Rahul Gandhi takes a break from India (Sunday Guardian)

Rahul Gandhi | Photo: Reuters

By Madhav Nalapat

f a little bird which nests in the dovecotes of the stately buildings atop Raisina Hill is correct, Rahul Gandhi decided to take yet another break from India after the just-concluded assembly polls,travelling Business Class early morning of March 9 on a Thai Airways flight out of dusty Delhi into exciting Bangkok. The bird warbled that the Congress Party's Mr Always Correct spent a delightful week at pricey locations in Southeast Asia before getting back to Delhi on March 15 to resume helping Mamma run the party and the country

After absorbing the results of the 5 state assembly elections on March 6, Rahul Gandhi must have been a trifle disconsolate. After all,he spent months advertising the intense affection he feels for India's underprivileged. Despite his exertions,Congress candidates did poorly,including in Punjab,where even his worst critics did not expect Rahul's party to lose, while in Uttarakhand,it was a state BJP leader known for being generous both in the distribution of laddoos to his own party leaders and to rival Congress candidates of at least six BJP contestants who ensured that the Congress Party formed the government in Dehra Dun. Hopefully,memory of the laddoos consumed by them will stay the hand of the BJP leadership against this highly spirited saffronite from the hills of Uttarakhand

If those monitoring movements and safety of the man who was begged by Manmohan Singh to join the Union Cabinet are accurate,Rahul's hair colour became visibly lighter when he finally reached his holiday destination. Of course,the Youth Leader had shed his khadi uniform,wearing instead a faded pair of denims and a sports shirt. North Block avians say that the reason for the colour change is that while in India, Rahul's cranial hair is "blackened out of a tube", so that the 43-year old appears more a native of the subcontinent than a Mediterranean. However,such a conclusion may simply be conjecture, as may be reports that an individual who was "visibly close to Rahul" was waiting for him in Bangkok, with whom he participated in "a host of activities that were enjoyable despite being strenous"

The action sports indulged in by the youth leader and his holiday companion were not revealed by the little bird,who is wary of the many air guns in the vicinity of the Raisina Hill structures,all trained to shoot down gossips such as himself on sight. Following a pattern mandatory in external travels of the Maino-Gandhi's, no one from the media was anywhere near the comfortable locations where Rahul was getting over the disappointment of the just-concluded polls,not that Indian or international journalists have shown any interest in the overseas prereginations of the Maino branch of the Nehru family. And when they do report, taking thewir cue from a Swamy tweet followed up by an AICC spokesperson's clarification,the media mix up New York with London while mentioning the location where another member of the family recently travelled on a corporate jet,this time for reasons other than a holiday. Of course,the corporate jet was supposedly travelling to that destination to ferry a mid-level company official,who spent the flight in a seat close to a toilet

As the Mother of Transparency in India,who waved a magic wand and gave the people the Right to Information Act,hopefully Sonia Gandhi will initiate a Court Diary that tells her adoring people exactly when,where and how the country's post-royalty royalty travels.Till then,we will have to depend on the birds for information about the House of Maino-Gandhi

http://www.sunday-guardian.com/analysis/rahul-gandhi-takes-a-break-from-india

Interview: Corruption drives India’s spending on foreign arms (Global Times)

Global Times | March 20, 2012 19:35  By Gao Lei

Professor M.D. Nalapat (Nalapat), director of the School of Geopolitics at Manipal University in India 

Editor's Note:

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) released on Monday its latest international arms transfers data, which shows that India has become the largest arms importer in the world. What drives this huge demand? How will this affect regional stability? Global Times (GT)reporter Gao Lei talked to Professor M.D. Nalapat (Nalapat), director of the School of Geopolitics at Manipal University in India, on these issues.

GT: Why does India need to import so many weapons? Is it for countering China, or is India planning to expand its own arms industry?

Nalapat: India has become the largest arms importer for domestic political reasons. The Indian political class has become even wealthier than their US counterparts. These days, the purpose of politics is to enrich those in the system, which is why children of politicians in India get trained to fight and win elections, and are supplied with the money to do so. 

