Sunday, September 5, 2010

For Pete's Sake



Elin Maria Pernilla Nordegren, a Swedish model and the ex-wife
of Tiger Woods encashed on her insecurity. (Cartoon By Mike
Lester,The Rome News-Tribune - 6/30/2010 12.00:00 AM;
©Copyright 2010 Mike Lester.). Click for larger image.

Iran in Stone Age

On the Islamic side of the world, in Iran, courts reopened a 2005 adultery case of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani. After the trial, it was decided that Sakineh would be stoned to death for her 'crime'.
This would have been just another case of Desert Bloc justice, till the French First Lady, Carla Bruni sprang to the 'defence' of this 'victim'. The case become more high profile, after Brazil's President, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, offered asylum to Sakineh - which Iran rejected.

Iran has reportedly sentenced Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani – the 43-year-old Iranian woman who faces execution after being convicted of adultery – to 99 lashes in prison for "spreading corruption and indecency" after allowing an unveiled picture of herself to be published in a British newspaper.
The claim, which could not be confirmed, comes from her family and a lawyer representing Mohammadi Ashtiani, based on reports from those who have recently left the prison in Tabriz where she has been held for the last four years. (via Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani to be lashed over newspaper photograph | World news | guardian.co.uk).


The "Free' Press had a gala time with a 'free' victim.
Cartoon by Joe Heller, Green Bay Press-Gazette -
4/16/2010 12.00.00 AM. Click for larger image."

On the other side

In the USA, over the last 12 months, we have a modern-day spectacle - The Hounding of Tiger Woods.
His crime?
Tiger Woods had sex with willing women. With a lot of willing women. No pedophilia, no rape or forced sex, no violence.
Just simple sex.
OK. May not be simple sex. Maybe in complicated 'kamasutra' positions, in unusual locations, with varied partners. But does all this, change the issue. Make it any different.
Guys, he just had sex.
Nothing more than sex. How can consensual sex be a sin, immoral, crime, shameful, and all that baggage of guilt? If there is an injured party, I can only see Tiger. All those willing and able women quite 'enjoyed' both the kissing, and the telling. Not to forget the money they made for both the kissing and the telling!

Mebbe ...

Coming from the land of kamasutra, where काम kaam (desire, including sexual) is my right, probably I am under-developed. Maybe these advanced, monotheistic Desert Bloc religions and societies are more advanced than the primitive culture I am from! Maybe, the social system of भारत-तंत्र Bharat-tantra has 'corrupted' me.


What exactly is it that Tiger Woods did? Cartoon by Mike Smith
from the Las Vegas Sun.

Who can object

Not Elin Nordegren.
She made US$400 million (or is it US$500 /600 /750 /1000). For her insecurity. That Tiger may abandon her and the children, while he is chasing all these women. A fear that is fair and legitimate. For a mother to two of Tiger's children.
Not a bad deal. Or is there something more? Am I missing something?

What's the difference

Now.
I really don't see a difference between Iran's stoning of Sakineh and the American stoning of Tiger Woods.
Except that the stones are different. The US and world media has tried to kill Tiger with stones made of words, ill-will and smear, imputations, cans of tar and brushes. All of them, ganged up, against one man. One lonely man.
Just because a married man had sex with a few women!


Did the world have to hound him for having sex? Cartoon
by Christo Komarnitski, Bulgaria - 4/9/2010 12.00.00 AM

Now Iran is doing much the same thing. The stones in Iran are different.
The Western world has made Desert Bloc ideals of shariat into Liberal-Christian dogma. Although the West has become 'educated', 'advanced', 'developed', 'civilized', rich - they have not given up. Stoning people.
God knows, Jesus tried.

Monday, August 30, 2010

Gunpowder - The Indian Monopoly!

A vizcacha, relative of the chinchilla, in Chile's Atacama
Desert. These herbivores are among few who thrive
in the Atacama. (Photo shot o assignment for
"The Driest Placeon Earth," August 2003, National
Geographic magazine) Photographby Joel Sartore

Arid, Desolate Atacama

On Chile's northern border is the remote, arid Atacama desert. Desolate and dry, rain in Atacama happens once in 2-3 years. Some people living in the Atacama have never seen rainfall in all their lives. Yet, there is some sparse wildlife - a tribute to hardiness of living beings.
Strangely, the Atacama is home to a few ghost-towns - once boom towns. For five years, from 1879-1884, Bolivia and Peru fought with Chile over this rainless, arid and desolate terrain.
Behind this curious importance of the Atacama desert was nitrates. It was Atacama's nitrates interestingly that broke an important British monopoly - based on India's saltpetre production.

