Black Friday.

It is a shocking black Friday of mishap for Kerala with death toll of 104 persons near Sabarimala Friday night. The people killed were devotees of Lord Ayyappa. They were returning after the Makaravilakku festival in Sabarimala . This is a major tragedy in Kerala after a total of 107 passengers of Bangalore-Thiruvananthapuram Island Express met with a watery grave as the train fell off Perumon bridge across the Ashatamudi lake in Kollam district on July 8, 1988.
The huge rush to Sabarimala and the bungling roads are the main reason for the accident. All precautions and care taken by the government till date have gone futile with this major accident.

More scientific planning is needed for crowd management and road traffic to make Sabarimala pilgrimage season incident-free.

K A Solaman
The New Indian Express dated 17 Jan 2011

Woman assaulted at school fete

It is really an unsightly event by the Deputy Director –Education, Alappuzha to manhandle the mother of a student participant for photographing in her mobile the ugly scene enacted by the DDE at the school fete venue at Thuravoor. The teacher turned DDE should learn how to behave in public. Seemingly he is incompetent to guide the teacher community and to maintain a peaceful atmosphere for school education in the district. He should be given compulsory retirement from service.

The whole fete at Thuravoor was carried out erratically and DDE sending parents to programme committee and the programme committee sending back them to DDE for rectification of grievance is evidently an indication of the lack organisational ability of the department. Local goons taking charge of school fete have made all events nasty. Shashikala, a poet from Punnapra and the mother of the Ottumthullal participant is a known figure in the cultural world of Alappuzha and people know her well that she would never indulge in nasty acts as did by the DDE.

If the teachers in charge of the fete are not able conduct it neatly transfer their duty to police or abandon all such meets in the future. Women whether a presiding officer or a budding poet- all are assaulted by goons in and around Alappuzha. This must stop.
K A Solaman

Fee for a view-that is it!

When CPM leaders in Kerala has sneakily withdrawn from ‘nokkukooli’(fee for a view) and said they were against it, the CPI has taken it as a prestige issue and its leader Kaanam Rajendran said they were not against ‘nookukooli’ According to him nookukooli is the right of the working class who were denied opportunity by mechanization. Kaanam was carrying on shoulders worn out cine actor Thilakan for quite long and when he realized there were no takers for Thilakan issue, Kanam shifted his target and become the new incarnation for nookukooli.

Kaanam should understand that they are not workers who demand nookukooli. Can he find a worker for climbing coconut tree or ploughing field? He can find only workers for party demonstrations and agitations. By asking nookukooli, common man is denied freedom to do their work themselves or to assign work to people of their own choice.
Nookukooli is in fact a virus and people like Kaanam should take decades to understand it.

K A Solaman

Black money in foreign banks

The allegation against former Chief Justice of Supreme Court of India Justice K G Balakrishnan and his son-in-law is the hot subject of discussion in political circles. Several politicians who started from zero and now possessing assets worth several crores have demanded probe against KGB. And in that case BJP’s demand that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh should make efforts to bring back the black money deposited by politicians and businessmen in the foreign banks is in the right direction.

If the PM wishes to ensure corruption free system the demand of BJP should be viewed with utmost importance. Let the common man see ‘who owns, how much?’

K A Solaman

This time judges will not be “nincompoops”!

The Supreme Court of India has upheld the decision of Kerala High court banning public meeting on road sides. And one hopes this time the Marxist leader M V Jayarajan will not call judges as ‘idiots’ as he did earlier. It is a tough job to find synonym for the word ‘idot’.

In fact the State Government of Kerala is wasting its time by filing appeal at apex court for unjustifiable demands of political parties. Blocking roads and curtailing the freedom of movement of people is against constitutional provisions.

K A Solaman

Monsanto is the saviour of this house|

The CPM has put their hoary opposition against Monsanto into cold storage. They are no longer against genetically modified seeds. The move in the party’s stand on genetic crop farming is not because of any scientific know-how about BT seeds but to keep shut the mouths of Opposition parties on various issues.

Interestingly the CPM stance has drawn support from Union Minister of State for Agriculture KV Thomas, a person who forgot all the burning needs of the State when he has become central minister. The president of Kissan Sabha comrade S Ramachandran Pillai speaking in tune with Monsanto chief is also interesting to hear. Though Pillai is a politburo member of the party his opponents say he is incapable of winning a ward election if contested. He is making himself the author of ‘gods of small thing’ by uttering words indigestible to vast population of the country. Arunthathi speaks for Pakistan, likewise Pillai speaks for Monsanto.

The somersaulty by State Finance Minister Thomas Isaac, who opposed BT brinjal and disbursed Rs 20 lakhs to his party men for what is called Mararikulam Brinjal festival, now favouring Pillai is also intriguing.

K A Solaman

The sky is the limit

The success or failure of a space mission depends on many factors. The probability of successfully launching a satellite can't be predicted. That's the reason not too many people are criticising the recent failure of the GSLV satellite. The scientists must focus on rectifying technical snags. More than Chandrayaan, India needs more space projects that improve our communication network facility. Chandrayaan can only fetch data already available with Nasa or
similar agencies.
KA Solaman, via email
The Hindustan Times, Jan 2, 2011

Maternity leave for a decade

Yet another new year gift by the Kerala State Pay Commission to the State employees, teachers and of course not for pensioners is the proposal for revision of maternity leave of one year for women and paternity leave of ten days for men. The Commission is wise enough to identify that men have no effective role in bringing up the child. Wonderfully the commission has not restricted the number of such leaves to women. And if a woman so desires to give birth to ten children she could earn a good buck without doing any work for ten years. This I say because I have a friend who signs in his date of birth as 10/5/50 which also means that he is one among ten children of his parents and he is the fifth one. If anyone needs to meet my friend fix an appointment through woofer space blog.

