Trip to Shimla - A Beautiful Town on the Mountains

A Case of Lost and Found

In April, I lost my wallet in my office. I had kept it on a sofa on ground floor of my building and forgot to take it with me. I returned back in 3-4 minutes but found that it was gone. I went to the security gates, but they were only noting down the “found” items and not the “lost” items. I kept visiting them for a month, but nothing was returned to them – that I could see by going through “Lost and Found Register”. I had lost my 2 credit-cards, 1 debit-card, 1000+ rupees, my driving license, and pictures of self and my wife. Losing the Driving License was a great loss for practical reasons, others gave me emotional pain. I found it weird that there was no place in our campus where we were registering/documenting the lost items in the campus. 

Till then, the security team used to register only found cases. Suppose I lost my wrist watch and followed up with the security (by visiting each of the three security gates and checking the respective registers) for a month and then gave up my hope. Someone had got the watch but was not able to return because s/he was on leave/onsite/travel. The person returns the watch on 31st day. Since I am not following up with the security anymore, where will this watch go? If they have a “lost” register, they can match the descriptions and verify and return it to me. Also, the benefits of noting down the details of “lost” cases are many. Just an example: if we analyze the data and find that 50 thefts have happened from a particular area in a building in a month - we can install a CCTV to monitor and curb the trend / catch the person responsible. We have about 20,000 employees in our campuses here, and daily a number of items are lost and found. A proper “system” should be in place to document the cases. 

I raised a formal request, asking “where can I register the ‘theft’ I have faced”. The initial response was insensitive. But I never accepted the explanation. The company has a fair and just system, so I had faith that I would end up making a positive change. The request went through many cycles and escalations. I was tempted to get discouraged and close the case. But I let it persist. Ultimately after two months, I have now got a communication from the facilities team that they have directed all security gates to register “lost” cases also, in the same “Lost and Found Registers”. 

I have informed my colleagues with the new development and asked them to use this facility when needed. It helps those who lose their items and have to face a lot of troubles enquiring/reclaiming those items. It also makes our facilities system more transparent and effective. I am happy that I was able to be an agent for this positive change. I haven’t got my wallet back, but there are chances that those who will face the same would go through less distress than what I went through, and the cases would also reduce just because someone is keeping a tab on them. 

- Rahul

Pictures from Shimla

Here is my public album with pictures from my ShimlaVisit:

Trip to Shimla - A Beautiful Town on the Mountains

Slideshow:

Saving Nature

Heart melts at this news:

Sadhu dies after a 73-day fast to save Ganga

http://tinyurl.com/3wc7cl7 and http://tinyurl.com/68qkndu

New Beginning for me in Volunteering

Donating old clothes and some usable items like toys and utensils is a very good idea. Often we have the will but don’t find the opportunity. There are many NGOs who specialize in facilitating in that. I knew of a very good NGO which ran a campaign to collect old clothes in cities and then reach it to remote and needy people for ‘cloth for work’ scheme. It has also won many awards, including a Best NGO and a World Bank award. They have a collection center or warehouse in my city, but that is far from our office. So here is what I thought and made a scheme: 

I talked to them and offered myself as a volunteer. I planned to collect old clothes and items from my colleagues and friends, and would deposit those to their collection center in the weekends. They have agreed to my offer and gave the necessary details. 

So I have informed my colleagues and friends that anytime if they want to donate old clothes and some usable items for the poor, they could feel free to contact me. I shall make sure the items reach the NGO. I am not posting the specific details like name of the NGO and address; would like to pass these to those who are interested. 

This is my first proper social initiative. So far I have tried to be part of some one-off social campaigns and also contributed monetarily, but this time I wish to contribute my efforts, selflessly, with a plan… 

Regards,

Rahul

Puppy

Our company has an online bulletin board on which people can post ads and messages for a host of things. Buy and sale for items, flat on rent, any event being organized - colleagues are allowed to share the message with others. At times some very touching messages appear there. Like one that appeared today. A lady colleague posts the picture of a pup she said she had rescued and wanted someone to adopt. She says the pup is around 1.5 months old and needs to be adopted by some family which cares. And what a cute pup it is! See yourself:

His Ego

Writing in a very quick story, but it means a lot. It is complete fiction, out of my mind:

It is the story of a girl and a boy. They married after felling in love with each other. After marriage, the girl realises that she was only a means for the boy's ego satisfaction, only a prize in his eyes. That lowered the girl’s respect for the boy. The boy never failed to fulfil any demand for his girl, but somehow the girl kept seeing it again as a gesture of his own ego fulfilment. One day, she decides to quit and separate. They don’t remarry, but lead separate life. The girl takes up a profession and achieves name and position. She outshines the boy. At one time, she realises that the boy had indeed tried 4-5 times in those years to reconcile and to get together again. But she had never agreed and ignored the gestures. In the end both get old. She lies on bed and is rethinking about her own life. Suddenly she realises something. She realises that it was her own ego in the first place which had separated her from the boy. It was again her ego which had made her not accept his gestures and requests to reunite. She wonders since when she also had an ego, which she accused the boy to possess in excess? She realises that she also always had the ego – only it manifested itself in different ways than that of the boy. Only after she had separated from the boy, her ego had become of the same kind as that of the boy… Now she is able to separate the boy’s ego from his love. She returns back, and is surprised to see that the boy still accepts her… As a conclusion she realises that though he had an ego, the ego didn’t come as an obstruction to their love. His ego had only boosted his love…

- Rahul

Book Review: Games Indians Play

Games Indians Play: Why we are the way we are’


By V. Raghunathan

(Forward by N.R. Narayana Murthy)

Penguin Portfolio

Dr. V. Raghunathan is a man of many credits. He has been a professor of finance at IIM Ahmedabad from 1982-2001; then worked as President of ING Vysya Bank and later as MD of GMR Industries. He is author of 9 books, has been on many companies’ boards, and esteemed panels. He is also a popular columnist in newspapers; and is involved in CSR roles as of now. You can check his LinkedIn profile here; or can go to his website. When such a man writes something, readers have better take him seriously.



