Saving Mumbai from herself

2009-05-09T05:00:00.000-07:00

Who wants to become a doctor?
Evidently, not too many people, as this ToI report notes.

It takes ten years of sustained, punishing, high-risk training of the finest minds to make a trained specialist (obstetrician, surgeon, pathologist); fourteen if you want a 'super' specialist (cardiologist, brain surgeon). The results these days, despite the risk, can be quite impressive.
The only known 'de-risker' we know? The calibre and training of the mind-hand holding the scalpel.

About 15 years ago, Maharashtra created a new 'super-risk': a line of mantris and babus of the command-and-control dispensation, for whom doctors were slave labour.
Clever policies and incentives ensued: mandatory rural postings, endless exams, shifting universities, disappearance of teaching seats, and, of course, increasing reservations.

The finest minds have voted with their feet. Should we be surprised?

Why do we have such appalling bureaucrats?

2009-03-19T22:09:00.000-07:00

http://www.dnaindia.com/report.asp?newsid=1240793

Municipal commissioner Jairaj Phatak was criticised by the High Court for equating the case of a newborn that went missing from Sion Hospital to instances of stolen mobiles and ornaments on Wednesday.

...because our babus are not accountable to ordinary citizens in any way. At least netas have to get votes every 5 years!

The epitome of this creed is the IAS, whose officers have no accountability to the people they are supposed to serve. This is, however, not surprising, since the IAS is the direct descendant of the Imperial Civil Service (ICS) whose sole intent was to keep the white man above the native, giving him free reign to exploit and suborn. Saheb was answerable only to the queen. We have merely replaced the white man with a brown one, the queen with the CM/PM.

Which explains Phatak's grossly callous statement.

The IAS is a failed institution, way past its expiry date. It needs to be taken behind a barn and shot. Roles like the 'MC' need to be handled by professional managers selected competitively and held in place with performance contracts. Incompetence such as this should ensure that the person remains unemployable for life.

At long last -- Mumbai reforms her property tax system

2009-03-19T21:55:00.001-07:00

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/south-or-suburbs-one-rule-for-assessing-prop.../436798/

This was an idea whos time has come a 20 years ago.
While still riddled with caveats and riders, this is a welcome move.

Linkage to capital value create buoyancy in the tax base, and mumbai will no longer have to depend upon constant increase in tax rates (the tax rate for commercial propoerties, for instance, was over 120%! -- like 97% income tax in indira gandhi's time) to fight inflation.

Now, how about the other property reforms the city sorely needs:
1. Sending Rent control where it belongs -- to the dust bin?
3. Repealing archaic laws like fixed FSI that throttle the supply of real estate and moving to a more rational system that frees space? (e.g. more FSI near transport hubs)?
4. Moving to a city master plan with simplified, rational bye laws for construction that use FSI as a motivator for realtors to give up land for creating open spaces and infrastructure?
2. Mapping all property parcels in the city down to cadastre into a visual, electronic database (such as a GIS)? This will allow efficient tax administration, ownership management and allows for total tax control, transaction control and also gives the administration full view into land usage?

Many more to come, for mumbai to even become a city worth living in!
But with ULCRA gone and taxes reformed, some glimmers of hope!

On Gandhian fetishes

2009-02-17T20:57:00.000-08:00

If the pre-poll sound bites are to be believed, one thing looks clear.
Irrespective of who wins the general elections in 2009, centers like mumbai will find things getting grimmer.

For no political party wants to focus on fixing things, choosing to fall back on tired, ruinous ideas and shibboleths.

The Congress has promised a return to nehruvian economics.
Which means incubus like state smothering that slows everything in its path to a crawl.,
Fair enough, we've lived under that with the UPA.

Not to be outdone, the BJP too wants to take india back to the stone age by resorting to Gandhian economics.

We leave the readers to enjoy the fruits of some other Gandhain policies. The reason gandhian policies fail is not because Gandhi was not a good man. Far from it.
The reason they fail is because the world is not full of men as good as him. Hence, they are motivated by baser notions like greed, fear etc. Gandhian policies fail because they're designed for an ideal world, not the real one.

1. The Gandhian fetish of "rural-ism" that posits that india is a country of villages.
Sure it is, but most villagers dont want it to be that way.
That, is immaterial to policy planners, who focus on choking cities of infrastructure..
The result: Mumbai today

2. the Gandhian fetish of "do-it-yourself" or swadeshi.
The result:

3. The Gandhian fetish of "Non-violence", even when facing a murderous enemy.

Not one political party is talking about stuff that matters: such as making our institutions accountable for one.

Slumdog and Slumbai

2009-01-23T23:40:00.000-08:00

It had to happen again.

Some white guys threw a bone in the direction of something indian (i am referring to slumdog millionaire, the movie), and people went into raptures about how the west is 'waking up to india'.

Most people i spoke to called slumdog millionaire a "triumph of the spirit over hardship" or "the never say die mumbai spirit" or something similar and seemingly inspirational.

Friends and colleagues gushed about how the fellow in the movie rose despite the deprivations of the slums and having to dive into human faeces to win some international dole-fest.

Cliches and prejudices aside (brilliantly articulated here), they are to be expected, it is the misplaced joy of the average mumbaikar that is disturbing: not one person found the presence and the continued growth of slums troubling anymore.

Not one person.

The slum -- and the urban planning failure it represents -- is the pink elephant in the room nobody wants to talk about. Just like the pink elephant of islamic terrorism.

It is now part of us, never to be sought to be removed, merely to be accepted and taken in our stride.

However, this pattern of ignore and move on has been going on. For 60 years, year after year (or election after election) we the people of mumbai have consistently voted NOT to fix things, preferring the soporific of rice at 2 kgs (for the masses) or the "wonderful mumbai spirit" (for the chattering classes) to real, painstaking change.

Mumbai is now a city without a collective objective and a collective aspiration.
A city without a future.

Over at Shadow Warrior, Rajeev points out how this is also visible among hindus at the national level. Everyone has a plan for our decimation. We don't even know that we're being hunted.

Going to the dogs, literally

2008-12-23T21:34:00.000-08:00

The Mumbai High Court recently passed a landmark judgment - the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC for short) can now cull stray dogs, especially if they are a nuisance.

This is a welcome move, and a long-overdue rescinding of the very unfortunate blanket ban on culling that was introduced over a decade ago. Since then, the number of strays in mumbai has skyrocketed, with numbers such as 60,000 - 4,00,000 being trotted around!

Of course, sundry animal rights activists are aghast. This is not surprising -- for their very existence is totally dependent on the perpetuation of the nuisance of stray dogs.

And a nuisance is what it is -- over 18,000 people fall victim to dog bites every year in Mumbai. This is merely the number a) reported and b) in government hospitals. The real number is likely to be much higher. Strays also pose a real threat in other ways -- they harass pedestrians, bite children and 'gang bark' through the night -- depriving citizens of sleep.

As a result, strays are persona non grata all over the world. If found, they are impounded, handed over to volunteer animal lovers to keep as pets within their premises. Those that are not 'rehabilitated' are put down with lethal injection or other humane options.

So why did the HC have to pass this judgment, that too to fix a silly 'no kill' rule that had prevailed for some 15 years?

Like all debates in Mumbai, this one too is an example of how powerful, connected vested interests can corner a decerebrate administration into misgovernance.
Disallowing killing of strays was a blatant piece of misgovernance -- because it placed the safety of stray dogs over that of the populace.

The way to get this is to use one of the oldest tricks in the book to fool the saamanya nagarik: re-frame the problem. 'Stray activists', whose survival depends upon these mutts reframed the argument as a "animal rights" argument. The saamanya nagarik, unsure how to respond, agrees, that animal rights need to be protected. A few ask tough questions, but their voices are soon drowned out. Flood the newspapers with photos of singlet wearing girls holding animal rights logos and you have a fait accompli.

However, ours is a system with checks and balances -- and justice, even though slow, grinds exceedingly fine.

But the battle is not over yet -- 'stray activists' may even hold a dharna in front of Vilasrao Deshmukh (or his replacement, i forget his name) to pass a 'let strays remain stray' ordinance. Bolstered by images in ToI, He may oblige.

This story is an exact rehash of the Mumbai taxi story -- 15 million mumbaikars cannot get safe, clean, transparent taxi services because 55,000 existing cabbies want the status quo to remain.

So how do we get out of this -- how do we save Mumbai from itself?
Simple: vote in an administration that will place the interests of all citizens above the interests of specific identities.

That means voters must vote for leaders who promise governance, not distribution of scarcity on identity-based criteria (free power for x, college seats for y, you know the spiel).

