Was Uttarakhand tragedy human-made?

Recent tragedy because of heavy rain and flash floods in some regions of Uttarakhand has resulted in heavy loss of life, property, and damage which will take years to recover. Many villages and cities were affected because of this natural calamity. No doubt that the disaster was because of heavy rains and flash floods, but the question is what is the reason for such a heavy loss of property and life? Why they didn't give a warning to residents of those areas? Why evacuation orders were not issued which is a normal protocol in almost all developed countries in case of such anticipated natural calamity. Why proper disaster response team was not in place so that when such a disaster strikes all government machinery doesn't panic and don't know what to do and where to start?

The entire world now is in a crazy race for economic progress. Everyone wants development which brings more money and in turn, is supposed to bring more happiness. The race is too competitive and furious, it seems there is no time to plan any strategy they just want to proceed at any cost and win the race. Nothing wrong with all these ambitions and aspirations about progress and development, they are required to motivate people to do good work, discover new inventions, and in turn bring long-term sustainable progress. But very few are looking for long-term sustainable progress, most are in the race for short-term gains, and the quicker the better. No one has time to think about the impact of our actions on the environment.

Because of recent economic progress in India, there is a huge migration of the working class from villages to cities and they settle in cities in whatever place they find, it is all unplanned and unregulated, and it generates a lot of waste. All these things are putting enormous pressure on the infrastructure of these cities and some of them are crumbling under the pressure of uncontrolled migration and poor management. In most of these cities, people build homes wherever they find empty space, dry river beds, on top of the drainage, on the bank of a river, or on hills. No place is forbidden, they manage it either legally or illegally (with the help of some local politician who in turn gets all these votes). I lived in one of such illegally constructed neighborhoods for most of my life. In the beginning situation was horrible, with no water connection, no latrines, electricity, etc. but slowly things improved and we got all the required facilities. As these neighborhoods are illegal they don't follow any rules or regulations that are there for any legal residential construction. If anyone takes a tour of any of these neighborhoods they will understand what I am talking about. There is almost negligible or no space between two houses, people construct homes like card houses, side by side, resting on each other. People try to construct something on each and every available space. There is no plan for an emergency exit or proper drainage, any free space is too valuable to waste for such unnecessary things. Over the time these neighborhoods grow, many people with their families settle there and call it their home and then it's almost impossible for any government or authority to remove them from that place. The encroachment crisis becomes a humanitarian crisis. Even the government legalizes many of these settlements because there is no other option for them (our house was legalized after two or three decades). Everything goes fine as long as nothing catastrophic happens like what happened in Mumbai (in 2005) or in Uttarakhand (2013). If some disaster (natural or human-made) happens, the hell breaks loose, and people don't know what to do, where to go, or how to escape, because there is no escape path, there is no emergency exit, and even it's difficult to send any help to these places.

Whenever I visit my old home, I often wonder if some natural calamity strikes this place (I really wish it won't) then how are these people going to save themselves. The lanes are so narrow, and buildings are so close to each other that some of them don't even get any sunlight even during a bright sunny day. Even ambulances can't reach many houses as they are only accessible either by walk or by two-wheelers, but thousands of people live there. My neighborhood is just one among thousands of others situated in many other cities, and they are growing every day. These things multiply the destructive ability of any disaster (fire, flood, or earthquake). This is the ugly side of unplanned development. Everyone wants to move to a big city, they are willing to live in any condition but they want to live there. The craze to move to cities is there because somehow the modern development plan of India doesn't include villages. All development is only happening in or around cities, and villages are left out, therefore, people are moving out from villages in search of a better life. As everything happens in cities, it's better to be in the city, this is the perception among people. We need to change this, at least in India we can not afford to have such nonsustainable growth (because of our huge population and very limited natural resources).

I hope people demand better infrastructure both in cities and villages, and once they get it they try to maintain it. I hope they follow the rules and don't play with their own life. I know it's easier to say this than to do but all these disasters should force all of us to think. It is not logical or even practical to follow a single model of growth for a country like India. India is such a diverse (geographically, socially, and economically) country so we need to have some model that takes into account everything (not only directed to the middle class, skilled workers, or educated class). India needs its unique development model and I hope something is developed soon that suits our diverse country and its people. I am sure with proper planning and implementation of good and practical ideas we can avoid such disasters. I know we can not control nature's behavior but we can definitely control our actions and make sure that we don't make situations more complicated and worse by our own mistakes.

