REPLY TO RTI

You have to read this in conjuction with Padma to Saif Ali Khan of an earlier vintage in this blog.

Well, the Home Ministry did finally respond to the RTI application that I had made. And did so in the stipulated period of 30 days. But prevaricated, in-fact the reply was an oblique denial of all that had been so directly asked. It said, most incredulously, it was not aware of any pending duty evasion case or any case with regard to black buck killing. What a blatant lie. I pause and perpend to think, who is responsible for this shamelessness and audacity in a democratically elected government.

In a democratic set up, it is wrong to blame the government. Democratic countries have polities that reflect the attitude and aspirations of the people. The governments are tenured and elected by the people. There is a system of universal adult franchise and adult sufferage. So if anyone has to shoulder the responsibility, it is us - the common man.

But this system works very well in countries where the disparities are not as much as they are in India. With such social contradictions in a land, nay, a sub-continent, that is home to the worlds richest and also the poorest and that too in equal right, home to the most literate and most illiterate also, it is indeed arduous to spell out the common aspiration of the such a diverse peoples. The politicians and bureaucrats make the most of this dilution of common aspiration.

The government knows, such trifling events hardly have any bearing on its life and even credibility. It will go back to the people, and win again. It just has to ensure proper seat allocation and appeal to caste and other parochial prejudices. The job is done. Mountbatten and Churchill, both most presumptuously believed that left to its own India would Balkanize.

When voices of people like Arun Shourie faded away in din of an uncouth, goon and history sheeter manifested parliament, then who would care for a person like me. The RTI was received by the Government and with procedure disposed off. The bureaucrat is so bogged down by being the man Frdiay to the politician, that his heart has stopped bleeding for the common man. The common man that he himself was just before joining the service. The common man that his kin still are, whom he obliges everyday with some bureucratic favor or the other. His predisposition to the common man is just like it should be for a legatee of the oficer of the Raj.

My grandfather who, before becoming a part of the bureaucracy was a freedom fighter. He used to tell me, that independence was the aspiration of each and every man and woman of the country. Everyone wanted to make his or her wee bit of contribution to the struggle for independance of the country. One of the anecdotes that he told me was an operation, for which his group of revolutionary students needed some funds. They approached the railway station. The station master( the highest that an Indian could rise to) exhorted them to tie him up, before they pull out the key of the safe from his pocket and scoot with booty, which would invariably never be more than 50/- but of course enough to buy a mauser.

Independance having being achieved, if taking India to the same level that Bharat was once, would be the next mission or passion of all people, then an RTI like the one that I made would be a golden opportunity for an otherwise bogged by the system bureaucrat to expose the truth. To veritably bring the facts to the fore and be an agent of change, be a tool for getting a wrong undone.

But regretfully, this is a nexus. Today the spineless officer is actually reading and interpreting the fine print of the rule book to the convenience and advantage of the neta. He has aligned his interest with him. He guides the neta on how VIP security can be obtained, how business class foreign travel with family be still managed when ostenibly there is an austerity drive on.

Such a bureuacrat will actually run to the Neta to tell him, how adeptly he had responded to an RTI that raised a fundamental issue like debasing the solemnity of a national award, was rubished by him. He is the complete anti-thesis of my "station-master". He has actually made common cause with the exploiter. There are some who dont make common cause, but turn a Nelson's eye or a too timid to turn the tide.

But I shall not give up yet. I don’t have the grit of an activist, but I shall certainly not stop here. I have some energy still left.

The IPL Awards - A whimper

Well, it was the IPL Award Ceremony at the Grand Hyatt Mumbai. All teams were lodged there, members donning blue IPL T Shirts or the usual Black Suits. Of course, one or two old fashioned members were in Tuxedos as well.

Willy – nilly, I have to admit, players ought to be judged by their play and not their demeanor in arenas which are not of the sport they practice. I say this because off those arenas, most of them are awkward, their expression lacks refinement, they strut around with a swagger that reeks of arrogance from shallow understanding of life and of course, there is often a conspicuous lack of humility; the money that they earn and multiply, oozes out from all quarters, the girls - most of who are mesmerized by the flashy lifestyle, the glitz and glamour of these players and places that they go, and some who just find the sweat and testosterone just too irresistible - keep throwing themselves on these players and keep the attention of audiences and onlookers alike riveted by their juvenile and jaunty behavior. Also, most of these consorts are from middle class background. Their socialite bravado and sometimes saucy looks launch them in these circles. Their tryst with glamour and glitz is post adolescence. Following the trend, they all have to adhere to western couture. The awkwardness and discomfort of carriage is evident. But they must wear gowns. All of them without exception. Thats ordained by the high priests of couture.

I was also surprised to see the now much controversial Lalit Modi apparently acting pretty much in control of the situation even on the eve of his dismissal, beckoning and back slapping players as though the findings that flambéed the fortnight that was, were nothing beyond the the supposedly dead - pan revelations of an arm chair media, not meriting anything more than a cynical sneer from a typically American fall guy, and to be buried out of the peoples memory after a quotidian enquiry.

