Dinwa – A story that never began

It was a warm Sunday morning when I saw four gloomy people carrying a charpoy to the hut settlement near our house. Sun was still in its yellow hue. Birds chirping made it a perfect summer morning except for the wailing of an old lady now clearly crossing her eightieth year of existence. Bearers of the charpoy were of all sizes, from healthy and stout to lean and thin were carrying the still body of Dinwa covered in a tattered piece of rag, in such a bad shape that dare I call it a cloth.

What should have been the perfect summer morning of 1980’s clearly turned out to be a really bad start. I was too young but this one scene is yet engraved in my memory as if it was just yesterday. The wailing from the old lady was too shrill to be silenced even today. She was Dinwa’s grandmother and only surviving close blood relative alive. Probably Dinwa was the one for whom she survived so long even after seeing so many deaths and sorrow.

For lively hood she used to sell vegetables which she bought and mostly borrowed from the relatives and neighbours, all staying in the same hutment. Entire area belonged to a community called “Khatik” , who were primarily involved in business of selling vegetables.

We were not too fond of the old lady as kids. While we played gully cricket and did many a times hit the ball near the huts, first house belonged to Dinwa and his grandmother. She used to hurl abuse and never used to return the ball back to us. I surely do not remember how many we lost to her. On some rare occasion Dinwa did join us for the game and those were the days we were sure that we will not lose our ball to anyone.

I distinctly remember one of my encounters with the old lady. One of a distant relative or may be close one, I did not care about that, had send her a letter, post card to be precise. I happened to be passing by and she caught hold of me to read the contents. All the possible ladies from the neighbourhood surrounded me as we all settled on the neatly laid mud and cow dung spread floor. What happened there after is an embarrassment I did live for long. The letter was written in Hindi with the worst possible handwriting in the world. I am sure though the script was Hindi the dialect must have been Bhojpuri. The net result was I could not read a word out of it. They were amazed at my capabilities or non-capabilities to be precise. I could see giggles from them while covering the mouth with the end of their sari’s pallu. Some also commented on what I do in my school, worst was when one said “Pass toh hota hai na!”.

In days to come I had to walk with my eyes dug deep in the earth as if trying to find an escape route, whenever I used to cross the hut area. It was difficult to avoid that route as it was my normal thoroughfare. The alternative route was three times longer but I do remember I used to take that whenever possible.

It would have been in my first decade of existence and Dinwa must have been a couple of years older to me. Within minutes all possible acquaintance in the neighbourhood around and grouped some wailing and others comforting. I did have a balcony view of entire proceedings from the third floor and comforts of my house. They had put a round belied pot near the charpoy with a scented white fume emitting overdose. Some of that smell did meet my nostrils and I have that lingering smell still coming to me whenever Dinwa’s name flashes in my memory.

Dinwa was a meek and fragile, boy of few words. I do remember asking Dinwa one day “What would you like to become when you grow up”. Probably the most common question we undergo as a part of all our childhood rituals. He told me something which was one big lesson for me those days “First I am not sure if I will live long enough to grow”. I was too small to think about death, I do not think Dinwa was too old for these words of wisdom either.

It was for the first time in my life I was confronting death that close and that to a death of a person who was so close to my age. That time of my life immortality was what I thought is the reality. Dinwa was suffering from mysterious illness of which nobody had a clue. I do not think they had resources to get it diagnosed forget about getting it treated.

After few hours it was time for Dinwa to embark on his final journey, now draped in a shinny white sheet of cloth. Finally he did get the best and brand new piece of cloth before his mortal remains were taken care of. Later I heard that he was buried, as a young unmarried youth are not cremated. The grandmother did not survive for long after that and in about a year’s time she too departed to join Dinwa and take care of him again.

I did visit my old house few years ago. Now there is a big mansion standing right where Dinwa’s hut was. The smell of the earth has been erased forever. To me this mansion is just a monument in tribute to Dinwa.

All along my story I have spelled his name as Dinwa, but quite honestly his name was to be spelled as Deenwa – The poor one or the misfortunate one. It comes out of word Deen and the last part ‘wa’ is added to any name in that part of the world, for that matter I am “Sandeepwa”. I wonder what made his parents think about this name; his fate did live to his name for sure.

