Dead Man Walking / Association of the Dead

Another SKAR classic. The Mritak Sangh (Association of the Dead) founded by people in India who have incorrectly been registered as dead.

Forget the "Carlos the Jackal" loophole in British documentation, this one is too bizarre to be anything but true. From a Time Magazine Article in 1999:


"I'm here. I'm alive," Lal Bihari told revenue officials after discovering he was listed as deceased in 1976. "That may be so," an unruffled clerk replied, "but according to my books you're dead." It took Lal Bihari 18 years to get his life and his land back. During that time, he added the word Mritak, or Dead, to his name and to prove that he was living sought arrest, tried to run for parliament, kidnapped the son of the uncle who had stolen his property, threatened murder, insulted judges, threw leaflets listing his complaints at legislators in the state assembly and demanded a widow's pension for his wife.


Wow. now that's what you call a Dead Man Walking.

Lal Bihari (born. 1961, dead. 1976-94, reborn 1994-date) founded the Mritak Sangh for other like him, who have been dispossessed by the Indian land registry records. The organization supposedly has over 400 members today, and has managed to declare 4 of them "alive"

His story has served as inspiration for the movies, and in 2003 Lal Bihari was the recipient of the IgNobel Peace Prize "for a triple accomplishment: First, for leading an active life even though he has been declared legally dead; second, for waging a lively posthumous campaign against bureaucratic inertia and greedy relatives; and third, for creating the Association of Dead People."

Lal Bihari overcame the handicap of being dead, and managed to obtain a passport from the Indian government so that he could travel to Harvard to accept his Prize. However, the U.S. government refused to allow him into the country. Spoilsports.

The opening scene of the movie Barah Anna is based on Lal Bihari's life.

Long Live Sri Lal Bihari!

The Internet is NOT for Porn

...says the Indian Government, as they ban a popular porn website in India called Savita Bhabhi




ContentSutra has the story. I quote (with emphasis added):


N. Vijayaditya, of the CCA, confirmed the development. “There were several complaints against the site. We have taken action under the relevant sections of the IT Act and blocked the site,” he said. When asked if the agency will give a chance to the owners of the site to defend themselves, he said nobody has come forward so far with such a request. He said he could not say if the agency will pursue legal action against the operators of the website.

....

Savitabhabhi is the 82nd-most-visited Indian website, attracting more visitors than Bseindia.com, the website of the Bombay Stock Exchange.

.....

The portrayal of a married Indian woman as wildly promiscuous raised the hackles of many in a largely conservative nation. One of them, Bangalore-based N. Vijayashankar, who describes himself as a “techno-legal information security consultant”, waged a sustained campaign against Savitabhabhi, complaining to the government’s Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-IN) as well as the Director General of Police in Karnataka in October last year. “Cartoons are a more participative medium. Videos don’t do as much damage. When a child is watching a cartoon, he imagines himself as the character. This has a deeply corrupting influence on our youngsters. This, apart from the fact that an Indian name was being used in such an obscene cartoon, is what led me to make the complaint,” Vijayashankar said. “A child will see a Savitabhabhi among his relatives.” When asked if there was any scientific basis to his thesis that pornographic cartoons did more damage to young people than pornographic videos, he said that was his own psychological interpretation. (Vijayashankar has no training in psychology.)

......

In an email interview with contentSutra, the main brain behind the site, who goes by the handle Deshmukh, said they were exploring legal options. “We are talking to our lawyers and trying to figure out our options. The initial reaction is since the site does not pose any threat to India’s national security and is not illegal, it must be against some international treaty to block it. However, we are still working on the legal angle.”

Currently it seems safe to say:
1. SavitaBhabhi can't do much about the power of the Indian govt over Indian ISPs. In fact, it appears that they still haven't understood the reality of regulatory control in India. The government has fairly broad rights under Section 67 of the Indian IT Act 2000.

2. The Indian govt can't do much more about SavitaBhabhi registered in the US. However, what kind of due process bans a website first and provides review upon request afterwards? The cart appears to be before the horse.

3. N. Vijayashankar really doesn't quite get the Internet. Or psychology. Or adolescent children. Poor guy.

4. There will be more back-and-forth here. For instance, check out www.savesavita.com

As a freedom-of-speech issue, it will be interesting to see if anybody in India picks up the cause. Crates of comics to Mr. N. Vijayashankar, our favorite “techno-legal information security consultant”? I doubt it.

