What is the most self-destructive and self-sabotaging creature to have ever traversed the grasslands of Bharatvarsha? In bitter parlance such loony creature goes by the name of liberal Hindu Right Wing. In the animal kingdom, the unwritten code of conduct is to not feed the snake because snakes are known to bite back the hands that feed them. But loony H RW is known not only to feed snakes but feed them milk, an expensive diet in these parts of the world.
Recently the loony H RW is busy feeding milk to the snake which goes by the name of Shatir Khan by paying for his shenanigans in #Dung-all. Few months ago this snake brought notice to the jungle authorities about growing intolerance virus in the lands of Bharatvarsha. The snake was worried about his future snakelings in the wild grasslands infected by intolerance virus. Given the false propaganda by the snakes and his tribe, loony H RW upped the ante against the snakes few months ago and boycotted their grass on TrapDeal and AirHel. The tribe of loony H RW and their Sarpanchs in different grasslands vowed to not entertain demands of snakes in the future.
Having shed too many crocodile tears in PaiseBanao Jayate, Shatir Khan realized that he can fool loony H RW by selling grass on sob stories, hence he produced the new grass called Dung-all. In Dung-all Shatir Khan showed how loony H RW has suppressed all the females of their tribe and need reform virus to rejuvenate their life. Not to forget, during all this time Shatir Khan never mentioned about the suppression virus unleashed on the females of snake family.
But the most surprising thing in this whole exercise is the self-sabotage action reflected in the words of supposedly H RW animal. Having boycotted TrapDeal and other products under the snake flagship, suddenly the whole H RW is buying grass with sob stories in Dung-all. One important point to note here is that Dung-all is produced from real life grass, which has already been harvested in the grasslands of Gharyana. Without the support of snake, Gharyana has produced enough Olympic grass. So, rather than using real grass owners like Makshi Salik for propaganda, the action of loony H RW to support known snake Shatir Khan is beyond the comprehension of all experts of animal kingdom. Giving free grass to Shatir will only increase the population of disruptive snakes in the grasslands of Bharatvarsha.
The self-sabotage virus has increased its population immensely in these parts of grasslands. Anything less than permanent Bhojaism is unlikely to cure any kind of daughter-selling/self-sabotage virus in the long run. The grasslands of Bharatvarsha are looking forward for complete sanitation and rise of Bhoja anti-dote against this loony virus which has infected the forever agitated brand of TrendVeer animals of H RW on bitter.
Also read: Different species of Hindus found in India
PS: The new scales of Shatir Khan in Dung-all were developed using steroid grass, a deadly variety of grass used as a short cut to build new scales by many animals.
There is a huge social media outrage over Saif Miya and Kareena Bibi naming their newborn after old Jihadi Taimur. The outrage on Twitter is quite understandable considering the fact that this move by the couple is a calculated one to rub insult into the sub-human second-class dhimmies of India, aka Hindus. After all, why would they name their kid after Taimur — a Muslim Jihadi who famously killed 100,000 Hindus in Delhi in one day and made a pyramid with their skulls? Since most Muslims in India are forced converts to the tune of 90% of the population, it is quite natural for the rape descendants to name their kids after their rapists so that they can later claim to be descendants of conquerors rather than the victims.
Illustration from Zafarnamah (c.1520 CE) — Source: @TrueIndology
Liberal Hindus and their defence
Whatever one may think of liberal Hindus, at least they are true to their principles — they are consistent in their lack of self-respect. Take any typical liberal atheist “Idea of India” type intellectual. They thank the Mughals for massacring Hindus by the millions and putting Hindu women into harems — all because they brought biryani to the subcontinent. These people are expected to lack self-respect. This kind of self-respect-lacking apologia is natural to the liberal Hindu who are quite happy to be sub-human dhimmies to the Jihadi elites. Seeing them celebrating the Jihadis openly mocking the sub-human dhimmies of the subcontinent — the Hindus — is “Idea of India.”
Twitter outrage by supposedly self-respecting Hindus
However, it is the Hindu reaction to this debacle which is puzzling. Many Hindus outraging at this act as if they have some self-respect and are hurt by how Jihadis name their Jihadi spawns. But the question is — do they really have self-respect? After all, these are the same self-respecting Hindu folks who turned PK into a superhit, adore the Jihadi Khans of Bollywood and glorify Pakistanis romancing Hindu actresses in Bollywood films. They are quite proud of this fact when some Jihadi predictably accuses them of being “intolerant” and they gladly prove otherwise by showing their secular certificate.