Untold secrets

In 1809-1810, the British had to mount a serious campaign in the Indian Ocean. The French, from their Indian Ocean naval bases at Île de France (Mauritius), Bourbon (Réunion) and Rodrigues, attacked East India Company ships carrying valuable saltpetre (also saltpeter, nitre, niter) - so essential for the Spanish War (1808-1809).
The British army, retreating across Spain, in harsh winter conditions, needed saltpetre. Under the onslaught of the French forces, ruthlessly pursued, the final escape of the British army, from Corunna was a miracle. The British General, John Moore's death, at Corunna, Spain, was turned into a heroic 'victory'. Charles Wolfe's poem, The Burial of Sir John Moore after Corunna became essential reading for every English schoolboy.
Indian saltpetre for could not reach Confederate armies due to Union naval blockade!

In 1800, a son from a rich family of refugees from the French Revolution in America, after a survey of business opportunities in America, wrote

There already exist in the United States two or three mills which make very bad powder and which do however a very good business. They use saltpeter from India which is infinitely better than that which is produced in France but they refine it badly.
The son was Eleuthère Irénée du Pont, the family was the Du Pont family - and their firm is now known as EI du Pont de Nemours and Co. EU du Pont's expertise in manufacturing saltpeter came from his training with the French Agency for Powder and Saltpeter (Regie royale des poudres et Salpetres) - and under the tutelage of Antoine Lavoisier, the French chemist, he boasted.
Behind the Dupont fortune was Indian saltpetre. Behind Lincoln's success in the American Civil War was saltpetre. Behind Anglo-French confidence against Germany in WW1 was the control of the saltpetre deposits from India. Germans were able to sink many of these British saltpetre shipments. In turn, Germans with the Haber-Bosch process, in BASF factories, continued the war - without Indian saltpetre or Chilean nitrate supplies.
Was Nalanda behind the gunpowder expertise in Bihar and
Bengal region. A section of the Nalanda Mahavihara. The
qualities of Buddhahood were personified in the vibrant style
of art that was created in the university's intellectual
atmosphere. (Picture by BENOY K. BEHL, courtesy: The
Frontline). Click for larger image.

Saltpetre - what's that?

What was saltpetre? Why was saltpetre important. Why did India play such an important role in saltpetre?
Unusually important, the chemical name of saltpetre is potassium nitrate - an essential ingredient in gunpowder. Indians had perfected the method of preparing potassium nitrate (KNO3). The other two ingredients in gunpowder being charcoal and sulphur - easily and freely available and cheap.
India's military technology is history's greatest 'hidden' secret. Official (and Western) portrayal of Indian military systems in the face of Islamic invaders, Mughal sultanate and the rise of British imperialism makes out India as a sitting duck with ill-trained and terrified soldiers, armed with bows and arrows, who were hopelessly outclassed by the enemy.
Facts being otherwise, it raises questions about motives for this deliberate wrong portrayal.

The story from Mongolia

In the last 1000 years, there are sketchy records of gunpowder in India, with Rai Hamir Deva of Ranathambore of the Malwa region, who supposedly used some Mongol deserters (1300 AD) to fight Khilji armies with gun powder. This may be misleading for two reasons.
Modern history credits China with the invention of gunpowder. Firstly, this is largely based on the work of a self-confessed Sinophile - Needham. With a dismissive one sentence, Needham opines, "On Gunpowder history in India, Oppert (1) was duly exploded by Hopkins(2)." And Indian history as the world's largest producer of gunpowder was swept under the carpet. Needham conveniently ignores evidence like how
Jean Baptiste Tavernier recorded a local tradition in the 1660s that gunpowder and artillery were first invented in Assam from whence they spread to China and he mentioned that the Mughal general who conquered Assam brought back numerous old iron guns captured during the campaign.
Secondly, Mongol territories extended from Mongolia to the gates of Vienna and Russia - but not India. How is it that a few deserters-soldiers could establish the world's largest gunpowder production system, so rapidly in non-Mongolian India. But, could not do so in conquered territories of China, Central Asia, Middle East, West Asia, and Europe.





