We maybe irrational but we are logical.

Are Indians the strangest people on the planet? The Consumer Price Index was 4.4% in September, just a tad higher than 3.7% in August, dramatically down from the double digit rates during Congress raj. The Wholesale Price Index has been negative for 11 months, coming in at -4.54% in September. Despite consistently falling inflation rates people in India expect retail prices to rise by 10.7% in the next 3 months and by an even higher rate of 11.1% in the next one year. Why? Core inflation, which ignores food and fuel, rose to 4.1% in September from 3.9% in August but even so is within comfort range. Apparently, if people expect prices to rise in the future they increase their spending to take advantage of lower prices at present while if they expect prices to fall they delay purchases. Which should be good thing. The inflation rate in Europe is at 0% so the European Central Bank is keeping its interest rate at 0.05%. Interest rate in the US is 0.25% while in the UK it is 0.5%. This is to keep borrowing costs as low as possible so that companies invest in new ventures, creating jobs, which, they hope, will increase the inflation rate to 2% by increasing spending. A higher inflation rate will encourage people to spend more which will result in increased production to meet the demand and create even more jobs. So, with high inflation rates Indians should be splurging on new purchases and the economy should be booming along. But, behavior of people is not guided by economic theories. Neuroscientists are getting involved in economic research, though advertisers have apparently known this all along. Thing is, India is not Europe or the US. China has been cutting interest rate so the Reserve Bank cut interest rate by a hefty 50 basis points last month to boost business. According to the RBI there are only 20 million credit cards in India. Total outstanding credit is Rs 324 billion and average per card is Rs 15,000. Although this may sound huge it is only a fraction of the total population of 1,300 million people who can take advantage of lower borrowing costs. The expectation of rising prices may not increase spending in India. The reason is that there is no safety net for middle class Indians. No unemployment benefit, no income support and no state pension. The poor get cheap food, free schooling in private schools, which has penalised the middle class through rising fees, and various subsidies, while taxpayers get nothing. Rising prices hit the middle class very hard which is shown in the fall in financial savings. So expectation of inflation has the opposite effect in India. Or maybe the method of calculating the inflation rate is wrong. There is logic behind irrational behavior.

What is the use of rescue equipment if the rescuers are dead?

A few days back there was an earthquake in Afghanistan. Although around 7.6 on the Richter scale this one was 200 km below the surface, so it did not do much damage, unlike the one in 2005 which, though of similar magnitude, was only 20 km below the surface and caused extensive damage. The reason for frequent earthquakes in this region is because there is a fault line in the earth's crust underneath the Himalayan range. This is where the Indian plate is subsiding underneath the Eurasian plate at the rate of 40 mm per year and since this will continue into the future we may expect earthquakes to occur regularly in this region. Apparently the quake was felt in Delhi, mostly in higher floors of buildings, though most people on the ground did not feel anything. Scared by the slight tremor residents are demanding equipment for rescue and training in disaster management. Why are people panicking? Because almost all the houses in Delhi are unsafe. Excuses are many. Some blame new buildings built on stilts, to accommodate car parking, some say that builders concentrate on aesthetics and not on safety others blame illegal construction by owners. The real reason is greed, fueled by the explosive rise in real estate prices, which means rental yields are the highest in the world. Almost every building has been modified by owners to increase space, without any regard for safety. It is a huge industry. Owners get increased rents, municipality fellows get huge bribes and large numbers of poorly trained artisans, who have migrated from villages, earn daily wages. If most of the buildings collapse, police, firemen, ambulance drivers and nurses will be particularly affected because they live in unauthorised buildings where rents are relatively affordable. What is the point in having rescue equipment if the people who will operate them are already dead? It is the old parable about catching a monkey by putting a nut in a bottle with a narrow neck and then anchoring the bottle to the ground. The monkey can take its hand out by releasing the nut but is too greedy to do so and is easily captured. The earthquake that hit Japan was 9 on the Richter scale but caused little damage, it was the tsunami that followed that killed over 5,000 people. A building with 10 floors was constructed in 45 days in Mumbai after obtaining permission for repairs. If the media had not reported the violation it would have been sold off as in the Campa Cola case where 35 illegal floors were built and sold off without anyone noticing. The residents have been thrown out but we have not heard of the builders or the municipal fellows being punished. Victims are punished in India while criminals are free to enjoy their spoils. If, God forbid, there is an earthquake in Delhi tens of millions will die. Pray that death is quick.

If the US can, why can't we?

Professors know all the theories but do they know where to apply them? One professor has written about a theory propounded by a sociologist, Mark Granovetter which postulates that an action by one person in response to a perceived offence sets a threshold for the rest of society. This theory was used to explain a spate of shootings in US schools. The professor is writing about the recent attacks on writers in India but he is guilty of conflating the causes of different incidents as the biased media in India has done. There is no excuse for killing anyone even if his writings are intentionally offensive in an effort to sell his book. The commonest cause for murder in India today is a dispute regarding real estate, because prices have risen to astronomical levels, but police have quickly ruled out that motive. We do not know how. In the second incident Shiv Sena activists threw paint over one Kulkarni who was launching a book by the former Foreign Minister of Pakistan, Khushid Mahmud Kasuri. This is completely different from the first incident. Firstly, it is to do with local politics. The Shiv Sena is a junior partner in the present state government in Maharashtra and is afraid of losing control of the municipal corporation of Mumbai, which is the richest in India with a budget of Rs 312 billion. That would make the Sena irrelevant and, since power and pelf come from ministerial posts, politicians in India will kill to win elections. However, the real question is why does this Kulkarni want a former minister of Pakistan to sell books in India? This is a country which regularly threatens to use nuclear weapons against us. At the very least Kulkarni should be charged with sedition for consorting with the enemy. It is a mystery why some Indians are so keen to become pally with Pakistanis when a journalist writes that she and all Pakistanis support the army and the ISI because they fight terrorism. It is clear that she is either ignorant or comfortable with support for terrorist attacks against India. But a bigger mystery is why are we so weak? Why do we concentrate so much on what the US says on Pakistan? It is as if we are wimps being beaten up by a schoolyard bully and then running to complain to the teacher. We analyse every meeting between the US and Pakistan. The US government clearly knows about Pakistani support for terrorists as hacked emails of the CIA Director have revealed. Yet it nods when Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif spouts the same old lies and rewards him by giving eight F16 planes. On the one hand they threaten us and then beg to play cricket against us to make money. Since we admire the US so much we should copy it. Declare Pakistan a terrorist state, cut off all relations with it, build a fence along the border, lay landmines so that not even a mouse can cross over and apply economic sanctions on it. After all Bill Clinton applied sanctions on us after nuclear tests. What is sauce for the goose..... etc.

