Owner: India Retold URL:http://www.vinodksharma.blogspot.com Join Date: Fri, 04 Apr 2008 02:40:29 -0500 Rating:0 Site Description: I write mostly about the current political, societal and security related issues that affect India as it readies to reclaim its place as one of the great nations of the world. Site statistics:Click here
NA NO MA MA TA TA? 2008-09-03 02:48:12 Mamata Bannerjee is on the verge of destroying her political career. Having got carried away by her victory in Singur on shrill cries of ‘na’ and ‘no’ for the much awaited Rs1 lakh Nano, the dream car of India’s lower middle class, she has managed to push Ratan Tata to the verge of saying 'ta ta' to West Bengal and re-locating the Nano plant to another state.
If the Nano project does mo
FROM OBAMA TO LALOO: A RUDE REALITY CHECK 2008-09-02 07:32:51 Laloo Yadav did not take more than a couple of days to give Indians a rude reality check. Obama may have inspired millions of Americans on August 28 with his promise of a refreshing change they can believe in, but Laloo quickly reminded us here in India that it is still the Laloos who continue to call the shots.
Laloo’s value system remains untouched no matter what the tragedy, no matter how
OBAMA IS THE CHANGE THAT INDIA NEEDS 2008-08-30 02:36:13 On August 25, 2008, Michelle Obama spoke to America. That moving speech set the tone for the profound change that is energising America and the history that is being made there.
Yesterday, Barak Obama spoke. And left many of the 80,000 Democrats who had gathered to listen to him in tears, tears of joy, tears of the fulfilment of Martin Luther King’s dream, tears of hope and tears of relief.
OBAMA and BIDEN vs OSAMA bin LADEN: COINCIDENCE? 2008-08-29 07:47:13 Is it just another meaningless coincidence?
In an earlier post, ‘OSAMA AND OBAMA: SAUL AND PAUL’, I had highlighted the many similarities between Osama and Obama, both of whom are creating history. Depending on which side of the seemingly unbridgeable divide you are, metaphorically one of them is Paul, and the other Saul.
The war that Obama will have to fight against Osama, should he become
KASHMIR: 'SECULAR' SEPARATISM REVIVED OR COMMUNAL FACE EXPOSED? 2008-08-28 06:56:10 The raging and seemingly endless violence that has erupted due to the Amarnath land transfer controversy has spilled into the TV studios in Delhi too. Kashmiri separatists, long used to holding centre stage as the only representatives of the people of the entire state of Jammu and Kashmir, suddenly find that the people of Jammu as well as Ladakh are not willing to be silent sufferers any more.
WIFE, MOM AND FIRST LADY MICHELLE 2008-08-26 09:53:13 Yes we have all heard and watched Barak Obama magically mesmerise not just Americans but people all over the world with his integrity, intelligence, wit and a clean, positive energy, the likes of which have perhaps never been seen by Americans ever. If Kennedy was charismatic, Obama is divinely magnetic.
This post is not about Barak. It is about Michelle, his wife and the mother of two lovely
MUSHARRAF GONE, PAKISTAN'S SLIDE IS ON 2008-08-25 10:41:26 Just six days back, when almost everyone in Pakistan and India was celebrating the ouster of military dictator Pervez Musharraf as President of Pakistan, I had reiterated the warning that I had given just after elections earlier this year that if Pakistani politicians do not co-opt Musharraf in the country’s really serious internal war against Islamic terrorism, they may not be able to save
INDIAN SPORT RE-BORN IN BEIJING 2008-08-21 00:28:40 Georg, my German blogger friend living in France, had asked me only a couple days back as to why India was not in the limelight at the Beijing Olympics. A very logical question considering that China, whose population is not much more than India’s, is sitting right at the top of the medals heap, pushing sporting giant US to a distant second.
