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Whispers Forum

Debates, reader views and sharp takes on the issues shaping governance — a new conversation every week, archived by date.

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2019 309 posts · page 15 of 26

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Tuesday, 18 June 2019

Whispers Forum — 18 Jun 2019

DEBATE (1)
Presidential system of Government is good but but in the long term it will fail in our country.
Rakesh Tiwari
DEBATE (2)
Yes in 2022 there will be referrendum and Narendra Modi will be the President .
S K Tandan
Budget 2019 Budget 2019-20 is likely to be presented on July 5, 2019. There are many challenges before the Govt. Un-equal distribution of national wealth increases social injustice. As per one of the report 1% of top population holds 73% country's wealth. Tax system and its implementation plays vital role in distribution of wealth and achieving social justice. There are two major sources of revenue. Tax (direct and indirect) and non-tax revenue. There has been shortfall in tax revenue from estimated target. Non-tax revenue is collected through licensing of spectrum, auctioning of mines etc. which is generally good. There are number of steps Govt. can take to increase tax revenue like: 1, Scrap tax exempt (NGOs, Trust etc) institute list. Let every organisation pays tax to serve the nation. As these organisation are serving society at large, so there will be no problem in serving the country when they are needed. Law makes party will also contribute to the Nation building as they are already serving the country by paying tax. This requires an Amendment in income tax act which can be done thru the budget, 2. Steps to recover the loan from top 10000 defaulters. 3. Reduce the subsidies and create earning opportunities for every one. 4. Tax compliance is poor in categories other than salary class. No tools are available to assess the income of professionals, traders, businessman etc. It is estimated there may be more than 10000 people earning more than 100 crores per annum but how to figure it? Utilise the man power and time for developing innovative methods for assessing the income of professionals instead of scrutiny of cases low income group below 5 lakhs. Exempt these people from filing tax returns and save time and man power as well as processing power. 5. Simplification is key to success. Consider removing the tax on Long Term Capital Gain instead increase proportionately STT to compensate the losses due to LTCG. As it is easy to collect STT and every transactions gets covered. This will boost the tax revenue. 6. It is estimated 95% farmers earning is less than 5 lakhs and will not be paying tax. Hence consider tax on Agriculture income above 5 lakhs so every one is treated at par. Above points may be considered in the interest of Nation Building.
Naveen
“India’s Judicial System Flawed”
PM Modi failed to punish the corrupt in 1st term. Voted back in 2019, the public with higher expectations is keeping a close watch on Modi-2 sarkar. Unwilling to be fooled again in 2nd term.
PM Modi had left the punishment task totally incomplete. Rather, gave it the lowest priority.
India's most wanted: the Nehru- Gandhi dynasty, the Chidambaram, Karti, Mallya, Choksi, Vadra, Lalit, Nirav Modi, Tharoor, several UPA ministers etc are all having a free run.
People not only wanted to vote out the corrupt but also want them to be punished without delay.
The reasons for granting frequent and long adjournments and bails by courts, must be displayed in public domain.
Why blame India's Kanoon ? Blame, India's laidback Judiciary.
Culprits are receiving frequent bails, adjournments by Indian courts without substantive justifications. Subordinate courts are not accountable to higher courts. At least, so it seems.
The system is flawed. The Collegium system looks like a private club.
A total revamp of courts, including investigation into the assets of many judges, is a must
Concept of NJAC as the only transparent alternative must be revived . Kanoon koh bhi badal daalo. An amended bill must be passed afresh by the Parliament making it mandatory for the Apex court to enforce the Law.
A K Saxena (A former civil servant)
Monday, 17 June 2019

