The Budget and the elephant

It's budget time again. 

Fuel prices are set to go up. Grrr...ok, we know it is inevitable. All the newspapers and news channels worth their salt are abuzz with the recent Budget. Extensive analysis, sectorwise impact analysis of who will benefit and who will crib...the usual stuff. It looks like yet again, our FM has delivered a neatly balanced budget.

But, this post is not about nuances of the budget.

This time around, the guys at Times of India have done an amazing job of presenting the budget. There were lot of tidbits, interesting stories, images from all over the world, lot of images, comparison with economies of the world and even cases filed by people demanding exemption from paying taxes. It was a pleasure to read their coverage. Great job!

The part I liked most was the way they compared Indian economy to an elephant. The front page story reads:

The elephant has been synonymous with India from time immemorial, through history, mythology and belief. For decades, the Indian economy, too, came to be likened to an elephant, but in a pejorative, lumbering sense. Today, as the balance of global power shifts to the East, and India is regarded with awe for weathering the financial storm better than most, the elephant analogy is back – but with the positive attributes of size, stability, solidity and strength. With our economy projected to become the second largest in the world, after China and ahead of even the US, there’s a growing sense that we’re riding a quiet but powerful giant, one that needs to be taken care of if we want it to travel far and carry over a billion people on its back. Just as the elephant-god is worshipped by millions as remover of obstacles and bearer of good fortune, our Budgets are awaited with a prayer that they will lead us to a better tomorrow. Will this Budget make a difference to our lives, will it help the elephant dance?
Shankar Raghuraman | TIMES NEWS NETWORK

To support this theme, the paper had different images of elephants in different settings with appropriate captions.

All said and done, it's time to start working harder. 

You know, we have to earn more to pay to the taxman.

 

More images

Responsibility

At first glance this image evokes thoughts about hormonious co-existence. But then, is there anything natural about it?

The elephant lives in a herd and generally exhibits a highly social behaviour. The one in the pic definitely doesn't look like one in captivity. Then what makes it to haunt the national highways and demand food from speeding trucks, putting its life at such a huge risk ?

Typically the ones that get separated from their herds behave like this. Yesterday's newspapers reported that in a small town in Orissa’s Keonjhar district, such an elephant had attacked some villagers while on a rampaging search for its food. Obviously it had got used to threatening people to get its mouthful and so it was another attempt on another empty stomach day.

The inaction of forest officials and all those who had the power to do something about it had angered the villagers. It seems the tusker had killed eight people in the last two years. In spite of the track record, no efforts were taken to retrieve and confine the wild streaked animal. The common villagers could only see the threat from the big animal. From their simple existence, things like conservation and protection of endangered animals do not matter as they are constantly pitted against such life threatening situations and for them its a matter of their survival.

Fed up of the animal's antics and fed up of inaction from concerned officials, the mob took things in their hands and turned their fury on the elephant. Someone poured petrol on it and then lit it on fire.

After the incidence, the officials blame the public, the public blame the officials but the half burnt elephant had run away into the jungle.

Who knows when it will return?

Who knows what will be burnt next?

How many such half burnt issues are running amok just waiting for a solution from the empowered ones?