Ae Dil Hai Mushkil - What are we missing?

This is what transpired. A movie, Ae Dil Hai Mushkil by Karan Johar was about to be released. Due to the Uri attacks, MNS publicly declared that they are going to block the movie because the producer cast Pakistani actors in that. The Pakistani actor in question, Fawad Khan has already scooted away home with the money he got. The real problem is not that. He was ready to condemn Paris terror attacks but there was a deafening silence over Uri. After safely ensconed in home, he gave a half hearted statement.
After all, belly is more important than anything else for a human being. For Farad Khan, if he openly opposes Uri, he is going to see hell in Pakistan. For Karan Johar, a few lives lost elsewhere are nothing when compared to the crores which will go down the drain. There was an arbitration between Raj Thackerey and Karan Johar done by the Chief Minister, Devendra Fadnavis with the outcome that Karan Johar will pay 5 crores to army relief fund and will put a commemorative display highliting the Uri issue. All were up with cudgels, including the army against MNS for extracting a ransom, in effect, blood money for releasing a movie. My take is that, MNS tried to find a way out of the logjam. Recognizing the loss the producer is going to take and to mollify the angry ranks and common public, they have asked some money to be transferred to the army exchequer, not to his personal or party account.
The drama continues. As usual, people take sides, some supporting the view that in a war like situation, national interests come first and some, asking not to link art and terror. Anurag Kashyap, then jumps into the bandwagon demanding the Prime Minister to apologize for visiting Pakistan. And today, Farhan Akthar states he is not going to give 5 crores to the welfare fund because the army declared it doesn’t accept coerced money.
This raises many questions.
1. Let’s start with the cast, including Fawad Khan. Fawad Khan came to India on a work visa. Even if there are troubles, is it correct to give a retrospective punishment for whatever was done in the past? Block any future visas or participate in a boycott for anything which is going to come, but for whatever that is completed?
2. Take Karan Johar. In such a situation, is a contempt towards anyone and anything except the money he poured in, is it necessary? Why didn’t it strike his mind to donate voluntarily and offer a public apolgy for casting Pakistani actors? Why should someone remind him of his duty towards the nation? Rather than taking the way he took, asking a tax rebate in lieu of reshooting all the scenes casting Pakistanis would have made him a darling in the eyes of these nationalists. The same is more applicable towards Farhan Akthar who held his money even closer to his heart. Contrast this with how people donated their jewellery for 1965. These things, patriotism, social responsibility and the likes need not be taught by anyone. They should come from within.
3. Anurag Kashyap’s immature comment of demanding apology from the Prime Minister highlights another big issue. There is too much exposure to armchair pundits who have zero knowledge over a topic. A big zero in foreign affairs and realpolitik, the fault lies with the media for giving his comments exposure. Let all people blabber whatever they want. Doesn’t it become the responsibility of the media to sift the garbage from what is actually needed for public consumption?
The point here is simple. It’s high time we recognize what we are, what we are capable of and decide what are our priorities - is it fighting for the country’s interests or is it pulling BJP down without realizing that BJP is the sole representative of India today? Too much attention is given to non-issues and it’s high time the press and the country decides the correct priorities. India’s equals in the world are China and Russia, not Pakistan or Somalia. Remember what Hitler did to Emil Hacha. That is Pakistan’s status today before India and that’s what India needs to project. The news should talk about comparisions with USA or China or Russia, not Pakistan or ISIS or Somalia. 

Tata Empire - A Single Cohesive Unit or a Thousand Isolated Kingdoms?