So the question is — why this double standard? Wouldn’t it be easier if these self-respect-lacking dhimmies outraging at the name of the Jihadi’s son just didn’t waste their time and energy on it? Is it going to change the fact that these dhimmies are going to make the next Bollywood movie featuring a Jihadi another super-duper hit? So when these self-righteous hypocritical dhimmies are not going to make any kind of impact whatsoever, then why whine and prove to the world that all Hindus are just dhimmies lacking self-respect at heart? To a neutral observer watching the drama, the only difference between the supposedly outraged RW Hindu Trend-Veers vs liberal Hindus is that the latter is far more honest about their lack of self-respect.
Maybe Hindu Trend-Veers should come down from their fake moral horse and fake self-respect and start addressing actual problems facing Hindus today — which are much more important for the Hindu cause than how Jihadis in Bollywood or anywhere in the world name their children and future Jihadis. While the shoddy demonetization tragicomedy is destroying the economy, RTE is being enforced with zeal by the Hindu thekadar BJP, and temple money is looted under the watchful eyes of Hindu BJP government in various states for development and healthcare. How Jihadis name their future Jihadis should be the last concern for our Hindu Trend-Veers.
There is a growing group of Hindu traditionalists in India who take up the label of Alt-Right to identify themselves and subscribe to their ideas. This might range from intellectuals of the traditionalist space who subscribe to the alt-right positions on various issues like gender, race, morality etc to Hindu Sena celebrating Trump victory while offering Pooja on his behalf. On the superficial level, the obvious alignment of the Hindu traditionalists with the traditionalists and alt-right of the west might look natural – both want to preserve family values, both see the threat that Islam poses to their societies and both see that the liberalism is a disease sold as a cure for the imperfect human civilisation. But what the Hindu traditionalists (or more accurately Dharmics) don’t seem to get is that enemy of your enemy is not necessarily your friend nor is that the alt-right has little in common with Dharma beyond the family, anti-liberalism and anti-Islam. Many of the alt-right views on gender, race and morality are downright adharmic and against facts and evidence. This series of articles will dig deep into various alt-right positions:
Alt-Right views on Race vs Reality
Alt-right thinks that white race is genetically superior to the Blacks, Indians, Arabs, Chinese etc and cherry-pick the examples of IQ tests and scientific advancements made by the west recently to claim it as “fact”. This is a flawed position because the facts don’t support their claims if accounted for various confounding factors. IQ is not a static measure which is set in stone for various races. IQ is largely influenced by nutrition, schooling, schooling of the parents of the kids, gender (gender has a statistically significant role in intelligence) and of course genetics. So the average IQ of India being 85, has a lot to do with the malnutrition rate of 50%, poverty rate of 60%, adult literacy rate of 65% (with literacy being ability to read or write and not education) of India and it obviously is not a marker of full genetic potential of Indian minds (actually proper nutrition can add another 10 or so points to Indian IQ). The same is true for Africans too as most of Africa is consumed in civil wars run by governments which are only slightly better than Indian government. But then the alt-right brings up the issue of IQ of African Americans in USA vs that of the white Americans. But then again, the African Americans in USA are not in the same level of social mobility vis-a-vis white Americans in the US with Africans having higher single and unwed mothers, higher divorce rates, lower schooling etc compared to white Americans. Again, not a fair comparison, although white supremacists blame the above problems as well on the African IQ. But this is not a very sound argument as one can notice that Africans in Africa have much more stable families than Africans living in America, thus removing one of the most equalizing force for Afro-Americans.
Then comes the curious case of East Asia. Chinese and other East Asians like Japanese and South Koreans have an average IQ of 105 which is higher than the average IQ of alt-right and of course, Askenazi Jews having a higher IQ than the average white guys. But this is somehow not addressed by the alt-right when they discuss about IQ differences being the reason for the backwardness of the black community in USA or their own failure in front of Jews. Their argument for black American backwardness in USA is due to IQ differences and not because of their systemic enslavement by whites or the fact that black Americans were the worst affected by the social liberalism and family breakdowns caused by feminism and other progressivisms. Of course, it is sometimes hilarious to watch these people confront this cognitive dissonance in debates as seen by Bannon of Brietbart news weaselling about why Indian and Chinese people dominating the IT field in USA is bad for the USA, which they achieved by merit unlike white American dominance of USA which they achieved through the lands they stole from the natives.
