Saturday, May 09, 2009

Thanks, but No Thanks, Mr. Gupta

IE editor, Shekhar Gupta's "Hindu rate of BJP Growth" has an unsolicited advice for BJP. Proferring it is his business, so no complains about it as such. The article teems with 'secular' agitprop, and it's really futile to go in all its details but for this one:
..at least five parties — the Congress, the Left, the SP, the RJD and the NCP — can have nothing to do with them.
This is, at the least, factually incorrect. Sharad Pawar's NCP shares a municipal govt. in Pune with BJP and ShivSena. They've also had tieups in Northeastern states with BJP. But Pune is backyard of Sharad Pawar's Maratha-centric caste politics. Knowing this, it becomes difficult to be convinced of Mr Gupta's assertion. But again, that's not the point.

The universal dictum of politics is, and shall always remain, that, in politics, there are no permanent friends, nor allies, only permanent interests.

Before 1999, Mr. Gupta's list would have invariably included DMK, the self-proclaimed "rationalist," secular party with admittedly nasty anti-Brahminical roots. But the unkind history caught up with 'rationalists' too. I'm not aware if Mr Gupta had any such list then. 

The two Yadav parties, SP and RJD, may have to rethink their position in near future. With the flight of the much sought after secular vote into Congress kitty, self-preservation will force this duo to look for greener pastures. The Yadav votebank by itself doesn't provide even a shimmer of hope in the numbers game that could assuage their fears. Whence, where else would they go? Their fellow castemen will have very little issue with stepping into communal shoes if such a need arises.
  
If the nascent Muslim parties in WB and Assam gather any traction, even the Marxists of Bengal will start singing a "nationalist" tune. After the wholesale bankruptcy of Maoism, the only glue that props the Chinese dictatorship, ironically, is nationalism. And if history be our guide then what China does today, Bengali Marxists will do tomorrow. 

It can thus be reasonably said that Mr Gupta is too quick in writing off history. But then again, in current media monopoly, hyperbole is king. 

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

MM Joshi vs Chindu: A fitting reply to foolish historians of the Chindu.

Full response (pdf) hereWorth reading it full.

Anonymous said...

This is a fitting reply, indeed a great and weighty stuff, to Chindu and its bufoon-historians.

Just to cite only one example - regarding the knowledge of medicine, plastic surgery etc. in ancient India, let us see the following statement:

Nor do scholars contest India's claim to have produced the first
surgeon, Susruta, whose methods (and tools) of surgery,
including plastic surgery and prostheses for amputees,
pioneered the field.

This is from Sashi Tharoor, Chindu's secular poster-boy!

And this is how the authors of this weighty piece conclude:

Nevertheless we sincerely hope that this is a passing phase of perversion for the newspaper.
We also hope that "The Hindu" – an age old institution, would redeem itself from the abyss of the
ethics-less journalism and anti-national treason into which it has fallen.

Rooney said...

Drummer Gupta is weak on logic. He was finally rewarded for his loyalty with some Padma award this year.

Rooney said...

What do you do with e-readers? Ask N Ram.


http://www.hindu.com/2009/05/10/stories/2009051054250500.htm


Digital readers cannot be a substitute for books, says N. Ram. “Habit of reading will not go away”
(Funny guy!)

Anonymous said...

Well said socal

Unknown said...

Regarding last Sunday's article on "India Shining" there are a couple of mails published in Hindu today:

Motivated propaganda?

I write to you as an apolitical, informed, educated, concerned citizen of India.

The compilation “From India Shining to India was Shining” (Magazine, May 3) appears to have been put together by an amateur, ill-informed writer. It is surprising that your Magazine section had to stoop to this level and publish this piece at all. I am searching for answers to the following queries:

1. Why has the paper been discreet about the compiler and the “eminent historians” referred therein?

2. If this was meant as a political exercise, there has been no attempt at even political correctness.

3. Any such article should have focused on the facts of the subject matter rather than the person or the party affiliations.

4. Not one of the “brief comments” from “eminent historians” holds water.

I wish that my newspaper remained a daily, sought after for the quality of its contents rather than for including content motivated by political shades, hues, tints and dyes.

R. Swarnalatha

New Delhi

It was dismaying to read the rebuttal offered by “eminent historians” to Murali Manohar Joshi’s viewpoints. As a practising surgeon, with no political axe to grind, I choose only to comment on one of their statements, that India had no practice of plastic surgery until modern times.

It is a well established medical historical fact that Sushruta (600 BC), the father of Indian Surgery, made dramatic contributions to both plastic surgery and cataract surgery. Indeed he is extolled world wide as the innovator of the Rhinoplasty technique (reconstruction of the nose).

The Susruta Samhita, a compilation of his works in Sanskrit, was translated into Arabic during the Abbasid Caliphate (750 AD) and later found its way to Europe. There is specific evidence of this in Italian surgical literature. Much later in the day, British doctors witnessed traditional Rhinoplasty in India and published this in the Gentleman’s Magazine in 1794. In 1816, Joseph Constantine Carpue, an English surgeon performed the first Rhinoplasty, having spent 20 years in India. The Indian reconstruction technique of using a flap of skin from the forehead, became Carpue’s operation.

If the eminent historians are unaware of such basic surgical history, the perceptive reader is left to wonder about their eminence.

Dr. Uma Krishnaswamy

Chennai

kuttychathan said...

The 'Readers Editor' should have expressed his strong disapproval about that shit of the bastard-historians. But that old-foggy is content with dotting the 'i's and striking the 't's.

Anonymous said...

What to say about these "eminent" scums and their empty-headed patron? For them, the history of Bharat starts from the time the missionaries and mullahs set foot on our soil. And before that it was all darkness and primitive existence. Why can't all these eminent junks take a sabbatical (perhaps, forever) in Saudi Arabian madrassah?