Courtesy - Indian Express!

POST POLLS
To say that Nitish Kumar's victory negates identity politics is overstating or perhaps even misreading the situation ... But perhaps a beginning has been made The results have made it clear that people of Bihar have broken the shackles of caste. The large participation of women has added a new chapter in democracy.
NITISH KUMAR Bihar chief minister.
Bihar has changed, and for the better. But the nature of this change is more complex than “development winning over caste and identity politics“.
Development and governance were indeed factors that contributed to the sweeping victory for the JD(U)-BJP combine, but so did a formidable caste confederation that Nitish Kumar stitched over the last five years.
Kumar's campaign speeches rode on the theme of development with the subtext of caste and religious identities.For his rival, Lalu Prasad, caste was the only text and the subtext as well.
In contrast, Kumar tailored his development agenda to address the concerns of all such groups that had been left out of the social engineering Bihar saw in the past two decades.
He carefully crafted and nurtured a political strategy that put extremely backward castes and women at its core, while not ignoring the expectations of the relatively privileged sections of society.
Development is not a concept that has any universal meaning, particularly in a society that is driven by sharp faultlines along caste identities.
The roads were built, the schools got teachers, and the doctors were present at the primary health centres (PHC), at least once a week. But that much is not good enough to win a political battle in Bihar, yet. Who has got the contracts for building the roads, what is the caste of the teacher at your school and the doctor at your clinic are important questions in Bihar. Development in Bihar cannot have a caste-neutral outcome. Kumar's real success is in understanding this and building in the caste component in everything that he did -from local body elections to teacher appointment to general political discourse.
An uncharitable interpretation of Kumar's caste politics is that he mopped up all sentiments against two particular castes -the Yadavs and Paswans, who were the prime beneficiaries of the first wave of lower-caste politics in Bihar. Non-Yadav backwards have been at the receiving end of Yadav empowerment under Prasad. Non-Paswan Dalits have been getting a raw deal, economically and politically, all through.Kumar mobilised their frustration and anger.
A more charitable take is that Kumar widened the umbrella of political participation, offering some fruits of development to the hitherto neglected and lowest in the caste hierarchy. He courted Muslims by quickly dealing with the remaining Bhagalpur riot cases of 1989, providing funds for madrasas and burial grounds and keeping controversial Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi out of Bihar's political equation. In that sense, Kumar took social empowerment from where Prasad left it and built on it.
In this hugely successful and imaginative journey, Kumar created three new identities, which go beyond caste -women, youth and Bihari.
Kumar addressed the development and empowerment aspirations of these three categories in tangible measures and promised a lot more in the second coming. By introducing 50% reservation for women in local bodies and distributing cycles to girls in schools, Kumar awoke the latent urge of the state's women to be part of the progress. In 23 districts out of the 38 in the state, more women than men showed up to vote, and more women, perhaps, voted for the ruling alliance.
Kumar compared his governance with that of his predecessor and declared that it's no longer a shame to be known as a Bihari -a slogan that instantly caught on with the youth of the state who travel outside and face humiliation. He urged the youth to empower by learning -a departure from the Lalu-brand of politics. “I am proud to be Bihari,“ said the BJP's spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad in New Delhi. That view is being echoed in many parts of Bihar, although the Bihari identity is still nebulous To suggest that Kumar's victory negates identity politics is overstating or perhaps even misreading the situation. Kumar did change the vocabulary of politics in the state. That's why everyone in Bihar and outside is calling the verdict a victory for development over caste. But it's too early for Bihar to put an end to caste and identity politics.
Perhaps a beginning has been made, and the credit is fully due to its new leader.

The Truth!

