KING AT DEATH: A ROYAL MESS

KING AT DEATH: A ROYAL MESS


Michael Jackson weighed just 50kg at death, grossly underweight for a man 5ft 10in tall
His hips, thighs and shoulders were riddled with needle marks
Was totally emaciated, ate only one frugal meal a day. His stomach had no food; just semi-digested pills
He had lost most of his hair and covered his baldness with a wig. His haggard face was disfigured by 13 plastic surgeries. The bridge of his nose had crumbled Several of his ribs were found broken a result of desperate attempts to pump life back into his heart There were 4 needle wounds near his heart, apparently from failed efforts to restart it by shooting adrenaline into it

Are Indians filthy foreigners?

Are Indians filthy foreigners?Jug Suraiya Wednesday June 17, 2009

In the wake of racist attacks on Indians in Australia, and a consequent backlash to such assaults, a large number of anti-Indian Australian Facebookers have accused Asian immigrants, particularly those from the Indian sub-continent, of being dirty and unhygienic in their public behaviour. In short, they’ve accused Indians of being literally filthy foreigners.

We Indians dirty? What utter rubbish. But it’s not the first time such a charge has been made. Last year it was the British who rubbished us. Tory MP Lucy Ivimy was reported to have said that Indians don't know how to dispose of their rubbish and are congenital litterbugs. Though she later apologised for her remark, Ivimy's accusation provoked dudgeon among Indians in not only Britain but, even more so, in India. Us Indians? Creating a mess wherever we go? What a load of garbage.

Unlike people in the West and other so-called developed societies we Indians are scrupulously particular about all matters pertaining to hygiene management and waste disposal. Take the example of household garbage. What do they do with it in these so-called advanced countries? They store it -- as though these scraps of leftover food, vegetable peelings, egg shells and other guck were precious jewels -- in a special container made for the purpose and generally kept in the kitchen. How thoroughly disgusting. Imagine keeping rotting refuse in the kitchen, which after the puja room is the most hallowed sanctum sanctorum of the Indian household.

A barbaric notion totally inimical to 5,000 years of Indic civilisation and culture based on the totems and taboos of ritual pollution. Which in turn is based on the concept of what has been called inappropriate context. For instance, it is appropriate to wear shoes to go outdoors, but it is inappropriate (ritually polluting) to wear shoes indoors, more so within a place of worship. Similarly, keeping ritually polluting garbage within the kitchen and defiling its symbolic purity is an emphatic no-no. So what to do with the muck? Simple. Throw it out of the window. That's what windows are for, apart from letting in air and light.

The scrupulous cleanliness of us Indians is attested to by the assiduity with which we expel all forms of rubbish, garbage, junk and litter from our homes and places of work and dump such offending and offensive matter where it rightly belongs: on our public streets and thoroughfares.

This is what less anciently civilised communities can't understand about us: the cordon sanitaire that we draw between our pure, pollution-free personal space (our homes, offices, etc) and the public space of the outside world at large (i.e. anything and everything beyond the sacrosanct confines of our homes, offices, etc) which we rightly use for the purpose it has obviously been designed, namely to be the natural receptacle of all our filth and rubbish. That the 'outside' India of our public space is unmitigatedly dirty and squalid only testifies to the fact that the 'inside' India of our personal domains is squeaky-clean and spotless.

There is a profound chasm, not just cultural but spiritual, between us and societies and individuals who are obsessed about 'outside' (and therefore irrelevant) cleanliness at the expense of 'inner' salubrity. It is this basic misapprehension of the uniquely Indian concept of sanitation that causes outsiders to trash us. Which they are once more planning to do at the forthcoming G8 meet where the US and Japan will try to arm-twist India into accepting emission norms for industry.

This western phobia about carbon emissions is incomprehensible to the Indian mind. Carbons are dirty things, right? In which case why are people so hung up about emitting them (i.e. getting rid of the darn things, like chucking garbage out of the window)? But people like Al Gore (and now our very own R K Pachauri) carry on something fierce about carbon emissions and how horrid they are (all the more reason to be shot of all that nasty carbon and dump it where it properly belongs: in the global public space known as the environment).

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is proposing to go to the G 8 summit, where presumably he will try to educate the US, Japan and other misinformed parties about the right and proper manner in which to deal with industrial emissions and all that rot. Will someone open the window, please?

Using the armed forces for a pittance

Using the armed forces for a pittance

SANTOSH DESAI


If there is one subject on which all of India agrees, be it the media, the middle class or different political parties, it is that of the selfless bravery of our armed forces. No matter how fractious we might be about most other issues, the valour of the Indian jawan has never been called into question. Of course, this passionate espousal of the armed forces does not quite translate into concern for their well being, as the recent controversy over the recommendations of the pay panel bears out. We are quick to sing songs in the honour of the Army, gratified to find our eyes moisten as the forlorn figure of a brave widowed wife climbs up the podium to receive a national honour, but slow to respond to any tangible, real life needs of those in service. Our response to the Army is a complex one, made up in equal parts of awestruck admiration , exaggerated respect and profound indifference.
If we step back a little and think about it, the Army is a very strange institution. We recruit ordinary people by the thousands to die for the rest of us. We ask them to make this supreme sacrifice and then take away any say that they might have in the situation. We glorify unquestioned obedience in the name of discipline so that the soldier acts no matter what the order. We give them the right to kill in return for their agreement to die, but we take away any moral consideration from the equation.
We frame the need to do so in terms of the needs of the nation state, and accord this abstract ideal overriding importance over all other human considerations. In a world otherwise driven by money, where we place economic value on things on the basis of how important they are to us, or on how inaccessible the product or service in question is, we place an astonishingly low price on the lives of those ready to die for us. Army personnel earn a pittance considering what they put at stake for the rest of us; any market pricing mechanism will place a much higher value on the service they provide.
What makes people willing to do this for the rest of us Of course, they are patriotic and brave, but there is a much larger set of forces at work here. They are comfortable with the idea of killing people they dont know and dying for people who dont know them, because they are made to believe so. Society manages to recruit people into the Army by constructing a sense of an overriding moral imperative around this institution. It buttresses this by creating an elaborate and seductive aura of grandeur around the Army. We give them shiny uniforms and decorate them with colourful ribbons that blaze across their chests. We give them designations that command respect and which they can append to their names even after retirement . We rein them in by glamourizing discipline but permit them special privileges that civilians cannot have. They live in clean cantonments , get free rations and cheap liquor, have a fleet of vehicles at their disposal, and are not subject to the laws of the land but instead to their own. It is interesting that however difficult life in the rough conditions where the Army operates might be, what the Army celebrates is not a life of frugality, but one that is full of pomp and pageantry. Every small action is converted into a spectacle, through elaborate acts of ceremony. It is through the power of ceremony, the potency of ritual and the ubiquitous visibility of symbols that the notion of military service is glorified.
We construct the military cunningly , for we need it to do something no rational person would otherwise agree to doing. The foot soldiers are recruited from the underclass, seduced by a life of respect and honour , granted privileges that make them feel special and used for a purpose that they end up believing passionately in. The rest of us instinctively know that if we are fulsome in the symbolic honour of our martial warriors, we dont really need to worry about them as people. We trap our soldiers in a web of honour, imprison them on a pedestal made of florid tribute.
When we talk of unleashing our Army in response to every provocation that comes our way, we ask some people to go out and die for us. We are able to live with this because we have created an institution just for this eventuality. And yes, if some brave young man loses his life at the age of 23, well we are all proud of him, and besides , isnt that what soldiers do

A FAILURE CALLED PAKISTAN

A FAILURE CALLED PAKISTAN

Indias Neighbour Among Top 10 Failed States, According To Index Prepared By Foreign Policy Journal

Our Political Bureau NEW DELHI


PAKISTAN , one of the biggest exporters of fundamentalist terror and a basket case terriotory in terms of economic conditions , continues to be among the top 10 failed states.
A failed states index prepared by Foreign Policy journal, has put Pakistan in the tenth position. The ranking is done on the basis of the following factors: demographic pressure, refugees/internally displaced persons (IDPs), group grievance , uneven development, economic decline, delegitimisation of the state, public service, human rights, factionalised elites and external intervention. The top 10 failed states in the latest list are: Somalia , Zimbabwe, Sudan, Chad, Democratic Republic of Congo, Iraq, Afghanistan, Central African Republic, Guinea and Pakistan.
As there is linkage between failed states and terrorism, it is bad news for India. The situation in the neighbourhood is fast going out of control with the Taliban battling Pakistan army in the Swat borders and Lashkar e Taiba and its offshoots creating troubles within and outside.
Pakistan has been displaying its reluctance to act against terror by releasing Lashkar leaders jailed after the Mumbai outrage. In his meeting with President Asif Ali Zardari in Russia, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh gave vent to New Delhis anger.
Foreign Policy noted that it is a sobering time for the worlds most fragile countries, what with the global financial meltdown, natural disasters , and government collapse. Answering the question of which failed states demand attention might well come down to which are deemed to pose the biggest threat to the world at large. But even the widely presumed linkage between failing states and terrorism is less clear than many have come to assume since the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks sounded the alarm about the consequences of governments not in control of their territory, the journal said. It also said some of the failed states are unmanageable for even outfits like al-Qaeda . Take Somalia, once again the No. 1 failed state on this years index. A recent report by West Points Combating Terrorism Center, drawing on captured al-Qaeda documents, revealed that Osama bin Ladens outfit had an awful experience trying to operate out of Somalia , for all the same reasons that international peacekeepers found Somalia unmanageable in the 1990s: terrible infrastructure, excessive violence and criminality, and few basic services, among other factors. In short, Somalia was too failed even for al-Qaeda .
The journal said countries such as Yemen may not yet be front-page news, but its being watched intently these days in capitals worldwide. A perfect storm of state failure is now brewing there... Many worry Yemen is the next Afghanistan: a global problem wrapped in a failed state. Its not just Yemen. The financial crisis was a near-death experience for insurgency-plagued Pakistan, which remains on IMF life support... All indications are that 2009 will bring little to no reprieve, the journal said.

