Outlook magazine has a cover story this week titled, “Why Bangalore Hates the IT Culture”.
Why? For land-grabbing, zooming property and rental rates, the rising cost of living. For creating traffic jams, pollution, encroachments. For turning ‘garden city’ into ‘garbage city’, pensioner’s paradise to ‘suicide capital’. For devaluing other professions. For destroying the City’s intellectual and artistic culture. For introducing a culture of conspicuous consumption in malls and bars.
The former Indian Institute of Science Prof Chintamani Nagesha Ramachandra Rao director voices his thoughts, reproduced here courtesy the magazine.
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By C.N.R. RAO
I am a real Bangalorean. I was born in Basavangudi. The greatness of Bangalore was that it allowed simplicity and enjoyment—a cup of coffee and a masala dosa at Vidyarthi Bhavan kept you happy. I don’t see that Bangalore any more. It is now an awful city. There was more poetry and music here before the IT boom. The city we have created in recent years is rotten—highly polluted, garbage strewn everywhere, including the intellectual garbage dumped on this city by the IT industry.
Bangalore was always a highly intellectual city. Though people called it a garden city, there was more science here than anywhere else in India. Nowadays, nobody talks about it. They only call it an IT city. When it all started, I thought it was a good thing because so many people were getting jobs. Over the years, it has created a large upper-middle-class population who crowd the malls. There is nothing wrong in that, but what is really serious is the influence this has had on Bangalore’s intellectual content.
It is wonderful to have a lot of young people getting big salaries, provided they don’t take away the essential lifeblood of other professions. Bright people at a very young age, before they are even 20, think of IT as an option because they can make quick money. Lots of intelligent people are doing jobs that are much below their intellectual capabilities. They are like coolies who are working for wages and not producing great intellectual material.
Can an India of the future afford a highly skewed growth like this? All the humours should be balanced—we must also have good poets, good economists, fine historians, quality scientists and top-class engineers. An NRI recently asked me, if India is so great in IT, how come it produces only 25 PhDs in computer science per year? That’s a very good question.
Right in the beginning, the IT industry should have planned their campuses in towns like Ramanagaram (40-odd km from Bangalore). They should have created IT satellite towns, but they all wanted land inside the city. They not only took away that land, they also complain about not getting enough. They say they want better roads, but why should we create them?
IT people have a responsibility that they are yet to fulfil. If they’re making so much money, why shouldn’t they create an outstanding private university equivalent to Stanford or Harvard? Had they done something like that they would have compensated for the other problems they have created. If IT people are making money, what do I get out of it, unless I am employed in Infosys with Narayana Murthy? The trouble is, we have given them a lot, but have got nothing in return.
Our society has created a bunch of icons and role models who are distorting not just the future of this city but of all India, and of our sense of values. Our people have lost respect for scholarship. Money and commerce has taken over. If IT is going to take away our basic values, then you can burn Bangalore and burn IT.
As told to Sugata Srinivasaraju
Read the full story: Raiders lost the arc
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Also read: ‘Indian IT doesn’t benefit its own people’
‘If IT’s so hot, why don’t want IITians want to join it?’
‘A City whose soul has been clinically removed’
CHURUMURI POLL: Who killed Bangalore?
Photograph: The Hindu Business Line
churumuri 
That’s right… let’s burn down the malls and bars and all those who work in them….
Let’s burn down all the IT campuses… and all those who work in them…
Let’s ban employment since it is so obviously eating into our masala dosa and coffee time.
Let’s re-animate the dead and shoot all the living so that “Old Bangalore” will be back with a bang.
I suppose we should also blame the IT people for Deve Gowda while we are at it.
Just imagine the temerity of the young people… they want jobs!!! They want, gasp, recreation!!! The horror!! The horror!! Why can’t they all be happy with just masala dosa and coffee?
After all “real Bangaloreans” born in Basavanagudi have this God-given right to demand that the wheels of change come to a grinding halt just outside the borders of Bangalore.
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Prof.Rao is a well respected and an eminent person. But I did not expect such a statement from him. World is changing and new oppurtunities are opening up. If IT is enabling such a change it is welcome. With every change comes many good things and also some bad things. No body can force anyone to join IT, if someone is really interested in Science and Phd’s they will definitely pursue that career despite IT. Moreover with 200+ odd engineering colleges, who is providing employment to most of them? Moreover I have seen the original article but why have you highlighted ‘Narayana Murthy’ in here?
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I am a Bangalorean. I am a Kannadiga. I was born in Saint Martha’s hospital in Bangalore, not in Basvangudi. I have been to the markets in Basvangudi. . I have even had coffee and masala dosa at Vidyarthi Bhavan, MTR and many such places. I even hang out a lot in Brigade and MG road. I am a techie too. But does my voice count? Or will i be considered as an alien from mars out to destroy Bangalore(my city) and its culture(my culture).
PS: If anything needs to be burnt, it is magazines like outlook and channels like ndtv that treat Bangalore as a foreign city where you land once in a blue moon, just to file biased, simple minded and foolish reports from a foreigners viewpoint.
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I fail to understand how Prof. Rao, an eminent scientist, could come up with such utter nonsense. I am no fan of Infosys, Wipro or TCS but clearly the opportunities they have provided are better than sitting on a desk in HAL or BHEL and passing files.
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The reality/truth whatever you want to call it..lies some where in between. Definitely the sensitivity levels has gone down badly….IT has lot brought lot of good stuff. And I also feel with majority of good students jumping IT bandwagon for obvious reasons…number of good people entering Masters and PhD programs (qualitatively) has decreased. We will not feel the pinch of it now….9-10% growth (at what cost?) is all fine in short term…next 10 yrs or so, we will see the effects….we need good teachers in schools/colleges…..and that is where the real problem starts…
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When an industry is booming and creating jobs, what do you want to do? close your eyes and ignore it?
Skewed growth..yes, thats what it is. But from an overall perspective. While liberalization and IT have created wealth, more taxes – the resulting money (through taxes, direct and indirect) hasn’t been used anywhere. Not a single thing was developed between 1990 and 2000 as a step to being ready.
Good planning and governance would have made us utilize the boom and create a balance.
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IISC was built because of the foresight of Tata ‘s and vision of Regent Vani Vilasa Sannidhana and r Maharaja of Mysore Nalvadi Krsishna Raja Wadiyar. To day their names have been erased. The circle in front is known as Prof.CNR Rao Circle. This is his contribution to Bangalore !! No one worth his name would have allowed this to happen. However eminent he may be as a Scienetist, he come across a pompous ordinary human being.
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I was a student there when he was the director of IISc, though not taught by him. I beleived in all the things such as science & Technology. I worked in developing rural technologies to help the rural populations on my own will. At that time he starved our dept without any funds, saying that what we are doing was not high science. Though I had a pittance of salary working there, I had to leave the job as the funds dried up.
Now Prof. Rao is barking at the wrong tree. Instead of fighting and influencing the policy/policy makers of science education and research establishments, so that the scientific professions are as attractive to work as IT (at least in terms of monetary benefit to start with), he is wasting his breath by saying IT is the ill of Bangalore. At least due to IT middle classes of Bangalore are able to dream about a roof over their heads, which was not possible in his times, unless one is a corrupt govt officer or one’s forefathers preserved a piece of land for the family.
Coming back to Bangalore, lopsided or absent urban development policies of the Govt. after Govt. are the cause of today’s pitiable infrastructure. Added to this we had some village bumpkins as our town planners, who had no vision of what a metropolis is and how it needs to accommodate coming generations. They have designed layouts with 30′ X 20′ with 20′ feet roads in some layouts. Their camber of the roads is always in the opposite direction, such that water from storm water gutters always flows into the middle of road and eats away the tar layer forming potholes rainy season after rainy season.
Leaving the details aside, which are countless to count, there is no politician, who will stand for Bangalore’s cause, fearing thy will go the Chandrababu’s way. I think with the kind of intellectuals and politicians we have, Bangalore’s infrastructure will slowly turn into a nightmare, if it is not already a nightmare.
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It is not a coincidence that URA sounds as plaintive as CNR in his now famous interview published in Mayura, is it? Od India, old Bangalore were paradisal because in those days we had people like J. H. Patel (no matter how inebriated he was), inspired mari Lohias (demogoguery and sense living in unhappy proximity), and of course, the young URA. the blackmailer journalist PL., etc. The habit of mourning the loss of a golden age that never existed is a universal habit.
Old Bangalore, Old India, old masale dose (the batter is mixed and fried in an entirely unconventional way now) are now dead, just like old Kannada and Kuvempu who made it is medium of magniloquence. Idella satya kanaa.
The question we should be asking is: How do we make Bangalore more liveable, not just for ourselves, but our chidlren and their children?
Once global warming dries up the money in IT and BT, they will flee Bangalore No point in blaming their money-grubbing. What is our disaster planning? Why should Kannadigas should forever be arming themselves against this calamity or that? Is a life of nemmadi impossible for us within our own land, between the Krishna and the Kaveri?
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Maybe Mr. Rao is right. But why blame the IT industry for not setting up its base in Ramanagara? The government – politicians and bureaucracy (of which Mr. Rao is a part) – should have created the infrastructure which would attract the industry into software parks outside the city. The had no foresight or even if they did, they had no capability to provide the basic facilities that is expected of the government. Even now they can go about doing it. But no, all they will do is sit and complain while the world moves on.
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I agree with Prof. Rao’s common sense approach of IT satellite towns. However, it is not just the IT sector that is to blame for the demise of the Bangalore that once had a unique cultural identity. One must understand that when he says burn IT, he doesn’t literally mean it. Those statements are the anger expressed by a good man and others of his kind. The outrage it is, of having seen the destruction rather than the preservation of the city we once knew as Bangalore. RIP, my once favorite city. O favored cultural icon, may you live forever in our memories.
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Let’s not blame IT (and Narayan Murthy) alone for the deteriorating bangalore both from cultural and infrastructure perspective. When a city (like Bangalore) has a phenomenal growth, especially with no plan, all kind of problems bound to arise and erstwhile small city culture and values bound to disappear slowly.
Our netas didn’t had vision for the growing city and never seriously looked into the problems. Instead, while grabbing whatever they can (from sizzling real estate), they were patting their backs and claiming they were the reason for all the glory. Once in a while, wake up, when Premji’s of BLR give dhamki of shifting their business to outside of Bengaluru.
Our raajakaarani’s don’t even know that there were other reasons why IT companies (the early comers) choose Bangalore in late 80’s and early 90’s. It’s the presence of Public sector companies like ITI, HMT, HAL, etc., which had good talent and equally augumented by good educational institutions (IISc, IIM, engg colleges, etc.,) were the basic reasons.
Ofcourse, the good weather and peace loving cosmopolitan turned kannadigas were big factors as well.
The recent political fiasco caused karnataka to loose several thousand crores of investment. Does DG, BSY or the novice HDK understand or in retrospect care to look what their actions caused the state and bada naagariku. They only cared about them and their family while screwing the state.
These politicians when they are back into power they will makeup for the loot they missed during the fiasco and president rule. But how we can make up the loss ??
For all the trouble these politicians created they all should be sent home not for a single term but for their life. Do we have that WILL to do it.
First 4 decades in post independent india, karnataka has to bear the centre govt’s step motherly attitude because of our spineless meek politicians. Railway ministry approving single lane between MYS and BLR is a simple example to show how ineffective our leaders were. They took what was given as alms and never cared to demand their fair share. Even after 15yrs the 2nd lane is not complete.
