‘I’ am truly democratic. Are ‘You’?

The way certain words and actions of some are interpreted, distorted and misrepresented to mislead people and carve out alternate realities in India political arena, it is important to establish certain definitions of those words which represents its acceptable usage elsewhere in the world. Those that depart from these agreed usages of terms, using them to mean something other than what they are intended to represent, therefore stand guilty of being fomenters of social mistrust and hatred. Such people often come in the garb of the ‘educated’ or ‘expert’ voice, belong to certain political backgrounds and entertain personal and political ambitions that go beyond their stated purpose in life.

In the age of social media driven politics and campaigns, where episodes like an Arab spring or a Muzzafarnagar riots are created with rapid-fire speed, it is imperative that such words that have the power to singe, scald and burn, be clarified. Readers can then ‘interpret’ the ‘codes’ that are used to keep the nation divided and suspicious of one group or another. ‘I’ represents all those who are feeling oppressed and marginalized by how words have been hijacked and used as throw-away ‘labels’, lapped up by others who have little or no inclination to make their own minds up based on evidence available. ‘I’ tries to turn sheeple – people who behave like sheep - to people with an independent mind and thought. 'I' also tries to identify those individuals who pretend to be sheep in wolves' clothing; those that use words wrongly to mislead 'sheeple'.

First, ‘I’ am no supporter of religion in politics for I believe religion is a personal matter and should never enter public life of people, which is what politics deals with. I reject the type of 'Hindutva' that involves building temples where mosques used to be or insist that Hinduism has answers to all of Indian society's modern day problems and needs. Religion has no place in public policies other than as a right that needs to be safeguarded in a secular democracy. Whoever uses religion for any point-scoring exercise is guilty of the same charge they make on the other side. To say that terrorism where the culprits are Hindus is ‘saffron-terror’ is as terrible as calling all terrorism carried out by Muslims as ‘Islamic terror’. Terrorists have no religion and whoever makes such statements is not secular but is using the word to hide his/her inherent bigoted nature.

Second, ‘I’ don’t buy the rhetoric of all those opposed to 'Hindutva' that anyone who is a Hindu and supports a person or party automatically becomes a right-wing nationalist. That is stereotyping and social hatred at its worst. Bush's doctrine of 'You are either with us or with the terrorists' is an example of such warped thinking. All those who abuse and misuse this term are guilty of a social crime - that of fragmenting the society on religious lines - crimes that they allege right-wingers engage in. Why? Because ‘Hindutva’ according to a 1995 Supreme Court of India judgement, means "the way of life of the Indian people and the Indian culture or ethos". There is nothing religious about it. Those living in India as its citizens live the Hindutva way of life - Muslims, Christians, Buddhists, Sikhs and of course Hindus. Much like those who live in the west live predominantly a western form of life, which you may as well call a ‘Christian’ way of life.

Third, ‘I’ also dont believe that people should be allowed to use double standards for all those who are considered 'communal' in India. For those who continue to hold Modi for Gujarat riots should also open their mouths about the Congress role in Sikh genocide. Such folks will run to Supreme Court for the slightest affront to their sense of right, but refuse to accept court's verdict when it suits them. These same people are the ones that either support explicitly or keep quiet when a political party overturns the judgement of the Supreme Court in India that grants women the right to receive alimony from their husbands after divorce for their maintenance and that of their dependent children. ‘You’ are appalled? Well, you should be. For these folks who claim to be ‘secular’ and not ‘communal’ did this to Muslims. No other religious group in India is subjected to this social abuse and destitution that the divorced Muslim women undergo. This is the worst form of hypocrisy and double-standards. Who are these people? Supporters on the largest party that calls itself ‘secular’ and is in power in India today.

‘I’ am democratic for ‘I’ don’t misuse words to justify my beliefs, distorting the words to pretend I am something that I am not. ‘I’ also have the courage to say what I believe in rather than being a coward that hides behind distortions. ‘I’ am a truly democratic for I say what I believe in, rather than whisper or say something that I don’t. Do ‘you’ consider yourself to be entirely democratic after reading this?