Found this gem somewhere!!! Thought I should share:

The Devil was talking to his friends when they noticed a man walking along a road. They watched him pass and saw that he bent down to pick something up. "What did he find?" asked one of his friends. "A piece of Truth," answered the Devil. The friends were very concerned. After all, a piece of Truth might save that man's soul - one less in Hell. But the devil remained unmoved. "Aren't you worried?" asked one of his companions. "He found a piece of Truth!". "I'm not worried," answered the Devil. "Do you know what he'll do with the piece?". The Devil replied, "as usual, he'll create a new religion. And he'll succeed in distancing even more people from the whole Truth."

- Paulo Coelho

Prostitution...A serious issue unattended!

-The word originates in Latin: Pro + Stature which literally means "to expose" and its a pan-universal issue.

-It has diverse considerations in different societies and nations. In some countries, it is legal, while in some, death penalty is given. In Sweden, Iceland paying for prostitution is illegal. In India, UK, Canada, USA prostitution is not a crime but associated activities such as pimping activities of brothels & soliciting in open is a crime. In several countries it is legal in a limited form.

-According to a survey by the Ministry of Women & Child Development, 2.8 million sex workers have been identified while unofficially it is 15 million.

-The troubling part: India has 35.47% of prostitutes belonging to the under 18 years age group. As per official estimates, Mumbai has the largest concentration.

-There are many variants of prostitution: common prostitues to singers and dancers, call girls and even the dev-dasi traditions being generated at certain places.



-Section 497 of IPC - Consensus sex is not a crime if the lady is 16 years old or more. For the married woman too, consensus sex is not a crime. However, concealment of information is a crime.

-The legal complexity of the provision was adopted under SITA Act-Suppression of Immoral Trafficking, 1956 but couldn't be effected. It was ammended again in the form of IT(P)A [Immoral Trafficking Prevention Act], 1986.
-The Law forbids sex workers to carry out their profession within 200 yards of public places. However this Act does not recognise male sex workers or gigolos, who sell sex services to women or husslers, also known as rent boys who sell sex as a part of MSM (men having sex with men). Both are illegal.

Causes that contribute to prostitution:

>Family prostitution
>Poverty
>Migration (of illegal nature esp., from Nepal and Bangladesh)
>History of rape, divorce, peer factors, bank company, poverty
>Technological factors - websites, chat sites etc.
>For the payment of rent/borrowing, the lady spends sometime with the person - Chukri System. (It is the oldest system in India).

Should it be legalised???

In favour:
>This group can then be better attended
>Better policies can be framed for them
>Better rehabilitation can be done

Against:
>It would then become an industry and pimps would become entrepreneurs
>Organised crime associated with it wouls also become difficult to handle
>Child-rights violation will become more rampant
>Efforts of controlling this problem would cease


Facts::

1. It is one of the gross violations of human rights and it has been considered as a modern day slavery.

2. Acc. to a UNICEF study, India has the largest number of child prostitutes while in terms of ratio, it is Cambodia.

3. In ILO Convention of 182, it is rated as the worst form of child labour.

4. As per WHO survey of India, more than 50% of sex workers of Mumbai and Kolkata are HIV+ve.

5. In July, 2005, the MHR Govt. passed a law, banning bar dancers but it MHR High Court maintained it as unconstitutional. The matter is still pending in the Supreme Court. Irrespective, the stoppage of bar dancing has added to the large number of prostitutes thus contributing to the problem.

6. In a PIL filed by "Bachpan Bachao Andolan" (an NGO), SC Justice A.P. Patnaik and Justice Davir Bhandari has called upon the Govt. to make strict provisions to deny bail to those people who are engaged on child prostitution. Retired CJI K.G. Balakrishnan is of the opinion that it should be legalised to have better monitoring and medical facilities provided.

{Note: Just because we are unable to stop it, it doesn't imply that we should legalise it!}

being emote is a very good reason for heart burn! So chuck those sentiments away...

Being mechanical sure helps these days! Thanks to so much of advancement in technology, one can do away with emotions and let the keypads talk for us.... We don't really feel much when using a technology platform to commute thoughts...So why bother? Lets keep moving where it leads to! Noone's complaining and I too don't need to...