Image of the Day: August 31

By THE NEW YORK TIMES

Stiff Sentence for Former Gujarat Minister

August 31, 2012, 10:59 am

By GARDINER HARRIS and HARI KUMAR

NEW DELHI, India â€" A top lieutenant of one India's most powerful politicians was sentenced to 28 years in prison Friday for her role in a deadly attack that killed at least 94 people during the 2002 Gujarat riots.

Mayaben Kodnani, a state legislator and former state education minister, was given a 28-year prison term after being convicted of murder, arson and conspiracy. The other 31 defendants were given decades-long prison terms, including one who must remain in prison for the rest of his life.

Ms. Kodnani was a confidant of Narendra Modi, Gujarat's chief minister and a top contender to become the Bharatiya Janata Party's candidate for p rime minister in national elections scheduled for 2014. Mr. Modi has long been plagued by accusations that he discouraged police from protecting Muslims during the riots, accusations he has denied.

Ms. Kodnani's conviction and long prison sentence are a blow to Mr. Modi's efforts to distance himself from responsibility for the deaths and could derail his campaign to lead the Bharatiya Janata Party. Since Muslims represent nearly 15 percent of India's population, no political party can afford to alienate them entirely.

The judge in the case, Jyotsnaben Yagnik, said that Ms. Kodnani and Babu Bajrangi, a member of a Hindu hard-line organization, were the key conspirators in the massacre of mostly women and children in the Muslim neighborhood of Naroda Patia.

Akhil Desai, the prosecutor in the case, said that Judge Yagnik intended the long sentences to serve as a warning. “The judge observed that the riots were very brutal and the punishment should be such th at such offenses should never occur again,” Mr. Desai said.

The Gujarat riots, which claimed the lives of more than 1,000 people, are the first in India's history to be followed by significant prosecutions and convictions. Perhaps because of that response, there has been no communal violence on the scale of the Gujarat riots, although ethnic attacks in Assam in recent months have claimed at least 78 lives.

Protest Over Coal Spills Onto India\'s Streets

By HARI KUMAR

A political fight over one of India's most important natural resources, coal, spilled out of Parliament on Friday and onto the streets.

The Bharatiya Janata Party, or B.J.P., the principal opposition to India's Congress-led government, held a protest in Delhi and said they will hold dozens more around the country on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Other opposition groups, including the leftist parties and the Samajwadi Party, had a sit-in at the gate of India's Parliament building on Friday.

The government's ruling coalition has been the target of fierce criticism over alleged irregularities in the allocation of coal blocks, which one investigation said cost the government nearly $34 billion in lost revenue. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and other Congress Party leaders deny the accusations. Debate over the issue has paralyzed Parliament and brought law-making to a halt in New Delhi.

B.J.P. leaders are demanding the resignation of the prime minister and say they will not allow Parliament to function until then. Other opposition parties are calling for an investigation into the coal block allocation by a sitting judge of the Supreme Court or the Central Bureau of Investigation.

Parliament was disrupted Friday for the ninth day in a row and adjourned until Monday.

During the protest at the Parliament building gate, opposition politicians shouted slogans, demanding a judicial probe into the coal block allocation. Mulayam Singh Yadav, the president of the Samajwadi Party, protested for one hour, then announced, “Our demand is that a sitting judge of the Supreme Court should investigate the coal scam. If it is not done, we will protest throughout the country.”

Mr. Yadav's party won a major victory in state polls earlier this year in Uttar Pradesh, India's most populous state. His party is expected to play a major role in the next national elec tion, due in 2014.

Leaders of the B.J.P. addressed a crowd of a few hundred people who had gathered at a separate protest venue in New Delhi. Leader after leader narrated a long list of corruption scandals and their estimated monetary value.

Protestors shouted slogans like “Koyala choro gaddi choro” (“Coal thieves, leave the chair”) and “Koyale ki dalali me pradhanmantri ka muh kala” (“The prime minister's face is blackened in the coal scam”).

Anurag Thakur, the head of the B.J.P.'s youth wing, promised that “the coal scam will be the last nail in the coffin of Congress.”

Israeli Diplomat Will Ask Narendra Modi to Confront \'Hitler\' Store

By MALAVIKA VYAWAHARE

An Israeli official in India plans to ask Gujarat's chief minister, Narendra Modi, to pressure the owners of Hitler, a clothing store in Ahmedabad, to change the business's name.

Orna Sagiv, the Israeli consul general based in Mumbai said Friday, she would bring up the matter in a scheduled meeting with Mr. Modi next week in Gujarat.

“I am shocked that the owner of an apparel shop would name his shop after Hitler and have the swastika as one of the emblems on the shop banner,” she said, adding that it was “totally unacceptable” and “insulting” to the Jewish community, not just in India but across the world.

The clothing store is one of a handful of businesses in India named after the Nazi dictator. Recent news coverage in India Ink and other publications has brought the store international attention.

On Thursday, the Anti-Defamation League in New York, an organi zation that fights anti-Semitism, called on Mr. Shah to “heed the concerns of the local Jewish community and the voices of others from around the world by immediately changing the store's name from ‘Hitler.' ”

It called Mr. Shah's decision to use the name “an affront to the memory of the millions of Hitler's victims.”

“It is a perverse abuse of the history of the Holocaust to name a business after one of the world's most notorious mass murderers and anti-Semites,” Abraham H. Foxman, the ADL's national director and a Holocaust survivor, said in a press release.

Hitler holds an unusual fascination for some in India. His manifesto, “Mein Kampf,” remains a strong seller at streetside book stalls, and various businesses named after the German leader have popped up over the years, including a Mumbai cafe called ‘Hitler's Cross.'

Ms. Sagiv said the attitude reflects “deep ignorance and insensitivity in an otherwise tolerant society,” one where the Jewish community had never suffered any discrimination, even when anti-Semitism was at its peak in the rest of the world.

The Anti-Defamation League also expressed concern Thursday about the name of the Nazi leader “seeping into India's popular culture without any appropriate context.”

In an e-mail interview with The Times of India last year, the spokesman for the Israeli Embassy spoke of the need for greater awareness in India about the atrocities committed against Jews by the Nazi regime under Hitler, which led to the death of six million Jews during the second World War.

His comments were in regards to a pool parlor owner who had named his establishment Hitler's Den.

In the case of the Hitler's Cross cafe, the owners agreed to change the name to Cross Cafe and revamped the decor. The owners of the Ahmedabad clothing store have expressed no willingness to change the name unless they are compensated for it.

A Conversation With: Constitution Expert Madhav Khosla

By AAYUSH SONI

Madhav Khosla, a doctoral student of political theory at Harvard University, is the author of “The Indian Constitution,” a short introduction to the world's longest political text, which consists of 395 articles and 12 schedules. The book is a fascinating tour through the life of India's supreme law, analyzing its central features like federalism, fundamental rights and the separation of power. In an interview with India Ink, Mr. Khosla explained why he sees the Constitution as more than a political text and how his book isn't just for lawyers.

Do you think Indians should be (or can be) “introduced” to the Constitution?

I think it depends a lot on what you mean by introduction. I don't intend to make a flippant, semantic response, but I think what all of us ought to do is to, at some level, engage with some of the central debates in it. One of the interesting things is that in the U.S., it's amazing how muc h general knowledge about the Constitution is prevalent. Somebody will have some view of the First Amendment or free speech, and I think in India the basic knowledge is far less. So the aim was to make it more central to public discourse, and I think that's certainly possible.

One striking aspect of the book is its sophisticated yet accessible prose. Was that easy to do? What was the writing process like?

I was always trying to prevent two scenarios: one is that it'll just collapse into a pamphlet, a book for dummies. The second is that it will be inaccessible to people who aren't lawyers. So the aim was, at each stage, to see whether or not the point that I'm trying to make addresses a certain moment or scenario in Indian politics for people to grasp. Also, if somebody doesn't know anything about Indian politics or about Indian law, he probably won't get the book at all, and I think that's also fine. So the aim was to park it in the middle of these two.

As a doctoral student, I assume you're used to writing a lot of academic prose. Did that style ever creep into the writing process of this book?

I'm sure it did, and I kept going back at it to see if there are any other matters that are technical and showed drafts to friends. A huge challenge was also to synthesize all of this into a proper story because the book is shorter than the Constitution. You're talking about cases that have developed over 60 years, which is a huge amount. The standard treatise of a constitution is about three or four volumes; the largest one is 10 volumes. Each of these is like a 1,000 pages. So that's another challenge â€" to pick and choose what stories might be more relevant than others.

Your book is peppered with examples of such prominent cases as the Armed Forces Special Powers Act and the J.M.M. [Jharkhand Mukti Morcha] bribery case of 1993. Did you cite these to make the book relatable to your audience or was their presence naturally born out of the aspects you were discussing in the book?

I think the most important factor in determining what examples to choose and what cases to emphasize is actually bench strength. The Indian Supreme Court sits across different courtrooms and the importance of a decision depends on the strength of the bench. So the most important thing was to respect the varying degrees of bench strength. So if I'm taking a case on parliamentary privileges - the 1993 case - my pool is typically limited to cases of five benches [where five judges of the Supreme Court decide the matter] or more, which are constitutional benches. Within it, I see whether one of them is raising particularly interesting issues, and then it's a judgment call to take a newer case or an older case.
I used the Armed Forces Special Powers Act in a very specific context of how legislative power is interpreted, and it struck me as a case that might resonate with people, w hich is why I used it even though it wasn't a five-bench case.

You also write about how the asymmetrical nature of our Constitution poses the risk of an identity crisis. Is there a way to avoid such a scenario?

