digital thoughts

Anything can trigger Tamil-Kannada violence. Even a statue. Unveiling Thiruvalluvar statue in Bangalore caused lot of drama in Bangalore. I feel that there should not be any statue allowed in any public place in the country. Why the hell we need statues? If you like Thiruvalluvar, follow his poems. He advised people against corruption and greed. How many Tamil politicians really respect and follow Thiruvalluvar’s advice?

Our roads are small; there are not enough spaces to go around. In the middle of the road, we have lot of statues. If you go to Marina beach road in Chennai, politicians erected statues wherever they feel like. Few years ago, Actor Sivaji’s statue was erected in the middle of the road. Everyone complained about that, but politicians went ahead with their plan.

Politics is the reason behind all statues in India. Just like caste and religion, statues will continue to trigger violence and disturb the peace.

Related Link: Story in Hindu

U.S. President Obama used web 2.0 tools extensively in his election campaign. Some candidates in U.S. tried blogging and setting up websites in prior elections. Obama went many steps ahead of them and used tools such as Central Desktop to organize the volunteers and execute the campaign. As we all know, his strategy yielded fruits and put him in the White House.

Now, BJP’s L.K. Advani is trying the same tactic for his election campaign. He uses Adsense extensively to draw traffic to his website lkadvani.in. You can see some of his ads below.

L.K. Advani has to use lot more than Adsense to win the hearts of web savvy people. Obama used online tools such as this one. Obama pulled all the volunteers and organized them to make sure that their efforts are not wasted or duplicated. Advani can use the similar tools, but I am not sure how many of his volunteers really use the web. Is the politics in India changed? They are not using gundas any more?!

There is couple of other options. Orkut is the only successful social network in India. Facebook, MySpace, Fropper, etc., will take long time to catch up with Orkut. Advani or any other web savvy politicians should use Orkut to spread the message of his campaign and events.

Youtube is also another better avenue. BJP can create some catchy videos with patriotic themes and put it in Youtube. May be they can get some bollywood stars to endorse Advani.

BJP and other parties can do everything they can in the web. But, their success hinges on how many web savvy people go out and vote on the Election Day. Educated and elite always complain about bad politicians and infrastructure in the country. But, they don’t care to vote. Most of the illiterate and villagers vote and they literally elect who governs India. It started changing in the recent years. Advani’s campaign results will tell us how far it is changed.

Related Links: Advani’s Blog | How Obama used Web 2.0 | BarackObama.com

Mumbai attacks gave us the wake-up call. Government is acting on it. It passed the bill similar to POTA it opposed not too long ago. Lok Sabha unanimously passed the National Investigation Agency (NIA) Bill and the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Amendment (UAPA).

The bill to amend the UAPA has stringent provisions, including a detention period of 180 days, instead of the present 90 days, and denial of bail altogether to a foreigner accused of acts of terrorism in India.

The amendments also provide for freezing, seizing and attaching funds and other financial assets or economic resources held by individuals or entities engaged in or suspected to be engaged in terrorism.

The NIA is proposed to be set up to probe terrorist attacks, trade in counterfeit currency and other crimes with ramifications across the country.

I hope that Indian government will keep watching the new developments in geo-political-terrorism area and adapt to it proactively rather than reacting to it after hundreds of innocent people were killed. There should also be an amendment to speed up the judicial process to speed up the cases on terrorists or the people that support the terrorists.

Related Link: Anti-terror bills passed after acrimony in Lok Sabha

In a bizarre turnaround, Taliban offers to help Pakistan if it goes to war with India.

“We may have a dispute with the Pakistan government, but we would set aside our differences if our homeland was threatened by outside powers,” said Maulvi Nazir, head of a powerful Pakistani Taliban splinter group in the tribal area of South Waziristan. “We would raise a force of 15,000 tribal Taliban to fight on the side of Pakistan’s armed forces. We would infiltrate 500 suicide bombers into India to cause havoc there.”

Obviously Taliban is trying to seize the opportunity to end the attacks by Pakistani forces. Taliban may also hope that they might get a chance to recapture Afghanistan with the new regime in Pakistan after the war.

Many ordinary people in northwestern cities such as Peshawar are wary of expressions of national unity and more inclined to empathize with India’s position, Pakistan journalist Yusufzai said. Just when Taliban offered their help, car bomb exploded in Peshawar killing 20 people.

Pakistani defense analyst and author Ayesha Siddiqa noted the Pakistani Taliban’s apparent overnight transformation from pariah to patriot amid the public furor over the events in Mumbai. “And hadn’t we been informed earlier that all these patriotic warriors were in fact murdering Pakistan’s people and its brave soldiers?” Siddiqa wrote.

Related Links: Mistrust of India Forges Sense of Unity in Pakistan | A hoax call that could have triggered war

Although Pakistan denied any links to Mumbai attacks, recent U.S. report clearly indicates Pakistan as the source of terrorism.

“Were one to map terrorism and weapons of mass destruction today, all roads would intersect in Pakistan,” the report states. More details are here.

Related Links: Enough is Enough | The Perils of Blaming Pakistan | Pakistan is International Migraine

I guess that I am lucky to see the history making moment as it happens. It’s not just that a black man get elected as President. It’s much more than that. Most of America came together, irrespective of their race, and supported Obama. In the last one week, there were lot of things thrown at Obama. Still, he managed to sail it thru because of the support of the majority of the people.

It’s truly a landslide victory given the circumstances. I was in San Francisco last week, when CNN broadcasted the accusation about Obama meeting with pro-palestinian professor. When I saw the news and outraged Sarah Palin on the TV, I thought that it was going to hurt the chances of Obama. Two days later, there was news about Obama’s aunt staying illegally in U.S. Nothing could prevent Obama becoming the President of U.S.

Not only Americans, people all over the world expect a lot from Obama. It’s going to be a challenge for him because he is going to takeover messed up economy. If he wins, entire America wins.

Related Link: History is Made

In U.S., Starbucks is running an ad campaign with this tag line “What if we all cared enough to vote?” for the upcoming presidential election on November 4th. I wish that India has similar organizations that push the voters to get out and vote.