The recipe for democracy

India is the largest practising democracy in the world. In terms of sheer numbers, the stats are mind-boggling enough not to require repetition here. But are people there really living in a liberal democracy? Most who live and follow the process and concept called India would disagree. So why has it been so hard for the fruits of individual human rights, rule of law that’s free and fair, policies that benefit people in reality, not just in some ideological sense that party manifestos require them to, and elected leaders who are transparent in their dealing, been so hard to achieve? After all the nobel laureate Amartya Sen wrote that being the ‘Argumentative Indian’ had given the citizens a natural edge over other nascent and evolving democracies. The answer lies in how democracy arrived in India. To understand the process, comparison with how democratic principles entered western (rather the European) societies in the latter stages of last millennia is well worth the time.

Democracy evolved over a period of over 400 years in western Europe. It was the culmination of a long process of churning and evolution. The western nations’ reliance on a mode of analytical and logical thinking, the bedrock of rational decision-making based upon freedom of speech that is an essential pre-requisite of democratic thinking, is as much a product of what preceded this way of thinking. What preceded was of course the excesses of the Church with its abuse of authority, suppression of scientific and rational though linked with denial of individuality. India has not yet been able to, or rather its political leaders have not allowed the nation to lift itself above the regressive and emotive pull of religion, the use and abuse of caste and religious background for vote-bank politics and the overbearing reliance on populist and quick-fix measures as opposed to logical and analytical approach to managing governance. It needs to traverse a similar process of self-reflection as a nation that many western European nations did in the 13th to 17th centuries which led to emergence of the philosophy of science and the age of industrial revolution to really accelerate the process of democracy.

This process in Europe involved sequentially the ages of renaissance, reformation, rationalism and revolution. These stages ultimately broke the stranglehold that ancient and regressive religious thoughts had over people as the predominant mode of determining social realities and manage societies. The change in mindsets was not limited just to enlightened leaders but their subjects too. The period of renaissance was the first stage of breaking this stranglehold. It involved a critical analysis of the religious scriptures and a retelling of the natural order, a viewing of ‘reality’ through the prism of logic; a renaissance of thought. Indeed Nico Machiavelli, the Italian Chanakya, who was credited with writing probably the first treatise on politicking, reportedly said that all his wisdom was a retelling of old knowledge and wisdom contained within the Greek classics.

Renaissance was followed by reformation of the church. Those choked by the puritanical and abusive control of the church broke free and various movements facilitated this, leading ultimately a separation of spiritual realm from political field. Religion became more a personal matter and not an over-riding gear on matters of governance of states.

This era was in turn was followed by an era of rationalism. The freedom from a state of lack of querulousness about matters of nature and the visible world and rejection of superstition and dogma led to the use of reason and logic to explain the mysteries of the universe rather than invoking supernatural forces. This led to the age of industrial revolution in the 17th century in England and the arrival of mechanical aids into the life of people with a value on material wealth and diminution of the spiritual.

The last stage in this process was revolution in many European states as a means of violently purging the society of religious hegemony and monarchic excesses which the previous stages of change had not succeeded in eradicating. There was a violent flux that cleansed many European communities of the royalties and gentry that exploited the common man using religion to attribute motives to man's actions. These four stages spanning a period of nearly 500 years were the precursor to individual rights and use of reason as the primary means of organising societies and decision-making on a daily basis. These precursor stages heralded the arrival of democracy. Development of bureaucratic institutions, and laws of tort: hallmarks of democracy, allowed groups of people to participate in the process of governance, had been evolving through the previous four stages of change.

For the individual, s/he had been a witness and a participant of a huge cathartic process whereby dark forces of superstition, feudalism and internecine medieval warfare that involved the suppression of one group by another had been, in a piece-meal manner, smashed beyond recognition. His own intellectual evolution and emancipation was as much the stuff of democracy as the Magna Carta, that first piece of document penned in Lincolnshire and now preserved in the small town of Runnymede by the Thames. In other words, democracy did not evolve overnight like a magical solution to centuries of autocracy, despotism, nepotism and malevolent monarchy alongside parasitic spirituality/religiosity. It took centuries of development which formed the bedrock of civil society in Europe and the Caucasian world.

