Criminals of the Constitution

In 2004 general election, BJP’s “India Shinning” campaign could not shine their fortune and voters packed them out of the power. INC did not get the required majority but all BJP haters joined hands together and formed UPA 1. The elected MP’s of Congress selected Mrs. Sonia Gandhi their leader. Ideally, leader of the largest party is always nominated PM. But when she met with President Kalam on 18-May-04, she proposed Dr. Manmohan Singh as PM. President was surprised as he was expecting that she would stake the claim. There are lots of theories on why did she not become PM. But that is not the topic of discussion. Mrs. Gandhi’s this sacrifice was glorified across the country and we made her larger than life! 

Now Congress was facing the serious issue on how Mrs. Gandhi can control the govt. being just MP! She cannot become a minister under her junior and UPA Chairperson isn’t a constitutional position. To resolve this crisis, they created a constitutional body using the power of Prime Minister. PMO notified formation of National Advisory Council (NAC) (http://www.nac.nic.in/) on 31-May-04. PM appointed Mrs. Gandhi as its Chairperson on 3-Jun-04. She was given the complete authority to select the members. The constitutional precedences of formation of any constitutional body were ignored. There is no procedure of selecting its Chairperson or members. No bureaucracy or opposition party is involved in selecting its Chairperson or members. Though its charter is to provide inputs in the formulation of policy by the Govt. and to provide support to the Govt. in its legislative business, its main purpose is to provide complete control of the govt. to Mrs. Gandhi. NAC can intervene in any ministry, ask their files and ask their secretary to make the presentation. It has control over Planning Commission as well. The activities, which were earlier done by respective ministries or Planning Commission, are now being done by NAC. See this link. (http://www.nac.nic.in/press.php) One can get the idea of their interference in governance.  There are ample evidences that NAC had intervened in selecting/changing ministers and bureaucrats without involving PM. Quickly, NAC became a pseudo cabinet and Mrs. Gandhi as Super PM with complete authority but with no responsibility! To deflect people’s attention from its main purpose, NAC acquired its validity, respectability, sanctity by appointing well known personalities (some controversial as well, in my opinion). Their work such as Right to Information, Right to Education, Right to Health, Food Security is now being promoted as their original work although constitution of India does talk about these citizen’s rights.

The story does not stop here. Mrs. Jaya Bachchan was expelled on 17-Mar-06 from RS by President on Election Commission’s recommendations for office of profit as she was holding an office of UP state. The opposition parties demanded similar action against Mrs. Gandhi being Chairperson of NAC. Just before Election Commission could take such action, the intelligent lawyers of Congress recommended her to resign both from NAC and as MP. She took high moral ground by resigning on 31-Mar-06 declaring that she is in the politics for serving the nation and people of India! It created such a profound impact that she was re-elected from Rae Bareli in by-election in May 2006 with emphatic majority over 4 lacs votes. The rest of candidates lost their security deposit! But this victory could not solve their main hurdle! She could not return as Chairperson of NAC. Although she resigned from NAC, it continued to function till 31^st Mar 2008 and ceased thereafter.

To remove this hurdle, Congress amended the Office of Profit Act 1959 itself! To hide their main agenda of removing NAC, they removed 55 offices from it. These offices were mainly from West Bengal and UP.  As Left and SP were main beneficiaries, they supported the amendments. BJP protested against the amendments strongly and walked out of the Parliament. Left and SP helped Congress in passing the amendment amid BJP’s walkout on 17-May-2006. The President sent back the amendments on 31^st May 2006 for seeking some clarifications. The government sent back the same bill to him without any modifications for his approval.  As the cabinet and parliament are supreme in the democracy, he had no other option but to give his consent on 18-Aug-2006! These amendments were also challenged in the Supreme Court. But SC, in August 2009, refused to intervene in legislative competence and power of parliament.

Now all the hurdles were cleared. NAC was reconvened and Mrs. Gandhi once again became the Chairperson in 29-Mar-2010. Her control over PM and Govt. started once again. She once again became Super Prime Minister! She is solely responsible for diminishing and devaluating India’s PM. Mr. Manmohan Singh silently allowed it to happen and became rubber stamp PM!

Mere act does not indicate whether it is virtue or sin. The intension or purpose behind the act decides it. If the purpose is empathy for others, then it is a virtue. But if the objective is exploitation, then it is a sin. Therefore, though Congress actions were correct in the eyes of law, but they resulted into exploitation of constitution for giving undue favor to Mrs. Gandhi. Therefore, it is a BIG SIN Congress has committed.  The people of this country should not forgive and punish these criminals. Let’s hope that such immoral body would be demolished and the respect of our constitution would be restored back during NaMo’s govt.

Nostalgia

Last few days, my mother is serving us aambil (आंबील) in the morning. Cuisine, recipe and taste of the food are generally unique to the family, caste, religion and region. Continuous churning happens in these social actors and new recipes / eating habits are developed. Similarly, though aambil is not a part of dietary tradition of our family but it entered through the impact of the region where we are brought up. We all siblings cherish its taste and enjoy it during the summer. It is not the only one which entered in our family but there are few other recipes like aalan (आळण) (Many people in our region can’t pronounce “ळ” and therefore they pronounce it as “आरण”) and dhasala (धासलं) and they became the tradition of our family.

On close observation of these recipes, I realized that they are extremely economical, easy and very quick to prepare. They also represent a profound innovation of lower income group to adjust their dietary habits according to their income. This is my small effort to put them in front of you.

