Corporate theory, realized in Bangalore traffic - #1

After spending quite some time in industry and many evenings in Bangalore traffic, I seem to see a simile –

Progress made (Career growth achieved) in a given time depends on the ability of the vehicle (person) in front of you rather than your vehicle’s (own) ability.

To give an example, an Auto Rickshaw behind a Mercedes has a greater chance to realize its potential compared to a Mercedes behind an Auto Rickshaw.

Interestingly, the solution is also in Bangalore traffic –

If the vehicle (person) in front of you is not giving you way despite of you honking & giving signals (giving feedback in reviews), it may be its (his) lack of power/maneuverability (capability/flexibility). In that case you need to take risk, based on your vehicle’s ability (own capability), to change lane (discipline/department/company) and overtake.

Dublin Airport and a couple of impressive Ad campaigns

Last year September, when I landed in Dublin airport, I was welcomed by a series of impressive visuals with a catchy phrase –

“It’s who stands behind you that counts”

It was a campaign by a telecom company supporting Ireland’s dream on the eve of Rugby world cup.

This year same time, when I landed in the same airport, I was surprised to see the transformation. And welcomed by another impressive advertisement campaign –

A picture of a tiny frog with a caption below – “Prince en route”

In the same campaign, there are other visuals – “Swan en route” and “Butterfly en route”

This campaign is to highlight the expansion and modernization project the airport is going thru’.

These nice visuals definitely reduced my agony while waiting for the luggage.

Bangalore Traffic management – another ‘solution’?

Recently there are Sign Boards erected along the ORR (and may be in other roads also) – Prohibiting Heavy Vehicles on the right lane. It is a bi-lingual sign with pictorial representation – nicely done, I should say.

There has never been dearth of ideas – the problem remains in implementation and enforcing (by this time, it is proven that only enforcement works in our country). I could see series of heavy trucks on the right lane all along my 20KM daily journey from house of office. My simple question is – what happens if the trucks are found on the right lane?

I would also like to ask what happened to plans launched earlier (needless to say, with lot of hypes) –

> Blackberry to the Police
> Cheetah squad
> No headlight in M G Road
> Cameras in traffic junctions
> No bus stands on the junction
> The solutions given by the experts – good road, working signals and decent footpaths
> Etc. etc.

Along my route to office, there are ten odd bus stands; all are spot-on the junction. It is not difficult to imagine the havoc they create. Is it so difficult to relocate them with proper bus-bays? We all know that the main culprits are the BMTC buses. Are they not been regulated by the same government?

Jalahalli circle, a nightmare to all, is a classic example of government’s apathy – one can see all problems at one place and its impact on daily commuters – a perfect candidate for conducting case studies. The stretch of Subrata Mukherjee road, between Ayyappa Temple and Jalahalli circle is out of this planet – ISRO can conduct Lunar Vehicles testing there.

I would like to highlight another issue I have been affected by – broken down vehicles – of all size and shape. Every day in last 1 ½ year (yes, every day), I have seen traffic pile up caused by broken down vehicle. I do not know, what to blame – bad roads or horrendous traffic – but the onus of clearing the mess remains with the traffic department.

At the last, let me come back to the mother of all questions – where the Tax Payers’ money going? We all pay hefty tax while buying vehicles and fuel. We are also paying cess, income tax, sales tax, property tax, betterment fees etc. It is the time to make the authorities responsible – monsoon comes and goes, the pain of daily commuters worsens.

A comparison of GDP

In all our discussions and reporting, we always highlight our country’s high rank in the Global GDP (& PPP) list. Yes, the attached table gives the statistics – we are in the twelfth position in the globe.

The other half of the table gives another perspective – how we manage our resources in comparison with USA and other emerging countries. The scene is not as pleasant as we normally tend to believe –
- For the size of our nation, our GDP is better than Brazil and Russia, almost equal to China BUT way below USA
- For the size of our population, we have the lowest GDP – another indication of our low productivity levels. The nearest contender China is 2.5 times of ours and USA is nearly 50 times!
- As far as the environmental impact goes, we do better than China. It will be interesting to look at Brazil’s figure – they are probably the best in the world

I leave the inference to the readers…

Farming on City Roads!!

Every time I see a tractor on our city roads, I wonder – what this is doing here? How stupid I am, answer is very simple – it is carrying / pulling something. Yes, it carries all sorts of living and non-living things in the trailer it tugs.

But is it fit to be driven on city roads? It is a specially designed machine for a specific application. Any tractor would have limited acceleration, speed, breaking and agility. With the trailer, it becomes much more unpredictable on city roads. It is another reason for traffic congestion. The worst thing is none of the trailers has the Tail Lamps!

What does our City Traffic Department say about this?

‘Who Dare Wins’

“Future belongs to those who dare” - these were the words written on a poster framed in my Divisional Head’s office wall. I observed it in one of the early visits, more than a decade ago. I was attracted to the poster because of two reasons –

> The sketch of two galloping horses was very dynamic
> The caption caught my eyes

I am sure; many of my colleagues would have seen that poster and some of them should be able recollect even today.

After reading the caption, I kept on thinking about the relevance of the caption. The question in my mind was “dare to do what?” May be to think or act differently – I was answering myself. But the bigger question was whether our society and corporate world accepts any “daring” move.