Egyptian cotton

King cotton

When it comes to sheer comfort, enduring finesse and luxurious softness, nothing can be cooler than Egyptian cotton

Reshmi R Dasgupta

AS TEMPERATURES and humidity soar, thoughts turn to cool, cool things. I dont only mean the latest aviator sunglasses, split airconditioners or frozen diaquiri but the most basic of heat-beaters : cotton . On your bed, in your bathroom and most importantly, on your person . In these times of global warming and, in Indias case, increased power cuts, nothing is quite as airy and fresh as good, long-staple cotton , and that is why Egytian cotton is an essential luxury.
Egytian cotton, you wonder with a smirk... Surely shes got it wrong as it seems as oxymoronic as English tea or Irish coffee. Ancient Egypt, you may to remind me, used linen and flax not cotton , both for the living and the dead. Indeed they did, which is why I already listed linen as an essential luxury in a column long ago... But Egyptian cotton is the new wonder fabric from an antique land, and unlike Egyptian linen, its magic has not been hidden and forgotten in pyramids for centuries.
Have you heard of an Egyptian leader called Mohammed Ali
Pasha Hes the one who had the foresight to introduce a wonderful long staple cotton to his countrys farmers in the Nile delta the 1820s that catapulted them to the top of the quality ladder. Adroit timing also ensured that cotton from Egypt captured the British mill industry when the US stopped exporting their raw cotton during the Civil War. Piquantly, the cotton plant used by the Egyptians is a native American variety Gossypium barbadense but it has clearly taken to the sun and sand of the Nile .
Nowadays, whether it is a shirt, dress, bedsheet or towel, the words Finest Egyptian Cotton not only guarantee unbelievable softness and absorbency but also tough resilience , and of course, it comes at a price. And that depends on the ply and thread count the finer the thread, the higher the count ergo, higher the price too. Ply refers to the number of yarns in the thread, which also denotes quality. In Egypt, local cotton products can go up to 600 count from their normal 300 (per square inch) but the really top quality Egyptian cotton garments and cloths manufactured in other nations can go up to 1500.
Most items that do use Egyptian cotton display that fact very prominently as it is a beacon for quality (and luxury) hunters. The most wonderful and satisfying characteristic of this cotton is that the more it is washed the softer it gets and it never develops nubbles or lumps or gives off lint. That is because its strands are at least double the length of other cotton varieties. Yet, despite its fineness , there is a tough core, thanks to the long strands of cotton, that makes it resistant to wear and, especially , tear. That is why it is absolutely perfect for longtime investment.
Markets in Egypt, obviously, have shops specialising in their cottonware but the fabric has also got an entree into the best of retail addresses and brands across the world. The tip is to look closely at the label of the shirt, towel or sheet to spot the magic words Egyptian cotton in the unlikely case that it is not proclaimed prominently! Once anyone has used this fabled fabric, the chances are that they will never settle for anything less ever again. Given the way temperatures are rising, Egyptian cotton is definitely an essential luxury!

Lalgarh: Exposing Citizen-State Relationship Bare Naked Administrators have not succeeded in reaching out to constituencies, nor have they granted c

Lalgarh: Exposing Citizen-State Relationship Bare Naked

Administrators have not succeeded in reaching out to constituencies, nor have they granted citizens full access to the resources, institutions, and power that are theirs by right

Mihir R Bhatt


WILL the current police action in Lalgarh only multiply the Maoist threat If my visits to villages around Lalgarh earlier this year to review flood recovery are any indication , the answer may very well be yes.
The dissension that Lalgarh represents is apparent in places across India, including in the districts of Bihar, West Bengal and Orissa and it has the potential to spread further. The recent incidents in Lalgarh bring attention to the fact that over the past six decades, administrations in Kolkata, Patna, Bhubaneshwar and Delhi have not succeeded in effectively reaching out to diverse constituencies, nor have they granted citizens full access to the resources , institutions, and power that are theirs by right. The state and its citizens are detached and it is this detachment trauma that reinforces the Maoists insurgency. The distant relationship between the State and Citizen begs the question: has the caregiver been less caring
Links of attachment between citizens and the state are developed over long periods of time. The state has not been a consistent caregiver almost throughout the lives of Lalgarhs protesters and has not cared enough for their food, shelter, water, health, work or education. Nothing worked. Nothing reached. No one cared, explained a female community-leader in Balasore, Orissa. Wearing a blouse-less worn out saree from her total collection of three sarees, the woman described the complete lack of maternal healthcare in her community before, during and after each flood. She added that the best meal she has ever had was a fist-full of puffed rice. Disasters always expose the citizen-state relationship bare naked.
Regardless of the intentions that underlie many of our public policies, they often end up serving poor citizens and districts last and only after everyone else has eaten. These policies also allow private companies to control or purchase forest-land from the state, land that rightly belongs to forest citizens and has for centuries. To an extent, recently, Indias exceptional economic growth has decreased interdependence between the state and its citizens, as many individuals become more financially stable and self-sufficient .
This has created a coincident focus on individual worth that keeps our attention fixed on what we study, what job we take, and how much we earn; it also leaves us less concerned with injustice that do not affect us directly . Indias economic progress must not be allowed to erode the states obligations to its citizens. 2009s projected 9% growth in GDP will and should increase the individual worth of many, but not at the cost of citizens worth to the state.
Lalgarh reminds us that as a nation, we must develop a shared sense of citizen worth, empathy , and a collective ability to compromise in the face of disappointments and distress. Our failure to develop such an appreciation of human worth has a high cost and threatens our capacity to hold our government accountable. What to do asked a man I met in the east Midnapur district of West Bengal who had lost his home to floods three times over past six : Mare Lal Killa sar kare Taj ko tode (blow up myself Run down Red Fort Break Taj Mahal) . Neglected of care by the state has left him with few options to think positive. Disaster and conflict risks often overlap, and fuel each other.
People in districts like Lalgarh are born in a free India. They see their fellow Indian citizens in cities taking jobs, moving ahead, making it . But they dont have a chance to do the same; even worse, they know that the few things they do havetheir land, forests, water, and dignitycan be taken away under the consenting eye of the government that purports to protect them. One young man I met in Bihar migrates for work and spends nine months each year away from his home. He said, My father was a chowkidar and so am I. The small factory in Morbi in Gujarat where my father worked is the richest tilemaking unit now. Voh Kuch nahi the aur aaj subkuch hai. Aur hum, kabhi kuch bane hi nahi. (From nothing they are everything and we never became anything or anyone). Sadly, this view is held by many many more and one that is spreading quickly.
Citizens in districts like Lalgarh fear police, doubt doctors and are cautious of the collectorate; unfortunately , they have good reasons to be. Few have ever been successful in obtaining the healthcare or food promised to them by authorities.
The only thing they can access easily is an institutionalised detachment from the authorities and Indian society. Repeated bad experiences with the caregiver have left them with almost no attachment to their government and little commitment to pursuing reasoned solutions to conflicts that arise with the statenot after they themselves have been dealt with unreasonably. Hume apna banaya hi nahi(never made us ours), laughed one women I spoke with. She collects food grains and stores it for relief after floods because the recovery package after Koshi floods is yet not declared although national headlines after the VIP visits declared upcoming recovery package several times.
The damaged relationship between citizens and their state means we must rethink police action in Lalgarh. Answering a communitys detachment with force is a starkly routine but routinely ineffective response that can only reinforce their detachment from the government. The attachment between Citizen and State that is sacrificed during such actions will be compensated for eventually, possibly in ways that simply support the Maoist threat.
Perhaps the question is not how to wipe out the Maoist threat, or immediately establish rule of law, but how to develop attachment between the state and the citizen in such parts of India.
Police action cannot give to anyone more than what it takes away from everyone, I have found across and around India.

