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Gurmeet Singh
@Gxs1967
Vidya Vichari ta Paropkari...true learning inspires service to mankind. Learner for life. Excited by Ideas and Possibilities. Chai. Movies. Cricket. Gardening.
Joined March 2014
740 Following
118 Followers
5.7K Posts
*BRILLIANT*
The French made a short film about what could happen after all immigrants would follow the ‘_white, angry old man’s_’ advice to go back where they came from.*
Dr Singh pride of India ❤️
A portrait at Cambridge is more than an honour—it is a reminder of what India once valued in its leadership: scholarship, intellect, humility and global respect.
Dr. Manmohan Singh earned recognition through a lifetime of academic and public service with humility.
The contrast with today’s leadership under PM Modi could hardly be starker.
From intellectual stature to image management. From substance to spectacle.
That is the difference.
This is a mighty fall.
Education Matters.
During the Nuremberg Trials, Hermann Göring gave an interview to psychologist Gustave Gilbert and said:
“Of course the people don’t want war. Why would some poor farmer want to risk his life in a war when the best he can hope for is to come back to his farm in one piece?
Naturally, people don’t want war. No one wants war in Russia, England, America — not even in Germany. That’s obvious.
But in the end, it’s the leaders of a country who determine policy. And it’s always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it’s a democracy, a communist state, a parliament, or a fascist dictatorship.”
Gilbert objected:
“But there is one difference in a democracy — the people have a voice through their elected representatives.”
To which Göring replied:
“That’s all well and good, but whether the people have a voice or not, they can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and for exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.”
— Nuremberg Diary, April 18, 1946
Doesn’t it sound familiar?
India's grid just hit 277 GW. New all-time record. The May heatwave is now worse than April, and we have 3 more months of summer left.
Here is what happened in the last 48 hours that nobody is talking about. 19 thermal power plants are running on critical coal stock — less than 4 days of supply. Rajasthan imported 6 GW from neighbouring grids, 50 percent more than its allocation. Two states issued load-shedding orders despite the Centre telling them not to.
The grid frequency dropped to 49.75 Hz three times yesterday. For non-engineers: below 49.7 Hz, automatic load-shedding kicks in to prevent cascade failure. We are 0.05 Hz away from automatic blackouts.
Solar is doing its job during the day — 62 GW at noon. But the evening ramp is becoming unsurvivable. Between 5 PM and 7 PM, the grid needs to add 55 GW in two hours as solar drops off. That ramp rate did not exist in any planning document.
India's power planners assumed 277 GW by 2030. We hit it in May 2026. The gap between planning assumptions and reality is now 4 years. Every infrastructure investment thesis in India needs to be rewritten starting with this number.
Death at every corner. You can die while doing ordinary things in this country.
A young man died after being electrocuted by a live wire dangling from an electric pole while pushing his scooter in the rain near Commercial Street. This is in the heart of Bengaluru,a shopping hub.
There was a time when stardom was a fortress. In the 90s, Ruby Bhatia wasn't just a VJ; she was the electric pulse of a new, liberalised India, reportedly commanding Rs 1 lakh per show. Rahul Roy wasn't just an actor; he was the face of a generation’s collective heartbreak, the Aashiqui boy whose silhouette defined romance and whose haircut was the bestseller in every saloon. Govinda? He was—and is—the undisputed king of the masses, a comic genius who could make a cinema hall shake with a single pelvic thrust.
Fast forward three decades, and the fortress has been dismantled by the relentless, voyeuristic machinery of social media. Today, these icons find themselves under the harsh, unforgiving glare of a "content-hungry" digital mob that mistakes struggle for failure and evolution for desperation.
Recent headlines have taken a perverse pleasure in dissecting Ruby Bhatia’s career shift. Yes, the woman who once defined "cool" is now a life coach charging Rs 3,000 for a six-month program. To the keyboard warriors, this is a "fall from grace." To any sane mind, it is a woman finding meaning after a nervous breakdown, choosing to make mental health accessible to the masses rather than gatekeeping it for the elite.