Thanks for reading and please share your views on this topic.

(Copyright: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing)

Links:
1. Geologist explains why Uttarakhand tragedy was man-made

Please recycle and reuse

I consider myself a recycle freak. I try to recycle as much as possible. If I see something in a trashcan that is recyclable I try to remove it from there and put it in recycle waste containers. It makes me really uncomfortable to watch recyclable waste dumped in normal trash. Many countries have recognized the need to recycle most of the waste generated by humans. Consumerism is at its peak in our society, because of the easy (and cheap) availability of a lot of stuff we are using more than required and then generating a lot of waste, and we don't bother to recycle it. So, we make two mistakes at the same time, we overuse the stuff (which is totally avoidable) and then don't even efficiently recycle the stuff. In many countries, especially in developed nations like the USA, they have made it very easy to recycle many things but still, I see that many people are not aware of these things or they don't care and dump all things in the trash. It's really bad to dump things that can be easily recycled in normal trash. People think that just one person doing all this recycling and other climate-friendly activities will not make any difference, so why do it. I agree with this to some extent but if everyone starts thinking like this then no one will do it. Someone has to start doing this and why can't that someone be us? Actually, many good things always start with one person, and then others follow.

As I said things are available so easily and cheaply nowadays that it's hard for people to think before they use them or throw them. Whether to print or not is not a very big decision nowadays, printers and papers are available everywhere (home, office, anywhere you go). Many organizations are trying to reduce the use of paper by switching to e-statements and e-bills rather than traditional printed format but still, many prefer traditional printed format. There is nothing wrong with it but at least make sure that to recycle that stuff. We teach many good things as part of our tradition and culture to our kids and I think we need to include the habit of recycling and using things more efficiently (so that we generate less waste) as a part of our cultural training. Our planet and environment are everyone's property, we all own it and use it and that's why we all are responsible for protecting it and taking good care of it. There is no single owner of this planet that doesn't mean no one should care for it. Rather we all are owners of this beloved planet so it should be treated with utmost respect and care by all of us but this is not happening. People care a lot about their own religion, country, family, and home but don't care much about their planet which is actually the reason for the existence of everything around us, it's very strange but true.

If we can't stop ourselves from overusing things then at least by recycling we can reduce the impact of our consumerism on the planet. This can also generate a lot of jobs in the recycling industry. There is no negative or side effect of this activity. This is a simple habit we need to incorporate into our lifestyle. Most of us are already very careful about not dumping any trash outside, we make sure that we throw it in a trashcan, and this is how we try to keep our surroundings clean. We need to do exactly the same thing but next time whenever we throw trash we need to make sure to throw it in the "proper disposal bin," that's all. It's not that difficult. Most of us are in search of many good habits to incorporate into our day-to-day lives and I feel the habit of recycling and reusing things as much as possible is one of the good habits which can make us better people and help our planet. Think about it, one simple habit can help our planet and future generations, so why not give it a shot.

Thanks for reading and please share your views about this topic. 

(Copyright: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing)

It is better to live in present

"Better to live in present than glorify past which is never going to repeat itself." I read these lines in one of the comments to the article where the author wrote a post glorifying the Indian past thousands of years ago where women had equal status to men and contributed to all aspects of society's development. I always come across many posts that talk about our glorious culture, especially, a time in history when India was considered the wealthiest nation of that time (financially and intellectually). There are many things from our past that we all should be proud of but at the same time, there are many things that need introspection and honest analysis. Many people try to defend age old caste system and try to show how it was designed with good intentions but it's the people who messed it up. They are not ready to accept that the system itself had some flaws that allowed this type of exploitation. Some even regret that the era where women had very specific roles such as looking after the home, serving the men, and producing kids, is being threatened by feminist movements. I think readers must have understood what I am talking about here.

