Sunday, May 29, 2005

The Art of War

The book came highly recommended, and I have read a couple of chapters, but it hasn't started making sense yet. Am I trying too hard to see the metaphor too soon?

Football v/s Cricket

According to an Indian Express story:

Blanket TV coverage of almost all top leagues... has created a set of fans as well versed in the skills of Thierry Henry as they are in the batting stats of Rahul Dravid.


Hmm... sounds good. So when can we expect our team to make it to the World Cup final? By 2025? Or 2050? I'm waiting.

PS- I may have just taken a few lines out of context from the story. The story is worth a full read.

Thursday, May 05, 2005

Disclose Dowry, Get Job

According to a Supreme Court order, government male employees should be asked to disclose whether they had taken dowry. The SC is hopeful that this will discourage dowry-giving-and-taking.

I don't see the purpose of having such a rule, simply because no person of sound mind will voluntarity provide dowry information to the government, especially since he knows that more the details he gives, more will be the questions asked. Declaring dowry could be a nice way to attract trouble towards yourself.

And let's not underestimate our government officers. The people who ace the IAS exams aren't exactly duds.

Sample this:

"Do you think government servants will do that [disclose dowry details]?" asked a top official from the state’s General Administration Department.

"We will always find a way to escape this," he told Newsline.


True to character, the order hasn't even been implemented, and the bureaucratic high-handedness has already begun to show. Contempt of court, anyone?

P.S.- How about asking political candidates to disclose their dowry details?

Sunday, May 01, 2005

We're not the only ones

Only 5.6 per cent of the reported rape cases in the UK end in conviction. And it also turns out that trainee detectives are handling rape investigations.

And I thought such things could happen only in India.