Well, in this melee the man who stood out, showed grace and also a twinkle of intelligence in his eyes was the diminutive Sunil Gavaskar. In the midst of the big bodied players, our little master though dwarfed, stood out. He had both appeal and aplomb which seem to be growing with the years that he is adding to his age.
One phenomenon which intrigues me no end is the fad of being flanked by burly black bedecked men, who apparently are paid to protect the VIP - the people they lunge around. Why should able bodied players carry protection. I think more than need, it is a matter of trend and fashion. It is a statement of having arrived in life. These guards are mostly a nuisance for people at large, and ironically enough, land up roughing up the very people who build this semblance of stardom about their protectee.

Padma Shree to Saif Ali Khan

I am quite disillusioned and even piqued by the type of people picked by the government for awards. There have been controversies galore about the nominations of the Padma award for decades now. Dr Rajendra Prasad wanted to reward the nurse who looked after him through his illness by the Padma award and mind you she was.

Saif Ali Khan, indicted in multiple cases, like the black buck killing and also the duty evasion case, was also awarded.

Notwithstanding the fact that I have nothing personal against this Khan, I made an RTI application on the procedure followed for short listing for the Padma Award. Of course my angst is more against the government which is making a mockery of these awards than against the Khan, who probably does not even know what he has got.

My making such an application should not give the reader an impression that he was the only person who did not merit the accolade. There are many more. Then why did I choose to writ against the Khan. Well I do not have any sound reason for this, other than he is one undeserving person who I was familiar with and I was precious sure and aware of his indictment in some cases.

But of course, this is true, that these actors are rewarded enough in terms of money and fame that another award from the government would do them hardly any good. Clearly they don’t seek the type of recognition that such awards are associated with. The government needs to clarify to the people what these awards stand for. A committee of peripatetic bureaucrats is hardly the right constitution for recognizing musical, academic, theatrical or any other fine arts talent. Chronically, bidding time in one ministry for a more lucrative tenure in another, perhaps makes them most inappropriate for making such selection. Being themselves, a product of a system that is bereft of any mechanism of recognizing much less nurturing talent, how does one expect them to do this for others.

I do recall, once, while I stood in a queue for check in at the Jet Airways counter, I saw a diminutive man sneak into the queue and ask the counter agent, if the flight could be delayed as Mr Saif Ali Khan accompanied by Ms Kapoor were trapped in traffic. Well to the dismay of this handy man of the Khan, I had overheard him. While Jet Airways seemed inclined to make this small gesture to a big celebrity, I threatened to de-plane if the flight was unduly delayed for any such reason. Since my de-planing and consequent de-manifesting and bag offloading would have delayed the flight much more than the courtesy waiting for the star, good sense prevailed on the airline which confirmed to me that no such special treatment would be extended.

For those who saw the last Filmfare award ceremony, would occasion with me to agree, that the onstage buffoonery of the duo - SRK and SAK – was pitiable. The “chote nawab” joke was really in cheap taste. It bemuses me completely, to imagine how a man who operates at a low mental level that he does, and is involved in criminal cases that he is, be found deserving of such national honours.

Why Micromanage?

Why Micromanage

To micromanage is a syndrome that is becoming more and more prevalent in the corporate world. Well it is established and widely acknowledged that micro – managing has its perils and limitations. I wonder why bosses tend to micro manage.

It is important and prudent to delegate. Just that you have to diligently choose the right person for the right job, which could be onerous at times and of course very critical. Having done that, it is important to delegate, trust the judgment of the operational manager and give them space to exercise discretion and operate.

Today, because of the various conveniently available tools of communication, un-imaginative mangers are encouraged to relinquish their own briefs and minutely chase the progress of their direct reports or those even a step lower. They are completely deprived of new ideas and thus find chasing their manger a task more simply accomplished than creating value at a higher plane or making an action plan for a change of orbit.

I think, one of the most successful empires of the world was the Roman Empire. It was clearly upon the King to look for talent who could govern in his name, following the basic tenets or principles set by the King himself, but nothing beyond. How that value system that the King espoused was to be translated into governance was left to the good judgment of the Governor.

Having chosen the right, dependable and loyal candidate, all that the King would do is to watch his caravan disappear into the dust kicked up by the horse chariots round the corner of the hill.

Selukas Nikator was left behind by the Greek general Alakshendra or Alexander.
Ayodhya was left to Bharat, who governed in the name of Ram ensuring that the values that his elder brother stood for were upheld and the people were safe and happy. Chandragupta ruled upto Taskent of course not by micro-managing.

But e mails, faxes, telephones and above all, video conferences, have your bosses continuously breathing down your necks and always making suggestions which are more like directions.

No micromanagement is also one of the reasons, why companies hived off the parent invariably do better than they were doing as a part of the group, because they become owners of their own destiny. Lucent technologies being hived off from AT&T is a stellar example.

