Dilip Simeon's blog

Jumla wasn’t the only joke Prime Minister Narendra Modi pulled on the nation. On the appointed annual day for tomfoolery, Upala Sen takes sombre stock of the many rides the nation has been taken for  It was always apparent for anyone who chose to see it for what it was. By the time the Bharatiya Janata Party's prime ministerial candidate, Narendra Modi, was done campaigning for the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, he had participated not only in 400-plus rallies but also 1,350 3D hologram-based interactions that were broadcast to 5,390 locations. Now, a hologram is a three-dimensional image, created with photographic projection. A sleight of light on eye and reason. It was reported that in several remote parts of the country, when projectors beamed the image onto the darkened stage, villagers took the hologram for the man. And when the lights came on at show-end and he was nowhere to be found, it puzzled them a little. But it was nothing compared to the thrill of having such a b...

Just weeks after the Indian government declared that there was  no data to support the existence of female genital mutilation  in the country, a small study has shown a 75% incidence across the Bohra Muslim community. “My mum told me that a lady would come to remove some extra skin from down there. When the day came, my great-grandmother was holding me tight on her bed,” said 26-year-old “SH”, a law student cited in the report, recalling how she had been cut at the age of seven. She remembers “sitting on the toilet, crying of unbearable pain, too scared to even pee”. Her mother had reassured her that “everyone in the building has undergone this procedure”, referring to the blocks of flats in Byculla, in the heart of Mumbai, where the Bohra Muslim community has lived for decades. Her account and those of 83 women and 11 men across five Indian states are included in the  first-ever study  about female genital mutilation (FGM) in India, compiled by three independ...

If I don’t beat my own drum, who will? George Bernard Shaw For 67 long years, we made a tryst with darkness, and now the time comes when we shall redeem our pledge, not wholly or in full measure, but very substantially. At the stroke of the sunset hour on May 26, 2014, India awoke to life and freedom Subtext of the message   on Modi Sarkar at two (with apologies to J.L. Nehru) New Delhi, May 28: A weekend evening picked to perfection. Between the final knockout game of the IPL and the final itself, in a convenient trough between one television blockbuster and another. It meant the celebratory gala for two years of Modi Sarkar mounted the box two days after the anniversary, but it also meant it aired insulated from any threat from eyeball-grabbers. It grabbed at eyeballs so exclusively and so long this evening, it left them a little sore. Ek Nayi Subah, Doordarshan's five-hour live effort - obligingly streamed by a...

As Prime Minister Narendra Modi departed on his latest foreign mission to spread the word about Digital India in Silicon Valley, I embarked on a more nostalgic excursion to visit Rabindra Bhavan, one of the landmarks of Nehruvian modernism in New Delhi. My intended mission was one of architectural curiosity but I stumbled instead into the wormhole of an exhibit recently inaugurated by the Minister of Culture, Mahesh Sharma in Rabindra Bhavan’s art galleries. It was entitled  Cultural Continuity from Rig Veda to Robotics. Inside the gallery was a display of plastic placards decorated with calendar art and tele-serial imaginings of the Mahabharata, coupled with crude info graphics informing us that by correlating references to the planets and stars in the Sanskrit epics with astronomy software, the historicity of Lord Ram, and the narratives of the Ramayana and Mahabharata had now been firmly established. To wit: the “fall of Duryodhan in mace bettle” occurred at 06:50 on November...

NB: This is an accusation that is repeated on a daily basis by sympathisers of the Sangh Parivar/and or the Modi government. The latest such may be read here . For those still interested in truth over propaganda, I append a short list of material on jehadi terror and Muslim communalism that has appeared on my blog. I am an avowed socialist, but a critical one.  The list leaves aside other sources, (apart from the first two links below).  The third link ("An Open letter to the world'.." is a letter I wrote 43 years ago, against the Naxalite policy on Bangladesh : DS Centre for Secular Space Centre for Secular Space Facebook page An Open Letter to the world on the Bangladesh crisis of 1971 Centre's reported order on Taslima shocking, says Javed Anand ***************************** Long Live Charlie Hebdo! : A letter to the left-leaning Turkey nightclub shooting: Istanbul mourns victims as search continues Mazin Sidahmed - Saudi Arabia woman who posted...

An ever-extending list of insane utterances & activities by India's leading lights..  (To be continued..) Andhra Speaker compares women to parked cars, says they won't get raped if they don't step out Dressing Like Men Causes Hormonal Imbalances in Women: Mumbai College Principal   Cows Inhale And Exhale Oxygen, Says Rajasthan Minister   Senior Indian policeman recommends 'honour killing' Nationalisation of sex: Togadia sells cure for impotency at a discounted rate for Hindu men '3000 condoms, 2000 liquor bottles at JNU': This BJP MLA is keeping count Twitterati can’t get over BJP MLA’s condom count at JNU Rajnath Singh Says Nothing Inflammatory In Katheria's Agra Speech Muslims warned of ‘final battle’ at Sangh meet: Union Minister Katheria  Union Minister Gen VK Singh compares the killing Dalit kids with 'stoning dogs' BJP MP Adityanath’s outfit offers guns to Hindus in Dadri Karnataka Home Minister K J George says rape b...