praveen kumar on Indian police,policing and the UPSC and poems on love and human nature.

2002-09-13T20:55:00.000-07:00

praveen kumar on Indian police,policing and the UPSC and poems on love and human nature.

An analytical study of the philosophy and field dynamics of the policing in practice with live instances from the field penned by a Police Officer from India. The hypocrisy and the sad state of affairs in the profession in India and the UPSC as its appointing agent are effectively brought out by the author.

THE WORLD IN THE 21ST CENTURY

We may be wondering what arsenals are in store for the 21st century after the
momentous and suspenseful events along the passage of the 20th century that
mangled the quiet facade of the Earth. Life as a stream of endless processes,
catenated by the cardinal rule of cause and effect, may open up a vista for us to infer
what the world will be in the 21st century.

Taking clues from the loose ends of the 20th century and realising that every-
thing moves in circle and ipso facto every practice and every idea has its own ups
and downs in circular motion along the course of time, helps to deduce the possible
structure of the 21st century on and around certain fixed pillar posts vacated by the
20th century in its haste to give way to the 21st century. I am certain that you will
find my analyses and inferences interesting.

As the dusk of the 20th century gives way to the dawn of the 21st century, new
alignments may emerge to replace senescent superpowers that ruled the roost in
international politics. The trend in world politics would be the coalescence of
regional powers to harness maximum financial strength. The politics of ideological
conflicts of the 20th century may give way to the politics of pragmatic dispensation.
National affiliations may lose their fervour and each regional alliance of nations
may develop into a loose, federal government as the century draws to its end. A
more liberal and universal outlook with the progressive intermingling of cultures
would be the hallmark of the 21st century. The world probably may awake to a
world-culture with all divergent nuances of the current world being absorbed into
a mainstream culture in the new century.

The 21st century shall be known by future generations for the growth and
universal acceptance of an open market economy and a combative economic spirit.
The last decade of the 21st century may find the laissez-aller in economy touching
its ultima thule and concomitantly its breaking point except for a few scattered
pockets still clinging to a controlled economy as remnants of yore, which will work
as a springboard in subsequent centuries to move the world back to a modified
guided economy.

Another significant development of the new era would be the upsurge of
economics in the new order of things to mark the century as "The Economic Age'.
The present national and ideological divide would be replaced with a new economic
divide, leading to a regrouping of regions by economic convenience. The concept
of the European Economic Community of the 20th century will lead to similar
economic groupings in East Europe including united Germany, Central Asia,
South-East Asia, South Asia, West Asia, South America, North Africa, South and
Central Africa and finally North America to create distinct economic zones along
the passage of the 21st century with more and more power and authority transferred
to these new units to control and govern the social life of the people. National
identities would be relegated to oblivion as a thing of the past by the end of the 21st
century with the world divided into a handful of distinct and well-defined economic
units, each of which will strive towards the telos of economic prosperity and
increased self-sufficiency. However, increased concours between the new
economic units could bring tension back to the world in the later part of the century,
leading to the failure of this new concept of living on this Earth and return to good
old nationhood in later centuries.

United Germany, as the leader of a regional power, consisting mostly of the
present Warsaw Pact countries may provide a real challenge to the financial strength
of Japan and its neighbouring allies in the first half of the 21 st century and grow to
be a financial giant of the world in the second half of the century by pushing the
latter to second place. A close run for supremacy as a financial power of the world
between regional powers led by United Germany and Japan would be the main
political drama of the new era. Both USA and Russia would be decimated to minor
parts in the battle-royale.

The 21st century may see impressive breakthroughs in unconventional energy
sources like nuclear energy, solar energy and oceanic energy which may cheaply
meet the major share of the world's energy needs by the end of the 21st century.
This may reduce the importance of oil-rich countries in world politics and add to
the relative peace of the coming century.

The new century may see nuclear energy becoming the staple energy source for
motor transport and aviation. There would be major breakthroughs in harnessing
and using solar energy. All anxieties about depletion of energy sources would be
laid to rest in the 21st century. The new era may find people going for artificial nutritious foods produced from cheap edible plastic chemicals. This would lessen
the dependence on agricultural produce and provide a permanent solution to the
problem of hunger. Major breakthroughs in recycling of waste may provide the
solution to shortages and ecological contamination. The 21st century is unlikely to
make any tangible headway in space and interplanetary research due to the factors
involving time and distance and the changing circumstances that may localise issues
to the world we live in and ipso facto control the passion to explore outer space.

The real scientific leap of the 21st century would be the discovery of normal
temperature superconductors and their universal applications in the fields of
mobility, communication and energy that could revolutionise life on this Earth by
obliterating the notion of distance from its face. Man may travel at speeds very close
to that of light by the end of the century. He would then be able to control things
anywhere on this Earth by sitting in his place and monitoring audio-visual feed-
backs. Some advancements by the end of the century in the ability to penetrate to
the past cannot be ruled out either.

A positive outcome of the new concept of living in regional economic groupings
would be the increased realisation of the futility of wars and military expenditure.
The new age may spawn hope for sempiternal peace and prosperity, with the
aggressive side of the human psyche being increasingly engaged by the ceaseless
demands of the free market economy. The 21st century may witness a spurt in the
general standard of living, brought about by the deployment of resources hitherto
utilised only for military research and expenditure.