In the last 1 or 2 decades of coalition era, again we have to bear similar treatment but with our own local netas. non-IT people are getting poorer and poorer and the parity between the rich and poor is alarmingly widening. This does not bode well for Bangalore or Karnataka or for that matter INDIA.
I see good number of people on this list seem to know the issues and present sanity in their thoughts. Can some of these can think seriously of trying for public office and do something in action… May be the upcoming elections is a good start.
KP (blog owner) should openup the conversation and see if we brainstorm, and convince some to take the plunge. We may loose the deposit but it is a good start and will succeed eventually. Forums like these should start creating awareness. Unless the sane people participate in the governance, these spineless netas would rule and sell us.
That’s my rant and hope it makes some sense. If not anything, atleast participate in the voting and elect the sanest among the available lot.
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“Pulikeshi the Last,” I salute your sincerity and your power of articulation (love reading you!). But I agree with Professor Rao.
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One would expect a person of the eminence and scholarship of Prof. Rao to come up with more refined and insightful remarks about the impact of the IT industry on Bangalore. Prof. Rao should ask himself this simple question? If he were a young 20 something engineering or science graduate today, what career would he have chosen? IT?? What do his grandchildren do? Are they in the IT field? (sorry for being personal…)
If Prof. Rao was content with just a masala dosa and a coffee at Vidyarthi Bhavan, it was because people in B’lore at that time did not have the options they have today. In any case, why should he expect everybody else to be satisfied with the same?
Bangalore is definitely not a less “intellectual city” today than it was before. It continues to produce excellent writers, musicians, artists and social scientists (incidentally, the same edition of Outlook carry’s another article by the eminent historian and writer, Ramachandra Guha, a Bangalorean). And why should the IT industry set up a private university like Harvard or Stanford? IT Companies are businesses and not charities. They earn their profits on the back of their entrepreneurship and hard work which they are bound to share with their shareholders and employees. They are of course obligated to pay taxes and obey the laws of the land. If Prof. Rao is so concerned, he should use his position and influence with the Indian government to strengthen existing Indian universities or set up new ones.
The truth at the end of the day is that the IT industry brought unprecedented development and growth to Bangalore, which our politicians and bureaucrats failed to efficiently manage. Poor governance is responsible for Bangalore’s ills, not the success of the ITindustry.
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outlook should be congratulated for this article.
bangalore is just not IT. politicians( s m krishna etc)–media–IT CZARS nexus worked overtime to create this impression.
slowly but surely NAMMA BENGALOORU is coming out of IT HANGOVER.
these companies even asked for bars and discotheques to be opened till early morning .
dating allowence ,mating allowence then came abortion allowence
truly shocking turn of events.
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Sugata Srinivasaraju is a paid hack, so one must expect no better than a bunch of unattributed generalisations. But CNR Rao is a scientist. Is this all he can muster in terms of rational thinking?
In his distaste for “outsider”, in his disregard for the “other”, in his pining for a long dead past, and in his contempt for the present, Rao shows he is no better than Narendra Modi. I only hope one of these days he doesn’t go around painting English signboards with the KRV goons.
The IT industry may have indeed contributed to all that it is being charged with. But are we to therefore conclude that all this—land-grabbing, rising cost of living, traffic jams, pollution, conspicuous consumption etc—did not happen before? That Bangalore was a paradise its pensioners lived in?
Rao finds it exceptionable that Bangalore is called “IT City”. But did the city have any claim to fame, except of the soporific kind, before IT “happened”? In all its years of existence, what has prevented IISc from procuring a stellar reputation for Bangalore?
Instead of blaming those who gave Bangalore something to cheer about, and filled Karntaka’s coffers in the process, Rao should be questioning the planners for not envisioning the growth, the government for taking the money and not building enough roads, etc.
Values, scholarship, intellectual atmosphere are all easy cliches on the lips of those with houses in Basavangudi and Malleshwaram. But what of the rest? Why should the young be burdened with sustaining those when the old couldn’t create the avenues for them?
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Ree Mysore Boy!
Swalpa clean-aagi interview odhi innondhsala..CNR suggestions kottiddhaarey–what works for Bangalore antha! Either CNR is reading DB regularly and is probably a secret fan of his writing…?:)
…I quote from the interview, ….”Right in the beginning, the IT industry should have planned their campuses in towns like Ramanagaram (40-odd km from Bangalore). They should have created IT satellite towns, but they all wanted land inside the city. They not only took away that land, they also complain about not getting enough. They say they want better roads, but why should we create them?
IT people have a responsibility that they are yet to fulfil. If they’re making so much money, why shouldn’t they create an outstanding private university equivalent to Stanford or Harvard? Had they done something like that they would have compensated for the other problems they have created. If IT people are making money, what do I get out of it, unless I am employed in Infosys with Narayana Murthy? The trouble is, we have given them a lot, but have got nothing in return.
Our society has created a bunch of icons and role models who are distorting not just the future of this city but of all India, and of our sense of values. Our people have lost respect for scholarship. Money and commerce has taken over. If IT is going to take away our basic values, then you can burn Bangalore and burn IT….”
This is what I have been shouting from the roof tops! People wake up!
QED
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I agree with Dr Rao to a cerain extent, when he says ‘Our people have lost respect for scholarship’. This is entirely true. ‘Money and commerce has taken over’, very true, but is something abominable is the question. My grandfather used to go for a walk every morning and evening for a longtime..He complains that he cant do that even nowadays..why should he be expected to ‘change’ for the every hindi spouting northie harbinger of ‘development’ and ‘growth’ that comes into blore, with an almost indignant ‘hindi nahi aata kya’ ?
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The circumstances are so rotten over here that it is impossible visualize a change. Things would have been much better if IT industry focused its growth in towns like Ramanagara or Tumkur. It would have contributed lot of growth. In western countries, they have university towns and political capitals that is different from business hub. Unfortunately we have not followed that model. Today they are shifting other big cities like Mysore and Mangalore, only to corrupt them.
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The circumstances are so rotten over here that it is impossible visualize a change. Things would have been much better if IT industry focused its growth in towns like Ramanagara or Tumkur. It would have contributed lot of growth. In western countries, they have university towns and political capitals that is different from business hub. Unfortunately we have not followed that model. Today they are shifting other big cities like Mysore and Mangalore, only to corrupt them.
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I am from National middle /high svhool and college.I have grown with Bhattara hotel dose, geetha bhavn vade and Harsha stores Badami haalu, Binnyy vs Blues football and Prasanna-chandra double spin attack.
Because IT has brought lot of money, it doesn’t mean old charm is gone. Vidarthi bhavan is still there side by side with ‘Roti Ghar’.Bangalore coffee board’ coffee is still available with Big Mac and KFC.
It is easy to bemoan Bangalore’s growth and prosperity on IT.Whereas the new IT industry was taken on the cusp by companies like Infosys and Wipro what have the scientists, done? A handfull of them became buearacrats, kept congratulating each other and they are even after 30 to 40 years stayed as Prof Emiritus / Advisor and what not? They did not allow any budding scientist to come up with the result quite a few got fed up and went back. Scientists should introspect and see whether allowed other scientists beyond their ‘inner circle’ to come up. Why China produces more original papers in magazines like ‘Nature’ or ‘science’ than India?
The politicians did a bad job of not planning the growth of a city for which we can’t blame IT industry.
If IT had not come in, even as late as early 1990’s Bangalore was mostly by two coffe and 2/3 dose type city.Thank god it has grown with more choices, more options. Ask any IT industry boy’ girl Would he / she been happier registering with ‘Emplyment Exchange’ and waiting for an interview once in 5 years. Prof. C.N. Rao will get the answer.
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DB,
I agreewith you and mostly what CNR Rao says. I am an IT guy of 30 years standing, and cannot see the destruction that the IT outsourcing is causing to Bangalore and Mysore. If I have one major criticism about CNR Rao is that he did very little for IISC and after that his appointment like the previous Mysore University VC etc.. and this is because he considered himself first. Instead of comments he could do something doing something tangible- opening a chemistry academy in Bangalore where he could teach chemistry free for all kids who are interested,
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ERR,
CNR is only saying IT is taking too much while giving nothing back to the community. We can argue this till the cows come home…sure our boys and girls are better off with jobs and opportunities and that’s why we need ‘ultra-sensitive-to-criticism IT Nethas’ to do something for the benefit of the community they so conveniently live in. I had written earlier that NRN thought nothing of donating so much money to Cornell and he demands better infrastructure all the time…however you seem to have written accurately about the scientists and their oligarchy.
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This ‘nostalgic’, ‘old-is-gold’ is best ignored. In that process, lets not be rude to him.
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ERR is right on the mark with his comments. There are several instances of PhD research scholars not getting paid their pittance of scholarship for months together by CSIR, UGC etc. and yet you bemoan youngsters not taking to science! Students apply for travel grants (a few thousand rupees) to attend foreign conferences, months in advance, anxiously awaiting the result till the day before the conference. Pity the young faculty member who is not on the good books of the all powerful HOD. Institutions other than IISc and IIT are condemned to the dump.
The country needs good quality scientific manpower, both for industry and academia. The problem is not going to be solved by attacking Narayana Murthy and Premji. Scientocrats with the right Sarkari connections and influence have to take the initiative to revamp the system so as to make education and research more meaningful and attractive.
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i understand the frustrations of the prof.
my thesis is this: because we were such a nice and soft city, we took it easy and there was nobody holding the fort. since were content intellectualizing and eating doses between /2 kaapees, we were ripe for taking. and we got taken and how!!
we are the science city, but our town planning, sewage systems, water supply, pubtrans, etc all suck. these didn’t fail in the last decade suddenly. The stage for the collapse was set by the way the city developed during the ‘glory’ days. if you think the glory days were glorius please see the image below which i have posted many times before and will post everytime bangalore issue comes up. we have the highest number of ‘jnana’peeThas but our kids reading skills are amongst the lowest in the country(churumuri had a blog on that), our primary/secondary education sucks and we are yet to solve the problem of medium and even degree admissions problem.
Being among the largest wetlands of Bangalore, the health of Bellandur lake is symptomatic of the condition of the waterbodies all across the city.
A recent study by the Energy & Wetlands Research Group at IISc points out that rampant unplanned developmental activities, untreated sewage, solid waste disposal, and encroachment of lake beds in its catchment have put the Bellandur Lake under extreme environmental stress, impairing the functional ability of the lake’s ecosystem resulting in poor water quality, depletion and contamination of ground water, and frequent flooding in the catchment. Lack of integrated planning approaches pose serious threats to the sustainability of the region.
Environmental Impact of Developmental Activities in the Bellandur Lake Catchment.
Authors: Dr. T.V. Ramachandra, H.S. Sudhira, B. Karthick, and K.G. Avinash, Energy & Wetlands Research Group, Centre for Ecological Sciences, IISc
the was no bangalorean holding the fort. the sad part is, to see all this does not even require high science or satellites. 500 years ago people knew that building lakes on valleys was the way to go.
it is not sufficient to politicians and babus. where was the intelligencia putting all their(p&b) fancy ideas to test and review? heck for all the intellectual talk, bangalore does not even have a solid local paper, yet all the media houses in the state are housed in bangalore. the way churumuri started i thought atleast bangalore/ mysore would get a solid online media. but lets not even get started with what churumuri is dishing…
the point is bangaloreans have failed bangalore. the only question worth discussing now is how to take the fort back?
