In 1984 the world viewed the media blackout and violence against the Sikhs in India. In June 1984 the Bluestar operation was brutal - killing thousands of innocent lives.

A few months later for 3 immediate days after Indira Gandhi assignation thousands of innocent Sikhs were killed. The total number of Sikhs and non-Sikhs killed has never been officially recorded but it is in the thousands. What is known in many cases, is the names of the instigators of the violence that occurred. After 24 years and major national enquiries no one has been brought to justice over human right abuses and targeted slaughter of a community.

Today India offers a manufacturing base that competes with the Far East. In terms of India�s strength in computer software development and support, again there is no doubt that India can offer immediate financial returns and committed employees. In recent years I have visited Bangalore and was impressed by the scale of development. India now has digital telecommunications, high speed voice and data networks. Investments have also taken place in Hotels.

Investment also means investing in equality for all parts of the population and also assuring justice and honesty. Although Dr Manmohan Singh has acknowledged the wrong that was done at the time, we still need those that committed the crimes of communal violence to be brought to trial.

For humankind there is a need for a concerted effort to ensure that justice does prevail. After 24 years victims of the 1984 Bluestar operation and Delhi genocide families are still suffering.

At a Facebook group inviting people to attend a rally in London (Hyde Park) on 8th June I read the following - It sent shivers down my spine!

See : http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=15741218422&ref=ts

Amritsar resident’s account

One resident of Amritsar gave an eyewitness account to the editor of the Sikh Messenger, a British publication. “The army pounding of the Golden Temple area continued over the next few days confirming our fears of deliberate and vindictive destruction. On the night of the 5th, the aged and chronically ill father of the couple next door finally expired and on the morning of the 6th the army gave our neighbours special permission to take him to the crematorium. Even before reaching this site, they could smell the stench of putrid and burning flesh. On entering the crematorium grounds they saw a sight that literally made them sick with horror. Grotesque piles of dozens of bodies were being burnt in the open without dignity or religious rites like so many carcasses. The bodies had all been brought there by dust carts and from the number ofcarts; the attendant estimated some 3,300 had so far been cremated

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Wow! What a week it was last week.
I had a call late Thursday to interview Reverend Jesse Jackson.

Mono:

Stereo:

He was passing through London and I had a chance to meet and interview him for a friend in an organisation.

It had some amazing points to make about the importance of justice and equality, through his work with
The Rainbow Push Coalition - The Rainbow PUSH Coalition is a progressive organization fighting for social change.
As a mighty coalition of conscience; workers, women and people of color have the power to make the
American Dream a Reality!

They believe that the issues consist of:

The Issues
RPC is dedicated to improving the lives of all people by focusing on cures for social, economic and political ills.
Our issues include but are not limited to:

• Jobs and Economic Empowerment
• Employee Rights and Livable Wages
• Educational Access
• Fair and Decent Housing
• Voter Registration and Civic Education
• Election Law Reform
• Fairness in the Media, Sports, and Criminal
• Justice System
• Political Empowerment
• Trade and Foreign Policy
• Affirmative Action and Equal Rights
• Gender Equality
• Environmental justice

and in terms of the UK http://www.equanomics.org.uk/
Equanomics UK is a growing coalition of organisations across the UK who want to develop more economic
analyses and approaches to equality in the UK. It is a project incubated at the 1990 Trust.

It was fascinating to hear him talk about the need for greater equality and ways that it could materialise, for example:

* Investing in firms, through stock purchasing
* Making people aware that the recent sub-prime mortgage problems may impact selective communities.

With regard to the latter, there will be marches held in December 2007, in both Wall Street and London’s stock
exchange area to highlight the need for a rescue package. The Rainbow Push Coalition on their site suggests…

It is time to act. Join us on December 10 on Wall Street and in cities across the country.
Stand up to stop the wave of home loan defaults that threatens to foreclose not just on their homes but on our hopes.
The problem keeps getting worse. Two million homeowners face foreclosure over the next year. Their neighbors will
lose billions in the equity they have in their homes. Millions will find themselves stuck, unable to get a decent price
for their homes in a flooded market. Tens of millions more will tighten their belts. Communities will struggle with budget crises….

It is interesting some banks were quick to lend. However, now that there is an issue, they need to show both
Corporate Responsibility and justice. Now is the time for creative solutions to ensure that people, all who are hardworking
can manage their existence and dreams.

