The WTO deals elaborately with rights of traders.
It is mostly silent about the obligations of the traders.
What if a patented product messes up the environment and the patentee
has perished into the dust or is untraceable? Who exactly is
responsible for the mess? We today find that the ENRON mess is sought
to be cleared with funds from LIC and EPF. The mess by DDT and other
"US Patents" could hardly be seen as "innovative steps" - they were
just innovative in causing new kinds of cancers and seriously injuring
the natural food cycle that is not easy to repair.
The monopolisation by non-free software companies threatens education
and the moral values we have.
Janet McLean, Faculty of Law, University of Auckland, New Zealand,
delivered the "George P. Smith, II Distinguished Visiting
Professorship Lecutre" at Indiana University School of Law, USA on the
subject of "The Transnational Corporation in History: Lessons for
Today?" which is avilable online at:
http://www.law.indiana.edu/ilj/v79/no2/mclean.pdf
"If we start with the notion that corporations are created by
states or by the operation of law, that they are abstract persons,
then we will be more likely to find a space at least to talk about
what a corporation's obligations should be."
The responsibility and obligations of transnational corporations is
yet to be investigated, researched and found out. Then, the WTO is
clearly an irresponsible regime, incomplete without answers, and it
cannot be shamelessly pushing forward the private interests of a few
multinational corporations who could vanish into the thin air at wish.
Other links to ponder upon:
http://www.healthgap.org/press_releases/05/030104_HGAP_AA_INDIA_IPR.html
The plea from Africa, asking India not to proceed with the
amendments to the patents law, is heart rending, and we should
hold a helping hand, even if it means that bombs may rain over us
this monsoon. There is no much of a choice here: many are waiting
to "out-source pharmaceutical" research to India - in plain
English many poor Indians would end up being used as guniea pigs
for "research" - and the wonderful products could be safely
"protected" through our legal system itself - what convenience!
http://www.expresspharmapulse.com/20050317/happenings05.shtml
William (Bill) Haddad addressed the members of the Press on the
ills of the current Patent Ordinance and rules. He also had a word
of caution for the Government of India, the people of India and
the national sector pharma Industry not to bow to the MNC pressure
and to learn from the pitfalls of the US Patent laws and the
problems faced by the people due to the same.
The agenda for 2005-03-18 at the Lok Sabha included:
<quote>
Patents (Amendment) Bill, 2005
16. SHRI KAMAL NATH to move for leave to introduce a Bill further to
amend the Patents Act, 1970.
ALSO to introduce the Bill.
______
STATEMENT REGARDING ORDINANCE
17. SHRI KAMAL NATH to lay on the Table an explanatory statement
(Hindi and English versions) showing reasons for immediate
legislation by the Patents (Amendment) Ordinance, 2004 (No. 7 of
2004).
</quote>
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Forwarded Message:
Subj:Bangalore one Project – A reverse gear e-governance: Re: IAS officer reply with respect e-Seva project to Central MIT Minister, NISG, INDIA-EGov, CM's, Secretary's of e-Gov, WHICH is being REPLICATED in Karanataka State Date:3/12/2005 8:28:39 PM Pacific Standard TimeFrom:umashankarc@yahoo.comTo:ellakannada@yahoo.com, cm(a)karnatakacm.com, cm(a)kar.nic.in, cs(a)karnataka.gov.in, itsec(a)bangaloreit.com, devcom(a)karnataka.gov.in, prs-fd(a)karnataka.gov.in, secybud-fd(a)karnataka.gov.in, secyexp-fd(a)karnataka.gov.in, hcom(a)vsb.kar.nic.in, prs-infra(a)karnataka.gov.in, prs-home(a)karnataka.gov.in, prshigh-edu@karnataka.gov.inCC:vs@nisg.org, ceo(a)nisg.org, piyush.gupta(a)nisg.org, satyajit.suri(a)nisg.org, sandeep.paidi(a)nisg.org, binay.sharma(a)nisg.org, bala.srinivas(a)nisg.org, rekha(a)nisg.org, devajoy.choudhury(a)nisg.org, umashankarc(a)yahoo.com, minister(a)mit.gov.in, mos(a)mit.gov.in, secretary(a)mit.gov.in, srinath(a)mit.gov.in, rgilani(a)mit.gov.in, dg(a)nic.in, lalitha(a)hub.nic.in, kashinath(a)hub.nic.in,
pspillai(a)hub.nic.in, ellakannada(a)yahoo.com, novamed(a)aol.com, India-egov(a)yahoogroups.com, ellakavi(a)yahoogroups.com, ias-tn(a)yahoogroups.comSent from the Internet (Details)
Bangalore one Project – A reverse gear e-governance
Author: C.Umashankar IAS., (TN)
http://www.sugame.com/umashankar
umashankarc(a)gmail.com
The views expressed in this article are the personal
views of the author and they do not reflect the views
of any Government or the Indian Administrative
Service.
In the name of e-governance, Karnataka had decided to
favour a consortium of private companies through
Bangalore One project. Actually there is no
e-governance in the whole design of Bangalore One!
Collection of utility bills or collection of passport
applications can not be considered e-governance.
Bangalore one is a purely vendor driven utility bill
collection arrangement whereby the citizen who enjoys
remitting the sum through different banks and
different modes as on today is being cornered to make
the payment through the kiosks operated by the private
vendors. The effort would be to discontinue the online
payment portals (I wonder whether they are operational
even now) and direct service facility through the
respective offices/organisations.
I would appreciate the Karnataka Government if it had
decided to carry out this venture for true
e-governance such as online procedure for all licences
and permits, government approvals for building
permits, RTOs, labour department procedure, employment
exchanges, treasury payments, entire commercial tax
procedure, traffic police operations, police station
operations, rural development operations, highways
and PWD operations and so on.
The proposed Bangalore one nonsense does not cover any
of these areas!
After commencing true e-governance through Bhoomi,
with the full technical help of National Informatics
Centre (NIC), my esteemed colleague Rajiv Chawla had
jettisoned NIC and went for private vendors. And this
time it is not e-governance, but a good business for a
private partner in the name of e-governance. The
undoing of the e-governance momentum in Karnataka had
just begun.
What is the agenda behind this move?
I have certain pertinent questions?
Why a State Government wants to involve itself in
collection of BSNL bills?
BSNL and all telecom operators have their collection
systems already in position. Why include them? Is it
to show ‘volume of business’ which the AP
government boasts now and then when they talk about
their e-seva centres!
