"Other Gender" option in admission form -- Yes it is true now..

In India, while traveling in the train or at a busy traffic signal or at other public places, most of us must have faced transgenders disturbing our peace of mind as asking for some money. Rather they threat one to shell out some money from one's pocket otherwise they would create some unpleasant situation. We all generally shell out Rs. 10/- to get rid of this situation and proceed to our work (the same I do too).

Meanwhile, from my college days, while filling up any of the form, one question always struck to me - Why we are not having a third sex in form - Male, Female and Others. God has engineered all and why Third Sex is not getting the opportunity to prove themselves as a normal human being?? Many of the times I discussed this with one of my roommates, Mr. Ramakant Pathak . Yesterday, he e-mailed me that one of my long standing dreams is getting true. NLSIU, Bangalore has decided to add a third sex in their form as "Others". It gave me a great delight and satisfaction. Newspapers or media didn't give it as much focus as it deserved, but it is a great step taken by one of the premier institute of the country and a great leap towards the end of inhuman discrimination faced by transgenders. Naturally, they are devoid of sexual pleasure and by not giving them a fair chance in other fields, we were committing a sin.

Most of us might not be aware, but in the UN's Civil Society Task Force on HIV/AIDS, India is represented by an eunuch. Laxi Narayan Tripathi is the only "Others" in this task force. I came across to this fact last year while watching one of the most controversial television series "Sach Ka Samna"("Sach Ka Samna" is the Indian version of Moment of Truth ). I recommend all the readers to please watch the episodes of this series, featuring Laxi Narayan Tripathi, once. Laxmi Narayan is a person of strong will who proves that trans-genders are as capable as any of normal Men or Women. They only need support from society and law.

With NLSIU coming with this historic decision, we can hope other institutions and government bodies will come with an "Others" option in their employment, admission and other forms. It is not only an issue of ending discrimination, but also a move to prepare a huge workforce to contribute constructively towards the nation growth.

55% of Indians are Poor and Rupee Gets its Symbol

Almost an year ago, I was discussing the notion of Europeans about India, with my German language trainer. The very first thing she mentioned was that it is a land of extremities and contradictions. I am not sure whether it is only a coincidence or fate, that almost every time, whenever India celebrates its economical success or flexes her power muscles, in parallel some other activity starts which forced me to think whether this celebration is fake or real. Few of my previous blog entries have reflected this, and this article is one in that series.

Two days back India released the symbol of its currency. It is nothing but another show of India's economical might and one forward step towards becoming a powerful economy. India is preparing herself for next moon mission; we are organizing Commonwealth Games this year and targeting for Olympic. Now, we are producing winners not only in Cricket but in other sports also. India is one of the biggest defense equipment buyers and our energy thirst is forcing us to explore all the fields to get energy. Sounds Good ...... really we should give a pat on back to ourselves.

But almost the very same day a report released by Oxford University (Multidimensional Poverty Index) shown India her another face. According to it, 55% of Indians are poor (Country Briefing:India). Eight of our states are poorer than the poorest African countries. I would like to name those state - Bihar, U.P, Rajasthan, Jharkhand, M.P., Orrissa, West Bengal and Chattisgarh. Lets have a look the geography of these states. Bihar, U.P. and West Bengal lies in the one of the most fertile land of world : The Great Ganges Planes. The Ganges has provided a natural assistance to the soil of these areas and that is why it add to one of the most densely populated areas of world. This land is one of the best land of world for agriculture which made it one of the first choices for human to live. Rajsthan, Jharkhand, Orrisa and Chattisgarh are most mineral rich states of the country. Still they are poorest !!!! Many of these states are facing Naxal insurgency now a days and government is finding it tough to combat them as they are our own people fighting from our own land.


This all force me to think where did we go wrong in this development saga. Half of India is proceeding to compete few of the richest European nation and the rest is preparing to compete in poverty with poorest of African nations......!!! How contradictory; but its true. It again echoes the words of my German trainer in my ears.

For last few decades, we have talked about social inclusiveness, where all sections of society should get benefited from the development. But it seems that it has been rather social exclusiveness, where the development has become exclusive phenomenon of few areas. Definitely, the credit goes to the government and public of those regions as they made themselves empowered. But what about other states. Have they been found dozing off when the cherry of development has been distributed or they made themselves reluctant to accept any new change and decided to stuck with old ideas of development or the government made them fool ? I think all of the above reasons apply to these backward states. In U.P. and Bihar, the blatant caste politics has made the society blind. The public don't know anything but caste while voting. The ancient idea behind choosing the caste representative has been the development of the particular caste; but now, it has become only a means to make fool of public. So politicians are also milking the cow and drinking the all milk themselves. It has nothing to do with development. The public of these states have made themselves reluctant towards new and progressive developmental ideas and is still stick with age old caste based society. West Bengal has become a battleground of two political parties. Rampant corruption has made M.P. and Rajasthan handicapped while Orissa, Chattisgarh and Jharkhand are being exploited by their own people due to their natural resources. At some places, government has been failed to provided a social inclusiveness and at some places public has handed over a cane to government to beat them.

Ultimately it is the responsibility of government and public both to decide in which league they want to be shown. Social inclusiveness is not about the reservations on basis of caste, it is about the proper implementation of policies and identification of disturbing elements and their removal.Public must realize its responsibility as they are going to be labeled with "THE POOR" tag.