Kiran Bedi Hits the Glass Ceiling

Top cop Kiran Bedi was deftly sidelined by the UPA government for the post of Delhi’s police commissioner. Instead, Yudhbir Singh Dadwal, her junior by 2 years, has bagged the post. Here is what the Hindustan Times reports:

On a day India’s first woman President took charge, the first woman to enter the Indian Police Service over three decades ago lost in the race for the post of Delhi Police Commissioner.
Yudhbir Singh Dadwal will take over as Delhi’s next police commissioner on Thursday. Kiran Bedi, senior to Dadwal by two years, said it wasn’t just an individual loss but a loss for the Capital. In a series of interviews, Bedi lashed out at the decision and declared she would look at all her options.
"Merit has been compromised in this appointment… This decision will send out a very wrong message for women," she told a private channel, dubbing the government’s decision "unfair".
Bedi said the Prime Minister had been unfair to her. "It is complete injustice to me, and PM Manmohan Singh has let me down. I am completely disappointed with the government and the bureaucracy," she told IANS. "I am a person who has always stood up against injustice and I will continue to do so."
"Dadwal has some time with him. I am left with two years while he has four-five years. I could have finished my tenure and he could have taken over then. I don’t understand this impatience," she said. "Some people have decided to be unfair, it is as simple as that," she said. "To the best of my knowledge, I have an outstanding record and seniority. Both seniority and record have been given a go-by...I did not indulge in lobbying. I did not look for patronage or relationships," she said.
A home ministry official, however, insisted it was the government’s prerogative to make key appointments. There are judicial pronouncements holding that an officer had the right to be considered for a post, not to be appointed. "This remains the prerogative of the government on the basis of an officer’s suitability and capability," he said.
The police commissioner’s post is of the rank of the director-general of police; she holds this rank at the Bureau of Police Research and Development. Her chances were believed to have brightened after the government appointed Tejendra Khanna as Delhi’s Lt Governor this year. Bedi had worked with Khanna at Raj Niwas in his first stint as L-G; there were expectations that he would push her case. But the Centre clearly wasn’t convinced that the Magsaysay award-winner was cut out for the crucial post.
Officials said Dadwal, who is from the the 1974 batch, had the advantage of having served in key positions. He had served in New Delhi and East District, the Cabinet Secretariat, Special Branch, Operations. He was IG, Chandigarh and Arunachal Pradesh. He was Special Commissioner, Intelligence, Administration. He was awarded the President’s police medal for meritorious and distinguished service. It was under him that Chandigarh Police cracked the Beant Singh assassination case.

Magsaysay Award winner Kiran Bedi is not only a brilliant police officer, but also a well-known humanitarian. Currently the director general of Bureau of Police Research and Development, Bedi has served in a number of tough assignments ranging from Traffic Commissoner of New Delhi, Deputy Inspector General of Police in insurgency prone Mizoram, Advisor to the Lieutanent Governor of Chandigarh, Director General of Narcotics Control Bureau and also on a United Nations deputation. She is popularly referred to as Crane Bedi for towing the Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s car for a parking violation (the PM was on tour of United States then).

Bedi influenced several decisions of the Indian Police Service, particularly in the areas of control over narcotics, traffic management, and VIP security. During her stint as the Inspector General of Prisons, Tihar Jail (Delhi), she instituted a number of reforms in the management the prison, and initiated a number of measures such as detoxification programmes, yoga, vipassana meditation, and redressing of complaints by prisoners.

She established two voluntary organisations — Navajyoti (1988) and India Vision Foundation (1994) — with the objectives of improving the condition of the drug addicts and the poor people. Her efforts have won national and international recognition, and her organisations was awarded the Serge Soitiroff Memorial Award for drug abuse prevention by the UN.

With all these positive points and seniority on her side (she’ll retire in 2010), it’s a shame that the UPA government chose to let a junior officer supercede her to the post of commissioner. This comes at a time when the government is tom-tomming about their achievement in electing a woman president! Such hypocrisy!

Sources say Bedi was not made commissioner because she’s known to be a tough and radical officer. But isn’t an officer at the higher ranks supposed to be tough? All these reasons are mere cover-ups for the government’s bias against Bedi.

Reports claim Bedi has already gone on protest leave. I sincerely hope that she takes the government to court over the issue as the appointment is clearly arbitrary. It’s time that some action is take to prevent sincere people becoming victims to state excesses.

Meanwhile, I’m sure the lady has braced herself for a long battle. Go right ahead madam, we all are with you.

As an afterthought, had Bedi been made commissioner, Delhi would have been the seat of woman power — with a woman president, a foreign woman (behind the scenes) PM and a woman commissioner! What do you think?

Mumbai, honest? Gimme a break!