Fighting a parliamentary seat in India is expensive, and costs about $2 million, sometimes much more. Almost all this money comes from unaccounted, usually criminal, sources, who pay the politician so as to get protection for their illegal activities.

Defense procurement from abroad has become one of the biggest sources of generating secret cash reserves for influential politicians, almost as big as hidden payments from purchase of oil products from abroad. Although Defense Minister A. K. Antony is himself honest, yet he has been unable to prevent large-scale corruption in defense purchases. Delhi is filled with international arms merchants, complete with suitcases of cash and tempting women.

The reason why Indian companies are prevented by successive central governments from entering the field of defense production is that many politicians do not trust Indian businessmen to keep secrets. They believe that if they collect huge bribes from local private companies, information about this may leak to their rivals. Hence they keep out Indian companies and deal only with government companies that they fully control and foreign companies, who can be trusted to keep secrets.

Unlike China, which has developed a huge indigenous defense industry, India is reliant on foreign suppliers, mainly Russia, France, the US and Israel, for almost 80 percent of its critical equipment. Although hundreds of billions of dollars have been spent on such purchases, this far India has not even been able to build a local third-generation aircraft, whereas China is experimenting with fifth-generation models.

The reason is the exclusion of the Indian private sector from defense procurement. So long as politicians in India are greedy for money, the hard-earned foreign exchange reserves of the country will be wasted on expensive weapons systems, just as countries in the Middle East are spending tens of billions of dollars on such systems. Corruption is at the core of India's massive defense purchases from abroad.

GT: Pakistan is third on the list of Asian spenders. Are the two rivals in an arms race?

Nalapat: The Pakistan army has a single ambition, which is to be the equal of India. This is not logically possible, but the objective has led to a flood of arms purchases by Pakistan, including from China, that have had a severe negative effect on its economy. 

My view is that an India-Pakistan or an India-China war is very unlikely, because governments in all three states know that citizens wish nothing more than economic development. A war would devastate the economy.

However, arms merchants continue to fund "experts" who write and speak of "imminent" war between Pakistan and India. 

Also, if you examine the roots of the many commentaries of a likely war between India and China, you will find that NGOs and others with indirect links to arms dealers are behind such talk. The fact is that the two giants of Asia have leaderships that are too wise to go to war with each other.

GT: Why is India, unlike China, not seen as a threat to global security?

Nalapat: India is the second-largest English-speaking country in the world, after the US, and by 2020 will be the largest. 

Further, India has institutions modeled on the British colonial pattern, including its judicial, police and administrative systems. Hence people from the US and the EU do not feel challenged by India the way they do by China, which has a much lower level of congruence with US-EU systems. 

Also, India is far behind China in economic and technological development, and cannot pose a challenge to the dominance of the US-EU the way that China already is. 

For all these reasons, it is not possible that the US-EU will see India as a threat, unless of course Delhi aligns with Moscow and Beijing as a counter to the NATO powers. 

GT: Would the money be better spent on public welfare than arms?

Nalapat: Any major power needs a strong defense industry. It cannot rely on foreign sources to protect its people, the way corrupt politicians are forcing India to be. 

However, to ensure that the defense industry generates local employment and technological advancements, it has to be as indigenous as possible. This is the policy being followed by China, which has localized much of its defense procurement, especially since President Hu Jintao took over in 2002.

http://www.globaltimes.cn/NEWS/tabid/99/ID/701225/Corruption-drives-Indias-spending-on-foreign-arms.aspx

Why Silence Robert Vadra (Sunday Guardian)

