The Interview

Hi,
Do you notice the author also is from the south!
For people from regions that never really suffered muslim atrocities, this is typical ``hoiler than thou`` reaction.
generally by inference meaning to say ..``look there is a BAD hindu..i am not like him..i am balanced..`` etc.
sort of ``i am ok you are not`` stuff.
Just wait till you feel the heat some day.
that will be the true test of secular goodness!
jayen

post 31:-
I mostly find people from the south of india talking like this.
the south was less exposed to muslim onslaught. Though the sack of vijaynagar can be treated as the sack of a very prosperous south indian city. (Hampi was its rich capital?).
The truth is, companies dont ``fall`` due to such reasons.
individuals are sacked unfairly and ``not hired`` fairly and yet the companies prosper!
this is not a ``morals`` but a ``markets`` game.
One ranjana down, 10 will be available and ``proper`` ones!
so dont moralise here..simply because you would be off target!
There is no doubt this happens on a far wider scale in pakiland! (ofcourse you would be silent on that one wouldnt you?)..
How many paki companies ``flounder`` on that ``morla`` issue?
come on wise up baba!
The mughals ruled india THAT PRECISE WAY!
IF they floundered it was not due to morals..but due to wrong social and military policies and simply due to arrogance and ``head in sand`` business.
jayen

I think in order to get published in chowk, it had to be a Hindu girl and a Muslim boy I think.. :-))

Anyhow, it is a nice read.. First, since the girl retains her name, it implies she married into a liberal family.. Usually the girls get names like Ayesha, Safiyah etc.. (wives of old Mo).. and pushed into the purdah.. My brahmin neighbor got ``Ayesha`` and the ``purdah``.. :-))

Well.. If this happened in real life, then that company won`t survive.. Who`d lose a talented employee based on who she married. how does that matter if she married out of religion / out of caste??

Hi,
My post number 29 is a sort of ``testing of the water``.
If this gets ``edited``....``blocked``..and so on, i will have to judge chowk in different light.
It will then turn out to ``one of many`` islamic sites full of vitriol for hindus and christians..
with posts quoting heavily from the koran how despicable ``hindu baniyas are`` and so on and so forth..
Reflecting generally a closed world of mutual back scratchers glorifying their past and ``looking down`` on the rest of the world.
It is precisely this head in sand attittude that has led to the present status of the islamic world.
No questioning of anything, mere robotic glorifying of a past already 1000 years gone!
Hindus were like this when qassim arrived in Sindh!
We all know what happened.
A 1000 YEAR eclipse is for all to see and some to enjoy vicarously.

Well! Each dog has his day i guess, the hindus had theirs for a loong time in pre-history..the egyptians had it good for 4000 years before Caesar and cleopatra..

The muslims had it until the sack of Baghdad under HALAKU.
IT is down hill since then.

Will they have a renaissance? Like hindus had under dayanand saraswati, ram mohan roy, c.v.raman, vivekananda?

Questions..questions..questions..but are the muslims ready to question in the first place?

I had a muslim friend in singapoe who gave me a Koran to read.
There was a Dawa something site where i was supposed to ask questions if any.
he himself shied away from any questions on the koran saying ``we cannot interpret or question it. period``!
The dawa guys too said the same thing to my astonishment!
At one place the prophet was angry that his followers insisted on feasting ``because the jews do so`` ..(i am relying on memory here..so dont go ...) the prophet got angry with them and said ``we shall fast if they feast!``
I was quite struck how a person supposed to have been a visionary could be so ``reactionary``?
The dawa guys were silent on that one.
Also there seemed to be many instructions on how to kill all able fighting males of the adversary and how to ``divide loot``!!
Wow a religion instruction ``division of loot``?
I was taken aback to say the least.
No doubt the MANU-SMRITI has many such strange instructions..it was a wild world back then..BUT NO HINDU STICKS to it anymore. (some guys pay lip service to it for political reasons though).
But muslims? will they ever question?
As long as they arrogantly keep saying ``our beliefs are above questioning``..etc, no reform is possible, and no democracy is also possible, because the right to be question is inherent in a democratic dispensation.
jayen

