PAN and Political Correctness

Have you read the PAN card application form closely?

Check this screen grab. It was taken from the online PAN card application form.

Click to open a larger image

Want to confirm?
Visit this page. Scroll to the bottom of the page and from the dropdown choose "individual" and then click select. Read the form that is displayed.

Maybe the government needs to allot some of the money earned from taxes in taking a few lessons on political correctness.

Via e-mail: Vidyut Sonde

Our Nation's Most Creative Minds. . .

I am sorry I ever doubted the ability of our government babus. Never ever again will I commit such sacrilege. Such decisons can only come from highly evolved creative thinkers.

The Commercial Tax Department has served a notice on Airtel, owned by Bharti Televentures Ltd., seeking payment of Rs. 24.18 crore as tax, interest and penalty for the sale of `light energy' to its customers for providing broadband through optical fibre cables (OFC).

The department has been investigating alleged tax evasion by OFC broadband providers, both in the public and private sectors, for selling light energy to customers.

[. . .]

Mr. Chitaguppi said that OFC operates on light energy, which is artificially created by the OFC providers and sold to customers for the purpose of data transmission and information, on the OFC broadband line. Without such energy, data or information cannot be transmitted.

"Whoever sells light energy is liable to pay VAT as it comes under the category of goods, and hence its sale constitutes taxable turnover attracting VAT at 12.5 per cent," he said.

Immense respect swells in my heart for Mr. Chitaguppi and the others of his ilk. I know we hardly ever recognise and appreciate the value of service that these babus render to us. Its time we did something about it. Maybe we can't feliciatate Mr. Chitaguppi and his colleagues in the service in a public function nor can we build monuments to their creativity. But surely there are ways around such piffling barriers.

Maybe someone on orkut could start a community dedicated to bringing together people who appreciate the immense intelligence of these babus who have provided us with such signal moments of pride and joy. Who would want a dead stone monument when there are living and breathing fans building communities and fandom around you? And wouldn't such a community be far more constructive and worthwhile than any of those "I Hate India" communities?

Any suggestions for an appropriate name for this community? How about "Babus are Gods?"

The Difference Between a Politician and a Mere Administrator

I happened to read Sharad Pawar's interview by Shekhar Gupta today. Pawar is probably the most pragmatic and practical politician in India at the moment. And extremely intelligent.
Sharad Pawar, in the interview, admitted to have deliberately misled the people of Mumbai during the 1993 bomb blasts in order to avoid a backlash against the muslims.

[. . .] I recollect on March 12, I was sitting in Mantralaya and at about 12-12.30 pm I heard a big noise, it was the explosion in Air India’s office. Within ten minutes I got a message that explosions had happened in 11 places, more than 365 people had died. I immediately realised that all these places were essentially dominated by Hindus. I guessed there must be some design, and that design must be that Hindus should react against the minority.

[. . .] I realised that basically the design seems to be that there should be riots. So I straight went on television and I misled people, deliberately misled people, instead of 11 bomb explosions I said 12. And one of the places that I mentioned was Masjid Bandar, an area dominated by minorities. So I spread the message that it’s not only in Hindu areas, it’s in a Muslim area also. I also said that I had seen - because I’d immediately visited the Air India building - and I said I’d visited it and the type of material that had been used was used essentially by some of the southern Indian side terrorist organisations. And I tried to (point a) finger at the Sri Lankan side...

[. . .] That was also deliberately fudged, I wanted to divert the attention from the Muslim angle to other areas. Because the design was to create further problem in Mumbai. Ultimately investigations established ki that was the design...

It's decisions and actions like these that show Pawar's political acumen. My respect for this politician has risen a few notches.

This is one of the best interviews given by a politician in some years. Pawar also talks about his views on the dance bar bans in Mumbai, the role of the left in the UPA government, economic reforms, and yes, even the selection system in Indian Cricket.

Do read it for this absorbing interview will give you an insight into the thinking of one of India's better politicians.

Willing to Spend 2 Days in a pit for 4 Lakh Rupees

Anyone of you who went near a news channel in the last two days know what this is about. Prince, a six-year-old, fell down a 50/60-feet deep borewell. The army pitched in and after two days, Prince was rescued.

Great work guys. A round of applause and a pat on the back for the rescuers.

Story ends? Nope, not quite.

NDTV tells me:

Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda has announced a grant of Rs 2 lakh for Prince. The Prime Minister has also offered full medical care for the six-year-old.

The Haryana government has also announced Rs 51,000 for rescue team.

A Rediff report says:

The Centre and the Haryana government each announced Rs 2 lakh for Prince.

That's 4 lakhs of the money that you and I have filed as tax returns paid as taxes. And no, much as I would like to, I am not even cribbing about the reward for the rescue team (How many were involved?) or the offer to pay all the medical expenses of the kid.

That's benevolence alright. But I hate it when the government bestows largesse with our money.

Update:
Amit Varma expresses a similar viewpoint here.

We Shall Overcome (Maybe) . . .

According to this rediff report, Amitabh Singhal, a spokesperson of the Internet Service Providers Association of India (ISPAI), has said that the blockade on blogs by various Indian ISPs will be lifted in another 48 hours.

Apparently the ISPs would have to tweak their Domain Name Servers (DNS) in a way that they block only the sub-domains DoT wants blocked while allowing other blogs to be accessed as before.

I hope this news is true.

For the moment I am willing to accept this partial upliftment of the ban. Ideally I would like all the sites to be free of censorship -- even the ones that the Government feels are inflammatory and against our nation's interests. Blocking these sites will not help much. If these sites are accessible, at least bloggers and readers can counter the "dangerous" rhetoric on these sites. For such arguments have to be countered by engaging these people in a debate and countering their ideas with logic, rationality, and understanding. Blocking these sites won't make the problem go away. Rather we the risk of festering a wound instead of trying to cure it.

