8 hours of work ?

Last week when I started my shift in the evening I thought of meeting this developer who was handling my client. I walked into the floor and asked for him. Let us keep his name as Michael Jackson. I didn't see him in his desk and I asked the other guy (Let’s name him Obama) in the next bay. Obama said “Michael Jackson will leave sharp by 7:30 PM!”. I couldn't transcribe the way in which Obama replied, it had lots of hidden meaning in it. The hidden message was “Michael Jackson won’t extend his shift and he won’t work for long hours”.

Most of us think that people who stay and work late are good workers\employees. And, people who leave on time, in spite of finishing their work are average\below average. The problem is not with the Michael Jackson kind of people, but with Obama’s. Some Obama’s are proud to say their long working hours.

There is this letter from N. R. Narayana Murthy which surfaces every now and then in the social media. He asks his employees to leave office on time. Every word in the letter is true. Most of us don’t have a hobby of our own. All we do is write some codes, crunch some numbers, talk to the people whom we will never meet in life and strive to meet our targets. On weekends, either jump into the pit of boozes or sleep like a lazy cat.

As usual, May Day passed quietly this month. When companies\corporates can celebrate Christmas, Deepavali, Holi and Ayuda Poojai…why can’t we celebrate May Day!! I'm not a big fan of these days, but it’s a shame that we didn't even exchange greetings or acknowledgement on May Day.

I don’t want to take history lesson here, google it for yourselves of what is a May Day.

8 Hours of work is still a dream.

**Above image by the blogger

Files in the drawer !!

The recent ruling by the Supreme Court of India on commuting the death sentence of Murugan, Santhan and Perarivalan has created a wide array of arguments. This article is not to discuss about the nuances of the law, emotional reactions, social implications or political loss\gains. I would like to point out something which is a kiddish argument in this episode, which portrays the lackluster scene of a government office/officer.

FYI, the timeline on Rajiv Gandhi Assassination case-

May 21, 1991- Rajiv Gandhi assassinated.

May 20, 1992- CBI files chargesheet in the Special Court on 26 persons (This includes Nalini, Murugan, Santhan & Perarivalan).

Jan 28, 1998- The Special Court awards death sentence to all 26 persons.

May 11, 1999- Supreme Court reduced death to life sentence for 19, while sentencing Nalini, Murugan, Santhan & Perarivalan.

Oct 17, 1999- The four death row convicts send mercy petitions to the then Tamil Nadu Governor Fathima Beevi.

Oct 27, 1999- TN Governor rejects the mercy petitions without obtaining TN state cabinet’s views.

Nov 25, 1999- Madras High Court defeats TN Governor's rejection of mercy petitions. It directs the Governor to pass a fresh order after obtaining the state Cabinet's views.

Apr 19, 2000- State Cabinet chaired by then Chief Minister M Karunanidhi decides to recommend commuting the death sentence of Nalini alone.

Apr 21, 2000- TN Governor accepts Cabinet decision to commute death sentence of Nalini.

____________________________________________

Apr 28, 2000- TN State government forwards mercy petitions of Santhan, Murugan and Perarivalan to the then President KR Narayanan via Union Home Ministry (BJP led NDA).

Jun 21, 2005- Union Home Ministry (Congress led UPA) submits the mercy petitions to the then President Abdul Kalam  for consideration.

Aug 12, 2011- Union Home Ministry communicates to state Government about President's (Prathibha Patel) decision to reject mercy petitions.

____________________________________________

Aug 26, 2011- Execution of three convicts fixed for September 9, 2011.

Aug 30, 2011- Tamil Nadu Assembly (AIADMK govt.) adopts resolution urging the President to commute the death sentence of the three.

Aug 30, 2011- Madras High Court stays execution of Santhan, Murugan and Perarivalan on their plea. Petitions transferred to Supreme Court later.

May 1, 2012- Supreme Court says it would hear the petitions of three convicts.

Feb 18, 2014- Supreme Court commutes the death sentence on grounds of delay in disposing their mercy pleas. The court also says the appropriate government may consider releasing the convicts under their constitutional powers.

Feb 19, 2014- TN State Cabinet decides to release Santhan, Murugan, Perarivalan, Nalini, Robert Pious, Jayakumar and Ravichandran. It then sends its decision to Centre. 

If you look at the above timeline, there is a delay in 10 Years & 9 Months - 5 Years 1 Month with the Home Ministry and 5 Years 8 Months with President. Being a highest constitutional authority, the delay by President cannot be questioned. But when we look into reason why the Home Ministry sat on it for such a long time (5 Year and 1 Month) is laughable. This shows the sorry state of our bureaucracy.

The Reason-

…..shortly after the receipt of the mercy petitions in 2000, a note was prepared but thereafter the file was lying in the drawer of some officer of the Ministry of Home Affairs, and, hence, could not be processed.

You can find the above reason mentioned in the Feb 18, 2014 Supreme Court judgment. 

Check the page 9 in this link http://judis.nic.in/supremecourt/imgs1.aspx?filename=41228

Image sourced from - Ministry of External Affairs - www.mea.gov.in

Man Vs Mosquitoes

WARNING: Not for week, oops weak hearts

Man Vs Mosquitoes is a new world war, at least in Chennai. Everywhere (Places wherever I go) I see these sullans. 

The other day there this huge war went against these mosquitoes, even though we killed most of it, they had a last laugh by their count. The ratio got increased with the killings, man:: mosquitoes- 1::20, kill 5 mosquitoes, the ratio became 1::25, then 1::30. 

It was like kill 5, their backup will send 10, and so the mosquito battalion got increased!!

