Is India a Democratic Country?

I’ve asked this question to myself several times in my life. We Indians claim that we are the largest democracy in the world. Of course that is true but…

Compared to many other countries in the world, we can very well say that India is a democracy. But if you closely follow the day to day happenings in India, you will be a bit confused. Then this question arises in your mind.

The word Democracy is derived from Greek which means ‘rule of the people’. The most important aspects of democracy are equality and freedom. But the latter is being misused by a large section of people. Now in India, people with money and power can do almost anything. Money and power are very much related. If you have one, the other will come automatically. If you have both, you are the king. For those who don’t have both, making money will be the easiest way to become a king. So naturally people will have a passion towards money. When this passion becomes an obsession, it becomes dangerous. Political parties exploit this passion of people towards money to its fullest. This is the main reason for the spontaneous increase of gundas in the recent times.

We are now living in a society where freedom of speech is limited to a smaller section of people. But we claim that each one of us have this. Yes each one of us have the right to express our opinion and thoughts in a sincere way but at the risk of our precious life. The values of democracy are shattered by our own people. They don’t understand the importance of democracy. Humans will realize the value of something only when they are deprived of it. If we Indians are to realize the value of democracy, they should be deprived of it. In my opinion we should have an autocratic rule here also for at least one year (the rules should be tougher than that in Saudi Arabia, which is a Monarchy). If the ruler is good, Autocracy is better than Indian Democracy.

If the mentality of Indians does not change, we are going to reach nowhere in 2020.

Is India Really Shining?

Despite the tide of global recession, India registered a growth rate of 6.7% during the previous fiscal and is expecting a growth rate of over 7% during the current fiscal. Indian economy is the second fastest growing economy in the world. But does that really mean India is shining???


The per capita income of India is estimated at `40,141 during 2008-2009. This does not mean that every Indian earns at least this much amount every year. There are quite a few number of people who earns well below this amount. According to the surveys conducted by various organizations, there are people who earn less than `100 a day. The standard of living of poor people is not increasing accordingly to the increase in GDP. The increase in GDP is contributed to the fact that wealth is being accumulated on to the hands of the rich. This situation should change in order to achieve overall development. The Government of India along with The Reserve Bank of India can play a very important role to achieve this. Instead of going after the growth rate, the government should try to bridge the gap between the rich and the poor. Then automatically the other things will come in our favour.


Indian financial system is very robust, functioning under the strict guidelines of the RBI and the government. This is one of the main reason why Indian banks have not collapsed during the economic turmoil which affected major economies of the world. The government should also be able to leverage this to the development of its people, especially the poor.


The food price inflation in India is remaining as high as over 17% for the past few weeks. Inflation based on Wholesale Price Index in January is 8.56%. How can a fixed income earning Indian citizen cope up with this high inflation? Almost impossible. There is no wonder why people turn into naxals. A very low or negative inflation is also not good for a healthy economy. The government should try to contain the inflation between 3 to 5 percent. This is not an easy task. To achieve this, corruption and hoarding should be completely erased from the Indian soil. According to the study conducted by Transparency International, India is placed at 84th position w.r.t Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI). India has a CPI value of 3.4 out of 10 in the year 2009, where a higher value denotes less corruption. New Zealand is the country with least corruption (CPI 9.4). But it is encouraging that the CPI for India is consistently increasing according to the surveys. Hoarding is also a major factor for the rising food price inflation. In order to stop hoarding, we should stop corruption first. Those officials who support hoarding should be punished.


The Union Budget presented by the Finance Minister in the Parliament recently has a number of good propositions which are overshadowed by the move to increase excise and customs duty for petroleum products. This will make the life of ordinary people more miserable who are already suffering due to high inflation. The firm stand by the PM and FM on this issue is very disappointing for the ‘aam aadmi’. Though they calculate that this move will not increase the inflation greatly, a slight increase may affect the ordinary people. The Ministers and political leaders will not feel much difference because they are living at the expense of the people.


India is one of the wealthiest countries of the world in terms of human resource. But are we able to leverage this advantage to its fullest??? The answer would be a big no. The government should take initiative to make India investor friendly in order to exploit this advantage. The Central Government along with various State Governments can do a lot more to make India really shining.

