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Musings

Simple homebrew beer recipe

Preparation time 20-30 minutes
Brewing time 10-14 days

Equipment:

  1. 3 Liter mason jar with a tight screw lid/plug
  2. Airlock
  3. A grommet gasket or foodgrade plug with 7-8mm inner diameter
  4. A steel pot (at least 5 liters)
  5. A hydrometer (optional)
  6. Swing top glass bottle (6 x 500ml or 3 X 1L)
  7. Food grade siphon tube (1.5m) Preferably one with a automated pump and a steel mesh filter.

Consumables:

  1. Malt extract: 450gm
  2. Purified water (RO or bottled) 3 liters
  3. Brewing Yeast: 1 tea spoon
  4. Hops to taste (3gm to 10 gm)
  5. 1kg ice (from boiled water)
  6. Gelatin and Bentonite clay
  7. Sulfur less sugar 6 teaspoon (or brown sugar)
  8. Campden (sodium bimetasulphite)
  9. Iodine solution 5% (few drops)
  10. yeast nutrient 1/2 teaspoon

Steps 1: Prepare wort

  1. Near Boil at least 2 kg of water
  2. Add malt extract: stir it to prevent it from sticking to the bottom and caramelizing
  3. After 15 minutes of continuous boiling
  4. Take a few drop of this wort and test it with iodine solution. If it turns purple then you have unmalted starch residue and 15 more minutes of flame is needed.
  5. Add hops: Continue boiling for additional 5 minutes (more if you want bitter taste)
  6. Take the vessel out of flame and plunge it in ice bath.
  7. Chill till room temperature is achieved and then filter to make your wort.

Step 2: sanitize

  1. Use diluted campden/iodine solution to wash & soak all equipment and surfaces (at least 5 minutes of soaking of the mason jar)
  2. Rinse it with sterilized water to remove any residual taste/color of the disinfectant.
  3. You might have to use a hot nail to puncture the lid of the mason jar to insert the grommet gasket & airlock.

Step 3: kickstarting fermentation

  1. Pour wort in the mason jar, take the hydrometer reading
  2. Oxygenate (use a hand blender or manually shake vigorously)
  3. Add yeast: After ½ and hour you will see bubbles forming in the wort (if not then add some more yeast and wait)
  4. adding 1/2 teaspoon of yeast nutrient is good to give your yeast the natural boost required to finish the task.
  5. Seal the lid and attach the airlock
  6. Store it away from sunlight in a cool dark place and check periodically over next 7 days.
  7. Towards the end of fermentation you can add 1/2 a tablespoon of Bentonite clay and gelatin for clarifying your beer otherwise it might look closer to stout (it takes 24 hours for the process)

Step 4: bottling

  1. Wait till bubbling has stopped completely (usually 7-10 days depending on ambient temperature) also a thick layer of yeast has settled at the bottom
  2. Taste & take the hydrometer reading to check for any unfermented sugar (sweetness)
  3. (optional) Chill or Refrigerate your mason jar to near freezing temperature. Add some dissolved gelatin to further clarify your
  4. Sanitize the swing top glass bottles & rinse off the disinfectant.
  5. Use a siphon tube to pour your beer into the Bottle & add 1-2 teaspoon of sugar for natural carbonation
  6. Seal the cork tight and store the bottles in a cool dark place for natural carbonation
  7. Serve chilled in a glass mug. (Homebrew is never drunk from the bottle directly because of the yeast deposit at the bottom) BTW this yeast is completely edible, in the whole process you haven’t added anything toxic.

You can visit https://www.facebook.com/arishtam/shop for any help & supplies for your homebrew. Also they conduct classes every 4th Saturday of the month to help amateurs.

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Musings

Sharbati Wheat Malt

Commercial Wheat malt is often made from cracked HRSW Hard Red Spring Wheat which is another way of saying wheat fit for lifestock consumption. Indian Whiskey is often made from molasses. Hence a homebrewer seeking quality often has to rely on making their own malt. Here is a step by step guide:
Step 1: Immerse the wheat in a water bath. Any pest, infected wheat should float and should be removed.

Step 2: Overnight soaking in a strainer. The volume of wheat should also grow by 50% in the process. If you can crush the grain between your fingers then the wheat is adequately soaked.

