varnam

One person who is unhappy with everything in the world in Arudhathi Roy. Her anti-American, anti-capitalism articles have a wide following among the people who believe that there is an alternate way. After criticizing every living thing in the world, she turned her attention to non-living things and the object of her wrath was the cell-phone.

"Are you going to starve to death dreaming of a mobile phone or you going to have control of the resources that are available to you and have been for generations, but have been taken away so that someone else can have a mobile phone?"[India's dying ‘n we flaunt mobiles: Arundhati Roy]

Sure, there must be a big adrenalin rush while criticizing anything used by the not-poor people as there is an audience for it and also it is a lucrative field. But isn't she a thinker, something above the whine-bloggers? So while criticizing something, one would expect some creative suggestions from a person like her who travels around the world and reads a lot. It she really wanted to help the poor, she would have said, asking people to go back to stone age looks stupid. So let's see how we can use the forces of globalization and technology to improve the condition of the poor. For example, there is something we can learn from the Africans, who are using the cell phones for banking.

With the new technology, a grandmother in rural area can receive money from her son, working hundreds of miles away, with the beep of her cellphone. A teenager can buy groceries with a few punches of keys. Not a coin need change hands.

It's a high-tech solution designed to help poor people here who never have had access to banks, cash machines, or credit cards. And it's another example of using digital technology to fast forward development in remote areas.[Africa's cellphone boom creates a base for low-cost banking via engadget]

I am happy to announce a new blog, The Palm Leaf, devoted to Indian History, hosted here at varnam.org. From now, the regular blog will cover current issues whereas time travel will be done in the history blog. This new blog has been initialized with all the history posts from the original blog.

The word, Palm Leaf, was chosen as it was a popular medium of writing in India for almost two thousand years. Letters were written on a dried, smoothed, smoke treated leaves of palm trees using a stylus and then blackened with vegetable juice and lamp black. This site hopes to be the electronic version of those palm leaves.

Even though the tagline says, A look at India's Past, I don't plan to cover each and every topic related to our history. So you will not see much mythology or discussions of various religious texts. Instead there will be archaeological news, coverage of development of language, and information on people, places and monuments. There will be more posts about the Mauryan empire, Saraswathi-Sindu civilization and Kerala due to my current interest in those areas.

On the technical side, the new blog runs Movable Type 3.2 with dynamic publishing. This means that only the main page has a physical existence. Rest of the pages are created on the fly based on the request. The style of the new blog is the same as the old one, but it will be changed soon.

Looks like that opening Rediff had for fact checkers has not been filled yet. Today, while reporting on Adoor Gopalakrishnan being awarded the Dadasaheb Phalke award, Rediff Entertainment Bureau wrote

A three-time National Award winner and a Padma Shri, some of Adoor's most famous films include Swayamvaram, Chemmeen, Elipathayam and Nizhalkuthu.[Phalke award for Adoor]

Pakistani ministers contantly say that there are no terrorist training camps and madrassas do not incite terrorism. The chorus for this song is sung by various Presidents, Prime Ministers, Newspapers and think-tanks. But here comes a party pooper from Pakistan itself.

The fact is that most top madrassas are directly or indirectly involved in breeding militant Islamists who are inclined to become terrorists. This has been proved beyond doubt, unless you want proof of nothing less than actual military training grounds on their premises. Pakistan’s most notorious terrorist wanted by India together with Ahmad Umar Sheikh, the murderer of Daniel Pearl in Karachi, is Maulana Masood Azhar, a graduate of the Banuri Town madrassa in Karachi. The director of the madrassa, Mufti Nizamuddin Shamzai — target-killed last year –arranged the first meeting between Osama bin Laden and Mullah Umar, the self-styled “caliph” of the Taliban. The South Waziristan terrorist still on the loose in his area, Abdullah Mehsud, went straight to Banuri Town madrassa after his release from Guantanamo Bay and declared war on the Americans and “their allies”. After his mentor Mufti Jamil of the madrassa was killed in Karachi, he struck in South Waziristan, kidnapping two Chinese engineers, with horrible consequences for Pakistan. On June 24, Mufti Rehman and Maulana Irshad, new heads of the Banuri Mosque madrassa in Karachi, were also target-killed.[EDITORIAL: Madrassas, Ijaz ul Haq and Musharraf]

The history blog, The Palm Leaf's feeds were having issues for bloglines subscribers. It has been resolved. If you don't see any updates, please re-subscribe.

