The Devil's Advocate

Understanding recession

2009-11-05T17:56:00.000+05:30

Well its quite common these days to cut costs but i really dont think the Macro Economy level impact of this can be ever positive .Cutting costs by itself would reduce the short term loses in a given recessionary condition, But it will actually prolong the over all recessionary cycle, as cutting costs reduces agg demand of the economy.. When there is unemployment then consumer demand falls. Even if you have reduced short term lose, you will still incur some lose over a longer period of time, and hence negating the effect of the cost cutting. Instead if a price cut is brought into place then you will increase your short term lose, but reduce the recessionary period without hampering your production pattern, There would be no stock piling in warehouses and also the company can retain its employees and expertise and can attain super normal profits when market recovers.The recession would really wont last long as given the fact there would be no un employment and hence no reduction n the aggregate demand.Its better going production optimizing during recession than trying to go for profit maximization mode of production. One of the major reason India at a negative inflation rate had a reduced recessionary cycle it was a mare slow down

Jinnah's Islam or Gandhian Hinduism???

2009-08-20T16:42:00.003+05:30

Its been years a read the book, i remember i had borrowed it initially from a friend who was preparing for his IAS exams. He told me the UPSC recommends "The Freedom at Midnight" as an appropriate course material for Indian History.
Having bought it later as the book had made an impression on me,i thought it was time i revisited the book.As it was endorsed by the UPSC i guess i needed to go back to it before i penned down the thoughts.

Since the Jinnah row re-appeared on the news, the thought put forth by Mr Jaswant Singh had haunted me. What made an Ambassador of Hindu - Muslim unity turn into Qaid -e-Azam of Pakistan.
And i still agree it was Gandhian Hinduism rather than Jinnah's Islam.

Islam for Jinnah was just a surname he was born into. He was non practicing anglicized barrister for whom practicalities of life mattered more than rigid faith.

His day started with the best Bacon's of Bombay served in a full English Breakfast, and ended with the Highland Malts and cigar. I dont think these can be traits of a religious fanatic propagating Islam.
He was also one of the first person to ostracize Mohammad Iqbals demands for the separate states.

Before pointing fingers we need to get a few facts right. The demand for seperate electorates was first demanded by Sir Seyed Amir Ali of the (Aligarh Muslim university fame) along with Mr Aga Khan. The reason was less political and more social , though it would go ahead and create a political divide. The Muslims then were losing out on social equity on grounds of education. The demand of separate electorates were done as a quota system. The same system for which our friends from the UP legislature still hails B.R Ambedkar.
To enforce this system required a leader who could fight the Muslim cause yet remain united for the Indian cause. Mohammad Ali Jinnah was their man.

Mahatma Gandhi on the other hand could have been a Mahatma when we try understand his ideologies but for all practicalities of politic he was just M.K Gandhi for me. Though he has been portrayed as a great secular leader, to me , a person who enforces his own religious fundamentals on his followers is far from being so. He was strong follower of Hinduism and was preacher of atma suddhi, ( self cleansing of soul) dharma and vegetarianism . All traits of Hinduism. He did not even have faith in modern medicine , and wanted his followers to follow the same path.
And Jawaharlal Nehru was a blind follower of Mr M.K Gandhi the politician.

In one of his writings the Mahatma had mentioned his detest for modern parliamentary democracy. for people who do not know for him democracy was like a prostitute and parliamentarians her brokers. His perfect form government was the Ramrajya the self restaining vegeterian form of government with out any administration. And for him Jinnah would not fit the bill for such a governance he was too practical for that. Hence even though Jinnah was a better administrator he chose Nehru over him as the Prime Minister of India.
This was against the aspirations of Jinnah, and also he realised in the kind of government the Mahatma was endorsing Muslims of the country would not be able to relate to.
And rest as they say is history.
I dont know if Jinnah was secular or not he was not religious... and to me Mahatma Gandhi too religious to be secular and to idealistic to be practical.

To end i would just like mention some interesting facts. Jinnah died of tuberculosis within few months of independence, and during the same time Nehru had gone to Lord Mountbatten and confessed he was not a good administrator. It was the last viceroy who was running the Indian Government for his Nehru's behalf.

Only if Jinnah ruled for these months instead of Mountbatten and had Nehru become his understudy , I guess when Nehru would have taken charge it would have been an unified India

Greener than you think

2009-07-09T23:59:00.004+05:30

On 26th of may going through the news papers waiting for the electric line to be restored, i read on the front page that Aila had claimed 8 lives officially. Most people have noticed this event. But the news that many would not have noticed was the city had also lost over 1000 tress in the cyclone.And with over 150 trees in Saltlake alone. That by itself would have been a headlines in a City like Mumbai, where a loss of 500 trees might not have been possible in the first place, cause for all you know there might not be 500 tress in heart Mumbai at all. I had once asked a Mumbaikar class mate of mine what she felt which was the greener city Kolkata or Mumbai. She said of course Mumbai.. we have the race course for morning walk she had exclaimed. After coming to Kolkata i have realised that she had no idea about this city and i am sure enough she never had visited the city even. One can find lush green avenues and green walk across entire Saltlake which would be bigger than the green South Central Delhi. Also not to mention the Central Park within Saltlake township, which can give mumbai race course in Mahalaxmi a run for money any given day and twice on Sundays. The park will be twice its size.

Driving a bit further one can drive through long stretches of farmland around EM by pass, which during monsoons looks wonderfully serene and gives the city a uniqueness which no other city can boast of. These farmlands were originally solid waste dumping yard. The solid waste used as fertilizers has made it bear crops all year long and that too in the heart of the city.
Kolkata also has its share of Race course and of course the Maidan region, the lungs of the city . The long 2 km stretch of manicured grass and trees with horses grazing around might not be a sight that many travelers imagine before they enter the city. But it is an integral part of the city.

But the area of concern for this city is the citizen have taken this greenery too much for granted. I have seen boys play football on barren rocky soil across the country, but here the grass is omnipresent. In Google Maps, when zoom on Kolkata in remain green , but in cities like Delhi and Mumbai its ash gray satellite view, showing the devoid of greenery. Yet Kolkatan think that the greenery has faded away, may be it is so , my friends told me hundred years back the sunderbans reached up to todays city limits. There has been a loss in vegetation due to urban development for sure, and i expect many more trees to felled across the next to years with the East West metro construction, yet to my eyes, as a stranger from a different city ,Kolkata is greener than many metros that i have seen.......

Little Less conversation

2008-11-28T13:23:00.000+05:30

Abhigyan Sengu... madame
Anwesha Bhatta... yes..
Abhigyan Sengu... u dont give me the jumbles any more
Anwesha Bhatta... i dnt do them myself any more
Anwesha Bhatta... dint know u wr missing them
Abhigyan Sengu... :(
Anwesha Bhatta... hey y the frown
Anwesha Bhatta... kal theke debo
Abhigyan Sengu... amar prochur kaj.. kintu not in the mood today
Abhigyan Sengu... i am in my world of conspiracies again
Anwesha Bhatta... wat conspiracies?
Abhigyan Sengu... political
Abhigyan Sengu... war
Abhigyan Sengu... riots.. everything
Anwesha Bhatta... as in?
Abhigyan Sengu... see i always believed.. with emperical data
Abhigyan Sengu... everytime there is a severe depression
Abhigyan Sengu... tolerance level in humans tend to falll
Abhigyan Sengu... there is violence that follows
Abhigyan Sengu... the great depression was followed by the second world war
Anwesha Bhatta... whrz the relevance?
Abhigyan Sengu... every thing has trigger
Abhigyan Sengu... that starts a domino efffect
Abhigyan Sengu... butterfly effect
Anwesha Bhatta... ok...
Anwesha Bhatta... and?
Abhigyan Sengu... like one thing leads to another
Abhigyan Sengu... if today FBI which is coming to India .. proves Al queda had a role to play with pakistan nationals involved.. what will be India's stance
Anwesha Bhatta... u tell me
Abhigyan Sengu... USA already is ready to storm North Waziristan
Anwesha Bhatta... hmm...
Abhigyan Sengu... they are attaccking the province every second day
Abhigyan Sengu... Obama called this attack india's 9/11
Abhigyan Sengu... by saying so it gives us an oppertunity to attack pakistan.. like USA attacked afghanistan
Anwesha Bhatta... u think india shud declr war on pak?
Abhigyan Sengu... may be it will be brain washed to go in to a war
Anwesha Bhatta... by who?
Abhigyan Sengu... USA
Anwesha Bhatta... hmm...
Anwesha Bhatta... posbl
Abhigyan Sengu... the economics of war
Anwesha Bhatta... hmm
Abhigyan Sengu... the Economic depression ended with the world war
Anwesha Bhatta... yes
Abhigyan Sengu... People had to increase steel production.. heavy engineering. automobile
Abhigyan Sengu... demand increased
Abhigyan Sengu... employment increased
Abhigyan Sengu... Govt spending Increased
Anwesha Bhatta... right
Abhigyan Sengu... thats the Conspiracy theory i am talking o
Abhigyan Sengu... of
Anwesha Bhatta... i get yr pt
Abhigyan Sengu... 2 mins ill help Kunj with his luggage and come back
Anwesha Bhatta... ok
Abhigyan Sengu... so whats ur views on my theory
Anwesha Bhatta... m nt sure, never thot abt it actually
Anwesha Bhatta... watvr u sed meks sense
Anwesha Bhatta... as a theory
Anwesha Bhatta... but then, its difcult to speak for war under any circumstnces
Abhigyan Sengu... yes
Abhigyan Sengu... i knw
Abhigyan Sengu... its just a thought tht will not happen
Anwesha Bhatta... it might end depression, but then, it might not, but it'd do more than that
Anwesha Bhatta... ya of cors, we r discussing a hypothetcl theory
Abhigyan Sengu... yes
Abhigyan Sengu... also the thing needs to be seen is the tolerance ofppl
Anwesha Bhatta... as in?
Abhigyan Sengu... of govts
Abhigyan Sengu... they are at an all time low
Anwesha Bhatta... yes
Abhigyan Sengu... any thing can happen
Anwesha Bhatta... yes, nothing wud come as a suprz
Abhigyan Sengu... thts why dnt rule out war so easy
Anwesha Bhatta... ya i guess so
Anwesha Bhatta... it might happen, now wen i come 2 think of it
Anwesha Bhatta... so all the peace talks bw india & pak down the drain?
Abhigyan Sengu... lets see who the gun men where first
Abhigyan Sengu... if all 26 were pakis then we have a problem at hand
Anwesha Bhatta... how
Abhigyan Sengu... then war is emminent
Abhigyan Sengu... congress wont be able to win elections now
Abhigyan Sengu... after Mumbai
Abhigyan Sengu... because complete security failure
Abhigyan Sengu... they need to push elections back
Anwesha Bhatta... right right
Abhigyan Sengu... that means declare emergency
Anwesha Bhatta... hmm
Abhigyan Sengu... state emergency can be called in the state of WAR
Anwesha Bhatta... yes
Anwesha Bhatta... and?
Abhigyan Sengu... its easy to declare war if we can prove we have been attacked from outside
Abhigyan Sengu... if all 26 of them are Pakis we have been attacked
Anwesha Bhatta... absolutely
Anwesha Bhatta... talk 2 u after lunch
Abhigyan Sengu... yes

To Pary and Parvy

2008-07-11T12:44:00.004+05:30

Abhishek aya tha kya, tum logo ko bigaar raha hai woh. every second night he comes with a bottle and gets u guys drunk.
This was maushi's idea of Abhi. Pary and Parvy always nodded, as a sense of yes even if Abhi was snuggling the whole night in hostel bed with the be bugs.

Please change your tickets to the 14th she said.I cant travel alone. Please we would both travel together from Calcutta to Pune. Naive as he was our man , with sense of possible romance blossoming, asked his dad to change the tickets for the fifth time.
He had reached howrah stn an hour early to make sure he could catch her on time and help her with luggage.And help her find her seat. the thirty six hour long journey with her was something he was looking for. The opportune moment to come closer and may be speak out. He had thought it was a good time to carry his music essentially simon & gurfunkel cd and his collection of Ruskin bond .She loved them thats the only musical connection they had.
They boarded the train, and within minutes the pair of laurel and hardy emerged from no where to meet her. Abhishek thought this is it, they are not going to steal my show. It was I who changed my tickets for her, but alas they were her friends from college . Batch mates. she knew they were traveling in the same train. She introduced Pary and Parvy to Abhi. Initially disgusted by their presence , Abhi did carry on with the small talk.
Soon as she went to sleep with his music, he started enjoying the conversation with the duet. From small talk, to boy talk, they found more common friends, found ghosts in their heart that they wanted to seek. From intoxication to football to brufen to black coffee. The thirty six hours sped past while she slept.
The day Abhi reached Pune he found Pary and Parvy waiting for him at the hostel door. Thy went ghost hunting that day, and have been chasing their dreams together since then.

