VOX POPULI
by
S Kamat
as
Aam Admi
Contents:
1. Supreme Court Is Wrong In Allowing Women Between The Age Of 10-50 Years Into
The Sabarimalai Temple
2. Who's Communal - BJP or Congress?
3. Winning The No-Confidence Motion By The Opposition
4. Do Not Keep Adding People In Government
5. Modi's Acche Din In Dreams Only
6. Investigate Formalin Issue Thoroughly To Make Fish Edible In Goa
7. Parrikar's Dilemma
8. Is There A Deal Within A Deal For Mallya, Nirav Modi & Choksi?
Supreme Court Is Wrong In Allowing Women Between The Age Of 10-50 Years Into The
Sabarimalai Temple
The recent decision by the Supreme Court in allowing women of all ages on the basis of an equity with men into the Sabarimalai Temple is wrong. In matters of faith jurisprudence has no place and the courts and the judges should not interfere. This is being stated with no intention to be disrespectful to the judges including that of the Supreme Court who delivered the above judgment. The courts decide on matters put before them on the basis of the arguments put forward by opposing counsel and on the basis of their knowledge and existing precedents. In matters relating to faith in places of worship, this process is deficient since there is a broader aspect than what is presented by the various persons involved. The knowledge of the judges may also not cover the aspects that are brought out by the particular issue. In the matter at hand it was brought to the knowledge of the courts that the particular deity at the Sabarimalai Temple, Lord Ayyappan is a bachelor and to respect that status women between the ages of 10 - 50 be barred from entry. Also women who are menstruating are considered impure to participate in any Hindu religious ritual. It is not that they are excluded but they actually abstain from the religious ritual for the greater good of their families. Once their menstrual cycle is over they can participate in the rituals and then there is no discrimination. For the Sabarimalai Temple, there is also a purification period of 41 days that needs to be undergone by the visiting devotees which has been followed for generations and there is no necessity of this to be questioned since it is a matter of faith and is voluntary. It is not that this period has been made out to specifically exclude women from visiting the temple as it was made out in the Supreme Court judgment. Any of the arguments that we make to defend excluding women in the age group of 10 - 50 from entering the temple may be deficient because of our own limitations and could have been also related to the remote location of the temple and access to it in olden times may have been difficult or it could have been for the protection of women not to be caught in the multitudes of menfolk who throng the temple for the limited period it is kept open. It is also possible that those who formulated this regulation may have had greater knowledge about the matter and who unfortunately are not there to defend the matter. It is a known fact that as we are progressing through time as we see around us wisdom is depleting which could be another of the limitations that we have to defend the regulation. Thus as said earlier when it comes to matters of faith the courts should not interfere. Just to give an example and this is not to bring an inter-religious dimension to this issue but based on pure and simple logic. In the Christian faith the ordaining of saints is dependent on a certain number of miracles that the particular saint should have performed in the person's lifetime or after their death. These miracles are greatly suspect and will not stand the test that rationalists will put them to or those who are against superstition. So will the Supreme Court entertain a case if some lay person brings a case against naming a particular saint? Obviously not since it is a matter of religious faith for the particular community and supported by their internal institutionalised ordainment procedure. Another aspect related to this matter is that nowadays there are people who seek publicity for no reason except to satisfy their bloated egos. Thus in the matter of this judgment it can be said that the Supreme Court is pandering to these misguided and deviant elements within our society who take pleasure in bringing down established practices. The Supreme Court should have therefore recused themselves from this particular matter and referred it, if it so wished, to a panel of Hindu seers who would be better placed and be more competent to decide on the matter. Lately the Supreme Court has been a touch over-enthusiastic in taking up matters which may not necessarily be in their domain taking advantage of which there are petitioners who file cases in the hope of getting a judgment which makes the matter beyond the reach of any argument. The Supreme Court needs to be wary of such tendencies. A case in point of equivalence that can be cited is that the Mumbai High Court lately has been asking why so many abortion cases are coming to it since maybe i5 was more generous with its judgments in earlier cases.
Who's Communal - BJP or Congress?
Recently 2 Cabinet Ministers from the BJP have called the Congress party communal. This is clearly a case of the pot calling the kettle black. One of the Ministers has gone further and said that leading up to the 2019 General Elections the Congress party will play the communal card. It should not be that the BJP playing the game by using the aggressive posture of calling others what it actually is, deal out the first strike card by inciting communal riots. If you track the riots from near the turn of this century, there were the 1984 anti-Sikh riots and then 18 years later we had the 2002 Gujarat riots, so going by that chronology 2020 should be our date for the next major communal conflagration. It can be assumed that here is no harm if in the interest of the General Elections this event is preponed by a year or two to serve the agenda of either political party.