One more thing that is very common among some Indians is, that whenever they see some novel invention (let it be anything, starting from the discovery of gravity, the earth's shape, or the discovery of Higgs Boson) they always like to go back, find some related reference mostly from some ancient Vedic text or quote by some ancient personality or mythological story and claim that Indians were the first to think or know about that invention. These people fail to appreciate or give full credit to people who discovered these things on their own and introduced those concepts to the modern world. Many scientists work very hard to develop these ideas into something very relevant and applicable concepts in the modern world. It's not wrong to feel proud about the glorious past or study scriptures to get some clue but using these things to dilute the impact of others' hard work and independent discoveries is very wrong. Somehow all these things make me feel like we Indians are too much in love with our so-called glorious past and want to ignore the present situation of our country (which is not so glorious). One simple question we need to ask ourselves is, if we were first to discover all these things then why did we fail to develop them? Who stopped us from sharing it with the rest of the world?

We still mention proudly about Universities at Nalanda, Takshila, and Nagarjunkonda and how people from all over the world used to come to study in them, but we fail to acknowledge that we are responsible for their destruction and failed to rebuild them and reestablish their original glory. We Indians talk all the time about how these things got destroyed but don't want to talk about why we failed to rebuild these things. We proudly mention Ayurveda but at the same time don't want to accept that we failed to capitalize on the early head start given to us by our ancestors in many fields (like maths, medicine, astrology, etc.). For example, in Ayurveda, a vast knowledge about various diseases and herbal medicines was accumulated but nothing was standardized or developed in a reliable medical knowledge. Even though astronomy was well developed, and we knew about many stars and their properties, developed various mathematical theorems and equations but nothing beyond that, this was not translated into any radical discoveries like airplanes or trains. We didn't bother to continue the process of knowledge generation and propagation and lost the advantage. The truth today is that till now we haven't contributed any new medicine in modern-day drug therapy that can be accepted all over the world, we even failed to standardize our traditional medicine system so that it can produce medicines with reliable quality and reproducible results. Research and development is not our priority even today. We need to buy many sophisticated instruments and technologies from other countries, most of these countries are way ahead of us in many ways and we are not even trying to catch up with them. We even are not in a race, not because we can't run but because we don't want to run.

Somehow we proudly want to take credit for all the good things that our ancestors did in the past but completely reject or blame foreign invaders for the bad things (including casteism, religious riots, superstitions, etc.). These bad things happened in the same society and our ancestors were very much part of it. It is a very common habit to blame everything on foreign invaders. They all came from outside and messed up our wonderful system and culture. We were so good, so intelligent, so brave and so honest but we still got duped by some foreigners who came in small groups and destroyed our whole system. If we were so superior and intelligent then how did invaders manage to fool us? Why did we lose battles with them even though they were smaller in numbers? We take the easier path to blame them for everything but don't accept that we also were equally responsible for this downfall which pushed our society into the current mess.

A glorious past is always a nice thing to have and it can teach us a lot but only if we want to learn from it. We should be definitely proud of it but mentioning it again and again just to show off and take away (or dilute) others' achievements may make us happy temporarily but it's a useless exercise. If we are not willing to make any serious efforts to reach that level again then it doesn't matter how glorious was that past. If we develop a habit of living in the past then we may not be able to fully understand and recognize the challenges of the present and won't be ready to face the problems of the future. Presently our society in India is in a total mess, our political system sucks, the bureaucracy is heavily corrupted, and we have a pathetic medical infrastructure. We are going to face a lot of social, environmental, and economic challenges if we continue like this. Living in a glorious past is not going to help us in any way. We need to look at the present situation and tackle all these problems right now before they go out of our reach and become the reason for our dark future.

It always pays off to live in the present by getting all possible clues and lessons from the past. But if we refuse to accept the present situation and just keep on singing songs about past glories then we all know what will be our future. So, let's accept that currently there are many problems that we need to solve and also accept that these problems are mostly created by us, so it's our responsibility to find answers. I believe if we change our attitude then it won't be difficult to fight with these issues and work towards finding possible solutions, but the big question is are we willing to change our attitude? This is the question I want every Indian should ask today.

Thanks for reading and please share your views on this topic.

(Copyright: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing)

Links:
1. Were Our Ancient Ancestors Scientifically Advanced?