Pary and Parvy One was a cute teddy another an seemingly under nourished Martian with a shaved head and a ear stud complete. They complimented each other to the point of being opposites. Pary slept when Parvy woke up. One and atheist another a pious human being. The teddy used to take full responsibility of the Martian brat , leading the life of peter pan. And then came Abhi a moderate amongst the extremes. But did wand his alcoholic concepts on Parvy and made Pary reduce dry.
They stayed together through thik and thin and stood by each other.. and Abhi today does not know where his Ruskin Bond collection is or the person who took it is either but where ever she is , he would really liked to thank her for making him change his traveling date.
Some things happen because they are meant to happen. And today when abhishek looks back to his Pune days, It can not be complete even to the half with out those laurel hardies.

The weakest sex

2008-06-09T12:57:00.002+05:30

If you are a man , in todays world... and that to from the general category make sure.. that life is bound to be tough for you. Not only you need to compete with, ST,SC and OBC quotas.. but also womens quotas. Many colleges like already have a womens quota in place, their exist a womens quota list of 12 girls, where the general first list does not exceed 50. And soon we could expect a 33 percent reservation for women not only in the parliament but also in the public sector. They already have seats under quota in trains and other public transport. They pay less tax, than a normal man. They have their education fees reduced, and still call them selves weaker sex. Well they argue these were necessary to bring them at par with men. I would still understand the less tax and lower education fees but quotas.. why are they not intellectually proficient enough.
And as for as equality is concerned, for the normal urban women, its to shrug household work, as demeaning, as thats suppose to be pulling them down, and tying them to household..and all those hackneyed womens liberation propaganda .
I guess men are more proactive in erstwhile household bastion for women.
As a market researcher by profession myself i took a survey amongst my friends circle and colleagues across urban India of 50 men and women respectively of age group of 20-28. Many would find the sample size small and the hypothesis skewed, but its a trend alright.
And the survey result made me smile.
out of the lot 38 men cooked their own food, or could cook a full course meal . the number for women were 14, another 10 said they could survive on maggi and tea, cause thats what their culinary skills were.
45 men did their own bank work, and paid their bills. Only 20 women did so, most of them working, rest found it cumbersome and time consuming.
25 men could wash their own clothes without washing machine.. the number of women was 28. Well i knew men would lose out this front, but did expect a much higher margin.
As far as grocery and other utilities and chores. 40 men did their groceries at least once week , for women it was 28.
I did not ask about doing the dishes part, as only very few members of womens sample ever entered the kitchen.
the demographic break was quite interesting, out of the 50 women surveyed, 20 were working, 20 so called home makers, and 10 students. And 40 of the men were working and rest students.
Brilliant equality i presume.
People like us, in times to come would be able to apply for only 5% of the seats in colleges, and public jobs, would be expected to earn a handsome living, run a family, cook a meal,and a take care of the household chores. and already the trend shows they are getting prepared to do so, not that they like it, but their partners, liberated urban women find it demeaning for their fight for equality to learn these things, and hence the common man does not have a choice.
I guess a person like me, a common man from the general category ( worse if from the majority community, as minority reservation is being discussed in high levels).. would soon rather has already become by far the weakest sex

Publicity

2008-02-02T12:46:00.000+05:30

With every publicity comes a negative publicity. If you are good , then You are better than some one hence.. some body is worse off than you. So every time you publicise your are good you are telling some one they are bad and you are there too get their Job.
Why am i talking of this, well today while driving to work i saw near my home a new three storied C3 opening. For those not from Calcutta, C3 is a big super market rather retail house which can take on Reliance fresh in business any day and twice on Sundays. This was their second outlet in saltlake itself. But how come i did not see any demonstration against it, well they are in to retail business are they not and sell cheaper than our corner grocer shop.
Some how it occured to me it was publicty rather lack of it that allowed its business grow.
It never publicised that they will procure directly from farmers and over ride middle men and nullify them to sell at a low price, neither did they claim they will sell cheaper than the papa-mama grocers.
Reliance on the other hand did the same, and hence the entry barrier. They publicised that they would NULLIFY .. and hence they were annulled in Calcutta.
With every publicity comes negative publicity

Kamikaze

2008-01-15T11:59:00.000+05:30

No body knows where they came from or how did they get there , but as legend says even if you want tiger milk you get it in SS Hogg market , or as we commonly call it New Market. Kushal taking a stroll down the bi lanes of new market found them alive in a fish tank. Two bright pinkish Silver salmons.
Something passed through Kushal's cynical mind , and he bought the tank and yes with the fishes.
There were two of them one large almost a 30 kilogram giant, another a small puny baby perhaps.
While keeping them on his drawing room corner, th middle aged lonesome bachelor thought of giving the fishes their names. They would now be his companions. Two names that some how rang a bell was some thing he was fascinated by this afternoon. While reading the book on Japanese world war history. He read about the Kamikaze Pilots , who would crash their aircraft into a ships boiler to sink it, and if they fail they would commit Hara-kiri , our takes one own life to restore honour.
He named the young one kamikaze and the older one Hara-kiri.
As time went by, it became more obvious that the younger one was getting Kushal attention more than the giant.
Yes a 30 Kg fish might seem a wonder, but some how through his loneliness he preferred the baby. This had disheartened Hara-kiri, as he felt he should steal the show. When ever people visited Kushal, they were amused mt hara's sheer size, but over some time even they paid more attention to the kids behaviour and playfulness .
I will get him some day he said to himself, the kid is doing this in purpose to humiliate me, the day i get my chance ill kill him.
But never could he have thought his chance would come sooner than he had anticipated.
Nandita walked in the other day. The moment she saw the salmons, she started laughing. You know Kushal she exclaimed, your this sense of absurdity made me leave you, who would try to pet a 30 kg salmon, other than an oaf like you. You have not changed have you.
Even if you had told me that you have kept them to make a good continental feast out of it, but knowing you it does not suit your taste.
Nandita always did that to him, humiliate him, but some how with he could never stand up against her, rather gullible enough to follow the same.
This time was no anomaly either.
He took out his car with the tank in his rear seat. The safari drove straight towards Princep ghat.
Standing at the banks of Hoogly river he glanced one last time at the fishes. They have been is companion for around three months now. Kamikaze was bigger now than what he came as , but yet small enough for Hara-kiri to kill him.
There was a silence in Kushal's eyes. He was doing yet again doing a spineless act knowingly, where his emotions for Nandita overwhelmed that for the fishes.
Splash they went into the water.

Hara-kiri had been waiting for this moment for ages, a moment when Kushal's eyes where not on them, the moment he could avenge his humiliation and agony created by kamikaze. A humiliation that never was.

Scratch , there goes your pectoral , and here is one your tail. He attacked Kamikaze with all his venom.
But to give him a slow painful fearsome death, left him alive.
With a gash in his tail and a broken pectoral fin, the young salmon was in this alien territory which he had never seen or thought of. His world was the tank, where he could play around. The river was less of freedom and agony galore for him. His whole purpose in life from now was to run away from the only other fish he ever knew: Hara-kiri. One day during on of his stints in running away he bumped into a fish who though smaller but looked similar to them. A telapia it was, a common river water fish of Hoogly, from the same genre as Salmons.
You look new here, we have not seen much oof your kind here. You must be like Hilsas,who come to fresh water to lay eggs and go it seems. I dont know replied Kami, i have never been a river before, I dont know what i am , i just know i am alive. Yes Alive said the telapia, our only meaning of life is staying alive, to remain away from the nets of the fishermen and jawas of bigger fishes.
You also need to eat, dont you, what food do you have , well we usually have coloured balls for food answered kami. No real food like the worms , talking of worms see that worm there near the surface, thats the food you should look for. Ill show you how to hunt, and the telapia swam towards the worm, and moment he bit it the the jerk of the fishing rod pulled it outside. Kami was amazed to the point of fright and swam as fast as he could only his fate was against him, it was but a conspiracy he thought, as he swam right into hara. Food!!!! exclaimed hara, and bit Kami's tail . Kami fought for his life, he managed to wriggle past Hara but he knew the damage has been done, his fins where broken so was his tail. Within no time Hara would get him.
This was it he thought, lets take the bull by the horns.
he went out when Hara was looking behind went straight for his gills, he bit hard but damage was not much. It was not damage he was looking, he wanted Hara's attention
that he had got. give me five yards, give me five yards. the strength for five yards
, he swam as fast as he could but his tail was giving up on him. Yes he was there, but snap went his back as the jaws of the larger salmon clamped against it.
But he was there he bit the worm , and off in jerk went the fishing rod, taking hara along with him. Kamikaze had done what the Japanese aircraft fighters did , take the larger ships down with its self destruction. Where as Hara-kiri, committed suicide by bullying Kamikaze, a suicide that was forced on him for not being honourable.

A Different Take

2008-01-08T13:00:00.001+05:30

I was seating in this auto-rickshaw back seat today.. when a young lady about my age came up to the Auto , and sat next to the driver on the right hand side. Suddenly i realised that i had not got out and given her my seat like i used to earlier during my school days.
With the wake of the whole womens liberalisation movement, i suddenly find it to be impertinent to the same. Don't get me wrong here. Not that i am not a chauvinist but yet, i do not do this as an act of chauvinism.. But as an extreme act of feminism. In the sense if i had got down from my seat and given it to her it would be as if i was saying lady you are fragile enough to not be able to seat in front seat, and she would have not liked it at all.
Hence to not demean her i do not leave my seat these days. Its different when it comes to senior citizens. I would have done that in either cases, without considering their sexes.

Similarly i would disagree to the concept of constituencies reserved for women candidates.. its like telling them you are not competent enough to fight with men when fitted against you.

Mean and Meaningful

2007-10-23T17:46:00.001+05:30

Life's complexities are much more weird than humans can comprehend, and sometime things that you dread are the best for you.
The fact life moves on, is the hope that people grab on to like a red and white cane yet, the satiation some where remains incomplete.
To the most mean and meaningful person it said. A letter that he found in the old pile of his college life, a life that was on the verge of being forgotten, in the corner were he seldom visited in his room. He needed his notes that day a simple micro economics paper he had written that an acquaintance required, some body he hardly knew. She worked at his mom's office, part-time and a student of Economics as well.
He happily had granted her wish. Who would have thought this would lead to a butterfly effect.
It was in his drawer, in a stale brown image that spoke of its age. It was not meant to be there though. He had forgotten about it over these years.
It was his mother who had left it hoping Abhishek would give it a look.

It was written for the most Mean and Meaningful person in her life, along four page examination paper, with neat hand writing. It was written to him four years back, funnily she was not known for her writing ever.
It was her hand writing that caught his eye, and he some how had this tremendous urge of taking the trip that he so did not want to. The trip down the memory lane via the letter route.
The letter was subtle, meant to be read between lines, a letter that was meant to be deciphered like a womens heart.
Some things are not meant by what they mean. It was these subtle innuendos that had kept his hopes alive that he should not have then.
The letter was spoke of the ups and downs of their interaction over time, and what it meant.Was Abhishek 's egotistic attitude really mean, or had she crossed the line between ego and self esteem. This letter was the defense lawyer to her idiosyncrasies but some how the prosecution was spell bound in the mysticism of the arguments put forth.
He started reading ,and for a while had this churning feeling in his stomach, a flash back to the hunky dory days, when every thing in life had this honeymoon effect painted on . But the honey moon effects are not meant to last, and the faster it ends its better,.
it gives the clear picture of what lies ahead.
Then his eyes were blur, today they were wide open and knew some how what happened was best at least for him, but why were they feeling moist today. Did she require the fourth chance, that he did not give her. or was it just a rush of emotion that rushed up like the dormant volcano errupting before it goes dead for another era.
Was she married today? he thought, or was her engagement called off.. was he the reason why it was called off in the first place, was he really the mean guy, or just another person whose self esteem was ravaged.
"Are those you notes in your hand can i have a look , noted the young girl "
No just piece of examination paper for which had not taken good notes he replied,hence i flunked, but the beauty is , is made me take good notes and hence today you can use them.
He gave her his economics notes, while his live's class test was flying in shreds near the dust bin. It had made him aware that the semesters are there to be taken, and the test was important but just another wake up call before , that prepare you for the big thing, Life,
Life's complexities are much more weird than humans can comprehend, and sometime things that you dread are the best for you.

Manual Override

2007-10-04T11:02:00.000+05:30

Few days back, a friend of mine and me were travelling in his expensive sports bike, manufactured in India, and after a stoppage, his electronic start would not work. The electronics had a short circuit. He then used his kick start to make the bike work. And Suddenly it Dawned on me that's the beauty of India, if electronics fail we always have a Manual Override in any form and any circle of the country.
I was watching Die Hard 4.0 , and was thinking in India such an incident would have been a huge failure, as most times the traffic signals do not work here, and its the cops who clear the jam. Even today stock brokers along with huge electronic support have the back up paper work ready. While boarding the flight even if the systems are down the list is out where your name just needs to be ticked, and may be uploaded later. One of my colleague was travelling in a reputed European air carrier few days back, and could not check in early, as the system was not ready to check him in. In India, you just have the manual Over Ride.