And face it: By blocking websites, by refusing to acknowledge the "other," by censoring thoughts and words that are unpalatable to us, aren't we at risk of falling a victim to the same separatist hatred that some of these sited are advocating?

So people, 48 hours it is. Let's wait and watch.

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My earlier posts on this issue:
Blogs Blocked (workaround link) and What's Missing From our Lives (workaround link).

What's Missing From our Lives

Just came across this on The Hindustan Times:

"Officials" have this to say in defense of the decision to block blogs:

We would like those people to come forward who access these (the 12) radical websites and please explain to us what are they missing from their lives in the absence of these sites.

What am I missing? How about:

• I am missing reading a number of blogs that have some of the best writing that I have ever come across. Or is it that the government expects us to read only their circulars?
• I am missing the freedom to go online and read whatever catches my fancy -- and yes even if it is something radical, anti-India if the argument has been logically and excellently made. And no, that doesn't mean that I get influenced by these "radical sites."
• And since I spend a substantial bit of my day on reading blogs, my life is suddenly bereft and empty (well actually nothing that dramatic, but it is irritating to workaround the ban to access the blogs I want to read).
• I am missing the feeling of living in a democratic nation. I know the government controls a lot of my life in ways that I probably can't even fathom but this is too intrusive. I hate this big brother approach. I hate to grouped along with nations (Pakistan, China, the Middle-East nations, Ethiopia . . .) that censor the Internet.

That quote just confirms what I said earlier. Whoever thought of this and authorized the ban is so incompetent, clueless, stupid, dim-witted, and idiotic that the mind boggles.

And I hate to have a government of dolts.

update:
The Protests By Bloggers page on the public wiki is now available here.
Any lessons to be learnt from the ban on blogger? Quite a few.

Blogs Blocked

At least the blogspot ones are. And the ones hosted on geocities and typepad as well. Soon it might be the turn of other blog hosts too. And this evidently is on the orders of the Government of India. The gag has been put in place because apparently, terrorists are now using blogs to communicate.

When I received an email from Mridula, I thought that it was just a temporary ISP glitch. (Ban in India? For us Indians these sort of things happen only in Pakistan or China, but a gag on the Freedom of Speech in India -- never.) Moreover, whoever I contacted confirmed that blogs were accessible. However it looks like some ISP's were just slow in implementing the gag order. I came online a while ago to catch up on my blog reading, to find that not a single blogspot blog is accessible through my Sify broadband connection.

I would like to know which incompetent, clueless, overbearing fool ordered this gag. Doesn't the government have anything better to do?

And it is all so irritating, frustrating, and pathetic.

I can access blogger. Which means that I can log into my blog account, write a post, edit it, if I feel like it -- color the text, change the font style, wonder if the government doesn't have any serious "governing" to do, and while I am it -- call the government overbearing, foolish, clueless, incompetent (might as well add stupid, dim-witted, and idiotic to the list), and then publish it.

But I can't read my own post on my blog without resorting to what seems like underground resistance.

Bloggers have already banded together: there's a bloggers' collective on Google groups. A wiki: Bloggers Against Censorship has come up that lists the ISP's that have blocked blogspot and typepad. A page very helpfully lists various workarounds so that people can still access blogs. And of course a page that lists bloggers who are at the picket line voicing their protest.

If you are a blogger please write a post and join the protest. And if you are not a blogger, join the protests too -- email your friends, talk to your neighbor -- spread the word. Stop this policing now.

Or before you realize it we'll be back to typing letters in triplicate because some idiot in the government might decide email too needs blocking.

And it would mean that for once the terrorists have won. We can't allow that to happen, can we?

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Here's a quick list of workarounds:

Use a feed reader -- I use Sage which comes as an extension for Firefox browser. But I guess any feed reader (Bloglines, Google Reader) will work as well.

Use http://www.pkblogs.com/ -- this is a Pakistani website that came up when the Pakistan Government had blocked blogspot. This works fine but is a bit on the slower side.

Use http://www.shysurfer.com/ -- allows anonymous browsing and is quite fast.

The Brute State

Anita from Aniamit, in this post writes, about Mandala -- a basti in Deonar that was unfairly demolished without providing adequate notice to the slum-dwellers. A few days back, the police put up a notice asking the slum dwellers to vacate the basti within 12 hours. The minimum time mandated by law is 24 hours (I feel that's inadequate too). The slum dwellers gathered to protest and when the slum was set on fire. A lathi-charge followed.

Most of these slum dwellers are people with proof of residence till 2000. They have the right to be there.

It is not that I am a big fan of the slum cause. A slum is usually an encroachment (probably always) and yes, slums are an eyesore. But having said that, people live in slums out of necessity and not out of choice (and this slum is right next to the Deonar dumping grounds). Burning bastis and lathi-charging people is not the way the state should go about cleaning slums. And if the slum dwellers have proof of residence till 2000 and are legit, there's no way that the state can walk in one day and wipe out their homes. Rehab and relocation have to be provided -- the state simply cannot abdicate its responsibility in this case.

There are probably quite a few more dimensions and angles to this issue that I don't know about or will never understand. But I do feel that prima facie the state has committed a grave injustice and has been very unfair to the residents of Mandala.

The Narmada Nav Nirman Abhiyan is coordinating relief work for the slum dwellers. Donations in cash and kind for the Mandala residents can be sent to: Narmada Nav Nirman Abhiyan, Pervin Jehangir261, Jupiter Apts, 41, New Cuffe Parade, Bombay - 5.

Read Anita's post on the subject here: A city of many realities.

Please help spread the word.