Then comes the issue of the scientific advances. This is where the IQ question becomes even more hilarious. The same Anglo-Saxons who boast of genetic superiority of the whites today were living in caves and engaged in looting and raping as a legitimate way of living in 500 BCE when Buddha and Mahavira were enlightening the minds of Indian Kingdoms and Vedas were in pristine glory. The same Anglo-Saxons who like to write how genetically superior they are now were bottom feeders of Human race well after 4000 years of first Human civilisations. Human civilisations began in Sumeria, Iraq (Babylon), Egypt i.e. brown Arabs, Iran(Persia) i.e. brown Persians, Indus valley i.e. brown Indians, Yangzte river/Chinese Civilisation of Yellow Chinese. The nearest equivalent for whites was that of Greece which dint even appear 2000 years after the ancient civilisations of the world rose. This is even funnier when one looks at the fact that Greeks were not even considered to be westerners, until the very late 19th century. The current West which boasts of being a civilisation today is actually made up of largely Anglo-Saxons of UK, Germany, Scandinavia, USA and its illegally invaded/conquered lands in Australia, North America. Even Irish were not considered whites until late 19th century in US, when they had to fight their Anglo-Saxon/British protestant descendants in US to even get acknowledged as “whites”.
It was not the Greeks who engaged in genocides across the world in the name of a Jew (Jesus) and conquered the lands around the world nor are the Anglo-Saxons descendants of Greeks. The reason why these alt-right neonazis even associate themselves with the Greeks and Romans is because without culturally appropriating the Roman/Greek history, much like how the Nazis under Hitler culturally appropriated Hindu civilisation as their own because Sanskrit was similar to German, the history of the Anglo-Saxons is rather pitiful and non-existent. It was the Romans who conquered these cave dwelling Anglo-Saxons of present day England and civilised them into a Kingdom in the 2nd century BCE. Then the Germans were conquered and civilised into a proper state/kingdom by the Romanised Gauls/Francia under Charlemagne in the 7th century AD, who proclaimed the Holy Roman Empire consisting of present day France (West Francia) and Germany (east Francia). The Scandinavians/vikings of course were still barbarians and looters even in 10th century before they were civilised. If the white Anglo-Saxons were so damn smart by genetics, they would not have been lagging behind Brown Indians, Brown Arabs, Brown Egyptians, Brown Persians, Yellow Hans in establishing settled human civilisations by 4000 years. If the same IQ test was done in 5th century BCE- Indians, Chinese, Iraqis, Egyptians, Persians etc would have blown the Anglo-Saxons and their illegal spawns in the Americas out of the water. The results would have been no different even few centuries ago.
Note that these are the same people who follow a Jew as their high lord and saviour while simultaneously whining, without any sort of cognitive dissonance, on how much Jewish influence is ruining their world. Their cognitive dissonance is so powerful that it can shake the gravity of the earth. These people are so brilliant genetically that they could not even bring their own set of morality and had to adopt the secularised/reformed morality of Christianity which again is a reformed form of Judaism which is again an Asian religion.
Then comes the question of major scientific discoveries of the world being from the west/Anglo-Saxons. This is of course a spurious argument because we are looking at the time period when West is at its peak after centuries of genocide of natives in Australia, North America, Africa, Asia and South America. This even discounts the fact that the second most powerful economy in the World i.e. Japan has nothing to do with the Anglo-Saxon whites whatsoever genetically. Also, the analysis of the 19th and 20th centuries, when Indian and Chinese civilisation was in decline due to conquest , will obviously yield a skewed result on which race has produced best science. The same west was a cultural backwater as late as in the 13th century CE when black plaque decimated 1/3rd of their population of Europe. Of course, if one has to look at the entirety of the Human history, it was the Indians and Chinese who contributed the most towards science and technology. Astronomy, Algebra, Numbering system, Architechture etc had their origins in India while gunpowder, paper, printing press etc have their origins in China. It was not without any reason that Europeans were dying to get to India in the 15th century, just like how present day Indians dream to reach the American shores. While Indians were building Mahabalipuram Cave temples, which still stand today, in 5th century CE, Anglo-Saxons were looting and pillaging the then Roman empire for feeding themselves. Was the supposed genetic superiority of the white race sleeping at that time? So next time you meet an alt-righter don’t expect any answer for this dormant IQ superiority.
This is of course not to argue that IQ differences cannot exist by race on a population level nor is it an argument that IQ differences are not important for success of an individual or a society. This is only to show that the present day intelligence/IQ testing does not take into account the various other factors which determine and help in development of intelligence. When this is the case, the white nationalist/alt-right version of genetic superiority of races should not be taken as anything but as a cruel joke born out of western genocides and imperialism.
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The suggestion that Indians as a people lack a sense of history is repeated often with little scrutiny. The beginnings of Indian historiography have been attributed to the marunmatta-s and mleccha-s, ignoring a much older native tradition of chronicling the past. The beginnings of historiography date back much earlier, to the period of oral transmission as reflected in the purANa-s and itihAsa-s. Likewise the nAstika-s have their own histories preserved in the biographical works of the jina-s and sthavira-s of their sect. Various other historical traditions were preserved within the narrative work the bR^ihatkathA. In addition there exists a vast corpus of historical plays. Several of these sources contain what appear to be reasonably accurate records of historical events that occurred long before their composition, suggesting that they drew upon pre-existing literature much of which is lost today. While the absolute dates are only speculative, much of the relative chronology is beyond doubt.
