Of Kharab or Neel Rupees Economies

It is heartening to see more media and public attention towards the national economy growing to a certain trillion-dollar economy by a certain year. It is one of the positive discourses competing with too many gloomy discourses pulling the country and us backwards. If we pay more attention to the discourse and do things to ease the passage, at some time in future, other national economies will count their economic worth in Kharab or Neel of rupees.

Niraj Kumar Jha

FOMO!

It is not fear of missing out, it is a general tendency not to miss. One is always driven to do something if other people are doing that thing. And, this happens often for absurd reasons or no reason. Advertising and marketing agencies capitalise on such tendencies. The challenge for education is to make people see things in the light of objective utility. Does a thing or happening suit the person and their community in some balance or not? Or, are you helping with something? One must be trained to see things in this light.

 
Niraj Kumar Jha

Justice

Justice is the most human construction. Here, human beings disagree with both their internal beings and externalities. 

Niraj Kumar Jha

Mobile Egalitarianism

Mobiles (handheld unfixed telephony and computing devices) are the most revolutionary things to happen, more revolutionary than any revolutionary phenomenon except rationalism which gets us into science and technology. My reference to revolution here is about egalitarianism.

First, mobile is ubiquitous, thanks to the market economy. More people possess mobile than anything else except some items of clothing. Secondly, mobiles hold eyeballs for more time than anything else if they are not under compulsion to watch something else. Thirdly, mobiles provide people many platforms and mechanisms for doing things from anywhere. The point is that things come to people, people do not go to things. It is a well which appears before the thirsty. A person becomes the centre. Lastly, mobiles cut every phenomenon to the size of their screens. They deprive any spectacle of its mojo and thus make a major tool of inegalitarian ordering far less effective.

Niraj Kumar Jha

सभ्यता

सभ्यता सभ्य जीवन का स्थूल रूप है। सामान्य संपन्नता, स्वच्छता, स्वास्थ्य, सुरक्षा, सुगमता, कलामयता, सौंदर्यबोध, तथा व्यवहार में विनम्रता सभ्य जीवन के महत्वपूर्ण अवयव हैं। यह नागरिकता की उन्नत स्थिति है, जो किसी देश के लिए अभीष्ट स्थिति है। इस स्थिति को प्राप्त या लगभग इस स्थिति के देश विकसित देश होते हैं।

विकसित स्थिति मूलतः सामाजिक मानस की स्थिति है। यह मानसिक स्थिति ज्ञान-विज्ञान की गवेषणा की सामान्य प्रवृत्ति है। भौतिक विकास इस मानस का प्रगटन है। वैसे, कोई भी समुदाय ज्ञान से रहित नहीं होता है, लेकिन अविकसित स्थिति में ज्ञान का उद्देश्य आत्म-संरक्षण अथवा स्व अथवा समूह वर्चस्व को प्राप्त करना होता है, वहीं विकसित स्थिति में ज्ञान का उद्देश्य उत्कृष्टता और तादात्म्य होता है।

उक्त कथन अत्यंत साधारण प्रकृति का प्रतीत होता है। 

नीरज कुमार झा

पूँजीवाद का मूल

पूँजीवाद का मूल निष्काम कर्म है। तथ्य से अवगत होने के लिए मैक्स वेबर का प्रतिरोधी नैतिकता पर प्रबंध पढ़ा जाना चाहिए। समाज विज्ञान और इतिहास की समझ रखने वाले इस तथ्य से परिचित हैं।

 
नीरज कुमार झा

Ideology and Knowledge

Ideology and knowledge overlap, and they mostly go undifferentiated. Academia tasked to preserve and disseminate knowledge falls into the ideological trap (of one in fashion) of a time and often lags behind social progress and may also hinder social progress.

Niraj Kumar Jha

The Western Ideological Trap

Though tattered, early-twentieth-century European-originated ideologies continue to trap academic imagination in our country, and more ironically, any of these ideologies cuts across desi ideological divides. For example, European leftism informs both our left and right consciousness. People here hardly realise that these ideologies in secular cover were mechanisms for their respective ethnic chauvinism or supremacy as per their cultural values. We fail to differentiate between the purpose and method parts of their design. The sciences of learning and doing, rather than what they were doing, are relevant to us, and that too to an extent. This great lacuna of not differentiating between those two is hindering the realisation of our worth.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Authoritarianism Limit

Authoritarianism can secure high growth as it can mobilise everyone and everything by force, but when the very growth makes people rise, the rise threatens the exalted position of the ruling people. The people at the helm then get wary of both people and growth. The economy gets off track. This may be happening in China at the one end of the spectrum of this phenomenon. 

The democratic way of development is based on the centrality of a person. The system lets everyone do whatever worthwhile they can, and the Commonwealth is on the path of ever-going and sustainable development.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Education Abroad

The government and charities must encourage and facilitate more and more students to study abroad. They can give financial incentives to students to study where normally they would not go, and, thus cover almost all countries of the world. The embassies must secure and assist as many students as they can to study where they are located. Such returning students would create a pool of people having global experiences and connections. It will strengthen India's reach and business in every nook and cranny of the world. If they do not return and settle there, they would become part of the global Indian diaspora bringing handsome dividends for the homeland both in terms of influence and wealth. This is vital for India to become a power commensurate to its deserving position in the world as the largest democracy and civilization state. Money spent on such a project would be a very beneficial investment.

At the same time, India must have global institutions of learning where students from all over the world would come to study. India must incentivise students from those countries to come to India from where they would not come normally or cannot afford to come. One must realise that educational institutions play a very significant role in the influence, power and wealth which the Western world commands. And, now China is trying to replicate the story.

Every concerned citizen, a citizen must be so, must realise that if we want to have an edge over our global rivals we must have to struggle everywhere on the planet. It is our responsibility too to make the world a better place by spreading the idea of essential Indianness.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Talking the Basics

If one tends to categorise their acts as good and bad and feels good and bad about them respectively, it means that the person's innate humanity is stronger than their innate bestiality. Such people qualify as being good human beings.

Being human requires one to be proactive for good. It is in the interest of the good people to promote good. Goodness around helps a good person and evil dominating strengthens bad people.

Promoting good is also an obligation for good people. If good prevails to our good, to whatever extent, it is simply because some good people have made extraordinary efforts for these goods. And, for the good things we have, we owe to others doing good on our part. Ordinarily, ignorance and devilry have greater force over human minds and actions and empower bad people. Human progress is an outcome of the conscious thoughts and actions of sensible people or good human beings.

NIraj Kumar Jha

The Rationale of Beliefs

Believing is an act, though most people are unaware of it being an act, which by definition is not an act of reason. It means that we see something which is not there for seeing with open eyes without their constructed representations.

Beliefs, whatever we can only imagine existing, stand for us against nothingness. Nothingness is a corollary of things and also inheres everything. If not defied, it is meaning-consuming and life-destroying.

People cannot avoid believing, but if they believe by visualising its rationale, as I have done in this post, they can help mitigate the evil effects of unconscious acts of believing and augment their good effects.

Niraj Kumar Jha

The National Mood

The mood is unmistakable. Cultural pride can no longer be hostage to history and material prosperity to the ideological preferences of the indoctrinated intelligentsia. People endorse national and cultural assertiveness. A civilization-state is reclaiming its glory and worth rather unapologetically this time. The unity and conviction, though invisible and unarticulated, are palpable.

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Theory of Arrogance

 Theoretical knowledge, bereft of practical experiences, makes a knower arrogant. They pride themselves on their privileged forays into the world of purified knowledge. It is the practical experience of life which brings humility to a  conscious knower, and makes them see truism. Theoretical scholars remain childish in their persuasions though their audiences remain oblivious of their (non/ill)effects as they are also enamoured of academic ritualism. The audience too prides themselves on hearing those pious indecipherables. 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Democracy's Propensity for Common Good

Democracy brings in some maturity in the citizens on its own. It works to its fullest in a libertarian order but even in discrepant settings, it works for the general interest if collectivism, whether primal or ideological*, remains below a threshold. With some magical effect of democracy, people in their mandate apart from seeing their immediate interests do endorse some general good. Democracy's propensity for the common good is unmissable.

