Power Play

Black and White on Black and White

A great movie to watch for everyone, especially those who sympathize with terrorists in the name of religion. A movie for all types of people to see why Muslims in India are a strong part of the secular democracy and the wonders democracy and secularism does to a society, something that lacks in some Islamic states, whose greatest export to western world has been terrorists.

India had its share of failures in protecting its minority citizens, but the resilience shown by its minority Sikhs, Muslims and its majority Hindu's to work together and defeat the separatists and fundamentalists among them has turned it into a powerful, secular functioning democracy that has thrived in spite of being surrounded by countries like Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Burma and China.

Solution to a problem starts with first accepting it and then working to fix it, something that we should follow in Canada.  No one religion is perfect and those who claim their religion is the best, should know it all that even their God does not say that.

Canadian Companies(& Conservatives) can learn from India

While Canadian manufacturers complain that a strong dollar is hurting exports, Indian companies view the rising rupee as a buying opportunity.

A very striking line  I hope will make many Canadians, Ontarians particularly affected by the rising dollar to think of acquiring businesses in the US and other parts of the world to expand their opportunities.

This reminds of a story I heard in B-school. Two sales guys from a shoe company were sent to Africa to explore business opportunity. The first came back and said, "there is no opportunity, no one wears shoes". The second came back and said "there is 100% opportunity, no one wears shoes"

Remember how the diamond industry made Japanese brides wear diamonds and now it is one of the biggest markets. Canadian businesses need to go beyond the mentality of fur traders and look at the global picture.

The recession in US and rising Canadian dollar is a great time to pick strategic investment properties and our government need to support it, which is not happening.

The conservatives have been calling for Corporate tax cuts in Ontario, which is ridiculous.Rather the Federal government should be creating an environment for our businesses to expand into the US and other parts of the world, which they are not doing. So lets see, right now their top priority for Free trade is Columbia. (hahahah, sorry I couldn't stop laughing) Maybe that's because Uncle Bush wants to reward Columbia for standing up against Venezuela!

The Conservatives are not doing anything with BRIC countries, in fact their actions have been reversing the benefits of Paul Martin government.  Columbia. hahahah!  Where is Brazil, Russia, China and India, the real super power emerging economies.

Getting back to the topic of Indian businesses, India is booming because of political reforms and in spite of corrupt politicians!  No wonder, Wall street Journal was screaming "India dominates Billionaires' List"

The Forbes List is good indication of where growth is and why we should look at those markets.

We need to see reforms in economic approach that will encourage and reward small and medium base companies to look for export markets beyond US and acquire companies and expand operations in China, India, and other emerging markets.

The world can also learn from India viz China that democracy and development can go hand in hand and development does not have to come at the cost of democracy. We don't need to compromise on our values to grow our business. we can do business with China and still rap them for their human rights violations, we can do business with India and ask them to do more to eradicate poverty, we can do business with Middle East and still talk about democracy and women rights, but we need to respect and maintain our limits.

Politicians and political parties also need to aware of how business is done in those parts of the world. In most cases we see those countries from the prism of political organisers within our parties and that usually leads to things like this which is not going to help Canadian businesses.

Red tape and bureaucracy are major issues and governments in emerging markets can make it worse or impossible for Canadian companies if our politicians for domestic political gains fail to recognize the concerns of those countries.

That applies to China, middle east and other markets.

The Parliamentary Struggle: Glen Pearson

I admire Glen Pearson for the work he did in Africa and his desire to bring change through politics. I see a lot of me in Glen and may be that's why I admire him.  For many years I  have been involved in issues related to poverty, women, children and empowering them through Education. I started the Canadian arm of Asha for education, a global organization that works on basic education rights and recently got involved in a more strategic project that focuses on building a sustainable program that can be mass implemented in several countries around the world, using e-learning networks.

My next step is to put together these learning's in impacting the lives of children in Canada and helping those who need that extra help in making themselves economically independent. We are going to partner with groups here that can share the learning and development and focus primarily on education related issues in GTA and First Nations using computer aided learning (CAL) and satellite Internet for remote areas.

I was the founding chair of the Young Professionals of the Indo-Canada Chamber of Commerce, 18 months after I came to Canada. There was a need for young professionals like me to network and since there was a void, I just jumped in to fill it. what made me do it? a desire to make this place better. Today it is a big bubbling group of young professionals with tons of events every year.

Our Music festival desiFEST, the largest of its kind in North America has helped us create ideas, that lead to the formation of UMA foundation, where our mission is to empower youth through music and we plan to start soon with projects in Scarborough, Jane/Finch and gradually move to other parts of Canada. Music has the power to unite minds and engage people in a way that sometimes brick walled classrooms fail.

