The 3 mistakes of Chetan Bhagat!

"Billionaires get A to Z-class security.Little girls learning A to Z, however, continue to get kicked out of police stations. What priorities,"  tweeted writer Chetan Bhagat.

Chetan Bhagat is criticizing Government's decision to give Z-Class security to Mukesh Ambani. 
Billionaire Mukesh Ambani to pay for Z-category security

This comment makes me wonder whether Chetan Bhagat should instead stick to writing love stories revolving around IIT, Gujarat etc and leave the nation's priorities to intellectuals. Apparently the IIT and IIM degrees do not qualify Chetan in that bracket for now. 

Providing Z class security to a "national asset" is a step in right direction that shouldn't wait for solutions to all the others problems plaguing India. Any such comparisons, where solutions to other problems are portrayed as a precursor to any other positive developments, are more often than not meant to confuse you. 

Businessmen are nation's wealth and should not be scorned. A person of Mukesh Ambani's calibre feeds thousands of families. How many families do Chetan Bhagat feed? A nation that can't save its businessmen and industrialists has probably got its priorities wrong. 

As for the other 2 mistakes of Chetan Bhagat, they will be posted as and when he commits them. 

Victims - 2

Rape of justice

What an apt headline for this incident! The 10 year old victim was put behind bars when the family did not agree to the police demand of not filing an FIR for rape!

"The senior superintendent says the two constables had not even completed a year in the force, so they did not have the experience to deal with such a 'sensitive' situation."

Now, as an Indian citizen you know this statement is dogshit and any living human being would know how NOT to deal with this situation! But what befuddles you is

1) What is the IQ of a person, who rose to become a senior superintendent of police ?

2) How much does he really thinks is the IQ of an average citizen on whom this excuse is supposed to work?

3) In reality, it is quite expected of the experienced constables to do this. I mean, I have had friends wanting to file an FIR for loss of cellphone being threatened with similar consequences. Hell! no matter what you go to police for, they are always interested in putting you behind the bars instead. But, it is horrifying to know that even young cadres, who are expected to have some passion and conscience take very little or no time to become a part of the system!

I am sure this is not an isolated incident. No matter how underdeveloped your economy is, your police isn't supposed to work like this. There's something seriously wrong with the system!

Victims

Got up to the news of the death of the rape victim. One of the saddest mornings ever. My heart cries. I am moving a little slowly today and I am sure many of you feel the same way.

A nation is like a big machinery with many different moving parts.Trying to seek a repair on just one part will still not make the wrecked machine work. I hope her death doesn't go in vain and we wake up to the fact that even the disruptions in parliament affect the outcome of our ability to discuss and enact new laws. The next time any opposition government disrupts the session, pay attention. Don't ignore it and then complain we do not have laws.  

Then again, we can write a whole new set of laws and that still won't work. Better policing and better judiciary will not come overnight. Stop expecting shortcut solutions offered by likes of Anna Hazare and Arwind Kejriwal. Lets try to fix the problem at its root. Stop fooling yourself - Corruption is not the root cause of our miseries. Its just a symptom to a much deeper problem. Trying to solve corruption at this juncture is like having lozenges to get rid of sore throat. While it can give you a temporary relief, the problem will still very much be there. Corruption is largely an impediment to progress which is anyway not coming if we oppose every price increase and foreign investment. 

Changing the mentality by educating the masses and then giving them the job opportunities will reduce the disparity and push the masses to middle class. Middle class families are ambitious and bring stability to a nation. While I am not saying that even this will solve all our problems, but this should ideally be where we start. It will be a painful road and for a big nation like ours, the changes will only reflect years later. Lets encourage our entrepreneurs, lets encourage our industrialists. Lets get out of our colonial mindset - no walmart is NOT coming to occupy your country - no Manmohan has NOT sold the nation! Lets understand - that corporations are not here to loot your wealth - you DON'T have it in first place! Corporations create wealth and opportunities! Lets encourage change in mentality and only then can we prosper and solve the different symptoms of the problem.

Lets change our mentality. Lets change us!

Not Loving it!

Here's something that a country should really be proud of :

Why-mcdonalds-is-shutting-down-in-bolivia

Apparently, "The rejection is in the minds and mentality of Bolivians", which is awesome!

I am not against McDonalds in anti-foreign investment way. It provides a wonderful option to those who really are in a hurry. I love their Mc-Spicy and don't even get me started on their perfect French Fries. I am also a big fan of Ray Kroc, the man behind the success of McDonalds.

Its just that I am really proud of those who can stay away from Fast Food. Fast Food is yummy and convenient but I hate to think of the time when McDonalds was my everyday lunch, well almost! Its really not healthy! A balanced diet is really the simplest way to a healthy life.A healthy society is far more productive than an unhealthy one - not to say that countries with McDonalds are unproductive.  The fact that McDonalds tried for 10 years and couldn't get enough Bolivians to eat their french fries and burgers is inspirational. 

