So, someone has seen sense in this great nation of ours! Read the entire judgement here.

The judgement is beautifully written. I’ll quote the parts that I think have far-reaching implications here:

Pg 26:
Dignity as observed by L’Heureux-Dube, J is a difficult concept to capture in precise terms [Egan v. Canada,
(1995) 29 CRR (2nd) 79 at 106]. At its least, it is clear that the constitutional protection of dignity requires us to acknowledge the value and worth of all individuals as members of our society. It recognises a person as a free being who develops his or her body and mind as he or she sees fit. At the root of the dignity is the autonomy of the private will and a person’s freedom of choice and of action. Human dignity rests on recognition of the physical and spiritual integrity of the human being, his or her humanity, and his value as a person, irrespective of the utility he can provide to others. The expression “dignity of the individual” finds specific mention in the Preamble to the Constitution of India.

Pg 61:
enforcement of public morality does not amount to a “compelling state interest” to justify invasion of the zone of privacy of adult homosexuals engaged in consensual sex in private without intending to cause harm to each other or others.

Pg 62:
Further, Justice O’Connor while concurring in the majority judgment added that:
“Indeed, we have never held that moral disapproval, without any other asserted state interest, is a sufficient rationale under the Equal Protection Clause to justify a law that discriminates among groups of persons.”[page 582]

Pg 64:
Thus popular morality or public disapproval of certain acts is not a valid justification for restriction of the fundamental rights under Article 21. Popular morality, as distinct from a constitutional morality derived from constitutional values, is based on shifting and subjecting notions of right and wrong. If there is any type of “morality” that can pass the test of compelling state interest, it must be “constitutional” morality and not public morality.

Pg 86:
At the outset, the Court observed that the Act in question is a preconstitutional legislation and although it is saved in terms of Article 372 of the Constitution, challenge to its validity on the touchstone of Articles 14, 15 and 19 of the Constitution of India, is permissible in law. There is thus no presumption of constitutionality of a colonial legislation. Therefore, though the statute could have been held to be a valid piece of legislation keeping in view the societal condition of those times, but with the changes occurring therein both in the domestic as also international arena, such a law can also be declared invalid.

Pg 96:
Respect for human rights requires that certain basic rights of individuals should not be capable in any circumstances of being overridden by the majority, even if they think that the public interest so requires. Other rights should be capable of being overridden only in very restricted circumstances. These are rights which belong to individuals simply by virtue of their humanity, independently of any utilitarian calculation.

Pg 100:
The role of the judiciary is to protect the fundamental rights. A modern democracy while based on the principle of majority rule implicitly recognizes the need to protect the fundamental rights of those who may dissent or deviate from the majoritarian view. It is the job of the judiciary to balance the principles ensuring that the government on the basis of number does not override fundamental rights.

Pg 104:
If there is one constitutional tenet that can be said to be underlying theme of the Indian Constitution, it is that of ‘inclusiveness’. This Court believes that Indian Constitution reflects this value deeply ingrained in Indian society, nurtured over several generations. The inclusiveness that Indian society traditionally displayed, literally in every aspect of life, is manifest in recognising a role in society for everyone. Those perceived by the majority as “deviants’ or ‘different’ are not on that score excluded or ostracised.

Read the whole thing. It’s fabulous. And mark my words, this is a landmark judgement!

Isn’t it ironic? That a week after i wrote about reducing information flows in my life, I have 81 unread mail-threads (roughly 600 emails) in my gmail box, another 100 unread blogposts in my reader, and at least 10 new documents on my desktop to read?

There’s also a serious sleep-deprivation & lack of time to spend with family.

Makes one think, doesn’t it? And what am i doing writing blogposts? Right, be good now +poof+

Anannya Deb has a slideshow up on Slideshare that quotes from an email conversation we had a while ago, regarding the financial crisis & its impact on jobs, specifically with regard to the kind of people who will thrive in these unusual times. Do watch…and when you’re done, please do leave a comment to let me know what you agree/disagree with.

Will someone please explain why the fuel surcharges put in place inflicted by airlines when crude was $140+ still remain in place today? (Crude @ $44)

The Taj Hotel released a press statement and promised all help to the authorities. The statement read:

The Taj is very much a symbol of India and we are actually seeing a battle on and we will be defiant. We are monitoring the development of the unfortunate situation unfolding in South Mumbai, in and around our hotel and are fully cooperating with the police and the government authorities to ensure the safety and security of all our guests and staff. That is all we can say at the moment and we would like to channelise all our effort and energy to ensure a speedy normalisation of the situation as best as we can. We will rebuild every inch that has been damaged in this attack and bring back the Taj to its full glory.