Abhinav Bindra had by then won for India its first
MUSHARRAF MAULED: JINNAH'S PAKISTAN NEXT? 2008-08-21 00:12:41 When Pakistan voted the two main political parties of Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif to power earlier this year in an election ordered by General Pervez Musharraf, it looked like Pakistan had voted to save Jinnah’s liberal Pakistan from Arab-led Islamic fundamentalists who were determined to turn that country into a ‘pure’ Islamic state, just like Afghanistan was before 9/11. Then, everyone
McCAIN AND OBAMA: COWBOY AND COWHERD 2008-09-27 06:43:47 Today was the first of the debates between John McCain and Barak Obama. Today was McCain’s big chance to prove that he, with all his experience and exposure, was the right President to lead America for the next four years. Today was the day when Obama was supposed to get ruffled and exposed for his naiveté in so far as his world view was concerned.McCain did try to rub in what he thought was hi
THE 'BIG' WAR BETWEEN MUKESH AND ANIL! 2008-09-27 06:29:38 Mukesh and Anil Ambani, sons of Dhirubhai Ambani are at war. Over the Empire, Reliance, that their father created from a scratch. And a lot more. They talk at each other through the media and haven’t talked to each other for a long time. A couple of days back, however, someone mischievously mixed up their schedules so that they could come face to face and sort out all their messy problems as big
ISLAMIC TERRORISM: MUSLIMS IN INDIA LIKE JEWS IN NAZI GERMANY? 2008-09-23 07:18:32 Of all the ugly charges and abuses being hurled at the Indian state, this one is the most horrific. And it has not been made by a demented cleric. It has been made by Shabnam Hashmi, the toast of India's English media. In a program on NDTV on September 22, 2008, she actually alleged that the condition of Muslims in India today was like that of Jews in Nazi Germany! Can anything be more incendiary
IT IS INDIA, NOT PAK THAT US NEEDS TO WIN TERROR WAR 2008-09-21 11:55:26 It was always going to happen. America’s war on terror in Afghanistan was never going to be a success with Pakistan as its ally. Perhaps the Americans too knew it. But immediately after 9/11, they had little choice but to co-opt the creator and cradle of Islamic terrorism. Taking on a nuclear powered Pakistan straightaway, before Afghanistan was converted into a firm base from where US troops co
WAR ON TERROR: FIVE WASTED YEARS 2008-09-19 00:26:20 The serial blasts that shook Delhi on September 13, 2008, have finally jolted India’s ‘secular parties’.Laloo Yadav, who till the other day was defending the SIMI, has made a complete ‘U’ turn. He now wants the head of the Home Minister for failing to prevent terror attacks. Mulayam Yadav’s voice, Amar Singh, has suddenly started talking like a statesman by calling for a bipartisan app
BLESSINGS OF THE LEADER, CRIES OF THE LED, CURSES OF THE DEAD 2008-09-17 08:12:49 By now, every kid on the street knows that India has a Home Minister who just does not fit the job. This ‘Clothes Man’ is a far cry from the ‘Iron Man’ that Sardar Vallabhai Patel was as India’s Home Minister. On September 13, immediately after Delhi had been hit by serial blasts, Shivraj Patil was seen calm, unhurried and unruffled at three different places in three different dresses wi
INDIA AND THE US: PARTNERSHIP OR SUBSERVIENCE? 2008-09-15 07:45:58 When India finally got an exclusive waiver from the Nuclear Suppliers Group(NSG) to mark its all but formal entrance into the Nuclear Club, a wave of elation washed over most Indians, particularly because it was perhaps India’s first ever ‘victory’ over the Chinese. Never mind that it was Bush who forcibly pushed it down unwilling Chinese throats; India had something to crow about. The waive
DELHI BLASTS: BLAME PAK, BLAME ISI, GO HOME 2008-09-13 22:10:11 Now it is the turn of Delhi. Five blasts in a span of 45 minutes starting 6:15 PM this evening have claimed 18 lives already, still counting. The usual email of the Indian Mujahideen claiming responsibility for the attack has been received by the police. As per the email, Operation BAD(Bangalore Ahmedabad Delhi) is now complete. The pathetic blame game and talk of ‘intelligence failure’ has a