Based on a suggestion by P@L, the name of the blog might change to either Talapatra (Sanskrit for The Palm Leaf) or Talapatta (Pali). If you have any suggestions/preferences/opinions, please leave a comment.

There have been movies on the Dalai Lama (Kundun, Seven Years in Tibet), but only documentaries about Buddha (Life of Buddha). The only movie in which I have seen Buddha is Siddhartha, but he had a cameo appearance.

Now Shekhar Kapur (who by the way has a blog) is planning a movie on the life of Buddha and it has controversy written all over it.

Shekhar Kapur's much-hyped and yet-to-be-shot movie Buddha would not shy away from showing incidents from the life of the founder of Buddhism who also had his 'fair share of pleasures' before attaining enlightenment.

Producers of the movie MCorp Global have made it clear that like any other Shekhar Kapur movie, Buddha would be based on the real life story of Siddharth, the prince who bathed in all the pleasures that man could ever dream of and Buddha, the enlightened, who experienced pains that no one could ever dream of.

Asked if Buddhists would not be offended with the depiction, Modi said "Buddhism is the only religious philosophy not based on god. It is based on a level of spirituality not relating to god alone. Buddha was a prince enjoying the best of royal luxury, he was married and had a son. All these are established facts."[Shekhar Kapur to portray the Buddha as human]

Buddha asked his disciples not to worship his image, but spend time practicing his teachings. Hence early disciples used to represent Buddha with icons like foot print, dharma wheel or the lotus flower. Later they started making statues and found that lighting agarbattis in front of it was easier than doing a ten day vipassana course. For those people, this movie might be offensive.

Since Buddhists are generally pacifists, we may not see any fatwas or heads literally rolling with the release of the movie sometime in 2007.

Two decades back, an art dealer approached the Getty Museum in California and told that he possessed a Greek marble statue dating from the sixth century BC. A geologist from the University of California was asked to examine the statue and after about fourteen months of investigation, the museum agreed to buy the statue. A few months later the museum invited a former director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York to take a look at the piece and the word that popped into the Director's mind when he saw the statue was "fresh". He was sure that something was not right. The Museum took the statue to Greece and the consensus among experts was that the statue was fake. The Director was able to make that call in a few seconds of seeing the statue, in the blink of an eye.

Whenever we meet someone new, in the first few seconds we form an opinion of that person and usually stick to it. Strangely that opinion is often consistent with an opinion formed after lot of thought. For verifying this psychologist Nalini Ambady gave showed some students video clips of teachers, lasting ten seconds with the sound turned off. The results were consistent with the opinion of students who took the course for a full term. This book by Malcolm Gladwell deals with thosesnap judgments and the process behind them.

We are able to form quick judgments due to a process called "Thin Slicing", which is the ability of our subconscious mind to find patterns in situations and behavior based on narrow slices of experience. This is apowerful force within us and is behind many of our impulsive decisions. While this unconscious force is very powerful, it can make mistakes, especially while operating under pressure.

That is what happened during the shooting of Amadou Diallo in the Bronx by four police officers. Diallo was standing outside his apartment at midnight taking in air, when a patrol car got suspicious and pulled aside. Two officers wanted to speak with him, but Diallo got scared and started to run. At the same time, he wastrying to pull something from his pocket. One of the cops saw it in a flash as a gun and as trained shot Diallo. The other officers joined to protect their partner. Forty-onebullets and Diallo was dead. The object he was trying to pull from his pocket was his wallet and not a gun. All this happened in seven seconds.

Under pressure and fear, the snap judgment of the officers failed. The motor skills broke down and certain portions of the brain stopped functioning. Vision became restricted and behavior turned aggressive. Such temporary autistic situations that happen in life-threatening situations can cause lot of harm.