 
* Primal collectivism exists in unevolved communities cut off geographically and economically from the global mainstream. Ideological collectivism grips backward societies, which lag due to historical reasons from their global peers.

 
Niraj Kumar Jha

Let the Arguments Win

Everyone thinks that they are wise and suspects most others being idiots. The relevant fact is that we all suffer idiocies. Each, therefore, must contest others' ideas respectfully and find out the true worth of ideas no matter who holds them. Everyone fears appearing dumb but ironically does not bother their sufferings caused by the prevalence of idiotic ways. People must cultivate the art of arguing with such finesse that nobody looks losing or winning an argument. We must always remember that we are not arguing against each other but for the collective good. Let the good arguments win.

Niraj Kumar Jha

विश्वतंत्र

विश्व तंत्र में यह युगांतकारी संक्रमण का दौर है। पिछली सदियों के शक्तिशाली राजनीतिक निकायों का पराभव और नवीन शक्तियों का उद्भव हो रहा है। इससे दुनिया के भूराजनीतिक समीकरण बदल रहे हैं। चूँकि दुनिया के राजनीतिक कार्यवाह इस असामान्य परिस्थिति से अवगत हैं, वे अपनी स्थिति को संभालने या सुधारने में लगे हैं। जिन कारकों को वे दृष्टिगत कर रहे हैं, उनमें नवीन प्रौद्योगोकियों के दूरगामी प्रभाव अज्ञात हैं। एक स्थायी नए विश्व तंत्र की संरचना अभी बनने के दौर में है और इसका अंतिम स्वरूप आने में समय लगेगा।

 
इन बनते समीकरणों में भारत की स्थिति पूर्व की तुलना में काफी सुदृढ़ है। इस संदर्भ में सामान्य नागरिकों को दुनिया के घटनाक्रमों को समझने और उनपर चर्चा करने की जरूरत है। जनतान्त्रिक देशों की राजनीतिक संस्कृति में नागरिकों की भिज्ञता और चेतना की भूमिका निर्णायक होती है, जो राजनीतिक कार्यवाहों के क्रिया-कलापों की दशा और दिशा को निर्धारित करती है। यदि नागरिकों का राजनीतिक ज्ञान और सरोकार उच्चस्तरीय होगा तो अवश्य ही भारत अग्रणी देशों में अपना स्थान और ऊँचा कर पाएगा और सामान्य नागरिकों की स्थिति भी और अच्छी हो सकेगी।

 
नीरज कुमार झा

Power Redefined

For a long time, as I know, people have seen power as the prevailing will in any demographic setting. Tragically, the definition determines practices. I propose a new definition. Power is the ability to work for a worthwhile purpose in the best possible way. This is how great organisations work today and empower everyone to whom they relate. 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

सभ्यताओं का संघर्ष और विश्वविद्यालय

औपनिवेशिक शिक्षाप्रणाली का लक्ष्य स्पष्ट था। सीमित लोगों को सीमित बौद्धिक कौशल प्रदान कर औपनिवेशिक शासन हेतु निष्ठावान कार्मिक प्राप्त किए जाएँ  और उनको तथा उनके द्वारा अन्य लोगों को मानसिक  दास बनाया जाए। इस योजना के  परिणामस्वरूप लोगों ने आधिपत्य के कुचक्र को उद्धार के यंत्र के रूप में देखा। 

विउपनिवेशीकरण के पश्चात उपनिवेशों के लिए  पूर्व में संघर्ष और युद्धरत देशों में सामूहिक समझ विकसित हुई कि  ऐसी अंतरराष्ट्रीय प्रणाली निर्मित और संचालित की  जाए जो स्वचालित रूप से उन देशों की प्रभुता और लाभों को निरंतर रख सके। 

इस व्यवस्था का एक प्रमुख तंत्र पाश्चात्य जगत के शिक्षण संस्थान हैं। ये वही काम वैश्विक स्तर पर आपसी सहयोग से  कर रहे हैं जो उनके शिक्षण संस्थान औपनिवेशिक दौर  में कर रहे थे। 

उनका इंद्रजाल ऐसा है कि वे ज्ञानमीमांसा के स्वामी बने हुए हैं और शेष को ज्ञानकर्मी बनाए रखा है। उनके लिए ज्ञान शक्ति है, शेष के लिए शक्ति ज्ञान है। वे पूरे विश्व की शक्तियों को वैधता इस आधार पर प्रदान करते हैं कि वे  उनके द्वारा सृजित योजनाओं के कार्यवाह हैं। उनके द्वारा शेष जन के लिए मेधा का प्रयोग वर्जित रखा गया है। 

यहाँ इस वक्तव्य, जिसमें  सामान्यीकरण अनुपात से अधिक है,  का उद्देश्य पाश्चात्य शिक्षण व्यवस्था का विरोध करना नहीं है, वरन उनसे संदर्भित तथ्य को सीखने की आवश्यकता को रेखांकित करना है। हम अवश्य विश्वबंधुत्व के लिए पूरी निष्ठा के साथ प्रयास करें लेकिन जो घात लगए बैठे हैं, उनसे अपना  बचाव भी करें।  यहाँ यह समझना आवश्यक है, जैसा कि मैंने कृत्रिम बुद्धि के बढ़ती क्षमता के संदर्भ में लिखा है,  कि दुनिया में सभ्यताओं के अविराम संघर्ष में भी विश्वविद्यालयों की भूमिका रणनीतिक है। कहीं भी भवनों को खड़ा देना, ऐसी ही लोगों को इकट्ठा कर देना, और एक-दो मनभावन वाक्यों को उसका ध्येय निरूपित कर देने में कोई गंभीर उद्देश्य परिलक्षित कर पाना दुष्कर होता है। 

नीरज कुमार झा 

Political Epistemology

Generally, God-fearing, law-abiding, and moralistic commoners are at the receiving end of political-economic activism and redressals. There are smarter folks who beat the system without violating the laws and there are people who defeat the system without a care for anything. Making the arrangement favourable to the gentle citizens is the real challenge. Minimalism and the minimum with maximum accountability are the ways to the objective. Ironically, everyone sees the redemption of their beings in maximum collectivism. People need to see the political epistemology and practice with clear eyes.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Digital Civicism

Social media is ubiquitous and engages more people for more time and yet it does not have the character of mass media, though it carries all the contents of mass media. It is either curated or customised by the interplay of participants (Here, a user is not only a user but a participant.) and AI. Only a viral piece has the effect of earlier mass media communications and it is only occasional, not regular.

 
It has pros and cons, but it makes it necessary for the commoners to remain connected with family, friends, and colleagues and share pieces of information relevant to the targeted people. At the same time, it is also advisable not to share any piece of information not relevant to a person or a group.

 
Sharing any idea must have a positive purpose. People are already stressed by the deluge of irrelevant but emotionally burdensome pieces of information. One must be circumspect in this respect. I think it is a vital digital civicism.

