No mention of Gandhi?
"MANY FACES OF GANDHI -- Indian children dressed as Mahatma Gandhi on Tuesday in Ahmadabad to mark the date of his birth in 1869. The children marched in a rally against violence (Boston Globe October 3 2012)."
And I failed to note it on this blog. I'm ashamed.
All I get is a printed photograph that isn't in the web version?
The closest thing they got now:
"Younger Gandhi to lead Congress India’s ’14 election" by Andrew MacAskill and Bibhudatta Pradhan | Bloomberg News, November 17, 2012
NEW DELHI — Rahul Gandhi will lead the ruling Congress party’s campaign for parliamentary elections due within 18 months, signaling the elevation of the latest member of India’s famed political dynasty.
Earlier this week, Congress president Sonia Gandhi appointed her son Rahul, 42, to head a six-member panel that will formulate and implement alliances, the manifesto, and publicity ahead of the 2014 vote.
‘‘It’s a clear indication that eventually he will lead the party and will become prime minister if Congress comes to power,’’ said Sanjay Kumar, a New Delhi-based analyst at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies.
Manmohan Singh, India’s 80-year-old prime minister, will look to Gandhi to help resurrect the government’s fortunes after being dogged for almost two years by corruption allegations, a faltering economy, and plunging popularity. Flunking a major leadership test, Congress was routed into fourth place in May elections in Uttar Pradesh state after Rahul Gandhi took charge of the party’s campaign.
Since being elected to parliament eight years ago, Rahul Gandhi has kept a low profile, giving few major speeches and declining requests to join Singh’s government. If Congress were to win the 2014 election, senior party figures have said they would press Gandhi to become prime minister.
When he has spoken Gandhi has focused on issues facing India’s poor and how to make economic growth more inclusive.
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Also see: Sonia Gandhi addresses party corruption
‘‘I think of him as a Gandhi-esque character.’’
I don't. He's a CIA asset -- which explains all the media attention the guy gets. Know that upsets a lot of people, but it explains a lot. "
"Prime Minister Manmohan Singh announced the $82 million mission during a speech Wednesday marking the 65th anniversary of India’s independence from British rule."
Are they?
"Britain to end financial aid to India" Associated Press, November 10, 2012
LONDON — Britain will halt all aid spending in India in 2015 in a significant shift in relations between the emerging economic giant and its former colonial ruler, Prime Minister David Cameron’s government announced Friday.
Acknowledging the country’s rising wealth and status, International Development chief Justine Greening said Britain would change its entire relationship with India — seeking to boost trade as it ends its aid program.
Britain offered India about $447 million in assistance in 2011, focused heavily on education and health programs for impoverished children.
No one is for more impoverished Indian children' however, the British people are taking a big load of austerity back home.
However, many legislators in the United Kingdom had targeted the development spending for scorn, arguing that Britain, struggling to cut its own national debt, could no longer afford to help a booming nation that has its own space program.
‘‘Now is the time to move to a relationship focusing on skills-sharing rather than aid,’’ Greening said. ‘‘It’s time to recognize India’s changing place in the world.’’
You're a player, guys!
Britain is struggling with spending cuts worth $162 billion through 2017.
But they always seem to have enough to trail along USrael's military adventures.
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And as the Indians waste millions in space millions of them wallow in poverty.
"India launches new system for handling welfare" by Muneeza Naqvi | Associated Press, January 02, 2013
NEW DELHI — India will send billions of dollars in social welfare money directly to its poor under a program inaugurated Tuesday that’s designed to cut out middlemen blamed for massive fraud that plagues the current system.
Previously, officials handed out cash only after taking a cut — if they didn’t keep all of it for themselves — and were known to enroll fake recipients or register unqualified people. The new program will see welfare money deposited directly into recipients’ bank accounts and require them to prove their identity with biometric data like fingerprints or retina scans.
Welcome to the New World order, Indian people.
Finance Minister P. Chidambaram has described the venture as ‘‘nothing less than magical,’’ but critics accuse the government of hastily pushing through a complex program in a country where millions don’t have access to electricity or paved roads, let alone banks.
Well, the bank part probably a good thing, but they are cracking down on welfare when corruption among government and the ruling classes is rampant along with massive wealth inequality?
The program is loosely based on Brazil’s widely praised Bolsa Familia program, which has helped lift more than 19 million people out of poverty since 2003....
The country has 440 million people living below the poverty line.
Related:
"Hunger is widespread in India. It is said that at least 50 million Indians are on the brink of starvation and over 200 million Indians are underfed"
Gandhi would be absolutely heartbroken were he to see India today.
‘‘In a huge new experiment like this you should expect some glitches. There may be a problem here and there, but these will be overcome by our people,’’ Chidambaram said. He appealed for patience with the program, which he called ‘‘a game changer for governance.’’
The opposition Bharatiya Janata Party has accused the ruling Congress party of using the program to gain political mileage.
As a first step, the government plans to begin directly transferring money it would spend on programs such as scholarships and pensions.
Eventually the transfers are expected to help fix much of the rest of India’s welfare spending, though Chidambaram said the government’s massive food, kerosene, and fertilizer distribution networks — blamed for much corruption and lost money — would be exempt.
Oh, wow, the Indian government caters to it's special intere$t$ just like mine.
The program will use data from Aadhar, a government project working to give every Indian identification numbers linked to fingerprints and retina scans. Currently hundreds of millions of Indians have no identity documents.
Your paperz, pleaze!
On Monday, 208 activists and scholars published an open letter expressing concern the government was forcing the poor to enroll in Aadhar without safeguards to protect their privacy.
What else are they going to do? Poor have always been a testing and proving ground for social theorists and societal managers. Just wondering when business and corporations are going to have to submit to retina scans and fingerprints to get their tax loot subsidy. When are those crooks going to have to undergo a violation of their civil rights because of their "dependency?"
Others said the government was trying to do too much.
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Also see:
Despite the array of new tools, Zarir Udwadia, a Mumbai doctor who uncovered some of those mutant strains, said he remained pessimistic about India’s ability to conquer drug-resistant tuberculosis. He doubted the government could exercise enough control over a health system where quacks with no training treat TB patients, and pharmacists routinely give out antibiotics without prescriptions."
But $omeone made a boodle.
Also see:
Humans on there because it $ure looks like someone is trying real hard.
All but gone 55 years after the Great Soul's death.
