Rights of Admission Reserved

Middle India's horror of the prospect of having to be admitted to a government hospital is probably equaled only by the prospect of having to apply for a driver's license, buying a house and having the servant not turning up for work because her kid is sick.

We of course never step into one unless we've been in an accident, in case of which one of our relatives will promptly transfer us to the nearest private hospital as soon as we are stable, or to get a doctor's certificate. We pay for it. Why do we not use it? Why let the rickshawwalla monopolise the GHs? We pay horrible amounts to the private hospitals which we could save if only we forced the policy makers to shift some thought to the sick sick sick state of healthcare in India.

Be warned, our private hospitals too are slipping away. We'll soon have no choice.. and by that time it could be too late. If you've noticed the proliferation of white and arab faces in the lobbies of the private hospitals, you'll know what I'm talking about. Medical tourism has brought smiles to the faces of doctors, hospitals and the hospitality industry. And it has increased the healthcare costs of the middle class. The doctors have no time for you, the Indian acute angina patient.. you only pay around two lakhs for care. The arab guy in the 5* room next door pays 20. The white guy in the other 5* room pays 20 too and the sweet fella even tips the wardboy and nurses in the thousands while you snap at them to dust your luggage. What are your chances? of getting a smile from the cute nurse? a decent wash from the wardboy without missing a spot? They'll get their chest shaved with a mach4 and you with a seven o'clock single blade.

Most of the problems in modern India can probably be traced to the complete apathy towards the society from middle India. The only people with the opportunity and resources to change the face of India are only too happy to sit on their asses and complain in the kitty party or the smoking corner of the office about the servant who didn't show up.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/oct/04/india-slums-children-death-rate

We don't only have modern day tragedies like the above right beside our glittering skyscrapers (ok.. 30 storey buildings anyways), we're building a future tragedy for ourselves.

Seriously, how do we get away from this trap? We already subsidise a spoilt bunch of brats to do the MBBS. Now we're letting an environment create itself where they'll probably have to be forced by regulation to treat Indians. They're already railing against the 1 year rural stint. We'll probably have doctors protesting against what they'll call a quota system where for every 1 case of medical tourism, they'll have to treat an Indian (we have the right to choose who we treat, rights of admission reserved, its a competitive world - if you can't afford it go to the unani/siddha practitioner). There's talk of a parallel system to treat rural patients with a 3 year medical course. We, with our medical insurance, better sanitation and currently grinning docs, couldn't care less about second rate care for the rural patients. Won't we soon be relegated to second rate care too when the pathetically small number of medical professionals that India turns out (and a significant %age of which bleed out to developed nations) would rather treat those who pay them better?

Lets remember that we have no "public option", no social security net. We're completely dependent on ourselves and our relatives/friends in case of a medical catastrophe without de-risking. We've let the government healthcare system get screwed and in our apathy, we've also left out other parts of healthcare like malpractice laws, accountability of doctors in both public and private practice, primary care, emergency care, urban and rural sanitation etc. etc. etc.

Its time we got involved in our future health. Unlike the short sighted people of Surat who kept their houses sparkling and dumbed crap on the streets and then found themselves in muck of their own making, lets start concentrating on real issues. Indian hockey and the sad state of Indian theatre will sort itself out.

Support the govt when it asks the newly minted docs to do a rural stint or at the very least in a in a semi-urban govt facilty. A secondary cadre of medical professionals is OK as long as they are never mistaken for doctors - paramedics with training in primary and emergency care should be more like it. We need medical schools much more than we need IIMs. Instead of expanding already stressed govt. medical colleges, open more secondary and tertiary care centers in semi-urban centers. If IT/ITES, real-estate firms and auto manfs. see potential in Tier 2/3 cities, so can the govt. Create mechanisms to identify good students from govt. schools to be trained as docs with subsidies and loans - they'll be less susceptible to taking the subsidy and running to the US/UK. Create an NRI quota to explicitly cross subsidise poorer students.. their fees shouldn't be just fully costed, they should have a nice fat profit margin. Tax medical tourism liberally, not as a luxury or to punish but enought to help cross subsidise primary care in India and keep the industry competitive. Loans are a far better way of administering student education expenses. Instead of subsidising any student, the govt. can pay a large percentage of the EMI as long as the person stays back in India.