Niraj Kumar Jha

ज्ञान शक्ति और विश्वविद्यालय

पुरानी समझ है कि ज्ञान शक्ति है। आज के दौर का सबसे बड़ा सच यह है कि ज्ञान की शक्ति अत्यधिक बढ़ चुकी है और बढ़ रही है। पहले अधिकतर तकनीकें और उपकरण मांसपेशियों के बल को बढ़ाते थे अथवा उसका अधिक शक्तिशाली विकल्प देते थे । अब नई तकनीकें बौद्धिक क्षमता को बढ़ाते हैं और उत्तरोत्तर उसका शक्तिशाली विकल्प दे रहे हैं। अंततोगत्वा कोई भी प्रौद्योगिकी और उपकरण आमतौर पर आमजन को सशक्त बनाते हैं लेकिन इसके इस स्थिति तक इसे पहुँचने में एक अंतराल होता है। लोकहित के दृष्टिकोण से यह अवधि विपत्ति का कारण हो सकता है और सजगता की मांग करता है। इस संदर्भ में कृत्रिम बुद्धि को लेकर आम जागरूकता और सजगता की आवश्यकता आज का सर्वाधिक संवेदनशील मुद्दा है।

इस उद्देश्य से भारत में विश्वविद्यालयों की भूमिका को गंभीरता और प्रासंगिकता से युक्त करना होगा। आज की चुनौतियों का समाना करने के लिए ज्ञान संसाधन की आवश्यकता आधारभूत है। इसके उत्पादन हेतु विश्वविद्यालय सहज कार्यशाला हो सकते हैं। विशुद्ध शोधसंस्थानों अथवा प्रयोगशालाओं की तुलना में विश्वविद्यालय की विशिष्टता इसका समाज से सृजनात्मक जुड़ाव है।

इस परिदृश्य में नवीन शिक्षा नीति विश्वविद्यालयों की स्वायत्तता पर जोर देती है लेकिन लोकहित रक्षण और राष्ट्रशक्ति के विस्तार हेतु इस व्यवस्था में सतत परिमार्जन की आवश्यकता होगी। आज कृत्रिम प्रौद्योगिकी और पर्यवावरण क्षरण की चुनौतियों के बीच विश्वविद्यालयों की भूमिका रणनीतिक है और इसकी प्रभावी भूमिका का विकल्प नहीं है।

नीरज कुमार झा

उम्मीदें

चेहरे पे गर्द जमी है, लंबे सफर की कहानी ना पूछो
रौनक भी है, उम्मीदें सफर नहीं  जो खतम हो जाए

नीरज कुमार झा 
 

An Observation

Every person views a particularity differently. For a person, their viewing of a phenomenon has a unique effect. The sameness of the narrative of a particular viewed object is either an imposition, an agreement or a limitation of expressive skills/inclinations on the part of the people.  

Niraj Kumar Jha 

 AI exposes yet another old malpractice: deepfaking. 

NKJ

नकल

नाटक और दुनिया का प्रभाव उभयपक्षी है। नकल एकतरफा नहीं है। पटकथा लेखन और उसके मंचन में अत्यधिक सावधानी की आवश्यकता रहती है।

नीरज कुमार झा

संस्कृति सूत्र

सोच से दुनिया बनी
रहने से बना घर
चलने से रास्ते बने
जीने से बना जीवन
प्रयास समझ हो
समझ प्रयास हो
संस्कृति-श्रेष्ठता का 
और क्या सूत्र है

नीरज कुमार झा

The Predicament

Only pure selfishness and philanthropy work for the common good. By pure selfishness, I mean knowing and doing what is good for one's personal interest. An enlightened person knows that his personal interests are utterly dependent on the public good. If most people seek their personal good at the cost of the public good, nobody can be sure and secure of anything. And, life for everyone gets troublesome. Tragically, this happens in many political communities. This is the poverty of collective knowledge. Careful people must be conscious of and proactive towards knowledge. The suffering communities fail to grasp, and that is the cause of their suffering, that knowledge is about know-how for improving life. They instead think that knowing itself has some magical power for accomplishing things. They also believe that all people in individual capacities are flawed entities. People can be good only collectively. This collectivisation places some of them in superior positions vis-a-vis the rest. The crux of their faulty visioning is thus twofold: they believe and behave likewise that abstractions are superior to experiences at any time and collectives are superior to individuals. These misconceptions mutate naturally to working fundamentalism and they fanatically dismiss individual experiences and persons and taboo both their self-interests and their charitable instincts. This only leaves the vast majority at the mercy of a few and life becomes nasty, but the suffering people never realise the cause behind their predicament.

Niraj Kumar Jha

National Interest

National interest is the pivot on which everyone's personal interests rest. For a couple of decades, a large number of Indians have emerged out of abysmal poverty, and the middle class has managed to lead a comfortable life. This is a recent development after almost a millennium of dehumanised life for Indian commoners. India's fabled precolonial wealth was limited to a minuscule number of households. The current somehow livable life for the middle strata and hope for the impoverished folks come from what is now an out-of-currency acronym, LPG, and the demographic dividend that India is reaping now. The matters of concern, which nobody seems to be bothered about, are that LPG is on the back burner and demographics now may be headed downwards. This is the time for concerted efforts for maximal liberalisation of business processes, sweeping privatisations, and systematic facilitations. For working out these critical tasks, the professionalization of administration is a need of the highest order. Preliberalisation queues for rationed sugar and wheat, and beggars sitting and roaming around every pavement and street corner may not be a distant reality again.

NIraj Kumar Jha

Republic v. Monarchy

A monarchy and a republic are contradictory systems, and a polity may progress from a monarchy to a republic. There is nothing like an intermediate model intervening between the two, yet it is a long passage. The critical element lengthening or stretching the passage endlessly is the people. They also have to transition from passive subjecthood to proactive citizenship. The challenge is subjecthood persisting despite the formal order having transitioned from authoritarianism to democracy. The lag is caused by the very nature of the subjection, which permeates the genetic coding, psyche and culture of the people who have endured subjection for a prolonged period.

People who are chanced to have acquired citizenship spirit, need to use the formal mechanisms to the full and discover and devise means further to transform republican formalism to substantive republicanism. In this respect, the most consequential activism is in the domain of knowledge. It is proper knowledge, which alone guides public agency to the public good.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Thirdworldism

The third world, as it is (not gone) and whatever it is, corresponds to an ideology too, and that is Thirdwordism. Roughly, the first world is about individualism, the second is about collectivism, and the third is about confusion. It poses solutions as problems and celebrates self-defeatism as deliverance. Its intellectual elites successfully justify their vocational compensations for being the architects of the redemptive projects, which offer only mirages to the suffering citizens.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Logrithm of Democracy

Democracy is humankind's becoming, though it has yet to cover the whole of the kind. And, where people conduct themselves democratically, it needs substantialization. More concerning is the massive gap between human advancements, particularly in technologies, and democratic institutions, which remain vintage.

American Constitution began when horses offered the fastest means of travel and homing pigeons means of communication. The British evolution to democracy earlier remains, as it was, socially organic even to date. In other domains, even in the field of public administration, things have changed fundamentally. Business corporations have changed beyond recognition.

Democracy needs to be reimagined and redesigned. One of the greatest challenges of democracy is that it tends to demerit merit and prioritise opinions over expertise. The advanced democracies, therefore, disregard the democratisation of international agencies.

Niraj Kumar Jha

अयोध्या

 हम  माता सीता और प्रभु राम की सनातन प्रजा हैं। अयोध्या नगरी प्रभु की राजधानी है। श्रीराम अपनी जन्मस्थली पर  नवनिर्मित  मंदिर में विराज कर हमें कृतार्थ करेंगे। हम भी संकल्प लें कि हम बनाएंगे अयोध्या को विश्व की श्रेष्ठतम नगरी और वैश्विक सभ्यता का केंद्र । अयोध्या  मानव जाति के उत्कर्ष और कष्टनिवारण का केंद्र बने, ऐसी योजना का कार्यान्वयन हो। विश्व धर्ममय हो, यह हमारा दायित्व है; अयोध्या इसकी धुरी होगी, तो यह शीघ्र संभव है। 

नीरज कुमार झा 

Work for Being Human

 Working for longer hours and working more productively are related issues but not the same. It is better that people work longer and more productively. They merit even separately. 

Working is in fact redeeming one's humanity. It is by working we advance from a being to a human being, from barbarism to civilization. Basically, what we mean by work is service to others. This is how we become a society, civilization, and humanity.  The more we work, the better we get. Self-indulgence is secondary and is just a break to realise ultimately it is work that gives meaning to our life and brings fulfilment.