The bArhadratha-s
The territory of magadha lay to the east of Aryavarta (southern Bihar of the present day), separated from its northern neighbour vaishAlI by the ga~NgA. It had for its capital the town of girivraja, a town surrounded by the five hills — vaibhAra, varAha, vR^iShabha, R^iShigiri and chaityaka — and supposedly founded by the legendary king vasu chaidya, the progenitor of its earliest dynasty the bArhadratha-s.
It was in the line of bArhadratha-s that the villainous monarch jarAsandha was born. At the dawn of the kaliyuga the ruling monarch of the line was his grandson somAdhi. Very little other than the names of its kings of this dynasty is known.
A great deal of error has crept into the purANic accounts with regard to the following period. The purANa-s describe the pradyota-s as capturing power in the period following the fall of the bR^ihadratha-s and the vItihotra-s. The purANa-s seem to have mistakenly placed them amidst the dynasties of magadha, whereas they were the rulers of avantI.
The pradyota-s
The last vItihotra king was assassinated by his general puNika who placed his son pradyota on the throne of avantI, c. 598 BCE. The murder of a brother of pradyota by a tAlajangha named vetAla at the festival of mahAkAla mentioned by bANabhatta may have been an act of revenge by a member of the former royal clan. pradyota earned the epithet chaNDa-pradyota or mahAsena on account of his powerful army and remained feared by his neighbours. He led two campaigns against shatAnIka of kaushambI, while the first ended in failure, it was during the second that shatAnIka met his end. An impending attack by him on ajAtashatru is mentioned in the majjhima nikaya. The jaina tradition also alludes to a war with udrAyaNa of king sindhu and sauvira which ended in defeat.
Following a 23-year long reign he was succeeded by his second son pAlaka (r. 475–451 BCE), his elder son gopAla having abdicated the throne — an event that coincided with the nirvANa of mahAvIra according to jaina accounts. After ruling for 23 years he was overthrown by his nephew Aryaka (r. 451–430 BCE) the son of gopAla, who reigned for 21 years. The kingdom then passed into the hands of avantivardhana, the son of pAlaka. Their rule came to an end following defeat at the hands of shishunAga soon after assuming control of magadha.
The bimbisArids
The purANa-s place the shaishunAga-s after the pradyota-s whose fame shishunAga is said to have destroyed. This would mean shishunAga reigned after the time of bimbisAra, who was a contemporary of pradyota, and the later redactors of the purANa-s have mistakenly considered bimbisAra a descendant of the latter.
The overthrow of ripu~njaya the bArhadratha was carried out by a predecessor of shreNika bimbisAra (a contemporary of the buddha), likely his father named kshemajit/kshatraujas in the purANa-s and bhaTiya in the mahAvaMsa — an event that can be dated c.550 BCE. The mahAvamsA makes bimbisAra (b. 571 BCE) 5 years junior to the buddha and attributes to him a reign of 52 years following his accession at the age of 15. It was during his reign that a~Nga was conquered under its last monarch brahmadatta. He was also responsible for the establishment of the new town of rAjagR^iha.
ajAtashatru (r. 494–469 BCE), identified in the jain accounts by the epithet kUNika, imprisoned and later assassinated his father, seizing control of the kingdom. In the initial years of his reign he faced attacks by prasenajit of kosala and pradyota. Disputes also arose with the vR^ijji-s to the north, and the dIghanIkaya mentions the building of fortifications at pATaligrAma to hold out the invaders. A few years later the brAhmaNa minister varShakAra was planning a campaign against the vR^ijji confederation. The war with the vR^ijji-s led by the lichchhavI chieftain cheTaka lasted twelve years after which ajAtashatru emerged victorious, breaching the fortifications of vaishAlI.
The reign of his successor darshaka, mentioned only in the purANa-s but whose existence is vouched for by his mention in the svapnavAsavadattam of bhAsa, was likely but a short interregnum. udayin (460 BCE–?) another son of ajAtashatru, succeeded darshaka. Astika and jaina traditions attribute the foundation of pATaliputra at the site of the village of pATaligrAma on the southern bank of the ga~NgA to the king udayin. The reigns of the successors of udayin are obscure — muNDa named only in the southern and northern bauddha texts is encountered in the anguttara nikaya as a king of pATaliputra. He was succeeded by another obscure ruler aniruddha. These two rulers together reigned a total of 8 years. The final ruler of the dynasty nick-named nAgadAsa assumed the throne after killing his father and was ousted by the people of magadha tired of patricidal rulers.
