Where is Raj thackrey ?

There is a major crisis going on in Mumbai and when people need the Super Manoos to save Mumbai he is no where to be seen and neither are his supporters or any of his spokesmen.
The Shiv Sena and the MNS are all missing during this crisis situation. Specifically the people who went rioting across Mumbai like there is no tomorrow. This clearly shows how helpless these politicians are and that they cannot be trusted during a real crisis scenario.They are extremely good at giving fiery speeches and making "commitments" about improvising peoples situation and conditions.All are gone into hiding - thats the least we can say as they are nowhere to be seen.

Sometimes I feel its a very esay job being a politician. You play with peoples hard-earned money. You destroy common mans property using the same money. You use the same money against the common man to instigate fear and differences. And you use the same money to eat the daily food and sleep on a comfortable secured couch. If you are a politician, you can get away with anything. You do all of the above things mentioned and there is no one to stop you. The least the police can do is beg in front of you and tell dont do and offer you protection too just incase..!!

DAMM !! I must say that the Indian judicial system has gone to the dogs. The political leaders sit in the comfort of their office spaces and say the famous words,"We condemn them..". Damm to your condmen statements. Why the ***k cant you just shoot the terrorists instead of giving them a secured place to stay (jail) and food to eat and make them live for another 20 years. By the time the judges change like a million times and then its too old to give a punishment to anyone.

The government is too lenient on the criminals - lazy is the correct word according to me and majority of them are just to make good money - again its the common man who suffers..!!!

Terror strikes Mumbai !

In yet another terrorist attack in Mumbai - this time being a hostage situation in South Mumbai. From what the news channels and the portals claim it seems to be an organised plot by Lashkar-e-Tayyabba (LeT).

And the target is the rich, affluent class of people specifically the foreigners holding USA and UK visa passports. It is very strange and difficult to understand what is the objective of the attack - apart from spreading panic, chaos and causing discomfort.The 5-star hotels at the Gateway of India Taj, Trident and Oberoi were the targets of the terrorists.
The attacks started at around late 9:30pm in Taj and it is suspected that the terrorists came in a boat and entered the Taj from the back route. There is not much clarity about the back route though.

The surprising part is that the Chief Minister of Maharashtra was nowhere in sight / available during the emergency. Infact no traces of the "Mr. fiery-speeches" MNS leader as well. There is very little difference between the terrorist attacks in Mumbai today and the MNS attacks on people, public transport and public places. And the difference is that the terrorists are getting killed but the MNS people are free to go.

We all are still waiting for the "saviour of Mumbai" to come out and do something. Infact, there is no news from the Sena team as well. All seem to quiet and playing a wait n watch game. They are all waiting to point finger as to how the situation was not handled properly and how it could have been managed well if they would have been there.

To be honest, when such terror strikes - people from all the religions and caste unite to fight against EXCEPT the politicians who try to gain political mileage by playing stupid games to come in power. End of the day the loser is the common man...!!

Weird Ambitions !!

THE small-statured warrior king Shivaji is credited with bringing about the downfall of India’s Mughal dynasty with nimble guerrilla tactics. Raj Thackeray, who rules Mumbai as the city’s unanointed prefect in the name of Shivaji, may not quite succeed in wrecking the present republic, but he may have succeeded to a large extent in undermining the idea of India.

Though the facts about Shivaji’s successes and failures are a matter of conjecture depending largely on the chronicler or historian you quote, there is little doubt that the Maratha armies his legend inspired did succeed in controlling vast swathes of India, becoming perhaps the only post-Mughal Indian group to attempt to ascend the throne of Delhi. Marathas are notionally a part of India’s middle castes that have become assertive in its largely caste-based contemporary politics.

The Thackeray family, headed by Raj’s estranged uncle Bal Thackeray, though technically of the Chaandrsenia Kayastha Prabhu caste a notch above the Marathas, but a bit below the Brahmins has sought to infuse militancy in the caste equation to neutralise the hold of other Maratha contenders in the fray. They include Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar and Home Minister Shivraj Patil who belong to different corners of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s delicately-balanced coalition. Raj Thackeray’s faction of the family is believed to be clandestinely shored up by the Singh government.