But with proper training, you can master the art of making correct snap judgments. One such person is psychologist John Gottman who canpredict with great accuracy if a marriage will last based on observing a video tape of a couple in conversation. He does this by assigning code numbers to each emotion the couple displays during the conversation; a code number for each second of the tape. Then based on the final number, he can make a successful prediction. Later he found that there are specific emotions (of which contempt is the top) that can give a good indication on the longevity of the marriage. Now Gottman can eavesdropa conversation and make his prediction by looking for those specific emotions.

Similarly when Brendan Reilley took over the Cook County Emergency Room in Chicago, the hospital was short on funds and had to treat a large number of patients with critical needs. Since there were only few beds, he had to decide fast if patient who came in with chest pain had to be admitted or not for hear attack. Analyzing apatient history took time. So Reilley turned his attention towards the work of a mathematician called Lee Goldman who devised a simple algorithm for taking the guessworkout of treating chest pain. By asking a few specific questions, doctors could make a quick call and make the correct decision. For making that decision, they did not need too much information, but less.

Combining various experiments in psychology and neuroscience, and combining evidence from fields as diverse as advertising to war games this book presents a fascinating view of how the brain works when it makes quick decisions. This science is presented with enough anecdotes that there is never a dull moment. Sometimes there are too many stories that you get caught up in them rather than the science behind it. But on the whole this is a very intriguing book and is worth reading.

Bloggers are heavily dependent on mainstream media, for ideas and for use as a football. The newspapers benefit a lot from the increased traffic sent by the bloggers and many columists get wider audience due to discussions in the blogosphere. But now New York Times has decided to make people pay for reading Friedman and Dowd

Beginning Monday, the Times will begin charging $49.95 a year to people who don't get the paper delivered at home for access to those writers as well as other columnists for the Times' business, metro and sports sections.[N.Y. Times website to charge for access to featured columnists]

The story that was propagated about Subhash Bose's death, that he died in a plane crash in Taiwan turned out to be false. Now that has been confirmed by Americans as well. Theory (2) is that he was held as a prisoner in Russia where he died or probably escaped. Theory (3) is that he lived as a monk in Uttar Pradesh

The Mitrokihn Archive which broke the news that Congressmen and Communists were on KGB payroll has some relation to information about Subhash Bose as well.

A key deponent of the Mukherjee Commission, Purabi Roy, who took off for Moscow tonight, said Mitrokhin knew about Bose's Russia link and had helped her locate classified information on him.

But Roy, who has submitted four affidavits till date in front of the Mukherjee Commission till date, is worried. "My key worry is that the Commission should be allowed access to classified documents in three archives, the Federal Security Bureau(FSB) - which was called the KGB in the Soviet era, the President's archives in Kremlin and GRU, the military intelligence archive. After all, the Commission has been asking for permission for visiting Moscow for the past three-and-a-half years," Roy said.[Netaji disappearance case takes a new turn]

One person who knows something about this is L.K.Advani. While he was the home minister he refused to give some files related to Subhash Bose's disappearance to the Commission saying that it would affect India's relations with some friendly countries, which I guess is a code word for Russia. Maybe the search should be done more thoroughly at home first.

Previous Links: Subhash Bose: The investigations, How did Subhash Bose die?

Will Oil touch 70USD/barrel at the end of this month? Will Rahul Gandhi be made a cabinet minister by the end of 2005? Will Jagdish Bhagwati win the 2005 Nobel Prize or will Hillary Clinton contest the 2008 presidential elections?

The pundits on the blogosphere and the commenters have differing opinions on questions like the above. But are you willing to put money where your mouth is? If so take a look at PublicGyan, the Public Knowledge Exchange, where you can make predictions for the future and trade like the Iowa Electronic Markets. Nitin, the man behind the idea has an excellent introduction to this concept.

The site was implemented by the man who breathes technology - Srijith (with lot of support from his wife). Currently you can join only if you have an invite from one of the members. If you need one, please leave a comment with your real email address or mail me at jk at varnam dot org.