THE CLASSICAL DILEMMA OF DHARMA

The Classical Dilemma of Dharma

The word Dharma has always intrigued me. I call my dilemma classical, as I know I am not the only one battling to understand what it means. Not so much because of its esoteric import for the Anglo Saxon world, or the complexity of its etymology, but more because of the complete lack of a parallel in the English language.

Morality, duty, piety, truth, religion, legality, righteousness, conduct all seem to individually and severally signify in some measure the import of the word Dharma. But only in some measure, as the significance of the word is far beyond all the above can collectively connote.

Derived from the Sanskrit Dhātu Dhŗ which means to sustain, the word Dharma defies precise definition. The manifest meaning is too broad to even a very scholarly westerner to discern, decipher and define.

As a child, sitting on my maternal grandfather’s lap, I used to hear him deliver discourses on Dharma and basically in context of the most unsung hero of epic India – Bharat, the younger brother of Rama, the King of Ayodhya. “Ye dhryati, iti Dharmah” – “That which sustains is Dharma”. This to his mind was the actually the most precise definition of the word Dharma and to me the most intriguing also. How does the common mind translate this to daily life. No way!

What sustains? Of course the cosmic order.

How does that sustain? Of course because it must.

Why does it sustain? Because of the cycle of eternal perpetuity.

And of course, I needn’t say more on why I find this the most intriguing question.

Well the demagogue ( I am a Hindu, and if I can call Hinduism a religion, there is no well defined concept of blasphemy in my religion, so I can, unlike followers of any other faiths take the liberty of calling the famous charioteer a demagogue ), who preached Dharma / Karma and then in a teacher like exasperation Bhakti to Arjuna, much as the latter, in his bout of emotionalism, failed to imbibe the subtleties of either Dharma or Karma, thus being advised by his charioteer to abandon cerebration and adopt the path of Bhakti, as Bhakti needs no reason, it is unconditional surrender to the master; was perhaps the only one who understood the esoteric import of Dharma and its ever changing and so very situation and actor specific definition.

In the Mahabharata, Dhrtrashtra was forever, fondling with the idea of Dharma, and distorting its definitions to sponsor the designs of his son - a reflection of his own aspirations - leaves the naïve reader completed confused about the concept of Dharma with his convoluted argumentations to suit his son’s ambition.

Similarly, whereas Gangaputra Bhishma, who I would say was the most coherent of the epic cast after the slave son Vidur, also has in places shown an understanding of Dharma which is very confusing. How can a Kshatriya stay a silent spectator to pawning and then humiliation much less the disrobing of a women, and even more egregiously his own grand daughter in law, in the court that he was ordained to adorn, guide and protect, against all threats from within and without, and yet claim to being on the right side of Dharma?

How can a man of such immaculate erudition and seasoned judgement as Devvratta himself, a man whose senses would have been so refined by decades of abstinence and penance, err in his understanding of the profoundness of Dharma. If err he could never, how can Dharma ever allow Bhishma to stand witness to such guile, such deceit and such avarice and such rapaciousness. How come his bow was not strung of sheer indignation and anger on those masters of deceit.

The only character in the epic who shows complete moral and intellectual fidelity to his views and values and demonstrates unwavering coherence to what he believed was his Dharma was Vidur.

Help me guys in understanding the profoundness of Dharma.

AWARD NITE, STAR MIGHT, AUDIENCE PLIGHT

Giving awards has become a catchy trend. Institute awards and give them amidst pre-scripted fanfare stretching into midnight, one award affair barely distinguishable from the other, including detail of where the lectern for the anchors is positioned. Carefully choreographed, nay cartographed as it is more of chess board PT than dance.


Multiple celebrity anchors, who bring in some wit and some humor ( not necessarily without stink), some rancour, some play, some frolic and some prank mostly imbued in imbecility.

The Khan clan usually outdoes others in this race. Shah Rukh is the front runner. The man has manic energy and has something that clicks with the common man. Intellectuals, find him just another freak case of success of probability or the probability of success.

The only one award function that I did the mistake of attending in person and not viewed on TV was the felicitation of the Sushmita and Aishwarya after they won the world beauty pageants in the mid 90s. Serpentine queues outside and euphoria brinking on madness inside. In fact a colleague of mine was so struck by the actual physical presence of these dames that he jumped the bamboo barricade, breached the security cordon and reached next to the jeep in which these women were riding and waving to the crowd. Of course in hot pursuit were the cops and he did get a lathi of a Mumbai police, but he was euphoric about being able to touch Sush’s hand and remained steeped in a blissful hypnagogic hallucination thereafter for many days.

Speaking of the Filmfare Awards of last week, many of the impromptu jokes and crowd interaction seemed pre-meditated, orchestrating a situation which sometimes can be actually more embarrassing than humorous.


If some of you would have seen the Filmfare awards, the chhota nawab joke was pretty much in poor taste. But the nymphs must giggle and the cameras must focus on them to complete the ritual.

