Notepad Doodle

Artistic people doodle. Indolent people like me, type on notepads!

I have a tendency to watch two to three movies in a single day. Not because they fulfill 'some void' but because it is hard to let go of the inertia once you have been sitting on your ass for three hours and picturing a virtual world. But by the time I reach the third movie, I tend to get restless. This was my attempt at developing my endurance.

I open a small, minuscule window of notepad on the corner of the video, and start typing the dialogues in it. This is I suppose one such day, when I watched Hugo, The boy in the stripped pyajamas, and some F.R.I.E.N.D.S episodes continuously. Normally I don't save the texts, but this, I did :D.

was one big machine i couldnt be an extra part i have to be here for some reason and that means you have to be here for some reason too. get back i'll bring tabard tomorrow night at 7 are you sure about it not really but i think its the only way to fix him thank you so much if he is who has been winding the clocks if he us deceased then who has been winding the clocks this was sir come in come in isabelle please dont the be mad mama we found out who papa george is i will immediately he hasnt  please let me express to you the profound debt of honour i am so pleased you remember my husbands films with such fondness but he is so fragile i was another person would you like to meet her again that's not possible they are gone one of george's films but we did have fun madame melies we painted it by hand frame by frame  mama its you ues beautifule she stull is is that it is very hard to make this world a better place i can still  well they are different ralph you promise how was i to know he could see from our window there was one of them in our kitchen fed upp you say the same playing with who rachel how sitting around being miserable wont make things any happier one thing is for sure sitting around being miserable wont make things any explorings like what come back in now and we'll think of somethings i even miss school i've arranegd a tutor so we're not going to school school's coming here on an old bicycle i gather genocide it's a bird without a infatuation good morning well you can ask an old one spare tyre he's vey you're only 12 a swing that does sound exciting here now move take this boy there's some tyres in there well little man what are you waiting for some tyres in there bruno why fdo you wear pyajamas outhouse swing are you hurt sir where's my mum she's out when's she back but i ight bleed to death no you won't it's only a small cut it's not that bad there all better what's your name pavel now you'ce got to i think she's going to see for herself it isn't you're not a doctor now you peel potatoes i practised you couldn't have been much good then how do you know that farm nice is it nice what i fell pavel here he carried me in and put a bandage on it go to your room thank you but pavel said that i its not fair i'm not swapping i think more recent i read bruno have you been reading newspapers adventure books  mainly this is why i am here to help time to start learning about facts time to learn about the real things and this should be good start. yay die die explore die die what kind of a farm is that it is a farm is it not why are you wearing pyajamas hello how old are you i am exploring what are you doing we're building a new hut but we fight a lot i can be on my own shmuel that's your name no one's called shmuel i live in the house back there have you got any food on you are you hungry how old are you eight me too its not here me it's just my number then what happens it was nice to meet you bruno its not fair me being stuck here football it will be in one of your cupboards my dear cellar for your football have you looked in the cellar can i have a chocolate a piece yes damn mum rachel i've seen all your dolls it's not right to play with silly toys while people are risking there lives for the fatherland. my people's destiny is my destiny it's my pleasure the termination of the lecture is for the tutor to decide not the pupil i'm going to the town for an hour do you want to come can i ask you something they took all our clothes away i do quite but not the sort that takes people's clothes away he's a watchmaker it's like pavel he used to be a doctor but gave all up to peel potatoes i saw the chimneys my ma says its old i can't can i because of this are you not allowed out why what have you done i'm a jew i think i should go now will you be here tomorrow i'll try little present sweetheart thank you mummy have you seen bruno outside on the swing i think yes thursday is perfect did you smell that horrible smell from the chimneys father she is ill yes i can hear yes we look forward to it is grandma did you smell it dad that horrid smell look what gretel hey thats not fair ralf this tutor you well do we know what he's teaching them gretel's become all sorts the jew corrupt everywhere his influence was corruptive the jew if it were there is such thing as a nice jew is there i think the aim of the jew is to be the ruler of the humanity