Threatening situations

First Politicisation of Bureaucracy, Then Bureaucratisation of Government Are the public servants expected to be completely loyal to the politician and compromise transaction of official business as per law mandated? Should they be rewarded as ministers for their loyalty to a political leader, party or ideology? Both the situations are threatening to a vast majority of public servants, examined, interviewed and subjected to background check by more than one state agency. The politician public servant manages everything from interview to background check and succeeds in acting too much of an arrogant for long years of a career of a public servant. Once in the political executive, s/he acts like a bureaucrat, forgetting all sense of public service. The issue is: should political interference be continued to be treated with contempt or accepted as the new norm of Indian democracy? One reason why an occasional emergence of a Narendra Modi receives such a warm welcome is the expectation of those public servants who doggedly refuse to compromise their loyalty to the Constitution of India or exchange it for the loyalty of the politician. Can permanence to a changed public service culture be assured by the present Narendra Modi or the future Narendra Modi ? The problem is very serious taking into consideration state governments. Sting operations telecast threats to public servants to fall in line or be ready to suffer consequences (very derogatory to say “boria-bistar baandh lo”). Such political interference with the law emboldens and bonds the politician and the public servants. That is responsible for ruining the image of a great India in just 70 years !
M L Gupta
Prediction went true
On my inputs a few weeks ago, you had predicted that NS Nigam, IAS posted as MD West Bengal Transport Corporation would become next Secretary, Transport Department succeeding the then Principal Secretary, BP Gopalika, IAS. The prediction went true this week. Please post the message in your site for information of all concerned.
Rabindra Nath Sarkar
Anger will not help Mamta Bannerji !
Doctors are on strike in many parts of the country in sympathy with the doctors in Calcutta. Who is responsible for this sorry state of affairs where common people are suffering ? Decidedly the Chief Minister of West Bengal who not only failed to handle the doctors' strike tactfully but added fuel to the fire. What after all the doctors are wanting ? Safety against violence from the patients ' relatives who sometime in their grief on losing a kin lose all sense of proportion. Doctors are not God .They can give care and treatment for cure but then they also cannot save if a patient is dying. What happened in the hospital in Calcutta was truly repugnant. Doctors were beaten up so mercilessly by the relatives of a person who died that one of them landed up in ICU. The anger of the doctor community on this episode is understandable. Instead of condemning and threatening the doctors Mamta Bannerji should have taken some action to ensure their safety so that such attacks do not happen again. It seems the electoral reverses in West Bengal in Lok Sabha elections have rattled her so much that she is not able to think properly or concentrate on governance. Calmness not anger can help her in showing her the way to reclaim her lost ground.
Aarti Khosla
Saturday, 15 June 2019

Whispers Forum — 15 Jun 2019

DEBATE (1)
If Rahul not AICC Chief, no outsider either becomes one !
Rahul Gandhi doesn’t want to be Congress President but if an outsider is made party’s President , the inner coterie of Gandhi family will finish his political career.
Manish Srivastava
Forest fires and indifference of the powers that be
Forest fires are raging in Uttarakhand-not one but so many in quite a few regions. One in Pauri is along the route to Kedarnath. These fires are annual phenomenon which has resulted in thousands of hectares of forests destroyed severely affecting the ecology of the state. What surprises one is total indifference of the powers that be to this destruction .Our national media does not even report it. Having been a regular visitor to the state every summer one reads about it in the local newspapers or hears it from the people there. While travelling through the state also one observes the black bare hills with burnt trees. Only two weeks ago while staying at one tourist house one witnessed a blaze on a nearby hill spreading very fast but mercifully it rained in the evening and the fire was extinguished. One of the reason for this disaster is dry grass which falls from the pine trees in summer littering the entire ground beneath. This grass called 'Perul' in local language is highly inflammable. They say it contains resin. Throw a cigarette or a beedi it catches fire and spreads in no time engulfing the trees. Sometimes the village folks while cleaning the outside of their houses gather it and light a match stick to burn it like stubble burning. All this is being irresponsible and shows lack of awareness. It is high time authorities educate people about this as also explore the commercial exploitation of this grass so that the same can be collected and forests cleaned of it .We need to have advanced measures to douse these fires. It is high time some serious thought is given to this to save the forests in this beautiful state as this is also threatening the wild life pushing the endangered animals towards the populated area adding to the animals- people conflict. When will we wake up to save our forests ?
Aarti Khosla
Friday, 14 June 2019