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I’ve written about the appalling behaviour of some people on TV in the past. For example, Dragons Den. Recently I considered how many programmes of this type actually rely on a bullying factor. I accept that programme editing may influence the end product, yet some of the things said, if taken at face value can be demoralising and spiteful. Sure, some people may have become successful and it maybe irritating to view some ‘interesting’ propositions, but the art of tact, tolerance and decency seems to have disappeared.

I strongly believe that ruthlessness is not the route or path to success. I live in hope that people are essentially good but if one is faced with a situation of threat to human rights. We have to stand-up and ensure that evil does not prevail.

Back to debate on TV bullies. Does this mean that to make TV watch able we need to see such terrible behaviour? If we believe in the old adage, ‘What goes around, comes around’, then maybe these bullies will have to face the music eventually. Do some of these people sleep at night? Remember the film, Flatliners? The movie features how one could be possibly haunted by all the bad things you’ve done during your life!

The government is clear that we will not stand for bullying in schools, yet everyday successive and appetite fuelling reality TV programmes showcase bullying in all shapes and sizes. Whether it is race, sex or weight, the formula of placing one judge as a ‘hate’ figure is the same. What adds further spice is often the arrogance of the bully in question. He is mocked but still appears smug in his/her comfort zone.

If motivation is the key issue, then I have to say that bullying never works. Instead it can cause deep rooted emotional cuts.

Personally, I can reflect on my childhood of being bullied for the first three years at senior school. Everyday I was the target for an easy fight. A punch here and there from anyone that past my way became an unfortunate acceptable norm for me.

It was not until my 4th year aka year 10, that I managed to redeem some element of respect. I remember the fight to this day. I was in a brawl with one of the schools biggest bullies. I won the fight. Considering the technique, I wasted a lot of energy by punching the opponent in the back. The scene was barbaric; I was surrounded by a circle of kids, probably 10 deep, all shouting, ‘Bundle, Bundle’.

My redemption was through showing strength. I could not take being a punch bag anymore.

Today we have more rules and a different atmosphere to assist our kids. However, some TV executives are probably the bigger bullies, being sadistic rather than being creative.

We should be projecting our energies for the common good, not supporting the common bad. The last thing we want is for a double standard both from a corporate and personal perspective, who knows where it could end up!

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Last week everyone watched with shock and horror the post nightmare of the Virginia Tech shootings. Scholars and lecturers were gunned down in a pointless sense of rage by one lost soul. Was it true that a single armed individual could cause so much pain and suffering, creating a ripple effect of shock and disbelief around the world. Yes, unfortunately, the killer, whose name does not deserve to be in print, established himself as a mass murderer.

One has to ask why and a hope that it will not be repeated? Yet, I wonder if the underlying reasons for him ‘snapping’ were more than his apparent inability to be ‘in with the in crowd’. Maybe he was mentally disturbed or his condition could have been as a result of an accumulative set of circumstances.

If people feel left out, unfortunately little is done to help them reach out and find a support group or a proactive approach to help get involved in team activities, for example: school games, competitions or techniques to bring out the positive qualities of individuals. I believe that today there are many lonely people in a world. Ironic, as we are surrounded by over six Billion individuals. Clique mentality exists everywhere but little is done to expose possible areas of stress.

In the case of the Virginia Tech shootings I am certainly not giving any excuses to the person who’s loose screw eventually made him lose any sense of reality.

What continues to confuse everyone about this killer is the potential difference between his online and off-line persona. Maybe he hid his true mental situation well and that no amount of profiling would have exposed this would be killer? Although I mentioned the need for a proactive approach to pick-up on potential killers, it appears that in late 2005 a special Justice’s order directed the Virginia Tech killer to seek outpatient treatment and declare him to be mentally ill and an imminent danger to himself. Why did no one pick-up on this fact? This fact alone fits the federal criteria of him (the killer) being unable to purchase a gun i.e.: The stated circumstance should have immediately disqualified him.

I am not implying that we need Big Brother type policing. However, today we certainly have sorting algorithms and data mining tools to review and correlate data in an attempt to profile potential killers.

Finally, a lot has been written about whether the world should have been exposed to his online documented persona. One argument is that this exposure immortalises him and that may have been one of his aims. However, I believe that the reverse is true. We see from his videos and pictures that he was truly beyond reason and had ‘lost the plot’. His videos expose him as a fraud and deluded.

For our proactive approach to halt such a reoccurrence, we are able to learn more about opening up our attitudes to people and the need to urgently consider new strategies to capture potential lost souls.

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