‎Rudramadevi Review

‎Rudramadevi‬ is watchable in theaters. Anushka Shetty show all the way. Well the movie is not like Bahubali,even if the graphics work is not so good,it doesn't matter to me, but what disappointed me was the way the screenplay was written.This was supposed to be a historical film,but the history part was not handled well. Instead, this gives the feeling of watching a mass movie. Only character which tests our patience is Allu Arjun's. His appearance, dialogues were mocked to the core in theater :D grin emoticon.To compensate Allu Arjun,the director has used Vijayakumar very well.He comes only for 2 scenes and doesn't have any dialogue :D grin emoticon. If you are expecting some entertainer, then this movie is worth it. Anushka rocked. Her intro scene of taming an elephant received thunderous response. In some movies, the heroine fights will not work out and may look funny, but Anushka pulls it off with ease. Her fierce look,body language everything fits well. Deserves the Lady Superstar title :-) smile emoticon Ilaiyaraja's background score fits perfectly. Still the 'Raja' magic works smile emoticon sunglasses emoticon

BJP and the 'holy' cow

The Indian media is in celebration mode as they have got the much needed 'communal-violence' to report.It was an attack on one family and one man was brutally killed. So many people gets killed daily.Incidents of communal violence has been happening throughout the nation for a long time. Still the recent Dadri incident is something special.With Bihar elections fast approaching, pre-poll surveys showing positive sign for BJP and more importantly as the victim is a Muslim, this incident is more important to media. Usually I don't give much importance to such incidents, but this time even I am forced to write a second blog post on this incident.

The news channels has long back lost its credibility. Anyone, who is active in social media(especially twitter or facebook),would have understood about the news channels and their intentions. The behavior of some channels makes me think whether they are funded by some 'external forces' to create unrest in India.Media is known for its biased stand.If the victim happens to be a Muslim/Christian, media will work overtime and will send a message to the entire world that 'Muslims/Christians are not safe in India. Hindus are extremists. RSS/BJP is behind every communal incident.' 2 years ago, a woman was gang raped in Karaikkal. Allegedly, the rapists involved were Muslims and people close to VCK(Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi - a party which claims to be working for the upliftment of Dalits). That was a horrible incident. The incident was not given importance. Because the victim was a Hindu,she didn't have a strong background and more importantly the people involved in the crime were allegedly Muslims. This is Indian media for you.

http://www.newindianexpress.com/states/tamil_nadu/Ramadoss-Gives-Caste-Twist-to-Karaikkal-Rape/2013/12/31/article1974414.ece

Anyway this blog post is not about the biased media, it is about the irresponsible behavior of BJP. I am not associated with any political party. I am just a common man, while am able to understand how the media will twist an incident and give communal spin to it, being a ruling party(at centre) shouldn't the BJP be knowing this? When an incident like this is reported, it is the duty of the police to take action and it is the duty of the state govt to direct the police to take action. The UP state govt and the police has not done enough. Infact, it was the inaction and callous attitude UP state govt, has resulted in such a brutal murder.Instead of asking questions to state govt, the local BJP leaders and some MPs are issuing irresponsible statements.

They are trying to exploit the situation for electoral gains.The Union culture minister Mahesh Sharma has been making controversial statements repeatedly for the past few months. It seems this fellow has violated the prohibitory orders of police and entered the Bishada village days after the murder took place. Another BJP MLA Sangeeth Som accompanied him it seems ( source  http://epaper.newindianexpress.com/c/6803943 ). Another BJP party man says, if police takes any action against innocent people, the consequences will be different. Issuing such veiled threats in a charged atmosphere can potentially aggravate the situation. 

As usual,the BJP MPs known for their controversial statements - Yogi Adityanath and Sakshi Maharaj, has joined the party now. These are their statements :

 "We won't remain silent if somebody tries to kill our mother. We are ready to kill and get killed." - Sakshi Maharaj (source - http://www.newindianexpress.com/nation/BJPs-Sakshi-Maharaj-Ready-to-Die-to-Save-Cows/2015/10/06/article3065946.ece ). While he makes sense in asking the UP govt why the CM raised the compensation from 10 lakhs to 45 lakhs and why Hindu victims were not given any compensation, the aggressive statements projects him in bad light.