The volume of business is an utter nonsense. Even
without the e-seva or Bangalore one, the volume of
business is there. It is not that these kiosks
generate this volume. The BSNL (or like organisations
which have joined the bill collection kiosks) does all
the hard work. They generate the revenue through their
own business plan, infrastructure and manpower. The
kiosks simply collect these amounts as collection
agents. But this amount is shown (which is usually
large) as a turnover from the kiosks. It is a cheap
business trick. If I could find out the cheap trick
beyond this smoke and hype, it is not going to take
much time for others to find out this in the near
future.
After India had commenced liberalisation, the States
and Central Government have hardly any role in private
business. They have to move out from their existing
business ventures through disinvestment. The
Government of India and State governments have
already been doing this. But Karnataka wants to get
into private business!
It cannot be argued that this effort would result in
better citizen services. Because the citizens of
Bangalore have already been enjoying online payment
facility and payment facility through multiple bank
counters. The kiosks would restrict them to go to
these 15-50 counters! It is going to be a downgraded
service and not the other way around.
And what are the plans for the rural masses! Can this
service provide online Old Age Pension service or can
it allow the rural masses to enhance their democratic
participation through transparent and online rural
development administration? Can it empower the women,
especially the rural women or can it empower the
SC/STs?
I am deeply concerned and so I am using harsh words
against my own wishes.
Why I am concerned?
I am explaining the cause of my worry in the
succeeding paragraphs.
Before I explain why the Bangalore one nonsense is
against humanity, let me share my anguish from a real
life situation.
Runaway bribe culture. Can Bangalore One rein in this
culture?
A month and half ago, one of my acquaintances
approached me and informed that an officer was
demanding Rs.10 lakhs to clear a file. There was
nothing unusual or out of the way in the whole
proposal. Even when everything was alright with the
proposal he was asked to remit the huge sum as bribe.
I wanted to intervene. But my acquaintance said that
if I intervened the whole thing would be off and they
would ensure that he would be ruined. He begged me to
desist from interfering. He did not have the money to
pay the bribe. Rupees ten lakhs is not a small sum!
This acquaintance had come up in his life doing porter
service in Chennai railway station. Through sheer hard
work he had come up in life. The situation was that if
he did not pay the bribe, he was going to lose the
whole investment which he had already made in that
venture. This was all borrowed money. So he chose to
borrow the bribe sum and remitted the same in two
instalments. Even after remitting the huge bribe, the
officer had cleared only one out of the two proposals.
The other one is still pending. In between I had to go
to Bihar for election duty. Today morning (12th March
2005) the acquaintance called me to inform about this
daughter’s engagement. I asked him a few more
questions. Yes, till date he did not get approval for
the second part of the proposal though he had paid
the full sum (agreed bribe sum for both the
proposals). His partner had decided to break off from
the business because of this delay. I also asked him
whether he dealt with through agents or the officer
himself had interacted with him directly. He replied
that the officer himself gave the instructions in
person to him. He had paid the last instalment of Rs.2
lakhs at Nagercoil bus stand, as per the officer’s
instructions!
Now people would raise questions, in all the wrong
ways! (The way Tehelka was witch hounded)
Why you did not inform the Government?
You are also a silent accomplice to this fraud and so
on.
Let me request you to look at the point I wish to
drive at the end of this paragraph.
(I informed the CBI. They said they would not be able
to do anything without the consent of the State
Government. They are now looking for the assets of
this officer. If the assets are created in TamilNadu
they would be able to catch him. But I am sure he is a
clever guy. He would be creating the assets in some
other State).
What I have described here is only a tip of the
iceberg. I don’t have many acquaintances who run
business or do special commercial ventures. Within
this limited number I got this information. I tremble
to imagine the real magnitude of corruption in
TamilNadu and rest of India. If something like this
can happen in TamilNadu which is supposed to be a
better administered State, what could be the position
in other States?
Now the question is does the Bangalore one project
have the prowess to curb this type of looting of
honest citizens?
No. None of the services envisaged has anything to do
with e-governance.
At present these utility bills are being collected by
the respective organisations. In addition to that
infrastructure they are creating a new kiosk
infrastructure only to benefit the private partner.
This private partner (consortium) would go to another
State such as Maharashtra, Rajasthan, TN etc and get
another order. This is a pollution of the highest
order. Unfortunately, this pollution spreads faster
than the environmental pollution.
Role of NISG
e-governance is supposed to capture the government
processes and not the bill collection alone.
As explained here, Bangalore One does not have any
components of e-governance.
NISG, a new venture to support e-governance in the
country apparently does not know the meaning of
e-governance. I fail to understand the decision of
NISG to be part of Bangalore One. This is a pure and
cheap commercial venture in which an august body such
as the NISG has no role at all. This had demoralised
die hard e-governance lobbyists like me.
What demoralises the e-gov enthusiasts more is that
the wrong lead given by NISG may lead to a series of
wrong ventures in Karnataka and other states too.
Bangalore One is going to raise questions about the
existence of NISG!
What is e-governance?
e-governance is the process of automating the
government operations in such a manner that wherever
the government to citizen/ G to business/ G to G
interface takes place the same should be electronic
enabled. This means the citizens should be enabled to
file all their applications for licences, permits etc
online and get the orders of the Government / local
body online. Internet has to play a crucial role.
The Government offices /local body offices have to be
e-enabled to process the entire requests online.
Primacy should be given to electronic records and NOT
paper records. The citizen interface should be fully
e-governed. The government employees should commit
their transactions online. All the Tottenham based
personal registers have to give way to process driven
automation system!
In short, process automation is the key to
e-governance.
Similarly, the business houses have to get a facility
whereby their entire interaction with the Government
should go online. Today, the business community in
India has to bribe its way in all its interaction with
the Government. If one wants to register a company and
obtain a Sales Tax certificate there is a price, the
labour department has its own pricing system for every
type of transactions, the inspector of factory office
has its price, the electrical inspector has his price,
the Assistant Commissioner of Commercial Tax
department has his/her price, and the tale of owe goes
on and on.
Another of my acquaintances was explaining his recent
encounter with a lady Assistant Commissioner of
Commercial Taxes (enforcement) department in Chennai.
This lady officer believes in straight business. Her
way is to start the bribe negotiations right at the
first minute of her entering the premises of a
factory/company. She fixes her amount and places her
demand for bribe sum even before setting her eye on
any of the records of the factory / company which she
visits.