The shishunAga-s
The first king of this line to rule over magadha was the obscure ruler shishunAga (r.411?–396 BCE), who as per certain commentaries on the mahAvamsha was a minister of nAgadAsa hailing from the lichchhavI clan, invited to invade magadha by its citizens. The purANa-s state that shishunAga shifted the capital back to girivraja from pATaliputra and placed his son on the throne of kAshI.
He was succeeded by his son kAlAshoka (‘ashoka the black’) also known as kAkavarNin (‘The crow-coloured’). He is said to have ruled at the time of the second Buddhist council at vaishAlI and was also responsible for presiding over the shift of the magadhan capital to pATaliputra once and for all. The purANa-s state that he ruled for 36 years from around 396–360 BCE. bANabhatta’s harshacharita refers to kAkavarNin shaishunAgi as having been murdered in the vicinity of his capital by having his throat slashed. His successor was ugrasena ‘mahApadma’ nanda who ruled initially as a guardian of kAkavarNI’s sons.
Other contemporary dynasties
The Vatsa-s: The ruling clan of vatsa was an offshoot of the kuru-s and claimed descent from parIkshit. They had their seat at kaushambI. sahasrANIka vasudAna the twentieth in line from parIkshit probably reigned in the mid 6th century. He was succeeded by his son shatAnIka parantapa who was a contemporary of mahAvira and the buddha. He was succeeded on his death by his young son udayana, who married vAsavadatta the daughter of pradyota and later padmAvatI the sister of darShaka. Famed for his mastery over the vINA, the stories of his romances were the subject of several plays and remained popular centuries after his death.
Kosala: At the time of the buddha, kosala was ruled by prasenajit, the son of sa~njaya mahAkosala who had annexed the neighbouring kingdom of kAshI. ajAtashatru of magadha is known to have waged war with him over the non-remittance of revenues from a village in kAshI given to his father as dowry. The war ended in a truce and a matrimonial alliance. He was succeeded by his son virUDhaka/kshUdraka. The AikShvAku-s too lost their independence three generations later under the reign of sumitra, probably annexed by the rising magadha under mahApadma nanda.
Gandhara: gandhAra fell under the control of achaemenid Iran around c. 500 BCE and is named along with hindush (sindhu?) amongst the achaemenid satrapies in the behistun inscription of Darius the great. Previously at the time of the buddha it was ruled by the king puShkarashakti. It seems to have regained independence soon after, being several smaller principalities in the time of Alexander.
The nanda-s
The nanda-s are conventionally identified as a set of nine rulers — a father and his eight sons in the Astika and jaina traditions, or as nine brothers by the pAlI tradition. Both the Astika and jaina traditions identify the nandas as a clan of low birth, though differing in explaining their relationship to the previous ruling clan. The purANic accounts identify the senior nanda as the son of mahAnandin through a shUdra wife while the jaina-s identify him as the son of a barber. The latter account seems to tally better with the accounts of graeco-roman writers, who identified the father of the king contemporary to Alexander as a barber who, having seduced the queen, murdered the reigning monarch.
mahApadma nanda was perhaps the first emperor since the decline of the kuru-s of old. He managed to capture vast tracts of land — the purANa-s compare him to bhArgava of the tret-yuga in being a vanquisher of kshatriyas. His reign included most of the Gangetic plain, extending south to ashmaka, kuru in the north-west and to kalinga in the east. He was succeeded upon his death by his 8 sons who ruled in succession. dhana nanda the youngest was the emperor at the time of chandragupta’s conquest. The PurANic accounts give the dynasty a century-long rule, though the la~Nkan chronicles reduce the reign of the entire nanda line to 22 years. Thus mahApadma nanda began his reign around 360 BCE, dying around 332 BCE. He was succeeded by his sons who ruled until c. 320 BCE.
The maurya-s
The origin of the maurya-s remains obscure. While later Astika traditions identify them as a line of kings of shUdra descent, the bauddha-s identify them as a kShatriya clan from pippalivana, mentioned as one of the kShatriya clans vying for a share of the tathAgata’s remains in the mahAparinibbAna sutta. There is sufficient reason to believe the tradition that chandragupta was assisted by the scheming brAhmaNa chANakya in his attempt to overthrow the nandas — as attested by Astika, bauddha and jaina sources. He even defeated seleucus I nikator, who ceded to him territories to the west of the sindhu perhaps as far west as arachosia. He was succeeded upon his death by his son bindusara amitraghAta, known to the Greeks as amitrochates. bindusara was eventually succeeded by his son ashoka, the last great maurya, after whose death the empire seems to have been divided up between his grandsons dasharatha in the east and samprati in the west. The dynasty was brought to an end with the murder of bR^ihadratha by his brAhmaNa general puShyamitra.
