A resurgent BJP. Who is responsible??

I am not a political observer or activist, but just a normal citizen who cannot even vote, being a NRI. I have read about the BJP victories in Gujarat and HP elections and also read the comments of Prakash Karat blaming Congress for it. I would like to share my views below.

Around 1 year back, I told my colleagues that BJP is finished as a political force and people will vote for Congress overwhelmingly and they might even get a simple majority in the next Loksabha elections.

I was proven wrong. Why? I believe it is Prakash Karat and his friends to be blamed for this situation. Or may be it is Congress, who could not read the game plan of the left??

Around a year back, Manmohanji and gang were on a home run. Then came the 123 agreement. Prakash Karat and his friends left no stones unturned to show the people of India that they can make Congress crawl at their feet at will. They humiliated the Prime Minister and the Government of India time and again. Of course, Left Parties continuously said that they have no obligation to prop up the Congress. But, they want Congress to defeat BJP at the same time.

How could they imagine that the people of India will vote for such a weak Prime Minister and Congress Party who cannot even stand up against parties which hardly gets 0.5% of the votes like forward block or RSP? Who had to touch the feet of a family enterprises man like Karunanidhi? The writing was on the wall and the responsibility for the BJP wins rests squarely with the left and the other regional barons like Karunanidhi who showed to the Indian Public that the congress lead by Sonia and Government lead by Manmohanji and a few of the very old Gandhi loyalists have no courage to take issues head on.

Karat complains that Congress did not clearly stand on the side of secularism and that is why they lost Gujarat. Even Karat can not be so naive as to believe that in a predominantly conservative Hindu majority state like Gujarat, you can win by bashing Hinduism!

In my belief, Karat was trying to down two birds with one shot. By siding with Congress, he wanted to destroy BJP and at the same time, he wanted to undermine Congress by blackmailing the Government. Now look at what he achieved. He has delivered Gujarat in a plate to BJP and with the HP win too under their belt, we now have a resurgent BJP who sense that people are tired of this hide and seek game between left and the Congress.

In addition to that, Nandigram happened and his own CM in Bengal gives scant respect to their allergy to MNCs and FII investment and is virtually sleeping with the enemies. In Kerala, they have proved once again that they are not capable of running a Government, but only is good at playing Mr. Know it all critics. It is such a pathetic performance and now they have started canvassing in religious tones for survival. The very party who expelled a founder member like Raghavan for saying that if necessary, they should take the help of Muslim League!

Yes, I have to admit that I was wrong or too quick to write off BJP. BJP must thank Karat for all their fortunes they find themselves in today.

As a last observation, I would also like to ask Karat what favors have Iran done to India so that India must support Iran at the expense of US. Have you heard of PL480? When India was starving, it was the US which supplied wheat and Milk Powder. On the other hand, If Iran is indeed making a bomb, whom do you think will be at the receiving end of an Islamic Bomb co-sponsored by Pakistan? And if you do not know, China has commissioned their 26th Nuclear Plant in December in co-operation with US and received the highest amount of FDI in the world! Yes, they can do it because they are strong and they are not subjugating to US!!! I have not seen any other better performing hypocrite than the left party leaders in India. They want all comforts of a capitalist world like cars, lap tops, mobiles, air-conditioning, but hates those who make it! It seems communism means every one equally poor except the leaders.

Life's is an adjustment

Recently, I saw the above line in a young girls profile. I was surprised. Are you resigned at such a young age, my friend? Times have changed. How could you imagine walking into the bedroom of a completely unknown person and start loving him from that moment? I could not imagine that even for a minute. Why is a young girl resigned to her fate? What is wrong with us parents so as to drive them youths to desperation?
Many of my friends often say that it is because I do not have any daughters that I dare think so differently. Is it so? I don't think so. I am convinced that the more we try to stop the boys and girls from knowing each other, the more we are forcing them to do things behind our back and that is more dangerous. They often fall prey to stalkers on the net, porno sites etc...
We (that includes me) always have two standards. One for us and another for them. Hypocrisy? Our society and life has come a long way from the old times. In fact, it was much better before. In my childhood, I used to play with boys and girls of the neighborhood. Our children? School, Tuition, Competitive exam preparation, computer, TV... no time to play around with friends or read or play some physical games...
No wonder that an 18 year old girl is driven to say that life is an adjustment!!!!