Being drained out while working is the most satisfying thing to get into. The problem is that we do not have satisfying jobs or we do not like the jobs we do and we begin our work feeling drained. This is tragic. 

The basic problem is that many people do not have any work to do, even if they may be employed. And if they have a job, the problem is not about the time one spends on a particular work but of organisation and culture. We may be valuing jobs one over another and doing a job not in a likeable way. It is a problem of collective norms and know-how. 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Oṃ Sarve Bhavantu Sukhinaḥ

Liberalism functions as capitalism in the economic domain and republicanism in the political domain. Liberalism, as per the human inclination it manifests, is not typically ideological in its nature but is about humanism, the perseverance of human beings to become human. It is about the dignity of each human being and the full flowering of their persons. Liberalism is the discovery of Dharma by the West, which made them modern and brought the modern age to the world.

Humanism is the core of Liberalism. It means all value one and get that one centre stage. This is to properize being.

Proper knowledge systems must home to this properization of being human. It means epistemology must cohere with capitalism and republicanism, which seek human beings to evolve from herds and sovereignly use their own faculty and agency while respecting the similar rights of others.  It is about the age-old wisdom of living and letting others live.

It is the most challenging task to work with people's consciousness. The scope of working human consciousness is about epistemology. It is epistemology, which shapes human consciousness and becomes consciousness. Epistemology gets anatomical. It becomes one's mental eyes with which one sees the world. It is almost impossible to navigate one's deviant consciousness to course. But, it is not entirely a hopeless scenario either. 

Let us work for the essential human spirit: let us translate this prayer into reality. 

ॐ सर्वे भवन्तु सुखिनः
सर्वे सन्तु निरामयाः ।
सर्वे भद्राणि पश्यन्तु
मा कश्चिद्दुःखभाग्भवेत् ।
ॐ शान्तिः शान्तिः शान्तिः॥

May all sentient beings be at peace,
may no one suffer from illness,
May all see what is auspicious, may no one suffer.
Om peace, peace, peace.

Niraj Kumar Jha 

On History of Rationality

Thinking and acting rationally is a very late historical development if we see humanity as a whole. Surprisingly, the ancient world, particularly India and Greece and maybe others, had such an approach, though contested by other approaches. Presently, this is how humanity brought humanism and modernity to itself; but this is still evolving, and struggling in many pockets of the world and of any culture. 

It is not that reason has been missing in any age but it rarely commanded the centerstage or remained sustainably there. Traditions and affectiveness still remain dominant in human minds, and reason finds itself at the receiving end. The persisting reality, the highlight of this post, is this: the primal instincts have always, throughout history, appropriated reason for their own ends. 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Talk Well

Talking well gets wellness.
Talking positivity promotes positivity.
Logical articulations, even in casual conversations, promote general rationality and science.
Always speak well and be a good human being and responsible citizen.
This is how you can contribute by simply being.

 
Niraj Kumar Jha

Educating Health

The ancient Nalanda University had a mandatory course on health and medicine in their graduation programme. This was solid wisdom. Personally, being educated has no meaning if a person does not how to be healthy and what to do in case they fall ill or face an emergency. Otherwise, too, healthy people boost the health of the commonwealth. How to be healthy, physically and mentally, and what to do in medical emergencies must be a part of school education and be mandatory to earn credits for the graduation programme. In other words, personal health management and basic medicinal awareness must be a basic part of education.

General health and medical facilities should also be one of the main focuses for associational entities. Health security must be brought to be a prime rationale of and core mandate for the State.

Niraj Kumar Jha

सामाजिक मीडिया

सामाजिक मीडिया लोकशिक्षण के प्रभावशाली माध्यम एवं मंच के रूप में स्थापित हो चुका है। हालाँकि इसके अंतर्वस्तु प्रदाताओं में विभिन्न अभिकरण सम्मिलित हैं लेकिन इसका विशिष्ट पक्ष यह है कि इसमें बड़ी संख्या में लोग  व्यष्टि रूप में सम्मिलित हैं। यह एक शक्तिशाली जनतांत्रिक मंच है।

जहाँ तक शिक्षण का प्रश्न है, सामाजिक मीडिया आबालवृद्ध के मानस को गढ़ रहा है। यह ज्ञानियों और ज्ञानमीमांसकों के लिए अद्भुत अवसर है। पहली बार उन्हें इतने व्यापक रूप से सामान्य जन उनके सम्मुख श्रोता सह पाठक के रूप उपास्थित हैं और जिनसे वे संवाद भी कर सकते हैं। यह सच्चे विद्वानों के लिए गोलबंद प्रवंचकों से भी पार पाने का अवसर देता है।

 
प्रायोजित गोष्ठियों और बंधे पत्र-पत्रिकाओं एवं स्टूडियो से स्वतंत्र एवं इच्छानुकूल सम्प्रेषण के लिए सुविधा अत्यंत सीमित थी। सामाजिक मीडिया यह सुविधा सभी को निरंतर और स्थायी रूप से देता है। कुशल जनहितैषी विद्वान इस मंच पर विमर्श कर मानवता की भलाई के लिए अपना योगदान प्रभावी रूप से दे सकते हैं।

नीरज कुमार झा

Ideoconomics, Popiconomics, Pruconomics, and Poweconomics

Four Portmanteau Words for Economics

1. Ideoconomics: ideology-driven economics
2. Popiconomics: populist economics
3. Pruconomics: prudent economics
4. Poweconomics: power-driven economics

Niraj Kumar Jha

हँसते धूल कण

धूल का हर कण हँस-हँस कर लोटता है
मगरूर आदमी जब उस राह गुजरता है

नीरज कुमार झा

शब्द संग्रह

किसी व्यक्ति अथवा समुदाय की सच्ची समृद्धि इस तथ्य से सिद्ध होती है कि उसका शब्द संग्रह और विशेषकर प्रयुक्त शब्दों की संख्या कितनी है। प्रयुक्त शब्दों की अल्पता जीवन की विपन्नता का हिस्सा है। यह भिन्न तथ्य है कि विपन्न जन या समुदाय भी प्रयास के द्वारा कृत्रिम रूप से शब्द संग्रह का विस्तार कर लेते हैं।

शब्दभंडार का स्वाभाविक विस्तार व्यवसाय, उद्योग, विज्ञान और संस्कृति में व्यक्ति तथा समुदाय के सुधारवादी दृष्टिकोण से युक्त क्रियाशीलता से होता है। मानव पकृति से ही विकासवादी जीव है और विकास का एक कारक, और प्रभाव भी, उसका शब्दों का संग्रह है। यह विकास की प्रक्रिया का उपकरण, विकास को धारण करने का साधन और श्रेष्ठ जीवन का सरोवर है।

शब्द संचय पृथक प्रयास नहीं होना चाहिए। यह पिछड़ेपन की स्थिति में होता है। शब्द संग्रह का विस्तार प्रयोग के क्रम का स्वाभाविक परिणाम है।

समुदाय पिछड़ा इसलिए होता है कि उसे लक्ष्य और हेतु का अंतर पता नहीं होता है। वे उत्पादन के घटकों और उत्पाद की पहचान को लेकर भी भ्रम में रहते हैं। 

उद्यमशीलता संस्कार और समृद्धि का आधार है।

नीरज कुमार झा

Menacing Idiots

 The audacity of idiots and the timidity of wise people have been the biggest bane of humankind. 

Niraj Kumar Jha

Dysfunctional v. Functional Untruths

 People use falsehoods or lies generally to mislead people, cover up wrongdoings or deceive others for personal gains. There is another aspect of such acts which is often ignored.  Many untruths speak for some great suppressed truths. These truths may be very big and vital but cannot be upheld due to some reasons. Untruths cover the void and make up for the anomalies caused by the absence of the relevant truth. Everyone must have a discerning eye to view everything that goes in the name of a 'fact' or a piece of apparent untruth. And, every uncovered false-factual untruth or patent falsehood must be examined to see whether that misleads or leads to some buried truth. Blanket dismissal of any falsehood is not a good thing to do, particularly on the part of thought workers or volunteers.  