The private companies, even if they are very honest
are scarred to gain enmity of these vultures because
they can always find some technical fault. Even if
there is none, they can write a false report and
implicate a defiant company.
It is extremely painful for an honest businessman in
India to run his business. Lack of transparency which
induces corruption is the root cause. It is a
different matter that unless these businessmen carry
out their day to day activities there can be no
employment, no taxes, no income to the Government and
there can be no government worth its salt too. Yet,
the honesty of businessmen is tested on a day to day
basis all over the country by these vultures. The
system however is a darling for the unscrupulous
businessmen.
In the end, the citizen is the loser. For every such
bribe paid, the businessman has to recoup the
‘loss’ though some other way. The balancing act
results in public damage such as adulteration, under
wieghment etc.
e-governance has to put a check on these vultures. By
resorting to process driven automation system and
bringing up all the citizen/business interfaces
online, the Governments can achieve a high level of
efficiency and revenue accruals.
Had it happened in Karnataka?
There are only two places in India where process
automation takes place, viz., Tiruvarur district of
TamilNadu (1999 onwards in all Taluk offices) and in
Taluk offices of Karnataka (Bhoomi project (2001)
which does the limited operation with regard to land
record maintenance in rural Karnataka).
One needs to e-enable the citizens by hosting these
services online using internet and open source
software as medium.
Karnataka’s proposed Bangalore one nonsense has no
solution to any of the ills descried above.
Let us make an analysis of the Bangalore one.
The pluses and minuses of Bangalore one
1. it has no governance or e-governance content. It
has no software for handling the back office
operations of the government offices. It does not have
even a single service which can be called
e-governance. Payment of utility bills does not come
under governance at all. This may come under the
definition of (part of) e-commerce. It is a different
matter that Governments have no business to involve
themselves in e-commerce. It is an exclusive domain of
the private corporate.
2. it has nothing for the business community, save for
the consortium which had been identified for the
implementation of the project.
3. it is not process automation based.
4. it does not have any plan for the Government
offices. It has plans only for the window dressing
(kiosks)
5. it does not have anything for the poor who
constitute over 50% of Kannadigas.
6. it has nothing for the rural areas, which
constitute 75-80% of Karnataka.
7. it has nothing for women or SC/STs. (The rural
e-seva project which has been under implementation in
West Godawari district of Andhra Pradesh has given
primacy to women self help groups for the kiosk
operations. Though the West Godawari project had not
automated the back office operations, it had resulted
in massive empowerment of the rural women. For this
achievement, Sanjay Jaju and his team deserve all
credits. West Godawari had gradually started building
the back office automation as well, according to the
latest reports. Why Karnataka chose to ignore this
women empowerment issue?)
8. Bangalore one or any other similar project has the
retarding effect of stalling true e-governance
projects. This had already happened in AP. The e-seva
project had resulted in stalling of all other efforts
to bring in true e-governance. AP has nothing to quote
as genuine e-governance effort except the registration
department automation which was commenced before the
commencement of e-seva. The private vendors would
allow anything which has something for them. After
tasting success in one project such as the e-seva,
they look for only the ‘revenue models’ and not
something which is beneficial to the citizens/common
man. The revenue model means revenue to them. May be
it is a shared revenue.
9. According to the e-mail admission from NISG, the
NISG which manages the Bangalore one nonsense has no
plans for rural areas.
(http://www.sugame.com/umashankar)
Sabotaging political will
True e-governance requires a strong political will.
The very fact that Karnataka had reached this level
with Bangalore One shows that there is tremendous
political will for e-governance in Karnataka. The
political executive apparently is of the opinion that
they had given go ahead for e-governance. They had no
idea that they had consented to something which does
not come under the definition of e-governance! This
had been clearly explained in the foregone paragraphs.
I am deeply concerned that such a political good will
coming from Karnataka Government is being cunningly
diverted to a smoke screen project which is aimed at
benefiting only the private sector implementing
agencies/consortium. By the time the political leaders
realise this malady, precious time would have been
lost. A forward looking and potential state for
wholesale e-governance is going down in an abyss. A
potential opportunity is being wasted through this
diversion!
Who is behind this Bangalore One nonsense?
Why the advocates of Bangalore One are afraid of True
e-governance?
After achieving political will, true e-governance
venture requires careful assessment and planning. It
requires leaders. It needs the support of the
Government employees. It needs champions from among
the bureaucrats to spearhead the momentum. This list
is only illustrative.
These steps involve real leadership and efforts.
People don’t want to take pain or leadership. They
want to show results without any efforts or pain. So,
the private operators come up with this magic wand
called e-seva, a magic wand that worked ‘wonders’
in Andhra Pradesh.
But the times have changed. When Andhra’s e-seva
was introduced, India was nowhere in the e-gov field.
Now there is tremendous awareness among Indians within
India and abroad. The magic wand is going to fail this
time.
The very fact that I have written this piece shows
that the magic wand has already been failing to
impress!
Every paisa spent on Bangalore One project has to be
brought under CAG’s scanner.
Today experts in e-governance are ready to volunteer
the CAG’s team to study and analyse a deeds/misdeeds
of a government in the area of e-governance.
Let us start with Bangalore One and then with the
momentum created by it let us implement other e-gov
projects!
This was the question posed by a senior officer of
Karnataka Government when we had a telephone
discussion on this subject.
The officer wanted to know the feedback from me for
various angles. So, he acted as a devil’s advocate
and raised a few questions. This is one of them.
I answered him that Bangalore One would not create the
momentum one expects.
‘When we implement e-governance solutions we need to
put our best foot forward. We should never put the
wrong foot forward. Because the first wrong foot
forward would beget another wrong foot. For example,
the Andhra e-seva project which was a wrong foot
forward had already resulted in another wrong foot in
the form of e-procurement which is totally vendor
driven. There is no enabling factor in both these
projects. So, my opinion is that Karnataka should not
put its wrong foot forward. The proposed Bangalore One
project would not result in any empowerment. We need
the Government employees, citizens and the Government
to get empowered through any typical e-governance
effort. In the Bangalore one project, the Government
and government employees are being kept away. Only the
private vendor has his say all the way. Bangalore one
would create a severe dependency factor. Both the
Government (its employees also) and the citizens have
to be dependent on the private partners who carry out
the project. This goes against all parameters’
I also informed another angle as to why Karnataka
should not go for Bangalore one with the present
content. This is my genuine concern too. We all know
that the press is dominated by the middle class. The
middle class oriented press would look at the hype
that is being generated by Bangalore One with special
interest. The hype will be generated by the private
partners as they are getting a sizeable income out of
this project. Looking at the hype, the press would
start writing great stories about Bangalore One. The
very same private operators would assist the
preparation of documentation for prestigious awards
such as Stockholm challenge etc. The officers behind
the project would get some award because the awards
have to be given to some one, every year. After
getting such awards, the officers who are behind this
project would feel satisfied that they had achieved
some great thing (whereas their achievement is next to
nothing) and then they would never have the drive to
look at the rural areas, women empowerment, SC/ST
empowerment using e-governance and so on.