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Thank you, Great Mysorean. It is definitely a blessing to know others read what one says, however minor the merit of the response may be and however small the audience.
Whether Bangalore will ever return to its presumed glory, maintain its current status as the ” silly can” city of India, or even remain Kannada raajadhaani are matters of importance only to the elite–writers and artists who live on various kinds of handouts from the government through its many parasitical agencies–the Pradhikara, the varoius academies and parishaths, Mangaayana;miasmic politicians who have got fat on the blood and flesh of the very people who voted for them because of jaathi or need for protection; the IT, BT vampires who have repaid only a fraction of what they owe to Bangalore while sponsoring pretentious nonsense like Bengaluru Habba, happily investing their ill gotten wealth as culture capital. Let us remember that mythical Indraprastha, Hastinaavathi, historical Pompeii, Persepolis, Byzantium, intellectual Nalanda, Takshashila have all perished, their accomplishments notwithstanding. Nothing in the accounts of these noble culture citadels tells us about how the counterparts of our bada Boregowda lived. (We do know a lot about the Nero-like Devegowdas, however.)
The question that nags me and keeps me awake at night is this: What about my people who can speak only Kannada, who live amidst the hellish filth under the flyover near City Market, on the banks of the dry Bhima in the north, near toxic sludge filled keres and kaaluves that have become charandis all over the state, often in the face of daily hostility from non-Kannadigas?
Does the splendour of beautiful Bengaluru matter to those who cannot read a line of Kannada, let alone tomes by the Guhas, the Janaki Nairs, and even the DVGs? What does the artistic historicity of the Bangalore palace mean to those who cry themselves hoarse all day long in harsh weather in return for a meal and handul of soiled notes on its maidan?
In what sense have the Theosophical Society, Wadia Institute, Gokhale Institute, Mythic Society, yes, IISC and its cheap money making imitations like PES, the Kannada Adhyayana Samsthe at Bangalore University, the Culture department of Karnataka Government once headed by a woman who can be as un-Kannadithi as one can imagine, and the like influenced or improved the quality of life for our brothers and sisters who sell vegetables from pushcarts, still work with their hands, backs bent, on the streets of our mahanagara?
I can go on forever about the cruel and obvious disconnect between the high culture of Bengaluru and millions of its inhabitants. Culture matters little when it has nothing to do with the least among us. Yes, I will happily trade Bengaluru’s golden intellectual children like Narayana Murthy and Kiran Mazumdar Shah for cleaner air, safe drinking water, and other creature comforts for Kannadigas who do not know that life can often be a pleasant experience and not painful repayment for some karma commited in an unknowable life. Not to brag or anything, I go through the painful and, ultimately, self-humiliating because it is easy, moments of buying unripe seebe hannu, distatsteful pictures of Shani (of all the thirty-three million gods and goddesses) from children who risk life and limb at busy intersections under the watchful eyes of constables who will collect their “maamul” at the end of the shift.
To make matters worse, we have now a new danger, a culture vulture called Kannada Rakshana Vedike, now getting noticed, which is being courted by the likes of HDK as well as Ananthakumar. If encouraged, it will become a machine of extortion collecting money from the rich IT, BT folks in return for not not damaging their milion dollar properties and from those who live by their sweat. Let no one tell me about Karnataka becoming a Bihar. Let me know how we can keep Bengaluru from becoming another Mumbai. It is excruciatingly ironic that Basavaraja Kattimani foresaw the fate of Bengaluru in “Girija Kanda Cinema” decades ago. Even as we deify our cultural kommondants, we pay little heed to what truly meaningul writers like Kattimani and Niranjana have already said. Incidentally, neither of the two would have earned a Jnanapitha Prashsthi.
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Well, if we had not seen a spurt in IT growth in Bangalore, then we would have seen comments about how other cities have garnered major projects and we are good only for masale dose and coffee.
Yes IT czars can and should do more but this is something we must ask of industrialists from other fields as well. There have been a large number of billionaires from India in recent years but only a handful of them are from the IT field. There have been textile, real estate, petroleum and pharmaceutical magnates before IT as well and their contribution has not been exactly stellar.
As far as demanding more contributions to education or institutes of excellence from the IT, even if this happened would it not be more likely that they would create more technology institutions rather than Harvards? Pray how does this increase the number of poets, artists or scientists ?
The idea of having satellite towns is commendable but this cannot be made IT centric. It should have been suggested for all industries. That might have eased some of the traffic problems. However there is no saying whether the old world culture of the city would have remained. Even with satellite towns, there would have been an influx into Bangalore resulting in more cosmopolitanism and more exposure of local people to outside influences.
So on the whole while the interview has some valid points, it looks like several issues have been mixed up and IT has been used as a whipping boy.
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TS, thanks. Sorry to know we may have missed your posts.
I think the Prajavani and the Kannadaprabha do try to show that they are not irredeemable in their editorials and letters to the editor, if not in the general content. ( I am still trying to understand why T. J. S. George was given a Kannada Rajyothsava Prashasthi, but then HDK is no fool.) By giving the media a taste of destructive censorship, Indiramma forever destroyed their independence. I have just now looked at the ad naseum drivel about Sonia Gandhi’s birthday being celebrated in the DH and its sister paper.
The DH and the Prajavani are beholden to the liquor lobby which in turn owes much to its godfathers in government. What commitment to the community can we expect from them? By the way, look at how the DH skirts or ignores matters of significance to Kannadigas, highlighting only what our new colonial masters might be interested in.
The story of the VT is as laughable as VJ’s party hopping. If someone as talented as VB is not willing to defend us, who can?
I still have not been able to seek the Kannadaprabha as one of our own despite my readership of thirty-five years. No nationally owned paper can champion regional causes effectively. The locals do not have the nerve. The tabloids are busy slinging excrement at their victim of the day. I fear when the Gowda family is kicked out of politics and avoids jail by ceasing its mining operations, it will try to monopolize the media in Karnataka.
How is the lost ground to be regained? I am not without hope.
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Tigers Whiskers the Last,
There is a contradiction in your thinking…”The question that nags me and keeps me awake at night is this: What about my people who can speak only Kannada, who live amidst the hellish filth under the flyover near City Market, on the banks of the dry Bhima in the north, near toxic sludge filled keres and kaaluves that have become charandis all over the state, often in the face of daily hostility from non-Kannadigas?…”
Then you turn around and rant about KRV. It is ONLY due to KRV some of the blue collar jobs are getting through to Kannadigas. Wake up man! Are you on some ‘guligey’ dude?
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Db,
Thanks for your comments. Narayana Murthy and Premji created more jobs than all the Govts and Other industries PUT TOGETHER. That should answer what they have done to the community.
Their foundations have done more for the schools and colleges in rural areas. Yes They could do much more like Bill Gates and Paul Getty. Probably that can still happen.
Against this ,what have the politicians and scietnists have done so far to scout talent and nurture them? A retired IPS police officer in Bihar has ’30 CLUB’ wherein he prepares 30 students for IIT year after year. Have you heard of C.N.R. Rao, Yashpal Sharma churning , helping out budding scientists, poor but brilliant students in rural areas? Have they even gone to rural areas, I ask.
Either you have to be a top notch scientist in the top 5 % in the world to produce papers ( Nobel kind ) or train great students or really spread science education in rural areas, help poor but deserving students like the ‘IPS GUY’ and reach out to lot of students. If the handful of scientists become Govt. Babus, neither being in cutting edge of Research nor in spreading science and train young scientists, for all practical reasons you have become a babu.That’s one reason even when IT chaps are coming home, the scientists still do not want to come back. One Ex: A ph.D. in physics or chemistry fetches 15 to 20k. A Bsc working in a call center gets 40 -50k.! I have seen houses wherein a ph.D coming home in a rickety scooter whlie his younger sister ,after two months of work at a call centre will come in a brand new car! What will Our scientists tell the Ph.d guy? When we asked Mr. Chidambaram, Advisor to P.M. for scientifif affairs in a seminar in Institution of Engineers last year , how he is going to solve such problems, he had a simplistic answer- ‘ not all work for money’! All the science students present there broke in to a derisive laughter!
Eminent scientists will have to rake their brains and come with workable solution, make it attractive rather than still sit in their ivory towers and pass comments on some other industry and bemoan their fate!
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I wish Churumuri had also given a link to “other side” in the same Outlook by CEO of MindTree Consulting. This guy hit the nail on the head with this paragraph.
As far as my own comments – it appears we always need some straw man on whom all social ills can be blamed. Earlier it was land mafia, MNC mafia, World Bank/WTO mafia, ore mafia, liquor mafia, private college mafia, english medium mafia etc – and now it is IT’s turn! That too shall pass once the media finds another “mafia” to blame all the ills on.
On to the article….I agree on communication problem with IT folks..
Unlike doctors and journalists and actors and policemen who could tell you what they did, the geeks did not communicate the fact that the code they wrote made the ventilator in the icu work, brought down the cost of the ultrasound machine or was actually behind the fall in cellphone prices that made communication affordable to the dabbawallah and the vegetable vendor. The IT industry became a beautiful island in a dreary landscape.
http://www.outlookindia.com/full.asp?fodname=20071217&fname=Cover+Story+%28F%29&sid=3
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There are several challenges which a scientist can tackle. Our energy problem, food shortage, education and population control. And a 1000 other interesting problems.
But no. The man wants to burn Bangalore. And have his coffee and masala dosa in peace.
He sounds as short-sighted as a manager in an IT outsourcing labour shop.
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TS
“Bangaloreans have failed Bangalore” – knock out punch.
DB
I disagree on your argument about private endowments building public infrastructure. While in the short run it might ease the pain, the role of government and more importantly the responsibility of government will completely erode if we take this path. They will simply tax us and take home the money (a lot more than what they are doing now).
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Aruna,
Right now the government is just a sieve of funds whenever development work is involved–so better to have ‘real’ infrastructure developed by private endowments. In fact we must erode all this shit about government responsibility–except when it comes to defence and foreign policy
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Bangalore is well planned city by the Great king Kempe Gowda (Definitely not Deve Gowda’s father :) ). It can survive for any capacity. Still we have enough room up to Anekal. Already we have seen hub for IT and BioTechnology and we are going to see for NanoTech also. Still old areas are same, take Jayanagar 4th block, or the old townships are still same except new commercial brands coming in. Also people rush to have a life after work is obvious. They need to spend their money and have a life after tiring work, we cannot blame them. Government should allot more land outside the city for commercial activities. Tax geeks/companies to build a new University like IISc out side the city in 500 acres, we don’t complain. So many companies ready to pay for that voluntary. If you think Bangalore is very fast, rent your house to a IT manager and move yourself to Shimoga and you can still have Coffee and Masala Dosa for a affordable cost.
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Pokkade,
Mindtree consulting is just another IT outsourcing shop specializing in labour arbitrage. No real software products happen there, let alone doing math or solving tough problems like the article suggests. So obviously we should take the bombast in the article with a pinch of salt…
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‘X’ Guy
I completely agree. There are so many BSAs (Bullshit Artists) in the ‘IT’ business, one’s mind boggles at the sheer number of geniuses who can spout instant wisdom on any subject that grips their fancy:)
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KARNATAKA RAKSHANA VEDIKE’S swaabhimaani samavesha was an astounding success. message was sent LOUD AND CLEAR—-BENGALOORINALLI KANNADAVE SAARVABHOUMA.