Is it any wonder why democracy in India still resembles a myriad forms of religious states, dynastic monarchies, feudal states and despotic authoritariansm? In the next part, we will explore what needs to happen for India to start becoming truly democratic - in practice rather than simply in principle. We shall ask whether the recent liberalisation of economy, the advent of free media, and a more open society has changed a people that are still in many ways ancient.

Telepathy - Science or Illusion?

Biologists have missed a trick by entrapping all we think, feel and do to activities within a bunch of neurons in our brains. Whilst they communicate chemically through neurotransmitters which themselves are regulated by neurohormones and neuromodulators, that they also emit electricity and hence are electomagnetic cells with fields and waves are often lost to biologists. EEG, MRI and PET all rely upon this electromagnetic potential of the neurons to map their functions.

One great topic for skeptics of rational scientific logic is the concept of telepathy. Telepathy is one of those things that you either accept as a possibility or reality, or as something without substance that is performed by clever illusionists. In 2007, the British Association of Science set apart a section of its "Annual Festival of Science" to allow a scientist Rupert Sheldrake to discuss "Telephone Telepathy". We've all experienced this, or at least the majority of us. We think about a person seemingly out of the blue only to find the telephone rings and that person is the one who is calling, the one we were thinking about. As a result of the subject being discussed, the Association found itself at the centre of a huge controversy.


Professor Peter Atkins, aproven skeptic and rationalist, without necessarily being humble and realist, commented in a radio interview that the samples used were tiny, and that the effects were statistically insignificant, further, that the experiments had not been conducted in a "scientific" way. Professor Atkins later admitted that he had not actually seen any of the findings of the experiment, but insisted that it made no difference to his original statement, adding that there are no serious reasons for believing in the effect of telepathy.Not all scientists however agree with Atkins.

The criticism used against the British Association came from an attempt to test the assertion that "Telephone Telepathy" was real. The skeptical view was that selective memory was at play, where people would attach significance to strange events, but ignore times when there weren't anything strange. The experiments in question were carried out by Dr Rupert Sheldrake who has been examining these areas for several years now. His claim is that the person making the call obviously thinks about the person they're about to call before they telephone. It is this that the person at the other end detects psychically before the telephone rings.

Sheldrake recruited several hundred volunteers, each of whom nominated four friends. One of these four was then picked at random to make a telephone call to the recipient. The recipient then had to state before they answered the call, which one of the four they thought it was. Statistically, chance alone dictates that 1 time out of 4 they'd be correct, or 25% of the time they'd be correct.The results showed that 42% of the time people correctly identified the caller. Way above, and almost double what it would be with chance alone.

The skeptics have had their view challenged repeatedly. Another test most people are familiar with is the "ganzfield" test which involves people naming a shape displayed on a card that is turned away from them. A recent combined analysis of these tests, using over 3000 examples performed up until the year 2004 was completed. Again the success rate for these tests by chance alone should have been 25%. The results showed that the overall success rate was 32%, a small, but statistically significant number. This goes a long way to answering criticism tht only small numbers of people have been tested. Skeptics still refuse to accept the findings, blaming everything from bad analysis to outright fraud.



Dr Marios Kittenis based at the University of Edinburgh, has been using EEG techniques to provide the best evidence yet for telepathy, or at the very least a new phenomenon of consciousness. People who claimed strong telepathic links with each other, decided who would be "sender" and "receiver".

They were then taken to seperate rooms and wired up to EEG machines, which detect activity in certain parts of the brain.When in these rooms, the subjects were exposed to the sounds of rythmic drumming to bring their levels of consciousness to a similar state. Whilst in this state, random light flashes were beamed at the "sender". This triggered activity in the visual cortex of the brain (the area which activates with signals from the eye). Their startling discovery was that the visual cortex in the "receiver" also responded in a similar fashion, despite them not being exposed to any light flashes. This 'response' started at the same time (t=0) in the brains of 'senders' and 'recievers' and lasted 400ms, peaking around 200ms.