So, Bangalore One has the potential to thwart
Karnataka One, meaning Karnataka on top of every other
States in e-governance.
The so called e-governance which is actually
collection of utility bills in Bangalore city would
be restricted to the precincts of Bangalore city. The
effort would not evolve into process automation based
e-governance in Bangalore city (BMC) or in rest of the
government processes in the entire Karnataka state.
Private partner driven bogus e-governance, a threat to
India’s future
I am concerned at this lurking danger that
e-governance effort in India would be hijacked by
these private partners. The national e-governance
action plan had been approved for Rs.12,500 crores.
Everyone who wants to do business may have an eye on
this pie. The businessmen who believe in short cuts
may like to propose e-seva/Bangalore One like projects
only. This would result in total discredit to the
concept of e-governance in India.
It is my assessment that even 50 years after the
introduction of projects such as e-seva or Bangalore
One, the government offices would continue to be the
same. The vultures in the government offices (calling
themselves as Government officers) would continue to
fleece the citizens. The politicians would remain
happy because these vultures would offer a share of
the booty to the political class for their election
expenses. But the citizen would continue to be a slave
under a fully ‘e-governed’ atmosphere.
The citizen would have two sets of full fledged
governments, one run by the actual government and the
other by the vendors who have taken up the
‘e-governance’ projects. Both of them would have
equal number of employees. In the initial period of
hype, the private sector bill collection centres may
not indulge in fraud or corruption. Such a situation
would not continue for long. A time would come, not
long from now, we would hear the news that the
Directorate of Vigilance and Anti corruption had
entered XYZ seva centres and seized unaccounted money
or records.
This would be the natural result of an over grown
bureaucracy run by the private sector to administer
‘e-governance’.
The women, especially the rural women would continue
to remain deprived and oppressed. Their husbands would
happily beat them as usual despite the change in
times, from a traditionally governed nation to a fully
‘e-governed’ nation.
The Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe population would
continue to be discriminated against with no change in
the social system. They would be confined to their
slums/bastis despite the governments taking great
strides in the sphere of so called e-governance.
Oh! I am sorry for Karnataka and sorry for India.
Long live Bangalore One
Umashankar
12th March 2005
umashankarc(a)gmail.com
http://www.sugame.com/umashankar
Apologies for using the word nonsense often. I did not
find a more appropriate word than this to express my
feelings.
The inner voice:
1. There are enough number of critics to any new
initiative! Do you have a solution framework
Umashankar?
I hear this voice.
Yes I do have a solution framework.
In fact the whole write up had stemmed out from such a
solution framework.
I cannot volunteer unless the decision makers who
matter wish to change course and listen to the right
ways. I am willing to collaborate. Of course open
source will be the base line for any such initiative
or idea.
2. Open source vs. proprietary software: I have not
got into the open source Vs. proprietary source
(Microsoft) issue which is very much relevant as on
today. Because there is much more here which forced me
to analyse the basis of the project, a project which
has no foundation!
Open source, the beauty of future mankind has to wait
for its turn.
--- Venkat Kumaraswamy <ellakannada(a)yahoo.com> wrote:
> Hello Members of this forum,
>
> This is an email written by one of the IAS officers
> of INDIA from TAMILANADU CADRE.
> No member from this great forum has not even talked
> about and discussed about this. WHY ? He talks about
> e-Seva Project of AP, which is now being REPLICATED
> as BANGALORE ONE project in Karnataka State.
>
> Any one in this forum knows how much money has
> tarnsferred hands in this transaction? This has
> happenend without TENDER PROCESS. It has goine to
> the same company. How can you all expect things are
> going to get corrected in INDIA. World Bank Funds,
> UNDP Funds, USAID , USAEP funds and othe agencies
> funds is being used by GOI and State govts. in INDIA
> for some of these projects.
>
> I think we should send this email of this IAS
> officer to WORLD BANK, UNDP and other agencies so
> that they all should know what is happenning in
> INDIA. IS e-GOV really happenning in INDIA by
> reading this email ?????
>
> This forum should discuss these kind of things
> openly, so that things can get corrected.
> -----------------
> Forwarded Message:
> Subj:Re: ALTERNATIVE TECHNOLOGY - Bangalore one -
> Sucides need not be assisted by NISG Date:1/27/2005
> 7:06:28 AM Pacific Standard
>
TimeFrom:umashankarc@yahoo.comTo:ellakannada@yahoo.com,
> minister(a)mit.gov.in, mos(a)mit.gov.in,
> secretary(a)mit.gov.in, srinath(a)mit.gov.in,
> rgilani(a)mit.gov.in, dg(a)nic.in, lalitha(a)hub.nic.in,
> kashinath(a)hub.nic.in, pspillai(a)hub.nic.in,
> cm(a)karnatakacm.com, cm(a)kar.nic.in,
> cs(a)karnataka.gov.in, itsec(a)bangaloreit.com,
> devcom(a)karnataka.gov.in, vs(a)nisg.org, ceo(a)nisg.org,
> piyush.gupta(a)nisg.org, satyajit.suri(a)nisg.org,
> sandeep.paidi(a)nisg.org, binay.sharma(a)nisg.org,
> bala.srinivas(a)nisg.org, rekha(a)nisg.org,
> devajoy.choudhury(a)nisg.org, prs-fd(a)karnataka.gov.in,
> secybud-fd(a)karnataka.gov.in,
> secyexp-fd(a)karnataka.gov.in, hcom(a)vsb.kar.nic.in,
> prs-infra(a)karnataka.gov.in,
> prs-home(a)karnataka.gov.in,
>
prshigh-edu@karnataka.gov.inCC:ellakannada@yahoo.com,
> novamed(a)aol.com, India-egov(a)yahoogroups.comSent from
> the Internet (Details)
>
> 27-1-05
>
> Dear Mr.Kumaraswamy,
>
> The e-seva concept implemented by Government of AP
> is
> meant for underdeveloped states.