Satyameva jayate will triumph over gold coins.

Seems that Initial Public Offerings by companies in India this year have received lukewarm response from retail investors. Out of 16 IPOs that have hit the market the portions set aside for retail investors of 7 have been under-subscribed. Why? In April, a study showed that investors would have lost money on 60% of IPOs since 2003 and returns from 20% of those that were trading higher were less than term deposits in banks would have given. From January 2008 to June this year shares of 303 firms have lost 90% of their value. Alban Offshore dropped from Rs 5,151 to Rs 319, MMTC dropped from Rs 1,921 to Rs 45 and Koutons dropped from Rs 1,000 to just Rs 2.45, per share. Is it because the share market in India has crashed? No. Last December the Indian market was ranked sixth in the world in terms of price earnings and price-to-book ratios over 10 years. Why were 60% of investors losing money from IPOs when the market was doing so well? Because most business fellows in India are greedy, more interested in short term gains than in building long term reputations, and the market is highly manipulated by a few big players. Why then do so called experts keep on urging people to invest in shares? They work out the returns on term deposits in banks, real estate, gold and on shares and show how, over the longer term, shares always give returns many times higher than any other type of investment. Even with property prices reaching US levels investing in shares gives higher returns. If you do not have the knowledge to comprehend company balance sheets invest in equity mutual funds, they advise. Your money will be safe with experts, they say. Will it? Mutual funds are more interested in launching new schemes than generating higher income from older ones because the up-front commission is the highest. If the regulator modifies rules for one type of product, for consumer protection, the industry quickly comes out with different ones, to milk the customer. Banks have suffered when they loaned money against shares, based on reports of analysts. So, people do not trust companies, mutual funds or so called experts. Those who need regular income, such as pensioners, invest in term deposits, which are safe but lose value due to inflation, those with lots of money, especially black, buy real estate, and others, who want to guard against inflation but have small amounts of money, buy gold. India has overtaken China as the biggest importer of gold. The government is cracking down on black money and will launch a gold monetisation scheme in which people will get interest if they deposit their gold into banks. Will they? People will be afraid of questions about taxes so they may deposit only the new gold they buy from banks. Still, it may reduce the volume of import. Instead of selling Ashoka Chakra gold coins the government should sell trust. Satyameva jayate will be a game changer.

Does being a liberal mean a complete lack of principles?

There are lots of people of Indian origin in Canada such that 19 have been elected to the parliament in the recent elections. Professor Vivek Dahejia of Carleton University in Canada finds a lot of similarity in the politics of Canada and India. Stephen Harper of the Conservative Party lost the elections to Justin Trudeau of the Liberal Party. Justin is the son of former Prime Minister, Pierre Trudeau who wore a rose in his lapel, tightened government control over socialized medicine, restricted foreign investment, distanced Canada from the US and transferred the wealth of natural resources to the center. " Loved by writers and artists at home and abroad, he almost single-handedly managed to wreck Canada's economy." If the father was like Nehru then the son is like Rahul Gandhi, except that the Congress has ruled India for 56 out of 67 years since independence and Rahul Gandhi will be the fourth prime minister from the same family, if he manages to win. Harper was hated by Canada's liberals. " The visceral hatred felt by the liberal intelligentsia for the now departed Harper and the Conservatives is matched only by the analogous hatred of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), and for similar reasons," writes Prof Dahejia. What crimes did both commit against the liberals? " Both leaders threatened the cosy hegemony of a supposedly liberal - in reality, self-serving, opportunistic, and at times explicitly venal - elite class tied umbilically over decades with a vast, interconnected, nepotistic, and crony-driven patronage network presided over by each country's self-presumed party of government - the Liberals in Canada and the Congress in India," he writes. Known as ' brokerage parties ' by political scientists, these are " without fixed principles or policies " which exploit " the power of the central state to bribe or bully incompatible constituencies to join together to share the spoils of government." So, the liberals hate Modi, not because of his policies, but because he has stopped the handouts the Congress was giving them. Modi refuses to take media persons with him when he travels abroad. Writers, most of whom have probably been read only by family and friends, have been returning their awards. All these liberals are regurgitating the western media attacks on Modi as a Hindu Nationalist because of a few hundred Muslims killed in riots in Gujarat in 2002, while supporting the killing of millions of Muslims by bombing and drones, sanctified by 'Christian Values'. One so called liberal has denied that liberals are anti-Hindu by listing all the times someone has spoken against other religious practices. Oh dear, such lies. Show us when there has been such vicious unrelenting attacks on any other group, over weeks, by every media outlet, as recently mounted on Hindus. How the liberals have been bribed has been exposed by another article bemoaning the silence of university professors who have been bribed with fellowships to travel abroad. So, which liberal to believe?

Politicians should be forced to play rugby.

Rugby union is a physically punishing game. Played over 80 minutes by 2 teams of 15 players each, the game is decided by points. A penalty earns 3 points and a try, in which a player carries the ball over the opposition goal line and places it firmly on the ground, earns 5 points, with another 2 points earned from conversion, which is kicking the ball over the crossbar. A player carrying the ball maybe tackled to the ground and the opposition is pushed in a scrum or a maul, so injuries are frequent. New Zealand and Australia are going to contest the final of the Rugby World Cup in London next Saturday. There was great indignation when the referee awarded a penalty to Australia in the last minute of the quarter final match against Scotland, allowing Australia to win by a single point. The Scots maintain that the infringement was a knock on, which should have resulted in a scrum, but Australians say that several Scottish players were offside and so it was a definite penalty. All this is technical and completely incomprehensible to most Indians, who only understand cricket, but what is easy to understand is that Scotland benefited earlier when they played their group match against Japan on 23 September, just 4 days after Japan had beaten South Africa on 19 September. Normally, teams are given at least 7 days between matches to recover from injuries. If Japan had been given adequate time to prepare Scotland may never have reached the quarter finals. So the loss against Australia was some sort of justice. Whereas there is justice in sports there is no such justice in politics. That slimy liar, Tony Blair has admitted at last that the attack on Iraq was wrong and led to the rise of Islamic State, or ISIS. But he cannot stop lying. He calls it a 'mistake' when, as a lawyer, he should know that when your actions result in the deaths of over 200,000 people, mostly innocent civilians, then you are a criminal, guilty of mass murder. He says that the intelligence was wrong, which again is a lie, because the UN weapons inspector, Hans Blix said that he could find no WMDs in Iraq. He committed to his unequivocal support to the illegal US attack on Iraq one year earlier during his visit to George Bush's ranch in Crawford, Texas. Sadly, Blair's crimes go unpunished. Instead he was appointed a 'peace envoy' for the middle east by the US. A mass murderer as a peace envoy, the irony could not be more painful for those who suffered. But if Blair is despicable then David Cameron is even worse because he engineered the attack on Libya, killing 30,000 people, despite the catastrophe in Iraq. Blair still maintains that removing Saddam Hussein was justified because he was a baddie. Donald Trump says that the world would be better with Saddam alive. And Trump could well be the next president of the US. Rugby players are penalised for fouls but politicians get away with mass murder.