Though Yogi Adityanath has not issued the statement directly,a member of his outfit Hindu 'Yuva Vahini' has said "We will go and meet Hindus who are being harassed by authorities concerned. We will provide them all possible help, be it tan-man-dhan-gun, if they are harassed," Tyagi said.

Such statements are uncalled for. Yesterday,Bihar's ex deputy CM Sushil Modi has said that if the BJP comes to power, there will be complete ban on cow slaughter in the state.Cow slaughter was banned in many states. Ban on cow slaughter is not something new rather it was not done by BJP first. Today Digvijaya Singh has confessed that it was the Congress which was first in banning cow slaughter.

"Congress was the first in banning cow slaughter, will consider backing central law on ban: Digvijay Singh"

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/49231773.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst

In some states, BJP banned the cow slaughter too.Go through this link, you can understand, cow slaughter is banned in so many states and the law varies from state to state.

 http://www.ibtimes.co.in/beef-ban-states-where-cow-slaughter-legal-illegal-649249

The problem is not in making the cow-slaughter-ban a poll promise, it is the timing of the statement that matters. Well it may be argued that the Dadri incident is not an organized communal clash and it is being blown out of proportion.Anyway,the world is watching all this. There is a charged atmosphere in Uttar Pradesh and twitter/facebook. Will such statements not worsen the situation? 

The Union Home minister,Rajnath Singh says not to communalize the incident.The finance minister Arun Jaitley says such an incident brings bad name to India. The Prime Minister has time and again stressed on inclusive growth and assured of the safety of every Indian(which obviously includes minority). When the party's top leaders are being responsible, why does the local leaders behave like this? As usual,the pseudo-secular camp started demanding an explanation from the Prime Minister. I have mentioned about a gang rape at the beginning of this post. None demanded the then PM to issue a statement on it.Rather all these Azam Khan, liberals, Owaisi, Sharad Yadav, Lalu  etc expressed concern over the incident. They were not even aware of it,so demanding an explanation from Prime Minister is publicity stunt and politics too. This Azam Khan has written to UN that Muslims are unsafe in India. Dear Azam Khan,do you even know that people living in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir wants to live under India's control?

Rahul Gandhi visited the victim's family.Aravind Kejriwal too visited the family.Kejriwal is Delhi CM and he is not a national leader too.So many people died in dengue in Delhi.The Delhi CM has not visited a single family of the deceased.But he has time to visit Akhlaq's family.This is also communal politics.

If BJP too wants to going to cash-in on the situation, then there is no difference between BJP and others.Prime Minister office sought report on the incident from Minister of Home Affairs.Hope the BJP top leadership acts against people issuing such statements. These statements cannot be brushed aside as statements of some low level party workers. Some of them are MPs, their irresponsible statements cannot be tolerated and hope the PM and BJP president takes proper action against these people.

The fake 'beef' violence

An UP Homeguard spread beef rumour to instigate attack on father and son.this was to seek personal vengeance.I said, it might be due to rivalry between two groups,but now it has turned out to be due to personal dispute.Initially the news was reported that 'Muslim man killed by Hindu mob for consuming beef'. And as expected fringe elements started their rants that Modi should speak about it.Only after Modi became PM for every stray incident he is expected to comment on it.Has there not been any personal dispute cases before? The fun is,law and order is a subject of state govt,not a single voice was raised against UP state govt :D UP is a state and not a union territory to claim police was controlled by central govt.Instead of taking action,the CM Akhilesh Yadav is challenging the central govt to ban beef export which in no way is related to this incident.So many people are getting killed in India,why,in UP alone. Minor Dalit girl was raped and killed (http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/minor-dalit-girl-raped-killed-in-up/article6914581.ece), many such incidents were reported, did the UP govt announce any compensation to them? There were incidents of violence incited by Muslim groups, did any govt or politician use the word 'communal' then? People were dying of dengue in Delhi, Kejriwal didn't visit the family of any of the deceased, but he is now showing his secularism by visiting this Ahlaq's family.There were many jawans who sacrificed their life in border fighting for the nation, did any of these fellows visit their family?

