A question of culture

We have seen this before. Japan has already risen like a phoenix after the twin nuclear strikes that ended the Second World War in 1945. They have to do it all over again – well almost. I do not know what exactly is the status of the damaged nuclear facility at Fukushima. Nor do I know the exact extent of damage caused by the earthquake and tsunami on 11, March 2011. Then, today I read the following news item on Japan, which exposes my worst fears.

“Even in a country whose people are known for walking in lockstep, a national consensus on the proper code of behavior has emerged with startling speed. Consider post-tsunami Japan as the age of voluntary self-restraint, or jishuku, the antipode of the Japan of the "bubble" era that celebrated excess.”
The extend of self-restraint and exposition of traditional values in this the twenty first century is something expected from the Japanese.  Japan has elevated those workers fighting to reduce contamination from the damaged reactors to smurai. The Japanese people have voluntarily switched to jishuku by minimising their wants and anything with even a small hint of luxury invites condemnation. This moral fibre is exhibited, when Japan is home to the latest technology in areas of electronics, automobile engineering, and robotics to name a few.

A question that stares me in my face is “what is culture” and by extension “what is Indian culture”
In my quest I found many ‘definitions’. The two I repeat here have been chosen only to illustrate my point.

Definition 1

“India’s languages, religions, dance, music, architecture, food and customs differ from place to place within the country, but nevertheless possess a commonality. The culture of India is an amalgamation of these diverse sub-cultures spread all over the Indian subcontinent and traditions that are several millennia old.”

Definition 2

“The term culture refers to a state of intellectual development or manners. The social and political forces that influence the growth of a human being is defined as culture. ………rich values in a person always remain unchanged because they are deeply rooted within our hearts, mind, body and soul which we receive from our culture”.

As espoused in definition-2, culture is a set of values which in the Indian sense is to be tolerant, accommodating, open-minded, deeply but not ostensibly spiritual and concerned with the common human welfare. This is how our country has achieved a common culture, despite a staggering pluralistic society.

Does playing holi, dancing a bhangra and wearing a sari represent Indian culture? Or does upholding the values of humanity represent Indian culture. Culture is the values that are deeply rooted within our hearts, mind, body and soul – not what we wear and what we do not. The dance, dress and festivities are at best cultural heritages and do not define culture in themselves. It is this moral fibre (culture) of a Nation which saves it from travails and tragedies.

But then another question is now staring at me.

Philanthropists Warren Buffet, Bill Gates and Melinda Gates are visiting India. One of the agenda of their visit is to persuade, coax, goad or encourage the Indian rich to give.

Now, are they more Indian than we are?

The match of the cup

The dessert has arrived before the main course. An Indo-Pak final which is the coup de grace in any tournament such as the world cup of cricket, will be delivered before the end. So be it.

I for one am not as excited about and Indo-Pak clash, say as I was ten years ago. I do not even know the Pak team by heart. Those that I know are well past their prime. OK, they defeated a lacklustre Australia. Defeating Australia is not a big deal these days anyway. Pakistan can not win against India. But India can lose! To safeguard against such an eventuality, India should go in with 8 batsmen. The team should be: Sehwag*, Sachin*, Gautam, Virat*, Yuvraj*, Dhoni, Raina*, Yusuf*, Harbhajan*, Ashwin* (was an opening bat once) and Zahir*. Players marked * can also bowl.

It does not matter who bowls to the Pak batmen they will score the same number of runs as previously determined by a special complex formula involving many variables. So, the Indian team has been selected purely on batting prowess. The Pakistanis bowl well and some time can surprise you with peculiar behaviours of the ball. In an uncontrolled attack the hurtlers do not themselves know how the ball will behave once it leaves their hand! Packing extra batters will help.

No tactics, no stratagems, no preparations – just pick the right team and get on the filed. Pakistan can’t win – India should make sure, they don’t lose.

A "Surprising" world cup of cricket II

Some more 'surprises'

There is an old saying - there are three types of people in the world: those who can count and those who can't.    Something like Bajji’s teesra. The doosra in cricket is now passé.