Robert Vadra at the inauguration of the 33rd Indian Handicrafts and Gifts Fair in Greater Noida in February 2012. PTI ust when India was finally hearing an unscripted message from a member of the Nehru family who interacts with the public and the media, he has been silenced. Hours after Robert Vadra, the muscle-strewn swashbuckler who won the heart of Priyanka Gandhi, revealed that he was not averse to assuming public responsibilities, The in-law of The in-law seems to have vanished from television screens. Although there are rumours that subsequently he was chief guest at one of the myriad corporate functions that provide Delhi influentials an excuse for mingling in convivial company, it was also reported that Vadra lost consciousness during the event and had to be taken away in an ambulance to a hospital known to attract celebrities. Some defensive reflex in his subconscious must have warned Robert Vadra that his formidable mother-in-law may not take kindly to his presence at a public function, and may abandon the omerta she routinely exhibits with the Indian media to give him more than a slice of her mind on such a transgression. But why the hesitation in outing Robert? Perhaps there was the worry that the Vadra biceps may make the other biceps (of the forever waiting prime minister-in-waiting) seem puny by comparison. Or it may well be that Robert Vadra's earthy manner and confiding style may win for him media attention independent of the "paid news" variety, although he is but a mere in-law rather than a full member of the Nehru-Maino bloodline. Which has succeeded in ensuring that the alternative Nehru-Anand bloodline be driven away first from the Indira Gandhi residence and subsequently from the political party that the lady created in 1969 from what was left of the Congress party after Kamakshi Kamaraj Nadar handed it to her in 1966. Judging by the way in which Vadra has been prevented from revealing more of his hitherto secret desires to the people of India, it seems obvious that Head of the Household Sonia Gandhi does not regard her son-in-law as being as deserving as her son is of the most prominent place in the Indian sun, which is the Prime Minister's room at South Block. What if she is wrong in her assessment of her daughter's cherished spouse? What if Vadra's effortless candour resonates better with the people of India than the expertly scripted statements that flow out of the Congress president? Or indeed the rehearsed stances that her son and political heir Rahul Gandhi sports? Although it may well be that Sonia Gandhi was breathless with sorrow after the Batla House encounter, it is not impossible to believe that the Rahul effusions in Bhatta Parsaul and in numerous dingy huts across a country that his family has dominated for close to seven decades were motivated less by emotion than by political calculation. The country has watched the post-2009 transformation of Rahul Gandhi from pragmatist to populist. Clearly, Mamma's success that year convinced the lad that it was all due to the numerous freebies that poured out of the exchequer, mainly into the pockets of officials, middlemen and politicians. And that a doubling of populism could morph into a Congress majority in 2014. From that time on, Rahul Gandhi was one with Lalu Yadav in degrading the fortunes of those who are the engines of the economy, the middle class, albeit "in favour of the deprived". How the poor gain from low economic growth has, of course, not been explained by the Youth Leader.

he Indian middle class is disliked not only by Rahul Gandhi but by numerous foreign personnel in multiple NGOs across the country, who are eager to shut down commerce and industry within the country, thus driving the middle class back into poverty, rather than pursuing a policy of high growth that would transform the poor into the middle class. The UPA has been relentless in its animus against the middle class, raising its cost of taking loans for education and housing, superintending huge spurts in inflation and causing the murder of industrial growth by the RBI's UPA-approved policy of absurdly high interest rates in a situation where lower rates are needed. Of course, higher rates help the tens of thousands of foreign investors, even as they hurt the interests of tens of millions of those unfortunate enough to hold an Indian passport in UPA-ruled India. Thus far, unlike his brother-in-law, we have yet to hear from Robert Vadra about how his heart "beats for the poor", a remark sought to be reinforced by his brother-in-law through brief stays in some nameless unfortunate's hut. Thus far, Vadra has not travelled that gimmicky way, nor have we heard him shout out the castes of those who are his close associates, the way Sam Pitroda was outed as a Viswakarma by the Congress Party's Prince of Wales. Robert Vadra has this in common with Sonia Gandhi, that he too is an in-law. If the daughter-in-law of Indira Gandhi could at one time aspire to become the Prime Minister of India (after all, who can forget the fact that Sonia Gandhi, MP, once declared in writing that she supported Congress president Sonia Gandhi as PM?), what is the problem in her son-in-law nursing the same ambition, except that he is from a family different from her Orbassano stock? After all, Robert has done well in business, and is known to be of immense help to his friends, attributes useful in politics. What Rahul Gandhi needs to generate a genuine spark in his inner motor may be competition from within the family. Once Robert Vadra gets into his stride and reveals his mind and his interests to the public, perhaps that would goad Rahul into doing the same. For too long, too few questions have been asked — or answered — about India's most powerful family. All the more unpardonable that Robert Vadra seems to have been forced into silence just when he showed that he still had a viewpoint that was not the creation of handlers, but represented his own views. Too bad for transparency in politics. http://www.sunday-guardian.com/analysis/why-silence-robert-vadra

