[Reader-list] Of differences between India and China

[Rahul Asthana]

Zainab,
You are making a vacuous connection,apparently for the
sake of a soundbyte.
Are you aware of the "hukou system" in China?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4424944.stm
Or are you aware of the Henan Aids epedemic in which
close to 1 million were affected due to the
callousness of the government?
http://www.usembassy-china.org.cn/sandt/henan-hiv.htm
rgds
Rahul
--- zainab at xtdnet.nl wrote:

> China does not have the problem of democracy that we
> have
> 
> It was sometime in the month of June. At 10:30 PM, I
> was waiting at Dadar
> for a BEST bus to get home. Quiet, lonely, just a
> few people around. There
> was no bus in sight.
> 
> I leaned against the bus stop. On the footpath were
> several shops, all
> shut at this hour. Outside the Bata Shoe Shop, an

> old man and an old woman
> were setting up their bedding. They were pavement
> dwellers. They sat
> chatting once the bedding was up. They were very old
> and perhaps very,
> very poor. About ten minutes later, a man on his
> bicycle came up on the
> footpath. He stopped at the bedroom of the old man
> and the old woman. On
> his bicycle was a steel filter. This man was a
> traveling tea seller. He
> stopped by the old man and old woman and handed them
> out a cup of tea
> each. The couple then brought out a piece of bread
> each and dunked it in
> the tea. Perhaps it was their dinner. The tea seller
> chatted with them for
> a bit with and went away. The couple blessed him as
> he was leaving.
> 
> Last night I was walking from Mazagaon to Byculla to
> get to home. I passed
> by what I thought were the familiar streets of Love
> Lane, but they did not
> seem so familiar yesterday.
> 
> As I entered Love Lane from Mazagaon, I found
> several hawkers who had
> spread out clothes and things to sell on plastic
> sheet. A little ahead was
> a man, obviously struck by a schizophrenia seated on
> his knees, staring at
> the ground and oozing out saliva as if there were a
> fountain stored in
> him. A few meters ahead were stray hawkers selling
> peanuts and bhel puri.
> Further down I saw a swank new Sahkari Bhandar store
> which was never there
> earlier. One side of the road in Love Lane is under
> repair. The laborers
> who are here, working on the road repair have set up
> their tents and there
> are preparations being made for dinner. One aspect
> of poverty lives in my
> face. On the other side of the road is a huge
> garbage dump with an
> overflowing municipal rubbish bin.
> 
> Further down there is a sense of quiet. Here are the
> upper middle class
> buildings where Bohra, Marwari and Gujarati
> residents reside. Ahead there
> is a gutter burst open and sewage is flowing. The
> Udupi restaurant is well
> lit and abuzz and people are walking in and out of
> it. A little ahead of
> the Udupi restaurant, a man is asleep on the
> pavement. His beard his thick
> and there are tinges of white on it. His face is
> flush with calm and
> restful sleep.
> 
> The regular coconut seller is dumping the left over
> coconuts in a steel
> box. This space is now permanently occupied by him
> ever since I have known
> him. The flower seller by the wall of the street has
> already packed up and
> left. The road repairs have intensified further up
> towards the end of Love
> Lane. The sandwich fellow is also packing up his
> stall. Another
> development is the painted picture of the Shirdi Sai
> Baba which has been
> framed on the wall along the street. It has now
> become a semi-shrine where
> people have started throwing coins. A little down a
> Muslim wedding is
> taking place and usual flower seller is making
> business selling exotic
> bouquets. On the opposite side of the road is the
> Shiv Sena Shakha office.
> 
> I have nearly reached the Byculla police station
> after which I turn into
> the lane to go home. The police station is lit up
> and there is a Hindu
> prayer ceremony taking place in the police quarters.
> A woman is sitting on
> the pavement. Asleep a little ahead is her man and
> at his feet is their
> child. At the child’s feet is one shoe which is
> meant for a child and a
> lady’s shoe. I don’t know if this is an irony of
> some sort.
> 
> This evening, a dear friend of mine tells me of
> Nandan Nilekani’s
> interview he recently watched on television. Thom
> Friedman, the
> interviewer, asked Nilekani what is the difference
> between India and
> China. Nilekani replied saying that China does not
> have the problem of
> democracy which India has.
> 
> My word!
> 
> 
> 
> Zainab Bawa
> Bombay
> www.xanga.com/CityBytes
> http://crimsonfeet.recut.org/rubrique53.html
> 
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