Saltpetre from India kept the British 6-pounders
busy at Waterloo! Click for larger image.

A 100 years before Needham, India's pioneering status in saltpetre was common knowledge. English publications, for instance in 1852 and another in 1860 gave weightage to the opinion of
those who believe that gunpowder was invented in India and brought by the Saracens from Africa to the Europeans; who improved its manufacture and made it available for warlike purposes.
Unlike China, with an odd textual reference or a drawing or a singular artefact, was the entire industry in India - which remained unrivalled in the history of the world. Compared to China's paltry production of gunpowder, India's widespread and organized gunpowder production system points towards indigenous development. There are reports, that in "664 an Indian visitor to China reportedly demonstrated the peculiar flamability of saltpeter and provided instructions on how to locate it (Pacey 1990, 16)."

Tall tales ... thin stories

The deserter Mongol soldier source seems rather far-fetched considering that Mongol armies studiously avoided attacking India. India, the richest economy of the world at that time, known and famous for its wealth, was spared by Genghis Khan! Just why would history’s foremost looter, invader, pillager spare India?
When Genghis Khan’s Mongol armies were running rampant, Islamic refugees found shelter in India, during the reign of Iltutmish. In 1221, Khwarezm-Shah and other Persian refugees, sought refuge in India, across the Indus into the Punjab, India, from Genghis Khan's Mongol armies.
Encyclopedia Britannica says Fortunately, the Mongols were content to send raiding parties no further than the Salt Range (in the northern Punjab region), which Iltutmish wisely ignored …” (emphasis mine). As Indian military reputation waned under foreign Islamic rule, the Mongols mounted a military expedition. The Mongols could succeed in India only under the foreign rule of the much-derided Islamic Tughlaks.

India - the largest gunpowder source in the world

Now, combine saltpetre production with the fact that the heart of the Indian saltpetre production was in Bihar, which was also the home of the Nalanda seminary /university.
By the 16th-17th century,
In parts of India that never were frequented either by Mohammedans or Europeans, we have met with rockets, a weapon which the natives almost universally employ in war. The rocket consists of a tube of iron, about eight or ten inches long, and above an inch in diameter. It is filled in the same manner as an ordinary sky-rocket, and fastened towards the end of a piece of bamboo, scarcely as thick as an ordinary walking cane, and about five feet long, which is pointed with iron.

What about Europe

Saltpetre based gunpowder was in constant short-supply in Europe. Gold from the Americas, flowing into European trade channels, fuelled demand for gunpowder. Gunpowder became an essential ingredient for subjugation of natives, extraction of gold, capture of territories and slaves, piracy on the high seas - all the real reasons for ascent for European power.
The European gunpowder situation was grim. This can be gauged from "a letter of 1605 from the King of Spain to the Viceroy of Goa (the Portuguese trading settlement on the south-west coast of India) for example ordering the annual dispatch of 10 or 12 caskets of saltpetre." Remember in 1605, Spain was the prime power European power. Compare that to the Indian situation.
When Raja Pratapaditya of Jessore capitulated to Islam Khan in 1609, he agreed to surrender twenty thousand infantry, five hundred war boats, and a thousand "maunds" (41 tons) of gunpowder.
The outcome of Waterloo can be gauged from a forgotten statistic - "In the year before the battle of Waterloo (1815) the East India Company exported 146000 cwt. of saltpetre to England." 146,000 cwt is 7300 tons of saltpetre. British Ordnance Board powder mills in 1809,
produced 36,623¾ ninety pound barrels of powder and private contractors using government supplied saltpetre a further 24,433 ninety pound barrels. Some of British munitions output was supplied to allied governments: Portugal received in the years 1796-1801 ... 10,000 barrels of powder, 500 tons of saltpetre; the British Government put into execution the gigantic plan of being a depot, the manufactory, the place of arms, and the centre of the European war
Spain and Sweden also received munitions for fighting on the British side against Napoleon. British victory at Waterloo, was in no small measure "thanks to the use of Indian saltpetre, British gunpowder was widely recognised to be far superior to the charcoal-like French product." British creditworthiness received a boost just before Waterloo. British debt, trading at 25% discount in 1813, was boosted by Indian gold, in 1813, procured by Britain.
Western historians now reluctantly admit, that without the "accumulated credits from Indian transfers since 1757, Britain's financing of land warfare during the French wars could have been compromised." Napoleon and France could not "march their combined armies to India, and strangle the supplies of British gold that had been financing successive coalitions against France."
Without the advantage of Indian saltpetre, with a threatening Britain
in 1792 France was able to face danger on all sides, it was because Lavoisier, Fourcroy, Guyton de Morveau, Chaptal, Berthollet, etc., discovered new means of extracting saltpetre and manufacturing gunpowder.
Some 6000 factories manned by 'salpetriers' worked in France to overcome the naval blockade.