The Motorcycle Diaries (2004) starring Gael Garcia Bernal, Rodrigo de la Serna. Directed by Walter Salles

Soon after they leave Alta Garcia, Argentina, on a motorcycle for their trip across South America in 1951, Ernesto Rafael Guevara de la Serna, a medical student and Alberto Granado, a biochemist hit a dog and fall off the bike. Ernesto chides his friend and takes proper care of the dog. Later, completely broke, they reach a town and con two women in a restaurant to order them food and wine and get their father to repair their broken bike. They visit a newspaper office and get an article printed that both of them are expert doctors curing leprosy and then use that newspaper article to get people to do favors for them. They hitch rides, seduce women, hunt animals and convince strangers to provide them lodging.

But what started as a fun filled trip changed both men at the end. Ernesto Rafael Guevara de la Serna, the asthmatic, introverted idealist tranasformed into "Che" Guevara, the revolutionary who influenced revolutions in many countries and was later killed in Bolivia. The silent romantic young man was transformed into a killing machine and a psycho

In January 1957, as his diary from the Sierra Maestra indicates, Guevara shot Eutimio Guerra because he suspected him of passing on information: “I ended the problem with a .32 caliber pistol, in the right side of his brain.... His belongings were now mine.” Later he shot Aristidio, a peasant who expressed the desire to leave whenever the rebels moved on. While he wondered whether this particular victim “was really guilty enough to deserve death,” he had no qualms about ordering the death of Echevarría, a brother of one of his comrades, because of unspecified crimes: “He had to pay the price.” At other times he would simulate executions without carrying them out, as a method of psychological torture.[The Killing Machine: Che Guevara, from Communist Firebrand to Capitalist Brand]

The actors who portary Ernesto (Gael García Bernal) and Alberto (Rodrigo De la Serna) have done an excellent job. Though there is not much in terms of action or drama, the script is tight enough to hold your attention till the end. As the trip starts, Gradado is the older wiser person, but towards the end it is Ernesto who does the talking. The two differing personalities are bought out through dialogue and situations. Though you may disagree with the path that Che followed, this is a movie worth seeing for understanding the influences in his life.

Mohandas Gandhi and Swami Vivekananda both traveled all around India to get to know the problems first hand. This travel influenced the path they chose to address the issues and it did not involve murdering people. The time Ernesto became Che was after India became independent and I wonder if he even gave some thought to the ideas of Gandhi.

Postscript: Chasing Che is an excellent travelogue by Patrick Symmes, who decided to follow the route taken by Ernesto and Alberto

If you have lived in Chennai, you know the problems with water supply. Due to scarcity in supply, people are forced to buy water from private tanker suppliers who just pump water from some river, lake, or some place you don't want to know. This water is not treated and is directly sold to the consumer. So long as they do not see any corpses, body parts or dead insects people are happy. In other places people are getting water from borewells and it has its own issues.

Residents of the Tamil Nadu Housing Board Colony, Korattur, have tried to boil the water for drinking. Says G. Janaki, "I boiled the water and allow the sediments to settle at the bottom so that it can be used for cooking. But, it has a metallic taste and an oily substance floats on surface. Vegetables cooked in the water turn dark and unappetizing."[ It's no cola, it's the water supplied in Korattur]

Factories and homes in one Tamil Nadu town have clean, reliable water supplies for the first time thanks a new private sector plant, but while industrialists are happy, consumer groups are worried.

State-backed, but majority owned by private firms and investors, the water treatment and delivery plant in Tirupur is the first of its kind in a country where almost half the urban population and 87 percent of rural dwellers live without running water.

The plant is operated by Mahindra Water Utilities, a 50-50 joint venture of Mahindra Infrastructure Developers and Britain's United Utilities. It pumps treated supplies 53 kilometres from the Bhavani river to the nation's T-shirt capital, Tirupur, source of most Indian knitwear exports.

Before the 10.25-billion-rupees project was completed two months ago, private tanker trucks provided the water, untreated, straight from the river or from wells.[Pioneer private water provider makes waves in India via Globalization Institute]

The protestors will also raise the issues of privatisation of water and power.[Nationwide strike by Left unions tomorrow]