I Bourgeois

Untouchable women enjoy a night of fashion
http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/07/03/untouchable-women-enjoy-a-night-of-fashion/#comment-336791

Why the hell wasn't this reported in Indian media? Because the indian media is more concerned with suppressing the acknowledgement of the existence and treatment of dalits than in bringing it to light. Why? Because its audience, the "great" Indian Middle Class is more embarrassed than shameful of its treatment of the Dalits. They'd rather not acknowledge their existence than do anything to better the "untouchable"'s lot. A dramatic example of this of course is the middle class student's protests over Mandal 1 & 2. Obvioulsy all of the students were upper caste and it was such a blatant upper caste movement that they didn't even try to prove otherwise that it was a pan-class movement. In their disgusting diplay, the upper caste students and their parents brandished brooms and rakes to tell the media what they thought their under-privileged brethren should rather be doing.

Our NRI brethren are of course, as is their wont, even more vocal about their objections to reservation and they don't care enough to make a distinction between SC/STs and OBCs. NRIs are almost exclusively upper caste excluding at the most a few OBCs from TN/Andhra, Punjab and Gujarat. A quick run-through of the common surnames will tell you the truth.

A run through of the NRI demonstrations on the 2006 reservations issue.
http://www.friendsofsouthasia.org/caste/reservations/PressRelease_060906.html
The author writes about the hypocrisy of the demostrators far more effectively and in fewer words than I can

An IIT defending its reticence to reservations
http://www.indianexpress.com/news/badge-of-iit-is-talent-not-privilege-or-caste-iit-kanpur-staff/5246/

Sure, you can be agnostic to caste and privileges if you're an Amity University or an IIPM but you're an IIT. If the Govt. forces Air India to fly to Aizwal for all of two passengers and we look at that as a public service, how is an IIT/IIM/DU any different? An IIT is our government's construct. Our government is Our societal construct. A society that has over 160 million Dalits, over 80 million Tribals constituting a good quarter of our poulation and a wide variety of lower castes estimated at 52% of pop. by the Govt. and quoted at 35% by the National Statistical Organisation, which figure obviously the anti-reservationists use (they selectively don't use the 28% of SC/STs)

If an IIT's job is to take children of traditionally privileged parents who can afford an education in a DPS or a DAV, the extra tuitions, the Kota classes and Brilliant's tutorials and turn them into exemplars of talent, why don't we simply outsource the job to SRM university? For if it were not for these consequences of privilege, many of the IITians and DU students would find that their "merit" is the same as the the son or daughter of their sweeper. Their SC/ST brethren also labour under the stigma that their surnames produce automatically and the fact that their parents are usually blue collar or menial workers who can neither afford nor understand what their children need to succeed academically. IIT Kanpur is mistaking the symptom of its existence to its cause.

The atrocities against Dalits, Tribals and minorities aren't just systemic and institutional but also violent.
http://www.sikhtimes.com/news_012806a.html
http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2323/stories/20061201004713000.htm
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/779892.cms
http://www.aiccindia.org/news/gohana_incident_probe_panel_seeks_action_against_district_officials.htm
http://parliamentofindia.nic.in/ls/lsdeb/ls10/ses1/0409089101.htm

As one would notice, the violence isn't random but is brought to bear brutally when the oppressed stand up for their rights or show cognisance of their rights or show improvement in their lot beyond what is judged by the upper castes as agreeable.

The Indian Middle class is rife with hypocrisy. So are its constructs like the Indian media. Unlike Engels idea of the bourgeois, I refuse to give the Indian Bourgeois the credit for breaking down barriers and dismantling feudalism. The Indian bourgeois is more interested in keeping those barriers and constructing a modern version of feudalism.

Holding a mirror to yourself - Slumdog

The NYT tries to understand why we Indians hate Slumdog

To be honest, I didn’t think it was a great movie as far as Oscar nominated ones go. Considering the stilted english (as opposed to accented), the bad acting by the lead etc. But I did think it was an honest and plausible portrayal of the situation surrounding the characters.