That means a literate, economically aware populace that can make the tradeoff between short-term issues and long-term improvements.

Till then, be prepared to travel in a dirty, bone jarring, rickety old taxi, a stray dog in tow.

Changing Gears

2008-09-15T01:29:00.000-07:00

Its time for a change.

Going forward, this blog will focus on issues, of Mumbai, for Mumbai and created, more often than not, by Mumbai (and her residents themselves).

Its an attempt to shift focus from things that don't matter to the things that do.
Things that will determine if Mumbai remains a city worth living in 25 years from now.

Fooling all the people all the time

2008-09-07T03:46:00.000-07:00

The Indian media is going into raptures over the NSG waiver, hailing India’s “major success”. Some are even proclaiming the “End of Nuclear apartheid” thanks to this deal. India will now have 24/7 electricity, it would seem, thanks to Manmohan Singh.

The BJP predictably, is rather angry that too much may have been given away – specifically in the area of weapons testing – to get this waiver.

In reality, however, both parties have got it wrong. This deal is totally, completely irrelevant – both from an energy and military security perspective. It is classic politics -- all froth, no substance.

In terms of energy security, the waiver will do nothing for India. All the waiver does is allows India to enter the “shop of suppliers” (who peddle uranium and nuclear power plants) and do business with them at market rates. The trouble is these toys do not come cheap.

Nuclear power is extremely expensive, even before considering potential environmental costs. Various sources have placed the price of power from a nuclear power plant in India in the region of 12-16 Rs per unit, vis-à-vis Rs 2-8 per unit from the conventional “mix” of plants (hydel, coal, gas, oil, others).

The “waiver” is hence the intellectual equivalent of a Prada store adopting an open door policy. Sure the indigent and daily wage earners can come in, but they’re unlikely to be able to afford anything on sale.

Second, these toys take extremely long to make – upto 10 years from stone laying to commercial power supply. In that time, India’s generation gap is likely to cross 70,000 MW! Montek and Co themselves concede that at most, nuke generation will contribute 10% to this gap closure.

So we will have 7,000 MW of Nuclear power ten years from now. Maharashtra’s power shortage is 6,000 MW. Today. What do we do for the immediate 10 years?

In Indian conditions, Even the 10 year time frame is a myth. It took India 20 years merely to get one Sardar Sarovar done, when its only downside was tribal displacement. Replace “displacement” with “toxic nuclear waste” and pictures of deformed babies. Now imagine the opposition to even one such plant.

All in all then, Manmohan’s great coup – coming on the back of purchased MPs and a forever tarnished Parliament, is likely to yield nothing for the country. We will still remain in the dark.

On the other side, the BJP’s obsession with weapons testing is also tiresome. And irrelevant. Since when has International Law been an impediment to developing your own weapons program?. Such inconveniences have scarcely affected our neighbours – Pakistan and China – from coming together and raising a vibrant (and promiscuous) “Nuclear family” all the while claiming to be chaste. BJP is revealing its own lack of political depth if it it believes they cannot do the same when in power!

In all this, there is something to learn, however, about how to become a superlative politician. In one fell swoop via this deal, Manmohan Singh has re-earned and further burnished his “Reformer” credentials, washing away from the public’s mind all memory of his and his Administration’s grave acts of omission and commission since 2004 (inter alia, multiple constitutional travesties a-la Goa and Bihar, ruinous economic policies resulting in the fiscal deficit growing to pre Narasimha Rao days, blatant communalization of Indian politics with “first claim to resources to muslims” while serially trampling on hindus (“Ram did not exist”), total mishandling of domestic terrorism and reduction of parliament to a horse trading floor).

It is for this alone, that I have to admit to a grudging sense of admiration for both MMS and the Kkkangress.

They’ve proved, that if done right, you can fool all of the people all of the time.

Proud of being Indian

2008-03-20T04:49:00.000-07:00

... because India still has true Patriots, who put the Nation ahead of petty personal gains.

In one statement, Srabjeet's wife, Sukhpreet Kaur, has shown that she has more guts than the entire UPA ministry.
Even as Manmohan and his other neutered dhimmis babble "terrorist exchange", Srabjeet Singh's wife stands for the right thing: India above all else.

Every now and then, someone comes along -- today it is Sukhpreet -- that gives hope. Hope that the idea of India has not been killed off yet.

I salute you Sukhpreet Kaur.

Ashamed of being Indian

2008-01-30T03:27:00.000-08:00

The Manmoron Singh UPA government has never made any bones about its disdain for Indian security or for those men who keep India's borders (and her land) safe.

Instead, they -- Manmohan himself included -- have always bent over backwards to provide compensation for terrorists, grovel for Haneef in Australia and what not. He's lost sleep about sundry terrorists, but snored away as Mumbai and half of India was bombed.

But they've outdone themselves -- and have now sent an Ashok Chakra, a posthumous Ashok Chakra -- by telegram. Imagine the anguish of the family that has lost a Son, to know how little his nation values his supreme sacrifice.

I feel an irrepressible sense of Rage and disgust for our current political masters -- and a deep shame about being Indian.

Weekend musings: what Chanakya knew

2007-11-25T06:36:00.000-08:00

A recent McKinsey report, based upon a study of schools all over the world made a very insightful finding:

The quality of an Educational System cannot exceed the quality of its Teachers

The report notes how students with similar intrinsics follow dramatically different life trajectories based upon the quality of teaching afforded.

Acharya Chanakya knew this over 3000 years ago. He noted the importance of teachers in individual development and, by direct translation, Nation building.
His beliefs were excellently paraphrased in the excellent TV serial from ~1990, which i only remember vaguely:

Shikshak koi saadharan vyakti nahi ho sakta, Dhana Nanda.
Prakruti uski god me khelti hai... main tumhaare raashtra ka pyaasa nahin.
Chaahe to main apna samraat swayam nirmaan karoonga.

Contextualised translation: A teacher is no ordinary man, Dhana nanda; he nurtures nature in his lap. I do not come to you with aspirations for personal power [but for the task of securing Bharat's borders]. If i choose, I can create my own Emperor [who can do the task of defending Bharat].
And he did.

But education in India today lies in ruins, its Chanakyas ideologically cleansed.
As a result, India's education system cannot create the next Chandragupta -- the Emperor who reunited a fragmenting Bharat.
Perhaps that is why we have to outsource the running of the nation to Italian waitresses.

Postscript: Visit YouTube for some truly evocative and inspiring clips from the same TV serial. Replace Magadha, Takshashila with modern names: Arunachal, Sikkim, Kashmir and the message is totally consistent.
We have forgotten our own history, and we're putting ourselves at significant risk of it repeating itself.
Post-Postscript: If any reader has the link to that sequence on YouTube or elsewhere, can you please let me know?

Becoming literate more expensive than becoming a doctor?

2007-10-12T02:57:00.000-07:00

India's Education tragedy continues.

Families in India have to spend a considerable amount on the primary school education of their children, making the fundamental right to basic education a distant dream, according to a recent UNESCO report. In contrast, university education remains subsidised and costs just half of the primary school spending.

Take a deep breath, and read that again: going to School is twice as expensive as going to University. This when a University education can pay for itself (by making you qualified for more skileld jobs)and hence be rendered as a fee-for-service.

And Arjun Singh wants to continue meddling with the IITs and the IIMs.
Of course, we all know why -- seats at these schools are a powerful tool for political patronage.

In contrast, making functional primary education requires real work -- as you need to create millions of them to educate the hundreds of millions of Indian Children.

When the Government, despite focusing on Uiversities like a hawk, has still failed to create enough capacity, can it, by any stretch of imagination, ever provide enough Primary Education?

Education in India is the largest remaining bastion of the License Raj, propped up by rabidly discriminatory laws like Article 30 and surrounded by an impressive ring of lies, half truths and emotionally wrenching but factually empty statements (Private education will be too expensive. Education is too important to be given to the rapacious private sector. Private companies will fleece the poor etc. etc.).

This bastion must fall, for India to get anywhere. Otherwise, no amount of hand-wringing, staring at the demographic bulge, exhorting Indian businesses and companies or calling for innovation is going to help.

I despair.

SC tells Singh Parivar to focus on Primary Education

2007-09-27T18:25:00.000-07:00

The Supreme Court is one of the few bastions of common sense in India.
Reflecting its common sense, it has asked a reasonable question: Why this undue haste to mess with the II (T+M)s when Primary Education is such a shambles?

Come on, your honours, you know the reason:
Because fixing Primary Education will require real work -- and real reform, including allowing private participation in Education.

The tokenist UPA has made no real reforms -- as the expose of Lalu's Railway turnaround also reveals (more like a run-aground, if you ask me).

