Scamsters, Gangsters and ...

Not so long ago India was touted as the land of elephants and snake charmers. Not anymore...India today is known as the land of information technology and call centre...or is it truly so...I think India should be known as the land of scamsters, gangsters (and masters). Let me explain in detail.

Scamsters: A dictionary defines a scamster to be one who perpetrates scams (or perpetrates something that invariably ends up in the involvement of lot of money...hell of a lot). But can we define all the scamsters in the same light...Certainly not...In the world of Madoffs (of the infamous Ponzi fame) and dirty US bankers (the ones who brought the world to its knees) Indian scamsters are to be considered in a different league altogether...Yes, no prizes for guessing that I will be talking about the dirty rotten scoundrels – Indian politicians...and not one or two but a plethora of them. The year that is about to end in a few days time, was marked by the occurence of atleast half a dozen “mother of all scams”. Such was the magnanimity of each scams that each one would fight for the coveted “mother of all scams” title. First it was the Commonwealth Games (should I call it common wealth scam), a scam of roughly around INR70,000 crore...then came the Telecom Spectrum Allocation Saga, a scam of roughly around INR170,000 crore. I would stop the listing here, leave alone the superstars involved in these scams...these numbers do numb my mind and boggle mind in drawing bizarre conclusions...Land of Scamsters – hence proved.

Gangsters: Men (or women, pardon me if I hurt the female sentiments!) with dark character and an uncanny poise and charm that works wonders to create the aura of invincibility around them. Contract killing, extortion, kidnapping, murder (and many more) are his watchwords. Such dogged is their determination that it would put the greatest of all determinists to shame. These stars, a breed which is abundant in India, determine the fate of the common man and the politicians (to whom they are close associates) alike. They can control the profits of your business (read extortion) or manipulate the results of assembly elections (read contract killing, murder, kidnapping...). Such is their stronghold that it is quite common in our conutry for many of them to lead political parties. After all they have that innate ability to influence and lead people!I would not tarnish their glorified names here...but needless to say they hold a status quo in the society which is time and again glorified by the Indian media...Land of Gangsters – hence proved.

Till now I have tried to deduce a lot (not much deduction I should say, but applied inferences)...in a fashion similar to Holmesian inference (For the ignorant soul, I would leave it to them to find out the meaning of Holmesian inference). In the end, I would like to deduce that India is also a land of masters. These men are ordinary men with extraordinary deeds. They are masters in their own right...who have actually brought a lot of laurels to our motherland. Once again I would not want to take names (just in case I miss out on any and alas! The media also does not glorify them always like it does for the previous two cases) But nevertheless, these men of extraordinary repertoire deservedly command respect and I salute them. Not for their great deeds, that I deem them worthy of the honour but for the hope that they give me...that hardwork and determination pays and that all things can't go wrong in this great country.

Hail our heroes, whether they are scamsters, drilling a unmendable hole in the Indian exchequer or gangsters, killing and extorting ruthlessly or masters, glorifying India in the world stage. Don't get me wrong...I am just asking you to hail the heroes...laurels or brickbats ultimately they are the stars which defines or lends a meaning to India...the “LAND OF 'STERS''...upto you to decide what should be appended to 'STER'.