Cooking with Quinoaby Nirmala Garimella
The Cent Percent Solution by Gayatri Subramaniam
INDIA CURRENTSINDIA CURRENTSMOM-Mission Possible!
by Karine Schomer, P. Mahadevan
Celebrating 28 Years of Excellence
I WILL SURVIVEI WILL SURVIVE
By Priya Das
Real people, real stories of courage, endurance, and the strength of the human spirit
november 2014 • vol. 28 , no .8 • www. indiacurrents.com
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Little Known LaureateAfter the announcement of the 2014
Nobel Peace Prize jointly awarded to Malala Yousafzai and Kailash Satyarthi, there was a sense of overwhelming validation at the first name and of overpowering curiosity at the second name. Yousafzai’s remarkable grit has been justifiably well chronicled: a young girl speaking out for girls’ education despite the fear of brutal reprisal. When it comes to Sa-tyarthi, as Sandip Roy, First Post senior editor and our own columnist, so acerbically put it, “most of India went ‘Kailash who?’ before they were proud of him.”
If you do a quick search for both names on Google, this is what you’ll find (as of Oct 22): 18,400,000 results for Malala Yousafzai and 8,510,000 for Satyarthi. And of the 28 pages of “relevant” results about Satyarthi, most articles have been written in the recent past, post award.
These results and reactions are telling and not because we didn’t know Satyarthi before and we’re obsessively following him now.
The Nobel Peace Award is one of the most controversial awards and too often the leitmotif seems to be currency, clout and con-nections. The list encompasses do-gooders, activists, politicians and campaigners already famous for their humanitarian and political stances.
In the past, the prize has been given to
heads of state like Yasser Arafat, Yitzhak Rabin, Anwar El Sadat and Barack Obama; to statesmen like Cordell Hull and Henry Kissinger; and well-known, well-deserving non-violent activists like Tenzin Gyatso, Aung San Suu Kyi, and Martin Luther King Jr, yet eliding Gandhi.
So who is Kailash Satyarthi? Here’s the little we know. At the age of 26, he gave up his teaching career and started Bachpan Bachao Andolan (Save the Childhood Mis-sion) to fight against child labour. For 34 years he has waged a crusade for children’s rights. Thirty-four years!
It is people like Kailash Satyarthi, how-ever, those silent strivers who are empowered by their own passion and persist in the face of staggering odds that too often remain a forgotten footnote in the human struggle for justice and fairness.
Yes, Satyarthi shares the prize with Yousafzai, the youngest ever awardee, and that too is transformational: two courageous advocates from neighboring wrangling coun-tries, a woman and a man, both with an overriding need to safeguard children, the future of our world.
This time I believe that the Nobel com-mitte got it right.
Jaya Padmanabhan
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November 2014 • vol 28 • no 8
3 | EDITORIALLittle Known LaureateBy Jaya Padmanabhan 6 | FORUMShould Global Warming Concerns Drive Economic Policy?By Rameysh Ramdas, Mani Subramani
10 | A THOUSAND WORDSThe Fourth IndiaBy Ragini Tharoor Srinivasan
15 | POLITICSCorruption is Still India’s Biggest ProblemBy Shashi Tharoor
28 | YOUTHFilms, Femme Fatales and FeminismBy Radhika Munshani
30 | COMMENTARYThe Cent Percent SolutionBy Gayatri Subramaniam
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52 | RELATIONSHIP DIVAHonesty is Not Always the Best PolicyBy Jasbina Ahluwalia
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78 | BUSINESSInside Silicon Valley’s Boys ClubBy Vivek Wadhwa
90 | REFLECTIONSLife, Liberation and the Pursuit of BlissBy Jojy Michael
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6 | INDIA CURRENTS | November 2014
There are two reasons why global warming should be the primary domestic policy agenda for the United States. First, there is abundant evidence now that the ocean temperatures
are rising. The rise in temperature is primarily due to the green house effect of CO2 caused by human activity. The only people who don’t believe these scientific facts are more worried about leaving the next generation a world with debt. What they should be worried about is leaving them a world at all! The fact that global warming is caused by human activity does not mean we all hold our collective breaths and say OM. It means we need to focus on finding solutions to the problem at hand.