Since my childhood, I have always been preached to not to take paths less traveled. In middle class families of that time, “How dare you?” was very common. It was very true in organizations also. Even thinking (forget about Acting) ‘out of the box’ was not encouraged. At times it used to be misinterpreted to be disrespect to the prevailing norms (to be read as ‘people’).

Today, after many years, I keep thinking - have we changed? From Indian perspective, the whole thing is moving in circles. As a nation, we are confused – whether to stick to the tried and tested, old philosophy or to embrace some of the newer ideas. As we are deciding, time is passing by. We need to break free – earlier the better.

A Nation running low on Pride

I have been conducting a secret little survey on my own since quite some time. My target segment is the circle of my friends and colleagues. Obviously this segment represents average intellect, middle aged, middle class population of our country. Objective is to find out our “top of the mind” answers to the questions –

1> As an Indian, what are you proud of?
2> Which brand/product represents India in the globe?

Let us analyze them one by one –

What are we proud of? –

In most of the cases, the answer has come from ancient era – oldest civilization, expertise in old form of science & medicine, invention of Zero, oldest religion etc. In some cases, it has been some thing what we happen to be a part of – largest democracy, diversified culture and language. In few cases it has come from more recent time frame – fast growing economy, science and technology hub etc. Very few have referred to Rabindranath Tagore, Satyajit Ray and C V Raman.
If we consider the ancient glory as a measure of present national Pride then, Iraq and Pakistan should have been top of the list. The second set of reasons is happen to be by chance and we also know the problems associated with those. And for next set, conviction is too shallow. The current economic engine is running on only one USP – low cost labour – and we all know it is only matter of time before some other country emerges cheaper than ours. Little probing of the people in the last bracket revealed that they do not have much idea about these famous personalities and their work.

The bottom line is, the current generation is seriously lacking anything from the recent past to be inspired about. Here I use the word “recent” in a broader sense. In the time line of history, a period encompassing few generations can be considered as recent.
We, as a nation do not have any memorable and significant achievements in recent past which all of us would be proud to be associated with. We have not won any battle, nothing significant in the field of sports. There is no invention or scientific development what we can remember, neither there is anything in art and literature.
I know that there is some significant moments of glory but hardly any of them could touch the heart of the mass. Almost all of them are limited to a small section of population. Here problems are two folds – there are not many incidents and as a nation, we pay very little attention to those.

This issue is little more serious than it appears to be – it is one of the main reasons for our attitude towards our own country and its heritage. High level of corruption, no respect for national heritage, flag & anthem, alarming inefficiencies and umpteen numbers of social and political conflicts are some of effects. National pride is one thing that unites a nation beyond all differences and creates a unique strength for propelling to higher levels. We, as a nation, lack this. If you have any doubt, a soul search is solicited.

What are global Indian brands? –

The popular answers are –

Bollywood, Chicken curry, Yoga, Magic (rope trick and “Fakirs” included), Indian Music, Indian Spices (& Basmati rice), Indian elephant etc.
If you notice, all these are very generic and vague most of the times. Foreigners only have some hazy ideas about all these, nothing really concrete. All of these are not branded. At times philosophical and spiritual I believe.
I would recommend the readers to ask this question to any one from western (and eastern too) countries. You will see the difference on your own.

I asked this question to my Irish colleague. I thought he would be a softer target to try the question compared to Germans, Englishmen and Americans. He replied without any hesitation “Guinness” – a truly Irish brand – across the globe.

Human Resource – the most underutilized one

In every possible occasion, many of us acknowledge the importance of Human factor in today’s business. It is true that HR is the main differentiating factor between average and successful companies. In today’s world, capacity, technology and infrastructure, important ingredient of success, can be managed easily. What bothers me is the mismanagement of the most vital cog – Human Resource.

In complex business environment, the effectiveness and efficiency of an organization largely depends of the human factor. A motivated team can produce much better results even with limited technology and capacity compared to a depressed team with class-leading technology. I have seen this happening in my own career.

Let us see how we mismanage this – the gap between what we “actually do” and “should do” could be a quick measure of the current status.

- Human resource management & development is not a responsibility of Human Resource Department (HRD) alone. Everyone in the organization manages human resource in our daily life in one-way or other. It is important to be aware of this fact and impact positively. In real life situation, it is left to the HRD.
- Human resource is to be managed and developed in on-going manner. Most of us limit ourselves to a great extent to believe this. It is not an annual or bi-annual activity like conducting performance reviews.
- Managing small activities (shift scheduling, accounting attendance & leaves, salary calculations etc.) occupy organizations’ time and energy. Nothing is left for value added stuff. How many of us are involved in Competency mapping, Gap analysis, succession and development plans?
- We always say – “Recruit a person based on his attitude because skills can always be imparted” but do exactly opposite, time and again. Most often, the only question asked outside the work related area, is “Tell me something about yourself”. And almost in all cases, this is just for making the candidate comfortable.
- How many occasions the organization offers the employee a “career” not a “job”? I am surprised to realize that in most of the cases the organization does not have a plan in place for a new recruit beyond one year or the current project in which a person is inducted. What happens if a person decides to work with the same organization for his legitimate career span? Can the organization provide him with a challenging and satisfying career? I leave this to HR fraternity to answer.
- Lower the organizational level you are in, smaller the attention you get from the HRD. But logically speaking, the lower rungs need more attention and development. These are the levels in the organizational pyramid, which directly involved in generating the output. More motivated they are more prosperous & responsive is the organization.
- Money is the least motivating factor – the most is challenging assignments. Almost all organization increases the remuneration as a retention strategy and invariably fails in the process. In every annual review, salary increase has become a norm (considering inflation, it is a must), but who cares about enrichment of job content? In my career, I have seen many leaving job after getting a promotion. I have also done once. The fact is – with promotion, salary increase but in most of the cases, the job content remains the same.