On the other hand, continuing to meddle and micromanage higher education brings significant benefits -- political patronage, being the most important. Imagine being able to stand up in front of a crowd of "the disenfranchised" -- whoever that is -- and saying "your sons and daughters now have spots in the IIMs!"

Of course, only 10 of them will ever make it there, even as millions of "the disenfranchised" remain illiterare. But that rocks the vote!

The SC has demonstrated its solid common sense yet again. However, it should not hold its breath -- desperados of the Singh Parivar (MMS, Arjun etc.) have little to no interest in reforming Education. That'd be like shooting the chicken of continued poverty that lays the electoral golden egg!

Prime Minister's Independence Day Address -- Part 3

2007-09-08T03:46:00.000-07:00

Economic Development [Continued from previous post]

This Government believes that the role of Government in economic activity is not that of a principal industry player or provider, because Government has neither the expertise, nor the capacity to run each and every sector.
Instead, the Government's role in this area should principally be safeguarding the interest of the single largest community -- consumers.

Hence, my Government, over the next 5 years, and in particular, over the next 100 days will begin the process of relinquishing Government control and management of several such companies while establishing strong regulatory mechanisms -- such as self-funded independent regulators.

Depending upon the scale of the Government-owned enterprise in question, small assets (those below 1 billion dollars in value) will be put under public ownership on our capital markets directly.

The divestment of larger companies will be overseen by Special Purpose Vehicles (SPVs) that will oversee the gradual transfer of management and assets to professional management. Some of these companies include National airlines, state-owned metal and mining companies and entities like the Food Corporation of India.
In line with our overall economic thinking, we believe that while the services of these companies are important (e.g. FCI provides basic rations to our poorest citizens), Government can not and should not be running them as monopolies. Hence, some of these companies, will not be sold en bloc but as de-merged agencies that will have to compete for resources (e.g. such as food vouchers).

Finally, even as the Government reduces its role in running enterprises, some enterprises operate in sectors of vital strategic importance. These include companies in sectors associated with natural resources (water, minerals) and energy (e.g. oil and gas) and with some critical national installations (e.g. Ports).

We believe that like in other sectors, daily management of these companies should not be a concern of the Government, but, given their strategic importance, Government should continue to own them in significant measure.

To ensure strong strategic management of these companies, ownership of these companies will be divested from their parent ministries and transferred to a holding company that is responsible for the management of these entities. We believe this separation of company ownership from the regulating ministry is essential to establish an 'arms length' relationship. This is to ensure that no player gets privileged access, ensuring a level playing field.

These holding companies will be placed under the direct management of Bharat Uday -- a Sovereign Strategic fund that will own these government assets. Bharat Uday will be staffed with the best and brightest Indians who will be tasked with professionalising the management of these companies to ensure that they compete with the best companies in the nation while earning the Government top-quartile returns. Returns from companies owned by Bharat Uday will be utilised to further strategic interests by investing in vital assets worldwide -- such as oil and gas reserves.
To ensure Bharat Uday meets its strategic objectives, it will be accountable directly to the Prime Minister and the Cabinet. We believe such a construct will add an altogether new dimension to India's National Interest -- that of Strategic Security earned by Economic power, in addition to military power.

Social Reforms

Finally, my Government will extend its philosophy of establishing clear roles for Government (regulator, provider or financier) to the Social Sector.
We believe that in the Social sector, the role of Government is exclusively as a regulator that establishes a fair and level playing field for all citizens -- irrespective of their differences.
To that end, my Government will focus on reforming or, in some cases, altogether eliminating rules and laws that create distortions, driving wedges between peoples.

It is my belief that initiatives designed to address perceived deficiencies or weaknesses of communities or sectors of society by providing selective benefits against these perceived deficiencies have only succeeded in highlighting these deficiencies, driving a wedge among communities.

For instance, laws such as Article 30 -- expressly discriminate against Hindus by disallowing Hindu organisations from running Schools and Colleges, simply because they are a majority.
This has effectively made Hindus a disadvantaged community, dependent upon Schools operated by other communities for their education. In addition to being discriminatory, such policies artificially reduce the number of schools in our nation.

However, merely removing discrimination is not enough: government must also actively enforce fairness and justice.
Hence, even as social services are given additional freedom, they will now be expected to conform to regulation. Just as our companies must meet norms of probity and accountability, so must our social sector. To that end, a social sector regulator will be established to ensure that all Social organisations -- NGOs, Religious institutions of all denominations and not-for-profit institutions will be required to declare their accounts and activities to the public, in a prescribed format.
This is particularly important, given alarming evidence of the involvement of several NGOs and religious institutions in activities detrimental to India's -- and her citizens' -- welfare and security.

These are our priorities for the next five years: security, education, healthcare, economic development and social sector reform.

In conclusion, India embarks on another illustrious year in her dramatic 6,000 year history. All the Indians I have spoken to in the past few months have been clear that they want this year to be different. A year when we shall promise to our children -- and their children -- an India of unparalleled security, prosperity and opportunity.
Making that difference -- and delivering on that promise -- is a massive challenge. It is now upto us all to deliver.

Jai Hind.

[Concluded]

Serial stupidity -- a la the politician

2007-08-30T02:24:00.000-07:00

Two articles from today's newspapers demonstrate that stupidity does not respect party lines.

Exhibit one: The ever entertaining "Dr. Ramadoss"
In his ongoing battle to suborn the AIIMS (into, what else, his personal fief?), his latest salvo.

"...saying that the premier institute was slowly becoming a "doctors' factory" for foreign countries and not for the needy Indians.
"Over 60 per cent of the AIIMS passouts are going outside India. It's becoming a doctors' factory that is producing talent for foreign countries and not for the poor Indians," Ramadoss said.

This is a tried and tested strategy to choke anything and everything: first call something anti poor, then, under the guise of "saving the poor" make it a government fief and reduce to a semi-coma and finally kill it altogether.
Just like Medical Education in Maharashtra.

If the government is so worried about doctors decamping with its money, it should stop spending on them!

My mind screams "Regime change" when confronted with such idiocy.

But, alas, the main opposition -- the BJP -- is also not immune to this phenomenon -- as exhibit 2 shows.
So here is the story: Mumbai Municipality plans to introduce 'telescopic' tariff rates for water consumers by which people who consume more pay more per unit of water they consume.

This will make water charges progressive -- just like income tax (earn more, pay higher %).
When done judiciously, this is fair and desirable -- it shifts the burden of payment to luxury users (guys with pools, jacuzzis, washing machines, 600 litre fridges).
This is highly desirable: it will allow BMC to generate surplus to re-invest in maintenance and capacity expansion. Further, this surplus will be generated by charging those who can afford to pay.
It also creates strong incentives to reduce wastage -- and this is no secret -- the biggest consumers are also the biggest wasters.

However, some BJP-wallahs think this is "anti poor".
Look at this fellow's line of reasoning:

However, committee members said that citizens do not get adequate water and therefore no reforms should be made. “The BMC provides only 90 litres per capita per day. The civic body should first follow the national norms and then introduce telescopic rates,’’ said BJP member Yogesh Sagar.

[emphasis mine]
This is like saying no reforms are necessary in telecom because there are insufficient phones in India!. The reason Mumbai's pipes leak, Sir, is because there is'nt enough money to fix the leaks. The only way you're going to get that money is by making people pay, or by handing over BMC's water to a private agency (that could raise productivity by firing non-performers etc.).
Given the second option is out -- can the existing chaps at least get some money to repair our pipes -- even if it is at slightly higher prices?

That's not all...it gets better

BJP leader Bhalchandra Shirsat said that BMC had shown dreams of 24X7 water supply to the people but citizens were not even getting enough water for daily use. “There is no reverse accountability from the civic administration,’’ he said.

Fully agree that BMC must be accountable, but have these fellows heard the term "you get what you pay for?"
Water in Mumbai is charged at Rs 2 per one thousand litres when it costs six times that to catch, store, purify and deliver. Bisleri costs Rs 10,000 per thousand litres!!!
What exactly is the BMC accountable for? Providing water for free? Into perpetuity?
How can BMC provide water even at current volumes if it loses money on every drop it provides?
You, Sir, are accountable to the city for ensuring that water remains available 20 years from now -- not for subsidising jacuzzi owners!

And even better:

The committee members suggested that instead of increasing the price for those consuming more water, the civic body should undertake a campaign for educating people to use less water.

This would have been funny if it were not so tragic.

The icing on the cake: The BJP is not playing a sour-grapes opposition role here -- they are the party in power!

What are these guys thinking? Are they even thinking? Can they think?
I despair.