Similarly, Rahul Roy has been subjected to the "cringe" treatment for appearing in social media reels with unknown creators. The internet, in its infinite cruelty, ignores the fact that this man is a brain stroke survivor. He is fighting aphasia, paying off legal debts that predated his illness, and trying to "stay active" and work for as long as he is alive. When he asks his trolls to find him "decent work" instead of mocking his reels, he isn't showing desperation; he is showing a spine of steel that most "influencers" couldn't dream of possessing.
Then there is Govinda, the man who once gave the Khans a run for their money, now frequently seen performing at school annual days and weddings. The "dark shadow" of social media brands these "small shows," as if the size of the stage dictates the stature of the legend. Govinda’s response is a masterclass in humility: "I never let my ego influence my work." Whether it’s a Chief Minister’s event or a local school function, the man dances because he is a performer. There is more dignity in one of his "wedding steps" than in the entire collective output of a thousand anonymous trolls.
Social media has birthed a generation of spectators who believe that unless you are at the absolute zenith of your power, you should vanish into the shadows. We have become a culture that feeds on the "tragedy" of the legacy act.
But here is the truth: There is nothing sad about a veteran getting up and going to work. There is nothing "cringe" about an icon refusing to be defeated by a health crisis or a shifting industry. The desperation doesn't belong to Ruby, Rahul, or Govinda. The desperation belongs to the social media ecosystem that needs to tear down giants just to feel tall.
People don't realize how absurd this view actually is.
A camera. On a robot. On Mars.
Built by humans on a planet 140 million miles away, launched on a rocket, landed using a sky crane, and now driving across an alien desert taking pictures so detailed you can count the rocks.
100 years ago, your great-grandparents thought airplanes were a miracle.
You are scrolling past Mars on your phone.
Most people go on The Tonight Show to plug a movie or show off a new suit. Diljit Dosanjh went on there to drop a 112-year-old historical checkmate with the casual shrug of a man who knows exactly who he is.
When Jimmy Fallon asked about the Vancouver show, Diljit didn't just talk about the lights or the noise. He reminded the world that while the Punjabi spirit is global, the welcome mat wasn’t always rolled out.
Back in 1914, the Canadian government was playing a rigged game. The Continuous Journey Regulation was simply a “No Indians Allowed” sign, disguised as a travel rule: you could only enter Canada if you came on a non-stop ship from your home country. Since no such ships existed from India, it was a legal trap.
The SS Komagata Maru arrived with 376 souls—340 Sikhs, 24 Muslims, and 12 Hindus—who thought they were British subjects with rights. Instead, they were treated like a contagion.
For two months, they sat in the harbour, just 2,000 metres from the shore, being denied even the basic dignity of food and water. The city didn’t just look away; they sent a tugboat full of armed men to force them out.
Fast forward to Diljit standing in the centre of BC Place in Vancouver. While the ghosts of the 1914 exclusion act still linger in the salt air of the Burrard Inlet, Diljit turned that 2 km distance into the shortest, most triumphant walk in history.
His witty repartee to Jimmy wasn't just a fun fact; it was a savage flex. “They did not allow us then. Now 55,000 people were there to celebrate us."
Diljit didn't need to be angry to be impactful. He just used the facts as his backup dancers. From the 20 martyrs shot dead at Budge Budge to the roar of a sold-out stadium, the math finally adds up to justice. The "undesirables" of the past are now the icons of the present.
History tried to write a “No Entry” sign. Diljit just signed his name over it.
Look at this map.
Nagpur 45°. Ahmedabad 44°. Prayagraj 43°. Delhi 42°. The entire country is a single dark red mass. This is not a heatwave. This is a country that was told its forests were fine.
And this is April. Not May. Not June. The hottest months have not even arrived yet.
The past few days have been hell. So I did what I always do when something bothers me. I went looking for answers.
What I found was a policy con job that has been running for over two decades.
But before I explain what happened, let's clear some definitions.
A garden is not a forest. An orchard is not a forest. A plantation is not a forest.
A forest is a living system. Soil, water, fungi, insects, birds, mammals, decades of accumulated complexity, specific to its land and climate. It cannot be designed. It cannot be harvested. It regulates water, cools land, shelters hundreds of species. It takes decades to become what it is.
You can plant a forest. But it will take decades to become one.
In 2001, India's forests were disappearing. The Indian state, led by the Vajpayee government, faced a choice. Protect what remained, or change what the numbers said.