Sometimes I feel, it may be wrong to be critical. You can admire the heavy stuff, but laugh only at buffoonery. That is what these stars are doing. Only that they take a fortune for that buffoonery.

Gurcharan Das

When he was 3, his name was Ashok Kumar. His grandmother suspected, his mother had a silent crush on the actor Ashok Kumar. So to undue the sin, she took him to her guru and putting the 3 yr old at his feet, pleaded the guru to christen him. The guru saw the child at his feet and magnanimously chose to call him Guru Charan Das.

I would now not say, what is in a name!

Our Neta

Well, our generation saw the worst of them. The ubiquitous Neta, clad in immaculate white, cynically grinning, undaunted by scandalous exposés, master of subterfuge, archetypically one who could most brazenly blame almost anything on opposition – vipaksha ka hath, is the stereoptypical image that my generation grew up with. Just as my fathers generation saw many who were committed administrators, diligently reading and pushing files, and my grandfathers generation saw nation builders and statesmen, who put the country before self, by the time I was in my teens, politics was literally degenerated to the refuge of the scoundrel. It seemed then, the mores of this tribe had already reached a primal abyss and could not drop deeper.

Neta – surprisingly for me, Webster, still does not recognize the word, implying the English language has not yet co-opted it, notwithstanding lack of a word with parallel connotation in the English language. In-fact, there is clearly no prototype of this character in the Anglo Saxon world. This creature is quite specifically found in India and predominantly in the IndoGangetic plain, though significantly enough, no empirical evidence has been established between this creature and flora and fauna of the Indo Gangetic plain.

Bimaru states (15 pct of Indias GDP), where the combined GDP of all of them is less than the Education Budget of the USA. But, ironically, an average politician of these states can easily buy the President of USA many times over.

Today, I must admit, there are some Netas if you could call them who are very sound and couldn't care less for the strappings of power. P Chidambaram our Home Minister - who has jettisoned symbols, like the beacon light on the car that stands out like a phallic symbol of sarkari power or black cats, whose patented posture of elbows jutting of their modified ambassadors, figuratively forewarning "dont mess with us"- whether they create a protective layer around the protectee or not is yet to be tested, but they clearly do a good job of intimidating all who come their way, and mark the VVVIP from the VIP.

When as a student 15 yrs ago, I had approached PC for a seminar, he opted to sit with the students. Today, at the Grand Hyatt Mumbai, I saw him alight from his unmarked most simple Maruti Esteem, while his counterpart of the Maharashtra State's convoy was too long to fit in the hotel porch.

He also keeps the airport staff, most eager to offer their faciliation to him, always baffled. He exits like a normal passenger, while the officials scurry to facilitate his clearances. He always manages to outsmart them. He carries his own brief case as well. You call this reverse modesty or just his efficiency stretching beyond sarkari files. Clearly, politicians from my home state of UP need to imbibe some this virtue.

See you soon.

Jalesvava Jayamahe

Jalesvava Jayamahe

This is the motto of the Navy of Indonesia in Sanskrit. It is the language of the Devas!! Well, I think here the connotation is – language of our forefathers – at least 2 millenium ago.

It is common practice, to ascribe divinity to a language that has fallen in disuse, and is no longer the lingua franca, is spoken just by a handful of elite, and is not understood by common man. Once upon a time, such a language has been a language of the common man, and the import of creation or literature of such language were not considered so esoteric to require a scholars interpretation, but with passing eons, as the language falls into disuse, such interpretation becomes critical.

Increasing disuse and eventual dismissal as the language of everyday use, on one hand curbs the enrichment of the language, but at the same time, imparts an element of divinity to the language, a gain that no amount of literary effort and enrichment would have been able to impart.

The resistance that the Christian world faced from its ecclesiastical cadres against the translation of the Bible into English from Greek and later Latin is common knowledge. Similarly, the Koran cannot be in a language other than Arabic.

Such languages also become, what one may say, the exclusive preserve of a handful few, some of who pursue it with a curatorial quest and others who see it a vehicle to become a part of the infrastructure of divinity and godliness. It goes without saying, the latter do not bring any real value to the language but certainly do benefit from the knowledge they have of it.

Today Sanskrit, extolled internationally as one of the most scientific languages, is on the brink of extinction, as it has no students. An art or know-how which has only teachers and few students is bound to fade away.

Interestingly, there are about 2500 scholars of Sanskrit in MIT. Globally, there are some 4 millions speakers of this language, most of them outside the nation of its origin. In India till date, because of the colonial past and, because of the deprivation, the life of a common man is a struggle, the environment has not been conducive to pursue something that brings value other than that which can be monetized immediately or sometime in the future. English is obsessively pursued not because it is so rich, but because it can be a tool for earning wealth, station and or sometimes simply livelihood.

But, just for the simple preservation and advancement of the science behind this language - sanskrit - which the original speakers conceived, the study of this language should be encouraged. Interestingly, this is the only language in the world, which has tools like sandhi and samas.

