It is one of the saddest days for Indian democracy, the master plan of Indian Government has succeeded as the Lokpal bill has been deferred till next session. In the end, the whole nation seems to be dumbstruck with the betrayal of their leaders. I don’t know what is the purpose of the whole exercise, still the dream of strong and effective Lokpal seems to be impossible in current political mechanism. In last 48 hours, the political community has made the mockery of Indian democracy. Sadly this bill has gone back to cold storage where it has been lying for the last four decades. It is really shocking to see how shamelessly and blatantly our so called elected government completely failed to create strong Lokpal.

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With an eye on 18.5 % Muslim voters in Uttar Pradesh, the UPA government has decided to provide sub-quota of 4.5 % to minorities within the 27% quota currently reserved for the Other Backward Classes (OBC). By offering reservation to the minorities, the Congress hopes to split the MY (Muslim-Yadav) equation, the main political weapon of Mulayam Singh Yadav in Uttar Pradesh. This reservation will be applicable to the central government jobs and admission into educational institutions like IIMs and IITs. Interesting point is that, OBC Muslims were already under the 27 per cent OBC quota but they were not getting the benefit so the government fixed a minority quota.

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Bharat Ratna is the highest civilian award of our country which can be awarded for the highest degrees of national service. According to the recent amendment, Bharat Ratna can now be awarded in recognition of exceptional service/performance of the highest order in any field of human endeavour. The Government of India has modified the criteria to allow sportspersons and film stars. Now Sachin’s fans are demanding Bharat Ratna for him. He has already been honoured with the Padma Vibhushan award, India’s second highest civilian award, and the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna award for his achievements in Cricket. Whatever he has done on the cricket field, has no social relevance. He has been a professional cricketer. He performed on the ground and was well paid in the form of match fees and lucrative advertisements. Giving Bharat Ratna to Tendulkars and Khans who have no social relevance is making a mockery of the award and an act of degrading the prestige of the award.

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The year 2011 has been an eventful one, full of surprises, not only for India but for the whole world. On international front, we will always remember this year for Arab uprising, death of Osama Bin Laden, Gadhafi etc. From Indian viewpoint, Anna Hazare was biggest newsmaker of the year. Anti-corruption movement in India, under the leadership of Anna Hazare got huge response from millions of Indians. Thousands took to the streets in support, waving the tricolour and the now famous ‘I am Anna’ caps and T-shirts. It’s only due to this movement, Indian Government is about to take a huge step forward towards a historic new anti-corruption law. Anyway, let’s revisit 2011 photos.

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We will see the explanation behind Indian Rupee falling against American Dollar. Let us suppose that there are only two international traders between India and the United States. Mr. Bharat in Mumbai, India who supplies Diamonds to a store in Washington. Mr. Obama in Chicago who supplies computer parts in Noida. Now assume dollar price today is 50 rupees. Today Bharat sold 10 Diamond sets to Washington store, cost of each piece was 1000 dollars. Total selling amount = 10,000 dollars. Now Bharat wants to convert 10,000 dollars to Rupees. If rate is 50 rupees to 1 US dollar. After conversion Bharat should get 5 Lakh rupees.

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Most of the popular social networks like Facebook, Twitter, Google plus, Orkut etc. have already self-regulating mechanism in place and they take action whenever any offensive or illegal material is brought to their notice. For instance, in facebook, you can report abuse by selecting the “Report” link located near photos, videos, notes or other content you find offensive or inappropriate. From there, you can choose from a set of categories to classify the content. These categories change depending on what type of content you’re reporting, but they let you know what we consider abusive and help our user operations team process reports even faster. So, I don’t think there is any need to interfere and censor social sites.

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Last week, rediff.com, India’s one of the oldest web portals, published an interview of Syed Abdul Rehman Geelani. This man was accused of being the mastermind of the attack on Indian parliament. He was charged under POTA and he spent around 2 years in jail. He was later acquitted by the Supreme Court. On the 10th anniversary of the attack on Indian Parliament, Vicky Nanjappa (Rediff’s reporter) talked to Geelani about the whole incident and his trial. Rediff published this interview with the title ‘Kashmir will BURN if Afzal Guru is hanged’. From this title, any person will get an impression that Geelani is saying this statment and indirectly opposing the Supreme Court’s judgement on Afzal Guru.

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This years we have 57 new companies in the Fortune India 500 list. The list reflects the strong demand/supply and fast-growing Indian market. There are eight Indian companies which are included in the Fortune Global 500 List of 2011. Indian Oil Corporation Limited is the biggest with annual revenue of Rs 3,23,113.12 crore, followed by Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries with a revenue of Rs 2,72,923.36 crore. These two are followed by Bharat Petroleum (Rs 1,56,580.12 crore) at the third and State Bank of India (Rs 1,47,843.92 crore) at the fourth place. Other companies in the list are Hindustan Petroleum (5th rank), Tata Motors (6th), Oil & Natural Gas Corp (7th), Tata Steel (8th), Hindalco Industries (9th) and Coal India (10th).

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Ten years ago, the vanguard of Indian democracy, the Parliament was attacked by Lashkar-e-Toiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed terrorists. The attack led to the death of innocent Indians. It unprecedentedly increased tensions between India and Pakistan at the Kashmir border. Afzal Guru, a Kashmiri was convicted of this attack and was sentenced to death by the Supreme Court of India in 2004.  The police case was based on evidence that the individuals who participated on the terrorist attack on Indian Parliament on 13 December 2001 had been in contact with Afzal in Srinagar just prior to the operation, and on an apparent confession made by the accused. The sentence was scheduled to be carried out on 20 October 2006.

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As we are going to enter a new year, 2012, let’s look back at some of the top films relased in last one year. 2011 was definitely a great year for Hindi movies. Bodyguard was the most successful movie of the year. It became the highest opening day grosser as well as the biggest grosser ever for a single day. It was also the third straight 100 crore-plus film for Salman Khan and Kareena Kapoor. With movies like Bodyguard and Ready, Salman Khan has established himself as one of the most successful actors of Hindi cinema in 2011.

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