Will Xi Jinping follow Jiang or Hu? (PO)

By M D Nalapat
What is the fundamental difference between the founding fathers of the Republic of India and those who created the Peoples Republic of China? The former were prepared to accept even tenth best, when they saw that getting even the fifth or sixth best option would mean work and sacrifice beyond their capacity. Although the Republic of India was touted as the legal successor of the British Indian empire, the latter comprised Myanmar and Sri Lanka, besides the vast territory that was separated to form Pakistan on 14 August 1947. Besides, the British Indian empire had a special relationship with Tibet, Nepal and Afghanistan. None of this survived the coming of independence. Although Mahatma Gandhi had on several occasions said that India would get divided “only over my dead body”, he seems to have had a lapse of memory when precisely such a step was carried out, accepting the partition without visible protest. His hand-picked Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, was delighted to preside over the newly independent country, despite its far smaller size and significance, as compared to the period when it was under colonial rule.

Since 1947,successive rulers in India have continued on the path of accomodation and compromise with solutions that are less than the best. Collectively, they have ensured that poverty, disease, illiteracy and misgovernment continue to haunt India, sixty-five years after the Union Jack was replaced by the tricolour in buildings across Delhi Contrast this with China. Although Mao Zedong presided over a peasant army starved of resources, he ensured that Inner Mongolia, Manchuria, Tibet and Xinjiang got incorporated into the Peoples Republic of China. The only remaining slice of territory awaiting absorption was Taiwan, and it was deemed by Mao to be so small (in comparison to the incorporated lands) that it could wait. Hence, by 1949, a united China faced a divided India. Small wonder that the former has far outpaced the latter, becoming more than double the economic size of India by the 1990s, while it was less than half of (present-day) India’s economic size in 1949.

China’s leaders have wanted the best for their country and their people, and they have been stubborn in their determination to achieve this. In a way, they followed in the footsteps of the leader who ensured the military defeat of Adolf Hitler, General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union J V Stalin. It was the latter’s ruthless confidence that ensured the holding of Moscow, Stalingrad and Leningrad, the names of the latter two getting changed by Boris Yeltsin in the 1990s to please the US and the EU, the two power blocs that Yeltsin was a servant of throughout his decade in power as President of the Russian Federation After Stalin, the attempt by Lavrenty Pavlovich Beria to take power was foiled by Nikita Khruschev, who took over as General Secretary and launched a policy of seeking the friendship of the US and West Europe. This was in contrast to Stalin and Lenin, both of whom believed that the interests of the USSR would always be opposed by the US and West Europe, whatever the public statements of friendship, and even of these, there were not many.

