Government’s Annual Budgets.

Though I am from the Finance profession, the annual budgets of the government never interested me. I always felt that they are political in substance, and in supportive of the policies of the party that is in power at that point of time. The sops announced are normally before elections and a mean to perpetuate their rule and get back to power.

The way billions and trillions of country’s currency is spent or waived makes me wonder whether any morals are followed in preparing those budgets. In my view, it is a huge financial misappropriation, and no one is made accountable or answerable. The usual audit objections and resultant queries are not really taken serious and never subjected to investigations. All of them are looked into. Public memory is short on these aspects, and finally any committee’s reports gathers dust or get into archives.

I hasten to add that the preparation of this huge document is essential to run the government, and is a great guidance for the economy to run on macro levels. But, the propriety of some basic financial principles is given a go by, thereby eroding public trust in its governance.

You begin to wonder- Whose money is being squandered? And who has given them the power to do as they like? You cannot say that the public has voted us. But, an ordinary citizen is brushed aside with scorn, and with a villainous smile.

That is why these budgets do not interest me.

Boorish Behaviour.

I have been reading Australian Newspapers online regularly, for over three months now. The Sydney Morning Herald, The Australian, and The Daily Telegraph are the main papers I read. My interest got stirred up by the Cricket matches that India played Australia on their soil. My reading was not confined only to cricket matches, but also to know Australian’s life style, culture, and how the media covers them.

Well the coverage and reporting by media is no different than in other parts of the world. They highlight crime, Politics, and international news on its front pages, along with briefs on sports. It was articles on cricket I focused.

The Indian tour of Australia just ended, with India winning the One Day internationals series over Australia. It was a big moment in the history of Indian Cricket. There was great euphoria over this win, with the Indian cricketers becoming millionaires with prize money showered by the Cricket Board.

What was sad about the tour was the behaviour of very few of the players on both sides. The Australian Cricketers are known for sledging on field to apply mental pressures on players to disturb their concentration. Some of the Indian Cricketers, when provoked, retaliated, bringing the game to acrimonious levels. Some of them got away with reprimands, and with fines. The Australian spectators were seen booing the cricketers, and the media blowing the issues out of proportion. Some of the newspapers were highly one sided, and often biased in reporting.

Though the cricketers exhibited excellent skills, and raised their performance to incredible heights, their overall behaviour was annoying, and not worth speaking about. Several Australian Sportsmen called for “fundamental courtesies and manners” to prevail on and off the field.

This boorish behaviour is not confined to Cricket arena alone, but indulged even in parliaments of countries, by its members, often coming to blows inside the house in front of the speaker, disregarding the appeals for calm. A few days ago, Speaker of the Lower house of Indian Parliament, in deep anguish, said some of the members are finishing democracy!

I read reports of such behaviour in the parliaments of communist countries, and some of the other countries as well. The members get away with such behaviour, claiming some immunity or the other.

Some of all this is shown on TV and the scenes evoke response of amusement, annoyance and sheer repulsion.

No wonder, such behaviour percolates to all levels of the society, to homes, thus causing strained relations, and aberrations in cultures.

I would blame the education system that has been infringed by politicians with lop sided priorities in their governance. With a will to win at any cost, greed in acquiring wealth quickly, the morals necessary to uphold certain traditional values have been consigned to dust.

The words “Discipline” and “Self-Discipline” are being redefined. The disciplined breed are being referred as persons not competitive, laid back, introverts, noncombatants, and above all dullards!

What a pity and tragedy!

An author of a book (I do not remember) writing about discipline in public, said that “discipline is not only how to speak, what to speak and when to speak, but also how to dress, what to dress, and when to dress is also important”.

These lines are far away and inaudible to those believing in irrational, boorish behaviour.

Austin-Hyderabad Connection.

A news item, under the headline - City Of Austin - EMRI ink pact - in the Sunday edition of THE HINDU, dated March 2^nd, 2008, caught my attention, and gave me a little pleasure. It read as follows:

City of Austin in Texas in the United States Of America and one of the best performers in running the ‘911’ emergency, on Saturday became a strategic partner with ‘108’, the service run by the Emergency Management Research Institute (EMRI).