Rape is never the victim's fault

Recently, I saw this very realistic post on my Facebook wall shared by one of my friends, the post conveys a very important message "Rape is never the victim's fault". We all read many posts or articles where many people accuse victims of rape or any sexual assault for that crime. They question the victim's behavior, dress, choice of friends, and many other things. These things according to them encouraged the other person to sexually assault the victim. Most of these comments and objections try to put the entire blame of the incident on the shoulders of the victim and draw some ridiculous conclusion that the victim asked for it and got what she deserved. Forget about the insensitive nature of all these comments that's not what is important here but the attempt to put the blame on the victim and indirectly sympathize with the perpetrator of crime bothers me a lot. 

This picture below speaks for itself, no need to explain anything. Women have the total right to choose what they want to wear (the same choice that most cultures and societies offer to men). There is heavy commoditization of the human body in the advertising world but that's true for both genders. But women get criticized more for exposure compared to men. Some people (mostly men) are not very comfortable with the exposed women's bodies and behave erratically and they try to blame their weakness of erratic behavior on women. They use the name of culture, tradition, religion, or whatever that can help them to justify their erratic behavior. Women are expected to cover their bodies and show some decency, follow the rules that are supposed to help men control their sexual desires. Somehow society thinks that the responsibility of keeping men's sexual desires under control lies on women.

The accusation that by dressing in a particular way or by their behavior or choice of friends or partners in a relationship they ask or invite sexual assault is ridiculous. Nothing, absolutely nothing, gives anybody license to sexually harass anyone based on their appearance or behavior or anything. By putting the blame on the victim these people make that victim feel inferior, guilty, and worthless which is very dangerous as such isolated victims sometimes take the extreme step of ending their lives (then the same people blame them for being weak). Victim of any crime needs all support and help society can offer to him/her and victims of sexual crimes like rape need even more support because not only their bodies but their minds are also hurt and it's not easy to heal these types of injuries without a robust support system. Because of social pressure and the stigma attached to such crimes sometimes even near and dear ones hesitate to support victims the way they should. We need to confront this mentality. If these people are allowed to become successful they will bring back the era of human civilization where women were forced to cover themselves (not by choice but by force) and follow all gender-biased restrictions imposed on them by a male-dominated society. I don't think we want that era back. We need to make this clear to these people, stop blaming victims. I can't say that there are no fake rape accusations or that some people don't misuse sexual harassment laws to their advantage but these types of cases don't justify any victim blaming or shaming.

Sexual harassment is a very serious and complicated issue, and treating it in such a casual way is not the way to handle it. People need to be educated about this issue. Both men and women need to be educated about their rights and responsibilities. I know that we can not eradicate this problem completely but at least we can help the victims to deal with their pain and spread awareness to reduce these incidents.

Thanks for reading and please share your views on this topic. 

(Copyright for text: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing) 

Links:

1. Elizabeth Smart: Abstinence Education Teaches Rape Victims They’re Worthless, Dirty, And Filthy

Lal Krishna Advani, always number two

The resignation of the senior leader of the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) Mr. Lal Krishna Advani (LKA) and its subsequent rejection and withdrawal was in the news for the last few days. It seems Mr. Advani is not happy with the direction his party is going and the way decisions are taken nowadays (without consulting him). LKA never hid his aspiration for the PM (prime minister of India) position. He always wanted to become PM but somehow destiny denied him that chance. He worked really hard to make BJP a strong political force (from just 2 seats in Loksabha in 1984 to 161 seats in 1996, and then subsequently to power in 1999). He was a central figure in the Ram Mandir movement which actually helped the BJP to attain the status of a major opposition party. He created a vote bank for them and also helped them to win the 1999 general election. But despite all his efforts and aggressive politics LKA always remained number two in BJP with Atal Bihari Vajpayee being a more acceptable face to other coalition partners of NDA (national democratic alliance).