D V G WRITES—- YELLARALI ONDAAGU MANKUTIMMA this is the meaning of cosmopolitan.
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Thank you for the update, Dr. Ramesh. I hope Pulikeshi is reading your posts.
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Dr Ramesh, if IT didn’t arm people with money, then where will they get money to pay your dentistry bill?
Thank IT because people can come get their teeth fixed – instead of just ignoring or going to Govt Dental Hospital in Kalasipalya.
As for the article, CNR Rao’ rant is like a typical red-tape bureaucrat – idotic to the core – cry hoarse at everything.
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the whole problem with the bangalore is not with the town planners.. first let us look at the reason bangalore was formed.it was formed by K.G as a fort town in order to stop the enemies.if you look at the areas in bangalore you can see that they are too small when compared with the suburbs of bombay in which each suburb is as big as a city… so when the IT companies came to bang in droves even politicians and planners were taken by surprise sice plenners as late as in 1990 had not visualised this situation.. It happens to every city once in a generation. there is no point in blaming anyone. just no to waste any time and take remedial measures on war footing.
As for the IT companies dont expect them to leave bang.. they wont.. as back as 2005 premji and NRN had said that doing buisness in bang was impossible and we are leaving it for good.. but till now no one has heard from them any news on that front..they wont leave since they cant find such peacefull environment anywhere in india…
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Doddibuddi–
Not read Dr. Ramesh. God forbid. The learned doctor is the light of the lost ones like me. If nothing else, his devotion to the Holenarasipura clan should make us all proud of him.
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Rightly said pulikeshi!
DB,
pulikeshi has only raised a valid point of the KRV descending into rollcall activities. I refuse to believe that you are that naive not to know that. They have more nuisance value than doing any real good to kannadigas.
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Svaabhimmani KannaDigare, get up , waste not your time. There are many people who did’t oppose the ITI< HMT< HAL< BEL etc when they were established in Bangalore. Probably they wanted industries and jobs then. How many people got jobs inthose organizations should also be thought of. OK.If an uneducate/ half educated makes a comment on IT/BT or some such thing it could be understood. Just because my grandfather/father were going to office in a bicycle/walking you expect me to do so. There were no tapes in the houses, you used to have wells OK. No electricity,OK. When the whole world is changing you should also think of changing sensibly. Let us not cultivate the habit of blaming for all our evils and weaknesses. Try to think positively and also look at the brighter side of the scenario.
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Let’s not ‘burn Bangalore, burn IT’. Let us not talk ill of an industry that valued merit and strove to put Bangalore on the global map. Let the IT personnel (quite a large number of them are from other states) start owning the city as their own precious possession. Let them intermingle with us — Kannadigas — and understand us and share our affection. Let not getting rich-quick careers unsettle the minds of our young techs. Bangalore would not have become the ugly city of today if there had been imaginative planning with statelite towns around it built to house the IT industry. Many are not aware, nor are they able to comprehend, how much good the IT industry has done for them . Unfortunately, there has been a huge communication gap. As Subroto Bagchi of Mindtree Consulting says: “Going forward , the IT industry will have to communicate to the society what it does, who it literally benefits both directly and indirectly, in a much better way. It also must return some of the favour it has received in a visible sustained manner beyond just doing corporate social responsibility.”
A large part of Bangalore’s problems, the awful infratructure especially, are the creation of politicians who are power-hungry, corrupt, ignorant of planning, who do not consult the experts and the knowlegeable in various sectors, especially the likes of scientists cum patriots like C.N.R. Rao who rightly says: “Our society has created a bunch of icons and role models who are distorting not just the future of the city but of all India, and of our sense of values.”
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I have been seeing Karnataka Rakshana Vedike’s messages on urine splashed walls of malodorous of old Bengaluru. Why is it not everywhere?
What does the inflighting in the organization tell us? At the moment I remember there is something called Pravin Shetty bana. There are others.
What accomplishable program does the Vedike have? For starters, it might consider that there is quite a bit of difference between saving Kannada and saving Karnataka. Everyone who has made Karnataka, whether he speaks Kannada or not, is a Karnatakan. Let Narayana Gowda and others of his ilk remember there is not much to be accomplished by splashing black paint over signs in English alone. The lovely Yahoo. Com building gladdens my heart by the Kannada lettering proclaiming its name, but I am not at all sure that Kannada means anything inside the building.
Suggestion for the KARAVE people: Work on sending every MP from Karnataka home and elect new ones. (I suppose the same medicine will work for our MLAs and MLCs. Ask the ones who represent us what they have done for our cause. Shame them publicly by asking questions in a civil and enlightened manner. Remember H. D. Deve Gowda said it was a waste of time for him to attend Lok Sabha sessions.
Oh yes, my friends. Remember how the Shiv Sena got its start by terrorising non-Maraathis in Mumbai. Terrorising non-Kannada Karnatakans is what the Vedike will do because it has no unselfish agenda. That is not going to be much by way making our swaabhimana greater. Also remember that New Delhi is just looking for a good reason to make Bengaluru a union territory. Any kind of Kannada -related violence will give it the incentive.
The original pro-Kannada movement floundered because it tried to banish talent–M. S. Subbulakshmi, etc.–from our Ramothsavas. This is something like banishing Bhimsen Joshi from Pune because he is or used to be a Kannadiga. Unlettered Vataals took over the cause and succeeded in running it into the ground. Vatal Nagaraj is a rich politician today and just as much an embarrassment as he ever was to Kannadigas.
A language cannot be artificially kept alive. It lives so long as it is spoken voluntarily. The only places where our Kannada will survive for a while are the nearly monolingual Kannada areas in the state.
The Vedike does not have a leg to stand on; that is why I think it will crawl on violence.
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look how DURABHIMAANI TAMILS were treated in malaysia.
when a person is living in a state he is duty bound to leran the language and respect local culture. if not ,they are the losers.
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Nobody is a loser if the local language is not learnt. In this age, nobody has the time or the will to learn new languages which won’t prove useful if you move out of the state. More stress should be given to english, which is true global language, it connects people inside and outside the country and not hindi/kannada which people from a few states can speak. You can cry out as loud as you want but nobody wants to learn YOUR language. And nobody can stop you to speak it. But keep the language and your revolutionary thoughts to yourself.
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Dr. Ramesh–
Long time Tamil residents of Malaysia speak Malay as well as Chinese. The current unhappiness of Tamils has more to do with ethnicity than language, a problem that Singapore has deftly avoided.
Do Tamils have to be demonized everytime we think of the well being of Kannadigas?
John–
I don’t know who you have in mind in your outburst. Language love, revolutionary zeal, and all other emotional sources put together cannot save any language, be it English or Catalonian. My posts have to do with what we can do for everybody who has made Karnataka his home, whether he speaks Kannada or not, is a Karnatakan.
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@ Puli
Fanatastic piece .. ‘A language cannot be artificially kept alive. It lives so long as it is spoken voluntarily’ — very well substantiated
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mr.john and others,
u have made up u r mind not to learn the language or respect kannada way of life. u have every right to do so.
similarly kannadigas have every right to ask immigrants in bangalore to come in line. b coz its the privilage federalism of the country has given us.
KARNATAKA RAKSHANA VEDIKE HAS BEEN A REVELATION ,IT CAN GET ONLY STRONGER.
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John-
Mate I can understand the angst your fore fathers went through before they converted faith. Looks like it is has been passed on down the generations and has manifested as something else. It is becoz of guys like you and your attitude that gives more than a chance for the likes of KRV to run riot
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We will need an altogether different thread to talk about religion. Can we please not bring it in here?
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My raves and rants about it are here
http://thoughtslot.blogspot.com/2007/12/burn-it-burn-bengalooru.html
Can not help it bit infuriated.
~rAGU
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Rao the respected turning Senile? So what you grew up here – that doesnt give you the right to f**k around and saying what you want to. See, it hurts when I say the same about you. no?
IT or no IT – this is evolution. You want peace and no traffic jams – well go to some village maybe? Why do you want to hang around here when you dont fit here any more?
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It is a common habit among indians to “blame others”. I am a Kannadiga, and find it funny when i see Bangalore’s problems are blamed on – others – IT industry, hindi-speakers, tamils, global weather, foreigners.
what a shame. Its in our habit.
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CNR Rao is really saying this:
I am not able to for morning walks because of the traffic. The cause of the traffic is GOVERNMENT, HD Deve Gowda like politcians – who Proudly Announce they will not build Roads in Cities. But i am a part of the same lousy sleep and corrupt bureaucracy… i can’t blame govt. or myself.. or my men. Let me find a easy visible target. Ahaa! “IT” will make a great victim. So here i announce and show my intelligence (level) – I found i found i found … the secret is out – IT Industry are the culprits, Techies the Goodas.
My sons and grandsons are poets and dancers. How dare my neighbours are into software?
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Tamils should stay in Chennai, and not bother coming here. We need to develop our art and culture and get classical status for kannada.
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@pulikeshi the last,
what do you know about krv? if you can read kannada, go and check their website and blog. their activities till-date are listed there.
website: http://www.karnatakarakshanavedike.org
blog: karave.blogspot.com
You should have the patience to go through the online content available. have you done this? Have you sent them e-mails to understand their programs? write an email to them at kannada@karnatakarakshanavedike.org and they will reply.
You have extended your stereotyped opinion of earlier kannada organizations to krv. and the inputs which mould your opinion have been un-researched / under-researched news that you read in english / kannada media. Have you done some field work – gone around bengaluru and other parts of karnataka to understand what is krv and what it means to the people of karnataka? if not do so. that would give you a better perspective of whats happening around.
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@ vitlan potli,
neevenaadru KRV hesaru helkondu rollcall maadta irodhanna nodidira / kelidira?
KRV takes stringent action against anyone who uses the name of KRV for such activities. mr.vitlan potli, if you happen to see / hear about such activities, please pass on this information to KRV head office in Gandhinagar, Bengaluru (phone no: 91-080-22370032) or mail them at kannada@karnatakarakshanavedike.org.
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Tams who speak Kannada, as they do in Halebeedu and Chikkamagaluru, are Kannadigas. Kannadigas have the right to expect they will be understood in their own land when they speak Kannada.
At the national conference of the Congress in 1929, Kannadigas were the first to argue for a Kannada state. No other linguistic group had thought of an idea like that ever before.
Kannada will survive in Karnataka, but my dream is to see it prevail.
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Thank Portuguese and French first dear Kannadigas!
If they’d first laid seize on Bangalore it would have been a Goa or Pondichery. It would have been IT and Liquor and a differenct “culture”. These KaRaVe goons and supporters should understand the true meaning of a metropolitan city. The more you bark, you’ll get stoned soon!
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In Fact Bangalore, Shimla, Dehradun, Jaipur should have never been State Capitals!
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dr Ramesh, what the hell are you talking. What rights do you have to talk about Tamils in Malaysia. Does it affect your f***ing KaRave or language? If not limit your thought and comments to your neighbourhood. Dont cross international borders. You are much like a “KoopaMandooka”, wants to teach your language to “intruders” but can’t stop spitting venom against other communities. First call back your Shettys back from Mumbai. Eat what they cook. And dont allow Kannadigas to work in Central Govt Departments. Have your own Railways! (dont take my words at literal meaning and start laying the railway tracks!)
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Mr.Quicky, why should Dr.Ramesh not have an opinion on Tamilians in Malaysia? When you can have an opinion on Kannada-Kannadigas and KaRaVe, why should Dr.Ramesh not express his opinion? neevenaadru churumuri forum nalli obre baribeku anta contract togondidiro hege?
