SPIN the verdicts

                                 The Daily Pheesh
                                 Friday July 1 2011

History was forged today as India's major religions buried centuries of acrimony to unite to form a single entity. The newly formed spiritual conglomeration, aptly titled SPIN(an acronym for Spiritual Power India) is the culmination of months of effort on the part of the heads of religious orders in India and has already been accepted as the governing entity by Hindu, Muslim, Christian and Sikh spiritual leaders. The governing body of SPIN shall, in accordance with the glorious heritage of post-Independence India, comprise 3 members from each of India's major religious communities. Swamy Vishweshwarananda, the head of the VHP, and proposed Supreme Leader of SPIN pointed out that the composition of the governing council was a resounding slap to thoe who believed that the VHP scorned other religions. "They are all Hindus anyway", he said.

It is believed that congregations of religious figures of all religions will gather in the near future to formally approve and sanctify SPIN. The Vatican, in a brief statement, greeted the formation of SPIN and termed it yet another step in the progress of the gospel of love and harmony.

SPIN sources categorically denied a rumour that the formation of SPIN is in any way, a response to the landmark Supreme Court Judgement legalizing civil unions between homosexual couples.DP



Image credits 1

Charity begins at..

                                 The Daily Pheesh
                                 Thursday February 1 2018


The Sree Parasuram Seva Sena(SPSS) is a charitable educational and moral concern which seeks to harness the values of our ancient civilization towards the greater good of our society. Though only 10 years old, the Sena is the inheritor of a tradition that stretches back to the glorious Indus Valley Civilization and seeks to ensure that this unbroken chain runs on for ever and ever. The Sena's primary initiatives are in the field of education and public service and it coordinates with a host of civil society organizations that share its values and principles. The Sena's educational institutions have been praised as models of the education of the future as they combine high academic standards with an ethical touch.

"Sree Parasuram Seva Sena schools and colleges have impressed me deeply with their commitment to the moral uplift of society. I urge all concerned parents to embrace the Sena schools for the sake of the nation and its culture"

Sri Vidhvesharahitananda
M.Litt, D.PHil
Educational expert

The Parasuram Seva Sena is proud to introduce two new courses for its able and dedicated students. They are:

1)B.Mp(Bachelor of Moral Policing)- Duration 1 year
This course seeks to instill the precepts of social activism in students and encourage them to realize the historical and cultural background of intervention in social affairs. The students will be instructed by a distinguished array of experienced faculty and will receive specific instruction from elite guest professors. A great deal of emphasis will be laid on field work. Male and female students will be permitted to attend this course. There will be no fees and students will be required to sign a bond pledging to serve the organization for one year
Eligibility-The applicant must be Hindu and healthy.

2)M.Mp(Master of Moral Policing)-Duration 6 months
This course will impart the philosophical background of social and moral activism to the students and prepare them to take up the mantle of leadership of social organizations in these troubled times. The students shall be granted access to senior functionaries and leaders of friendly social organizations and can learn from them in the best traditions of the guru-shishya tradition. This course is reserved for male students though exceptionally talented female students will be considered. This course will also be free of cost and students will be drafted to the higher levels of the SPSS.
Eligibility-The applicant must have a B.Mp degree and must be healthy and male(except for select cases.see above)

All donations made to the Sree Parasuram Seva Sena will be refunded by the Government of India.

Image credits

The Mask of Saffron Death

2009
As Gaza burns(again) and a bout of Obamania breaks out(again), an interesting drama has been playing itself out in the corridors of India's own "party with a difference". While the origins of the conflict can be traced to the Gujarat elections or even to some grave comments made many years ago, the past couple of days have added some spice to the protracted trench warfare between the honchos of the BJP.

To summarize, ex-Vice -President Bhairon Singh Shekawat(probably inspired by Al Gore) publicly speculated on the possibility of his contesting the Lok Sabha elections. Now this would be bad enough were it not for the fact that the Hon.exvp made things worse by not very unsubtly pointing out his geriatric credentials and by snubbing the party president. Of course the party, quick to the defense of its crown prince and heir apparent(that's L.K Advani btw), shot Shekawat down only to land right into the midst of another controversy as prominent Indian industrialists(in a sign of times to come) recommended Narendra Modi for the post of the PM. The CEO of Gujarat broke his silence and finally endorsed Advani for the PM in characteristic style(he called it a conspiracy) and the dust has settled, or so it would seem.

The BJP has always claimed to be a "Party with a difference", a very dubious claim since it has its own version of the "foreign hand" that "guides" it. This control however has neither been complete nor harmonious and so the BJP has had to spend considerable time in confronting the issue of factionalism. It has been specifically difficult as the BJP has never really learned the two prominent ways whereby parties encounter factionalism.

1Neuter all middle level associates and concentrate power in "The Hand".(See Gandhi Indira)
2) Expel your opponents/Leave the party/Rejoin(See "The 101 Janata Dals").

