Aviation: The Next Scam?

The fake pilot license scam is in the news for some days. News reports suggest that this was possible owing to some crooks in the DGCA itself. That doesn’t surprise anyone. There seems hardly any government department that isn’t enjoying its free run on corruption. That is just about breaking. Sometime in November 2010 neither the media nor the then Aviation Minister, Praful Patel, paid much attention but some passenger groups protested the extra-ordinarily high fares being charged by airlines. Fares between metros went up as high as Rs.20000 to Rs.30000. Praful Patel acted only after flyer groups forced him to.

Now this smoothing talking minister is on record calling Nira Radia an ‘economic terrorist’. This was probably in response to her statements about him in the leaked tapes. And this is what she had said: “But he [Patel] has destroyed the sector.....He’s worked as a minister for Naresh Goyal [Jet Airways] and now Vijay Mallya [Kingfisher]. He cannot brush off this charge”. (From Outlook)

Between Nira Radia and Praful Patel you can decide who you want to trust. That Air India has been bleeding and making severe losses is no big secret. One would have thought the Civil Aviation minister would be very concerned and involved in reversing the loss-making trend of Air India. However, since Vayalar Ravi took over the aviation ministry some news reports make alarming reading indeed.

Here are excerpts from an Outlook magazine (March 28) report which make sorry reading:

Killing the Maharaja gently! (From Hindustan Times)

“As many as 32 routes, many of them believed to be profitable, have been abandoned by the carrier (Air-India) since 2004. (This includes those run by Indian Airlines and Air India, before they were merged in 2007)Union aviation minister Vayalar Ravi confesses his ignorance of why his predecessor, Praful Patel, would have cancelled profitable routes.....” The report also mentions Air India withdrawing from the busy Bangkok and Singapore routes.

Some union members of Air India have also complained of profitable time slots being shifted while private airlines had better and more profitable time slots. So your guess is as good as mine on who eventually benefitted from the profitable routes vacated by Air India. 

In  Good Times

 It seems the opening up of the economy and allowing private enterprise to take up major domains of previously government held businesses is now the primary source of revenue for political coffers. It is just as well that Praful Patel is out of the aviation ministry. 

Whether she is an economic terrorist or not, Nira Radia does have information and insight that enable her to make the statement she made about Praful Patel. The aviation scams may be just starting to take off!

Prime Sinister – Too Low For Zero

I am not talking about the French metal group but the words are from an Elton John song. In my career I have come across many resumes in which an applicant has claimed to be ‘honest, sincere and clean’. My response has always been that being honest, sincere and clean is normal and it doesn’t get anyone a ‘premium’. You do not get a special increment or raise because of honesty or sincerity. So why is it that a lame duck PM gets to hang on to office because of these very personal traits? Along with character there is something called ‘Conscience’. You can read it as conscience or con-science, whichever way suits an office. For consistently heaping corruption on the nation I would think in the PM’s case it would, indeed, be ‘Con-science’!

Manmohan Singh has brought nothing but indignity to the high office of PM. The latest Supreme Court ruling on the appointment of  P.J. Thomas as CVC being illegal is the proverbial last straw for this honest and clean man. No matter who his boss is, no matter what the compulsions of a coalition government, one can still choose to act on one’s conscience. If anything, his conduct increasingly appears to be sinister in the manner in which the corrupt have been shielded.This is not a Prime Minister in office, this is Prime Sinister!

I have often called him a ‘head-in-sand’ PM. And with good reason. There can be no excuse or reason for condoning a string of corrupt practices under his rule. Whatever his loyalty to Sonia Gandhi or Rahul Gandhi he has failed to put the nation first. That’s the least expected of a PM. And these words from the Elton John song seem to reflect his current predicament quite appropriately.

Head-in-sand - Prime Sinister?

I'm too low for zero
I'm on a losing streak
I got myself in a bad patch lately
I can't seem to get much sleep
I'm too low for zero
I wind up counting sheep
Nothing seems to make much sense
It's all just Greek to me...