I do not know if any of my siblings or friends will remember him. I wonder how many of his relatives and neighbours would do the same. Form me he was a special life teacher. I feel bit relieved that after so many years that have passed by I could pen down at least a small percentage of my feelings.

However small and insignificant we may be but we do impact life of people around us.

I had written this story in my diary quite some time ago, I was inspired to share this and put on my blog after editing it a bit when I happen to revisit this few days ago. I just realized I do have some more collections of similar story though not so gloomy, will wait for another inspiration to share some of them.

Chand Kavitaye

So I am trying to put few of my poetry here now. The first one I have specifically chosen. This poetry doubles up as a disclaimer as well as guideline to read any further. Honestly I do not have a good vocabulary nor too good even in spellings hence hope that you will be bit liberal with those while reading though you should point it out to me for my corrections.

So here goes the first one:

माना की गुस्ताकी की है पर हौसला तो देखिये
माना की दम जुदा हे पर जस्बात तो देखिये

छिपा छिपा कर जो सजोये थे जो जस्बात मेने
उनको जो बताया तोह यह बवाल तो देखिये .

लबो को सिलने से तूफान कही थमा नहीं
उबर के आया तो यह इत्मिनान तो देखिये

उड़ने की क्या कोई परिभाषा होती हे ?
कोशिश की तो यह अहसास तो देखिये

कौन कहता है पानी आग को है बुझाता
जो जलाये तो वोह जलन तो देखिये

Second one finds its place here only for the matter of convenience as this was already converted in Devanagari script. Little background for this poem. I did go almost out of the city on a business call on the eve of "Id" and happen to see the sun hiding behind the beautiful clouds. I did click a photo(one at the top) and then "Id", Sun,clouds and for sure the mood did play a role in this:

खबरे कुछ नासाज है मनो खुशियों ने रोजा है रखा

आज जब यह आफ़ताब (Sun ) डूबेगा तो शायद मौला बोलेंगे इद मुबारक

शायद बादल के पीछे छिपा होगा हमारा इद का चाँद

सब जानते है मौला , की जरूर होगा यह आपना चाँद

यह तो नक्की है की छंटेंगे दुखो के बादल खुशियों के बूँद बन कर टपकेंगे यह ही बादल

मौका है दस्तूर है की हम याद करे तुम्हे ए खुदा

दुखो की शायद यह ही है वजह ए खुदा

सुना है मौला ने बोला है की इद आने को है

आज नहीं तोह कल बस अब ईद आने को है

मुश्कील है यह इन्तेजार ए आफ़ताब

और न सताओ क्योकि इद आने को है .

Now the last one for now. The inspiration was a coconut tree which is visible from my office. It did coincided with some new ideas I was working on. Not to mention the weather was too good too then. Hence this is the result :

आज मेने पेड़ो पर कुछ मंजर देखा था
नाजुक कोमल सी मंजर हवा में खिलखिलाते देखा था

मौसम ने भी न जाने क्यों कुछ सुनी थी इसकी बाते
कुछ बूंदे कुछ बादल और कुछ रेशमी धुप मेने देखा था

निसानी है कुछ नए मीठे फल पकने के
हाँ ऐसा तोह रात खवाबो मैं भी देखा था

सारे मंजर फल न बने तोह क्या
सरे ख़यालात पुचक न पाए तोह क्या
ख़ुशी है की आज मेने पेड़ो पर मंजर देखा था

I have been writing almost one or more a day. This way I could end up putting up a entire volume soon. Some of my friends who have been reading have been already jokingly said the same. I am glad that they do correct me a lot many times and have been very encouraging, so I have decided that will write on them too some times.

Please do post your comments as I said I am OK with any comments.

Poems

Recently I have started to pen down some poems in Hindi and Urdu mix. Will be posting some of them on the blog soon. Honestly it did required lot of introspection before gathering enough courage to do so. Hence I am now quite ready to take praises and criticism both. Since I personally of a view that I need a lot of improvement hence criticism is what I surely reading.