Winning The No-Confidence Motion By The Opposition
The way for the joint Opposition to win the the No-Confidence Motion that Parliament will be seized with tomorrow, Friday, 20th July 2018 is to get the disgruntled BJP MP's to abstain in the vote. At various times during the last couple of months it has been said that 50% of the sitting BJP MP's are not likely to get nominations in the upcoming General Elections and out of that some 50-60 from U.P alone. What the Congress and other Opposition parties supporting the No-Confidence Motion have to do is to persuade these MP's to go against the Whip that BJP will Issue and either stay away from Parliament tomorrow on some pretext or other or simply abstain at the t8me of voting. Voice vote or voting by show of hands should be avoided and electronic voting should be used. Postscript: On the night of 20th July 2018 what had to happen, happened in the Indian Parliament and the Opposition lost the vote-of-confidence by 325 - 126 to the BJP-led NDA Government.
Do Not Keep Adding People In Government
The issue of employment in government keeps coming back all the time in Goa. On the one hand it is clear that the government in Goa is overstaffed. Sometime back when the papers had done a survey it was found that one out of every 15-20 Goans works in the government or putting it another way almost every single family in Goa has at least one person working in government. So why does the government keep on recruiting people? The CM himself has said that some 1000-1200 government jobs will be advertised in Aug - Sept 2018. Is this required? Why do they not re-deploy the surplus they have in overstaffed departments to others where people are needed? At the clerical level such re-deployment should be possible since specialised skills like for technical jobs are not required. Thus the new jobs could be held back to see if existing employees can be moved around. This is particular true in the context of the DDSSY scheme where the government proposes to run it & the newspapers indicated that there may be some hiring of people necessary for that. Not only that for any work that we see it is said that it has been given to consultants. Like for instance the survey of solid waste being generated across Goa to decide upon a plan for disposal of this. Do we need a consultant for this? Can the Solid Waste Corporation personnel in association with the PWD not handle this? The approach should not be to have government employees idling and all work passed on to outside consultants. It is important as we go along that the size of the government should be reduced which in turn will result in reduced costs. This should be the approach of the government rather than keep burdening the exchequer.
Modi's Acche Din In Dreams Only
The much touted MSP hike for agriculture produce announced recently falls far short of the guaranteed 50% margin over costs that Modi had promised or that which the M S Swaminathan Committee had recommended. In fact the farmer’s margin has only increased by little. Will Modi explain why has he suddenly thought about farmers at the fag end of his term in office? He is as much responsible for neglecting farmer's interests as the Congress or the other Opposition parties. What was he doing all along since 2014 when he came into office? Maharashtra the Death State for farmers and a BJP run State has reported 695 farmer suicides, the maximum among all other States, in the first quarter of 2017. Similarly there is a health insurance scheme launched by the Central government that quotes big numbers on coverage but if you look at the budgets provided for the scheme on claim payouts, it amounts to only Rs. 20 per person. This is the chicanery that this government is playing on its people. All bluff and bluster, hardly any truth in any of the schemes. The excuse is that this is an election year and we have to tolerate this!
Investigate Formalin Issue Thoroughly To Make Fish Edible In Goa
The formalin in fish coming into Goa controversy refuses to die down and is taking many different turns by the day. At the end of it all we will be told that there was no formalin in the fish at all, the FDA will give a clean chit to the fish coming in from other States and as if by magic all the fish would have been cleansed off formalin. But that is not the truth of the matter.
It is not only Goa but other major fish eating States like Bengal, Assam and Orissa have found formalin in the fish consignments that they have been receiving from other States at this same time, the principal culprit in all likelihood being Andhra Pradesh. The ministers who are waxing eloquent on the matter may also tell us that given the fact that we have been eating formalin with our fish for at least the last 10 years, the formalin concentration in our body is saturated for the level to get cancer. Therefore if we eat fish containing formalin now, it really does not matter!