Prime Minister's Independence Day Address -- Part 2

2007-08-24T08:31:00.000-07:00

Education

Reforms in Education constitute the third focus for my Government.

Analysis of Government spending in education reveals a startling fact: expenditure on higher education (medical, technical, engineering and managerial development) is orders of magnitude higher than on primary education.

This is an unsustainable and unacceptable distortion. Insufficient investment in primary education implies that a significant fraction of Indians are not provided the opportunity to earn even a high-school certificate.
Overspending on higher education -- while neglecting primary education -- is perhaps the single-largest mistake we have made in perpetuating discrimination within India.

Insufficient investment in Primary Education (and, I may add, Primary Health) also means non-competitive and anti-merit steps such as quotas and reservations need to be taken to provide symptomatic relief for this underlying flaw.

Finally, international evidence has demonstrated that government subsidisation and control over higher education is largely unnecessary. This is because higher education is usually self funding since degrees typically translate directly into employment opportunities. This has also been proven in India, where private colleges, despite working in a highly restrictive environment, have created tremendous value. They have conferred degrees on lakhs of engineers, doctors and professionals who are now in a position to compete for -- and win -- global opportunities.

Against this background, my Government's Education reform agenda has two simple objectives: universal Primary Education, and a liberalised, competitive higher education sector.

We plan to treble investment in Primary Education -- buttressed by "Education vouchers" similar to healthcare vouchers -- to ensure universal primary education becomes a reality.
Even as investments in Primary Education are increased, the mode of delivery will also be revamped. Special Purpose Vehicles (SPVs) managed by educational professionals will be formed, under strict performance-payment contracts to ensure that Education is actually being delivered.

In conjunction, the Government will begin the slow divestment of higher educational facilities. Key institutions like the IITs, IIMs, Medical Schools and other higher educational institutes will be transferred to autonomous Trusts, with complete authority -- and responsibility -- for maintaining standards and remaining fiscally viable.
Liberalising the rules to allow private institutions, along with fiscal reforms to facilitate funding of higher education will ensure fee levels remain competitive -- and educational supplies flex to match changes in market demands for talent and skills.

To ensure that quality is maintained in a multi-provider environment, robust regulation is also required. A Primary Education regulator shall be formed to monitor the performance of the SPVs referred to earlier. Existing higher educational regulators (e.g. the UGC) will be vested with higher executive authorities to effectively regulate (as distinct from control) a more diverse higher education provider base.

We believe that, for a nation with a unique dempgraphic like india, a "students' market" that provides skills ased upon job seekers' needs -- rather than an "educators' market" which provides skills based upon suppliers' ability to provide -- is preferred.

Economic Performance
The robust economic growth shown by Indian enterprises since Prime Minister Narasimha Rao initiated liberalisation in 1991 is one of the major success stories of post-independence India.
This growth has weathered several storms -- recessions, boom-bust cycles and global crises. Even as Indian companies have made record profits, acquired global companies and expanded, domestic consumption of virtually all goods (commodities, services, retail) has increased strongly across all sectors -- demonstrating that Indian enterprise is second to none in value creation.

Given this stellar track record in value creation, my government believes that this responsibility should be left to the Indian private sector. The role of the government here should be restricted to regulating the system and preventing distortions.

This will free up government resources and expertise to focus on creating value in areas where the private sector is unable or not suited to value creation -- such as law and order, healthcare and education.

[to be continued]

Prime Minister's Independence Day Address -- an agenda for reform Part 1

2007-08-14T06:50:00.000-07:00

PRESS RELEASE
15 August 20xx

In a significant break from tradition, the Prime Minister delivered the Independence day Address to the Nation while standing outside Parliament, in contrast to the usual heavily barricaded Ref Fort ramparts.

Excerpts from his speech:

"My dear countrymen. This day marks the xxth anniversary of India's political independence from over 300 years of Imperial occupation.
Every Independence day is a time for reflection -- of past successes and failures and of future opportunities.
Too many independence days have been spent thinking of the past, and of missed opportunities.
I believe, starting this Independence Day, India and Indians should spend more time thinking about their future.
Keeping that in mind, I spent a significant period of my first 30 days in office meeting over a thousand Indians, from all walks of life, from all parts of India.

Despite their incredible diversity, what struck me was how similar their aspirations for India were: Virtually all aspired to see, in their lifetimes, an India that is safe, powerful, prosperous and dynamic; an India that guarantees the safety and security of all her peoples.

As your Prime Minister, that message is especially pertinent : my people are demanding actions from me and my Government that take concrete steps in setting India in this direction.
And we are required to deliver -- in five years.

On the occasion of this 15th August -- my government's first 15th August -- i will unveil our "first 100 day plan". Reflecting the urgency of expectations, this plan is time-bound -- a response to a clearly articulated expectation of tomorrow's India.

This 100-Day Plan is clearly focused on fundamental reforms and improvements in five core sectors that underlie people's aspirations for a safe, dynamic and wealthy and caring India.
These sectors are: Law and Order (internal and external), Healthcare, Education, Economic performance and Social reforms.

Even as we have focused on these five core sectors, my Cabinet colleagues have debated extensively what the role of Government in each of these areas should be. We believe that in any sector, the Government can play three separate roles: the role of a regulator (that sets and enforces laws), of a provider (an entity that renders a service) or of financer (pays for the service in question, but does not necessarily provide the service itself).

My government has established a clear point of view on the Government's role in each of these sectors.
The objective of the "100 day plan" is to set in motion fundamental reforms in each of these sectors. I shall outline my vision for reform in each of these sectors one by one, beginning with probably the most important: Law and Order.

Law and Order
Ensuring the security of peoples is the first and fundamental role of any Government. Unfortunately, over the past decades, this area has been systematically ignored.
This is an oversight that must be corrected; for, unlike in the other sectors, the role of the Government here is that of regulator financier and provider -- all in one. Failure in this sector is thus entirely ascribable to a Government failure.

Our first priority then in Law and Order will be to raise the funding of elements of our internal and external law and order mechanisms. Resources are needed to raise the service levels of our Courts (that have over 22 million cases pending), our understaffed Police services and our Armed Forces -- to minimise this risk of failure.

In addition to augmenting resources, structural reforms are also necessary to ensure that Lew and Order are always upheld. My government is working to create a reform blueprint to completely insulate Law Enforcement from political influence. This is necessary to ensure that the fundamental right of all citizens to a safe living environment is never held hostage to political and vested interests. It is my belief that with the implementation of these reforms, every perpetrator -- irrespective of class, religion, creed or nationality, will be brought to justice effectively and quickly. A crime punished is ten crimes averted.

Healthcare
Ensuring the mental and physical health of all 1.2 Billion Indians is the bedrock of a strong society.
Healthcare is a top priority for this government since in the next 5 years, this country will have over 300 million children below 15 and over 200 million people over 65 -- both of whom have significant healthcare needs.

The first reform my Government plans to make is to shift the burden of payment for healthcare from the user to the provider.
In our present healthcare system, the government funds hospitals and providers -- irrespective of the quality of care they provide or whether they provide care at all. In this system, citizens end up paying healthcare expenses from their own pockets -- a system that, in nation after nation, has proved to be inequitable and inefficient.
In contrast, the healthcare payment system being devised by my government will provide citizens with cash equivalents that they can redeem in exchange of healthcare services. Hospitals and doctors will be paid on the basis of healthcare cash equivalents they accumulate.
This will significantly increase the efficiency of the system by ensuring that costs are incurred only for services rendered, while also providing users -- especially the poor -- with a real choice in healthcare. A special ring-fenced fund will be established for administering this service to the poor.

The second major reform in health care is around quality management: its important for the Government to ensure that only those health facilities that meet stringent quality, service, hygiene and competence criteria are allowed to operate.
To that end, strong professionally run regulator institutions will be established in the next 5 years to monitor healthcare education, hospitals and patient safety.

[to be continued]

How Sarkari "enterprises" destroy value

2007-08-01T21:06:00.000-07:00

Air India has bought 2 Boeing 777s that can fly direct to New York.
But the inaugural flight has gone empty.

Even as Union Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel flagged off Air India’s inaugural non-stop flight to New York amid much fanfare early on Wednesday, the flag carrier’s top brass mulled over the near-empty Boeing 777-200LR that pushed back from Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport at 12:45 am.
For onboard the “historic” flight were a meagre 80-odd passengers—including a dozen freeloaders [emphasis added] —as against the 238 seats available. Or a paltry 33 per cent load. What’s worse: things don’t appear much better for the first fortnight either.

In an era of free(er) skies, will anyone really fly Air India? I had the misfortune of flying them once and was appalled, really appalled at the planes and the (total lack of) service.