കേരളം – ദൈവത്തി‍‌‌‌‌‍‍ന്‍റെ സ്വന്തം നാട്

Kerala, popularly known as ‘God’s Own Country’, is one of the beautiful states of India with almost 100% literacy. If you travel through the interiors of Kerala, you can understand that the epithet ‘God’s Own Country’ is well deserved. The backwaters are one of the greatest attractions in Kerala. A journey through these backwaters not only calms your mind but also is a lifetime experience. Kerala was selected by the National Geographic Traveller as one of the 50 destinations of a lifetime and one of the thirteen paradises in the world.
Kerala is having a very favorable climate for agriculture (or rather I should say that Kerala was having because these days the climate in Kerala is very much unpredictable). There are acres of farm land which are left uncultivated throughout Kerala. Keralites depend on other states (where the climate is not as favorable) for almost all food items including fruits and vegetables despite the favorable conditions prevailing here. One of the major reason for this is labor problem. There has been an incident where farmers were forced to bring machines for harvesting their fields because of shortage of labor. But they were not able to harvest because of the intervention by trade unions (who claim to represent the working section of people but I cannot believe this because of various reasons). Because of this, many acres of cultivated land were left unharvested resulting in the loss of crores of rupees for the farmers and to the government.
Infrastructure development is considered as the building block for every other development. One of the main aspects of infrastructure development is the availability of road and rail networks. I think Kerala is blessed with road networks. Kerala may be having the highest density of road networks per square kilometer. But are these roads safe for travel??? The recent gas tanker accident on one of Kerala’s busiest roads points to this fact. Will a huge tanker turn upside down by just hitting a small car??? It is just unbelievable. There has been a demand for an express highway in Kerala for quite some time. But before going into such big projects, the government should make the existing roads safe for travel. Just take as an example the pathetic situation of the M.G Road running in front of Kerala’s prestigious Secretariat and Legislative Assembly. This is not only because of the policies of the government that these roads are remaining like this but also because of the people of Kerala. If the situation of a road in the capital city is like this, then one can imagine the condition of roads in other parts of Kerala (I’m not saying that all roads are like this. There are good roads in Kerala).
What is the time frame for completing a project in Kerala??? The answer would be interesting – ‘n’ multiplied by the average time needed to complete that project, where n>=2. Every body knows the minimum value for n but nobody knows the actual value. Yet another Aryabhata or Brahmagupta has to be born in Kerala to find its value. The number of projects in pipeline or in progress (and would remain in progress for n years) are more than the number of completed projects. The Vizhinjam project, Smart City project, Vallarpadam project, Railway Coach Factory, IIT, Kuttanad package, NH development project, MC Road development project… the list goes on… Both Central and State Governments, along with various political parties share equal responsibility for this.
So who are the anti-heroes here??? I should say that they are none other than the people of Kerala. That is why I’m forced to add a few words to the epithet for Kerala – ‘God’s Own Country and Devil’s Own People’. And the greatest irony is I’m one among them!!!

Proud to be an Indian

The month of January creates an aura of patriotism as Republic Day of India falls in this month. It was on 26th January, 1950 that Republic of India was formed and the Constitution of India came into force. Republic Day is celebrated with much enthusiasm throughout the country. Despite being the most populous democracy in the world, it is also a country which is blessed with different religions, societies, cultures and languages, all interplaying with each other in harmony. Being an Indian, feel proud of our rich culture, languages, dialects, traditions, customs and religions that makes India a marvellous multi-cultural country.

Being patriotic does not mean that we should hate other nations. A true patriot should be able to respect the cultures and feelings of others. While being at school, we all have taken the pledge to treat everyone with courtesy. But actually how many of us are following it???

People who have a different dialect or different culture are yelling for a separate state for them. But at this point, we should understand one thing - India is a republic consisting of 28 states and seven union territories with a parliamentary system of democracy. But have you ever thought why The Republic of India was divided into these 28 states and seven union territories? It is for the ease of governance. The government can reach the people more effectively if the state is a smaller one but it does not mean that we should divide our motherland into smaller pieces. The states should not be too large or too small. After the creation of three new states recently, statistics have shown that their contribution towards our GDP has increased. This clearly shows that states should be small enough so that developments can be done in a much faster way.

The way in which people express their desire for a new state is pathetic, I should say. After all we all are Indians. We have a rich heritage. We should not respond like this. I should also say that one of the moves made by The Government of India was a hasty decision which made the situation even more worse. Those who are holding respectable positions should understand that we are a multi-cultural country. Some people will respond favorably for your decisions while some others do not. So they should be very careful while taking any decision especially in sensitive matters.

In this Republic Day, we can take a pledge that we'll stand united despite all the differences in opinion. Everybody should always remember that, 'United We Stand, Divided We Fall'.

All these are my opinion. Please feel free to correct me or add something extra.

JAI HIND.