Niraj Kumar Jha

मैं मुकाम पर

जिसे सिर्फ चलते ही जाना है,

जिसका हर कदम ही मुकाम हो,
उसका रास्ता कोई कैसे तय करे।
रास्ता दिखाने वालो,
मुझे भी बतलाते जाना,
मैं अभी मुकाम पर ही खड़ा हूँ,
मुझे कहाँ जाना है।

नीरज कुमार झा

Like Wolves

This is the irony of our age: we can make machines learn but can do nothing with ourselves. We still settle our scores like wolves. 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Republicanism of Intellect

Processing pieces of information into knowledge and further into wisdom, which conduce public good and thereby the lives of the members of the public, needs sound and trained intellect on the part of a person. Tragically, people rarely have it, and others, including people tasked with it, are of little help; and, nowadays, the information glut complicates the processing hopelessly. The fact of being knowledgeable occurs with the intense engagement with the subject; it is either live or mentally simulated. The problem is that so-called knowers are alien to the processes they seemingly expertise in, and their loud mouthing of personal prejudices and ideological proclivities are matched only by the silences of the practitioners. The disengagement between knowers and doers costs and hurts all. Among people there exists a category of people who are privileged by mechanical means, not in an organic way. This vocal category has no stake in the public good. Many of them flourish by troubling waters and harvesting riches.

 
Republicanism is about a person's intellect; its training and exercise.

 
Niraj Kumar Jha

In response to a post on friendship (by Shri Anil Kumar Singh)

The fact of the matter is that friendship or for that matter any relationship is locational (geographically and socially). Means of communication, viz. personal visits, letters, telephoning, and now online communication do stretch the locational sense but do not replace it. These days, more concerningly, the last one, the internet means of communication and engagement, usurps the location itself and empties relations of what it was meant for and reduces these to a mere formality. It is a marker of advancement but the tragedy is that we abysmally lack the public infrastructure or even the awareness of its need to support people in distress. Being distressed is an inevitable part of everyone's life; one must realise this too. Old age is one such inevitability for most people and traditionally they depended on their children for support. This is also now gone in too many cases.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Yet Another War

Enemies of humanity perpetrate yet another aggression. A former superpower continues with its act of aggression against another nation. The aggressed are inevitably at war. Humanity should appreciate the warring nations and their warriors for defending national integrity and freedom. 

Our country also confronts the most pernicious and barbaric enemies. The world is turning more dangerous by the day. Other than rogue states, non-state actors are active with their vicious agenda. We need to remain united, contribute to national strength, and confront the elements and factors trying to disrupt the national resolve. 

Today, globalism of chaos displaces earlier short-lived processes of economic globalisation. That was the phase when peace and prosperity were making their appearance in every nook and cranny of the world.  Commoners had started enjoying their life and realising their worth for the first time in history. Now, everything is uncertain. Promises are increasingly crumbling. We often come to see the debris of hopes. 

Factors are many driving people to discredit the idea and dismantle the architecture of global integration. Entrenched forces felt threatened and control freaks suffered withdrawal symptoms. Agencies went overboard to structure globalisation and disrupted the evolution. But none of these was the prime factor. It was the dragon, which benefitted immensely from the liberalised trade regime but totally dishonoured its norms. International agencies had no means to discipline the giant. Other nations hurriedly retreated to guard their respective domestic economy. 

Hope is still there and always there. We, human beings, are always becoming beings. The fact of the matter is that smart technologies work to unify humanity, and the present-day threats and crises, other than anti-globalism, cannot be tackled without the concerted efforts of the whole of humanity. It depends on the present generation of humanity whether it chooses to work for the inevitability of a united humanity or prolong the chaos. 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

On Conversation

Conversation is about the polite and appreciative sharing of feelings and ideas. This is the way of being human, and being into it is a very humanising process. 

While a conversation is about interpersonal sympathies and intimacies, as it appears and is so, it also has profound implications for the political life of a community. It is a beautiful experience but has very powerful underpinnings. A citizenry with a cultivated art of good talking to each other makes a great republic. It brings in mutual understanding and general awareness; persons conversing facilitate each other and take their commonwealth forward.

People can get trained in debating, oratory, or rhetoric but fine conversation comes to one from their culture. A refind culture is the making of the good sense of the generations. But we can always make up for the time by merely being conscious of the need. A path that leads to a destination, is a part of that destination.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Some Basics

The nature of beings, things, and happenings, or phenomena in one word, may vary from what one knows about them, and the operating knowledge system may even be totally wrong in accounting things as they are. This sounds normal, but it also applies to collectives. Even dedicated knowledge agencies may be entirely off track hopelessly and forever. But, the power of an operating knowledge system is such that it blinds one to view the follies it may espouse.

 
The prime proof of knowledge of a society being substantive, not being frivolous or misleading, is that society itself is not a pack of herds but a community of dignified and autonomous men and women of substance. It is a nation of enterprising and responsible citizens. In other words, in a properly knowing state, a community is constituted of individuals in possession and control of their persons. If the knowledge system of the community is such, it offers a quality life to itself. It means each has the security of life, possessions, and of doing things worthwhile. To the degree one lives without fear and is free of wants and can do things which make them happy without inconveniencing others, they have, to that extent, a functional knowledge system.

 
Invariably, for any autonomous community, a troubled existence is mostly an outcome of its deficient or faulty knowledge system.

 
Epistemology matters; for those who do not care, humanism is only a notion and being sapiens is just being members of another species.

 
Niraj Kumar Jha

मुद्दे क्या हैं? किस तरह की सांख्यिकी की जरूरत है?

कृत्रिम समझदारी रोजगारों को खत्म कर रही है और बड़े पैमाने पर करेगी। कृत्रिम समझदारी की अपार क्षमताओं का हम कैसे लाभ उठा सकते हैं? ब्लॉकचेन प्रौद्योगिकी के लाभ और नुकसान हैं और साथ ही इसका व्यापक सामाजिक-राजनैतिक प्रभाव होने वाला है। आईओटी और मशीनलर्निंग का कैसे सदुपयोग हो? आगे महामारियों की रोकथाम कैसे हो? गंभीर रोगों से कैसे लड़ा जाए? दुर्घटनाओं को कैसे न्यून किया जाए? राष्ट्रीय अर्थव्यवस्था को कैसे प्रतियोगी बनाया जाए। सबसे बड़ा तेल उत्पादक देश ईवी में निवेश कर रहा है। हाइड्रजन दुनिया का ईंधन बनेगा। धनवान और प्रतिभाशाली लोग  देश छोड़ रहे हैं।

 
हम किस तरह की बातें कर रहे हैं!