Despite this,

Air India had opened bookings with fares over 30 per cent higher than the industry average on the sector, which were later brought at par, because of slow bookings.

So, not only does the airline offer pathetic services, it also charges more than its competitors! That's rich!!

Inquiring taxpayers (like myself) want to know where the money goes, and why the all-knowing Government of India continues to squander my taxes on funding this -- and other -- white elephants.

Medical Education in Maharashtra – 2

2007-07-15T04:54:00.000-07:00

A path to resolution.

Now that the stewards of state (of “commanding heights” fame) have completely botched things, how do we reform? Where do we begin? What do we do?

To answer that question, it may be useful to remember the Cheshire Cat from Alice in Wonderland, “[what you need to do] depends a good deal on where you want to go.”

To understand what we need to do, we need to have a suitable vision of where we want to go. We may, for instance, want to “Establish a system to produce world-class physicians and health care leaders to meet Maharashtra’s and India’s demand for talent, while creating economic value via high-quality patient care, research and accelerated job creation.”

Translated into plain English, this means more and better hospitals -- say three times as many, with vastly improved teaching skills and capabilities that directly meet India’s healthcare needs.

It is tempting – but wrong – to conclude that all it will take is more money. If that were the case, the thousands of crores of taxpayer money the government has spent in shoring up Air India and Indian Airlines again and again would not have been as completely wasted as they have been.

No – it’s not more money that is required. What is required is an entirely new system for channelling cash, most of it from private pockets, to create an all new educational system.

There are three big changes the government must drive to make this happen:

1.Create competition in the delivery of medical education by liberalising norms governing setting up of medical institutions

The only way we can have more medical schools is, well, by allowing more people to start medical schools.

Transparent, simple yet stringent norms should be established – and anyone meeting those norms should be allowed to start a medical school. The norms could well cover requirements such as financial stability, experience in running medical schools – perhaps even globally. This is a good way of getting schools like Harvard and Hopkins interested. Incidentally, Singapore adopted a similar strategy to attract Insead Business School and Duke Medical School to Singapore.

Going beyond the school itself, medical institutions should be allowed to select the university with which they choose to be affiliated. Ergo Medicine programs should be repatriated to their parent universities, completely reversing the current trend for sameness. Creating competition – where universities strive to be affiliated to the best schools – is a far more powerful means of creating quality than by obsessing over standardising curricula across the state.

2. Create payment security in Education to attract the best medical schools

While (1) will grab the interest of leading healthcare educational institutions, it is unlikely to keep them from having bouts of attention deficit. To make sure the Harvards of the world come – and stay – the Government will need to assure them of a good return on their investment.

Discussing “returns on investment” in education is typically considered inapplicable – heretical even.

I disagree.

An education – in particular, a degree from a reputed college – is highly monetisable. When an average IIM-A student gets a starting salary worth 10 lakh, the market deems the worth of that “student+degree” combination to be worth at least as much. So, if an IIM-A student is charged Rs. 5 for a degree, s/he should not really be bothered – s/he will still be, economically speaking, better off.

So, in a nutshell, the government must give full freedom to medical schools to charge market rates for their fees.

And, instead of controlling fees, mechanisms should be established whereby the poorest of the poor have access to the capital required to fund this education. A cornucopia of solutions – from student loans to vouchers as suggested by Friedman – are possible. The government can, in fact, “fund” the education of students from whichever caste/creed/demographic/electorally useful group of people it wishes to pamper by directly paying the school the full cost of their education.

Such a move will have an altogether salubrious effect on the schools themselves. Forced with having to compete for the student’s rupee, colleges will have to offer better facilities, higher teaching standards and resources to attract students and value –added services – like career counselling and placements. The motivation for becoming distinctive will also incentivise them to establish tie-ups and alliances for research and development.

Existing shackles that prevent these relationships from emerging should also be removed.

3. Ensure public safety by establishing an independent regulatory authority.

While (1) and (2) may be adequate in other sectors, it is certainly not enough in medical education. After all, is it safe to leave the licensing of physician to a bunch of colleges that is interested in a 100% pass rate?

This is a legitimate concern, but effectively solved by establishing an independent regulator.

In the United States for instance, all physicians – even those from the best schools –must pass stringent licensing examinations administered by an independent licensing authority.

India too has successfully established ombuds and regulators such as the TRAI, indicating the viability of the concept. This regulator should be kept independent of the government (which means the Ramadoss or Grand poobah of the time should not be allowed to meddle in its operations). It should also be made financially secure by providing it with ring-fenced government funding and “licensing fees” collected from students and medicall colleges.

This independence and financial stability is crucial to staff the regulator with high quality experts – and not some spineless lackeys beholden to the present Minister.

Details about how we can make this regulator – indeed any institution – at arms length from political vicissitudes is matter enough for a separate post.

So there we have it – a framework to pull Maharashtra back from its state of self-inflicted medical decline and place it firmly onto a growth trajectory.

Of course, several operational issues remain unanswered – such as how do we ensure that these medical colleges have the right kind of teaching hospitals available? This one is easy: allow hospitals to forge alliances with existing hospitals to upgrade them into teaching institutions. Give incentives for adopting and transforming poorly run government hospitals and so on.

Some questions are harder – such as how do we get the best here? How many medical schools are enough? How expensive is too much?

They are all valid and important.

However they are also amenable for resolution under the umbrella framework of the three shifts listed above: competition, payment security and outcome regulation.

So, why have we not started as yet?

Unfortunately, like most changes – this change too has to start from the government. Babus have to go from thinking of themselves as thekedaars and maay-baaps of the sector to facilitators and nurturers.

They have to realise that this sector is too important to be held ransom to their petty egos.

Alas, the recent fracas with Ramadoss and the AIIMS demonstrated how far the sarkar is from this realisation.

Einstein had once said that a problem can only be solved at a level of consciousness higher than at which it was caused.

Our netas and babus need to raise their levels of consciousness pretty significantly to embrace such radical change.

Cold comfort, that we need to wait for our Netas and Babus to think differently.

Perhaps they should begin their journey by reading Alice in Wonderland.

Kerala Left behind: No organised retail

2007-07-01T18:19:00.000-07:00

The Kerala Lefties are at it again: throttling enterprise.

They now plan to ban organised retail.

KOCHI, JULY 1: The Left Democratic Front (LDF) government in Kerala is all set to bring in a law to ban corporate retailers, both Indian and MNCs, in the state.
...
This would be the first attempt of its kind in the country. Divakaran said the Left in Kerala doesn’t intend to draw the line for big retailers at peddling food grains, as Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee did for Bengal a few days ago. It will be a blanket ban and, according to the minister...
“We don’t want to tell MNCs from Indian corporates, both are bad for the state. We don’t want to go for a conditional or limited ban because we really don’t want them here at all,” Divakaran said.

This reveals the commies for what they are: a bunch of power hungry, control obsessed despots (not that it was ever in doubt). With no real interest in farmers' or citizens' welfare.

And farmers like organised, vertically integrated retailers .. they give them better prices for their crop than the government.
But of course, the commies don't -- they cannot lord over the aam aadmi anymore!

PS: My essay on Medical Education 2 is still pending -- I will post it over the next week.

Medical Education in Maharashtra - 1

2007-05-20T06:36:00.000-07:00

Creating a robust Medical Education is a strategic imperative for India – healthcare is a critical sector of the economy in any nation. In a growing nation like India – with an absolute deficit of doctors, -- establishing a robust "pipeline" of medical talent is a critical element of development. After all, you cannot create economic surplus if you're sick.

Stewards of state are therefore expected to create an environment where talent is allowed to nurture and bloom.

Sadly, stewards of state in India -- and in Maharashtra in particular -- have done exceedingly well at destroying talent by establishing a deadening centralised license raj.

This is the story of what has happened in Maharashtra -- and what to expect as a result.

To begin with, starting a medical college in India is tough. You have to jump through multiple governmental hoops to get a green signal: from the number of beds you have/need, to the sizes of lecture rooms... even the fees you can charge!

However, the government worries very little about what quality of doctors you produce (in stark contrast, virtually all nations tightly regulate the quality of doctors produced; important, since a drop in educational standards can directly cost human lives).

As a result, many freshly graduated doctors in India are, to put it midly, incompetent. I had colleagues in my class who could not read a chest X-ray. This in a country where the first, second and third diagnosis for chronic cough is tuberculosis, tuberculosis and tuberculosis.

As a result, even after nearly 6 years of schooling, employment opportunities for a Doctor are slim (in stark contrast to graduates from engineering or management colleges).