Meanwhile in India

Malwa's rulers recruited Purbias from Bengal and Bihar for their expertise in gunpowder. The British initially valued and later (after 1857) feared the Purbias for the same reason. The other reason was an established saltpetre production in the Malwa region till the 19th century. In Punjab, the main centres were Lahore, Hissar, Multan and Amritsar.

India's gunpowder production system

India was the largest gunpowder production system - in the history of the world, till the 20th century. Specifically Bengal and Bihar regions. Operated by a caste of peoples called the nuniah, saltpetre beds supplied the most vital element in gunpowder - saltpetre. And India produced virtually all of it.
Especially, Bihar, Bengal, Agra and Tamil Nadu, Andhra and Karanataka regions (Anantapur, Coimbatore, Guntur, Kurnool). The Guntur Sircar also manufactured saltpetre on a commercial scale. A mid 17th century Royal Society paper documented how saltpetre was made in India. Most of the miniscule amounts of saltpetre produced in the rest of the world was calcium nitrate, a hygroscopic salt, which spoilt easily by absorbing moisture from air.
The Armenians, the ill-fated Omichund, a "notorious Calcutta merchant who was later to engineer the Plassey Revolution" played an important part in the Bengal/Bihar saltpetre trade. They were all significant players in the export of saltpetre (potassium nitrate). Also known as niter, saltpetre was a necessary ingredient for gunpowder.

Gunpowder becomes a British monopoly

"By seizing Bengal, the British exerted mastery over 70 percent of the world's saltpeter production during the latter part of the eighteenth century. Since powder stocks could not be prepared quickly or easily, demand was no less during peaceful interims than during times of war, for, in addition to normal sales for peaceful purposes, gunpowder was steadily purchased or produced to build up military powder reserves for emergency use.

One reason why China developed fireworks, rockets, and other incendiaries rather than shot-firing artillery was China's reliance on artificial saltpeter for making gunpowder. The Chinese also often used a higher proportion of charcoal and sulfur, which resulted in more fire and less ballistic strength. (16) India, on the other hand, produced saltpeter of very high quality, enabling the development of gunpowder weapons, in particular heavy siege guns, in addition to rockets. In many ways, Indian gunpowder making was more advanced than that of China, particularly regarding the strength of the final product, in its commercial organization, and in its application to military purposes.

As early as the 1460s, nearly forty years before the commencement of the East India trade, these Persian sources make it clear that the rulers of Jaunpur and Bengal already had organized saltpeter production as state monopolies managed by their chief merchants.

India was roughly a century ahead of Western Europe in terms of developing the infrastructure for gunpowder technology. It is significant, though, that gunpowder was not shipped to India from Europe in any significant quantities. By 1617, the Portuguese king had joined the general European clamor for more saltpeter. The capitalization of the saltpeter trade at Rajapur was in the hands of Saraswat Brahmins, with investors participating from as far away as Goa and Diu. Shivaji (r. 1664-1680) and his successors made nitrate procurement into a state monopoly, thus forcing the Portuguese, their Indian agents, and Banjara peddlers to deal with the Maratha state.

The Mughal Empire has been styled a "gunpowder empire," which is a debatable characterization. (34) It is clear from Mughal records that guns were important, if only as symbols and occasional instruments of imperial power. The victory of Babur (r. 1526-1530) over Ibrahim Lodi (r. 1517-1526) often is attributed to his use of artillery, however, Babur himself valued his own judgment at least as much as his Turkish guns. (35) After the Battle of Panipat (1526), the first Mughal ruler ordered executions by firing squad, which are some of the first such killings recorded. Contemporary descriptions of Babur's battles, however, emphasize the continuing dominance of cavalry, with guns present but not decisive. Nevertheless, warfare was changing in South Asia. Babur's eldest son and successor, Humayun (r. 1530-1539/1555-1556), was keen to bring Rumi Khan, the Turkish artillery expert employed by the Sultan of Gujarat, over to his side. (36) The widespread use of firearms by Sher Shah (r. 1540-1545) during the brief Sur interregnum is significant, as is the fact that Sher Shah himself was killed by a gunpowder explosion. (37) The early sixteenth century, for India, was a time of significant military change, a watershed between the age of the blade and the age of the gun.

