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The Paper Leak Epidemic: Jharkhand's Unending Agony and India's Broken Exam System

On 28 January 2024, the Jharkhand Public Service Commission (JPSC) was set to conduct its examination. Three hours before the third shift, the General Studies paper for 50% of the candidates was abruptly cancelled. That exam was later re-conducted, but doubts never vanished. In December 2025, results were announced, and within days, successful candidates were issued joining letters. Yet, the embers of protest were already glowing. The anger of the youth, simmering since that hurried joining in late 2025, exploded when the results of the 14th JPSC examination were declared on 2 July. Within 48 hours, allegations of massive irregularities spread, and students took to the streets demanding that not only the latest results but all appointments stemming from the January 2024 exam be scrapped.

The agitation in Jharkhand is not a sudden outburst. It is the logical culmination of a system where merit has been replaced by money, fairness by fraud. And the response of the government — led by Hemant Soren — reveals a deep disconnect between those who rule and those who dream.

The Chronology of Betrayal

On 28 January 2024, the paper was cancelled because of a leak. The re-test was ordered, but questions about its integrity surfaced immediately. Despite this, results were declared in December 2025, and candidates were appointed. Students say that even before the ink dried on their joining letters, they had evidence of foul play. When the 14th JPSC result came on 2 July, OMR sheets of several candidates were leaked online. The data showed that candidates with lower scores had secured jobs while deserving ones were shut out. The demand swelled: cancel the 11th, 13th, and 14th JPSC examinations, and conduct a fresh, fair process.

The government took notice only after the protests grew. A high-level committee was formed, but the students refused to meet behind closed doors. “We will not talk in a closed room,” they declared. “The government must come to us, in the open, with the media present.” This stance mirrors the Jantar Mantar protests of NEET-UG aspirants, where the central government refused to face students publicly. The bargaining power of the youth now hinges on this public confrontation — a strategy that underscores the deep trust deficit.

The Demands: Cancel, Investigate, Rebuild

The students’ charter is clear:

• Cancel the results of the 11th, 13th, and 14th JPSC examinations.
• Annul all appointments made from the December 2025 result.
• Conduct an independent, transparent investigation into the entire examination process.
• Ensure that the probe extends to the assets of all officials linked to the JPSC, Jharkhand Staff Selection Commission (JSSC), and the private agency TDPL that has been repeatedly accused of irregularities.

To understand why these demands are not excessive but urgent, one must look at the history of competitive examinations in Jharkhand. Since the state was carved out of Bihar in 2000, there has not been a single JPSC or JSSC examination that has not been mired in allegations of cheating. Not one. The system is so deeply corrupted that a clean recruitment drive seems an impossibility.

The Government’s Response: Too Little, Too Late

When the protests escalated, the Hemant Soren government sent SDMs and ADMs to the protest site, offering a five-member team to meet at the Chief Minister’s residence. But the students refused. They insisted on an open dialogue. The government eventually formed a committee, but the youth remain unconvinced. Their fear is legitimate: closed-door negotiations can easily turn into a whitewash.

Hemant Soren has claimed that the state’s CID has acted swiftly — 18 people arrested, documents seized, and key conspirators identified. He believes this should restore trust. But the students have ample reason to doubt. The CID is a state agency, and in Jharkhand, political interference in investigations is an open secret. Moreover, the central agencies that might have offered hope — the CBI and the ED — have their own credibility crises. The CBI’s conviction rate in paper leak cases is abysmal; the ED’s selective targeting of opposition leaders has made it a political weapon, not an impartial arbiter.

The Vyapam Precedent and the Supreme Court’s Sword

The students’ demand for cancellation finds strong legal backing. In the Vyapam scam in Madhya Pradesh, the Supreme Court cancelled the degrees of over 600 medical students who had reached the final year of their MBBS. Admissions taken, exams passed over several years — everything was declared void because the foundation was fraudulent. If the apex court could do that, why can’t the Jharkhand government annul appointments based on demonstrably tainted examinations? The answer lies in political will, not legal hurdle.

The irony is that the Jharkhand High Court, in an unrelated case, had strongly indicted the ED for arresting Hemant Soren without solid grounds. The ED lost that case in the Supreme Court too. Yet the same Hemant Soren, when faced with student anger, has not shown the same resolve to uproot the examination mafia that his own government’s agencies are supposed to control.

A Nationwide Cancer: The Paper Leak Industry

The Jharkhand agitation cannot be viewed in isolation. India is witnessing a terrifying surge in examination frauds. A PTI report reveals that the CBI has over 150 cases related to recruitment exam irregularities — investigations are complete in most, but trials have not even begun. Some cases are 20 years old. The CBI is now trying to move these to fast-track courts, but the damage is already done. The faith of the young has been crushed.

The 2024 NEET-UG paper leak case is a glaring example. The main accused, Sanjeev Mukhiya, was discharged by a court because the CBI found no evidence against him. The ED, which arrested Hemant Soren in a money-laundering case, was itself pulled up by the Supreme Court for frivolous arrests of opposition leaders. The investigating agencies that students are supposed to rely upon are either handcuffed or complicit. In such a scenario, the demand for an independent probe becomes a cry into the void.

The Anatomy of a Cheating Cartel

The CID’s raids have thrown up chilling details. In Jharkhand, post-dated cheques worth Rs 6 crore were recovered from the houses of Lalu Yadav and Pradeep Yadav of Hazaribagh. These cheques were signed by different individuals — likely candidates or their relatives — revealing a pay-after-success racket. The CID also found admit cards of constable recruitment exams and carbon copies of candidates’ OMR sheets at the residence of Santosh Kumar Singh in Palamu. The suspicion is that candidates who could not pay cash were forced to part with land documents as collateral.

The private firm TDPL is at the heart of this network. Blacklisted by the Jharkhand Staff Selection Commission in May 2025, the company was re-engaged to conduct examinations. That re-appointment itself stinks of a deep nexus. The case of Abhay Tiwari is even more instructive. The CID claims that Tiwari, between 2013 and 2024, passed over 12 competitive examinations, including those of Jharkhand and the Centre. In every exam where Tiwari succeeded, TDPL was involved in some capacity. That is not coincidence; it is a meticulously managed, exam-clearing formula for sale.