 
नीरज कुमार झा

चुटकुला नहीं

हताश अपनी कृश काया से  
व्यक्ति, मान्य अतिबुद्धिमान  शरण आया । 
पूछा उपाय, शरीर कैसे बने ?
तुम जैसा शरीर चाहते हो, 
उसी नाप के कपड़े बनवा लो । 
उसे पहनने से तुम्हारा शरीर  वैसा हो जाएगा।  
बताने की जरूरत है कि 
उपाय सही नहीं है,
और यह चुटकुला भी नहीं है।  

नीरज कुमार झा 

इंसान

शतरंज दुनिया दुनिया का खेले 
आदमी सभी हार-जीत के मुहरे   

न सालारी का शौक और न उस्तादी की तलब 

हम क्या करें, हमें तो इंसां , इंसां ही अच्छे लगे 

नीरज कुमार झा 

नेति नेति

सीमा किसी की नहीं, 
असीम भी कुछ नहीं है।  

कहीं प्रारंभ नहीं, 
अंत भी कहीं नहीं है। 
कोई  अंश नहीं, 
सम्पूर्ण भी कुछ नहीं है। 
घटित कुछ नहीं,
अघटित भी कुछ नहीं है। 
कुछ  सदा मृत नहीं, 
अमृत सदा भी कोई  नहीं है
नहीं कुछ भी नहीं है,
न-नहीं अस्तित्व है। 

नीरज कुमार झा 

Nothing

Nothing is unlimited
Nothing is limited
Nothing is a part 
Nothing is a whole  
Nothing is an occurrence 
Nothing is a non-occurrence 
Nothing is the beginning 
Nothing is the end
Nothing is eternally alive 
Nothing is eternally dead
No-nothing is the existence 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

On the Sense of Appreciation

 In some of my earlier posts, I mentioned refined oratory being rare among people and good listening ability being even rarer.  In the same vein, I note that people in general lack the sense of appreciating the good. Appreciating a good piece of art or music needs some training, and for a piece of literature good education, but people even appreciating, in general, normal things, happening, and each other's conduct in day-to-day affairs is rare. Appreciating good is a utilitarian act of furthering the good life for our use only. It is discerningly pointing to virtuous elements and effects of one's demeanour and doings or simply gesturing to goodness anyway. By the very effortless acts of appreciating good, we can facilitate social advancement. Instead of that, we generally indulge only in sycophancy or mutual ego messaging. This is how we partake in social decay. 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Democracy: Slide or Surge

Observers note that there is a democratic slide globally. This I find a misdirected approach. Such observers fallaciously identify democracy with the values and norms of a particular ideology, the parameters of political correctness of a historical period. On the contrary, what I see across continents is a populist swell. Demos become more demanding. The reality is that there is a democratic surge around the world. 

At the same time, one can not deny that problems are getting severe internationally and within nation-states. Climate change, for instance, poses an existential challenge for many people. Among states, irredentism is back in fashion. There are strifes and upheavals in many corners, and even metropoles see fires blazing frequently. 

The problem is not with democracy but with the global political-economic ecology. The autonomous and logical trajectory of democratic evolution, which led to the collapse of Communism and was channelling human agency through LPG to international harmony and prosperity, was stalled rather deliberately. Democracy was riding neoliberalism to become global, but as it threatened the entrenched forces and vested interests, the threatened ones broke the vehicle to which the naive academia lent moral support.  

Aspirations that neoliberalism led to rise now become pent-up feelings seeking outlets. 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Teaching

 A good teacher does not transmit what they know. The good ones know the possibility of fallacies in any piece of knowledge. A good teacher would rather talk about the practical and historical uses and abuses of any piece of knowledge,  its limitations and the need to explore further. 

Niraj Kumar Jha

रामचरितमानस : सामाजिक रूग्णतारोधक

गोस्वामी ने रामचरितमानस की रचना भारतीय समाज की रक्षा के लिए की। भक्ति भावना के साथ गोस्वामी का उद्देश्य रामकथा को लोकसुलभ भाषा में प्रस्तुत कर लोगों का मानसिक विकारों से रक्षा करना था। इसकी गेयता इसे स्मरणीय बनाती है और लोगों के मानस में गुंफित हो यह उनकी आसुरी प्रवृत्तियों से रक्षा करती है। एक ग्रंथ भारत को अत्यंत विपरीत परिस्थितियों से निकाल कर ले आया। इष्ट के प्रति निष्ठा के वचन के अतिरिक्त यह ग्रंथ समाज के लिए संक्रमणरोग-प्रतिरोधी टीका (वैक्सीन) का कार्य करता आ रहा है । यह मानव मन के लिए एंटिवाइरस का कार्य करता है। इसलिए इसका नियमित पाठ जरूरी है। आज सामाजिक रूग्णता और वैयक्तिक मानसिक व्याधियों से रक्षा की लिए इसका नियमित पारायण और भी आवश्यक है। इसका पाठ कर व्यक्ति अपने मानस को स्वच्छ और स्वस्थ रख सकता है।

नीरज कुमार झा

On Being Tactfully Truthful

A person achieves goodness, contributing to the wellness of self and society only by seeing, speaking and engaging with truths. An excruciating process it is, and generally people avoid it. The fact is that truths horrify and lies entice. Being truthful is inviting enemies; living lies is cosying with amiable people. Despite everything, truthfulness is the sole source of self-contentment and social advancement. Science is nothing but a methodical pursuit of truths. But, there is a word of caution: truthfulness without tactfulness may be dangerous. Bruno spoke of the most shining truth; he was tried, tortured and put to death.

Niraj Kumar Jha

सत्य सनातन

सत्य सनातन 
सत्यनिष्ठा सनातन 
अंतरात्मा की वाणी  सनातन
करुणा सनातन 
संवेदना के आँसू सनातन 
वीरता सनातन 

परपीड़ा हरण की तत्परता सनातन 

निश्छलता सनातन  

विमल हास सनातन 

सर्वमंगल की कामना  सनातन 
बुद्धि की प्रखरता की प्रार्थना सनातन 
सन्मार्ग सनातन  
प्रकाश की ओर यात्रा सनातन 

ज्ञान सनातन 

विज्ञान सनातन 

उपासना सनातन 

सब में वह सनातन 
उसमें सब सनातन 
बंध-कबंध नहीं, अबंध सनातन 

सदानीरा मानवता सनातन 
सनातन संकल्प पुरातन 

नीरज कुमार झा 

Cyber Democracy

Cyber space quickens the ephemerality of human experiences. Fanciful, troubling, intriguing or whatsoever, a mind grab has only a few moments to survive. The space, boundless and with fast shifting occupations, offers more equity and extends this into the overlapping real world.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Knowledge and Intelligence

Real education leads people to discover what they know, not to deny what they know. The statement may puzzle one, but the fact is that human beings are naturally knowing beings. Uneducated scholars know what others know and do not know what they know. They reposit a vast mass of knowledge but can little cultivate intelligence to know what they know.

Niraj Kumar Jha

For Depuppetisation

Collectivism devitalises democracy. It deprives an individual of their person and delivers them to some puppeteer. If one respects and cares for humanity and self, one must see redemption in laissez-faire. Laissez-faire is the core value and practice of the democratic system. It is both its means and end.

Niraj Kumar Jha

On Poetry

A true poem has no meaning. It is only a feeling which connects one seamlessly to self and others. Words only contour inexpressible sentiments.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Grand Hollowness

What they learn and know

Makes gigantic architecture 

Having perfect arches and beams of logic 

Intricate carvings of flawless wordsmithery 

But lo and behold 

It covers only a grand hollowness

Offering no shelter

No solace either

No place for rest and recreation 

Their design is to leave you 

Awestruck and bewildered 

The tragedy is that you visit them eagerly  

Is it that hollowness within you seeks assurance 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Living and Reliving Reality

A piece of news is there due to its newsworthiness, and the shock value of news makes it more so. The greater possibility is that the reported happenings may not be the trend or representative of the larger reality. On the other end, strangely, something that is just an event of a very quotidian type gets flashed and even that shocks people. Why does this happen? The reason is that specific trends and practices people tend to overlook or do not take notice of because these are so routine, and when these come under abrupt media focus, all those who are aware of the trend and even part of it get shocked to discover it to be a shocking matter. Living reality and reliving reality reported are different cognitive phenomena.  

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Laissez Faire: the Substance of Democracy

 It is capitalism that loosens close-knit communities letting their members recognise and exercise their individuality. Further, an individual discovers his or her person and owns that. People do not know or ignore the simple fact that democracy is a byproduct of capitalism. Chinese collectivists deployed captive capitalism to build a massively productive economy but now it is difficult to keep the mechanism captive. Capitalism inevitably casts subjects into human beings, who in turn tend to remake the society into a republican order. 

Self-respecting people consent only to a republican democracy. They should know that the processes and procedures that they see as democracy are only processes and procedures of democracy, not democracy itself.  The sustaining substance of and for democracy is capitalism. People in businesses serving each other devise means that transform into the republican regime. Any knowing democrat would always seek the maximisation of laissez-faire. 