thousands of germans would be no it's none sachel i'm going out to the swing to to read i told a lie i've just got adventure books go on off you go then now maria there's two extra for supper tonight commodore's father is coming too here what's the matter don't throw it back it's dangerous do you not like playing just not we just all have numbers shmuel ell me how the number game works bruno what are you doing my ball went over i was just getting it back they smell the worlst when they burn don't they but surely you would understand elsa i was sworn to secrecy i took an oath upon my life you believe in this too you want this country that isn't war the fatherland we all desire you included cannot be achieved grandpa's here we'll be there in a moment who told you about this how's grandma she's under weather i hthink perhaps next time when she's she has been talking about this visit for weeks but he won't read any adventure books the work your father is doing here is history in the making well he was a professor of literature at the university he left the country some time ago about four years ago where did he go you father the professor of literature i believe it was just when we were were he tubucular i'm afraid i really don't know you would have to ask him unless of course he had disagreements presumely if that was the case you cretin jew ralf what did you expect him to do the jew deserved it you dont still think it's a farm do you about the farm it's a camp for the they're evil they're the enemy Herr listz has been telling us Dad's not incharge He's making the country great again. evil enemy vermin they're not really people at all. What are you doing here they wanted some tiny fingers to clean all these we're not supposed to be friends we're supposed to be enemies you want some what's your dad like you've never thought he wasn't and you're are you eating have you been stealing food he gave it to me no sir what little man do you know this jew i've never seen him before in my life come away he was helping himself do you know this jew genocide when we come back we will have a little chat about rats who steal you are now organised sport is not the only thing on offer occasional music other recreations include almost all activities a worker can wish for  is available inside the camp goodbye little man i dont understand and it looked so nice i saw i dont know why i did it been coming here for days but you weren't here i'm really sorry for what i did we are still friends aren't we where's kurt thse days i've not seen him which was his duty towards his mother when will pavel be back never stupid it's father they've been bombed grandma's dead kotler neither do i i dont want you to go away again you can't behave like this i can't if i cannot control my own family even your own mother couldn't love you are you happy here yes very and you gretel i do miss home you must miss those friends of yours not anymore really i suppose the real question somewhere safe all of us i must stay and complete my work here she just feels right now you need to be somewhere else this is not the appropriate place to be spending you childhoodit is time for you to move awayis everything alright he went on a different workduty with some of the men and he hasn't come back mum says this is no place for children yes wou will you i wish i could help find your dad look i could come over to your side if you just thousands of them i want to help find your dad dont forget the pyajamas your dad's not here bruno it's my last chance go on then bruno it wsn't easy to get away did you forget the sandwich would i let you down here how do i look right lets get going bruno thats enough lets go and find your dad come on master bruno can we go to the cafe maybe i should go home what about papa yeah we'll check our hut first come on papa we go on marches sometimes bruno he must have been outside somewhere ma'am move quickly get up you must which means our weekly capabilities would be almost tripled wait here come on move move join the queue come on you bruno's missing go on bruno bruno we're just waiting in here untill the rain stops no it's just a shower herr kommandent open the gates move move good morning father how is she a bit of a bloddy nose first william london and now come in please sit have a seat would you care for a cup is there sugar yes yes somewhere here i put in the thank you father we all love the what would be the point of a secular song which boy frosty the snowman has people would realise a lot like christmas donald miller the boy acted strangely when he returned from class how did he act strangely he laid his head on the desk and or this is what you wanna discuss the boy's well being is my responsibility did he say something i had a talk with the boy he is twelve years old this is not about my tone and you're controlling the expression tell me what happened in the rectory forcing her to marry bobby is gonna make that happen and bobby is going to be there the whole time how much easier you have made this for her you are my favourite guy in the  whole world and i want him to have his uncle