Skeptics are finding it more difficult to dismiss these findings so easily, stating that there must be some unknown error in the experiment causing these results. More than likely, like Atkins, they've not even examined the experiments before making these armchair conclusions. In America, Todd Richards from the University of Washington has performed similar tests using a more sophisticated technique using Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI). Which is another method used to study brain activity in great detail.

The results were the same as those done with the EEG machines. That the sender who was exposed to random flashing lights, somehow triggering the same response in the visual cortex of the receiver. A significant number of these experiments have been carried out and each time producing the same startling results. Both teams have stated that more experiments need to take place before a proper conclusion can be made, but even at this early stage believe these findings to be the result of an "anomalous phenomenon".

A 3-step solution to all evils

Indians suddenly getting obsessed with corrution is akin to saying Scandinavians getting obsessed with cold. Certain things are inseparable. Many options are doing the rounds from group protests to legislative changes, from individual-led rights movement to government-led suppression of expressions of legitimate demands of their citizens. I think one can sum up the solutions in three simple steps using the principle that kick-starts democracy. No, not the vote, neither rotten bureacracy nor freedom of speech, that much abused element of democracy these days. This can be resolved by referring to one's basic human rights. There is a charter of human rights which within a democracy if for a moment we accept that India is one (despite the gratuitous disregard to human rights that characterise its governance on a daily basis) that makes everyone equal in terms of their freedom to be granted certain rights. IN that regard a minister is equal to a fakir, a Baba is equal to a judge, a prositute is equal to a sports-hero, and so on. That's the kind of rights-led and rights-based western libertarian democracy most NRIs in the west live as do all westerners. Its a concept unthinkable for those who have not lived abroad in the western Europe or Northern America, Australia and New Zealand. I dont include those who live int eh middle east for that's anything but democratic, or Africa, Russia, South East Asia or indeed South America. The democracies there are perhaps less evolved than Indians. And no, I also dont mean those living abroad on borrowed time as students, tourists, posted diplomats or touring sportsmen. I mean residents with all the rights. If one has lived this way, the solution to the corruption problem is a 3-step simple solution.



First principle: Basic human rights that the Indian constitution grants must make a reasonably serious government have laws for those rights to be upheld. For example if I am paying taxes for the municipal corporation to clean the roads and make it reasonably smooth, then there must be a law that compels certain departments with an accountable head to be responsible for its delivery, failing which I the citizen have the right to complain to another department, an ombudsman if I am not satisfied with the respone and ultimately the right to seek redressal through courts. Clear penalties are established rapidly in courts with quick dispensation of justice.



Second principle: Indians must have civic centres in every town, village and hallis. The role of that centre must be to provide information on rules and regulations on pretty much everything. From what to do if the garbage collectors dont colect garbage to whom to contact if there is no water supply to how to proceed against a tenant unwilling to vacate a house. These centres could concievably include advice on who to approach if your GP indulges in negligence or your solicitor does not pay you your fees as an expert witness. In India such centres do not exist or if they do, one has to pay a little bribe to a little Babu who has his time in the sun and warmth in pocket. Information is power and much of small level corruption is driven upon one's need for information on issues that are governmental in nature ,e.g. what to do if you need to get your name changed by a poll-deed (note: private agencies provide as much information when they';re trying to get business, but little when they're about to lose it). Its in the pursuit of the right process that needs to be carried out through the right and proper channel that much of India's corruption takes place. Once citizens get their information first from a reliable source (which is audited annually for customer satisfaction and financial effectiveness) and approach officials from a postion of knowledge and civility rather than ignorance and bribe (or violence and connection or 'pairwi') the real catalyst for corruption is taken out. If the work recommended is not done in a timely fashion, there must be a grievance redressal system, which taps into principle one above.



