It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.....

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times; it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness; it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity; it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness; it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair; we had everything before us, we had nothing before us; we were all going directly to Heaven, we were all going the other way." - A Tale of Two Cities -  Charles Dickens


Now that the year 2010 has come  to an end, one is reminded of the above quote.This best describes India in its present state. As I have said before India is going through the phase which Britain went through during the Dickensian era  and the United States in the early 1900's. 


At the risk of  repeating myself , India is in the sweet spot which comes not just in a lifetime, but probably in a millennium. Partly because of luck in the form of demographics which a few decades ago the doomsayers were saying would condemn India to  perpetual poverty and starvation, as predicted by Malthus a few centuries ago, but the young population  is now turning into a trump card for India

However not only did we overcome the food production ( with some help from the United States ) we are now in a position of exporting certain food grains. The rise in population instead of being  a ball and chain is being seen as boosters ( provided we can keep creating jobs) for our economic growth. 


This year has been the most eventful ( at least for the last five years since our return). On the positive side , the economy is predicted to grow at 9%. We hosted a successful Commonwealth Games . Indian athletes performed  well in the Commonwealth and Asian Games. All the major head of states Cameron, Obama, Sarkozy, Wen, Medvedev and others all visited India during the second half. With the exception of Wen, all of them said appropriately flattering things which made all of us feel good. 


On the negative side, the headlines also talked about the corrupt bureaucrats who organized the Commonwealth Games and reportedly diverted money to their own pockets, the Adarsh prime land scam in Mumbai, the 2G auction which apparently deprived the government of potential revenue of approximately $40.0 billion.. The Armed Forces which until recently had a relatively  clean image was also dragged into the mud because of the shenanigans of a former Army Chief. The Judiciary which is supposed to keep the rest of us honest found accusations being made against senior judges. Finally the media which prides itself on being unbiased was found to have feet of clay. Two of its  most prominent members had to defend themselves.Delhi  the capital of the country is becoming an increasingly unsafe place for girls at night. A recent newspaper item mentioned that four or five children go missing everyday from Delhi.  


I could go on and on about the positives and the negatives, but looking at the glass half full, I feel that perhaps we are reaching a point where thing will start to change. The very fact that all these issues are out in the open and being discussed is a positive sign. However what will convince me that the tipping  point has been reached  is when some of these scoundrels, politicians, bureaucrats etc who are accused are actually convicted and put behind bars without being granted any special privileges or allowed out for  frequent outings or supposedly  for medical reasons or on compassionate grounds. 

The Central Government should do what Nitish Kumar has just done in Bihar. He has passed a law where any government servant who is convicted has his ill gotten gains seized by the state and has started implementing it. Now if only other states could follow his example !!!

The Mountains Are High And The Emperor Is Far Away

In China this is a commonly used proverb in the outlying provinces which are furthest away from Beijing.

The Bihar election has once again proved as it does time and time again in elections around the world, that what matters most to the local electorate is what affects them on a day to day to basis. They could not be bothered whether President Obama says " India has emerged" or whether the United States will support India's attempt at a permanent seat in the United Nations Security Council .

They care about whether they have roads which allow them to take their produce to the market, do they have schools for their children, is the government able to provide them security , are they able to get employment close by home instead having to go to far away places ?

Nitish Kumar in his first term understood and concentrated on this. Among his initiatives was the building of roads, improving the law and order situation, focusing on education- including that of girls. He empowered the economically backward classes and women  by reserving 20%  and 50 % respectively,  of the seats in the village councils and urban local bodies.He overhauled the judiciary to ensure that the law and order cases were fast tracked and culprits brought to court.

This  resulted in his party and his alliance partner cornering a historic  206 out of the 243 seats  in the state assembly.There is a lesson  for the other political parties.If Bihar can do it , surely so can they ?

One Person Can Make A Difference !!!!

Until 2005, Bihar was considered the classic example of a failed provincial state. Under its former Chief Minister Bihar stagnated while most of India moved on. Ruled by a combination of divisiveness and gangsterism,it became a difficult place for most people to have a normal life. You were not able to go out at night. Most well off ( and I am not talking about the super rich ) ran the risk of being kidnapped. The  talented Bihari's started migrating to other states and other countries.

Then in 2005 Nitish Kumar got elected as Chief Minister. With some social engineering and with a determined focus on improving the law and order situation, with building the infrastructure and empowering women he changed Bihar from a "bimari"state to one of the fastest growing state in the country. While it still has a long way to go, hopefully the very strong results in today's election will not make him complacent. If he does a repeat of the first term , Bihar will emerge to be one of the best managed state.

We hope that this will prove to the politicians that development  helps you get elected and others will follow his example.

Do you know who my father is ?

In  New York Times dated November 17th,  there is an article about  the misdeeds of  the children of people  in power.

In this case the son of a Chinese  provincial deputy chief of police in a drunken state mowed down two girls who were roller skating in the college grounds. One of whom eventually died. When arrested he shouted at  the security personnel " My Father is ...... "   ? This has caused a bit of uproar in China.

We see this so frequently in India, not just in accidents, but in other incidents whether it is land allocation or election tickets being given to the princelings . Some times it goes beyond that  to Mothers in Laws or Brothers in Laws or nephews or cousins.

There are hundreds of  anecdotal stories. . One I heard recently was about the toll both charges on the NH-8 ( Delhi - Gurgaon ) expressway. A friend of a friend of a friend was behind a car , where the driver of the car was arguing with the  toll collector.Since it was peak hours there was a long queue of cars. After a few minutes he got out of his car and went to the counter to see what was the issue.The driver was insisting that he be allowed to pass through without paying the toll because his brother was a minister in the State Government. The friend  ( 3 ) offered to pay the toll charges, but the driver refused and insisted that the toll collector call his brother's office. In the meantime the traffic continued piling up. All this for a princely sum of twenty rupees. This has to take the cake !!!!