A similar pattern emerged in the NEET-UG case. Dinesh Binwal, his brother Mangilal Binwal, and Mangilal’s son Vikas were arrested. Of the five arrested by the CBI, three belonged to the same family — a family whose five children had cleared NEET-UG in the previous year. Rajasthan Congress chief Govind Singh Dotasra had tweeted the names and asked uncomfortable questions about where these children were studying. The answers are still buried.

The Political Calculus and the Media’s Silence

On the protest stage at Jantar Mantar, several political parties sent leaders, but the ruling BJP in Jharkhand exerted no real pressure on the state government. Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan never once engaged with NEET aspirants. The NTA chief, despite the paper leak, did not resign; he did not even accept moral responsibility. In contrast, the JPSC Chairman, E. Khizangte, stepped down on 22 July after CID raids at his home and office. That resignation, however, is little solace to students who have lost years of their lives.

The students in Jharkhand have displayed remarkable discipline. They have consciously kept political, religious, and caste symbols off the stage. They have banned personal attacks on individuals and maintained a sharp focus on systemic reform. This is a movement led by young people who understand that their power lies in their unity, not in the patronage of any party.

Data Points: The Scale of Contamination

Aspect	Detail
Exams passed by Abhay Tiwari (2013-2024)	More than 12 (state and central)
Post-dated cheques recovered	Rs 6 crore (number of cheques undisclosed)
CBI cases on recruitment fraud	150+ (investigations complete, trials pending)
Oldest pending CBI paper leak case	20 years
NEET UG 2024 arrested family members	3 out of 5 accused from one family; 5 family children passed NEET
JPSC examinations since state formation without corruption charges	None

The Road Ahead: A Republic Without Fair Exams?

Every country’s examination system carries a certain prestige. India’s used to. Today, it is a market. The youth are not just protesting a leak; they are questioning the very legitimacy of a state that cannot hold a single honest test. The Jharkhand government must accept that no closed-door committee will placate the anger. The central government must ensure that the CBI is empowered to deliver swift justice, not just file chargesheets. The political class must understand that using agencies like the ED to harass opponents while ignoring exam mafias is a recipe for social explosion.

The students have said it plainly: “We do not care about any party. Come and support us, understand our pain.” Their agony is not partisan. It is the agony of a nation that has told its young: work hard, and you will rise. But when the results come, the seats are already sold. The paper has leaked, and so has the dream.

Criticisms

• A transparent dialogue with protesting students in an open forum is consistently avoided by the government.
• The moral responsibility of resigning upon witnessing a paper leak is not accepted by senior bureaucratic officials in central agencies.
• Blacklisted private firms are re-hired for conducting competitive examinations, with no explanation provided.
• The ED is utilized as a political instrument to target opposition leaders rather than as an impartial investigative body.
• Fast-track trials in paper leak cases are not completed, and delay in justice is perpetuated.
• The credibility of the CBI is eroded by repeated failure to secure convictions in recruitment fraud cases.
• The Hemant Soren government in Jharkhand is allowed to project the CID’s actions as sufficient while systemic rot remains unaddressed.
• The network of post-dated cheques and land documents as collateral is not investigated with the urgency it demands.
• Political parties are observed to treat student movements as vote banks rather than engaging with the core issue of examination integrity.
• The NTA’s flawed examination processes are not overhauled despite repeated national-level leaks.
• A uniform national law to punish exam cheating with stringent action is not enacted by Parliament.

I Spent 2 Weeks Talking to People Across 5 Salary Brackets - Here's What I Found

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On a random Tuesday, in a big Indian city, five people woke up under the same sky, in the same city, on the same unremarkable Tuesday. No one would call it special. Yet, for each of them, the day unfolded in vastly different orbits — shaped not by the weather or the headlines, but by a single number: their monthly income. These five are not caricatures. They wear gold rings, chains, maybe even a bracelet. They think of themselves as middle class. But if you look closely, only one of them is the real middle class of India. The rest are far richer, or far poorer, than the label suggests.

Most of us have no idea where the Indian middle class actually stands, how much they earn, or how different their life is from ours. So let’s walk through a Tuesday with these five people — and discover what money truly buys at every rung of the ladder.

The Real Indian Middle Class: Rs 12,000 a Month

If you line up all 1.4 billion Indians by income, the person standing exactly in the middle — the median Indian — earns around Rs 10,000 to 11,000 a month. Not a comfortable living. Not “aspirational.” This is the real Indian middle class, often invisible in our Instagram and LinkedIn feeds. According to the Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) 2022-23, the average employed person in India earns about Rs 21,900 a month, while the average self-employed person brings home just Rs 13,500. So our first protagonist, earning Rs 12,000 a month, is not poor by statistical averages; he is, in fact, the median.

His day does not begin at 6 a.m. It begins at 4:30 a.m. He lives in a shared room, a bed in a cramped space that costs him Rs 3,000 to 6,000 a month, depending on the city. Break that down: Rs 100-200 of his daily Rs 400 income goes just to keeping a roof over his head. Breakfast is home-cooked, never ordered. A simple vegetarian breakfast costs about Rs 29. It won’t be protein-rich; it’ll be carb and fat-heavy because hunger, not nutrition, is the enemy. Zomato and Swiggy? They don’t exist in his world. Not because the app isn’t on his phone — it might have come pre-installed — but because a single food order averages Rs 135-150, almost half his daily earning. His entire day’s food budget is around Rs 85-90.

Commute is a battle. He lives far from work because cheap rents and job hubs never overlap. Local trains, metro, bus — Rs 10-15 a day. The minimum auto-rickshaw fare in India is around Rs 36 now. On a rainy evening, when he’s stuck in traffic or a breakdown, an auto is not an option. Uber, Ola? Unthinkable. He will walk, or push a bicycle bought with painstakingly saved money. By the time he reaches work, a significant chunk of his day’s income is already spent: rent (Rs 100-200), food (Rs 80-90), commute (Rs 15-20), along with tiny UPI dents, mobile recharge, the dreaded electricity bill that sometimes crosses Rs 400. Remember, he is not classified as poor. He is the Indian middle class.

