Showing posts with label Blatant Lies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Blatant Lies. Show all posts

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Relevancy of title to the article

The creation of a title to an written article is an art. The writer is forced to summarize what he has written in a few words to convey the overall theme but also interest the audience to bite. In a pure metaphorical sense it is the bait to reel in the fish (something this writer strugges with). The Chindu does a reasonably good picking its titles, mostly safe and bland but gives the reader a reasonable sense of what is contained within.
However a recent article had an interesting title, War for the soul of Islam in India by Praveen Swami. The summary beneath the title detailed that Islamic leaders have rejected terrorism and the terrorist remain outside the fringe.
Deoband’s rejection of the jihad will do nothing to persuade violent Islamists to end their campaign. It has made clear, though, that jihadists enjoy no support except at the polar fringes of Islam in India.

While this seems a logical extension to Khare's earlier rant, this article meanders into historical anecdotes of how the Deoband was created to the history of mushrooming of madrassas in Pakistan and finally
meanders into a discussion on Islam and modernity. The article does not present any cogent arguments or evidence on how the jihadists remain on the fringes but rather delves into irrelevant history.
The disturbing information presented in this article is the repeat of a statement by Maulana Khalid Rasheed on the challenges to Indian muslims,
India’s Muslims have faced three critical challenges. The first was Partition itself, which communalists leveraged to coerce those Muslims who chose to live in India. Second came the demolition of the Babri Masjid, which represented a full-blown assault on the economic and political future of our community.” “Now,” says Mr. Rasheed, “terrorism poses a third make-or-break threat”.

This makes little sense.
After the partition if the communalists were so powerful how come the Congress ran the Central and most of the state governments for about 40+ years?
Why is that Babri Masjid destruction blamed for every issue?
Why does Chindu take everything said by these so called Islamic leaders at face value, but question any word said by people of certain other sections of society?

The poor summarization by Chindu coupled with such illogical articles often does not help put forward any useful thoughts towards the resolution. Praveen Swami has proved that he's the political irrelevant equal of Judge Iyer.

Saturday, April 26, 2008

Fudging the numbers as see fit

Analyzing democratic elections become very complicated when there are more than two parties involved. Coalition politics makes it difficult for any person with average mathematical skills to predict the winner of an election.
Thus, the CPM led left front can claim victory despite having won a bit more than 10% of the total seats. However the same rules do not apply to neighboring countries like say, Nepal. Sure the Maoists have passed in flying colors, learning how to rig democratic elections from their friends from the country bordering the north and comrades from a southern state. However the Chindu decides to not apply the same rules here. Read this article,
http://www.hindu.com/2008/04/26/stories/2008042660061700.htm
The Chindu's hatchet man in this case Siddharth Varadarajan, rants that the US is preventing the Maoists from forming the government. But in the article the evidence given is,
According to political and diplomatic sources, the U.S. ambassador in Kathmandu, Nancy Powell, is “actively pushing” the idea that Girija Prasad Koirala should continue as Prime Minister.

Then the article meanders to rant at how the Nepali Congress with a 100 seats is preventing the Maoists(who do not have a majority) from forming the Government.
How is it that the CPM which does the exact same political blocking in India is lauded as fighting for the common man and NC's action's seems as anti-democratic?
Let us know of your thoughts on this incident of double standards by The Chindu.

Left and the price rise

Consider the two reports on th price rise issue: the first one is from Chindu and the second from ToI.

Chindu's report suggests that Manmohan reacted to Left's proactiveness and took measures curb inflation. It appears as if the PMO's statement is aimed at the opposition.
The Hindu : Front Page : Manmohan: avoid scaremongering
His remarks were contained in a statement issued by the Prime Minister’s Office after a Left delegation led by Communist Party of India (Marxist) general secretary Prakash Karat called on him.

The team, comprising members of the CPI(M), the CPI, the Revolutionary Socialist Party and the Forward Bloc, suggested six measures to curb price rise.
ToI report gives a totally different picture. In fact, it goes to the extent of clarifying that the statement by PMO was directed at the Left. The scaremongering party here is clearly identified as CPM.
Left sees Red over PM's remark on inflation-India-The Times of India
The frost seems to be back in the Prime Minister's ties with the Left as the statement, though couched in general terms, was clearly directed at Left leaders who had just urged him to take several steps to contain inflation. While more or less rebutting the Left's arguments, the PMO virtually accused the comrades of scare-mongering.