PS: You've got WAY free time if you managed to read this entire jargon! Get a life!!

The Great Indian Development Story

With the FDI in retail soon coming up, the allocation of coal blocks, even if stinking of misconducts and scams, already done, and the automobile industry booming, India seems set on its path to revamp its economy with plenty of reforms on its plate. But with these reforms, we almost forget the tacit compromises we make with the environment. The GDP we so desperately map today, measures productivity and inventories, but not resources.

India still relies on thermal power plants to satisfy a major portion of its power requirements. With the subsidies and externalities associated with the production of this energy, and the bureaucratic and maintenance hurdles associated with its solar equivalent, it seems coal shall remain the prime exploitable resource for the many decades. The coal reserves in India as per the latest Geological Survey of India are around 286 Billion Tonnes, of which 44 billion tonnes were allocated just in the period from 2004 to 2009 (not counting the de-allocations of coal blocks worth 6 Billion Tonnes before March 2011). With the data of pollution from these plants accrued with us, I do not even need to strain about the rapid coal resource depletion to exemplify the blotted inheritance we are leaving our future generations.

The Great Indian Growth Story runs concomitant to this depletion. As rightly put by economists, adherence to an environmentally sound policy might not augur well for our nation. Forget leaving the power generation to desuetude, with the way economy today is defined, even the prospect of de-allocation of these coal blocks has led to a decrease in the equity prices of these companies, and affected thousands of shareholders. Moreover, with the elevating energy requirements close on heels with the industrial growth, it becomes necessary to exploit the present resources to sustain the livelihood of the bottom billion, to reduce unemployment and to crawl towards the final goal of total poverty alleviation. Whether the path we tread on is apposite or the goal is achievable is a different question. Growth and resource exploitation seems central to any idea of poverty alleviation today.

The conflict thus in framing any climate policy, and the debates on the actions to be taken to mitigate the climate change risk, is how to pledge towards saving environment while uplifting those whose lives depend on the degradation of these resources. While many environmentalists advocate the radical changes in the functioning of the economy, and a primary focus on the resource utilization capabilities of the future generations, the question of whether it would be justifiable to the present one always arises. As Paul Krugman puts it, the market today does a balancing act. One can't develop without destroying the other.

Alas, even though this seems important, the main problem today is not development vs environment. It is skewed development vs poverty vs environment. Ramchandra Guha describes this with an ecological framework. There are three kinds of people today. The omnivores, who are the rich and the exploiters, the ecosystem people, who are the ones dependant on the local ecosystem to sustain themselves, and the ecological refugees, who are already facing the blunt of the escalated and assimilated destruction and have been displaced from their surroundings. The ecosystem people and the ecological refugees are the ones who suffer when the fisheries are over exploited, the wheat or potato is over produced, or the hurricanes and cyclones strike the coastal lands. But these still depend on the model of trickle down economy to live their life of hardship. If the present practices are continued, the future generations will suffer even more. We are facing a choice between the 2-3 billion people arriving on earth in the next 50 years, who would also contribute towards emissions while being victims of our affluence, and the poorest of poor today, who are already bearing most of the damage that the omnivores have done. One of these two has to be castigated for the other. This is the sad part. Most of us live in the illusion that a poverty alleviation program today could work while we focus on climate risk mitigation. That cannot be so. The number of poor, even though the resource exploitation and development is at full swing, has not reduced for the past five decades. While this remains a debacle of dysfunctional policies and corruption in place, even if the said resources were to be used to abate poverty, it would leave our country bare by the time we are successful.

Chandran Nair, in his book 'Consumptionomics', says the situation today is primarily the result of the rampant and leisure-born consumption mania present in India. It is the dream of the developing world, led by India and China, to match the level of affluence of its US counterparts. While the earlier imperialist economies crouched on the resources of their captured nations, the developing nations today have started to follow their footsteps. The only difference in this exploitation is that with nowhere else to go, these countries are looking inwards and destroying themselves for greed. With the omnivores in Guha's model gaining the power to frame policies; their affluence is being paid by the health, climate risk, resources and lives of the ecosystem people. This model is explained even more clearly in the "Story of Stuff", a small animation of the consumerist society developed by Anne Leonard. The resources of the locality get trashed, and the locals with no other options have to be subservient to the demands of the rich. While their resources are exploited, they suffer the burden of the externalities of what they produce, sideling their own growth. The system in place today, even though being advocated as one of development, does not help in correcting this warped distribution of growth. This argument is bolstered by the crisis being faced by the fisherman of Chilika Lake in Odisha, and documented in the movie "Chilika Bank$" by Akanksha Joshi. Chilika is a brackish water lagoon, which means it has a unique mix of salt (marine) and fresh water suitable for prawn development. The salt water comes from the opening Chilika Lake has to the Bay of Bengal. The lake which boasts of being the second largest lagoon in the world had a plethora of Prawns which sustained the fishermen in the area. But with the identification of this rich resource, and the subsequent globalisation of the economy, the lake began to be over-fished. The tourism also developed, and with this started the 'development' of the region. The forest cover was substantially affected. The sand eroded, and silt starting flowing and got deposited on the shore of the Chilika. Its mouth to the Bay of Bengal was choked. A new man-made mouth was created, which imbalanced the salinity required for Prawn development. The fisheries of Chilika have exhausted today, and artificial cultures developed by encroaching the lake are the major source of prawns. The irony in this development story is, even though the fisheries were exploited, the fishermen didn't get the benefit of it. They are still poor, and their livelihood today is pitched against the future of Chilika and the millions she will sustain.

