Of politics and such like!

This Karnataka state is getting increasingly tough to inhabit...for me, and i'm sure for others as well...
i mean, allow me to state some of the things happening in June alone...

I watched a film on Nandigram occupation, nay, invasion of land (with not so subtle games by Buddhadeb & Mamata & Co.) and after the screening, we had a discussion on how Ramanagaram slums are being occupied for SEZ...i read in the papers that another village, called Nandigud in Karnataka is also being acquired...and they're thinking about getting Tata Institute of Social Sciences for doing a baseline survey...sheesh..how low we stoop for credibility.

My friend lives in Frazer town, and the corporator and MLA asked the slum dwellers there to vacate and asked them to live in the park for a few days. In the meantime he would get them separate accommodation..so you had a whole slum living in the park, and to make matters worse, the residents living near the park complained about these "dirty people" being a health risk and being an eyesore and all that kind of nonsense...

The 73rd Amendment to the Indian constitution is being used to take all rights away from Gram Panchayats in Karnataka. Basically the deal is that a Gram Panchayat has the right to identify beneficiaries in 29 areas which include housing, Below Poverty Line Card (BPL), ration card, etc etc...and the allegation from State is that these Panchayats are not doing work in time. So the new Act proposes that if these Panchayats don't identify beneficiaries in time, then all power of identification of beneficiaries goes to MLAs. So basically even though the proposed act, uses the housing as a pivot, Gram Sabha members are freaking out because it says housing and other functions...and the complaint from the Panchayats is that none of the info on schemes reach them on time, funds are delayed, ya dah ya dah....so anyway, there was a huge protest on the 5th of July and about 2300 people turned up, some of them Gram Panchayat members but the majority of them were Gram Sabha members, basically people living in a village and coming within the purview of the Panchayat, ordinary people deciding to come all the way to Bangalore, spending their own money to protest against this act. The surprising thing was that there was nobody from the media, even though the Hindu covered it...but even they came only to the press conference organized near the Vidhan Soudha...but on second thoughts, it was not that surprising.

Moving on, we hear that the Centre has approved of the Nandagudi SEZ in "prinicple" whatever that means. What it does mean is that the Karnataka State govt has recommended that it be passed, just like the State of Maharashtra did....I think about 8000 odd hectares of land will be used to develop a township, complete with swimming pools and shopping malls and all...the juggernaut of urbanization rolls on...we hear that a slum area in Ramnagaram has also been granted clearance for a SEZ....its amazing that there is no large scale protest against this kind of blatant violation of basic right to land...in the name of economic growth, land acquisition is taking place at a fanatic place...a virtual feast for the big guys...which was not the purpose of the SEZ in the first place...anyway, the govt is very conveniently blind to this fact and is clearing things faster than anbody can respond...I've seen some coverage from the mainstream media but these are increasingly getting confined to the inside pages...pity..

Today we find that the govt might have manipulated tenders so that only few of the big companies can provide free bicycles for school children in govt schools...we have made a scam even in cycles...this is the limit...no actually that's not true...lalu's fodder scam was the limit..but this comes pretty close..i mean, who wants the IAS? good old city corporations are good enough for that extra buck...depressing shit i tell you...