Tamilians in Malaysia are Malaysian citizens. They should sort out their problems within the framework of Malaysian constitution. And they have no business in internationalizing domestic issues. Tamilians who migrate to other lands for a living should know how to become part of the mainstream culture of the place where they migrate to, be it Sri Lanka, Malaysia or Karnataka. They would face no problems if this happens.
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Mr.Raviraj Gowda and others:
First of all let me make a point clear..There are no two “baNa’s” in KRV..There one and only KRV led by Mr.Narayana Gowda..
There have been umpteen number of achievements done by Karnataka Rakshana Vedike which you havn’t spoke about rather you dont know about..You can go through their website once provided you are literate enough to read kannada: http://www.karnatakarakshanavedike.org
A state level convention that happened a fortnight ago had nearly 1 lakh kannaDigas for the show..The impact of swaabhimaani kannaDigara samavesha is huge in a cosmopolitian city like bengaLooru.
You all still have your old preconceptive notions that pro-kannada organizations are here only to make money..KRV is no such cheap organization..
Have you ever seen any bloody political organization trying to unite kannaDigas on the same floor..KRV has achieved it by celebrating its 6th state level samavesha.
Have you ever heard KRV making money by threatening people?If yes, did you make an attempt to complain at their head office in Gandhinagara?I am sure you would not have got this oppurtunity as they never indulge themselves in cheap money making acts…
What other idea do you guys have to bring bengaLooru or karnataka into a proper shape..Why dont you share them with an organization like KRV who are moving ahead in a promising channel..
Come out of your saddist attitude and shed out your cosmo skin…
Debate with facts and figures…Dont just scribble some nonsense to show off your English skills…
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Rajesh–
Tongue-lashing is not a substitute for reasoning. People use English at this forum because it is accessed by a substantial number of readers who do not know Kannada yet. The policy helps make Churumuri viable.
I shall contribute all I can to KRV if it can show me that it is capable of protecting the interests of my people even to a limited extent. I will publicly apologize for my statements and even do urulu seve in front of “Sirgannadam Gelge” sign near Cubbon Park.
A year ago, our successful writers, lawyers, and others inaugurated their “Kannada Sene” amidst much fanfare. What has become of it?
To begin with, Suresh avare, tell me what the Vedike can do in order to root out corruption in our public life. Unless this is accomplished, we have no way of picking legislators and parlimentarians who will put Kannada and Kannadigas first in Karnataka. (I have indeed visited the website and read the article about Shri Narayana Gowda in “Thatskannada” as well.No one can defend the way he was brutalized by the police in Arasikere.)
Even organizations led by professors and Ph.D. s like the Pradhikara, Sahithya Parishad are no more than the government’s recognized beggars colonies. How will the Vedike maintain its independence and not be beholden to anybody in power for its existence? That inevitably leads to the questions: How is it going to finance itself? How will it account for every kaasu it takes in order to maintain its credibility?
What will the organization do to counter cheap and unscientific notions like there is some such thing called “Pure Kannada” and that it eschews all words borrowed from other languages?
What will the organization do to teach our police and bureaucrats to speak politely when they do use Kannada? What does the organization do when Deve Gowda uses unprintable words at his press conferences? Yes, the press itself is to blame for this. It contents itself with saying “Gowdaru avaachya padagalannu balasidaru.”
What will the organization do to stop the daily insults to Kannada and Kannadigas that stream out of abominable Kannada movies and their so-called lyrics? What can the organization do to bury the filth of the Kannada tabloids?
In “Karnataka onde, ” poojya Bendre says that the only true property Kannadigas have is Kannada. There are Kannadigas who don’t even know that they own their language. What plans does the Vedike have to teach Kannadigas about Kannada?
Let us make it possible for every Kannadiga to say: “If there is a choice, Kannada will always be my language.”
It is hard work. It cannot be accomplished by mimicking the techniques perfected by politicians. The discussion taking place here is a necessary first step for nothing like it has happened before.
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@pulikeshi the last (PTL),
Suresh: I have embedded my replies within:
PTL: I shall contribute all I can to KRV if it can show me that it is capable of protecting the interests of my people even to a limited extent. I will publicly apologize for my statements and even do urulu seve in front of “Sirgannadam Gelge” sign near Cubbon Park.
Suresh: Good that we have people who have an open mind to debate and understand other’s viewpoint. Thanks, Pulikeshi
PTL: A year ago, our successful writers, lawyers, and others inaugurated their “Kannada Sene” amidst much fanfare. What has become of it?
Suresh: Are u talking about Karunada sene or Kannada Sene? there are several such organizations that we find only in November. Please do not compare KRV with these organizations
PTL: To begin with, Suresh avare, tell me what the Vedike can do in order to root out corruption in our public life. Unless this is accomplished, we have no way of picking legislators and parlimentarians who will put Kannada and Kannadigas first in Karnataka. (I have indeed
visited the website and read the article about Shri Narayana Gowda in “Thatskannada” as well. No one can defend the way he was brutalized by the police in Arasikere.)
Suresh: KRV is looking at building an alternative front to provide good governance in Karnataka and protect the rights of Kannada-Kannadiga-Karnataka (K-K-K). And definitely governance is a central theme in this movement. Today, Youth who are joining KRV in large nos are not happy with the present political parties and are eagerly looking for an organization / leadership which can provide good governance and also protect the interests of K-K-K. And this is where KRV fits in. It has a clean and an able leader in Narayana Gowda, it has core interest of K-K-K central to its existence and is backed by strong organizational presence (12 lakh members, 4500 branches spread across all districts & segments of the society across karnataka). This strength of KRV has frightened the wits out of the 3 major political parties in Karnataka today. In the recent past, these political parties have been creating issues out of none to spoil the image of KRV. The incident in Udupi during the sahitya sammelana was also part of this ploy to weaken KRV.
PTL: Even organizations led by professors and Ph.D. s like the Pradhikara, Sahithya Parishad are no more than the government’s recognized beggars colonies. How will the Vedike maintain its independence and not be beholden to anybody in power for its existence? That inevitably
leads to the questions: How is it going to finance itself? How will it account for every kaasu it takes in order to maintain its credibility?
Suresh: This is an obvious question. At this point of time, KRV has no of well wishers across Karnataka and outside Karnataka / India who finance it as they find the organization capable to achieve its defined objecives and credible enough to fund. KRV maintains the accounts and they have an independent auditor who audits the accounts at the end of every financial year.
PTL: What will the organization do to counter cheap and unscientific notions like there is some such thing called “Pure Kannada” and that it eschews all words borrowed from other languages?
Suresh: KRV understands that languages evolve with time and exposure to other languages. Also, KRV is Karnataka Rakshana Vedike and not Kannada Rakshana Vedike. Protection / Development of Karnataka and Kannadigas is also as important as protection / development of Kannada. Definitely, Kannada is core to the ideology of the organization but KRV does not have any purist view of the language.
PTL: What will the organization do to teach our police and bureaucrats to speak politely when they do use Kannada? What does the organization do when Deve Gowda uses unprintable words at his press conferences? Yes, the press itself is to blame for this. It contents itself with saying “Gowdaru avaachya padagalannu balasidaru.”
Suresh: KRV could create awareness in police / bureaucrats to speak politely with public. But this can really happen only when people in power create this culture of politeness and good behaviour in their interaction with public.
PTL: What will the organization do to stop the daily insults to Kannada and Kannadigas that stream out of abominable Kannada movies and their so-called lyrics? What can the organization do to bury the filth of the Kannada tabloids?
Suresh: There are certain things that KRV can do. At max, it can create awareness about these issues. But rest market decides. Only when Kannadigas collectively decide to boycott these movies / tabloids can change happen.
PTL: In “Karnataka onde, ” poojya Bendre says that the only true property Kannadigas have is Kannada. There are Kannadigas who don’t even know that they own their language. What plans does the Vedike have to teach Kannadigas about Kannada?
Suresh: KRV is an organization which has defined objectives and focus areas. It is working in organizing / mobilizing kannadigas at grass root level and creating awareness about relevant issues. KRV’s focus areas are twofold: first regarding those issues related to the protection of K-K-K (rakshane) and second regarding those initiatives related to the development of K-K-K (eLge)
PTL: Let us make it possible for every Kannadiga to say: “If there is a choice, Kannada will always be my language.”
It is hard work. It cannot be accomplished by mimicking the techniques perfected by politicians. The discussion taking place here is a necessary first step for nothing like it has happened before.
Suresh: Yes, it is very very hard work. KRV has been doing this for the past 7 years and the results are for you to see. KRV has worked hard to establish credibility among the Kannadigas as an organization that is wedded to the rakshane and eLge of K-K-K.
pulikeshi the last, Hope I have been able to answer few of your questions. As a Kannadiga and as someone who believes that KRV has it in them to deliver the goods, I would look forward to more discussions to exchange views / ideas in this regard.
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suresh,
I hope a person who can articulate things as clearly as you is an integral part of KRV (not just a commentor on the blog).
PTL,
Looking forward to the ongoing discussion…
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Suresh,
One of the most important problems is education particularly, the medium of instruction problem. i am sure you know how this problem manifests at all levels – class, culture, oppurtunities and rest of it and i am sure you can appreciate the primacy of this problem. I would like to know KRV’s solution to the problem.
Additionally, we have been discussing a possible solution here at churumuri. it will be great to hear your criticism of it.
to prevent being put in a moderation queque instead of posting a link i am reproducing it below. folks at churumuri who have already read should kindly pardon.
thanks.
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#1. towards universal education, why cant we have:
kannada, social studies, including civics in kannada. english, science and maths in english. for all students irrespective of their backgrounds and location?
#1a. this would help students to be bi-directionally globally connected to the fast changing world of the sciences. english is the de-facto language in the peer reviewed world of science. for example, so many papers in the sciences from non-english speaking countries are rejected because of lack of clarity in communication. quite a few of these papers are so poorly written that it is impossible for others to look beyond the language, and assess the quality of research. i.e. many times papers are rejected, even when international reviewers sense that they carry important information, because they cannot be sure the authors mean what the reviewers think the authors mean. this is limited world of academics, where you can find people idealistic enough to read a paper a 10 times. you can imagine the impact of this in the much more pervasive world of practical engineering/sciences where people have actually invested their fortunes.
on the otherhand, it took modern scientists to “discover” that there is a species of freshwater cat fish now called glyptothorax kudremukensis. perhaps the locals have known of this fish since ages as kemmeenu and they could have told more about it if it were not for the language barrier? similar is the case with mount “everest” aka sagarmaata/chomolungma.
#1b. studying social studies and civics in kannada would help children think about their immediate surroundings, their history and their role as citizens in kannada. hopefully, with kannada as the medium for social sciences and civics, the schooling syllabus will also be more local in content and more relevant. growing up we learnt all about the map of india, but knew nothing about the map of how our town. genghis khan, napolean and akbar we learnt about but nothing about abbakka, benki nawab and kempe gowda, who i now learn, via internet, was a pioneer in rainwater harvesting. the constitution of india and magna carta we learnt about but not who or what a mayor, a corporator or a panchayati head is. had to learn out of school that gaNasabha’s were probably the earliest forms of representative governance. it is left to word of mouth learning post graduation to know how local governance works. what the byelaws and traffic rules are, what is meant by a revenue site or an agri land. what use is a education in civics without knowledge of these everyday essential facts?
