India joins elite club of nations, might soon overtake China
Day before yesterday, I wrote this post yesterday analysing the dangerous step taken by the Government of India in blocking blogs and various other internet sites to surfers inside India, the same way China controls its citizens' access to information on the internet using the Great Firewall of China.I have also, on this website for some time, been asking my dear Readers to send me their own articles on subjects related to India they feel strongly about.
I am glad to say I received yesterday by email a very interesting satirical article on the UPA Government's latest outrage from a dear Reader who wishes to remain anonymous. I have made some (minor, mostly cosmetic, plus adding some relevant questions and links) changes to the article that was sent in that I hope improved it and I hope my anonymous contributor will agree and not mind.
The article is as follows. Enjoy !
India joins elite club of nations, might soon overtake China
By An Anonymous Indian
India has just proudly qualified to join an elite association of nations -- the Internet Filtering Club -- by blocking access to Blogs, Yahoo Groups, and Geocities webpages from inside India as of July 15 2006.
The 4 illustrious current members of this prestigious club are Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Ethiopia, and China.
This group is half the size of and hence twice as exclusive as the G8 group of rich and powerful nations.
With its current "blanket ban on entire domains" system, India is still far behind some of the other 4 members of this elite club at this point. The filtering system is being refined, and a sophisticated high-technology solution like The Great Firewall of China is the final goal. China is the world leader in this area and India hopes to catch up soon.
This exciting breakthrough was achieved entirely by accident. A number of weblogs and websites were clamouring on the internet asking uncomfortable questions like:
1. Why has Home Minister Shivraj Patil not resigned even after failing to prevent so many terror strikes in such a short time in the recent past: such as attacks in Varanasi, Nagpur, Delhi, Ayodhya, Ghatkopar, Srinagar and now Mumbai ?
2. Why has Government of India been unable to prevent such a large number of gruesome attacks ? Is any preventive action being taken at all ? Why haven't the perpetrators been caught yet ? If the Government of India is unable to protect its citizens from Pakistani terrorism then what right does it have to stay in power ?
3. With no progress on such an urgent issue like terror strikes killing Indians every few weeks, why has the Government of India been more active instead on divisive issues like Caste-based Reservations ?
Faced with questions like these on internet sites, while the mainstream media was careful to avoid asking any of these uncomfortable questions, the Government of India, in a truly inspiring flash of insight, had a brainwave: Filter the Internet, Muzzle the Critics.
In that one flash of insight, India joined an exclusive and prestigious international club of nations. This was a truly stupendous achievement -- perhaps the greatest -- of the current Government.
With this development, India's Government is hoping to count itself among the most technologically-advanced repressive regimes in the world. An Indian Government spokesman was quoted saying "We are in a position other aspiring repressive regimes like the ones in North Korea, Sudan, Libya, Cuba, etc can only aspire to, because they have no internet to filter at all. We are far more advanced. With only China to beat we will soon be the world leader in one more area."
When asked to highlight some of the major achievements of the Government of India in the fields of repression and human rights abuse, the Government spokesman pointed out the impressively brutal crackdown that was launched last month by India's police on school and college students who were protesting against Casteist Reservations.
Indians can now experience Totalitarianism -- an exciting change from decades of boring democracy -- for free sitting at home; no need to travel to Pakistan for that anymore.
This will be a new and improved experience, with no Loknayak Jai Prakash Narayan around to spoil it like he did clamouring for democracy during Indira's exciting Emergency of 1975-1977.
As a bonus, all citizens also get a free life-long lesson in English Literature by experiencing George Orwell's "1984" first-hand, plus, to enhance their knowledge of quality English non-fiction, also F. A. Hayek's "The Road to Serfdom", all for absolutely free: no tuition
fee, no additional tax, no charge at all !
Free education for all. This is the first serious implementation of the Right to Education enshrined in India's Directive Principles of State Policy.
The only cost was a minor technical difficulty with the Fundamental Right to Free Speech. But most people were not using his Right anyway and thus it is not a real problem at all.
The solution is very simple: a Constitutional Amendment to pass, and new NCERT Civics textbooks to print, and that useless Fundamental Right will go exactly where the similarly once-existent Fundamental Right to Property is now cooling its heels: into the garbage-bin.
The mainstream Indian media gets an exciting free gift -- a free course in Orwell's "Newspeak".
What a smart idea -- everybody wins. I love India and the good kind and wise old ladies and gentlemen who rule it. Long live the Nehru Dynasty.
posted by Harsh Vardhan @ 3:34 pm
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