Manmohan Singh has sunk to such levels of ineptness that he is too low for even zero. He might want to wonder why he even has to be defended so often by tainted Congressmen. It is time he quit honourably and let some one else take charge. I don’t care about his legacy or that of the Congress. He has already earned the title of ‘India’s worst PM’ and there is nothing more to add to his legacy. His leaving might help bring out the truth about all the misdeeds of the UPA.

Mr. Prime Sinister, please leave!

NDTV – We The Poodles: Crime Pays!

'We The Poodles'

It is laughable to watch a tainted journalist strutting around a TV studio asking this question to prominent politicians and citizens. That’s right, Barkha Dutt’s ‘We The People’ on Sunday (February 20) had this very question: “Has the India Story been endangered by Scams or is that too negative a self image”? Imagine discussing the effects and consequences of corruption with someone like A. Raja. Would you? I doubt, but there are prominent journo-politicos like Chandan Mitra and Congressmen like Manish Tiwari who don’t seem to know better.

A few days back NDTV also had another ‘Indian of the year award’. Prominent citizens worthy of many awards, like Sachin Tendulkar and superstar Rajnikanth, were among the recipients. Once again, would you receive an award for honesty from an A. Raja? I admire both Sachin and Rajnikanth but I somehow feel they should avoid awards from the tainted. It is time prominent citizens started sending a clear message to tainted journalists, tainted news channels and the poodles of a corrupt government. Both Sachin and Rajnikanth represent the best of the Indian people and not the ‘negative’ self-image that the scams have brought upon India.

Experience TRUTH?

Corruption and scams by politicians and businessmen are not new to India. They existed since independence and were largely institutionalised by the likes of Indira Gandhi and the Congress. If the recent scams have deflated the Indian spirit and brought in a negative self-image it is largely due to the media scams. People had immense trust in journalists and the news media. It is when the last bastion of ethics and propriety collapsed that people are now stunned and have no one to trust in the public domain.

Of course, there are still many honest and upright journalists who dare to talk facts. But if anything has contributed strongly to denting India’s image it is the news media.

The scams are huge. But if one were to look up news coverage and journals since November 18, 2010 the most talked about corrupt-practices are the ones about the media. Even international journals and websites have discussed Indian media’s corruption extensively. Barkha Dutt being the main focus of most of that coverage. And yet, the gall with she asks such questions seems to be a tradition with NDTV.

The chairman of NDTV, the smooth-talking Prannoy Roy, is sometimes referred to as the father of Indian NewsTV. Some observers have been watching this father quite closely since the Radia tapes broke. Here’s a report from the Indian Express in January 1998:

Indian Express in an article CBI case against Prannoy Roy dated 20 January 1998 reports

"Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) filed a case of criminal conspiracy against New Delhi Television (NDTV) managing director Prannoy Roy, former Director General of Doordarshan and present Chief Executive Officer of Star TV R Basu and five other top officials of Doordarshan.  The First Information Report (FIR) filed on the basis of “source information'' says that the undue favour granted to Prannoy Roy had led to a loss of approximately Rs five crore to Doordarshan. The FIR names Ashok Mansukhani, the then Deputy Director General (DDG) of Doordarshan, Harish Awasthi (DDG), Shiv Sharma, the then Director General (DG), S Kapoor, the then DG, S Krishnan, the then DG, Prannoy Roy, Managing Director NDTV and the television network too  According to the CBI charge-sheet, DD suffered a loss of over Rs 3.52 crore due to the ``undue favours'' shown to NDTV as its programme The World This Week (TWTW) was put in `A' category instead of `special A' category".

Roy (R) - Romancing the Good Times

So the story on Prannoy Roy and NDTV’s romance with corruption and the corrupt doesn’t seem to be something new. One has to wonder what happened to the CBI investigation and who buried it. The case and related reports and developments or its sudden closure is dealt with in great detail on the sites of some media watchers listed below: (and I strongly recommend reading them)

CBI FIR against Prannoy Roy on MediaShame. NDTV & Prannoy Roy – Once upon a time on Zoomindianmedia and CentreRight. I have stated a few times earlier that no matter how much the mainstream media tries to suppress facts and history, it is hard to do so in the tech-age. Is it any surprise that Barkha Dutt dislikes bloggers?