You do that Mr. Tata. And I promise to stay there on my next mumbai trip for a night (not sure I can afford more than a night at Taj)

First of all, I hope you and all your loved ones are safe, wherever you are.

The words are threatening to choke me, and so I have to put them down here. However, the emotions are too many, too intense & too confused.

First off, the coverage. For now I have linked to some here. Desipundit has some notables here. And some others worthy of some time are:

• Amitabh Bachchan
• Sonia Faleiro
• Parizaad Khan’s eye-witness account of being trapped in Taj Hotel for the night
• Salil Tripathi
  
• Udayan Tripathi (19-year-old student at Georgetown, and Salil’s son)

I feel angry, confused & lost. This is not the country I grew up in, the country I was brought up to love, the country I came running back to. This is not the country I want to bring up my kids in. A place where anyone can threaten your life & liberty with impunity, a place where the defenders have to battle politicians who will cast insinuations about their work & character, where I have live my life worried about every young man carrying a backpack, every lady bearing a bouquet. I feel impotent, useless, worthless. I feel for those who lost their loved ones, for the armed forces & police personnel who have been fighting this battle for 36 hours now, for the valiant officers who sacrificed their lives, and for those everyday heroes who took strangers in, gave rooms in hotels free of charge (Gordon House Hotel), fed people through gunfire (Taj Hotel). This gives me hope in humanity.

And so, in reply to Amit’s comment

Earlier today, I was working on a final polishing of my novel before it goes to press. Now I wonder what’s the point. The book will come out in April, and Bombay will be a different city then. This book was written in a Bombay before these attacks; it will come out in a Bombay after these attacks, and it somehow feels, as I sit here in the business center of a boutique hotel a stone’s throw away from mayhem, that it will be inadequate. It is a love story—and isn’t that perverse?

I wrote:

I would just say that right now Mumbai (& India) needs love stories as much as it needs journalistic reporting, live blogging & debates around security. I’m not just saying it as a biased friend of yours. I believe a city (like an individual) has many faces. Life isn’t black or white, it’s not even shades of gray; it is a rainbow of many colours, not all of which are pretty to behold. And so those who love a place/person need to emphasize, to publicize & to highlight different hues of its personality.

We will hopefully discuss this in more detail over emails/coffees; right now my heart, like yours, is filled with grief, sadness & anger. But I know that the human spirit has infinte capacity to move forward, to build anew, to recover, revive & resurrect itself. It is important for us to remember this day forever, to take lessons from it to build a better world where this day is never repeated. And we will.

I still need to believe.

The primary job of a leader is to give hope.

It’s been a long, productive, hectic, yet surprisingly stress-free & fun-filled 4 months.

But what with the weather behaving the way it is, and with a full inbox, and a to-do list chock-a-block full of transactional tasks, and with quite a few things not going the way you’d want them to…the old familiar darkness is rearing it’s head again. The heart grows heavy, the steps weary…

Hang in there dude. This too shall pass.

Sometimes not knowing when or where it will end, helps us enjoy the journey better… experience it more fully!

Are we not penalizing the kids who don’t get the lucrative jobs or want to get into startups etc.? Do keep in mind that every single IIM has a course on entrepreneurship. Also, if the average salary is being used to buttress our argument for the hike, I would point out that 50% of students get paid below the median & usually a larger percentage gets paid less than the average.

If you speak to any IIM/IIT prof, they would criticise the current generations “lack of values” & “unhealthy focus on money”. But if we charge fees that are of the order of 7-11 lakhs for a course, aren’t we encouraging the same “focus on money” that we criticise our current & would-be students for displaying?

Are we misusing our near-monopolistic status to extract rents (as the Eco profs would say)? By so doing, do we actually risk losing the support of those who fought with us when a certain govt. tried to fix the fees a few years ago?

If we argue that the institutes have to be run on capitalist principles (something I might agree with), are we then willing to give up all govt subsidies since we do not believe in the socialistic principles any more? Will we also then pay back the govt. a fair price for the infra & land?

Disclaimer: The author studied at an IIM.