The Comfort Seeker: Rs 30,000 a Month

To crack India’s top 10%, you need just Rs 30,300 a month (PLFS data). Our second person, earning Rs 30,000, is already in the elite 10%. His daily budget is Rs 1,000, three times that of the median earner. Life has loosened a little. He still commutes by metro or bus, at Rs 15-30 a day. But if it rains at 6 p.m., he might just splurge on a one-way auto for Rs 40. There’s breathing room. Yet, the edges are sharp. A survey by a financial advisory firm in 2023 found that 29% of Indians run out of money by the 15th of every month, and a staggering 75% have zero emergency funds. If next month’s salary doesn’t land, there is no fallback. Out of that Rs 30,000, maybe Rs 3,000-5,000 can be saved in a good month. But Diwali, a trip home, a movie outing, a Zomato order — and the savings evaporate. In this Rs 1,000-a-day life, there is space to breathe, but no space for a stumble.

A Pause for Financial Sense: The Monzi Interlude

Before we climb higher, a word about a tool that can make a difference, especially for anyone navigating these delicate income bands. Credit cards are a double-edged sword. For many young earners, the first Rs 30,000 salary feels enormous, and a shiny credit card seems like free money — until it turns into a debt trap. On the other hand, if used correctly, paying the full bill every month, a credit card can be a powerful financial ally. But with over 400 credit cards in India, which one is right for you?

This is exactly why we built monzi.co — not to make money, but to truly help. In 60 seconds, through a few simple questions, it selects the most suitable credit card for you from those 400, based on your habits and needs. No personal details asked, no tracking, no ads. You see the card; you decide. No one will chase you. The intention is transparent: to become your best companion for any financial decision — credit cards today, maybe mutual funds, insurance, or loans tomorrow. It’s a small step towards making informed choices in a country where financial literacy often arrives too late.

When Money Buys Time: Rs 80,000 a Month

Our third individual earns Rs 80,000 a month — roughly Rs 2,665 a day. He’s no longer in a shared room but a one-bedroom apartment, paying Rs 12,000-15,000 in rent, perhaps more if close to work. For the first time, money starts buying something precious: time. A cook arrives in the morning, prepares breakfast and dinner, and leaves — costing Rs 2,000-5,000 depending on the city and tasks. A cleaner handles the sweeping, mopping, dishes, and laundry for another Rs 3,000-5,000. This marks a profound shift: out of 1.4 billion Indians, only the top 1% wake up and watch their breakfast being made for them while sipping tea. The money that hired the cook bought back the hours spent chopping, stirring, cleaning. But is that reclaimed time used well? Not always. Often, it’s swallowed by reels and YouTube shorts. Still, the availability of time is a luxury bought only after a certain income threshold.

Commute is now a two-wheeler or an entry-level car, or at least occasional cabs, adding Rs 5,000-7,000 a month. The life seems sorted. Yet, underlying numbers are sobering. Among earners in this bracket, only 40% are debt-free; 60% carry some loan. And the emergency fund statistic remains brutal: 75% still have none. The margin for shock is thin, even when the salary sounds fat.

The Distance from India: Rs 3,00,000 a Month

At Rs 3 lakh a month, you’ve entered India’s top 1%. The income tax data shows that to be in the top 1%, you need an annual income of about Rs 30-32 lakh — so our fourth character, earning Rs 3 lakh a month, comfortably fits. His life is insulated. He lives in a posh neighborhood, a two-bedroom apartment with rent between Rs 70,000 and Rs 1,25,000. The household staff is full-blown: a cook, a cleaner, a nanny for the children, a driver. Their combined salaries could be Rs 40,000-60,000 a month. Children go to international or premium schools, with monthly fees starting at Rs 10,000-30,000. This is the first income level where, if expenses are managed wisely, substantial savings and investment discussions begin: where to invest, how much to SIP.

But there’s a strange phenomenon here: distance from India. Gated communities create a bubble — 24/7 electricity and water, security, clubhouse, children playing within walls, school a short drive away. One rarely encounters the chaos, the crowds, the struggle that forms the daily reality of the median Indian. You step out of your car only into insulated spaces. This separation is arguably what money buys at this stage — the ability to curate your environment so thoroughly that you forget how most of your country lives. The downside? A lifestyle so calibrated that it becomes hard to imagine scaling down. And when income stops — because for many freelancers or entrepreneurs it eventually will — the fall can be catastrophic. Up to 65% of high earners have not planned for that eventuality.

The 0.1% and the Power of Options: Rs 30,00,000 a Month

Our final protagonist earns Rs 30 lakh a month — Rs 3.6 crore a year. He is not just top 1%; he is in the 0.35% of Indians who declare over Rs 1 crore in income, and likely even the 0.1%. Here, the numbers blur into lifestyle statements: the house is likely owned, not rented, with an EMI alone of Rs 2-5 lakh a month, for a property worth several crores. A meal out can be Rs 5,000-10,000. At this altitude, the value of money changes. A Rs 300 purchase doesn’t even register; Rs 500 feels negligible; Rs 700 isn’t a decision; Rs 1,000 is the new spare change. There is a psychological inflation that resets the floor of noticeable spending.

Yet, the most profound thing this income buys is not a bigger house or a fancier car. It buys options. You want to live in a tower or in a villa? In this country or abroad? Do you want to work, and if so, with whom, how many hours, on what terms? Every aspect of life becomes a conscious choice rather than a compromise. That is the ultimate luxury — the sovereignty over one’s own time and energy. When you can walk away from anything because your financial base gives you that power, you have arrived at the pinnacle of what money can provide.

The Rs 2,000 Shock: A Thought Experiment

Imagine a sudden, unforeseen expense of Rs 2,000 — a broken phone screen, a dental emergency, a medical test. How does it hit each of these five lives?

• For the Rs 12,000 earner, Rs 2,000 equals five days’ wages. He cannot absorb it. He will make frantic calls — to family in the village, to a brother-in-law, to a sister. It becomes a begging exercise. If help doesn’t come, a local moneylender steps in, and a small problem balloons into a debt spiral.
• For the Rs 30,000 earner, it’s two days’ income. It goes onto a credit card — no distress calls, but the monthly SIP gets paused that month. The safety net is thin, but the immediate crisis is managed.
• For the Rs 80,000 earner, it’s less than a day’s earning. A UPI transfer and it’s done. The day moves on as if nothing happened.
• For the Rs 3,00,000 earner, it’s barely a rounding error. The amount might not even be mentally registered as an expense.
• For the Rs 30,00,000 earner, it’s invisible — not even a line in the sand.