Animal spirits travel on trains.

For years the Indian Railways has been starved of investment and run on the socialist concept of the cheapest possible service for the millions of poor. Trains such as the Janata Express took 40 hours from Delhi to Calcutta and the Toofan Express takes over 45 hours. Air-conditioned Rajdhani takes 18 hours. 'Toofan' means 'typhoon' and 'express' means 'fast'. The irony of naming the slowest train a 'fast typhoon' seems to have been lost on our former leaders. Because tickets on these trains are very cheap they are crowded and because they are excruciatingly slow they become dirty, so travel, especially in summer, is torture. IR has the fourth largest network of tracks after the US, China, and Russia, which are much larger in area than India. Other than walking or cycling trains are the most energy efficient mode of travel which means that cost of importing fuel is much less and they are least polluting. When we think of the US we think of planes and flying but, at 250,000 km, it has the longest tracks in the world. No wonder it is so rich. However, IR carries 23 million passengers every day, which is around 16,000 every minute. Flying maybe quick but it is expensive, unless tickets are bought well in advance, it is very uncomfortable because of limited seat space, especially on low cost airlines, and the amount of luggage is strictly limited, which means it is suitable for short visits. So important is the IR in our nations's economy that we are probably the only country in the world where there is a minister for railways and there is a separate budget for IR every year. During previous coalition governments the railway minister was a political appointee from a smaller party, to get its support in parliament. Naturally, these people used the railways for political purposes, increasing the number of trains to their states and often on non-profitable routes. No wonder the IR was racking up huge losses, leading to worries about its viability. This being India and IR being a public sector company there was corruption at every level. Just this year there was the freight scam, where freight was being deliberately under-weighed, the ticketing scam, where officials were selling tickets to touts instead of passengers, and a bottled water scam, where officials were buying water from private suppliers. Seems that at long last the present government has recognised the importance of IR for the nation and is arranging long term financing to lay new tracks, modern trains for much better passenger services and a dedicated freight corridor. Such spending will not only create more jobs in the short term but will improve domestic trade in the long term. Indian Railways are the arteries of the country. Animal spirits can revive only if it is flowing.

Information before scams may help.

According to a report from Credit Suisse there are 10 companies in India with the highest amount of debt. Their combined debt add up to 27% of corporate loans and 12% of all bank lending. Adani group has debt of Rs 960 billion, Essar Rs 1.01 trillion, GMR Rs 480 billion, GVK Rs 340 billion, Jaypee Rs 752 billion, JSW Rs 582 billion, Lanco Rs 471 billion, Reliance Rs 1.25 trillion, Vedanta Rs 1.03 trillion, and Videocon of Rs 454 billion. Most indebted companies are into minerals, which have been hurt by the crash in commodity prices, real estate, because of the clampdown on black money by the present government, or infrastructure businesses, which have suffered because of delays in land acquisition. More than half the debt of 6 of the 10 companies is highly stressed and their ability to pay interest on their loans, called interest cover, has fallen. GVK has an interest cover of 0, GMR of 0.15 and Lanco of 0.2. Less than 1.5 is taken as weak cover. Jaypee group has defaulted on 65% of its debt, Essar on 36%, GMR on 37% and Lanco on 38% of its debt. These are terrible figures and one would expect that banks would be foreclosing on their loans and taking over the assets of the companies. Not so. Loan approvals to indebted companies have risen by 85% since 2011-12. Partly it is because bank officials are afraid to declare bad debts on their books so they issue new loans to offset the previous ones, called evergreening, and partly because of enormous corruption in our banks. A scam amounting to Rs 60 billion in money laundering, called hawala transfer in India, has been unearthed at the Noida branch of the Bank of Baroda. A loan for bribes was discovered last year at Syndicate Bank. There are brokers who are earning millions of rupees by arranging loans for dodgy business fellows, who have no intention of repaying, by distributing expensive presents or bribes. Most of our companies do not disclose all the information required under our rules. How are investors to make informed decisions on whether to buy shares in these companies? No wonder Indians have a deep distrust of the stock market. But not just private companies. Our government is also slothful in collecting and releasing information about the economy. Figures released are corrected later. How is the Reserve Bank to decide on monetary policy and companies on investing if they have no idea on the direction of the economy. Toll charges are high, causing resentment among users, because traffic projections were wrong. It is because of a lack of proper accounting that we have the yearly circus of the budget where taxes are regularly increased to cover unforeseen deficits. Ignorance is blindness. Digital information before digital economy.

Why should the strong surrender to the weak?

Physicians have known about geographical differences in disease prevalence for a very long time. For example Chagas Disease is found in South America, Yellow Fever in Africa and Pernicious Anemia almost exclusively in blond, white skinned people. Economists, on the other hand, apply the same theories, developed mostly in western universities, to every country in the world, regardless of climate, culture, eating habits and communicable diseases, which reduce the strength and efficiency of the people. India has the highest number of child mortality in the world. Partly because of our huge population and very high fertility rates but in large part because of poor sanitation. The Prime Minister has started a project to provide toilets in every house but there is cultural resistance to having a dirty room within a home. Why is all this relevant? Because ever since Thomas Piketty wrote his bestseller about rising inequality there has been a deluge of articles about it by economists. Figures look almost similar. The richest 1% own 50% of the total wealth of the world while in India the top 1% own 53% of the total wealth. There can be no comparison between India, which is about $2 trillion economy with the US, which at $16 trillion is 8 times the size, with one-third the population, and yet the rate of inequality is the same. Clearly the causes cannot be the same so the remedies have to be completely different. The US is an unabashedly capitalist country which prides itself as the 'Land of Opportunity', where you can follow the 'American Dream', which is for anyone prepared to work hard and take the risk of failure. Nowhere is this more evident than in Silicon Valley, where failure of one idea does not prevent a person from starting again with a new idea. Socialism is written into our constitution which has meant absolute power for politicians, which includes the power to distribute resources to family and friends, to use taxpayer money without any accountability, to levy very high taxes which rewards those with black money, and to pour trillions into social schemes which reward the poor to produce more children, thus keeping us mired in poverty. So, what should we do to get out of the pit? Some recommend high taxes, a minimum wage, guaranteed employment and social support for the poor. Others say that redistribution does not work but inclusive growth, in which the government invests in training the workforce to improve productivity, is the answer. Professors recommend 'quality education, skill development, health services, transparency, a level playing field, restraint on expenditure' and so on. But we need politicians to make all that possible and they have no intention of doing so. The Congress passed the 42nd Amendment to the Constitution which replaced Fundamental Rights with Fundamental Duties and is resisting the GST bill tooth and nail. We are weak, they are strong. Why should they give it up?