Theres a new aggressiveness in Chinas approach to India

Games Neighbours Play

Theres a new aggressiveness in Chinas approach to India

G Parthasarathy


Dwelling on the prospects for Sino-Indian relations just after his meeting with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at Yekaterinburg , on the sidelines of the BRIC summit of emerging world economies, Chinese president Hu Jintao said: Both sides should make steady progress in pushing for dialogue and cooperation. The two Asian neighbours have cooperated closely in international forums on crucial economic issues like global economic recovery and the restructuring of international financial institutions . India and China have made common cause on vital issues of climate change, indicating that while they share a common interest with the developed world in arresting global warming, they would not succumb to pressures that would limit their common quest for economic development.
Sino-Indian cooperation on such issues has, however, been overshadowed by some disturbing policies adopted by China in recent days. Quite evidently bolstered by US secretary of state Hillary Clintons comments that US-China relations are the most important bilateral relationship in the 21century and by a realisation that the US needs its cooperation to revive its crisis-ridden economy, China has become more assertive in recent days in flexing its muscles across the Asia-Pacific and Indian Ocean regions. It has overridden the concerns of its neighbours on its territorial claims in the South China Seas by extending its maritime boundaries with Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Brunei and the Philippines unilaterally.
This has been combined with a continuing barrage against India, not only denigrating Indias economic development and its approach to neighbours like Pakistan, but also issuing not too thinly veiled warnings about its territorial claims to Arunachal Pradesh, which it refers to as Southern Tibet .
The policy of denigrating India picked up steam after the 26/11 terrorist carnage in Mumbai. Government-controlled media organisations in mainland China and Hong Kong launched an anti-India barrage claiming that the Indian governments eagerness to declare the attacks were carried out by foreign forces was an attempt to cover up internal contradictions . The official mouthpiece of the Communist Party, the Peoples Daily, proclaimed on December 2 that the attack was a major blow to Indias big power ambitions . More recently on June 19, it claimed that the mindset of people in India towards China is one of awe, vexation, envy and jealousy .
What has raised concerns in New Delhi is that, as China now displays its military might openly and calls on the commander of the US Pacific Fleet to recognise the Indian Ocean as a Chinese sphere of influence to be managed by Chinese nuclear submarines and aircraft carriers (a suggestion the Americans rejected), we are also witnessing growing aggressiveness in Chinese claims to the entire territory of Arunachal Pradesh. This is a far cry from Chinas position in 2005, when it implicitly agreed that in resolving the border issue, the status of populated areas on both sides of the line of control would remain unchanged. Just after the Mumbai attack, a publication in a Chinese government-linked think tank noted, even before Pakistan claimed that India was manifesting aggressive intentions, that China can support Pakistan in the event of a war . Post-Mumbai , China has blocked attempts in the UN Security Council to impose sanctions on Maulana Masood Azhar, head of the Jaish-e-Mohammed .
Matters came to a head when China formally blocked the passage of a $2.9 billion assistance programme for India, from the Asian Development Bank (ADB), merely because it contained provisions for aid to developmental projects in Southern Tibet . New Delhi reacted strongly and China stood isolated when every other ADB member including Pakistan rejected its objections and endorsed the assistance package for India. The Americans appear to have signalled that they do not favour Chinese aggressiveness in putting forward claims to Arunachal Pradesh. And Pakistan realised that backing the Chinese line could result in the end of international developmental assistance for projects in PoK. What now appears clear is that while the US and its European partners would seek Chinese participation and support in dealing with international issues, they will not endorse manifestations of Chinese aggressiveness.
India has complemented its diplomatic success on Arunachal Pradesh in the ADB by deciding to bolster its defence preparedness in the state, with the decision to enhance military deployment with two additional mountain divisions and supporting artillery. New Delhi has also boosted its air power with the induction of frontline SU 30 aircraft into the north-east .
But both our service officers and defence scientists would be well-advised to remember that mature nations do not speak strongly or publicly about military deployments on disputed borders . Statements and leaks to the press about troop and air power deployments in Arunachal, or about development of China-specific Agni 3 and Agni 5 missiles, are uncalled for and appear to forget the old adage that actions speak louder than words. There are areas where we can and should cooperate with China on the global stage. At the same time, proactive diplomacy can deal with the strategic challenges that China poses in our Indian Ocean neighbourhood.

The writer is a former high commissioner to Pakistan.

Unique ID card project has transformational potential

Identity Marker

Unique ID card project has transformational potential


For a huge country with a 1.2 billion population, providing biometric unique ID cards to citizens would be a mammoth project. And much would depend on who headed the assignment . With Nandan Nilekanis appointment as chairperson of the Unique Identification Authority of India, theres comfort. Representing a potentially fruitful public-private partnership, the ex-Infosys co-chairmans cabinet-level induction marks a welcome departure from the usual practice of keeping key national projects in political and bureaucratic hands. Picking the right brains was key to executing such a big-ticket reform.
Nilekani has reflected on the problem of the multiplicity of identity markers, as his book Imagining India shows. The Congress-led UPA, on its part, had made the single national ID a poll issue. This meeting of minds on the schemes transformational nature should help address the challenges ahead. And there are a few. The 2011deadline for delivery is ambitious, for starters. A national population register needs to precede issuance of cards, providing error-proof citizenship data. There are also big technological challenges. Central and state government services would need to log into this mother of all e-governance initiatives.
But difficulties in implementation are worth facing considering the gains. The security benefits are obvious, given the terror threats India faces. The problem of illegal migration can be better tackled. There are huge social and economic benefits as well. Poverty alleviation will get a fillip with proper identification of the beneficiaries of, say, job guarantee or food security programmes. Governments can get to save money by plugging leakages and targeting subsidies efficiently, a fiscal gain. Besides, business transactions would improve in general in myriad time and cost-saving ways.
Likewise, ordinary peoples lives will be made easier. Right now, people have to furnish any and everything from birth certificates to ration cards and PAN numbers for getting things done with different organisations, whether passport issuers, tax authorities or banks. We can also expect more accountable government , with networks of political patronage and corruption being dealt a blow. Another political dividend: poll-managers would better counter misuse of the electoral process. It remains for the authorities to ensure that the process of building an identification database is transparent. The glitches and complaints of identity theft that have marred, say, BPL or voter ID card disbursal cant afford to be repeated here, since were talking citizenship stakes.

Come out of gurukuls: Profit is not an ugly word

Come out of gurukuls: Profit is not an ugly word

Raghav Chandra


IT IS part of our traditional mindset, nurtured by mythological stories of gurukuls and meditating, levitating and spiritually endowed gurus, that we have got so fixated on treating education as a not-for-profit activity.
In reality, education is no different from any other sector of business. It entails massive expenditures on infrastructure, systems, faculty , capacity building and operations and management as any other area of business. The only difference is in the end resultgood education delivers qualified citizens and productive workforce; good business may only produce exciting balance sheets, and not necessarily social-value for society.
Nowhere is this travesty reflected more piquantly than in our higher and technical education . The Foreign Universities Bill and also various pronouncements by the judiciary have made the pursuit of profit look ugly and stymied all attempts to motivate generous infusions of capital into higher education. Why cant we learn from other success stories
If the US has hitherto swept the Nobel prizes in the scientific categories, it is a tribute as much to the astounding quality of its higher educational system as to the genius of the academics who bagged the coveted awards.
Winston Churchill is credited to have remarked , empires of the future will be the empires of the mind . Nowhere is this aphorism attested more tellingly than in the outstanding reach and calibre of the US university system where each university is practically an empire unto itself, accumulating capital and creatively innovating, bidding audaciously for the best academic talents as faculty, commissioning new courses and research, much like the city states of the European Renaissance, which vied with each other for artistic talents to sculpt magnificent monuments.
A case in point is Harvard, which started out in 1636 and has managed to create educational standards that are amongst the best in the world today. Harvard Universitys prowess stems no doubt from the incredibly high teaching standards, and the global diversity of its students. But, it is also the meticulous efficiency with which Harvard manages its internal systems of admission, recruitment of globally competitive faculty, contemporaneous research and innovation, academic engagement and external outreach and infrastructure.
What is overlooked and usually ignored is the implacable efficiency with which Harvard has acquired endowments and managed to enhance their real value by suitably augmenting them. With endowments currently valued at about $ 30 billion, Harvard is one of the richest educational institutions in the world. It is the massive capital formation and its prudent management that has silently gone in to make Harvard the samurai of the academic world.
It is this strong financial backbone that supports Harvards endeavour to pick up the best faculty, bidding aggressively in educational mandis (eg, Chicago for Economics, where Yale is Harvards prime rival), retain them and to inspire them to attain the highest levels of excellence. Not surprisingly, even though Harvard has produced seven presidents of the US, it has also produced 43 Nobel Prize winners and produces more PhDs annually than most other universities.
How does Harvard elevate its robust and mundane economic aspirations above the prosaic and rarefied atmosphere of academics Harvard has set up a separate company to manage its liquid assets. The Harvard Management Company (HMC) brooks no interference in decision-making from the Harvard University. The Chairman of the HMC is the Treasurer of Harvard University. That is the closest that the university gets to this company.
The CEO is by convention non-Harvard . We were told as a class of 1998 by the then CEO, Jack Myers, that the Board leaves the operations and decision-making entirely to a focussed team of financial professionals, by prescribing benchmark performance, based on an evaluation of the global financial markets and indices. Any performance above this benchmark is linked to incentives. In fact, he rued, lightheartedly, that their Portfolio Manager had earned far more than him the previous year because the essential burden of evaluating risk and return rested on his shoulders and so the incentives were tipped in his favour!
Harvard University spends a huge sum to protect its brand name. Harvard is also one of the richest landowners in Massachusetts, owning acres of real estate from Soldiers Field to Peabody Terraces, hotels and hospitals, a construction management department, Insurance Company, Harvard Publishing Company that publishes among others the famous case studies and the Harvard Business Review, and not the least, the Harvard Coop.
All this only illustrates what Derek Bok, the former president of Harvard has said in Universities in the Marketplace: The Commercialisation of higher education, that when people think of universities they tend to think only of education and research and dont realise how many activities go on within a university that are really quite similar to corporate functions. He underlines the importance of a creative dialogue between the university system and the corporate sector because of the need to synergise competences in an advanced knowledge economy.
According to Bok, American universities are the best in the world at what they do because of the incentive structure, subtler than that in hierarchical institutions. He states that universities spend hundreds of millions of dollars on business-like functions as food service, building maintenance, construction and personnel. In these domains, corporate practice and experience has valuable lessons for the university system.
He also argues that the level of innovation in the university system is hardly significant compared to that which has occurred in the corporate sector. Corporations moved by pecuniary incentives, do a better job than universities of carrying out the tasks society has given them. The motives that inspire professors may be nobler than those that animate business leaders, but in some respects, at least, they have proved less effective. Professors who look down on business would do well to bear this point in mind before dismissing the ways of commerce as irrelevant to the academy.
Harvard has generated surpluses by capturing a fraction of the economic dividends from global economic progress. Government, on its part has left it unfettered, to strive for the highest goals, both academically and in commerce. In fact, this laissez-faire approach has percolated downwards.
Each Harvard school is autonomousfollowing not only its own academic methodology but also its own pricing. Each school competes healthily with the other. Various endowments from grateful alumni and generous corporations and fund-raising campaigns have helped boost coffers. Lawrence Summers, as president of Harvard, has explained that endowments are critical to the Universitys academic and financial aid programs and to its capacity for growth.
The success of foreign universities in efficiently managing and enhancing resources contains a lesson for our university system and policy-makers in India. Clearly, the time has come to change the antiquated mindset in the arena of higher education!