People always ask how do I find the time do all these, my work, music festival in 3 cities, children's program, politics and what not.. and I look at say, I have never felt tired doing any of these, physically or mentally, in fact it is inspiring and makes me stronger.

Politics should be a passion, a driving force that you want to use to bring positive change towards humanity. It has to be the feeling, the urge, the desire to make an impact in the lives of millions of people, that rises from the bottom of your gut.  That's what drives me towards politics and I can bet you, that what got Glen Pearson.

I find it equally frustrating that it is very difficult to be principled and speak up against issues and still want to be a politician. I have been advised recently, that I can either be a politician or an activist, not both. Democracy was built to facilitate free speech, but in some way to be successful in a democratic process, one needs to mince words and accept the realm of political reality.

To me it is a constant struggle, battling between your principles, your vision, your hunger to bring change Vs political reality. A reality that I have come to believe in ,but when I see people like Barack Obama and Glen Pearson, it gives me the glitter of hope that Idealism is not necessarily a bad thing in politics with your ability to accept it in the form it can be used in real life politics.

Here is a note Glen Pearson wrote , that I want to share with you.

The Parliamentary Struggle

"I am still new enough to Parliament that I view it through something of a detached lens. I watch the bitter partisanship that so often substitutes for political discourse and I feel the same sense of revulsion expressed by voters.

There has clearly been an alteration of tone and civility in this most hallowed of political chambers in Canada. All parties must share the responsibility and much of the blame. Something is slipping and it’s becoming obvious. Seasoned politicians and journalists have claimed that it wasn’t always this way; it has been primarily the last two years in which decorum in the House has sunk to significant lows. A certain moral and intellectual strength is ebbing away. The field of once blooming ideas has withered and Canada is slowly losing its way, its national will, and that deep and abiding sense of purpose that once brought this nation together and held it in place despite our numerous differences.

It’s probably easy for anyone reading these lines to understand that I’m something of an idealist. But I am an idealist without illusions. Great issues are debated in Parliament and partisanship actually does work for the greater good – but only when points of view are held in respect. We can’t always agree, but we can choose to respect the other views, realizing they come from genuine public servants attempting to represent the hard-won convictions of their own respective communities. In my short time here I have witnessed many politicians from all stripes attempting to honorably live out their sense of purpose.

It is when things turn mean or personal that our sense of a higher, more noble calling suddenly takes a nosedive. The public good must regularly trump rank partisanship, lest the political system itself become little else but words and reasoning always falling on deaf ears."

Riya Mulpur- our darling

work, politics, music festival, business, charitable work, community, family, ..oh yes friends..life is busy..I wonder at times, why? How would life be if we went to work 9-5 and..nothing else.. I guess I would have a heart attack!

Among all the hustle and bustle, today was an exciting day. A cute darling among our friends, Riya Mulpur, the first baby in my close friends circle in Canada. We were all singe, then we got married and now the first to move to the next level of family. So exciting... I don't know, I am  not an emotional person, but sometimes, even the ice in Antarctica melts in winter...I am happy today, because I feel human and not a machine...

After all there is more to life than work, politics, music festival, business, charitable work, community... there is family and friends.. and Riya..there is a lot more to life than our ambitions, careers, big houses and fast cars......and for now just Riya..

Harper Ethnic strategy in B.C. will fail

The Tories are back to mischief again. They are trying their new found Mantra of reaching out to  ethnic communities because that is what they are lacking to win a majority. Ethnic outreach from Conservatives is not something new, we have heard about it earlier too

The good news is that finally the Conservatives are starting to treat visible minorities with respect, the bad news is that they are just seeing us as a instrument of vote to get them a majority.

Lets look into the facts. The conservatives are targeting the Chinese, Jewish and Hindu's among the top ethnic groups along with Koreans, Filipino and some other communities except Sikhs and Muslims. The rationale is that Sikhs and Muslims tend to go left (NDP) from the Liberals and they are targeting communities that they think will go right(Tory) to them, but they are wrong. There are Sikh and Muslim MP's in the Conservative party and all communities, like mainstream support parties based on their platform and commitment, not as a bloc. 

The Conservative approach towards Chinese and Hindu's have similar patterns. Appointments, family values,attending community events, criticizing the Liberals for lack of support to these Communities, but they have never done anything credible at the grass root level to win the support of the voters. Sure, some people will tend to go Conservatives because of various reasons including not being happy with the Liberals, but then that is a small percentage that can be seen irrespective of the Conservative ethnic strategy. At the same time, there are people who voted Conservative last time, who say they will vote for the Liberals next time.

By large, polling numbers and in conversation with people in the Chinese, Jewish and Hindu grassroots, people are not flattered with Harper that will make them vote for the Tories.

In fact more and more people are realizing that the Conservatives are all about talking and media time, but are not doing anything for the people. The Conservatives lack understanding of ethnic communities. They think community leaders will be gateway to the community, but don't realize that their own people end up being the gatekeepers.