Why are they afraid of becoming wealthy?

If we listen to our media, India is in a terrible state where the economy is doing very poorly, despite the Prime Minister's promise of 'achhe din', which means 'good days', the poor are suffering, because spending on the MGNREGA scheme has fallen, and Hindu Nationalists are running amok killing everyone. Seems that there has never been such suffering until the BJP government was elected last year. The media is incensed because the Prime Minister has put a stop to taking journalists on his foreign trips, where they enjoyed great food and drinks at taxpayer expense. Journalists love going to western countries and many probably have children studying or working there so they echo western press in its hostility to India. Civil servants are incensed because subsidies are being dispensed to the poor directly into newly opened bank accounts, which cuts off a source of extra income for our babus. Only Re 1 out of every Rs 5 spent on the MGNREGA scheme reached the poor so the spending on this has come down, causing great anger to the social workers and do-gooders who thrive on the lucrative business of poverty. Poverty is not only big business it is a fairly easy way to get a Nobel Prize in economics. Business men are disappointed that they cannot game the system by paying ministers and civil servants as in the past. Mines and telecom spectrum are being auctioned in a transparent manner, cutting off opportunities for massive scams as in the past. Not everyone is critical though. In an article one Rajiv Kumar, of the Centre for Policy Research, gives us a list of the achievements of this government. Credit to the corporate sector grew 10.2% in September, which may be a sign of increased investments. Corporate debt to equity ratio has declined to below 80% and will fall quickly once the economy starts to grow again. Sale of commercial vehicles expanded by 24.5% from April-May. Foreign Direct Investment, which is long term and not hot money, grew 10% during those months. Inflation has fallen to low levels allowing the Reserve Bank to cut interest rate by 0.5% last month. Capital expenditure of the government has increased 38%. This is going into infrastructure and to recapitalise banks and so is good for long term growth. The government has clamped down heavily on the cash economy, which has stalled the real estate sector. Apparently 100,000 fellows have fled offshore to protect their black money. It will take time for the economy to adjust to open transparent business when real growth will spurt. That is terrifying politicians of other parties who are used to living like kings on our money. It is amusing to see the Congress bleeding for our farmers when their condition has remained abysmal through 56 years of Congress rule. Too much wealth and power in poverty. No one wants to lose it.

If natural is better should we follow Mother Nature?

Vegetarians in India have been branded as fanatics after the killing of a Muslim man in UP, allegedly for eating beef. Because most news reporting in India is biased and sensational we do not know whether the man was attacked for stealing cows, which cost a lot of money, or for eating meat. The debate on eating meat has become religious when it should be based on rational logic. We can dispense with God straight away because God must have created all the predators we see today. Predators appeared at the beginning of life on earth and have played a crucial role in evolution. So, if not God, what about morality? Is it moral to cause pain to an animal for food? Hindus slaughter animals by beheading it in one blow. Does it cause pain? Millions of human beings have been beheaded in history. During the French revolution the guillotine was used almost on an industrial scale. Charles I of England was beheaded with an axe. Today the ISIS uses a scimitar for beheading its victims. There is no study to see if victims of beheading suffer any pain but we can conjecture that, as the cells of the sensory cortex die off, there could be intense pain for some seconds. So, should we subject an animal to pain just for food? The question then arises as to whether death from natural causes, such as old age, cancer, stroke or heart failure, is painless. Ischemic pain is so severe that it needs intravenous morphine for relief. There was great rejoicing when passive euthanasia was allowed in India by the Supreme Court. Animals cannot talk so will have to suffer unnecessary pain from illness. Nature does not allow such suffering. In the wild, an old or sick animal will be killed by predators. Even a sick lion will be killed by other lions or by hyenas. Perhaps, stunning, as practiced in the west, is the most humane way of slaughter. Surely, eating meat is bad for health? Not so. Gujarat, which has probably the largest number of vegetarians, has the highest rates for diabetes and hypertension in India. Raising animals is very bad for the environment, right? Cows are said to be methane factories, which is worse than producing CO2. Trouble is that vegetarians in India consume large quantities of cow's milk and milk products. Farm animals cause depletion of natural resources, such as water. Rice takes a lot of water to cultivate and farmers burn the stubble after harvesting, creating severe pollution. Because it is difficult to obtain the same nutrition from a plant based diet you need much more land which means destruction of forests. The haze in south east Asia is for producing palm oil. Pesticides are highly toxic and poison water sources. Finally, meat eating animals are much more intelligent than grass eaters. If humans become vegetarians we may evolve backwards into goats. Do we really want that?

The numbers are sky high but isn't that a great distance to fall?

Lu Yucheng, China's Ambassador to India has written a glowing article about how China is modifying its economy from investment led growth to consumption and how it intends to benefit all its neighbors as it becomes more wealthy. He cites a bunch of figures to support his thesis. Market valuation of Xiaomi has soared to $45 billion in just 5 years. Market capitalisation of Smartisan, which wants to create new ideas for smart phones, has risen to $400 million within 3 years. Alibaba is a world renowned company , valued at $150 billion. Impressive. But in May Alibaba was sued in the US for selling counterfeit products on its site. Apparently Gucci bags, which sell for $795, were being offered for $2-5 on its site, provided the customer bought at least 2000 pieces. Alibaba is lobbying hard not to be blacklisted in the US. " China attaches importance to strengthening cooperation with neighbouring countries, and India is among our largest development partners," writes Mr Yu. And again," China is known as the 'world factory', and India the 'world office'. We can better align our development strategies and work together to make the Chinese phoenix and the Indian peacock fly higher." Of course, as ambassador, it is his job to dish out bromides and we wish we could believe him. Even as he was writing this article China commissioned a huge dam on the Brahmaputra in Tibet to divert its waters to its territory. China is the main protector of the Pakistani government's policy of supporting terrorist groups which mount attacks against India. The Cultural Revolution under Mao Zedong killed around 45 million people. While other countries would revile such a monster Mao is still revered in China and his body is still preserved in a mausoleum in Beijing, an idol of a god for the Party, which does not believe in religion. One of the men who suffered in that revolution, Xi Jinping is today's president. One would expect that having suffered under a dictator Xi would move towards more democracy and transparency but he has become more powerful by using corruption trials to put opponents in prison and treating leaders of other countries with contempt. Xi is visiting Britain today where he will be treated as royalty as he stays at Buckingham Palace. Our Prime Minister is to visit Britain next month and he must be careful not to fall into any British trap as it struggles to stay relevant in the world. China's growth rate has slowed to 6.9% which would be considered fantastic in any other country but as it adjusts its economy away from investment unemployment may rise. Xi has made a lot of enemies and as the pressure builds there may be a coup and a civil war. That would benefit everyone.