What is crucial to any asymmetry is that it must have an internal logic of its own, and I think that was present in the Constitution's founding moments. So if we decided that Dalits were to asymmetrically treated, there was a certain logic to that. It was ground in coherent argument about discrimination and unequal starting positions.
My real fear is that normative arbitrariness is creeping into constitutional amendments, and there's no logic to the asymmetry anymore. I think the most glaring and recent example of that is the current debate of promotions and quotas. The argument was that people have unequal starting positions in society and so, at the entry level, you bring them to a level playing field. Now, I disagree with how the government identif ies backwardness. However rich you get, you'll still be of the same caste. I think you should use economic criterion.
On the equality doctrine, there was a clear argument for asymmetry. Now, the Constitution is amended to provide quotas and promotions on consequential seniority, which basically means you get your promotion and you then use it to say you're senior and you claim further promotions on that basis. It's like an indefinite double promotion. The court struck this down saying, look, you do what the hell you want with backwardness, we'll generously endorse your usage of caste, but it should fit into a more coherent structure. Our Constitution was routinely amended for that, and it's not clear to me now what division of equality rests on.

You seem to view the Constitution as more than just a political text. It seems you've sought to interpret it as a document that affects a much larger society than just those who are part of its political system.

I th ink it does impact all of us. The Constitution isn't simply about what the prime minister can do or the president can't do. It's fundamentally what gives us and what sustains our membership in this community. So part of my hope has been that each of us need to engage with it far more rigorously because it affects all of our daily lives in profound ways. We see that in some ways - like in politics you'll see a [Arvind] Kejriwal saying, How can you not let me protest?
But there's little emphasis on really what the text says. A lot of it is going at a level of generality that's unhelpful. I certainly believe that it's relevant to people more than just political actors. I think it's relevant to everybody who's in this political community.

So why do you think Indians have treated the Constitution only in terms of generalities?

That's a really tough thing to say. It could be a limited emphasis on legal education. It could be the fact that we haven't tried enough. There could be a range of reasons for it, but I think that that ought to change. It's very important to realize that this is about all of us. In some sense, this is the fundamental document that gives us our identity. We are who it says we are.

(This interview has been lightly edited and condensed.)

Aayush Soni is a New Delhi-based freelance journalist and a recent graduate of the Columbia Journalism School. Follow him on Twitter at @aayushsoni.

India\'s Economy Continues to Be Weak

By NEHA THIRANI

The Indian gross domestic product report released Friday for the April-June quarter showed that the economy was doing only marginally better than in the previous quarter. Growth was up 5.5 percent during the quarter from a year earlier, the lowest rise in three years, compared with 5.3 percent in the period ended in March, which was the weakest in nine years.

Analysts said high interest rates have dented investment, while the investor outlook continued to remain bleak. “High inflation, wide trade and current account deficits, bloated subsidies and a gaping fiscal deficit have all taken a toll on the real economy, while the rupee has plunged 25 percent since July 2011,” said Jyoti Narasimhan, senior principal economist at IHS Global Insight. “The investment environment remains toxic because of corruption scandals, policy inertia and fierce political opposition have stifled progress on reform.”

The report showed that the manufacturing output in the April-June quarter rose only 0.2 percent from a year prior, dashing prospects for growth. The growth in agriculture, forestry and fishing was 2.9 percent, while mining and quarrying remained nearly flat at 0.1 percent. The sectors that showed significant growth in the quarter were construction with 10.9 percent growth, financing, insurance, real estate and business services at 10.8 percent and community, social and personal services, which registered a 7.9 percent growth.

Forecasts for the coming year are less than rosy. “Weak growth is likely to remain a strong overhang on the corporate sector, and in the near-term raises chances of a sovereign downgrade, particularly in the light of the stalemate on the policy front,” said Tirthankar Patnaik, the director of institutional research at Religare Capital Markets.

A rebound of the economy is expected to be a gradual process. “The pickup in growth was encouraging, but growth still suffers due to external headwinds and supply constraints,” said Leif Lybecker Eskesen, chief economist for India and Asean at HSBC Global Research. “We expect a gradual recovery from here on the back of structural reform progress and global economic stabilization, although there is a risk that it could prove more protracted.”

All eyes are now on the Reserve Bank of India, the central bank, which meets Sept. 17 to review monetary policy. While there are expectations that a low growth rate would cause the R.B.I. to cut interest rates, just last week the central bank said that lower interest rates alone were not enough to jump-start the investment cycle. “Despite ever-worsening growth data, IHS Global Insight, expects the R.B.I. to wait until October to resume its rate cuts,” said Jyoti Narasimhan, senior principal economist at the firm. “We expect only a shallow recovery in manufacturing and investment, and only a mild uptur n is expected by year-end.”

From Bihar, a New Approach to Flood Control

By RANU SINHA

The year was 2008, and I had just walked out of a meeting on flood management with the chief minister of Bihar, Nitish Kumar. Mr. Kumar, fully aware of the challenges of annual floods in Bihar, had asked for assistance in building new flood defenses.

Unfortunately, this call for help came a little too late. Hours later, the eastern embankment of the Kosi barrage, a major flood protection infrastructure in Nepal, collapsed on its left side, resulting in one of the most devastating floods in the history of the state. In Bihar alone, over three million people were affected, with official sources reporting over 500 deaths and close to 3,500 missing.

However, this flood did not occur as a result of too much rain. In fact, the water levels in the river were much lower than expected. What caused the flooding was too little maintenance. Official reports state that much-needed repairs on the embankment s had been delayed for a number of years, severely weakening the effectiveness of the infrastructure. Eventually, the day came when the barriers of the embankment could not withstand the pressure of the river.

The business of flood management in India - the ability to predict, prepare, respond and recover from flood-related disasters - is the responsibility of state governments. Though non-state actors and the people affected can play a part in flood management, the lion's share of the formal responsibility generally lies with state-run irrigation or water resources departments. Other agencies, like state disaster management and local governments, also play a key role.

Though research is limited on this topic, it is clear that there is a significant gap in the quality, performance and ability of these institutions to manage the complexity of floods.

As one of India's most flood-prone states, Bihar faces enormous challenges. Bihar's river systems and its 16 river basins are some of the most complex in the world, with a heterogeneous set of rivers flowing into the state from the Himalayas. Excessive rainfall, bursting rivers and breaching embankments are a recurring phenomenon that tend to wreak havoc on the lives of millions, with the poor usually the worst affected.

The 2008 Kosi floods were a wake-up call for the government of Bihar. Its water resources department is now trying to make sure the disaster of 2008 doesn't happen again. I am leading a team of experts to study how the department institutionally manages floods. Our research, which is sponsored by the International Growth Center (I.G.C.) India-Bihar country program, a global research and policy center headquartered in Britain, has attempted to investigate the institutional factors that may be contributing to increased risks from floods to Bihar's 103 million people.

Our team conducted household surveys of affected communities and staff interviews of wate r resources department engineers, from junior officers to the leadership in the state capital of Patna.

The findings were eye-opening. The water resources department is in charge of both irrigation and the management of floods, but in most cases the supply of staff in the department does not match the demand of the dual responsibilities of irrigation provision and flood management. Staff shortages tend to lead to an overemphasis on the construction of new flood protection infrastructure and little time and manpower for ensuring the quality of what already exists.

Some staff members stressed the need for further training in modern-day flood management techniques, particularly the junior members who generally bear the responsibility of being the first to protect infrastructure and communities in the event of a flood. The staff also did not have sufficient hardware and software to adequately perform their duties. Tools like vehicles and computers, as well as flood-r elated technology, are in short supply. Inefficient systems monitor the performance of staff and the quality of the maintenance of flood infrastructure.

Engagement with communities, actively involving them in essential flood-fighting activities, seems to be ad hoc and underdeveloped, while coordination with other agencies at the local and state levels needs to be severely strengthened. Essentially, the problem boils down to too much to do in too little time, with too few resources.

Bihar is not alone in grappling with these challenges. In June, an embankment breach on the island of Majuli in Assam on the Brahmaputra River affected more than 200 villages and is being called one of the worst floods in the state in the last 14 years. Reports from the flood indicate that much of the early work of flood preparedness and embankment maintenance was largely nonexistent. This recent flood may have been less severe had the local irrigation department conducted high-quality maintenance work on the embankments.

It is not purely a coincidence that total flood damage in India, in terms of population affected and crops and assets destroyed, has risen from approximately 520 million rupees in 1953 to over 88 billion rupees in 2000. India, therefore, desperately needs to transform its water management agencies to address these concerns rather than pour money into more concrete.

Bihar is one of the few states in India to begin transforming its flood management practices. Data from firsthand experiences has convinced policy makers that reforms are necessary. This means hiring thousands of new staff, setting up world-class training institutes, improving the knowledge of field staff in state-of-the-art techniques of flood management and creating new quality procedures and inspection systems that can track how well an embankment is performing. It also means actively involving communities in disseminating warnings and sharing the burden of floo d protection alongside its engineers.

In Bihar's 2011-12 budget, the government estimated it would spend close to 77 billion rupees ($1.4 billion) on irrigation, flood control and energy. This is significantly higher than the amount budgeted in 2010-11, which was close to 56 billion rupees. The increase in funds will be critical to implement crucial changes.

What India has now is more like underpaid, poorly trained firefighters fighting blazes with leaky hoses and battered trucks, and this status quo cannot adequately protect the millions of lives at stake. Reform must happen even though these are not easy changes to make. They cannot happen overnight, but they will make a difference in the way state institutions plan, manage and respond to the inevitable flood. The changes under way in Bihar may soon lead the way for the rest of country.

Ranu Sinha is the former Deputy Director of the International Growth Center India Bihar Country Program. This article re presents the author's views and does not reflect the opinion of the International Growth Center as an organization.

BRICS in Space

By THE NEW YORK TIMES

“Let's send a mission to Mars, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh announced a couple of weeks ago, just as his government was fending off corruption charges and the country was still recovering from the biggest blackout since the invention of electricity,” Hartosh Singh Bal wrote in the New York Times's Latitude blog.

Mr. Singh's “$77 million plan did nothing to divert attention from his administration's failings,” Mr. Bal wrote, but “it did focus some unfortunate attention on India's space program.” It suggested, “what had been a fine endeavor to date has now been hitched to India's dream of becoming a great power.”

