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My Friend Sancho
My first book, My Friend Sancho, was published in May 2009, and went on to become the biggest selling debut novel released that year in India. It is a contemporary love story set in Mumbai, and had earlier been longlisted for the Man Asian Literary Prize 2008. To learn more about the book, click here.
If you're interested, do join the Facebook group for My Friend Sancho
Click here for more about my publisher, Hachette India.
My posts on India Uncut about My Friend Sancho can be found here.
Recent entries
This personal essay by me appears in the winter edition of Forbes Life India. I feel the ground sway…
I’m amazed that India hasn’t yet woken up to the fact that Himesh Reshammiya is the new Govinda. I…
If you thought Ponytail’s speech the other day was funny, wait till you see this: Vishwa Bandhu Gupta, former…
The New York Times reports: A video of a dog apparently mourning the death of his owner at a…
Huffington Post reports: Glenn Beck called Hurricane Irene a “blessing” on his Friday radio show, saying it would teach…
07 September, 2009
Where Your Taxes Go: 41
On a Rs 42 crore mansion, on “a sprawling 1,00,000 sq ft area”, for Mayawati.
Mayawati’s latest mansion is to be seen to be believed. With 18-ft high stone walls and matching copper and brass gates, it looks more like a fortress on Mall Avenue, the most prized address in Lucknow. With every second house here having been taken over directly or indirectly by Mayawati—be it in the name of the Bahujan Trust or the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) office—her detractors, including Mulayam Yadav, have taken to calling the street ‘Maya Avenue’.
The chateau-like bungalow betrays Mayawati’s weakness for pink Dholpur stone and expensive granite.
‘Maya Avenue’ is a suitable name in more ways than one. The nugget I found most delicious in the report was that to make room for her bungalow, “Behenji ordered that the Sugarcane Commissioner’s office shift out from next door.” A sugarcane commissioner? Why the fug do we need a sugarcane commissioner anyway?
Mayawati has featured in the Where Your Taxes Go series before, here and here. I’m no longer surprised at the scale of her excesses, though. The way our political system is structured, it is entirely rational to enjoy the spoils of power after you get to such a post. We elect governments not to serve us, but to rule us. As long as that is so, our rulers will take full advantage.
(Link via email from Noor. For more on how our government loots us, click here.)
Posted by Amit Varma in