I will write about Tatas, but not about the ruckus of the day. I don’t care about who heads the firm but what bothers is that even if Tata is a charade, it was a charade well maintained. Now, because of this, there are questions over Ratan Tata’s conduct as a gentleman, there are questions over the sophisticated way in which the company is run - Tata Mundra, NTT Docomo, Corus, Tata Nano are failures and $18 billion as write offs is not a number to talk about. Succintly put by someone, the single line tells loads. What is the Tata Group? A string of under performing companies, if you exclude TCS and JLR, but strutting around because of the value system it firmly holds. But yes, Cyrus Mistry didn’t behave as the gentleman he ought to be. He was wronged and he blurted out in anguish. But was he without blemish?
Well, the topic of discussion is one single complaint made against Cyrus Mistry - he looked at Tata Group companies as individual units and not a composite whole. Ironically, this is applicable to Ratan Tata as well, to some extent. I have got a few questions in this regard.
1. What did the management do to convert 6.5 lakh Tata employees to loyal Tata customers?
2. Are there any migrations happening from one Tata company to another? Will this not knit them more and help in sharing expertise?
And let’s look at a few things which the Tatas can do to turn around their loss making business. It’s surprising that none from the Tata hierarchy did anything in this effect(well, some may have been done).
1. TCS is based on a client-vendor model and requires extensive client visits. Is there a tie up between TCS and Taj Hotels?
2. If, say, a 10% discount is given to all Tata employees to all Tata products, how many will go to a different company other than Tata Motors, Croma or Westside/Landmark?
3. In sprawling Tata campuses like TCS Siruseri or Tata Steel Jamshedpur, do we have a Star Bazaar+Croma+Westside combine serving everything for the employees, with counters or even, kiosks for Tata Motors, Life Insurance and other products? How much business can you make for that?
4. Tata Power is a major player in Mumbai and Jamshedpur. How much percentage of Tata facilities are supplied power by Tata Power?
5. TCS, say, has clients as Lufthansa. Is it possible for TCS to operate as a mediator between Lufthansa and Tata Motors for sale of buses? What if they are offered an additional 5% discount on the final deal as coveted trade partners of TCS? Can TCS work as a front for Tata Motors or other Tata companies to boost up their business volume?
6. Tatas, can they venture into defence manufacturing or ship building or iron intensive industry? That in itself will create a huge market for their loss making Steel business.
7. How much percentage of Tata employees use Tata Indicom or Tata Docomo? What incentives can be given to employees to switch over to Tata Teleservices?
8. How much of Tata trust funding for research is funneled into Tata Motors, Tata Steel and others?
9. How many companies of Tata group have their IT managed by TCS?
This is the direction in which any Tata Sons chairman should think - form the complete group into a cohesive, single entity and not thousand independent units. That will give it a level of positive feedback boosting up it’s revenue. We Indians are proud of Tatas, let it be like that.