Toon porn doesn't have the same zing as a Consortium of Pub-going, Loose and Forward Women



Meanwhile, Avenue Q explains:



Lyrics | - The Internet Is For Porn lyrics

ps. Section 67 of Indian IT Act quoted below. Young Deshmukh will do well not to announce his real name in India.


67. Publishing of information which is obscene in electronic form.

Whoever publishes or transmits or causes to be published in the electronic form, any material which is lascivious or appeals to the prurient interest or if its effect is such as to tend to deprave and corrupt persons who are likely, having regard to all relevant circumstances, to read, see or hear the matter contained or embodied in it, shall be punished on first conviction with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to five years and with fine which may extend to one lakh rupees and in the event of a second or subsequent conviction with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to ten years and also with fine which may extend to two lakh rupees.

Gladwell on Anderson: The Gods Must Be Crazy (to be dissing each other like this)

In India, we have 16-330 million gods whom we pray to daily, so they can explain life to us. They don't do a good job.

In the US, since things are more rational and efficient, every generation has only 4 gods, but they explain everything.

Currently they are called Gladwell, Anderson, Surowiecki and Diamond (though Diamond's luster is fading, and is being replaced by lord Taleb on his chosen vehicle - A Black Swan)

Gaze upon their holy countenances.






Don't you feel elevated?

Recently, the New Yorker published an snappy critique by Gladwell of Anderson's book Free. Observe the thunderbolts of Great God Gladwell.

Information wants to be free,” Anderson tells us, “in the same way that life wants to spread and water wants to run downhill.” But information can’t actually want anything, can it? Amazon wants the information in the Dallas paper to be free, because that way Amazon makes more money. Why are the self-interested motives of powerful companies being elevated to a philosophical principle?

Overall, a quite cogent argument. The Great God Gladwell (3G?) is revealing an avatar I would like to see more of, the thoughtful critique.

Unfortunately, I think that was possibly an Outlier

I now quake to imagine what might happen if there were to be a clash of the Gods, a type-face Titanomachia? Blogs would bleed the world over.


"GUNS, GERMS AND STEEL rain down upon a LONG TAIL of OUTLIERs. for FREE"

"The WISDOM OF CROWDS says if you BLINK you will COLLAPSE"


etc. etc. A truly horrible outcome.

I can't wait.

ObAMMA Grrl: The Market for Premium Hugs

At SKAR, we believe that premium markets reveal a lot about human nature. The market for hugs however, has never gone premium until recently.

Got us thinking about the original inventor of the Free Hug movement. Referred to many as AMMA, she has given over 26 million free hugs over the course of her lifetime. 

In an article with Salon, Amma says:

"What's happening here cannot be described. It is true communion, pure love that flows, flows like a river. It is pure subjective experience. It's like somebody trying to explain about drumming. You cannot explain with words. In order to really understand, you have to play a drum or listen to it. It's a direct experience, a real meeting between hearts. It's like looking in a mirror and cleaning your face."

Wow. She continues:

"I'm trying to awaken true motherhood in people, in men and women, because that is lacking in today's world. Today there are two types of poverty. The first is a lack of basic necessities. The second is a lack of love and compassion. As far as I am concerned, the second is more important because if there is love and compassion then the first kind can be taken care of."

We're sold. With such a huge need for free hugs in India SKAR wants to start offering luxury hugs.But how could we compete with AMMA? She's got a lock on the market for true motherhood.

Well, we could follow the idea of the IPL and bring in some differentiated talent, like.... ummm... ObAMMA Grrl here.

If ObAMMA Grrl dressed up in a sari and offered you a hug, how much would you be willing to pay?



ps- She can lip-sync too. Quite well.

Jugaad is the asli spirit of Innovation

Now that GM looks likely to be owned by the American taxpayer, and that all the fuss around the $2000 Tata Nano is dying down, I was gratified to read that the Economist has not forgotten about Jugaad - the original low-cost auto design from Asia

A year or so ago, when somebody asked me to describe the soul of India, I gave them the phrase "jugaad". Jugaad means nothing works like it should, there is no infrastructure, there is no blueprint for success. But you have a pressing NEED: to get from point A to point B. So you just make it happen, however you can.

Like this taxi...


Or this tractor...