Mr. Narendra Modi is an emerging and very popular face in national politics. He already proved his power of governance and decision-making as Gujarat's chief minister and is now aspiring for a bigger role in national politics (prime minister's post). Everyone related to Indian politics knows how much LKA wanted to become PM. He lost his chance to ABV in 1999, because LKA was considered too radical or too extremist to be a leader of a coalition front that consisted of some so-called secular parties such as TDP and JD(U) (his pro-Hindu ideology and close association with the Ram mandir movement). One can say that today NM is what LKA was a few decades back. But with a proven track record of success he achieved as Gujarat CM, gives NM a better creditability and chance to secure the top position compared to LKA. However, like LKA even NM has the tag of too radical Hindu extremist leader (more because of the Godhra incident in 2002) and there is no doubt this label will be a roadblock in his journey to achieve a wider acceptance among other partners of NDA. So, I think LKA is not happy with the fact that what he couldn't achieve some years back someone else with a similar background and credentials can achieve so easily that too in his own party. Actually, all three ABV, LKA, and NM come with RSS backgrounds, they all believe in the same ideology but for their party workers, some are more acceptable compared to others.

I think by this time Mr. Advani must have realized that there was no point in fighting on the issue of Modi as the future leader of BJP. LKA did whatever he could to achieve success to his party, but he feels that he didn't get his due but that's how it is. In life sometimes you have to compromise. I think LKA realized this and that's why withdrew his resignation. BJP is definitely stronger with LKA with them than without him. Whether Modi can win this election or not is another big issue to discuss but right now there is a lot of buzz in the media about his name and he is very popular. It will be interesting to see how other partners of NDA react to the selection of his name. It's good that LKA realized that there was no point in stretching this drama any longer, better to be late than never. I think he made the right decision, let's see what happens next.

Thanks for reading and please share your views on this topic. 

(Copyright: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing)

Camping - a chance to connect with nature

Like last few years (3 years to be precise), this year also we went camping. It all started 3 years back when my very enthusiastic friend Vishnu threw this idea about going camping. Normally, I am not very enthusiastic about visiting any exotic place, but this idea of leaving your comfortable home for no particular reason appealed to me and we started this adventure. People who know me know how enthusiastic I am about traveling! I don't like to travel that much. I know it is exciting and many people just love to travel but somehow I don't enjoy it as much as I enjoy many other activities. But even after all this, I go on many trips, not just because of my interest in the places where I am going but most of the time because of people or groups with whom I travel. I am particularly lucky to have met a lot of amazing people in my life and they all make all these occasions special and unique for me. The pleasure of traveling with amazing people takes care of other boring aspects of the journey. But camping is the one thing which I enjoy just because there is a huge element of unpredictability in it. We always try to go to the new campsite every year. So, we don't know how it will be (you can get most of the information from the internet but there are always surprises). We normally plan it 1-2 months in advance so whether is not known, and during camping (with tents and sleeping bags) one can not isolate oneself from whether like one can do by staying in hotels or resorts or other places which can protect you from temperature fluctuations, rain, and other weather fluctuations. All these things make camping a lot more interesting than other outings for me. Maybe this is not the best way to spend your long weekend for everyone but it's definitely an interesting way to spend time with your family and friends.

All these camping trips are unique experiences for me in their own way. Every time there are some new people in our group, most of them try this adventure for the first time in their life with us and most of them enjoy this and they try again. Based on the description I am providing I am sure that some people might think that this doesn't look like a thing to do for everyone or maybe doesn't sound like a lot of fun, and it is true. Sometimes these things are physically very demanding and one starts thinking why to do it when other more comfortable options are available. Another thing that I like about these outings is I also get the chance to spend time away from TV and the internet. Only our phone stays with me and that too for important calls, so there is a lot of free time for discussion, games, arguments, walks, etc. These activities are great but nowadays we struggle to find any free time to do them regularly in this era of the internet and video games. I do enjoy the internet and video games a lot but there are many equally wonderful things that we should enjoy.

Whatever I wrote in this post about camping is my personal thoughts. People may or may not agree with them, they might think camping is a bad idea, a health risk (because of allergies, risk of physical injuries, etc.) and they are right but there is an element of risk involved in almost everything we do and it's up to us to evaluate and decide whether we want to go for it or not. There might be better ways to connect with nature and understand our surroundings than camping but this one suits me and my nature that's why I love it. I recommend trying it at least once before rejecting it.  