Bal Thackeray is aligned with the Hindu revivalist BJP.Bal Thackeray and his son Udhav run the Shiv Sena. Newphew Raj Thackeray has formed the breakaway Maharashtra Navanirman Sena (MNS). The family has used muscle power to deal with its rivals. Their quarries have included leftist trade unions, South Indians, Muslims and now “north Indians”, euphemism for migrant workers from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. The anti-Bihari campaign in an election year should spell disaster for both the BJP and the Congress who overtly or covertly support the Thackeray family’s antics. This is so because of the enormous number of votes they would lose in the populous states of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar.

This potential loss could however be offset for the BJP because of a parallel campaign being run by Bal Thackeray to target Muslims. Last week he extended support to a woman preacher, a sadhvi, with links to the BJP, who has been picked up for questioning in the bizarre but palpably real terror links of Hindu extremists replete with successful bombings and blasts that misfired and killed their own. Bal Thackeray’s blessing of the sadhvi is of a piece with the kind of communalisation being carried out across India ahead of the make or break elections for the BJP.

The son-of-the-soil movement, upholding the virtues of Marathi manoos visa a vis the alleged intruders with their alien culture, has spared the Gujaratis, as often happens across India. Gujarati is the lingua franca of Indian bourses, including the main one in Mumbai. The selective targeting of communities on ethnic and religious grounds clearly shows that the Shiv Sena, and now the MNS, mostly attack the weak and the poor. In the absence of a political strategy to combat religious bigotry of the BJP and regional chauvinism of the Thackeray family, India is in a dangerous flux. As some would say the very idea of India as a bouquet of diverse cultures and nationalities is facing a severe test.

As so often happens in this kind of flux, given the political vacuum, people have themselves resorted to humour as the best medicine for symptomatic relief if not the cure. Just as the Ziaul Haq jokes circulated with impunity in his lifetime and they do their rounds against the current dispensation in Pakistan, there have been quite a few on the internet on the Raj Thackeray episode. One such is the lampooning of the future of India with him in charge of Maharashtra. It goes thus:

We all should support Raj Thackeray and take his initiative ahead by doing more...

1. We should teach our kids that if he is second in class, don’t study harder. Just beat up the student coming first and throw him out of the school.

2. Parliament should have only Delhiites as it is located in Delhi

3. Prime-minister, president and all other leaders should only be from Delhi

4. No Hindi movie should be made in Bombay. Only Marathi.

5. At every state border, buses, trains, flights should be stopped and staff changed to local staff.

6. All Maharashtrians working abroad or in other states should be sent back as they are SNATCHING employment from Locals

7. Visits to Taj Mahal should be restricted to people from Uttar Pradesh only

8. Relief for farmers in Maharashtra should not come from centre because that is the money collected as tax from whole of India, so why should it be given to someone in Maharashtra?

9. Let’s support Kashmiri militants because they are right in killing and injuring innocent people for the benefit of their state and community.

10. Let’s throw all MNCs out of Maharashtra, why should they earn from us? We will open our own Maharashtra Microsoft, MH Pepsi and MH Marutis of the world .

11. Let’s stop using cellphones, emails, TV, foreign movies and dramas. James Bond should speak Marathi

12. We should be ready to die hungry or buy food at 10 times higher price but should not accept imports from other states

13. We should not allow any industry to be set up in Maharashtra because all machinery comes from outside

14. We should STOP using local trains...Trains are not manufactured by Marathi manoos and Railway Minister is a Bihari

15. Ensure that all our children are born, grow, live and die without ever stepping out of Maharashtra, then they will become true Marathis.

Following a nationwide condemnation and an uproar in parliament, the Maharashtra state government finally arrested Raj Thackeray on Oct 21. He subsequently secured an interim bail. Said the editorial in an outraged leftist journal: “Such a chauvinistic campaign mounted by the MNS and the accompanied vandalism is simply not acceptable.

The Indian Constitution clearly gives the right to any of its citizens irrespective of their caste, creed or gender to reside and pursue occupations anywhere in the country. It is this fundamental feature of the Constitution that is being attacked with impunity. It is the duty of both the centre and the state governments, who are in office under the oath of this very Constitution, to take all measures, stringent if necessary, to protect, uphold and implement the provisions of our Constitution. Both the governments led by the Congress party have, so far, failed in this task.” Having said that, the Left Front itself has not been able to come up with an effective response to the rightwing upsurge. Shivaji led his people out of Maharashtra to dream of an India under their watch. The Thackeray family is using his name to take the people back to the narrow confines of a matching mindset.