SARAH PALIN EFFECT: MEN BECOMING "GULLIBLE SHEEP"? 2008-09-13 14:02:44 On August 29, John McCain, the Republican Presidential candidate, stunned everyone by picking Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate. Till that day, very few people outside Alaska had hear of her. But on that day, everyone saw that McCain had picked a stunner. Sarah Palin, is a former beauty queen and was runner up in the Miss Alaska pageant in 1984. In 1988, she worked briefly as a sport
ARUSHI CASE: A DAMNING INDICTMENT OF INVESTIGATIVE AGENCIES 2008-09-13 06:56:35 Just four days back, I had written that the CBI, which had taken over the sensational Arushi murder case and claimed with much fanfare on July 11, 2008, that it had solved the case, was unlikely to file a charge sheet against any of the three accused whom they had arrested. On September 4, Vijay Mandal was granted bail by a court on the ground that the CBI had no proof to name him as an accused. T
IT'S TIME BJP EMBRACED NUCLEAR DEAL 2008-09-11 04:49:49 The BJP is in a terrible bind. Of its own making. It has realised, just too late, that it has committed what may turn out to be it its greatest historical blunder by opposing the Indo-US Nuclear Deal. Dr Manmohan Singh, with a generous push from George Bush, has emerged triumphant as a PM whom the nation can blindly trust. How many Indian leaders would have staked their own chair for the sake of s
MAYA VS SONIA: THE BATTLE FOR UP IS ON 2008-10-14 08:54:48 How important Uttar Pradesh is for the race to Delhi has been graphically demonstrated in the last couple of days. And, once again, Mayawati has trumped Sonia Gandhi. The Congress, BJP and SP, all looking to trip Mayawati in UP, seem actually to have made it a habit to fall into Maya jaal (net) like hypnotised subjects stunned by a magician who is the master of his craft.With general elections aro
STOCK MARKET: BITTER BUTTER OR SWEET SANDESH? 2008-10-12 08:13:40 Some things never change. This is not the first time the stock market has given investors the shock of their lives; nor will it be the last. But, like always, lessons crying to be learnt remain unlearnt by most looking to either beat inflation or achieve financial freedom through the stock market.Wasn't it only a few months back that every one was gung ho about the scorching India story? Weren't m
NANO SEES RED...CARPET IN GUJARAT 2008-10-07 10:46:10 Nano, the world's first $2500 car, does not seem to able to get rid of 'red'. First, Ratan Tata found a home for it in West Bengal, one of two Indian states ruled by communists. For a change, the red brigade rolled out the red carpet for this large capitalist project, thanks solely to the Deng Xiao Ping like Chief Minister of the state, Buddhadev Bhattacharjee.Then, as the project was getting comp
ZARDARI'S PEACE NUKE 2008-10-06 12:51:21 The new President of Pakistan has dropped a nuke. He has, without warning, all but trashed the foundational underpinnings of Pakistan and shocked not just the people of that country but Indians as well.Asif Ali Zardari has told Wall Street Journal columnist Bret Stephens that Islamist groups operating in Kashmir were 'terrorists' and that India has never been a threat to Pakistan! He has also said
SP IN UP: CONGRESS MOVING IN FOR THE KILL? 2008-10-05 13:31:24 In March this year, as the Congress was giving the first signals of falling out with Mayawati and cozying up to Mulayam Yadav's Samajwadi Party(SP) again, I had written that the latter, badly mauled by Mayawati in the assembly elections, would only be too keen to ally with the Congress for the critical number of additional votes needed to get enough MPs into Parliament in the forthcoming elections
SARAH PALIN EFFECT: MEN BECOMING GULLIBLE SHEEP?- 2 2008-10-05 10:18:00 A fortnight back, I had written about the effect that Sarah Palin was having on men, some of whom were becoming “gullible sheep”, quite like what had been found in an unrelated study done by the University of Leuven. Well, it appears that it is not just ordinary men who are falling prey.Even Heads of State are not safe. Of course many of them have perfected the art of concealing their personal
NANO QUITS SINGUR 2008-10-05 10:13:11 Not very long back, Ratan Tata had said in an interview with Barkha Dutt "if someone holds a gun to my head, he has to pull the trigger or move the gun away because I am not going to move my head." As this post is being typed, Ratan Tata speaking at a press conference in Kolkata, has just repeated that statement and said that Mamata Bannerjee has pulled the trigger.It is official now. The Tatas ar
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