No one comes to medical schools in India to recruit the next generation of Naresh Trehans or Nitu Mandkes: the cost associated with separating the wheat from the chaff is just not worth it. The best hospitals, in fact, simply do not entertain candidates until they earn credentials overseas – a simpler way (but more effective, at least from the Hospital’s perspective) of ensuring quality of supply.

Despite these flaws, the system was getting by: many doctors were starting out on their own, others were earning overseas qualifications and either returning or emigrating.

Somewhat predictably, the Maharashtra government began facing a crippling shortage of medical officers -- particularly in her rural areas.

Instead of freeing up the supply of doctors to address this shortage, the Government actually strengthened its stranglehold over supply and brough every aspect of medical education under direct governmental control.

All students were forced into mandatory rural service (girls from my class have served their bonds in Gadchiroli – a naxal infested area). Bonds were signed to make sure no student ‘slipped the dragnet’. Since the government could not "afford" to pay her resident doctors (doctors in teaching hospitals working to earn their MD/MS degrees), salaries were reduced. In fact, several resident doctors working to earn their DNB, do so gratis! Imagine a 27 year, unpaid neurosurgery resident!

Education delivery was next. Medicine programs that had run for perhaps longer than a 100 years at Mumbai and Pune University (among others) were dismantled and centralised to a no-name university operating out of a shed in Nasik. Centralised because the state found it easier to control one puppet university, Nasik because that was the health minister’s constituency.

To complete the picture, private medical schools in Maharasthra were also told by the government whom they must admit and what fees to charge!

As respected programs were demolished and replaced with an unknown and unwanted one, examination standards dropped; the new degree was even invalid internationally for several years. Doctors’ employability levels dropped further.

The result has been predictable. Lines to join medical school have been getting thinner. Growth in seats has stalled -- not one medical seat has been added in Mumbai in the past decade. Those already stuck in the system are leaving: fully half my graduating class has either migrated overseas, moved out of the clinical sciences or both.

Over a short span of ten years, vibrancy in medical education in Maharashtra was decimated, replaced by a deadening License Raj. A Raj of unmet demand, insufficient supply and poor quality.

But the divine law of supply and demand -- hated by the dirigiste state -- has caught up with Maharashtra. Over the next 20 years, Maharashtra will face a catastrophic shortage of medical doctors. This shortage will hit where it hurts most: public healthcare.

This catastrophe will not be easy to fix: it takes years to create a medical college of any standing (infrastructure, teachers, a working hospital) and nearly a decade to make a doctor (longer, if you include complex specialities).

By acting cynically to perpetuate their personal control over the sector, Maharashtra’s political leaders have virtually wiped out an entire generation of physicians, exposing her citizens to medical risk of institutional proportions.

They must be tried for criminal malpractice.

And yet, it is possible for Maharashtra to reverse the decay; i shall cover the topic in a separate post.

First you screw them...

2007-05-14T07:09:00.000-07:00

... then you give them sops.
Classic maay-baap sarkar behaviour: choke off all sources of income to reduce to penury.
Then save from penury -- but only just -- by starting a life-support drip.
Control the pace of the drip to ensure that income is never infused fast enough for the patient to recover and walk off.

When will the UPA idiots learn?
The solution to Agriculture, as elsewhere, is simple:

1. Establish a water and electricity policy -- including private transmission and distribution to ensure farmers have the "raw materials" to grow and transport food (a lot of food perishes because our cold chains are poor -- because we dont even have 100% electricity). Buttress with a buildout of roads (remember the NDA's golden quadrilateral?)

2. Get out of the way -- dismantle controlled price regimes and allow farmers to produce what the market needs -- and sell directly to consumers.

New addition to the Arundhati-Teesta-Shabana tribe

2007-04-16T07:49:00.000-07:00

The Poor thing is getting anxious about "so much inequality everywhere"

"From a policy perspective, it is crucial that the attributes of disadvantaged groups are clearly and objectively determined. The interlocking of inequalities — cultural, social and economic — is evident. As such, there is a need for policies that do not put the challenges of recognition and of redistribution into separate boxes, but clearly address the areas of their overlap. A balance must be struck between the claims of sheer identity and those of palpable material deprivation."

A textbook example of how to spout utter garbage but make it sound intellectual and scary. Of course, her solution to inequality: even more inequality -- in terms of access and benefits.
These jhola-walis cannot seem to get it into their heads: the only reforms in India that have worked are those that have universally lowered access barriers.

But how can she? Blinded by Communism, she is!

Its surprising newspapers dedicate column space to this rubbish... guess anything with the name "Nehru" automatically finds its way into the news.

Older version cross-posted on www.rajeev2004.blogspot.com

Careful UPA -- your slip is showing

2007-03-28T20:32:00.000-07:00

The UPA claimed to be interested in "development with a human face" in 2004.

Development, yes, but whos? This article points to the answer: Not the Farmer's.

With agribusiness hotting up, private players are establishing their own supply chains and offering higher prices to farmers for their produce.

Anyone with the "farmers' interest" in mind would welcome this development.

Not the Central Government.

The Central Government, clearly, is not concerned about the farmer.

Instead of allowing farmers to get higher returns, MMS and Co. will now force farmers to sell produce to the sarkar at lower prices than the market.

But then, the UPA is then doing only what its (time tested) Nehruvian Stalinist ideology says: rob the citizen and keep him poor, 'fix' him on an IV drip of doles and alms and control that drip!
Rob the farmer of a fair price, drive out competition and leave the poor farmer dependent on a drip of FCI-fixed prices.

Thank you Finance Minister for informing us of your intent to "help agriculture" in your '07 budget. Now we know who you're planning to help.

Terroristan and Cricket -- Woolmer murdered by team member?

2007-03-22T18:08:00.000-07:00

The plot sickens.
Evidence has emerged that Woolmer did not die "of natural causes" but may in fact have been murdered.
The post mortem has revealed Woolmer's cervical vertebrae were fractured -- suggesting that he was strangulated. Given the circumstances, many are hypothesizing that this was an inside job.

My theory is this:
He was murdered by one of the rogues -- sorry, team members -- he tutored.
Which neatly explains why Pakistan lost and is now in an undue hurry to pack up and go home -- they want to be "home and dry" when the Jamaican Police come asking uncomfortable questions.

Reveals again the pathological mind of these fellows -- did I hear Peace Process?

Sharia imposed in Kashmir

2007-02-20T06:24:00.000-08:00

Kashmir has fallen.
The state assembly has sanctioned the imposition of Sharia in the State.

See:
http://www.outlookindia.com/pti_news.asp?gid=4&id=449812

With the exception of the Indian Penal Code, Kashmir is now outside Indian law, to be governed by Islamic Law. What of the Pandits, I wonder

Slippery slope? Thin edge of the wedge?

Reforms -- a means to an end

2007-02-18T04:24:00.000-08:00

It’s been 30 months since I moved from the United States back to Mumbai to start my first real job. So it was with much excitement that I was looking forward to visiting the United States again.

The America I left in 2003 was swaggering and strutting, buoyed by the confidence of a rebounding post 9-11 economy (concerns about being "Bangalored" notwithstanding). It was also the America that had, with impressively little effort, pulverized the Taliban that had successfully kept the Soviet war machine busy for over a decade.

Against that memory, America 2007 felt palpably different to me. The swagger had given way to a shuffle –The war on terror in Afghanistan still lingered and continued to add to the body count. Worse, the invasion in Iraq had gone horribly wrong, costing billions and killing thousands of troops. Scanners, metal detectors, x-ray machines and ID checks were everywhere, constant reminders of the here-and-now nature of terrorism.

America had also suffered multiple domestic body blows. Katrina had severely shattered America’s confidence. As New Orleans plunged into sub-saharan African style anarchy, the world saw the soft underbelly of the sole superpower.

America’s vaunted healthcare system also seemed to be misfiring – with medicare bankruptcy within the next 10 years a real possibility.

Was this it, then? The beginning of end of the American century? The end of Pax Americana as we know it?

My guess is probably not – for while the damage was visible, what was also starting to show was an acceptance of the problem and a resurfacing of the “we shall overcome” spirit.

A store clerk in LA quipped to me that “The climate is changing, we’ve done something wrong and it aint what it used to be.” Another man noted how in his home town in Colorado, they had snow in February for the first time in over years.And it was not merely in words – for the first time I was seeing words like hybrids, low emissions, green housing and sustainable buildings in American newspapers. In general, the focus had shifted from an analysis of what is broken to what is needed to fix it. On healthcare too, the debate was rapidly shifting to systematically controlling costs and ensuring coverage. America seemed to be waking up and smelling the coffee.