Courtesy: Dawn.com

Stale !!

The financial crisis in USA is a very sad story of how the management handled the entire operations. But nevertheless, its a good learning experience for the Indian finance institutions considering the skyrocketing price of the property rates.
It seems like we are very much on the same track as the US - the only difference being that the Indian people pay up the home loan money. Else, the banks dont waste time in sending the goons across to beat you up and torture you or your family :P
But, the property rates are still increasing, the interest rates are increasing, this eventually increases the prices of goods, the food, the daily essentials of life. This has a spiralling effect on the inflation index.And then the RBI increases the rate of interest for home loans to curb the inflation.

Lately, the government passed a rule to sell new projects only on carpet area, which is of very little use to anyone 'cos the builders only increase the selling rate of the property. For example: for a 1000sq feet house if the rate was 8000rs per sq feet - you would pay up 80Lacs (without the stamp duty and registration). After the rule has been passed, a new buyer will still pay 80lacs 'cos the price has now increased to approximately 11K per sq feet for a 700sq feet house (carpet area - considering 30% is utulised for the built up space). And this is a fact because why would the builders want to compromise on the money earned.

Now that the financial crisis has hit the US markets badly and with the FII (Foreign Instituional Investors) pulling as much money possible back from the Indian markets. Its really scary as to what is in store for the Indian economy considering that people has suffered heavy losses in the share market - but the property prices are still the same. Yes, they are stagnant, not increasing but defintely not decreasing.

I am wondering what the investors are holding on to and why. The property market has gone down but no one wants to bring down the prices. Infact, I can still see new projects coming up with the same crazy rates and the builders asking to pay some amounts in black and the rest in white.

So many projects have taken a hit, but still the project managers are hoping and waiting for a miracle to happen and the property prices to soar more.
Infact, I am waiting for the prices to go down atleast by a couple of 1000 so that I can buy a decent place for me and my family to stay.

The latest buzz in the market is that some builders in Mumbai are giving a 1BHK free with a 1BHK. In some areas like Delhi the builders are giving away a free Mercedes alongwith a flat worth Rs.3 crore and above. I have no clue when they can afford to give away such luxurious as freebies why cant they just reduce the price of the property so that everyone can buy and afford a good house. Makes things a hell lot easier for all, aint it !!

Cheers..!!

Expats ask U.S. to put MNS on terror watch list !!

A group of non-resident Indians (NRI) has asked the U.S. to put Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) on the "list of terrorist organisations which are out to hurt the humanity. "We requested the U.S. department of state to put Raj Thackeray and his group Maharashtra Navnirman Sena on the list of terrorist organisations which are out to hurt the humanity," said a letter to US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice by the US-based NRI group called Humane Mumbai.
NRI Ravi Verma, who hails from Katihar in Bihar, formed the group Humane Mumbai. "There are several Indians of Marathi origin who were among the first to join the group Humane Mumbai," Verma told IANS over phone from California. After the hue and cry in India in the wake of the attacks on non-Maharashtrians, the Indian diaspora is also not taking this lightly, he said.
"The Indian diaspora prays that there is never an insane (person) like Raj Thackeray in the US or UK who starts a US or UK Navnirman Sena and instigates attacks on the Indians living there," Verma said.
Verma said Humane Mumbai initiated the process of putting Raj Thackeray and Maharashtra Navnirman Sena on the infamous terror watch list Thursday. Once Raj Thackeray is on the terror watch list, they will be under surveillance by the US for their activities, he said.
Verma, CEO of Telecommand Software and Services in the Silicon Valley, said there was widespread dismay among Indians throughout the world over the persecution of people of North Indian origin living in or visiting Maharashtra. Indians of Marathi origin are particularly embarrassed at the events back home, he said.
The protests continued in Bihar, Jharkhand, and Uttar Pradesh against the attacks on non-Maharashtrians. Railway Minister Lalu Prasad and Steel Minister Ramvilas Paswan have demanded a judicial probe into the killing of Rahul Raj, a youth from Patna, in a Mumbai bus by police Monday and the lynching of Dharamdev Ramnarain Rai from Uttar Pradesh the next day.

Another youth, Pawan Kumar from Bihar's Nalanda district, was allegedly killed by MNS activists in Mumbai after he had gone there to take a railway recruitment exam.

Courtesy: SiliconIndia