The article also talks about Kellogg's failure in India. 
"According to analysts, a major reason for Kellogg’s failure was the fact that the taste of its products did not suit Indian breakfast habits."

Well that and the fact that most of us didn't have working mothers and I strongly believe that Kellogg has a better chance of success in countries with high proportion of working couples. 

I missed Blogger!

Its such a long time since I have done some serious blogging. I was so caught up in life. 

I missed Blogger. Ever since I have left blogging,  my writing skills deteriorated.

I hope to be regular once again. Emraan Hashmi's interview (below post) inspired me to come back :-).

I hope kids don’t watch my film

Emraan Hashmi: I-hope-kids-dont-watch-my-films

and I hope no one does...

"His living standard worsens if he is married"

Laughter is the best medicine and here's the dose for today.


TOI breaks its own record and comes up with the stupidest piece ever : 


Indians spent Rs 5.8L crore extra due to inflation in last 3 years


As if this wasn't enough, I was totally floored by the below comment :


===============
There is no need for an economist to understand the scenario or to provide suggestion. If only we could stop BPOs and Software companies we could have controlled inflation. The employees are in their twenties and they get highly paid. They just waste their money on electronics and clothing's. But yes the purchasing power increases and so the GDP is high. But due to the purchasing power the prices of things goes high. Which in fact is difficult for a common man. For example, a BPO employee can afford a rented house for Rs7000-10000 contrary to a regular employee. Cos of this a common man settles down for a low cost house. His living standard worsens if he is married. His children dont get good education and good schooling cos of high donation and fees. Our GDP and economic growth is high cos of the purchasing power of the few young BPO and software employees who dont know to spend money. And our stupid government and its policy fails to understand and tackle this simple thing. Our education system doesnt focus on farmers but computers. a day will come when One Thaali food will cost 1 lakh rs and there will be people who can buy that...lol... Its high time we realize that working in front of computers will gives as money for food but what if there is no food to available in the market....
===============


 How do we even manage to produce such people?:-) 


Edited to Add:


This just keeps getting better and better..


Another commentator,another solution :


==========
Inflation is in fact the biggest scam of government in collaboration with RBI. Inflation occurs only because of EXCESSIVE increase in printed Currency. Since Government/RBI prints huge amount of Currency in form of Rs500 and Rs1000 Notes, the currency in Market Increases but the commodities like grains, pulses, vegetables, milk etc, remains limited. As a result, the thing (Ghee) that one used to get for Rs100 per kilo is now available at Rs300 per Kilo. The Only Way to Reduce Inflation and than Deflation and similar Bubbles of Indian Economy is to Discard Government printed Currency and to ADOPT FOR GOLD STANDARD or Gold Standardized Currency. this is the only way for reducing GAP between Poor and Rich. However, Government will never agree for discarding government printed money and adopting for gold currency because if it do so, it will loose the strongest and best weapon to ROB poor and middle class Indians. According to a report shown on Zee News today, 72% of Indians uses Rs2, Rs5, Rs 10 and Rs100 note (everyday), while merely 12% use Rs500 note and only 2.4% use Rs1000 note every day. The remaining are those who often fail to use even a Rs 2 note. So why is Government adamant to keep printing more and more Rs500 and Rs1000 notes? In fact, Indians don't need any note. People will do much better with Gold Standard currency and it will solve Inflation problem too because Gold cannot be created or Inflated/increased.
===============

What a Shame India!

National player thrown off train in UP, loses leg

For those of you who say "India toh India hai(India is India afterall)"... there...your India! It is a shame that your national player had to travel in a general compartment, it is a shame that a robbery attempt was made and she was thrown out of the train. 

India Today reports 

"A profusely bleeding Sonu was rushed to the district hospital here. "

It is a shame that India today uses the word 'rushed' whereas it isn't probably true, 

Hindu reports :

"The injured and unconscious Arunima was cited by the tracks by a cabin man. No passenger or official of the train-guard, driver or the police force lodged a complaint at the next stop, let alone bring the train to halt or provide care."

It is a shame that she was offered a paltry sum of 25,000Rs and only when she snubbed the offer was she offered 2lacs and a railway job.

It is a shame that a national level player was to attend a recruitment examination of CISF.

It is a shame that a complete fool like Mamta is our railway minister and a thug like Mayawati is UP's chief minister. 

Mind you - this is definitely not an isolated incident. It is just a high profile case that was worth publishing according to the calculation by various media groups. 

Police will probably not even be able to catch the culprits, and even if they do, what is the guarantee that the case will be solved in the next 5 years?