Ten years is being stated since China has been doing this for ages and close to five years ago they were banned from selling seafood into the US for following unhygienic and hazardous practices including use of formalin. With the age of instant communication that we have seen since like with the Net and mobile usage, the idea of using formalin for preserving fish would have come to India particularly where long distance transportation is involved. Across the country it is known that Hilsa from Gujarat would be shipped to Bengal involving at least 5-7 days in road transit and therefore preservation would be an issue. That is where formalin is coming into the picture. In places like Goa where in the monsoon months fishing is banned, the fish comes from distant States like Orissa and Andhra Pradesh involving 4-5 days of roadtransit. Even at other times of the year to meet excess demand fish is brought in from the adjoining and above named States. So here again formalin came into the picture. Andhra Pradesh has been named principal offender by the Bengal FDA authorities from where annually almost 1 lakh tonnes of fish is brought into Bengal. So finding formalin in fish in Goa is not unusual since we also get our fish from the same sources. Once the fish coming from outside States is known to the trade here as containing formalin, will our people be it the wholesalers or retailers lag behind in using it. No, they will use it at times of excess supply or to streamline irregularities of supply and for holding buffer stocks. And by now it has become regular practice. So all of us have been eating formalin laced fish all along.
Therefore the FDA when they raided the Margao market did Goans a great service by bringing out the formalin issue into the open. At least now it will be tackled. The concerned official in FDA who exposed the matter to the media should be complimented and not criticised for acting in the public good. The only thing about the FDA is that they should do these raids on a regular basis and not necessarily on fish alone but all food items. Then they would be acting according to their charter of operations.
All those Ministers who tried to influence the FDA to change their report about the formalin content in the fish should be publicly castigated. Public health should be first and not the wholesale and retail trade in fish and their profits. As for the head of the wholesale fish trading body an enquiry should be launched to find out if he was aware that formalin was being used by his suppliers from other States to preserve the fish and whether the wholesalers are complicit themselves in using formalin. If so they should be proceeded to be charged on a criminal basis for manslaughter. Why the CM has to get involved in this matter defies comprehension since by saying that he is personally looking into the matter, will the formalin in the fish disappear? He should have left the matter to be dealt by the concerned Minister. Interestingly there has not been a beep from the Fisheries Minister Palyekar on the matter with everybody including the Opposition parties giving opinions, a dime a dozen. Does Palyekar's silence mean that he was all along aware that formalin was being used to preserve the fish? This was the man who had said that he would ensure that fish becomes affordable to Goans which has not happened and there is his ministry official saying that their job is to take care of the interest of fishermen and once the fish reaches the jetties their job is over and from then on where the fish goes or is sold at what price, is none of their business! This one would say is the height of irresponsibility.
It is not only Goa but other major fish eating States like Bengal, Assam and Orissa have found formalin in the fish consignments that they have been receiving from other States at this same time, the principal culprit in all likelihood being Andhra Pradesh. The ministers who are waxing eloquent on the matter may also tell us that given the fact that we have been eating formalin with our fish for at least the last 10 years, the formalin concentration in our body is saturated for the level to get cancer. Therefore if we eat fish containing formalin now, it really does not matter!
Ten years is being stated since China has been doing this for ages and close to five years ago they were banned from selling seafood into the US for following unhygienic and hazardous practices including use of formalin. With the age of instant communication that we have seen since like with the Net and mobile usage, the idea of using formalin for preserving fish would have come to India particularly where long distance transportation is involved. Across the country it is known that Hilsa from Gujarat would be shipped to Bengal involving at least 5-7 days in road transit and therefore preservation would be an issue. That is where formalin is coming into the picture. In places like Goa where in the monsoon months fishing is banned, the fish comes from distant States like Orissa and Andhra Pradesh involving 4-5 days of roadtransit. Even at other times of the year to meet excess demand fish is brought in from the adjoining and above named States. So here again formalin came into the picture. Andhra Pradesh has been named principal offender by the Bengal FDA authorities from where annually almost 1 lakh tonnes of fish is brought into Bengal. So finding formalin in fish in Goa is not unusual since we also get our fish from the same sources. Once the fish coming from outside States is known to the trade here as containing formalin, will our people be it the wholesalers or retailers lag behind in using it. No, they will use it at times of excess supply or to streamline irregularities of supply and for holding buffer stocks. And by now it has become regular practice. So all of us have been eating formalin laced fish all along.