And here are some more 'jugaadu' shots from the Indian highways, courtesy of the Flickr Jugaad group

(thank you also to the Power of Ideas blog)

It's just a reminder that as long as anything costs Rs 1 in India, somebody will be ready to improvise a solution that works half as well, for a quarter of the cost.

No matter how ridiculous it looks.

Patel vs. Patel vs. Patel vs. Patel vs. Patel vs. Patel

If you thought only the Indians in India were nuts, you need to read this post.

On July 19, 2001 Cricket umpire Roy Higgins turned up to umpire a game between Yorkshire LPS & Amarmilan club from Bradford. To his surprise, all 22 of the players on the pitch were named... Patel

BBC Sport has the story, but I'd like to quote from LPS club secretary Ishy Patel
"We didn't realise we all had the same name until the match was under way, but even then we didn't think it was anything special.

"We certainly didn't think it would become such a big story.

"Twice before we've played and there were 21 Patels lining up against each other, but on this occasion our regular wicketkeeper, who is not called Patel, had to go to London for work."

Spare a thought for the one non-Patel. No wonder he took off to London for work. The scorecard from that momentous game is here below:



But thats not the only Patel story in town:

BBC News last week has an article about a marriage mart in Wembley, where groups of British Patels can meet & date another...er.. Patel. There are 250,000 Patels in the UK, divided across half a dozen castes.

As the guests arrive they are handed lists relating first names (surnames are obviously a given at this do), ages, qualifications and occupations of their opposite numbers, together with the names of the villages their forefathers came from. One girl explained:

"You look for the village where your own folks come from. But you can't link up with someone who's from your own village because they'll be too close, like your cousin or your brother."

The mind boggles. It's approximately 6800km between Wembley and any village in Gujarat.

Creative Protests 2: Gandhigiri

In 2003, Indian film actor Sanjay Dutt (no stranger to the law himself) starred as Munnabhai MBBS, a small town lad in Mumbai who pretends to his parents to be a doctor but actually makes his living as a small-time thug or "goonda" practicing extortion, called "goondagiri".

The movie was a big hit, spawning a sequel in 2006 called Lage Raho Munnabhai

In order to win his lady love's heart, (and also beset by a talking apparition of Mahatma Gandhi) Munnabhai has now become an RJ preaching ..er.. "gandhigiri" as a substitute for "goondagiri".

It's a lot simpler if you watch the video.


"Gandhigiri" with its dual antecedents in violence ("Goondagiri") & non-violence ("Gandhiism") has gained prominence fast in India and across the world.

Observe:
+ A feast held for 20 befuddled foreign students in Punjab (as a way of protesting against racism in Australia)
+ A bouquet of roses for the health minister in Delhi (to protest inaction on a dengue epidemic)
+ and my favourite: Flowers for the USCIS (Immigration) Department in Washington DC (protesting delays in green card applications)

Quotes from the head of USCIS
"The public reaction to the July 2 announcement made it clear that the federal government's management of this process needs further review,"

Quotes from the feasted students:
Visibly confused but enjoying all the attention, Simin, president of the foreign students association here, said, "It's really a heartwarming thing done by the Indian students. I really liked the garlands. After today’s function, we feel safer and more secure in this city. We just hope the same treatment is reserved for Indians abroad."

"Visibly confused, but enjoying all the attention"? I bet.

Gandhigiri has potential to go global. A group of US Citizens trying to bring their fiances into the country sent a batch of chocolate kisses to the Vermont Service Center of the USCIS

Poor USCIS, but... hahahaha... I heart gandhigiri!

Creative Protests 1: The Power of Bangles

The power-distance between an individual and the state can be very large in India, often literally. It can take a long time to get an electricity connection.

One way, as women in India, to shame the government officials to pay attention to you is to storm into their office and make them wear bangles!

Hindu reports

"Angry over the erratic power supply in the district, Awasthi and her supporters Friday barged into the office of executive engineer R.S.Gautam and forced him and other officials there to wear bangles, police said."

Wear bangles! This brand of shaming is not unique to the subcontinent however. In Thailand, derelict policeman are forced to wear hot-pink armbands featuring "Hello Kitty,"

It's hard to say where to draw the line between "humiliation" and "soul force" as a motivating factor, but it's fair to say that from the medieval blacking of the face to Gandhi's "satyagraha"; communities in India have evolved colourful ways of registering protest.

