Most Richest Candidate in General Elections

The name of Mr. Deepak Bhardwaj came in news when he filed his nomination on Bahujan Samaj Party ticket from West Delhi. In his affidavit he declared the assets worth Rs.622 crore (the richest candidate fighting general election in 2009 till date). Mr. Bhardwaj has overtaken Mumbai builder Mr. Patadia, Independent candidate from Surendranagar in Gujarat whose assets are worth Rs.513 crore. BSP says since it can not provide funds to candidates to fight elections that's why the rich candidate has been given ticket.

Some other rich candidates are :

Congress’s L Rajagopal from Vijaywada (Rs 299 crore),
BSP’s Karan Singh Tanwar from South Delhi (Rs 150 crore)
SP’s Abu Azmi from Mumbai NW (Rs 122 crore).

In this election many old candidates/sitting MPs, MLA assets have increased many folds and most of the candidates fighting election in this election are crorepati so we can say Parliament is becoming the meeting place of crorepatis/rich peoples, then why all these candidates are saying they will serve the nation and upon victory will work for the betterment of common man, (all this is purely fictitious statement by this political leaders.)

The important point to be noted is what action is being taken to investigate the sources of funds/assets with these candidates. I think tax department is doing nothing as they have to work under these leaders after election.

If you know any of the good leaders who are fighting this election please mention his/her name here.

Level of Journalism!

CNN = Politics
Program: Situation Room by Wolf Blitz
Discussion is on: Obama getting his new dog in the White House.
A supposedly 'dog expert' giving his views on various aspects!
In the back ground, the Obama family strolling in the gardens of White House with the new dog.
Captions being shown: "Obama's 100 days; The most popular dog in the world.

What an issue! CNN claims that it is equal to politics (CNN = Politics). What a topic to discuss in "Situation Room"! They kept discussing and out of disgust I switched off the TV set and starting focusing on the tea and pakoras that my wife had just prepared. This also happens when you have TV channels running for 24 hours! They have to show something, I believe!
This is today April 18, 2009 at 5:50 PM (Central Time).

Whistleblower Protection Act: Bring it in Private Sector also!

A few days back, as I watching the news on a local Chicago channel, the Illinois Governor Patt Quinn ( Governor is an elected official, hence equivalent to Chief Minister of an Indian State) announced that in order to encourage the phenomenon of whistle-blowing, some percentage of the money -if recovered - would be given to the whistle blower also. This I believe will encourage people to come out with more exposures.

The Illinois state has provided a website so that a person can get help how to expose corruption.

What does the term "Whistle blower" mean? The website tells us that: "A whistleblower is someone who exposes wrongdoing, fraud, corruption and/or waste."
The government provides protection to someone who exposes corruption (whistleblower): Whistleblower Protection Act.

Does India have Whistleblower Protection Act (WPA)?

Yes, it was enacted after a lot of public pressure and outcry.
One of the resource on internet says:

" Four years ago (2005?), India was rocked by the murder of Satyendra Dubey, a government engineer who exposed corruption in the national highway building program.

Two years later, Shanmughan Manjunath, a manager at a state-owned oil company, laid bare a scheme to sell impure gasoline. His body was found riddled with bullets in the back seat of his car. Is this what honest person should get in India.

After all, Satyendra Dubey may not have died in vain. His death was neither the first, nor will be the last that vested interests will perpetrate, but Dubey’s death uniquely galvanised nation-wide protest. That he was an alumnus of IIT mattered. IIT-ians across the world demanded action. Now at last, India has taken the first tentative step towards a full-fledged law to protect whistleblowers.

Finally on April 21, the Ministry of Personnel issued a notification granting immunity to all employees of the government except those in armed and intelligence services.

For the moment, the protector of whistleblowers will be the statutory office of the Central Vigilance Commissioner (CVC). A robust law is however, some years away."

What Further?
● In India, WPA is a welcome step. Indian government machinery is thoroughly infected with the virus of corruption. This will help fight the corruption to a certain extent. Make it more popular, and efficient! Make it simple!

● But it should be extended to private sector also so that more of Satyams can be prevented.

