"We are shaped by
our thoughts; we become what we think."
—Buddha (Indian, 563-483BC)
Word
for the day
Zugzwang (n)
A situation in chess where a player is limited to moves that cost pieces
or have a damaging positional effect.
Malice
towards none
Reema Lagoo:
Millions of Indians secretly wanted a mother like her.
Will be missed for
long.
First random
thought this morning
The super success of Bahubali: the Conclusion may not be
as good a news for Indian cinema industry, as it may sound at first instance.
One, a majority of movie watchers may have defined budget
for entertainment. Spending more on Bahubali may mean cutting expense on other
movie (s). Consequently, we might see many otherwise good movies may not doing
that well on Box Office. So in net effect, we may be at par at the end of the
day.
Secondly, It may trigger a race for making very high
budget movies, many of which may actually not do as good, inflicting huge
losses to the industry.
The positive is that we may certainly see some really
world class movies being made in India.
Means are equally important
Economic growth which is not
sustainable and equitable has little meaning, in my view. Such growth, whatever
statistic shows, brings only misery and dissipation.
A harmonious and peaceful society enjoying a decent lifestyle
should be the ultimate goal of economic growth and development. Otherwise, it
has little meaning, regardless of the statistical achievements.
Swami Jagadatmananda in his famous work “Learn to Live”
extolled the readers - the sincerity and honesty of the means to achieve a goal
is equally important as the goal itself.
Mahatama Gandhi succinctly explained — “Independence begins at the
bottom. A society must be built in which every village has to be self sustained
and capable of managing its own affairs. It will be trained and prepared to
perish in the attempt to defend itself against any onslaught from without. This
does not exclude dependence on and willing help from neighbours or from the
world. It will be a free and voluntary play of mutual forces. In this structure
composed of innumerable villages, there will be ever widening, never ascending
circles.
Growth will not be a pyramid with the apex sustained by the
bottom. But it will be an oceanic circle whose center will be the individual.
Therefore the outermost circumference will not wield power to crush the inner
circle but will give strength to all within and derive its own strength from
it.”
More popularly, in blockbuster Hindi movie DDLJ the hero Shahrukh
Khan articulated this thought in a conversation with the mother of his beloved.
When for the fear of her husband’s retribution, the mother advises the two
lovers to elope – the hero tells her that the path suggested by her appears
easy but it would lead to nowhere. He would rather prefer the path of courage,
honesty and integrity which though arduous definitely leads to the desired
goal.
Many may want to argue that it sounds utterly utopian in the
current context. Some may yield that it is desirable but argue that we have
traveled too far down the road we took post independence from British rule; and
it is too late to go back and begin again.
In my view, this defeatist and fatigued attitude is unwarranted.
What we need is a zero base discussion on the subject and solutions will emerge
that would lead us to the desired goal of making 1.3bn people free, fearless
and happy. An incremental approach howsoever sincere might not yield the
desired results.
Even statistically, to propel the economic growth to much higher
orbits, we need a socio-political organization for the country that is free,
fearless and fair.
Social sector reforms, in my view, should be given top most
priority in the economic growth and development agenda, rather than making it
an aftereffect of the economic development.
Read with the following
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