Yes, don’t be surprised; Bajji is practicing a teesra. It has been reported digitally on the net through some ad campaign.  A little drone tells me that he has also mastered a chautha and a Paanjwa. A teesra is a ball that is a slight variation of the boomerang in performance. A boomerang is supposed to return to the thrower after it does its job for which it was dispatched – fell an enemy or a coconut or whatever. A teesra after leaving Bajji’s hand with a lot of backspin (a la a golf ball hit - by a nix handicapper - with a medium or short iron in his approach shot) will swirl in the air, pitch on a good length drawing the batter forward. Unlike other balls, after pitching instead of hurtling towards the wickets,  just before the bat can make contact, the ball will come right back into Bajji’s hand irrespective of the shot or bat angle giving the impression that the batter has played a return catch. Voila! What a surprise. I can see some of you nodding disapproval…you think the URDS will catch it. Come on, there is no way a ball can travel back 12-15 yards unless it has been hit…( other than the secret teesra); the batter, to hide his embarrassment will never refer. Also the teesra can also be gainfully employed after the opposition exhausts its two referrals.

You will see Bajji bowling his teesra against the WI tomorrow. The chautha is for the QF with the Paanjwa as a surprise for the SF. In the finals it will of course be all chakka with Bajji also chipping in with some.

Exciting world cup of cricket this! Full of surprises!!!

A 'surprising' world cup of cricket

Back at the academy we were all wearing the war paint huddled in our battle dress listening to the orders from the ambush commander. It was all there on the makeshift cloth model in detail down to the cut off party or whatever.  At the end of it all with a smart salute the commander thundered ‘I have finished, sir”.  All heads turned towards the DS – “Well done”, we all thought he would say as the orders were impressive. In the plan all angles were covered and there was no obvious reason for failure. “The plan is fine. But there is no element of surprise to the enemy (deception by us). What if the enemy patrol spots the ambush and rushes the Light Machine Gun (LMG) position?”  Our ambush commander was well prepared and he did have a deception plan. He would deploy the rattler (that which simulates the staccato of a machine gun) across the nallah on the opposite side from the LMG. In this way the enemy would not know the correct location of the automatic.

I was reminded of this story, when MS Dhoni said that the surprise selection of Piyush Chawla in the world cup team is meant to be his surprise weapon against all opposition on the Indian tracks. Like the rattler, as yet Piyush Chawla has been a non-starter. Another surprise was losing the last 9 wickets for 29 runs after being 271 for 1 against SA. That one was better than the rattler. You leave the office early at about 250 for 1 hoping to catch up at about 350 for 3 with about 10 overs yet to go andYusuf Pathan at the crease.  When you reach home late through heavy traffic because many others thought the way you did and you find Harsha Bogle with his new hair and all on the screen telling that India are all out for 297 (was it?), you had to rate this one above the rattler.

When you lose, either the batsmen, the bowlers or the fielders are at fault. The surprise is that they seldom perform well all in the same game. So England were surprised themselves that they equaled India’s 327 to tie the match. Ireland were surprised India found it difficult to score 221 for a win against them. Bangladesh were well placed against India and they lost is the only surprise which was not a surprise.

Where does the Indian team go from here? Most of the players went home (or for ad shoots) after their loss to SA. Till the last report many of them had not returned to base. The respite from the rigors of practice was ostensibly to let players get back their concentration. Now the surprise of surprises – the loss of concentration has been blamed on you, me and other Indians. MSD questions as to why did we leave our office at 250 for 1. In the days of Gavakar and Kapil, he argued, we never moved from our seats lest the Indian batter get out. We used to will the ball from Willis away from the stumps and on to the bat of Sandeep Patil so that he scored six fours off one over from him. Now we want Tendulkar to bat on while we move out of our office into our cars and get stuck in traffic. Why were we not concentrating on the ball?

So friends, if you want India to win the world cup, get back to your old ways while Dhoni employs his surprises(deception). We may yet win the cup.

Democracy and governance

My house is located alongside an almost blind 80’ ft road about 50m from the main road. All houses/buildings on this 80’ road have basement parking. As is the practice in Bangalore (and possibly elsewhere) the spaces on kerb side in-between gates are used for parking by visitors to the shopping places on the main road. The lazy ones just turn into my road (80’ road) and park haphazardly at the entrance itself, from the main road. When I question such parkers they nonchalantly ask me,  ‘eh tera baap ka road he kya?’ I have exaggerated the language a bit to bring home a point that to an average Indian (majority) the meaning of freedom is contained in that sentence. And on equality it is, ‘if you can drive your car on a road I can as well park on it’; it is his road too!!! Isn’t it? In such a situation my choices are as follows.