The lies we believe. Are we stupid?

British tabloid, The Mail on Sunday claims to have obtained secret emails, released from private servers of the former US Secretary of State for Obama, Hillary Clinton. They were written by the Secretary of State, Colin Powell to then President, George W Bush. They reveal Tony Blair's promise that Britain would support any war on Iraq militarily, one year before the attack on Iraq. Bush had flattered Blair's ego by inviting him to his private ranch at Crawford, Texas and the photo of Blair smiling at Bush, as the two men shake hands, shows his adulation for the American President. At the time Blair said," This is a matter for considering all the options. We're not proposing military action at this point in time." Powell wrote in his memo to Bush," Blair continues to stand by you and the US as we move forward on the war on terrorism and on Iraq. He will present to you the strategic, tactical and public affairs lines that he believes will strengthen global support for our common cause." So not only was Blair lying to the British people he taught Bush what lies to tell the world. Blair lied repeatedly to the British parliament about Saddam Hussein developing Weapons of Mass Destruction, even claiming that Saddam had " active military plans for the use of chemical and biological weapons, which could be activated within 45 minutes" and that he had " no doubt " that inspectors would find the " clearest possible evidence " of WMDs. UN chief weapons inspector, Hans Blix found no evidence of WMDs in Iraq but Bush and Blair attacked Iraq anyway, killing hundreds of thousands. Colin Powell lied to the UN Security Council, even to the extent of manufacturing evidence. The Bush family apparently had extensive business links with Saudis, including Bin Laden's brother, Salem. Fifteen of the 19 hijackers on 9/11 were Saudis but the FBI is accused of deliberately suppressing evidence linking Saudi involvement in 9/11 attacks. Maybe, because the CIA and the Bush family had extensive links to the infamous Bank of Credit and Commerce International of Pakistan which shut down in 1991 but its activities were taken over by Bin Laden. Obama suppressed information obtained from Bin Laden's house after he was killed, to claim the Al Qaeda had been defeated, for his reelection in 2012. David Cameron's cronies acted as agents of UAE to attack Qatar in the British press. Yet the Emir of Qatar was welcomed at Buckingham Palace by the Queen when he visited in October last year. Cameron used a Security Council resolution authorising protection of civilians in Libya, especially Benghazi, to kill Gaddafi. 30,000 civilians died and 50,000 were injured. Libya has descended into anarchy today. They lie, we believe, we must be stupid.

Would it not be worse without bubbles?

We should be worried. If pundits are to be believed the world is witnessing the largest financial bubbles forming everywhere but central banks are unwilling, or unable, to control them. The source of the greatest concern today are known as 'unicorns', which are start-up companies valued at more than $1 billion. In Silicon Valley there are more than 100 such companies, some of which are making money, but most are running huge losses. Uber is valued at $50 billion but is running losses every quarter. Amazon was valued at $247 in July, having reported a loss of $57 million in April on sales of over $22 billion. India is no exception. Here too valuations of companies are rising to ridiculous levels, based in some cases on fictitious sales figures. Venture funds pour money into dodgy start-ups on the theory that if one is successful among dozens the returns will be enormous. One of the reasons for such valuations is that central banks, especially in rich countries, have pumped trillions of dollars into the global economy through bond buying programs, known as quantitative easing. Interest rates have been reduced to near zero levels which means that borrowing has never been cheaper than now. Stock markets are reaching record levels. When US non-farm payroll figures came in at 140,000, lower than expected, markets celebrated, because this may force the Federal Reserve to postpone any rise in interest rate to 2016. The Fed kept interest rate on hold in its meeting in September, citing a poor outlook for the global economy, especially China. Central banks are now talking about negative interest rates, where people have to pay to keep money in banks, and of helicopter money, wherein the government borrows money from the bank to hand out cash to the people. India is well ahead in this game, called targeted subsidy, in which the government transfers cash to accounts of people, deemed to be poor. No wonder retail inflation rose to 4.41% in September from 3.69% in July. Cheap cash leads to soaring asset prices which means that the richest 1% now own 50% of all the wealth in the world. Such is the gap in wealth that possessing $3,210 will put one in the top 50% of people in the world, where more than a billion people live on less that $1.25 a day. In India, the top 1% now own 53% of the nation's wealth and the top 10% own 76.3%. The top 1% owned just 36.8% of the nation's wealth in 2000. Shows what 10 years of socialism and crony capitalism by the Congress has accomplished. Professor Roubini has calculated risk profiles of 174 countries using 200 quantitative variables which can predict countries at risk of financial problems. Trouble is politicians will do anything to win elections. The US is again talking about government shutdown because Congress may refuse to raise the debt limit. Just as the Congress has vowed not to pass any bill in the Rajya Sabha. Central banks have to blow bubbles because politicians are a drag.

Is a weak man more dangerous for the world?

There has been a sudden rash of knife attacks, described as 'lone wolf' attacks by the Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, on Jews in east Jerusalem, which is occupied by Israel. This started because some orthodox Jews wanted to pray at the Al Aqsa Mosque, a holy site to Jews, known as Temple Mount, which Palestinians see as a plot by Jews to take over the mosque. Although denied by the Israeli government the flames have been fanned by social media which show videos of Palestinians shot by Israeli police. What has really rattled Israelis is that these are Palestinians living in Israel and not in Gaza or West Bank. Israelis are so terrified of being attacked on streets that they are arming themselves with pepper spray and guns that shoot tear gas. To add to Israel's worries Iran has just shown pictures of a long line of brand new trucks loaded with long range missiles, ready to be fired, in an underground tunnel, cut out of rock, 500 meters under a mountain whose location has not been revealed. According to an Israeli paper Netanyahu had made a decision to bomb Iran's nuclear facilities last year but the attack was aborted after Obama threatened to shoot down Israeli jets as they flew over Iraq to get to Iran. This was denied by Washington as a rumour. But what if Israeli jets fly south over the Red Sea and then are allowed to fly east across Saudi Arabia? What if Saudi jets join in the attack? Will the US shoot down both Israeli and Saudi jets? The US Congress could not muster a two-thirds majority to block the nuclear deal with Iran, which will apparently stop Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon for 10 years. Sanctions will disappear once the deal comes into effect, which will inject billions of dollars into Iran's economy as it is able to sell oil once again. Feeling immensely stronger than before Iran has sent soldiers to join Assad's forces in Syria, along with the Hezbollah from Lebanon. They are being helped by Russia which is bombing all rebels, including the ones supported by the US. The west has been taken aback by the sophistication of Russian weapons systems and the efficiency with which they moved aircraft, tanks and troops into bases in Latakia in Syria. Russia is using 'Blazing Sun' thermobaric bombs, capable of flattening 8 city blocks in one strike. Apparently Russian hackers have targeted the stock market in Poland and a steel plant in Germany, disguised as Islamists, causing damage. In India we obtain our news only from English language sources so we do not know whether all this is genuine or propaganda to start an all out war with Russia through eastern Europe, mainly Ukraine. Obama is ready to sign a nuclear deal with Pakistan. Not content with killing hundreds using drones he wants to be responsible for a holocaust. A weak man is infinitely more dangerous than a maniac.