But the ambition of a Mars mission “goes well beyond practical applications,” Mr. Bal wrote. “It's about basic science research and planetary exploration, as well as a very real, and ludicrous, race to space with China.”
Read more '

Tata Motors Helps Jaguar and Land Rover Regain Luster

August 31, 2012, 12:55 am

By THE NEW YORK TIMES

Four years after being bought by Tata Motors, the “well-known but somewhat faded British brands” Jaguar and Land Rover “are regaining some of their lost luster,” Vikas Bajaj wrote, and “racking up big sales from Shanghai to London.”

“The success has stunned analysts and investors,” he wrote, many of whom had said that Tata Motors “was making an expensive mistake when it acquired Jaguar Land Rover from Ford Motor for $2.3 billion in June 2008.”

At the time, Ford was raising money to ensure its own survival, and it sold the brands for several billion dollars less than it had paid to acquire them years earlier.

Analysts say Tata h as done what few companies from emerging markets have been able to do - turn around and successfully run a troubled Western company.

Read the full article.

Yale University President Is Stepping Down

By TANYA ABRAMS

Higher EducationThe Choice on India Ink

Guidance on American college applications for readers in India from The Times's admissions blog.

After 20 years at the helm, Richard C. Levin, the president of Yale University, announced on Thursday that he will be leaving the Ivy League school at the end of the academic year, our colleague Richard Pérez-Peña reports:

When Mr. Levin took office, Yale was being described as a university whose perch among the world's top schools had grown shaky. The administration often battled the faculty members and the troubled surrounding city, there were budget shortfalls and staff cuts, applications were down and facilities badly needed renovation and repair.

A search committee re peatedly postponed the deadline for naming a new president, reportedly settling unenthusiastically on the low-key Mr. Levin after being unable to find a more charismatic outsider. Almost two decades later, Yale's academic reputation and its finances are more secure, and Mr. Levin, commonly called Rick, is among the most respected university leaders in the country.

Under him, the university has built a new business school campus; greatly expanded its facilities, including its science center and medical school; overhauled its buildings, including all 12 undergraduate residential colleges; started construction of two new residential colleges to make room for the first major expansion in undergraduate enrollment in decades; and embarked on new programs overseas.

Yale's global initiatives grew under Mr. Levine's leadership. The student body became more internationally diverse. In 1999, the university announced that it wo uld offer need-blind admissions to international students and financial aid packages under the same terms as its American students. Yale's India Initiative also began during his tenure.

Mr. Levin, 65, who has served as the university's president since 1993, has had one of the longest tenures in Yale's history. He is also the most senior president among Ivy League leaders.

In a letter to the Yale community, Mr. Levin called his departure a “natural transition” after having accomplished many of the institution's goals.

“These years have been more rewarding and fulfilling than I ever could have imagined,” he wrote.

Mr. Levin, incidentally, is the second university president to leave the Ivy League this year. In July, Jim Yong Kim, the former president of Dartmouth College, became the new leader of the World Bank.

Mr. Levin intends to take a sabbatical next year, during which he plans to finish writing a book about higher education and econo mic policy.

Image of the Day: August 30

August 30, 2012, 11:30 am

By THE NEW YORK TIMES

Nine Killed in Midair Collision of Air Force Choppers

By HARI KUMAR

Two Indian Air Force helicopters collided midair during a training exercise in western Gujarat on Thursday, killing all nine people on board.

The MI-17 helicopters, which had taken off from Jamnagar Air Base, crashed at 12:05 p.m. in Sarmat, Gerard Galway, an air force spokesman, said by phone. The nine passengers included five officers.

The air force has formed “a court of inquiry” to determine the cause of accident, said Mr. Galway.

TV news footage showed rescuers among the wreckage of the two helicopters, one of which had broken into pieces.

India has used the MI-17, a Russian-built helicopter that was introduced in 1970s, for both military and civilian purposes. The medium twin-turbine helicopter can be used for transport and as a gunship.

In 2010, a MI-17 helicopter crashed in Tawang, in Arunachal Pradesh, killing 12 air force personnel, and in 2011, another MI-17 c rashed, again in Tawang, killing 17 people on a civilian flight.

In Kerala, Feasting, Splurging and Mollywood Usher in Onam

By T.P. SREENIVASAN

Visiting Kerala this week is like visiting New York during Christmas week, except for the scale. Both places have the festive atmosphere, illumination, feasting everywhere, high alcoholic consumption and crass commercialization, including a grand shopping festival. None of these have anything to do with the traditional Onam festival, but care is taken to do all these in the name of Mahabali, the legendary ruler of prehistoric times. His majestic and well-fed figure juts out of every hoarding like Santa Claus in the West.

Onam, whose festivities center around Thiru Onam, observed on Wednesday, is a combination of the Kerala new year and the harvesting festival, marking the end of torrential rain and misery associated with the previous months. But the Onam legend of Mahabali is the best excuse for the feasting and the splurging. Keralites believe that they have to appear as happy and prosperous as they were in the days of M ahabali, the benevolent king, who returns to Kerala once a year to see his subjects. This was a boon he received from the Supreme God himself, Vishnu, who sent him to the nether-world out of envy for his popularity.

As the story goes, Vishnu appears disguised as a Brahmin boy, who seeks three feet of land to do his prayers. Mahabali promises to provide that, but then Vishnu suddenly grows so large that he measures the earth with one foot, the heavens with another foot and demands that Mahabali find room for his third. Mahabali offers his own head as the third, and Vishnu pushes him down. However, Mahabali managed to negotiate a deal to visit Kerala once every year.

The fame of Mahabali made him a ruler par excellence, without any parallel in history before or after. The literature that describes his reign reads like the description of the Utopia, or the Promised Land: socialistic in concept but capitalist in terms of prosperity and plenty. Everyone was equal, no untruth or deceit, not even an iota of falsehood. No wonder the gods grew jealous as even in heaven, they did not have such a paradise.

The regime change that Vishnu brought about may have had to do with more than jealousy. It was a just regime, but there is no talk of the empowerment of women or faith in God. Some believe that these were the tragic flaws that transported Mahabali to the nether-world.

The legend of Mahabali and his kingdom may well be the primeval memory of a people, in jumbled up images of old times. But more likely, it is a vision, a dream that is difficult even to conceive of, not to speak of accomplishing. By portraying a dream as something that existed in the past, the creators of the legend gave it a touch of reality. The creation of the image of Mahabali was another master stroke to give form and content to the dream.

The Keralites do not see deception in pretending to be content on Onam day. It is a le gitimate way of pleasing their ruler. The deception gives the Keralites the license to indulge in luxuries. Even the sale of immovable property is permitted to celebrate the Onam festival. The government abets the splurging by giving salary advances, which will have to be repaid in subsequent months.

Onam, in the old days, meant 10 days of feasting, flower decorations and traditional dances for women and martial arts and sports for men. Like Thanksgiving, Onam brought families together, even if it meant travel over long distances. Onam used to be very private and unostentatious, but today, Onam is a street festival, with an eye on attracting tourists. Kerala is sold as a tourist and shopping package during Onam.

Today's Onam also revolves around Mollywood, the Malayalam movie scene, which has been exceptionally active in recent years. The supreme stars like Mammootty and Mohanlal still hold sway, and the dream of every television channel is to get them to talk ab out themselves on Onam day. If the networks can't get hold of them, every other star is lined up on Onam day. Meanwhile, Keralites are waiting breathlessly to hear the health bulletins on the popular character actor Thilakan, who is struggling for his life on a ventilator during the Onam week.

Onam is not about a legend anymore. It is a contemporary festival to rejoice, to feast, to shop and to ogle at film stars. Mahabali is just an excuse for Keralites to deceive themselves that they are well. As long as remittances come from the Keralite workers in the Gulf, Onam can have all the glitter it has acquired.

For menial work in Kerala, people from West Bengal and Odisha come in large numbers. For them, Kerala is the Gulf, with jobs in plenty and good wages. The chief minister of Kerala, Oommen Chandy, had to greet the migrant workers on Onam day in Hindi this time.

In the Onam season, everything is postponed till the long holidays are over. This year, the Ona m celebrations continue to Sunday, but the official holiday will close on Monday so that everyone gets an extended break. Once it emerges, bleary-eyed, from the Onam season, Kerala will return to its routine of hyper politics, high spending and Kerala model development, and Mahabali will return to his nether-world home in the belief that his subjects are happy today as they were in his times.

Mr. Sreenivasan, a former Indian diplomat, is the executive vice chairman of the Kerala State Higher Education Council. His views are personal and do not reflect the policy of his state.

Where Will Literature Go From Here?

By THE NEW YORK TIMES

“Considering the views and the hair color of the 50 writers who had assembled for a quaint conference in Edinburgh, the congregation could have been called '50 Shades of Grey,'” Manu Joseph wrote in The International Herald Tribune. “But most of the writers agreed,” at the World Writers' Conference, that “they were repulsed by the lowbrow book that has probably outsold all their works put together,” he wrote.

“Speaking on the subject ‘Should Literature Be Political?', the Egyptian writer Ahdaf Soueif, who writes in English, said of her own situation as a novelist from a nation in tumult: ‘Attempts at fiction right now would be too simple. The immediate truth is too glaring to allow a more subtle truth to take form,” Mr. Joseph wrote.

“For some reason,” Mr. Joseph wrote, “Indian English literature is far less political than Arab English literature.” He argu es:

Is it because the Arab region is more tumultuous than India? Or is it just that the Indian elite is a remote island within the republic that has protected itself from the country's realities, while the Arab elite has yet to destroy its bridges? Or is it because the Western literary market, the most powerful and lucrative market for novels in the world, demands Arab literature to be political, refusing to accept any other kind of stories emerging from the region, while sparing Indian novels such narrow expectations?

Read the full article.

In India, Businesses Named After Hitler Defend Their Decision

August 30, 2012, 12:23 am

By MALAVIKA VYAWAHARE

What's wrong with naming your business after Adolf Hitler?

So asks Rajesh Shah, the co-owner of Hitler, a menswear store in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, which opened earlier this month.

Mr. Shah said in a telephone interview that his shop is named after his business partner's grandfather, who was nicknamed Hitler after he acted the role in a college play. The name stuck, owing to the grandfather's strict disposition.