I was surprised by some of my friends’ reaction to the movie. While they borrowed phrases like “poverty porn” and used the argument of western condescension which used tired old cliches like the taj, bachchan etc… they WERE honestly disturbed by the picture of India that the movie painted.
… which is endemic to the middle class and higher in India. Most of us have absolutely no idea how our drivers and housemaids and electricians live. Seeing them on the screen disturbs our “middle-class sentiments”. There is no acknowledgement that we, the middle class are a privileged 40-50 million in a country of a billion. We’re interested only in stories of Vinod Dham and Sabeer Bhatia and gossip about our business houses’ latest acquisitions abroad… and forwarding fake spam on how 30% of NASA is Indian and the value of the Hyderabad nawab’s fortune.

Helplessness? Apathy? Romanticisation of poverty to hide guilt? I don’t know but “Slumdog Millionaire” as an international phenomenon is discomfiting.

Again, most of the Indian middle class would like very much to subscribe to the right winger's idea of India. A great country where there aren't any cultural dissonants like Muslims and embarrassing truths like our Dalits. Where all of us live like the NRIs in the Karan Jonar-Yash Chopra movies. Which is why you'll find wide support for the "nationalist" right wing loonies of the sangh from the middle class. This is even more drastic in our NRI brethren who hypocritically would support all kinds of minority protection, anti-racism measures etc. in their adopted homes but would generously contribute moral and monetary support to the Sangh which does the exact opposite of supressing minoroties and glossing over our societies damnable truths like untouchability, casteism, indentured servitude and feudalism.

As for the organised protests and forced shutting of theaters, I tend to agree with Mr. Sinha’s analysis of our dear Hindutwadis attempting to deflect attention from their actions which for probably the first time are being seen on mainstream internation screens. Its an embarrassment to them. Movies like Bombay, Parzania and Black Friday might exist but that an open truth to be shared among us Indians and we'll then proceed to give it a cursory acknowledgement. But to be seen on the silver screen all around the world? And just when Advani is launching his web2.0 initiative? The right wingers are giving people around the world more credit than they deserve. They're assuming the people of the world or the NRIs will put two and two together and actually see that Advani is the same leader that helped inititate the embarassing scene of riots in Slumdog. Don't worry my dear saffronites, we resident Indians and much less our NRI brethren are all too caught up in fighting off the 100 Re. increase of our housemaid's salary to notice you a******s tearing our country apart.

The Sigma Protocol... in action.. in India

"...The Second World War was a conflict that had clear rights and wrongs and yet many of those involved were utterly indifferent to what was at stake. There were numerous corporations whose only concern was to maintain their operating margin. Some, alas, even viewed it as an oppotunity to be exploited-an opportunity to increase their profits. The victors never adequately came to grips with this legacy of corporate double dealing. It was never convenient to do so." Her sardonic half-smile reminded Ben of his brother's banked sense of outrage, his smouldering anger. "Why not?" "Too many American and British industries might have had to be seized for trading with the enemy, for collaboration. Better to sweep the problem under the carpet. The Dulles brothers, you know, made sure of it.


Fictional? Entirely. Believable? Almost. From the Sigma Protocol, a fictional book that stretches ideas and ideologies to their limits.

With their endorsement of Narendra Modi, some of the titans of Indian industry, including deeply respected ones like Ratan Tata have proved that capital knows no boundaries. Political and more importantly Moral.
Encouragement of this kind for hate-mongers and genocidal prima donnas like Modi spur and concretise the radicalisation of places like Gujarat. It provides the Modi-apologists and supporters with a ready excuse with which they deflect the attention from their atrocities.
An argument can be made for capital being agnostic to moral and political issues, which is in someways desirable too. But does the current issue make business sense?
From L.K. Advani's Blog
http://blog.lkadvani.in/uncategorized/how-gujarat-has-become-%E2%80%98vibrant%E2%80%99

Like all rhetorical BS coming from the BJP, he doesn't answer the main question in the title itself "How"
Instead he takes the easy way of describing its outcomes and crediting Modi for it. Are the Gujaratis so insecure that they can't realise that its them that's the reason for Gujarat being the industrial state it is? That they need to give credit to their development to Narendra Modi who has been in power for less than a decade? Are they willing to give up on their pioneering mercantile history of more than 400 years so that they can subscribe to Modi's version of Gujarati Asmita? I sincerely hope that isn't the case but the vast majority of responses of Gujaratis to Modi's antics in articles online and offline seems to prove otherwise.