Therefore the FDA when they raided the Margao market did Goans a great service by bringing out the formalin issue into the open. At least now it will be tackled. The concerned official in FDA who exposed the matter to the media should be complimented and not criticised for acting in the public good. The only thing about the FDA is that they should do these raids on a regular basis and not necessarily on fish alone but all food items. Then they would be acting according to their charter of operations.
All those Ministers who tried to influence the FDA to change their report about the formalin content in the fish should be publicly castigated. Public health should be first and not the wholesale and retail trade in fish and their profits. As for the head of the wholesale fish trading body an enquiry should be launched to find out if he was aware that formalin was being used by his suppliers from other States to preserve the fish and whether the wholesalers are complicit themselves in using formalin. If so they should be proceeded to be charged on a criminal basis for manslaughter. Why the CM has to get involved in this matter defies comprehension since by saying that he is personally looking into the matter, will the formalin in the fish disappear? He should have left the matter to be dealt by the concerned Minister. Interestingly there has not been a beep from the Fisheries Minister Palyekar on the matter with everybody including the Opposition parties giving opinions, a dime a dozen. Does Palyekar's silence mean that he was all along aware that formalin was being used to preserve the fish? This was the man who had said that he would ensure that fish becomes affordable to Goans which has not happened and there is his ministry official saying that their job is to take care of the interest of fishermen and once the fish reaches the jetties their job is over and from then on where the fish goes or is sold at what price, is none of their business! This one would say is the height of irresponsibility.
Parrikar's Dilemma
It is said that anything that is conceived in an irregular manner will not have anything good come out of it. It will get its due or meet its final proper destiny sooner or later. So is the fate of this coalition government led by the BJP in Goa. Having snatched the opportunity to form the government away from the Congress which was the largest single party after the election results had come out, it is now close to meeting its end, what with almost every single minister of its Cabinet falling sick with serious and debilitating health issues. One could say it is a 'sick' Cabinet. First it was Manohar Parrikar who was diagnosed with a serious ailment that required him to go to the US for treatment and it is learnt that he will have to travel again to that country for further treatment. Then it was Pandurang Madkaikar who was felled by a brain stroke at Mumbai and has not recovered fully to be able to resume his official duties. It was then the turn of Sudin Dhavlikar having to undergo an angioplasty again at Mumbai and was last reported to be in the ICU. Even before that it was Vishnu Wagh, the Dy. Speaker who again had a stroke and is unlikely to recover from it as per last reports. Thus it is best that Manohar Parrikar recognises that he should call off this bad deal since in any case he will have to name someone else as Chief Minister. Upon doing that with internal bickering this government will surely fall. So the best is to read the writing on the wall and call the Congress' bluff and hold mid-term elections either immediately or along with the 2019 General Elections and be the first to join the One Nation - One Poll proposition of Narendra Modi. The other day in the papers it was debated why Parrikar can or cannot allocate the portfolios of the sick Ministers to others or even name some new ministers to the Cabinet. At the present moment the ministries under these sick Ministers are being handled by the Chief Minister himself, some 26 with the Monsoon Assembly session looming on the horizon. Parrikar needs to know better and should not overstrain himself considering the state of his health. At the same time he cannot name others as ministers to replace the sick ones since the supporters of the sick Ministers will ask Parrikar, why he has not named an alternate Chief Minister? In chess, this called Check & Mate.
Is There A Deal Within A Deal For Mallya, Nirav Modi & Choksi?
In the high profile scam cases like Vijay Mallya, Nirav Modi etc. the modus operandi of the investigating authorities and the government is to feed media with whatever action that they are taking to show that they are doing something. But if you assess the news about seizures made and the value thereof, you will find compared to the scale of the scam and its consequent liability, the value of property seized be it movable or immovable is peanuts. Thus it is best that the authorities have a SOP of giving reports on such cases to the media on a regular timeline basis unless there is something sensational that needs to be publicised. The recent offer by Vijay Mallya, to pay back his debts from his property valued at Rs. 13,000 crores is yet another scam since firstly, the valuation is suspect since none of his properties that went up for auction fetched anywhere near his declared value or even their market value and secondly, if you read between the lines in this report where mention of his letters to the PM & the FM are mentioned, there seems to be a quiet deal in the offing which is natural considering that the 2019 elections are around the corner and the BJP needs money to fight the elections. So it would not be surprising if starting with Mallya, the first offender or poster boy of scams, as he himself put it, may be completely absolved followed by Nirav Modi & then Choksi, with the aam admi holding the bucket for the losses of the PSB's.
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