#1c. if the issue of medium is amicably resolved, perhaps attention can then be focussed on the more critical issues of pedagogy – issues like how to move from rote learning and testing regurgitative ability to testing for understandability and application.
#1d. developing facility in both kannada and english will also facilitate cross-over and cross-pollination.
it will enable kannadigas who are scientists to easily help preserve and sustain naaTi science. at the same time it will enable kannadiga scientists to contribute to popular scientific content in kannada directly. similarly, it will enable students of the arts direct access to ideas from the west.
kannada can only be saved if kannadigas are confident and directly enabled and see no contradiction in being a kannadiga and a citizen of this modern world.
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quicky,
If you hate kannadigas and karnataka and love the malaysian tamils so much, why dont you move your a** to malaysia? Nobody wants you here.
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Thanks to Suresh for a response that is free of rancor and name calling. There will be more from me by way of a response to what he says later.
I agreed with TS a while ago that the only way for Kannadigas to prosper is to accept the inevitability of bilingualism–even trilingualism. We have to learn to beat the Hindi imperialists at their own game. They don’t understand what we say in Kannada or English. We need to smack them in their own lingo. This is an unfortunate price to pay for having lain low so long about our language and culture. In the meantime, let’s be careful not to antagonize Kodava, Tulu, and Konkani speakers in the state.
I can understand AG’s resentment. But let us not demonize Tamils or anybody else when we are talking about our own well-being. Constitutionally, there is just isn’t any way to bar non-Kannadigas from making their home in Karnataka or in any other state except Kashmir. Why are we not producing Kannada speaking IAS, IPS, and IFS karmacharis in proportion to our population? Why are the ones who can speak Kannada worse than the outside creatures who rule us in Bangalore as well Bukkapatna? What have our own Mahishis, Baligars, Raos, Gowdas, Shastris, Sharmas done for the cause of Kannada?
Let us send home every damn politician and official who is ignorant of what Suresh calls the K-K-K. Let us boycott every litterateur lecturing us about the greatness of Bharatha while ignoring Karnataka’s pitiful state: First in the nation in electronics, second in AIDS infection, second in corruption, sixth in the number of suicides and the last in self-awareness. Let us learn from the Telugus, Tamils, and Malayalis what they have done to maintain their sense of self.
Karnatakada janara baalu hasanaagali. Haagaagalu daari thoruvarigella nanna namana.
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Ivaththia prajavaniyalli KRV bagge Basavaraja Havaldar barediruva lekhana nodi.
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Unknown Anonymous Guy: It is your attitude towards others which shows! You will reap what you sow. If dr Ramesh feels ‘his house is burning’ how can he make a comment ‘Durabhimani Tamils’. I am not a Tamil. But YOU or drrrrr Ramesh should limit your comments to your neighbourhood. Right. I know that Kannadigas especially around Mysore and Bangalore hav applied Fevicol to their Asses and refuse to move. But have a loose tongue.
Vijay. If you call others Durabhimanis and Scoundrels (Steriotyping) what do you expect back? Respect? My foot!
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Ramesh if at all in medical profession: Should look at his way of addressing other communities. I think before he asked his patient to open his mouth, he will find whether the toungue talks Tamil or Hindi!
Anony: I dont hate Kannadigas. I have pity for them. They only are responsible for their plight and are showing frustration due to this.
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I dont see any difference between saabees and Tams both f@#K up the places they Live and when the going gets tough they turn terrorists .
Kannadigas assimilate everywhere so hardly anyone ‘quicky’ can point a finger .
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@Suresh,
Your reply made me think a while. I knew KRV is doing good job, but never knew such strong ideological assertiveness they have.
Good to see KRV become a true representative to takeup all K-K-K issues and yield some results too. They have delivered a great result in uniting the belagavi kannadigas and capturing the corp there.
I hope they will keep their integrity and will always behold the true fighting spirit and kannada values they have shown so far.
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Suresh:
I now know what your organization’s self-perception is. When the rest of us can say that you have accomplished most of your laudable goals will be a memorable day for Karnataka.
As I have said, jaathi is our worst antagonist in this matter. We must begin by getting our people to see that all Kannadigas belong to one jaathi. Let non-Kannada speaking Karnatakans do what they want as long as they respect the land, the people, and the language.
Can we begin by getting Kannada signs on interstate trains? Getting street names properly spelled? Getting businesses to put their names in Kannada first?
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pulikeshi, absolutely true. jaathi is the biggest barrier in uniting kannadigas. krv has “kannadave jaathi” as part of its motto. this helps getting our people to see that all Kannadigas belong to one jaathi.
once kannadigas unite and decide to fight for their legitimate rights with an organization like KRV in the forefront; getting kannada signs on inter state trains, getting street names properly spelled, getting businesses to put their names in kannada first are all very much possible.
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TS,
KRV understands the importance of education in one’s mother tongue. KRV also recognizes the need of english in today’s globalizing world. An education policy which balances both these requirements is the need of the hour. KRV is open to suggestions from experts in the field of education regarding the way forward.
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quickly the kannadiga pityer,
Part of the growing strength of KRV is due to the ignorance and bad attitude of people like you.
Keep up the good work!
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Anony:
know that Kannadigas especially around Mysore and Bangalore hav applied Fevicol to their Asses and refuse to move. But have a loose tongue.
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What Ignorance and Bad attitude you are talking about. dr Ramesh the venom spitter was raising unnecessary comments which doesnt’ affect the functioning of his clinic or KRV.
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Nice to see a real discussion about K-K-K on churumuri.
@ tarlesubba
I tend to agree with your education recipe in parts.
Indeed, having Social Studies in English is nothing short of belittling Karnataka’s proud history and distancing students from all that is near and dear. The names and workings of our own kings and institutions are made to seem so far by this entirely foolish system of education that the student begins to hate this very important subject. This is precisely what the British wanted, of course. And we have been following this for want of grey matter between the ears.
Now on to your suggestion of having the sciences and mathematics in English.
Although this is unquestionably the right (actually, the only) short-term solution in urban areas where people have the wherewithal and responsibility to compete globally in fields of learning which are globally attested, the suggestion falls short of being the short-term solution for rural areas, and short, too, of being the long-term solution in both rural and urban areas.
Even in the short term, having English as the language of instruction in rural areas is flawed for two reasons – (i) the age old argument that instruction in the mother tongue is best and (ii) the impossibility of providing urban-quality English education in rural areas.
In the short term, having Kannada as the language of instruction in urban areas for the sciences and mathematics is flawed because of one simple fact: the existing (but surely not insurmountable; see below) impossibility of providing global-quality Kannada education in the sciences. This reason alone holds today the power to render temporarily void the scientific fact that even urban Kannadiga children are best taught in Kannada.
So much for short term solutions.
From long-term solutions we must not shy away, even though accomplishing them looks daunting. We need to think of and implement (the latter being a greater challenge) a really long-term solution to the problem of medium of education – a solution which goes beyond the current gloom which encircles Karnataka and Kannadigas in this age of globalization, a solution which draws on the whole of Karnataka and not just the urban areas to bring out weapons of global competence.
And in that long-term solution, Kannada reigns in Karnataka even in the sciences and mathematics, as reigns Japanese in Japan, Hebrew in Israel, French in France, Dutch in the Netherlands, German in Germany, Spanish in Spain, Catalun in Catalunya, Danish in Denmark, Swedish in Sweden, Finnish in Finland, why English in England.
The question is – do we as a community have what it takes to keep the long-term goal unaltered as well as move, if slowly, towards that goal even amidst responding to the challenges of globalization using only a trifling urban populace which is disadvantaged by definition due to being taught, if for want of choice, in English?
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rameshe gowdre… thanks will get back.
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gowdre …
thanks for your detailed response. that idea that we have discussed is meant to be draft of an idea that hopefully will evolve.
(i) the age old argument that instruction in the mother tongue is best and
(ii) the impossibility of providing urban-quality English education in rural areas.
about (i) i am not not personally very sure. there is lot of empirical evidence that to me says there perhaps is no correlation between learning/understanding and mother tongue. there is no evidence that your average american/english/australian kids are seeing anything more in science than the indian kids. given our economic status our scientific output is quite respectable. (in non-resource intensive fields like like statistics the best/top in field journals come out of india.)
what is perhaps different is that their average kids are more articulate than our average kids. that perhaps stems from familiarity of language. that is the case to be made for medium. i think understanding, appreciation and knowledge itself is beyond language. I’m no educationist. i might be wrong. but a few papers i saw i found them problematic. but even if this idea is correct, as you said right now it is unimplementable. because debating on this theoretic point with an all or nothing approach will only kill more time and the issue will only become harder to tackle as years pass by. we have to start right now and somewhere atleast to get some traction.
(ii) when i mean english medium, the texts could be english with writing in english but the actual discussion in the class could be kannada for most parts atleast initially especially in rural KA. vondu gas na compress maaDidre adara density hecchaagutte. it will also involve spending by the state to retrain teachers during summer breaks perhaps at taluk level.
the primary thing is to make education atleast conceptually universal and level the playing field. right now odds are stacked against the average kid in the best KA school when compared to the average kid in average english school who right off the bat starts with an advantage.
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@ tarlesubba
(i)
Empirical evidence, in truth, is against non-mother-tongue education. Are you sure your empirical evidence is not a couple of data points which count only as statistical outliers? If empirical evidence is all it took to erect the correct system of education, we should have been convinced long ago going simply by the statistics of SSLC results which have proven year after year that rural students fare better than urban.
Your point about native English speakers’ articulation is only the tip of the iceberg. However, this point alone is enough to establish the primacy of language in education. As Wittigstein said, “die grenzen meiner sprache sind die grenzen meiner welt.” That is, the limits of my language are the limits of my world. Language today limits the world of Kannadigas. Putting together this and the infinite difficulty (which we have already agreed upon) of switching to a totally different language in the rural areas, it is not difficult to see how important mother-tongue is in education.
(ii)
Your proposal here is very close to the ideal system. This may well be an interim solution. But then again, we need to very clearly understand why we should choose this one as opposed to the pure Kannada (even pure itself not being completely divorced from English) system, sort out the reasons into those stemming from current inabilities, history, mere inferiority complex, and scientific evidence. The final system even as we discuss it decades before it is implemented should not admit the first three as factors. Otherwise, we may well be taken for traitors by the next generation.
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In short, we need a short-term solution and a long term solution.
In the short-term, it is difficult to erase without a trace the urban-rural divide and there shall surely be resistance from both urban and rural areas. This is inevitable. It may even be impossible to get the receiving end (again, both urban and rural) to nod in agreement while you articulate this strategy.
In the long term, the divide should cease to exist, and even the feeling that Kannada falls short of being the language of the sciences should have been completely annihilated. Of course, I think we very well understand that even in the long term, Kannadigas must be really good even in English.
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A discussion that has garnered 87 responses should not be relegated to the earlier enttries limbo. That it has shown up the emptiness of the startup article and directed the discussion to what matters to four and half crore people is a heartwarming development, however unexpected. Keep batting, folks. May the wicket be ours!