(The author is an IAS officer, former principal secretary, technical education, MP, and alumnus
of the Harvard University. Views are personal)

Homeward bound in India

Homeward bound in India

A rolling stone gathers not moss but memories

Raghu Krishnan

FOR someone like me, whose father was in the Indian Railways, the word home takes in much of the country. Home was the brightly-coloured marbles descending like manna from heaven on the wooden floor of the railway club at Danapore near Patna. Home was the slide in the garden in the Colvin Court colony at Howrah. Home was the fiery blast-furnaces lighting up the night-sky of Rourkela where my father went on deputation for a few years to the steel plant designed and developed with German co-operation . Home was the badminton games on the wooden floor of the railway club in Adra and of a teenaged John bobbing up and down while shouting 7-all , partner . Home was New-Year eve campfire-songs composed by Robert Burns and sung in the heart of West Bengals Midnapore District: Should auld acquaintance be forgot/And never brought to mind/Should auld acquaintance be forgot/And days of auld lang syne.
Home was the 16-mm movies being screened outdoor in summer at the Chakradharpur railway club. Home was a view of the mohua blossoms from a moving train. Home was Mary Hopkin singing Those were the days my friend/We thought theyd never end/Wed sing and dance forever and a day on a portable HMV gramophone player. Home was the radio in the living room tuned in to the BBC Outlook programme , followed by the sound of Big Ben ticking off the seconds for the next world news broadcast. Home was the BBC radio play of Murder in the Cathedral where the likes of Thomas Becket did the right thing for the right reason. Home was the books in the railway library, historical romances like Rafael Sabatinis Scaramouche whose unforgettable first line was He was born with the gift of laughter and the feeling that the world was mad. And that was his only patrimony. Home was the first glimpse of the Brahmaputra while driving from Guwahati to the railway colony at Malegaon.
Home was the railway colony at Mumbais Budhwar Park where we played tennis in the afternoon, followed by a bath, tea and an evening-show in a nearby movie theatre. Home was the Akashvani Theatre where I went for latenight K L Saigal retrospectives and walked back listening to the tide coming in at Backbay while humming Dukh ke ab din beetat naahi/Na main kisika, na koi mera/Chah ja taaron, pura andera --the original Devdas could sing without tripping all over himself like the later version. Home was standing in a jampacked suburban train while reading Busybees column on the back page of the late Evening News. Home was returning from a December 31st late-night Ravi Shankar concert which the sitar maestro dramatically brought to an end at 12 sharp just so he could say Happy New Year .
Home was reading in New Delhi O Henry short stories set in New York like The Gift of the Magi . Home was flying from Dallas to New York while reading Naipauls India: A million mutines . Home was listening to Simon and Garfunkel singing But all my words come back to me/In shades of mediocrity/Like emptiness in harmony /I need someone to comfort me/Homeward bound/I wish I was/Homeward bound.
raghu.krishnan@timegroup .com

One nation, one board: Are we ready for it

One nation, one board: Are we ready for it

Wide Infrastructure Gap Among Schools Across The Country May Be Difficult To Bridge

Manash Pratim Gohain | TNN

New Delhi: If Kapil Sibal has his way, the 33 state boards in the country may be on their way out as could be the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), to be replaced by a single board. And a single board examination in class XII.
Sibals flashy 100 day plan has impressed many but the feasibility of such a vast exercise and the logistics of actually implementing the conversion is something that the government may need to work very minutely upon, warn academics. There is a catch too. If the move will remove the stress of class XII boards, wont it double that of the class XII examination
Says Dr Jayanti Dutta, a clinical psychologist and a faculty of Delhi University, At the age of 15 when the child takes class X examinations he gets a practical feel of his own capabilities and of where he stands. So when class XII happens he is more prepared. Universalisation of education needs to start right from nursery. Isnt class X a little too late
The constitution of the new board, says former CBSE chairman Ashok Ganguly requires a lot of thought and planning. The first concern is that the very credibility of our internal assessment is so low that how does one judge students Moreover the heterogeneity of our schools - while some schools have the best of facilities and teachers, a large number of them dont even have blackboards - is a huge impediment in standardisation of education. It is a good move, but there has to be some kind of assessment of the progress made by both the student and the school, Ganguly - who is now in charge of the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan in Uttar Pradesh - said.
But the good thing about the proposal is that it seeks to change the system of allotment of streams. Teachers know a students interests the best. So if a one-off examination stops being the criterion for stream selection, we will prevent a lot of problems arising out of wrong choice, said Pragya Srivastava, joint commissioner of Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan.
Welcoming this de-stressing initiative, principal of Laxman Public School, Usha Ram said: We have been waiting for this for a long time and had made representations. This should be implemented systematically now.
The very format of a single board would mean that the text books and the quality of teaching become crucial and with that will come massive preparations in the nature of a curriculum framework and also teachers training.
S L Jain, chairman of National Progressive Schools Conference , said: Even under a single board a lot of decentralization would be needed as there are a lot of concerns to be taken care of. Then there will be schools having primarily first generation learners, schools in tribal areas and schools with no teacher. In such a situation a uniform system is not possible. Simply introducing uniform text books and syllabus does not ensure uniformity . The challenge is to ensure uniformity in infrastructure and quality of teachers.
Apart from replacing the present assessment procedure of giving marks to awarding grades, the government would also explore the possibility of setting up an independent accreditation body for schools to ensure quality.

why india is meeting bharat

why india is meeting bharat

Politicians and corporates are walking the extra mile to invest in the aam aadmi

Neelam Raaj | TNN


When Rahul Gandhi stepped out of his BMW SUV and into the homes of Dalits, tribals and farmers, the media called it, with some condescension , his Discovery of India . Be it pre-poll strategy or a genuine attempt to understand the peoples problems, the Gandhi scion did make the journey. More recently, Union minister Sachin Pilot and Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan borrowed a page from his itinerary. But long before politicians got up close and personal with Bharat, many highflying corporate executives had already gone the distance.
Its not an easy divide to bridge. The gap between the towering skyrises of affluent India and the unglamorous one that goes to bed hungry can't be measured in mere kilometres. Much of the new India regards the other with less sympathy, more scorn, a burden on the countrys glittering future. The India that has caught the worlds imagination is the one that boasted the worlds fastest growing population of dollar millionaires in 2008; the one that has supplied Silicon Valley with some of its brightest minds; the India that notched up an astounding growth rate.
But a new breed of do-gooder is set on blurring the boundaries between the two worlds. Senthil Gopalan, a 36-year-old mechanical engineer, has earned himself the epithet Enga Ooru Shivaji (Shivaji of the village) after superstar Rajinikanth. The actor returned from the US to play reformer in the Kollywood blockbuster Sivaji The Boss. Senthil, likewise, chucked a well-paid job in Detroit, and returned to a new career in Tamil Nadu social work. Using all his savings Rs 30 lakh he set up Payir, a nonprofit trust in Thennur near Trichy. Payir has already built a hospital in the village, which is in one of the states most backward districts. Now, it will focus on education and employment if we still have the money to keep going , says Senthil. Last month, his blog nearly carried an obit for Payir but a friend pitched in with Rs 1 lakh and the work went on . In yet another part of Tamil Nadu, there is Rangaswamy Elango. He studied at IIT Chennai and gave up a promising career at the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research to do voluntary work in the village where he grew up.
Today, Koothambakkam, near Chennai, owes much of its transformation to its Dalit sarpanch. Roads, drains, toilets and 100% enrollment till Class IX its a model village. I saw inequalities and injustices while growing up and I knew I wanted to do something about it, says Elango. His work has inspired 13 other MCAs and M.Techs to quit India for Bharat. They are using my village as a laboratory so that they can take this experiment with development to other parts of the country.
So is corporate India serious about the business of doing good The Azim Premji Foundation, funded by the head of Wipro and the Akshara Foundation and Arghyam Trust established by Rohini Nilekani, wife of Infosys cofounder Nandan Nilekani, are proof that Indian tycoons are increasingly ready to invest in Bharat.
To some extent, Indian business isnt just about making money any more but also about being sharp enough to achieve social goals. But what of the fat pay cheque Its not so difficult to live without money, says Senthil who traded his flat and Volvo for a hut without electricity.
Many share his drive and dynamism , in what Ranjana Kumari of the Centre for Social Research a calls a promising sign . She says, India and Bharat are two different habitats living in contradiction . There is an urgent need to end disparities and bring them closer.
The kings of yore used to mingle with commoners incognito. Legend has it that Rana Pratap shared coarse millet-bread made by a Bhil woman while wandering Mewar. Akbar often went around his kingdom in disguise to find out the real state of his subjects. The difference today is that when modern Indias political and corporate princelings visit Bharat, everybody knows. A sign of the times