Now the name adorns the banner of his grandson's shop, complete with a tilted swastika sign. (An upright swastika is regularly used as a Hindu symbol, a practice that predates Nazi Germany by hundreds of years).

Members of Ahmedabad's tiny Jewish com munity, who number less than five hundred, have approached the store about renaming it, calling the German leader a monster, Mr. Shah said. But so far Mr. Shah and his co-owner have resisted a change.

“None of the other people are complaining, only a few Jewish families. I have not hurt any sentiments of the majority Hindu community. If he did something in Germany, is that our concern?” Mr. Shah asked.

He said he thought Hitler was a “good, catchy” name for his shop. In fact, his business plan seems to include cashing in on the name to attract customers. “We have not written anything below the sign or on our cards to indicate what we sell to generate mystery,” he said. “The customers who come in tell me they came in seeing the name.”

So far, business is good, Mr. Shah said.

If the Jewish community really wants the name changed, they can pay for it, Mr. Shah said. “I have spent too much on branding for my shop,” he said.

The A hmedabad store is one of a handful of Indian businesses named after the Nazi dictator. Owners seem to have picked the name more for shock value than an embrace of or admiration for Nazism.

Baljit Singh Osan, the owner of a pool parlor called Hitler's Den in Nagpur, Maharashtra, said the name is what has made it famous all over town.

Mr. Osan, who opened the pool hall six years ago, said he settled on “Hitler's Den” because he was looking for a unique name, something that had recall value. He said he did not sympathize with the German dictator or his beliefs, but still he refused to change the name when the Jewish community in Nagpur protested.

“If I name my son ‘Hitler' and I wanted to start a business in his name, would they have a problem with that?” Mr. Osan said. “There are no laws like that in our country.”

In an e-mail interview with The Times of India last year, David Goldfarb, the spokesman for the Israeli Embassy, said of Mr. Os an's business: “We can only assume that the owners of this new establishment are unaware of the horrendous meaning of the usage of Nazi themes and insignia for commercial gain.”

A television serial on Zee TV about a dictatorial woman, which began in 2011, also uses the name of the German leader in the title: “Hitler Didi,” or “Hitler Sister.” It was renamed “General Didi” in December 2011, after the Anti-Defamation League in New York protested the original title. The name change affects only its broadcasts in the United States, though. In India, it is still called “Hitler Didi.”

“We deeply regret any distress that this name may have caused, and it is our intention to change the name immediately,” The Hollywood Reporter quoted a Zee TV statement from 2011. “It was never our design to cause any grief and for that we deeply apologize.”

An apology is not forthcoming from Prakash G., who goes by his first name, the manager of an Inter net advertising company that was first named Adolf Hitler Inc. when it started in May 2011. The Tamil Nadu-based company changed its name to AHI ADS in January, bowing to what he called “public pressure” and the huge amount of negativity it generated, Mr. Prakash said.

Asked about the usage of a variation of the swastika symbol on his current Web site, Mr. Prakash said that AHI ADS was an abbreviation of “Adolf Hitler Inc. Ads.” He added that he did not believe that Hitler was “such a bad person.”

“I have read his autobiography and like some of his ideas,” Mr. Prakash said.

In Conversation With: Prosecutor Gopal Subramanium

August 29, 2012, 11:25 pm

By NIHARIKA MANDHANA

India's highest court on Wednesday upheld the death penalty for Ajmal Kasab, the sole survivor among a group of militants who attacked Mumbai in 2008. Mr. Kasab, a Pakistani, confessed to the attacks and asked to be hanged while in custody. He later retracted his confession, saying he was framed by the police. Judges said the conspiracy behind the attack was “vicious,” the trauma and loss of life caused by the attacks made them the “the rarest of the rare” since the birth of India and the attackers attempt to pass off as Indian Muslims was “ominous and distressing.” (Read the full judgment here.) 

 For Gopal Subramaniam, a former solicitor general and the prosecutor in this case,  th e judgment was a moment of personal and national pride, he said. In the months of marathon arguments that tackled questions of constitutional and international laws, Mr. Subramaniam, who also prosecuted the case involving militant attacks on the Indian Parliament in 2001, faced Raju Ramachandran, an Indian lawyer appointed as amicus curiae, or friend of the court, to defend Mr. Kasab.

In a conversation with India Ink, Mr. Subramaniam talked about the trial, the public pressure for speedy judicial results and terrorism.  

Many have called this judgment historic, but you have said the trial itself is historic for India. Why?

When the trial was under way, I was conscious that this was a case with international ramifications. The way in which Kasab would be dealt with, I knew, would be a benchmark. Our institutions and our performance as a country would be subject to international scrutiny. People do expect to see how the In dian judicial system works. That's why I wanted to make sure that our benchmarks were completely international.

I would say that the standards of rigid scrutiny which were employed in this case were stricter than would be observed in Europe or the United Kingdom.

This trial raised several questions about the rights of the accused in our criminal justice system. Do you believe Kasab received a fair trial?

Yes, I think every judge gave Kasab his fair chance. No judge allowed emotion to come in. There was no prejudice against Kasab.

The Indian government actually gave an opportunity to the Pakistan government to ask for a Pakistani lawyer for Kasab. But Pakistan disowned him. They didn't send him a lawyer.

An amicus curiae was appointed in this case. He maintained the high traditions of the bar, which postulate that no person can be left undefended. He took a few months off and studied the record in a meticulous way. And he came up with valid const itutional points.

As the prosecutors, we used a human rights liturgy. This was not a case where the prosecutor said ‘Hang him, hang him.' The prosecutor said, let's look at the evidence and come to conclusion A, then B, then C, then D. I used every standard which was the higher benchmark.

Kasab has been found guilty of waging war against the state. What were the arguments for and against this contention?

According to the lawyer for Kasab, this was not a case where there was any waging of war at all. They said that attacking a few buildings in Bombay is not waging war against India. So I then argued that if you make a wanton attack on the people of a country because they are citizens of that country, it constitutes waging war against the state. I borrowed a public international law definition of state, which is to be found in Israeli decisions, among others, and the court has accepted that decision.

What were the main questions of law considered by t he court?

Kasab's fundamental point was: My trial did not follow due process.

There were two important constitutional issues of due process which were urged by Kasab.  This first was in reference to hisconfession. The court has accepted the confession, except some portions of it.

They said that if you think that in procedural compliance [while the confession was made] there has been adequate adherence to constitutional values, you can accept the confession. And a retracted confession in our jurisdiction can still be acted upon if you have corroboration.

The second argument was that Kasab should have had a lawyer from Day 1. The court has actually agreed to that. But they've said that the absence of a lawyer doesn't vitiate the trial. That's a very interesting development in our law.

What kind of evidence was presented before the court?

I want to point out that courts of appeal are not meant to be always appreciating evidence. So you had t o read the evidence afresh.

There was eyewitness evidence. Poor people, many of whom had lost close family members, took the trouble to be witnesses. Second, there was documentary evidence in the form of audio transcripts of terrorists in conversation with each other. The third was DNA evidence. The fourth was video evidence of a man shooting people and walking.

People feel disillusioned with the slow delivery of justice in India. In this case in particular, there was a lot of pressure from the media and the people for swift punishment. Did that weigh on your mind?

Public feeling is different from public justice. Public justice would require the rule of law to be followed. Many people thought we should send him to the gallows immediately, that he should be shot dead. But that's not the rule of law. That would really be the rule of law in a banana republic. We had to try him.

I think we did a completely professional job. I was unaffected by all the pub lic discourse.

How does the Indian judiciary look at terrorism? Do they treat it differently from other criminal cases?

Terrorism is a stronger kind of case than a mere murder. Terrorism's impact is much wider. Terrorism can make a country bleed. It can break asunder a country. This is the first judgment that gives the state or the prosecution the right to treat such crimes as an act against the people of India.

You have significant experience dealing with terrorism cases. What lessons do they hold for policy makers and society in general?

We must look at terrorism as a mental disease. We must view this in a very different way. This is a product of cognitive dissonance that happens in the psyche.

We must therefore find out the psychological cause which makes people vulnerable to suggestive behavior from people who slowly win over confidence and then push a person from a phase of rationality to a phase of irrationality.

Image of the Day: August 29

August 29, 2012, 11:50 am

By THE NEW YORK TIMES

Convictions in Gujarat Riot Case Could Have Political Consequences

By GARDINER HARRIS and HARI KUMAR

NEW DELHI, India â€" A former state education minister and 31 others were convicted Wednesday for their roles in the deaths of 94 people during one of the most savage attacks of the 2002 Gujarat riots.

The convictions could have political consequences. Narendra Modi, Gujarat's chief minister and a possible candidate for prime minister for the Bharatiya Janata Party in 2014, has long denied any role in the riots despite witnesses who say he discouraged police from intervening. The conviction of the former state education minister, Mayaben Kodnani, who is also a state legislator, is the first among Mr. Modi's confidants. Cellphone records demonstrated that she was at the scene of the riot, contradicting her own testimony.

“This is the first Gujarat riot case which has links to the political conspiracy,” said Teesta Setalvad, a victim's advocate who has played crucial roles in many of the Gujarat cases. “I salute the decade-long fight by victims and witnesses.”

Sentencing may occur as soon as tomorrow.

Jaynarayan Vyas, a cabinet minister for the Gujarat government, sought to distance the administration from Ms. Kodnani, saying she only became the state education minister after the riots. “Until we read the full judgment, we will not give our opinion,” he said. Prakash Javadekar, a spokesman for the Bharatiya Janata Party, said: “This is the judicial process. Whosoever is the culprit will be punished by the court. It is the first stage of judgment. This is a legal process.”

A total of 327 witnesses testified in the case, and prosecutors presented 2,005 documents. Sixty-seven people were charged, of whom 32 were convicted and 29 acquitted. Six defendants died during the proceedings.
“More than 90 defenseless persons, mostly women and children of a minority community, were killed,” said Akhil D esai, the prosecutor on the case. “I pleaded with the court to give them the maximum punishment of a death sentence.”

