"We live in a world of uncertainty and ex-post whether it is the Comptroller and Auditor-General, whether it is a parliamentary committee then they analyse post facto. They have a lot more facts which were not available to those who took the decision … We take decisions in a world of uncertainty and that's the perspective I think Parliament, our CAG and our media must adopt if this nation is to move forward." ~ Prime Minister Manmohan Singh
June 10, 2011:
The Empire of Corruption is striking back! There is a sudden streak of hawkish hot-headedness evident in the Government's postures and pronouncements.
In particular, one notices the Human Resources Development and Information Technology Minister, Mr Kapil Sibal, and the Home Minister, Mr P.Chidambaram, adopting a conspicuously imperial tone and tenor, which is clearly hostile to 'We, the People', to whom they are beholden for their transient positions of power and authority in the first place. Mr Sibal has the bravado to hold up as "a lesson for all" the sneaky and dastardly Ramlila maidan rampage by the police against sleeping, innocent men, women and children who had come from far-off places just to join the movement against corruption and black money.
Mr Chidambaram has the braggadocio to denounce a sovereign people's inherent basic right to protest as "destabilising the Government" and attack the media's brilliant performance in highlighting the people's anger and revulsion against the Government's black deeds as "competitive populist coverage of these movements" and an attempt at "undermining Parliamentary democracy".
VALUES OF FREEDOM HEROES
With all the "behave or else!" hauteur that he is capable of, he imputes motives to the media's discharge of its mandatory duty to keep the people informed, basing his insinuations on "reasons which I can't spell out".
No doubt, he is ominously hinting at some concocted intelligence and cooked-up cases the Ministries of Home Affairs and Finance are planning to foist to subjugate the media and silence the critics.
If Mr Chidambaram has read his history from ancient times with the intelligence he is credited with, he would have known that human spirit fighting for a just cause, has never been, and can never be, extinguished by brandishing the deadly weapons of tyranny.
Our rulers should know, as from an authentic witness to the glorious age of Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru whom I had seen from close quarters, that they are behaving contrary to the values of colossuses who won for us our precious freedom and taking the country back to the era of slavery and savage repression by even doing one better than the British colonial masters. {Read the full story on Business Line}