Sher Shah realized that a large army of peasant matchlockmen, recruited and paid by the state, could only exist in the context of a bureaucratic regime with enhanced revenue-collection capabilities and in a kingdom with strong commercial institutions. This lesson was not lost upon Akbar (r. 1556-1605), whose advisor, Abu al-Fazal, adopted many of Sher Shah's innovations. The rising importance of the saltpeter trade, as well as its lowly origins, may be gauged by the meteoric rise of the warlord Hemu, who had opposed Akbar's accession to the throne. Akbar's biographer-courtier, Abu al-Fazl, uncharitably informs us that Hemu was a member of "the Dhusar tribe, which is the lowest class of hucksters in India. At the back lanes he sold saltpetre (nimak-i-shor) with a thousand mortifications ... till at last he became a government huckster...." As Akbar's army set out to challenge Hemu, their spirits were roused by a giant image of the saltpeter merchant-turned-general, filled with gunpowder and set on fire. (38) Ironically, Hemu was killed by the Mughals not with a musket shot, but in the old-fashioned style, with an arrow in the eye, followed by a sword blow to the neck.

Significantly, Sher Shah's infantry, carrying firearms, were recruited from the eastern Ganges Plain, the same region in which saltpeter production had already become an important component of the regional economy. Later, this area provided infantry for the Mughals and eventually for the British, too. (from The Indian saltpeter trade, the military revolution and the rise of Britain as a global superpower. from: The Historian, Article date: September 22, 2009, Author: Frey, James W.)
After obtaining this vital monopoly, Britain protected this. Saltpetre exports were banned. Thus an ancient Indian technology was harnessed by the English to subjugate the Indian.



India's widespread manufacture of saltpetre was
private enterprise! Without state subsidy
or support! (Picture by BENOY K. BEHL,
courtesy: The Frontline). Click for larger image.

From gold came saltpetre, which made getting gold easier

Greater access of saltpetre to the British and with the shutting out of other European powers, saltpetre became essential for other European powers, because English had it. It became rare, as the English monopolised the trade.
In 1775, the French scientific publication, Observations sur la physique a proposal by Academie Royale des Sciences for increased saltpetre production within France. Finally, a prize was announced in 1783. Nicolas Leblanc set up a factory at St.Denis, during 1791-194, near Paris for manufacture of saltpetre in France. The whole of France was mobilized for this saltpetre collection and gunpowder production.
Directions for gathering of saltpeter were printed and sent all over France. The prescribed recipe for saltpeter, charcoal, and sulphur was dispatched to the flour mills and the powder was ground according to simple specifications. Each district was directed to send two citizens to Paris for a month's course in the casting of bronze and iron and in new methods for the manufacture of powder. (from From crossbow to H-bomb By Bernard Brodie, Fawn McKay Brodie.).
At the start of the American Civil War, against the Southern Confederates, The North started with the benefit of a stockpile of some 3 million pounds of niter - i.e. saltpetre. The Confederates sent James Mason and John Slidell to obtain saltpetre from Britain - and not empty diplomatic recognition from European powers. Mason and Slidell were captured by Unionist forces. Britain demanded release of Mason Slidell. Lincoln refused.
Queen Victoria issued a proclamation forbidding the export from all ports of the United Kingdom, of gunpowder, nitre, nitrate of soda, brimstone, lead, and fire-arms.—London Gazette, Dec. 4.
Britain imposed a ban on exports of saltpetre. Known in history as the Trent Affair, as Union saltpetre stocks went down, Lincoln backed down and agreed to release Mason and Slidell. Prices of saltpetre skyrocketed from some US$0.20 to US$3.0 within one year after the war began. The Confederates established a Niter Corps to manage this shortage. British godowns overflowing with Indian and Egyptian cotton, did not really depend on Southern cotton, declared neutrality - and supplied both sides with Indian saltpetre.
Well understood by the US Government, C.H.Davis, of the Bureau Of Ordnance, Navy Department, on November 22, 1862 reported to the US Congress,
I feel it, therefore, to be my first duty to urge that suitable provision of ordnance material be made for probable future necessities of the Navy. Most important among them is nitre, which enters so largely into the composition of gunpowder that it may be said to be gunpowder itself, with some slight additions of sulphur and charcoal under proper combination.