Whispers Forum — 14 Jun 2019

DEBATE (1)
Under the present circumstances next five years are very bad for the Congress.
Neeraj Mehra
DEBATE (2)
Difficult to name any Congress leader. Family did not promote any leader .
N D Telani
Great, WIC’ prediction came true
Your prediction about NS Nigam, IAS (WB 1998) made few weeks ago proved correct. He is appointed as Secretary, Transport Department, Government of West Bengal and took charge yesterday (10/6/19) from BP Gopalika, IAS (WB 1989), in terms of order no 1190-P&AR (IAS) 7P-149/2011 dated 06/6/2019 of P&AR Department, Govt of West Bengal. Great.
Rabindra Nath Sarkar, IAS
" Disturbing Trends, Mr Prime minister, Sir "
You are surely not enthused by the infighting going on between your two cabinet ministers for heading or getting memberships of various Cabinet sub-committees ? Hostility between them has come out in the open.
Artificial bitter-Sweet relationship. Mutual aversion. Speculations are rife that original orders of Cab Sectt had to be amended in order to accommodate a minister after his reported threat of resignation.
Public is appalled, amazed with the elected representatives ,they voted for,in last general elections. Public is disillusioned with ministers’ lust for power. Electoral fraud.
Ibtedaa-e- ishq hai rota hai kya, Aage aage dekhiye hota hai kya.
Ministers proudly call themselves Desh-bhakt. All are power-seekers.
Bahut na-insaafi hui hai ,public ke saath.
Even, the NSA was elevated to cabinet rank to maintain balance of power in the government after induction of the new Foreign minister with cabinet rank. Administrative compulsions are inevitable.
But, why wash the dirty linen in public .Open rivalry among serving ministers reveals a disturbing trend that sends misleading message to the public. This is no time for experimentation in governance.
Rolling-back of initial orders reveals non-application of mind and surrender to blackmailing.
A K Saxena (A former civil servant)

Whispers Forum — 14 Jun 2019

DEBATE (1)
Now only Priyanka Gandhi. Minus Nehru-Gandhi family there is no Congress.
R Maheshwari
DEBATE (2)
No one can revive Congress Party.
N P Sanghi
Wednesday, 12 June 2019

Only Priyanka Gandhi can revive the Congress Party.She needs now five years to re-unite the Party. Amit Pande

DEBATE (1)
DEBATE (2)
If the Congress has to revive and get ready for 2024 as strong opponent, should appoint one President in each state/union territory who should be a local candidate only. That local candidate start working right from now on and connect with every voter in his territory i.e. reach the last citizen in the queue. There should be one strong old hand who should coordinate their performance on daily basis. That old hand should be the President of the Congress Party.
Harish Kumar
Unfortunate electorate
Very unfortunate that a most competent and honest leader who did so much for his constituency has been let down by the electorate. By showing their apathy to a political leader, they have committed a biggest blunder and they themselves will be responsible if the district does not develop and they should not cast aspersions on any one else for their bad judgment.
Srinivas
Tuesday, 11 June 2019