The reason neither of these approaches ever worked for the BJP is that they contradicted with the party's image of being this sleek monolith. Of course it was never so and once the party tasted power(and infinite possibilities of patronage), the seams began unraveling at the speed with which one said Deen Dayal Upadhyaya. So in the best traditions of the second option mentioned
above, the BJP had its Uma Bharati,Madan Lal Khurana and most recently Kalyan Singhs. The first option never really took off as no single leader(including A.B Vajpeyee) was ever allowed to reach a position where he or she could effect a culture of complete cronyism. The question is: will things remain the same?

The BJP seems better placed than the Congress from the perspective of the next elections. But it is an indisputable fact that it's leadership is far from inspirational. Atal Behari Vajrayee is almost catatonic. Advani has become the national bore and very few among the younger generation of leaders has a significant base. It is at such a moment, when senior swayamsevaks go about proclaiming their seniority, that the allure of Modi seduces. He has been an "effective" administrator in every sense of the term making special efforts to reach out to the corporate world. It is possible that he senses such efforts are his best way to gain a degree of acceptability in the country.

Now there are a lot of issues at stake here,the two bad words of corporate responsibility among others. The most important one is of course the rise and rise of the Butcher of Baroda. There are been many who argue that Modi should be given another chance and cite his impressive record as a "development politician" over the past couple of years. Such arguments only remind me of an earlier set of arguments flung about in the mid-90's in the midst of Congress fatigue and Deve Gowda about how the BJP should be given a chance at power since it would at least be an improvement over the reigning horse merchants. The utter lameness of those arguments was proved time and again over the following years. It's an instance which must not be forgotten

The rise of Modi and a BJP which over the next couple of years might turn to him as their next saviour is a very chilling possibility. There have been innumerable reports of Modi's intolerance of dissent. One can visualise a BJP 2.0 somewhere in 2020, a triumphant Modi in charge enacting the option 1 to eliminate factionalism in the organization. It will be an endless march of Modi-masks who shall aspire for ghettoized development. A most disturbing thought.

Talk about the Mask of Saffron Death!

Ps.This article by Swapan Dasgupta in The Pioneer is splendid evidence in support of the above argument especially since he mocks arguments of this sort.

Eyes wide shut?

Sonal Shah, a member of President Obama's transition team, has 'renounced' her links to the VHP and it's affiliate in the USA, the VHP-A. Those who have been following this controversy that began immediately after she was appointed to the transition team and picked up steam after Vijay Parshad's powerful article in Counterpunch will be all the more confused with this seemingly contrite statement. Ms Shah has the gall to say :

"Had I been able to foresee the role of the VHP in India in these heinous events, or anticipate that the VHP of America could possibly stand by silently in the face of its Indian counterpart's complicity in the events of Gujarat in 2002 -- thereby undermining the American group's cultural and humanitarian efforts with which I was involved -- I would not have associated with the VHP of America."

meh! duh??

I am still confused as to what/who she is talking to here. Here we have somebody who has worked with the Clinton administration and Goldman Sachs telling is that she did not do even a most simple background check while associating with an organization! So we have the Disney princess-like well-intentioned Sonal Shah lending her name to the VHP-A because they were being charitable? A bit of a stretch isn't it? I mean you cannot really ascend the corporate ladder and actually work with the government if you are so wide-eyed innocent can you?

But of course that's not all to it. Ms Shah conveniently brushes aside the fact that her family ties to the VHP-A precede the work she did with the organization. The association with the VHP-A was a very natural thing for her to do. The key point is that she chose to, conscious or unconscious of the "rich" legacy of the VHP in contributing to India's communal fabric. So she's either a closet fundamentalist or a incompetent moron of the highest order(somehow that seems unlikely).

It's possible of course that Ms. Shah, in the best traditions of American insensitivity, just did not bother. However that's not an excuse. Those who are in the public sphere carry bigger burdens. That's a universal reality. Sonal Shah got caught. She better leave if she wants to save her already battered reputation in the USA.

Ps. Of course the joke in this is that things started heating up for Shah when former Republican senator Rick Santorum wrote an op-ed in the Philadelphia Enquirer criticizing her appointment. What was merely a 'lefty' fad suddenly became a 'bi-partisan' critique. Ms Shah's statement and her email to her 'supporters'(" I need to moblize [sic] people against the leftists and the right wing.") are merely desperate attempts to save her job. For some reason I keep getting reminded of Bill Clinton.