It is not produced naturally in this country, nor by any other but India, except in insignificant quantities.

Hindostan alone supplies the whole world, which being a British dependency, places us entirely at the mercy or caprice of that power for our stock of this essential article.

End of the saltpetre era

With the arrival of Chile's nitrate (sodium nitrate - NaNO3) deposits in Atacama desert, the world was weaned away from Indian saltpetre. Chilean nitrates were used to derive nitric acid, a key intermediate for explosives manufacture.
Chilean nitrate was sodium nitrate, (NaNO3), which could be used to derive nitric acid. Nitric acid was used for manufacture of explosives. HAPAG, the Hamburg based shipping line, became the biggest in the world, carrying Chilean nitrates to Germany. The end of Boer War (1899-1902) saw the emergence of Germany as a major producer of munitions - especially the smokeless gunpowder. Even Britain started buying from Germany.
For a brief while, guano, a natural fertiliser composed of bird droppings, was also a source of nitrates for explosives. But, with the Haber-Bosch process, Germany could manufacture explosives - without the Chilean nitrate.
With the discovery of nitroglycerine and TNT and its widespread commercialization by Alfred Nobel (of Nobel Prize fame) from the 1860s onwards, this British saltpetre monopoly end. As the British monopoly over gunpowder started weakening, the British policy changed.

Pirate nation to super-power

Till 1856, sea piracy was legal.
The British crown gave permits for pirates to operate on high seas – through, what were known as, letters of marque. With the sanction of the English State, high seas piracy became a national pastime in Britain. Pirates like Sir John Hawkins made money on slave trade and piracy - targeting Spanish ships. Queen Elizabeth, apart from knighting him, also participated in these criminal enterprises. The Spanish Armada was assembled by Spain to end British piracy. Further on, British propaganda made these pirates and privateers into heroes - and the Spanish Armada into an instrument of Catholic repression.
Piracy was outlawed by The Declaration of Paris, in 1856, ratified by various powers. Initially by Austria, France, Great Britain, Prussia, Russia, Sardinia and Turkey – but not by Spain, Portugal and the USA. Soon after, Britain became a buyer of explosives, munitions. Challenges to British power started soon after this.
In less than than a 100 years after invention of alternates to Indian saltpetre, Britain was a shadow of its former imperial self.

The end of Indian saltpetre

To cover the cost of the Anglo-Indian War of 1857, the British Raj increased taxes on saltpetre. British traders from India started clamoring for a reduction in export duty from 1860 onwards. From more 20,000 tons of saltpetre exports in 62-62, it fell to around 11000 tons by 1865, and continued declining there after.
By which time, Britain was already the preeminent power in the world. On the back of Indian gunpowder factories.

Friday, August 27, 2010

Indian Railways – The British Legacy

Elephants were widely used instead of engines - due to
engine shortage and easier manueverability of elephants

Romancing the Raj

Modern Indians carry this rather ignorant impression that Indians railways was a departing gift by the British to independent India. This is especially true of post-Independence, 2nd and 3rd generation Indians, who never travelled or saw the colonial railway system trains.
This impression is aided and abetted by Western media too. Recently, Robert Kaplan writing in The Atlantic gushed how the "British, by contrast, brought tangible development, ports and railways, that created the basis for a modern state" of India.
As though, India could not have 'bought' or developed railway technology on its own - from or without the British. After all India has developed a significant air-transport system. Or the comprehensive road network - which is getting further expanded and upgraded.
A further examination of facts exposes a completely different picture about the British claims about Indian Railways also.

Indian Railways

After the boycott of the Simon Commission, from 1927, and the death of Lala Lajpat Rai (Nov 17, 1928), it was clear (especially to the British) that their days were numbered. Britain enacted The Government of India Act, first in 1919 and then in 1935. Facing problems at home and abroad, the significant British interest in India was extraction of remaining wealth in Indian hands.
Indian Railway system too suffered from this approach. Especially after WWI, the Great Depression and the currency crisis, starved of investments and renewal, Indian railways suffered.
During WW2, nearly 40% rolling stock from India was diverted to the Middle East. More than 50% of the track system was the outdated metre gauge and narrow gauge. Track systems were nearly a century old. 40% of the railway system went to Pakistan. 32 of the forty-two separate railway systems operating in India, were owned by the former Indian princely states. More than 8000 outdated steam engines were used as motive power – and less than 20 diesel locomotives were in use. Apart from elephants and people - called as 'hand-shunting' in Indian Railways lingo.
Elephant shunting a train on the Bengal-Nagpur railway.
Picture quality makes it probably from WWII period.
So much for the British gift of railways to India.