On the morning of Feb. 28, rioters broke through the stone walls encircling the Muslim neighborhood of Naroda Patiya and attacked families eating breakfast. They threw children and old women into burning pyres and knifed and bludgeoned others. Some who tried to escape said that the police refused to help.

The day before the attack, a train filled with Hindu pilgrims was attacked by a Muslim mob in the nearby city of Godhra. A fire started and at least 58 Hindu pilgrims burned to death. Mr. Modi and his party endorsed a strike, and the charred bodies of the pilgrims were brought to Ahmedabad and laid out in public, where thousands viewed them â€" an act almost guaranteed to incite violence. Sure enough, massacres began almost immediately.

Little was done to prosecute rioters until 2004, when the Supreme Court ordered that a special police team be created and some trials be transferred out of Gujarat. Another crucial turning point came when Dr. Mukul Sinha, a lawyer representing victims, was given records by a top police official of every cellphone call made during the worst of the rioting.

The court decision on Wednesday, Mr. Sinha said in an interview, “gives us a lot of satisfaction because Naroda Patiya was the biggest massacre during the riots.”

Many political analysts believe that blanket coverage of the riots by India's newly vibrant TV news channels and the unprecedented prosecutions of hundreds may have helped to snap the country's long history of mass rioting.
Noor Bano, a former Naroda Patiya resident whose two teenage sons were seriously injured during the attacks, vowed in an interview to continue fighting for justice. “They killed our people, so they should also be given death sentences,” she said.

Convictions in Gujarat Riot Case Could Have Political Consequences

By GARDINER HARRIS and HARI KUMAR

NEW DELHI, India â€" A former state education minister and 31 others were convicted Wednesday for their roles in the deaths of 94 people during one of the most savage attacks of the 2002 Gujarat riots.

The convictions could have political consequences. Narendra Modi, Gujarat's chief minister and a possible candidate for prime minister for the Bharatiya Janata Party in 2014, has long denied any role in the riots despite witnesses who say he discouraged police from intervening. The conviction of the former state education minister, Mayaben Kodnani, who is also a state legislator, is the first among Mr. Modi's confidants. Cellphone records demonstrated that she was at the scene of the riot, contradicting her own testimony.

“This is the first Gujarat riot case which has links to the political conspiracy,” said Teesta Setalvad, a victim's advocate who has played crucial roles in many of the Gujarat cases. “I salute the decade-long fight by victims and witnesses.”

Sentencing may occur as soon as tomorrow.

Jaynarayan Vyas, a cabinet minister for the Gujarat government, sought to distance the administration from Ms. Kodnani, saying she only became the state education minister after the riots. “Until we read the full judgment, we will not give our opinion,” he said. Prakash Javadekar, a spokesman for the Bharatiya Janata Party, said: “This is the judicial process. Whosoever is the culprit will be punished by the court. It is the first stage of judgment. This is a legal process.”

A total of 327 witnesses testified in the case, and prosecutors presented 2,005 documents. Sixty-seven people were charged, of whom 32 were convicted and 29 acquitted. Six defendants died during the proceedings.
“More than 90 defenseless persons, mostly women and children of a minority community, were killed,” said Akhil D esai, the prosecutor on the case. “I pleaded with the court to give them the maximum punishment of a death sentence.”

On the morning of Feb. 28, rioters broke through the stone walls encircling the Muslim neighborhood of Naroda Patiya and attacked families eating breakfast. They threw children and old women into burning pyres and knifed and bludgeoned others. Some who tried to escape said that the police refused to help.

The day before the attack, a train filled with Hindu pilgrims was attacked by a Muslim mob in the nearby city of Godhra. A fire started and at least 58 Hindu pilgrims burned to death. Mr. Modi and his party endorsed a strike, and the charred bodies of the pilgrims were brought to Ahmedabad and laid out in public, where thousands viewed them â€" an act almost guaranteed to incite violence. Sure enough, massacres began almost immediately.

Little was done to prosecute rioters until 2004, when the Supreme Court ordered that a special police team be created and some trials be transferred out of Gujarat. Another crucial turning point came when Dr. Mukul Sinha, a lawyer representing victims, was given records by a top police official of every cellphone call made during the worst of the rioting.

The court decision on Wednesday, Mr. Sinha said in an interview, “gives us a lot of satisfaction because Naroda Patiya was the biggest massacre during the riots.”

Many political analysts believe that blanket coverage of the riots by India's newly vibrant TV news channels and the unprecedented prosecutions of hundreds may have helped to snap the country's long history of mass rioting.
Noor Bano, a former Naroda Patiya resident whose two teenage sons were seriously injured during the attacks, vowed in an interview to continue fighting for justice. “They killed our people, so they should also be given death sentences,” she said.

Death Sentence Upheld for Kasab

By HARI KUMAR

The Indian Supreme Court on Wednesday upheld the death sentence of Ajmal Kasab, the sole surviving gunman from the attacks that killed 166 people in Mumbai in November 2008.

Mr. Kasab, who is Pakistani, was convicted in May 2010 by a trial court in Mumbai of murder, conspiracy and waging war against India, and was sentenced to death. He appealed to the Maharashtra High Court, which upheld the sentence, and then to the Supreme Court. Mr. Kasab is on a list of more than 300 prisoners on death row in India.

Gopal Subramanium, the additional solicitor general of India, who argued the state's case, called the Supreme Court's ruling “a victory of the administration of justice.” Mr. Kasab was provided legal assistance by the government throughout the trial.

Mr. Kasab, along with nine other gunmen from Pakistan, entered Mumbai by sea and began killing people at several locations in the cit y, including the famous Taj Hotel.  The attacks, which Indian officials say was directed from a control room in Karachi, Pakistan, continued for three days. Mr. Kasab was captured alive, but the nine other gunmen were killed.

The Mumbai attack worsened the always-tense diplomatic relations between India and Pakistan. 

Ujjawal Nikam, who served as the special public prosecutor at the trial court level,  said Wednesday, “This is a very good judgment and I am very satisfied by it. We have proved in the court that Ajmal Kasab and his nine colleagues were helped by Pakistan even during the actual crime.” 

Raju Ramachandran, the lawyer for Mr. Kasab, said “I bow to the verdict of court. We all take pride in a justice system which stands by due process.”

In India, it can take many years for a death sentence to be carried out.  Mr. Kasab has the right to appeal to the president of India for clemency, but that process, too, can be very slow â€" th ere are decades-old clemency petitions that have yet to be ruled on.

Smoothing the Path From Foreign Lips to American Ears

August 29, 2012, 12:46 am

By THE NEW YORK TIMES

Foreign graduate students at Ohio University “are spending up to two hours a day learning how to speak so that their American colleagues and students will understand them,” Richard Perez-Pena wrote in The New York Times.

“It is a complaint familiar to millions of alumni of research universities: the master's or doctoral candidate from overseas, employed as a teaching assistant, whose accent is too thick for undergraduate students to penetrate,” he wrote. “And it is an issue that many universities are addressing more seriously, using a better set of tools, than in years past.”

At American universities, one in every six graduate students hail s from another country - about 300,000 of them, almost half from China and India, according to the Institute of International Education. In science and technology fields, foreigners make up nearly half of the graduate students.

Those from China and other East Asian countries are often like Xingbo Liu, a graduate student in nutrition here, who said she had taken English classes nearly all her life. “But we only learn how to write and read,” she said, “how to choose the right answer on a written test.” Many Indian or African students have done most of their formal education in English and are comfortable speaking it, but with accents that challenge American ears.

Read the full article.

Image of the Day: August 28

August 28, 2012, 11:30 am

By THE NEW YORK TIMES

Speaking Urdu or Bengali a Cause for Police Suspicion in NYC

By THE NEW YORK TIMES

“Earlier this summer, Thomas P. Galati, commanding officer of the New York Police Department's elite intelligence division, sat for an unusual legal interrogation, during which he talked of his keen interest in Urdu-speaking New Yorkers,” Michael Powell wrote in The New York Times.

“ ‘I'm seeing Urdu,' Assistant Chief Galati said of the data generated by his eight-person demographics unit,” Mr. Powell wrote, “which has eavesdropped on thousands of conversations between Muslims in restaurants and stores in New York City and New Jersey and on Long Island.” The officer told Mr. Powell: “I'm using that information for me to determine that this would be a kind of place that a terrorist would be comfortable in.”

Assistant Chief Galati expressed similar sentiments about Bengali speakers:

“The fact that they are speaking Bengali is a factor I would want t o know,” he said, adding that the information was used solely to be able to determine where “I should face a threat of a terrorist and that terrorist is Bengali.”

But here is the problem for those eager spies among us. Asked if all of this compiling of Urdu- and Bengali- and Arabic-language hangouts, and all of this listening in on the chatter, had resulted in tips about potential terrorist plots, Chief Galati conceded it had not.

Read the full article.

Sonia Gandhi Accuses Opposition of \'Blackmail\'

By JIM YARDLEY

With Parliament paralyzed for a sixth consecutive day, Sonia Gandhi, president of the Congress party, launched an attack Tuesday against the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party, blaming it for holding Parliament to “ransom by blackmail,” even as she tried to rally her party to fight back against criticism over the coal scandal that is now shaking Indian politics.

Mrs. Gandhi's remarks were part of a coordinated public relations effort by Congress to put the B.J.P. on the defensive over its obstructionist tactics in Parliament. Finance Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram and Coal Minister Prakash Jaiswal held news briefings on Monday night, hours after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was shouted down in Parliament by B.J.P. lawmakers as he submitted his official response on the coal scandal.

“It is a matter of regret, of even shame, that at a time when serious issues are affecting our people an d our country, Parliament is not being allowed to function and fulfill its proper constitutional role and duty,” Mrs. Gandhi said on Tuesday morning, according to a transcript of her remarks. “This is the handiwork of just one party â€" the B.J.P. This once again shows up the scant respect it has for democratic values.”