Niraj Kumar Jha

Globalism v. Internationalism

Nations, I think, would never succeed in designing globalisation, though I believe it would be the default destination of human evolution. A nation propagates the dismantling of barriers only when it has an edge versus the rest in competitiveness. Moreover, a powerful nation may disregard fairness in honouring intellectual rights and trade norms with impunity. Though one can propagate democracy in international relations theoretically or rhetorically, it is not feasible practically. A nation can only ensure its interests through good economic policy domestically and by entering layered bilateral pacts and multilateral arrangements. There is only limited scope for globalisation in the world though it should be promoted; nations can only have better internationalism suiting their national interests as well as global good. Globalisation needs goodwill which interstate interfaces hardly generate, whereas internationalism needs tacts, which every country deploys. If they skillfully act in pursuing their own good, they would be promoting internationalism and thus globalism incrementally. If most nations act rationally, it would become the operating logarithm of the world, without which no country be able to carry out its international business. The problem is that those countries that fail domestically also fail the fair global order. 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Historiography Shock

Among others, one purpose of historiography is to pave the passage of the future. It is always the future that poses the most critical challenge to humanity, a community, or a person. In this respect, knowledge of the past is a vital resource. It depends on the wisdom of people to use the past and move ahead well-equipped to suitably shape the future or let other people use the past to control them to their whims and fancies. The colonial historians did exactly the latter. India has yet to recover from that historiography shock. We are still far away from acting in unison to ensure that each of us can work to our best for the good of ourselves, our nation, and humanity.

Niraj Kumar Jha

हमारा सत्य

सत्य कोई परम सूत्र नहीं; 
नहीं यह कोई अबूझ रहस्य।  
यह यात्रा नहीं, 
गंतव्य भी नहीं।
यह प्रयोग नहीं, 
यह आविष्कार भी नहीं है। 
सत्य सतत सत्प्रयास है; 
संवेदना से युक्त क्रियाकलाप है।  
सहानुभूति का भाव है; 
स्वानुभूति की क्षमता है।  
यह क्रूरों का प्रतिकार है;
दुष्टों का उपचार है।  
यह सीमितताओं को चुनौती है; 
संभावनाओं के प्रति  सकारात्मकता है। 
सत्य हमारा अस्तित्व है; 

हर क्षण और कण इसकी धुरी है। 
सच हमारा प्रतिदिन का जीवन है।  

जीवन विजयी, सत्य जयी है। 

नीरज कुमार झा 

The Arthshastra for Our Times

 Aristotle had called political science the master science. This is a lasting truism. All different disciplines help humankind in myriad ways in their lives; it is political science which shapes their lives. The civilizational advance of humankind is basically a work of political philosophical or theoretical formulations. 

There is no science in politics but the nomenclature of the discipline studying politics as political science appeals to the concerned citizens of intellect to apply science in its studies. Finding patterns in social processes and scoping the same for human intervention for the collective good is making a science of politics. This is how humanity has moved away from the miserable state of being under the dictate of elements. 

However, applying science is not about sheer voluntarism or willpower, which requires some motivation. Any person and collective have to confront dogmas first and secondly, even more challenging than the first is that the entity has to steer clear of pseudosciences. The challenges are, however, not only mental: a powerful class of clergy espouse and enforce a dogma so the armed and brainwashed vanguards ramrod a pseudoscientific idea. 

Our traditions for long sustained a science of politics which Chanakya's Arthasastra epitomised. However, many would not be comfortable with this statement of fact as they see the treatise as a rule book or a manual of statecraft. They should know that it may look as one wishes but the fact is that it is the skimmed wisdom from the vast pool of knowledge drawn from observations,  experiences and contemplations of ages. 

We need to reinvent the Arthastastra for our times. 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Owning Expressions

There is a greater chance that one's expressions, thoughts they convey and language they use are not theirs, not even representing their status or interests. More often, expressions possess expressing people, appropriating their persons and dispossessing them of their natural selves and legitimate entitlements. People hardly express themselves; rather expressions puppeteer them. To a certain extent, we all are puppets for frozen expressions.

Niraj Kumar Jha

सामाजिकता के आधार

सामाजिकता के आधारों को लेकर विमर्श अल्प है लेकिन यहआवश्यक है। आधारभूत रूप से यह मानव की जैविक प्रकृति की उत्पति है। दूसरे छोर पर इसका कारक मानवजीवन के पारलौकिक लक्ष्य को लेकर मान्यताएँ हैं । दोनों छोरों के बीच, जन्म और मृत्यु के मध्यकाल में, सामाजिकता के प्रधान कारकों में अभाव और असुरक्षा हैं। सामाजिक उत्कृष्टता हेतु इन नकारात्मकताओं को न्यून करने और कला, साहित्य, क्रीड़ा, स्वास्थ्य, ज्ञान-विज्ञान और पर्यटन को लेकर सहकार की प्रधानता का मार्ग प्रशस्त करने की आवश्यकताएँ है। इसके लिए सामान्य जन की सुरक्षा सुनिश्चित और संपन्नता के पथ को निष्कंटक करना होगा।

नीरज कुमार झा

Appreciation and Veneration

As I can see it, the appreciation of good is almost non-existent. Most people are wired to admire prescribed objects or pieces. It is mostly conformity which we seek and admire. Here it is worthwhile to point it out: appreciation and veneration are two different things. The first is about understanding, gratitude and promotion of good in the spirit of fellowship and veneration is about incomprehensibleness and submissiveness to the perceived greatness. Let me define good here too. Good is one which serves the secular interests of one and all. One's interest is served only in a conducive milieu. The sense and approach of appreciation is a marker of a good education.  

Niraj Kumar Jha 

भाषाई विपन्नता का संकट

भाषाई विपन्नता सम्प्रेषण का बाधक ही नहीं, स्वतंत्रता का भी संकट है। बोध और अभिव्यक्ति की निपुणता का अभाव अधिकतर विवादों का कारण होता है। यह समस्या तथाकथित विद्वानों को लेकर भी भिन्न रूप में व्याप्त है। उनमें से अधिकतर ज्ञान के नाम पर किसी विशिष्ट विचारधारा में प्रशिक्षित होते हैं और उनका भाषाई संसार समृद्ध होने के पश्चात् भी एक विशाल व्यूह रचना ही होती है, जिसका प्रयोजन अन्य का पराजय और स्वयं का महिमामंडन होता है। इस व्यूह रचना का अंधपक्ष यह है कि इसके द्वारा निर्मित व्यवस्था पदसोपानात्मक होती है, जिसमें स्थित व्यक्तियों की परिलब्धियाँ वंचना से शुरू होकर विशेषाधिकार पर समाप्त होती है। वास्तव में भाषा की विपन्नता और इसका दोहन प्रभावरूप में समान परिघटनाएँ हैं ।

नीरज कुमार झा

Democracy's Edge

No matter how large and resourceful land they command, authoritarian regimes face their nemesis after a dazzling performance. As it happened in China, they very capably put the economy in full throttle, and that for decades, and forcibly flattened all the obstructions on the way. But a time comes when intoxicating power numbs the good sense of unquestionable leadership, And, when the leadership deviates, nothing can stop them. This happened in China even earlier, as the leaders there had perpetrated man-made catastrophes on their people.

Democracy, meanwhile, keeps swinging between the workable and non-workable, and any crisis either leads to a course correction or a change of leadership. A federal structure is more geared toward getting back to equilibrium.

Indian democracy, thanks to its great civilization legacies, holds the course. While removing the vestiges of its prolonged occupations, it is driving economic growth sustainably.
Democracy is the substance of national strength for any country, and more so for India. India does face challenges; poverty and corruption remain sticky. It is imperative for every citizen to contribute towards the common good for their own welfare. They must conduce their own conduct to democracy and promote democratic institutions. One must keep in mind that it is the free market that gives the lift democracy needs to remain afloat. The country must ensure a fully free market within borders and promote it strategically internationally.