It ain't happening Jason, not with the current strategy.

Hope Vs. Despair

A small ray of hope in this troubled region and an  act of desperation
Former Tamil Tiger rebels have taken a step towards participating the democratic process, a positive step towards peace through a political, democratic resolution, an action that ANC took many decades ago that paved the path to peace in south Africa. In a country where theInternational community has been plagued with failures after failures, small gestures like these, that might not be perfect, but a definite step towards a demoractic opinion is a ray of hope in the tunnel of darkness.

In Spain ETA rebels killed a former politician to express their desperation. They will have to learn that violence will not pave the path to peace or their goal for a separate state. Peaceful protests and articulation of their issues will get better international attention to their cause than violent assaults and assasinations that will only further isolate them.

Santa Harper dolling out money in Tory ridings

If you thought the Cadman story was not true, maybe this will throw some light on Conservative activities.

"The Harper government has been channelling a disproportionate amount of economic development money in Quebec into Conservative-held ridings, a Canwest News Service analysis has found.

On average, each Conservative seat received $10.8 million in economic development money. That is more than one and a half times the average of $6.6 million that Bloc Quebecois ridings have received, and more than three times the $3.2-million average for Liberal ridings."

Tory ridings in Quebec getting more handouts screams Canwest. Day after day, Canadians are tired of hearing about the hypocrisy of the Conservative government. The conservatives attacked the Liberals for the Ad scam in Quebec but are getting involved in a bigger favourism scandal by discrminating against Canadians who did not vote for them in Quebec.

But then, what do you expect from the Consevatives..

Conservative pattern with Black Candidates in Canada and US

The Harper Conservatives first kicked out African Canadian Mark Warner .Now they are accused to have helped against a African American Barak Obama

Do the Conservatives hate intelligent Black candidates?

Alberta Vs Afghanistan- Floundering democratic values

The media in Alberta is making a lot of noise about the lowest turnout ever here for an election. only 41% of Albertans voted in the elected that resulted in the conservatives getting elected again. I am in Calgary now and haven't come across one person who voted! Why? because
-I'm not interested,
-don't have the time- we are already short on employees,
-doesn't bother me,
-things are great, nothing to worry.
- all of them are useless

Having lived in India and been politically active there, elections in India was always called as a "democratic exercise" and of course it was. when you have over 600 million people coming out to vote, it is by far the largest democratic thing on this planet.

Canadians, like in most western world seem to be moving away from this exercise and it looks like with increased prosperity, there is a decrease in democratic engagement. The results in Alberta are shocking. One would expect the disenfranchised to come out and vote against the Tories, but the small L- Liberals lost nearly half the seats they held to be reduced to a paltry 10 seats in an symbolic opposition that will manage to find some corner seats in the legislature.

Canada has sent troops to Afghanistan to restore democracy there and we have lost 79 soldiers defending the rights of the Afghanistan people and protect their democratic values, but at home we have opted not to use our own rights.

I learned very early in life that rights not exercised will become privileges and we have seen that happen in many countries. No one thinks that will happen in Canada, but the majority don't seem to care about the very fundamental value that determines pretty much everything in our life- our democracy and our government(s). How can we not participate in it? It will be interesting to see what percentage of the voters were under 35 years of age. young voters are getting more apathetic to elections and part of it is also that our political system has done little to attract younger candidates.

The Tories might have won another majority(what is it 11th or 12th) but they have failed to inspire Albertans to participate in the democratic process, in fact they have contributed towards the political apathy among young Albertans.

Alberta and Canada in general needs to look into how we can boost voter turnout and taking a cue from the private sector, incentives always work. Do we have to give incentives to people to get them to use their rights? probably not, but we can not punish people for not voting either.

Political parties should look towards bringing brighter, younger candidates who are charismatic and can charm the public into participating the democratic process. High schools and Universities should consider providing credits to students who participate in the democratic process in some form- voting or campaigning. Private sector should encourage employees to go and cast their ballot and create a work environment on election day that will encourage employees to go and vote. Media should take the lead and encourage people to come out and vote. Governments should explore ideas that will make it attractive for people to come and vote, that includes incentives, new voting systems like voting over Internet, phone, longer voting hours, two day voting etc. Some other ideas are electronic voting machines that allow people to vote anywhere instead of just their riding. This will be convenient for commuting workers, to be able to vote in downtown for a riding in Markham.

Above all, people should take the initiative to come out and vote and encourage family and friends to do it. Nothing more can have a bigger impact. Our ancestors fought hard to get our freedom, rights for women to vote, rights for minorities, now we need to fight to uphold them and prevent the crumbling and destruction of the rights, that we our predecessors fought for us.

Apathy sucks, lets make a change!