This simple Rs 2,000 illustrates the granularity of financial vulnerability. It’s not just about how much you earn; it’s about how much shock you can absorb without derailing your life.

What Each Stage Buys You

When you climb from Rs 12,000 to Rs 30,000, money buys you basic comfort — the comfort of an auto when it rains, a safer neighborhood, a meal from a dabba instead of cooking. From Rs 30,000 to Rs 80,000, you purchase your own time back — no longer cooking, cleaning, or doing laundry yourself; others do it for you, freeing up hours that, even if squandered, are now yours. From Rs 80,000 to Rs 3,00,000, you buy distance from India — a curated life inside a gated world, where the messy, loud, struggling India is kept firmly at arm’s length. And from Rs 3,00,000 to Rs 30,00,000 and beyond, you acquire options — the near-total freedom to design your life on your own terms.

Conclusion: The Invisible Realities of Indian Incomes

- The true Indian middle class earns around Rs 10,000-12,000 a month, far below what most urbanites imagine. - Data from the Periodic Labour Force Survey and income tax returns reveal extreme concentration: the top 10% threshold is just Rs 30,300/month, and the top 1% starts at roughly Rs 2.5 lakh/month. - Across income brackets, emergency preparedness is abysmal — 75% of Indians have no emergency fund, and even among relatively high earners, debt is widespread. - A small financial shock of Rs 2,000 can push someone at the median into a debt trap, while it is entirely inconsequential for top earners — highlighting the fragility of lower-income lives. - As income rises, the nature of what money buys shifts: from sustaining life, to comfort, to time, to insulation, and finally to personal agency. - The biggest illusion is the label "middle class." Most people wearing it are far richer than the median Indian, and this cognitive gap blinds us to the vast inequality that shapes everyday existence in the country. - Financial tools, when used wisely (like selecting the right credit card through platforms like monzi.co), can help bridge some gaps, but systemic awareness and emergency planning are non-negotiable for true security.

References

- Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) 2022-23, Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation, Government of India. - Income Tax Department, Government of India: Statistics on income distribution and tax filers (2023). - Financial Wellness Survey, 2023 (various independent reports); data on monthly cash exhaustion and emergency fund prevalence. - Monzi.co: Credit card selection platform built for transparent, unbiased financial guidance. (Disclaimer: This is a sponsor-supported initiative, integrated here as a resource.)

The Parliament of Missing Answers

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The Parliament of Missing Answers

Fifteen days. Fifteen long, rain-drenched days in the monsoon session of Parliament, and one question hangs heavier than the Delhi sky – where is the Home Minister? The familiar scene outside and inside the House has frozen into a still frame: opposition MPs clutching placards, hoisting banners, demanding an answer. “Amit Shah, jawab do!” they chant. Cameras beam this ritual daily, but the man they seek remains invisible. Not a single frame captures him entering the Lok Sabha or Rajya Sabha. No off-record whisper explains why the man who once boasted of his 56-inch chest, who promised to walk into the lion’s den, now scuttles through the parliamentary corridors without ever taking his seat. The question is not just political – it is existential for our democracy: if the executive refuses to be questioned inside the temple of accountability, what remains of the temple?

A Monsoon without a Statement

The demand is simple. The opposition wants a statement from the Union Home Minister on the violence that unfolded in Delhi – where students, including young women, were lathi-charged, tear-gassed, and struck with pellet guns. It was not a border skirmish, not a foreign policy crisis; it happened on the streets of the national capital, under the watch of a police force that answers directly to the Ministry of Home Affairs. The nation saw bodies of young men and women bruised, their parents weeping. Yet, for fifteen days, the minister in charge refuses to walk a few steps into the House and address the elected representatives of the people. This is not a matter of scheduling; it is an arrogance that mocks the very idea of parliamentary oversight.

The Silence of the ‘Godi Media’

Where are the fearless anchors who hound the opposition over every whisper? Where are the YouTube patriot-chasers who camp at Jantar Mantar for every minor cause? Their microphones suddenly go mute when it’s time to ask the Home Minister why he is dodging Parliament. The same machines that amplified the Prime Minister’s promise to make Assam flood-free now cannot find the bandwidth to ask why Delhi’s streets ran red under police batons. Instead, the TV studios divert the question, turning it sideways – maybe they ask an Abhijit, an Ajit, a scribe who will pose a soft query so the audience feels that journalism is still breathing. But nobody asks the man who holds the baton, literally, under his ministry. The Godi media, once so eager to frame Rahul Gandhi’s every blink, now blinks itself when Amit Shah’s disappearance turns into a national spectacle. Is it fear? Or is it a silence that has been purchased?

What Does the Government Fear?

The ruling party’s logic, if it can be called that, is a puzzle wrapped in evasion. Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju argues that the House should function first, and then the minister will reply. But the House cannot function precisely because the opposition insists on a statement before any other business. It’s a deadlock crafted by design. Rijiju also claims the issue is “over,” that the country has moved on. Moved on? A nation that cannot forget a temple fund embezzlement is told to forget that its police smashed the bones of students? The BJP spokespersons and their digital army are spinning a fresh narrative: Amit Shah will arrive on August 6 with a bill to choke the funding of “anti-nationals.” Suddenly, the Home Minister’s calendar is leaked to friendly handles, creating a buildup of a heroic entry. But not a single anchor dares to ask why the same Home Minister could not spare fifteen minutes on any of the preceding fifteen days to utter a single sentence about the violence. He is not hiding in an undisclosed bunker; he is reportedly sitting in his Parliament chamber, attending office meetings, even meeting various Chief Ministers and religious leaders – his pictures with Bihar’s Shambhavi Chaudhary, Rajasthan’s CM, Goa’s CM, and a Christian spiritual guru on August 6 are proof that his legs work perfectly well. The walk to the Lok Sabha chamber, it seems, is the only journey his courage cannot complete.

