Aparisim 'Bobby' Ghosh is one more illustrious Bangali "braveheart" of the variety that Rajeev alluded to in the preceding post. Apparently, India/Hindoo bashing is an essential qualification to make it big in western academia and showbiz.
It would be safe to predict an increasing frequency of "gutter inspector reports" of the Katherine Mayo persuasion on all matters pertaining to India henceforth.
This does not imply the end of the world for the Indian cause; after all how many people in India read Time or Newsweek to be swayed by a Bobby Ghosh or a Fareed Zakaria?
However, this genre of journalism does contribute to inflaming the latent prejudices against Hindus in the West.
And it does add to the frustration of narrating the Hindu nationalist
perspective to the "educated" middle classes in India, because the Indian print media
tends to regurgitate reports from western sources uncritically, even when they pertain to India.
And, their "literate" readership (as opposed to "educated") is more vulnerable to swallowing such garbage, unaware of the maxim that
"Just because it's printed doesn't mean it's true".
Therefore, every success for the Ghosh, Zakaria, Amartya Sen, Anita Pratap... gang constitutes a net loss for India and the Hindus.
4 comments:
Karyakarta92, you might want to print the full article from Pioneer in the future, as typically, Pioneer links are short-lived.
So here goes the full article,
India-baiting desi gets top Time job
Pioneer News Service | New Delhi
The appointment of Aparisim 'Bobby' Ghosh as world editor of Time would no doubt be hailed as a first of its kind since he will be the first Indian and the first non-American to hold the post. It is also the first time that a person who thinks gobbledygook makes eminent sense simply because it runs down India, shall hold this exalted post.
Few readers of Time would recall that some time in 2001 Bobby Ghosh, the name he uses for his penmanship that appears in the American news weekly and its online edition, had 'organised' an essay competition, asking Indian and Pakistani readers for their views on the single greatest achievement in their country. The 'best' entries featured in his column, Subcontinental Drift, which appeared on timesasia.com.
Bobby Ghosh was impressed by the following entry on India's achievements, of which only a few lines have been quoted, to select it for 'special mention':
"Aelifgj0 r9814 a;kcr349m cpw lkdkj92l,g oewihv 620myj09v o568 oi4556u0 mov4598 ov96 pv59886 spviog qkjnd aoifng'ort a pokjtyb kjnvn clkfb xxq9c slrtv7c2 93c8u lfkn349 8u sl,cx m;'z'gi ;oesoityiu mpsporek psa9I u4302 pow95u w;4e9ie5 ;owetiuie r pqoiu 4w(pq34 o234q9 v;weoi 4ru0otoq;lorwiutrpo43jlrew98 wo9er7ov o349re87oa 9 9 7o..."
The 'essay' had an explanatory note: "What I mean to say from the above is that the achievements are nil and whatever they tried to achieve they made into mess, like the above." The writer whose entry Bobby Ghosh thought merited 'special mention' was a certain FDSFASDFA from India. Gibberish, Bobby Ghosh believes -- as also presumably do his employers -- make for quality journalism.
But Bobby Ghosh has been stacking his chips for some time now. His over-rated coverage of the war in Iraq is not the only reason why he has been awarded with a plum post over which some of his desi professional colleagues are going green with envy or delirious with joy.
During the NDA years, Bobby Ghosh indulged in unrestrained Vajpayee-bashing and was scathing about most things Indian, which helped him establish his 'credentials' with those in charge of Time's affairs. As did his columns denouncing the NDA Government for not joining the US-led war against terror in which he made out India lacks the guts to slug it out.
Never mind what the rest of the world thinks of Atal Bihari Vajpayee's innovative initiatives on Jammu & Kashmir, Bobby Ghosh -- how could he not! -- thought otherwise. "Vajpayee's Kashmir policy may be summed up thus: Don't Shoot, Don't Talk, Don't Act. Apparently, the Prime Minister hopes that if he buries his head in the sand, the problems ... will simply go away," he wrote in a particularly vitriolic column, adding, "Vajpayee's inaction is not just unsatisfactory; it is downright dangerous. Ostriches, when they eventually remove their heads from the sand, usually find themselves in a more precarious situation than before. So too will Vajpayee."
Similarly, he lashed out at Vajpayee for seeking to protect the Bamiyan Buddhas from the Taliban: "The land of Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru is being lectured on religious tolerance by Afghanistan's Taliban. For this, as with so many recent ignominies, India has Atal Behari Vajpayee to thank. Yet again the Prime Minister's desire to be seen the world statesman has left his country shamed... The response from Kabul -- and from leaders of India's Muslim minority -- was a stinging slap in the face.
The trouble is, it's hard to do a good impression of statesmanship when you're hopping about on one foot -- the other being lodged in your mouth."
