May Cricket Prevails

Yesterday, while having a discussion with one of my friend, I got a point to ponder. Now days, the IPL controversy is in limelight and naturally it drew our attention at tea time. He loves cricket but he does not love IPL. Let me generalize the thing; there are many who are ardent fans of cricket but ardent critic of IPL. Apart from controversy and limelight, IPL provides a full package to a cricket lover. Nail biting matches, extremely good performances, fours and sixes, dream teams where Sachin and Sanath can open the innings and Shane Bond and Shoaib Akhtar spearhead the bowling attack; all what a cricket lover would love to watch. With lightening performances of Sachin, Saurav, Rahul, Kumble, Kallis, Symo.....it has also been proved that this format of game has a lot to do with class and it’s not all about power. So why people do not treat it like a sport......??????????????????????????

After few minutes I got the answer too....it is not an India-Pakistan or Australia-New Zealand match or its not Ashes, where prestige of a nation is on stake. Agreed....but it is a reason enough to strip IPL??? After all it is all about cricket; money is involved but professionalism is very much needed to raise the standards of any sport. Nobody complains about English Premier League?? Except World Cup Football, soccer only played at club level. There is no series like Ashes or no rivalry like Indo-Pak or Trans-Tasman and there is more money involved in this than IPL; but why more than cricket people love to watch EPL(now Barklays Premier League-BPL)????? Because they want to see Rooney, Ronaldo, Ronaldinho, Rivaldo, Zidane, Bekhem. So why there is partiality with Cricket???????

Some have also the views that it is entertainment not a game.....but I think that the sole purpose of any sport is entertainment and physical exercise. That is why our forefathers have evolved with concept of sport. A sporting concept was never been thought as a War. It was and it is always for the art of that game, entertainment of others and physical fitness of participants...That is why we have SPORTING SPIRITS not WAR SPIRITS.

I agree that the recent controversy has marred the image of IPL but it has nothing to do with Cricket. Those who have marred it either are politicians or are businessmen. Business Houses run EPL(BPL) too; but EPL is still clean!!! Reason......a proper regulation. Government is doing all what it should have done two years back. There are few other aspects which have degraded the IPL image in general public i.e. Late Night Parties etc. These things need to be regulated properly. After all cricket is cricket and it is what a cricket fan would love to watch. I would like to quote Nawab Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi (former Indian Test Captain and IPL Governing Council Member) " Baby is clean, only water is dirty; we need to clean the water"....

I wish Cricket would win among all of this.....I wish the spirit of sports would win....

Are We Paying a Heavy Price for Democracy ???

Today is the day which has forced all of us to rethink. Rethink about the democracy in which we are living. Rethink about the liberty we are enjoying. Today Maoists have killed...or I should say butchered 75 CRPF soldiers and still they are enjoying the support of some sympathizers in the country. I can say it is possible only in India. Had it been in China, only God knows what would have happened to them. Had it been in USA, they would have been given them in same manner or in harder manner. But we are living in a democracy where anybody can abuse the integrity of nation on the name of democracy.

I would like to ask to all so call Maoist sympathizer- Is this the way to raise the voice in a civil society? I seriously suspect the very motive behind these organizations. Government is giving offers to talk, vocational training, money, employment opportunity; but now Maoist doesn’t want this. Now the real quest is for power and money. Now they want to run their parallel government. Are the Maoist sympathizers not sensing this or their so called ideology has made them senseless? A kid can sense that the people who are bombing the schools and trying to close the factories has nothing to do with education and development. They are only using the innocent tribals for their selfish motives; but the irony is that for those Maoist sympathizers, these incidents do not make any sense!!!

Since we are in a democracy, anybody can ask question.....but why some people use this liberty to abuse the nation. They abuse the nation in Kashmir, they abused the nation at the time of 1962 war by proving the point for China only and now they are abusing the nation by supporting the Maoists. Sometimes I think whether we are paying the price for democracy. Time has come to show some stern reactions, not only toward Maosit but also towards so called sympathizers because those are the people who are giving ideological and political shelter to the killers. A political will is needed to flush out the maoist killers, and more than that a social will is needed to flush out these so called intellectuals who do not see any crime in killing their own soldiers. Beware!!!! We are fighting a civil war now……

33% Women Reservation - How Much We Are Going To Achieve-1

During last few days, the Fair Sex has been in news for various reasons. Sometime due to 33%reservation bill for women, or other time for the Rupee Garland of Ms. Mayawati or due to mix reactions over the marriage of Sania Mirza with Shoaib Malik. We can say that we are living in a transition age where many defacto standards for women are cracking. Society is undergoing through a change process. I have termed this change as a 'Process' because it may take time and we may have to wait for a generation or two to reap the fruits of this change.