Today while coming to office , i was caught in this horrifying traffic congestion due to a bottleneck situation.
Suddenly 2 police personnel non-traffic though, came from no where, and cleared the traffic in 2 mins.
Even Indian Army today one of the strongest in the world in their conventional weapons prefer mechanic over electronics.
The whole question is why?
The whole manual over ride comes from 2 things, Indians have this great Human skills. For example when driving we always know, whats the other guy going to do. A guy is honking loud from behind and suddenly i realise its no point moving to left to give him space, rather move right ( India is right hand drive mind you), and there you go he overtakes from the wrong side. If there was a system in place that would not allow me to move to the right and him to overtake from the left, this could have been a an accident. We though have the traffic rules in place, but out here they more like guidelines, as long there is a smooth traffic, and accident free, to make both the travellers life easy you can manually relax the rules.
Secondly India has the human power, abundance of labour, and that to cheap. The broking firms can employ people who will manually type out entire data, and take a print of it and file it in the racks. If the comp is down out comes the type writer. If printers is down comes the stylo machine.
Thirdly and very importantly, the rate of technical change is very slow in India, and that to an extent is good as it gives us the flexibility. Its not that new Technology is not available in India, it is but the adoption is very slow, and while it is being adopted, it is being Indianised, for the welfare of the masses. The options are laid out to Indians .. which one you want . if you are tech savvy go ahead use the electronic option, or if you are scientifically challenged like me.. use the manual option.
Its like a a car, where u have an auto transmission ,EPS and ABS.. if they all fail the hydraulic takes over. For an entire country to do that in one go if very difficult. But India is a country which works with Hydraulic Power Steering and auto transmission. So when they fail the changes is not much and hence people are already adapted to it . So in a diverse country like India, Manual Over Ride is essential and will always remain.

Claustrophobic Love

2007-09-15T12:41:00.000+05:30

"Do you love me?" Do you love me she inquired again . Excuse me? Abhishek was prompt and yet shocked. I don't even know you he replied, i dont even know your name. Yet you trust me with your life? she retorted back with remorse.
They had been stuck in the elevator for over an hour now. Abhishek was finishing work on a non working Saturday. Hence he was late. He needed to rush, as it was the party of the life time and he did not want to miss. It was 10pm on a Saturday evening, with all black party due at Dublin. How could he miss it. He needed to change and rush. Usually he would always take the stairs even if it meant to climb down ten floors, he suffered from claustrophobia. But today he thought otherwise, today he was alone, and the lift was at his floor. He thought being the only person in the lift it was worth taking the risk.

The lift on its way down stopped at the seventh floor, where she entered.
The petite bespectacled yet charming young lady. he had seen her often in the building premises.
They shared a small greeting while she entered.
It was on the 5th floor it happened. Sudden power cut.
The elevator jerked to a halt. This was Abhishek's worst night mare. It could not happen to him again. Every time Abhishek boarded a lift more chances than not it got stuck, and yet again today when he thought the lift could not be overloaded, it stuck of power cut.
It was more than a hour now, it was the worst bout of claustrophobia he ever faced. he could feel a sense of paranoia around him. He could breath and still feel breathless . The dim emergency light gave the place a more smaller look than what it actually was.
He thought whats taking so long to get generators running, it was the Saturday night and that was the problem. Usually at this hour there were no people in the building. The guard hence always indulged in a bit of inebriation. today the bit was an understatement.
He did make some calls from his cell phone asking for help, it was long due. Every moment that passed was like a year, and ticking of his wrist watch seemed like gong of death.

You alright she asked, though suffering from paranoia herself she was more composed than him. I am averse to lifts he replied. Claustrophobic ? yes only in lifts though. Yes i had traveled with you once, you might have noticed, but u seemed comfortable traveling by air she smirked. We did! , well i cant remember though when, i am yet to travel from this office, i am a new joinee. No from Pune to Delhi was her reply. That was 3 years back. I have only traveled once, in that route. That was just after college. Well i am impressed, u seem to have an awesome memory, he smiled. He was quite amused, well those days he used to be in shape, and tall and dark, he thought.. his face lingered in her mind for over 3 years now, he was all self appreciation. Well my memory is not that great, she replied but yours needs to be improved. we studied in the same college , were my senior. I was part of the cultural society team, where even you were a part. And there was a silence, that seemed to echo in the dull elevator. This was impossible he thought, he knew he suffered from selective amnesia, but never till had forgotten people.
You never noticed, did you? the girl who used to hover around you, who would pass on the water when you guys were tired putting posters and back drops. Hold on the ladder, and pass the scalpel when the trees and wall needed climbing for banners to be put and the campus to be decorated . Was I that insignificant? Abhishek was blank, did not have single trace of her in his memory, he did not know what to reply.
Sorry if i ever hurt you. I was too engrossed with work. No you weren't, you were too engrossed wooing the hot chics i would say, she replied with a smirk, but it sounded as if it was a frown.

Do you love me she inquired?
Excuse me i don't even know your name, I hardly know you.
I dont know what you talking of, but i cant recall you. Sam used to assist me in all my college activities, he held the ladders for me , I even gave him my pen knife as a token so that he could take charge of the same next year.
And what about those days when he did not turn -up. Some one from my team would help me out.
So i am some one now, u don't even know my name, and yet you trusted me with your life. I was always the some one who held your ladder, passed the water and the knife. There where times i could have shaken you off the ladder, i felt like doing it more than once. Once i was about to stab you with your pen knife, but right at the moment Sam turned up. You owe your life to me she said with this hysteric laugh.
Suddenly the paranoia that had engulfed him for over an hour now increased in geometric proportions. He was choking he thought. But why, what was my fault i was always working, i never abused you, never passed any innuendos or tried to take advantage of you, then why.
Because you were indifferent towards my insignificant existence in college. I was not a popular in college was so minuscule for you that you never noticed. i have done so much for you and you never even asked my name.
When we traveling together, i greeted you. You did smile, i thought you had noticed me and recalled me, but it was the same greeting that you gave me in lift today, a small courtesy greeting. Is at right next to you, you at the window and i at the middle even when aisle was empty, just to have a chat with you, some thing i longed for years. But you put your earplugs on . You asked the attendant for a pillow, and told her you suffer from claustrophobia , hence wanted to sleep, but asked her not worry, its mainly in elevators you have problems not yet on flights.
Are you stalking me? he shouted knowing not what to say, no she replied only avenging you.
the moment the power failure happened in the darkness she had pressed the stop button. So even when power came back Abhishek did not realise, it did The lift never moved.
Abhishek for not knowing me, for your complete disregard towards my sole existence today you will pay the price. And suddenly Abhishek felt the choking intensify breathlessness along with paranoia, increased his palpitation . He shouted and screamed. He shouted aloud, and and fell of his bed. Hid dad glanced at him with one eye full of sleep, son you auditioning for Indian idol in your sleep or what, and went back to sleep. It was just a nightmare he thought, the one that shook him out of his wits, some how he remembered the face the petite charming bespectacled face.

he met the same face again on the stairs next day, she was coming down while he was going up, the passed the courtesy greeting once more, Abhishek still shaken by last nights dream. Some how after climbing few more stairs he rushed back and shouted, excuse me miss, where you from Fergusson?
Thank god she replied, i thought you would never recognise.

Abhishek's Selective amnesia could not erase every insignificance he wanted to forget, it caught up with him

Times have Changed

2007-09-06T11:42:00.000+05:30

Its over, the honeymoon is over. It lasted for 2 and a half years post graduation. It was a long time , and good till lasted. Well from Bob Dylan's Time they are changin to Things have changed, is a full circle that has changed the life of us Gokhaleites.. We love to meet each other though, we get nostalgic and go away, we all have something to say, which we would have told each other during Post Graduation , but now we find it not pertinent enough to disclose.
Do we have some thing to look ahead for, apart from how good we were together.
We had planned marriages, to attend ..and kids to tell stories off. We thought we would cry our guts out when people part. But why are our eyes dry today.. do we not love our friends no more, or is it just Let it be.
In this quintessential life of turmoil we have again come to believe relationships of any sort dwindle over time post college.. and we have been proved right again . as we are ready to make new starts to our lives once again post Gokhale, i just wish we were coming back to life once again as well.

Communalism and Communism

2007-09-05T11:37:00.000+05:30

I have grown up in a city, the final destination of Communism , Calcutta ( I do not call it Kolkata)
I have always detested the ideology, but unlike many Bengalis who practice the doctrine with having a clue of its principals, i would pat own back for criticising after studying it. Its Karl Marx who to me had foreseen the end himself, but wisely enough he did not pen it down, if he had then might have been different for his Marxist follower. He had seen the cycle, Royalty - Aristocracy- Bourgeois-Proletariat, was his cycle, The thing thats common between all the predecessors of Proletariat were, they started with a revolution, with a good cause in mind( or at least they thought so) but once in power got corrupted.. and hence new form of doctrine in brief the theory of Dialectic materialism.
Whatever i guess i am deviating from my point.
I have grown up in the final resting place of Marxism .. with the longest serving incumbent government in history of modern politics his still serving its tenure.
I hated their policies till recently , as even though i was always in favour of a welfare state, I always thought of the economic viability of the result.
Any way for many things that i have hated the left, there is one thing that i do like is abouts its one positive externality , annihilation of communal fanaticism.
Why i say its an externality is because, one of the few principle of communists is opposing the faith in god.
The the cadres, their party men were just left comrades.. their religion was communism
With wide advent of naxalism ( read firebrand vandalism) in the 70s gave onus to this communist doctrine .
Everytime their was a communal disharmony.. there would have been a clash of three.. The two communal groups and the communists... and no points for guessing who won. Its was like if you guys fight on communal grounds ,ill slaughter you both.. cant you see you guys are killing our cadres and vote banks.
So there you go..
I wont say riots never erupted in Calcutta, it e3rupted only in very few parts of the city, and cool down within a day or 2.
Even in 92 when India through out was burning.. Calcutta was relatively quieter. it was very weird for a state with a demography of a 50 -50 share in numbers. Whats funny was even though areas like Park Circus a pre-dominantly Muslim locality did see communal violence 1992.. yet the next year it again hosted one of Calcutta's one of the largest Durga Pujas.
thats one of the essence that communist have brought into Communal part of Calcutta.
Even though with its fair share (near 40%) Muslim Population, West bengal has never been very communal apart from the partition time which also stopped with Gandhi intervening .
Well the communal harmony has another reason to it. Bengalis are always Bengalis first and their religion are always secondary and communism has enhanced that as well. (Bangladesh breaking away from Pakistan on linguistic grounds remember)
Durga Puja is now not a Hindu festival but a Bengali Festival. and hence there are many large Puja like Park Circus, and Mohammad Ali Park which are to large extent funded my Muslims.. and hence that makes me a proud Calcuttan ( and under my breath i dont want people to hear, i am thanking the communists for that)

The Devils Advocate:

Calcutta with a secular mindset . and a soft corner for fellow Bengali's on the other side of the border , because they are Bengalis first , might become a safe haven for terrorists, in recent past we have noted, Bangladesh is becoming a breeding ground for them. Its easy for these louts to cross the volatile border and take shelter in Calcutta, as no body will question them.
Its weird how Communal Harmony is being used for Communal fanaticism .. and yet Indian Government might be in a fix to take any strong measure against Bangladesh.. as Bengalis will resist such decision.. This why I hate Bengalis being Bengalis first

Mark of Shiva

2007-08-23T11:24:00.000+05:30

Damn you cartoon u missed a frigging point point blank, scowled the one of the shooters...Abhishek was down in the ground wenching in pain.. did not know what hit him..it was the standard issue FN Browning Gp35 9mmx19mm bullet,it was his temple that hit.
Bloody joker, we need to bury him now.
Sorry saabji replied the other shooter in low key voice.
They were two of the elitest of marksmen in the country, and they had marked their man well from the international Bus depot they , since he arrived. From Saltlake to Esplanade they followed him from noon to dark they were his shadow, waiting for the opportune moment. The man had no clue what fate he had, their order was simple shoot to kill.
The Man had gone to the biriyani shop in the afternoon..they had their lunch at the table behind..then to the movies they followed him for the raunchy C grade soft porn flick.. They for a moment thought were they behind the right man..was he the Conspirator, or just another tourist from across.
Even with their doubts they followed him ..now to a bar, no, no way can be a conspirator. Yet their orders were simple shoot to kill. The man was a guzzler drank cheap whiskeys after another.. they could not seat idle them selves.. as his count increased.. so did theirs..they did not want any body to be suspicious.

This was now the man made his mistake, he streched his arms to yawn in a very sozzled fashion, giving them a sneak peak of his pot belly, and the colt double eagle, cozied in his trouser..
Thats an expensive weapon for a lout like him, they knew they had their man.
" saabji yehi tapkaun kya?" Sir should i take him down right now? asked the junior personnel..'nehi hume presswalo ka jhanjhat nehi chai ye" No we dont want the press hounding us replied the superior.. there were far too many people in the bar.

"Bahar jake thokte saale ko" will shoot him once he is out.

It was 11:30 in the night, Abhishek a bit drunk him self came out of the bar lit a smoke , he was expecting a call since evening which never came..
he should not be in this part of the town at this hour he thought, but were will find cheap liquor when your wallet does not assist you at the end of the month.
More so he was in this sulky mood whole day and needed a drink, he came here for some work.. but cheap booze stopped him and made him miss the last metro .

