy grow. Because reservation is holding back real talent and is reason of India's backwardness.

On other hand court don't find anything wrong in seats in education institutions and government department being reserved for relatives of management committee and children of employees of government department. People who keep posting on facebook and twitter against reservation for backward casts suddenly become silent on issue of reservation for relatives of management committee. I see clear bias in mind of people opposing reservation in favor of rich people. Critiques of reservation don’t want anyone to speak about reservation for children of affluent class in terms of management quota and discretionary powers. Reservation for relatives of management committee is even more harmful than reservation for affluent people because it produces a class of engineers and doctors who are incompetent and nation have to bear with them. These people are incompetent despite having all resources with them.

The critiques of reservation for backward castes blame all backwardness of India to reservation system and keep silent about management quota. These people want reservation for affluent class to continue bust quota for backward classes to stop. These people are from affluent class and want all good things to be reserved for them.

The court's argument about autonomy being granted to people who make investment at their own personal risk is faulty. Schools are allowed to decide their fee to recover their investments. Court can grant autonomy in deciding fee for school but not right to discriminate between students. There are many other fields where people make investment on their personal risk like insurance companies, telecom companies, hotels, restaurants etc. Can we allow them to discriminate between people just because they made investment on their own risk? If we allow so then we may see hotels allowing guests only from upper caste, restaurants refusing to serve people of certain religion or caste. If someone starts a business then he/she have to abide by laws of land and must be prohibited from doing any sort of discrimination. Fee charged for the services should be only criteria and no other criteria should be allowed in providing the services.

I see this decision to be a clear case of judicial corruption and against spirit of our constitution.

• 5 Feb 2016
• Hindustan Times (Delhi)
• Soibam Rocky Singh rocky.singh@hindustantimes.com

Management quota for nursery restored

NEW DELHI: The Delhi high court on Thursday restored the management quota and 11 criteria for nursery admission in the Capital’s private unaided schools abolished by the Aam Aadmi Party government. The court asked the government to take action against malpractices such as sale of seats.

In an interim order, justice Manmohan stayed a January 6 circular of the Arvind Kejriwal led government that scrapped 62 admission criteria, including the management quota under which schools could use their discretion to award seats.

After this order, apart from the management quota, private unaided schools will be able to admit students on 11 criteria under a points system such as first born, adopted child, twins, parents with proficiency in music, sports, national awardee, etc.

“Promoters of a school who make investment at their own personal risk are entitled to full autonomy in administration including the right to admit students,” justice Manmohan said.

“Prima facie, the impugned (January 6) order has been issued without any authority and is in direct conflict with the order of 2007 issued by the lieutenant governor (which permitted management quota up to 20%).”

Hours after the verdict, the government said an appeal will be filed while schools welcomed it.

A private schools’ association said its “autonomy” was upheld and the decision was timely enough to not disturb the nursery admission schedule.

“Facilitating good education for students in Delhi is the responsibility of the government. We will appeal against the HC order,” deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia, who holds the education portfolio, tweeted.

Earlier, Kejriwal had termed management quota a scam and a way to “loot people” while defending the government’s decision to scrap it along with 61 criteria that according to it were “unfair, unreasonable and non-transparent”.

The court declined to consider an argument that “schools have no discretion in admission because of a covenant in the lease deed”, saying it would be considered at a later stage.