Dating the Mauryas: A clue as to the date of ashoka is from his inscriptions that mention the names of various contemporary yavana kings — antiyoka (Antiochus), turamAya (Ptolemy), magA (Magas), antekina (Antigonos), alikasudara (Alexander) — identifiable as Antiochus I or II of Syria, Ptolemy II of Egypt (285–247BCE), Antigonos of Macedonia, Magas of Cyrene, and Alexander of Corinth or Epirus. This would mean the edicts were commissioned between 272 and 250 BCE, placing ashoka’s coronation no later than 286–264 BCE.
Hellenic accounts of the reign of chandragupta maurya (known to the Greeks as sandrocottus of palibothra) suggest that chandragupta rose to power following Alexander’s death (323 BCE). His rise to power must have occurred before 302 BCE when seleucus I returned to Cappadocia following his campaigns in the east.
The date of the buddha and mahAvIra
That the buddha and mahAvira were contemporaries is borne out by multiple statements in the canonical texts of both traditions. The canonical texts of the bauddha-s refer to mahAvira as the nirgratha jnAtaputra and he is one of the chief rivals of the buddha. Both contain references to shreNya bimbisAra and his son ajAtashatru. The mainstream shvetAmbara tradition places the nirvANa of mahAvira in the year 527 BCE. However hemachandra’s chronology fits better with the chronology of sthAvira-s attested within jaina tradition, placing the nirvANa 155 years later. Legends associating the AchArya bhadrabAhu who died in the 170th year after nirvANa with Chandragupta are possible only if the latter chronology were true. Thus the nirvANa of mahAvira may be dated to around 475 BCE, and given that he was 72 years old at the time he was born around 545 BCE.
The pALI tradition identifies the date of the birth of the buddha at 644 BCE and the nirvANa 80 years later at 564 BCE, however this appears to be a later tradition with an older nirvANa era at 482 BCE. The corrected long chronology seems to best explain various circumstances, though a date closer to 420 BCE as proposed by some cannot be entirely ruled out.
pANini
pANini uses the word yavana, a derivative of the old Persian yauna referring to Ionian Greeks, suggesting that his work belongs to the period succeeding the achaemenid invasion. This is supported by the presence of the word lipi, another borrowing from old Persian. The aShtAdhyAyI also indicates a familiarity with certain Buddhist monastic custom and the existence of ascetics of the school of maskarI. All this suggests that the aShTAdhyAyI belongs to the period beyond the mid-fifth century. pANini recognizes the existence of shUrasena, avantI, kosala and ashmaka as independent states and seems to indicate no familiarity with a unitary empire. On this basis his work can be assigned to the last decades of the fifth century, allowing him to be a contemporary of mahAnandin i.e. kAlAshoka.
The article was first published elsewhere. The author tweets at @Dirghakarna.
Adverse effects of demonetization are finally trickling down into the economy. Although a lot can be said about the poor implementation part of the policy, this article will focus just on the economics. One very important point to keep in mind during this whole discussion is to not cloud the economics judgement of policy through moral lenses.
The developments in the last few weeks have confirmed YP predictions in the past:
1) It would lead to slowdown of economy: The service sector contracted in November which is the first time in last 18 months. The Nikkei Services Purchasing Managers’ Index fell to 46.7 in November from 54.5 in the previous month, the sharpest reduction in three years. You can also take car sales as another metric of economic performance. Here again, November saw an 8% decrease in car sales pointing towards decrease in demand.
2) Big fish have found ways to escape: IT raid at the residence of two government officials found 6 crores of unaccounted cash, out of which 4.7 crore was in new currency. So while the poor and middle class are lining up at banks and ATMs and are restricted to withdraw puny amounts, those with large stash of black money have found illegal ways to change their currency.
The worst part in this whole exercise is the chest thumping by free market economists on rise of temporary tax revenue for GoI. Tax money for the Govt is just tax money of the government. It does not indicate the actual GDP of the country or economic growth.
For example, if people of the country are earning/producing 150Tn ₹ in total output and government tax rate on it is 10%, the Govt tax revenue will be 15Tn ₹. Let’s say if the Govt raises the tax rate by 1% to 11%, and the economy “contracts” by 1%, then GDP of the economy will go down by 1.5Tn ₹ to 148.5 Tn ₹, while the tax income for the Govt will still increase by 1.15 Tn ₹ to 16.33 Tn ₹. So, tax income increase for the Govt doesn’t automatically equal to GDP increase/growth/income for the public/citizens.
