"Playing 'God' with Spectrum"

Playing ‘God' with spectrum

The National Democratic Alliance (NDA), led by the former Prime Minister, Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee, in power then, never really thought it would lose the Parliamentary elections in 2004. But if it had had some inkling of the impending defeat and wanted another tilt at power, it couldn't have thought of a better ‘Trojan Horse' for the successor government to fiddle around with than the much criticised ‘first come first served' (FCFS) policy of handing out additional ‘spectrum' to mobile telecom operators.

Sounds far fetched? Not really. Consider the evidence. Up until then, it had been a well-settled principle of administrative law that the State cannot dole out any largesse to any section of society, except under the most objective or equitable principles.

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Yet, here was a conscious policy decision taken to give out radio frequency spectrum to mobile telephony operators when even canteen contracts in obscure railway stations are awarded through open tender.

Good overall summary  of the telecom saga.

‘Reigniting a new political imagination’

Arundhati Roy visits Occupy Wall Street.  Her take on the two-party situation in the USA and the virtually two-party system back home:

Even in India, we have the same problem. We have a right wing that is so vicious and so openly wicked, which is the Baratiya Janata party (BJP), and then we have the Congress party, which does almost worse things, but does it by night. And people feel that the only choices they have are to vote for this or for that. And my point is that, whoever you vote for, it doesn’t have to consume all the oxygen in the political debate. It’s just an artificial theater, which in a way is designed to subsume the anger and to make you feel that this is all that you’re supposed to think about and talk about, when, in fact, you’re trapped between two kinds of washing powder that are owned by the same company. 

...but it happens everywhere, and it will continue to happen. Even I know that if I go back to India, and tomorrow the BJP comes to power, personally I’ll be in a lot more trouble than with the Congress [party] in power. But systemically, in terms of what is being done, there’s no difference, because they collaborate completely, all the time.

 I like that metaphor:  two kinds of washing powder owned by the same company.  Nice.

Making Up For The Missing Posts

Was unable to post for some days due to various reasons. I'm back and hope to be more regular - 'hope' is the the keyword. Anyway, wanted to highlight some stories that I did not post about but wanted to.

This killing comment from The Hindu's editor about the Kosovo seccession and Bush's comment on it was priceless:

Kosovo’s unilateral declaration of independence has thrown the fragile Balkan peace into question again and caused much disquiet elsewhere in the world. The reactions of other states will be crucial. U.S. President George W Bush, with his characteristic grasp of international affairs, initially said: “The Kosovoans are now independent”;

Then there was the Rice testimony on the nuclear deal to the US Congress which justifies one of the criticisms put forward by the Left against the deal:

Washington: The Bush administration has said an agreement between India and the Nuclear Suppliers Group which will allow New Delhi to engage in nuclear trade will be supported by the U.S. only if it is “consistent” with the Hyde Act.
“We will support nothing with India in the NSG that is in contradiction to the Hyde Act. It will have to be completely consistent with the obligations of the Hyde Act,” Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told the House Foreign Affairs Panel.
Ms. Rice said if the Bush administration did not adhere to the Hyde Act — which, according to opposition parties in India, takes away the country’s nuclear sovereignty — U.S. lawmakers will eventually refuse to pass the India-U.S. civilian nuclear deal if and when it comes up in the Congress.
“We’ll have to be consistent with the Hyde Act or I don’t believe we can count on the Congress to make the next step,” Ms. Rice said in response to a query from the Chairman of the panel, Howard Berman.

Another thing, that was actually good to see, was the Congress giving back to the BJP on the issue of terrorism, over two days. Here and here. That's right - say it loudly and clearly and very publicly. After all, the last thing we need is another right-wing party coming to power on the basis of being 'strong' on terror.

Another story which I saw on cnet.com reinforces that the Internet has made so many things possible. And a lot of them are a force for the good. Like exposing Swiss Banks that apparently help launder money among other shady activities:

A federal judge in California has pulled the plug on Wikileaks.org, a Web site that specializes in posting leaked documents often provided by whistleblowers.
U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White on Friday ordered that the domain name be disabled at the behest of a group of Swiss bankers who filed a lawsuit alleging that confidential information appeared on Wikileaks.org.
... Wikileaks' summary of the leaked documents centers on Rudolf Elmer, the former chief operating officer of Bank Julius Baer in the Cayman Islands. The summary alleges the bank supports "ultra-rich's (sic) offshore tax avoidance, tax evasion, asset hiding and money laundering." The bank has refused to comment.