> It would not suit developed States such as
> Karnataka,
> TN or Kerala.
>
> The e-seva concept completely ignores two vital
> aspects viz., back office automation in the
> respective
> government offices and its non replicability in
> rural
> areas.
>
> The citizen is forced to go to the e-seva centres to
> avail the service whereas he/she can do it from home
> using his computer or any other computer.
> In the short run it may look like a great thing. But
> as it progresses one would realise that it is a step
> backward and not forward.
>
> e-seva is mostly for payment of utility bills. This
> is
> not e-governance. These items come under e-commerce.
>
>
> In Chennai you can pay your utility bills without
> movin g out from your home. All you need to do is to
> authorise your banker to make the remittances
> online.
> This is a free of cost service. The tax payers'
> money
> with the government agencies is also saved.
>
> The citizen should have a variety of options to make
> the utility payments. It should not be restricted to
> the e-seva centres. By adopting the e-seva concept
> in
> Bangalore, Karnataka is taking a step backwards as
> it
> treats its citizens illiterate who require the
> assistance of the e-seva centres. e-seva concept is
> good when the citizen is illiterate and is not in a
> position to operate computers on his/her own. I am
> sure Bangalore citizens are literate enough to
> operate
> computers.
>
> By adopting e-seva concept the Government of
> Karnataka
> is putting a huge seal on true e-gov efforts.
> Because,
> under e-seva concept, back office automation is
> given
> a go by. That means the back office work would
> continue to be under the manual method or a non
> scientific computerised method.
>
> Ideally speaking, the back office should be
> automated
> using online methodology. Each and every government
> official has to switch over to mouse and keyboard
> from
> pen and paper. After succeeding in this effort, the
> agencies have to open up their online counters to
> the
> public. This includes internet based payments.
> This would result in true transformation in the
> country.
>
> e-seva would kill such a transformation initiative.
>
> e-seva can be taken up only where user charges are
> there. Can you imagine user charges in rural
> development areas and social welfare areas?
>
> That means the so called "e-governance" would never
> reach these people in Karnataka. My colleagues would
> be happy to announce it as yet another greatest
> thing
> they have done. They may even be awarded with
> international citation!
>
> An e-governance effort without taking into account
> the
> poor section of the society can be called only anti
> human.
>
> Well, I have one more observation to make.
> Can e-seva reduce the loot that is being committed
> by
> Government officials and others in RTOs/police
> stations/PWD/HW offices/ education department/labour
> department/industries department/commercial taxes
> department?
> What about building licences!
> You can get a glaring building construction
> violation
> as long as you pay the right money to the Bangalore
> officials!
> Can they make the building construction approval
> online?
> Can they book the corrupt rats in the Bangalore
> corporation through e-seva?
> Can they issue driving licences and vehicle permits
> through e-seva centres?
>
> Let us first make the licence raj online.
> The country is under the peril of being
> disintegrated
> due to corruption in government departments?
>
> And where is the role for NISG here?
> Sucides can be done without NISG's assistance too!
>
> Regards.
>
> Umashankar
C.Umashankar IAS., (TamilNadu Cadre)
e-governance expert and Member (Special Invitee) - Working group for implementation of National e-governance action plan, Government of India, New Delhi.
Member, India e-gov group.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/India-egov/
Current assignment:
Election Observer (General) in East Champaran district - Motihari town from 7th Feb 2005 to 1st March 2005.
Tel: 06252-241035
Mob: 94316-32262
Chennai:
Ph: 91-44-52054443
94443-82827
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> > >All of you might know allready about program called PROJECT
> > >SHIKSHA which is being promoted by MS.
we all need to worry about M$'s dominance in EDUCATION
sector. M$is buying it's way into all States of INDIA. They are
signing MOU's with States to do PROJECT SHIKSHA. This is one of the
blunder done by Education Secretaries of INDIA and State Education
Secretaries. What M$ is doing is sponsoring Teachers, Professors and
Officials trip to USA and make them to attend some seminars given by
M$. Our people go for these things and they forget about the country
and it's Education system.
We need to find what M$ has played a role in awarding the OLTP project
? WAS anyone involved in this decision making and listening to the
advise of M$ ? M$ has deep rooted in Education System of INDIA. WE all
need to think of way to get out of this mess created by few people for
their greed.
I think M$ must be planning in developing application developers using
their technologies in INDIA, so that it will deny entry of OS in
INDIA. M$ is really worried about this. That is why BG of M$ is
increasing his DONATIONS in INDIA. Recently he has given funding to
MSS Foundation I think. These NGO's follow what M$ says. That is the
POWER of MONEY. IN ONE WAY M$ IS CORRUPTING our good NGO's and
Individuals. M$ can be held responsible for increasing our CORRUPTION
in our Country. WE all need to discuss this matter further in this
the M$ and it\'s AGENDA.
As far as BANGALORE ONE project, IT SHOULD BE OPENLY DEBATED AS
written by this IAS offcier. We all should support this and encourage
the IAS officer to go and challenge the ELITE people who are
recomending e-Seva to be used in BANGALORE ONE project. As all of you
know e-Seva has been slammed by CAG. In these days the e-Seva centers
are most vulnerable for,ONLINE SECURITY FRAUD. This is more
problematic by using e-Seva by GOK. I do not know how NISG is
recomending e-Seva to be REPLICATED in BANGALORE ONE project. GOD
SHOULD SAVE KARNATAKA STATE. NISG will not !!! They will go away once
the deal is made with GOK.
I think, we all need to discuss further and we should get more
opinions from the group and move forward on this. WE SHOULD FORM A
CORE COMMITTEE.
Thanks
Sincerely
V. M. Kumaraswamy
-------------------------------------------------------------------
",1]);//-->forum. We might want make a committee with in this group to look into
the M$ and it's AGENDA.
thanks
V. M. Kumaraswamy
---------------------------------
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Hello Sameer N I,
What you thought I was giving wrong information ? This is happenning all over INDIA. GOI has sold Education System to MS for their money. Because BG of MS is DONATING funds for HIV and other things. What BG of MS is doing throwing BONES at DOGS. Our Govt. BUREAUCRATS for their ME TOO ATTITUDE doing all these things by signing MOU's with MS for PROJECT SHIKSHA without even thinking of consequences. It is spreading like CANCER all over the country.