Mrs. Gandhi, speaking to a gathering of Congress party lawmakers in New Delhi, accused the B.J.P. of “false propaganda” and characterized the attacks against the prime minister as “politically motivated.” Mr. Singh on Monday said he assumed full responsibility for the actions of the coal ministry and denied any wrongdoing â€" a position that was blistered by B.J.P. lawmakers.

“We don't need a certificate of responsibility from Congress,” the B.J.P. spokesman, Ravi Shankar Prasad, said Tuesday on NDTV. “We need conduct of accountability from them.”

Earlier this month, India's comptroller and auditor general released a re port estimating that favorable government policies had led to sweetheart deals for power companies, enabling them to obtain rights to coal concessions at losses to the treasury estimated at $34 billion. B.J.P. lawmakers have called for Mr. Singh to resign.

For days, as the B.J.P. has hammered the prime minister over the scandal, opposition lawmakers have blocked any action in Parliament. In response, Congress lawmakers have offered to hold a full debate on the coal scandal in Parliament if the opposition will allow the body to function.

But the standoff seems to be hardening, and as yet there does not seem to be space for compromise. Some analysts say the situation could, in the most extreme case, lead to early elections. Or if the impasse continues, it may mean that the current “monsoon” session of Parliament will end without accomplishing anything.

Republican National Convention Enlists First Sikh Speaker

By HEATHER TIMMONS

An American Sikh is scheduled to speak Wednesday at the Republican National Convention in Tampa, Fla., the first time the party has invited a Sikh to speak at a national convention.

Ishwar Singh, head of the Sikh Society of Central Florida, will give the invocation on Wednesday evening, according to the most recent schedule available. Tropical Storm Isaac has disrupted some of the Republicans' convention plans.

“I want to educate the people, so they know about Sikhism,” Mr. Singh said Monday night by telephone. Mr. Singh said he was contacted by the party after the Aug. 5 shooting at a Sikh temple in Wisconsin that killed six people. The gunman, who was killed by the police, was an Army veteran and white supremacist who some believe confused turban-wearing Sikhs with Muslims.

Mr. Singh said he thinks the Sikh vote in America is split. “I think you're going to see everyone has their own opinion,” he said. “I won't say we're all Republicans or Democrats, you will see individuals like everywhere else.”

Mr. Singh moved to the United States in 1970 from Indian Punjab to study biomedical engineering, and he has worked as an engineer for much of his life. He runs a gurdwara, or Sikh temple, in Orlando, Fla., which has about 300 families as members. After the August shooting, the gurdwara held an open house for the local community that drew almost 600 people, he said.

Mr. Singh said that anti-immigration elements of the Republican Party receive outsized attention. “The majority of people who I deal with today who are Republican are open-minded about everything, but there are some people who are rigid, who are vocal, who try to control the whole thing,” Mr. Singh said. “That can happen with any party.”

“There are a lot more diverse people in the United States who are open-minded then there used to be,” Mr. Singh said of the changes he has seen since he immigrated. Thanks to mixed marriages and other factors, “the dynamics of the whole thing is changing,” he said.

Still, some Sikhs had not been expecting such an invitation. “I remain surprised,” Rupinder Mohan Singh wrote on American Turban, a blog about Sikhs in America. “If this turns out to be the case, it would be a touching gesture in the wake of the Wisconsin shooting on behalf of the Republican Party to the country's Sikhs and other minorities.”

At an Iowa fundraiser this month, Mitt Romney, who will formally receive the party's presidential nomination this week, mistakenly referred to Sikhs as “sheiks” when speaking about the shooting. A spokesman said he had “mispronounced similar-sounding words” and that the mistake came at the end of a long day of campaigning.

Mr. Singh is the first Sikh to speak at a Republican National Convention, according to available records of past speakers. He said th e party contacted Nikki Haley, the Republican governor of South Carolina whose family is Sikh, about enlisting a Sikh speaker for the convention, and that Ms. Haley's father referred the party to Mr. Singh.

Legislators Jeer India Prime Minister on Coal Deals

August 28, 2012, 12:12 am

By THE NEW YORK TIMES

“India's Parliament became a noisy stage of political theater on Monday, as opposition lawmakers shouted down Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's attempt to rebut claims that his government had awarded sweetheart coal deals to power companies, the latest scandal to hit his administration,” Jim Yardley wrote in The New York Times.

“Resign! Resign!” some Bharatiya Janata lawmakers screamed, as Mr. Singh, almost inaudibly, moved for the house to accept his written statement.

“Manmohan Singh, leave the chair!” went another chant.

The confrontation on Monday suggested that the current “monsoon” session of Parliament was likely to be little different from several other sessions during the past three years, in which political tactics trumped substance. This session, which ends on Sept. 7, has an ambitious docket, with important bills pending on food security, corruption and land acquisition. So far, though, not a single one has been passed in the lower house. Last week, Bharatiya Janata lawmakers forced repeated adjournments, shouting and protesting over the coal scandal.

Read the full article.

Legislators Jeer India Prime Minister on Coal Deals

August 28, 2012, 12:12 am

By THE NEW YORK TIMES

“India's Parliament became a noisy stage of political theater on Monday, as opposition lawmakers shouted down Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's attempt to rebut claims that his government had awarded sweetheart coal deals to power companies, the latest scandal to hit his administration,” Jim Yardley wrote in The New York Times.

“Resign! Resign!” some Bharatiya Janata lawmakers screamed, as Mr. Singh, almost inaudibly, moved for the house to accept his written statement.

“Manmohan Singh, leave the chair!” went another chant.

The confrontation on Monday suggested that the current “monsoon” session of Parliament was likely to be little different from several other sessions during the past three years, in which political tactics trumped substance. This session, which ends on Sept. 7, has an ambitious docket, with important bills pending on food security, corruption and land acquisition. So far, though, not a single one has been passed in the lower house. Last week, Bharatiya Janata lawmakers forced repeated adjournments, shouting and protesting over the coal scandal.

Read the full article.

Pankaj Mishra\'s New Book, \'Ruins of Empire\'

August 27, 2012, 10:19 pm

By THE NEW YORK TIMES

Pankaj Mishra's “flair for the grace note is matched by a sometimes ferocious instinct for the jugular,” Jennifer Schuessler wrote in a review of his newest book in The New York Times.

“Now Mr. Mishra seems poised for a fresh round of intellectual battle,” she wrote, with the publication of “From the Ruins of Empire: The Intellectuals Who Remade Asia.”

Some on the right have dismissed the book as a polemic, but Mr. Mishra brushes aside the term. “If your writing collides with the conventional wisdom, there's going to be some kind of friction,” he said in a telephone interview from his home in London. And when it comes to the mainstream m edia, he added, “there are still very few people presenting perspectives other than that of the West.”

“From the Ruins of Empire,” to be published in the United States next Tuesday by Farrar, Straus & Giroux, is a richly detailed account of late 19th- and early-20th-century Asian intellectuals' often bitter responses to what one Japanese scholar quoted in the book called “the White Disaster.”

Read the full article.

Image of the Day: August 27

August 27, 2012, 11:10 am

By THE NEW YORK TIMES

Parody, or Actual Government of India Statement?

By HEATHER TIMMONS

The government of India's sometimes uncomfortable relationship with technology in general, and the Internet in particular, came to a head last week, when officials confirmed they had asked Internet service providers and social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook to remove certain items and block some users in a response to violence in Assam.

The move was widely criticized by analysts and citizens â€" after all, social media sites have controls in place to remove both users who are impersonating others and using hate speech. Making the situation more puzzling, some of the items the government asked to be removed included those debunking fraudulent material that sought to incite violence.

The Indian government has a long history of curious engagement with the Internet and has passed tough laws limiting free speech on the Internet. Late last year, the minister of communications, Kapil Sibal, asked social media sites to screen user content before it was posted.

Perhaps not surprisingly, a number of satirical Web sites and parody Twitter accounts have sprung up recently that poke fun at the government's stance on social media, the Internet and technology. Sometimes they are hard to distinguish from the real thing.

Can you identify which of the statements below come from actual government statements, and which are parody?

1. “Any normal human being would be offended” by some of the content on the Internet.

2. “Twitter is for the bird-brained.”

3. “In this new era, all you need is a computer which can be connected to the cloud, with that, all your software and documents will be there. But until now, no one has studied yet …whether during rain or during a storm, will there be aberrations in it?”

4. In an attempt to reach social media users, new members of Parliament, to be called to be called e-MPs, will be no minated by Twitter and Facebook users through a public poll.

5. “Prior permission is required before hyperlinks are directed from any Web site/portal” to the Web site of the prime minister. That permission must be obtained in writing.

6. “The prime minister's office had requested Twitter to take appropriate action against six persons impersonating” the office. “When they did not reply for a long time, the Government Cyber Security Cell was requested to initiate action.”

7. Following up on its prosecution of Google, Facebook and other Web sites over “objectionable” and “offensive” content, the Delhi High Court has now decided to ban all telecasts of the ongoing India vs. Australia test series on the same grounds.

8. “I've just about got the hang of Google search. I'm yet to learn how to send an e-mail.”

1. Actual statement, minister of communication and information technology, Kapil Sibal, during a December 2011 press conference.

2. Parody, a tweet from “Dr. YumYumSingh” on June 13.

3. Actual statement. Vishwa Bandhu Gupta, a former income tax commissioner, in an August 2011 interview.

4. Parody, a March article from the satirical Web site “Faking News.”

5.  Actual statement, from the prime minister's Web site.

6. Actual statement from the prime minister's office, August 24.

7. Parody, from a January article on The Unreal Times, a satirical Web site.

8. Actual statement, from Shobhandeb Chatterjee, chief whip in the Trinamool National Congress, in an August interview with the Times of India.

Starving the Future

Emerging economic powers China and India are heavily investing in educating the world's future workers while we squabble about punishing teachers and coddling children.

This week, the Center for American Progress and the Center for the Next Generation released a report entitled “The Race That Really Matters: Comparing U.S., Chinese and Indian Investments in the Next Generation Workforce.” The findings were breathtaking:

- Half of U.S. children get no early childhood education, and we have no national strategy to increase enrollment.

- More than a quarter of U.S. children have a chronic health condition, such as obesity or asthma, threatening their capacity to learn.