Third principle: if a society cannot survive on trust and mutual respect and honour much as India cannot given its age-old fragmenters such as caste, regional dialects/languages, religion and increasingly wealth driven class system, then one must have terms and conditions for reasonable interpersonal exchanges between individuals. Much as in tort laws, if one does not honour one's side of the contract, then one resorts to a legal complaints system. For all of the above to take shape and turn India into a modern democracy, the law must be updated and millions of them created and changed on a regular basis. The lokpal bill is a step in the right direction only if both sides abandon their egoes and really get to solve the problems rather than throw brick-bats at each other. If the above fails, then we can resort to a simple formula. Let us start asking our elected representatives if they are ensuring the above in their constituencies for their constituents and if not, why not?



PS: This is what I experience in the west everyday and so do millions of others like me. The west was more barbaric and undeveloped 600 years ago than the east. They've catapulted ahead by establishing the pricniples of democracy starting with the first principle - ensure that every person's human rights are protected and if not, create sensible legal strategies to ensure that it is. Everythign else follows from that. In copying the west the fathers of Indan nation forgot that one needed to eradicate the fodder that feeds the mindset of a fragmented society with haves and have-nots that the Hindu caste system has established over millenia that education-driven class system has promoted which finally wealth and power driven political system has perpetuated.

The Terraces of Angkor

East of PhimeanAkas lies the terrace of Elephants. The wooden palace of Jayavarman, squeezed between the Bayon and PhimeanAkas, has not survived but would have stood on the terrace, the edge of its grounds marked by a latterite wall, of which only a ruined gopura remains. Don’t miss the elephants starching some 300m, and life-sized. Also worth seeing are the stylized elephants that are three-headed, their trunks delicately entwined around lotuses.

The adjoining terrace is that of the Leper King. It is believed to have been the site of royal cremations and the statue on the terrace is that of Yama, god of the underworld. For many years this statue was assumed to be that of Jayavarman VII who several legends say contracted the disease, although nothing remains to verify this. The real thing to see here are two walls of gods and goddesses that have been now restored with multi-headed nagas upto 7 storeys high. Behind and above all of this stands the towering face of Jayavarman scrutinizing everything. Amidst the crowd of tourists, their guides and vendors trying to sell everything from kravats to sculptures, my attention is drawn to two children, bare-feet and destitute who look lost and confused by all the photo-clicking and noise that the tourists make. They cant understand what the fuss is all about when they cant find enough to eat or wear despite their rich but transient neighbours.

Baphoun & Phimean Akas: Pyramids of the Far East

Built in 11th century, this was the capital and state-temple of Udayadityavarman II, Baphoun is undergoing restoration and is closed to the public. It has an impressive sandstone causeway, 200m long and raised on three sets of stone posts. Once comprising 5 tiers in the form of a pyramid, it had galleries running round the full circumference on its first, second and third levels.

Suryavarman I constructed his small state-temple Phimean Akas, which Chou Ta-Kuan, a visiting Chinese chronicler in the 12th century upon whose descriptions one gets a sense of life in the Khmer cities of yore, described as ‘tower of gold’. It was the first palace to be built within fortifying walls, but later absored into Angkor Thom which was built around 200 years later. It’s a relatively simple pyramid structure which bears uncanny similarity to Chichen Itza in Mexico. There is a steep set of narrow stairs to the top which don’t allow you to step off on the first two levels. Chou Ya Kuan wrote that the central cross-shaped sanctuary tower at the top (there is no idol, images or places of worship here) was home to a spirit which took the form of a serpent by day and a beautiful lady after dark. Unless the King visited her every night before seeing his wife, disaster would follow. To the north are two paved bathing ponds – the larger for men and the smaller for women. The surrounding area is full of broken pottery which my guide said date back to Rajendravarman’s time; 944-968AD. I picked up a couple a souvenirs.

