Mritunjaya
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India’s Mars mission, poverty and closet racism | Niti Central
India’s Mars mission, poverty and closet racism
India has now successfully launched its mission to Mars. The mission was achieved at an extraordinary low price tag of Rs 450 crore ($74 million) – 1/10 of what a similar mission would cost NASA or ESA. If this successfully reaches Mars, India will be the first country to have the Mars mission succeed on the first try.
The Provocation
Just as quickly as the rocket sped off, the Western journalists who marvelled at the moon walk in their childhood started engaging Indians in an unnecessary provocation. These are not coming from cheap tabloids, but reputed media houses. It is not the criticism that rankles, but how crudely they are hitting below the belt.
This author chose to include poverty right in the headline: India Mars Mission to Launch Amidst Overwhelming Poverty
What a refreshing headline! Not even poverty. It has to be “overwhelming poverty”. Who are we to launch into space? Should we not ask our British colonial masters before doing anything?
Apparently the other countries engaging in scientific research face no poverty. Apparently, space has something to do with poverty. Apparently, it is between funding ISRO and solving poverty. You cannot do both. No sir, no. Next time, when you write about something that Britain did well, sure to remember to randomly incorporate the poverty of Birmingham and the riots of London into the title.
“England wins 10 Olympic golds amidst all the poverty”
“NASA begins its moon mission despite failing to manage hurricane relief”
“European Space Agency launches a satellite despite the inability to control religious riots in Paris and Tottenham, London”
This CNN author didn’t even pretend to hide the racist idea:
Is India’s Mars mission the latest escalation in Asia’s space race?
For a country like Australia, the space aspirations are extremely pragmatically driven. On the other hand, a country like Malaysia is intent on putting astronauts in space — that’s very prestige-oriented.
Apparently, brown people’s ambitions to reach space is not pragmatic enough. Apparently, the $75 million spent on the Mars mission is the only thing that keeps us from building toilets.
This gentleman at Guardian makes a thinly-veiled threat:
ISRO to launch India’s first spacecraft to Mars
Critics of Britain’s aid programme in the country have also been angered by the mission. The UK gives India around £300m each year.
Britain threatens to pull its aid. This is ghastly. What would India do without all these do-gooder British aid? The Indian economy of £1 trillion was badly depending on these £300 million that come with no strings attached. We are an ungrateful bunch, aren’t we? We are supposed to surrender our national priorities and research work and listen to our ex-colonial masters for a paltry £300 million.
This Economist article is more subtle and even more racist:
How can poor countries afford space programmes?
What if the 16,000 scientists and engineers now working on space development were deployed instead to fix rotten sanitation?
Someone from Oxford wants to know why don’t we all Indians work on toilets and potty research?
If this author lived at the time of Renaissance, she/he might have written:
Newton, Michelangelo and da Vinci are wasting time instead of building toilets
Poverty should indeed be an excuse to postpone great achievements. Right?
India’s Mars mission, poverty and closet racism
India has now successfully launched its mission to Mars. The mission was achieved at an extraordinary low price tag of Rs 450 crore ($74 million) – 1/10 of what a similar mission would cost NASA or ESA. If this successfully reaches Mars, India will be the first country to have the Mars mission succeed on the first try.
The Provocation
Just as quickly as the rocket sped off, the Western journalists who marvelled at the moon walk in their childhood started engaging Indians in an unnecessary provocation. These are not coming from cheap tabloids, but reputed media houses. It is not the criticism that rankles, but how crudely they are hitting below the belt.
This author chose to include poverty right in the headline: India Mars Mission to Launch Amidst Overwhelming Poverty
What a refreshing headline! Not even poverty. It has to be “overwhelming poverty”. Who are we to launch into space? Should we not ask our British colonial masters before doing anything?
Apparently the other countries engaging in scientific research face no poverty. Apparently, space has something to do with poverty. Apparently, it is between funding ISRO and solving poverty. You cannot do both. No sir, no. Next time, when you write about something that Britain did well, sure to remember to randomly incorporate the poverty of Birmingham and the riots of London into the title.
“England wins 10 Olympic golds amidst all the poverty”
“NASA begins its moon mission despite failing to manage hurricane relief”
“European Space Agency launches a satellite despite the inability to control religious riots in Paris and Tottenham, London”
This CNN author didn’t even pretend to hide the racist idea:
Is India’s Mars mission the latest escalation in Asia’s space race?
For a country like Australia, the space aspirations are extremely pragmatically driven. On the other hand, a country like Malaysia is intent on putting astronauts in space — that’s very prestige-oriented.
Apparently, brown people’s ambitions to reach space is not pragmatic enough. Apparently, the $75 million spent on the Mars mission is the only thing that keeps us from building toilets.
This gentleman at Guardian makes a thinly-veiled threat:
ISRO to launch India’s first spacecraft to Mars
Critics of Britain’s aid programme in the country have also been angered by the mission. The UK gives India around £300m each year.
Britain threatens to pull its aid. This is ghastly. What would India do without all these do-gooder British aid? The Indian economy of £1 trillion was badly depending on these £300 million that come with no strings attached. We are an ungrateful bunch, aren’t we? We are supposed to surrender our national priorities and research work and listen to our ex-colonial masters for a paltry £300 million.
This Economist article is more subtle and even more racist:
How can poor countries afford space programmes?
What if the 16,000 scientists and engineers now working on space development were deployed instead to fix rotten sanitation?
Someone from Oxford wants to know why don’t we all Indians work on toilets and potty research?
If this author lived at the time of Renaissance, she/he might have written:
Newton, Michelangelo and da Vinci are wasting time instead of building toilets
Poverty should indeed be an excuse to postpone great achievements. Right?