- Every employee is generally categorized based on his or her expertise. In an organization, we all are compartmentalized based on our expertise and growth becomes limited automatically. HRD conveniently forgets that new expertise can be acquired. Lateral shifts are very important for individuals for gathering a holistic view of the business arena. With increased job satisfaction, it generates better outputs.

Income Tax – the Indian story – Concluding Part

In one of my earlier posts (dated May 28), I promised to come back with the remaining part of the story – where the money collected as Tax goes.

With little effort, one can find out the necessary details. It took me some time to arrange the data the way I understand. Let me confess that I am not an expert to analyze this. My effort to understand this is merely from a layman’s perspective. Any expert comment from any direction is always welcome.

The above charts indicate the details of Income and Expenditure of our government. I took the published data for the year 2007-2008 for illustration. I am sure any other recent year would show a similar trend.

Let us see, from where Government generates its income –

. For the financial year under consideration, the total income was Rs.709,373 Crores.
. Maximum amount (61% of the total income) is generated thru’ collection of Taxes
. Under tax, Corporation tax, Excise duty and Income tax are the toppers
. As an individual, we are directly affected by the Excise Duty and Income tax, which adds up to 35% of the total income
. The next highest source of income is Debt capital, gathered to bridge the gap between earnings and expenses – in more technical terms it is called ‘Fiscal Deficit’. That means, in that particular year, Government had to borrow Rs.143,653 Crores from various sources to meet the ends. As all of us understand, this amount attracts interest and creates a large hole in the pocket. Its impact is seen in the Expense chart.

The important aspect I would like to underline is the high dependency on Tax. In fact, other than Tax, there is hardly any other source of income. Another highlight is the high % of borrowing. 20% of the income is from borrowing. It was 3.17% of that year’s GDP.

Now let us look at the expense chart –

. In both Plan and Non-plan segment, the highest chunk goes as Revenue expenditure. As the definition goes, it is not for generation of assets.
. Non-plan expenditure is considerably higher than Plan expenditure
. 24% of the total income goes in repaying the Premium and Interest of loans earlier taken. That means, whatever we borrowed, all of that and little more goes in repaying the earlier loans. If we relate it to individuals, it looks like withdrawing from one Credit card account to pay outstanding of another. We all know, how dangerous it is. It is also very difficult to come out of this cycle.
. Another 10% goes in subsidies

According to the Economic Survey, India was investing 22.1% of its income to the economy during the first reform five reform years, 1992-97. This declined to 21.7% in the last five years. That means, most of the money is spent in running the government machinery. It is like running a power plant primarily to cater to its own needs. Hardly anything comes out as a net output.

To relate this to our own life, for a moment, let us consider this to be our monthly balance sheet. That means, we are borrowing every month and spending a considerable sum in repaying the earlier loans. To come out of this, there are few ways –

. Earning more
. Cutting down unnecessary expenses
. Minimizing borrowing
. Spending / Investing money more judiciously to generate more income in future

I know it is easy to manage if our Income goes up. But in most of the cases, we manage our expanses to come out of the deadly cycle.
The same is applicable to government. Instead of taxing the already burdened salaried, middle class, either it should find out new taxpayers or improve the efficiency of its machinery to generate more output with a given input. Otherwise, the continued deficit will put the improvement projects into the backseat. No need to say, it will have negative impact in coming years.

Some of the following Links are worth visiting –

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Business/Lower_fiscal_deficit_can_sustain_low_interest_regime/articleshow/2822368.cms

http://www.rediff.com/money/2005/apr/12fiscal.htm

http://www.theindiastreet.com/2008/05/india%E2%80%99s-fiscal-deficit-is-the-highest-in-the-world.html
http://www.livemint.com/2008/07/01093536/Bleak-fiscal-current-account.html

http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/2003/12/12/stories/2003121200030800.htm

http://www.crisil.com/india-budget-analysis/index.html#

An idea

For those who are not familiar with the object in the picture – it is a Dynamo fitted to a bicycle, generates electricity while cycling. It revolutionized the cycling experience in the last century. I do not see this in today’s cycles.

I was thinking about another idea –
Health conscious current generation regularly exercises in house and gyms. If this device is attached to the exercise cycles (the stationary ones) or treadmills, one can get one’s mobile handset (or even iPod) charged while exercising. I could visualize – instead of referring to “amount of calories burnt”, people will talk about “number of mobiles charged”.

Considering the grim future of our environment and fossil fuel reserves, this small idea can find more applications – a little imagination can help.

Indian democracy – little unique, little weird

A few days back, I was quite amazed by an opinion poll result published in the daily newspaper. It is not the verdict but the margin that stunned me. The question was –

“Is Indian democracy driven by politicians and not by its citizens?”