Father, Tiger - High Time We Stop Playing Victim to a Highly Inferior Entity

There is a famous story in Telugu which goes by the name Father, Tiger. It says, a boy guarding his family cows, once thinks of playing a prank. Suddenly he shouts, father, tiger. His father comes running, he sees his son laughing. This happens a few times. Suddenly one day, a tiger really comes. How much he shouts, no one turns up. The moral is, there is an expiry date for everything.
This is exactly what the Modi government is staring at, today. Pakistan is the Ivy League of Terrorism, Pakistan is the Mother Ship of Terrorism, people liked it and clapped. India conducted surgical strikes across the border. People were supportive. Well, there were mischievous elements in power which questioned the veracity of Indian Government and Indian Army by questioning whether the strikes happened or not, opening a can of worms and a hell lot of political vitriol, but the world got bored of that as well.
There are two aspects of that - How judicious is it for a person in authority to question the strikes themselves? A line should be drawn somewhere differentiating party and government. If you don’t do that? Whether the strikes happened or not, the reality is that it has achieved it’s goal. India proved that Pakistan is a state sponsor of terror by killing mercenaries inside the country and broke the myth of Pakistani military invincibility and called the bluff of nuclear threat. It’s a great achievement and every government is bound to milk mileage over it. But, what did we do?
China has got it’s own reasons to support Pakistan and Russia it’s own to take a stand which doesn’t suit India. What is India expected to do? Crib? Complain? Show them the contempt they deserve? India complained and cribbed. It didn’t show it’s toughness in dealing with the issue. The world has accepted that Pakistan is a pariah state. What is India doing to keep it hemmed just there? What is India doing to cut down it’s support?
First mistake. India should decouple Kashmir and Pakistan. The government did it to some extent but still complains to the world over Pakistan perpetrated terror in Kashmir. If there is a cross border fire or a terror attack, respond in kind. A terror attack should be responded by destroying a few launchpads, a ceasefire violation by destruction of the whole sector. That will tell the world what India’s tolerance is breached.
Second mistake. Pakistan is not India’s equal. India has the third highest PPP in the world, second highest population, seventh highest area, third largest army, one of the highest defence spenders in the world, one of the only four countries capable of launching satellites and what not? It was an island of stability for the whole world when markets started crashing. What is Pakistan before us? With India, what can they compete with? They have a proven track record of losing every war they fought and a failed state where the civil government has zero say in the government. Is that the country we are supposed to compare ourselves with? India’s real comparision lies with USA, China, Germany, Japan and Russia. Where can we compete them with? That is what India should focus on - what are the strengths of these countries and how can India join their club, if not beat them?
But to do justice to the Modi Government, by blocking access to the NGOs, we have seen a steep fall in cases of human rights violations against the army, they have made Hurriyat inconsequential, the pinch related to manpower, firepower and money is felt day in and day out by the mercenaries, in a fell swoop, it arrested the instigators of stone pelting there by crashing the movement and if the same stranglehold is kept for a decade, Kashmir will turn peaceful. There is rioting in Baltistan, Balochistan and PoK against Pakistani atrocities and the army is having a hard time crushing it.
This needs a fundamental change in the country’s thought process. A few things which should be done are -
1. Relegate every news regarding Pakistan to the last page of a newspaper.
2. Any terror attack should be responded in kind. An attack has a few components - funders, executors and supply chain. The executors are terminated, and every attack should follow by dismantling the funders and supply chain. Any Pakistani military material captured on the terminated need not be shown as proof to the world, but should be responded with demolition of infrastructure in cross border fire.
3. Any cross border fire should be returned in kind. Though the government asked the military to respnond, the aim should be demolition of a sector or a part of it completely.
4. Threaten Pakistan publicly stating we are capable of killing your economy any day but we won’t do such because we are civilized people. One simple example can suffice what we can do. We will send a public notifier to everyone in the world stating any ship which is supposed to go to Karachi port, if it unloads it’s stock in Kandla, it will be paid 1.3 times the money it gets in Karachi. And all legal liabilities will be transferred to Indian Government. It is that simple for us to destroy you. But, the question is what will we achieve doing that.
5. Entry of private players into manufacture of simple ordnance like AK47s and magazines or mortars or LMGs. This will reduce the pressure on government sector, allowing it to focus on real research.
The focus of all these is to ensure that Pakistani military will not pose any threat to India.
Next is the isolation of Pakistan and increase it’s suffering. Note that the fight is against Pakistani establishment and not Pakistani populace. They can be the sufferers but not the targets.
1. Since MFN is reciprocative, think of scrapping it off.
2. A big no to subverting Indus water treaty because the people hurt will be common people. India should go extra mile to say that India honours it because farmers are farmers and is ready to sacrifice a part of it’s share. This should be followed by a propaganda blitz
3. No to jobs, cross border trade, religious and cultural tourism.
4. Scaling down the diplomatic representation and providing voice to Baltis, Balochs and all those suffering.
Next is Pakistani isolation in the global arena. The biggest of the supporters of Pakistan in the world is China. What are Chinese interests in propping up Pakistan? A strong and investor friendly India will pull out all manufacture from China into India which as a country, China can never accept. The consequence of this is that there will be a sudden rise in unemployment and discontent leading to a potential collapse. To ensure this doesn’t happen, China will have to show India as unsafe to invest. What more can be more apt than supporting Pakistan which will always be ready to blast a few bombs in strategic areas? And how are the world powers ranged? America will collapse if China pulls out all it’s investments from the country. From the terms of bilateral trade and weapons sale, China is too big to handle for Russia. Neither of them are going to take sides between India and China. India can break China simply because by violating it’s age old Mandala System, China added more burden to it and hence is more of an artificial country with faultlines clearly drawn. But, a friendly China is more in India’s interests than a broken one. There are two things India can do - scuttle CPEC which India already did, but it needs to complete the demolition. This will ensure that there will be no Chinese presence in that area. Every country has it’s own price. Ask China it’s price in return for China occupied Kashmir, recognition of Dalai Lama and a say in the election of next Dalai Lama. Instead of CPEC, what India will offer is a land route from China directly through India with multiple areas of entry and multiple ports of exit, at a negotiated price and if needed, open borders between both the countries, opening a two way trade relationship. After all, China is using Pakistan to maintain it’s position in the market. If India is ready to give that to China, what’s the need for China to be belligerent to India?
The bottomline is this. Pakistan is a minor irritant and it should be shown it’s place. India needs to compete with the economic and industrial giants of the world and not midgets. The change in outlook is what is needed desperately.