Best Days Of Our Lives

Best Days Of Our Lives

Janardhan Roye


Meeting with the overseas buyers over, the man stood alone in the cabin when the phone rang. It was his sixyear-old . Will you fly a kite with me The request sounded urgent. I am in the office. I cant come now , the man began, but soon changed mind when he heard the boy say, Its nice and windy here. Cant you get your boss to let you out The man laughed and said, I am the boss here. Thats whyokay. Ill be there soon. Informing his secretary he was done for the day, he was off like greased lightning manoeuvring the car in the afternoons thick Bangalore traffic. At home, he changed into jeans and rushed to the playground where a blue sky, fleecy clouds and a delighted little fellow gleefully greeted him. Soon, the happy duo had the paper kite up above the houses and trees, talking and laughing with carefree abandon. On the way home, the boy said, Easily one of my bestest days, Dad!
Years later, the man sat on a bench waiting. Behind him, beyond the shimmering water was the red Golden Gate bridge and ahead cars struggled up the hill. Finally a blue-grey sedan pulled up. A young beaming techie emerged, all apologies. Sorry. I hope you didnt have to wait long The man smiled and said, No, did you finish your work I am sorry to have rushed you. I finished my work, dont worry. We have the afternoon to ourselves . So how was the museum he asked briskly taking the car on the road, Did you enjoy the Rodin statue and all that Soon, they were taking dim-sums with Chinese tea and joking and talking like long-lost buddies of Le Penseur, wealthy Americans supporting the arts, family jokes. The good times continued at Fort Point, the old lighthouse. In the distance, near Alcatraz , people on surfboards and multicoloured parachutes skidded on the water. Later, passing Crissy Field, they saw pelicans and seagulls and children and dogs romping in the park. A small boy flew a kite. And by his side stood a smiling man in a blazer with an open laptop near his feet. Observing them, the man with the Legion of Honor admission sticker on his jacket, said, This has been one wonderful fun afternoon. Easily one of my best days. Thanks, son!

Youth, Seize The Moment!

Youth, Seize The Moment!

Youth are the harbingers of change, the architects of a new world... They must never despair and always move forward. And, be the change they want to see!

SWAMI SATYA VEDANT


Not too long ago, the Chinese leadership brought in some new young faces at the helm of affairs. It was acknowledged by the ageing leaders that forcing young people into prolonged adolescence was not in the interest of China in view of the fast-changing competitive world. As for India, it is estimated that 47% of Indias current population of over a billion is under the age of 20, and teenagers among them number almost 160 million. By 2015, Indians under 20 will make up 55% of the population. The young intuitively sense that they are being misled and often reject not just the elders emphasis on ethical values but also any talk about success, achievement, excellence , etc. Finding solace in alcohol, drugs or sex comes as an easy way out and they take it up quite easily. Its sad that, as adults, we need to ask ourselves how we can rescue the youth from despair and invigorate it with a new energy for building a future. Osho, for example, has shown a great deal of concern for the young. Hes also given directions for them to become effective partners in transforming society by following these tips:

Be Willing To Learn:

A young person must be receptive to learning. Life brings new experiences and opportunities. Youth must have the spirit to question and grasp.

Have A Stand-Alone Spirit:

Do you have the the courage to stand apart from the crowd Osho says: One would rather die than give up the struggle in facing the world according to ones own sense of direction and understanding.

Wisdom, Not Knowledge:

Accumulating knowledge isnt difficult in todays day and age. However, to earn wisdom, one needs to have existential understanding. Wisdom and understanding bring a spontaneous response, which manifests inner strength, self-confidence and independence.

Meditate:

Wisdom, according to Osho, comes from meditation. So, he strongly recommends a movement for meditation , a kind of awarenessattacks in the society. Meditation brings intelligence and wisdom. The path of wisdom and meditation alone can bring about, what Osho calls, a cultural revolution . So, are you in for it

UNIV LINGO

MASTI ki paathshala

College sure prepares you for higher education, but an admission to DU means that you should also know things out of the syllabus. DT enlightens you on an education of a different kind

MEDHA SHRI Times News Network


Form submission,cut-off lists,standing in queues if you thought that admission in DU was just this, you might want to prepare yourself for a hatke education . Once you make it to DU, if your friends insist you treat them at KNags or to Chachas for CBats, you wouldnt like to look baffled, right Now, you may not come across words like KNags and CBats in any dictionary, but nonetheless, if you dont know these words by the time you enter the college campus , you may feel a little out of place. Allow DT to update you on the univ lingo...

Univ



MEANING:

Delhi University. University of Delhi, isnt that a lengthy name Univ is more like it short and cool.

USAGE:

Im going to the Univ office dude, wanna tag along

Campus



MEANING:

North Campus. While campus is a generic term in DU, the word means only and only North Campus . Make no mistake of calling the South Campus by the same name.

USAGE:

Heard the Campus has some cool hangouts, lets check them out.

KNAGS



MEANING:

Kamla Nagar. One of the hippest markets near the Campus. KNags is your one-stop complex for books, branded clothes and even a small flea market.

USAGE:

Lets catch up at KNags in the evening.

CBATS



MEANING:

Chole Bhature ; Eating Chole Bhature is so out of fashion. Cool people eat CBats.

USAGE:

I have a craving for CBats today, lets go to Chachas . (Chacha ke CBats are pretty famous in the Univ)

GJams



MEANING:

Gulab Jamuns . After CBats, if your sweet tooth is nagging you, what better way to indulge than by gorging on some GJams And for gods sake, dont call them Gulab Jamuns!

USAGE:

I need some sugar fix, people, wanna go for some GJams

Soc (pronounced as Sock)



MEANING:

A cultural or departmental group which is called a society. Once you are in the univ, youd have to be a part of a dance, music or literary Soc.

USAGE:

Im planning to join the Lit Soc (literary society).

Res



MEANING:

The college hostels are popularly called Res, probably a short form of residents. Also, a resident of the college hostel is called a Res.

USAGE:

Its cool to be a Res, you kinda rule the college!

Amma



MEANING:

Hostel warden never mind the gender . Its not because they remind you of your mother, but hostel wardens are generally referred to as Amma as they keep a check on the students and try to make sure that the res follow rules.

USAGE:

Hide those bottles dude, Amma is on her way.

Vella



MEANING:

A person who has nothing to do in life and is simply whiling away time. Vellagiri, the act of being Vella.

USAGE:

I have started a Vella Soc in college, a non-official Soc, for other Vellas like me.

CATing



MEANING:

If you are preparing for CAT then you are CATing.

USAGE:

Are you CATing this year (Are you planning to take CAT exam this year)

Dope-chi



MEANING:

A person who takes drugs or who looks like s/he takes drugs. A shabby hairdo (which is the in-thing at the Univ these days), black or grey T shirt, dark thick kajal (for girls), chappals , and a gait that says Whatever, man! are the traits that mark a Dope-chi . Most of them are loners, who like to keep to themselves and are rock music fans.Forgive us for the generalisation.

USAGE:

He is a Dope-chi yaar, hes lost in his own world.

BTMs (short for Behenji-Turned-Mod )



MEANING:

Girls who were behenjis by DU standards when they were freshers but have undergone a sea change over the years. However, a DU student says, its not too hard to trace BTMs in the campus as they still speak with their native accent. Also, their attitude is a dead giveaway.

USAGE:

That girlfriend of yours looks like a typical BTM. Did you notice the synthetic fruity top that she wore to the classroom yesterday Please dump her for Jes (as in Jesus ) sake.

Biyatch



MEANING:

Distorted version of B** ch. This word comes in handy when you have to abuse a good friend of yours, pyar se. Whats more, the term can be used for both boys and girls. You obviously cant call your friend a b** ch, right

USAGE:

You are such a Biaytch , why didnt you tell me you were going to wear a black top Now, we both look like identical twins.

Dramchi



MEANING:

A drama queen or a melodramatic person, also, someone who cooks up stories.

USAGE:

You are such a Dramchi! Im not going to share my notes with you.

Yava



MEANING:

Its something like embarrassment. Whenever you find yourself in a situation when you dont know what to do, or when someone asks you some embarrassing question, the answer for which you dont have, or when someone pulls your leg and you dont know how to react, you become Yava.

USAGE:

My friends mom asked me if I have a girlfriend in front of my professor. Mai toh Yava ho gaya, yaar.