And the result was -

Yes – 93% No – 6% Can’t say – 1%

One has to admit that the result is completely one-sided. Even considering the fact that the number of participant was not indicated and these quick opinion polls are not absolutely reliable, the verdict is very clear.

I have read another article in the same newspaper on the behaviour of our ministers in the parliament. Since then, I have been thinking – what is wrong with our politicians. Based on my thought process and reasoning, I have almost zeroed on the factor “Power Distance”.

In simple terms, “Power Distance” is an index indicating the degree of acceptance of inequality of power between members in any society. It is measured by Hofstede’s Power Distance Index and a higher value indicates higher degree of inequality that is accepted by society. I would like to highlight one thing here – this in-euqality of power is accepted in the society, it is not forced upon.
In another words, this index indicates how distance increase between classes in the society with power and how well it is accepted in the society.

To understand it better, let us consider few countries’ Power Distance Indices (PDI) –

#____Rank____ Country_______________ PDI

---------------------------------------------------------

1____ 1_______ Malaysia______________ 104

2____ 7_______ China, Iraq, UAE ________80

3 ____18______ India__________________77

4 ____45______ Pakistan_______________55

5 ____52______ USA___________________40

6 ____56______ UK, Germany ___________35

7 ____66______ Austria________________11

----------------------------------------------------------

Malaysia and Austria indicates the two extremes. The other countries listed are for a comparison. One can easily see the difference between highly and lowly ranked countries.

In a high Power Distance culture the following may be observed:

. Those in authority openly demonstrate their rank; responsibility and accountability never get counted
. Corruption frequent; scandals are covered up
. Subordinates are not given important work and expect clear guidance from above. They are expected to take the blame for things going wrong. The relationship between boss and subordinate is rarely close/informal. Politics is prone to totalitarianism
. Class divisions within society are accepted
. Parents teach children obedience – no question or argument is encouraged
. Teacher-centered education
. Income distribution very uneven
. Religions with a hierarchy of priests

India’s high position in the table indicates that we are comfortable with unequal distribution of power. And almost all the characteristics listed above are true for Indian society. Because of this acceptance, the society is eternally divided into two groups – Ruler and being Ruled. Therefore the only relationships that the Indians have existed comfortably in are of either superior or subordinate. There cannot be a third way, a relationship of equality.

This mindset explains many of the past and present phenomenons –

In General –
> We are never comfortable with power in our own hand. We do not know, how to manage authority. With power, our behaviour changes and we become rude. We are never good and courteous to sections less powerful to us. When have you last thanked the waiter in the hotel for serving you food or holding the door open for you?

In the past –
> As a nation, we have been ruled by foreign rulers for centuries. We were comfortable in most part of this era and hardly tried to free ourselves. I have a strong feeling that British freed India because nothing much was left to be siphoned. Without the non-cooperation movement (what we believe fetched us freedom), it could have been delayed by another decade or so. If interested, please refer to the poverty and literacy level of our country at the time of independence. I am not sure whether GDP was calculated in those days.

> We were so happy with the foreign rulers that we participated in their administration system and tortured our own countrymen who wanted freedom. Without whole-hearted supports from the natives, it was impossible for any foreign ruler to rule such a vast and diversified country.

> After becoming independent, our leaders were quick enough to distant themselves from the common people. That is the reason; the Governor’s residence is still called “Raj Bhavan”. Can someone tell me who is “Raja” in Democracy? Why elected ministers are residing in palatial houses and surrounded by innumerable ‘orderlies’? Why “Government work is God’s work” and why not “Nation’s work”? God never review progress, I suppose.


In more recent times -
> Our politicians come into power with Public votes. They are humble and friendly till they come to power. Once there, they become inaccessible. With maximum probability, your local minister is seen in your locality only once – when he came asking for support.

> How many of our political leaders are not rich? Does it mean that only rich people join politics? With the stipulated remuneration, it is a mystery how they become rich so fast! I am more qualified and draw more salary compared to most of them but still languishing in middle class.

> No action is taken against the corrupted ones – time and again they are charged with foul play and every time they come out clean.

> Common people have very limited or no say in policy and decision-making. The most recent one is the “Nuclear deal” which has almost toppled the government. Till the last moment the whole thing was kept away from the nation.

In this context, I remember a villager I met during one of my childhood excursions. He was saluting (offering “Namashkar”, to be exact) a helicopter that was flying meters above his head. I curiously asked him whom he is saluting to. He said that was the chief minister of the state. To the villager, he was almost equal to god as he “spends” money for the development of his village’s development. The most recent addition to the village’s infrastructure was a tube-well. Electricity was yet to come.

It is couple of decades since then – situation has hardly changed. In our country, politicians are treaded like kings. None of them is bound by the law, responsibility, and deliverables – arguably the best profession. No complaint from the mass that elects them to serve the nation – the Power Distance is in its deadliest form.

With a hierarchical society, tailor-made for Monarchy and Autocracy in the guise of democracy, we claim to be the largest democracy of the world! But the basic question remains unanswered - is this called democracy? The next logical question – is it going to change? The answer is, as per my judgment, ‘NO’ – nothing happens automatically under this sky and we are like this – demanding anything is considered to be ‘bad’ in our society.