An MoU to this effect was signed by Pete Collins, Chief Information Officer in the City Of Austin and Venkat Changavalli, CEO, EMRI at a function here. Under the MoU, the Combined Transportation Emergency & Communication Centre (CTECC) that runs ‘911’ in Austin and EMRI will share knowledge and processes for better emergency management.

Mr. Collins described the CTECC in Austin as a centre where the police, fire, and emergency management technicians worked together in a facility spread over 80,000 square feet. CTECC has as partners, the city of Austin, Travis county, Texas Department of Transportation and the Capital Metro Transit Agency, he said.

In his presentation, Mr. Venkat Changavalli said ‘108’ had saved 25,000 lives after attending to 6 lakh emergencies since August 1, 2005.It had recently started operation in Gujarat with 80 ambulances and would, in a week, sign up to offer services in Uttarkhand, he said, going on to add that by the end of December, 2008, EMRI would have covered four states with 3,000ambulances.

I am aware of this service getting popular in Hyderabad, though I did not get an occasion to use it. I did see their ambulances speeding on the roads in the congested undisciplined traffic of Hyderabad. I must confess that majority of the motorists driving in Hyderabad, do not follow traffic rules. Very often, there are traffic jams. One does require patience and skills to get through the traffic snarls. I always wondered how these ambulances wade through these traffic jungles.

Be that as it may, the news item did give me a tingling sensation that Austin is connected with Hyderabad!

I do look forward to the day when there are direct flights to Austin from Hyderabad. It would augur well for both the cities, in terms of business opportunities and making friends.

Kosovo, Telengana, and Me.

It’s about a fortnight since Kosovo, unilaterally declared independence from Serbia. This was recognised by America and some countries of the European Union. Serbia and Russia are naturally upset and opposing. The move by Kosovo is a result of oppression, as the Kosovars feel. I will come to that story a little later.

Telengana

Telengana is a region within the State of Andhra Pradesh in India. This region was under Nizam’s rule before it became part of Andhra Pradesh during state’s formation on the basis of Telugu Language. The dialect of Telugu spoken in this region is slightly different, for it got evolved over a period with words of Urdu getting mixed. Even so, it is not difficult to understand. The dialect in other regions is also unique to that region. As a matter of fact, no one can say the world over, that their dialect of their language is pure.

Telengana has a History, like any other region. Ever since it became unified with Andhra Pradesh in 1956, the people of the region felt discriminated and raised many complaints of not developing their region. Their demand for a separate state was always on the cards, and is gaining momentum these days. There are several factors to be taken into consideration for formation of a separate state. Many within the state are divided in opinion. Ordinary law abiding citizens see the issue as instigated by selfish leaders for political gains.

Whichever party that came to power at the center, has, in my opinion took decisions by and large in the interest of the Indian people who belong to different religions with innumerable castes. Touch wood, India believes Unity in diversity. I can say with pride, way of living is unique in India. I hope the uniqueness continues.

Me

I was born before India’s independence, before formation of Andhra Pradesh State, in Machilipatnam town, off the coast of Bay of Bengal. The town lay in the coastal region of present state of Andhra Pradesh. In all my life so far, I might have spent about six months in that town over a period. Yet, I am fond of my birth place. I now live in Hyderabad (Telengana Region), capital of Andhra Pradesh, a bare 350 Kms (219 miles), northwest of it.

I grew up in Delhi and Chennai for 28 years, and since 35 years I am in Hyderabad. In between, I visited several cities in India, and visited USA thrice. I speak Telugu, Tamil, Hindi, and English fluently, and can understand Bengali, Kannada, Punjabi, and Urdu to a reasonable level.

The way the politicians in some regions in India are demanding separate state, citing reasons that the local people are being deprived of jobs by the migrants from other states; are being oppressed; their regions are not being developed, so on and so forth. Their main aim is to come to power by any means, more often than not by instigating violence.