I would like to comment on 33% reservation bill; which made enough front page stories and editorials in all leading newspapers due to various reasons. The bill attracts both, the followers and the critics. The most interesting fact about this is that the parties, supporting this bill, have not more than 10% female candidates contesting in elections. Apart from this, application of this bill would require again a reservation of seats; we already have few reservations in parliamentary seats. The most important question is that whether the parties would be able to get ample female leaders to represent the constituencies or it will again be a series of dummy candidates)???); as it used to be in Panchayat and Municipal Corporation election. Let me make it clear that I am not questioning the leadership qualities of Indian Women. From Vijaylaxmi Pandit to Indira Gandhi to Sushma Swaraj to Sonia Gandhi to Meera Kumar to Brinda Karat to Mamta Banerjee; we have all the names which have been making glitters in section of powers. But these names are handful. Is there any process or system in the parties which reserves the seats for Women at party position??? At local levels, how many women are holding key positions in political parties??? Women reservation is already there at Municipal Corporation levels but if we analyze, we will found out that most of the female candidates are shadow candidates only. As I mentioned earlier, it is a process, and I think it is always better to start process at root level. Parties first provide a reservation to women at party level to make them eligible enough to represent 33% constituencies of India independently; not as shadow candidates. The current Lok Sabha contains 59 women MPs but most of them are relative to some strong Male leader. What are the parties doing to empower women at local level and party level? All of them are making hoopla about 33% reservations for vote bank but what exactly are they doing to implement this in true sense. I think it would be a better idea to implement this reservation first at party level and then only at parliamentary level; otherwise we may feel that this is something which we are forced to implement rather than a natural implementation.

Right to Education Bill - A Welcome Move

Today, Government of India implemented the bill of The Right to Education for Children. Undoubtedly, it is a welcome move in a country where more than 10 million children are deprived from proper education. Now, when we are growing consistently with 7% growth rate; the Government has ample money to fund the basic education of a child. After all it is the next generation, who will excel the country growth rate.

The one of the most important aspect of this Act is to include private schools in the process. In India, although 93% school going children go to public school, the rest 7% holds the advantage due to private school education. It is not that they are more brilliant than the other students; it is only because of the better monetary situation which they inherited from their parents. It is always a better idea to make the public schools at par with those; but till this happens, why should our future be deprived of quality education only due to their monetary condition?

All of this draw my attention towards one unaddressed issue - Regulation of Fees of Private Schools. In India, there is no regulation over the fees of primary education. It all depends on management how much they charge from parents. Many of the elite schools charge fees more than Engineering and Medical education. While admission, they ask for the bank statements of parents to check whether the parents have the capability to pay the fees or not. It is a standard symbol in our society to send children in Delhi Public School or other Convent School; not because they provide some extraordinary education, but only due to their high fees which can be bear only by elite class.

While Government is trying hard to provide basic education to child, many of programs are being run i.e. Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, School Chalo Program, Midday Meal; we all are contributing towards those programs (through 2% and 3% Education Cess from our salary), it would be a better idea to regulate the fees of the Private Schools so that more and more children can get benefited by already existing good education system. Education is not a Privilege and the new act justifies this; it is high time for Government to come with a law for private school fees regulation.

With this a strict implementation of existing laws for public school betterment is very much required. My cook told me a shocking story that the Government School is illegally charging 500/- Rs. for his children in his village (Duttpur Village, Dist Jashpur, Orissa). Nobody is here to monitor this. Government has given clause of 220 days compulsory teaching for teachers but the question is who is going to measure that. In most of our rural schools, 'Master Ji' uses to fill the full month attendance at one day only. The lack of a strict performance measurement system for teachers is still haunting us and nation; especially in the case where government is pumping a big chunk of money to improve the education and literacy in our system. The advent of Unique Identity System for each citizen can solve the problem, through which an electronic monitoring will be possible for every teacher's working hour. Unique Identity is one of the most ambitious plan government has undertaken but the outcomes of it are still under carpet and we will have to wait for that.