India, and the Taste for Conspicuous Consumption

There was a terrific article on Inconspicuous Consumption in the The Atlantic that got me thinking about certain consumption patterns in the Indian consumer

The article essentially states that as one's peer group becomes wealthier, consumption:
a. becomes more inconspicuous (ie. bathrooms vs. watches)
b. moves from products to services (ie. from fancy cars to fancy vacations)

Given that India, overall, is a very poor country that would imply a very strong tendency towards flashy consumption; and would also likely imply that consumption is centered around goods vs. services.

The match with reality: mobile phones sell like crazy in this country; currently 4 million a month and holding.

Luxury vacations meanwhile are only now picking up. For most Indians, vacations mean either visiting families or going on pilgrimages. For many urban Indians, vacations mean junkets to shopping destinations like New York, London, Dubai, Singapore, Bangkok.

Building businesses around upscale services may not be a bad planning strategy for the future. Which are the likely professions? Psychoanalyst? Personal shopper? Keep your eyes peeled for anything around you.

Monkey Business

Our collective imagination created the Monkey God
 and therefore it comes as no surprise that we, the Indian people are capable of fearing The Monkey Man!

Mass hysteria ensued in New Delhi in 2001 when a "half-beast half-man" was said to be unleashing its wrath indiscriminately on innocent people. Reportedly, the entire eastern district police force of about 3,000 personnel was put on patrol to hunt down the creature. The Times of India said an industrial worker died on Sunday night in nearby Noida town when he jumped off a first-floor building after being awoken by cries the "monkey man" was attacking.



Like almost every other supernatural story in India, this was a false alarm.

Yet, a month later, CNN reported that:
" At least three people panicked and fell to their deaths from buildings during the two-week saga because they were convinced the attacker -- described varyingly as a monkey-like creature with metallic claws and a cat with tawny, glowing eyes -- was pursuing them.
...
At the height of the panic, vigilante groups armed with sticks patrolled the streets at night on the lookout for the creature and police announced a 50,000 rupee ($1,067) reward for information leading to its capture."


And this in a country where the nominal GDP per capita is about $950.

Imagine roaming the mean streets of Delhi looking for a Monkey Man! "What did you do today?" "I looked for a half-beast, half-man. Didn't find him. Will try again tomorrow."


Monkey Men, show up in other places as well. Apparently, the Indian Railways believe that by dressing up a man like a monkey and making him walk on all fours, real monkeys will be stymied in the efforts to steal food from train passengers! 

If you don't believe us, watch the video:

And the Most famous person in the world EVER.......

Yahoo Answers thinks it's Walt Disney & Ronald McDonald

I think that can't be right. The most well-known person would have to be well-recognized in India & China to even have a chance of getting that title.

And nobody cut across national borders like this guy, twenty-five years ago....


Just look at his impact in India: knockoff videos, a genuine star and a little person. Look at his fans in China create a dancing terrorist-infiltrator and, of course, the little children

And then there's the other Thriller in Manila...

Beat that Ronald McDonald!

How Sex Education is Taught in India

Watch this video and wonder:



The video was produced by the Nrityanjali academy, a group which uses the performing arts to promote social causes in the state of Andhra Pradesh in southern India.

blog.telegraph.uk has the video, with quotes:

"Our main target groups are people vulnerable to the HIV virus like sex workers, transsexuals or truck drivers," said P Narsingh Rao director of the academy.

"We tour villages in mobile video vans to show the film. The screening is followed by a question and answer session about condom use and sexually transmitted diseases."


No published stats on the effectiveness in Andhra Pradesh are known to us, as of this date. However, the academy has had a chance to present its methods before Laura Bush.

So.. hmmm.. if only there was a comedic Texan cowboy with a promiscuous love life one could set to a catchy beat ....

Wouldn't be as good as this ad, perhaps, but a place in the Top 20?

Indian Kings Proud Amid Poverty

These five ordinary-looking gentlemen above are "kings" who will not leave their subjects. Legally privy purses were abolished by the federal government in 1971; however these kings and a few courtiers linger on as pensioned dependents of the state government of Gujarat.

But the lingering question remains: When does a king cease to a king? When he decides so, or when everybody else decides so? Who decides?

Thank God we have a democratically elected parliament to decorously discuss, debate and legislate these thorny issues.

The developing world is full of animal-shaped trash cans!