I had noted this behaviour during my days in Boston in 2001-2003. Those were the days when Americans were afraid of being "Bangalored" -- their jobs vacuum cleaned to Indian shores. I remember Wipro’s Azim Premji having to take some tough questions at MIT in late 2003 (he dispatched them with panache).

The breast beating lasted all of a few weeks. The American people accepted it, hunkered down and began reskilling to live in an outsourceable world.

And then it struck me. America -- and Americans are a resilient lot.

They see change -- and adapting to it -- as a pre-requisite for continued prosperity and growth. For instance, America has taken to green technology not because it is "good for mother earth" but because sustainable energy usage is vital if America has to continue to enjoy economic growth and security.

It is this resilience, this willingness to change to reach a higher goal that has made America a leader among nations.

So what does all of this mean for a resurgent

India

Should a nation that is only just learning to sprint slow down to a shuffle again, as she was shuffling under the weight of the Nehruvian Penalty*?

Hardly. Like America, India too needs to realise that reforms are necessary to ensure future prosperity and security. There are plenty of "bumps" in the road India has chosen -- bumps that can prevent india from getting into her stride. It is in her best interest, therefore to remove these bumps.

One of the biggest bumps facing India are her dismal education system. If India has to leverage her much touted “demographic advantage” over China and continue growing for the next 50 years – her education system needs to be nursed to fitness pronto.

Murli Manohar Joshi may have missed the point by asking for IIM fees to be dropped, but Arjun Singh’s "Mandal 2" crusade and re-establishment of an educational license-raj, with the government as lord and master, can potentially nuke it to the dark ages.

To fix this problem, Indian education needs radical surgery. As a first step, we should shutter (ideally nuke) the Ministry of Human Resources. Second, we should liberalise education delivery and allow any player -- private, public or charitable -- to start educational institutes. Finally, to ensure standards are met and enforced, an independent regulator should be established. This regulator should be staffed by experts (not babus), and may be funded by levying nominal charges from all institutes and users to ensure impartiality. A supporting framework to finance education for the 'meritorious poor' will also be required to ensure that no one is left behind.

In addition to fixing the system, the content our system imparts needs to be reformed as well. Education needs to be freed from the clutches of the 4Ms (Marxists, Mullahs, Missionaries and Macaulay-followers). Issues like Article 30 of the Indian Constitution that exclude Hindus also need to be scrapped. All that is another story, for another entry.

Such educational reforms will not come without pain -- Indians have grown used to the concept of "nearly-free" education paid for by someone else's money. Migrating to a system where you have to pay for the education you get is not likely to be an easy transition. The biggest opposition is not likely to come from the sadharan Indian -- he already pays for sundry coaching classes and "donations". It is likely to come from the Marxists and the JNU types.

They should be ignored.

In sum, if India wants to become prosperous, she needs educated professionals. Paying for making those professionals is a key means to that end. Like the Americans say, there aint no free lunch!

With India going through ebullient times, then, reforms need to be hotfooted (not backpedalled as MMS and co. are doing) – the pain will be easier to bear.

And seriously, good times or bad, will anyone really miss Arjun Singh?

***

* Incorrectly known as the “Hindu rate of growth”. India's poor rate of growth from independence to the 80s is attributable to Nehru and his policies, neither of which were Hindu. The term is © Shadow Warrior; see rajeev2004.blogspot.com for more.

Mani Ratnam's guru -- lessons in wealth creation

2007-01-20T19:28:00.000-08:00

After reading the rave reviews of Mani Ratnam’s latest opus, I was curious to see Guru. Like the reviewers, I came away moved by the movie on multiple levels: the acting, the refreshing and true-to-the-situation cinematography and the music.

But I was disappointed – by the reviews that is.

For all of them seem to have missed the main message of the movie: that for a nation like India, above everything else, wealth creation holds the key to poverty alleviation. A pertinent message, given that our so-called reformers are now back-pedalling quite a bit these days.

So, in my review about Guru , I will focus less on the fluff and more on the message. For starters, I will not refer to this movie as being “based upon the life of a leading Indian industrialist” -- for Mani Ratnam himself is clear that this movie is a tribute to the life of Dhirubhai Ambani.

And it is a very well made tribute -- with fantastic acting and cinematography.

Abhishek has finally come of age – from an awkward, wannabe Amitabh, who could do little more than scowl or leer at semi-naked ang-mo women (ang-mo is the Chinese equivalent of firangi and literally means person with red hair on his/her arms), he has matured and grown as an actor. He has detailed Guru richly and compellingly -- I particluarly like the peculiar style of laughing he deployed in the movie. Very impressive.

Aishwarya’s role is small, but she finally brings some intensity to her role and is extraordinarily comfortable with Abhishek; unsurprising, considering recent events. Madhavan too is good, but rather uni-dimensional. And of course, there is Mithun-da. The jholawala patrakaar, married to his ideology, unwilling to bend, no matter what the cost.

The cinematography and picturisation is also refreshing and remains true to Dhirubhai’s deeply traditional, Gujarati, Hindu roots. Where this is particularly evident is in the language – virtually all the dialogues are in Sanskritic Hindi, using rich, deeply Indic words. Guru bucks the trend in hindi movies to secularise and Arabise hindi with salaams, ishqs, mohabbats, subhanallahs, waqts, quams and what not.

What a relief.

But without doubt the most powerful message I got from the movie was this: A single Guru (or Dhirubhai) who creates wealth is a far greater nationalist than the entire army of brainwashed, self-loathing nehruvian stalinists could ever be.

By the end of the movie, I came away admiring Dhirubhai more and despising the socialist state even more.

Abhishek sums up the "Dhirubhai spirit" in the movie ... I am not interested in filling petrol cans all my life, I want to become rich. And yet, when I wanted to work hard and earn, I found all doors were closed to a poor man like me. And the doors had all been closed by people like you (pointing to the members of a government-headed commission). But I could not take no for an answer and was prepared to do whatever it took to open the door – if it needed to be kicked down, I did; if it needed a bribe I did that. Because i wanted to become rich.

And that was his crime. To the nehruvian socialist state, and its handmaiden – the socialist media – wanting to become rich was a crime.

You see, the socialist Indian state was never pro-poor, it was pro-poverty. It was never interested in alleviating poverty – it was only interested in perpetuating it. And that it did with impressive (and tragic) effectiveness.

In one scene in the movie, Madhavan (the reporter) attends the Shakti shareholders meeting to dig out news on how Guru’s company Shakti Corporation is breaking the law. The woman next to him – a middle-class gujarati housewife prods him to clap! She says with a gleam in her eyes that if India could produce 10 more gurus, poverty would be eliminated! Sheer music.

And that is why, to my mind, Guru is a nationalist, while the nehru-indira socialist state is not. Guru wants to lift himself and his community out of poverty – to grant it respect, to enable people to walk with their heads held high. The state, on the other hand is bent upon keeping people poor, reducing them to supplicants whom it condescends to save. All this while claiming to be concerned about them (Orwell would have been proud… remember war is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength?).

A brief exchange in the movie drives this message home: en route to a judicial hearing, a shabby looking man confronts Guru on the court staircase. The man introduces himself as a taxi driver – who ferried passengers from Vadala to Churchgate. He informs Guru that he owns shares in Shakti – shares that allowed him to pay for his daughters' weddings.

For all its bluster and talks about social uplift from the 'commanding heights', the state’s elaborate machinery is outdone by one Guru’s wealth creation.

I could not hold back the tears.

Sale of Kashmir to continue

2007-01-04T20:50:00.000-08:00

This is priceless -- under the able guidance of PM Dr. MMS, India's disinvestment plans are proceeding well. Kashmir is back on the sale block -- with Ghulam Nabi Azad exhorting the Pakistan Army to come and run his state for him.

The ISI and Pakistan Army must be salivating at this opportunity: despite staging war after war for over 50 years, they've been unsuccessful in wresting Kashmir from Indian hands.

Ghulam Nabi and Man-moron will now proceed to hand it over on a silver platter, surrounded with cress and seasoned with cash and God knows what else -- maybe even arms!

I suspect however, that the Pak Army will probably shoot Ghulam first for being treacherous and untrustworthy, not an altogether unwelcome event.
Bad apples can sometimes do good.

Azad for 'joint management' of J&K

Press Trust of India
Posted online: Thursday, January 04, 2007 at 1958 hours IST

From darkness lead me to light

2006-12-24T01:58:00.000-08:00

Media led transformations -- Afzal Guru and Sanjay Dutt

As I was putting together the second short essay about our Prime Minister (Dr.) Man-Moron Singh, I noticed two interesting transformations occurring before me. And how the media and the public willingly suspended disbelief to allow that to happen.