Dictionaries as Diwali present for our civil servants?

A highly literate civil servant, who regularly writes articles on economics, has sought to define what constitutes corruption in India. There is the misuse of public assets for personal gain, for instance official cars with flashing red lights. But a much larger misappropriation of public funds takes place when politicians distribute largesse with our money to win elections. There are bribes for services that should be provided automatically. Here he seeks to make excuses when he writes,"...a distinction needs to be made between petty bureaucratic corruption, at the level of the humble traffic cop, patwari, tax official, and high corruption, involving a nexus between politicians and bureaucrats. This nexus is unequal, with most of the gains accruing to the former. Also, the latter's participation maybe active or passive." Not true. Civil servants control access to ministers and also the movements of files, which are still the only fuel for the functioning of our government machinery. Mr Modi has restricted this form of corruption, causing great distress. It is amazing that such a literate person is so ignorant of the crime of being an accessory, when he so breezily excuses his colleagues as junior partners to politicians. As to whether corruption is increasing his excuse is that Rs 100 today maybe less than Rs 10 in 1990 because of high inflation in India. True, inflation is responsible, but not in that way. When a civil servant earned Rs 5,000 per month he would not dare to ask for more than Rs 50,000 as bribe but now that salaries have soared to Rs 50,000 per month their demands have risen to tens of millions, to reflect their status, or 'bribe price'. 15% of IAS officers say that they have no immovable assets, which means properties. Maybe because it is in other names, which is why they are so desperate to keep their family wealth hidden from public scrutiny, with risible excuses. A huge form of corruption is shirking work for which they are drawing salary every month. Modi has taken steps to root out deadwood from the system by forcing the useless to retire on time. Indian bureaucracy has been consistently ranked the worst in Asia, below China, Indonesia and Vietnam. To spend a lifetime doing nothing and then drawing a comfortable pension for life seems to be a most corrosive form of corruption. On an index of corruption it is ranked a proud 94. A rough estimate of the total black money can be made by adding values of all the real estate in India, excluding farms, and then comparing it to the US, based on total salary earned. A final excuse is," Howsoever morally repugnant, it is entirely possible that, if streamlines and predictable, some forms of corruption - speed money - may act like efficient taxes." Shocking and absolutely wrong. Taxes add to public assets while black money causes uncontrolled rise in prices. Which is why we are so poor.

Media howling, an Indian version of a horror movie?

The British tabloid, the Daily Mail has published a furious attack on Saudi Arabia, under the headline," The shame of Britain sucking up to these barbaric gangsters." The reason for the anger? A 74 year old British expat, Karl Andree was caught with bottles of wine in his car and has been sentenced to 350 lashes. Such punishments are carried out in public, in the square in front of the main mosque, on Friday after the noon prayers, called 'dhuhr' in Arabic. The person lies down on the ground and "...a white robed Islamist enforcer will exact the barbaric punishment as verses from the Koran are blasted from speakers of nearby mosques." Andree has apparently been fleeced of 35,000 pounds by a bogus lawyer. What the Mail is not saying is why Andree was brewing wine when everyone knows that alcohol is absolutely forbidden in the kingdom. There is a thriving underground market for locally brewed alcohol known as 'Sadiqi', available in bottles of mineral water. 'Sadiq" means 'friend' in Arabic. Normally, westerners are left alone in Saudi Arabia but if Andree had several bottles of wine in his car they may have suspected that he is selling them. To show its anger the Mail published the story of a Saudi man who beat his 7 year old daughter to death with an air-conditioning hose because she said that she did not love him. " The kingdom's extremist ideology, developed in the 18th century, is barely indistinguishable from the Islamic State," it says. Saudi Arabia is an extremely perverted society because of religious fanaticism. There is a fatwa which says that no woman can visit a hospital without a male guardian, who maybe anyone from brother to brother-in-law. Thus it is usual to find a brother present while his grown-up sister is exposed for examination. What has this to do with us in India? A 58 year old woman, Kasturi Munirathinam had her hand chopped off by her employer for complaining about her ill treatment. She had been beaten and starved. " When she tried to escape the harassment and torture her right hand was chopped off by the woman employer. She fell down and suffered serious spinal injuries," said her sister. The amazing thing is that there has been an absolute silence in the Indian media concerning this uncivilised savagery. But there has been concerted howling in the media, like a pack of coyotes, at a Pakistani singer's concert being cancelled in Mumbai. Why? Why should a Pakistani earn millions in India when it is Pakistani government policy to send in terrorists to kill Indians? Delhi Chief Minister has invited him to sing in Delhi. Like Mir Jafar invited the British. A lot of the media hysteria may even be based on outright lies. A Pakistani politician, part of the establishment, was invited to launch his book in Mumbai. Seems to be an Indian version of The Howling, a Hollywood horror movie. After all our media love the US.

Figures are for pundits, feelings are for people.