·        The aambil is made up of Javar (जवार) flour. It’s a main meal and normally prepared in summer as it is colder in nature. Take 150 grams of Javar flour. Ferment it overnight with the help of traditional culture or curd. Next morning, cook it with 3.5 - 4 liters of water. Add salt as per your taste. We also add pinch of cumin seeds (जीरा), sesame seeds (तील) and lovage seeds (अजवायन) for flavor. The thickness of aambil should be similar to the veg thick soup. It gets thicker as it cools down. Therefore, enjoy it hot! With the current market rates, 4 people can have stomach full meal in just (7 rupees for flour and 1 rupee for other ingredient) 8 Rupees!

·        The dhasala is made up of newly harvested rice. It is generally made during winter only. Take 200 grams of newly harvested rice and cook it with 2-2.5 liters of water until rice is completely cooked. Its thickness should be similar to khir. Add salt as per your taste. It is generally taken along with pickle or chutney. With the current market rates, 4 people can have stomach full meal in just 7 Rupees.

·       The aalan is a side dish or curry and accompanies with rice or roti. There are lots of varieties of it. But, I will explain only 2 simplest recipes here.

ü  Take just 10 ml of cooking oil and heat it in the pan. Make very thin batter of 2 table spoon of gram flour (बेसन) with water. Add red chili powder, turmeric powder and salt as per your taste.  Add mustard seeds in pan and allow them to crack. Crush 4 fenugreek (मेथी) seeds (1 per person) and add into oil. It gives very good flavor to it. Add batter in the pan and stir till it cooks well. Generally, spicy aalan is the most favorite in our region. The total production cost for 4 people (10 ml oil – 80 Paise, 4 Fenugreek seeds – 20 paise, 25 grams gram flour – 2.5 Rupees, others – 50 paise) is 4 Rupees.

ü  In other variant, replace fenugreek seeds with ladyfinger or okra (भेंडी). 100 grams are sufficient for 4 people. Make bigger pieces and add into gram flour batter. I also add 2 table spoon of curd into batter (but it is optional). The total production cost for 4 people is 9 Rupees.

All these recipes make me nostalgic and take me to my childhood. Moreover, they help me in remaining firmly on the ground and bring the memories of my primary school classmates. I strongly feel that they should be brought into mainstream dietary and given them due respect like we have given to Biryani. I am just doing my bit here. Give a try and give me your feedback!

What is New in This General Election!

The world’s biggest festival of democracy is currently happening in India. The citizens are jubilant, worried, scared and hopeful of the outcome of the election. There is tremendous churning happening across the country. It will definitely generate both the nectar and the poison as it happened in Samudramanthan. This parliament election is distinctly different than earlier elections in the following ways.

·         BJP declared Narendra Modi as their Prime Ministerial candidate on 13-09-13 and took a lead in the game. This is for the first time incumbent and successful CM is bidding for PM.

·         “Aspirant PM” NaMo has taken complete grip over his election campaign. He has already visited all the states before he started his Bharat Vijay Rally. He will be conducting 185 Bharat Vijay Rallies. In fact, he would conduct 225-250 rallies since Sept-13. He will reach out to estimated 125 M voters and additional 25 M voters during his Chai Pe Charcha! No PM candidate, in past, has taken such mammoth (20% voters) people contact program. No other political leader is even closer to him.

·         In this election, personalities are taking over the Party. It was true for other political parties earlier. Now, BJP has joined the club. The campaign is concentrated around NaMo and not BJP as party.  

·         Congress’s campaign is very weak as if they have already accepted the defeat. It is understandable that Sonia Gandhi can’t due to her health problem. But where is Rahul Gandhi in congress’s campaign?

·         Social media is the key tool for reaching out to the voters. BJP’s innovative idea of Chai Pe Charcha has completely broken the imagination of other parties on how technology can be used for reaching out to and interacting with millions of people.

·         Many non-political/spiritual fronts or organizations such as ex-military organization, Ramdev Baba’s organization, Sri Sri Ravishankar, Nair Seva Samithi, Anna Hazare etc. are openly taking political sides.

·         Large number of first time voters (24 Million i.e. 3% of total voters) who were not born when Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination, Mandal protest and demolition of Babri Masjid happened. They do not have slightest idea of imposition of Emergency in 1975.

·         All previous elections were fought on emotions and not on the issues. Many political parties are trying hard to bring 2002 Gujarat riots, Babri Masjid demolition, so called secularism at the center stage of election campaign. But the voters are not really interested in them. This will be issue based election.

·         In this election, voters are looking at larger and national level picture rather than state or local level issues. The trends show that caste, region and religious equations are already broken and only national issues have taken a center stage.

·         Third / forth fronts were declared with lot of fanfare. Initial enthusiasm has already converted into cynicism. Most of the regional parties already are in deep trouble today. AAP showed some promising start initially but their influence and support are waning in recent days.  

·         You can see political opportunism, lust for power, switching sides for power at one side and on the other hand many established leaders are shying away from contesting.

·         Media feels that they played a key role in bringing AAP govt. in New Delhi. They feel that they can replicate it at national level. Today, it is very easy to identify the planted / paid news or which media is taking which side. Did you observe TOI is becoming pro-Modi?

Let’s hope, on 16-May this election will make an end to the dynastic rule and dynastic political parties. It should demonstrate a common man can become PM with his hard work, dedication and service to the society. Let’s pray to God that such leader will fulfill the aspirations of all Indians, protect our border, blossom the forests, provide basic needs such as food, clothes, shelter, education, health, employment, security, peace, brotherhood, upheld Indian Dharma in the world and make India a Guru of whole world!