Step 3: Put your soaked wheat in the sprouting basket. An ideal sprouting tray would have a lid to keep mold and pest away, perforated base to drain excess water and ensure a healthy air supply. To get the optimal yield you need to ensure uniform sprouting, which means in spite of bulk quantity, all grains should get uniform temperature, air and light. Try tasting the wheat, it should be soft and sweet.

Step 4: Wait till the spouts are there. You know the sprouting is complete when two germs are visible and the length of the longer germ is equal to 1/2 of the grain length (as seen in photo). Waiting too long will lead to loss in malt weight as the sprout will start feeding over the starch. Waiting too little will lead to incomplete enzyme action.

Step 5: Stopping the germination. You could do it by drying it strong sunlight, freezing the malt which leads to bursting of cells and releasing the sugars and enzyme for good action. Industrial batches can be lightly roasted to achieve the same.
Step 6: Crush the dried grain between the fingers to remove the sprouts. It contains no ferment-able sugar and most of the protein. hence removing this will greatly improve your wort efficiency.

Step 7: Say hello to grunt work. 2 Hours of roasting with enough churning to ensure uniform caramalization of sugars. If the wheat starts making cracking noise, add a little water to ensure darker caramels without risking burnt grain. I typically watch a nice bollywood movie alongside this process.

Step 8: Break your malt into three lots.
a) lightly roasted cracked wheat malt which is ideal for light beers. It also makes an excellent porridge which is healthier than the market Daliya/broken wheat.
b) Medium roasted malt great for most recipes.
c) Dark caramelized wheat malt for stout beer.
Step 9: Aerate: Apart from the malty flavor this grain will have a lot of foul smells and storing it in paper bag for 2 weeks helps reduce the unwanted odor and retain the pureness of nature.
Step 10: Crush (not grind) in a pestle mortar. Essentially reduce the size allowing efficient sugar dissolving
Step 11: When you boil it into a wort use a few drops in a refractrometer to guage when to stop. A hydrometer is cheaper but you need to cool 50ml every time you take a reading.
Happy homebrewing.
If you want to outsource all this trouble, then you can buy home made malt at Arishtam

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Musings

Classic Insults

A UK member of Parliament to Disraeli: “Sir, you will either die on the gallows or of some unspeakable disease.”
“That depends, Sir,” said Disraeli, “whether I embrace your policies or your mistress.”
 
“He had delusions of adequacy.” – Walter Kerr
 
“He is a self-made man and worships his creator.” – John Bright.
 
“He has all the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire.” – Winston Churchill
 
“He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends..” – Oscar Wilde.
 
“I am enclosing two tickets to the first night of my new play; bring a friend, if you have one.” – George Bernard Shaw to Winston Churchill.
“Cannot possibly attend first night, will attend second … if there is one.” – Winston Churchill, in response.
 
“I feel so miserable without you; it’s almost like having you here.” -Stephen Bishop.
 
“I’ve just learned about his illness. Let’s hope it’s nothing trivial.” – Irvin S. Cobb.
 
“He is not only dull himself; he is the cause of dullness in others.” – Samuel Johnson.
 
“He loves nature in spite of what it did to him.” – Forrest Tucker.
 
“Why do you sit there looking like an envelope without any address on it?” – Mark Twain.
 
“His mother should have thrown him away and kept the stork..” – Mae West.
 
“Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go.” – Oscar Wilde.
 
I am not saying I hate you, but you are literally the Monday of my life
 
I am really sorry if I hurt your feelings by calling you stupid. I really thought you already knew that.
I was hoping for a battle of wits, but you are apparently unarmed.

  • You are the kind of guy to take to the cinema when I want to watch the movie.
  • Philip of Macedon-If I win this war, you’ll be slaves forever. Sparta- “If!”
  • Mark Twain-Politicians and diapers must be changed often and for the same reason
  • A conversation between a drunk man and  the American poet, Dorothy Parker: Drunk man-I can’t bear fools. Parker- Apparently your mother could.
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Musings

silent pictures


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Musings

pros and cons of 2-row & 6-row barley:

During my homebrew experiments, I was faced with the epic question of using Indian Barley or imported barley. Using 6 row barley malt or 2 row malt etc. Here is some literature that I could dig out on the same topic.