Jio Mania

Its been a month almost Reliance Jio is launched. Shall we call it a failure or a success? Having a look at the standard three parameters - reliability, affordability and availability, its a flop on two counts and there is nothing to comment since it is free on the moment.
Let's go for the good points fist before bashing the world's largest startup. The primary aim was to scale up to 10 crore customers as early as possible. Assuming the network is reliable and speed is as proclaimed, people would want to migrate to Jio. This presents two kinds of problems for other service providers - since Jio operates on VoLTE and since data, for the time being, is free, we would see people making less calls from other service providers. On the other side, since this results in lesser patronage among customers, there is no reason for a dealer to continue his dealership. Meaning, after the end of three months, we would be seeing no one will be ready to sell an Airtel or Idea sim card or a top up. Getting that share of the market is going to be very hard. Next is the beauty of simcard activation - finger print authentication for the Aadhar Card. Just have your card with you and if it is genuine, your fingerprint will match. I dont know whether this is one of the main purposes of Aadhar, but this single act is going to revolutionize identity verification in India. Now, the other side of the coin.
Reliance Jio came into market with one single aim - kill the market and take its place. For that to happen, you need to flood the market with sim cards. Had you done that, we would have seen people migrate fast. But well, how many would want to stand in a line for long or how many would want to go to the stores day after day to get a sim? Did they misjudge the volume, did they misjudge the target audience, who will tell?
Next is the problem of reliability. The number of interconnects provided is far less than Jio actually wants. Even though this is beta testing and even though other companies are crooked enough to try to kill Jio illegally, will an average customer understand that?
Next comes coverage. Chennai, I got a full coverage. But, the speed is atrocious. Warangal, even though the signal strength is better, the signal doesn't last for more than two minutes. I will have to put the phone into flight mode again and again. And the speed, even atrocious than that of Chennai. I understand that the speed is dependent on number of parallel users. Was this heavy usage not accounted for?
Next comes the availability of sim cards itself. Shortages apart, there is another big problem with the sim cards. Sim card gets activated only if you use a sim card of that particular state. In a country where change is led by the IT corridors which constitute at least 20-30% people from outside the state, how justified is this stand? May be, its an attempt for load balancing. But, the impacted parties are those who use it the most. This is another Jio should think about. Now, what's the alternate? I can ask a local to get me a sim on my pphone number. An Aadhar card can fetch you nine in total. Fine. But, is it correct to hold an obliging friend accountable for my mistakes? Rather, it should have been that his Aadhar can be used as a reference for my Aadhar.
Next. When are we getting number portability? Half of those stuck with their numbers will hesitate to move to Jio even if it is a success just because of that.
The final bit is the cost part post free lunch. 299 for a 21 day package for 4 GB is OK. This is OK only if the the total phone bill for a person talking at least two hours a day fits under a GB, meaning it should be no more than 150 or 200 KB per minute. I will trust Jio only when I am confident on this single point. And I will hope that Jio will be a market killer in the home turfs of entities like Vodafone. A bit more responsibility and a bit more focus on what you have today can do wonders.

