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E-mail from readers the world over
Date sent: Fri, 04 Jan 1980 05:37:22 -0500
Before dreaming of attracting different nationalities, let us set right a few anomalies which are making education in India a joke. Let us stop copying. Let's make sure that people who don't give exams don't get degrees. Let's stop intelligent young students from committing suicide because they fail in exams. Let us definitely change the curricula, making it application-oriented so that people look forward to a job that makes use of their skills instead of joining yet another postgraduate course to get the stipends. Let us stop the tuition rackets. Let us stop the selling of degrees. Then, let us dream of what we want to do.
Hariharan Ramamurthy
Date: Tuesday, June 09, 1998 9:26 PM
India should go ahead and nulcearise its weapons. If a Communist country like China has the audacity to tell us not to develop nuclear weapons, it should be taken as a political and scientific challenge for India.
Subsah
Date sent: Sat, 27 Jun 1998 11:31:46 -0400
A great person with very strong views cultivated through 50 years of critical review of people! Which is why it came as a pleasant surprise when R K Laxman did not have a bad opinion about the RSS, the BJP and its leaders. In his interview, RKL has criticised Indira and Rajeev Gandhi as flops, Jyoti Basu as someone who is boring and must retire, Narasimha Rao as grumpy, Sukhram as corrupt, Gujral as okay and Deve Gowda as sleepy. But he praised Vajpayee and his 40 year career. While RKL admires Bal Thackery as a comparable cartoonist (Is RLK's answer to Nandy's questions about other cartoonists missing?), he liked Girilal Jain but refused to even acknowledge pseudo-secularists like Dilip Padgaonkar and Gautam Adhikari. It is satisfying that this person, who has seen them all for 50 years, has little criticism for BJP leaders except for a passing reference to the Ram temple. Why is it that, while people like R K Laxman, R Venkatraman and C Subramaniam are positive about the BJP and its leaders, the English language media is so totally against them? Pritish seemed to be hurt when RKL called Jyoti Basu a bore and refused to acknowledge Dilip Padgaonkar and his fellow communists. Apart from the various issues raised in this candid interview, this analysis may be interesting to Rediff readers.
Date sent: Thu, 18 Jun 1998 11:37:28 -0500
George Fernandes, YOU ARE GREAT. Except for the Coca Cola and IBM fiascoes that you caused during the 1977 Janata regime, you seem to be the best. Keep it up and don't give a hoot to those who blame you for being a "foot in the mouth".
Srinivas Murthy
Date sent: Wed, 13 May 98 21:27 MDT
General (retd) Mirza Aslam Beg sounded quite logical until he hit the Kashmir issue. With all due respect, when will the Pakistanis come to terms with the fact that Kashmir is part of India and they need to back off? They have done enough damage in J&K and Punjab. In fact, the bloodshed he refers to with regard to Kashmir is the blood (mostly) of Hindus and not of his Muslim "brothers".
Angry Young Indian
Date sent: Mon, 11 May 1998 16:17:14 -0700
Dear Ashok Mitra Thanks a million for your unbiased view of the Tamilians' struggle in Sri Lanka. Your article rightly points out that the assassination of one man should not qualify as a reason to portray all the Ealam Tamilians as evil. Several people were involved in Rajiv Gandhi's assassination. And a breakaway LTTE group was used as a pawn.
K Thillaikumaran
Date sent: Thu, 30 Apr 1998 22:40:56 EDT
Good report! If we are ever going to catch up with China, we need to take some bold steps. We need to stop talking too much and do something substantial!
Date sent: Thu, 14 May 1998 20:10:33 -0700
The G-8, led by the Clinton administration, is obviously wrong to object to Indian security preparations. Are any of the G-8, or all of them together, in a position to guarantee India's security against an aggressive China? Obviously not. Then, they have no business obstructing India's domestic effort which is morally sound. This development is a blessing for India and she will come out of it shining like gold. Swraj Paul is our hero, and ALL NRIs have a duty to invest in India.
Pradip Parekh
Date: Saturday, June 06, 1998 7:40 PM
It is shocking to learn that the huge taxes imposed on the film industry are not ploughed back into film-making. The unnatural star system has blocked development in other areas of the industry. No wonder, the industry is financed by drug lords and scripts are written in foreign countries -- turning the film industry a fifth columnist which is denigrating the majority community and making an important instrument of entertainment and subtle education a colossal waste.