Thanks for reading and please share your views.

our temporary home

beautiful view of lake early in the morning

(Copyright: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing) 

Violence breeds violence

The murder of Mahendra Karma, the Chhattisgarh Congress leader in a terror attack by the Naxalites has initiated discussion about how to tackle this very complicated issue of Naxal violence in India. I am no expert in this area and I recommend readers to read some excellent articles mentioned in the links section which express very balanced views about this subject. These are very complicated socioeconomic and political issues for a country like India. There are many people who either support or oppose either side involved in this conflict. They all are very emotional about their beliefs but this argument about who is right and who is wrong has been going on for decades without producing any result. I think the time has come to stop that argument and think about the possible solutions all over again. Violence only breeds violence. We have seen it many times in human history, no matter for what purpose it is used, violence always results in more violence. People suffer, generations fight with each other for no reason, and different communities, countries, or religions hate each other without even knowing why they are doing this. This violence exists in many forms before it erupts as a full-scale bloody war and hatred or animosity between groups of people is one such form.

I think I have mentioned this before in some of my posts but let me say this once again, we humans are a very intelligent species and we very often use that intelligence to justify our questionable acts like war, murder, or any other controversial thing. There are so many examples from history or even from some scriptures where violence on a massive scale is justified or even glorified, celebrated and many people are very much okay with it as long as it is a part of their scripture. I agree that sometimes it is impossible to avoid war but to glorify it is an altogether different thing. One thing is for sure, we humans are no strangers to violence and we have been involved in it from the beginning of our civilization. But this doesn't mean that violence is the only option available for us to settle any major dispute. I agree that it is the most used option by many communities but we have also seen nonviolent ways to achieve great things. Many of these people who propagated nonviolent conflict resolution methods are ridiculed for their passive thinking and attitude. However, even after all the odds against them they were successful and were able to leave their mark on history, for example, Mahatma Gandhi. Unfortunately, they failed to generate loyal supporters who can take their beliefs to the next level and make sure that they become part of day-to-day lifestyle. I agree that it is not an easy way to follow, maybe that's why it failed to attract many followers. In today's world, these examples are looked at as kind of exceptional cases where this strategy worked somehow. Mahatma Gandhi is a very good example of this. He was instrumental in getting India's independence by using nonviolent protests but after getting the independence India is continuously battling with one violent conflict or another. Even in India, Gandhi's ways of resolving conflicts are considered outdated and nonpractical. Violence comes very naturally to animals. Even though humans are also animals, we call ourselves civilized animals, so we cannot behave purely based on natural instincts just like any other animal. However, many times our behavior doesn't justify the civilized tag for us, we need to work harder to call ourselves a civilized community.

In most cases, violent conflict is a result of false propaganda (especially in the case of communal riots). Some people mislead the masses for their own selfish political or personal benefits or gross negligence by the government (Naxal problem) creates situations where people engage in violence. Both these scenarios are totally avoidable with proper planning and education. People need to be aware of their rights and all resources available to them to practice those rights. At the same time, they should also be aware of their responsibilities, it is very important to be aware of both things to be a responsible citizen of any country. Rights and duties are different sides of the same coin. One cannot demand only rights without fulfilling their duties, and one can not fulfill their duties completely without having those rights, so both of these work together. Wherever we see any imbalance between the two a conflict is bound to emerge sooner or later. For any society to have a healthy atmosphere it needs to make its people aware of their rights and duties.

If we start arguing about who is right and who is wrong then it will become a topic of endless discussion. People from both sides can argue very passionately to justify their approach but ultimately we only see a lot of emotions, passion, and drama but no real solution. We need healthy dialogue not just arguments about this issue, and one should keep emotions in control during any discussion otherwise it turns into an argument and defeats the whole purpose.  Ultimately common people suffer in all this, so they need to take control of the situation. Once common people realize that they are being used by both sides as prawns to play power games I think they will look for a solution, until this happens this bloody game will continue.

Thanks for reading and please share your views about this topic. 

(Copyright: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing)

Links:
1. The continuing tragedy of the adivasis- Ramachandra Guha
2. दन्तेवाड़ा की जड़ें- सुनील