K A Solaman

Live more get more

A few items of the New Year gift by the Kerala State Pay Commission to the State employees, teachers and pensioners are very charming. One such item is the proposal for upward revision of pension in the case of persons aged above 80 years. It is quite certain for the Commission that because of the present life style in association with Beverages Corporation there would be no one above 80 years among pensioners.

Had the Commission fixed this upper age limit as 90, the payout from the state exchequerin this direction could have been brought to zero. What the pension minister (?) proposes, the Commission disposes.

K A Solaman

Naming season

Season for naming all institutions in the name of late Congress leader and Chief Minister of Kerala K Karunakaran has come up. The very first suggestion in this direction has come from the third wedded former union minister and Congress MP, Shashi Tharoor. He demanded the international airport at Nedumbassery should be named after K Karunakaran. Likewise Kerala Education Minister and Marxist leader M A Baby stresses the need for naming Thrissur Fine Arts College as Karunakaran college. More and more dignitaries are in the fray for naming other establishments after Kraunakaran. And for Mr Appunni Nair, a resident on the side of NH 47 the demand is NH 47 should be renamed after Karunakaran for his security men abused all passersby including him while Karunkaran was dashing away on the high way during his prime time.


A statue of Karunakaran should be set up in the Assembly Complex, and statue of his high speed car should be erected at any point on NH47 in between Thiruvananthapuram and Thrissur as worthy honour of the three-time chief minister!

K A Solaman

Do we need more engineering seats?

May be a pleasant surprise for students but is quite unlikeable for the conventional arts and science colleges in the country, Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal’s announcement of increase of 200,000 seats in engineering courses in India. Already some of the Engineering Colleges in TN and Karnataka are in the verge of collapse due to poor inflow of students and one wonders what prompted Sibal to sanction this much seats in Engineering sector. The huge infrastructure now available with Arts and Science Colleges are poorly utilised at present due to unattractiveness in pursuing conventional education and the present decision of the government would turn the issue worse.

The liberalised scheme now applied to Engineering colleges would not bring results as the minister expect. More focus on technical education would result in lack of interest in pure science study.

K A Solaman

GSLVgrid452

GSLV failure

Success or failure of a space mission depends on many factors. Barring match fix it is just like a cricket match with occasional win and loss. That is why not too many are criticising the GSLV failure. The scientists must focus more on rectifying technical snag rather than breaking coconut at the time of launch. And in doing so, harrying on gods can be avoided at infrequent launch failure.

What we need are more space projects that improve communication network facility rather than Chandrayaan. Chandrayaan can only fetch data that are now available with NASA or similar agencies.

K A Solaman

Fate of palmolein case

Death often makes a person dearer. And that is what happened in the case of four time Chief Minister of Kerala K Karunakaran. Nevertheless, all the four state ministries under him were tainted with allegations of nepotism and fraud. He was the key accused in palmolein import scam which has also sucked in the current Central Vigilance Commissioner P J Thomas. Karunakaran as chief minister had decided to import 15,000 tonnes of palm oil at 405 US dollar per tonne from a Singapore-based firm whereas the prevailing market price was 392 US dollar per tonne. The case was dragging in the court for the last 20 years and its first accused departed.
The palmolein case that emphasizes the ineffectiveness of Indian Judicial system due to its snail pace will continue in the court for another 30 years till the remaining accused bid adieu.

K A Solaman

Wishing all a wonderful new year!

Irreparable loss for Antony

Antony’s words about K Karunakran were from his heart. Antony said: “no Congress worker could ever forget the 'leader,' who was the real king-maker”. Really Antony could not ever forget leader as their healthy mutual fight reserved the Congress party nimble in the State all the time. However, comments from other corners such as, : Karunakaran was instrumental in bringing about rapid socio-economic development of the state, Karunakran was the only top leader of Congress party etc are indigestible.
The departure of very dear challenger who always kept good relations with him is truly painful for Antony.

K A Solaman

Forgotten Siamese twin

Like the present duo leaders Remesh Chennithala and Ommen Chandy of the State Congress , around 1978 it was K M Chandy, then KPCC President and K Karunakaran were the leaders of the Congress in Kerala. While K Karunakaran was a sharp fighter then, K M Chandy was a pacifier. They were known as Siamese twins. On death, K M Chandy went into oblivion, and possibly I might not have missed reading, no leading dailies in Malayalam which abundantly spent dozens of pages as funeral tribute to Karunakaran, has not mentioned a single word about K M Chandy. This is unkind and quite unfair.
One does hope, history should not repeat first as a tragedy then as a comedy.

K A Solaman

Merry X-mas and Happy new year!

May all of your world be filled with warmth and good chear this Holy season,
and throughout the year.
Wish your Christmas be filled with peace and love.
Merry X-mas friends.

K A Solaman

Onion price

The increase in onion prices has helped the merchants of Kerala make a quick buck. On the morning of December 20, the price of onion was Rs 50 per kg. By evening, it had become Rs 80. Although onion is not essential for survival, some gourmands got into a panic over possible onion shortage, and a few unscrupulous merchants made full use of the opportunity. The government of Kerala acts with unwarranted enthusiasm on certain matters, and goes into hibernation on some others. While the office of the minister for food showed no interest in the onion shortage, it tried to sale uneatable items through civil supplies outlets.

The Central government at least tried to adopt suitable steps immediately after the price rise. The Kerala government, on the other hand, just sat on the matter. As a result, despite assurances from the concerned ministry that onion exports would be banned till January, and notwithstanding the 13 trucks of onion that arrived from Pakistan, vegetable vendors continue to quote any price they like for onions.


K.A. Solaman,
The Telegraph, Kolkatta Dated 24-12-10

Leader K Karunakaran