We Are Finally Americans

Many years back an overseas friend told me that what struck him in India was the lack of overseas brands at airports, railways stations, street... India had cafes' soaps, detergents, shampoos, refrigerator etc.... but most of them were Indian brands... This he said was unlike any other place that he had visited, where American brands were prominent. Since my life ran parallel with the Licence Permit Raj, I felt proud at the observation. But that was then.... Now American brands are everywhere, afterall we are strategic partners which means differnt things to Kapil Sibal, Sitaram Yechury, Pranab Mukherjee, George Bush and Strobe Talbott... never mind. But the Americanisation of India is happening quietly but most certainly. Our business leaders who till the 1990s went to UK to watch wimbledon and strike business partnership have forgotten London and are flying off to Connecticut, Texas, Seattle and California. Ratan Tata, Anand Mahindra, Rahul Bajaj and Jamshed Godrej, Gurcharan Das. Asim Ghosh all US educated CEOs of the older generation are trying to keep pace with the much younger harvard and wharton returned CEOs in keeping up ties with US. Our youngsters, especially of the BPO and software industry variety are geographically separeated Americans [Gurgaon and Bangalore can be the 51st and 52nd states of the Union including the wild west spirit]. Our babies are brought up on a strong does of barbie and American cartoons. Our elders too are getting exposed to small town US through their migrant children mostly as baby sitters... We are all exposed and there is no escape.
Yet, we are fiercely Indian and would baulk at the thought of turning into Americans. How long can this process go on till we can definitely say that India as a nation has become Americanised? There is no definite answer: perhaps if the nuclear deal is signed; perhaps we start making films only for our brothers and sisters in the US, perhaphs when all the fortune 500 companies have back offices in India; or perhaps when there is a McDonald in Purnea[my place of birth?
So far as I am concerned, we have already become Americans as a nation in the last fortnight or so. This has happened with the launch of IPL or Indian Premium League. Please do not laugh.... We had taken the game of cricket from our rulers and turned it into our own and now we have given it away to our newly made American friends. I contend that IPL has very little to do with cricket so please do not spend time discussing whether 20 overs is good or not. It is just a mixture or fusion of Baseball and American Football adapted to Indian conditions including the cheerleaders, the dress, the agression, the money and the teamowners.. There is very little of cricket in it.
We have finally beocme Americans... Mr Yechury you do not stand a chance here.....
Cheers to the Cheerleaders:)

Flyovers are Chasing Me!

I just realised that I had almost half my adult life in Delhi and hold a Delhi passport. By Delhi standards, where you will hardly find a third generation Delhi-ite of my age, I am truly a son of teh soil and a true son, I really love my city fo reasons I am never tired of narrating to a patient listener.
Of late, however, my patience is wearing thin, not because of anythng else but because of the fact that I am now being chased by flyovers all across the city. It began way back in 200o when I went to live in nearly godforsaken East Delhi soon after the construction of the Nizamudding Bridge that connected Delhi with east Delhi. I was confident that in the next decade no new civil construction was doing to be take place in my locality. To my surprise, soon after the work started on a clover leaf flyover connecting various parts of east delhi to various other parts of east delhi and NOIDA, thankfully, Delhi contractors try and finish their work faster than elsewhere, but I had such night mares travelling that I left the place before the complicated flyover was completed.
I moved to what is known as south delhi in an older area and thought now this is the ideal place there is no scope for any contruction here everything has been done... I could not have been more mistaken..... They actually started working on one of the longest flyover in Delhi connecitng Lajpatnagar to Ashram chowk right at my backyard. I maintained my calm. Then they started builing an underpass over which was a road as well as a flyover. An underpass seem impossible there.... I remained calm, then they started repairing the old flyover across Moolchand to Defence Colony, builing gteh now infamous BRT, I was still with the planners firmly believing that this was for my good. In between, they dug up the roads on both sides of my house and buried the till now dry sarita vihar pipeline [the pies were about 8 feet in diameter. The last straw came 15 days back when they blocked the main road in front of my house to begin construction of over head metro lines...
I can;t sleep at night these days.... I dream of jams, pile drivers, diversons, pillars falling on my head.. I am traumatised. I am staying put in the hope that in my lifetime things will improve.
By the way, I think I am a good omen for you if you live in a locality where people are fighting to get flyovers, unerpasses, metro, waterworks, drainage systems, electricity: anything that can disrupt settled life done.. .So do please invite me to stay in your area. if you do not believe me hear this out: Two years that I was in Mumbai, the entire length of pavement from the city to Dadar was relaid and the work started on the airport flyover.

It's Politics Stupid!

It is fashionable to say following our liberalisation gurus in the US and Western Europe that politics should be separated from Economics. This coming from countries how have in the last 1000 years not been able to separate politics from religion sounds specious, but we shall let it pass for now. Following the dictum of separation of politics and economy many Indians who love the way things have turned out for them including myself, would like to believe that since 1991 politics has been somewhat separated from economics. Any government who has come to power since then has followed a smiliar line [if not in practice at least in preaching] of economic development.
Carrying on this trend of separation [separation of executive from judiciary, religion from politics and economics from everything else] further and separate politics from sports? I know most of us are slightly jealous of or threatened by China but this does not mean that we should try hard and screw up the Olympics, like the US and USSR did in the 1980s [I thought Cold War was over]
President Bush, President Sarkozy have been politicking against the Olympics really hard, not so much against the Olympics but against. And their feelings are being echoed by many others in that country. Ohterwise, one cannot account for so many Tibetan supporters in France and in the US. In normal times you do not see these countries or their leaders making too much noise for the Tibetans...
Of course, the fever has caught up in India also. First it was Baichung Bhutia declining to carry the torch, then it was Aamit Khan giving a confused reply and now it is Kiran Bedi who has declined [does not want to be carried in a cage] Who are these people in any case and what is their claim on carrying the torch? Why has the IOC approached them to carry the torch? The mind boggles.... Why can't we get a few former olympias to carry the torch? Why can't the government come out in the open and say they would like to see politics and sports clearly separated and make sure that the torch is carried safely to China?
There is a bengali proverb which says that when the elepehant is stuck in the mud even the toad kicks him... this is what is happening to China now... but remember the elephant ultimatley get out of the mud...
It is time that we stood up for the cause of sports and separated it from politics before we talk of separating sports from politics...