Hi all,
Iam new to chowk, and most muslims on this site are going to find my writing bitter!
But NOWHERE AM I INSULTING THE RELIGION ITSELF.
IT IS THE RABID PRACTITIONERS I AM TALKING ABOUT.
to keep facts straight..
1) - Is it NOT the truth that recruitment in the gulf in key positions is always RESERVED for MUSLIMS?
How come no one is protesting? And we find a LOT of fashionable secular whining when one muslim woman (i cannot believe it otherwise. one has to CONVERT to marry a muslim) got rejected on account of religion?
I mean SECULAR guys too have to be balanced dont they?
2) - The same muslims who want secular opportunities in secular countries, still WANT SEPARATE LAWS for themselves. WHY? HAVE THEY DROPPED FROM HEAVEN?
Why are the secularist apologists SILENT here?
3) - OK so one does get recruited..
next we find him / her asking for ``prayer time off`` god knows how many times a day...
next will come DEMANDS of ``NOT waering revealing uniforms``...etc!
next will come..complaints ``about no respect for my religion``..
next will come umpteen problems out of percieved insults..
the long lists of possible ``nexts`` is enough to put off people from recruiting muslims.
4) - Muslims are known to vicious when they ``feel`` let down.
who knows when a ``let down`` employee might sabotage things anytime?
After all in well of singapore..a respectable man turned out to be the mastermind of a plan to bomb the singapore underground metro..and his reasons?
SINGAPORE FOREIGN POLICY IS ANTI MUSLIM!!!
Wow at THIS RATE. which fool would hire muslims?
Jayen

Re: # 26

Rajesh
Thanks for the knowledge worker bit. It`s a good story but I find the interview situation phony. I could be entirely wrong but I`ve never seen HR sit in on a technical interview (again I`m not an IT person). They prefer to do their bit alone.

Re: # 24
Zahra, greatly appreciate the interest and effort. If your friend attended five marriages and in three cases, the Muslim boys had to look elsewhere, it appears to bolster Rohit`s argument. The story (it is pure fiction but I believe the premise is valid) is typical of how arguments happen - based on perception (shit I saw three burkha clad women in the market today. Ten years back I would see three in the whole year. These guys are taking over the whole place man) which is often more valid than cold statistics.

SWarrier,

A banker who joins an IT company to help them design better products continues to be a knowledge worker even though he is not technical.

Soysauce, Dina - The point I wanted to make was -
1.Rohit is willing to take a stand. He is willing to imperil his project deliveries (shoot himself in the leg) rather than hire Ranjana and hate sitting next to her each day.

2.The narrating character is weak and selfish. He sees injustice done but is not willing to jeopardize his good life. This is the case of moderates everywhere - they are selfish, not secular, disinterested not dispassionate

3.The narrating character believes even institutions are communalised. He believes nothing will come out of taking on the organisation.

Addendum to my previous post by the Indian friend -

[I forgot to add a comment that I read in an article on Indian Muslims. The Muslims of India are following the pattern of US African Americans, young religious and politically active are incarcerated for various unexplainable crimes, many lured into the billion $+ BOLLYWOOD film industry having corrupt reputation and gang ties, music vidoes and rest in the countless news andcable media companies.

Few muslims who succeed in career and education either leave(Muslim Indian Expats In Gulf ,Europe and US ), or marry prominent Hindu and get high posts within political or business positions and those coming from families of wealthy landlords or Nawaab just continue taking care of their properties in a subliminal non ambitious way. But there are still some famous Indian Muslims like A.R Rahman, Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi, Wipro`s Azim Premji, Azharuddin, Sania Mirza or Javed Akhter who humbly point to their religious convictions for their successes.