Rasik Sanghvi
Date sent: Thu, 14 May 1998 13:03:38 -0700
If it comes to the worst, Indian software houses can stop working on the Y2K projects and you know the US will come a-begging!!
Date sent: Thu, 14 May 1998 13:50:36 -0700 (PDT)
The euphoria, among Indians all over the world, over India's testing of nuclear weapons is assumed to be a normal reaction by both the Indian and foreign media. But the shift from Gandhian non-violence to the Bhagvad Gita's teaching of proactive deterrence against hedgemony is a research subject for sociologists. It would be especially interesting to watch the reaction of the new non-resident Indians, the software programmers, as the wedge is driven deeper between the so-called superpowers and an isolated India in the coming years. Will they identify themselves with India and be willing to share some of their new-found wealth for the development of their motherland? Even better, will they go back to India with a cheerful smile if the political situation drives them to do so? And when they are back there, will they show enthusiasm and participate in building a country struggling with poor infrastructure for little personal return? In my opinion (and a small survey among my friends -- guess what, I am in the US myself), we are not even willing to talk about the possibility yet. It takes only a few weeks for an Indian (may be a few months in some geeks' cases) to get Americanised after arriving in the land of greener ($) pastures. Fewer and fewer phone calls to lonely parents, pizza and coke instead of idli and sambar, Seinfeld instead of Sandhyavandanam, upgrades to faster cars and powerful PCs as soon as is financially possible and dough directly deposited into savings accounts made us forget a little about the realities of the world we came from. But no, we are not melting into the cultural pot. We conduct our Diwalis with Bharat Natyam in Hindu temples. We read The Hindu and Rediff during lunch and coffee breaks. We send leftover money to our parents for new flats in the center of metros. Are you saying that this nuclear thing may lead to sending us back to India? Who said Vajpayee could test this Pokhran thing before giving it to us to run a syntax check? Is this whole nuclear thing a conspiracy to make us come back to India? May be the government spent millions of rupees in educating us at the IITs and RECs. But, hey, how can you expect us to repay this with patriotism? Okay, okay. You know, when this really happens, maybe Vajpayee should ask us nicely that, we, the technocrats are needed for swadeshi projects. Do you think he will quote the Gita and say that we should do our duty and not expect any returns? Hae, Ram.
Date sent: Wed, 13 May 1998 23:52:11 -0700 (PDT)
Governments are disgusting and this is another example! For the sake of a few votes, they ruin everyone's lives. I strongly believe that India should improve its technological prowess and the downtrodden lives of 60 per cent of its population! Do you think that we are improving our image by telling the world that we are capable of dropping a nuke bomb on some other country? People all across the world are human beings, not animals intended for a slaughter house designed by some cruel government! Think of the tragedy that affected Japan during World War II. A nuke bomb is not a joke -- if a single mistake occurs, the effect of the radiation will leave a lifelong scar on the globe! I am not against the BJP or something like that! I know that Pakistan has, by illegal and cruel means, infiltrated terrorists into Kashmir! Kashmir has, and always will belong to India -- we do not need a nuke bomb to ensure that! The Kashmir issue can be controlled by more effective measures. The nuke bomb is the start of a stupid arms race in one of the underprivileged sections of the world! Don't you think we deserve better? The money spent on a nuke bomb test could have been spent more effectively in uplifting this fledgling developing nation. The after-effects of the recent test have been real bad! Japan has withdrawn aid at a time when India needed it badly. Please note whatever you think doesn't matter as you are among the upper middle class of India -- think of the 60 per cent who are under the poverty line! What will happen to them if daily commodities become more expensive because of a rash action by their prime minister. India, till now, was regarded as a peace-loving nation! We kept up to that reputation by condemning France recently for its nuke tests! And now, it's exactly the reverse! I agree India has to be competitive, but this is ridiculous! We are not a developed country as yet! And we cannot acquire that status overnight by testing a nuke! Think about it! If your relative was one among those maimed in World War II's nuke holocaust -- would you still be proud of your country? A distressed Indian, Charles
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