SAY BHARAT, NAY INDIA

It was holi last year and I had gone home to my parents. As I walked on the roads on which I used to cycle to tuitions, swinging my father’s penang lawyer I had a queer desire to relive those years. There are, in the English language enough words to describe such wistfulness. Such feelings often called nostalgia are not uncommon to experience when you reach a certain stage in life. I was perhaps just following an established stereotype.

The city was dirtier than when I used to live there. The roads had been encroached by sundry vendors, with their shops creeping ever closer to the margin of the road. Suddenly, a bus, very familiar passed by. When it motored ahead of me slowly negotiating the potholed road, which was now much narrower today than in my times, I read on the rear of the bus “ Bhartiya Praudyogiki Sansthan” my alma-meter.

Bharatiya and Bharat. That is the question. Modern strategic minds, corporate captains and many Gen X politicians tend to distinguish between an advancing India and lagging Bharat. A progressive India is contrasted with a backward Bharat.

Bhimbeteka, 40 minutes off Bhopal, traces antiquity to 40,000 year ago. The Pandavas, seem to have sought temporary refuge here as well, during their agyatvasa. The caves paintings speak of a vibrant society. The Harrappan sites too evidence an urban civilization with sewerage and town planning in an age, when the much of the contemporary world at best comprised cattle grazing nomads.

Having come a full circle, India, even today is 70 pct rural. One of the implicit pledges India made, at the moment of her “tryst with destiny” 60 years ago, was of health, nutrition and education for all. Today, India is not only far away from redeeming her pledge, but has failed miserably, even in providing drinking water.

Yet, Bhaskaracharya, the inventor of Zero, the decimal system with the place value, was of Bharat. Nagarjuna, Varahamira and of all, the illustrious Bramhagupta who expounded the then preposterous postulate of a rotating earth and the trees not falling off it, due to a gravitational force pulling everything on it towards its centre, not contemporarily with the West, but 800 years before the West, were indeed in Bharat too.

Whereas the crown jewel of India, Infosys, is still primarily a code writing company, in Bharat, there was mathematics, astronomy, innovative medicine, and even medical surgery. In India of today, we have nothing of even shade. No reader should construe this to be a suggestion to bask in past glory, but just to highlight, that our forefathers were civilized.

Many facets of Kautiliya Arthashastra appear in Kempo of Sholotu or the Magna Carta, 8 centuries later than the Kempo and 14 centuries later than the Arthashastra.

Sahayya sadhyam rajatwan chakram ekam na vartate – quote from Kautiliya Arthshastra, clearly indicates the vibrance of the Republican thought and structure of government 250 BC - in ancient India – Bharat.

In Bharat, you had universities – Nalanda and Takshila - which were internationally acclaimed. That, China was inviting Buddhist monks to teach physics, astronomy and mathematics in China, in the era of the Han Dynasty and Tang Dynasty, is no secret. To my mind, the first Indian expat was Gautam Siddhartha who was the head of Astronomy at the Chinese court in the 800 – 900 ADs. Xuanzang ( Hiuen Tsang ) took horse loads of Sanskrits manuscripts from India.

“Bharat Bhagya Vidhata” – the East India Company – later to be replaced by the crown (and I indulge in the act of defiance and perhaps impropriety by deliberately writing it in common case than capital) itself – had a crucial vested interest in depicting an ancient civilization as barbaric and a burden of the white men, an argumentation, that even Theodore Roosevelt would accept, and at later stage use to justify and even extol the virtue of Imperialism. Being legatees to this diligently propagated myth of Indian backwardness, done with the clear purpose of subjugating a nation, we continue to live in the same shadow, constantly trying to justify to ourselves, our coming of age, by seeking solace in simple achievements like the metro or launch Chandrayana.

Taking a leaf from from the Raj, myopic movers and shakers of the day often egg you to believe, the economically and socially backward “Bharat” needs to advance on the trickle of development that it receives from advancing and modernizing “India”. Well that is the myth that I am intending to challenge.

It is India, which is at crossroads, accomplishing the daunting task - trying to re - attain and realize the station that it relinquished 900 years ago – of becoming Bharat.

There is no gainsaying the fact, that the achievements of India in the last 60 years are in no way mean and cannot be trivialized, much less demeaned, food sufficiency and eradication of large scale famine ranking perhaps the highest, nevertheless, the rationale or the lack of it in wishing Bharat to be India is really the question.

Bharat contributed 24 pct to the world GDP even ahead of China and India contributes only 2 pct, so it would betray common sense if we were to demean Bharat and wish it to be India and not the other way round.

BUSINESS AND LEGISLATION

The story of the economic success of India is now real, in part due to large work force which is trying to procure basic necessities for itself and secure future for its offspring. The success though facilitated in some measure by good POLICY making post 1992, is largely due to lack of it and is more from the pockets of excellence created by Indian corporate houses and the value in niches created in by the small private entrepreneur.

