Insightful newsletter of Drishtikone: Issue #191 - Bringing down a Giant
Sometimes sheer chutzpah and self-belief can propel a young kid who has been cornered, to bring down the high and mighty. How Mahalanobis, the Indian planning architect, was demolished is legendary!
Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash
“To sell your soul is the easiest thing in the world. That's what everybody does every hour of his life. If I asked you to keep your soul - would you understand why that's much harder?” ― Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead
It is so easy to do the work like everyone else and seek safety. It takes a lot of courage and commitment to take on responsibilities and commit to quality even when you think no one is looking.
We write this newsletter daily with a lot of commitment to quality and serious work. Bringing insights that no one else is even looking at. Not because we are special. But because we do not respond to the forces that bind others.
When you look at things just your way without any compromise then things happen. Sometimes even legends can come down. Some quirky folks, the greats that our society has produced have had such an effect on others. And, society will be enriched because of their work.
Self-praise for Drishtikone
Almost 20 days back, when Mumbai High Court had denied bail to Arnab Goswami, we had written a piece where we cited Justice Krishna Iyer and his landmark statement “Bail is the rule, Jail is an exception.” (Insightful newsletter of Drishtikone: Issue #177 - Bail is the Rule, Jail is an Exception!)
Yesterday, Justice Chandrachud gave a scathing reprimand to the Mumbai High Court. And, he used the EXACT same argument.
“There was a rule established by Justice Krishna Iyer which was “bail is rule and jail is exception.” High Courts get burdened. Chances of incarceration is huge and the accused languishes as undertrial,” Justice Chandrachud added while giving reasons for granting bail to Arnab Goswami. (Source)
Justice Chandrachud gave a masterclass in personal liberty and the role of the High Courts to Bombay High Court judges who the Supreme Court avered abdicated its responsibility.
“The Bombay High Court abdicated its constitutional duty as protector of liberty by failing to take prima facie view of the FIR, the SC noted.” (Source)
Here are some of the quotes from Justice Chandrachud. (Source)
The Chief Justice of every HC should utilise the data to ensure equitable access to justice. Liberty is not a gift for the few.
We have given expression to our anguish in the case where the citizen has approached the Court.
We have also added a section on Human Liberty and role of Courts. Section 482 recognizes powers of the HC to give effect to other provisions of CrPC.
Courts be alive to the misuse of the provisions which obstruct liberty. Liberty across human eras is as tenuous as tenuous can be. Liberty is a casualty when one of these provisions are found wanting.
The Court would be abdicating its role as a Constitution Court if it does not aid a citizen who knocks on its door for protection from violation of fundamental rights.
Deprivation of Liberty for a single day is a day too many.
The remedy of bail is a solemn expression of humaneness in the justice system. We have given expression to our anguish in the case where the citizen has approached the Court.
Now, as much as we are proud of the quality, seriousness, and research in our newsletter, we have been shocked that no one in any media commentary ever looked at the Bombay High Court judgment with the lens that was laid down by Justice Iyer. A dictum that should have been the bedrock of the Indian judicial system.
How is it that everyone missed it? And, we are not even legal experts. So, that says a lot about the rest of the media in the country, doesn’t it?
How the Leftist Economic fake ‘giant’ was brought down by a 19-year-old
In his book, Reset, Dr. Subramanium Swamy discusses the history of India’s economy and where it went wrong.
He discusses, for instance, that the British colonial masters had a tax regime towards agriculture that was exploitative and led to a decline in the yield per acre of foodgrains. This led to a lower level of living. Chinese society, on the other hand, saw no such decline. IN 1870, the per capita grain output for China and India was almost on par. But by 1952, China’s output was 2.4 times that of India.
Agriculture should have been the focus of Indian planners at the time of independence. Which never happened.
Swamy blames Nehru and his advisors. Specifically, PC Mahalanobis, whom he characterizes as one with ‘limited knowledge of economics’ and credits him with pushing an economic policy ‘bereft of reality’.