Since Khruschev, other Soviet leaders too tried very hard to reach an accomodation with the US principally, all of them failed. The man who tried hardest was Mikhail Gorbachev, who adopted the playbook given to him by US President Ronald Reagan, and thereby caused the destruction of the USSR. He was followed by Boris Yeltsin, who watched as US President W J Clinton sought to de-technologize Russia by stripping it of its laboratories and scientists. Under Yeltsin, Russia degenerated to an extent that threatened the stability of the state, thereby leading to a reaction within that part of the ruling establishment not beholden to Yeltsin-patronised mafias. That pushback led to the coming to power of Vladimir Putin, who understood that the US and the EU would never willingly accept a powerful Russia, and would work hard to weaken and undermine the state left behind after the 1992 collapse In China, the successor of Deng Xiaoping was in the mould of those who sought a partnership with the US and with the EU. Throughout his tenure, Jiang Zemin boosted western influence in China, going so far as to dilute Chinese culture by the wholesesale introduction into it of elements such as pop music and bepop dance. To be as American or as European as possible was glorious in the time of Jiang Zemin, and Chinese women felt underdressed if they did not have French perfume, Italian handbags and shoes and British suits. Their men craved after BMWs and Mercedes-Benz cars, as also Mont Blanc pens and Rolex watches. Soon, large swathes of the more affluent in China stopped wearing or consuming anything that was Chinese, preferring imports from the US, Europe and Australia. They even resorted to plastic surgery to look as European as they could, in common with many of the citizens of Japan, who would even dye their hair blond in order to create the same effect. However, in 2002,the Chinese Communist Party got a General Secretary who was proud to be Chinese, and had no inferiority complex about the same.Hu Jintao began to push China into the high-technology sphere, whereas in the past, the country had been content to do what India is doing to this day, which is rely on foreign countries for high-technology items.

With Putin in charge in Moscow and Hu looking after the tiller in Beijing, the dominance of the US-EU combine in global geopolitics began to ebb. Sometimes, though not often, even India would challenge the US and the EU, in the process making common cause with Russia and China. However, overall, Delhi has remained broadly committed to following the US and the EU lead on most matters, as witnessed most recently over Syria, where India voted in a way that was the opposite of the stand taken by Beijing and Moscow. This despite the experience in Libya, where a UN resolution was twisted out of shape to give cover to a brutal NATO military campaign that finally led to the roadside murder of Muammar Kaddafy by the armed bands that NATO funded and armed for months. That the US and the EU are strongly in favour of regime change in Syria is no secret, and but for the joint Moscow-Beijing veto, would have found the excuse they have been looking for to begin a military campaign in Syria, of course for “humanitarian” reasons. Had India abstained, it would have been excusable. Voting against Syria has shown once again that when it comes to a crunch, the Sonia Gandhi-led coalition in power in India sides with NATO With Vladimir Putin winning the just-concluded Presidential elections in Russia, despite the presence of the Germany-influenced Dimitry Medvedev in his team, Russia can be expected to follow a course other than obedience to the wishes of the US and the EU. After all, the way that President Clinton expanded NATO to the periphery of Russia and sought to wean away all of that giant country’s neighbours from alliance with Moscow showed policymakers in that capital the futility of hoping for a change of heart. Annoiting Medvedev as President was a himalayan error of Vladimir Putin, for the man is very much in the Gorbachev-Yeltsin mould of surrender. In the years ahead, the mistake Putin is making by giving the Prime Ministership to Medvedev will cost the Russian leader dearly. However, in his efforts at crafting a foreign policy independent of the pulls andpressures of Washington and Brussels, Vladimir Putin will be greatly assisted if incoming Chinese Head of State Xi Jinping is in the Hu Jintao mould rather than a follower of Jiang Zemin. If he is the latter, then he will once again seek to “westernize” China, moving away from the Sinic consciousness that has flowered during the first decade of the 21st century.

If on the other hand, he recognizes that the US and the EU will be as unhappy with a super-powerful China as they would be with a powerful Russia, he will join hands with Putin in putting in place a Moscow-Beijing geostrategic pole that in less than a decade will be far more powerful

than the US-EU pole The whole world is watching to see which way Xi Jinping will go. Will he return to the policies of Jiang Zemin or anchor himself in the more Chinese vision of Hu Jintao? Will he see Vladimir Putin as an ally or will he look past him to the EU, specifically to the leaders of France and Germany, the duo most threatened by a resurgent Russia? Should Xi Jinping continue on the path of Han nationalism and Asian resurgence that has been so prominent during under Hu Jintao, he can change the global geopolitical order permanently before his ten-year term expires.
http://pakobserver.net/detailnews.asp?id=145267

Why Akhilesh (Sunday Guardian)