He was walking down the alley as many a taxi refused him to take him to his destination, as they thought he was drunk, and this was no up market locality.

He was walking when his phone rang .

They had taken their aim, it was difficult as the man was walking like a crab now.. was in state of drunkenness could not walk straight, yes we will take him down at the turn, they thought.
They aimed and they shot.. right at that moment the man bumped into a young guy who was about to take his phone out from his pocket..
Both fell.. abhishek was bleeding and and the man had passed out.

"Saale point blank tha woh.. Chal ambulance bula dekhte hai zinda hai mar gaya..
Chal chal usko thok."
."
That was a point blank you idiot.. anyway call an ambulance, and check if he is alive...and shoot the other bastard was the order.

Saabji he is alive.. but in shock.. lucky ass just has a flesh wound. the bullet grazed his temple .. worse sabji, we need a hush up
and the marksman started laughing like a rogue.. my name is Shiva..

Shiva's browning cracked twice more.. with the silencer it was just soft thuds.. now mistake this time.

Abhishek woke uo at a nursing home.. all his bills were already paid. He had a letter right next to him.
You saw nothing, and a cheque with a seven figure some on it...50 lakhs to be precise.

Abhishek still had no clue what happened..the bullet grazed his temple leaving a wide horizontal mark.. it resembled the the parallel marks of shivites or devotees of lord Shiva were on their forhead.. the Mark of Shiva.

If his phone did not ring that day he would never have been shot.. if he was not shot , he would not be as rich to be precise..

Nazi Part II Hitler

2007-08-06T22:42:00.000+05:30

To me Adolf Hitler was a patriotic man , who went wrong in the means to acheive the end. Well even if ends justify the mean.. no body can justify what he did and hence nor will I.
But what i am looking at Why the Nazism had a perfect fit for erstwhile Germany..
The answer is in World War I. Not just the treaty of Versilles.. which was absolutely humilating for Germany, from things like taking the blame of the war , to Ruhr being ceded to France. For those who have limited knowledge.. its like giving Kashmir Valley to Pakistan and Damodar Valley to Bangladesh. There was another reason for Germanys loss.. Jews. the Jews during the WWI was investing in every other country in Europe apart from Germany.. which allowed the the Allied powers a crucial edge.

Hitler Blamed the Jews for this reason which was legetimate.. but what he did was not.
Any way this is why the concept of One Nation State.. A state for German nordics..Aryans.
He was patriot because what he was doing was with basic love for the nation.. yes he had ultirior motives but he was patriotic in nature.
The whole concept of One nation State had instilled Germany as a country first in the minds of germans. Germans became a nation in itself. and that is why the Berlin Walll could have been brought down.. if some body could have done that it was only the germans.
Think of India and Pakistan even we were separeted around the same time... on the basis of religion.. a third part was curved out of pakistan on basis ogf language..
and we can never re-unite. as we are either Brhamins /Rajputs/ Vaishyas/ Shiya/Sunni etc etc first then May be a Bengali or an Oriya or Pujabi . then may be an Hindu or a Muslim . but never Indian First..

Is India a nation?? thats another arguement but its a multi national state and will nevr re-unite..

The misunderstood Nazi.Part.I

2007-08-06T10:31:00.000+05:30

I am a Nazi, sounds intimidating right.. well that’s the dogma behind the term that has almost created it as Taboo in a form..
Well though its an off shoot of fascism... Nazism and fascism are not one and the same.
Fascism originated from the word Fasces meaning a bundle of sticks tied to an axe , which was a symbol of power in ancient Rome.. it was common to Nazism in respect that both were dictatorial Governments in the same era, and the countries formed an entente..

Nazi: National Socialistic party , based on Nitschean Theory of Super man. Also known in political theory as the N.Theory of super man.. Where every Nation had leader who was the superman who was followed by all the classes.. This theory was backed by Hegelian theory of Class.

Well what is the basic Doctrine behind Nazism
It’s a dictatorial Government ruling a One Nation State.. Where the concept of State is very important, and the state is supreme.

According to Nazism the Society exists because the State and not State because of society.

Coming back to the first part of the doctrine ‘One nation State’.. this meant that in lay mans term the country(state) will consist of one race(nation).

Hence from the basic doctrine two things become clear

a) Nazism is racist
b) Nazism is patriotic
Both are quite inter related, if The Nation and State are the same…

In the next part, we will see the implications of the above bringing in Hitler in the equation.

Writers Block and selective amnesia.

2007-08-01T13:39:00.000+05:30

To People Who read this blog,

I have been suffering frequent bouts of what we call writers block, hence this month only one post worth reading has been uploaded.

Its a funny thing , writers block, u can have it any time of the year, at any weather, and u dont even need microbes to generate it. Its generated by laziness and ennui towards the QWERTY or just lack of topics thats tickles your brains, that would lead the intellectual juices flow.

Any time you just dont feel like writing you blame it on Writers Block...you will give excuses, such as the words are not just coming out right....but actually what you are really suffering from is a tremendous lackadaisical approach towards things you should be other wise committed towards.
See what i mean.. i dont even know where i am going with this post and how utterly non sensical it might be, but this is the only way i think i can get over the block..

Apart from the Writers block i am also suffering from bouts of Selective Amnesia.. its again some thing you would like to not suffer from, but at times very helpful.. as it allows you to forget what you dont want to remember, its as simple as that.. but some times it leads you to trouble when u realise u have forgotten that you did not want to remember at certain time.. but riight now, you could have done with.
Few days back i met a person, i recognised her straight away, what her name was, where she from, what she does.. blah blah.. but where selective Amnesia hurt me was i forgot she was my Batch mate...
But other wise Selective Amnesia, can be a very important blessing..
you can forget your Mom in laws birthday, your girlfriends dogs name.. or even your wifes birthday for that matter, just convince your wife or your Girlfriend u suffer from Amnesia of a very special kind.. and rare in nature ( may be not after this post).. she would empathize the fact forgot. But trust me you should not forget your anniversary..history says you should always learn from your mistakes...yes you can forget to get her the gift.. or to take her out for the dinner..
This by far is the most non nonsensical post i ever have written.. tomorrow i might select to forget it .. but this was to get over my writers block you see
Yes i choose the easy way out..How Convenient

Ode to an estanged brother

2007-07-24T11:55:00.001+05:30

We are estranged for years o Brother, we have fought over valleys and barren land for these 60 years. Three wars, thousands of lives. But dear brother , can their be any hatred if there is no deep rooted love involved some where.

Dear Brother we need each other today, for survival of a nation of people that lived across Indus and between Ganges, but later Departed.

A brother is always a brother... may be estranged but family.

I write this in a context: I went back home late yesterday, and switched on the news to find the Ex- Director of ISI talking of a overt Military action in NWF Province in Pakistan, and some Indian defence strategy experts giving their views what it meant for India.

Well USA is slowly turning into an ally of India, even though it almost attacked India in 1971, but those were cold war days..

USA has always been an ally of Pakistan since its inception. till today when it has questioned Pakistan's internal geographic sovereignty .

ISI has promised extreme action if any such US Military action takes place in Pakistan.

We should not also forget , General Musharaf is an ex Special forces. He is now cornered, they are trained to gamble with lives. When cornered , i can bet my life's savings that he would retaliate back.

So this the issue in hand.. my proposition is what would India's Stance be.. if a war actually breaks out.. It should be noted Pakistan would not be a roll over as Iraq or Afghanistan was for USA.

Will USA seek logistical help from India, who has fought 3 wars with Pakistan.

Rather another audacious proposition, would India help if Pakistan seeks help.. Come what may, they are our own blood.. 60 years of hostility can not erase 6000 years brother hood, many Indian families still have families in Pakistan.

One think is for Sure USA will not get any logistic help from India, no use of Air bases, or ports. Indian democracy will not allow such dollar diplomacy.

But still its a news that all Indian's should keep a watch on,
Its in initial stages.. but then again it can snow ball any time.

Pushing Bengal Big

2007-06-21T22:34:00.000+05:30

Enough is enough, its time i once wear my economist cap on, as for those who know me, i am but all a trained Economist.
Prof Rodestien Roden once spoke of his Big Push theory. A theory that had touched my soul, as one of the few ecomomic theory that was practical.
The idea was simple, a low developed country, put in a Basic manufacturing Industry.. and it will lead the economy through various Back ward forward linkages.

Even my loved , closest near and dear once, will think a zillion times to peg me as a communist. But today on their 30th anniversary I defend them for lack of better choice.

I hear today singur as a farce to the face of Bengal, and the communist government has done nothing to take Bengal to India.
But Dudes, Singur is the gift of the communists to bengal, tomorrow we will be the ones saying we have the TATA car factory to lead from the front.
Prof Roden once said, you establish a basic factory such as steel or automobile.. what you require is labour.. and raw material in case of car auto- comps, so what happens next auto comps set plants.. means more labour..
Auto comps means steel and aluminum.. hence ,ore industries.. and impetus to already dying industries of bengal
For once media housdes, should not report for politicians and report as economist, i hope the IIMCs have taught you guys the basics of that.
Nandi gram and singur are different stories
and tomorrow the media will hail singur for the engine of economic growth of India, rest to say bengal

And yes Left front , thios is my tribute to you..for ruling Bengal for 30 years
come next elections ill vbote for thee, as in Bengal ill never have a choice of not voting for you, the oppostion you have with 30 seats in the assembly is everything but a choice..
But that does not mean you guys are the best.

But you are secular, and i respect you withoput liking you
congrats

madness

2007-05-24T13:16:00.000+05:30

I have decided , come august i will chase the rains, the first step to my so wanted Vagabond life style. I am off to cherapunji and mawsynram for 5 days.. it will be just me and my pen diary and my hip flask.
People think i am crazy chasing rains at this time of the year.. but you should have a mad man in all of us.. and at times unleash it.

Education The Best occupation

2007-05-23T12:45:00.000+05:30

I was going through a very well written blog : the Professional-Assassination
This some what inspired me to write what i am about to pen down.
I was always scientifically challenged, never had the taste for it. I was more inclined towards Social Sciences , rather than its pure form. It was then I decided to to pursue Humanities in by senior secondary school, a decision well supported by my parents, but not quite by their peers and our relatives. Thats quite history now , but then at times it felt quite insulting. But things changed when i joined Fergi (Fergusson College), one of the so called elitist in India and the Best in Maharastra ( Xavierites from mumbai may differ, but when i joined Fergi was ranked Higher than Xaviers Mumbai in both Arts and Science)

At least i thought things will change.. it did as well but the change was drastic. It was a paradigm shift out there, getting through BA was about 10 times tougher than Bsc. A lot of science students if did not make it through to Engineering would prefer to join Arts than Science, but could not clear the cut -offs.
Well there i was i thought at last getting the due pay off we deserved. But it was an illusion that soon vanished.
The day i entered my class. Compulsory English ( more cumpulsory than english).
And as a result i studied in Fergi for 3 years and went to class for 3 mnths over all , and most of it in first year. the third year i attended lectures for 3 days.
Well this was so called one of the best places in India to study, and that to economics.. and i all most got a distinction, in all the 3 years.. of what i call a paid vacation.
I never learnt a differentiation in Economics, but did learn about world politics.. Did not learn Game theory but learnt the difference between strumming and plucking.. and why jimmy page was god.
I realised, weed was smoother than cigerattes.. but leaves you on a bad guilt trip for not knowing Econometrics.
I learnt every thing i wanted to know apart from my specialisation , thats economics.. and still at times manged to top the paper in college.
I later realised why its very important to go to a good college, as it might not make u a genius.. but definitely make you a man.. today i can faff without a drop of an eye lid,.. and be street smart with out knowing jack sit, thanks to a good college.
yet there is some thing about them ( good colleges) that tickle your intellect. Its you fellow students. remember even they are one of the bests as well. its this melting pot of ideas over a drink, thats opening your eyes and not you ekbote-notes .
When I reached my post graduation i understood, its not the education , that matters, but your apptitude for education. If u have it you can always start from scratch, but if u dont have your wits around you , or your intellect.. then even a good aptitude will never take you any where.
You need the self confidence/smartness.. which surely a good college instills in you.
Today i am not what i am because of my knowledge, but because what i can do with that knowledge.
and u need no college to impart that.. I did not take classes in bar tending or cooking.. but yet i was always the first choice chef and bar tender in all our parties.
Knowledge is some thing that you gather from your surroundings...and it does not matter if you are from IIT, if u cant use your knowledge..
Keep the windows of your mind to educate your self .. everyday.. as it will always be the best occupation

Of Honesty , truth and tact

2007-05-14T10:43:00.000+05:30

I have always defined Honesty the way i want it to be.
To me honesty has always been, being honest to myself, the feeling that i did my best possible to get the possible outcome for me , my loved ones and may be my employers. I have never been in all due respects Gandhian, who has taught us to believe means justify ends.. but on the contrary i have followed the Gita ( See me writing THE GITA.. so dont ask me who is Gita now) stating ends justify means.
The Day i look at the mirror and dont like what i see, i will know i have been dishonest, and to be true.. that has happened a few times already.

