Three Questions.

Posted on January 3, 2012 by Ramana Rajgopaul

The 3 questions below were raised by Krishan Khanna, at a 2 day Global Summit on Social Business hosted by Nobel Laureate Prof. Mhd. Yunus in Vienna in November 2011.

There were in all, 525 participants from 40 countries. The discussion was on various topics such as youth, poverty, unemployment, micro finance, skills, education, terrorism, black money, war, health care, etc..The 3 Questions were what he asked the Speakers and Panelists.

“I am a technocrat, an engineer and a social worker in India. About 25 years in Business and 15 years in Social Work. If we could address the following three questions, our Planet would be a better place for us and our future generations…..but we seem to be hell bent to do just the opposite………………..WHY?

1. Tax Havens….why we do not need them…WHY?

World Leaders in Business & Politics talk of Ethics in Business, Corporate Governance, etc….BUT all of them allow Tax Havens to flourish? These double standards need to stop as soon as possible. This Black Money is probably owned in these locations, by less than 1% of the World Population who probably control nearly 20% to 40% of the world’s wealth…this is BLACK MONEY. The G-22, UN, Citizen Groups need to work on demolishing these ‘Citadels Of Blatant Corruption’ and see that all these funds are re-cycled into their respective Governments, taxes paid and a small portion of this is re-cycled into areas like Education , Health-Care & Social Business for the 3rd World and Developing Economies of this Planet!

2. Export of Arms & Ammunition since the last 66 years to the least developed countries of Latin America, Africa, ME and Asia…WHY?…Why not Export Relevant Education?

The least developed countries of the world needed education, primary health-care after the WW II…but what they received was the exactly the opposite,very freely, was Arms, Bombs, and Hardware for destruction of Human Beings! 9/11 was only one result of all this. The western border between Pakistan & India is lit up at night and can be easily seen by astronauts!. We in India have been shouting from the rooftops about terrorism from Pakistan…to protect our selves from constant infiltration…but the USA gave $50 billion as Grants and Aid, most was used for arms and ammunition against India…How sad for the two poor countries of this world with a combined population of 1.4 billion? Similar stories and past is already known to all in other 3rd world countries….What a shame! We now have children in Afghanistan of 10 years in age who can beat a trained soldier in the operation of an AK-47, but cannot read and write. Why? What exactly are we trying to prove??

3. Estimated expenditure of $3500 billion or $3.5 trillion on world wide Arms and Ammunition….WHY?

The total GDP of all countries is about $70,000 billion about $70 Trillion….so this expenditure on arms is about 5% of world GDP. This is ONLY meant for fighting each other on this little Planet….WHY? The Younger Generation needs to ask this Question…the older Generation is fossilized and I suspect that even their brains are inactive and dormant. This defense is NOT meant for some external invasion from outer space or for fighting the biggest problems on our little Planet. Even if this Arms Race could be reduced by 10% and the funds diverted to Education, Primary Health-care and Social Business, this beautiful world of ours would be truly be what it is meant to be…A Paradise.”

Quite what answers he would have received in that panel apart, the questions should cause all of us to pause and ponder. Please do give me your feedback and comments.

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