Today, as much as a small entrepreneur representing the supply side, would fly overseas to seek our business / opportunities / orders, the buyer representing the demand side too is wandering on the markets of India seeking goods and services. The latter trend is more recent and growing, due to recognition and realization that there is entrepreneurship, business acumen, a skill - set and faster turn - around in India.

India ranks 75 as per a study ranking countries on the ease of starting a new enterprise index. But not allowing a business to start is big business in India. For a business man time is money. He is not inclined to approach the market with an idea which has lost its novel appeal. There is a huge infrastructure that protracts his time of mind to market. They call it speed money. He gives this. It does not involve bribing a particular person. It entails monetary incentive to anyone in the chain related to facilitating the enterprise. But the enterprise flourishes despite this hindrance. It flourishes with this hindrance.

But clearly, it is good world class policy making that is happening in India. VAT, GST, IT policy and now the PMLA. Over time the culture will trickle down to the level of the block and taluka.

RTI, act passed in 2005 and effective 2005 in India is a very powerful tool, and the government is taking this very seriously. India has been very proactive in enacting this. In the UK, this act was passed in 1980, and in 1966 in the USA. As you can see, India is not far behind. Clearly, unlike infrastructure, where India is trailing the modern world by a century, in rights and legislation and democratic values, the country is pretty much in sync with the best.

NETI - NETI

I think, the word means the end of Veda, but undoubtedly it marks the beginning of the Veda, and more than Veda, perhaps it is Shankaras interpretation of Yagyavalkya, which Shankara calls Advaita.

Yagyavalkya, in his discourse with Videharaj - the illustrious Janak, explained to him the intricacies of the Indian cosmic tradition - recognition of the Supreme power - which is the eternal essence of the cosmos, even of parts which constitute it. The underlying truth that constructs all that is real, true or for that matter even platonic.

Obviously, it is not surprising at all, that such a power, the condensate of the a million universes, defies definition, conceptualization, intellectualization and seems to be beyond the ken of most of mortals who cannot think of god beyond the anthropomorphic Hindu form or a Progenitor of other religions, including the Jains and Buddhists and Sikhs. It is just natural, should there be a progenitor, the commandments must follow, and hence all these religions have commandments, something that philosophers, commentators and students of faiths often keep seeking in Sanatan Dharma, but never can settle down to a universally accepted set. But of course, since Hinduism never did have a progenitor in the real sense of the word, the commandments were also not there.

In such a situation, what can be a better way of describing this Supreme Power or Supreme Being, if that is really the limit of imagination – believing that he is a being, than describing him as “neti – neti”.

Yagyavalkya, who having gained the better of most Brahmins through debates and discourses, and having gained the reputation of a Brahmagyani, described the nondescript and ineffable Supreme Power by “neti – neti”. Of course, at stake were a 1000 cows that Janak was to bestow on him in the event that he is invincible in the debate.

Well, it is precisely for its philosophical import, scholars who have so brilliantly dissected all other religions, find Hinduism ( if it is an –ism at all ) so enigmatic, a concept or philosophy so protean, that it defies precise definition. No book, no church, no institutionalization of congregation.

Would I be naïve, if I would say, Yagyavalkya, was indeed a sceptic? A school of skepticism, that believed in God but not in form of God.

Well, what is clear is, I have set myself thinking. That is important. Generations of scholars of jostled with these ideas and have attempted to decipher the manifestations of truth, and that, I with no shade of scholarliness should be able to do with ease is a proposition equally improbable. Supreme cosmic power, the Creator, the Brahma as "neti, neti" .

Road Rules

1.Rules are for fools

2.Footpath or pavement is for squatting, begging, vending or even parking but not walking

3.Red light is red only when a cop is standing, else it is usually safer than green to cross

4.Zebra crossings are not for humans, jaywalking is always safer.

5.Honking is line with musical tradition of India

6.The road dividing line should be taken in the middle of the car

7. Indicator grants the right to change lanes

8. Bigger vehicles have first right to traffic

9.Flat tyres should be changed in the centre or wherever noticed, and not on shoulders

10.Yellow light means accelerate to cross

CAMINHOS DAS INDIAS

It was unusual to be greeted in Brazil, when I went for a business meeting, with the President of a local Brazilian company, with a NAMASTE. Well it began with business as usual. Then during the course of a discsussion between this lady and her secretary, I felt I heard “thik hai; thik hai”. I thought my ears were resonating, I was perhaps home sick after a long and harrowing trip.

A little later, while talking to me this lady used the words “achha – achha”. I could not be making a mistake a second time. Clearly, something was amiss.

Curious beyond measure, I asked, if the Portuguese spoken in Brazil was different from the standard Portuguese, as I heard her dialog being punctuated with Hindi interjections, and with syntactically perfect usage and placement.

The lady was more surprised than me, as I did not know, having being in Brazil for 3 nights already, that a prime time soap was Caminhas Das Indias, a love story, set in post Independence India, shot in Jaipur, Delhi, Udaipur and Chandni Chowk, with Brazilian actors, in Portuguese, but with Hindi being used where necessary, just to create the desired impact.