The Means for an Honest end is either the truth or tact. Yes to me being truthful and bing honest are not the same.. being truthful might not be being honest and Vice versa.

A lot might ask me how do you define an Honest End, I would like to say no end is complete good nor complete bad, but i seek an End which is what thats called the greater good.

Coming Back to Truth and Tact , the two ways.. to an Honest end.
Again being tactful does not always mean you are not truthful, but it might mean you are being truthful in a diplomatic way.
Diplomacy, hypocrisy even a lie can be tact... but a tact is a best possible strategy, in a situation where the complete truth wont work, in lighter example, if some body asked me what did you think of the girl u just saw, and i dont know if he or she is expecting a positive reply, and even though i might be indifferent, i might give a subtle reply such as " she would look beautiful if she lost 5 kgs"....i am not being truthful here totally, but at the same time i am not being untruthful.. at the end its not leading to an awkward situation where i have my foot in the mouth, the person who questioned me is happy.. and i was honest to myself even though not being totally truthful.
But this is a lighter idea.. but what happens, in a situation far more sensitive, where stakes are high.. and may be diplomacy like previous statement might not work.. and the truth might make things averse..
This is a situation I have always dreaded, the best possible outcome out of a hypocritical white lie.. ( this is a situation lawyers find themselves a lot of time, thank god i am not one of them) but then again if my duty.. goal .. responsibility is the outcome.. which is of a greater good, which will do more better than worse of my lie, i wont think twice to lie. A person very close to my heart said, Its not always economics, but it is.. is the social costs of lie is lesser to the social and in-tangible benefits all derive out of my lie, rationally its better to lie.
The truth: The truth is in detailed facts. truth does not have emotions sentiments.. it does not see situations.. its blatant cold facts. It gives you the picture and sequence of events.. but might not give you the rationale of events.
And a true lie or the best possible method of tact, is not the event per say, but the to play around with the rationale of the events.
But at times i feel truth might be the best possible way of tact.. when u are completely clean, when no body can spot a mark on your shirt , smell a whisp of alcohol on your breath , or even put a finger on you..
This is when u use the Nuclear weapon ( read brhmaastro) of tact "tactlessness" .. calling a spade a spade.. after loosing yyour inhibitions will boost your ego a lot, u might get that respect that you deserved.. but also might put others back to place where they belong.. but the timing of this weapon has to be perfect.. or else it will misfire in your own territory, this aggresive weapon is always good to be up your sleeve as the last and final line of defence when everything else has failed

But then again i feel all humans are gray in nature.. and hence diplomacy will always remain the best tact to reach and honest end.. and truth will always be diluted

Travel log of A bachelor

2007-04-26T10:23:00.000+05:30

This was the travel log of my Brother( who then was a bachelor and could have been care free, i dont know if he did a trip like thi post wedding hahahahhah cheers maite):

This was a great weekend for me. I went on a roadies trip to Scotland. Booked a car, and moved on, to see the beautiful country. Scotland is a land of Glens (woods), Bens (peaks), Lochs (lakes) and castles. The landscape is primarily divided into highland, lowland and island. Lowlands are lush green meadows, with sheep, cattle, horses and deer farms (they eat deer; I also ate it, very tasty). Farmers are what we saw in our story books, caps and pipes, riding on a horse, 4 to 5 sheep dogs running around him, or standing with a staff, wearing kilt and smoking pipes……

The highlands are barren and mossy, but gets white with snow during winter. Here is where the world's best spirits are brewed. But that's not in proper highlands, that's where the glens come in the picture. Being woody, and owing to Scotland's climate, which is particularly foggy, damp and cold, added to the effect of the glens, it provides the ideal condition for fermentation. We saw an underground storage where whisky is kept to be matured in oak casks……….the place is cold, damp and dark, and you need to carry flame torches to be in there……….

Fortunately, it was a full moon night, and you should see loch ness in the full moon!! The fog descends, forming a thick cover over the loch, occasionally you would see old logs and dead trees looming over them, the full moon doesn't shine but hazily casts huge shadows, and the night animals cry on to complete the altogether spooky picture. No wonder, one might well have seen Nessy, the famous loch ness monster somewhere around there; it's highly probable!

Edinburgh is a lovely city, a mixture of the medieval and the modern. The town is built around the central castle, which stands tall on top of a steep cliff, surrounded by what was once a moat. It's virtually impossible to access the castle from any direction but one; the main entrance. And from the castle, one can view the whole of the city till the river that goes on to meet the North Sea. It's like if the king needed to know what's going on in the west of the city, all he'd need to do is peek from a window in the west!

The northern most part of Scotland is bordered by the North Sea, which was earlier used by Scotsmen to trade with the Norwegians. It is said the Scots are not Saxons, but Normans, and originally came in as Vikings through the North Sea and settled there. Several documents and subsequent research have verified the connection between the Celtics and the Vikings.

Like Gothic, the Scot tradition, art and architecture is called the Celtic form. Although they look much like Gothic, their constructions are sharper; the Gothic domes are replaced by the Celtic spears. They are pointed-conical shapes, which was later borrowed by the Brits in their Georgian Architecture. The British Castles, however, are markedly different in plans and construction, to the Celtic ones. While the former built castles virtually around entire cities, here the castle was like a palace, with the city built around it.

The weather makes the Scots a laid back lot. They are not lazy, though, but have a general sloth in whatever they do. They take their days easy, sit for a whisky whenever they feel like, and can just drop work at the middle of it and go off fishing!

A port was once built at Port Arbroath to trade with the Americans and Europeans. It was one of the biggest wet docks of the 17^th century. And they traded well too, till 18^th century, when some fishermen were settled there to add to the fishing industry. Slowly, the number of fishermen grew in Arbroath, even as the number of traders started to dwindle. After the Great War (the Europeans call World War I the Great War, and World War II the World War) trading was totally stopped and Arbroath became entirely a fishing port. The wet dock started housing fishing boats! Now the guys fish when they want to, and the fishing boats have been replaced by water scooters and motorboats, so they can go have fun when they want to.

Kilts look great on Scots! Kilts look great on me too, I bought one and wore it and I was looking fine indeed J

Kilts are extremely formal attire, and work with shirts shoes, bows or ties and jackets. But they are also worn with the traditional shawls in the highlands. Kilts primarily are made of 4 base colours, green, blue, black and red and each signify different clans and regions. Like blue base kilts are always from highland clans, while green based ones are their lowland counterparts. The royalty would wear the black kilts, while the ploughmen and shepherds wore the red one. I got myself the red one. They also have an intricate system of clans and families, where each has its own culture and history, name, coat of arms and flags. It is said that Scotland originally had 15 clans, which later multiplied till the last figures that show around 15000 of them! I got myself a cap pin for the McKenna clan, one of the first fifteen, and a very rare piece. It was from an old shop in the alleys, managed by an equally old couple, who sell cap pins and kilt pins and broaches. The old man had this bowl full of at least a thousand such articles, and while sifting across them he accidentally stumbled across this one and was astonished himself. Apparently he never knew himself that he had one of them! So from now on, I am also a McKenna, since I carry the clan's coat of arms J

But the best thing about the journey was the drive. More than 110 miles, north to south, east to west. The best thing about driving here, as I had mentioned before, is the fantastic documentation that they have, and the technology. GPRS systems have allowed road maps to be created for even the village roads all over Europe. And such maps are downloadable from the internet, or sold over the counters. All you need is an able navigator, whose job is to basically sit with the maps and trace the route. And the rest is pin-point precision. And the speed limit for the motorways here is a minimum of 70 mph, a max of 110 mph. you are fined both for going below and over speeding. And they are hefty amounts, too. So everyone follows rules and drives safe, as they know, at a 100 mph, even a kiss by another car would mean a kiss of death. And the car rentals work on standards in which they scrap any car that's run more than 6 months or 30000 miles, whichever is earlier. And by scrap they mean scrap……to the scrap yards to be broken down and recycled! That guarantees you have excellent car condition during these drives.

So long for now. Will tell you more about my next trip to Switzerland, due next week.

this by the way is not written by me .. but is a letter written to me a year back

Parochialism and Bengalies

2007-04-20T10:40:00.000+05:30

Parochialism is necessarily the greatest evils.. that cause hindrance to formation of a strong nation state or country... And India is suffering from this cancer for ages now.. The Cancer has now reached most part of the nation from Kashmir to Kanyakumari.. on caste and religion grounds.. it always existed in Bengal in regional and linguistic grounds.... and even I am being parochial here writing for Bengal, and not writing about Tamil Nadu here.

We Bengalis/Calcuttans have always had a superiority complex,that we are the intellectual force of India.. and why not.. all the Indian Nobel laureates are either Bengali or had some or a Calcuttan ( Tagore, Sen, CV Raman, Mother Terasa).. also we have in our community like the stalwarts like Ray.. JC Bose..Meghnad Saha..and the list continues. But one fine day i woke up to see the so called intellectual force of the country has become bigger than the country itself.
The other day a friend of mine asked me do you know what 25th baisakh is.. thinking that being a so called probashi for last decade or so.. now coming back , i might not be knowing the significance of the date( Tagore's birthday) .. I replied i have no clue what 25th Baisakh is but i know what 22nd sravan is ( Tagore's death anniversary ). To my suprise, my friend there did not realise the pun there.. and worse he did not know what 22nd sravan was,..to retaliate a question was what is 21st february... I was quizzed.. this time i really had no clue that it was suppose to be Bhasha Dibash.. or International Mother Language day.. this day is celebrated in Bangladesh as big as their independence day.. as their fight to have a country of their own linguistic grounds was fulfilled.. honestly i dont care a tiny rats ass about it.. i have more important dates to remember , ut most bengalis here will remember 21st February .. but not 9th August or 16th december or 26th july.. and mostly no body cares.

Any way i still see an allaince of many Bengalis towards bangladesh over India, in a lot of issues..also iam not very sure how unhappy bengalis were when India lost to Bangladesh.
Even when Saurav Ganguly was dropped, no body in bengal saw his then current form or lack of it.. IT WAS A BENGALI PLAYER WHO WAS DROPPED...

Even a bollywood song how pathetic it might be will be great hit if it has a bengali word in the song, or sung by a bengali ( Well there are a lot of bengali singers in Bollywood no doubt)

I am not questioning the Beengals Pride.. but Pride over the country.. the pride that blinds the right and wrongs.. a pride with out logic..
We as Indians should be ashamed if we forget dates like 26th November( As many do and many dont.. the actual day day when India became a republic..The day The Constitution of India was passed by the Constituent Assembly of India, even though we do not celebrate it .. )but as Bengalis we should be proudif we celebrate 21st February.

Alcoholic concepts.. and Dr Jekyl and Mr Hyde

2007-04-20T10:15:00.000+05:30

When ever a solution was asked to me in my college days, the simple solution was alcohol, or the lack of it. You have a cold., have rum or brandy.. stomach ache beer.. feeling hot beer again.. heart ache whiskey.. A pensive mood always suggested a chronic alcohol deficiency , or the medical terminology by Dr Abhigyan was definite symptoms of alcohol deficiency and a trip to Apache is recommended. It could be for kicking ass in an exam or after having your ass kicked in an exam.. the answer was always the same to me..I have won debates.. after getting drunk on stage.. or mastering the courage to sing a medly on stage and getting accolades for the same .. was again alcohol. First time ever when i topped a paper in college was after having hmmmmmmmm ( i lost count after 8) bottles of beer.(82 Micro economics) and second time post graduation after doing a tequila chaser in Environmental Economics. This was termed as Abhigyan's Alcoholic concepts .. over college and PG... But then every thing changed ....Alcohol started having me , the transformation was of that of DJ and MD... i could not remember any thing what happened the night before.. and the frequency increased.. i realised.. i am getting there.. to the road that leads to alcoholism.. as Dr J always knew What Mr D can do.. but still changed to MR D.. so did I... and what was scary.. i liked it.. a life with out inhibitions.. giving the window to my dqarker side And worse was if i remained drunk on the streets of Pune or Delhi.. no body with bother.. if i live or die. Mu first step was leave my credit cards back home while going to office.. and switch my cell phone off.. while drinking if ever.. the frequency of alcohol intake considerably reduced by the end of delhi.. But one day after few months Mr Hide re appeared..and why it re appeared i ma not sure... but it did.. but this time Dr J is ready.. to fight him.. Its not the alcohol thats ever been the problem.. it excess of it...its the urge to have more...even after few drinks... thats Mr Hyde here.. Well i wont turn into a dipsomaniac.. i know what is to be done and will do that

Of love or something like that

2007-04-17T23:22:00.000+05:30

People say i am averse to love, my friends are sick and tired of my over exposed singular status, nostly when with their respective girlfriends, spouses/ fiancees ..Some even question my sexual orientation. Why is it this difficult for some body to realise that a person can be happy of his single hood. Even my parents are a bit intrigued with my so called happiness as the seeds of my marriage have slowly started germinating in their heads.