Water Wars - Who is to blame - The Lazy or the Mighty?

Death of twenty is a tragedy. Death of twenty thousand is a statistic – Stalin

This is exactly the situation Karnataka is in, today. Tamil Nadu complaining it is not getting water for these many hectares is on one side and a particular farmer who will not get even a single drop of water if Karnataka releases water to Tamil Nadu is on the another. For him, his farm is more important than a distant Tamil Nadu getting his legal share of water. No individual, in this state, will allow release of water. He can even challenge the verdict with his life. And this single farmer is more potent a political force than whole of Tamil Nadu combined.

The background of the problem is this. Good or bad, there is an agreement between Karnataka and Tamil Nadu over distribution of Kaveri river water. By that, Tamil Nadu is entitled to get some water. Even, Karnataka’s picture is not that rosy. It’s not as if it has surplus and it is holding the water to torment Tamil Nadu. It is also starving for water there. But, Supreme Court has ordered Karnataka to release the water. Karnataka cribbed but it declared it will release water to the tune of 19000 cusecs per day. Bangalore exploded in violence immediately and the image the city had took a severe beating with companies shut down, violent protests and curfew all over. The gravity of the situation can be gauged from the fact that 10 companies of CRPF had to be rushed in to control the riots. Total losses in Bangalore – imputed, projected as well as real are pegged at 25-50000 crores. Tamil property was damaged, Tamilians were threatened and all sorts of noise was made. How much of this is for the forthcoming elections and it’s funding through ransoms, we will never know. Because Karnataka burnt protesting release of water, Tamil Nadu should burn protesting acts against Tamils in Karnataka. Who is to blame for this? Obviously, the one who is ordered to release water and the one who dared the Supreme Court. But, what is being done to enforce the judgement?

Looking at this, there are a few important points we need to ponder over.

1.     What is the water storage capacity of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu? What percentage of it is lost to silting of reservoirs and how much more can be trapped in tanks or whatever? What is the desilting policy?

2.     What is the percentage increase in water holding capacity of both the states post independence? Is it not time we buckle up and do something meaningful?

3.     What are both the states doing to trap flood water? Do they have any spill over or sort of lift irrigation scheme to remove a part of flood water to fill reservoirs in remote areas?

4.     The agreement was made ages before and a revision, unpalatable to both was provided. In this case, a scientific basis for calculation of the share should be established and should be revised every ten years. This should be done not based on the historic share, but based on the current usage – agriculture land, industries and cities, with any additional industries or farmlands in the last five years neglected. This will ensure that the data available will be real time and will iron out the issues even better.

5.     Today’s case is that Karnataka dared the decision to release water to Tamil Nadu. What is the recourse to bend Karnataka? One possible case is a fine of may be one lakh per cusec of water stopped. This will flow from Centre’s coffers directly into the aggrieved’s coffers. 120 crores per day is not a small amount for any state level entity. Either Karnataka releases water or it loses water. The financial pressure can handle the issues or in case it is ready to bite the bullet, Tamil Nadu can use the money to better it’s irrigation system

6.     Government of India’s data shows Tamil Nadu needs 4557 litres of water to produce one kilo of rice. West Bengal, on the contrary, uses 2169 litres per kilo. Even, West Bengal’s number is double that of China or Brazil. This can mean two things – there is too much wastage of water in Tamil Nadu or per hectare output of rice in Tamil Nadu is atrocious. Either case, it’s the fault of the government to let it happen. What did the government, then, do to educate the farmers and guide them in the right direction?