Here is a giant rabbit (India) a voracious penguin (Vietnam), an anthropomorphic monkey (India) and a shark (Israel). Who decided to place these abominations in public view?





A similar effort to place a giant green rabbit trash can in the UK was cut down by public opinion. Poor Paul Smith.

Trash cans are trash cans, especially in the developing world where they tend to become stained & overfull. Animal trash cans are not cute, unless they look like something you would buy on etsy.com for your kids

If you *really* want a trash can to be more than a garbage receptacle,then look no further than China.


The 'Do not litter' sign on this monument in the Forbidden City translates to:

"A single act of carelessness leads to the eternal loss of beauty"

Wow. Now THAT will make you stop before you drop or litter...

ps- Apologies for the blurred shot [Does anybody have one better?]

Yankee Yoga Shanghai = Montessori Nuclear Winter?

An American advertising Yoga Lessons in Shanghai.

David Swenson made his first visit to Mysore in 1977 and learned the full Ashtanga system as it was originally taught by K. Pattabhi Jois.

Yoga, once the cultural property of India, is about as Indian now as U2 & Bono are Irish.


In time, Yoga could become as ubiquitous as the word 'Montessori' or 'kindergarten'... and who cares now about Maria Montessori or Friedrich Frobel?

Like Herr Frobel, it appears K. Pattabhi Jois made a strategic error in 1977 by not trademarking the phrase "Ashtanga".

A mistake that today's Bikram Chowdhury appears determined not to make, much to the chagrin of ..umm.. the Indian government.

Very stupidly, the Indian government thinks things like 'yoga' or 'ayurveda' that draw on thousands of years of culture cannot be trademarked.

Well, they better watch out. Bikram says he has balls like atom bombs, two of them, 201 megatons each, and the Indian government, at last report, was still fiddling with 4-60 kiloton low-yield devices.



Just when you think you are out from a nuclear winter, they pull you back in...

Indians, Asterix and the Goths online....

if you believe Alexa, the #18 most popular site in India today is a website called Travian.in. It ranks slightly ahead of India's #1 job site naukri.com, and India's #1 travel site Indian Railways.

So what is Travian.in?

Travian is a browser game featuring a world with thousands of other real players. One begins the game acting as a chief of a tiny village. No downloads necessary, the game is directly playable. You can play with thousands of real players in a persistent ancient world. You can build up villages, wage wars or trade with your neighbors.

Take a look at the characters in the game: You can be a Roman, a Gaul, or a Teuton (Goth)




Hmmm...

Which probably means the Gaulish chief's name could be Vitalstatistix, the Teuton generals could be Metric, Rhetoric, Electric and of course the Roman villages names could be Aquarium, Tototum, Laudanum and Compendium. If this mystifies you, click here.

Hundreds of thousands of Indians are playing this game online, likely without reference to Monsieurs Goscinny and Uderzo. Charles de Gaulle once grumbled that his only international rival was TinTin; Unknown to all the same may be true in India online of the Indomitable Gauls.....

Vive le Gaul! Vive le Asterix! .. or perhaps, Jai ho, Gaul! Jai ho Asterix!?

Pranab Mukherjee loses cool, twists journalist's ear...

Pranab takes the old-school approach to media relations... what a strange & antiquated way of expressing displeasure!

Read all about it.

Perhaps this is the response to all the shoe-throwing happening nowadays in India, UK and of course, Iraq.

My how we've progressed!

Laloo Prasad & Rabri Devi - Keenest First Couple on the Planet

Imagine you are the chief executive of a state with 82 million citizens (same size as Germany, larger than any European country bar Russia). You have a strong electoral record, but a poor record of corporate governance. In fact your government is regulary rated the most corrupt in India.

Eventually your government is brought to the dock over a $200M animal fodder scam running over a period of ten years, you become the first individual to become the subject of a entire Lok Sabha (Parliament) sitting session, and are then dragged kicking & screaming from your executive post, charge-sheeted & deposited in jail.

End of career, no?

No. What you do then is recruit your illiterate wife (and mother of 9) to become the chief executive of the state for 3 terms till you fight your way out of prison. You contest election from prison, win, and return triumphantly to power. Like James Michael Curley, the Rascal King of Boston. Except better.

Your poor wife, who has been lamenting her position as head of state, returns to her cherished position in private life "at your feet". Presumably, the burdens of managing both family welfare and the family welfare portfolio was too hard for her..

And she has never been heard of since.