Inputs from –
Business Daily from THE HINDU group of publications, Thursday, Jul 10, 2008
http://www.clearlycultural.com/geert-hofstede-cultural-dimensions/power-distance-index/
http://www.via-web.de/282.html

Dark side of Electricity

I belong to a generation, which has spent a good part of life in the dark decades of our country. Like mine, many other childhoods would be closely connected to Candles and Kerosene lamps. Today, if we think that the dark days are gone, please visit our villages. Six-hour power cut is nothing abnormal. Needless to say, it worsens as summer peaks.

At this juncture, one would tend to believe that we need more and more power generating stations to cater to the ever-increasing demand. But, before concluding, let us see how is our present capacity utilized.

Our country relies on Coal based thermal power. By design, these are of lower efficiency. Here the efficiency figures are much inferior – blame it on inferior quality coal supplies. It is difficult to believe, our power generation efficiency is as low as 25%. Moreover, the gap between the installed capacity and actual power generation is huge – poor maintenance and frequent breakdown of our aging plants are to be blamed for this. Studies indicate that only 45% of our installed capacity is put into use.

So, in simple terms, if we have installed capacity of 100 units, we generate only 45 units.

Now here is the second part of the story – the Transmission and Distribution (T&D) losses – it is alarmingly high in our country. Figure published in 2005 indicates the T&D loss is 33%! One among the world toppers! To put it into perspective, T&D losses in developed countries like USA and Germany are 6% and 4% respectively. It is 7% in neighbouring China. Power theft and grid losses are generally blamed for this.

The bottom line is as follows - with 100 units generation capacity, 45 units are generated and only 30 units reach the consumers. Overall system efficiency is 30%.

The whole equation is to be viewed against a backdrop of economic growth. In our country, per capita electricity consumption is at 481 units, a paltry figure in comparison with USA (12,187) and even China (2,140). As a matter of fact, we are behind Pakistan (490). One can safely assume that the demand is going to surge in near future.

So what anyone should do first? My commonsense tells me, it is prudent to repair leak before start filling up a tank. I believe our Government is planning to set up National Electricity Fund by investing Rs.100,000 Crores in T&D sector.

I will remain interested to experience the changes like many of my compatriot.

Inputs from –
Power Plant Engineering – Raja, Srivastava, Dwivedi
The Hindu Business Line, Dec 03, 2005
Mjunction, Feb 05, 2008

Weather forecast

“Partly cloudy. Possibility of rain/thundershowers likely”

Looks familiar? Has to be. This is the weather forecast published in the newspaper I subscribe.

Considering the fact that we are going thru’ the rainy season, I find this “forecast” very interesting. The message (and most of the time, the sentence too) remains the same day after day. I have never seen such a reliable forecast.

PS: I believe that the Monsoon arrival prediction by our Meteorological department has a standard deviation of 7 days. That means, monsoon is almost certain to arrive within +/- 21 days of the prediction. Who needs anything better?
Identification of a cyclone from the satellite image is child’s play. Do we really need a separate department to do that?

Cycling for better future

I found the chart very interesting. I did not know that cycling consumes less energy compared to walking. Another interesting observation – Car traveling at 60 MPH consumes considerably more energy compared to 30 MPH

Problem of cycling in our cities could be high risk of meeting with accident. It is impossible even to imagine a separate cycle lane in Indian city centers. On the other hand, use of Cycle rickshaws in Munich and Dublin city centers has impressed me.

A little imagination and will (muscle too) power can impact our lives positively.

The face of Indian Currency

Yesterday I saw the currency note released by China on the eve of Olympic. Like many kids, I was interested in collecting currency of different denominations from different countries. With time and increased exposure, I realized how the pictures on currency depict the theme, belief, and culture of one nation. I was impressed by our National Emblem – King Ashoka’s four faced lion. I also used to like the pictures on the back – tiger, tractor, elephant …..

Now I see the face of Mahatma has taken over the most of the space – including the watermark. National emblem is reduced in size and parked in one corner. With all respect to the father of the nation, don’t we have any other national leader / freedom fighter who can represent our values?

This lack of inspiration will have a serious impact on our nation. The coming generations will have very limited exposure and curiosity about the national leaders and freedom fighters. The same is applicable to the foreigners. It will reinforce their common belief that our battle of independence was fought only by Mahatma and he is the only national figure we have had since then.

“Hamara Bajaj”

Trust me, this is not an article on ad campaign. This is the way I felt the change associated with de-regulation of country’s economy. I hope, like me, many would have experienced this in last few decades.

I have grown up in the regulated economy. I bet – not many of you would have seen a license for a transistor radio. I have seen my father paying the fees for having a radio. I was told that there were even surprise inspections to catch a defaulter.

To me, Bajaj Scooter is an epitome of that era. I have discussed this with many of my friends – it was a perfect example of what one should avoid while designing a two-wheeler. Just to brush up your memory – it was a carbon copy of an Italian design with poor seating and even worse handle bar position. One-sided engine and smaller wheel was a perfect recipe for disaster. Funny was the hand operated gear – how people managed that without wrist pain! Raw power was left unutilized. No one ever heard about efficiency figures those days. And the best part is – prospective buyers used to pay premium and wait for months together to get one of those!