The true fact is just because a person is single , it does not mean he is averse to love as much as the fact that not nessecarily a single man will always seek love..
The fact i am not seeking love, does not logically mean i am averse to it.
I have heard the cliche a godzillion number of times now, that the perfect match is waiting right at the next corner but you fail to see her.
I am so tired of it now.. i have made the perfect match criteria so difficult
.. that no body can ever say that again..its not easy to find a tall dusky curly haired intellectual bong girl any way..(technical barriers to find the match)

the other day an friend of mine. she came up to me and said, every body has a perfect match, u just need to find him or her.. yes right.. the world has a population of around 100 billion.. so the probability of finding her is 1 in 100 billion i said.. dont you think i have better things to do than running after such a probability.
Few days back, when i was in delhi, i use to cross the national adoption center everyday en route office.
One day i walked in, just to find that being a single father, i night have to wait a donkeys year to be eligible for adoption.
Why cant a single Man be a good father i Ask??
Why is everybody and the world at large conspiring to get me hitched??

On the hind side
The question i ask to myself.. am i really averse to love?? am i running away from it, has some person within me died , have i forgotten to emote? why am i setting such high standards for myself..am i an escapist, who is scared of the ghosts of the past?.. what if the all the cliches did com true... what if i have already overlooked people i have should not..should i make ammends for lost time??
or may be she will meet me at the most unexpected places on earth.. may be i have met her in the most unexpected place..

I have no answers..
but i believe i am happy.. but i dont know my belief is questionable or not.. but its my belief.. and i stand by me.
Yes i would love to get married some day.. i would love to fall in love again.. i would love to share those intimate moments, those romantic dinners, ythose fights which two people share.. and i know i miss them..but still i wait.. for what i dont know.i wait for some thing to happen

What happened to the pro active me...has it not done with its beauty sleep??

Am I averse to love??

Guys thats what I call A patiala

2007-04-10T09:34:00.000+05:30

It was Friday evening, the pentagon had its meeting today in Abhishek and Unmesh's double seater room in the block II of the hostel. Though room was called a double seater, it was big enough for three people and was unlike any other prison cell single seater in the hostel. it was a huge room with old wooden flooring, with the windows facing the barren fields between the hostels and the mess. This allowed the breeze during prolonged monsoon to cool down the atmosphere in the room which was perpetually heated by the argument between the childhood friends roommates.
The sheer size of the room, made the room the perfect meeting place for the Pentagon. Every friday evening Aritra , Arun, Kartik and the roommates met here over cheap whiskey and lemon concentrate, more than a dash of college gossip, and Kartik's never ending flings with a new girlevery week, but mind you, every week he thought he was in love.

Abhishek was that day in his ever so perennial pensive mood, that use to dawn on him during his first year of college. Today it was a fallout between the room mates again, today it was Abhishek's stuff on Udyogs side of the room again.
Fresh out of school, the children in them had not disappeared then yet.
The first member of the pentagon to arrive was Kartik, he was the one to score the whiskey that day.
Abhishek in his grumpy mood had decided not drink that day.
Slowly the gossips increased, with the flow of whiskey, Abhishek in his bed smoking his cigarette slowly feeling out of place, not being drunk. The heavy drinker he was , the whiskey bottle was too enticing for sleep, but he could not drink with the guy he fought that day he thought, and started contemplating in joining the party that was on its peak. No he will not drink he made up his mind for sure. It was then he realised, the bottle was three quarters empty.
And then it happened like lightning, before any body realised what struck them it was over, literally over. Abhishek had jumped from his bed after grabbing his glass from the bedside table, fixed himself to stiff 90ml drinks one after another and gulped it down neat. It was the statement that he made after that he meant after that remained a legend for years to come "Guys that what i call a Patiala"
Patiala was for sure, as sure as the fact that they had ran out of booze, not only that he had smoked the remaining two Wills navy cut thanks to the sudden rush of alcohol in his blood.
Unlike most of the days today the pentagon had a lot of money amongst them, and Abhishek was then the King of the world. At 3am in the morning he agreed to sponser good whiskey and packet of 20s wills for every body.
They had walked a mile to Good Luck cafe to in search of cigarettes.. Butno bootlegged liquor shop nor cigarette shops had kept the door open for them.
It was then Unmesh had the brilliant idea of picking up half smoked fags from the road and smoking them. At the hight of drunkeness that was the best possible option for everyone. With thousands of rupees in their wallets they had to scavenge for smokes, and beg for alcohol
near the military barracks, but did not have any luck with the whiskey the patiala had left the others not high and dry. That day a half smoked classic on the road was a goldmine to them.
As the defination goes.. Money is what money does , that day they were just paper.

Bengal Politics: Polity without Ethics

2007-03-29T11:34:00.000+05:30

Polity was originally a term used in Ancient Greece refer to the many Greek city sates that had an assembly of citizens as part of the political process. This did not include women, slaves, serfs, or metics. Thus, voting citizens usually included only a minority of the adult males.

Today it is usually a general term that refers to political organization of a group. It is often used to describe a loosely organized society such as a tribe or community , but can mean any political group including a Government or Empire, Corporation or Academy .
Thats what defines Polity. We were always told Polity and Ethics are the combination what formulates what we call POLITICS. Or at least thats what our Professor wanted us to believe.
But today i just cant believe in whatever I learnt in my 5 years stint of studying Political Science as a subject.

I don't know if I should be Proud or Ashamed to call myself the " Intellectual Bengali" given the situation in Bengal today. ( Some People will by cynic enough to say why are you not talking about India as a whole, well the answer is simple I choose not to, may be some time else, when i will be awestruck in negativity again, i will, and i very sure i will be given the chance much before I expect it.)

The first incident brought a smirk on my face, bloody Hypocrites i thought when i called up Pro-Left Family in 2004 when NDTV flashed that CPI(M) and Left will support a Congress left Government in the Center from out side with their 60 odd MPs( mostly from Bengal) to convey the message.

what quizzed me and i asked them " did you not fight the congress for Last 50 years in Bengal" and today the left had no inhibition to lend them their support."
The reply was no, they wont join the Government.
That could not have been better for the Left I thought:

You Support the Government as long they follow the CMP(Common Minimum Programme), Build pressure on them and pose threat to their chair, if things dont go your way, and yet you dont take responsibility for things going wrong at the Center, as you are "Out Side the Government".... Left front take a bow.. you just took the most Politically Correct decision ever...even though not the most not ethical. but then again Indian General Election is WAR.. and i save you of the Cliché, but what I did not get was is it a victory for Left or the Defeat for Congress.( Worth A blog)

The second incident was funnier still: A Communist Goverment seeking FDIs and Private Green feild Investment for Manufacturing sector on Agricultural Land .

( Damn Karl Marx Must be turning in His grave right now)।

Well i thought it was better late than never to think straight and give impetus to Industrialisation, and more so to the Auto-Sector, as that not only employs a huge chunk blue collared workers, but also is an industry with high incidence of backward and forward linkages। Well if there is a car plant, there will be Auto-component plants around, and so will be the distributors. CPI(M) political and ideological Idiosyncrasy was at last paying for Bengal .

The third being the funniest of them all : Trinamool Congress leader Mamta Banerjee's Gimmick to come out of political Oblivion, they won just 29 seats in the assembly and Speaker had to use his Discretionary Powers to name the Party as the main opposition। The left, theoretically can fulfill quorum in the assembly even if Trinamool walks out.

TMC who always had accused the left of depriving Industry in Bengal as a political manifesto, suddenly went Pro-agriculture when CPI(M) was seeking Industrialisation. She went on Hunger strike for months ( with out any effect on her body weight though) was the hight eccentric behaviour.
By the time it ended Tata's had already started the construction of their new Car plant.

All was fun to watch as an outsider, till Nandigram happened, it was now that slowly the frustration was seeping in. It was a clash of political parties where innocent citizens were made pawns.

While the police firing could have been uncalled for , the KJUNC was no innocent cog in the machine as well. The question that arises, why did the villagers think the Police was coming to take their land , while they were coming to bring Nandigram back under administration. How come The CMs decision to of the Land acquisition notice not trickle down to the farmers, and the villagers, why were they instigate the police? were they asked to instigate the police? these are few questions that arise.

What seeped in the frustration, was which sane headed investor/ conglomerate / Company will invest in state with such political turmoil ever again.... the question that arises.Is the road for Industrialisation over for Bengal?

The Master Blow: Today Morning the CM played his master strike.

No Industrialisation for Nandigram, but Chemical hub will happen at Land Earmarked by the Center.

Bingo.. center earmarking means State Congress out of action, suddenly the gun is centers shoulder which the State will fire..

TMC can now not blame state..( But then again who chooses the land? go back to incident 1)

Greatest Truth

2007-03-23T13:02:00.000+05:30

“The Greatest Truth

Some times in my leisure

I think of various thought,

I think why do they go where do they go,

I find no answer but I know

I day will come when I too must go.

It’s our greatest fear and our greatest threat,

Though before birth our destiny is set.

It’s the greatest truth and the greatest lie

For man, God is rolling a die

So why sorrow why cry...

So live your life till we die....."

I wrote this when I was 12-13 years old way back more than a decade now, I bumped into it the other day, and my parents published it in children's magazine. God only knows what I was thinking then, today when I read it I think was a cynic or an optimist or a realist at 12!! Today the happy go lucky self looking for the anchorage feels: did I take page out of this poem... live life till we die??

Today I don't say god is rolling a die, with all due respect to him. (See Preface) or did I learn to Walk on, thanks to this poem... today only if i could go back into that 12 year old boy's, and feel what he felt then.. But I too uncomfortably numb thinking of it now... the only thing that i can recollect is that yes i wrote it... It has my name written below it...

Abhigyan Sengupta

1994

Today I want to write............But I just cant ..........I cant write poetry no more, lost that art or wanted to loose it , I don’t know, but cant rhyme verse no more

“Light asks darkness where you stay, darkness replies in peoples mind from where you stay away”

Food for thought

2007-03-13T09:54:00.000+05:30

If only in India we all had pork and beef, or both the meat were categorically banned half the communal tensions were over, that what i really think.. if that was the case how could we differentiate between a hindu and a muslim, not that we can today by just looking at them alway. Think of it how many time has hindu turned down an invitation from a muslim counterparton different pretexts but actually owing to beef and vice-versa on jhatka meat* or pork???

If Beef and pork is banned in India you will se more hindus flocking to Muslim resturant for that rich biryani and succulent lamb.( East India is a different story)
that increased the camaraderie between the parties.
Also political motives of throwing beef in a temple and pork in a mosque will be a thing of the past, and even if it happens more chances than not the political motives will be well ascertained.

Another incredible true story is , not many people know that slaughtering cows is banned in most part of India, its mostly Buffaloes we slaughter. i dont remember reading any where that its sacrilege consuming buffalo in hinduism!!!

The issue is funny as Hindu religion considers cow holy but its equally pious to slaughter a buffalo as a sacrifice to Mother goddess in any form??
In some places the offering is then distributed as prasad. but then again if u remove its hide it looks same as a cow.
And then we hindus have a problem walking down a muslim neighborhood for the sight of the hideless buffalo looking like a cow.

As for me i love my Beef steak special sizzler with extra Ham in between the two steaks at Touche The Place Sizzlers. ..........Bon- Apetitte

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* Jhatka meat basicaly means lambs or chicken slaughter in one blow,that is decapitated, a hindu way of slaughter, against hallal the muslim way. Where hindus are not averse to halal meat muslims are averse to jhatka, hence most slaughter houses in India use the halal way, apart from east were jhatka is still widely a form of slaughter. What as a foodie i feel jhatka meat is tastier as the blood is allowed to remain in the meat.

Metmorphosed

2007-03-09T14:29:00.000+05:30

Welcome to Kolkata's Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose International Airpoorts Domestic Terminal the out side temperature is 28 degree Celcius. Thank you for flying Jet Airways, we would like to serve you again, we will using the Aero-bridge, so we request passenger to De-plane from the front exit' These were the first words I hear from the In flight Executive on my return to Kolkata on the 1st of march, I was about to get up while one of the attendants got my jacket from the rack, and thanked me for flying jet( some of the benefits of having a frequent flyer programme)

I came out dfrom the airport with the priority tag dangling on my luggage, and lit the Classic regulars, sporting a black ray-ban and in the elegant Black Park Avenue suit, was about to take the cab, when a guy came up to me and enquired me if I needed the Jet-Citibank credit Card, I told him I had it, but he insisted that I take the gold card, I obliged.

I sat in the cab, and was thinking while it zoomed through VIP road; it’s a home coming after seven years.

I still remember how over night i had booked the tickets for Gitanjali Express for Kalyan, and was 284 on the waitlist, was traveling with friend who decided to join me on the morning of our journey, with a general ticket only. We had to fill up the forms within the next 48hrs.

We did not fly; our parents had decided we see the world, as the way we had not seen till then. It was our decision to leave home, they supported us, but we were still on our own.

I remember taking that 30 hrs long journey in the May heat seating near the ‘ Wash Room' of the Indian Railways, smoking bidis.

Reached Kalyan at 12 in the night next day, and Pune at 3 am. I had fill up form in Fergusson College next morning.