Forget corrupt politician and business men. The only message coming out of tainted journalists and corrupt media channels is: Crime Pays! And to add insult to the injury they will talk about India’s ‘self-image’! “Oh God! What should I tell them”?

Barkha Dutt: Domestic Concerns Are ‘Distractions’

Barkha Dutt feels left out  in the cold. So she writes a piece called ‘When the iron’s cold’ in the Hindustan Times. HT is nearly the mouthpiece of the Congress that hosts people like Barkha Dutt, Vir Sanghvi, Vinod Sharma and, of course, Shobana Bhartiya herself, the Congress MP. 

 Of all the questions that were asked or weren’t asked at the PM’s meet with TV editors she feels “there wasn’t a single question about Pakistan”. Oh yeah? Well, first of all this was a meet with all the TV ‘Editors’ so one has to wonder why Barkha Dutt wasn’t there. Hmmm, that would be like the tainted questioning the tainted, wouldn’t it? And the reason for the missing questions on Pakistan? Well, we are ‘distracted’ by domestic issues! Distracted? Yes, that’s what Barkha Dutt feels about national issues, a distraction where Pakistan is concerned.

NDTV sent in her boss, Prannoy Roy who is not an Editor in the working sense of it. Why didn’t she tutor Prannoy to talk about Pakistan? All that the NDTV boss managed to do at the Press Meet was to deliver a long-winded sermon on ‘incumbency’ and asked if MMS would be a candidate for PM again 2014. That’s how concerned Prannoy was for the nation. In the only chance that he got instead of asking some real and relevant question, you can trust NDTV to ask some silly hypothetical question in the face of burning issues of the day.

And Barkha thinks the absence of questions about ‘Pakistan’ is because of disinterest. First nobody, nobody in the public gives a damn about ‘Pakistan’! The only ones who give a damn and suck up to all kinds of ministers and politicians indulging in the ‘peace’ charade are members of the media. There’s the TOI with Aman Ki Asha and there is Barkha’s obsession with Pakistan. Or should I say media’s obsession with Pakistan. But most of all the suggestion that we are ‘distracted’ by domestic issues and therefore overlooked Pakistan can only come from a very narcissistic view that it was somehow an issue only ‘I could think of and none of those idiots at the press meet’ bothered to think of.  

I, for one, strongly believe Pakistan is the 'Sewer of South Asia' and doesn't merit even the attention our media bestows it. And yes, we can also do without the likes of Rahet Ali Khan, Veena Malik or Adnan Sami. We have an abundance of talent in India, but it's the media that wants these stupid Pakis. Around the time of the PM's press meet guess who Barkha was interviewing? Yes, Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao, and the topic? You guessed it - Pakistan!

Corruption, Black Money, Scams, Tainted judiciary, Corrupt media, near collapse of governance – if all these are ‘domestic distractions’ then the lady seriously needs some help. So, for the benefit of Barkha Dutt I have put up a self-help Narc-chart. Analyze That!

India Undone

I am an admirer of Gurcharan Das’ writings. A marketing expert, a good journalist and an insightful writer. Sometime around 2000 I read his wonderful book ‘India Unbound’ about India’s journey from political independence in 1947 to economic liberation in 1991. The book was written nine years after the economic reforms were started by the Narasimha Rao government. Of course, the Congress and the media have connived to deprive Rao of any credit and continue to tout current PM Manmohan Singh as the architect of reforms. This lie continues to be perpetrated by the media. Gurcharan Das’ book is quite a must read to understand how people of an entrepreneurial nation were shackled by communist tendencies and the licence Raj. The book is a journey of frustration, hope, inspiration and aspirations of a nation. Indians were just about turning the corner.

India Unbound

If one goes back to 1991 it was just about the time when new TV channels, newspapers and magazines started coming into the market, followed by the internet and dot com boom. Coke and Pepsi were back. Star TV, Zee TV were among the first to hog your TV. Since then we now have well over 300 channels, national, regional and local. Even the local cablewallahs ran their own channels. These are just a few examples. Hope floated for millions. IT industry opened up the global age for Indians and talk of India becoming a super-power was being touted. A few years prior to 1991 the Telecom revolution was the first to touch the lives of Indians in every corner of the country. That was a singularly great accomplishment.