Ability to Walk on our Own

I guess the ability to walk on our own and move around is one of the biggest gifts of God. I could only realise the same when I met with an accident about thirteen years ago and almost lost my lost my right leg knee down. I distinctly remember the doctor in the emergency section telling after examining my leg that I might be taken to Operation Theatre to fix the leg if things demand so. I was on sedative and luckily things did not go worst from there and I was released from the hospital with a plaster. Later the same doctor confided me that he meant amputation of the leg .Six month on bed made me realise the value of mobility and respect for leg. Finally the doctor told me in his final comments that I might not be able to run all my life and finally when the knee has a massive wear and tear I have to get my knee replaced. I have pulled thru these thirteen years and feel that could take it till another thirteen but the background of fear of getting thru all those pain again haunts me still. Probably the best part of the whole thing was that I used to share my physiotherapist with a Ex prime minister of India and so many times lying down in opposite bed and the physiotherapist inflicting pain alternatively to both of us. Did have some short conversations with him too, I particularly remember the Doctor mentioning to him that I was very brave and was doing extremely well with the treatment.

All this flash back came back haunting to me. I am associated with an organisation which is a community driven but has an intense urge to do lot of social work. Recently they announced a free distribution of Jaipur foot. This is a brilliant indigenous innovation which provides mobility to people with amputated legs.

Process started with involving a PR agency to get the news covered in all the vernacular and English dailies of south India. What followed next was an amazing experience. We did receive near to 300 applications for getting free Jaipur feet. While seeing at the application we could see people from across all age groups, male and females, religion and caste. It was heartening to note that we would be able to help so many people at the same time it surprised us that so many helpless people did exist waiting for help.

The camp was divided in two days First was to get the proper measurements so that the exact size could be delivered after a month. Let me sum few of the cases in these two days typically on the final delivery day which I could remember for all my life.

We had a small girl aged 2 years old who had lost her both parents in the accident and lost one of her legs too, was present on the venue with one of her distant relative. Anybody could tell that she had barely learned to walk before loosening her leg. She howled when the technicians tried to fix the leg and tried to walk her around. To this day this scene hounds me and brings me a lot of discomfort. The distant relatives inquired if we could sponsor her education too, immediately there was chaos amongst volunteers to step in to pitch in individually. The commotion subsided with President mentioning that we as a community can do this and everybody can contribute to that fund. You can’t imagine how proud I feel to be part of these people who can ready to fight for helping people.

Another case was of young lad who was a auto driver again lost his right foot to the accident. He just could not imagine that he can walk almost as well as he could earlier. He came with a request if we can give him a certificate which enables him to drive his auto again. To the dismay of all we could not do that. What was heartening to note was that within hours his life was changed and he had optimism to lead a normal life, a reward no less for all of us.

There are lot of cases to and all individual more than 200 case is worth mentioning here but I will need to truncate this before mentioning one last one full of life and optimism to end this. The chief technician whom we got was from Erode and since early child hood he has managed his life with this brilliant indigenous support mechanism. He leads a very normal life, can run and is more active than most of us. What is heartening is he did not stop here and went ahead with the mission to provide the same liberation from a handicap he had when he was provide with his support system. All the patients he used to treat got a lot of confidence from him. A permanent fixed smile on his face did convey a lot about him to all of us.

We did have people from all possible cross section of society. Yes, even people who could have afforded it on their own where also there, I guess because it is more for the right place then right price.

I am extremely proud of being part of this bunch of people who make this organisation called KMS (Karnataka Marwari Samaj). The enthusiasm to help people and to even get angry if they are not able to contribute to their hearts content amazes me.

What more to say, I am sure by this yearly program we can reduce if not eradicate pains of few people.

Is Strength your weakness & Threat an Opportunity?

Something that puzzles me is the so called SWOT (Strength Weakness Opportunity Threat) analysis from the time it had been introduced to my mind. Initially feeling of “Wow” soon turned into just confusions.

My brush with SWOT started all again when someone in his gyan session asked me to do my own analysis. I ended up with almost similar entries in all the columns and hence Strength was a weakness and so it was a threat and occasionally it figured in opportunity. The fun was that it also almost ran similarly in opposite direction. Probably an example will give you a better insight into where I was.

Once on the weakness I wrote “anger” and almost immediately it became quite obvious to me that it should figure out in strength as I thought that some time it’s good to have that. Once I came to threat, I just can’t ignore the fact that it owes a space here too. On the opportunity column I wrote “Controlled anger”. Hence finally “anger” made its way to all the four columns.