The Katrina Awards

The citation

We are proud to present the Katrina Award to:
There is something very ironic yet fascinating in the fall of a 'chosen One'. That's because 1) the fall of a chosen One is a direct blow to the authority who made the choice and 2)there is often this inconspicuous and bumbling individual who ends up being the chosen One and it's really amusing seeing him/her strutting on a stage he/she does not belong to. That's the long and short of Uddhav Thackeray. Never a keen politico at any point of time, Uddhav has been thrust right into the centre of a controversy which has exposed his incapabilities as never before. There is, on one hand, the vast and tall legacy of the Thackeray Sr. There is, on the other hand, Raj Thackeray(handsomely aided and abetted by the Congress and the NC) who is stealing all the available thunder. One feels sorry as Uddhav is increasingly shut out from all public exposure, his statements(when he makes them ie) hardly provoking any response. Contrast this with Raj who has Maharashtra in flames and the rest of India fuming. On second thoughts, it's a relief. One Thackeray at a time is more than enough for India.


Image Credits

A press release

                                 The Daily Pheesh
                                 saturday 2 October 2151

This is the text of the statement released by the Viva Human Purity(VHP) on the recent incidents in Sector 9* in Area 15091947.

The Viva Human Purity strongly condemns the murder of one of our activists at the hands of members from the Cosmic Human (CH) group. We would like to remind the dear humans of our planet that ever since the first of these dirty worshipers of the "double perpendicular" arrived on our planet in the last decade of the 21st century, there has been no peace for us humans. It must be remembered that we, along with our sister organizations all over the world, had managed to do away with 99% of all impure races by the middle of the last century employing tried and tested methods. Our acts have been driven by the very virtuous motivation of ensuring the triumph of the one-and-only-pure human race on this planet. However the CH, coming from the distant and foreign worlds seek to convert our our humans to their religion which emphasizes the worship of some unknown Cosmic being. All of us also know that these infidels promise our human brothers free trips to space to convert them to CH-ism. We have also seen how these calculating fiends managed to take away the life of our dear brother who was trying to conduct harmless experiments to enhance the purity of our human race. Friends, Brothers, we must wake up to attempts to defile our uniqueness.We must fight back! Down with this comic cosmic-isms we say. The CHs will burn in the fire of our pure anger and will be destroyed by the force of our sheer virtue.

We also request all our brothers to join in the vaporization journey of our beloved deceased brother. We would like to use this occasion to remember his work and perpetrate it further as a mark of respect to him. We urge all participants to maintain restraint. Let the world outside not know the full extent of our technical skill till we are completely ready.-DP




*Orissa is the 9th biggest state in India
Image credits

Terror Terror everywhere....

The Nanavati-Mehta Commission's report on the Godhra incident was released on the 25 of September. The report disputes the U.C Banerjee Committee's version of the incidents on the 27th of February 2002 and declares the incident to be the culmination of a "conspiracy", the intention of which was to "create terror and destabilize the administration." The report also exonerates Narendra Modi and his cohorts of any any wrong doing during the riots that followed and makes the even more fantastic claim that the Godhra incident and the riots that followed were not necessarily connected.

While the second and third conclusions have, with ample justification, provoked great outrage from most of the sane-minded populace, I would like to focus on the first point. Rather the sub-point of the first point. The part about "create terror" and all that.

(Let us for a second ignore the larger and most important issue of whether it was the Muslims of Godhra who set fire to the train and assume for merely "argumentative" purposes that the act was committed by them.)

Rarely in the recent past has terrorism and its manifold possibilities evoked such a powerful response in India. Even so, the Commission's charge that the Muslims of Godhra actually intended to create terror and destabilize the government is almost inconceivably stupid. The very thought that the extremist government of a state that is 89% Hindu(and very aggressively so) would be in any sense destabilized by a conspiracy by Muslims to burn Hindus(kar sevaks that too) alive in their own locality is to say the least, preposterous.

Come now, you would say, isn't it obvious that terror is nothing but violence inflicted mindlessly to instill fear and undermine the confidence of the people in their legitimately elected governments. By that standard, Godhra was definitely an attack of terror.

The above mentioned definition of terror is one that is gaining increasing acceptance. It is to be expected, for we live in a society where the impression of being under siege is cultivated with great ardor. As a society and a country we find it difficult to understand such bursts of violence. Therefor we attribute it to conspiracies and term the violence 'mindless'. The underlying assumption here is that conspiring and inflicting mindless violence are not traits that belong to our society, that we are victims. So we distance these traits and their perpetrators from our midst. As time passes and things grow more chaotic, the list of groups that fall under the umbrella of terror will increase. The communists, social democrats, trade unionists and all.

In the troubled times ahead, the biggest question will not be whether we will root out terror but what we will turn into in the process of rooting out terror. Will we keep in mind the fact that terrorism is not a disease but a weapon? Will we try to reason that the violence inflicted is never a mindless act but a strategy in a war being fought by sections of our own society against other sections? Will we restrain ourselves from linking every conflict, every issue with the "war against terror" ?

These questions linger on silent and unobtrusive, yet they will perhaps be the ones which determine the nature of the society we shall inhabit. After all how do you think Big Brother came to power?