The intention of media is to instill a sense of fear among the people that Narendra Modi is working day and night to finish off minorities, which can potentially prevent BJP from winning Bihar elections.During Delhi elections,incidents of church attacks were reported and without any proof, Hindu outfits were blamed for every reported incident. In all the cases reported,not a single Hindu group was involved. After Delhi elections, it stopped.

To top it all,for the rape of a 71 year old nun, Hindu groups were almost 'indicted by the media'.Later some Bangladeshis were arrested for the nun rape. All those liberals and wannabe-secular warriors,never regretted for blaming the Hindu outfits for these incidents.

The intention of writing this is not to justify the violence that took place,but to condemn exaggerating a personal dispute and reporting it as an attack on a religion. Otherwise, anyone involved in this incident should be punished. And politicians belonging to all parties(SP,BJP,Cong,JD(U),AAP) should stop their blame game and issuing irresponsible statements.

You can read about the personal dispute in detail in the below link :

"According to a senior police officer, Vinay had a personal dispute with Akhlaq earlier and had been instigating a group of youths to attack his family, alleging that they were involved in cow slaughter."

http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-others/dadri-lynching-up-homeguard-spread-beef-rumour-to-instigate-attack-on-father-and-son-says-police/

The Tamil National Alliance and the UN resolution

The Tamil National Alliance in Sri Lanka welcomes the UN resolution.Just saw an interview of Mr.Selvam, Sri Lankan Tamil M.P., in Thanthi TV​ . He was sensible.While the SL Tamils and their leaders are sensible, some jokers in Tamil Nadu are doing comedies like attacking KFC(because it is an American firm) and threatening more protests against American companies.I have given below some of the important points from his interview. Hope some 'Dravidian' parties and 'warriors' doesn't 'brand' him anything :-)

"The previous SL govt(under Rajapakse) would not have even allowed the Tamil MPs to travel to Geneva and surely,Rajapakse would not have accepted the UN resolution. The current govt,has accepted the resolution,which means,the SL govt admits there were human rights violations. Also the present govt will earn the wrath of Sinhalese while the Sinhalese support will increase for Rajapakse. Inspite of all this, SL govt has come forward to accept the resolution. Rejecting it outright,will do no good to the SL Tamils.When LTTE was active,such an opportunity was also not provided by the UN.

The resolution doesn't have everything we expected,but with the clauses mentioned in it, we can make use of it. The resolution recommends the abolition of anti-terrorism act,which is an important aspect of it. By abolishing it,our Tamil youngsters,who are undergoing punishment in jails, can be released. Moreover, if we reject this resolution outright, we will never get the support of the international community.

If we don't give an opportunity to the Lankan govt, that will create a bad impression about us and we will never get any backing from other countries,including India.Let this be an opportunity given by us to the Lankan govt, probably, a last chance to the govt.

Opposition to the UN resolution is fine,infact opposition should be there.But we also shouldn't forget the fact that,it is America, which has brought a resolution against the human rights violations that happened in Sri Lanka.So,our opposition against the resolution should be meaningful. Violence or protests in front of US embassy will again create a bad impression."

Interview came in Thanthi Tv(Kelvikku Enna Bathil with special reporter Mr,Hariharan), once the interview is uploaded by the Thanthi Tv team,I will share the link here.

Everything is working fine in Sri Lanka, rehabilitation process is going on, not even their politicians complain so much about racism, as the people fighting for them in Tamil Nadu do.The reason is the leaders in Sri Lanka are honestly working for their people, but the leaders and some fringe groups in Tamil Nadu, are working day and night to incite violence and create unrest in the society. This is the difference between the leaders in both the countries.

Remembering 'Mahatma' Gandhi

Pic taken from : This blog and sketched by Mr.Surya

Mahatma Gandhi - a lot being debated on the great man even now.Some people oppose Gandhi saying his non-violence approach was not effective and India would have got freedom much earlier,had they followed the Netaji way.Another group claims Mohandas Gandhi was a British Agent and gives lame facts to justify the claim.They go on to say India became independent,because British had no might to rule us further. Some Hindu groups too hate Gandhi and blames him for all the problems in the country.Ironically, people who are hell-bent on bashing these Hindu groups too hates Gandhi. Gandhi did some mistakes. Some of his political moves too were wrong.