A Double Game of Cowardice

Only two conclusions can be drawn from this prolonged vanishing act. One: the government deliberately disrespects Parliament, treating it as an irrelevant debating club that must not interfere with the executive writ. Two: the ruling party is terrified of facing the opposition inside the House. For a regime that once thundered about decisiveness and fearlessness, this cowering is a spectacular reversal. The very man who promised to rewrite the geography of Kashmir and end floods in Assam now hides behind procedural tricks to avoid a question on a police lathi. The irony is brutal. And the opposition, stunned perhaps by the sheer audacity of the denial, keeps holding up posters – “Amit Shah Missing” – and I can imagine the Home Minister chuckling at those placards from some safe distance. But the laughter can’t mask the constitutional vacuum his absence creates.

The Cooperative Disaster: A Minister’s Report Card

While the government’s defenders dodge the Delhi question, let’s examine another portfolio that Amit Shah holds – the Ministry of Cooperation. This was the grand experiment of Atmanirbhar Bharat, a ministry created to empower cooperative societies, particularly in the Prime Minister’s home state of Gujarat. The data, placed in Rajya Sabha by the central government itself, tells a story of spectacular failure. Out of over 18,000 cooperative societies in Gujarat, between 10% and 15% are completely non-functional, and more than 1,300 are on the verge of bankruptcy. The state that is showcased as a laboratory of governance is drowning in cooperative losses. And the Cooperation Minister, who promised to make Assam flood-free (Assam still floods), who failed to bring peace to Manipur as Home Minister, now presides over a financial ruin that unfolds silently. If a minister cannot manage a department of friendly cooperatives, what confidence can the country have in his ability to manage the security of 1.4 billion people?

Gujarat Cooperative Societies: A Portrait of Collapse

Indicator	Data (as per Govt. reply in Rajya Sabha)
Total Cooperative Societies in Gujarat	Over 18,000
Societies in Loss	A significant portion, with many incurring continuous losses
Non-functional Societies	Approximately 10% to 15%
Societies Facing Bankruptcy	Over 1,300

These are not the numbers of a minister who can lecture others on efficiency. Yet, the same government that dodges accountability on police brutality expects the opposition to stay silent on a record of administrative negligence. The demand for a statement is not a “drama,” as Rijiju calls it; the drama is the Government’s stalling of Parliament to protect a minister from answering for his failures.

A Broken Promise: Jammu and Kashmir’s Statehood

The protests outside Parliament are now also laced with another unkept vow – the restoration of Jammu and Kashmir’s statehood. The Supreme Court’s constitutional bench in December 2023 directed the Centre to restore statehood at the earliest and hold assembly elections by September 2024. Elections were conducted, but statehood remains a phantom. Two years after the court’s historic order, and over six years since the abrogation of Article 370, the Modi government has failed to produce a timeline. In December 2025, when petitioners approached the apex court again, the government pleaded that “ground realities” and “cross-border situation” cannot be overlooked – the same old excuse wrapped in new paper. The Prime Minister himself had given a “sovereign guarantee” that statehood would be restored, and Amit Shah had repeated that pledge in Parliament. Today, with opposition MPs including Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah holding banners that remind the Home Minister of his own words, the promise lies buried under a silence as deep as the one over Delhi violence. The government’s tactic is transparent: stall, deflect, create a spectacle of legislative activity on bills that neutralise dissent, while the core questions of democratic accountability are left to rot.

A Session Held Hostage

The monsoon session is bleeding away. Day after day, the Rajya Sabha and Lok Sabha are adjourned after verbal clashes between the Leader of Opposition Mallikarjun Kharge and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju. Kharge has made it excruciatingly clear: the opposition wants only two things – an apology from the Prime Minister for the breakdown of parliamentary discourse and a statement from the Home Minister on the Delhi student violence. The request is so minimal that it shames the government’s refusal. The government, meanwhile, hides behind the bizarre argument that the opposition cannot dictate which minister should come and when. True, but the Home Minister is not a random junior functionary; he is the custodian of internal security. When the police under his command are accused of brutality, his presence in Parliament is not an opposition’s whim – it is a constitutional necessity. But the government has chosen to strangle the session rather than let a single day of debate expose the rot.

A Calculated Absence

The media’s role in normalising this paralysis is chilling. Not a single prime-time debate has stripped the layers of this evasion. Instead, the managed narrative keeps the country distracted – a new bill, a new threat, a new enemy. The Home Minister, who once strode the corridors with an air of invincibility, now reveals a political fragility that his earlier bluster concealed. He has shown that when a storm of questions rises, he can step backwards and vanish. But the real damage is not to his image; it is to the institution of Parliament. If a minister can refuse to answer for fifteen days and remain unscathed, then the sovereign body that fought for its right to question the executive has been reduced to a stage prop. The opposition is left wondering: is the government so weak that a single statement would shatter its narrative? Or is the opposition so strong that it cannot be faced? Both possibilities are ominous for a democracy that still pretends to function under the rule of law.

Criticisms

• No statement is provided by the Home Minister on the police violence against students in Delhi, despite daily demands for over fifteen days.
• Parliament is deliberately prevented from functioning by the government’s refusal to allow a discussion on the conduct of the Delhi Police.
• Accountability for the baton charges, pellet gun use, and tear gas on unarmed students is completely evaded by the Ministry of Home Affairs.
• The media’s failure to persistently question the Home Minister’s absence is allowed to become a shield for executive arrogance.
• Questions about the financial collapse of thousands of cooperative societies in Gujarat, under Amit Shah’s ministerial charge, are not raised by the so-called nationalist press.
• The restoration of Jammu and Kashmir’s statehood is delayed indefinitely, disregarding a Supreme Court directive and a solemn promise made by the Prime Minister and the Home Minister.
• The government’s tactic of using bills to divert attention from unanswered questions of democratic accountability is not challenged by the parliamentary majority.
• The opposition’s legitimate demand for a ministerial reply is dismissed as a “drama” by the ruling party, while the real drama of ministerial vanishing is ignored.
• The moral authority of the Home Minister’s office is eroded by a prolonged absence from the House, yet no censure is initiated by the Speaker or the Chairman.
• The narrative that the issue is “over” is promoted by the government, while the victims of police excess still await justice and a single word of acknowledgment.
• The courage to face elected representatives is exhibited so little that the entire parliamentary session is sacrificed to protect one individual from scrutiny.

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Will UPI Payments Remain Free? Or Is the Noose Tightening Around Digital Payments?