One Pronab Sen has written a scholarly article on the causes of rising prices in India and how the Reserve Bank finds it difficult to control inflation through monetary policy, which means interest rate. The RBI controls the amount of cash in the country. All cash is held in 3 forms - in bank deposits, by people in the form of currency and in black money. Cash moves into the system when people withdraw money from banks to pay for higher food prices, due to direct government handouts through various social schemes and generation of black money. Price of food rose from 2009 to 2014 because the Congress increased the Minimum Support Price paid to farmers and did not release enough grains from stores. This was a deliberate policy to increase income for farmers. Thus even during drought years farmers had excess income and the NREGA program increased cash in the system, increasing prices. Then there are artificial shortages of food, especially onions, created by traders to extract illicit gains. In 2014 the MSP was raised by 3.8%, the government released 6.5 million tonnes of grain and spending on the NREGA scheme dropped by Rs 12,000, probably due to strict control of corruption, so the rate of inflation fell sharply. So the RBI had no role in controlling inflation. Splendid. We understand all that, but what does it mean? Does it mean that the RBI should do nothing if inflation rises, as it did to nearly 15% under the Congress in April 2009, but merely standby as a spectator? If we compare inflation with interest rate we see that every time interest rate was lowered inflation spiked and came down when the rate was raised. It was lowered to 4.75% in April 2009, just before general elections in May. The RBI has no control over government spending even if it strongly disagrees, as it does with waiver of loans given to farmers. Politicians like to shower taxpayer money on the people to win elections because it does not cost them a penny. To finance its spending the government borrows money from the market by selling bonds through the RBI. Even if a high interest rate did not help in controlling inflation the RBI can signal its alarm at irresponsible government spending by raising rate. Not just in India. Markets went up when it was revealed that the US created far fewer jobs last month than predicted. That is because it prevented the Federal Reserve from raising rates. The US, Europe and Japan want to raise inflation rate to 2% to make people spend more because people postpone purchases if prices are dropping. Indians do not think like western people because we do not have any social safety net for the very high taxes we pay so we tend to save as much as we can. High inflation means we save less, which means less money for investments and a low interest rate encourages people to buy gold. The only way to generate trust is to provide positive real interest rates. Only the RBI can do that.

The end of the world may well be nigh.

Astrologers and assorted cult leaders, mainly Christians, have been predicting the end of the world for thousands of years. The latest prediction was for the 7th of this month when the moon appeared red, a natural phenomenon known as 'blood moon'. Normally all these prophets of doom are ignored with an amused shrug as harmless loonies unless one tries to create an apocalypse, as Aum Shinrikyo did when it used Sarin gas on the Tokyo metro in 1995. In 1993, 76 people belonging to a doomsday cult called Branch Davidians died in a fire at a ranch in Waco, Texas. These incidents, although shocking, are rare and insignificant. But now it seems that an apocalypse could actually take place. Not because of any celestial or religious event but because western powers seem to be engineering it. In World War I there were over 38 million casualties, 17 million dead and 20 million wounded. In World War II over 60 million were killed, about 3% of the total world population in 1940. This time casualties will be in hundreds of millions, maybe in excess of a billion. The difference is that there were no nuclear weapons during those wars and WWII ended abruptly when the US dropped nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Those bombs, with yields of 13-18 kilotons of TNT were mere toys compared to today's bombs which can deliver energy equivalent to 48-50,000 kilotons of TNT. Nine countries are known to possess nuclear arsenals, of which the US, Russia and China have the deadliest, along with delivery systems capable of reaching the farthest corners of the globe. Iran is getting there. What has all this got to do with doomsday cults? The US has dropped 50 tons of grenades and ammunition, and possibly anti-tank weapons, on northern Syria, apparently to 'good terrorists' fighting Bashar al-Assad. An earlier air drop of weapons, meant for Kurds, ended up in the hands of ISIS. Clearly the US does not care who gets the weapons because their aim is not to fight ISIS but to fight a proxy war with Russia. This is precisely the same stupidity that governed the supply of arms to the Mujahiddeen, who were invited to the White House by Ronald Reagan. That led to the formation of the Taliban, the civil war followed, killing thousands and displacing even more, leading to 9/11, and the rest is history. Supplying weapons to terrorists is only going to prolong the war and the agony of the Syrian people. Syrian refugees in Jordan are in such poverty that they are returning back to their homes with their children despite the carnage. After the suicide bomb attacks in Ankara, blamed on the ISIS by the government, Turkey bombed Kurds in northern Iraq. Make sense? It does in the middle east. If the US weapons fall in the hands of the Peshmerga they could use them against Turkey, a NATO ally. Obama has been looking for a legacy. The death of one billion would be a nice one.

Things never work out the way you want, do they?

A noted historian makes a case for dividing the state of Uttar Pradesh into smaller states for better governance. He starts with the recent report of 2.32 million applications in UP for 368 posts of peons or Class IV employees, as they are known in official lingo. Of these 255 had PhD degrees in subjects, such as engineering, and 25,000 had Master's degrees. This is due to a lack of job opportunities in UP and because most degrees awarded in the state are rubbish. In August, in a bizarre protest, students at a paramedical exam cut themselves because they were not allowed to cheat, as in previous years. But, as is usual among all experts the article does not mention the real reason for the dismal state of UP, and that is fertility rate. Although it is coming down UP has the second highest fertility rate in India after Bihar, which is holding elections to its assembly, starting today. With huge numbers of unemployed young people it is no wonder that the two states also have the honor of having the highest rates of violent crimes in the country. Because the state government does not provide public services the top industries in Kanpur are " those marketing bottled water, recruiting and providing security guards, and installing generator sets." " Thus, while in a city like Bangalore, those involved in 'start-ups' venerate the likes of NR Narayan Murthy and Nandan Nilekani a young entrepreneurship with ambition is more likely to take Ponty Chadha or Subroto Roy as his model. He seeks, like them, to cultivate close links with politicians, so as to divert public funds for private gain, the loot shared between the politicians entrepreneur and entrepreneurial politician," he writes. And again." Whether reckoned in terms of economic development, education, health or social (and especially communal) peace, it is absolutely the worst governed state in the union." We would respectfully like to disagree. The hill state of Uttarakhand was carved out of UP and is equally, if not more corrupt. Land prices in the capital, Dehradun have increased a hundred fold, such is the level of black money. After the flash floods in 2013 which killed around 10,000 people officials 'ate up' Rs 1 billion of the money given for aid of flood victims. The BJP brought in Gen Khanduri to clean up the image of the party before assembly election in 2012 but he was sabotaged by members of his own party who did not want to lose the opportunity to loot. Creating new states by dividing UP further will create new assemblies, multiplying the numbers of politicians and civil servants, thus increasing corruption to new levels. Delhi is a typical example. While only a city it has a state government and 3 municipalities. When Kiran Bedi was declared the candidate for chief minister in state elections by the BJP, party workers and supporters voted against her because she has a reputation for being tough on crime. Result, an overwhelming victory for AAP and hundreds dead of a dengue epidemic. The more the politicians the more the crime. This is India.

The Julius Caesars of India.

