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August 05, 2005
Site Finally Looking Good, PILs and Silly Talk
I finally figured out how to work with Movable Type. Thanks to Ajit and Jigs, Movable Type 2.6x was upgraded to 3.1x yesterday. I spent many hours this evening trying to figure out how to use MT correctly and properly and finally with the help of Elise's site, things worked out. The site finally looks the way I want it to.
In the meantime, I also managed to download FeedDemon, a news aggregator, which seems to be working fine. Until now, I was using Sage, a skinny feed-reader available as an extension in Firefox.
I have been irritated the whole day by SMSes and emails sent by supposed well-meaning people about the PIL that has been filed by high-profile celebrities like Mahesh Bhatt, Alyque Padamsee and the like, asking all authorities including the BMC, railways, etc. to give detailed answers about what they had done during and after Terrible Tuesday. This according to me is a complete waste of time, makes no sense at all and almost seems like a publicity stunt.
We also have people like Pritish Nandy, in the TOI of all places exhorting us not to pay taxes and Fali Nariman in the Rajya Sabha saying that Mumbai should be hived off Maharashtra. Sure, all of us are angry, but shouldn’t there be some sense in what we say?
Probably one of the better suggestions was from Cyrus Guzder, during a panel discussion on NDTV, where he mentioned that "mohalla" committees need to be empowered at the local level to interact with the ward officers and corporators. I believe that grass-roots mobilization will help, along with one definite plan of action at the top level involving all the concerned authorities (fire brigade, police, hospitals, BMC, etc). But acts of frustration, whether manifested by PILs, proclamations and opinion pieces or by stopping trains and gheraoing officials, do not really help anyone.When the trains are delayed, the ones really troubled are those who have to get from one place to another for their jobs and their employees.
One of the best sites to read about the problems at various levels in Mumbai is Death Ends Fun, by Dilip D'Souza. The piece by Deepika D'Souza on the Mithi river and the Mahim creek estuary is amazingly enlightening.
Posted by bhavinj at August 5, 2005 08:16 PM
Comments
Hey Matunga man, I'm flattered by what you say about me, though perhaps the link should not point to the Navhind Times? And it's Deepika, not Devika.
Are you really in Matunga? How did the rains treat you? Let's meet sometime, I'm in Bandra. Thanks again.
Posted by: Dilip D'Souza at August 6, 2005 09:41 AM
thanks mfm, no thanks required at all. and the site's looking pretty fine, although knowing you this is not the last look that we're going to see :o)
happy tinkering, and herez looking forward to a lot of posting!
Posted by: amenon at August 6, 2005 10:00 AM
Sorry about the link snafu, Dilip. It was 1AM in the morning and I guess I was half-asleep. I'll change it ASAP.
Posted by: MFM/Bhavin at August 6, 2005 02:08 PM
hey mfm, good post. there should be sense in what we say, and suggesting that we should stop paying taxes or that mumbai should be hived off maharashtra is just wrong.
Posted by: uma at August 9, 2005 01:14 PM
This whole PIL thing really reeks of opportunism, the more I read about it and the more I think about it. Some of the things that were written and said (Nandy, Nariman, etc) could be passed off as the product of anger and angst.
Posted by: MFM/Bhavin at August 9, 2005 02:53 PM
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