More interestingly, the lady, pulled out with a flourish, which even girls in modern India will find difficult to mimic, a mangal sutra that she wore on her bossom.

It is a love story between a Dalit boy and Brahmin girl, a theme, too beaten and hackneyed and soapworn for India, yet appealing to a foreigner, who even today find the India caste system too intriguing and defying comprehension, to ignore. From such a amazingly vast canvas of themes imbued with the archetypically soap type melodrama and sentimentality, they chose one that impinged on the caste system.

But these are soft conquests which Indian culture is known to make, right from the days of the Cholas when India acquired a cognizable marine might. Infact, culture would be the avant guard of the army.

Masai Mara

Trip to Masai Mara, home to still about 2,000 Lions was pretty much a vacation by accident or say serendipity. When I would see my younger son hooked on to Discovery, watching the big cats prowl through the shoulder high grass on grasslands which appeared to meet the sky on the other side but appear never to end, I would always wonder, if they did exist in real world, or were just a fantasy of a nature possessed camera man.

Kichwa Tembo, the tented resort - they have a property in MP/India as well in collaboration with Taj, Mahua Kothi - was the place we lodged in, based upon the recommendation of a friend. Well equipped tents. Very clean surroundings. Set in a jungle and has immaculate hospitality.

This 1500 kms of unrestrained wilderness is home to primates, mammal, birds and reptiles. Well, clearly, there is nothing to match the primates of the Indian subcontinent, who do all that humans do, saving working on laptops - could be just a matter of time.

Animals, terrestrial and others, don't seem to recongnise political boundaries, they, following an age old instinct, ambulate into Kenya from Tanzania, just after the rains. The Mara river too heaves up during this time and crossing the river is an integral and instinctive part of the migration. Mara - meaning mottled - as the grasslands are patchy, and the shadow that a lonesome cloud castes on the grass shuffles like an elephant trampling grass in an intoxicated slumber.

This is true, to Indians, the African elephant is not particularly exciting. It is not a companion. Its looks are not gentle. You cannot expect it to help you climb on to its back with a tug of its trunk. But these tuskers merge very well with the primates and predators alike, walk some 25 kms each day, in search of food and water. The herd sticks together in a pattern resembling a military formation. The oldest and tallest is usually the leader of the herd, being first to take a peril head on, and the baby calves are protected by this formation.

Clearly, the high point of this tryst with the wild was Cheetah chase. An unwary water buck, strayed away from the herd, enjoying a drink from a rain puddle, was the vulnerable one. Cheetah ( apparently from the Sanskrit word Chita ) is a crespuscular creature, and prefers to chase than to stalk its prey. But a high alertness of the buck and an iota of miscalculation of the buck landed the springing cheetah in the puddle which broke her speed and saved the buck just by one inch - we saw the replay in a friends camera.

Well after a long safari, a delectable meal tastes even better, if you, as you return to base, encounter a pride leisurely basking the sun right in the middle of the road, mindless of all at least till the next chase or hunt for food.

LUPIN PHARMA

It may have made a modest start with Suprax, but today the brand business of Lupin is growing close to 70 - 80 pct. After having bought Antara from Oscient, made by Ethypharm on its platform technology, it is now fully poised to enter the branded markets with Oral Contraceptives and Liquid formulations.

Suprax marked the beginning of a new era at Lupin. After Suprax there was no looking back. The best part of Lupin is the professional management. The promoter family is involved, but both Nilesh and Vinita ( more involved with the US market) are very professional.

With 105 ANDAs filed and 35 approved, the company is poised to grow fast on the US market.
The company is not fighting shy of investments either. Oral contraceptives, which the company is now getting into, and has filed about 7 ANDAs for, as per the new guidelines will usually all call for a CT. The cost of the CT could well be USD 10 - 15 Mn depending upon the product and subjects. So the company is getting into high value and difficult to make products.

I hope Lupin, which indeed was one of the benefactors of the debacle that happened at Ranbaxy, will restore the glory that Indian Pharma lost.

You Never Know

The Russians will never leave Afghanistan. Gorbachov is a bluff master. This was indeed not only the line of thinking of Robert Gates who now leads the Pentagon and travels in the Doomsday ( the air machine that he uses ), but also of an average American who believed that the threat from Communism to the American civilisation was bigger and graver than all else.

When Marx wrote Das Capital of which the first 30,000 copies were sold, as publishers positioned the book as a treatise on capitalism, being precious sure, it would not sell otherwise and people bought the first copies looking for methods to make capital, little did he know, he is propounding a philosophy that would that would keep the mightiest economic and military power unsettled for almost a century.

By the time the myth of rising tide of communism died, Gates a go getter, old school soldier had morphed into an anti terror and middle east expert and had upped the ante against islamic terrorism. Many of the promises made by Obama were softened as Gates opposed them. Such is his power of persuasion of this ex Eagle Scout.