It chose the numbers.
The Forest Survey of India quietly changed the definition of what a forest means. Any land with 10% tree canopy cover and more than one hectare in area was now a forest. Your mango orchard. A coconut plantation in Tamil Nadu. A tea garden in Assam. Lodhi Garden in Delhi.
All forests, on paper.
The FSI will tell you that 10% canopy cover follows international norms. The FAO also uses 10% as its threshold. But the FAO's definition comes with a crucial exclusion that India's FSI quietly dropped.
The FAO explicitly states that fruit tree plantations, oil palm plantations, olive orchards, and agroforestry systems are not forests. The World Bank says the same. India adopted the number but discarded the exclusion.
It took the cover of international legitimacy while gutting the standard that gave it meaning.
The government will also tell you this was never hidden. That it was publicly stated in every report, disclosed in Parliament. That is technically true. But a disclosure buried in a technical government document is not transparency. It is the appearance of transparency.
I did not know any of this until I went looking. Neither do most Indians whose forests, whose land, whose air this directly concerns. The con is not in what was hidden from experts. It is in what was never explained to the people it was done to.
This is not a technicality. This is the con.
It was a trick as old as power itself. If you cannot fix the problem, fix the measurement.
For ten years after 2001, Congress governed India. Two terms, two environment ministers, including Jairam Ramesh, one of the more serious ones. They saw the numbers. They knew what the numbers meant.
They did nothing.
Because the lie was convenient. India looked good in international climate negotiations. The fiction of a greening India served everyone in power, so everyone in power kept it. Congress did not create this lie. It simply chose, year after year, to live inside it.
The BJP is different.
When they returned to power in 2014, they came with something Congress never had. An absolute majority, and no coalition compulsions. They did not merely inherit the lie. They built on it. And in 2023, they legislated it.
The Forest Conservation Amendment Act of 2023 removed legal protection from "deemed forests." Forests that existed outside the official definition but were ecologically real.
Forests that Adivasi communities had lived in and depended on for generations. Forests that cooled land, held water, sheltered species. They were not on the right list. Since the amendment, forest destruction on Adivasi land has accelerated.
The people who knew these forests best, who had protected them longest, now watch them being cleared. Legally.
CONT++
His name is Bant Singh.
He is a farmer and folk singer from Jhabhar village in Mansa district, Punjab. He had been singing since he was ten years old.
In 2000 his daughter was studying in Class 9 when three men gang raped her. The panchayat told him to settle it quietly. He was offered ten lakh rupees and three acres of land to drop the case.
He refused. He filed a police complaint. He went to court. In 2004 all three men were convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment.
The village did not forgive him.
On January 5 2006 he was cycling home through wheat fields after campaigning for a labour rally. Seven men ambushed him with iron rods and axes. He lost both arms and his left leg.
He was moved from Mansa to Patiala to PGI Chandigarh where doctors operated for hours to save his life.
When he regained consciousness he asked for his harmonium.
He said they cut my arms thinking they would silence me. They were wrong.
All seven attackers were eventually convicted. He kept performing at rallies. He kept singing.
He still sings today.
Follow for real stories about people India must never forget.
Dove on a swing!
@thevirdas Really enjoyed the movie.
Waiting to watch it again on OTT whenever it comes out.
Difference between Chhole and Pindi Chana and a foolproof lipsmacking good recipe for it https://t.co/frUJaFmnx0
Turning simple hair into pure elegance 💇♀️
Which one steals your heart the most 😍
Jerry Seinfeld at his best..again..after a long time. Have missed him.
Jerry Seinfeld captures humanity's greatest paradox in a single line.
Easily the most endearing gesture you will see in these trying times….
😍😍😍
That's the greatest 400m we've ever seen ‼️
47.78 championship record, take a bow for @GoSydGo 🙌
#WorldAthleticsChamps
@Sage1709 A small correction..Kaur means Prince (not princess). The word for princess is Kaurvaki. Kaur is the root word for Kunwar, Kumar etc. By naming girls Kaur, Guru Gobind Singh ji freed girls and made them equals of boys, leaders of communities & people.
I don't think people realise how big of a deal this achievement is:
IMR doesn't just reflect on perinatal care, hospital services, newborn care, etc.
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