1. I quietly retreat, go home and have a drink. I did and did not feel any better.

2. I go to the authorities. I did. The police of course politely told me that they do not have enough personnel to implement these parking rules. I understand the police are an over-stretched organisation. I went to the corporator. He asked me for a complaint in writing. I did not give that because it was not a personnel matter but a public transgression. You see, armed with my ‘complaint’ the corporator will make me the fall guy to garner votes! – good old divide and rule stuff. So, dead end there.

3. With my entire boxing experience, throw an upper cut straight into the solar plexus of the offender. I would not do that because I could not be sure of the implications as there generally are more than ten odd vehicles parked there at any given time. These are all ‘educated’ guys mind you. One on one I could take them on, I feel. But one against ten was not the right odds.

 The inherent flaw is in the way we flaunted our new found ‘freedom’ in the last sixty odd years. In the exuberance we just let things be and forgot that there is a country to be governed. In the process, our political system threw up a strange phenomenon much like going to the temple and forgetting GOD. A picture was presented that the end all of democracy is elections – the universal suffrage. Thus governance never figured in the scheme of things for our elected leaders. To the bliss of the bureaucrats governance was left to them. On the other hand people are under the impression that giving your vote is quid pro quo for exercising ‘freedom’. Freedom to do anything any way!

Democracy is strange. The word itself is of Greek origin which vaguely means ‘rule of the people’. Some city states of ancient Greece followed this system which afforded equality and freedom to the people. In the Indian system of democracy there is none of the former and too much of the latter.

 I think ‘rule of the people’ (democracy) is conflicting in itself, a sort of an oxymoron. Here is a system where everybody is a ruler as well as the ruled. Does that mean democracy is an impossible system? Of course not; it is not impossible but difficult to sustain. The two basic factors for democracy to succeed are sadly missing in our system. They are 1. Self discipline.  2. A pan India Nationalism (instead we have a rampant pursuit of parochialism - a controversial topic in itself).

In passing…..

Shri Ramesh Chandra Majhi is a Minister, State (Independent) for IT and Science and Technology in the Orissa Government. What is the big deal?, you may ask. The news report is that he is appearing in the Cl XII state board exams this year as finally it has dawned on him that in the discharge of his day to day duties some relevant knowledge will be handy. Speaks volumes for competency of the executive and legislature

Of astrology and astrologers

In these days when money is made issuing pilot licenses what is the big deal in placing or misplacing a few planets here and there for the extra buck. Ravan (of Ramayan fame) who supposedly piloted his own aircraft without a license had once put all these influential planets in a bag to prevent their good influence on Ram during battle!

Ironically on Friday last, while I was in a meeting with some people (all Indian) from the local Japan pricipal’s factory, one of them got a call about the earthquake in NE Japan. Tsunami came later. Thereafter the interlude centered on earthquakes. When on the topic of earthquake I related my experience on Latur earthquake as I was in Pune (HQSC) at the time. One of my colleagues present had a strange story to tell. It seems at the time of the late night Latur earthquake, he was in the air flying into Bangalore from either Mumbai or Delhi. Dinner was being served on the flight when the plane all of a sudden dropped about 1000ft in altitude. All dinner lay scattered and the passengers were a little bewildered before normalcy was restored. It later transpired, this incident took place approximately over Latur area at about the time of the earthquake. Being a first hand narration I can not dismiss this as a cock and bull story.

We all know a lunatic. Moon (Lunar) is the closest heavenly body from Earth. We have high tide and more exposition of lunatic ways when the moon is closer to earth…it does not require research to understand and recognize these explicit and widely acknowledged phenomena.

We also do not need to pour over lengthy thesis to realise that there is yet something enabling creation of life (as opposed to creation of babies!) beyond comprehension of known science. How the new born begets life. Science has an answer to an ill born child – it has no answer to a still born child yet. So I say, life is a force in the universe which has bits of contributions form Saturn, Mars and all other celestial objects. The intensity of forces from these objects varies according to location and time.

