Yet another day, yet another blast and so the story goes! How cruelly appropriate that a day after we unnecessarily bickered about the singing of the national song, we were reminded once again in Malegaon of our national capitulation before terror. Apparently the 200 lives lost in Mumbai didn't ruffle any feathers. Now is there any point in launching yet another tirade against the Maharashtrian authorities and the sardar government? Forget it!
Malegaon is not far from Ahmednagar where I was witness to Muharram day riots few summers back. No big news really, only few people died! I wasn't affected in anyway (didn't even get leave since my office was in the suburbs!), but I still wonder why the district authorities blacked out all television channels on the two days that city was under curfew. Funnily police allowed the city cable to air local news and they spread rumors with a gusto! If the point was to prevent rumors, police kind of ensured the people got just that! If it was meant to prevent unlawful assembly, won't the city be more peaceful with people watching 'bakwaas bahu' soaps at home than rioting outside?! Wonder whats the scene like in Malegaon now.
The other day my colleague of Russian origin appreciated that India had leaders from the minority communities occupying the highest political positions in the country. Now I'm not going to tell him that these so called 'leaders' chose to represent a fringe minority of bigots by not singing the national song instead of the millions of largely tolerant and easy going muslims/christians who happily paid tributes to the song on its 100th anniversary. Manmohan Singh has fallen one more step in my eyes.
Sometime back we had a hard time convincing a Mexican friend that not all Indians get malaria and that its possible to get water from sources where buffalos aren't meditating! Guess I will have to hide from her now. My grandma in Chennai and a respected Tamil columnist in Mumbai have been diagnosed with Chikungunya. Although my grandma jokes that it doesn't make much difference since she had pain in the joints anyway, I feel terrible. If even these people aren't safe from such diseases, I guess India has a long way to go on public health.
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Hope your grandma is feeling better. I do agree with you that India has a long way to go in terms of public health. Indian health officials are not at all proactive about anything. They simply react to health issues, which doesn't seem to be the right approach. Cleanliness is a major issue, but I blame most people living in India, in addition to the Municipal Corporations for this. I daresay that judging by the way they keep their apartments in the US, Indians are a dirty bunch of people.
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