We have reached an impasse today over where to go from here. There are two sets of victims, the present poor and the future children, with our affluence and greed being the main culprit. With the resources of the earth limited, this present growth paradigm will itself be challenged once the resources are exhausted. On one hand we have the ephemeral resources, and on the other the proliferating population. The exploding population has put a tremendous stress on the resources. The carrying capacity of the planet is far past. Moreover, whatever development trickles down to the poor, is always engulfed by the growing families to support. It is an inverse relation between how  much we exploit and how many we have to support. This rapidly growing population is what prompted China to follow its 'one child policy'. One may question the morality of the step, but with the omnivores of Guha still bent on increasing the affluence, it seems far suited to reduce both the future perpetrators and victims than to question values or principles. The only way we can hope to sustain the environment, and still uplift the masses is to control both our population and the affluence. Unless such an attempt is made, any development even if democratic and reaching the poor will remain inconsequential.

We do have to choose between the present and the future, but we can try to mitigate the damage that has been done and can be done.

The fourth pillar, or a potential weapon?

Reading newspapers is a habit I acquired early, and not because of some interest in national issues, but because of the stories. It was precisely the same reason that I liked history books too. Stories of people succeeding, people innovating, people motivating, erudite historians explaining war strategies, esoteric economists explaining market movements. Up down. Up down. Comes the pedantic orator, who decides to enlighten everyone with his views on these issues. But all of it made it worthwhile.

Slowly, the trend defining the print media changed. I liked the editorial sections, because they focused on opinions. Much like the pedantic orator. But rest all changed. The success stories of people transmuted to protests. Motivations converted to sedition. People raged, rioted, looted, raped, getting killed! The newspapers weren't worth reading anymore. I started to predict what the highlights would be. More graft, more scams, more protests. But what seemed even more fascinating was how the mood of different newspapers changed periodically over time. Once a praising session begins, it continues, and suddenly it is revealed that the government isn't doing such a good job after all, and the collateral criticism starts. In the recent past, a myriad of under table deals have suddenly surfaced. This sheer volume coming out in such a short time is astonishing, and when the media too starts lambasting the government instead of being impartial and putting both perspectives forward, it is hard to not be skeptical about the reliability of newspapers today. Even to the extent that would exonerate the government from various blotches on its image. In a movie of Hitchcock, he shows a similar fate cornering James Stewart, when public opinion accrues to charge him with graft, even though he is the one unveiling it. Just imagine, such a powerful force somehow pressured to follow a directive. And it is not hard to do so. In most of the country, with pronuclear arguments coming from people like President APJ Kalam, or the hard earned Nuclear treaties signed with USA, people are voicing in favour of the Kundankulam Nuclear Plant. Voices supporting the protesters are difficult to be heard. Or with the Jal Satyagrah just finished in Khandwa, the Madhya Pradesh government came out in good light even when it was culpable for the problems plaguing the people there. With the Congress bashing going on at present, there was no space in which to fit the plight of the Khandwa villagers, so the news remained elusive for 20 days. And it came out with the promise of Chief Minister proclaiming "Government flexibility for suiting people's wishes".

The tendency of a business to shift its products towards the consumer base is evident when newspapers skew articles to fit public opinion. When the public opinion is pro-government, the shortcomings of the rulers get carefully draped. This happened a while ago too. Indian government was lauded for the Copenhagen Summit. The newspapers praised the diplomacy of Jairam Ramesh, showed how the decisions benefitted India and made its liability for environment minimal. Then came the Wikileaks, and blew the lid of the act! The US supposedly scripted the whole event, sending secret wires to national representatives, pressuring, forcing them, and finally passed its own model. And as it came out, all the news reports became a sham, inconspicuously lured in creating a false public opinion without knowing the truth. And this is just the tale of one country, on government. There is an ensemble of governemt and non-government actors waiting to stage their acts. And the sad part is the truth remains elusive to most till a breach inside reveals it. The mood at present is anti-government, and with even the foreign elements now blaming the government for its indecisive and deriding policies, the sudden comprehensive surge in the anti-government sentiments overhauling the newspapers seems perfunctory. It is hard to believe that the forces are not at work again, that it is entirely true, and many crucial elements aren't hidden while the articles are construed to suit the public opinion.

Truthfully, since the WikiLeaks came out with their horde of documents, it has become hard to believe that a secret government, or anti-government channel is not functional to try and feed us the news it wants. And unlike Hitchcock's hypothesis of a single person controlling the entire faction of media, it is the secret information flows between the controlling group, which I think exists and we don't know about, that trouble me. Much like the wind currents in higher altitudes which mysteriously bring rain.

If I ever wanted to join politics, it was only to get a look at these secret information flows.

And be a part of it.

'Don't turn the Page'

An open letter published today in the Hindustan Times for the perusal of the Indian bureaucratic and political class. Adds to the numerous issues plaguing the country, which I know about but have incongruously ignored.