The same can be said about the other assumptions used by the author. Most of the figures quoted everywhere for black money are just guess-estimates with government or economists having little clue about the numbers.
But the analysis is flawed even from the welfare perspective of the policy. The way regular economists would evaluate any policy is by comparing growth with the counter-factual scenario. Agricultural sector picking up due to better monsoon is not an effect of demonetization and would have been there irrespective of the policy implementation.
The gains also rest on future increase in tax net. People who pay taxes today are in no way liable to pay taxes in the future and a large number of them can drop out again. Hence the push for digitizing the economy to make it easy to track the transactions.
And it is really difficult to understand how increase in government tax revenue at the cost of decrease in overall GDP growth is hailed as success of the policy. Once accounting for the pain faced by regular citizens plus deceleration of GDP growth, some temporary increase in GoI revenues does not seem such a great policy.
As predicted by YP, thanks to the jugadu nature of Indians and help of government officials, people have converted their old notes to new notes. Effectively, the claims of removing 4-5 Tn ₹ of black money from the total stock of money would not materialize. So, GoI has failed on its primary goal in the short run. On top we are witnessing a contraction in the economy, which would linger on for the next few quarters. Once taking into account all these factors, it seems that the whole policy was big farcical show for nothing substantial.
The recent decision by PM Modi government to take out Rs 500/1000 notes out of circulation has caught the media and the whole country into a frenzy. The policy seems to be the government antidote against the issue of black money in the economy.
The main reason behind this demonetization decision is to cut down the black economy in the country and dry up the illegal funds of those who have collected it over the years. So if you have large unaccounted cash, it is as good as piece of paper beginning November 8.
The government is acting on the premise that there is large amounts of black money in India and it is held in cash. This gives us two scenarios in the wake of this decision-
1) There is really large amount of black money in the economy. So if you take this money out of economy, it will hit the economy hard post this decision, thus making demonetization a bad decision
or
2) There is no large amount of black money in the economy and there would be no impact on the economy. If this is the case, then it hardly makes sense to demonetize.
Having seen how an average medium sized business operates in India, one should lean towards the first scenario that economy will be hit hard by this decision. There are large number of inefficient and unseen taxes on businesses, which makes them less productive and also makes it essential for them to engage into unlawful activities to keep the business running.
So who might have large amounts of cash sitting at their place? Just think of any neighbourhood shop which does not give a receipt for your purchase, the owner there might have generated some amount of black money. And if the amount of black money hoarded by them is really high, expect them to fire their employees and shut shops in the wake of this decision.
One of the sectors which is supposedly flushed with large amounts of black money is the real estate sector. The real estate sector has not done well for the past two years and it might get hit even more post this decision. There might be many people with white money, who have invested in unfinished projects, and they would lose all their investment because the real estate company cannot complete the project now.
Also, the whole exercise seems a bit futile once you take into account that the government has decided to reissue new Rs 2000 notes. The rules of the game i.e. the discretionary power with the babus, have not changed and those who earlier collected Rs 500/1000 notes will now switch to hoarding money in Rs 2000 notes. So, this will have no impact on the future generation of black money.
So, what should you make out of this policy? Brace yourself for a rude shock if you really believed that black money formed a significant part of Indian economy. And if you don’t get this rude shock, then it was just an empty noise without any substance and black money was not even an issue to begin with. Black money is a symptom of the inefficiencies and bad laws in the economy, which forces a large number of businesses to cut corners to remain viable.
P.S. 1- The article only dealt with the economic issues of black money and some people will point out its impact on terrorist infrastructure or future state elections.
P.S. 2- There is 3rd scenario not mentioned above, if you believe in super powers of black money hoarders- they have large amounts of money but they find a way to fool Modi government.
Donald Trump surprised everyone and defeated Hillary Clinton to become the next President of the United States. The rise and win of Trump can be simple explained by the fact that he promised change while Hillary offered “More Of the Same”. While the plebeians heard this message, the elites in the ivory tower ignored the message and tried hard to continue with the old system.
The parallels will be drawn with Modi’s win in 2014, as he too defied all the odds and all the negative campaign against him, while he just chanted- “Sabka Sath Sabka Vikas”. Trump almost seemed to have borrowed from Modi’s template when he kept saying -“Make America Great Again”. While Hillary had nothing new to sell other than her being the first woman to run for the President’s post as candidate of one of the two major US political parties, Trump gave a message of positivity. And the people accepted the latter.
US is on cusp of demographic transition with number of white kids born in US already below 50%. It is a changed country and white men have voted probably for the last time before demography hits them finally in the next elections. So, it is just the beginning of identity politics in US and it will only get worse. Identity politics is part and parcel of democratic system and there would always be politicians who will take benefit from it.