- More than 22 percent of U.S. children lived in poverty in 2010, up from about 17 percent in 2007.

- More than half of U.S. postsecondary students drop out without receiving a degree.

Now compare that with the report's findings on China. It estimates that “by 2030, China will have 200 million college graduates - more than the entire U.S. work force,” and points out that by 2020 China plans to:

- Enroll 40 million children in preschool, a 50 percent increase from today.

- Provide 70 percent of children in China with three years of preschool.

- Graduate 95 percent of Chinese youths through nine years of compulsory education (that's 165 million students, more than the U.S. labor force).

- Ensure that no child drops out of school for financial reasons.

- More than double enrollment in higher education.

And the report also points out that “by 2017, India will graduate 20 million people from high school - or five times as many as in the United States.”

As I have mentioned before, a book written last year by Jim Clifton, the chairman of Gallup, called “The Coming Jobs War,” pointed out that of the world's five billion people over 15 years old, three billion said they worked or wanted to work, but there are only 1.2 billion full-time, formal jobs.

This should make it crystal clear to every American that we don't have any time - or students - to waste. Every child in this country must be equipped to perform. The country's future financial stability depends on it.

As if to underscore that point, the Center for American Progress pointed out that “between 2000 and 2008, China graduated 1.14 million people in the STEM, or Science, Technology, Engineering and Math, subjects; the United States graduated 496,000.”

But instead of dramatically upping our investment in our children's education so that they'll be able to compete in a future that has more educated foreign job seekers, we seem to be moving in the opposite direction. A White House report issued last Saturday noted that:

“Since the end of the recession in June 2009, the economy lost over 300,000 local education jobs. The loss of education jobs stands in stark contrast to every other recovery in recent years, under Republican and Democratic administrations.”

Not only is our education system being starved of investment, but many of our children are literally too hungry to learn.

A survey of kindergarten through eighth-grade teachers released this week by Share Our Strength, a nonprofit that seeks to end child hunger, found that 6 in 10 of those teachers say “students regularly come to school hungry because they are not getting enough to eat at home,” and “a majority of teachers who see hunger as a problem believe that the problem is growing.”

The report quotes a teacher in the Midwest as saying, “The saddest are the children who cry when we get out early for a snow day because they won't get lunch.”

It is in this environment that Representative Paul Ryan proposes huge cuts to food assistance programs. As the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities points out, Ryan's plan “includes cuts in SNAP (formerly known as the food stamp program) of $133.5 billion - more than 17 percent - over the next 10 years (2013-22), which would necessitate ending assistance for millions of low-income families, cutting benefits for millions of such households, or some combination of the two.”

Representative Todd Akin, he of “legitimate rape” infamy, even said earlier this month that the federal government should stop financing the National School Lunch Program altogether. That man is just a font of humanity.

We will need to make choices as we seek to balance the nation's budget and reduce the deficit, but cutting investments in our children is horribly shortsighted.

And, as we pursue educational reforms, beating up on teachers - who are underpaid, overworked and always blamed - is a distraction from the real problem: We're being outpaced in producing the employees of the future.

We're cutting back, while our children's future competitors are plowing ahead.

From the Prime Minister, a Lengthy Defense on Coal

By THE NEW YORK TIMES

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh spoke to India's Parliament Monday about a recent report from India's Comptroller and Auditor General concerning the allocation of coal assets in the country. The report alleges that the government lost out on nearly $34 billion in revenues by selling coal assets in private negotiations, rather than auctioning them. The prime minister and other central government officials dispute this figure.

The prime minister has been criticized recently for failing to address his critics and fully defend policies and decisions. In Monday's statement, he presented 32 separate points related to coal allocations.

Here is his full statement:

I seek the indulgence of the House to make a statement on issues regarding coal block allocations which have been the subject of much discussion in the press and on which several Hon'ble members have also expressed concern.

< p>2. The issues arise from a report of the Comptroller and Auditor General which has been tabled in Parliament and remitted to the Public Accounts Committee.  CAG reports are normally discussed in detail in the Public Accounts Committee, when the Ministry concerned responds to the issues raised. The PAC then submits its report to the Speaker and that Report is then discussed in Parliament.

3.  I seek your indulgence to depart from this established procedure because of the nature of the allegations that are being made and because I was holding the charge of Coal Minister for a part of the time covered by the report. I want to assure Hon'ble Members that as the Minister in charge, I take full responsibility for the decisions of the Ministry. I wish to say that any allegations of impropriety are without basis and unsupported by the facts.

4.  Allocation of coal blocks to private companies for captive use commenced in 1993, after the Coal Mines (Nationalisation ) Act, 1973 was amended. This was done with the objective of attracting private investments in specified end uses. As the economy grew in size, the demand for coal also grew and it became evident that Coal India Ltd. alone would not be able to meet the growing demand.

5.  Since 1993, allocation of captive coal blocks was being done on the basis of recommendations made by an inter-Ministerial Screening Committee which also had representatives of State governments. Taking into account the increasing number of applicants for coal block allocation, the Government, in 2003, evolved a consolidated set of guidelines to ensure transparency and consistency in allocation.

6.  In the wake of rapidly growing demand for coal and captive coal blocks, it was the UPA I Government which, for the first time, conceived the idea of making allocations through the competitive bidding route in June 2004.

7.  The CAG report is critical of the allocations mainly on three coun ts. Firstly, it states that the Screening Committee did not follow a transparent and objective method while making recommendations for allocation of coal blocks.

8.  Secondly, it observes that competitive bidding could have been introduced in 2006 by amending the administrative instructions in vogue instead of going through a prolonged legal examination of the issue which delayed the decision making process.

9.  Finally, the report mentions that the delay in introduction of competitive bidding rendered the existing process beneficial to a large number of private companies. According to the assumptions and computations made by the CAG, there is a financial gain of about Rs. 1.86 lakh crore to private parties.

10.  The observations of the CAG are clearly disputable.

11.  The policy of allocation of coal blocks to private parties, which the CAG has criticised, was not a new policy introduced by the UPA. The policy has existed since 1993 and previo us Governments also allocated coal blocks in precisely the manner that the CAG has now criticised.

12.  The UPA made improvements in the procedure in 2005 by inviting applications through open advertisements after providing details of the coal blocks on offer along with the guidelines and the conditions of allotment. These applications were examined and evaluated by a broad based Steering Committee with representatives from state governments, related ministries of the central government and the coal companies. The applications were assessed on parameters such as the techno economic feasibility of the end use project, status of preparedness to set up the end use project, past track record in execution of projects, financial and technical capabilities of the applicant companies, recommendations of the state governments and the administrative ministry concerned.

13.  Any administrative allocation procedure involves some judgment and in this case the judgment was that of the many participants in the Screening Committee acting collectively. There were then no allegations of impropriety in the functioning of the Committee.

14.  The CAG says that competitive bidding could have been introduced in 2006 by amending the existing administrative instructions. This premise of the CAG is flawed.

15.  The observation of the CAG that the process of competitive bidding could have been introduced by amending the administrative instructions is based on the opinion expressed by the Department of Legal Affairs in July and August 2006. However, the CAG's observation is based on a selective reading of the opinions given by the Department of Legal Affairs.

16.  Initially, the Government had initiated a proposal to introduce competitive bidding by formulating appropriate rules. This matter was referred to the Department of Legal Affairs, which initially opined that amendment to the Coal Mines (Nationalisation) Act would be necessa ry for this purpose.

17.  A meeting was convened in the PMO on 25 July 2005 which was attended by representatives of coal and lignite bearing states. In the meeting the representatives of state governments were opposed to the proposed switch over to competitive bidding. It was further noted that the legislative changes that would be required for the proposed change would require considerable time and the process of allocation of coal blocks for captive mining could not be kept in abeyance for so long given the pressing demand for coal.  Therefore, it was decided in this meeting to continue with the allocation of coal blocks through the extant Screening Committee procedure till the new competitive bidding procedure became operational. This was a collective decision of the centre and the state governments concerned.

18.  It was only in August 2006 that the Department of Legal Affairs opined that competitive bidding could be introduced through administrative i nstructions. However, the same Department also opined that legislative amendments would be required for placing the proposed process on a sound legal footing. In a meeting held in September, 2006, Secretary, Department of Legal Affairs categorically opined that having regard to the nature and scope of the relevant legislation, it would be most appropriate to achieve the objective through amendment to the Mines & Minerals (Development & Regulation) Act.

19.  In any case, in a democracy, it is difficult to accept the notion that a decision of the Government to seek legislative amendment to implement a change in policy should come for adverse audit scrutiny. The issue was contentious and the proposed change to competitive bidding required consensus building among various stakeholders with divergent views, which is inherent in the legislative process.

20.  As stated above, major coal and lignite bearing states like West Bengal, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Orissa and Rajasthan that were ruled by opposition parties, were strongly opposed to a switch over to the process of competitive bidding as they felt that it would increase the cost of coal, adversely impact value addition and development of industries in their areas and would dilute their prerogative in the selection of lessees.

21.  The then Chief Minister of Rajasthan Smt. Vasundhara Raje wrote to me in April 2005 opposing competitive bidding saying that it was against the spirit of the Sarkaria Commission recommendations. Dr. Raman Singh, Chief Minister of Chhattisgarh wrote to me in June 2005 seeking continuation of the extant policy and requesting that any changes in coal policy be made after arriving at a consensus between the Central Government and the States. The State Governments of West Bengal and Orissa also wrote formally opposing a change to the system of competitive bidding.

22.  Ministry of Power, too, felt that auctioning of coal could lead to enhanced cost of producing energy.

23.  It is pertinent to mention that the Coal Mines Nationalisation (Amendment) Bill, 2000 to facilitate commercial mining by private companies was pending in the Parliament for a long time owing to stiff opposition from the stakeholders.

24.  Despite the elaborate consultative process undertaken prior to introducing the amendment Bill in Parliament, the Standing Committee advised the Ministry of Coal to carry out another round of discussions with the States. This further demonstrates that the decision to seek broader consultation and consensus through a Parliamentary process was the right one.

