Before anyone gets all excited, this starbuck is not related to the gorgeous, spirited and sexy pilot of Battlestar Galactica… a huge fan though.
So, Gregory David Roberts’s pretentious tome, “Shantaram” is being made into a movie, with no less than Johnny Depp and Amitabh Bachchan starring in it. Don’t know if anyone else got the same feeling, but methinks it was created with the hope that it will one day grace the silver screens across the world. It has all the Masala of a Hollywood film complete with prison torture, odd "Madame" characters, War and a dying hero in this same war. Best part is, it will also appeal to the bollywood crowd, as it seems to have bollywood masala cleverly woven into the plot! Ah globalization !
If anyone out there is asking for my opinion, I think Leonardo Di Caprio would have made a far better Shantaram. No substitute for Amitabh Bachchan for the role of Khader Bhai. I hope they pick Rajpal Yadav for the part of Prabhaker.
Thursday, February 28, 2008
Sunday, February 3, 2008
Charity and Governance
Now that the markets are a bit more stable, I have been able to think of other things. This time it is about Charity.
Charity is a big thing in this part of the world and also while in Ireland, I noticed that the Irish are really big on charity. These days, I have noticed a lot of advertisements asking for charity. Some say you can sponsor a child in Africa or some where in the third world. There are visuals of malnourished kids and emaciated families.
There are tax breaks and various incentives to provide to accredited charities. To facilitate charities, it is now possible to authorize deduction of charities at the payroll itself. This allows mobilizing vast sums towards charities. To mobilize these charities and channel them to the target audience requires overheads of organization. Organizing and deploying charity is an industry in itself and has huge corporate sponsorship and charitable giving is likely to be part of performance appraisals in the near future.
The average Canadian is quite happy to donate to charitable causes the year round. The fact that quality of life is good in the first world allows people to be open to donating and also sensitive when shown human suffering.
What is prominent is the fact that there are campaigns to provide education and basic living facilities to disadvantaged children in the third world. This is really a good achievement. However, I always wonder if there are any charities that are aimed at addressing the root cause of these misfortunes. There is a common link between orphans, poverty and refugee issues and that is poor governance. The difference between regions of prosperity and regions of intense misfortune is governance.
Regardless of whether a country is resource rich (like Nigeria) or totally barren (Ethiopia) or has been prosperous in the past (Zimbabwe), the common thread is poor governance. The responsibility of the government is to be the custodian of the collective futures of its citizens and to manage the resources with a good vision and effective clean administration. Where this element is absent, what happens is that the proceeds of national resources do not reach the people. Corruption becomes rife and when public protests increase; there is a violent clampdown. It is established that those in government can benefit from the national resources, then elections become violent and common people get caught in the cross fire. Democracy becomes a casualty.
The result of all of this is the swelling number of orphans, poverty, and hopelessness. People who can flee such regimes end up as unwanted refugees. They risk their life and limb and end up in the shores of Spain or elsewhere in containers.
I am going to spend some time on the net doing research to find out if any NGO is involved in addressing these root causes and will share my findings. Meanwhile I can only think that if we are in a boat that has a hole in the hull, bailing buckets of water will help only to a certain extent. What will really solve the problem is sealing the hole. Similarly charity addressed at providing education and food to orphans and the needy in the third world is like bailing buckets of water from the boat. The water will continue to fill up until the hole in the hull is plugged.
Charity is a big thing in this part of the world and also while in Ireland, I noticed that the Irish are really big on charity. These days, I have noticed a lot of advertisements asking for charity. Some say you can sponsor a child in Africa or some where in the third world. There are visuals of malnourished kids and emaciated families.
There are tax breaks and various incentives to provide to accredited charities. To facilitate charities, it is now possible to authorize deduction of charities at the payroll itself. This allows mobilizing vast sums towards charities. To mobilize these charities and channel them to the target audience requires overheads of organization. Organizing and deploying charity is an industry in itself and has huge corporate sponsorship and charitable giving is likely to be part of performance appraisals in the near future.
The average Canadian is quite happy to donate to charitable causes the year round. The fact that quality of life is good in the first world allows people to be open to donating and also sensitive when shown human suffering.
What is prominent is the fact that there are campaigns to provide education and basic living facilities to disadvantaged children in the third world. This is really a good achievement. However, I always wonder if there are any charities that are aimed at addressing the root cause of these misfortunes. There is a common link between orphans, poverty and refugee issues and that is poor governance. The difference between regions of prosperity and regions of intense misfortune is governance.
Regardless of whether a country is resource rich (like Nigeria) or totally barren (Ethiopia) or has been prosperous in the past (Zimbabwe), the common thread is poor governance. The responsibility of the government is to be the custodian of the collective futures of its citizens and to manage the resources with a good vision and effective clean administration. Where this element is absent, what happens is that the proceeds of national resources do not reach the people. Corruption becomes rife and when public protests increase; there is a violent clampdown. It is established that those in government can benefit from the national resources, then elections become violent and common people get caught in the cross fire. Democracy becomes a casualty.
The result of all of this is the swelling number of orphans, poverty, and hopelessness. People who can flee such regimes end up as unwanted refugees. They risk their life and limb and end up in the shores of Spain or elsewhere in containers.
I am going to spend some time on the net doing research to find out if any NGO is involved in addressing these root causes and will share my findings. Meanwhile I can only think that if we are in a boat that has a hole in the hull, bailing buckets of water will help only to a certain extent. What will really solve the problem is sealing the hole. Similarly charity addressed at providing education and food to orphans and the needy in the third world is like bailing buckets of water from the boat. The water will continue to fill up until the hole in the hull is plugged.
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