7.     25000 crores is the loss to Bangalore and insurance doesn’t cover property damaged during rioting. Who will compensate the individual who lost his property? Surely, not me, sitting in Chennai or Hyderabad and funding it through the taxes I paid. It’s a fault of Bangalore and people in Bangalore should hold collective responsibility for whatever happened there. There should be a riot levy imposed on the city based on a formula, may be as a surcharge on VAT. The number of days it should be imposed and the extra tax rate should be based on an automated formula but less than a month. Once it starts pinching the pockets of everyone in Bangalore, especially of those innocent or those from the silent majority who saw Bangalore burning without any intervention will then be proactive enough to boot out the ruckus creators.

Overspending - Who is at Fault - The Law or the Law Breaker?

I was booked under the charges of overspeeding a few days ago. My license was impounded and I was asked to pay the fine. Being a sincere, docile and law abiding citizen, I paid the fine. Now, the situation is this.

1.    What are the speed limits in Tamil Nadu? What is the speed urban and what’s rural? What’s on bylanes and what’s on highways? Note that I was caught on a highway in a rural area, not urban.

2.    Since no one under the rank of an ASI cannot collect fine, were we presented any credentials before collecting the fine?

3.    The challan was issued in the name of someone else, driving a different vehicle and possessing a different driving license number.

4.    Assuming I am overspeeding, where is the proof that I am overspeeding? Is there a snapshot with the speed gun showing the number plate and vehicle speed? I was not shown any. Is it not mandatory?

The charges were filed under Section 183(2) of Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 which clearly says – Whoever causes any person who is employed by him or is subject to his control in driving to drive a motor vehicle in contravention of the speed limits referred to in section 112 shall be punishable with fine which may extend to three hundred rupees, or, if having been previously convicted of an offence under this sub-section, is again convicted of an offence under this sub-section, with fine which may extend to five hundred rupees.

The law clearly states someone forced/induced me to drive above the prescribed speed limits. The challan is issued on the name of some other person with a different vehicle number and driving license number. That clearly means that a person driving a vehicle with such description induced me to drive above the speed limits and was charged. Where is the proof that he existed? If he existed, why was I forced to pay the fine? Even the argument he escaped and I was asked to pay the fine does not hold good – a person absconded and not caught questioning the competence of the police; if he is not caught and if there is no signed affidavit from my side, how did they get that person’s driving license number? This single act creates a web of suspicion and the person under whose name the license is issued should be apprehended to prove the veracity of the claims of the police.

5.    Rather than having an average speed across a distance, why is speed at a point considered? Who is going to compensate me for the time which I lost because I had to waste 15 minutes on Dollar, Sholinganallur and Infosys signals? In that case, there should be two speed limits actually – one regular and one during peak rush in free stretches. It is ironic that I will be honked and will meet with an accident if I drove at 40 because even at the maximum limit, I will be the slowest on the road; slower than the next slowest by almost 20 kmph.

All of this points to one single thing – callousness. Why shouldn’t the callous be punished? Next is the speed limit. On a road journey of thirty km between office and home in a direction with more than an hour wasted on traffic jams, what justifies an atrociously ridiculous speed limit of 40 kmph, that too on a highway? Is the duty of the police department only to fine wrong people under wrong sections, that too without telling them what the charges are and not providing a better and comfortable environment to drive?

Looking at this in the prism of a recent article, of the total 4224 vehicles on Mumbai-Pune expressway during the timeframe of 21 hours, 4185 broke the speed limit of 80 kmph - more than 99% broke the rule. This clearly states the rule is faulty, not the 99.xx% people of people who broke the rule. It’s high time we look at these things seriously and make rules more rational. Else, people will be forced to revert back to lunas and tractors for travel inside the city since those are the only once which don’t cross 40.