The INDIA that is not INDIA!
We are in the midst of times when too many things are happening around within too little time. Let me delve into some of them and share my thoughts.
We now have a grand alliance of the opposition parties and it is given the abbreviation as I.N.D.I.A. A smart move indeed, if only they could convince that it is a pan-India, all-inclusive alliance formidable to throw Modi and his party out of the power at the center. Let us leave it there.
This article is not about the grand opposition alliance. It is rather on varied subjects that are contemporary and my thoughts on them.
It has been a very long time that I wrote on my blog. Not that I didn't have anything to write or didn't want to, but it is simply because the thoughts kept on coming to my mind and just got vanished before I could put them in words and put it here in the blog.
So many coincidences could be observed in the styles (or lack of it of some) of functioning of several state and the Central governments. Many a times they appear to be similar, but the purposes being different.
I see so many similarities in the way decisions are taken and announced by KCR and Narendra Modi, to take it as a sample study. Both are hard communicators. They connect with their targeted audience so well. They surprise with most of their announcements. They set the narrative and make every other party fall in line with their narrative, without even realizing that they are booby trapped into their weak area.
Many a projects are being taken up by Modi as well as KCR and their governments. Innumerable infrastructure projects are being taken up and completed mostly as per the set timelines by the Modi government, be in Highways or Railways and some Engineering marvel projects. These projects are improving the last mile connectivity in the country and as the economists say, "good roads lead to good economy". If one travels around the country, one could see changes coming up so fast, which could have been possible in the greatest of the imaginations. If only the priorities are right for KCR, things would have been so different. So many flyovers, bridges, steel bridges, projects are happening in Telangana, particularly in Hyderabad. One can't say if any of these expensive projects are serving any real purpose. It is a billion dollar question. The state government seems to run a real estate agency and do not even hesitate to claim the appreciation (artificially or otherwise) of the real estate rates as the achievement of their government. I keep wondering if any of the two Telugu states are benefiting because of the bifurcation. Here is a revenue surplus newly formed state, thanks to the twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad, falling into the debt trap owing to its appeasement politics and irrational schemes. A person owning 200 acres of land in Telangana, without even doing any cultivation, gets Rs. 2000000 per year, just because he owns the land. It is supposed to be accounted as farm input subsidy. The landlord is neither doing any farming activity himself of incurring any input costs. In the name of farm lands, the landlord either keeps it without any farming or leases it to a hapless farmer, who wouldn't be entitled to any input subsidy, by the way. Seeing the success of this scheme, even the central government and other state governments have come up with similar ones, but with a difference. The scheme is limited to only those within 5 acres of farm land and atleast it makes some sense. You have another Telugu state which has no revenue share but has its hands on the large hundi collections of TTD to dole out 9 schemes, titled Navratnas, which would ensure that most of the sections of the society are getting these benefits, even at the cost of huge burden on the state. There is neither sense or any limit to this freebie culture.
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