I am fighting in different fronts in Karnataka State Governament.
There is more than NAGAPUR UNIVERSITY. You should submit an application to the University and also on GNU Letterhead. This should be done by all of us.
All of you need to reab the CURRICULUM written by MS. This is a large file. I can't send it through the group. But I am going to copy the report written in outlookindia.com
Wrtten by: Sugata Srinivasaraju <sugata(a)outlookindia.com>,
Sent: Saturday, February 19, 2005 12:24 PM
Subject: microsoft story
Dear Sir,
Outlook has used just 500 words in print from this article. It could not use the rest due to space constraints. The full article would be put up on our Internet site.
Regards,
Sugata.
By Sugata Srinivasaraju
It was a primary school in Argentina. A few years ago computers had been newly installed. Prof. Kenneth Keniston of the MIT went there to understand how children were getting used to the new technology. He asked the instructor how the kids were faring? She said they were picking up things amazingly fast, but her only concern was that the software in the computer was converting little Argentines into little Americans.
It is a somewhat similar anxiety of erasure of identity that has made writers, linguists, educationists and local language computing experts raise questions about a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that the Government of Karnataka (GoK) has recently entered into with Microsoft for IT education at the primary and secondary school level.
Dubbing the MOU as the "Microsoftisation of education," the critics want the government to terminate the agreement and ensure that a more multilateral IT education is imparted, instead of allowing just one multinational corporation to "monopolize" the minds of children. In fact, renowned playwright and MLC, Chandrashekar Kambar, has raised the issue in the Upper House of the Karnataka legislature in the recently concluded session.
The MOU is part of Microsoft�s �philanthropic� effort to accelerate the spread of computer literacy among students and teachers in government schools across India exclusively through Microsoft products. Through �Project Shiksha� they intend to reach out to 3.5 million students and 80,000 teachers in the next five years. To meet this target, they have entered into an agreement with many state governments and Karnataka was the most recent signatory in November 2004.
Eminent Kannada writer and Sahitya Academy award winner, K P Poornachandra Tejasvi, who has been leading the charge against the MOU, in a letter to the government, has accused it of spending crores of rupees in the name of IT education to merely forward the business interests of Microsoft. "When responsible governments across the world are moving towards open source software, which is available free and could be evolved to suit our local needs, why should we remain at the mercy of expensive proprietary software?" He asks.
When we point out that the Microsoft proprietary software is after all coming free for Project Shiksha, he shoots back: "That is what we are made to believe, but read clause II.2 in the MOU it clearly says that the government will set up three IT Academies in �a central location� of Bangalore, Dharwad and Gulbarga and give it to Microsoft for an annual charge of Rs. One [repeat Rs one] to run for five years. They also specify that the government should provide a minimum of 1000-2000 square feet building with �electricity, running water, sewer, security and maintenance staff and phone and/or lease lines.� The government also assures that it would regularly supply students for the IT academies, which is like saying that we will supply regular customers for Microsoft. This means the government has to shell out crores of rupees of taxpayers� money to help Microsoft carry out its philanthropy."
Additional Chief Secretary and Development Commissioner Chiranjiv Singh, who has responded to Tejasvi�s letter admits that the facts of the matter have come as an "eye-opener" and he would ask the heads of the departments concerned to "examine the issue and take appropriate action."
US-based Nova Group CEO and President, V M Kumaraswamy, who has started an Internet activism group on the issue and who is currently in Bangalore to petition Chief Minister Dharam Singh and former prime minister Deve Gowda, says that if the government were spending taxpayers money to get some unique technological exposure to our children then we could have thought it was well worth it, but training in Microsoft products only would mean restricting job opportunities for these kids later.
"The correct approach is to teach children with total open source solutions so that they become marketable once out of school. If they are trained only in Microsoft products they may become less marketable or not marketable at all, judging from the present trend among business houses and governments all over the world," says Kumaraswamy.
"We are not against Microsoft products, but we are against the one vendor policy of the government. It is ethically wrong that a MNC which is fighting monopoly charges in US and European courts is allowed to monopolize government IT initiatives and that too in a very important sector like education which prepares the next generation technologists," Kumaraswamy clarifies and adds that he is contemplating a PIL in the matter very soon.
Eminent linguist at Kannada University, Prof. K V Narayana, agrees: "Project Shiksha is only advantage Microsoft. Also, I have doubts if the government is capable of creating infrastructure and the learning mileu that it has promised in the MOU. One needs to just take a look at the government schools to understand what I mean. They still do not have toilets and don't get textbooks on time. In other words there is no preparedness for the technological leap that it claims to be envisioning."
Kambar says he is also concerned about the lack of transparency in the whole affair. "They are neither ready to share the curriculum nor the source code for their products. With source code especially there are a lot of security issues involved," he says.
Nandu Pradhan, director, Public Sector and Governments, Micorsoft India dismisses these allegations: "Microsoft is a responsible global citizen. Project Shiksha was launced by Bill Gates himself when he came to India in 2002 and the idea behind it is to empower the masses. We simply want to help the common man join the knowledge economy. About 20 million US dollars has been set aside till 2007 for the project," he says.
When we ask him about the monopoly charge, Pradhan gives the analogy of a driving school. "When we go to a driving school, we may learn on one brand of vehicle and may later end up buying a different brand of vehicle. So what we are doing through Project Shiksha is we are only teaching basic skills and fuelling IT literacy. We are investing quality time and are developing a top class curriculum. We will also pay for the faculty that teaches children, besides offering licensed copies of software."
But another issue that has complicated matters for Microsoft is the Kannada Language Interface Package (LIP) that it has developed for the Windows platform. Tejasvi, Kambar and others have accused Microsoft of not caring to consult local language computing experts or linguists while developing LIP. "There are nine universities in Karnataka and one Kannada University which deals with language related issues, not one person in these institutions have been consulted," they say.
Countering the charge, Raveesh Gupta, marketing in-charge of localization at Microsoft India told Outlook that over 500 language users, including U R Ananthamurthy, were consulted. "In fact Jnanpith laureate Ananthamurthy was the keynote speaker at the launch of the Kannada package. Also, we need to understand that the package is not cast in stone, it is an ongoing process. We are open and what we have done is in no way comprehensive," he said. Microsoft shared nine names of Kannada experts that it consulted, only Ananthamurthy's name was recognizable in the list. But he has been erroneously described as a 'linguist.'