Dear Prime Minister, Chief Minister of Maharashtra & fellow countrymen,

Read this, don’t turn the page. I am a cotton widow from Vidarbha – yes, I know you’ve been hearing about farmer suicides in this region for years, but I really do need urgent help. Just yesterday, four farmers committed suicide while Ajit Pawar, the deputy chief minister was here for a janata darbar. We need you to pay attention. I live in village Huira, near Panderkawda, 150 kms from Nagpur. My husband and I were eking out a living, somehow managing two meals a day. I could only feed my son and two daughters dal and rice every day, adding a vegetable to the meal as a bonus, may be once a week, but we were happy with that. I’d say we were even content.

We are poor; a BPL family in government records but we had a pucca roof over our heads.  My husband, Chattar Singh Bass, owned four acres of land. He was happy selling the eight to ten quintals of cotton that he grew. But slowly, the costs started escalating. Seeds which were available for Rs. 300 per 500 grams shot up to Rs. 1000. The cost of fertilizers and pesticides also increased and the cultivation costs were higher than the returns. A bank loan was the only option.

One day in 2007, my neighbours barged into my house and told me that Chattar Bass was lying listless in the field. He had gone there, like he did every day, but the pest attack had killed our crop. My husband’s loans had spiralled to 70,000 in a two year period and the dal and rice that we had become so accustomed to – minus the weekly vegetable – appeared an impossibility. Dying had become easier than living.

I had told my husband, we could survive on roti and salt; I’d comforted him by telling him I’d work as a farm labour and bring in Rs. 100 a day but he had become a loan defaulter and the moneylenders squatted at our door. Consuming the pesticide was his way out of the drudgery.

Nothing new, you must be thinking, but put yourself in my shoes, or in those of most households in Yavatmal, Amravati or Wardha. I was perhaps lucky to get the compensation of Rone lakh from the government. After clearing the debt of Rs. 70,000, I was left with only Rs. 30,000, not enough to buy seeds, fertilizers and pesticides and pay the moneylender. Not enough to get back to eating dal and rice. I had to revisit a moneylender and now my son Ganesh is in debt. The pesticide bottle often tempts me, but Ganesh is only 18.

Mr Prime Minister Sir, you had visited us in 2006 and announced a package of Rs. 3750 crore.

Two years later, you had generously offered Rs. 71,860 crore worth of loan waivers for farmers across the country, but the suicides have not stopped. I hope your officials have reported the truth to you: large sums of money have been siphoned off.

Sir, I hope you know that the waiver was meant only for farmers who had taken bank loans but 75% borrow from money lenders. Relief packages were also restricted to farmers who own not more than four hectares but so many of us don’t have farms in our own names. Lata Rathod, who, as widowed this year on August 25. Her husband Hitesh Rathod killed himself but she won’t even get Rs. 1 lakh in compensation because the land is in his brother’s name. Hitesh has left behind a sorry legacy for Lata – debt worth Rs. 96,000. Where is she going to get any money from? Her family now says she might have to become a commercial sex worker.

So many crores have been spent but the number of suicides are only spiraling. More than cotton, we are harvesting death. I also need to let you know that the administration sometimes say that the death are due to excessive alcohol or domestic tiffs but can you afford to make us part of a statistical game. Does it not bother you’ll that our shrouds are woven from the same cotton that we grow; that we are the aam aadmi your government likes to showcase. Hitesh Rathod did not drink himself to death, but which official will believe that? They have developed immunity to a story that is more than a decade old.

Sir, do you know that 2012 has aggravated the crisis? We sowed cotton in May and June but the crop died due to lack of rain. We borrowed money to buy more seeds and the unseasonal rain has killed the second crop. This double blow has led to a spate of suicides. Vidarbha has already recorded 530 deaths.

Sirs, can I plead with you to repackage our future? Make water conservation a mass movement. Do not earmark more money for irrigation projects, for despite the crores you might spend, irrigation will not benefit a majority of us. Please give us a decent minimum support price. Increase it from the current R3900 per quintal. Just before the election in 2009, the loan waivers were announced. If you are planning another one, do remember that most of us are bank defaulters. Lastly, we are willing to diversify but don’t have the means. Help us raise greenhouses. We can grow flowers and send them to the cities. Sir, if nothing else, they will make your houses look prettier.

On behalf of the dead and the living,

Yours till I can hold on,
Baby Bassi
Resident of Yavatmal
Maharashtra, India

http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-news/Maharashtra/Don-t-turn-the-page/Article1-926787.aspx