Bayon: Jayagiri of the Khmer

Whilst Angkor Wat gets much of the attention and plaudits from tourists, there is something enigmatic and an other-worldly quality to the Bayon, with its enormous towers ending in the most compassionate expression that you could possibly find carved into stone. After going in through the East approach, we arrive in front of the south gate. There is a huge crowd there already, particularly a group of Japanese tourists, who are quite irksome. Without wanting to be politically correct, I should point out that the Japanese and some Spanish speaking tourists are the most inconsiderate that I’ve personally come across during my travels. The Spanish speakers tend to push their way through and speak far too loudly hogging spaces. The Japanese tend to travel in huge groups, speak not a word of any other language than Japanese, appear to be oblivious to everyone around them and most selfishly keep taking photographs in front of key spots, preventing others from doing so. It’s as though if they are not there, no one will believe that they ever visited those spots. Knowing the lengths that they go to in order to remain socially included perhaps this is an area of social niceness that their sociologists and psychologists can work on. Europeans and Americans are the best, they take their snaps quickly and move on or wait until you’ve done your bit without rushing in. I’ve come across far too few people from south Asia to be really able to offer an opinion on their touring styles, but all those that I’ve come across have been polite and shy, at least outwardly so.

The morning is fresh, and there is a clear sky that displays the eery looking structure in front of me. The colour of the stones is strangely black – I’m told its latterite but this one seems to have a covering of black sandstone. I take out my new 55-300mm Nikkor lens and try and take a long distance shot which does not come out well. On second thoughts it isn’t the camera. There’s nothing attractive about the pile of black stones, dark and imposing, stacked up in front of me, which is exactly how the Bayon looks from about 500m away. As I approach the temple, perhaps as a conjurer’s trick, the temple begins to adopt its identity. Scores of the most compassionate face begin to magically appear out of the black stones until you cannot avoid them. The faces are everywhere, yet you don’t feel as though you’re caught in an intense stare as all of them have their eyes closed in the form of the meditating Buddha. There are 49 towers on the outer circle and 5 in the inner – a total of 54 which Sukun, out guide, says is the magical number of 9 which is considered auspicious in Buddhism. However each of the towers have 4 faces making it a total of 216 faces in all, again a total of 9. Is that all there is to it or do the numbers hide a deeper secret. More shall be revealed in these pages later.

Bayon's original name was Jayagiri - the Victory Peak or Victory Tower. Strangely the French who have the most atrocious pronounciation rules on this planet, could not pronounce it and so called it, the aboslutely hideously unimaginative 'Bayon'. Why? Because the temple was covered in a huge bnayan tree. So much for French creativity. Jayavarman VII had this majestic temple built in late 12th or early 13th century intending it to be a ‘Sarvadharmasthal’ or a place to embrace all the religions of the kingdom including the Islamic beliefs of the newly conquered Cham (modern Vietnam). This was rapidly consecrated as a Buddhist temple as the kings of Angkor had changed their religion from Hinduism. It was not until Jayavarman VII reconverted the state to Hinduism that the Buddha in the central tower was lowered into the well and replaced by Vishnu. This act was reciprocated in Angkor Wat when after the advent of Buddhism, Vishnu was casted out to a non-descript corner while Buddha was instated at the central place.

The best way to enjoy Bayon is to enter through the south gate (see map) and make your way to the south-east corner and the bas-relief on the 3rd enclosing wall. Then follow the corridor to the north-east section to view the scenes on 2nd enclosing wall and finally walk into the central sanctuary and climb up the stairs until you reach the roof-less top. The Bayon temple seemed to me to have three distinct levels to it and I don’t mean the Hindu cosmological levels, described elsewhere. The lowest tier is devoted to bas-reliefs and whilst these are not of the quality of Angkor wat, they are quite imposing in their own right. The second tier consists of the central sanctuary full of images of Buddha that tourists can worship to. This level also allows opportunity to take photographs of the image of Lokesvara in various manners, especially through strategically placed windows. The upper-most tier (bear in mind that the tops of the towers have been destroyed) allows a great view of the surrounding forest and Siem Reap town in a distance, as well as engage in touristy thing such as take snaps with modern day Apsaras.