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Democracy and the Corporation
Corporations run our world and so it’s no use talking about democracy, equality, human dignity and freedom when none of these are corporate values. Corporations are and promote autocracy, blind followership, and conformity while talking about the importance of freedom, dissent and innovativeness. Thereby they also promote and reward hypocrisy. If the world is to…
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Become a rock in the foundation
I want to begin by saying that today I am truly proud that my nation, India, is still a democracy and that we the people of India are people with courage and the willingness to stand up for each other. Frankly, going by our recent history and the rapid polarization of our society and proliferation…
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What’s your Worth?
I am not against economic development. I am against giving it precedence over honor, truthfulness and integrity. After all, if we do that, then what’s wrong with drug dealing, stealing, bribing, human trafficking and a plethora of ways to make money? It is only truthfulness, the sense of right and wrong, virtue and sin that…
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Learning from Life – Morsi
This is my attempt at trying to learn some lessons from history. Let me warn you in advance that if any analysis is to make meaning or prove useful, it must be divorced from emotion. I know that many of my readers, indeed I myself, can think of many excuses for what Morsi did and…
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Democracy and Islam
A party is elected not by the majority of the population of the country but by the majority of those who cast their vote. If you don’t vote, then don’t blame anyone else for the result. You are responsible, and you will pay the price.
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Strategic advice to Indians in South Africa
In 2005, I wrote an article titled, ‘State of the Nation’, after a trip to South Africa at the invitation of the Jamiat ul Ulama where I met and addressed hundreds (perhaps over a thousand or more in total) of Ulama, businessmen, scholars, teachers and parents in Johannesburg, Cape Town and Durban. I also…
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Dhan ki Baat
I read this article with great interest. http://epaper.newindianexpress.com/c/21887818 The final sentence is salutary. I want to add that whether governments or judges guard or curtail rights will depend on what we, the people, do about it. Active citizenship is not something that we are used to. We are still used to being the ‘ruled’, looking…
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Anesthetized anarchy
We, in India, are living in a state of anesthetized anarchy. We seem to have lost it in more ways than one. In the days of the sabretooth tiger mankind needed to be totally in touch with reality if it wished to avoid being the tiger’s next meal. Since we made the STT extinct we…
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Close Encounters of the Terminal Kind
Ralph Chaplin said: “Mourn not the dead that in the cool earth lie, but rather mourn the apathetic throng, the coward and the meek who see the world’s great anguish and its wrong but dare not speak.” A friend asked me for my opinion about the Bhopal ‘encounter’ which is in the news at present…
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When the voiceless get a voice
If there’s one overwhelming sign that numbers mean nothing and organization means everything, it is the plight of Dalits and Muslims in India. Dalits and Muslims are officially 17% and 13% of the population. That means that together one in three Indians is a ‘Dalim’ – Dalit Indian Muslim (my coinage today – in case…