Few months ago few MBA students wanted to do a marketing related project on our company. I knew that they will be doing a SWOT and was quite keen to see the result. Finally once they finished the draft project and showed it to me, I couldn’t resist going to SWOT page almost immediately. I can tell you that these people were equally confused like me but they had carefully and painfully tried to find different nomenclature for the same terms. I too started to further confuse them and took up some weakness and started reasoning out to be in strength column and then on threat and so on and so forth.

Finally my conclusion is that I am able to understand poet Kabir’s couplet finally now:

Nindak niyare rakhiye aangan kuti chhawaye;
Bin sabun pani bina nirmal karat subhaye.

(Keep critics near you in your backyard for they will help you cleanse yourself without soap and water)

Probably this is the best way to work on your SWOT analysis because once you make it yourself you are heavily biased, when someone who do not understand you does it for you knows nothing and makes it a futile exercise. Hence it’s important to keep a critic who understands you and gives his unbiased opinions. Not an easy job to find one, & certainly not easier to hear criticism but that’s what SWAT is all about.

Trivial Matters ( Part - II )

During my schooling most of the time we did not have watches. It was difficult to tell when the periods would end. I was tall enough to be entitled to back bench I was luckier to get a window seat, overlooking Nandu’s compound (He was a petty part time farmer who grew vegetable just outside our school boundary. Window had grill and we used to have sunlight coming in till the lunch time. Hence I used the Jantar Mantar style to track time. Probably it was the best thing to find when the boring classes would finally come to end. It used to be pretty handy if there were crux situation and knew that I will be in receiving end of teacher’s wrath. So the periods were neatly marked with the pencil, ready for the minor alignment for summers and winters can be incorporated. A real trivial thing to substitute the watch but did mean a lot to me those days.

After 10th grade I got the opportunity to study in a residential school near Chennai. This required a long travel in a normal class. It used to painful especially when you were near the destination. I used to be glued to the window all the time. Ticket collectors used to be annoyed with us as all the time we used to ask him how far we are from the destination and how much time it will take to reach there. So there was a big necessity to find the way out without speaking a word to anyone. In this process I found a way that by mere watching and with help of a pen and a watch, I could tell how far is the destination, expected time of arrival and the most important the speed of the train. No rocket science, just the power of observation.

If you have electrified tracks you will see that there is a numbering mechanism where in on the top is a larger no for example say 252, and then on the bottom there a number system which goes like this 1/16 . This 1/16 keeps on changing per pole and it becomes with the second pole 2/16 and once you cross 16/16 the top line number will change to 251. Hence the conclusion is 16 poles are equal to one kilometre. The top line number reduces because it indicates the distance to a major station or junction where the train will get terminated.

Hence all you have to do to calculate the speed of the train is to time the kilometre travelled. You keep jotting it at regular interval and then the simple mathematics to roughly predict when you will arrive to the respective station. Trivial isn’t it?

In my final year of graduation I finally gave in to my ambition of being an entrepreneur. I always wanted the attire to be also of one and hence came my challenge with the neck tie. To this date I am a regular with the neck tie and have a good collection of the same. But not many know the science involved in wearing a simple thing like tie, A truly a trivial matter.

When I started wearing a tie it used to never perfect. All the time one or the other end used be larger than the other. If the inner thing was large it could be tucked inside the shirt but it also resulted in the other end too short and would look awkward to wear. Hence a formula was derived to sort the matter out. All you need is stand in front of a mirror and adjust the tie with the desired length from your neck to the belt. Once done from that point you need to measure from the thumb to the end of index finger fully stretched. This is the point you have to start tying the knot and you will arrive with perfection to the desired length. Thou minor adjustment might be required from tie to tie and that you can gain that from experience or you can ask the expert and inventor of this science. The calculation is simple the length from ones starting point of the thumb to the index finger is what it takes for the knot to come in and hence it is always perfect. There might be other way around but to this date I carry on with my trivial innovation.

Walking is passion for me, even after I met with a nasty accident where I almost lost my right let knee down. That was the time when I did not even hear about pedometer and I wanted to calculate the distance I walked. Calorie burned was not the there in my mind but calculating distance was surely some interest to me.