China, in that decade, was much better positioned, to push for industrialization, than India, because its agriculture was not as comprehensively devastated as India’s.
India’s failure was to adopt the Soviet model without first setting its agriculture right.
The sway of the Soviet model on India’s ruling class, per Swamy, has a history.
Soviet propaganda about the success of their economic model in the 1930s was very readily lapped up by some of the Western intellectuals and their Indian underlings. The Indian elite pursuing Oxbridge degrees were primarily from the rich landowners class.
Swamy asserts that most of the Indian students who got recruited into the Left movement in Britain were from the rich landowning and comprador class.
They had a vested interest in the adoption of the Soviet model where the state is the main administrator. As these same classes were ruling at the helm, the usurping of resources and power by the state essentially meant little loss for these classes, while masquerading as a moral struggle.
The intertwined families and power equations along with the leftist influence due to Soviet sway in British Universities where these elites were brainwashed meant that the Indian intellectual class became a target and a purveyor of Leftist ways.
Even though the Zamindari system was gone, the power wasn’t.
Anyone who didn’t agree to the diktats of this class and deify the Soviet model was beaten down as a crank. Swamy cites the examples of Charan Singh and C. Rajagopalachari.
Subramanium Swamy has had a long history of confrontation with the Nehruvian model of 5-year plans.
When the young Swamy joined the famous Indian Statistical Institute for his Masters, the institute was headed by world-famous Professor Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis (PCM). For some reason, PCM developed a strong dislike for Swamy. Something that percolated to the rest of the staff as well. They started belittling him and failing him in subjects.
Mahalanobis was, as Swamy says, the “darling of the Left, USSR and Nehru”.
But Swamy wasn’t the one to just give in so easily. That was the beginning of his credo “I give as good as I get.”
He says that he parked himself in the library and read everything that Mahalanobis had written. And, to his astonishment found that Mahalanobis’ 2nd Five Year Plan was simply a copy-paste of Grigory Feldman’s Soviet Growth Model written in the 1920s. And, Mahalanobis had shamelessly plagiarized Feldman’s work without giving him any credit.
This was passed off as the Mahalanobis Growth Model and adopted into the Indian Five Year Plans.
He then set about tearing down the reputation of the great-small ultra Leftist man who had been hoisted on India by the Soviets and against whom no one in the press would dare to write.
So Subramanium Swamy set about writing a critique (Source) of Mahalanobis’ magnum Opus on “Fractile Analysis.”
He sent it to the journal which had published the original article from Mahalanobis. The journal asked him for a rejoinder, to clarify the charge of plagiarism. He had no answer.
And, he demolished the entire reputation of the legend of Indian Five Year Planning globally.
Thereafter, Mahalanobis lost all funding for his research work from abroad, and collaborations with professors at the top universities worldwide.
The journal also withdrew the original article exposing the ISI Chief’s plagiarism.
Meanwhile, Harvard University took note of his work. They were intrigued by a 19-year-old writing complex mathematical equations. He was offered a scholarship for a Ph.D. course in Economics at Harvard.
Thus Swamy saved his career and demolished that of the greatest name (carefully crafted by the Leftists and Nehruvians) in Indian economics in modern times.
suicide-terror, masochism, and pan-Islamic sentiments
From Tipu Sultan inviting the King of Afghanistan to invade India to Farooq Abdullah’s invitation to China to rule in Kashmir recently - treason that opens the doors of India to foreign attack has been the hallmark of certain forces.
“Today Kashmiris do not feel Indian and do not want to be Indian. They are slaves. They would rather have the Chinese rule them,” he said in an interview to veteran journalist and television commentator Karan Thapar. (Source)
When the idea of Pan-Islamic allegiances runs stronger than respect for the security of one’s own nation, then invitations to terrorists, invaders, and plunderers are a natural consequence.
Something similar is being now witnessed in Mangalore.
Problem is that people do not ask the questions that need to be asked. The belief systems which have started from outside India and have a global affiliation tend to tear apart the loyalties and even sensitivities of many of its adherents. The fanaticism that sees suicide and masochism in the path of installing one’s belief ahead of everything else has consequences.