Six-Row Pros:

  • It has more protein, less starch, and a thicker husk than two-row.
  • Six-row is less expensive per pound, and allows further cost cutting through the higher use of inexpensive adjuncts to offset the high protein levels.
  • Six row is locally available, which means lesser logistic hassle and uncertainity.
  • Higher protein levels may help speed conversion to fermentable sugars. This is important to homebrewers using high mash-in temps; more conversion would take place than otherwise.
  • Six-row has higher enzyme content for converting starch into fermentable sugars. More enzymes means it can convert adjunct starches (which lack or are deficient in enzymes) during mashing. Offset this with more (less expensive) adjunct grain use, and you know why so many large breweries use six-row.
  • Supplementing two-row malt with some six-row malt might increase extraction, conversion time, and fermentability, particularly if you have a high percentage of adjuncts.
  • Six-row yields more per acre, the true reason for its affordability.
  • Those thicker husks improve the filter bed for lautering.

Six-Row Cons:

Enzyme and protein levels are high enough that a brewer probably doesn’t want to use six-row barley exclusively in a recipe. (Adjunct grains are cheaper.) Unmalted cereals (corn and rice) are often mixed in with malt to compensate for the higher protein levels in six-row barley—up to 40 percent of six-row grist can be adjunct. New malt strains mean adding adjuncts is no longer necessary, but it’s economical and, in the case of some large breweries’ beers, traditional.

  • Six row is more susceptible to the formation of dimethyl sulfide, a process begun through protein breakdown in malting. Some DMS is acceptable in some beer styles, but too much may contribute to a cooked or sweet corn flavor.
  • Higher protein content can result in more break material during wort boiling and cooling, which can cause protein haze. Pay attention to this extra hot break for coagulation and removal.
  • Six-row husks are high in polyphenols (tannins), which can contribute to protein-polyphenol haze, and can impart an astringent taste.
  • Higher protein content often indicates less starch for conversion in malting. Six-row malting barley contains from 12-13.5 percent protein, whereas two-row has 11-13 percent. Malting doesn’t change the protein levels much.
  • High protein levels can lengthen steeping time in the malting process, which causes erratic germination, particularly if low- and high-protein barleys are mixed to meet protein limits for malt. (And I was worried about controlling what went into my malt extract…)
  • High proteins can lead to other beer quality issues like color control.
  • Syrup adjuncts and six-row: Syrups are prepared by enzymatically hydrolyzing corn starch into fermentable sugars. It’s added to wort in fermentable form, which can take the wort over acceptable enzyme and soluble protein levels if you’re using six-row barley cultivars.

Two-Row Pros:

  • Greater drought tolerance
  • You can make more beer from two-row than from six-row malt; its lower enzyme content, lower protein, greater starch content, and thinner husk make it better suited to higher extract. This is less obvious at the homebrew scale and more a concern for large breweries.
  • Arguably gives beer a mellower flavor than six-row.

Two-Row Cons:

  • The lower diastatic (enzymatic) power of two-row becomes an issue when a large proportion of unmalted adjunct grain is used.
  • Two-row tends to be more expensive per pound.
  • Big breweries generally use far more adjunct grain than they strictly need; large amounts of adjuncts tend to have little body and less maltiness.

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Musings

Economical punching bag installation: piñata style for amateurs

This post is meant for amateurs only who are operating at a shoe string budget and constraints on space.
 
Why you need a punching bag?
After a stressful day at work, who does not like a piñata to beat the crap out of. Want to clear your mind: just stick the picture of your least favorite person on a bag. This is what prompted me to install a punching bag at home and I soon realized that it’s actually a good cardio exercise and a compact practical tool as well. Cycling, treadmill and most cardio exercising machines focus on mainly leg muscles but this bag gives much needed toning to the upper torso. Also a few lessons on self-defense are like swimming, you never know when you need them but can be lifesaving when you actually use them. MMA Pads occupy the least space, if you are unsure of your fitness goals. However, you would need one dedicated person to hold the pad and coach you for the pads to be of any use. Hence a suspended bag is preferred.
 