The baby thus gets a dose of life with the prevailing intensity at the place she is born. Babies born in Delhi and Panipat at a particular time get almost similar doses. Do not forget, that is not the end of life. It is just the beginning. In brief, as the baby grows the forces in  the immediate environment have varying influences in his life. With TV, internet and such media further influences his life. As these influence a Delhiite differently from a Panipatite they grow into different material environment – ay be one more affluent than the other or better educated assessed on a PPP basis.

There are no fixed rules for making money from the more gullible amongst us. I do not speak for astrologers; but astrology can not be brushed away. The science of astrology is as yet elusive to a lesser degree than life itself.

Cricket world cup I

Cricket is the flavour of the season. The circus is back in the sub-continent. Teams from different parts of the world are here to entertain and in the process try and win the world cup of cricket.  It has all been true to character till now. Sreesanth was his normal self with Ricky in a practice match.  It took the Australian captain a couple of days plus to retaliate with his groin guard – he avenged the on-field transgression on a, possibly mute (that is how TVs in dressing rooms are tuned) television set in the dressing room.  50-50 has not abdicated its place in favour of 20-20. Sample these for thrills - England has specialized in upset results. It toiled against Holland where it just about managed a win; tied a match with India it should have won; Lost to its neighbour Ireland for the upset of the century (as yet); won against SA, a match it should have lost. Then they have gone and lost and Pietrson and Broad to injuries.

 Bangladesh is blowing hot and cold in consonance with the weather along their coast line; for good measure some ‘pebbles’ were thrown at the West Indies team bus, waking them up from their dreams of returning to the days of Lloyd and Richards.

 So far India has flattered to deceive; they have struggled in all their matches. There is time yet, ardent Indian fans say. ICC on their part has added spice to proceedings…One day the 2.5m rule in URDS saved Ian Bell of England against India and a week later it could not save Ireland’s ‘whatishisname?”. Here is another problem; with so many minor teams and newer players, remembering names and faces has become a problem…what did the Irish do after losing the match? They went and lost a bag of bats.

Yesterday Pakistan was faring very well till the 45^th over, playing them into a winnable situation. That is when they realised this possible win against New Zealand would be their fourth in a row in a world cup and so duly conceded 100 runs in the last 5 overs. We will have to wait to know if ICC will investigate this.

There is lots of entertainment lined up for summer - cricket world cup, IPL, budget session, assembly elections, CBI show, mud slinging, et al.

There is Justice; let us cash in

It is a given that the judiciary in India is in competition with the snail for speed. But in this one case in regard to ex CVC, PJ Thomas, it has surpassed itself and delivered. In the process it has also thrown a lifeline to the diminishing governance quotient in India.

The Judiciary, recently stripped PJ Thomas of the appointment of CVC, given to him by the Executive, on grounds of illegality. An Executive, on the back foot well into its crease nearly trampling the stumps, hails it as ‘democracy at its best’. Such sound bytes would please an Egyptian who dreams of democracy.  With this one they can’t fool me, a veteran citizen in this democratic system for over half a century. We applaud the judiciary for exposing the Executive and the degenerated governance in our country. Is this judicial activism as the Executive would call it? The answer is an emphatic “No”. Once elected our federal democracy affords our electoral college to work in a cartel. It is a quid pro quo system – a recent statement by our PM accusing the BJP of stalling the implementation of GST while demanding to free an accused from their party in Gujarat can not be taken lightly. I consider it as an indication towards what may have been happening all these years – The Mulayams, Maywatis, Lalus et al. Like never before the credibility and competency of our rulers is suspect.

In the wake of the Satyam fraud, the Government was very vocal in criticising the role of independent directors on the Company board. The competence and eligibility of independent directors on boards of all companies was questioned – what with public money and Indian citizens being directly involved with these listed Companies. How could the Government shirk its responsibilities? A very pertinent question. And so plans were being drawn to empanel competent independent directors a la the ICC empanelling cricket umpires!!! Pray, why not apply the same criteria for politicians and bureaucrats heading ministries?

There are a lot of G’s going around these days – all or almost all causing setbacks to the big G – Government. Whether the three G’s (Sonia, Rahul and Priyanka) will do the Congress party and hence the country any Good is a moot point…3G on the other hand has surely  helped Pranab to rein in the fiscal deficit despite increase in expenditure in the revised budget estimates for 2010-2011. While distribution of 2G was handled by Raja, the distribution of 3G was handled in effect by the Praja (in full public view).  Was Raja competent to handle the telecom Ministry?