Prayers, calls, and edicts urge the adherents to an exclusive society where only one narrative rules. And, that is taken as an article of faith. Once it has been perched on the mantle of faith’s central precepts, then anyone as much as questioning it is targeted by the many without pausing for a sanity check.
To understand this, please listen to this role-play by the String team to bring out something that no moderate talks about, forget criticize and argue against in his place of worship, and every radical swears by.
The larger eco-system tries to silence criticism and whitewash acts of terror and even genocide when the radical Islamic elements are involved. Vivek Agnihotri shares something very disturbing in this brilliant expose of how Terrorism is perpetrated in India.
The only reason why the moderate Muslims in Indian society, except a few (who are derided by their community anyway), do not even bring up these things is that their allegiance to the pan-Islamic code is stronger than the good of their own society.
And, while the pan-Islamic oriented protect the code, people from other faiths are coopted in the name of humanity and rights. That latter part is the leftist credo.
To break any modern society, that is why the Islamist-Leftist combination has been so lethal.
market corner - 10 quick bytes
Lakshmi Vilas Bank becomes DBS India; 94-year old bank part of history now - more
Max Life hired 2000 executives by digitizing its recruitment and onboarding process - more
Forex reserves climb $2.518 billion to record $575.29 billion - more
Nitin Gadkari says MSMEs will contribute 30-40% to India's GDP in next 5 years - more
IRDAI approval for ICICI Lombard to acquire Bharti AXA General Insurance - more
Q2 GDP data: Manufacturing enters the positive zone, construction continues to see contraction - more
72% bullet train contracts for Indian cos; Japanese firms limited to telecom, signaling works: Railways - more
Citibank report titled ‘Bitcoin: 21st Century Gold’ said the price of the bitcoin could hit the $3,18,000 mark by December 2021. This will mean a 19-times growth from the current level of around $17,000 - more
Gold jewelry demand to decline 35% in FY21: ICRA - more
Flipkart and Amazon corner 88% share of festive online sales - more
nota bene
India ties with Russian vaccine also: India will produce over 100 million doses a year of Russia’s coronavirus disease (Covid-19) vaccine Sputnik V beginning 2021 following an agreement between the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) and Hyderabad-based Hetero Biopharma (Source)
Loan Moratorium by Supreme Court: The Supreme Court on Friday heard petitions seeking interest waiver during the loan moratorium period. A bench headed by Justice Ashok Bhushan said the COVID-19 pandemic has not only caused a serious threat to the health of the people but has also cast its shadow on the economic growth of the country along with other countries of the world. (Source)
Iranian Nuke Scientist Assassinated: Iran's most senior nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh has been assassinated near the capital Tehran, the country's defense ministry has confirmed. Fakhrizadeh died in hospital after an attack in Absard, in Damavand county. Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, has condemned the killing "as an act of state terror". (Source)
The vaccine in Black?: Fears of the black market in COVID vaccine rise in China (Source)
Fears of Office: Around 83 percent of employees in India are still nervous about going back to the office as there is no vaccine, according to a survey by IT company Atlassian. (Source)
when two Enlightened Beings meet
The idea of death and enlightenment have a strong relationship. Arjun got his initiation on the battle-field by Krishna. The pan-pyaaras of Guru Gobind Singh also went into the tent knowing that they are meeting their death and emerged as enlightened beings.
Here Sadhguru shares a very interesting story of how he met a resplendent enlightened being in a farmer’s market in Bangalore. Worth listening to.
Today’s ONLINE PAPER
Check out today’s “The Drishtikone Daily” edition.
Support Drishtikone
If you consider our work important and enriching and would like to contribute to our expenses, please click on the button below to go to the page to send in your contribution. You can select the currency (for example, INR or USD, etc) and the amount you would like to contribute.
If you like this post - please share it with someone who will appreciate the information shared in this edition -
If you like our newsletter, please share it with your friends and family -