"I am really disappointed that some people are jeopardizing the destiny of our language. Also, the government is encouraging Microsoft at the cost of many local companies which have worked on Kannada software for years now. At one time there were 26 companies working on Kannada software, now there are 4 left, with the entry of Microsoft those four too will cease to exist," Tejasvi paints a grim picture.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I have more on MS, if group members wants to know more about MS and what they are doing and how they are buying their MARKET share in INDIA and other things. Just let me know.
We should do a petition to stop MS growth in all the places. MS are breaking into SCHOOLS and UNIVERSITIES. We all need to stop this. SPREAD THE WORD about MS on what they are doing.
Thanks
Venkat Kumaraswamy
Sameer N I <strike(a)proscrutiny.com> wrote:
Venkat Kumaraswamy wrote:
>
>Good thing this thread started about MS.
>
>All of you might know allready about program called PROJECT SHIKSHA which is being promoted by MS. Even MS is writing curriuculum for PRIMARY, SECONDARY and HIGH SCHOOL.
>
>GoI has sold the Education System to MNC called MS. We need to stop this also.
>
>Even some STATE Govts. in INDIA have signed MOU with MS for this PROJECT SHIKSHA.
>
>MS in the name of PHILONTHRAPHY is buying their way into EDUCAION SYSTEMS in INDIA.
>
>Even some Govt. colleges and Some Universities are offering courses only in MS products.
>
>I will post some articles related to this in my next posting.
>
>We all need to think how we can stop this MS mania !!!
>
Strange but true...
Nagpur University has M$ .Net and ASP included in their syllabus..
I am ready to fight with the university officials but then I do not have
enough authority..
An application on a plane paper and an application on gnu letterhead.
The two will definitely have substantial difference.
Any thoughts?
Regards,
Sameer.
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Thursday March 17, 4:00 AM
Left, BJP refuse to bite Patent Bill
By ENS Economic Bureau
With both BJP and the Left parties putting their foot down, the UPA
government is finding it extremely difficult to push through the Patents
(Amendment) Bill in its present form.
Desperate to convince both friends and foes, the government met both Left
Parliamentarians and the BJP leadership on Wednesday afternoon, but
appeared to have made little headway. The government's logic that it is
under international obligation, as a signatory, to enforce the bill, found
no takers in both the BJP and Left camps.
With Left MPs refusing to fall in line to allow the passage of the bill as
it has been envisaged, Commerce Minister Kamal Nath turned the BJP's help,
again unsuccessfully.
Kamal Nath called on BJP President L.K. Advani in his chambers in
Parliament on Wednesday to discuss the bill. He argued that the bill,
after all, had been initially moved by the NDA government. But Advani
insisted that the bill be sent to the Standing Committee for detailed
discussions, before moving it in Parliament.
This was as per BJP's earlier stance and the party been quite vocal about
it since Tuesday. After Wednesday's meeting, Advani told The Indian
Express, ''BJP's stand even earlier was to refer the bill to the Standing
Committee. We have always maintained that many suggestions could be dealt
with in the Standing Committee.''
The earlier bill was sent to the Standing Committee towards 2003-end and
as the 13th Lok Sabha was dissolved soon after, it never got discussed,
Advani said. The party now wants the UPA government to follow the same
route and not rush it through Parliament.
Open defiance
. Left continues to oppose provisions in Bill . BJP opposes it more for
political reasons . Patents Ordinance to lapse sans passage by next week
Advani said Nath agreed to ''consider'' the suggestion and would get back
to him after discussing it with his Cabinet colleagues.
Unlike the Left, which has consistently opposed many provisions in the
Patents Bill, the BJP has no ideological problems with it. The party has
decided to oppose the bill more for political reasons, sources said.
If the bill is not passed by next week, the Patents Ordinance issued by
the government in December will lapse, and a fresh ordinance will have to
be issued. But senior Left leaders have been quite critical and have said
they did not ''understand why the government was not inserting protection
clauses permitted under the Doha declaration.''
A senior Left leader who has been part of the negotiating team said,
''Those protection clauses can give our domestic industries some leeway to
operate, but the government would not for unspecified reasons be taking
recourse to them.''
Other Left leaders said one could understand the Trips requirement and the
obligations the country had to fulfil. But, they said, there were
provisions in the proposed Amendment Bill which came under the Trips plus
category.
Senior CPM Politburo member Prakash Karat said in its present form the
bill was unacceptable. Those Left leaders, who attended Wednesday's
UPA-Left meeting in Parliament on Patents (Amendment) Bill, said it was
''inconclusive''. The Left said till now the UPA government appeared not
to have climbed down on any of the key issues on which it held a
diametrically opposite point of view.
Atul Chitnis writes about the threat faced by the Free Software
Community ( Read Open Source = Free Software -- we are two different
parties of the same "code-sharing" community. We co-operate on all the
practical issues).
The threat is very real. Read on....
<quote>
Recently, Open Source Definition Author Bruce Perens spoke about some
of the threats facing Linux. He specifically pointed at things like
software patents, which he rightfully identified as a real danger to
any form of innovation and growth in Linux.
However, it isn't the only one. There is another one - sneakily
creeping up on the Open Source world, ready to bite - something I call
the "Corporate Eyeball Trap".
Allow me to give you some background first.
</quote>
Read full story http://comversations.com/columns/showentry/11
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A proud GNU user
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Please sign this memo and add your suggestions and points. FN
_____
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\/ -----------------------------------------------------
Writing with a difference, on issues that really make the difference.
- - - - - - - - -
http://bangalore.gnu.org.in/?VTU-FLOSS_Campaign
VTU-FLOSS Campaign
The Vice Chancellor Visvesvaraya Technological University Belgaum - 590 014
Karnataka State, India
Respected Sir,
Re: Opening wider software avenues for your students through Free
Software.
There are thousands of engineering and polytechnic colleges in India. Each
year, a few hundred thousands of graduates and diploma holders earn their
degree. They pay thousands of rupees as fees to get the best facilities. A part
of this goes to buying the softwares which they use either in college lab or
for doing their assignments at home.
For every software which India's engineering students use; there is an
alternate Free Software program available. Free Software offers freedom,
accelerated possibilities and wider vistas to our students. But in a 'talent
rich, resource poor' country like India, it is also an issue of costs. Huge
amounts of resources will be saved, and productivity gained, while deploying
Free Software. This will not only make engineering education more
cost-effective, but also more productive.