Dear Fellow Congress persons,*

DEBATE (1)
Rahul Gandhi wants to resign and still serve the Congress Party as a loyal soldier!
Does he realise that the Congress Party has been overhauled from a political party into a strange animal defined by "Gandhi family loyalty" read "zero democracy, subservience, intolerance and insolence" resulting from the myriad fears of those who understand their own unsuitability?
Does he realise that this regime was implemented in the name of keeping the family legacy safe for him?
Does he realise that he was "the future" who justified the compromises inherent in the advent of his mother's Congress Presidency?
Does he realise that his culturally alien to Congressism mother has staffed (never allowed to be elected) Congress functionaries from the top to the very bottom with so-called party men and women who know nothing about Congress history, ideals, and spirit? These opportunist power junkies who have bought into the Congress system, corrupted it and laid all waste during this makeover, are surely not the ones to whom Rahul should bequeath the party.
If Rahul is convinced about his being inappropriate to be Congress President then it is his duty to rid the party of the parasites who have been planted to condition the party-environment in his favour. Only after that will his resignation make any sense for the Congress Party. Else, he will be doing bigger disservice to the party by handing it over to these unprincipled family loyalists. In these circumstances, the party will die, or even worse fate shall await it.
Rahul must stay at least a little longer to help the party re-educate and renew itself. God knows, in the process he may discover a new himself: his father's son, Motilal and Jawahar's descendent; instead of the disallowed-to-learn misfit that his mother has fashioned him into.
The first step is to suspend all arbitrary procedures. The second is to identify non-Congress sentiments and commitments of foreign-driven (cultural baggage as well as ordered subservience) entities and oust these from Congress decision making.
We must all take responsibility for what has happened, either because we were ignorant and unsuitable, or we were plain weak, or worse because we justified these departures citing our attachment to the family, thereby defiling the very concept of attachment.
We must understand how we got derailed in the name of love, manipulated and misused through our attachment (which we have always known to be the cause of misery) and it's politically motivated western misnomer "love," about which we have been recently enlightened through the last episodes of the Game of Thrones: that love is the death of duty!
To get back the love and respect of the Indian people in the true sense of the words, all Congressmen need to introspect and sort out our psyche, awareness, knowledge, proclivities, beliefs and commitments -- a return to core Congressism as conceived by the founding fathers of the grand old party.
If Rahul Gandhi really wishes to serve the party, let him bring in fairness in organisation, procedure and decision making in the party as a first step.
If not, Rahul must step down, not alone but with the entire gang of philosophically illiterate family lathaiiths and retainers clogging the party set-up.
With regards and best wishes to Rahul Gandhi as well as to all genuine Congress men and women.
Namit Verma
Monday, 10 June 2019

Whispers Forum — 10 Jun 2019

DEBATE (1)
Do not know much about the political persons associated with congress.
For revival of party besides working president four zonal presidents who are very good speakers and are able to communicate with people in Hindi and the regional language should be appointed. The very good speakers from outside party can also be given chance.
V K gupta
225 sector 2 Kurukshetra
DEBATE (2)
Rahul Gandhi tried the best in the era of hate politics. He should continue and he or Sharad Pawar or Sindhiya may only revive the party after Rahul.
Man
Govt. of India should gather some intelligence and do research as to why our aircraft are getting disappeared time and again near Arunachal Pradesh or China's border to find out whether China has deployed any software near the border so that the control system of our aircraft is hacked and controlled by that country.
Paul
It is really unfortunate that Shri. Pon. Radhakrishnan, BJP candidate who served as a Minister of State in Vajpayee's and Modi's cabinet, could not win this time from prestigious Kanniyakumari Constitutency in Tamil Nadu. The worst part of the fact is that during his tenure as Minister of State from May 2014 to February, 2019 he has brought projects worth Rs.40,000 crore which includes flyovers, National Highways and Doubling of Madurai-Kanniyakumari Railway line and he is known for his honesty, integrity and easy accessibility. The whole of Tamil Nadu is said about his defeat as he is regarded as Junior Kamarajar (Late CM of Tamil Nadu) best known for his simplicity. The main reason for this poll debacle is that some groups did actively involved in mis-propaganda. It is unanimously felt that a thorough probe should be ordered whether any one using religious or communal sentiments to polarize votes.
Sivakumar
Saturday, 8 June 2019

Whispers Forum — 8 Jun 2019

DEBATE (1)
Kamal Nath knows all the leaders in the country and he has a capacity to unite the Congress.
Rohit Mehta
DEBATE (1)
Digvijay Singh has all the qualities. The person who can challenge to the BJP is Digvijay Singh.One minus point is age-factor.
R D Rai
Friday, 7 June 2019