Let’s talk business: Why you need a punching bag, How to fill your bag, how to install it, and what protective gear to use.
How to fill your bag?
The most expensive punching bags have 5 layers of concentric cylinders. The outer most will be leather (vinyl or canvas if you opt for a cheaper version) then gel/fluid to prevent knuckle bruising, followed by a layer of dense scrap fiber or high density foam/mattress filling. In the core there will be high mass sand column encased in a PVC/cardboard tube (5th and 4th layer respectively). If you are at an amateur level, most likely you will buy an empty sac and fill it yourself. Here are a few tips:

  1. Inspect the seams and buckles of the bag carefully for any damage.
  2. Make sure that the outer bag is not of cheap vinyl. It can withstand at least 6 months of brutal assault by your fists and feet.
  3. Buy a roll of duct tape and reinforce the seams from inside. This will lengthen the life and prevent dust/fiber bits spraying after repeated blows. Also patchwork from inside is much more elegant than any repair you will do from outside.
  4. Avoid sand. The inner material will invariably leak and sand only makes a mess. If you are looking for a really heavy bag, go for rice/grain instead. They are homogenous enough to pack tightly, and large enough to absorb blow, yet not leak from the seams.
  5. Always encase your heavy material inside a bag/cardboard case. Else they will breakdown into powder and settle at the base. Sand/flour settling at the base is an issue because the bag will not be homogenous and also will make you more prone to injuries when you kick the bag. If you can stack it as thin long packets, duct-taped into a tube, it will be the best.
  6. Raid your old garments, old mattress to get the filling that you are looking for. Make sure that it is sundried enough to prevent any mold infestation. You could use paper shreds also to supplement. The ratio of width of inner dense core to softer filling depends on how hard you want to train and your endurance levels. For kick-boxing you could even use low density saw dust which is ideal for beginners.
  7. Remove any plastic, metal esp. buttons from the garments before filling. Try to have uniform packing from all sides and press as much as you can before adding a new layer. Keep in mind the intended heavy bag weight that you want to achieve before you seal the bag.
  8. Take care of the zipper and seams. Try to paste a duct tape on them to prevent them from spraying dirt when you hit them.

 
How to Install:
Most websites will recommend you to install the punching bag through the ceiling. That is great if you have access to a shed where there is a beam (timber or steel) to loop through and hoist your bag. If you have a dedicated MMA (mixed martial arts) room, then you could probably remove your ceiling fan and install a punching bag instead. However, most condo/apartment dwellers don’t have such a luxury.
Also most ceiling fan hooks are 10 feet high making the boxer to invest in an expensive long chain (default ones are usually only 1 feet long and ropes are susceptible to breakage) You could buy a boxing stand and attach it to the wall, but that is expensive and is going to be a permanent fixture.
What I did was install a simple door frame pull up bar on my door. (you could use it for pull ups and exercise as well) and install the punching bag on it. It has a few advantages:

  1. The bag will be low enough to allow you to kick without the extra expense of an extension chain.
  2. You can easily remove the bar and the bag without leaving any tell tale signs of being a fitness freak.
  3. You can install it yourself without need of any drilling machine and tools.
  4. Make sure that there is enough space below your bed/behind it to stash away the bag & bar when not using it.
  5. Also the bag swings a bit more than the ceiling mount, but a bit of rope can arrest this movement.
  6. When you want to do “round horse kick,” move the bag to one side of the door frame. During punches/jumping kicks move the bag to the center.
  7. Kick-Boxing is an intensive sport that allows you to tire every muscle really rapidly. Be mindful of the door frame when you exercise. Kicking/punching wood accidently could seriously harm you.

Protective gear:
Luckily most boxing/mma gear is useful only when you go for actual combats or learn defense. Punching bag can only teach you offense and right padding on wrist is usually enough. Go for wraps (atleast 2m long and not more than 5cm wide) and boxing gloves with good amount of padding. Wraps tightens the small delicate bones in your hand to prevent carpal/arthritis/bone shards in the future. The cushion of the gloves prevent knuckle bruising and wrist damage due to impact. So one cannot compensate for the other.
Best of luck for your training and post pictures if you find the tips useful.