MADHAV NALAPAT  NEW DELHI | 13th Mar

Akhilesh Yadav walks at his residence before leaving for a meeting with the newly elected legislators at party headquarters in Lucknow. REUTERS hy did the Samajwadi Party choose Akhilesh Yadav and not party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav to be Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh? Commentators have gone off in two broad directions while answering this query.The first is that the SP supremo takes print and visual media a bit more seriously than they actually do, and hence got influenced by the ocean of (almost entirely favourable) coverage about the Australia-educted son of the party founder. Clearly,Akhilesh has sprinted miles ahead of the now cast-away Amar Singh in winning over the media,at least for now. Hence - or so a section of the commentariat believed - his selection as CM would act as a huge boost to the SP's influence within the political spectrum. The other strand of analysis was the state of the senior Yadav's health,the perception being that ill-health made it mandatory for him to pass the sceptre to Akhilesh. As Atal Behari Vajpayee ( who was significantly challenged physically since end-2002) has shown, poor health has never stopped a politician in India from believing that he or she is indispensable to the future of the country. And as for press coverage,the numerous treacly reports about Rahul Gandhi did not result in his mother ensuring that he be given some administrative experience,at least as a Minister of State,or even in the Union Cabinet ( perhaps as Minister for Youth and Sports). Nor will the present crop of negative stories affect Rahul's status within the party,which is to take charge of the party when Sonia Gandhi decides to call it a day.This may take a while,as the Congress President evidently believes her party would crumble without her,just as Britain's Queen Elizabeth sees as crucial to the future of monarchy her remaiing the Sovereign for as long as her limbs permit. Hopefully,Rahul will not have to wait as long as Prince Charles has,although on present reckoning,it would seem that Sonia Gandhi is still reluctant to trust the 42-year old with administrative responsibility. Mulayam is no Sonia,however,and he obviously trusts his son. But apart from filial affection,there is another reason why he has not taken up the responsibility of governance. This is the Congress Bureau of Intimidation,known by its initials as the CBI. This organisation has a mound of dossiers on both him as well as bete noire Mayawati,and is certain to use them,once commanded to do so by the organisation's political masters in 10 Janpath and 24 Akbar Road. However,Akhilesh comes with a clean bill of health,a status that hopefully will continue into the future. His takeover of the chief ministership has removed a powerful instrument of "influence" ( the use of the term "blackmail" would be unmannerly) over the SP. By annoiting Akhilesh,Mulayam has substantially enhanced his degrees of freedom vis-a-vis the Congress Party. Now even the CBI may not be able to stop the father-son duo,should they come to the conclusion that the Congress Party has remained in office too long for any good that it may be doing (to paraphrase Cromwell) ,and call upon it to go. http://www.sunday-guardian.com/investigation/why-akhilesh

We need a Jobs, not more Lalus (Sunday Guardian)

