When many haven’t come out of ‘kolaveri’, somehow I caught by this song.. Hearing again and again and again, still haven’t got bored yet.. A superb romantic melody by GV Prakash.. If the new trend of singles from the films brings out such a good songs, it is very much welcomed.. 
Mullaperiyar (or Mullai Periyaru in Tamil), a dam constructed 100 years ago and in control with Tamil Nadu ever since, caused a bigger issue than we ever imagined.
While Keralites speak as if the dam would not stand even for another year, we, Tamils, as always post our views in Tamil and get noticed by none of the onlookers, hence looks like some arrogant gang of people who always want to fight with neighbour states.
Tamil Nadu is very unlucky geographically as almost all the main rivers of it starts in the neighbouring states. Even few rivers that starts in Tamil Nadu travels a bit in Kerala and comeback to the state like this Mulla periyar river. Those who talks as if Tamil Nadu is arrogant when it comes to water disputes think about one thing. In all the disputes, we ask the fellow states to give the water which they refuse. When it comes to sharing, those who refuse to give is arrogant not the one who request them to share.
This shouts of Mullaperiyar being weak started only after Kerala built a larger reservoir in Idikki. Before that, they never raised any such concerns. Whenever we talk about the safety of the dam, the main claim by Kerala politicians is if the dam collapses, whole Kerala would be affected and more than million people’s lives are in danger.
But in the arguments of the dam being weak and it poses the danger of killing millions people are absurd when you know about the reality. Of course, the dam was built 100 years back using lime, it was strengthened at various times with tonnes of cements at later years. The specialist committee set up by the supreme court itself certified that the bank is strong enough to store the water up to 142 meters and based on it the supreme court allowed us to increase the storage level.
Also, the location of the population that were said to be affected if the dam collapse are actually above the level of the dam location. So hypothetically, even if the dam collapses when it is full (7TMC), the water would safely reach Idikki reservoir which has the capacity of 70TMC without causing any dangers to the lives of any people living around there.
Then what was the problem. It is just the cheap politics by Kerala politicians to divert their people from various issues. Keralites should understand this.
While the protests in Kerala are organised and conducted by the political parties, the protests to save the dam in Tamil Nadu are carried on by the farmers who would be affected if the state’s rights over the Mullaperiyar water has been taken away. We already have bad examples from Cauvery water dispute with Karnataka and Palaar water disputes with Andhra.
This is why we are not ready to lose our rights to the water by submitting to the cheap politics by Kerala politicians. Hope the fellow Indians in Kerala understand the fears about the dam is created in political motive and no truth in it.
This dispute is just Kerala governement’s itching to gain control over the water of Mullaperiyar so that they can play politics with it, not the safety of the people, as there is absolutely no danger in it.
It was a surprise. No hype, no promotion in India but still the hall was half full where the film ‘Machine Gun Preacher’ screened. I didn’t even know a movie with that name released till I gone to PVR and got to know that there is no ticket available for the tamil movie I wanted to go.
The only thing that drawn me toward this movie was the fact that it was directed by Marc Foster, the Kite Runner fame. So without knowing anything about the movie, we, two of my friends as well, got the ticket and settled in.
Gerrard Butler as Sam Childers
The film started in Sudan at a war field and it moved to past. When the title said it is based on the life of Sam Childers (Of course, I did not know who he was), I had a hope that it won’t turn out too bad. It didn’t. There are some shortcomings in the film, but I’ll let them be dealt by experts.
The pace of the film was perfectly set to give the feeling of the real life incidents. Gerrard butler did a wonderful job as Sam Childers bith an angry biker and as an activist. All the actors done a commandable job. I liked the guy who acted as Deng and the kid who got rescued from IRA. Both done a commendable job.
I liked the film first for the fact that it introduced me one of the greatest person, Sam Childers, an activist who works for the children in the war affected Sudan. Yes, we do know about a lot of philanthropists who work for the under privileged human beings. But still, it never cliched.
And all of them were very different. This guy Sam Childers, a former biker and convict turned preacher and activist is really a wonderful human being who would definitely inspire many to do at least what we can do. We don’t need to sell our business and the basic necessities to help the under privileged but we can try to do a bit. As they say, nothing is smaller when it comes to help others without expecting anything.
The civil war and the effect of it on the people live there, reminded me the Eelam struggle. You cannot be reminded of it whenever you see the effects of war after seeing the real videos of Channel 4.
The real Sam Childers
I hope the film gets notified and Sam Childers, the man who tries to improve the lives of citizens of a country that had no way related to him, would inspire our people who are indifferent of what happens of the people who thinks India as their native land in our neighbor country.
Well, Is that just a coincidence or Kapil Sibal really scared about me, he announced about the censorship just when I decided to start blogging.. 
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In fact, not a great week to start something like a new blog when your government talking about control the social media with the look out for ‘controversial’ and derogatory comments. I don’t have any issues with the government asking the site owners to remove the personal attacks through social media.
But the inclusiveness of the terms, ‘Derogatory’ and ‘Controversial’, got me worried. Those who argue these restrictions are for good should think about certain points they are missing out by inclusiveness. The government can say anything controversial including the comment opposing their new policy, in future. If we don’t act now, we can’t do anything when something like that happens.
These censorship is simply against the constitution of India’s one of the basic rights, Freedom of Expression.
In my view, the government simply doesn’t like the pace at which the details about the scams and idiotic policies reached to the common man. These caused the huge support to the Anna Hazare movement and the huge embarrassment to the government when they agreed to take civilian representatives to form a constitutional law.
So they want to avoid such embarrassment in future so that in future any movement can be controlled before it gets the limelight.
Another surprise thing in this issue that I noticed is the relative silence of the so-called India’s future, the youngsters, the same people who stood behind Anna when his much hyped movement against corruption was at full swing. The fun part is, half of them don’t even know that the government is thinking about such rules.
But I doubt, would many of them worry much about it even if they’ve known about it. For most Indians, the social media is the place to hang out with friends and finding new friends rather than expressing one’s views to larger audiences. If Mr.Sibal told that from here on, a guy cannot comment in a girl’s wall, the whole community would have taken the roads against this action.
What to do, those who wanted to express the views through social media are in the minority. Even in this minority people, most of them don’t have courage to speak against the government.
In my opinion, this is definitely against the basic right to express one’s views. the government don’t want any revolution like that of Egypt to happen in India thanks to the awareness created by social media. This just shows how confident they are about their governance. We are being proud of living in the largest democratic country in the world, but the dictatorial Egypt citizens had more rights.
Hope more awareness created against this proposed censorship and the basic rights would be ensured.
Well, I am not new to blogging. I already tried my hands on in my mother tongue Tamil and also had a book blog. The problem with the Tamil one is it became all serious stuffs and I always intend to post my views on most important issues. And with the other blog been completely dedicated to books, this is a first blog with the real sense of blogging.
But having a space for myself is always a wonderful feeling. I would like to share all the things I did in various platforms here. The books I’ve read, the films I’ve seen and all the things I like will have its separate space in here.
Though I’m familiar with the feeling of starting something new to blog your thoughts, I am still excited about this new thing. Hope I won’t abandon it as I did on the other things..