Clearly, our chiefs of staff can learn a few things from this rabid patriot and arch exponent of American Exceptionalism and not treat the Chieftancy of the force they head an a pre-cursor to a gubernatorial assignment or license to relax, party, inaugurate and hope to get immortalised by the plethora of commemrative plaques that cite them.

Bringing back the reality of the borders to the corridors of power in the North and South Blocs, shaking the bureaucracy out of slumber and conceit and ensuring decisions that preserve the territorial integrity of the country is a key and critical funtion of the top brass of the army, which apparently they have for long abdicated. They must like Gates, commit themselves for keeping their promise to the country.

The Poster Boy

As a young student and also the President of the student body, I had a desire to organise the annual fest of my MBA College to a perfection that is reveled in and recalled with a feeling of fondness as well as nostalgia.

Well the economy was being doctored a new prescription. The prescription was revolutionary and supposed to bring immediate symptomatic relief to a tired and aching economy that seemed to be suffering with the so called Hindu growth rate. The man in command was Manmohan Singh, an illustrious academician, acclaimed economist and politician who defied the stereotype, and brought in a version of Keynesian Macro economics which even the communist bowed to.

Of course, he was the one who I wanted to invite for my annual fest. Of course, I knew for a student, approaching him, cutting through the layers of bureaucracy was well nigh impossible, of course I knew, a man who was still writhing from the pain of pawning the countries gold to keep the governments head above water, would be much too busy to make an inaugural address at a students function. But clearly something within me drove me into stalking him at a function which he was presiding on, with an enthusiasm that refused to subside.

Well, the FM agreed to Preside on my function and I went to pick him up from his the official residence of the FM, he was already waiting outside for me, to be picked up.

That was the day when the humility of a man so illustrious set me thinking. It did have an impact on me, as I to this day can recall the event so vividly, as though it was yesterday.

In the car, I asked the FM what inspired him to open up the economy. "Well", he said, "for you MBAs, TINA ( there is no alternative )". I could also sense his deep sense of humiliation of pawning the countries gold - 47 tons was shipped to the Bank of England for a mere USD 5oo mn to prevent India for a loan default.

He spoke for 90 minutes with an enthralling erudition. He spoke from the heart. He spoke with facts and figures. He spoke with the zeal of a reformer. He spoke to render all else speachless.

Today, this man who once propounded Keynes, is the guru of economic recovery and counter cyclicality, and guru of modern fiscal management, a man who showed an adeptness and uncanny knack of handling political contradictions with a simplicity and unambiguity of purpose that puts career politicians to shame.

India Meri Jan

India Meri Jaan

It was not even two decades ago, that the corporates in India were struggling to snatch talent from the Government and the public sector institutions. They were professions of choice, nay of status and station as well, and of course gave the necessary sense of security that the people of that generation so much needed.

For 400 million middle class India it was still an arduous struggle to get a gas connection or a telephone connection. The telephone which seldom worked or showed signs of life, was always cloth covered and found a place of reverence equivalent to the idols in the house. The always elusive lines man was always in great demand, the quintessential messiah, who would help us connect to friends and family by bringing the black contraption back to life. When the strowger exchanges gave way to electronic ones, I know, my mother went out of the way to get one for ourselves, though our house was not really in the area where the switch was first happening. My brother studying at a prestigious college in Bhopal was enjoying his freedom a little too much, being away from home news of his well being was too critical not to obtain, and the electronic telephone connection was sought just to accomplish that. But to gain the complete benefit of the electronic technology, it was essential that the call receiving connection was also electronic.

Since independance, the telecom industry has undergone a lot of change, including one nationalisation and one corporatisation. The DOT being changed to BSNL ushered an era of change.
Today, there are 400 mn mobile phone users, a long journey from the first connection in Calcutta in 1851. In some months India has added some upto 10 mn users, and annually numbers which equal the population of Russia.

In the Automobile sector, year 2009 was an year of moderate degrowth though the production figures of 2010 show about a 25 pct growth. Of course to an extent this is due to the low base effect. Within the automobile sector, the Multi Purpose Vehicle did show the highest pace of growth.

IT, the industry that is the hallmark industry of the country is poised to be a net recruiter this year. The domestic industry is poised to grow 10 pct from USD 14 bn last year and the exports have touched a new high of USD 50 bn, although this milestone was achieved just 2 years later than the forecast of 2008 of Mc Kinsey. To the domestic market you could easily add USD 10 bn which is the estimated size of the e Governance market including the Unique Identification Number scheme.

The recession notwithstanding, the pharmaceutical industry has shown a growth of about 17pct in year2009. Today, India is home to the largest number of US FDA approved plants outside of India. Though, medical tourism in India was poised for a growth much more than it actually showed. Yet, the healthcare industry in forecast to be USD 70 - 80 bn in the next 5 years.
The Medicity, built on lines of the John Hopkins may give a fillip to Medical Tourism once again. Mauritius is clearly one country where the medical tourism has made noteworthy advance.