Many people see the approach to global warming as a zero sum between economy and climate. They would like to continue the status quo, plant a few trees or bike to work when convenient to save the environment. This approach is very short lived and has no chance of success. Even if we stopped any economic development and only sustained what we have, population increase alone would increase the carbon dioxide emissions. An excellent example of such short sight-ed and foolhardy policy is the fracking boom in the mid-west. Burning natural gas to generate electricity is far less pol-luting compared to burn-ing coal. Natural gas only releases a fraction of the CO2 that is released with burning coal and does not suffer the disadvantages of other sulfur based pol-lutants emitted during coal burning.
That brings us to the second reason why global warming needs to be the number one economic priority in the United States. It will give the economy a sense of direction and purpose. The industrial-ized world has always been driven by broad directives and goals. These have resulted in technological innovation which have provided for a better quality of life for everyone. Similarly, a policy in place to reduce carbon emissions will invariably create a better life for all. In California, Tesla Motors showed that it was possible to make highly efficient cars that co-exist on our roads quietly and have a low carbon foot print. Thanks to the vast deployment of solar panels, a significant portion of residents’ power needs, especially on hot days, is generated by the sun. The largest cellulosic bio-refinery was opened recently in Kansas. This type of biofuel is not only carbon neutral and easily integrated into the fuel supply it is generated from corn stover which does not compete with food or animal feed. These are the kinds of breakthrough solutions that the world needs to reduce carbon emis-sions, create jobs and, heck, even bring Republicans and Democrats together! This type of innovation has to occur in great numbers and at a very large scale. This can only be possible if it driven by legisla-tion, funding and focus. n
Mani Subramani works in the semi-conductor industry in Silicon Valley.
The primary purpose of economic policy should be to promote growth in employment and GDP, with a strong dollar and stable prices. Any other goal such as combating global warm-
ing can be peripheral—so long as it does not negatively impact the economy. Unfortunately, some zealots on the far left of the environ-mental movement believe that economic policy should be driven by their climate change goals, often advocating steps that will negatively impede economic growth and opportunity for our citizens.
The environmental movement often dramatically overstates the effects of activities like oil and gas exploration, and demonizes the innovation of corporations and farmers. As former VP Al Gore commented on the CO2 crisis: “I believe it is appropriate to have an over-representation of factual presentations on how dangerous it is, as a predicate for opening up the audience to listen to what the solu-tions are, and how hopeful it is that we are going to solve this crisis.”
To combat pollution, global warming and climate change, the world must target the worst polluters such as China. The Wash-ington Post had a revealing study comparing air pollution in 10
Worst China and United States cities with PM2.5 produced by fossil fuels as the measure—the worst United States city, Bakers-field, clocked in at 18.2 micrograms (> 10 is bad per the WHO) and Xing-hai, the worst city in China clocked in at 155.2 with not one city in the list from China below 100! Many in the United States forget that emissions from other
countries flow into the universe as well and just stifling the United States and depriving its citizens of fuels, water, or natural resources is not going to solve the problem on a global scale. By imposing egre-gious and draconian measures such as denying water to our Central Valley farmers and dumping it in the ocean to ostensibly to “save” the smelt fish—is simply shooting ourselves in the foot. In California we have reduced our water usage by 7.5% state wide.
Rational citizens do their part in supporting and promoting ef-forts to protect the environment by recycling and expending natural resources responsibly. It is other nations such as China, India, Mexico and Brazil that need to do more. However, if the goal of the environ-mental movement is to use the scare of global warming and climate change to redistribute wealth or alter the way of life in America, then that must give us pause.
President Obama’s science czar is quoted as saying that “A massive campaign must be launched to restore a high-quality environment in North America and to de-develop the United States ...” Yes, we must protect the environment, but not at the cost of “de-developing” America nor robbing its citizens of their livelihood and quality of life. n
Rameysh Ramdas, an S.F. Bay Area professional, writes as a hobby
Many in the United States forget that emissions from other countries flow into the universe as well ...
Should Global Warming Concerns Drive Economic Policy?
By Mani SubramaniBy Rameysh Ramdas
Many people see the approach to global warming as a zero sum between economy and climate.
forum
No, it has nothing to do with economic policy Yes, it needs to be driven by legislation