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for me the problem is that, especially in these types of issues, outliers dont come out of the blue, they point out that other models are possible too. [i have debated these issues with my prof until he retired. :) ]
for me the problem is not about finding a true theoretical model but what to do with it?
what if that principle is right? what if it is not? what do i do with that model? only if I am interested in moulding a society after a theoretical model and am willing to impose a lot of physical and psychological violence to make the society confirm to the theoretical model is that question important.
but let us not get involved in semantics, especially because we agree that in the long term proficiency in english is essential. i am not invested in establishing the validity of that(medium of inst.) claim either way, since we agree there are other reasons such as articulation, that are more important to pursue. in any case, it does not matter to the main discussion we have.
i cannot thank you enough for bringing in metrics to the discussion. i was thinking about ‘what next’ and i went into the intractable ‘what is the purpose of education’ debate. i have written about utilitarian aspects of science in english in the previous posts. here is another take.
one way to think about this is that learning a language as a subject is not enough. you need to practice its application in a field other than language. so if english proficiency is essential then english needs to be practiced in a field outside of english. ditto for kannada. english medium kids even with first language kannada cannot perhaps apply kannada. forget about 3rd language kannada kids.
so why science for english and social studies for kannada?
#1. available source material.
#2. more importantly, scope & impact. it is called social studies for a reason. most people use science as end effects but their life experiences are influenced by social studies. this classification impacts more people and a larger parts of peoples lives. ( i have this notion that ‘scientific’ societies are self destructive because they put in too much too much brain/theory and self delusion to life which despite all pretensions, is animalistic, but let us not get there)
#3. even more importantly, this choice sustains creative impulse. in science at all times scientists will have to return to english for discourse. More importantly, science being science transcends language whether you arrive at a scientific truth via english or kannada the scientific value of the discovered truth does not change. Madhva’s works in samskruta have the same scientific value as Newton’s work. That framework is established and universal. what constitutes science is well defined and universal. but that is not the case in social fields.
Here there is scope for an entirely KA/Indic centric world view. Avadhoota is way beyond Ayn Rand. Shareefa is poles apart from Pink Flyod. and so on. There is scope for a distinct Kannada genius to emerge in social fields. And this cannot happen without teaching application of Kannada to social contexts to everyday experiences. Saying work is worship is not the same as saying kayakave kailasa. even though they are talking about the same thing, the contexts are completely different.
to put it slightly differently,
which do you think is a greater loss? (pardon my examples)
1) people picking western authors over karanth and basava
2) people picking popular science over GT Narayan Rao or even Karanth’s encyclopedia?
i think (1)
i am not saying that there is nothing to be learnt from the west, but it cannot be that the land of sharanas, of akka, of madhva, of vidyaranya, of shareefa, of karanth (please dont pick on me if i have left anybody out, I have a very limited worldview) can only be regurtitating shelley and marx. nothing wrong with shelley and marx either, but the world cannot be only them, there has to be something else. what it is i dont know, but i am convinced that there is something else and it does not look like this english medium and kannada medium idea is going to get us there. and one of the signs of KaKaKa rennaisance is that we get there. rennaisance is not a once achieved then done goal. you have to keep revisiting it again and again. basava took us there once, then perhaps karanth and later day saints did, now we have to go there again. the only question is how and on whos back?
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TS, Ramesh Gowdre/Pulikeshigale, nimagella aDDa bidde gurugale!!
Excellent discussion. I want to add a few more drops of oil to the burning fire here. While I agree with Ramesh Gowda about the importance of education in tayinuDi, I see a lot of value in Tarle’s suggestion to use English in teaching science and maths, at least in the short-to-mid term. It makes sense in urban areas where the middle class insecurity drives a lot of parents to English schools. I don’t think we can overcome such career related insecurities (which are very real today) and deeply embedded class consciousness regarding English overnight. I don’t think we can switch to English in rural areas overnight even if it means teaching important subjects. Instead we need to move towards greater implementation of local languages in administration and their use in daily business to ultimately make the knowledge of our languages a requirement for jobs and survival. So far we have shown incredible subservience to English. Our elites have found ways to exclude majority of people from direct participation in democracy and economy by their insistence on using English whether required or not. It is time to turn the tables and let the majority assert themselves.
We also have to remember that history is full of ups and downs. What goes up must come down. Greek was influential in Mediterranean once, Persian was used in administration in India during Muslim rule, Arabic rose to prominence and preserved the scientific knowledge while Europe was in dark ages, and so on. Who knows what language will be the dominant glue language in the next 50 years. Perhaps it will be Mandarin. We don’t know if Spanish will relegate English to a second place in the Americas. In this context, we need a long term view and ensure that basic education is always provided in tayinuDi while still learning the dominant glue language(s) of the time to keep us competitive in the business world. We have to continue to absorb good things from others to keep our languages and culture alive and relevant.
What about the state’s right in controlling education? Why should we have ICSE/CBSE schools that place no importance in teaching local culture, history and languages? Can we rely on bodies like NCERT to do the right thing? I can understand the purpose behind centrally run KVs. But our federal structure has been diluted and central bodies are now flexing their muscle in state’s turf. If our govt does come up with uniform education policy and resolves medium issue, what does that mean for centrally affiliated schools? The state govt for its part should empower local bodies too and resist the growing menace of centralisation in everything. Maharashtra govt had fight its case all the way to SC which finally upheld the govt order asking ICSE/CBSE schools to make Marathi a compulsory subject. Our Kannada activists have made noise about teaching Kannada in ICSE/CBSE, but are we there yet?
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@ tarlesubba
One can forever be stuck up with trying to explain statistical outliers. I would consider it prudent to let outliers be outliers and not break the head about them. It is when one is stuck up with outliers that the approach tends to become theoretical and beyond application. When one is trying to explain why the mean of the bell-curve is what it is, and why the standard deviation is what it is, and labours to set right both, that is the most practical of approaches.
As I wrote earlier in the context of the urban-rural divide, no social intervention will be without what the society considers as psychological/physical violence. This should not defeat the enterprise of the true reformer since he, and only he, knows that the perception of the society is nothing different from the perception of betrayal which eclipses a child upon being asked to part with a knife whose harmfulness it cannot fathom.
I will not comment any further on the choice of Kannada for subjects other than the sciences since we have already agreed that this is the right approach in both the short and long terms, for both urban and rural students.
I will also not comment about the need to make students masters of our own thinkers and philosophies since I am in agreement even there. I will, however, point out that even with regard to philosophies and the social sciences, it is best for Kannadigas to understand those from all over the world just as you propose (and I agree) be done for the sciences.
It is completely true that English education will not make too much sense without application in a field other than language itself. For this, the model adopted by the Japanese, the Germans (and the other countries I’ve quoted in an earlier post) can work for us too. Their model is to use the language of the land for all purposes of education right up to the level where global interactions do not happen, and switch to your Kannada-with-English-technical-words kind of system only above that level. Why can’t we do similarly after bringing about urban-rural uniformity together with good standards in education at the school level? In my mind, there is nothing which prevents us from doing this other than the perception of pscyhological/physical violence of the society under question and the unfounded feeling of guilt in the reformer.
Please note that much of the feeling of violence can be eliminated by careful execution of the “theory”. In fact, if the reformer remains sensitive but not oversensitive to this perception, he will come up with a myriad innovative ways of allaying the fears of the society.
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@ Girish
Could not agree more with your point that the usage of Kannada in administration and daily business can itself take us pretty much forward.
Coming to your well-made point about the rise and fall of languages in history, we Kannadigas should have a secret goal to make Kannada the glue-language of the world despite all existing proof of the stupidity of such a goal. Such dreamers we should be, such lovers of Kannada we should be. Obviously having dreams and love alone can’t take us to the moon, but not having them wipes out even the slightest of possibilities of reaching even the treetop.
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Girish–
The primary dream is to make Kannada the primary languaage of Karnataka and ensure that no Kannadiga gets cheated out of his right to lead a decent, fruitful life in Karnataka, be he Devegowda or Brahmananda Shastri.
I am all for the other dreams that follow.
In the meantime, what do we do about the federal neanderthals, non-Kannadigas, and outright demented Kannadigas who rule us?
Oh, yes, our buddhijeevigalu–begging the Feds to make our Kannada a shastreeya bhaashe, threatening hunger strikes, etc. Let them all shut up for a year, so if not classical status for Kannada, we can have some peace.
URA is now out to defend veerashaivism, having given up his bhakti for the Madhwa Pejavara guru. Throws a condescending namaskaara to Budhism, but says it is a difficult relgion to practice. Hope his his dalit friends see how patronizing the comment is. If religions were easy to follow, this would not be Kaliyuga.
If only the millions misspent on the Belagaavi session of the Vidhana Sabhe and the Udupi jaathre had been employed to find a solution to the problems we have been discussing here!
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girish excellent points.
RG I was working on this statement of yours:
But then again, we need to very clearly understand why we should choose this one as opposed to the pure Kannada (even pure itself not being completely divorced from English) system, sort out the reasons into those stemming from current inabilities, history, mere inferiority complex, and scientific evidence.
out of town will get back.
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@ pulikeshi the last
Thanks for summarising “the dream”.
Please note that the “shaastreeya sthaana maana” protests, irrespective of the respective agendas of the protestors and irrespective of the arguable uselessness of such a status for Kannada, go a long way in giving a strong message to the “federal neanderthals, non-Kannadigas, and outright demented Kannadigas who rule us”.
Regarding buddhijeevigalu. Don’t you think it’s time we stop applying this appellation with reckless abandon to all and sundry that writeth a word or two in Kannada? There was a time when the pen could and would be wielded only by the true buddhijeevigalu. Atleast a few centuries have rolled on since then, and it makes no sense to continue to equate writers to thinkers merely out of habit.
I will say a few words about the Belagavi session of the Vidhana Sabhe and the “Udupi jaathre”.
The first one is a major step by the GoK to assert that Belagavi belongs to Karnataka and not Maharashtra. The importance of this issue cannot be exaggerated. It is because of the absolute lack of self protectionist forces and moves that Karnataka had disintegrated into the twenty-odd pieces. Against the backdrop of such a history and the outrageously threatening moves by the MES in Belagavi, both the symbolic blackening by KRV of Vijay More as well as the session of Vidhana Sabhe at Belagavi are welcome, nay required moves by an increasingly self-aware Karnataka.
The second one is a very important event too. If done correctly and with the correct selection of writers and delegates, the world of letters can return to the important position it used to hold during the times of Alura Venkata Rao, Aa Na Kru and others.
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Thanks, Ramesh Gowdare.
You are absolutely right about the need for applying the term “buddhijeevi” more wisely. Whatever appellations we confer on our writers, the truth is many of them have become dangerous to Kannada interests, since they are not apolitical like ANK and AV and have power among the communal pockets of our universities. They create the syllabi for our dying humanities. They had or have political godfathers. They have taken up permanent residence in the editorial columns of all major Kannada newspapers. Whatever differences Kannada writers had–Kuvempu and Bendre, for instance, were not the best of friends–they did not try to break up the emergent Kannada consciousness by establishing jaathi based factions. Besides, a few of our writer folk have hopelessly muddled up issues like the teaching of Kannada in the schools because each one of them is an expert on everything that happens in Kannadanadu, from education to economics and beyond.
About the Belagavi session–how many of the lesgislators were even aware of the lofty ideas you mention? Do you recall the junkets arranged for them at taxpayer expense by the Deputy Commissioner? If I am right, it cost over a crore to conduct the session there. Could not that money have been used to protect Kannada interests in border areas? Or perhaps spent on building the textile park that the local weaver community has been demanding? Maharashtra was quick to offer them that facility. I find it perfectly horrifying that that state’s governor who said in his inaugural speech to the Maharashtra legislature that his government was committed to retaking Belagavi from Karnataka is being beseeched to come back to save the Congress in Karnataka. Will we ever get a break from opportunists?