There are hopes that the current boom in economy might be a blessing for all. I hope and wish the same for Indian Muslims as after all they gave up Pakistan for Bharat and deserve justifiable recognition as Indians. ]

Rajesh,

I forwarded your article to a few Indian Muslim friends. One of them responded with her perspectives. Being an active woman in her community and a working professional in the US, she has her observations that I decided to post over here. Hope you will appreciate my extra effort :)

[Thanks for the interesting read. Having spent 18 days in Nov2005 in Delhi, Lucknow, Agra and Aligarh I must say, things have changed. I was there for five weddings - two of them were between Hindu girl and Muslim boy and Muslim boy and Arab girl. Three were between like minded similar families. The interracial marraiges, believe it or not, were between grand kids of high ranking govt. officials and between upper class rich business families. I do agree somewhat with the sentiments expressed in this article though in reality this is not the case.

Having close ties with Aligarh Muslim Univ and being part of the most recent Jahangirabad Institute of technology, JIT, I can say there is definite lack of ``fire in the belly`` amongst Muslims of India due to this presumption of job bias against Muslims in the work force. I know as a student of premedical Biochemistry I was selected from 700 applicants and was amongst the 6 female students in a batch of 40 students. Out of the six females, 4 were hindus and the other were muslims besides myself who got selection through source (daughter of DIG police and ex Alig). The segregated women`s college had 90-10 ratio of Muslims and Hindus. Fee and expenses were minimal and many were on stipends and there was open selection for Muslim applicants. With all this, there were always more applicants from other faiths than Islam and yet we complain there are no opportunities for Muslims in India.

Since 1990, most of the successful graduates of AMU have moved to the UAE and the gulf countries because pay scale and standard of living is much much better. I obviously speak for the UP side but in places like Banglore and Hyderabad, its very different where Muslims are very successfully employed or own business withouit much bias. But if one generalizes the whole Muslim population, obviously the most poor and impoverished state of bihar with so many Muslims need to be added in and that distorts the whole statistics. Add in the Gujarati Muslims and some from Punjab then figures distort further in terms of economic and academic levels.

So i would say, these articles and stories are good to read and give a perspective but they do not apply toward the whole nation. Currently there is a rise amongs marraiges between Muslim girls and Hindu boys. Reason, freedom of career/life, most are non practicing themselves they care less, third want to be secular and promote harmony at the cost of family disharmony.

Thanks for forwarding the article. Read the story of the 50+ Indian lady pretty inspirational. Chowk has grown, last time I visited was probably in 2000. Lots of articles now.]

Re: # 13

That`s sho shweet.


The intent was to highlight the fact that women in agressive careers have agressive personalities - high testosterone level. They cannot get along with an average man. These women need an above average(bright), mentally stable and physically alert handsome creation of God to complement the dangerously high level of testosterone :) The average kittens won`t be able to stand that energy level. Did you get it? Ab Samajh Ayee Ya Naheen? Khabardaar Ayinda Sae Zyada Chalak Ban`nae Kee Nakam Koshish Kee!!! Your comprehension is disappointing. My remark had no reference to the PMS you have been experiencing on Chowk. I hope you feel better. You can take some herbs to help your symptoms. Best Wishes.

February 27, 2006
Op-Ed Columnist
Graduates Versus Oligarchs
By PAUL KRUGMAN

Ben Bernanke`s maiden Congressional testimony as chairman of the Federal Reserve was, everyone agrees, superb. He didn`t put a foot wrong on monetary or fiscal policy.

But Mr. Bernanke did stumble at one point. Responding to a question from Representative Barney Frank about income inequality, he declared that ``the most important factor`` in rising inequality ``is the rising skill premium, the increased return to education.``

That`s a fundamental misreading of what`s happening to American society. What we`re seeing isn`t the rise of a fairly broad class of knowledge workers. Instead, we`re seeing the rise of a narrow oligarchy: income and wealth are becoming increasingly concentrated in the hands of a small, privileged elite.