If Hillary Clinton can use her women card, Trump just trumped her with white card. But apparently in the insane world of leftists, only they are allowed to create identity boxes and no one else. Only such cultists can be proud of their own stance while ridiculing the others for their own position. Look at the below excerpt from New Yorker, the liberal elitist magazine, to understand how some identities are important for the author, but white men endorsing their identity is somehow disgusting.
In any case, the noise will die down and the world of politics will go on as usual. Trump or Hillary, one person can only change so much. So, lets take the time to congratulate the next POTUS with below video, which shows he just did not get lucky and had clearly worked for the position he won today.
Why do you create riches if the enemy waiting behind the lines will come and take it all away one day in the future? Would not you have been better if you had invested that time in building defence and keeping the barbarians off your territory?
Let me start by retelling early recorded Chinese history. There was once a confederation of nomadic tribes which the Chinese referred to as Xiongnu, known as the Huns today. The most famous person of the confederation being Attila the Hun who sacked the eastern Roman empire. This retelling is about Meha the Hun, an ancestor of Attila, who was able to unite the various tribes into a strong Confederacy. Meha, a brave and capable general went on to raid China repeatedly. Basically these Nomads lived off by plundering the Chinese who had a far refined culture, way of life as well as developed systems of governance. All the Huns did was bide their time and look for a perfect opportunity to attack and plunder and take away whatever they could, be it women, gold, silver, horses etc. Many would now find parallels between the Afghans and the Huns, which is true, both lived on plunder. Now let us come to the present times, Hindus are today working hard, earning money, trying to build a civilization, rather rebuild it as some of the readers may point out later on, while Pakistan or certain sections of our society are simply biding their time. They are not bothered about poverty or well being, they know they can always snatch what they like from others when the opportunity arises. Does Kairana ring a bell?
Civilization is a delicate thing. To protect it we must strive to destroy the barbarians at the gate, at all costs. Humanity or other forms of opiates which stem from universalism or similar doctrines, should be neutralised as soon as possible and never let these problems prolong as time only strengthens the barbarians at the gate.
When the barbarians arrive to plunder our civilization, refinement, superior ways of life will count for nothing! Seize the opportunity and smash the enemies into oblivion. Compassion is a value your enemies do not share.
The state of right wing media is very fluid in India right now. The market is already showing some signs of consolidation with the acquisition of OpIndia by Swarajya.
One thing which you can take away from the discussion is that there is a big potential in this market and there is big scope for rise of new portals, both in English and local languages. What is needed is a genuine effort to popularize the ideology and help each other grow.
Right wing is a big tent now and is growing fast after Modi’s win with the rush of turncoats to identify themselves with the new winners. On most social policies though, there is not much difference between any of these media houses- all follow western liberal constructs and find it valuable for Indian society without evaluating the current rot in western societies.
But traditions are equally important and what we need is rational defence of the old wisdom and not give in to the unabashed hedonism promoted by most mainstream media houses under the guise of individualism.
PS: Some portals missed in the above podcast: HinduPost, Jagruk Bharat, MyIndMakers
The liberals are in outrage over Hindu celebration of Diwali. Since they could not find any other problem, they are outraging over some fumes caused by crackers during Diwali celebration. The irony gets lost over these arm-chair liberals who sit in AC during the whole summer, travel in airplanes and gas-guzzling SUVs, but leave no stone unturned to lecture the unwashed masses on protecting environment.
This is what Livemint said
The data shows that pollution levels this Diwali were far more dangerous than last year. As per the SAFAR data, last year after Diwali, the PM 2.5 levels were 428µg/m³ which was nearly six times the safe limit.
A newspaper which prides itself on reporting finance news does not even know the concept that air quality has too many factors and it is foolhardy to compare last year with this year’s level of pollution. A cloud cover can increase pollution much more than any Diwali. Or a small rain can reduce it to unimaginable levels.
The above figures are taken from a service which tracks air quality in real time. So what does the above figures show? There is no significant difference post Diwali i.e. Monday 31st October 2016 and the days preceding Diwali. So pollution levels were in dangerous territory the whole week before Diwali. The overall AQI hovered around 500 both before and after Diwali.
It is obvious to anyone who understand even a little bit about air pollution that one day of Diwali will add hardly anything to the overall pollution levels in big cities, which get choked due to vehicular pollution as well as other factory emissions.
The data punctures the narrative on high pollution levels due to Diwali. There is not much change in pollution due to Diwali even compared to previous week and the increase is definitely negligible in the overall pollution levels in a pollution sink-hole like Delhi. So, liberals can go and whine while we heathens will continue to celebrate our festivals with great pomp.