My interaction with one of those machines was very brief – in my high school days, I was riding my friend’s Bajaj scooter. I toppled badly – the culprit was a pothole at the turn. I fell, damaging my elbow and knee. The scooter fell on its side, skidded and hit a tree. I still remember the face of my friend who was walking behind me. I promised not to touch the machine in future.

The same company, in recent times, has changed the country’s biking experience. This is what opening of economy does with the product and consumer. Do you remember the launch of its first bike? It has been a trendsetter since then.

Opening of economy brings competition in the market place forcing the manufacturers (or service providers) to improve their product performance. The net result is a better product at a very competitive price. The winner is the customer. Is it not the right thing to do?

Looking back, I feel sorry for those consumers who suffered their entire lifetime from poor product/service quality in those decades of regulation. I do not know what took us so long to open up the economy. My judgment tells me, our country is progressing at a faster pace since then.

Global Emission – a quick comparison

If CO2 emission is an outcome of Economic activities, Population and Size of any country, this table is a comparison of the performance of BRIC countries (emerging economy) with respect to the USA.

The depiction is self-explanatory -
1> Brazil has done exceptionally well. In fact it is in 16th position in the table of Absolute CO2 generation. Probably it is due to the effect of blending ethanol with auto fuel.
2> India scores better against China in all departments.
3> USA’s CO2 emission per Million GDP is lower than that of Russia, India and China – is it an indication of efficient usage of clear technologies?

Global Warming - as simple as this

Low cost labour – attractive?

Since many decades, our country has been highlighting low labour cost factor. We have also been attributing our economic growth to this. I think time has come to look at the matter from a different perspective. The best way to anticipate the future is to analyze the past.

Historically low cost labour was attractive in three major sectors – Industry, Agriculture and Construction. And these were the country’s growth engines since many decades till the IT industry boomed.

Industry was the first to get rid of the labour factor in the name of productivity. Since the inception of automation, industry realized that low cost labor is an expensive proportion. The biggest plus with the automation was its predictability and consistency. In our country, we replicated this trend in last few decades. In all types of industry, the prime focus has been reduction in labour force.

More recent changeover I observe in our country is in the construction sector. Not many years back, pumping concrete were not even in our wildest imagination. And now premix concrete, heavy construction machineries are the norms of the day. We have realized that low cost labour can’t keep pace with rapidly growing demand. Industry has also realized that deployment of machinery is much more profitable compared to sticking to the old philosophy.

The only sector, which is still dependant on human labour in our country, is Agriculture. And we know our productivity figures are very low compared to world benchmarking figures. Within the country, western side is doing better compared to eastern side because of use of machinery. To keep pace with the ever-increasing demand, very soon we will see a major shift in the way we do firming.

Now let us come to the youngest sector – IT and ITES. Yes, till now we are enjoying the fruit of low cost labour in the global arena. But have we not seen migration of job to newer destinations? Frankly speaking, “low” is always is in comparative terms and there will always be someone “lower” than us in another corner of the world. And as someone said – “an IT job can go to any corner of the world where Internet connection goes”.

The bottom line is – we can’t survive with this “Low Cost” tag in coming decades. Shifting our focus on terms like “Efficiency”, “Productivity”, “Knowledge”, “Skill” etc. will pay much better dividends.

I always believe that “we perform the way our performance is measured”. Time has come to change our country’s “USP”. For a prosperous future, the faster we change the better.

India – Changing boundary

My recent search for Indian Map in Internet was quite an interesting experience. To my surprise, I found many maps available in many reliable and educational sites, which are completely different from the one we have grown up with. For discussion sake, let me consider the one available in http://maps.google.com/.

In this map, the northern state and one of the northeastern states of our country is shown with dotted boundary! Obviously, the dotted boundary was meant to denote disputed territories. The extent of the dotted boundary was significantly alarming. To the best of my knowledge, the depiction is wrong. For any country, wrong depiction of its territory is a sensitive subject.

I am surprised to see no communication from our government on this subject. I get a feeling that our policy makers are not interested in resolving this. Currently they are busy with building stronger ties with our neighbours!

Frankly speaking, we are living with this touchy subject since ever. No elected government of our land has made a sincere attempt to resolve this. And my experience tells me that any dispute left unresolved becomes convoluted over time. It is true with this matter also.

What surprises me is that a country of our proportion is keeping quite over this matter. A country with 1.1 Bn population can not define and protect its territory! Thankfully, we have sea on three sides!

Our Neighbor has gone “Ahead” of us

Our next-door neighbor has just made a record – now we have one country western to ours ahead in time. I am no expert to comment on whether semi-tropical country like ours needs a Day Light Saving but I can tell you that we need more than one time zone.

The realization of the need came to my life at an early stage when I was traveling to my aunt’s place on western side of the country. Having spent my childhood entirely on the eastern side of the country, I was amazed to see the extended day light during the visit.

Subsequently, I moved to another location, more central in country’s map, about a decade and half ago. The childhood realization has just got reinforced during my recent visit to Northeastern part of my country. I was mesmerized to witness that sunrise in the Himalayas in the early hour of the day. From my current place of living, whenever I go to my native, I always feel the difference - Sunrise is significantly early.

Logically speaking, we should follow the sun, not the watch. Watch is only a mechanism to refer to. It is man made and man adjusted. Watch can always be adjusted to suit our need, what we can’t alter is sunrise and sun set. Sundial, which is governed by the movement of Sun in the sky, had managed the mankind for several centuries.