Rampant extraction

The railways run by the Indian princely states became party to the collusive price fixing systems. Like this extract (linked to the right) shows, all the business went to the British engineering yards. To this add the guaranteed returns systems, and what was achieved was something else.
"The guarantee system did not encourage cost control, and, at an averae cost of BP18,000 per mile, the Indian railways were some of the costliest in the world. (from Another reason: science and the imagination of modern India By Gyan Prakash, page 165).
Indians took to railway travel - quickly, easily and in large numbers.
Indians enthusiastically took to train travel from the start. This confounded the arguments made by some who suggested that considerations of caste and religion would lead many South Asians to shun train travel because they would not agree to the close personal proximity sitting or standing in the coaches required. Women for reasons of modesty or demands of seclusion were expected to be particularly resistant to rail travel. Others argued that poverty would make travel by train impossible for all but the well-to-do. In the event many of all castes, classes and gender traveled by train. (from Engines of change: the railroads that made India By Ian J. Kerr.).
Even though the poor Indian passenger was more than 80% of the traffic, he was always short-changed.
Third-class passengers quickly became and remained the most numerous passengers and the railroads' largest source of revenue from passenger traffic. High volumes-87 percent of passengers carried in 1902 traveled in third-class-more than compensated for low fares. (from Engines of change: the railroads that made India By Ian J. Kerr.).

Safety last

Starved of investments and maintenance, the railways infrastructure at the time of British departure was crumbling. Colonial British (subsequently, the Indian also) response was to affix the blame onto the employee at the lowest rung and move onto the next one accident.
Extract from 'A history of modern India, 1480-1950' By Claude Markovits,
page 433. Click on picture for larger text.

Post-independence India continued with this practice – till LB Shastri called a halt to this. In 1956, the Madras-Tuticorin express plunged into a river when when a bridge at Ariyalur (Tamil Nadu) was washed away in floods. 144 (some records suggest 156) passengers died. He resigned from the Union Cabinet – claiming moral responsibility for the railway accident.
This resignation saw LB Shastri become a political legend. This (resignation) also changed the mindset of the Indian Railways. After fresh elections of 1957, one year later, he was re-inducted into the Union Cabinet.
Steadily, over 30 years, Indian railways infrastructure was upgraded, accidents decreased.

What we see today

In 1952, it was decided that IIIrd class passengers deserved fans and light - and it took another 7 years to implement this decision. Elephants used for shunting wagons, box-cars, finally got a respite after WDS-4B shunters were introduced by Chittranjan Locomotive Works in 1969. Safety bars in windows were introduced on night trains in a phased manner over the 1970s. Till then, most trains had open windows leading to passenger-safety issues. Earlier, it meant "getting into a third-class general compartment — through the window, literally pushed in by someone on the platform. Well, now all the windows have a grill provided for the safety of the passengers".
It took a non-Congress Government in 1977 to change the face of Indian Railways. Prof.Madhu Dandavate, the Railway Minister in the 1977 Janata Government started the railway renaissance in India. 3rd class railway travel was abolished. Wooden-slat seats were abolished. Cushioned 2nd class seating system was made minimum and standard. Train time tables were re-configured. Reservation systems improved. Railways started getting profitable.
The de-colonization of Indian Railways began effectively in 1977 – 30 years after British departure. Symbolically, that was also the year that the Rail Museum was set up. The progress after that has been remarkable. Without going into the merits of safety and comfort, today Indians can travel at significantly lower cost. For a US$5, an Indian can travel for 1000 km - compared to nearly US$100 for 1000 km (gold-adjusted dollars).
All this when only 25% of Indians travel by rail at least once a year.
OLD FAITHFUL: An 80-year-old elephant shunting a railway
boxcar in 1945, Picture courtesy - The Times of India,
Dated 27th February, 2010

The benign British

Should we complain so much, if we inherited a decrepit, run down, accident prone, investment starved railway system with outdated technology from the British – though financed by loot from India?
Even though it took India 40 years, to modernize the colonial railway system, we should be thankful. Remember, they could have uprooted the rails, and taken away the wagons and engines. After all, Indian Railways was the biggest scrap iron collection in the world at that time.
Till Lal Bahadur Shastri’s resignation – the poor Indian railway-man was routinely blamed for railway accidents – by his British, and later the Indian bosses also.