Neostar

Today, I will write about the birth of Neostar.
In September 2002, my FDs with HDFC bank was due for renewal. My Personal Banking Manager, Balaram, called me and told me that my FDs which was earning 10.5% interest will now earn only 6% and as a priority Customer, they will give me a rate of 6.25%. I literally fell off from my rocker. Since I came out of India in 1991, I have never thought of any alternative investment opportunities other than bank deposits and was content to have a good interest rate without too much head ache.
Since Balram was a very nice guy and friendly, I asked him if he could suggest me any alternative method of investment. He was very kind to come to my home and explain to me about Mutual Funds. Sensex was @2,650 on that day. I was a little skeptic, but decided to take a calculated risk by starting with a small amount first. I invested 40,000 in spread in 4 mutual fund schemes. Once I invested in Mutual Fund, I started reading about it and that lead me to equities. I understood that MFs invest our money in equities and share the profits generated with us after taking a small commission. I thought, why not directly invest in equities? I went to the friendly neighborhood Geojit (There were not so many brokers available in those days) and opened an account. I invested 60,000 in i 5 shares suggested by the BM.
Then, the sensex started sliding down wards to 2,350! My investment was in big loss. I resisted the temptation to withdraw and kept on bravely and in fact added some money in HDFC Growth fund. I sold of the first investments when these returned to some profit not wanting to take too much chances. I would rather not see the prices of those stocks today :(
I realized that investing in equities without proper advice is worse than gambling. Then I noticed that Capital market was one source used by most financial channels and portals. I wrote to them and took a subscription to telefolio paying Rs10,000 and started investing as per their advise.
My fortunes improved dramatically. Then I wanted to take their full service which was priced at 1 lac. I asked 4 of my friends to join me showing the returns I got and we subscribed to the full service together. Then other friends joined and the circle got bigger. And so did our knowledge. In 2005 January, I went to Geojit and told them that we as a group find it difficult to trade with ease and asked them to give us exclusive access. They suggested that we take a franchisee.
That is how Neostar was born. We expanded the consultation from capital market to 3 more other Equity advisory Services to get have more safety by spreading the risk. Our friends also increased to 50. Initially we used to take contributions from all to pay the consultants. Then, our franchisee started to pay for itself and we stopped such contributions. Now, the equity advise is provided free. We also went one step ahead and reduced the brokerage from 0.675% to 0.5% and also started keeping P/L account for our friends and sending it weekly to them.
I am glad to say that we have created a few millionaires during the past 3 years of operation.
Now we are expanding the circle further with the aim of taking such products to more people so that they also can join the up trend and profit from it even if they are completely ignorant about the equity markets etc... We have profited. We would like more people benefit from such buoyant economy.
We do not want to aggressively market any products for our own profit. Our profits come from our own investments. But we would like to see that more people get to know the choices available and even the poorer section of the people can profit by small amount of investments in Mutual Funds. We will never try to sell a product for our benefit only, but will suggest products that will benefit the investor. That is our motto.
The current bull run started from December 2003 has made millions of people rich. But mainly in Metros and in Gujarat. What I would like to see is that more common people benefit from it like we have benefited. That is our mission.

Religious?? Save Humans, not the Gods!

Someone in Shelfari recently invited me to a group which deals with a particular religion and their holy book. As a courtesy to the friend, I accepted the invitation. In another group, I read that some posts were deleted because the posts were speaking against a particular religion. These two incidents happened in the same day. That triggered a thought process in me.
I always used to think in these lines, but have never expressed it in writing. Though I often talk about it and my wife accuses me of turning my son into a non-believer or atheist!
1. Are there your God and my God and his/her God - means are there many Gods? Can't be, right? If there is God, the God must be just one. So, is it really necessary to fight each other in the name of Gods???
2. If we assume that the human being and all living things are created by God, how could any one take out a life of another living thing or for that matter a fellow human being? Or bode ill against another human being?? Will that not be against God's will???
3. Do you believe the God you believe in is powerful to create the Earth and control the destiny of Earth and everything in it? If yes, then why do you assume that the all powerful God needs your help to propagate his will or his religion on Earth or needs your help to protect his Temples / Mosques / Churches from the other human beings??? Is it not Blasphemy to think that the God is so powerless so as to need your assistance to do something??
4. If God is all powerful and owns the Universe, why would you want to go to a particular Temple / Mosque / Church to pray to him. He is omnipresent. He is in you. Why don't you just pray from wherever you are???
5. In most religions there is a belief that if you do something wrong (sinful) you will be punished or sent to Hell. Then how come that you offer special prayers, or donate something to the Temple / Mosque / Church or do some special poojas or admit your guilt to a priest and that you are free of the guilt? How come you are trying to offer bribes to the Gods through the priests to escape from the repercussions of your wrong doing and go on doing fresh ones? Do you think that Gods can be bought by bribes like you???

Well, I have always been thinking on these lines from when I could remember. May be because my family was not so religious, may be because I started reading from the early ages and it influenced my decisions. Professor A.T Kovoor, a renowned atheist also had some influence on me. In any case I have come to the conclusion that:
a) God is inside one and around one in the nature, one need not go around searching for God
b)God is able to protect himself and does not require our help,
c)It is us human beings who need help to control our greed, our temptations
d) Try not to hurt others for your own benefit, try to be good to others, think positively, treat others as you would expect you to be treated by others, believe in other fellow human beings and try to do whatever you can to help others - you do not need to go to any places of worship, God will smile on you.
And that for me is Religion. It is a private thing, not to be shouted around, not to be forced upon, not to be coerced in to, but it is something you are....
To me all this noise about fighting for the God or religion is just the way some one trying to exploit the masses. I am positive that the God will not give you a golden chair in Heaven just because you killed someone supposedly belittled the God you think you believe in. If you have any sense, you should understand that God is capable of taking care of himself!
We have so many other issues in the world that needs our attention - helping our fellow human beings is much more a Godly act than killing in God's name. Isn't it really a paradox that in many part of the world, the protectors of Gods (in many religions) spent so much money to kill other fellow human beings while so many of our brothers and sisters die of hunger and illness? Just imagine the amount of money spent on arms purchases and manufacturing around the globe. Poverty and illness can be wiped out from the face of Earth if all that money spent on arms and destructive material for one year is spent for removing poverty and illness!
I used to adore Subash Chandra Bose while looking down on Gandhiji. I don't believe Gandhiji was perfect or his methods were perfect or he was flawless. But, his message was right. We do not need arms to achieve any goal. We are the most potent weapon - our brain is the most potent bomb.
So where do I end up? You and I, we need to tell everyone that listens to forget about protecting the Gods, bribing the Gods for small personal favours and become a part of God by doing good.
Sorry, If I bored you, but I am talking to an empty audience!!!! However, I have not finished, not yet. I will return on this subject another day :)