Twenty years since the reforms began it now seems that the reforms haven’t dynamically changed lives for most of our common men, women and children. It is hard not to deny that the reforms have led to nothing but crony capitalism. Population explosion, farmer suicides, stock market scams and corruption are the items that make the most headlines. If not these, then it’s the obsession with Cricket and Bollywood though these aren’t harmful in anyway.

The new century is dominated by two significant traits – the sacrifice of ethics and a culture of greed. We have people in politics, business and the media who constantly claim to love India and yet do everything that is anti-Indian. The PM, the leader of the nation, is seen as a wimp who will tolerate anything to merely survive in office. We have an extra-constitutional office called ‘Chairperson of the UPA’ with enormous powers and absolutely no constitutional responsibility.  In the face of dying farmers we have had campaigns like ‘India Shining’ and now in the face of unprecedented corruption we are still running  ‘Incredible India’. The single biggest debilitating crime has to be corruption. Corruption eats away a nation, destroys patriotism, breeds terrorism and destroys the security and defence of the country. And there are media-men like Raghav Bahl who talk of ‘Superpower’ as do many others. 

The media, like Rajdeep Sardesai stated before, is under an illusion that people crave only for sensationalism, cricket and bollywood. A crumbling, deceitful and power-brokering media are sure indications of a banana republic. The number of journals or TV channels owned by politicians is on the rise, particularly in the south. Communist-style propaganda is what our media practices. And to top it all people like Rajdeep Sardesai even blame ordinary people for all the corruption.

I am reminded of a famous scene from the movie ‘The American President’, where in a crisis situation an aide tells the president how people ‘drink sand’:

Presidential aide Lewis Rothschild (Michael J. Fox): You have a deeper love of this country than any man I've ever known. And I want to know what it says to you that in the past seven weeks, 59% of Americans have begun to question your patriotism. They don't have a choice! Bob Rumson is the only one doing the talking! People want leadership, Mr. President, and in the absence of genuine leadership, they'll listen to anyone who steps up to the microphone. They want leadership. They're so thirsty for it they'll crawl through the desert toward a mirage, and when they discover there's no water, they'll drink the sand.

The President (Michael Douglas): Lewis, we've had presidents who were beloved, who couldn't find a coherent sentence with two hands and a flashlight. People don't drink the sand because they're thirsty. They drink the sand because they don't know the difference.

That’s right, a majority of Indian people don’t know the difference Mr. Sardesai and Mr. PM. If they are constantly fed a diet of scams, masala news, false promises and a blatant disregard for the law, they will be tempted to get used to it and drink the sand. Not because it quenches their thirst, but because people in the public domain have fed them nothing else.

Some statistics are daunting. Unemployment has grown from around 6% in 1995 to around 9% in 2010 in the employable workforce. From a ranking of 66/85 in the Corruption Perception Index in 1998, India is now ranked 87/178 countries in 2010. Constantly talking about the GDP growth rate or the boom in the stock markets is the kind of ‘sand in your face’ that hides everything else. Corruption has become the staple diet of all major players in the public domain. There is nowhere for the common man to turn to. This fallen complaint box says it much better than words can.

At this current state of the nation the most important reform required is not in the economic domain. It is our justice system. A revolution is required to modernise and reform our justice system and courts. Freedom and liberty mean nothing when the judiciary has crumbled. The media and those in public life should be clamouring, campaigning and shouting from the rooftops for urgent reform and modernisation of our courts and justice system. This should be the highest priority for the government.

We will now have over a month of Cricket to put everything else on a back burner. You can rest assured our media will faithfully splurge on the big bucks of Cricket. It could also well be a much desired respite for the UPA government from all the scam and corruption charges. And at the end of the tournament we can get back to where we were. It may not be long before Gurcharan Das is forced to write a sequel to his book I referred earlier. 

This time I have chosen the title for him – ‘India Undone’!