Ashamed to be an Indian citizen

March 11, 2014

Woke up to heart breaking story in The Mumbai Mirror. This baby ought to be in an incubator. But he's in an icebox made of thermocol and kept warm by a 60 watt bulb.

The newspaper reports: "TheThe boy's parents sold off their belongings, including a TV set, and managed to fund the treatment for 20 days. However, they got their baby discharged after they could no longer afford the hospital fee of Rs 8,000 per day, and approached BMC-run KEM and Nair hospitals, where the authorities turned them away citing long waiting lists for neonatal ICU admissions.

The couple also has an eight-year-old daughter, Charmi. The boy's father, Ramesh Chauhan, 35, who works at an artificial flower store in Crawford Market and earns Rs 9,500 a month, said that the KEM authorities told him that there were 750 applicants already waiting for admissions, while the Nair Hospital's waiting list had 274 patients."

Pardon my language. But what the fuck are we doing as a nation? The other day I woke up to an almost gleeful sounding headline: India set to challenge US for election-spending record

"Indian politicians are expected to spend around $5 billion (2 billion pounds) on campaigning for elections next month - a sum second only to the most expensive U.S. presidential campaign of all time - in a splurge that could give India's floundering economy a temporary boost.

India's campaign spend, which can include cash stuffed in envelopes as well as multi-million-dollar ad campaigns, has been estimated at 300 billion rupees (2.9 billion pounds) by the Centre for Media Studies, which tracks spending."

Where does this country's heart lie? What are its set of priorities? All of the jokers in politics can outspend every other nation when it comes to grabbing power. And yet not have enough to save the life of a baby. This is why I feel ashamed to be an Indian at times.

What are your morals like?

March 10, 2014

*My results based on the Moral Foundation Questionnaire*

What are your moral foundations? It is an interesting question and one I find compelling. An ongoing study tries to provide some insights into yourself on the back of questions you choose answers to from a drop down menu on www.yourmorals.org. This chart up there, tells me how I stack up against the average liberal or conservative. The green bar represents my moral foundations, blue for the average liberal and red for the average conservative.

On a scale of one to five, this test tells me I place a very higher premium on not harming anybody and fairness, have moderate loyalty, no respect for authority, and veer towards the puritanical.

What does that say about me?

When all the tests that are part of this study are stacked up, the answers around who I am and what I stand for, I was surprised. I always thought I'd average out as liberal.

But I find myself at various points given various situations. There is a capitalist in me, a socialist, a liberal, an autocrat, a conservative. All put together, there is enough fodder in here in chew on.

I take this scale reproduced above seriously because its co-creator is Jonathan Haidt, a social psychologist who teaches ethical leadership at the Stern School of Business.

I first got acquainted with his work when I chanced upon his absolutely delightful The Happiness Hypothesis. Reviewers called it one of the best books to have emerged out of the Positive Psychology movement. I am no authority to comment on that. But I can say it offered me sharp insights into ancient wisdom across all traditions. I think it a mandatory book on all shelves.

I think everybody ought to give these tests a try and then spend time reflecting on what they're about.

I did the best I could with what I had

March 10, 2014

*Philip Roth: Image from the New Yorker*

"When I decided to stop writing about five years ago I did, as you say, sit down to reread the 31 books I’d published between 1959 and 2010. I wanted to see whether I’d wasted my time. You never can be sure, you know.

My conclusion, after I’d finished, echoes the words spoken by an American boxing hero of mine, Joe Louis. He was world heavyweight champion from the time I was 4 until I was 16. He had been born in the Deep South, an impoverished black kid with no education to speak of, and even during the glory of the undefeated 12 years, when he defended his championship an astonishing 26 times, he stood aloof from language. So when he was asked upon his retirement about his long career, Joe sweetly summed it up in just 10 words. “I did the best I could with what I had.”

Philip Roth on Writing in the New York Times

How to disappear online

March 09, 2014

Lifehacker is one of my favorites for the sheer number of productivity tips they come up with. This post, on how to disappear from all things online, is one I stumbled on a while ago. I don't know how practical it is. But it caught my attention because I quit Facebook very recently and articulated why on The Other View.

This infographic was originally published on Lifehacker and the link to it is right here. May I suggest you bookmark this website?

The only problem with trying to access Lifehacker from India is that it gets redirected to www.lifehacker.co.in. I'd have much rather I had the option to choose between the original www.lifehacker.com and www.lifehacker.co.in. This whole idea of geoblocks and IP targeting gets my goat.

If it bothers you, I strongly recommend using a plugin called Hola. I use Chrome for most of my needs and this plugin sits well with it. Haven't tried it with the other browsers. But do give this a look.

Grow up, will you? →

March 08, 2014 in Ideas

PRESS RELEASES

PRESS : BOYCOTT OF NDTV

Saturday, 08 March 2014

Kind attention,

Tweet being manufactured by a channel in order to hurt BJP is unprecedented. BJP therefore has decided to keep away from panel discussions of NDTV for present.

Just came across this press release on the BJP's website.