It's Not Even Wrong

We at 108 Sullu World H.Q. do not know whether the eminent Kannada writer/Socialite Socialist U.R.Anantha Murthy and the man milking the cash-cow at Crime Diary Ravi Belagere are sworn enemies are not.

But, if you read this, this & this it's not too difficult to conclude that there's not much love left between them. Mr.Belagere even suggests - without naming him- that Mr.Anantha Murthy is the kind of person who would ask a partially burnt woman whether her private parts also got burnt.

Now that both of them of them are voicing their opposition against the growth of the I.T. industry/call-centers in Bangalore, suddenly Mr.Anantha Murthy starts appearing Gandhiesque to Mr.Belagere.

Mr.Anantha Murthy has written -- in our opinion -- a really dumb article about the impact of the I.T. industry/call-centers on India. Mr.Belagere loves it so much that he decides to publish it verbatim in his own column.

You can read it here.

The article is so bad, to paraphrase Wolfgang Pauli, it's not even wrong.

What is so bad, you ask?

First of all it romanticizes rural poverty in India. As per Mr.Anantha Murthy, the people who cant afford to eat anything but ragi balls twice a day, sleep in their dilapidated houses and can't even afford to buy a bicycle are not poor. Coming from cocktail sipping, globe trotting Mr.Anantha Murthy this comment is so rich in irony.

Then there is the needless yet necessary bashing of Western countries. If you are from a Western country, your expression of concern about hunger in India is just "duplicious politics". But, when Anantha Murthy does the same after attending cocktail dinners, it's "truly humane".

You have to have some stupid comment about modernity don't you think? Of course. According to Anantha Murthy one true benefit that modernity has brought to India is -- drumrolls please -- "women now don't have to die while giving birth!" Other than that, he says: "we don't have to worry about them".

Let those rural folks live in their huts, he tells us. See, how happily they are singing and dancing in groups?! Forget about them. After all, we the Sophisticated Socialists must attend a Chinese Opera programme in a five-star hotel that is introducing a new Chinese menu.


And so it goes on and on.