Luckily Internet was there to offer me a quick solution. I downloaded a converter and tried to see what a step would count for. Roughly a step we take while walking is about three feet long and 3 feet = 1 yard. Now all I had to do is to find how many yards are equal to one kilometre, and it is 1093.613. That means if I take about 1100 steps it is a kilometre of walk and those interested in calorie count can proceed forward or if you want to save hassles just buy an inexpensive pedometer. Till this date whenever I take a new route for my daily walking I count it thoroughly to be sure of the distance I covered on that route.

This is as trivial as it can get, but you cannot carry the pedometer every time with you. I had one of this equipment but lost it as it is too small and it can easily snap away from the belt. This calculation came handy to me once when few friends were debating over the length of walk in our colony football field. To end the debate all I required is to count the steps and arrive at almost perfect numbers.

Finally a project which I think is still viable. During my graduation days with help of my friend Mohit, I did meet a HAM Radio enthusiast. He was a retired army man in probably in end of the eight decade of his existence. He painfully explained us what it is all about, with his over sized radio tuning in his Morse code device in a tiny room he had earmarked for his hobby in his apartment.

Those days Internet has not found its way to my ears, must be in quite nascent stage with the US army. He explained us that he could talk to anyone in world fee of cost. Once the interesting part was over he went into a caution mode where he started mentioning details that the misuse of this device was impossible. He did mention that government gives licenses and kept a keen watch on what was transferred. Matter almost ended until I met another friend of mine, to whom I did explain about my findings probably to sound more intelligent. This guy was even more keen to assert his intelligence and told me that the data transfer is possible thru this, and one of his friend in US is also into it and is already been able to do 300bps (Baud per second) data transfer using Ham radio.

Hence my project started, as others all in my mind. I thought 300bps is quite less we already had 1200bps modems in market by that time, but was enough to do text based transfers. Hence I started dreaming about my own version of today’s Blackberry. The advantage was I could send message to any part of the world. Integrate the solution with the computer etc. The plus was that like internet it was almost free and had even wider reach to every nook and corner of the world. To this date this advantage still remains with this technology, you really need not worry about the connection any where even in the deepest of jungle with any inhabitants.

Later with the advent of Internet I thought of further integrating it with internet with a gateway solution anywhere in the world. There were problems and I had solutions too for them. Like since this service was free and worked in broadcast mode what could be done if we had huge traffic once launched in commercial real life world. The solution was that Ham could be used as technology demonstrator and for commercial thing a new frequency or a satellite transponder could be bought. Probably if miniaturisation of this device is possible it can be part of any handheld device. I still somehow get excited thinking if this technology is feasible there can be many advantages and add-ons example global Bluetooth kind of technology. Well I need to end here as this part too is getting quite big.

There were many other but I did try to choose best amongst them. Well what else I just wait for your feedbacks and most importantly I do want you to share some of your own experiences, please do.

Trivial Matters ( Part - I )

In life people keep on inventing or discovering few things on their own. This might be quite trivial for one and important to another. I did have fair share of these discovery moments. I thought to pen some of them which I think were great moment when I found them out. Some of them were larger projects and I had my share of setbacks on them. I leave it to your judgement how trivial they are.

My first moment was when I was about 6-7 years old. In hot summers some time we used to sleep on roof of the house along with our grandfather, it was spectacular site to watch the clear sky, those days it used to be clear sky. I could cite the moon in all its glory winning and waning. While it is to wan I could see crystal clear the rim of the moon on the darker side. I concluded that this phenomenon was due to the earth shadow. All I know by that time is that the moon reflected the suns light and did not have its own light. I remember confirming form my grandfather and it was one delightful moment for me to find this out all be myself. It is truly a trivial matter if I look back but was a great moment for me those days.

Life becomes serious as you grow up. Sky was replaced with a fan to gaze at. An idea stuck me that a perfect automobile can be build using this motor. I used to dream of building an automobile using it someday or even better driving one. Till this day I do not know driving probably waiting for my dream cart to ferry me wherever I want. So the research started with one of the encyclopaedia in my grandfather’s collection. Gosh, I now understand how much I missed internet those days. What I found out was no breakthrough in the technology itself but I found an enhancement for the same, a perfect renewable energy concept. What I saw was a simple diagram still fresh in my mind that of a U shaped magnet and a coil running thru it, explanation was while you turn the coil it will produce electricity. Now this was the bingo moment which started the stint of my day dreaming. What I thought was the battery could power the motor initially for the vehicle to move and then I could have four of those generators attached to the four wheels, what I thought it was enough to power the car once in motion. Even more I thought of the wind power, if the electricity generation was not enough I thought of putting small fan blades with the small generator in multiple no’s to close the gap. An accelerator was going to be a simple knob they use for the fan and hence to be contended with 5 speeds that it could offer.