The need for a different time zone is to utilize the available daylight in an effective manner. Otherwise, it was most practical to have one time for the entire globe. In the current state of alarming energy crisis, the most prudent way to tackle the situation is to make use of the “Father” of all energy sources, the Sun. By virtue of our location in the globe, we have abundance of natural sunlight. Creating different time zones will help us to minimize our dependency on electricity. Just by finishing the day’s work early by an hour or so, we can save significant amount of electricity and green house gasses as well.

The most practical use of this simple measure is demonstrated by the USA – a country with four different time zones, each apart from the next by one hour. More interestingly, this country also follows Day Light Saving. That means, a country with eight different time settings thru’ out the year!

The latest additions to this journey are Pakistan and Morocco. At this moment, there are many countries debating on this issue. Surprisingly, we do not have any taker from our country. I agree that there will be initial difficulties. But it is associated to any change. When in the history of mankind, a change is accepted without a trace of resistance? But history will tell us that in all cases, the logical changes have won the popular verdict and got implemented.

I urge the country’s policy makers to acknowledge the need of the hour and implement the necessary changes at the earliest. To me, we should have two time zones, Eastern and Western, with one-hour difference. Implementation of daylight saving is a much finer issue. Creation of two time zones itself will have round the year benefits.

Where is the countries’ science fraternity? Can we hear their voice?

Further reference - http://www.worldtimezone.com/

On Environmental Day – Aerodynamic Drag – a silent killer

On the World Environmental Day, I find Mankind in a very crucial situation. With all its development engines running heavily on fossil fuels, we are at the most difficult juncture.

Frankly speaking – the writing was always bold on the wall – after all how long one can manage with one’s ancestral bank balance? Reserve of fossil fuel was always limited. And everyone knew that it is not replenishable. It was only a matter of time before it had to happen. And it happened – the sky rocketed crude price has slowed the growth engine. Without any practical and affordable alternative, we are left out with one option – CONSERVE.
One might ask – why we were silent all these days? My assumption is – it was easier that way.

Let me take the Automotive example – one of the double edged swords - one hand depleting oil reserves and global warming on the other. And let me take a more specific area – Indian mass and goods transport. In current scenario, with booming economy and nicely laid roads, road transport is the choice of the individual and industry.

To understand the basics – fuel is burnt in automotive engines to generate momentum. That is, if the weight remains the same, it is used to accelerate from one speed to another higher speed. Then, why do we need fuel to maintain a constant speed?

As we all know, the world in not perfect – there are many resistances and losses we need to overcome just to maintain constant speed. Given a vehicle, two major such resistances are “Rolling Friction” and “Aerodynamic Drag”. The first one is commonly taken care by keeping the vehicle weight minimum, regularly checking and correcting wheel tube air pressure. My concern is the second one – which has more potential and generally neglected.

Aerodynamic drag is the resistance offered by atmospheric air to a moving object. Though air is not seen, it has all characteristic of a fluid. The resistance has two reasons –

1. The friction between air and the skin of the object
2. The resistive thrust generated due to difference in pressure between the front and rear of the object
And the second reason is more contributing.

The drag (or the resistance) is proportional to three things –

1. Cross sectional area of the object (A)
2. Air density (d)
3. Square of object velocity (V)

To get the absolute figure, this product is to be multiplied by another factor – Cd – coefficient of Drag, which is dependant on the shape

Drag = Cd x A x (1/2 x d x V x V)

If one closely observes, velocity is a crucial factor – 10% increase in velocity means 21% increase in drag. At higher speed, drag overtakes rolling friction easily. That means – merely checking tyre pressure will not help at higher speeds. And, to add to our concern, in India, average transportation speed has increased – thanks to better roads and improved vehicle. Ask any one in logistics sector – travel time has come down to half in many cases. And there is my concern.

Another closer look reveals - nothing is left to the transport owner or the driver. Cross sectional area is fixed for a vehicle and the air density depends on the operating altitude and temperature. The economics of the business does not allow the driver to bring down the speed – it does not help the country’s economy either. So, we are left with the main factor – Cd.

To understand the Impact of Cd, let us take some common shapes. Two extreme cases could be – Smooth Sphere - 0.1 and Smooth brick - 2.1

It is a common sense that a smooth flowing shape means lower Cd, hence low resistance. Based on this theory, through ages, people are interested in making smooth shapes to reduce resistance and attain speed. This is more relevant in Aerospace Industry. Boering 747 has Cd of 0.031. In automotive sector, in search of speed and efficiency, people have attained new heights. There are commercial cars in today’s world with Cd as low as 0.3. For Concept and Racing cars, this figure is really low.

Here comes my point – what would be the Cd of our trucks and buses? I always surprised by the "blunt, square shapes" of our mass transport vehicles. In no imagination that could be Aerodynamic. I do not have any figure but am sure it will be considerably higher than the desired value. As I tried to explain, drag may not help us at low speeds or “stop and go” scenario. But for highway driving at high speeds it definitely matters. That means, for long distance, intercity buses and trucks, it has to be a factor to be considered for fuel economy.