What Did I Say ?

In my blog The Melting Pot Through A Cyrstal Ball dated 5th November , I mentioned about the Dalia Lama being a " honorary Indian ".

I quote today from   Paul Beckett's column in today's Wall Street Journal
“I am a son of India,” he ( The Dalai Lama)  declared during questions after his appearance at the Hindustan Times Leadership Summit in New Delhi. Not only has India been his transplanted home since he fled Tibet about 50 years ago, but “this body has survived by Indian daals, Indian rice, so therefore I describe myself as a son of India.”
He also considers himself a “messenger of India” .... because he espouses ancient Indian thought, especially the gospel of “non-violent action related with a compassionate mind.”
He also noted the India was the only country, in his view, where all the major religions “live together with respect.”

Need I say more ?

The Longest Journey Begins With The First Step

In my Blog of September 22nd,  I had hoped that the the corruption of the Common Wealth Games  highlighted by the media would be the trigger for the start of a movement which demands  accountability from  public officials . Also investigations are underway to see far the corruption went.


Yesterday the investigative authority  announced the arrest of  two members  of the Organizing Committee of the Commonwealth Games  . It remains to be seen whether the " big fish" will also be netted or is it just some small fry getting gutted ?

However a few other  events over the last couple of months makes one think that finally steps are being taken - even if they are small steps.

 1. A NGO called Janagraha has launched a website called (http://ipaidabribe.com/) where you can go online and report the payment of a bribe to get something done. Your identity is apparently not disclosed.

2. The removal of the  Telecoms Minister who while granting spectrum license's  has apparently enabled the state to loose thousands of   crore's  in potential revenues. The exact numbers vary from report to report.

3. Mr.Ratan Tata one of the most respected industrialist after remaining silent for many years has gone public that the reasons why they are not in the airlines business ( despite the fact that Air India was started and run by the Tata group and was reportedly the role model for Singapore Airlines),is  because he was unwilling to pay a bribe  to a politician as was advised by a fellow industrialist.

4. The Adarsh Housing Society  Scam in which Defense Services personnel and state politicians got together to allocate themselves flats in a building in a prime location in Mumbai at a throw away price.

5. A former Army Chief has been accused by the media for having assets beyond his means.

While some of these are still investigated, the very fact that these are being raised in the media and the Government taking steps to investigate them  is an encouraging sign. Hopefully the guilty will be punished and not protected for political expediency's sake.

While one can be cynical and say that nothing is going to come off it, I would like to think that we are moving in the right direction. These are  small steps individually, but as the Chinese say - " The longest  journey begins with the first step". I think we are seeing  the first step being taken !!!

The Melting Pot Through A Crystal Ball

A couple of weeks ago , I was having dinner with some colleagues from the United States and were chatting about how America was changing. One of the things which was mentioned was how the immigrants were no longer buying into the melting pot concept . His view was that in the past all immigrants , if not in the first generation , but certainly by the second generation had become Americanized. He felt that was no longer the case.He sounded a bit concerned.

I thought about it and feel that until the fifties the majority of the immigrants were white and predominantly Christian ( apart from the African Americans  who were brought in as slaves). Yes there were exceptions. You had Chinese who came to build the rail roads but who did not have equal rights. Then you had the Jews who  were initially discriminated against but gradually became part of  the mainstream. The Hispanics predated the Americans, but the numbers have jumped up radically. From the seventies you saw more of a influx of immigrants who were Muslims, Hindu's and Sikh's.

The concern now is that the recent wave of  immigrants now while living and working in America still want to retain their ethnic and religious identity. They want to build their own places of worship, eat their own food and speak their own language while at home. I do not feel that this is a cause of concern.  Once you have the third and fourth generation they too will become Americanized, but that does not necessarily mean that they will give up their religion. After all the first American immigrants came to avoid religious persecution. So why should the new generations of Americans be expected to give up theirs ? There will be  some who will , but there will be others who will retain theirs.Religion  however will increasingly  become of less importance as is the case  now for the many Americans, English and even for Indians.

If you want an example of what the American Melting Pot  will look like in fifty to  hundred years from now, look at India from a socio-cultural point of view. Starting from Alexander's time, followed by the Mongols, the Turks, the Persians and others , we have had invaders who have come and in most cases settled down and assimilated while retaining their own religion. Apart from the majority population of Hindu's, we have large communities of Muslim ( the second largest Muslim population after Indonesia) , Buddhist, Sikhs, Christians,Parsi's, and Jews ( most of them  have now migrated to Israel).What makes India unique is the the Indian identity - you  have fair, blue or green eyed Indians, you have brown Indians,you have Indians who are blacks,Indians who have Oriental features - but who  are all Indians. There are twenty official languages recognized by the Indian  Constitution.Although Hindi is the official language in most schools, students also study another regional or state language and or English apart from Hindi. 

During his visit this week President Obama in his  many speeches talked about the diversity  of India. At various times  and during his address to the Parliament, he interacted with the Hindu President, the Sikh Prime Minister, the Muslim Vice President and the Christian power behind the throne. Perhaps a meeting with the  Dalai Lama ( who after fifty years here could be classified as a honorary Indian) would have rounded off the major religions of the world.

Yes, occasionally we have incidents against certain minorities - Muslims, Christians and even Sikhs, but in the overall scheme of things these numbers are relatively small. For the most part, they live in harmony, and increasingly speak in a common language. They enjoy Bollywood ( and Hollywood) movies and shows. They root for the Indian cricket team and so on.

So the message to my American colleague is to look at India's social cultural mix. This is where America is going to be a  hundred years from now or even earlier.  Relax its not so bad.