I think of Mr. Bernanke`s position, which one hears all the time, as the 80-20 fallacy. It`s the notion that the winners in our increasingly unequal society are a fairly large group — that the 20 percent or so of American workers who have the skills to take advantage of new technology and globalization are pulling away from the 80 percent who don`t have these skills.

The truth is quite different. Highly educated workers have done better than those with less education, but a college degree has hardly been a ticket to big income gains. The 2006 Economic Report of the President tells us that the real earnings of college graduates actually fell more than 5 percent between 2000 and 2004. Over the longer stretch from 1975 to 2004 the average earnings of college graduates rose, but by less than 1 percent per year.

So who are the winners from rising inequality? It`s not the top 20 percent, or even the top 10 percent. The big gains have gone to a much smaller, much richer group than that.

A new research paper by Ian Dew-Becker and Robert Gordon of Northwestern University, ``Where Did the Productivity Growth Go?,`` gives the details. Between 1972 and 2001 the wage and salary income of Americans at the 90th percentile of the income distribution rose only 34 percent, or about 1 percent per year. So being in the top 10 percent of the income distribution, like being a college graduate, wasn`t a ticket to big income gains.

But income at the 99th percentile rose 87 percent; income at the 99.9th percentile rose 181 percent; and income at the 99.99th percentile rose 497 percent. No, that`s not a misprint.

Just to give you a sense of who we`re talking about: the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center estimates that this year the 99th percentile will correspond to an income of $402,306, and the 99.9th percentile to an income of $1,672,726. The center doesn`t give a number for the 99.99th percentile, but it`s probably well over $6 million a year.

Why would someone as smart and well informed as Mr. Bernanke get the nature of growing inequality wrong? Because the fallacy he fell into tends to dominate polite discussion about income trends, not because it`s true, but because it`s comforting. The notion that it`s all about returns to education suggests that nobody is to blame for rising inequality, that it`s just a case of supply and demand at work. And it also suggests that the way to mitigate inequality is to improve our educational system — and better education is a value to which just about every politician in America pays at least lip service.

The idea that we have a rising oligarchy is much more disturbing. It suggests that the growth of inequality may have as much to do with power relations as it does with market forces. Unfortunately, that`s the real story.

Should we be worried about the increasingly oligarchic nature of American society? Yes, and not just because a rising economic tide has failed to lift most boats. Both history and modern experience tell us that highly unequal societies also tend to be highly corrupt. There`s an arrow of causation that runs from diverging income trends to Jack Abramoff and the K Street project.

And I`m with Alan Greenspan, who — surprisingly, given his libertarian roots — has repeatedly warned that growing inequality poses a threat to ``democratic society.``

It may take some time before we muster the political will to counter that threat. But the first step toward doing something about inequality is to abandon the 80-20 fallacy. It`s time to face up to the fact that rising inequality is driven by the giant income gains of a tiny elite, not the modest gains of college graduates.

i thought the story was a bit exaggerated...the only thing i could relate is that education of muslim girl...because my own mother didn`t care much of the last, i suffer feeling not equal to a man...so yeah..the point of the story is great...the way he tells it...not so great
otherwise its` ok....

This is very nicely narrated story. You have a fluid writing style that keeps the reader engaged.
There is a subtext here that i`m missing out - Rohit`s arguments indeed make sense and I too am left wondering why all this is a bad thing and, more importantly, why a small company that has to hire good employees would shoot itself in the foot over abstract sociological arguments. This part did not quite gel for me.
In sum, the parts are well wrought but the sum is wanting.

Rajesh
I don`t understand some things in this story, perhaps I`m not quite up on IT terms. What exactly is a, ``knowledge worker``? How can a ``knowledge worker`` have a non-technical mind? Is it customary for HR people to sit in on a technical interview? The same question applies to Sales , Payments what ever??
Would a Project Manager be part of a specific team? I`m assuming it`s the same Rohit who is part of the Payments team?

``what do little communities wish to preserve themselves for?``

Why indeed?