The greatest blessing of the 21st century would be the conspicuous reduction
in international strife and concomitant military expenditure while the worst feature
would be the reduction of man and his environment to an average profile deprived
of all interests and curiosities. He and his environment may become more fragile
inside and outside as unending technological advancements increasingly take over
the fields of his exclusive skills and competence and ipso facto condemn them to
wither away by desuetude. The 21st century may be the beginning of this withering
process of human skills in a telling way. Life would be less interesting - though
more convenient - in the 21st century which could cause more and more people to
turn to religion and occult practice for solace and adventure.

Computers may become integral to all human activity thus leading to decline
in human skill and intellectual ability as the century advances. The menaces of
terrorism and drug-addiction may further grow to be the major challenges of the
21 st century. The increasing complexity of day-to-day living traversed with poverty
and an unabated population explosion may encourage new, unheard-of forms of
crime. New complex diseases may surface on the Earth to attack the populace from
time to time and keep the medical research establishment continuously engaged to
meet the challenges. Life's concomitant stress may spawn agitated, nervous,
frustrated and directionless minds. Family units would be in disarray with the institution of marriage in red and a new concept of an open society with guaranteed
institutional security coming into vogue.

The new century may witness more and more people turning to religion for inner
peace. As both Christianity and Islam fail to meet the growing spiritual needs of
the plebeians of the 21st century, the world may look for solace to Buddhism with
^ts spiritual interpretation of life. A new school of Buddhism called 'Scientific
Buddhism' may sweep the Earth of the 21st century to become its major religion.
The new age may also find proliferation of scientific research in parapsychology
and the universal application of its findings to control crime and improve labour
relations in industry and commercial enterprises.

The new century may see the concepts of family and marriage losing their
relevance to life. Each to his own ends would be the new dispensation and state
security to newboms, the old and infirm would become a basic responsibility of the
state machinery. With the increased demand on limited land, due to the progressive
rise in the population, the 21st century may find all lands becoming government
property, leased out to private parties on contract for a definite period for use:
though laissezfaire with private ownerships in other enterprises would be the
tendency in the 21st century economy. Public undertakings may become a rarity in
the new age. Even selected jobs in the governance of the country would be permitted
to be managed by private firms on contract. Such sensitive areas as development
activities, recruitment, crime investigation, collection of taxes etc. would be hand-
led by specialised private firms on a time-bound contract as the century draws to
an end. The turn of the 21st century may see only the legislature and judiciary
remaining the government's direct responsibility with executive jobs being handled
on its behalf by private agencies.

The new century may witness an upsurge of romanticism in literature and life'
fuelled by a new ferocity that spurns any constraint on natural conduct; free sex
may well become the rule. This new popular movement would spread across the
world in the new century, adding spice to growingly insipid lifestyles. New
philosophies and religions may spring out of it to alter intellectual and spiritual
perceptions.

While the new world will have advanced amenities at its beck and call, simple
natural needs like adequate space, clean water and fresh air will become rarities.
Piped water supply would be a matter of the past and clean water would be sold in
bottles in markets. The new age may also see special fresh-air sessions everyday
for half-an-hour: a luxury of breathing fresh air, produced by special treatments in
a costly process affordable only to the rich. The selling of small fresh-air packets
for use in private may become a lucrative business throughout the world and
multi-national corporations may make huge investments in both fresh-air packet
and clean water bottle industries.

Life would be a more complex and costly affair in the 21st century inspite of man's increasing success in bringing the world to his heels through inventions and
discoveries. Birth-control on demand would be a normal practice. Speed and
detached impatience would become the spirit and trend of the age, with passions,
emotions, moods, tastes, arts and pleasures becoming rare luxuries, known to a few
isolated deviates. Living would be reduced to a cutthroat competition with the
conflict between man and his poisoned environment compounded with that be-
tween him and his fellow-men turning extra modum in his fight and flight for
survival. The simple innocent side of his nature would become a further casualty
in the process with increased manifestations of criminal tendency at all levels in all
fields. Life would thus become less secure and more risky in the new dispensation.

The world would be less worth for living in the 21st century inspite of its
technical and material advancements. Though the threat of war would recede in the
new age, life's acceleration to the highly competitive tempo, necessary to ensure
survival, may render living a sick and uneasy affair. As man bends nature to his
convenience, nature's failures to meet his basic needs may balloon up to gigantic
proportions by the increased tax on her fragile attributions. Yet, it should be
remembered that the 21st century is just a minute phase in the huge evolution
process which takes the world to higher levels of existence through restless and
difficile passage.

We should know that this world is a great self-sustaining system, built to survive
all ecological, nuclear or population disasters. The life system of this Earth is a
wonderful self-regulating work-house with a skill for survival. We must rest assured
that the Earth will certainly survive all contingencies of the 21st century by its
wonderful self-regulating and self-sustaining mechanism that was at work in the
20th century coram nobis.

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THE WORLD IN THE 20TH CENTURY