Whispers Forum — 7 Jun 2019

DEBATE (1)
Minus Rahul Gandhi only Digvijay Singh can revive the Congress Party because he is down to earth.In politics he is senior to Narendra Modi and in Administration he has no less experience than the PM.
G S Mathur
DEBATE (2)
There is no Congress Party minus Gandhi family. Before Independence Congre3ss Headquarters was in Anand Bhawan Allahabad and after Independence it was shifted to Delhi.Minus this family no one could run the Congress Party.
Vijay Tiwari
For revival of Congress, I feel Shiela Dixit or Pranab Mukerjee (if he accepts) will be most suitable. Part way with the heavy baggages like Kapil Sibbal, Abhishek Singhvi, Manish Tiwari or Salman Khurshid who can't win a seat for themselves, let alone for others. They are good practicing lawyers, can't devote much time for the party and want Rajya Sabha seats only. Part ways with all parasites who flourish on sycophancy of Gandhi family only. It will take time because unlike 'walkover' kind of situation prevailing at Indira Gandhi's time, this time they have to face Modi who is at his pinnacle and can do no wrong.
V K Pandey
Rajnath Singh is a man of no words. He even doesn't know the rank structure of CPFs. He knows only one thing of praising everything. This is his last tenure as Minister and next tenure like Advani and Joshi.
Mahesh Nath
Thursday, 6 June 2019

Revival of Congress

DEBATE (1)
The Congress, the grand old party born 135 years ago, is about to reach its expiry date. Terminally ill. No chance of revival. It has always functioned like a Private limited company with umbilical cord connected with the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty. The INC never looked beyond the first family to re-invent itself . The dynasty always worked to make itself immortal.
Rahul Gandhi, owning party’s defeat, initially insisted on resigning as Congress President. Family drama . The Congress Chairperson with her ‘ Putra moh ‘ has been persistently rejecting son’s fake resignation. Public support is being garnered to create an impression of Rahul’s infallibility. No replacement. Rallies, dharnas organised to support Rahul’s continuance as party’s President. He finally agreed after dilly-dallying, provided he is not held accountable for similar setbacks ,in future. Sab Nautanki hai. The Congress is bereft of leadership. Only Chaatukaars abound.
Implosions of accusations, counter-accusations are taking place within the party. Rahul Gandhi, projected as challenger to premiership in the last general elections, was expected to be humble. No one thought, he would be so uncouth and aggressive. Always denigrated the defending champion PM Modi.
The rift within the Congress party is getting wider by the day. Split seems imminent. National Herald case merits to be fast-tracked to logical culmination. Judiciary is liberally granting adjournments , bails and permission to the accused for foreign travels on flimsy grounds.
Conclusion
Let me be upfront. There are signs of simmering discontentment in the party. Rahul Gandhi deserves the sympathy and support that an underdog usually gets . The gutless party veterans are victims of dependency culture, lacking initiative to stand up and be counted. All are being gradually sidelined following party’s doctrine of “Use and Throw”. The party is on ventilator. Administering life-saving drugs is futile.
A K Saxena (A former civil servant)
DEBATE (2)
Only Kamal Nath can revive the Congress because of his long experience in party organisation and the Government.
Bhupendra Gupta
Wednesday, 5 June 2019

Congress should acknowledge outright rejection of Rahul Gandhi

DEBATE (1)
An outright rejection of Rahul Gandhi served as a timely reminder of how political future of Congress can be. Congress is eliminating Congress itself. It should come out from Nehru-Gandhi dynasty and open the door for all Congress leaders to lead the country. The country has rejected the leadership of Rahul Gandhi. Party should consider over this rejection.
Sunil Kumar
Hearty congrats
Hearty congrats Guptaji for a very well analysed book about the 2019 LS elections. Your thoughtful analysis is so true. We wish you all the very best in your future endeavours. God Bless.
Srinivas. Bangalore.