Can someone tell me the Cd figure for our buses and trucks? I would love to see one of our institutes taking this up as a project and come up with some suggestions. And I believe the savings could be as significant as 10%! Can any one substantiate?

Inputs from –
Reducing Aerodynamic Drag and Fuel Consumption - Fred Browand

http://www.edmunds.com/advice/fueleconomy/articles/106954/article.html

Dear Mr. FM, where is SSN?

Few weeks’ back, our eminent Finance Minister gave a statement on how the use of PAN card has become popular during these days. He is right. Now one needs PAN for almost every financial transaction – from opening a bank account to depositing amount to buy mutual funds. This is another attempt, after introduction of DEMAT account, to curb the un-accounted transactions, which is otherwise known as “Black Money”.
Looking back, there were apprehensions in common people’s mind. It was more related to the hassles in implementation and fear of not meeting stipulated deadline set by government. It was nothing related to the “Black” thing. Common people never had those worries. I clearly remember the procedure I had to go thru’ those days and the long tense wait. When I had to get one for my wife, it was a pleasant surprise. Out sourcing the process has definitely made the whole thing user friendly.

Now, I would like to remind the minister about one more number – SSN. Somehow, I get a feeling that government has forgotten about this. For the benefit of those who are reading these three digits for the first time, it means – Social Security Number. As per the government web site, http://epfindia.nic.in/, this 14-digit number is primarily for tracking one’s Provident Fund.

As I recall, the process started sometime last year. Filling up the form was easy. But no one knew the target date of completion of the process. I felt the need during the whole of last month.

In my professional career spanning over 15years, my current job is the fourth and I did the last switch about a year back. Since then, despite my sincere persuasion, I could not make out whether the PF amount accumulated so far is transferred to the mew a/c. In this matter, all my employers lifted their hand. Upon enquiring with my friends and colleagues regarding the procedure for finding this piece of information, to my surprise, I found most of them are absolute unclear about their own fate. I started getting more involved in the search and found out the above mentioned website. It is quite informative with the contact details of the regional PF offices. But my happiness was short-lived when I realized that the e-mail ID s are orphans. I went back to fail-safe methods – fax and telephone calls. I got reply from one of the offices. The other office (which is in another state) choose to remain silent.

Then came the climax – I came to know that the PF accumulated during my first job (which was spanning over 12 years) is still not transferred to any of the subsequent accounts. But I clearly remember filling up the transfer forms at each of the job switches. As usual, none of the employers’ representative took the blame. For a middle age, middle class person like me, one can imagine the impact of loosing 12 year's PF. Needless to say, for us, the salaried class, this is the only means to survive the retired life. With increased life expectancy and ever growing inflation, I can imagine that the coming years are getting tougher. Now I am in the process of getting all my PF account transferred to my current one. At this moment, only GOD knows what is the chance of my success.

My point is simple – Government and the minister were interested in implementing PAN because it helps them to collect more income tax. But SSN is more important to the individuals. If Government is “for the people”, Pay Back time has come. Please stand up and get this implemented. Let the whole thing become transparent. This amount is lifesaver for many. And very few have any clue about the proceedings.

PS: The first SSN was allotted to former President Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam on Tuesday , February 25, 2003 (Source - The Financial Express, New Delhi)

Income Tax – the Indian story

I read somewhere that only 7% Indian are falling into the income tax bracket! It means, the burden of the country is shared by this small section of people!! Initially I thought this might not be true. But after a closer look and deeper thought, now I feel 7% could be an inflated figure. How I did this? The same old “eliminatory method” – let us see who all does not pay Tax at all or pay it marginally –

The section below Poverty Line – it is definite and obvious – the current figure is 30%
The farmers – however rich one of them may be – does it not look funny and flawed?
Small and Medium size Business house – most of them have some dubious accounting techniques, which indicate LOSS (or marginal profit) at the end of each financial year. In how many occasions a Pharmacy or your local grocer gives you a proper bill?
Politicians – all of them have very low income (most of it is Perks and ….)
Any one with income below the exempted limit – understandable - % of population figure is anybody’s guess
Any one who does not have any income – small kids, housewives, and elderly persons – in an average Indian family one out of five may be the income generator

So how much we are left with? My Math has always been weak …

So who are these Taxpayers – with most certainty, it is the salaried, 9 to 5 group – typically the “middle class” of the economy. My definition of ‘middle class” – a section of population which can never meet there demand / desire with the income they generate

Now comes the hammer – after paying a big percentage of their income as Tax at the source, this, already “taxed”, section pays more tax and surcharges in their life. For every purchase of household items, petroleum product, white goods, electronic items, restaurant visit etc., tax comes into play. It seems, government is more interested in milking this cow rather than capturing some more cows in their net! I can imagine that the effort required to capture these "wild" cows will be high. But have a feeling that it could be rewarding.

Don’t you think, with the help of the PAN, this tax paying section should get some rebate in taxes and surcharges? Unless someone thinks about widening of the bracket, this middle class will soon get crushed in the middle. After all “Tax” is a word with negative connotation.

And where this collected money goes – it is another story. We will discuss soon..

My blog - the preface

With age, wisdom comes in abundance. The idea behind my blog is to share and document my thoughts on various things around – anything from local to global, technical to philosophical.

All readers are encouraged to leave comments/suggestions. I believe that sharing knowledge and discussion is the cheapest and best way for development.