That was years ago now, 7 years to be precise, the beginning to my tryst with the road, since then i have walked many a avenues, in Pune , Delhi and Mumbai respectively.

I have learnt to drink the tears, and wash of that childish giggle of my face,

Learnt how diplomacy can over power raw emotion. I have learnt the Game theory of life and know " In the long run we are all dead"

Learnt to mix my drinks, and inculcated the Taste for good Whisky, there where times we had the cheapest, with lemon stolen from the mess.. Today try to keep walking.

By then the Taxi had taken turn to our salt lake residence.

Went up to our newly renovated home, touched moms feet.. she said eto dine ghorer chele ghore firlo ( it was time the son came back home). Went to my room.. The renovated transformation was a metamorphosis completed

Functional Democracy

2007-02-27T11:53:00.000+05:30

Democracy , A Government of the people, for the people by the people was claimed the Best amongst the worst possibilities of governance according to Abraham Lincoln.

As there can never be anything better than democracy as a governance.. but still democracy or the way see it is flawed

Democracy basicaly of 3 types, Presidential Democracy or what the USA follow, Parliamentary , That we indians try to follow..
And a third typeFunctional Democracy.. which is the theoretical third type of Democracy.

While there is again two variants of both Presidential and Parliamentary democracy , i.e Multi Party system and Bi-party system, Functional democracy needs a Multi functional society.

If i go into the details of the pros and cons of either a Presidential bi-party or presidential multi party, or parliamentary Bi partyor Parliaentary Multi-party..it would take me at leat 10 lecture series to complete..but putting it simple .. they all fall short of expectations in differen aspects.. some in the case of options the other in stability. some on in logic...

the most logical form of democracy hence becomes Functional Democracy..
What is Functional Democracy,
Its a democracy without constituencies or political parties.
the society is devided into multiple functions
or feilds of work...Like the feild of Lawyers, Medical Practitioners, Armed forces, Laboureres, Economists, House wives, Farmers... they choose the their representatives to the parliament.. and the parliament then chooses a governmentaccording to the representation, not by virtue of votes but by merit.. but at the same time the leader of each function automaticaly gets their portfolio..
like the elected armed force representative will get the defence portfolio..and economist will get finance
The what i ask and seek comments from the readers is ... is it feasible to have Democracy in India.. and my next few blogs will be on the same topic after getting your suggestions

Economics of Bribe Part II A Serious Note

2007-02-22T12:24:00.000+05:30

Are all Bribes Illegal?

Bribes either have a legal or a moral connotation to it, either its illegal or immoral, what about bribes which are neither, what about a mother bribing a child with a candy to go to sleep so that the mom can take some rest, what about my brother buying me several drinks , for saving his ass a several times.. Are they illegal or immoral? They are neither.

Everybody has a selling price..Which varies from time to time what he will be selling for,

My friend might buy me drink to save his ass from his girl friend for not visiting her. But a single drink might not be enough for me to save his ass if I find him cheating on her..may be 25 drinks wont be enough.. But a bit of sentimental self pity from his side will make save his ass again..
The bribe can tangible or non tangible... like drinks, money, gifts are all tangible .. Emotional bribing though is not materialistic but is the worse form.

Then there is the third sort of bribing.the worst possible. Which though is not immoral or illegal to many .. But it is some thing, which is not human in lot of respect.. Its exploitation of wants Do you think we will be the people who will sell their votes.. Or even the less fortunate than us. The answer is no.
The people who sell their votes. Don’t even know what voting means, they don’t know what constituencies. They only know may be a meagre some 200 rs and some food will quench their thirst and they for one day have a square meal.. If u don’t have food in your belly or clothes on your body... and roof over your head.. then democracy can go to the dogs its a luxury.. as humans will first try to get their basic necessities right first.

Another intriguing story is that of Missionaries and the down trodden, low caste. tribal, poors, lepers etc
the Missionaries take care of them.. provide food, shelter, child education.. and as their service to god take their religion, and convert them..
do you thing for the people who they are converting.. religion mattered earlier.. what mattered was food and shelter.. they in a way bribed them to change their religion.. but was taking such a bribe IMMORAL or ILLEGAL. n the other side the Missionaries are doing their service to the god, and converting is very small price to these people for the amenities they are getting , they would argue.. but could this service to the god be voluntarily done..
At times bribe givers are re more immoral than the takers, as the takers re held to ransom..

if i had not eaten in 3 weeks i could kill for a bread...

EVERY BODY HAS A SELLING POINT. IF NOT MONEY.. THEN MORE MONEY ..IF NOT THEN LOVE... IF NOT LOVE THEN EMOTION.. IF NOT EMOTION THEN MAY BE FAITH..AND IF EVERY THING FAILS HOLD HIM TO RANSOM

The Economics of Bribe

2007-02-22T09:45:00.000+05:30

In my days in college in Pune, we use to ride motorcycles without Driving Licence or PUC, or NOC.. And every once in a while we used to get caught for the cops, if one saw the combined fine being caught by a cop for breaking a signal or parking in wrong location, given the above anomalies would amount to exactly 2000 rupees then, (900 for noc, 700 for driving licence, 300 for PUC, and 100 for breaking the signal)

Every time we got caught, we bribed the cop 100 rupees, but it was not the 100 rupees that was important, but the harassment undergone was huge ordeal, hence we reduced parking in wrong places, stopped breaking the signals and got that occasional PUC done .

Ronald Coase once said if there are two parties in a conflict, and there are well-defined ownership rights, then Pareto optimality can be achieved by mutual consensus by bargaining a middle path. (I know that’s very basic argument and no rocket science involved. but he still got a Noble in Economics for proving this and is called the Coase theorem, that’s what most economist have got their nobles, proving basic arguments)

Why do I say so, well government has a well-defined quasi ownership to road safety and law and order, and the conflict is between me and the protectors of law. Hence a mutually beneficial middle path can be achieved which will be Pareto optimal, by mutual consensus of bargaining. Basically Bribe.

Lets make it simple in a way: The cop who gets peanuts of a salary finds it incentive enough to catch hold of the person breaking the signal for that Rs. 100 as a bribe, he will calculate a suggest 2000, but I will pay 100, if I had Paid 2000, then he would not find it incentive enough as he had to make a challan of the same, and the money goes to the Government not him.

Also its beneficial for me as I am get away paying 100 rupees instead of 2000 but the harassment is something I don’t like.

So I make sure from next time I don’t cut the signal, have a PUC, NOC, DRIVING LICENCE, and do not park in no parking.

This becomes socially beneficial, and doing so attains a social optimum.

Now take away the bribe scenario, what happens I always Pay 2000 rupees, so the cop does not have an incentive of catching me as His salary is not a Function of number of law breaker he catches, so he shirks his duty, and I break the signal and go scott free.

So the social optimum is not attained.

Hence what do I conclude, Bribes good???

No I would not say that exactly, I would put it this way, a Law Enforcers slary should be a function of the variable x plus a Constant C.

Or f(y) = fx + C (Hebrew?? Sorry I had to do it, at the end I am an Economist by Education)

Where y= the law enforcers salary

X= the incentive derived from catching a law breaker

C= Constant, or the basic salary he receives from the government irrespective of number of law breakers he catches.

With the basic Economic Assumption of Ceteris Paribus as mentioned by my fellow economists.

The basic hypothesis is to remove bribe and still have a social optimal the policy makers should increase the law enforcers basic salary (C) by giving him an incentive to catch the law breakers (x) to reach a Social Optimum situation or else the Economics of bribe will allow the society to achieve the Pareto –optimality between law breakers and enforcers.

The Preface

2007-02-22T09:42:00.000+05:30

I am Making my own destiny.. i just wont realise that till the point I reach there.
Hence will never realise the opportunity cost incurred on forgoing an alternative while making a choice in life.Will never know where the doors and avenues that i did not take would have lead me..
I just hope when i reach there i find it was a good life all in all seating with my lady while i pass the pipe around,

Its the end that always mattered
i thought of writing a book
then i realised my book doesnt have an end..
u cant tell a story.. if it has not ended
i hope of coming back to kolkatta which will give me an end.. the end to a seven year long quest to a quintessential life of a student.. who left home a boy and came back a man

The Under Trial

2007-02-21T12:05:00.000+05:30

JUSTICE FOR JESSICA or Hang THE MATOO MURDERER

I have been hearing this for a while now, then the Nithari Case, where Mr Pandher was bashed up by the Lawyers....
We want the criminals Punished. but why do we give the judgement before the court actually does..
We convict the under trials much before into criminals, before the court actually gives its verdict.

For Instance a big News Channel suddenly took up the case of in search of Bitty Mohanty, who jumped Parole, after being convicted by a fast track court. We were all praising the fast verdict.. but have we thought was the verdict too fast..
Was Bitty Actually framed.. why would a German tourist go with him from Delhi to Ajmer, stay in the same Hotel room.. and then after few days accuse him of rape..
i am not trying to be a chauvinist here .. but its easy to black mail a man when he has slept with some body, with the new DNA tests, he can be hold to ransom as he is very vulnerable to be accused of Rape when it was consensual sex.
Some where down the line we have forgotten to think and are to gullible to what media states...
Mr Pandher again had to face the wrath of the lawyers, and was beaten blue .. while still in trial.. is that fair.. he is not even proven guilty, actually the first series of Narco tests can actually acquit him.. but no media says he is a killer.. so let us kill him.. Wait a min here, I am no way defending what he did, thats in human, and i will be one of the first to demand his head if proven guilty.
Going back to the old Jessica and Matoo case, what if the accused are actually innocent, what if Ram Jethmalanis statement of dual bullet was actually true, why will a an fire to rounds of shot for asking a drink, when the first shot fired in the air, wont he give enough time for the waitress to react and may be out of fear get him his drink, hence shooting her immediately sounds a bit rusty..
But the media had a huge effect, on the case.. not only media but the people in general.. but did we think about the pros and cons of the case.
In Matoo case with no new evidence available to the High Court, pronounced Mr Singh guilty, out of sheer media, hype, while he was acquitted by the lesser court for lack of substantial evidence. Not only was he proved guilty , but also was given the capital punishment, which now has been stayed by the SC for Lack of Substantial Evidence.

The under trails only become convicts when they are adjudged so by the court, we some how driven by the media, do not give the under trails a fair chance under article 32 of the Indian Constitution as a part of the fundamental right to constitutional remedies.
we adjudge some as terrorist and some as murderers, they might be so. but some might just be being framed... and we kill them to.
so next time please leave the thinking to your self and do not allow the media to think for you.

The Scariest Tought

2006-08-08T15:08:00.000+05:30

A heap of Gun Powder...... Thats the thing thats common between Europe 1914, and Middle East of today.

Think about it, it needs just a trigger to blow things out of proportion.
Today if Lebenon refuses to follow the UN mandate, Isreal will take Action, which will make Syria support Lebonon along with Iran.( Remember Hezabollah is backed by Iran)And USA which is waiting to pounce on Iran will make most of it .

What makes me think it is possible is, Isreal keeps its national security at the top priority ...unlike many countries. Isreal is surrounded by Islamic states on all sides and the only survival technique that Isreal has taken till date is.. fight back... They went to Uganda under EDI AMIN to rescue their passengers we couldnot even go to Afghanistan

With Isreal fighting against Syria , Hezabollah, Iran... how long will Palestine wait to make hay when the Sun shines

So it begins Global war on Islamic Fundamentalism.... May be the begining of the end the Third world war

What scares the shit out of me is what will be India's stance
Remember India is home to... I repeat home to worlds largest Muslim population, which is relatively less fanatic to a high extent.

Can India mantain the so called NAM any longer.

Now hypothetically i put another angle to it, lets say it is documented by USA that some Indian Islamic groups like say SIMI is giving logistic and financial support to Middle East,may be even a fraction of the community is doing so and is true. Then what

What kind of pressure will be then Applied on India.

The scary thought is, if there is a global war on Islamic Fundamentalism, then the greatest loser will be India, as Islam is an integral part of India, and which is less fanatic than Middle east.

The questions arising are, will Islam in India remain the same after a global war on fundamentalism...
Will Indian Government Succumb to US pressure,
or Will stand tall and Face The US wrath.

India will be the greatest looser if a war on Islamic Fundamentaism is fought... as Indian culture , community , nation and flag is not complete without Islam..

We will fight but with whom we dont know... but who ever we fight.. India will never be the same.

The Juggernaut of Life

2006-08-07T15:27:00.000+05:30

Juggernaut an unstoppable crushing force.( Creative Destruction as well). Derived from the Indian Lord Jagannath's rath yatra.

An unstoppable crushing force of life...thats what you get when you Add Press to politics..

Do on to people what they dont expect us to do them... this may have been the motto of Edmund Dante long back during the Count of Monte Cristo days, but may be its slowly getting incorporated in the Indian media.

This blog is not to accuse somebody but look into the hypothetical view .. what if??

What if the the media projects what the State wants it to project...???

The allainces between Media houses and Political parties are hardly unknown, and does that make news change?

May be may not be, that still to be decided , but what surely changes is the perspective of the news.

