Make the connection!

Its not every day that one finds cause and effect answers on the same page of a daily newspaper. Its as rare an event as sighting a UFO or a comet, and therefore worthy of comment. Yet two coincidental headlines in the Times of India (Bangalore edition) of January 7 (page 3) revealed the sorry condition of the nation. The lead story on the page recounted that even 70 years after India attained political freedom, 67 percent of households in the southern state of Karnataka (pop. 63 million) — proclaimed one of the country’s most industrialised states and #1 in terms of information technology (IT) software exports — are yet to receive the basic facility of piped water supply into their homes. Shameful as this statistic is, Karnataka is #1 among major states with 33 percent of rural households served with piped water against the pathetic national average of 16.85 percent. Hows that for the socialist model of development? A reason for this abject condition of Karnataka’s citizenry is provided by a report in three columns on the same page. A surprise raid conducted by 12 officers of the anti-corruption bureau (ACB) on a handful of government bureaucrats in Bangalore on January 5-6, revealed that they have accumulated wealth and assets valued at Rs.40 crore — a sum vastly disproportionate to their incomes. The ACB raid on the government officials revealed that B.S. Prahalad, a superintendent engineer (technical vigilance) of the Bangalore municipal corporation, owns two houses, one land plot, three commercial complexes, and land lots in Chikballapura and Tumkur townships, two motor cars, 731 gm of gold and 865 gm of silver. Not any less enterprising, R.V. Kantaraju, deputy director of urban planning, owns five homes in Bangalore, 10 acres of agricultural land in neighbouring Ramanagara, 154 gm of gold and 4.5 kg of silver, a car etc. These rolling-in-wealth babus are just two examples of several officials with aggregate assets valued at Rs.40 crore unearthed by the ACB. Its impossible to believe there’s no connection between their wealth accumulation and the 67 percent piped water supply deficit of the states citizenry. Racist propaganda blasted There was a piquant irony in the comprehensive defeat of the India cricket team currently touring South Africa in the second test (after losing the first test as well) which went unnoticed except for individuals with long memories and awareness of Africas racial politics. All wickets in Indias second innings were taken by black Africans — Lungisani Ngidi (6/39) and Kagiso Rabada (3/47) with one batsman run out (Chheteswar Pujara for the second time in the match). The irony is that during South Africa’s cruel and dehumanising apartheid era which lasted over a century until Nelson Mandela was released from prison in 1990, white racist propaganda had spread the belief worldwide that black Africans were congenitally unsuited to play the complex and sophisticated game that is cricket. Even black Africans themselves were brainwashed into believing that they were racially unsuited for cricket, and that…