The despair you feel.Such shame India, such shame!

'Everybody has options' over Gulf compensation

BBC-Radio has this interview of the lawyer who is managing Gulf Oil spill fund of 20 billion USD, for BP.


I loved hearing this lawyer, he's so clear with the choice of his words (which is how a good lawyer should be).The lawyer doesn't instantly negate what the interviewer asks, yet proves him wrong. Amazing!

Subsidy Junkies!

For someone who is interested in trade talks – this one is a must hear:
It talks about the illegal subsidies (in various forms like low interest loans) that American and European Govts pay to their aircraft makers.

Boeing v Airbus

I have coped the heading of this blog from the Economist itself , because I just loved it.

Silly Charges!

 

NDTV reports :-

Air India responds to allegations of overcharging Indians in Cairo

“Air India Ltd would like to clarify that it ONLY recovered costs and NOT made any "huge profits" as alleged/propagated by some quarters. “

I find these charges totally silly. There is no way Air India will make profit if it wants to – they just don’t know what “profit” is.

TOI getting Dumber each day

This is how you misread stats or this is how ‘the glass is completely full’.

“The great Indian dream of pursuing an MBA in the US seems to be on the wane.”

and Why?Proof :

“In testing year 2005 (July 1, 2004 to June 30, 2005), when over 43,000 GMAT scores were sent to management programmes in the US by Indians, a mere 19,196 GMAT scores came from Chinese. Till 2009, India maintained its lead over China. But in testing year 2010 (July 2009-June 2010), for the first time the number of Chinese far outnumbered Indians: 80,000 to the Indians' 65,361.”

Second Argument is equally Dumb :

“In testing year 2010, over 17,000 Indians sent in their GMAT scores to Indian institutions. Meanwhile, only 1,743 GMAT scores from mainland China (and 5,184 from Hong Kong) were sent to Chinese B-schools in the same period.
While the last five years saw only a marginal increase in GMAT scores sent by Chinese in their own country (but a steady growth in those sent to the US), there has been an almost four-fold rise in the number of Indians applying to Indian management institutions—from 4,879 in 2005 to 17,087 in 2010.”

And Ergo :

“Ashok Sarathy, vice-president, GMAT Programme, feels this may have a lot to do with the emergence of high-quality management education in India.”

Do I explain it or does everyone get how stupid TOI can be?:-)

Or wait, is fall in 'logical reasoning’ ( an area tested in GMAT) the reason :-)?

Corporate lesson 1

 

One of the things that I have learned in my corporate IT life is that the employees of client company (the company that has outsourced its IT work) do not have the “one team” attitude towards employees from third party IT companies even though they are all literary working on the same team or project.

A client side line manager probably feels that since they are paying us for the job – it is totally upon us to deal with the problems we are facing in operations.This is a disastrous attitude as we are all finally running their own operations.Showing empathy to our problems instead of “your management problem” attitude will go a long way in building a strong unified and highly productive team.

 

To Pakistan.... With love ... US of A

Slow response of Pakistani Govt to the flood relief operations in north-western part of the country might be because of the fact that they are probably wanting more F-16s from US to help "rescue" stranded people (just like they want to fight terrorists with F-16s). No?

AND..

Don't be surprised if the US actually gives them.:-)

BP and the great leak.

My perspective on the BP oil leak is shared by few other people as mentioned below : 

“

The multibillion-dollar, multinational company found support for its efforts. In New York, that support came from billionaire Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

"The guy that runs BP didn't exactly go down there and blow up the well," he told a radio program. "And what's more, if you want them to fix it and they are the ones with the expertise, I think I might wait to assign blame until we get it fixed."

In London, England, a Downing Street spokesman said Prime Minister David Cameron spoke Friday with BP Chairman Carl-Henric Svanberg.

"The prime minister explained that he was frustrated and concerned about the environmental damage caused by the leak, but made clear his view that BP is an economically important company in the UK, US and other countries," the spokesman said in a news release.

"He said that it is in everyone's interests that BP continues to be a financially strong and stable company."

British Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg appealed for a reduction in the vitriol that has gripped many observers. "I don't, frankly, think we're going to reach a solution stopping the release of oil into the Gulf any quicker by allowing this to spiral into a tit-for-tat political, diplomatic spat," he said.

“

I have no idea – how is a protest going to stop the leak any faster?? This is because I believe BP is already doing all it can to stop the leak, unlike ofcourse the shameless Union Carbide India ltd – which got away with a slap on the wrist.

While all this is happening, Obama is delivering populist dialogues. Yes – dialogues.

Do not read beauty magazines, they make you feel Ugly!

 

On a lighter vein, enjoy this :

Love this, don’'t you?