Few years back i remember i was appalled by the fact that one leading daily during Godhra riots had written, riots claim 70 muslim lives and 15 hindu lives,

Would it not been enough to write the Riots claim 85 lives.

Yes it doesnot give a clear picture but at least it does not put fuel to the fire.

Well I don’t oppose or propose filtering of news as long its good for the state.

the above mentioned case the filtering of the published news would have been good for the state.

Even when reporters during Kargil , signed off from a report the mentioning of the place gave the enemies a clear idea which point India had its artillery guns.. which lead to the bombing of the same.

Well in such cases filtering of news should be allowed.

Now to the bigger Paradigm... do we need a free press or do we have a free press.

Are we made to believe what the State wants us to believe or the political party wants us to believe vide a facade of free press??

What are the evidences that it was a LeT plan to bomb Mumbai during 7/11, or was it a greater stance to deviate attention from centers failures to some thing more intriguing?

Are we made to believe we are always under a terrorist threat, even if we are not??

We start an investigation from the idea its Pakistan sponsored.. and that’s what we are meant to believe by the Politician and press makes us believe it.

This is what you call creative destruction.. make people hate them so much that they stop supporting.. if that’s the idea of the Government, they are bombing the wrong place..

What would have been better if the Government had bombed old Delhi and the press made us believe that it was the Jehadist... that would have proved that the terrorists are anti-Indians and not pro-some community.. i wont be amused if that is done.

Well it is understood that a political party spokesperson will always give you the parties view point and the actual truth is as unfathomable as Chinese pricing,

to see the bigger picture today we need to keep our minds open, and not blindly read what we are suppose to read

Well how did the Justice Pathak report reach the press before the Parliament, that to , to a particular news channel, and no body claims it to be leaked in the first place

The crux of the matter is very clear. Media shows us things we can not see. Media gets us news from all around. The phrase nowadays, though, is news and views. Question arises, whose views? Isn’t media supposed to be neutral in providing information to us? Accepted, lets say for a while that they do. Even then, it is entirely up to the Newsmakers to decide which part of the elephant they are describing to the blindfolded man. Covering a war from either sides of the border will give completely contradictory perception or “news” of the same event. Ironically, they are both ‘true’. The big question for the media is, which news to give to the people so that the benefit is maximised. Maybe they can cover all facets of the news and make it multi dimensional. And of course, there should be no influence or reference of caste, religion, nationality social status or anything that classifies human beings.

But here is where the big blow comes. With the increase in acceleration of growth, we need to be aware of things happening half way across the globe on the go. Technology allows us to gather information as they happen. But this comes with a cost. Technology is expensive. Transmission of information is a costly process. News agencies like Reuters can no longer depend on their correspondents to cross the Atlantic on a ship in order to bring news of the other continent. But in most developed countries newspapers are free, and some are charged at peanuts’ rates. All the money the news agencies and news channels get are from advertisements of big business houses. Some also get funds from various political parties. Naturally, the question comes, that the news agencies are being privately funded, would the funding bodies not expect something in return? Would they not expect the news agencies to protect their self interests? And what if the news agencies don’t? would they continue to get funded by the same organisation? Probably not, but then there will come another organisation ready to fund them, with the same ulterior motive.

This is not a new culture in the media. In olden days, majority of the political parties used to run their own newspapers. Some of them continue to thrive in states like west Bengal. These papers cover news from the angle of interest of the political parties they represent. This is declared, understood and accepted. They are, in other words, called the official media for the political party and bear their manifesto. But readers of such newspapers, in that case, are aware that they are already getting a biased, or maybe a one-sided coverage of the news. This is far safer than a so-called “neutral” and “pro-people” news coverage that really does not fulfil what it states. And frankly, there is no way we can stop them. They are now powerful enough to start and end wars, to create social and political unrest, to stir the economy of an entire nation, and even change the political and social portfolio of a state. The pen is mightier than the sword, they say, so imagine our plight when such a deadly weapon falls in the hands of a tyrant who misuses its powers to suit his own fancy! Sounds scary? Look around you – its scarier than you imagine.

Rationaly Calculated Self Interest ( RCSI )

2006-06-22T10:26:00.000+05:30

RCSI is basically a modified variation of Adam smith theory of self interest.
The theory that was propagated that, was all men are rational.. and what ever they do they have a tangible or a non tangible self interest .. the common non tangible being self satisfaction...

This theory is built on immense psychological aspect, Think of the monk who sold his Ferrari.. at first thought , that is absolute bogus and irrational.. but according to RCSI its self satisfaction from the sacrifice, is your self interest(in the book it was things like enlightment good health etc etc )
According this theory Every aspect of a mans action is governed by his self interest, and which by no means a negative aspect . A mother child relationship is usually thought as a self less act of love and affection of the mother, which actually is not , in the lady's mind deep inside there is a feeling of being a complete women which she derives from motherhood, the fact she feels good about the child, the feel good factor of being good mother.... that’s un tangible but is a self interest..this makes her happy
The essence of this piece is Even the most irrational thing in this world can be rational if it makes you feel good about doin the act

Hence there is no absolute rationality or irrationality ..Existentialism again

Existentialism and Political Theory

2006-06-20T11:27:00.000+05:30

Existentialism and Political Science sounds a bit far fetched but honestly they are inter twined..
during intial stages of evolution of political theory through the concept of law and liberty .. it was this existentialism placed the ground work
when early Liberals where pressing against state and for Absolute liberty this how things shaped up:

the concept of liberty... what is liberty.. does the concept of absolute liberty exist... the answer is it cant as absolute liberty will trckle down to no bodies freedom.. as absolute liberty will also imply me encroaching some body elses frrdom.. so how do you take care of that..that was through law.. and law was then essentially based natural laws whats also called Aristotalian laws.. which brought abt the concept of State..as the enforcer of law

i think i tried to rest my case here
it all yours now

Socialism and parts thereof II :dignity of labour

2006-03-29T10:29:00.000+05:30

Modern political theory is based on two major pillars... Autonomy and accountability
that is freedom / liberty and responsibility...

the reason why they are so important is because

a) Absolute liberty is nobodies freedom... That means if a state/society gives absolute liberty to a person, it also means the person is at liberty to encroach on others freedom...Its simple I have the freedom to kill , steal, rob, rape etc etc...

this was the major flaw in the concept of Liberalism...

b)Every bodies responsibility means no bodies responsibility
the problem with socialism was based on social responsibility ..
as every body was suppose to receive goods and services in accordance to their needs and not in coherence with their contribution to the society.

that mean you can contribute zilch and still get your necessities.
the production and contribution as I said was a social responsibility , that meant if one shirked he cant be reprimanded.. Hence every body would shirk...
hence no production.

Hence the socialist created this concept of dignity of labour.. or moral values for people , which made them not shirk but contribute...
As whole concept of socialism even though is for the so call proletariat it is a doctrine for the educated and people with high moral values...
which in country is always not possible... Hence most socialist / communist nations are dictatorship...
in country like India Socialism is bound to fail as it is first a democracy.. Secondly we dont have any dignity of labour.

Socialism and parts thereof part I

2006-03-29T09:42:00.000+05:30

Well in todays world Socialism has almost become synonymous to Communism...
but are they actually same? the answer is one is an ideology another a doctrine

When Robert Owen first propagated his concept of social equality .. That was the beginning of what we call the modern socialism...

Just a food for thought at the beginning : The Communist Russia under Stalin and Nazist Germany were both build under the key stone of socialism but it meant differently to both the countries...
for The Nazis (National Socialist Party) the Society existed because the state did .. And the state was supreme in Russia it was just opposite.

Socialism what was propagated by Owen was based on the concept of so called egalitarian society .. Derived from the word egalite . French for equal...
he spoke of a society where every body was equal...
this was the basic doctrine of Socialism... How this society could have been achieved he really did not answer that question much. His philosophy was more with evolution.

Marx took it up from here..And there it was Theory of surplus value , supremacy of the common man or proletariat...He did speak of a state with socialistic state but never spoke of revolution.....This was what we call Marxism.. Its a doctrine when socialism was the basic ideology.

Vladimir Illynych Illonov better known as Lenin...Took up Marxian philosophy...He spoke of a socialistic government .. To be achieved through bloody revolution and that's what in modern days we call Communism....Leninist
the big difference communism and communism Maoist /Leninist is a simple but a strong word bloody..." the source of power is from a muzzle of a gun" : Mao Tse Tung

Chairman NMCC and the Auto Industry

2006-03-12T10:43:00.000+05:30

It was an Executive Committee meeting of an industry organisation for ehich i work for..
It was my work allocation to escort the Chairman of National Manufacturing Competitiveness Council,
With out knowing Much about him i reached Vigyan Bhavan 45 mins early ..usually thats what you do when you go to pick up some Government Hob Nob.

I required a brief write up on his past...and to my suprise i realised the Dr was of a cabinet Minister Rank was a padma shree and padma bhushanand was chair man of SAIL and Maruti Udyog as well.

when he walked out of his room write on time with is immaculate and spotless white safari suit, .. and enquired me if we were late and if his office had offered me coffee..well to be honest we were before time as i just recived a call from my office to take a bit longer.

Any way when we were walking down the stairs i realised the white hair had seen a lot..

We reached the venue on time the meetin started on time...
the EC comprised of auto big guns... who went on asking their queries to the Dr.
and his knowledge was vast..
he asked the industry to review the growth rate..
to live upto the expectaions of the government and he promised NMCC will back the industry

ASEAN and the Indian Auto Industry

2006-03-07T09:09:00.000+05:30

The Framework Agreement on Comprehensive Economic Cooperation between India and ASEAN (Indo-ASEAN CECA), was signed on 8th October 2003 and it inter alia envisages a Free Trade Area (FTA) in goods between India and ASEAN. The Government of India and ASEAN have agreed to conclude negotiations by June, 2006 with a view to commence implementation of the FTA by January, 2006. The Indo-ASEAN CECA also envisages Free Trade Areas in Services and Investment.

So what does this mean for the Auto Industry??

Well as capacity utilisation in the western automotive world say Germany/ Italy is being optimised, to meet the demand of the ever growing industry big names like Bavarian Motor Works and Peoples Car ( VW) is looking at so called low cost countries such as us.

So India - ASEAN are fighting for the same investment space in the auto world.

Now if you were BMW, and you knew India is an awesome market and ASEAN was a great manufacturing hub, where would you have invested???

tough question but if you could import into India from ASEAN at Zero duty then??? Bingo

Well the Indian Auto Industry is competitive enough within the four walls of the factory , but the momnent the India foot printsof high electricity cost or embedded taxes etc come in we become less competeive than Thailand..

Again the industry is a highly tierised industry, OEM , Tier I , TierII and then downwards..
so the moment the balance in one tier is gone the whole industry will suffer.

If tomorrow a car comes duty free..is it only the car manufacturers who get hit.. no

if car is imported so will the engines..
engine makers like say cummins... then all people manufacturing so called HS 840991/9 items or engine parts..
this has a whole lot of items like pistons and rings, alternators, transmission .. etc etc
hence the whole industry is hit.

Every FTA has a negative list where duties are not reduced, so why not keep it in the the negative list.

Well ASEAN doesnt want one..and Indian head of Government has promised that this time if there is a negative list it wont be more than say 500 items..out of say 5600 tariff lines.

Where as with Indo -Thai FTA or BIMSTEC it was 1158 items.

Out ofthe 500 , 300 items will be agriculture, then cotton.. and then if some thing is left for the Auto industry .
I am not questioning the rationale of an FTA but the timing of an FTA,
Investments might just joke, a projected 400 Bn dollar component industry might be nipped at the bud..

so what is to be done...

Wait and watch???

lazy sunday afternoon post

2006-03-05T12:26:00.000+05:30

the music playing behind is live for ever by oasis,.. drinkin coffee at 1:oo clock afternoon . had a late night.

the biggest problem that people usualy face on a sunday.. is the afternoon..(As we hardly see the sunday morning)

we hope against hope that it could be a bit more longer.
we have been anticpating the week end for 5 days and suddenly its over..

On sunday afternoons you are half a mind thiking of what work do you have to finsh tomorrow,
in what kind of mood your Hari Sadu will be.

And the other half our mind is thinking about the things you need to finish at home.. such as iron your shirt, do the dishes, have a shave and sehr wichtige.. very important when to finish the half a bottle of whiskey thats left from yesterday.

We always shirk our chores on a saturday thinking the whole of sunday is left...
but at times we think sunday is only for 12 hrs...and even when you have a hell lot to do you are herewriting your blog which no ones gonna ever read.

any way aufweider sein
chutsch

good morning and smell the coffee

2006-03-03T12:04:00.000+05:30

enough of trying to conquering some body elses blog,, hence i created my own..
well right now i am amidst a pile of books namely customs law cenvat law and practice , economic survey , etc etc..

you know the business guys will not mind rating the budget 8/ 10 .. FM is happy PM is happy..
but honestly they havent yet analysed the budget...

thats what i am here for..
how does the 4% new CVD help or how does the -2.5%custom affect

i need a break .
so ithought of creating this

i am bored

A Big Yawn