Categories
Musings

Yashwant sinha speaks out

At first glance I dismissed his rants as a burned out veteran trying to come back to the spotlight even if it means jeopardizing the son’s career. However on second read, some of the points he raised makes sense:
1 What is the picture of the Indian economy today? Private investment has shrunk as never before in two decades, industrial production has all but collapsed, agriculture is in distress, construction industry, a big employer of the work force, is in the doldrums, the rest of the service sector is also in the slow lane, exports have dwindled, sector after sector of the economy is in distress
2 Demonetisation has proved to be an unmitigated economic disaster.
3. A badly conceived and poorly implemented GST has played havoc with businesses and sunk many of them and countless millions have lost their jobs with hardly any new opportunities coming the way of the new entrants to the labour market.
4 For quarter after quarter, the growth rate of the economy has been declining until it reached the low of 5.7 per cent in the first quarter of the current fiscal, the lowest in three years as per the changed methodology in 2015
So, according to the old method of calculation, the growth rate of 5.7 per cent is actually 3.7 per cent or less.
5 Even SBI, the largest public sector bank of the country, has stated with unusual frankness that the slowdown is not transient or “technical”, it is here to stay and the slowdown in demand has only aggravated the situation According to the SBI chairman, the telecom sector is the latest entrant to the long list of stressed sectors.
6. The prime minister is worried. A meeting convened by the prime minister with the finance minister and his officials appears to have been postponed indefinitely. The finance minister has promised a package to revive growth. We are all waiting with bated breath for this package. It has not come so far.
7. The performance of the monsoon this year has not been flattering. This will further intensify rural distress. The farmers have received “massive” loan waivers from some state governments varying from one paise to a few rupees in some cases.
8. Forty leading companies of the country are already facing bankruptcy proceedings. Many more are likely to follow suit.
9. The SME sector is suffering from an unprecedented existential crisis.
10. The input tax credit demand under the GST is a whopping Rs 65,000 crore against a collection of Rs 95,000 crore. The government has asked the income tax department to chase those who have made large claims.
11. Cash flow problems have already arisen for many companies specially in the SME sector. But this is the style of functioning of the finance ministry now.
12 We protested against raid raj when we were in opposition. Today it has become the order of the day. Post demonetisation, the income tax department has been charged with the responsibility of investigating lakhs of cases involving the fate of millions of people. The Enforcement Directorate and the CBI also have their plates full.
13 Instilling fear in the minds of the people is the name of the new game.
14 Economies are destroyed more easily than they are built. It took almost four years of painstaking and hard work in the late nineties and early 2000 to revive a sagging economy we had inherited in 1998. Nobody has a magic wand to revive the economy overnight. Steps taken now will take their own time to produce results.
15, A revival by the time of the next Lok Sabha election appears highly unlikely. A hard landing appears inevitable.
16. Bluff and bluster is fine for the hustings, it evaporates in the face of reality.
now the climax
17. The prime minister claims that he has seen poverty from close quarters. His finance minister is working over-time to make sure that all Indians also see it from equally close quarters.

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Musings

Bane of GST compliance

An Indian mind cannot think of anything simple. It is in his culture to over-complicate trivial issues, graft manuscripts detailing out the rules, scenarios and procedures detailing out a million cases yet keep the crux of the matter unaddressed and subject to interpretation. Furthermore, appoint a bureaucrat/enforcer who will swear by this rulebook as if it is the god’s gift to mankind and an army of middlemen who will guide anybody and everybody how to circumvent this rule…. This parasitic organization was once confined to the public sector & administrative services but has now percolated to the private sector as well. Here this vicious force is thriving without any moral consciousness, though patronage of the promoters without any checks and balances and really crippling the nation.

This is what I had written three months ago and the situation has shown no signs of change. As per clear tax, a business needs to file 37 returns each year to comply with general central requirements. On top of it, based on the nature of your business, there are more filings to be filed some of which are state specific.
Additionally, there are filings for income tax, export/import, foreign exchange dealings, RoC, plethora of state, municipal & central compliance of various licenses (often having contradictory requirements). No wonder an Indian businessman is always depicted as a pot bellied bania spending his entire time at the cash register or making ledgers. Unlike his western counterparts, he does not have time to greet the customers at his shop or even understand what they want.

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Musings

RSS views on minorities

Hindu’s never accepted any reforms in its religious practices. Setting minimum marriage age, banning Sati or Dowry, widow remarriage was met with stiff resistance from various Hindu organisations and think thanks esp. Hindu Mahasabha. One of the biggest reason for the 1857 freedom struggle was attributed to British trying to Romanize Indian culture through religious reforms and hence British did not try much to enforce or pass on new religious laws from 1857 to Independence. Even today, the government has been lobbying Supreme court to not criminalize forced sex with minors brides.
RSS Guruji & its second leader M. S. Golwalkar wrote a book We-or-Our-Nationhood-Defined and I was intrigued by its 5th chapter (pg 100 to pg 109). Probably this chapter throws light on why suddenly Indian government is interested in religious reforms & women empowerment when it comes to triple talaq, and minority.