Manmohan Singh By Madhav Nalapat Now that successive US administrations from Ronald Reagan down have placed the interests of the financial industry over that of the rest of the population, the US has turned into a country where talent may never find an opportunity, unless fused with millions of dollars. Since the 1980s, policy within the US has shifted in favour of the few, a trend accelerated by the decision of the US Supreme Court to legalise "Super PACs", interest groups that funnel hundreds of millions of dollars in campaign contributions to those candidates who promote their business interests. Given that this is (almost) the same court that won the election for George W. Bush by blocking an accurate recount in Florida, such concern for the rights of billionaires is not surprising. To the honourable judges of the US Supreme Court, those who have the money to buy politicians ought not to be denied that right, simply because a few are squeamish over the effect that such uncontrolled licence to special interests would have over public policy. Surprisingly, once he got elected as President of the US nearly four years ago, Barack Hussein Obama turned towards the very financial interests that he had warned against during the campaign. Timothy Geithner, who is almost as responsible as former Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson for the 2008 debacle, was put in charge of the clean-up. Instead of going by sound market principles and allowing those who had bet wrongly — often for reasons of hypersonic greed — to lose their money, Geithner oversaw an unprincipled transfer of funds from tens of millions of taxpayers to a handful of financial enterprises, all of whom enjoy privileged status in UPA-ruled India. Indeed, now that there are no savings left to plunder in the US or in much of the EU, these vultures (and their effective PR outfits) are flocking to India, to pick the pockets of investors here with their come-hither calls. Coincidentally, several of the children of local influentials, both political and official, have managed to find jobs in such predatory ventures. Such recruits may not be of much value in the office, but would be critical in whispering into Daddy or Mummy's ear at the breakfast table as to just why what is good for Goldman Sachs is just brilliant for India. They would, of course, be speaking to the converted. India is teeming with those holding the same view, especially those business journalists who share the view that while foreign enterprises ought to be facilitated to make profits in India, local companies ought to continue to suffer high interest rates, insane regulatory webs and Burundi-level infrastructure. { Now that he has smudged his copybook, Manmohan Singh needs to be renamed “Master of Lost Opportunities” in place of “Father of Reforms”. Now that he has smudged his copybook — seemingly beyond repair, although those who respect the man are still hoping for a miracle — Manmohan Singh needs to be renamed "Master of Lost Opportunities" in place of the "Father of Reform" tag that Montek Ahluwalia's innumerable PR lunches with journalists ensured for him. Whether it is by assisting international cotton speculators by irrationally blocking exports by domestic producers or by veering towards succumbing to the pressure from international drug companies to hobble generic competition from India, the UPA has given ample evidence that to its core policymakers, India and the people of this country come last. One of the worst performances has been in the sphere of the internet, a field in which India ought to have excelled. Rather than expand connectivity, the government is going slow on expanding coverage. Even more unforgivably, it has placed the need to snuff out negative comments about itself ahead of the opportunity of making India a country where a new Bill Gates or Steve Jobs can arise. Had Kapil Sibal defended rather than trampled upon internet freedom, had this country put in place a system of procedures that welcomed internet creativity rather than followed Chidambaram's "PC" (Police Constable) path of blocking innovation and expression, India would have been the ideal alternative location in a world where the US is busy trying to destroy its own future by seeking to get passed legislation that will destroy America as a knowledge hub, even while (temporarily) ensuring profits for a handful of music and entertainment companies. This is the time for India to give Julian Assange a new home, him and others across the world who exemplify the boldness and the freedom that the internet promises. This is the time to develop desi versions of Facebook, Twitter and Google, that can migrate to far continents. Instead, we have Kapil Sibal — to the shock of his one-time admirers, including this columnist — seeking to make India not the (freedom-friendly) America of the past, but the China or the Saudi Arabia of the present. This has been the greatest failure of Rahul Gandhi. A man who has travelled across the globe, lived in locations that during the time he was there were vibrant with promise, has converted himself into a Luddite behind the walls of his residence. Rather than ferret out the caste of Sam Pitroda, the only son of Rajiv Gandhi needs to introspect as to why he has not bothered to push his somnolent government into increasing bandwidth, or into spreading the benefits of internet connectivity to the extent seen in telecom. Rather than join his mother in weeping uncontrollably about the Batla House encounter, Rahul Gandhi needs to remind Kapil Sibal that he is unlikely to ever return to the Rajya Sabha, and therefore ought to focus on ensuring a policy matrix that protects rather than restricts internet freedom. He needs to ask why so many projects are being held up across the country because of actions (or inaction) of the very ministers and officials that he meets with each week. Specifically, just who is behind the effort to sabotage the Kudankulam plant in the way that uranium mining and the nuclear three-stage programme have been slowed to a crawl. The country wants solutions, not whining. It needs freedom, not colonial attitudes, and should Rahul Gandhi provide this rather than excuses, he could actually do some good for his party.

What if. What if the country had a leadership that had the confidence and the intelligence to understand that the people of India have the energy and the talent to achieve the best, only provided they are given the freedom to do so. So long as the opposite view is held — and thrust down the throats of the public through regulation after regulation — all that the UPA will generate will be not a Steve Jobs but another Lalu Yadav. http://www.sunday-guardian.com/analysis/we-need-a-jobs-not-more-lalus