The Udupi Jaathre has once again demonstrated the Sahithya Parishad’s pitiful status as a government aided Beggars Colony. What substantive effect has any of these sammelanas had on the well-being of Kannada, Kannadigas, and Karnataka? Tamil Nadu still drains our share of the Kaveri waters into the Bay of Bengal; Kaasaragodu will never ever be part of our state’s imagination; Kannada schools along the Andhra border are closing for want of suppport; we are a minority in Bengaluru and eventually will be so in all areas where manual labor is needed in Kannadanaadu. Think of the heart-rending irony of Andhaites buying up Kannada land on the banks of the Krishna and hiring Kannadigas as laborers.
To what used to be primarily jaathi-based infighting among our writers, the Sauharda sammelana added a religous dimension. Fortunately, thanks to the canine combat between JDS and BJP, there were no politicians receiving tribute at the Sammelana. It is true that thousands of books were sold, but a book fair might have been even more productive and less expensive.
I am faced with a question that troubles me more than any other in this context: If Andrhra, Maharashtra, Kerala, and Tamilnadu (all of those states but one refer to land in their names) could become powerhouses in New Delhi as well as at home as a result of the states reorganization, getting the Feds to back them in every dispute with Karnataka, why have we been reduced to a state (literally) where we sing of Bhaaratheeyathe because our Kannadathwa is more or less dead?
Despite all the hoarseness about unity in diversity stuff, we are Kannadigas first and Indians later. Is it an accident that we are being eaten into as if we were a slice of swiss cheese by our neighbouring states because of land and water issues or is there an agenda to disappear one of the richest states in the country as an entity?
Kannadathwa has to become a sacred obligation for all of us. As our most mystical yet realist poet Bendre proclaims in “Karnataka onde” Kannada is the only true property we have. If we do not realize this or if we are not lucky enough to have leaders who can transform our collective consciousness and enable it to see the myriad possibilities for Kannada, Kannadigas, and Karnataka, a few generations down the line, history books will likely have a chapter which begins with something like, “Once upon a time there was a part of India called Karnataka. The people of this land called themselves Kannadigas and their language, still available in the literature from that peirod, was known as Kannada.” An alarmist notion? Hardly.
Among us are Kannada geniuses who have carved out a large area in cyberspace for their intellectual endeavors. We need their help in saving Kannada, Karnataka, and ourselves in real space and real time. Any takers? Narayana Murthy need not apply.
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Typo in my post: Paragraph 3 “Andhraites,” not Andhaites. Sorry.
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What positive stuff can we say about the Karnataka manthris in the federal cabinet as far as their knowledgeability and integrity?
Rajashekharan: Doesn’t matter that his father-in-law was savaged by the very party he serves now. Let’s hear what he has said about Kannada to his Hindi masters.
Muniyappa: Sir, please introduce yourself to Kannadigas. Have you made a single speech in Kannada or in any known language in the Lok Sabha?
Ambareesh: Does he know whether he is a minister or even an LS member? Kannadigas made him rich beyond his dreams. What has he done for them in return? Playing cards does not have to be at the taxpayer’s expense.
There must be a fourth one that I know I know nothing about.
Our other MPs. Deve Gowda says it is a waste of time attending Loksabha sessions. Why not resign and spend his last days in Pauduvala Hippe, trying to earn a little bit of punya that will release him from hell after a million years?
BJP MPs are bad news. Hindi comes before Kannada for them. The Congress ones are too busy waiting for a chance to touch the Doresani’s white feet, singing “Janagana mana adhinaayaki jayahe.”
Ramaswamy, Naidu, Malya, Rajiv Chandrasekhar–altogether they spent nearly one hundred crores to be where they are. Can my people, Kannadigas, even imagine that kind of money?
We should have sent URA to the Rajya Sabha. He would have made sure that whatever he said wherever and however sycophantic would be reported in our all sixteen national languages.
Education, education, and more education is what we need. Kerala has a lot to teach us in this respect.
Do most other Kannadigas feel as helpless as I seem to?
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My Dear Athmasaakshi,
Do you have any athmasaakshi within yourself? How can you not understand the deeper purpose of life against only a financially viable IT industry?
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Too many people have taken offence against C.N.R Rao, failing to discern between the woods and the forest.
It is not the onus of Bangalore to provide employment for the entire nation. In the 90s one could see Kashmiris and Bihari students flocking to the city, as did the Andhrites in 80s and 90s, for “cheaper” Engineering courses. Fine, Bangalore loved the attention. I liked the cosmopolitan nature of the city, and had my days in the pub culture.
Having been living in the US for a very long time now, I often come visit, holding on to the romantic notions of Bangalore that I left in the early 90s, and am appalled to see the “City”, if you would call it one, morph into the way its shaped up.
At 10:30PM in the night, a once remote corner of Thyagarajanagar develops a grid lock, every two wheeler wanting to get away from every direction, every auto rickshaw front wheeling its way out, while car drivers honk their frustration out, in a neighborhood that probably has none of its residents partake in this melee, all trying to get a peaceful night’s sleep or catch up with a late night TV show! What happened to the concept of kids bicycling to their schools, heck I even used my bicycle while and after my Engineering course! Everybody wants a four wheeler now, let alone the “Hero Hondas” of yesteryears. With roads not even wide enough to sustain the two wheelers and auto rickshaws, where are you going to accomodate the Nanos now?
Walking on tree lined East Anjaneya Temple road, adjoining the Bugle Rock park, wa s one of the life’s simple pleasures. I watched in horror as a two wheeler side whacked my wife while we tried to steer our children away from these busybodies, and the driver not caring enough to look back on the damage he had caused.
Yes, Bangalore does not owe it to the wannabes from all nooks of India. Bangaloreans deserve the simpler pleasures of life. Burn all IT and take progress, jobs and your apartment culture with you, whoever you are and whereever you came from to plunder Bangalore.
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With lot of respect to a former IISC ian, I would like to point out that its just that his old age. People love to be in peace when they are retired from service.Thats fair enough. I stay in NY and have seen many retired folks shifting to the country side. They travel to NY once in a while. Maybe, even Mr Rao can consider shifting to some place quiet coz I believe cities are bound to grow one day or the other. If its not IT then maybe BT or aerospace, etc… Moreover, I strongly suggest that the administration should really think about the city’s infrastructure now otherwise it may not be able to take the load which is bound to increase everyday.
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my my, everyone is bashing prof Rao right and left here,where as prof.rao clearly appreciates the job oppurtunities created. But he also mentions the facts hard n straight, bangalore’s “intellectual” contribution is definitely ebbing out. I go/used to go to watch theatre plays quite regularly and now im bored to watch any kannada play because its the same old play which has been done ever and over and over again, nothing new, nothing CRISP! Making science professions attractive??? Science and Engg professions are definitely attractive
1. because of the products they create and maintain
2. The pay inititally is not as good as the “IT”, but once u establish urself as a good reliable practising engineer or once u finish your PhD and take to proper research and publish papers and books, money does roll in.
The unfortunate fact is u need to work a lot and fail a lot to finally succeed and a higher pay is only ensured at the end when u actually succeed! I for one do not find anything wrong in that, I think everyone here who is bashing Dr. Rao is just doing so out of “loyalty to the IT industry”(???). You dare not talk beause you have not seen things from the other side of the looking glass, which in this case is the Dr.Rao’s.
Oh btw, I for one am young,not a pensioner and i find malls utterly boring, i can’t even kill time over there, let alone relax;not to mention i hate driving in weekend traffic in bangalore; But im a bangalorean, wat m i to do? Do not answer that, Your suggestion would be for me to leave bangalore, all hail to the roundabout 10% of the population of bangalore,who say let all other burn in hell!
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oh yeah the question about such few doctorates from india in comp sci still stays a valid question
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oh bout traffic, anyone here argued with a two wheeler rider about how he wanted to ride his scooter on the footh path n u refused to let him do so cos u were walkin on the footpath
i have! n that dude wanted to come down to exchanging blows on this issue! nice what?
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Prof. Rao is more getting nostalgic remembering old days.
It is one country and as the culture in a city, called bangalore,
merges with other cultures(which, I believe, is good and probably
unavoidable in this age), People’s liking will change from ‘coffee
and dosa’ to ‘Malls and bars’, or probably to all of them
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Prof. Rao is a senily old dingbat! Go live in Mattur if you
are so in love with coffee and dosa retard!
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While reading this piece I focussed much too generously on
the sparse legit points that Professor Rao did indeed make. Sure,
it is unfortunate that real estate prices have spiralled out of
control and unnaturally fast. Sure, the high disposable incomes
that the IT professionals in the city now earn has created an
unequal distribution that bothers many, especially for those at the
rougher end of the spectrum. But the rather vitriolic and coarse
broader arguments provided above need some finer insight and
clarification. When Professor Rao says that it is a shame that the
city is now producing fewer “intellectuals” he is tracking these
fine specimens by virtue of their educational degrees (when he
mentions that it is a shame that “only 25 Computer Science PhD
students are produced annually). This in itself is a myopic comment
because a) he does not account for the large numbers that are
pursuing their doctoral studies (in popularly Computer Science)
abroad. This of course touches upon the tangential aspect of Brain
Drain but we will let that be and b) because a PhD degree in itself
is no indication of the contribution to intellectual wealth that he
so lovingly feels nostalgic about. What about the techies in the
city who file patents? What about those who invest in ambitious
start-ups? Moreover, Professor Rao laments the sudden dearth of
“poets”, “historians” and “economists”. Now I am unsure as to what
metric he has used to track this rapid decline of these wonderful
human beings within Bangalore, but it seems to me that he jumps
from a city-specific argument to a nation-wide argument (“Can an
India of the future afford a highly skewed growth like this?”). So
I am confused, how is the influx of techies in Bangalore at all a
reflection of the decrease in scholars of the liberal arts or other
disciplines the country over? Maybe Professor Rao does indeed hold
the key to some wonderful mathematical formulae that explains this.
But if I may be so bold as to pro-offer, I think the Delhi and
Calcutta Universities are still producing some fine economists and
historians (and Rhodes Scholars). Young authors and poets are being
encouraged, even as publishing houses are opening up. Now in the
confusing article, if Professor Rao was disparaging about the lack
of multi-disciplines in and from Bangalore, then I am at a loss of
words because a) I have no idea as to actual numbers and b)Doesn’t
this become a more complex problem? First, if more and more
youngsters are choosing the more lucrative options, then it is
unfair to judge them for it only because money can be and is a
powerful drive. The IT sector cannot be slammed for creating
opportunities, the potential employees cannot be slammed for
grabbing opportunities. Professor Rao may think of the intellectual
pursuit as worthy and it most certainly can be, but if he wants to
attract the youth towards that it has to be by showcasing the pros
of such a journey, as opposed to showcasing the cons of the IT
sector. It is in lack of clarity in these basic arguments that
Professor Rao has produced a worthless article. I can understand
some of the sentiments, but for such a distinguished professor (as
I have seen many refer to him as) this level of unilateral bashing
is uncalled for and provincial.
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I am not surprised by these left wing , communist/socialistic older generation. Its not their fault. The times in which they grew up were like that. A large inefficient public sector , government running everything , micromanaging the economy , socialistic and communist agendas. India needs a a second freedom , economic freedom and that will only happen when old schoolers like this joker kick the bucket and vanish into oblivion.
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