25.  The CAG report has criticised the Government for not implementing this decision speedily enough. In retrospect, I would readily agree that in a world where things can be done by fiat, we could have done it faster. But, given the complexities of the process of consensus building in our Parliamentary system, this is easier said th an done.

26.  Let me humbly submit that, even if we accept CAG's contention that benefits accrued to private companies, their computations can be questioned on a number of technical points. The CAG has computed financial gains to private parties as being the difference between the average sale price and the production cost of CIL of the estimated extractable reserves of the allocated coal blocks. Firstly, computation of extractable reserves based on averages would not be correct. Secondly, the cost of production of coal varies significantly from mine to mine even for CIL due to varying geo-mining conditions, method of extraction, surface features, number of settlements, availability of infrastructure etc. Thirdly, CIL has been generally mining coal in areas with better infrastructure and more favourable mining conditions, whereas the coal blocks offered for captive mining are generally located in areas with more difficult geological conditions. Fourthly, a part of th e gains would in any case get appropriated by the government through taxation and under the MMDR Bill, presently being considered by the parliament, 26% of the profits earned on coal mining operations would have to be made available for local area development. Therefore, aggregating the purported financial gains to private parties merely on the basis of the average production costs and sale price of CIL could be highly misleading. Moreover, as the coal blocks were allocated to private companies only for captive purposes for specified end-uses, it would not be appropriate to link the allocated blocks to the price of coal set by CIL.

27.  There are other important technical issues which will be gone into thoroughly in the Ministry of Coal's detailed response to the PAC and I do not propose to focus on them.

28.  It is true that the private parties that were allocated captive coal blocks could not achieve their production targets. This could be partly due to cum bersome processes involved in getting statutory clearances, an issue we are addressing separately. We have initiated action to cancel the allocations of allottees who did not take adequate follow-up action to commence production. Moreover, CBI is separately investigating the allegations of malpractices, on the basis of which due action will be taken against wrongdoers, if any.

Hon'ble members,

29.  From 1993 onwards, successive governments continued with the policy of allocation of coal blocks for captive use and did not treat such allocations as a revenue generating activity. Let me reiterate that the idea of introducing auction was conceived for the first time by the UPA Government in the wake of increasing demand for captive blocks. Action was initiated to examine the idea in all its dimensions and the process culminated in Parliament approving the necessary legislative amendments in 2010. The law making process inevitably took time on account of several fac tors that I have outlined.

30.  While the process of making legislative changes was in progress, the only alternative before the Government was to continue with the current system of allocations through the Screening Committee mechanism till the new system of auction based competitive bidding could be put in place. Stopping the process of allocation would only have delayed the much needed expansion in the supply of coal. Although the coal produced thus far from the blocks allocated to the private sector is below the target, it is reasonable to expect that as clearances are speeded up, production will come into effect in the course of the Twelfth Plan. Postponing the allocation of coal blocks until the new system was in place would have meant lower energy production, lower GDP growth and also lower revenues. It is unfortunate that the CAG has not taken these aspects into account.

31.  Let me state emphatically that it has always been the intention of Governmen t to augment production of coal by making available coal blocks for captive mining through transparent processes and guidelines which fully took into account the legitimate concerns of all stakeholders, including the State Governments. The implicit suggestion of the CAG that the Government should have circumvented the legislative process through administrative instructions, over the registered objections of several state governments including those ruled by opposition parties, if implemented would have been undemocratic and contrary to the spirit of the functioning of our federal polity. The facts speak for themselves and show that the CAG's findings are flawed on multiple counts.

32.  This, in short, is the background, the factual position and the rationale of government's actions. Now that the report of the CAG is before the House, appropriate action on the recommendations and observations contained in the report will follow through the established parliamentary pr ocedures.

Is a Youth Revolution Brewing in India?

By SAMBUDDHA MITRA MUSTAFI

Among the world's major countries, India has the youngest population, and the oldest leaders. A startling four-decade gap between the median age of India's people and that of its government officials most recently reared its head with a heavy-handed and widely-maligned crackdown on free speech on the Internet.

History shows us that generations with an exceptionally high youth ratio create political movements that shake up their systems and leave a profound impact on history. America's baby boomers â€" the 79 million people born between 1946 and 1964 â€" led the charge in the civil rights movement and the sexual revolution.

In China, out of the stormy Cultural Revolution emerged the country's current crop of leaders, who have taken it to remarkable heights of prosperity and power. More recently, in the Arab Spring there is evidence of a strong correlation between the ratio of the population under 25 and the urge to overthrow unresponsive governments.

Whether India will follow the same path may become apparent in the very near future.

There are some signs that the beginnings of India's own youth revolt are stirring â€" the “India Against Corruption” protests, which swept Delhi on Sunday, involved a about a thousand protesters, mostly young men, who broke through barricades meant to protect their elder politicians' homes and battled with the police.

The India Against Corruption political movement unleashes youth disenchantment against the establishment, using new means of communication like Twitter and Facebook as its fuel. Still, it is headed by an iconic 75-year-old Gandhian â€" call it shades of a youth movement, with the structure of a traditional Indian family.

India now has around 600 million people who are younger than 25, and nearly 70 percent of its 1.2 billion population is under 40. It is an unprecedented demo graphic condition in the history of modern India, and in absolute numbers it is unprecedented anywhere in the world. It also comes at a time when much of the developed world and China have aging populations.

The country's median age of 25 is in sharp contrast to the average age of its cabinet ministers, 65, which is a far bigger gap than in any other country â€" Brazil and China are next with age gaps just under 30 years. In the United States the gap is 23 years, and in Germany it is less than 10.

Beyond the Internet crackdown, there are other disturbing signs that the age and thought gap between the majority of India's citizens and their aging leaders is stifling India's teeming youth.

We see this at play when the chairwoman of the National Commission for Women tells women to “be careful about how you dress,” after a young woman was sexually assaulted in public by a group of men in Guwahati.

We see it when a police officer wielding a hockey stick cracks down on Mumbai's buzzing night life, and is defended by the state's home minister. We see it in the inability to overhaul the country's jaded bureaucracy that stifles fresh ideas.

Most tellingly, perhaps, we see it in the lack of political will to open up key sectors of the economy like retail to foreign competition, under the populist pretense of protecting existing jobs. This protectionism is far removed from the economic realities of the past two decades â€" India has been one of the clear winners of globalization. But as one writer put it, “The decision-makers in the Indian political class are still stuck in the mental framework of the 1970s, which is when they were blooded in politics.”

Because of these protectionist policies, millions of young Indians risk losing out on new jobs and technology that could substantially improve their lives.

Some may dismiss these as mostly urban issues, issues that do not affect India's vast rural youth. But the increasingly aspirational rural youth crave the lifestyle of their urban counterparts â€" and if they are not given the opportunity to get there quickly, they will have the incentive to rebel. The elite youth have the money, but crave the higher living standards of developed nations. And both groups care about jobs.

“The future of our country is today's youth and it is our responsibility to work for our country. It's a need for our country to elect right government. Educated youth are desperately needed in our politics” Neha a member of “Youth ki Awaaz” or voice of the youth posted on the online forum.

India's youthful population can be viewed as a double-edged sword â€" capable of bringing great benefit to the country in the decades ahead, but with extensive demands that, under current economic conditions, the country looks unable to fulfill.

A recent IMF report suggests that India's demographic dividend alone could contribute two percentage p oints to its annual G.D.P. growth for the next two decades, if the country adopts the right policies. A surge in the labor force with the right age structure, higher productivity due to urbanization, a low ratio of dependent people and an increased number of women joining the work force all add to this demographic dividend.

A 2010 Goldman Sachs paper projected that India's industry would need to create nearly 40 million jobs by the end of this decade to absorb this huge increase in the labor force. Aided by the demographic dividend, India could clock economic growth of 7 to 9 percent until 2030, possibly wiping out absolute poverty as we know it today, though the poverty line would then be readjusted.

Projections like this are dependent on several internal conditions â€" in India's case, that means changing its archaic land and labor laws, creating better trade opportunities and making huge investments in education and skills training. The state of the global eco nomy will be a key external variable.

Another study shows that India will have 12 percent of the world's college graduates by 2020, more than the United States, and second only to China, which will have a staggering 29 percent share. These graduates, their innovations and their patents will be the main drivers of the knowledge economy.

In simple terms, India's huge working-age population could be its biggest economic strength going forward.

Yet if you look at the pace of economic and social changes in India, you begin to wonder if the country's geriatric political elite have grasped the enormous opportunities and challenges that the country's youth represent.

Some commentators now fear that India's much touted demographic dividend is on the verge of going horribly wrong â€" that the economy may not produce enough jobs to absorb the fast-growing labor force, leaving millions of young people feeling bitter and betrayed.

Until now, most of India's young people have preferred to be silent bystanders or armchair critics of the political system, rather than actively participating in the process. A big turnoff has been the entitlement culture in the country's politics â€" of the 38 youngest members of Parliament, 33 have parents who are also politicians. But then, this entitlement culture is not restricted to politics â€" you see it in every profession, in every Indian household to an extent.

While India's affluent parents are as well-meaning as any in the world, critics say the easy inheritance they give their children breeds smug, conformist individuals, under constant pressure to live up to a legacy, rather than chart their own course and fulfill their own potential.

The most glaring example today may be Rahul Gandhi, heir apparent of the governing Congress party, who at the age of 42 is still struggling to step out of his mother's immense political shadow.

Between the 1960s and 1990s, East Asia went through a demographic transition similar to that we are seeing in India now. Aided by the opening up of their economies, the Asian tigers and China registered high growth, rapid poverty reduction and social development.

In spite of this “miracle,” many of these countries saw violent student movements against autocratic regimes, especially when faced with financial shocks.

India's demographic equation puts the ball firmly in the court of its young majority.

Faced with the prospect of a bleak future, will youthful energy challenge its sworn enemy â€" the status quo? Will India's younger generation strike back to install its own leaders and ideas? Or will it still remain aloof or just give up, and fall in line with the elders?