Thursday, January 14, 2010

Tribute to Haiti - in their hour of tragedy

What Haiti needs

Haiti was stuck by an earthquake measuring "7.0-magnitude quake, Haiti's worst in two centuries, struck at 1653 local time (2153 GMT) on Tuesday, just 15km (10 miles) south-west of Port-au-Prince and close to the surface." More than 100,000 people are estimated to have been affected. Haiti has been through worse - and the Haitians have always pulled through. What Haiti needs is non-interference.

Sordid reactions

During an earlier segment with a reporter for Robertson's CBN News, the televangelist had questioned whether the earthquake in Haiti was a "blessing in disguise."

"They need to have ... a great turning to God," he concluded, adding that the earthquake may have been a direct consequence of their "Satanic pact".

"Something happened a long time ago in Haiti, and people might not want to talk about it," Robertson said during a broadcast of The 700 Club on the Christian Broadcasting Network. (via US televangelist claims Haiti earthquake 'a blessing in disguise' | The Daily Telegraph).

What is it that Haiti did a 'long time ago' that made Pat Robertson, do rah-rah for this 'divine wrath'!

I know what Haiti did

Haiti was the world's first republic, set up by slaves - after a war of freedom. Haiti's, support for Simon Bolivar ended the Spanish Empire in South America. Most importantly, it forced the West to free all African slaves across the Europe and Americas. The second major 'crime' that the Haitians committed was that they rejected a 'liberating' Christianity - and continued with their voudou religion.

For all this, the West has not forgiven Haiti!

Messianic Rev.Pat Robertson

Pat Robertson, more than 40 years ago, founded the Christian Broadcast Network (CBN), which according to "Nielsen Media Research, The 700 Club, aired each weekday, has averaged 863,000 viewers in the last year" in the US alone. Some time earlier, Pat Robertson, had called for the assassination of Hugo Chavez, President of Venezuela - for which he later duly apologized. I wonder if the West would forgive if any Iranian Ayatollah issued a fatwa against a Western leader, and later apologized! Even earlier, when the Israeli Prime Minister suffered a stroke, he pronounced that as 'punishment from God!' Especially malevolent, Rev.Robertson's God is, I must say!

In 1999, he signed a deal with Bank of Scotland, part of the Lloyd's Banking Group, later the HBOS, for a Internet-telephone-banking venture. When the deal was called off, Pat Robertson launched a scathing attack. "In Scotland, you can't believe how strong the homosexuals are," Mr Robertson said on his Virginia-based Christian Broadcasting Network and his 700 Club television show. Pat Robertson, coming in at NO.2, defeated George Bush in the 1988 Republican Party's US Presidential nomination race, at the Iowa caucuses. Robertson's 'message of moral regeneration' appealed to the Americans.

The Magna Carta sanctioned slavery. In various judgments, US Supreme Court, the ultimate arbiter of the US Constitution, upheld slavery. Vatican's, Council of Gangra, re-affirmed its faith in slavery. The administrators of the teachings of the “Lord of lords, and King of kings.” (Revelation 17: 14) at the Council Of Gangra, 325 AD, issued edicts approving slavery - as did many other Vatican edicts. Pat Robertson, is just one in a long line of such Christian leaders, to support slavery.


In a twisted way, Pat Robertson maybe right.

Talking of money, rich foreigners and expats, who are keeping Haiti in misery, have lost a lot more than Haitians have.

Tell Haiti you care

Send Haiti your best wishes, your moral support. If you live in a less exploitative society than before, or a more exploitative society, remember, it was Haiti that stuck the first blow. A blow that en-slaver's have not forgotten 200 years later. To Haiti, we owe whatever liberty, freedom we have - or aspire to.

I don't know how your money will help them. They may not need your money (I guess), but you should give them your moral support (I strongly suggest). Just send a <ding> to this post. Or ping it. Whatever you do, just make it loud enough that your voice can reach Haiti.

In their hour of tragedy.