So, the question on every chai stall and every kirana counter: till when will UPI remain free? The government that once thumped its chest about a zero‑cost digital payment revolution is now quietly rewriting the law. The promise — backed by legislation — that UPI would always be free is about to be hollowed out. An amendment has already been slipped into a bill, giving the Centre the power to decide, by a simple executive order, which digital payments will attract a charge and which won’t. No parliamentary debate needed. No questions asked. Just a stroke of a pen, and the “free” era of UPI could be over.

The whispers have begun. For a person‑to‑person transfer, it may stay free. But if you pay a trader — say, a merchant whose turnover crosses Rs 1.5 crore — and the transaction exceeds Rs 2,000, a fee could be slapped on. The weapon has a name: MDR, or Merchant Discount Rate. And behind this move, there is not one story but a tangled web of stories. Let’s pull at the threads.

The American Angle: When “Level Playing Field” Means Killing the Competition

First, look west. The free‑flow success of UPI has bruised two American giants — Visa and Mastercard. Both earn their billions from transaction fees. In a market where a merchant can simply flash a QR code and accept money without a cut, the card duopoly struggles. Reports have been piling up since 2020 about UPI eating into their business. By August 2026, the pain was visible: Visa laid off 1,400 employees in India, slashing 40% of its Bengaluru workforce. The official reason — “restructuring and AI” — is a convenient cover. But well before the AI scare, UPI had already dimmed the card business’s sheen.

Then, in March 2026, the Office of the United States Trade Representative dropped its report. It accused India’s digital payment policies of favouring domestic players and creating barriers for foreign companies. Translation: Visa and Mastercard are not happy that UPI and RuPay are free. They want the same “level playing field” where everybody charges a fee. So they leaned on the Trump administration. And the impact? An influential newspaper noted that the pressure is on — and suddenly, the talk of levying charges on UPI is not a coincidence.

This is not the first time. Brazil faced a similar attack. Its wildly successful instant payment system, Pix, launched in November 2020, became a global benchmark. Low‑cost, fast, and largely free for users, Pix gobbled up market share from the same American card networks. The U.S. trade representatives criticised Pix then, too. And now India is in the crosshairs.

Congress leader Jairam Ramesh has pointed straight at Washington. He says the doors are being opened under American pressure so that once‑free Indian digital payments can be handed over to foreign companies. The government denies it. No one will name Visa or Mastercard; everyone will insist they don't take decisions under duress. But the timeline is telling.

The Subsidy Shell Game: How a Burden Is Manufactured

The official narrative now running in media circles is that banks bleed billions maintaining the UPI infrastructure. Every year, we are told, banks spend Rs 20,000 crore on payment gateways and maintenance. The government, they add, subsidises this — Rs 3,600 crore a few years ago, now scaled down to Rs 2,000 crore. The NPCI’s own costs are a modest Rs 750 crore. And yet, the proposal being floated is to earn Rs 17,000 crore through an MDR of just 0.25%. Why such a fat margin?

Hold that thought and look at the other side of the ledger. UPI has saved banks a fortune. ATM visits have plummeted. Between 2023 and 2025, cash withdrawals through debit cards fell by lakhs of crores of rupees. Branches are no longer choked with cash management. Printing and transporting currency costs less. So where is the net loss? And that’s not even the only silent gain. Banks have earned over Rs 25,000 crore from “minimum balance” penalties alone in recent years — a quiet extraction from the poor that never made it to the prime‑time debate.

Now add the mightiest cushion of all. The Reserve Bank of India transferred a surplus of Rs 2,86,000 crore to the government in 2025‑26. Even if we take the upper‑end estimate of UPI’s annual cost — say Rs 24,000 crore — it is still less than 9% of that RBI bonanza. As analyst T.C.A. Sharad Raghavan of The Hindu calculated, the cost of running UPI is just 3% to 8.5% of what the RBI hands over to the government. The question then becomes piercing: when the central bank sits on a mountain of cash, why should a neighbourhood merchant pay for the digital rails that the state proudly owns?

Item	Amount (Rs in Crores)
RBI surplus transferred in 2025-26	2,86,000
Government subsidy for UPI (current year)	2,000
NPCI’s annual cost	750
Banks’ claimed infra expense	20,000
Potential MDR revenue at 0.25%	17,000

The numbers don’t lie. The government’s own subsidy has shrunk while the appetite for fee‑based revenue is growing. Somebody is making room for a new stream of earnings, and that somebody is not the ordinary citizen.

MDR: The Tax That Dare Not Speak Its Name

The fine print of MDR is seductive. The fee, we are told, will be “only on merchants” — not on end users. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, in her carefully parsed statement, said that even if MDR is imposed, it will be borne by traders, not consumers. But the Reserve Bank governor, Sanjay Malhotra, was more candid. He admitted that in some form or another, “the customer may also have to pay.” He added that it may not be directly visible, but the burden will be felt somewhere in the economy. This is circular talk for a simple truth: if the shopkeeper is charged, she will either raise prices or refuse UPI. The small customer will pay — either in cash or through inflated bills.

Cast your mind back to ATMs. Once upon a time, withdrawing cash was free, no matter how often you did it. Then came the cap: beyond a few transactions, a fee. Then “minimum balance” penalties. Both started small and then swelled. The banking system has a habit of turning savings into charges, and the government watches with folded arms. When it suits them, they call it a “small fee” that nobody will notice. But from a billion transactions a month, even a micro‑charge becomes a roaring river of revenue.

What stings more is the betrayal of small traders. In the 2024‑25 budget, the Modi government set aside Rs 1,500 crore to incentivise small merchants — offering them a cashback of 0.15% on transactions up to Rs 2,000. The then IT minister proclaimed that this was to support small businesses and promote digital payments. Barely a year later, the same set of merchants is being told they may have to pay for those very transactions. The whiplash is not just policy inconsistency; it is a breach of trust.

The Banker‑Fintech Bonanza: Who Really Stands to Gain?

Follow the money. Media reports, citing unnamed sources, are already gleeful about the windfall. If a 0.25% MDR is imposed on transactions above Rs 2,000, the total take could be Rs 17,000 crore every year. HDFC Bank, Bank of Baroda, and Punjab National Bank alone could pocket Rs 700–800 crore each. Payment apps like PhonePe and Google Pay are projected to earn Rs 500 crore to 700 crore. Is the government bleeding for banks, or are banks being fattened for something else?