I am taking me as an example. There are millions of Indians, educated and illiterate, who, like me migrated from city to city by accident, by choice, by compulsion.

To which state I belong? Let me analyse with humour.

I was born in coastal region, but never lived there, so I do not belong to it. I lived in Delhi and Chennai. Since I am not born there, I am not a local, nor is my native language Hindi or Tamil. So, they do not want me in their states. I am an outsider in the Telengana region. My accent of speaking Telugu or English does not go in tandem with the local dialects. So, I could be thrown out.

Where do I go? Even my dead body cannot be buried anywhere, if the same logic goes. The body also cannot be flown and dumped either in Bay of Bengal, Arabian Sea, Indian Ocean, or in the Himalayas. Because, the states may object to flying over their territories! In which case, God has to lift me physically into his domain. I hope he will do so.

Doesn’t all this appear and sound weird?

But that is the way, politicians are looking at issues with a narrow vision, disregarding human element.

Kosovo

There is some similarity between India and erstwhile Yugoslavia, so far complexities are concerned.

In the Book LANDS AND PEOPLES, a set of six volumes published (1985) by Grolier Inc., Danbury, CT, Yugoslavia is described in one of the paragraphs as follows:

A popular formula that helps to simplify the complexities of modern Yugoslavia states that it is a nation of six republics, five nationalities, four languages, three religions, two alphabets, and one party - the league of communists of Yugoslavia.

The six republics that make up Yugoslavia are Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, and Macedonia. Serbia is the home of Yugoslavia’s largest minority group - Albanians who live in the autonomous province of Kosovo-Metohilja.

The five related south Slav peoples who live in the six republics are the Serbs, Croats, Slovenes, Montenegrins, and Macedonians. The four languages most widely spoken are Serbian, Croatian, Slovenian, and Macedonian. The three religions are Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Islam. The two alphabets are Latin and Cyrillic.

The Yugoslavians have been living as ONE nation with all these republics, and each of the regions has been enjoying certain political and cultural autonomy.

But with the fall of communism, this nation slowly got disintegrated, following the secession of most of the republics. The last to get separated was Montenegro.

Now, Kosovo, a province in Serbia, with ethnic Albanian majority, seceded. The ethnic Albanians were mostly followers of Islam. The Serbian minority in the Kosovo Province had a mix of Eastern Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism.

The Serbian majority did oppress the ethnic Albanians brutally until the NATO forces bombed and brought the Kosovo province under its fold. That was in 1999. The West promised then that The Kosovo issue would be solved amicably with Serbia so far as the sharing of power was concerned, and that Kosovo would not secede from Serbia.

With this unilateral declaration of independence by Kosovo, Serbia is up in protest with support from Russia. Serbia and the Serbian minority in Kosovo consider the region as “the heartland of Serbian history and culture”, and unable to foresee a future without Kosovo.

The whole issue has become complex, and would involve considerable diplomatic skill to arrive at a solution. Could the issue lead to instability in the region?

My View

It is a reality of life that people migrate from one region to the other within a country, and from a country to another for better standard of living. In the process they carry their religion, and perhaps follow it in a new environment if allowed. Over a period of time, from a minority status, they could become a majority in that region. Their faith, beliefs and their desires may form a factor for governance, which could lead to a Type of government, Autocratic or Democratic. To remain in Power, Political opportunism by their leaders could alter their fate or even new borders could get created within which they may be forced to live. This new position may alter their status from a minority to a majority, and vice versa. In the process of this transition, sometimes help of other countries is sought, or they themselves interfere to exercise their presence, and influence in those regions for domination.

Innocent people suffer because of this power play. Their emotions, bond with the region, their culture is totally disregarded. What for?

The order and practice of the day seems to split countries, split territories, split people’s cultures, and usher new type of rule and civilization.

Is this the change the peace loving people are looking for, and deserve?

God Knows.

Material referred: lands and Peoples- A Grolier Inc., publication; www.wikipedia.org; Articles from International Herald Tribune; The Hindu, and the Internet.