He nominated Mr.Pattabhi Sitaramaiah against Netaji for the post of Indian National Congress president. When Netaji won and Pattabhi got defeated, Gandhi said, 'Pattabhi's defeat is my defeat'. We can conclude - the relationship between Netaji and Gandhiji was not so good. When you are fighting for a cause, it is practically impossible to avoid people with different ideologies. Obviously there will be difference of opinion and strategies against each other. As a common man,I was disappointed with Gandhi's stand on one particular issue.We can understand from the recently declassified files(by Central Govt) that Netaji did not die in the plane crash and he lived as a prisoner in Soviet Union. Joseph Stalin kept him as prisoner and he was executed there. Nehru didn't make any efforts to save Netaji.Its understandable, as he is a politician. But Gandhi too didn't make any efforts it seems.Ofcourse, we can get more details only when all the files are declassified, but my instinct says, Gandhi didn't make any efforts to save Netaji. Inspite of all this,what makes him a Mahatma?

Bhagat Singh was a hero. He fought for the nation boldly against the British and sacrificed his life.Netaji wanted to throw away the British rule using weapons and army.There were lot of warriors who fought against British.Veerapandiya Kattabomman, Veera Vaanchinathan,Bal Gangadhar Tilak etc. They were all patriots and what they did against British was an act of bravery.But that was not enough to throw away the British empire. They fought either individually or with the people belonging to a particular region.

Entry of Gandhi changed the scenario completely.He had the charisma to unite people.He converted the 'Swarajya' into a mass movement.People from all parts of the country stood behind him.The freedom struggle gained momentum and the British found it difficult to go. It was in 1922, people the Chauri Chaura incident happened,in which a police station was burnt.Gandhi immediately stopped the non co-operation movement saying that we were not matured enough to rule ourselves.This move came under severe criticism and there is an opinion among the current generation people too that India would have become independent well before 1947, had Gandhi not called off the movement. But Gandhi was right, an achievement through violence will not last long.In 1930 he again came back with Civil Disobedience Movement and Dandi march against the salt tax.From then on, no stopping. India had to wait for 17 more years to get freedom.

This is a nation built on Gandhian thoughts and that is why India still remains a democratic country. Since 1947, India has seen many Prime Ministers,it had an emergency,it had witnessed the emergence of many political parties, but irrespective of whichever party or PM in power,we are able to voice out our opinion against them independently. Don't refer to one or two stray incidents and say the Gandhian model is a failure.

There is a pic of Gandhi doing rounds in social media. In that pic, Gandhi is seen dancing with a foreign lady.It has gone viral in social media and none bothered to check the authenticity of the pic. The person seen in the pic is not Mohandas Gandhi, but an Australian actor posing as Gandhi shaking a leg with the lady.Such fake images and information about Gandhi has actually made many believe that Gandhi was a womanizer, while he was not so.

I strongly believe,it was because, we got freedom through non-violence, we are still independent and have seen these many developments. Had we got freedom through Netaji's approach, there were high chances of someother nation colonizing us.

While Netaji had a different ideology, similar to Gandhian ideology, leaders like V O Chidambaram Pillai and Mahakavi Subramaniya Bharathiyar - the national poet, too united people. Mr.V O C was the first Indian to run indigenous ships in Indian sea to counter the British. Mahakavi Bharathiyar, through his poems united the people and made them think.

We can debate a lot about Gandhiji's assassination. We can also consider what Ghodse had to say on his act and debate whether his arguments are acceptable.But that is a different topic and we have to come up with lot of facts and figures to discuss about it. This post is all about some misconceptions and facts about Gandhi and how effective was/is his ideology.

Gandhian principle is not just ahimsa/non-violence, it means not-to-give-up and also not-to-indulge-in-violence. Don't give up your fight until you achieve your goal, at the same time, be sensible. I don't find anything wrong in this and nothing better than this approach. With some 'enhancements', still the Gandhian ideology is the best. One may or may not like Gandhi, may or may not agree with Gandhian principles, but don't abuse him. Sharing fake images/information without checking their authenticity is sheer foolishness.Sharing them purposefully, to malign Gandhi's image, only shows the sick attitude of people.