If, as is indisputably proved, Hindusthan is the land of the Hindus and is the terra firma for the Hindu nation alone to flourish upon, what is to be the fate of all those, who, today, happen to live upon the land, though not belonging to the Hindu Race, Religion and culture? This question is too very common and has its genesis in the generous impulse of so many Hindus themselves, that it deserves at least a brief answer.
At the outset we must bear in mind that so far as ‘nation’ is concerned, all those, who fall outside the five-fold limits of that idea, can have no place in the national life, unless they abandon their differences, adopt the religion, culture and language of the Nation and completely merge themselves in the National Race. So long, however, as they maintain their racial, religious and cultural differences, they cannot but be only foreigners, who may be either friendly or inimical to the Nation. In all ancient Nations i. e. all those who had a well developed National life even before the Great War, this view is adopted. Though these Nations practice religious toleration, the strangers have to acknowledge the National religion as the state Religion and in every other respect, inseparably merge in the National community.
Culturally, linguistically they must become one with the National race; they must adopt the past and entertain the aspirations for the future, of the National Race; in short, they must be ‘”Naturalized” in the country by being assimilated in the Nation wholly. Naturally, there are no foreigners in these old Nations, and no one to tax the generosity of the Nation by demanding privileges, as ‘Minority communities’ in the State. It is this sentiment which prompted the United States of America, England, France and other old Nations to refuse to apply the solution of the Minorities problem arrived at by the League of Nations, to their States. The avowed reason for their declaration, that the decision of the League was not binding upon them, was that its application might shatter the unity of their empire and create uncalled-for difficulties, by rousing the demon of separateness and variegated interests of the distinct minorities, which had been so long laid at rest. The same sentiment has been expressed in the speech of the American Representative to the League, on the occasion of discussing the advisability of applying the “Minorities” decision to all the countries in the world. He said, there are no distinctive characteristics in respect of Race, Language and Religion between the elements forming each of the peoples of that continent (America). Uniformity of language throughout the territory of each American State, complete religious tolerance combined with a completely natural assimilation of emigrants by the principal mass of population of each of the States, have produced in them natural organisations, of which the  collective unity is complete. This means that the existence of minorities, in the sense of persons with a right to the protection of the League of Nations, is impossible “. It is worth bearing well in mind how these old Nations solve their minorities’ problem.
They do not undertake to recognize any separate elements in their polity. Emigrants have to get themselves naturally assimilated in the principal mass of population, the National Race, by adopting its culture and language and sharing in its aspirations, by losing all consciousness of their separate existence, forgetting their foreign origin. If they do not do so, they live merely as outsiders, bound by all the codes and conventions of the Nation, at the sufferance of the Nation and deserving of no special protection, far less any privilege or rights. There are only two courses open to the foreign elements, either to merge themselves in the national race and adopt its culture, or to live at its mercy so long as the national race may allow them to do so and to quit the country at the sweet will of the national race.
That is the only sound view on the minorities’ problem. That is the only logical and correct solution. That alone keeps the national life healthy and undisturbed. That alone keeps the Nation safe from the danger of a cancer developing into its body politic of the creation of a state within the state. Prom this standpoint, sanctioned by the experience of shrewd old nations, the foreign races in Hindusthan must either adopt the Hindu culture and language, must learn to respect and hold in reverence Hindu religion, must entertain no idea but those of the glorification of the Hindu race and culture, i.e., of the Hindu nation and must lose their separate existence to merge in the Hindu race, or may stay in the country, wholly subordinated to the Hindu Nation, claiming nothing, deserving no privileges, far less any preferential treatment -not even citizen’s rights. There is, at least should be, no other course for them to adopt. We are an old nation; let us deal, as old nations ought to and do deal, with the foreign races, who have chosen to live in our country.
In the new states created after the war, however, such an assimilation had not been achieved, nor was there any prospect of its being achieved in the near future. All the same, this tried solution of the problem of the foreign races, should have been as a rule applied everywhere. But the League of Nations struck another note and formulated the now famous minority treaties – and laid down certain general propositions, which have been acclaimed as “the public law of the world.” (Arthur Henderson’s speech-page 24, monthly summary of the League of Nations, Jan. 1931 ) But not without many an apprehension and misgiving. The authors of the solution knew how beset it was with grave dangers, and yet they hoped that these treaties would serve as a first step, their declared object being “to secure for the minorities that measure of protection and justice, which would gradually prepare them to be merged in the national community to which they belonged.” (Sir Austin Chamberlain’s speech at the League Council on 9th Dec. 1925. quoted by Dr. Radhakumud Mukerji).
This risk, which the League ran certain states into, has been vividly expressed by Paul Fauchille in his speech at the League Council on 9-12-25. He said, “this is a solution (the minority rights solution) which perhaps is not without certain dangers; for, if equality of treatment of all the inhabitants of a country, is an element of political and social peace, the recognition of rights belonging to minorities as separate entities, by increasing their coherence and developing in them a sense of their own strength, may provoke them to separate themselves from the state of which they form a part; and in view of the right of peoples to dispose of themselves, the recognition of the rights of these minorities runs a risk of leading to the disruption of states”.
Prophetic words! How true they sound today after the recent developments in Europe, under the very nose of the League of Nations! The disastrous fate of the unfortunate Czechoslovakia (to which as promised, we now refer) proves beyond the faintest shadow of a doubt, how hollow were the League’s hopes and how justified the fears of Paul Fauchille. And yet the decision of the League on the minorities’ rights was the most equitable and just, that could be conceived of. But even this just and equitable arrangement, instead of fostering the assimilation of the minorities into the National community, only served to increase their coherence and create in them such a sense of their own strength, that it led to a total disruption of the state, the Sudeten German minority merging in Germany, the Hungarians in Hungary, in the end leaving the National Czechs to shift for themselves in the little territory left unto them.
Let us be forewarned, lest the same story repeat itself in our Country. Our modern solution of the minorities’ problem is far more dangerous. It confers untold rights not only on those who by their number and years of residence (we doubt it) may be considered according to the League as minorities, but also on all else, howsoever few or recent in their settlement-rights and privileges far in excess of the minimum advocated by the League. The natural consequences are even now felt and Hindu National life runs the risk of being shattered. Let us take heed and be prepared. We will not dilate upon this danger here, as it is outside the ambit of our work; we leave it to the reader to think for himself and read it in the developing events. We only remind him that it was not for nothing that all experienced Nations refused to adopt this decision of the League; that it is not for nothing that they refuse to recognise any elements entitled to separate treatment, that they insist on subordinating all to the general National life-religious, cultural, linguistic, political, that they lay so much stress, on the foreigners, either cutting their old associations and merging in the body of their National race in; every way, or deserving no right what-so-ever, no claim to any obligations from the National race. And having thus reminded him, we leave the reader to ponder over the Czech affair and find out for himself how; our National life is in even a much greater danger.
But enough of this. We refer, on the problem of minorities, our reader to “India and the League of Nations Minority Treaties” by Dr. Radhakumund Mukerji, M. A. Ph. D. and return to our subject. Indeed these questions arise in discussions about a “State” we are out to understand the Nationhood of Hindusthan, which done, all questions regarding the form of “State” shall be worth entrusting to the “Nation” as we find it to exist.

