Mr PM, a bailout for me, please

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"We will not let any citizen go hungry,'' you said on a rather kind note, Mr Prime Minister, after you made official that 2009 was a drought year. Thank you, Mr Prime Minister for thinking for us lesser mortals. After all when food becomes absolutely unaffordable, we should, taking cue form your words, come knocking on your door, begging for relief, reminding you what you said to the nation one August afternoon. That is also the only way you would be able to ensure that no citizen goes hungry. Unless we come and tell you, that we are hungry, have no food to eat, how would you know? You sure don't have a secret service running with agents specially employed to peep into people's kitchens, keeping a tab on who has food to fill hungry stomachs at home and who doesn't. Right Mr Prime Minister? So we....

Mind Your Language

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It's time all across India that schools changed their syllabus. At least as far as languages go. And parents insisted that they do that. French and Spanish may help your child prepare well to be a global citizen, Sanskrit may make you feel they are in touch with their roots but it's Marathi, that will get your child a ticket to the future, closer home. That is if they want to be in India, central India to be more precise, struggling hard to make a living or if he/she fails at securing admissions in a university abroad. For, if schools refuse to make curriculum changes then they are only setting stage for their wards to have a limited future. A future, that will be governed by the boundaries of the states in the country. One, that will have a chance at shaping into real perhaps....

Salaam Sam

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Over a year back, on a rather uneventful news day when I was left to meet the many bureaucrats one hopes to get a tip-off for a story from... I got a call from my editor. The National Affairs Editor at CNN-IBN was calling to assign me a story. My assignment for the afternoon was a rather urgent one. In the call that he made, my editor also warned me that I may end up getting no bytes for the story but I was still to try. My only hope was to seek help from the defence correspondent in the office who knew my story subject well. Sam Manekshaw was unwell. Out of the hospital but not quite alright. We were to do a story. The defence correspondent gave me the requisite details. Names... Addresses even phone numbers. The job at hand was to go to Hauz Khas, the....

Mauling Jama Masjid

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It's one of the largest mosques in Asia. The most important in India...one that actually set the architectural pattern for all mosques in North India. It's also the last architectural wonder of the Shahjahan. But very soon all of this will change. The 17th century Jama Masjid will be better known for the shopping mall that the Municipal Corporation of Delhi is building almost at a handshaking distance of the monument. The MCD's plan is shocking. It plans to dig 60-feet deep, just 30 meters away from the footsteps of the mosque. It has approved a 1200 crore rupees plan for a revamp of the Jama Masjid precincts..... which can even threaten its survival in the long run.... The plan is to build: an underground 60 feet deep four storey basement, complete with a shopping mall comprising over 600 shops and three tier parking space to accommodate 60 buses,....

Must Journos Soldier On?

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Soldiers are not supposed to think and mull over war and death. Their job is to shoot when ordered so. If soldiers get philosophical, perhaps all wars will be lost. Worse still, all thinking soldiers will perhaps be the first to be shoved into body bags. And that is not what army training is all about. It is about survival and victory. No soldier's ever gone to war thinking in his head that he will lose the war he is heading for. In some ways, journalists - no matter how small or big a story they are working on - are a little like soldiers themselves. Their lives are tough, jobs demanding, deadlines and results sacrosanct and mostly the boss's word has to be followed. So there is no missing a story. Like there is no missing a shot. There is no room for lame excuses like there is no....

Rang De... Aamir

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Mr Aamir Khan is answering the ``call of his conscience'' and he wants the ``youth of the nation'' to listen to every word that he says. He also wants the ``lumpen'' politicians of the country to get him right. And why not. After all Mr Khan has recently been to Jantar Mantar. Spent time with the activists of the Narmada Bachao Andolan there and walked across to the Park Hotel and held a press conference on the movement. Mr Khan has got his statistics right. He knows how high the dam should be. He is also telling the nation to watch his interview carefully, asking the poor to listen to his voice (all in urban English), telling us he has shot his films in Kutch and even praying to God for water for all states. He is angry that people are in Gujarat are protesting against him. They sure have....

Smoking Guns

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So Bachchan saheb has apologised, posters of him smoking in the Hindi flick Family withdrawn and the crusaders of the world are quiet and smiling now. Happy? Well if you want to be. Must be awesome to have the superstar of the millennium write an apology, admitting in public that he made a mistake. And what a mistake! A cigar gingerly hanging from his now aged fingers. That must be sinful. Considering Bachchan himself was just suggesting he was going to smoke it. If memories can be jogged... haven't other bigwigs in the world educated us on others jobs that the cigar can be used for... (remember President Clinton anyone?) But smoking a cigar is surely more harmful than just that. So why musn't we fret and make it a national debate, bring down roofs crying foul over how Bachchan has betrayed the cause of humankind and mislead the millions....

My TV Avatar

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I think I have probably arrived.(If I am to believe the many faces that tell me that this is precisely that.) My regular autostandwallahs... I have been summoning them every now and then,at weird hours and for even weirder routes for years together now, are now asking me what I do for a living. I didn't quite think it was important for them to know as long as they got their money after I had done my trip with them but now they want it explained. For over four years now whenever they took me to my office in South Delhi they didn't bother to ask me what I did. They would talk about film stars and the new flicks that had been released that week, the politics of the day as played out in the political circles and aired on television sets, Tendulkar's innings and even the problems caused....