ReleaseWire Connect

If there was a ranking of nations, its intellectuals and its media, based on hypocrisy and double standards, I have no doubt whatsoever that India would surely find a place in the top 10, if not the top 5. Many of you might have read recently about an intriguing development in Kashmir. I am not talking about protests and stone pelting; nor am I talking about the latest lament against human rights violations. I am talking about the arrest of a Christian pastor Rev. Chana Manni Khanna of the All Saints Church for the alleged crime of converting seven young Kashmiri Muslims to Christianity by offering inducements. The seven young Kashmiri Muslims, who have allegedly embraced Jesus Christ, have also been arrested. Interestingly enough, Jammu & Kashmir, unlike many other states in India, does not have any anti-conversion laws.

We are a nation that lives and breathes cricket, yet many feel that they are now getting an overdose of it. The 15-20 year olds today do not identify so much with cricket. They want something different, something fast and something trendy. Formula One seems to be the answer.

Be it pav bhaji at the Juhu beach of Mumbai or kebabs at Old Delhi pavements, Indian palate has been encompassing and blossoming all across the country – growing at mercurial 30 per cent, annually. This unorganized industry is latently acting as the most important driver of the Indian retail (unorganized) industry which is pegged presently at $70 billion and forecasted to reach $150 billion by 2025! Out of 10 million street vendors across the country, more than 6 million are food vendors only! The eating out revolution in Indian cities is pegged at Rs.33,000 crores. Even though international food and beverage chains are doing brisk business, the street food still attracts the burgeoning Indian middle class.

The cracks are already visible all across Europe. It was first Greece, then Portugal and Italy, with Spain waiting in the queue. The current situation of Europe reminds me of the situation post World War II – wherein most European economies and societies were in complete anarchy! Since the last five years, European nations have been facing major economic setbacks, which have been triggered by political mismanagement and have impacted their entire social structure to a large extent. Today, fallouts of erstwhile strong economies are leading to a cascading effect and sending tremors across the continent!

RIDING on Formula On fever, another racing event is set to take Indian audience by storm in January next year. Machdar Motorsports organisers of the i1 Super Series are banking on Indian drivers to pull audience to the event.

When I went to China a decade back, what I saw hit me very hard. I felt that if all of us in Delhi were to work 24x7 for 25 years, it would still be tough to convert Delhi into Beijing. That's the China I was expecting to see when I went there again last month. What I saw instead was an extra 25 years of growth in the last 10 years!!! If ten years back, there were gigantic roads but less cars, this time the roads were filled with American cars; brands which American companies haven't even cared to launch in India! If the last time I saw high-rise buildings, then this time I saw ten times more of them! If the last time I was amazed with Beijing, then this time I realized that we couldn't even become Guangzhou if we worked 24x7 for the next 50 years. I believe that every Indian politician must have a visit to China as a mandatory part of his induction process into the Parliament (especially the Communists of India who have also so shamefully cheated their respective states year after year), so that they are firstly aware of how they and their predecessors have cheated this country and secondly to know where a country can reach in no time! They say now that the Chinese economy has caught up with the American economy. In our book The Great Indian Dream, we had written ten years back about the same concept; and today I write that the Chinese economy has left the American economy far behind. Their products are so undervalued that no kind of calculation can show the real value of their humongous economy! And come to think of it, even a few decades back, China was seen with lot of scepticism owing to their political structure and a gargantuan population which was increasing by the day! But when we look at the nation today we realize that it took China just a few years' time to give this huge population a purchasing power and lifestyle that even many in the West are deprived of and to create an unfathomable miracle! What China did and is doing now is beyond the imagination of many nations; they created this gigantic economy by systematically planning at every micro level – and most importantly, taking its citizen along this growth path! Today, an average Chinese living in Beijing, or Shanghai is almost as well off as an average American living in New York or an average British living in London! So what exactly did China do?

There are innumerable cases wherein we as a nation have always found a better way to abuse a law than to put it in the right use. After about 6 long decades, the law making bodies finally gave India the most awaited tool of accessing information – the Right To Information Act (RTI). On one hand, it allowed the common man to access information which was earlier privy to the government, on the other hand, the same law is perpetually abused by many to settle down personal scores. And such is the scale of the abuse that now people have gotten to thinking whether to curb the law, to some extent. Under no circumstances, the law should be curbed but then at the same time under no circumstances the abuse of such law should be permitted which can have very severe repercussions.

India has come a long way from hosting games like hockey and cricket to hosting one of the world’s most elite games - the Grand Prix. The recent F1 race organised in Greater Noida speaks volume about the country’s ability to successfully host not only niche sports but also a destination for sports which needs precision in technology. Unlike other sports, F1 can’t be executed without state-of-art facility and latest technology at place. And thankfully, we pulled it off so smoothly, without any major controversy. Thanks to the government for their non-interference.

A few days back, the world population touched the 7 billion mark. No wonder the debate has gained momentum about how this growing population would put unprecedented pressure on already scare resources. The riots over food (in Egypt), water crisis and deaths due to curable diseases in developing countries have raised concerns over the population explosion. With the 7 billionth living child hailing from a country like India (and some other nations, symbolically chosen by the UN), the blame of populating the world and causing the global crisis is being shifted back to the developing nations and citizens of the Third World! But then, the moot question is – is the earth really not ready for 7 billion people and is nature really stretched for generating resources for all? Are the citizens of developing nations consuming more and is the population expansion in these countries the real reason behind the growing resource crunch?