Israel’s Attack on “Aid ship”.

All the opinions that one might form of Israel after its soldiers attacked the so called ‘Aid ship’ should be formed after watching this video that Israel has released :

BBC link here

It is a disturbing video. Only idiots can believe that these were ‘aid’ or ‘peace activists’.

World’s intelligence is probably plummeting, when it stridently opposes this incident. Ofcourse these people were only self proclaimed ‘peace activists’ . To me they were just malevolent ‘pro-Palestine’ Jihadists.

I agree with Israel’s ambassador to India when he says

“First of all any loss of life is tragic. This loss of life yesterday could have easily been avoided had the organisation that had been running it (flotilla) been a true humanitarian organisation dedicated to aid,”

You go and mess with armed soldiers, then you whine about the fact that they retaliated?Highest form of idiocy.

The world bias rankles me.And you??

Apologies from PCPA

 

“sorry-we-attacked-the-wrong-train” 

                      -- PCPA leader Umakanto Mahato

Oh common, we understand, anyone can commit mistakes. We totally forgive you.Things like that happen. Try not to repeat it though, but don’t worry, in case you repeat it, we will forgive you again.

“There must have been some miscalculation”

MUST ??

I like the tone of the statement..

Wiki Answers …. Almost anything..

 

Have you ever visited Wiki Answers ? It answers quite useful facts such as these :

Click on the image to view it clearly.

Link

I liked the question

“Has shahrukh khan ever had sex?”

Even more the line after that :

“The question has not been answered yet”

:-), Oh Boy! Now, thats a mystery !

 

Link

Another one , Just for fun

Q : “Has Kareena has exposed herself”

A : “Yes she was exposed”

:-).. Active and passive voice,, huh??

Link

There are tonnes of other.. I can do this whole day , but just one last one :

Q : “You want to marry a kashmiri girl?”

A : “Yes I want to marry a Kashmiri Girl?”

Notice the question mark .. :-)

Link

Fun, isn’t it??

Am I really “spoilt”??

Why do people think they know what’s best for you? Why are they sure that their decisions and only their decisions are what are going to keep you happy? Why do they not trust you with your own decisions?

Why should I do what ‘society’ will like and accept? If I do so, I will not be the person I am. How will I ever have self respect if I go against my principles? Will I not always and always remember that I did something I thought was wrong, but had to do it just for the ‘society’ that otherwise doesn’t even care about my existence? Am I indebted to society that I sacrifice my happiness for them ? Will, what I know is right become wrong just because the society doesn’t approve of it?

When I say society I am talking about Indian society. Ofcourse – the people elsewhere are more humane.The great Indian society where neighbours are more interested in what is happening in your life than the events in their. Surprisingly everyone seems to give a lot of importance to what his/her neighbours think of him/her. Although you will always be taught that your neighbour is a bad person, you will also be taught to give a damn about his perception of you. If he ain’t approving something, you are spoiling the family name if you still do it.

Almost all your relatives will take it for granted that they have the right to control your life too.The thing is even they will care more about the ‘society’ than they will for you. Finally, its all about the ‘society’. ‘Society’ will control your life till you reside in India. Oh, and if you leave India and talk of never coming back, you are “spoilt”.If you are open about your feelings for India – “I hate it“ , no one will still know – “why?” .You will have to hear to “Money is not everything in life!” sort of stuff. May be they just don’t get it and may be they never will.

Is it only about the comfort that I would never want to come back to India – No! Its the people, who interfere in my life, the people who judge me at every opportunity that they get . Its the sudo independence, the lack of freedom to act on my own decisions. You will almost read this piece few times a month :

Couple stoned to death

Indians are typically judgmental people – the sort that I truly hate. For us a divorcee is a bad person – an untouchable.For us a gal who drinks is bad.For us – 2 people who have consensual premarital sex are “westernized” and “Spoilt”. For us – a gal who can wear shorts outside the house is “spoilt”. We like to hide our judgmental nature under the cover of "our culture". What rubbish! I don’t get it – how does someone become good or bad because he/she had sex before marriage ??This disturbs me! And by the way because it does, I am “spoilt” too!

We also a cynical group, may be because of post independence lack of opportunity meant that we step on our neighbour’s shoulder to reach the top.I am taught that the whole world but my family is after my life – they are all here to fool me and take advantage of me. If I don’t get it, I am “naive” and “immatured”, “I have not seen the world”. What if I have seen the world, what if my world is different from yours?

“But… But.. you were born here” …

I did not have a choice! I did not choose to. I am an Indian only by birth, not by choice.

“But .. there are so many good things too “ ..

Ya, may be I want a little more than you do..

Do people love you only as long as you listen to them or agree with them? I guess so .. else you are just too “spoilt”.