Inconsistencies and Contradictions

             This post is prompted by the Facebook past (about the incidence/anecdote about a conversation between C.D. Deshmukh and Lokamanya Tilak) of Niranjan Rajadhyaksha. I did not write this long response there since I am often terrified to express my opinions about inflammable issues on social media. His Facebookpost started with the question – ‘Did the soldiers who fought in the army of British India or the administrators who served in the colonial bureaucracy in effect betray their country?’ Those two words at the end, ‘in effect’ are very important. The answer hinges on them. The answer to the question is – YES. They did in effect betray their country if they had a notion of ‘my country’ in their conscience and if we think that British rule was actively harming the Indian then.     But we cannot make more direct charge of betrayal because they did not intend, plan, or choose to betray. The same way they never chose to fight...

Case fatality rate or more casually death rate is a prism through which many of us are evaluating the Covid-19 situation. The evaluation resides on a principle where how alarmed we should be is proportional to death rate. Since Omicron seems to have lower death rate than previous waves, we are choosing to be relaxed about it. The principle is essentially seen in personal terms. If death rate is low, chance of I or my dear ones will perish is low. I wonder whether this association between collective measure and individual assessment is correct. What it means for me that death rate is 2%? 2% death rate means out of 100 Covid cases, 2 will die. It does not tell anything about which two. Seen from personal lenses, one can be either among 2 who are succumbing or 98 who will be surviving. Individually, there are only two possibilities that I either die or survive after contacting the virus and becoming ill. One will try to argue that but these possibilities are not equally likely. That i...