What is never adequately explained is why 0.25% is the chosen rate when the real compensation required is only a fraction of that. The NPCI’s cost is Rs 750 crore. The subsidy top‑up is Rs 2,000 crore. Even with a generous mark‑up, a much lower rate would suffice. The scent of a larger deal hangs in the air. Could it be that the system is being primed to make certain entities lucrative before a sale — to a waiting big player? Or is the groundwork being laid so that a new entrant, perhaps one with American backing, finds a pre‑warmed market with guaranteed margins? The questions are uncomfortable, and the silence around them is deafening.

The Security Farce: Innovation, You Say?

While the government and banks sing hosannas about innovation and infrastructure, let’s talk about what they have actually built. In the last six years, India has witnessed bank frauds totalling Rs 52,976 crore. Cyber fraud is not an anomaly; it is an epidemic. People’s lifelong savings are wiped out in a single phone call. They are then made to run from pillar to post, dialling useless helpline numbers, often with no recovery. The state and the banks have spectacularly failed to secure digital payments. Where is the “innovation” that a tiny MDR will supposedly fund? The banks have not been able to stop crooks from emptying accounts. The very same banks that want a slice of every UPI transaction cannot guarantee the safety of the money already entrusted to them.

Once, a bank robbery would shake the establishment. Now, thousands of cyber‑heists happen daily. The dacoits don’t need to visit a branch; they sit at home and trick people. And nobody is held accountable. If the government wants a fee, let it first demonstrate that it can protect every rupee in the digital pipeline. Asking traders to pay for a system that leaks like a sieve is an insult to the public.

The Freebie Hypocrisy: “Free Is Expensive” Only When It Suits Them

The government’s chief economic advisor, V. Anantha Nageswaran, recently declared that “free” is the most expensive word in public policy. Listening to him, you would imagine a deeply principled economist. Yet, when elections approach, the very same dispensation distributes thousands of crores in cash promises, freebies, and doles — without a whisper about hidden costs. The free cylinder, the free ration, the loan waivers: none of that is “expensive”? But when it comes to a public digital infrastructure used by hundreds of millions, suddenly free is a dirty word.

UPI was sold as digital India’s gift to the common man, a shining example of a homegrown system that beat the world. The political mileage was enormous. Now that the applause has faded and fiscal pressures are mounting (or priorities are shifting), the same gift is being repackaged as a burden. The citizen is being told, “You never thought something free could last, did you?” The question back is: why didn’t you say so from the beginning?

The Coming Burden and the Quiet Erosion of Trust

What is unfolding is not merely an accounting adjustment. The government has taken upon itself the absolute authority to decide when and how much to charge — no parliamentary approval required. A taxation‑and‑other‑laws amendment bill was passed in silence, with barely a minute of discussion. That is the subtlety of the trap. One order, and a “small fee” becomes permanent. Tomorrow, the threshold may drop from Rs 2,000 to Rs 500. The day after, person‑to‑person transfers may be included.

Small traders — already crushed by GST compliance, already grappling with e‑commerce giants — will be the first to fold. They will either absorb the cost and slip deeper into losses, or they will push back and tell customers to pay by cash. And just like that, the hard‑won shift to digital will begin to reverse, not because people don’t like it, but because the system made it uneconomical for those who implemented it at the last mile.

The government owes the public a clear answer. Is the MDR meant to make up for a subsidy it can no longer afford, or is it the price of pleasing a foreign power? Is the small merchant being sacrificed on the altar of bank balance sheets? And if the RBI can cushion the blow many times over, why is a single rupee being extracted from the neighbourhood shopkeeper? If the answers are not forthcoming, the people are entitled to smell a grand design — a design where public infrastructure is slowly monetised, and the citizen is first hooked, then billed.

This is not just about a fee. It is about the steady, quiet unmaking of a promise. The digital grapevine is whispering that free UPI’s days are numbered. And when the number is up, remember it wasn’t technology that failed. It was trust that was sold.

Criticisms

• A legislatively guaranteed free UPI service is being dismantled by the government.
• The power to impose charges on digital payments is seized by the executive without meaningful parliamentary debate.
• Small and medium traders are being burdened with a new levy after they were incentivised to adopt digital payments.
• The narrative of unbearable bank losses is promoted while hidden gains from falling ATM usage and minimum‑balance penalties are obscured.
• The RBI’s massive surplus is overlooked as a viable source of funding for public digital infrastructure.
• The potential windfall for large banks and fintech giants is prioritised over the interests of common citizens.
• The state’s abject failure to curb cyber frauds and bank scams is conveniently ignored while a security‑innovation tax is proposed.
• The language of “level playing field” is used to open doors for American card networks at the cost of an indigenous, pro‑people system.
• Broken promises are normalised by arguing that no free service can last, despite the government’s own history of distributing pre‑election freebies.

Linear Regression Comes to Your Financial Rescue || 3 Amazing Linear Regression Financial Use Cases

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AMAZING LINEAR REGRESSION FINANCIAL USE CASES

• Monthly expenses growth
• Estimated home loan closure date
• Estimated portfolio growth in "Current Value (in INR)" per day.

I was getting great ideas on how to name it and one such name was: Linear Regression Comes to Your Financial Rescue :D

You can find the code and data (original and unmasked) in my GitHub Repo. 

But here let's take a look at the findings:

I: Monthly expenses growth

Visual...

Note the spikes in the chart around 2022-23: these were times I made lumpsum payments towards real estate and renovation.

Excel Formula to Crunch The Numbers...

"Ignoring unusually large expenses (₹300,000 or more), how quickly are my monthly expenses increasing or decreasing over time?"

**Filter out rows with expenses exceeding 3L
Robust trend (with filter and without logs):
=ROUND(SLOPE(FILTER(C2:C200,C2:C200<300000),FILTER(B2:B200,C2:C200<300000)),3)

And this number stands out at: 1111.386
Meaning my monthly expenses are increasing at a rate of ₹1,111.39 per month (on average) over the last 5+ years.