The first setback this project suffered was when I watched a electrician repairing one of the fans in the house. He could hold the fan blades easily while the power was flowing to the fan, and as soon as he left the fan it wormed to its top speed. It worried me that how it could take the starting load of the dream car if it’s so powerless. It was time to get a mentor and hence I confided it to the best help available, hence my mentor was “Deba Bhaiya” our car driver. He heard the project with great interest and then put a lot of technical jargons in front of me like, What about Clutch? And Gears? Etc. I became too much for me to handle and I realised that I would need some formal education to start this project hence the project was shelved and it still remains there. Well now I just keep watching “Reva” on road as if they have stolen my idea and implemented it in very unprofessional way. The nearest that I came to the prototype of this car was much later in form of a line diagram using GW Basic and a PC with say 4.7Mhz speed and two floppy drives, those days there were nothing called hard disk to my knowledge. This was the last of my effort towards this direction.

It was exciting to know that water is made of two molecules of Hydrogen and one molecule of Oxygen, but more than bonding of Hydrogen and Oxygen what interested more was there separation. Electrolysis was of great interest and thought that this experiment can be tried at home. Motivation was to collect the Oxygen do administer it to my friends who were sick, no matter what the ailment is Oxygen would be good to heal the person was the thought. Hence started the process, since we did not have access to test tube in home first an empty glass jar was organised. Then the in second part two pieces of wire were organised. An afternoon time elders used to have a nap and hence was a perfect time to do this test. Wire was put in the plug on the one end and dropped to the wire, what happened next we did not have a clue as it cut the power supply to the house. Hence the major setback to this project happened. I still remember the task of putting away everything away as if nothing has happened was the bigger challenge.

I knew for sure that it will work and hence decided to repeat this with much more saner way. The Big jar was replaced with a small empty bottle of Homeopathic medicine. Source of power was the battery from my grandfather’s torch. To my joy it worked. I could see very tiny bubbles from one of the wire. But it was a partial success as it was the unwanted Hydrogen to which I did not have any application whatsoever. So I did know that the negatively charged wire was emitting Hydrogen twice the capacity that of Oxygen. Hence this safe experiment remained an experiment and I could not go ahead my intention of administering oxygen to my ailing friends. I am sure if they know about it now they would be thanking their luck.

Science really interested me but it was one demon everywhere in science which made me move away from it, and that was Mathematics. We used to have our mathematics teacher who was a ambidextrous (Person who can write with both the hands), short and stout (people who know him and if they read this will think I just called him skinny). All he did was stand in the middle of the blackboard and start solving sums from one end of the board to the other end without even mincing a word. We students used to have gala time chatting at the back as if no one is there. Hence the interest in science was mostly fuelled by magazines like “Vigyan Pragati” a quite inexpensive one, if I remember correctly thirty rupees was the annual subscription and seventy five paisa was the per issue cost of this weekly publication. The most interesting thing it contained was do-it-yourself project it used to have. In one of this project there was one to make a radio station.

It really caught my fantasy and started day dreaming about having my own radio station. More application was that we can spy (not sure on whom) and communicate with friends (Fellow spies) on their portable transistors. Hence the Bill of material was neatly copied in a piece of paper to be taken to shop which vended electrical components. Once beating the crowd to the main counter at “Burma Radio Ghar” reached out to the sales men to see if he had all the components and it’s pricing (funding was another challenge). Finally once the sourcing and funding problems were solved the project was already delayed by two months.

Then came the time to put the things in place, did everything carefully to the book but the thing decided not to work for me. Then came the right time to find a mentor for this project one of my friends uncle came to rescue we used call him “Raja ka mama”, we actually never bothered for his actual nomenclature. He did the setup in just an hour and the thing started working. This was the last exciting thing in the project as the range was pathetically less which refused to go beyond few meters. Actually I was still not ready to give up and made the TV antenna work as the radio station antenna but there was only a marginal improvement in the range. So that was the end of the spy and his team there.