Khapeter



MEANING:

When you fall short of words to describe someone whos very mischievous, you simply call him or her a Khapeter.

USAGE:

My teacher asked for my assignment . And I told her that Id forgotten my register in the hostel. But this friend of mine is such a Khapeter, he took out the register from my desk and asked loudly, Are you looking for this register, dude I got so Yava in front of the entire class.

Here are few more words that would come in handy when you are in DU



JAHNKEES:

People who overdress and especially boys who wear ekdum tight shirt and faded lose pants and sport bleached hair.

RICKS:

For rickshaws

SUTTA:

For cigarettes, joints and dope

ADDA:

Hangouts

CBSE VERSUS STATE BOARDS

Bring Everyone On Board

Indias school system must be more egalitarian

Krishna Kumar

Social scientists classify Indian society in many different ways to analyse how it responds to the forces of modernisation. The emphasis on caste and class categories and the rural-urban distinction often blinds us to the sharp divisions inherent in the education system, otherwise supposed to act as an egalitarian force. Our education system has many kinds of schools and universities. A few occupy national space while others function as provincial institutions. The former carry the label central ; the latter are associated with specific states. The difference between the two is stark, both financially and in terms of functional standards. It would be strange if the differential treatment they receive did not have significant social outcomes.
Each state has a few hundred schools affiliated to the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), but the majority is affiliated to a state board. On the face of it, both follow the usual procedures for conducting public examinations, and the marks they allot students have pan-Indian validity. From a purely administrative point of view, it would seem that schools being divided between CBSE and state boards is merely a matter of managing education in a huge country like India. The real story is different. The two systems represent two Indias that live together yet separately. It would be simplistic to say they represent the private and public spheres of educational governance since both spheres can be found in either.
We can begin to understand the difference between India No. 1 and 2 by looking at this years class X results announced recently by the Madhya Pradesh Board. The total number of schools under this board, both government and private, is 4,800. CBSE schools in MP number 432, or less than 10 per cent of the state board schools. This year only 35 per cent of the children who appeared in the state board exam for class X managed to pass . The pass percentage is still lower in the SC/ST categories. No wonder the announcement of results cast a pall of gloom across the state. Five children committed suicide on the first day itself. As more reports came in, the government reacted by promising to probe the reasons for the poor pass percentage and mulled over the usual remedy of expanding the compartment category.
The contrast between MP board schools and CBSE schools is not merely in their exam results and functioning. It has socio-economic dimensions as well. The state board caters to children of the poorer strata. In most states, non-CBSE schools have a chronic shortage of teachers and poor infrastructure. In MP, supply of teachers suffered a policy disaster during the 1990s; the state has not yet recovered from it. The state opted for para-teachers as a solution to the larger problem of the fiscal deficit . Many other states used this option, but MPs case was unique in that it declared fullsalary teachers a dying cadre , which meant no further recruitment of career teachers in government schools. When the term para-teachers became politically unpopular, the government went for other labels, attempting to conceal its decision to dismantle school teaching as a professional activity.
The difference between state board and CBSE schools is endemic to our education system and common across India. Quite a few states have sought to overcome it by prescribing the CBSE syllabus which means the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) syllabus and textbooks in state-run schools. This remedy is convenient but it can provide only symptomatic relief. The deeper problem lies in our examination system which CBSE schools are better equipped to tackle.
The National Curriculum Framework (NCF, 2005) identifies the problem in terms of the ideology of Social Darwinism and the use of exams as its instrument. This ideology promotes the view that only a few children are capable of success; the rest must fail. NCF suggests many ways to reform the examination system, starting with creating more opportunities for students to appear in examinations , change in the typology of question papers and a balance between internally and externally examinable knowledge and intellectual skills. Many states have adopted the new syllabi and textbooks prepared by NCERT on the basis of NCF, but few have initiated the serious examrelated reforms recommended by it. The CBSE has taken note of these reforms , but progress in implementation has been hesitant.
NCF points out that every child is talented in some way. The job of education is to spot and enhance that talent . When we assign an aggregate failure to children, we not only stigmatise them, we also perpetuate a cycle of waste in our education system. For every child who fails a public exam , India loses precious resources invested in that childs upbringing at home and education at school. In order to reform the system in light of this perspective, governments and schools need to alter their view of children and learning . Instead of pushing them harder in the race for marks, schools and governments need to focus on the haphazard processes of teacher recruitment and deployment, and the sad state of teacher education in both the private and the public sector.

US predominance is unlikely to fade away

US predominance is unlikely to fade away


THE US spent more than $607 billion on defence in 2008 according to SIPRI statistics and this constitutes 41% of global expenditure on defence. This far exceeds what the next nine countries spent during the same year. The Chinese spent $85 billion, the Russians $59 billion and the Indians $30 billion. The Brazilians, the fourth member of the newly founded BRIC, spent even less. There are others who calculate that the US spends far more than this in its endeavour to maintain global primacy. America maintains about 750 military and intelligence bases world-wide and its intelligence budget exceeds Indias defence expenditure. Consider also the reach of the US Navy and Air Force and we have a clear idea of the extent of the difference between US forces and the rest of the world. The fact that the US ability to influence events in its favour is not commensurate with its expenditure and reach is ultimately immaterial since the power to deconstruct remains overwhelming.
It is for good reason therefore that the BRIC combine will remain, for the foreseeable future , a body that will concentrate on global economic , financial and climate issues while trying to build an increasingly multi-polar world order . All of them seek a bigger role in the management of the financial global order and are not prepared to pay for their own encirclement by allowing the US to overspend in dollars. Barring the Brazilians, the others have concerns in how the Great Game would play out in the 21st century. American attempts to seek a role in Central Asia and the Caucasus worries the Russians, Indians fret about US military assistance to Pakistan and the Chinese remain concerned about US involvement in west Pacific and Taiwan. These are the geo-political drivers. The instrumentalities are going to be economic and financial and not military with China, for instance, willing to trade with Argentina and Brazil in renminbi. Sceptics argue that once multi-polarity is achieved the grouping will wither away under its bilateral contradictions and ambitions.
It is too early to predict as the US predominance is not likely to fade away soon but change is inevitable and BRIC will continue to hold for the time ahead.

LALGARH MAOIST UPSURGE

Put Out The Fire

Centre-state cooperation needed to meet Lalgarhs challenge


Bloodletting in West Bengal triggered by a Maoist takeover of Lalgarh, West Midnapore, shows no sign of abating. Even as police and CPM workers flee before the march of local tribals partnering armed Maoist rebels in growing numbers, the Left Front government appears immobilised in the face of the expanding conflagration in its former bastion. Such inaction isnt new. Following a botched Maoist bid on the life of the chief minister in November 2008, police high-handedness in the form of indiscriminate raids and arrests led to local protests and the formation of a Peoples Committee Against Police Atrocities (PCPA). Hardly any attempt was made then to defuse a potentially explosive situation. It was only a matter of time before the PCPA joined the ultras in attacking CPM cadre and security personnel.
Given that Maoists are emboldened by the state governments policy paralysis, Naxalite terror threatens to spill from Lalgarh to other areas in the district. The extremists are also said to be planning copycat upsurges in neighbouring Jharkhand where Naxal hot zones in Latehar and Palamau exist. Should Naxalites in West Bengal, Jharkhand, Bihar and Orissa forge links, this eastern belt could become a stomping ground for Maoists who operate in MP and Chhattisgarh as well. Lalgarh, therefore, no longer represents a mere law and order situation. In this context, its reassuring that the Union home minister has assured Bengal of central assistance and adequate paramilitary forces.
The Left itself spawned a culture of violence during its 32-year rule in Bengal. Nandigram 2007 armed CPM cadre unleashing terror on an unprecedented scale is emblematic of its arrogance of power. When the popular mood turned against it, the Lefts brutal tactics started to boomerang. Lalgarh isnt the only kind of war or war zone it faces today. In many parts of Bengal, the Left and Trinamul Congress are locked in a battle for dominance. This cycle of political violence and retribution, when combined with the Maoist threat, makes for a worrying prospect. The effort to counter the Maoists mustnt be politicised.
Trinamul cadre have been alleged to tacitly support the Maoists. Congress party workers too are reportedly fishing in troubled waters. As members of the Union government, both allies must demonstrate responsible conduct. Mamata Banerjee especially must see that, on the issue of internal security , brinkmanship with the Left is dangerous. With disturbing reports of Maoists preparing to take on paramilitary forces with the help of human shields, the battle may be long and hard. Violent extremists have acquired a measure of popular support thanks to political bungling. Its a delicate situation that requires both tough and intelligent handling . The Centre must lend full moral and material support to Bengal in its hour of need.

