You are right about the trail about Kasab. It does fall on Moily and not on Chidambaram directly. But this is not an ordinary trail and the Home Ministry has a tremendous stake in the procedure and outcome.

None, really. I wouldn’t be surprised if tomorrow we learned that appointments to cabinet posts were made on the basis of one’s closeness to “Sonia Madam”. I don’t think Chidambaram even knows what the departments in his ministry are. Ministers have rarely been appointed on basis of their abilities. It’s usually, sycophancy, favouritism and coalition politics that are dynamics. How else do you explain the presence of Mamata Bannerjee and those idiots from DMK in the government?

“Manmohan Singh who without question is one of the architects of the modern Indian economy and a financial guru.”
I won’t (can’t) comment on the awesomeness of our Prime Minister, but I don’t think he possesses the qualities of a leader. From what one can observe, he doesn’t seem to exercise much control over his ministers. He may be a really nice person, but is he competent enough?

“Prime Minister has mentioned that these movements present the greatest threat to India’s security”
His job is to evolve a policy to combat the menace, not to make such statements. That’s what reporters are for. But he seems to be acting more like a sociology professor than a politician. What’s even more hopelessly annoying is the complete lack of will on the part of the media in grilling the fellow. That’s the problem, we’re all too satisfied by a nice,long speech containing a few hi-fi angrezi words we don’t understand.

But from what one can gather, Chidambaram seems to be going for an out an out offensive, which is going to fail big time, IMO. The Naxals are not these bloodthirsty pyschopaths who do what they do because it’s cool to hate India or something, if anything their rise highlights miserable failures of the entire Union of India,of you and me. Crush the violence, but ensure the reasons these people sought recourse to violence in the first place are eliminated. (That doesn’t mean I support those “left-liberals”, ofcourse. )

“The Home Minister also has done a poor job of prosecuting the case against Ajmal Kasab. It was India’s opportunity to showcase its judicial system to the rest of the world. Instead the whole case has become a circus and a real black mark on the Indian judiciary”

The trial is in progress in a court which comes under the jurisdiction of the Bombay High Court. The Union Home ministry has got nothing to do with the trial per se. I would put majority of the blame on the media. By reporting stuff like his defecating times and the colour of his underwear, they’ve made him a superstar, that’s what has given him the audacity to say the kind of crap he does. It’s because we take him seriously. This and the occupational hazard that comes with trying anyone who’s involved in a terror attack having a religious angle in this country. Push the trial too fast,and you might have our zillion rights groups screaming “communalism” and “inhumanity” and all that tripe, not caring for the fact that he killed more Muslims than people from any other religion. (I’m hypothesizing, but I do feel it would have happened.) The Afzal Guru fiasco is a case in point.

” You cannot catch a potential terrorist by modifying the visa rules. You are only going to inconvenience millions of people who are entering and leaving the country every year for various purposes (tourism, transit, business and personal).”

It’s more a knee jerk reaction to the Indian consulate goofup in Chicago. It’s always easier to treat the symptoms instead of the problem :P

“All of us know what happened during the recent Telangana issue. The Home Ministry initially completely succumbed to the blackmail by KSR. ”

I didn’t understand why they listened to him in the first place. Why not just let him die? Nearly a third of India starves every day, yet we don’t see states being created lest they die! And they’re taking this loser seriously! The anarchy argument was invalid because it was happening in any case. Some believe Congress possibly saw KCR as a potential political ally, which I myself don’t believe really, because TRS has hardly any political visibility. Another possibility is the Congress genuinely sees merit in KCR’s argument, i.e. The only way Telangana can progress is through its separation from AP. That is again, a classic example of treating the symptoms while ignoring the problem, i.e. the need for decentralization of power from state to local self-governing bodies. It’ll only trigger demands for more states– Vidarbha, Gorkhaland, Cooch Behar, Bodoland etc. from regions that have (allegedly) received step-motherly treatment from their respective state governments. Again, it’s easier to create more states instead of undertaking the much more difficult(and hence much less appealing) task of examining why the demands originate in the first place.

“Does the Home Ministry have a policy and procedure in place for anything or is Mr. Chidambaram just making it up as he goes along?”

No, not unless Sonia Madam approves :P

Nice blog, btw… I’ll try to follow more often…