The Times of India reports that an international survey has found Mumbai to be the fifth most honest city in the world. Here is what the paper reports:


NEW YORK: If you were walking along and spotted a cell phone, would you pocket it or try to find its owner?
An international survey found people were more honest than expected, with Slovenians leading the pack. Reporters from the magazine Reader's Digest planted 960 "lost" cell phones in 30 public places in 32 cities around the world to test people's reactions in a cell phone honesty test.
They rang the phone as people walked past and watched to see if people would answer the phone, take the phone and attempt to call someone in the pre-programmed contacts later, or simply pocket it.
The most honest city in the survey turned out to be the smallest city in the group, Slovenia's capital Ljubljana, where 29 of 30 cell phones were returned. But bigger cities showed they also had trustworthy citizens with Canada's largest city, Toronto, coming second with 28 of 30 phones returned, followed by Seoul and Stockholm.
Hong Kong and Kuala Lumpur didn't fare so well, tying for worst performance with only 13 of the 30 "lost" phones returned in each city. Reader's Digest spokesman William Adler said while the study was not scientific, the results were interesting and indicated that people were more honest than preliminary interviews suggested.
Many people predicted in preliminary interviews that return rates would be in the single digits but the average return rate on the "lost" phones was 68%."People didn't expect a lot of good Samaritans," he said. The survey found that parents with children were keen to show the right behaviour and women were slightly more likely to return phones than men.
New York came fifth in the list, tying with Mumbai, and Manila in the Philippines, with New York advertising sales representative Catherine Borelli typifying the reason why people made such an effort to track down the owner.
Borelli, 24, said she found a BlackBerry e-mail and cell phone device in the backseat of a taxi on a recent trip so she called several contacts in the phone until she reached the owner's wife then set up a meeting place to return the device.
"I know how awful it would be lose all your contacts. If I lost my BlackBerry, I would hope someone would do the same for me," she said.
According to a 2005 National Health Interview Survey, the number of adults owning only wireless telephones continues to increase, raising concerns among pollsters regarding the validity of their phone samples in upcoming years.
The survey, conducted by the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Health Statistics, found that more than 1 out of 10 American homes did not have a landline telephone during the last six months of 2005.
Scott Keeter, director of survey research for the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, said his organisation has seen evidence of this shift since the beginning of 2001, indicating that the percentage of polls taken from those under 35 has recently decreased.

Surveys have never been known to be completely fool-proof. I'm not denying that there are a few honest people around in the city, but who has the time and guts to display this quality in the fast-paced city life?

And pray, what kind of a survey is this? Is the honesty displayed with regard to cellphones the same as honesty in other matters? Can we apply the same yardstick to all cultures?

There’s not a single day when we venture out of our houses fearing that our gold jewellery, cellphones or wallets might be stolen. The local kirana and grocery shop owners almost always charge us over and above the MRP for products. Then there are the TCs who enter train compartments looking for ‘easy prey’ and ‘settle’ issues without issuing receipts. And what about the hawkers operating in non-hawking zones? With whose blessings are they carrying out their business? And what about those students who copy during exams (as the supervisor turns a blind eye) and sail through while the more diligent ones slug it out?

And let’s not even begin to talk about all the bureaucrats and corrupt netas.

Is all this what the surveyors meant by honesty?

Honestly, this survey doesn’t work for me.

Harry is a major, so is his fortune

The Guardian has reported on the Harry Potter star's change in fortune:

Daniel Radcliffe has become a multi-millionaire. The Harry Potter star turned 18 on Monday, allowing him to access the reported £20m he has earned playing the boy wizard. Radcliffe says he has no plans to spend his cash on luxurious yachts and other extravagances.
"I don’t plan to be one of those people who, as soon as they turn 18, suddenly buy themselves a massive sports car collection or something similar," he told an Australian interviewer earlier this month. "I don’t think I’ll be particularly extravagant. The things I like buying are things that cost about £10 — books and CDs and DVDs."

So Daniel Radcliffe has crossed over into adulthood and a 'magical' fortune has fallen right into his lap. The fellow says he's going to be very careful about spending his fortune and seems sincere too. That's interesting, but I have my serious doubts. Because fame, like power, corrupts.

Coming down to his all-new look, it is a natural transition. The lean, mean, brawny look may appeal to all his female fans (and he may also become a gay icon), but his innocent, childlike looks of the past will always remain etched onto his hardcore fans' minds.

After Harry Potter, what next? He was recently seen in a play named Equus. He also claims there are other projects in the pipeline. I hope he does not go the Lindsay Lohan or the Britney Spears way. These two were successful early in their lives, and now both are enveloped by substance abuse and relationship problems.

The blog's a bit late and I'm no fan of his, but here's wishing the wonder boy a long and successful innings!