We must cherish and work for the glory of our civilization and democracy.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Troubles of Literary Representation

Literary and, more so, cinematic pieces are inevitably selective and creative. It is exceptional that a producer does good than harm the social good. Conscientious litterateurs and literature presenters must train themselves rigorously in ethics and sciences. 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Education and Liberation

 The absence of education has been the greatest threat to freedom. Unfree societies have traditions resistant to education. They do have mechanisms to mould and control minds and they do that in a way that each watches the other so none can defy the mechanism. Any perceived freedom deficit in a society is directly linked to the proportionate quality deficit of its education. 

Education is not about teaching, but it is about enabling the interested to learn. However, it is not as simple as it sounds. It is a consciously accomplished systemic arrangement. Well-meaning persons who are highly educated and competent can alone work the arrangement. There are many who thrive on prevailing ignorant beliefs and practices and they leave no stone unturned to let that go. Such concerted actions over time become traditions and make any learning almost impossible. They do deploy decoys which go by the name of education but only perpetuate the ignorant ways. 

There are many historical and contemporary instances of the subverted education system. I here cite one - the Bolshevic one. They forced the system on the people of the Russian empire and tried to indoctrinate the gullible lot anywhere in the world. The loss of education there in fact threatened the world and caused colossal harm to humanity. 

The effect of the loss of education in any historical phase lingers on. Colonialism in the same way dehumanised the folks in the greater part of the world. They deployed modern methods to uproot their subjects from their land making them mental slaves for times to come. Postcolonial societies have still to find ways to free themselves. And, it is their 'education' primarily, which keeps them clueless. 

A shining arrangement of a good education system was what our ancients devised. The system is testified by the flourishing of literature, arts and sciences during those times. It produced unparalleled prosperity and ensured peace in those times and remains unique in accomplishments to date.  

Niraj Kumar Jha 

The Visionaries

Market forces alone ensure balanced development, Other forces create ghost towns, deserted ports and haunted roads, which nobody uses. Market players produce what society needs and adventurers among them perish in their rush. Others do not have such fears. For example, a country founds some well-provided institutions of learning by straining its limited resources, but those very institutions only siphon the best out of society's scarce talent pool and pour them into channels flowing to foreign lands irrigating their soils. Despite the clear visibility of the outcomes, the founders are celebrated as visionaries. What an irony!

Niraj Kumar Jha

New-age Entrepreneurs

Of late, I see some entrepreneurs speaking their minds on social media. Indeed, they are new-age entrepreneurs, mostly professionally educated first-generation in the business. They are not the survivors of the socialist regime and possess considerable moral worth. It is the entrepreneurial class which hosts the society, while most of the others are only clients or outright parasites. It is in the general interest that we amplify those rare voices.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Make-believe Modules

 Make-believe modules capture the market of cognition, discernment, and appreciation. The abundant supplies make for art, aesthetics and knowledge, the pursuits which make a being a human being. We need not recall, analyse, and imagine. We have readied stuff or we can always do two-minute noodling. 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Phoney Vanguardism

When classism dismissed itself from the world, the leftist elements living off public money here shifted to another notional quick fix, ethnicism, and posed themselves as vanguards. Thus mutated the phoney vanguardism.

 
Niraj Kumar Jha

Human Guinea Pigs

 Human beings have served as guinea pigs for political ideologies. More tragically, the experimenters value the experimentation processes more than their outcomes. Now, ideologues may and should devise simulators with the support of AI  as there are enough data available to devise such a device.

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Understanding Democracy

If tyranny is just the opposite of democracy, so is collectivism. Again as a minority rule opposes the democratic spirit, so does a majority rule. Democracy, as a political arrangement, sets everyone free and at the same time does not allow one to harm others. When everyone has mastery of their beings and doings, the community has democracy in real. This basic necessitates laissez-faire in society and minimalism in governance. Bare capitalism without pluses and an efficiency-enabling model of government can only lead to substantive democracy, which in turn would ensure dignity in human life and peace in the world.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Substantialization and Trivialization

What is substantialization and what is trivialization? There is no definitive answer, and so least for universal application. Existence is a bewildering experience. The meaning and purpose, perhaps nature makes only human beings to pursue; it does not offer such things itself. Human folks discover and they have discretion. I think I have what I have. An equilibrium of everything one has may be the best thing to have. This is again not true for most at least notionally. Yet, I would like to point out that we mostly miss the fundamental: the absence of meaning and purpose being existential. We must balance this with our pursuits otherwise.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Reel Heroes

 A lead figure in a typical cinema produced anywhere in the world humiliates a man and demeans a woman. Indeed, the fictional figure balms your hurt ego but you end up glorifying everything you do not have in you and you cannot have in you. A cinema disregards the rule of law and civilized ways of conduct. What entertains us betrays our incompetence to devise a better system. Our collective failure is the source of our collective entertainment. What an irony!

Niraj Kumar Jha

Leftism: the Bane of Our Epistemology

Leftism more than an ideology is a psychology and a genetic coding. It is the genetic nostalgia of primitivism. Psychologically it is the herd mentality.

We fell to leftism in our encounter with colonialism. European imperialism over the world for around two centuries overawed us, Moreover, we were already under subjugation, and initially, many of our ancestors saw the colonisers as liberators.

While opposing the colonisers, we also admired and envied them. In opposition to them, we opposed their winning ideas but opted for their defeatist tendencies, which they allowed to exist but on the margins of their epistemological space. Liberalism, which evolved out of humanism and rationalism, was that winning idea. Humanism and rationalism were products of historical circumstances in Europe. These approaches were not alien to India but lethargic ways had overtaken the Indian mindset and we lost in the race. When colonialism enveloped our consciousness, we opposed the very idea which had made them the masters of the world and lapped up for the refurbished feudalism in the form of leftism.

Now leftism is fairly discredited but it keeps changing its forms. Welfarims is its sober variant, which flourishes across nations. We must have public services for people in need and in times of need but it cannot be a policy of making more and more people needy forever and providing them.

Our ancients sought riches and happiness and they lived so. We need to rekindle that spirit and discard the leftism for once and all.

Niraj Kumar Jha

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Epistemological Conundrum

 Most of the social troubles germinate from the dysfunctional epistemology a society harbours. Mainstreaming epistemology is often seen as a given despite all the discordant notes of dissenters and viewings and activities of all sorts of ideologues. It gets general compliance, mostly habitual but also wilful and grudging. On the part of knowledge workers, the most desired doable is to manage epistemology to functionality, i.e., make it serve the common good and harmonious progress. 

Niraj Kumar Jha

Action v Knowledge

Doings override knowings to cause progress. Doings get secular, knowings remain ecclesiastical. It is happening. Knowings supported doings could have worked wonders.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Follies of Knowers

Those who proactively pursue knowledge often invent pieces of knowledge which are totally unconnected from reality. Subsequently, if such persons or institutions have the right credentials and resources, they impose their products on reality and such misplaced perceptions distort social realities. The concern is the mostly ignored fact that knowing is not about discovering patterns but manipulating and disrupting patterns. The knowledge-based solutions in such cases may be a different problem but the concern here is that knowing is not about knowing exactly the nature of a phenomenon but determining the nature of a phenomenon. Knowers should deploy their tools with much caution and never ignore their common sense and instinct.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Sharing Good Ideas

If one feels that s/he has a good idea, the person must share it with others. A good thing may be waiting to be spoken about for happening. 

Niraj Kumar Jha

Learned Machines

 Learned, creative, and artistic machines end the age of elitism. They produce wisdom and beauty by sourcing from the best available thoughts and creations with the best possible perfection. Soon, we will have scientist machines, which would be inventing new technologies and even advanced machines. It would enable anyone to be a genius by keying in prompts. Machines would engender true Republican citizens. 

Niraj Kumar Jha