Free/Libre and Open Source Software has many other advantages such as
reliability, performance and security; building up of long-term capacity within
the state and country itself; the Free (as in freedom) philosophy; encouraging
innovations; offering alternatives to illegal copying; throwing up many
possibilities in localisation; helping students vastly by allowing them to
learn from the source code; getting access to literally thousands of tools; in
addition, of course, to lower costs.
Issues related to Free/Libre and Open Source Software (FLOSS) in education are
outlined very well at http://www.iosn.net/education/foss-education-primer/
Other than cost benefits, Free Software has other extremely pertinent
advantages. We would urge you to serious consider the following:
* No-fee licensing
* Ease of license fee management
* Better large-scale programmability
* Easier integration
* Better performance
* Development convenience
* Better support
Niranjan Rajani in a study on FLOSS in the developing world, notes, "FLOSS has
a complementary and reciprocal relationship to education. One needs an educated
section of the population to fulfil the full potential of FLOSS, and at the
same time FLOSS helps, enhances, and complements education by providing tools
to promote education."
In the case of education in computer sciences, FLOSS provides opportunities
which nothing else can, as the Finland-based researcher Rajani points out:
* Unrestricted access to the source code.
* An environment of unlimited experimentation and tinkering.
* Collaboration and interaction with a community of programmers,
coders and users around the world.
In addition to providing ready and available tools, Free Software provides
positive examples from projects around the globe. In practice, this means that
if someone in some other place has created a tool to reach a specific
educational goal, one can take it as a starting point and build on it, without
the need to "reinvent the wheel". The Dspace project and the Koha library
software, mentioned earlier, are but two simple examples of such possibilities.
As far as collaboration is concerned, Sourceforge is perhaps the biggest
collaboration project ever created, uniting tens of thousands of software
projects and hundreds of thousands of people around the world. "FLOSS itself
has been called the most collaborative human effort ever," as Rajani points
out.
In addition to the above, the inherent qualities of FLOSS make it a prime tool
for achieving local language educational software, especially for languages
which are not deemed commercially viable for proprietary software vendors. This
has the scope of offering both relevance and employment to so many of your
bright young students.
There are literally hundreds of Free Software's programs which colleges or
universities can adopt. As Vishweshwaraiah Technological University is one of
the biggest engineering-related universities in India, its time for VTU to give
the lead and move towards using Free Software. This would encourage other
Universities to follow suit. Let the VTU have the pride to be the first one to
adopt Free Software in educational curriculum, on a scale significant enough to
make a difference to the future of VTU, its many students, and India itself.
Here we submit some examples of three such alternative Free Software programs
which can be used for technical education.
* (1) Operating System: Windows v/s GNU/Linux
Because of the software tools prescribed in the colleges, and also a general
lack of awareness of Free Software options, most colleges use Microsoft Windows
based operating system. Yet, in terms of technological features, stability,
learning possibilities, the GNU/Linux is increasingly being recognised as the
best available globally. It is the best suited for any educational institution.
Students can not only use it, but also can study its source code to understand
its internal workings. Likewise, they can easily get in touch with the many
volunteers who have put together this amazing set of tools, and collaborate
internationally to created more suitable products and also hike their own
skill-sets.
But many of the colleges use or have started adopting GNU/ Linux, starting with
the server room, where it is well known for its stability and security now it
has entered our labs and desktops.
* (2) Simulation: Matlab v/s Octave
Matlab is used in communication and electronics lab. Matlab for an individual
license for use in a university (academic use) costs $500. Any college will
have to buy a minimum of 25 licenses. This means shelling out Rs.537,500.
Octave, which is a simulation software written by university professors. This
usually comes, along and as part of, the GNU/Linux Operating System. The
advantage to students is that they don't have to buy a limited student version
to use at home. They can use Octave both at lab and at home.
SciLab? is another Free Software competitor for Matlab. It uses sophisticated
algorithms to analyse data and produce aesthetic graphics.
NG-SPICE is another GPLd Circuit Simulator which is based on the University of
Berkley's Spice Version 3f5.
* (3) Office software's: MS Office v/s Open Office
Currently, we all used Microsoft Word to submit our project documents for
review and for other academic purposes. Recent technological developments now
mean that we have Open Office which is as good as Microsoft Office and has the
same, if not better, features. Microsoft Office in fact lacks some features
like PDF (Portable Document Format) support, compatibility with older versions
of Microsoft Office, lack a vector drawing application, etc. Open Office gives
you everything starting from a word processor, to presentation software to PDF
generator. It is fully compatible with Microsoft Office -- so already existing
data in those formats can be used. Don't you think it's the right time to save
money and enhance efficiency of technological education in our country?
The above are just examples. There are many such software programs from which
the students can benefit. We hope the university understands the urgency and
the need. We would be happy to give the university any information/help that is
needed. Currently, India has a wide range of volunteer GNU/Linux support
groups, a list of which can be found at http://wikiwikiweb.de/LugsList
* (4) Computer Networks Subject Teaching: Ethreal, tcpdump, NS2 etc
We use the above mentioned tools for the teaching of Computer Networks and Data
Communication subjects. There are a number of other GNU GPLed tools which can
be used in a number of other labs for teaching and learning.
* (5) Content Management Systems: Drupal, PHP-Nuke etc
For building websites and info portals for students to make online learning
possible. In the world of online forums, Free Software have a number of free
options. You could well imagine the impact that the accelerated spread of such
easily-reachable and usable tools would have, not just on the engineers of
tomorrow, but on the wider Indian society as a whole.
We thank you for your patient hearing, and urge your reputed university to take
speedy and decisive steps in this direction.
Thanking you, We remain, Yours sincerely,
http://www.financialexpress.com/fe_full_story.php?content_id=85335
<quote>
Cyber expert and Supreme Court advocate Pawan Duggal pointed out that in
the US, software itself is patentable.
So are business process methods embedded in hardware. “Not allowing
software and software embedded with hardware will cut significantly
India’s share in the patent pie,” he said.
</quote>
If software is patentable in the US, it merely means that the US is
clearly violating TRIPS and India should complain to the WTO against the
illegitimate and inane practice.
So far as the other argument goes, it is as bad as saying not enough
people are suffering from cancer, depriving hospitals, pharmaceuticals
and graveyards from revenue.