To be continued . . . . . . . .

Seed makes Jungle

There is nothing called good or bad, thinking makes it so. I think what this has done is put the responsibility on the people who analyze and comment and not on the doer. Good Taliban and Bad Taliban, Good business practice and bad business practice, Migration of Jobs to the developing economy to unemployment in the very recession stuck developed economy. There are different views on each side of the story making it good for one and bad for other. I will leave this debate for some other day. What is for sure all this mentioned above were once the seed before becoming a dense jungle of thoughts, processes, people, culture and practices.

Let’s see something from the story of now famous son of a school teacher, a part from his biography “He was the second son of a school teacher. When he was 16 years old, he moved to Aden, Yemen. Initially, he worked as a dispatch clerk with A. Besse & Co. Two years later A. Besse & Co. became the distributors for Shell products and he was promoted to manage the company’s oil-filling station at the port of Aden...”. The biography continues “Yemini administration realized that their main unit of currency, the Rial, was disappearing fast. Upon launching an investigation, they realized that a lot of Rials were being routed to the Port City of Aden. It was found that a young man in his twenties was placing unlimited buy orders for Yemini Rials. During those days, the Yemini Rial was made of pure silver coins and was in much demand at the London Bullion Exchange. Young man bought the Rials, melted them into pure silver and sold it to the bullion traders in London. During the latter part of his life, while talking to reporters, it is believed that he said “The margins were small but it was money for jam. After three months, it was stopped. But I made a few lakhs. In short, I was a manipulator. A very good manipulator. But I don’t believe in not taking opportunities.”. His most famous quotes are “You do not require an invitation to make profits” and the one that I like the most is “Think fast, Think big, Think ahead, ideas are no one’s monopoly”. So what was the seed? Probably the appetite to do big and the fuel came from the silver in Rials. Today those seeds have graduated in jungles (divided into two and both are growing) I must say. There were tons of allegation on his business practices but so it be the seed kept on getting its fuel and it grew to a tree and then to a jungle.

Some love it, some envy, some get there daily bread and some are simply proud of it. I am talking of what “Bangalore” stands for today, it again started with a small seed. Mysore Maharaja wanted electricity for Kolar gold mines(KGF), he did set up a hydroelectricity plant, the wires were crossing Bangalore and they decided to replace the oil/gas street lights with the electric one with the surplus electric production. This made Bangalore to be the first city in the country to have electricity. This proved to be an important resource for fuelling scientific, academic, research and technology around Bangalore. Finally when the India’s time came in the flat wired world it was actually Bangalore which was ready to grab this opportunity. Surely the small seed planted by the Maharaja has grown into a full-fledged jungle.

There was another seed sown way back in 1947. The formation of Pakistan was on the non proved theory of its founders that Hindus and Muslims cannot stay together in peace. They thought that the religion they represent will be in danger. Sometime I see merit in the famous communist quote “religion is the opium of masses”. If there is tasks unachievable just add religious mix and there will be a lot of buyer for that. A famous columnist and writer comments in his Sunday column “The two strands within Pakistan's DNA began to slowly split its personality. The father of the nation, Mohammed Ali Jinnah, thought he had produced a child in his own image, but his secular prescription was soon suppressed. His ideas were buried at his funeral. His heirs began to concede space to mullahs like Maulana Maudoodi who asked, in essence, that if Pakistan had been created to defend Islam, then who would be its best guardians?” So thus started the religious bias which was further fuelled by the politicians and the dictators the country had from time to time. You should not ride a tiger as the tiger do not know how to help you in dismounting; all it knows is to have a morsel. Hence nobody in Pakistan dared to dismount it and they continue. I was hearing a famous Pakistani cricketer turned politician for his reason on “sariat” (Islamic laws) implemented in one of the province (Swat), he said that it was implemented because there was no remedy to the normal people for their legal woes and this is the most efficient way to provide them this facility, it was there long term demand and the Government just conceded. I some time pity the people appearing to defend Pakistan in the Indian television from the Pakistani side. It is left best to the readers to estimate where this country is heading. The columnist concluded his column with “I had a previously arranged speaking engagement at a university in Delhi before largely Muslim students. I began with the suggestion that every Indian Muslim should offer a special, public prayer of thanks to the Almighty Allah for His extraordinary benevolence - for the mercy He had shown by preventing us from ending up in Pakistan in 1947. The suggestion was received with startled amusement, instinctive applause and a palpable sense of sheer relief.” All I have to say is see the seed and its growing as a jungle .