In the wake of the Supreme Court judgment in the PJ Thomas case which exhorts the Government “appointments should not be restricted to civil servants alone but people of impeccable integrity from other fields should also be considered”, I expect a public debate on who is competent to govern us to include the competency of bureaucrats also, to do whatever they are doing.

I propose a National debate on “Should we draft in experts in technology and management directly into governance?” – and of course save them thereafter from going the Manmohan way!

Can the Indian media live up to such a debate? They do owe this one to the Nation.

Thought and action

The Earth is billions of billion years old. The world evolved in that time through what we term as ‘ages’. There was the agricultural revolution where man evolved from a hunter-gatherer to a farmer. This age, the longest, lasted probably for more than 10,000 years. It has comparatively been a lightning progress for man since. It was the time of machines during the industrial age from 1750 to 1950 followed by information age between 1950 and 1990. Yes 1990; thereafter it was the age of knowledge till 2000. In the 21^st century we are now in the age of intelligence.

Bill Gates realised this quite early and recognized that information or knowledge by itself is useless unless it is used to achieve something! His book Business @ the Speed of Thought written in 1999, hints that information / knowledge has to be converted into action at the speed of thought. Any extend of thinking within or out of the box will not help unless there is concurrent action. Information or knowledge has to be used through te medium of intelligence to achieve desired results. I will dare say that in this century, intelligence has to be cultivated by channelling the thought process... 

In this age of intelligence time is the essence for result. Unlike for most part of the last century and earlier, information and knowledge is readily available at the press of a button (to use a cliché), intelligence and time is at a premium.

The process of constructive thinking will propogate thought that will result in fruitful action in some time ….the process of emotional thinking will result in........well….

……. next is the age of consciousness (bliss)…probably action will precede thought – or action will become irrelevant - not possible? – We will have to wait to know that…

Why China will not attack India.

 In recent times there has been a speculaion that China may attack India to redeem an internal turmoil. My thoughts are different.

There is a bit of contradiction when we say that an aggressive China will go to war with a pacifist India. It is just futile to maim or kill a pacifist when by a mere threat of violence much can be extracted from the pacifist!

Consider the economy of India and China. China is second and India fourth in size of economy by GDP. India is ranked a lowly 160th and China a bit better at 130th in per capita GDP adjusted for PPP. Neither China nor India is savouring the state they are in.

In case you did not know -  (Adjusted to PPP (Purchasing Power Parity) – suffice to say that non traded goods/services will cost less in India as compared with the USA – ie for ten US $ we can play more golf in India than in the USA! Or for one US $ we can get more hair cuts in India than in the USA. The calculations for realistic comparison are done on PPP basis rather than at normal exchange rates of currencies.)

For a comparison, the USA is ranked 1st  in GDP and 8th in per capita GDP. First 5-6 places in per capita GDP rankings are taken by Scandinavian countries.

A war will not make China any better. The econmy of India and China are different.

Whereas the Indian economy is driven more by domestic consumption, China depends more on its exports. Top five Chinese exports in 2010 have been computers, household goods, toys and sporting goods, computer accessories and video equipment. World economy is convalescing post recession weakening the Chinese export market.(Hence the Chinese reluctance to up-value the Yuan).  None of these five areas is the core competency of China. Core competency of China is building infrastructure – roads, dams, rail, power lines et al. The biggest market for China in these areas is India.  This will be a win – win situation for both, if China is involved in India’s infrastructure programmes. Tell me, why should China kill the hen that lays the golden egg? In this case you may have a question about the future once India has its infrastructure in place - that will take a minmum of fifty years though. By then the two countries could join hands and call the shots in an Esat lookinhg world...In the long term China needs India not North Korea or for that mater Pakistan.

India and China are already in talks for China to take on infrastructure projects in India. China is already in India on a couple these projects. The only hurdle in the way of big time arrangements being that China wants to bring in its own cheap labour while India wants it to deploy local labour.

In all this time, yes, China will threaten, flex muscles, show eyes and cock a snook; but an overt all out war in the current world disposition – I doubt it.  Yet the relevant question remains – Are we ready for China?