Nobel for Obama but none for Mahatma! Is the Nobel Peace Prize a farce?

Use of dynamite as a weapon of mass destruction and sufferings of victors, vanquished and neutrals alike led Alfred Nobel to institute the Nobel Peace Prize with a motto to acknowledge " the most or the best work for fraternity among nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the promotion of peace congresses."

By calling the Nobel Peace Prize a farce, are we questioning the credibility of the committee of high intellectuals or, are we questioning the committee which had bestowed the honour on Mother Teresa for her work among the poor and destitute, Muhammad Yunnis and Bangladesh's Grameen Bank for their endeavor to end poverty, the enthusiastic Kenyan environmentalist Wangari Maathai and our own R.K. Pachauri who led the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Have they not kept up with the tradition of awarding the prize to those who have initiated the mantra of world peace?

If your answer is a vehement NO, then i presume you are of the view that awardees such as Mikhail Gorbachev who facilitated the end of cold war, Martin Luther King who fought against racial segregation and discrimination, President Wilson Woodrow founder of League of Nations, did not deserve a merit!

Personal preferences stand on one side, and credibility on the other.

To analyze the case of Mahatma Gandhi let us sift the pages of the archives. Was Gandhi's work of global dimension?

He did not preach for peace but defiance in a peaceful manner. Ahimsa and Satyagraha were tools to facilitate the independence of his own country. He worked within the boundary of India and not for fraternity among nations. Even his struggle in South Africa was on behalf of the Indians, not the blacks whose lives were even worse.

In 1948 when his name was seriously considered his fellow countrymen did not let him live long enough. Due to practical reasons a posthumous award could not be conferred on him, but by reserving the prize for that year, place of Mahatma was silently yet respectfully left open.

If we are questioning the Nobel Committee's decision to award the Peace Prize to Obama, If we are saying that he only made promises and did not contribute any substance to world peace, we need to give it another thought.

From the ashes of the dead and obsolete, rise the phoenix of all that is relevant and pertinent.

The Nobel Peace Prize Committee has evolved with times its policy. It believes in being proactive rather than reactive. The Nobel Peace Prize is now being used as a means to give momentum to a set of causes that will lead to peace and harmony. This award is a call to action, a call for all nations to confront common challenges.

The Nobel Committee is a pragmatic body, which would like to maximise peace outcomes. It could of course have avoided controversy by giving the award to some inconsequential tree hugging activist somewhere. But crucial matters of global safety depend on decisions taken by powerful nations. The future of the world hinges on men like Obama!

GIVE IT A BREAK !

Well i guess getting philosophical in the last two posts was what has been keeping me away from blogging. There are times when you don't know who on earth has taken over the reins of your soul.

Lets get back. I would prefer some mundane topics .

exempli gratia : What is it like living in NOIDA?

Yeah .............. guess thats a good one!

NOIDA : the oh-so famed hub of it all.

Well its a fairly cool place to stay and hang about with TGIP and CSM etc etc. And certainly one of the most famous places in the world! We had corespondents all the way from BBC and CNN right here. And we had news ............ the world sat there glued to their TV sets ! Transfixed ! Staring at D - 5, Sector - 31, NOIDA .

The story was about some bones (decomposed) found in a drain behind a house believed to be of human beings. The media and police started its investigation , in which the media as usual was one step ahead. It turned out that little kids from the adjoining village were kidnapped ( rather tricked) and harassed . Then there bones were acidified and then thrown into the drain behind.

Next up, traces of human flesh found around the microwave! It seemed that they were cannibals.

Soon after D -5 , Sector - 31, became a tourist site ! Give it a break ! Do the others living here don't have anything better to do than turning into a guide showing the world how proud we are of these famed crime sites in our city???

This was about a year back! Guys, this is India! The investigation is still on. Its predicted (everyone is rather sure) that the owner of the house will manage to get away with it while the servant would be the one paying for it all.

No longer was this incident forgotten and the people in noida got back to normal, the feeling of insecurity returned . This time the finger was pointed towards loved ones. A cold hearted story which left one and all aghast! The Aarushi double murder case was undoubtedly something out of my frequency. The agencies seem to be equally perturbed, and if they know the case they just don't seem to be willing to expose it.

The disgusting part is how these lowest minds on Earth work. You'd be left amazed by the shallow thinking of these supposedly Homo sapiens sapiens. Some of them go about telling everyone to get attention, and others went a step ahead to say they were from D.P.S. noida even when they aren't. This, just because Aarushi studied there.

Is attention all that you want? Do something that gets you on the TV ( read : something awesome which makes you standout ... i don't mean to tell you to go ahead n commit such heinous crimes) and then brag about it and try grabbing all the attention you want!

So guys , Give it a break!