A British historian writes how Julius Caesar came to the senate on that fateful day of 15 March, 44 BC even though he must have sensed mortal danger. A former British Foreign Secretary has named it 'the hubris syndrome', in which a person in power becomes convinced that he or she is infallible. Julius Caesar died at the height of his fame and power so he has become a legend. If Pompey the Great had died when he had fallen seriously ill he would not have lost the battle against Caesar and forced to fall on his sword. Abraham Lincoln was killed after winning the civil war, before it became apparent that blacks were still treated very badly in Confederate states and John Kennedy was killed before his numerous affairs became public. Politicians today suffer from similar hubris and do not know when to go. If Margaret Thatcher had stepped down in 1987 she would not have been humiliated and if Tony Blair had kept his promise to step down in 1994 he would not have become a war criminal. In India no politician would ever dream of stepping down. Around 34% of our esteemed MPs have serious criminal charges, including murder, kidnapping and extortion, against them and the parliament is a safe place to hide. You get great opportunities to steal money and never go to jail, like former Telecom Minister Sukh Ram who was caught with pillows stuffed with notes, because cases continue forever in our legal system. Sukh Ram recently celebrated his son's swearing in as a minister in the Congress government of Himachal. Lalu Prasad Yadav is campaigning in the Bihar election while out on bail in the fodder scam, protected by the very police who are supposed to jail him. Two of his sons are candidates in the coming assembly elections. A politician's son guilty of murder is granted furlough, which is leave granted to soldiers, to get married. Then there is the adulation. When Ms Jayalalithaa was jailed many killed themselves. No wonder that all charges against her were dismissed, the judge ruling that she did not gain Rs 66.65 crores but only a few crores. Hope we will also be allowed to go free if we amass just a few crores from dubious sources. Members of Parliament get huge perks, plus added bonuses of chartered flights arranged by 'friends'. Those that are thrown out by the people at elections get themselves into the dumpyard of the Rajya Sabha, from where they maybe appointed prime minister. It is a gravy train, not just for life, but for generations. The prime example is The Family which is clinging on since 1947. That is why politicians will stoop to any level to get noticed. And when you have creepy crawlies you have a Caesar.

If problems are huge solutions must be tough.

Suicides by farmers is regular news in India. It maybe common, but remains extremely distressing because it is an unnecessary waste of a life and suicide by a man leaves his wife completely helpless, with large debts to repay and children to feed. One professor writes that virtually all the suicides are in men because men are unable to handle the shame of not being able to provide for their families. Suicide rates are the highest in Maharashtra because of the high incidence of first cousin marriage, which means the man loses face among his own relatives, whereas in north India, where men are not related to their wives, they are comfortable taking dowry from their in laws. The good thing is that the share of total rural population in India has dropped from 76.7% in 1981 to 68.8% in 2011, share of agriculture in total employment has dropped from 64.9% in 1987 to 48.9% in 2012 and the share of agriculture in India's GDP from 24.6% in 1987 to 15.1% in 2012. This means that large numbers have moved to cities in search of jobs which provide a steady income and are not dependent on the vagaries of weather. The bad news makes grim reading. In 2011 life expectancy at birth was 5 years less for rural people compared to urban people. Literacy rates were 68% for men and 59% for women, infant mortality rates were 48 per 1,000 births compared to 29 in urban India, almost 20% had no access to safe drinking water in rural areas and 70% had no sanitation facilities. Socialist policies have been responsible for this mess. Vast amounts of money are wasted in doling handouts, such as the NREGA scheme, but all farm income is completely exempt from tax, which helps only rich landholders and is a very useful avenue for money laundering. Many states provide free electricity for farmers, to get votes, which means that many electricity boards are bankrupt. Outstanding loans on Kisan Credit Cards has reached Rs 6.48 trillion, which are misused by many to buy household goods or for holidays, with no intention of repaying the loans. Rich farmers know that politicians will respond to suicides by forgiving all loans to farmers. This is known as loan waiver and is an easy way to use taxpayer money to buy votes. It leads to farmers becoming prey to bank officials. If the same amount of money is spent on improving irrigation it will ensure farmers earn money even in drought years. It maybe no coincidence that the highest rates of suicides are in Maharashtra where Rs 700 billion was spent on irrigation schemes which do not exist. An insurance scheme for farmers and affordable healthcare for all Indians will be most useful. Finally, poor farmers are poor because they have small landholdings. This is because land is divided among children, making each subdivision even smaller. The only answer to all problems of poverty is to stop childbirth. The only way is to target subsidies to those with one child or none. We must protect our children.

Nature can survive radiation but can she survive us?

Four years after a tsunami destroyed the nuclear power plant and 160,000 people were evacuated from their homes in Fukushima nature has reclaimed the land. Although 120,000 have still not been allowed back home trees and plants are growing exuberantly. This is even more evident at Chernobyl where the nuclear accident occurred 30 years ago. Here no human being has returned but the place is teeming with wildlife. Wolves are 7 times the number compared to surrounding nature reserves. It indicates 2 things - 1. If predators are so abundant it means that the prey are also healthy and multiplying and 2. Humans are a greater threat to animals than deadly radiation. Nature quickly reclaims any place that is deserted by humans, often with surprising results. Higher rates of thyroid cancer have been discovered in children who were near Fukushima at the time of the accident. Thyroid concentrates iodine so the power plant must have released a large dose of radioactive iodine at the time of the accident. The 2 bombs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the many accidents at nuclear power plants means that effects of radiation on humans have been studied extensively. People worry about the harmful effects of X Rays, used extensively by doctors to diagnose everything from pneumonia to broken bones, although the radiation from diagnostic tests is minuscule compared to that from a nuclear accident. We know that radiation can damage DNA, which constitutes our genes, and can cause anything from birth defects to cancer. Skin cancer is much commoner in white skin people who try to get a tan by exposure to the sun or even a sunbed. How then are plants growing where human beings are forbidden to go? And if plants are relatively resistant to radiation what about mammals, such as wolves? Germ cells, such as ova and sperms, and unborn fetuses are exquisitely sensitive to radiation so it is fantastic that so many species of mammals are breeding and look so healthy. There maybe 2 explanations for normal looking animals. First, deformed babies born to animals will not survive, so nature is selecting only the normal ones to become adults. Second, animals within the radioactive zone are sterile but the safety of the zone, because of the absence of human beings, with abundant food supply is attracting animals from surrounding areas. This is proof, if any proof is required, that we humans are super predators. We not only kill for food but for fun as well. What fun did this dentist get from killing Cecil the lion? How perverse! Our cruelty is easy and without any remorse. Sharks have their fins cut off and are then thrown back into the sea to drown. Legs are chopped off from living frogs because they are considered a delicacy in some parts of the world. But the biggest enemy of wildlife is agriculture, in which forests are cut down, reducing habitat, pesticides poison animals and increased CO2 is heating the oceans, bleaching corals. We should be proud. We are more dangerous than nuclear radiation.