I accuse… the Ministry of Human Resource Development of being confused about the nature of “values” in ours or any other society. Get this. The Ministry proposes to make it mandatory for students at IIT etc. to take courses on value education”. Yes, there are actually some Babus (who else could conceive of such a notion, certainly not an academic) who believe that like Math, values can be taught. Worse, these babus think that what they are teaching is more than ideological mumbo-jumbo. “Just as astronomy grew out of astrology and chemistry out of alchemy, there are positive signs that a new Science of Spirituality is emerging out of the welter of competing doctrines and ideologies that are vying for supremacy over the minds of men” (Giving Value Education a Stable Infrastructure”, forthcoming, (and I am not joking), Journal of Value Education, by NCERT, an “educational” institute financed by your taxes).

I accuse the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) of being unfair to the players suspected for match-fixing. Unfair - because it seems highly unlikely that the players would have indulged in the alleged malpractices without the knowledge of the BCCI officials. Further, it is also highly unlikely that the players could have been so brazen about their activities without more than a wink-wink from the authorities. Can I dare say that there is considerable amount of circumstantial evidence to support the notion that very senior cricket administrators, from around the world, were likely involved in match- fixing? And if administrators were involved, could politicians be far behind ? The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) pulls it punches in this regard - thereby confirming the above speculation.

I accuse the Delhi Government led by the Congress of putting into place policies that like many others in India, will only succeed in generating more corruption, even though most Delhiites know that it is almost impossible to have more corruption than at present. The Supreme Court recently ordered the expulsion of industrial polluting units from the residential areas of New Delhi. What has the government done to be fair and accommodate non-polluting industrial units? It has agreed to "redefine household industry to allow industrial units using up to five kilowatts of power and employing up to 10 persons to operate in non-conforming (residential) areas". So what is the no-brainer outcome? The babus will make money, Delhi politicians will take money (Chief Minister Ms. Dikshit please note) and there will be a sudden spurt in industrial units with less than 10 people and using only 4.5 kilowatts of power. And then Ms. Dikshit will claim as to how her policies have increased productivity five-fold in the short span of 6 months.

I accuse the Disinvestment Minister, and an above reproach crusader, Mr. Arun Shourie, of not being fair to himself and the country. Major public sector units like MTNL and BHEL are not being privatized. Why ? Because, according to the netas, these crown jewels are not worth selling at present, just as they were not worth selling at prices three times current levels. What is the real reason ? How about the fact that the reason privatization does not take place in MTNL (telecommunications) or BHEL (capital goods) is because someone loses enormously by the privatization. The politicians and the bureaucrats blame labor. Hah. The real loser is the Indian private sector which will suddenly face competition. So it pays the private sector to do whatever it takes to delay competition from firms like MTNL and BHEL. And whatever it takes is often good enough for our "in the name of the poor, especially poor workers" netas and babus. So what should Arun Shourie do ? Resign. Only when good people like him and the erstwhile Disinvestment Minister, Mr. Arun Jaitley, resign, and the bluff of the bad politicians is called, will there be any chance for justice.

I accuse those who find solace and fame in distorting numbers to suit their ideology. There is a disturbing trend, especially among the left intellectual elite, in showing greater poverty than actually exists. While this does wonders for guilt reduction (for the left elite), it actually is counter productive for the poor. Counter-productive because by exaggerating the magnitude of the problem, it makes the attempt at solutions futile.

The latest example of "ideology via fiction" is the recent report by the World Commission on Dams. I accuse the World Commission on Dams (WCD) of double-speak, especially of ideological speak towards the Seattle storming do-goody anti-globalization left. The exhaustive, and otherwise thorough report, is flawed by its overtures towards those who want to exaggerate the number of people displaced. Again, by exaggerating a legitimate problem, the solution is made intractable. The WCD report states that the "overall level of physical displacement could range from 40 to 80 million". Another statement, strewn throughout the report, and starting from the Chair's preface, is that there are more than 45,000 large dams (defined as those above 15m or with a reservoir volume of above 3 million cubic metres) in the world. So the average number of people displaced by large dams is 1333 (60 million divided by 45000).

But then in an apparent seizure of ideology, the Commission states the following "Thus, in India and China together, large dams could have displaced between 26-58 million people between 1950 and 1990". China, according to the report, has close to 23000 dams and India 4200. So the average displaced in these two populous countries is 1544 per large dam - a number close to the above average.

But the break-up between the two most populous countries, India and China, is revealing. India, with 4200 dams has displaced 16-38 million people; China, with six times as many dams - 23000 - has half as many displaced, 10-20 million! Nowhere in the report does the Commission attempt to explain this (ideological) discrepancy. Or the fact that if the Indian upper estimate is applied to China, then there would be about 226 million Chinese displaced by dams - or a third of the rural population of China. If you believe that statistic, you will also believe that 56 million have been displaced in India - a statistic cited by Ms. Arundhati Roy in her polemic on globalization, "The Reincarnation of Rumpelstiltskin", Outlook, Nov. 27, 2000. Incidentally, the India Country Study from where Ms. Roy ostensibly gets her ideological statistic, does not contain any reference to 56 million. I accuse...