Eventually man has to retreat, but before doing that he has to document the war for historical purposes, he called it as Massacre of Mosquitoes, here is the video evidence of the massacre.

Make sure your speakers are turned on to see this video.

Even though the graphic elements are blurred, The MPAA rating for the video is PG. 

157 countries banned this video.

 

If you are a film buff, identify the two background music in this video.

Rajapaksa - Welcome to India

From- Anandha Vikatan

An image is worth of 1000 words, this week Anandha Vikatan carried a cartoon ( By - Hasib Khan ) of Rajapaksa walking into India with blood-stained shoes. As Justice Kutja wrote about Modi in his blog (All The Perfumes of Arabia), Mr. Rajapaksha cannot wash his blood-stained hands in any temples in India. Today, there was disturbing pictures of the Prabhakaran’ son killed in a point blank range, which was published by Channel 4 UK.

There is a strong protest in Tamil Nadu (only Tamil Nadu) against Sri Lanka for human rights allegations and war crimes. These evidences should come from Tamil Nadu and not UK. When the war was closing in SL, international media was barred from North SL, but by the media strength that we have in Tamil Nadu, why did one… just one journalist was there secretly at that time to collect the evidences.

I have a question “who and what makes a Tamilan ?”, I have to think hard.

வேலை இல்லாதவன் பூனை மையிர செரசான்னா

There are lots of problems and issues to be taken care by the govt, they should concentrate on these issues rather is going gaga over a movie.

Vathachi Judgement

All the convicts were Tamil Nadu Governement Officials, serving the country in the name of law

I am ashamed to write this, that even in this time there are atrocities done on the basis of caste. More worried when it happens in my native. One such caste based atrocity happened a long time back in 1992, in a villiage called Vathachi, near Dharmapuri. This was the peak period of Sandalwood smuggler Veerappan, Jayalalitha has set foot in the assembly, Rajiv Gandhi was just cremated in Delhi, at this time a group of hooligans (it was TN govt. officials) from various departments like Forest, Revenue and Police entered the village in search of smuggled Sandalwood. What they found was the way to lose their sanity, they lost their minds. In this process they just demolished the village, killed the villagers livelihood, raped and tortured women.

With more than 200 officials entering into the village, they repeatedly raped 18 women. In a landmark identification parade, with 1000’s of officers, this was done by a batch of 50’s, those 18 women waved their right to anonymity to identify the culprits (read as you wish like ugly old dogs, fu___kers.) Ananda Vikatan, a leading Tamil Media say that the torture done to those women are “NOT PRINTABLE”.

Victims of Vathachi after the judgement

The judgement came on September last month, convicting 269 people, of which 54 has died ( If there was a hell, I wish they had a good time there) and this is a record that all the convicts were government officials. SHAME.

Dailt colony fenced by the upper caste people in Krishnagiri

In the wake of Periyar and the Dravidian parties, I always thought the Tamilians has shed their caste-based segregation. They have shed it only in their names; we seldom see a surname Goundar, Naicker, Ayer, Ayyangar, Devar etc., but deep inside most of them are growing and rooting for their caste. Worst is those Dravidian parties, headed by stalwarts of atheistic beliefs are nurturing the caste-based politics in breaking the harmony among the people.

We still have separate tea-glass for dalits in some places, they can’t enter the upper caste streets, and sometimes the upper caste people fence the street and block the access to dalit’s area.

 

I HATE CASTE, in whatever form it may be in.

Further reading, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-15106778

Pics taken from The Hindu.

Irom Sharmila

Last week we saw nationwide agitation in support to Anna Hazare, we even had both parliament houses debating for this movement, which ended the 11-day fast by Anna. Meantime there is a small piece of news keep emerging about a lady, in fact she is called as an Iron Lady, Irom Sharmila from Manipur fasting for past 11 year, and yes you read it correctly its YEARS. The government has put her in to tube feeding, using Nasogastric intubation.

Many are trying to draw parallel between Irom and Anna. Both are social activist, but fighting for a different cause, even though both are in India, the environment they live is different. Irom from the North East State of Manipur, is fighting for cause which is threating the daily existence of the people. Anna is much broader sense, covering a wide area of corruption. Irom is for the basic need of a human, survival, which is much more important than corruption. End of the day if one doesn’t live, it’s “The END”.

On November 2000, ten civilians were shot dead by the Armed forces, those people were innocent civilians standing in the bus stop. Since then Irom Sharmila started the fasting, her primary demand is to repeal Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), in short this act gives absolute power to Armed Forces. Then she was jailed as “attempt to suicide” and started to force feed.

She can’t travel freely across India. So she can’t garner any national momentum. In fact she tried to go to Jantar Mantar in 2006 and was arrested.

The entire North East (AP, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura) with J&K comes under AFSPA. Red Cross has mentioned there are severe human rights violations in these areas. Check the wikeleaks cables.

The people in these areas were so much humiliated that a group of women went naked before the Armed Rifles base in protesting the atrocities.

As usual a committee was formed under the chairmanship of Jeevan Reedy, a retd. Supreme Court judge, and as usual the recommendations by the committee is still kept dark. I can’t understand why government is trying to use excess of force, when they need to lend olive branches to win the people heart. They are trying to seed fear, which in turn will grow as anger. It’s also an irony that our PM hailing from the same region hasn’t done enough. Remember these states are sharing its borders to China. Why let these people down, when the dragon is next door.

Do you know, petrol a litre costs Rs 180, cooking gas Rs. 1500 and a KG of Rice Rs. 60, where? Read this.. http://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Chennai/article2339087.ece

More Links,

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0719-03.htm

http://iromsharmilachanu.wordpress.com/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armed_Forces_(Special_Powers)_Act,_1958