I read only the Economic Times during the week so I am spared the sensationalism of the tabloid press and can pay attention to what matters. Today, reading this paper made my blood boil. Not for the content but for the shocking news items. What is this country coming to?
Headlines: Foreign team visits will need MEA clearance. What was that again?
No organisation including private concerns can directly send delegates abroad. Here, now, everybody listen up. We now live in a regimented society. Big brother at South Block has to know who, why, where etc. Clearance also includes non-clearance. This will now be an added form of babu-raj. This will now be a new source of income for bureaucrats and politicians. Fill my pocket for putting files on top for clearance or to have a word in the ear of the self-appointed authority to affix a rubber stamp on your application. How can this country hope to develop if decisions cannot be taken by the private sector without having the permission of the government? Is this not total foolishness? Corporate decisions to send delegates or invite their counterparts are purely a business decision. The government has no business interfering in private enterprise. The only concern of the government with regard to private entities should be tax revenue. Beyond that let them decide for themselves. They have each more brains individually than the collective South block put together.
I-T may zoom in on those with Rs. 8-10 lakh income. Who do you think is in this income block? Mainly the salaried person who has TDS deducted as it is. In many countries, where income is mainly from salary there is no requirement to file a tax return. Here the government is going backwards. They want more and more details. We are all on our jolly way to the Animal Farm. Just watch. Instead of simplifying the tax structure, more and more complexities and taxes are added. Income tax, profession tax, service tax, capital gains tax, sales tax, value added tax, excise duty, customs duty, octroi, can you think of any more that I may have missed out? What is going on? Why not have a simple income tax and a goods and services tax that is a uniform percentage on all goods and services through out the country? Why can the Centre and State not devise a method of sharing tax revenue collected in that State by some formula? Is it necessary to complicate matters so no one understands them? Interpretation left to babudom, smart Alecs making hay with loopholes and the chase to plug those with more legislation? In a populous country like India where the average person can barely sign his name, why have such confusing tax rules? Throw them all out and revamp the whole system. But no, the self appointed pompous law makers will chase a well-salaried person (who definitely has would have both good education and talent to draw such a salary) until they decide to migrate and get out of the country.
Tucked away on Page 2 a column, UP minister seeks ‘Muslim Pradesh’. Azam Khan Minister for Urban development in UP seeks a Muslim Pradesh made out of West UP. Will someone please inform the Minister that such partitions were completed in 1947 and he can either go west to Pakistan or east to Bangladesh and this country is not an amoeba to keep breaking up into autonomous states or otherwise?
Worst of all, who was the Madhya Pradesh High Court judge who halved the prison sentence of a criminal who raped a 6 year old because he belonged to the SC/ST category? Rape itself is a heinous crime and a 6 year old victim at that. I have no words to describe this low-life. Such criminals should be buried alive. This MP High Court judge halved the sentence due to his belonging to SC/ST? Thankfully, the Supreme Court stepped in and reinstated the trial court sentence. Should the MP Judge not be questioned as to why this was done? How would the judge feel if the 6 year old belonged to his family? Are judges not made to take a test of logical reasoning or ethics before being appointed to their posts? If not, that should certainly be started now. Btw, I fervently hope child rapists in Indian prisons meet the same fate as those in Western prisons for similar crimes.