To conclude:
I also found a Indian blog dedicated to issues related to Whistle-blowing: http://whistleblowers.wordpress.com/

"If you must sin, sin against God, not against the bureaucracy. God may forgive you, but the bureaucracy never will!"— U.S. Admiral Hyman Rickover

Co-ordination in Security Agencies

After terrorist attack in Mumbai, a lack of co-ordination between different agencies of state government, central government, various security agencies came into the light. A National Investigation Agency is also raised. Senior Bureaucrats & Govt. Ministers said that the co-ordination will be stepped up between all security agencies but as per news published in Times of India in first phase of general election naxalist / Maoists group attack on security forces at various location and many security personnel's killed and now the BSF says that its soldiers died due to lack of intelligence but as per home ministry official BSF (Border Security Force) did not followed the (SOP) Standard Operating Procedures laid down for naxal affected areas while CISF (Central Industrial Security Force) followed and reduced its vulnerability. In a point it is said that security forces did not got the enough time to co-ordinate with previous teams and understand the areas of their deployment. these all comments by individual agencies are showing their spirt towards the coordinated efforts.

I want to ask that is terrorist/naxalists/Maoists organization are better organized and have greater co-ordination between them in comparison to our security forces? If so then the working & operating methods of forces need immediate review and the current scenario is hinting the things in this direction.

All the bureaucracy / ego / red-tapism / selfishness is costing the nation the lives of its brave soldiers.

Model Code of Conduct

Since the announcement of General Lok Sabha Election the model code of conduct has come into effect and many action has been taken against the leaders who are going against the model code of conduct but since last three days the construction of road is going on road from Ankhir Chowk to Badkhal Flyover in Sector-21, which I think purely against the model conduct of conduct. I don't know whether our electronic & print media is aware about it or not and what the officers on election duty is doing.

Don't you think that this activity is purely against the rules.

The problem of Naxalism

Naxalism in many states of India is a very big issues in front of Indian government. Few days back the Nalco's bauxite mine (The biggest bauxite mine in Asia) in Orissa is attack by Naxalites and they killed eight CISF peoples. Naxal organisations calls for boycott of elections, they sometimes threat public transport system such as Indian Railway. Some of the main question related to Naxalism is as under :-

- What is the aim of naxalism

- Why they are growing

- What are their sources of funds to operate & running their activities

- Who are members of think tank of these naxal organisations

- Who is supplying arms to them

- Are they getting any political support

- How to stop them

I think government must try to engage more and more youth from naxal hits area in to security forces, give employment to them in public & private sector. The speed of development works needs to be accelerated at a very high pace and mid-day meal programme, primary education, Rural Employment schemes must be started on large scales in the tribal areas of naxal affects states. In Parallel Government should start crack down on top leadership of naxal organisation and their financial resources must be tracked and captured. It must be noted that during the anti naxal operation of security forces there must not be any political interference.

Actually government should take hard action against the problem of naxalism otherwise in coming future the nation may face the problem of naxalism as a problem of Jammu & Kashmir, North-East states. Government must learn from the action of Sri-Lankan government who almost finished the LTTE from their country. LTTE is known as one of the biggest and powerful terrorist group of world. I will say that nation only needs political will to finish the problem of naxalism.

Reservation Policy

Reservation is a big issue in India. What is the basic objective of reservation, why necessity of reservation arises. I am strongly against current reservation policy. Generally many peoples who are talented do not get proper opportunity to go ahead and someone with less talent goes ahead. Reservation must be given only to those peoples who do not have proper infrastructure & financial incapable to use their talent for betterment of society. Some big officers who are from reservation quota are are able to arrange good facilities for their wards but still they get reservation which is really injustice to the talented and needy peoples.

Reservation must be given to poor and talented peoples, It should not be on the basis of caste & religion. Caste and religion divides the society which leads to tension between different communities and we know about the communal riots in India in last 2-3 decades.

To fight against the reservation Medical students stand and started their protest but no political party came in support of them and neither any NGO, individuals, students from other streams came to support them.

The main point is absence of political support to these protesting students which clearly present the aims & objective of political parties. All political leaders and parties are just fighting to gain power, acquire money for themselves. They don't think about society and nation as claimed by them and they draw their manifesto to gain more and more votes.

I think current reservation policy must be stopped immediately and a national reservation policy must be drawn on the observation given by representatives from every section of society. I think we must invite some international experts for the same who do not belongs to India.