"Good governance, Development and Security" is what Advani credits to Modi. The minorities, not just the muslims but the dalits and tribals have been marginalised further. Even China has a deppely ingrained policy of assimilating minorities so that they don't see themselves as having fallen back with respect to the majority community. Its a direct reason for social upheaval. We have a glaring example in the naxalite regions. Repressed communities WILL lash out eventually. It may be the communists who catalyse it, the missionaries might unwittingly consolidate the non-muslim minorities leading to a community-wide realisation of repression, the minorities might consolidate themselves behind a modern day Ambedkar or the democratic process might itself come in handy to consolidate them, Gujarat already being the birthplace of the Nav Nirmal movement. Irrespective of the cause, its an eventuality.

Business houses are supposed to be intelligent about the long term. Unlike us humans, in the long term, they're NOT dead. Do they really want to be mired in what is already shaping up to be the Hindu version of a Taliban state?

Business houses established in Gujarat should be looking to move out not the other way round. Its simple economic sense. People say that corruption is lesser in Gujarat but that is the newspaper version of the truth. Corruption is centralised and streamlined in Gujarat which makes it entrenched and harder to fight in the long term. Another point of view is that of course businesses USE corruption to further their ambitions, therefore it is only the more professional businesses that will need to keep off Gujarat. Those that do use underhand methods to further their businesses will find a readymade and friendly infrastructure in Gujarat.

Modi's Gujarat is unsustainable. As a social construct, it is a nightmare. As an economic construct it is dream... in the short run. Professional businesses intending to be in it for the long term and becoming global enterprises will do well to steer clear off the current state of Gujarat if they want to have sustainable businesses and do not want their names associated with a state that covertly promotes repression and is an international name for human and religious rights violations.

Grabbing the Fourth Estate

I stared at the Press Freedom Index compiled by the Reporters Sans Frontieres for the year 2005 for sometime before I realised that India wasn't in the first 50. Well Ghana was at 34, India can't be that far behind can it? Then I went past countries like Israel(50), Kosovo(70), and the like. Then with eyes slowly popping, I traverse past Congo(73),UAE!!(77), Timor-Leste(huh?)(83) and finally find India at 105 along with Ukraine.
Oh the Shame the shame!!
Did I take relief from the fact that the US ranked 119 for its occupied territories? why the hell would I?

Here lies the full report for the Press Freedom Index 2005

Is the Indian Government really so repressive towards the Indian press? On first thought I'd say "Of course not, Who're they kidding". But I then realised, its not the general press freedom that RSF is talking about. It the press freedom that the Government deigns to allow when push comes to shove. Its the freedom of the Press that is acknowledged and respected by the Citizens of a country.
What's the kind of red tape, animosity and sheer state sponsored anger that reporters are faced when they try to report in Kashmir, the Naxal areas, terrorist infested North-east and such? Forget those, what happens to the reporter who tries to report on the election of dalits in supposedly progressive Tamilnadu? S/he is stonewalled, misled, threatened and at times harmed bodily not just by irate villagers but by partisan and corrupt officials. And we finally never get to know about these anyways do we?
A gander at POST-riot treatment of journalists in Gujarat
A more comprehensive look at attacks on reporters in India in 2002

And what about the lame attempts of the Indian government to restrict blogs and social network sites like Orkut? That's not just repressive thats downright embarassing.

Its not just the Government that doesn't respect the freedom of the press. Reporters are routinely beaten up by people at the wrong end of the microphone.

Its a shame that the Fourth estate is thus repressed. Not as overt as it is covert.
THIS is only half the story though.