EDITOR'S COLUMN

Friends,

We are into the last month of the financial year 2015-16, supposedly the month of Budget – both Railway and General Union Budget, for 2016-17. Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu has presented his 2nd budget as Railway Minister on 25th Feb. Indeed for the 2nd time the incumbent Railway Minister presented his budget without any political colour. It was always the accepted practice of all former Railway Ministers to shower rail gifts for their States and Constituencies. Minister Prabhu has been professional. In many ways, its been a positive budget. There has been no raise in the passenger fare and freight charges. It has made both aam aadmi and Trade & Industry happy.

Budget focused on overall safety of passengers with special emphasis on women. It also sought to provide all classes of passengers more travel options, like Antyodaya Express, a long distance fully unreserved super fast train service to benefit aam aadmi, besides other trains like HumSafar, Tejas & Uday. Its been fairly imaginative, with highest outlay for infrastucture development. Ofcourse opposition has been critical as usual. 

Jan 2016 Focus “An open letter to PM NaMo” has, as expected, elicited unprecedented response from across the readership. While most have accepted the I&C assessment of his 18 month management of national affairs, some have disagreed to some of the observations and therefore conclusions. Ofcourse, hero-worship is one of the traits of homosapians. Indians are no different. There were few, who were very unhappy with the assessment. There was one who felt ‘King can do no wrong’ and called the write up a ‘crap’ the other didn’t appreciate the spirit of the letter, while a third one, kept mailing all that he thought great about Modi. Of course, those who liked it, were many. Our attempt was to draw a kind of balance sheet, which include both assets and liabilities, where assets were clearly more. Except opposition politicians and some anti national elements, everybody want NaMo to succeed. As of now, he is India’s best bet to do well. But prima facie, he has some issues, which only he can change for better. The letter tried to highlight the areas of concern. That’s all. Some of the concerns raised in the letter are being tried to be addressed by the government as we witness the happenings of recent days.

Month-In-Perspective has been as usual. We have tried to cover as many happenings of the last month as could be possible within the available space. However, there have been many issues left uncovered like, the Make-in-India event in Mumbai, despite having attracted a huge response, it did go-up in flames a bit. David Headley urf Dawood Geelani, a Pakistani convert, only to get U.S. Passport has exposed the Pakistani duplicity in their management of India affairs or rather anti-India affairs. Reservation stir of Jats of Haryana and the gori violence that it triggered are some of the events left uncovered in the Month-In-Perspective. 

Unease that prevailed post happening in the Central University in Hyderabad with the death of a scholar Rohit Vemula, continued with the Jawaharalal Nehru University imbroglio involving politically divided students. With a group of students shouting anti-India slogans, it became a flash point. We have taken it up in the Focus. Hope readers would find it interesting. Rest are as usual. Do comeback with your inputs. We value them.       

J.Shriyan