Save history from terrorists

Save history from terrorists

Ranjan Roy

What is lost in terrorist attacks is much more than life. Driven by single-minded hatred towards all things they either dont know of, understand, or those that dont fit into the Pashto-centric world view, terrorists have destroyed chunks of history and today are dangerously threatening more. After the Taliban destroyed the Bamiyan Buddhas in central Afghanistan because boss Mullah Omar had decreed all depiction in stone or paper of human and animal forms un-Islamic , the phrase archeological terrorism was coined by scholars who had watched the carnage unfold.
The world watched with horror as the Taliban destroyed ancient sculptures in Afghanistan. The response was a helpless , collective gasp as explosives, tanks and anti-aircraft weapons blew apart two colossal images of the Buddha in Bamiyan, 230 km from the Afghan capital Kabul. Today, the same danger looms over Pakistan , which contains sites from the Indus Valley civilisation.
Last Fridays suicide attack that killed well-known Lahore cleric Sarfraz Ahmed Naeemi in the seminarys office is a gruesome calling card by the Taliban that says no idea, thought or philosophy barring their own has any space.
Baitullah Mehsuds Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan has only hatred and disdain for the golden relics of Harappa and Mohenjodaro, the first of the urban civilisations built on syncretic ideas, which are anathema to the Kalashnikov-wielding Taliban. Imagine the damage caused in any attack on sites that have only in recent years started yielding pointers to the journey our modern society has traversed . Visualise the Taliban plundering the ancient site of Taxila, a few hours north of Islamabad, not far from where the Pakistan army is now fighting them.
The worries arent mine alone. Many young men, who make a living by acting as guides to tourists told me during a visit to Taxila two years ago that they are already being frowned upon for talking about Buddhism and Buddhist history.
Its not just a doomsday scenario. I shudder at the thought of Taliban attackers plundering thorough Lahore Museum that Kipling writes about in Kim. Its something that they have done and will do. Thats one more reason why this band of terrorists has to be defeated. Herat, the western Afghanistan city, fell to the Taliban even before Kabul did in 1996 and it is here that some of the teasers to the carnage of Bamiyan took place.
Journeying through Afghanistan the year Taliban captured Kabul, i smuggled myself into Herat to see some of this. Frightened residents, after ensuring it was safe to talk to me, took me to buildings where poets hid, lest they be executed for heresy. The kitemaker in a neighbourhood had run away after the Taliban destroyed his workshop and banned kite-flying as un-Islamic entertainment . And worst of all, was what i saw at the Herat museum that once housed priceless relics from the time that Alexander the Great crossed into the region . The Taliban had pillaged through the brick buildings and smashed ancient stone sculptures, pottery and glassware. Some residents had waited for the mob to go back and then sneaked in and collected whatever they could salvage. The greedier ones sold these pieces, some close to 1,000 years old, for a few hundred dollars each, but there were others who reportedly handed them over to authorities later when the Taliban were defeated.
UNESCO and governments around the world need to wake up to the danger that the building blocks of the Indus Valley civilisation and sites such as Taxila are today at grave risk. While the focus will remain on the ground battle, history too needs to be protected against terrorism.

ISRAEL PALESTINE PROBLEM

The Scales Are Tilting

Revised US policy on Middle East seeks a fine balance

Seema Sirohi

Jerusalem: US president Barack Obamas speech to the Muslim world was an opening to begin afresh but Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahus response was laden with old conditions and negations. Obama embraced the idea of Palestine as a just cause, but Netanyahu envisions a defanged, demilitarised and demoralised state dotted with Israeli settlements . Obama thinks continued Israeli settlements are unacceptable, but Netanyahu wants expansion and recognition of Israel as a Jewish state to prevent future attempts by Palestinian refugees to return home in large numbers.
The two visions are painfully at odds with each other but that is welcome news. For too long US policy has overwhelmingly been in sync with Israels , eased by a myriad winks and nods. Consider Netanyahus foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, who cheerily declared on assuming office that the Obama administration cant launch new peace initiatives without Israels permission. Believe me, America accepts all our decisions, said the perky minister. He has been quiet lately.
Six months into office, Obama has shocked Israel repeatedly and tried to reposition the US as a more honest broker. He came out quickly in favour of a two-state solution, gave his first TV interview to an Arab channel, invited the king of Jordan as his first Middle East state guest and his first visit to the region began in Saudi Arabia and Egypt, not Israel. He is willing to talk to Iran, despite Israels opposition. The pattern is clear. He seems determined to change the parameters of US policy, which for decades has had an overload of Israeli concerns and fears. He wants to establish a real dialogue with the Arabs and not just with their dictatorial leaders-for-life . And for that Obama has chosen to try to heal the oldest wound.
No single cause breeds more terrorism and anger than the dispossession and humiliation of the Palestinians. It fuels mullahs in their mosques and propels factories of fanatics. Add to it the long list of short-sighted policies funding a fundamentalist Mujahideen war in Afghanistan and then dropping the puffed-up Islamists like yesterdays fashion, a misguided war against Iraq, continued squeezing of Iran and Syria, and most recently saying little against Israels brutal 22-day pounding of Gaza and you are bobbing in an angry well. Israel has its own list of concerns, living as it does amid hostility and threat of terrorist attacks.
But Obama has calculated he can afford to annoy Israel a bit. Netanyahus right-wing coalition has made quick adjustments in the face of new and sustained pressure from Washington. From a firm No to a two-state solution, the prime minister has moved to a may be in less than three months. That is lightning speed given the glacial pace of progress in the Middle East where many a peace process has died of intransigence , insincerity or plain old exhaustion . But Palestinian leaders are not exempt. They too have to rise to the occasion, control their rockets, and present a united front, before they can come to the table.
True, Washington has huge levers in the region , especially in Israel, which receives $3 billion annually in aid from US taxpayers besides generous donations from the many American Jewish organisations. But only once has a US president dared to use those levers George Bush senior withheld loan guarantees to forcefreeze Jewish settlements. He was ultimately successful in pushing Israel to participate in the 1991 Madrid peace talks but he lost his own re-election , partly because of the immense power of the pro-Israeli lobby.
Obama has chosen the same issue settlements to change the dynamics because it has become a litmus test for the Palestinians, who helplessly watch their future state shrink. Since the 1967 Six Day War when Israel captured the West Bank and Gaza, religious Jews have built mini towns in occupied lands with the encouragement of successive governments . They are illegal under international law and the Fourth Geneva Convention (article 49), which prohibits demographic changes by the occupying power. The word settlement might conjure a frontier post with few facilities but these are concrete, sprawling modern communities complete with shopping malls and schools.
Today, more than 280,000 people live in 121settlements, occupying a total of 35 per cent of the West Bank through an elaborate system of jurisdiction , security rings, separate roads and industrial hubs. Palestinians are barred from entering or using the special road system. Another 1,90,000 Israelis live in East Jerusalem , the envisioned capital of a future Palestine. Then there are settler outposts of small mobile homes usually within shooting distance of an existing settlement. Netanyahu said he will not freeze existing settlements but will remove the outposts, which are illegal even under Israeli law.
The gun-toting , volatile settlers are a bargaining chip for Israel politicians who promote settlements later claim that forcible removal would cause civil strife and destabilise the government. But Obama doesnt need to buy the argument because a freeze on settlements has the support of nearly every group, including Israelis and American Jews. In the past, Israel has always been strong enough to resist a two-state solution. But with the US president shifting the balance, there is a fighting chance for peace.

Tackling Indias malnutrition problem

Tackling Indias malnutrition problem

THE COUNTRY NEEDS A DEDICATED & COMPREHENSIVE NATIONAL PROGRAMME TO FEED ITS BILLIONS

VEENA S RAO

THE PRESIDENT IN HER ADDRESS TO Parliament said that a National Food Security Act will be enacted, adding that malnutrition has emerged as a major health challenge needing urgent response. This gives confidence that the curse of malnutrition , will now be addressed.
In this context, a think-tank of experts, activists, NGOs and administrators under the leadership of M S Swaminathan brought out two papers: Essential Interventions to Combat Malnutrition in Children and Essential Intervention for Girls and Women that exhaustively enumerate proactive interventions to be taken to address malnutrition in India.
Data established that poverty is a prominent, but not the sole cause of malnutrition. Malnutrition is an extremely complex, inter-generational phenomenon with multiple causes, viz., physical poverty, hunger, calorie/micronutrient deficit, infection and disease; attitudinal/socio-cultural gender-discrimination in society and intrafamily food consumption, early marriage of girls, frequent pregnancies, superstition/ignorance regarding proper maternal & child care and feeding practices; governance related, mainly, inadequate nutrition/health services for women and children, low access to safe drinking water and hygienic sanitation and lack of social inclusion.
Malnutrition causes economic loss to the nation , due to reduced physical/cognitive growth and learning capability, and lower physical work output. Calculations indicate that India loses around $29 billion annually or 4% of GDP due to calorie/energy deficit.
On continuing high malnutrition and failure of on-going programmes to improve it, the expert group concluded that India has no comprehensive national programme with the standalone objective of eradicating malnutrition. Several nutrition related programmes address some but not all aspects and causes of it. The Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS) is not a programme for eradication of malnutrition but for child development. Absence of seamless and simultaneous critical interventions causes loss of gains accruing from existing dispersed and isolated interventions. Though Indias malnutrition is deeply rooted in an inter-generational cycle, present interventions do not address the issue inter-generationally . Thirty per cent of Indias population suffers from high protein-calorie deficit. The general population lacks adequate awareness regarding proper nutritional practices. Crucial prescriptions of the National Nutrition Policy, 1993, were not translated into programmes, viz., popularisation of low-cost nutritious foods, reaching adolescent girls, fortification of essential foods and control of micronutrient deficiencies. Most importantly, political will for addressing malnutrition as high priority in the National Development Agenda should be articulated.
No single intervention can eradicate malnutrition . The package of interventions must be widely inter-sectoral and address at least a majority of the causes; they must be simultaneous so that the benefit of one intervention is not lost on account of the absence of another; and they must cover the entire life-cycle of women and children to create immediate impact within one generation on the nutritional status of the three critical links of malnutrition, viz., children, adolescent girls, and women. Only then can the benefits be sustainable enough to break the inter-generational cycle, and pass on to the next generation.
The think-tank has listed a number of essential interventions to address each of malnutritions causes and methods for operationalising them at the village level on certain evidence based principles , such as supplementing through energy/protein /micronutrient dense foods prepared by SHGs from low-cost , locally available farm produce for the three inter-generational groups towards bridging the gap, enabling grass-roots convergence of all nutrition impacting programmes, and initiating a sustained public awareness campaign regarding proper nutritional practices within existing family budgets, to create demand and social inclusion.
It is hoped that this Budget states serious intent to initiate a National Programme with the focused objective of eradicating malnutrition. Since the subject is so inter-sectoral , effective coordination and monitoring of key nutrition related ministries, which have their own substantive mandates would necessarily require oversight and direction at the level of the prime minister. A high powered inter-sectoral panel, headed by an eminent person specialising in this field, should be constituted to finalise a national programme for eradicating malnutrition and draw up a road map with quantified targets and time lines, within a stipulated period.