The first was the transformation of Afzal Guru -- from a ruthless, cold-blooded, murderous Jihadi to a "family man".
It all started within minutes of the Supreme Court declaring Afzal Guru guilty and sentencing him to death. Predictably, the judgement stirred the tender sensibilities of India's conscience keepers (epitomised by folks like Prannoy Roy, pseudo-sec apologists, JNU-wallas, jhola-wallas, among others) . What we have here is a miscarriage of justice.
The Supreme Court had become Communal.

Communal.

The mention of that word was enough to send the media ballistic -- like a sniffer dog that had just found a huge cache of cocaine.

And the dog bared its fangs -- its sharpest, ugliest and most vicious fangs.

Enter Rajdeep Sardesai -- who humiliated and reduced to tears the families of the killed security folks, making it sound like it was their fault that Afzal Guru was given the death sentence.
Other enterprising TV channels had sound bytes of Afzal Guru's mother -- weeping that her son was innocent.

Barkha Dutt held the usual perfunctory debates, where the conclusion has already been drawn: India is "harsh on its minorities".

Arundhati Roy used the occasion to write another book that will earn her a handsome royalty and get her invitations to sundry "guest lectures" in Bush-whacked America where she can weep for the poor Afzal, along with other terror apologists.

After the fangs had torn into Indian minds, repeating "innocent" ad nauseam, Afzal Guru emerged... mysteriously... inevitably... inexorably... innocent.
The Government notes that it will take them 7 years to do something, as the utterly destroyed and demoralised families of the martyrs return their medals.

Truth by repeated assertion has worked its magic.

The other transformation was of Sanjay Dutt -- of a gangster into a 'man of peace'. Notice, how perfectly timed it all was... days after appealing for bail, Dutt visits a home for children with cancer.
Awww... how can this soft-hearted Gandhian be anything close to a terrorist?
A tragic study of how emotional positioning can be effectively used to gloss over real crimes.

In stark contrast stands another killer -- Manu Sharma. In reality, Manu's crime, though equally heinous, is a far smaller offense. Mr. Sharma has committed a single homicide, Afzal and Co are mass murderers. But Manu is getting skewered, and rightly so -- after all he has no communal or political card to play.

We used to learn as children the Sanskrit Sholka (from the Upanishads):

Tamaso ma jyotirgamaya (Go from darkness to light)
Asato ma sad gamaya (Go from untruth to the truth)
Mrutyormaa amrutam gamaya (Go from [this] place of death -- to immortality)
Om Shanti Shanti shanti (Let there be Peace, Peace, Peace)

I guess the time is ripe for a remix of this old meaningless couplet --
Go from light to darkness, from truth to untruth and from immortality to the mortal!

With an intelligentsia and media that has bartered its morals and its sense of right and wrong.

This truly is kaliyuga -- the end of living and the beginning of survival.

Man for all seasons -- Manmohan Singh (1)

2006-12-10T01:41:00.000-08:00

Celebrating the achievements of PM (Dr.) Manmohan Singh

In early 2004, India heaved a collective sigh of relief. The people had spoken, and had shown the communal BJP-led NDA alliance the door.

Gone was the weak kneed Vajpayee (of the infamous Kargil debacle, and the famous Kandhar and bus trip successes), to be replaced by the strong and dynamic Manmohan Singh -- the man who unleashed liberalisation in india in 1991 (no, PV Narasimha Rao had nothing to do with it).

With India back in the hands of a man of integrity, vision and a clear roadmap for development (much like Nehru was), rapid development, elimination of all ills, culminating in superpower status are obvious outcomes. With India on her way to becoming a superpower by ... err sometime in the future (but don't worry, it will all happen very soon), many of her recent achievements have been ignored. This series of small essays is my attempt at filling that void.

Does Manmohan Singh deserve all the credit?

Success, as they say, has many fathers. Failure is an orphan.

So it is with Dr. Singh's successes.

Many have sprung from the woodwork to claim credit for our PM’s success. Some say… “aah it was the communists that forced ... err encouraged... him to do that”, or “Sonia madame must have said so” or “this is the peril of a coalition”.

This is blatantly unfair, for at least two reasons:

First: Manmohan Singh is the Prime Minster of India. This isn’t some badly run business we’re talking about: this is the Government of India, a well run ship with a clear strategy. Further, these are not petty gains but dramatic victories. In a well run organisation, none of these can happen without strong leadership.

Second: It is unfair to blame leaders for failures but look elsewhere to celebrate success. If Bush gets the blame for having trigger happy deputies (e.g. Rumsfeld?), Manmohan Singh must get credit for the achievements of his team.

This set of essays begins with foreign policy, where arguably, the successes have been most spectacular (though his achievements in the field of minority development, educational excellence may be considered equally dramatic).

First fix your neighbours: Successes in Foreign Policy

No single area captures the statesmanship of Our Prime Minister like his achievements in the field of Foreign Affairs. In particular, his handling of Pakistan, the United States of America and of China are worthy of celebration.

Highly successful sale of Indian security interests to Pakistan

Since being appointed PM (he was never elected, but what do people know about leadership?) Dr. Singh has superlatively handled our nasty neighbor, Pakistan. In his own inimitable style he has successfully cowed them into submission with the clever use of Independent India’s oldest weapons – unilateral concessions and kid gloves. The result of this has been spectacular: Pakistan’s largest domestic produce – international terrorism – is now flourishing and is being exported all over the world.

But we are getting ahead of ourselves here. So we will start from the beginning.

As a first gesture, on coming to power, Dr. Singh immediately scuttled POTA (Prevention of Terrorist Activities Act). POTA was a draconian legislation that had allegedly offended the human rights of several terrorists. Some say this was at the behest of the Leftists, Madame Sonia, others; but the rightful credit must go to the man in charge.

Dr. Singh then established a most innovative solution for reducing terror: forming a joint terrorism reduction network with Pakistan. Under this arrangement, India (the 'customer' of terrorism) will share evidence of terror activities with Pakistan (her supplier) . This knowledge sharing mechanisms will allow Pakistan to study evidence from successful and unsuccessful terrorist attacks, enabling key producers like the Pakistan army, the ISI and NGTO's (Non-Government Terrorist Organisations) to get a clear picture of why some attacks worked and others failed.

They will see for example, how foolish terrorists left behind evidence trails that allowed Indian police to trace them back to Pakistan. This information can then be used to refine the next wave of terror attacks, to wipe out innocent Indians more efficiently. This move will dramatically accelerate the development of Pakistan’s terrorism infrastructure; early results have been encouraging (vide infra).

Manmohan has ensured that these efforts for efficiency are not hampered by Indian red tape and bottlenecks that habitually obstruct economic activity. Several jobs are actively being created in India’s burgeoning activist industry to pressurise war-mongers like the Supreme Court, the President and the Police to cease and desist. The masterful clearance of Afzal Guru is iconic of this new thrust for efficiency. So, the more Afzal Gurus Pakistan can produce, the more India will allow them to prosper!

With this masterstroke, painted across a global canvas (India, Havana, elsewhere), Manmohan has bested Chamberlain in negotiating “peace in our lifetimes”, against a remarkably hostile enemy.

Given the time constraints, Dr. Singh had to move quickly, ignoring Parliament in the process. Which is fine: after all, decisive leadership never works on consensus!

See the following references for more details:

“Annual reports” on the robust growth of terrorism:

An encouraging 2004:

http://www.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=32957

A better 2005:

http://www.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=52485

A spectacular 2006:

http://www.expressindia.com/messages.php?newsid=75101

Pakistan can no longer conceal her glee and for the first time admits that this is a key business!

Man of action:

PM ignores prejudiced Police briefings (what do our Cops know? They’re lazy, corrupt and communal)

http://www.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=74764&headline=7/11~Probe:~

Instead of indulging in this nonsense, the Mumbai police should think creatively and establish a joint “crime reduction commission”. Imagine how powerful that would be: the men in khaki and the sundry dons of Mumbai sitting across the table defeating crime! Alas our cops know nothing, and are lazy, corrupt and communal.

Making it happen in Havana: Manmohan’s masterstroke -- declaring Pakistan a victim of terrorism! The Poor things!

http://www.outlookindia.com/full.asp?fodname=20060925&fname=parthasarathy&sid=1

http://ia.rediff.com/news/2006/sep/18raman1.htm?q=np&file=.htm

Coming next: Towards a nuclear and bright India

If the masterly handling of Pakistan has demonstrated our Prime Minister’s intellect, the winning of the nuclear deal with America will demonstrate his thirst for success.

I will post this article over the next few days.

Empty post

2006-12-09T08:12:00.000-08:00

Placeholder

I will put content here over the coming weeks