II: Estimated Home Loan Closure Date

Loan Repayment Trend Line as of March 23, 2026

Loan Repayment Trend Line as of August 6, 2026

Date	Slope (balance change per day)	Intercept	Estimated Loan Completion Date
2026-MAR-23	-715.21	4881572.37	2041-03-27
2026-AUG-06	-713.91	4880959.87	2041-04-07

III: Investment Growth

Drops in Current Value
(1): Note the drop around mid of 2025: That was when I repaid my car loan.
(2): And the drop around mid of 2026: That was when I repaid my personal loan.

And the good news is...
My portfolio is growing at a rate of ₹936 per day (on average) over the last 2-or-so years. 
** As per the old and wise Owl named 'Linear Regression' **

And let me admit: rather having much to do with mathematical modeling, all three of these use cases have got an awful lot to do with financial discipline with money and patience to watch the numbers move tiny bit after weeks, months and years of data accumulation.

Tags: Machine Learning,Investment,Regression,
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Calcium Dosage

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CALCIUM DOSAGE GUIDE

1. OTC VARIANT AVAILABLE
- Calcium is widely available as an Over-The-Counter (OTC) supplement.
- Common OTC forms: Calcium Carbonate, Calcium Citrate, Calcium Lactate, and Calcium Gluconate.
- Many brands combine Calcium with Vitamin D3 (e.g., Cipcal 500, Shelcal, Calcimax) to improve absorption.
- Available as tablets, capsules, chewable tablets, syrups, and effervescent powders.
- No prescription is needed, but medical advice is recommended before regular use.

2. DISEASE / HEALTH PROBLEMS FROM TAKING IN EXCESS (Hypercalcemia)
- Kidney stones: excess calcium can crystallise in the kidneys.
- Constipation and bloating.
- Nausea, vomiting, and loss of appetite.
- Hypercalcemia (too much calcium in the blood) can cause confusion, weakness, and irregular heartbeat.
- Interference with absorption of iron, zinc, and magnesium.
- Milk-alkali syndrome in severe cases (from high calcium + antacids).
- Do NOT exceed the dose recommended by a healthcare professional.

3. DISEASE / HEALTH PROBLEMS FROM DEFICIENCY (Hypocalcemia)
- Weak and brittle bones (Osteoporosis) especially in women after menopause.
- Rickets in children (soft, weak bones).
- Osteomalacia in adults (softening of bones).
- Increased risk of bone fractures.
- Muscle cramps, spasms, and twitching.
- Numbness or tingling in fingers and toes.
- Tooth decay and weak teeth.
- In severe cases: abnormal heart rhythm and seizures.

4. HOW TO TAKE IT WITH FOOD?
- Always take calcium WITH food to enhance absorption.
- Calcium Carbonate: best absorbed when taken WITH or AFTER a meal (needs stomach acid).
- Calcium Citrate: can be taken with or without food (works even on an empty stomach).
- Best timing: after breakfast or lunch.
- Swallow the tablet whole with a full glass of water.
- Avoid taking it with high-fibre meals, spinach, or tea/coffee as they reduce absorption.

5. INTERACTION WITH OTHER SUPPLEMENTS (IRON, VITAMIN B, etc.)

- IRON: Calcium reduces iron absorption. Separate them by 2 to 4 hours.
- MULTIVITAMINS containing iron: take at a different time than calcium.
- VITAMIN B: Generally safe; no significant negative interaction.
- ZINC & MAGNESIUM: High calcium can reduce their absorption; take separately if high doses.

- VITAMIN D3: Improves calcium absorption; they work well together.

- VITAMIN B1 (Thiamine): No negative interaction; safe to take together.
- VITAMIN B2 (Riboflavin): No negative interaction; safe to take together.
- VITAMIN B3 (Niacin): No significant interaction; safe to take together.
- VITAMIN B5 (Pantothenic Acid): No negative interaction; safe to take together.
- VITAMIN B6 (Pyridoxine): No significant interaction; safe to take together.
- VITAMIN B7 (Biotin): No negative interaction; safe to take together.
- VITAMIN B9 (Folic Acid/Folate): No negative interaction; may be taken together.
- VITAMIN B12 (Cobalamin): No negative interaction; calcium may even help B12 absorption.
- NOTE: Unlike iron, calcium does NOT block the B-vitamins, so they can be taken together or in the same multivitamin.

- MEDICATIONS: Maintain a gap of several hours between calcium and antibiotics (e.g., tetracyclines, quinolones) or thyroid medicines.
- Do not take calcium with iron-rich meals at the same time.

6. NATURAL SOURCES OF CALCIUM
- Dairy products: Milk, curd/yogurt, cheese, paneer.
- Leafy green vegetables: Spinach, kale, broccoli, fenugreek (methi).
- Nuts and seeds: Almonds, sesame seeds (til), chia seeds.
- Legumes and beans: Rajma, chana (chickpeas), soybeans, tofu.
- Fish with soft bones: Sardines, salmon.
- Fortified foods: Fortified cereals, orange juice, plant milks (soy/almond).
- Ragi (finger millet) is a rich traditional Indian source of calcium.

7. PER DAY DOSAGE FOR DIFFERENT AGE GROUPS AND GENDERS (RDA)
- Children 1-3 years: 700 mg/day
- Children 4-8 years: 1,000 mg/day
- Children 9-18 years: 1,300 mg/day
- Adults 19-50 years: 1,000 mg/day (both men and women)
- Men 51-70 years: 1,000 mg/day
- Women 51-70 years: 1,200 mg/day
- Adults above 70 years: 1,200 mg/day (both men and women)
- Pregnant / Breastfeeding women: 1,000-1,300 mg/day
- NOTE: This is the Recommended Dietary Allowance (RDA) largely obtained through diet. The doctor should determine the exact supplement dose based on age, diet, and health condition (e.g., osteoporosis).

8. HYDRATION AND ABSORPTION TIPS
- Always drink a FULL glass of water when taking calcium tablets.
- Staying well-hydrated helps prevent kidney stone formation.
- Spread the daily dose: if taking 1,000 mg+, split into two smaller doses (e.g., 500 mg twice a day) for better absorption.
- Vitamin D3 and adequate sunlight improve calcium absorption.
- Avoid taking calcium with excess caffeine, tea, or alcohol.
- A little exercise/weight-bearing activity improves calcium uptake into bones.
- Do not take calcium at the same time as high-dose iron, zinc, or magnesium supplements.

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