Today, we all in our daily life sow a seed on quite a regular basis. It can be that of a thought in oneself, one that is in your work place, one in your home or your children, one in your community, state, country, world and so on and so forth. It is good to watch out these seeds, you never know which seed can survive and get enough fertilization to become a jungle. For seeds do not know good or bad they only know to grow and multiply albeit it gets its fertilization.

GDP again

Do numbers like 5.3 – 7 – 9 make any sense? To me it surely rings GDP. GDP growth 5.3 is the actual announced for the last quarter, 7% was promised, 9% was actually where we were. Recently going thru the news and there was a mention of India’s GDP growth for the third quarter coming down to 5.3% way below 7% promised by the Government as recently as in the last budget speech couple of weeks ago. I always had my own doubt on this GDP guy any ways as expressed in my earlier blogs and hence felt the responsibility to write on this issue when it made news headlines once again.

Well I have been going thru tons of information and hearing/reading as many analysts as I can. Finally I could find some solace in one announcing “Won’t get better soon, learn to live with slowdown”. I know you must be shouting “Solace?” I would still say “Yes” because he declared the truth and wanted us to accept the fact instead to keep us seeing Government’s false claims that we are not much affected. It’s time to start planning to handle the given situation now. Please change your mode from “Growth” to “Survival” if you survive you will eventually grow for sure. Bad news is rupee has taken the upward path again, new numbers to chew upon 50 – 52 – 54 - - - 60. We have started from Rs.50 for a dollar and already reached 52, near future we must see 54, that’s what the analyst have been saying, today morning in the GYM my CFO friend announced it will eventually go to 60. As soon as he was away few of the other friends who did not want to believe to this wild suggestion commented “How can one make this kind of statement, I simply do not believe””60, but when, he should answer that too” added another. Well at the end of the day we all were in the denial mood. Rupee flexing the muscle any way left me gloomy and I had no interest in flexing my muscle any more in the GYM.

Earlier to this my CFO friend also commented “All the major economy is in negative, that way our net growth compared to all those economy is still better”. I would say we never stop these feel good self solacing business. Worst part is agriculture is substantially down, Industry contributes mere 0.5% to the GDP. The sector which contributes the maximum is services and I have my own doubts on this sector as there will a lot of false elements contributing here.

Any ways guys still more bad news for people in IT and ITES as well as in job. Obama Government announced that the companies which have taken support package from the Government will not be allowed to outsource. That means millions of Indians will hit the shore from US soon and we will lose on the outsource business too. There are say about 6 million Indians abroad who remit some $30 billion a year. Labour migration has been the force behind globalisation which has gone is reverse gear for now. Recently I was chatting with a friend who is heading a US companies operation in India, on this he commented “Tell me, how they are going to implement that? How are they going to segregate? Example AIG has taken the financial package and they have a partnership in India, Do you mean to say the Indian arm will have Americans now?” I actually had no answer but for the sake of answering I said “You know, in US they plan everything to the minute details, I am sure the Obama administration would have done that”, he had no option but to accept that.

The positive side is Government announced few stimuli packages. I think the substantial one was on FDI which has surprisingly made quite less a headline. It is just like opening up the flood gates, I understand there is not much funds overseas but as soon as there is a flow it is bound to flow handsomely this direction. If things goes well we might see some Investments, may be from gulf region. Yesterday RBI announced the CRR cut of 0.5%, a third one in a row. If the banks finally decide to pass it off to their customers it should be good, they did not adhere to in last two anyways.

I conclude from the statement made by one of my friends in the armed forces. In the armed forces the proverb goes, "if rape is inevitable lie down and enjoy it". Civil society, it is perhaps, "God, give me the strength to change what can be changed and endure what cannot be changed, and to know the difference between the two" and” something is better than nothing" etc.

Philosophy has the last word.