How to Be a Good Boss in a Bad Economy

How to Be a Good Boss in a Bad Economy

Robert I. Sutton

Even in times of economic growth, it’s challenging to be a good boss. Research shows that people placed in positions of authority often become less mindful of others’ feelings and needs. Meanwhile, those in subordinate roles devote immense energy to watching and interpreting the actions of leaders. These tendencies make for a toxic tandem, which is only exacerbated during a crisis.

Sutton, a Stanford professor, provides a useful framework to get bosses focused on what their people need from them most. In a situation where people feel threatened, a good boss finds ways to provide more predictability, understanding, control, and compassion.

Predictability. Give people as much information as you can about what will happen to them and when. Preparation will reduce their suffering, and they can relax in the meantime—as Londoners during the blitz were able to do when the air-raid sirens were silent.

Understanding. Accompany any major change with an explanation of why it’s necessary and how it will affect routines. Internal communication should be simple, concrete, and repetitive.

Control. Don’t frame an obstacle as too big, too complex, or too difficult to overcome; people will be overwhelmed and freeze in their tracks. When it’s broken down into less-daunting components, they can tackle it with confidence.

Compassion. Tend to the emotional needs of people who are let go, and help them preserve their dignity. This is essential both for them and for their colleagues who survive the cuts. Demeaning those who have left will demoralize those who remain and may drive the best of them to jump ship.

A manager who provides all four remedies will be perceived as “having people’s backs” and will reap the rewards of employees’ deep loyalty for years to come.

How Concepts Affect Consumption

How Concepts Affect Consumption

by Dan Ariely and Michael I. Norton

prehistoric ancestors spent much of their waking hours foraging for and consuming food, an instinct that obviously paid off. Today this instinct is no less powerful, but for billions of us it’s satisfied in the minutes it takes to swing by the store and pop a meal in the microwave. With our physical needs sated and time on our hands, increasingly we’re finding psychological outlets for this drive, by seeking out and consuming concepts.

Conceptual consumption strongly influences physical consumption. Keeping up with the Joneses is an obvious example. The SUV in the driveway is only partly about the need for transport; the concept consumed is status. Dozens of studies tease out the many ways in which concepts influence people’s consumption, independent of the physical thing being consumed. Here are just three of the classes of conceptual consumption that we and others have identified.

Consuming expectations.

People’s expectation about the value of what they’re consuming profoundly affects their experience. We know that people have favorite beverage brands, for instance, but in blind taste tests they frequently can’t tell one from another: The value that marketers attach to the brand, rather than the drink’s flavor, is often what truly adds to the taste experience. Recent brain-imaging studies show that when people believe they’re drinking expensive wine, their reward circuitry is more active than when they think they’re drinking cheap wine—even when the wines are identical. Similarly, when people believe they’re taking cheap painkillers, they experience less relief than when they take the same but higher-priced pills.

Consuming goals.

Pursuing a goal can be a powerful trigger for consumption. At a convenience store where the average purchase was $4, researchers gave some customers coupons that offered $1 off any purchase of $6, and others coupons that offered $1 off any purchase of at least $2. Customers who received the coupon that required a $6 purchase increased their spending in an effort to receive their dollar off; more interestingly, those customers who received the coupon that required only a $2 purchase to receive the dollar off actually decreased their spending from their typical $4, though of course they would have received their dollar off had they spent $4. Consuming the specific goal implied by the coupon—receiving a savings on a purchase of a designated amount—trumped people’s initial inclinations. Customers who received the $2 coupon left the store with fewer items than they had intended to buy.

Consuming memories.

One study of how memories influence consumption explored the phenomenon whereby people who have truly enjoyed an experience, such as a special evening out, sometimes prefer not to repeat it. We might expect that they would want to experience such an evening again; but by forgoing repeat visits, they are preserving their ability to consume the pure memory—the concept—of that evening forever, without the risk of polluting it with a less-special evening.

So concepts not only can influence people to consume more physical stuff, but also can encourage them to consume less. Offering people a chance to trade undesirable physical consumption for conceptual consumption is one way to help them make wiser choices. In Sacramento, for example, if people use less energy than their neighbors, they get a smiley face on their utility bill (or two if they’re really good)—a tactic that has reduced energy use in the district and is now being employed in Chicago, Seattle, and eight other cities. In this case, people forgo energy consumption in order to consume the concept of being greener than their neighbors.

We suggest that examining people’s motivations through the lens of conceptual consumption can help policy makers, marketers, and managers craft incentives to drive desired behavior—for better or for worse.

Copyright © 2009 Harvard Business School Publishing Corporation. All rights reserved.

RURAL BPO : Ruralshores

HDFC buys 26% stake in RuralShores 

Boby Kurian & PP Thimmaya BANGALORE 

INDIAS $12-billion BPO industry has now reached Bagepalli, a rural pocket sitting on the margins of the arid Rayalseema belt in Karnatakas Chickballapur district . And its off to Purnia in Bihar as the rapidly expanding telecom and insurance firms seek native language help desks and data processing in the hinterlands, closer to their markets. 
In a possible affirmation of its belief in the rural BPO story, HDFC, the countrys largest home finance company, has picked up 26% stake in Bangalore-based RuralShores Business Services, a rural BPO firm floated by six technocrats last year. 
The ruralshoring start-up aims to link up about 500 locations , with a population below 20,000 to the fabled BPO script over the next seven years. This rather small transaction for HDFC was driven straight from its top echelons implying its significance. 
RuralShoreswith a promoter list that include former E&Y honcho V V Ranganathan, Mastek MD Sudhakar Ram, former MD of Xansa India Murali Vullaganti and G Srinivas of Dawn Consultingconfirmed HDFCs entry as a significant minority investor. 
Ruralshoring, a push towards shifting less complex BPO work to inexpensive rural locations, is the new buzzword for the knowledge economy, as these hamlets could possibly evolve into the back-office of corporate India. The BPO firms have been moving hinterland - to the semiurban centres - but the final push is in the offing with firms like RuralShores taking downstream work to rural pre-graduates who are employed under daily minimum wage regulations . 
BPO firms like Xchanging, which acquired Cambridge Solutions , and Hinduja Global Solutions have ventured into semiurban places like Shimoga in Karnataka and Durgapur in West Bengal. HDFC Bank through a fully-owned arm kicked-off captive operations at Tirupati last year, while Tata Chemicals came up with back-office centres at Barala in Uttar Pradesh and Mithapur in Gujarat. 
We typically look at setting up 80-100 seater centres in towns with a population of 10,000-15 ,000 with a cluster of villages around it. The work timings are between 6 am to 10 pm in two shifts with each centre employing 150-200 people, says Murali Vullaganti , CEO of RuralShores. The firm operates two such centres at Bagepalli and Ratnagiri near Vellore in Tamil Nadu where they operate along with the local schools. 
Bagepalli, located about 100 km from Bangalore, is one of the most backward regions in Karnataka because of its depleting water table and migrating residents . The employees are mainly pre-graduates , or plus-two passouts , who earn Rs 3,000 per month on an average. 
RuralShores is setting up a facility at Purnia in Bihar catering to a telecom client which is looking for native language help desks in Bhojpuri and Mythili dialects. The firms expansion roadmap hinges on roping in local entrepreneurs who would invest in technology and physical infrastructure while RuralShores works on service delivery . Estimates suggest that investments in infrastructure building for a small-size rural BPO will be in the range of Rs 40-50 lakh. 
Technology entrepreneur Sridhar Mitta believes that a wellscripted business approach is required for rural BPOs to establish a successful model, especially since many of them come with dollops of corporate social responsibility. 

RURAL BUZZWORD 



Ruralshoring, a push towards shifting less complex BPO work to inexpensive rural locations, is the new buzzword for the knowledge economy 



BPO firms such as Xchanging and Hinduja Global Solutions have ventured into Shimoga in Karnataka & Durgapur in West Bengal 



HDFC Bank kicked-off captive operations at Tirupati last year, while Tata Chemicals came up with back-office centres at Barala in Uttar Pradesh and Mithapur in Gujarat