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Musings

Demonetization and Operation Market Garden

Operation Market garden was a complex, collaborative allied invasion in which more than 45,000 troops (mostly paratroopers & tanks) across Britain, United States, Canada, Poland & Netherlands participated in 1944. The aim was to march 95km from Netherlands to Rhine (Germany) and secure key river crossings in the path. Both Churchill and Montgomery claimed that the operation was 90% success. Yet Prince of Netherlands Bernhard claimed, “My country can never afford the luxury of another Montgomery’s success.” 16-18 thousand troops died over the 9 day offensive and another 20,000 civilians died in the famine it resulted in.
The similarities of the 50 days of mayhem during demonitisation and the planning/operations failure in Market Garden is striking. The elected officials were practically shooting from the hip. The aim, objective, policy was changing everyday with no apparent rationale. Neither the RBI, Banks, financial institutions or government had planned or coordinated. As a result, there was a lot of hardships to businesses, common men and economy in general. The only industry that boomed was the money laundering. Scores of people lined up to exchange old currency with new. Banks and financial institutions happily facilitated anyone with undisclosed income to clean his money without paying a single penny in taxes. Government launched 2 tax amnesty scheme one after another, but there were hardly any takers because the churn caused due to demonetization facilitated in layering and conversion of black into white. Today 99% of the banned currency money has been deposited, yet government seems to be still labelling this policy as a roaring success.