Aggressive in tone and offensive in tenor, Bobby Ghosh is particularly fond of berating the Indian Army for its anti-terror operations in Jammu & Kashmir (although, strangely, he thinks the US-led war on terror is a good idea): "When under pressure, the Indian Army tends to drop any consideration of human rights and lash out in all directions, taking a heavy toll on the civilian populace... The recent strengthening of Indian troop concentrations in Kashmir and the belligerent statements from Army brass as well as political leaders suggests Delhi is preparing to step up its military operations in the disputed territory...".
Presuming to speak on behalf of the US Administration, but getting it all utterly so very wrong, Bobby Ghosh once pompously declared, "The US doesn't need Indian air bases, and were it not inappropriate to guffaw in these sombre times, Washington would probably laugh at Delhi's offer of intelligence on the Taliban and bin Laden. (My own contacts in the Indian intelligence community assure me that Delhi has little practical, up-to-date information to offer.)"
With such access to information and such insight into America's strategic interests, it is only right that Bobby Ghosh should be Time's world editor.
This phenomenon of Indians turning to India-bashing seems to be peculiar to India or more widespread than elsewhere. I mean there are lots of Chinese dissidents cooling their heels in the U.S but u don’t see them spewing venomously anti-Chinese stuff. They basically stick to human rights abuses etc. under the commie etc. With the Bobby Ghosh lot it appears to be different. Their attitude seems to be if the white man can criticize India (by extension Hinduism) we can do it better, “out-Herod Herod” as the phrase goes. Hence the extra-venom. Every country has its assholes but in India we seem to be blessed with more than our fair share.
I have been reading up recently on the recent developments in Russia and the somewhat similar parallels in India.
1. Russia moved away from Communism and got "Harvard educated" American (Sachs) and Russian (Gaidar) economist advisors who did not understand anything about the West or Russia and screwed everything up.
2. Despite the end of the cold war - the cold warriors transferred the traditional hostility towards the Soviets towards the Russians in a changed world - and kept funding Russians in the West who fed into Western prejudices and mythology about Russia.
3. A strong Russia standing on its own feet and keeping order in its region would actually benefit the West in too many ways to count (preventing 4GW in a chaotic stateless region, balancing the Middle East for oil and gas, balancing out Chinese adventurism etc.)
4. The West (everyone neo-cons,republicans,democrats,europeans-maybe) made a fundamental political, strategic and economic miscalculation in either trying to destroy Russia or undervaluing it and treating it with contempt, and there is going to be a very heavy price to pay - for everyone involved.
5. One reason for the misunderestimating;) was that the Russian people were classified as losers based on their real/perceived history (mongol rule) and religion (orthodox). Thus the failure was classified as a failure of the religion and history rather than a failure of the economic system (how come no one ever says that the previous Chinese failure was because of Daoism?)
6. In a state of weakness they were made to sign "colonial" agreements handing over their oil/gas to BP, shell etc. (nuke deal anyone) - once they became strong they now feel cheated out and no longer trust the West - In fact when one of the oil company CEO's asked Putin about rules for agreements/contracts in Russia - Putin answered "Honesty".
Replace three words above
1.Russia with India/Hindu
2. Communism with Fabian Socialism
3. Orthodox with Hindu
and reread it again.
Here is an article which covers the above scenario when discussing Russia
Excerpts
"We often forget that Soviet censorship isolated Soviet people not only from the knowledge of the West, but also from their pre-Soviet and Soviet history. Glasnost' opened the eyes of the Russian people not only toward the outside world but also to their history which had been stamped out and distorted during the Soviet rule. But there was little time to absorb the knowledge. Consequently, the "Westernizers" were as blind about Russia's past as they were ignorant about the West.
He seems strangely unaware of Janine Wedel's book, Collision and Collusion: The Strange Case of Western Aid to Eastern Europe 1989-1998 (New York: St. Martin's Press). According to Wedel, the U.S. government helped wreak economic and social disaster in Russia by providing inappropriate policy advice and aid to corrupt power brokers.
Tayler's damnation of Russian national heritage is not new. Many American Sovietologists had so little understanding of, and sympathy for, the pre-Soviet Russian heritage that they hoped they would never have to deal with it. They thought that Communism and Soviet Empire would last forever.
does this comparison make any sense - or is it just my inner Nehru trying out a new Bhai-Bhai formula?
Nice post, Habc. Even though Russia is White, they are the under-dogs among the White Nations. Very similar to India/Hindus.
As you might very well know, out of a total of 50 million to perish in WWII, Hitler killed 27 million Russians. Compare it to the 6 million Jews killed(which again is tragic). How many times have you heard of the Russian death toll?
I guess Russian blood is cheap like Indian/Hindu blood.
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