The purpose of this book is to analyze and understand why Indians are ‘like this only’. Now what is meant by ‘like this’ has often negative connotations. Dr. Raghunathan says that the root cause is that Indians are one of the most intelligent lots in this world. He says he has visited many places and understood many people – but never has he found such an intelligent population, as we are in India. Yet, he says our intelligence results in us taking rational decisions ‘individually’ in situations, but leading to our ‘collective’ failure. He calls us “Privately smart and publicly dumb”:



When I jump a queue or a red light, or throw that garbage on the sidewalk, I am taking a rational ‘squeal’ decision, since it seems to get me ahead of others or make life easier for me. Here I am privately smart. But then, as others are no less rational, intelligent and smart, they too start squealing for the same reasons, and before we know it, we have unruly traffic, filthy streets and stinking urinals. So collectively we are all worse off. And then we complain about a dirty country, a polluted city and appalling traffic. In short, publicly we emerge dumb. (P 42)



To show how whatever is in our achievement kitty fails to match up to the best in the world, glance this portion:



Impressive as the completion of the Konkan Railway or the Delhi Metro Railway have been, they pale in comparison to the Chinese projects, especially where implementation skills and political will are concerned. Consider the statistics. It took seven to ten years to complete the 760 km Konkan Railway. As for the Delhi Metro, between 1950 and 1990, some thirty feasibility studies were carried out by various bodies to evaluate an alternatice transportation system for Delhi. The final go-ahead came in 1990. Delhi Metro Rail Corp Ltd was established in 1995 and first phase of eleven kms was completed in 2004. The eighteen km Calcutta Metro took a good 24 years to complete, from 1971 to 1995.



China completed the final section of the pan-Himalaya Golmud-Lhasa railway - 1956 kms – at 5072 meters above the sea level. It had 550 km frozen belt, with snow alternately melting and freezing in summer and winter. Workers had to breathe bottled oxygen to cope up with high altitude (no single death due to this though). This stretch of 1142 kms was completed in a mere 4 years. (P13-14)



The best part of the book is the analysis. Dr. Raghunathan uses Game Theory and Behavioral Economics to analyze the situation. Though in the process, he ignores many factors. For example, he discarded the impact of colonization (by foreigners, for a thousand years) on our present behavior, in a one line sentence. Here, I didn’t agree with him. But seeing that history is not his area, and the tools taken up by him for analysis are powerful enough, I didn’t bother much. He explains the Prisoner’s Dilemma in the beginning and by the end he tries to reach a conclusion. Now I found that the Game Theory part could be applied to any case, not only to Indians or India. He worries that in a Prisoner’s dilemma situation, if everyone tries to take best rational decision benefitting oneself, in the end it harms all. So what was the way out? Now this was the most important part. I have typewritten a portion from his last chapters, though this is selective and not exhaustive enough:



Karmany evadhikaras te ma phalesu kadacana



Ma karma-phala-hetur bur ma te sango‘stv akarmani



(Bhagawat Gita, Chapter II, Verse 47)



Meaning: You have right only to the action and never to the fruit of the action. Fruit of action should not be your motivation, nor should you be driven by attachment to action.



For most of my youth and a little beyond, I always found these words innocuous and naïve. Taking this bit of verse as a random sample of what the Gita is all about, I thought I understood why we weren’t result-driven people. You see, innocence can lead to such quick generalizations.



Meanwhile, a good Samaritan presented me a copy of the Gita, which I did read now and then, though rarely pausing to contemplate seriously on its contents.



It was only when I started getting interested in game theory and immersed myself in it that the whole import of the Gita hit me like a truck.



In many ways, the Gita, in a quintessential form, lays down what one may call the absolute truth for most aspects of our lives, the dharma. To amplify this statement further: for years, my idea of right and wrong was largely intuitive. Yet somewhere deep down, I could never see any reasonable evidence to believe that there existed absolute truths outside physical sciences which one could ‘measure and prove’.



My argument was: If this is a world of ‘selfish genes’ and therefore selfish people, what makes it ‘wrong’ to shaft somebody, as long as you found it worth your while? Religions may proscribe shafting somebody, pronouncing such action as a sin. But the question is: ‘Why is it a sin?’ Who is to say that a wrong has happened, given that each individual is selfish and each one’s actions are supposed to be in the best interests of oneself? Similarly, the Gita might say that it is wrong to be driven by desires. But why is it wrong? Again, if I see a child begging for alms and risk reinforcing the system, or desist and risk the child going hungry? Which is the lesser evil?



For questions such as these and other social dilemmas, there don’t seem to be answers that are right or wrong. Or so I had believed for a long time. I was enlightened when I found game theory capable of answering many questions such as these unambiguously. But what really captured my imagination was that most answers which a game-theoric situation such as prisoner’s dilemma yielded were consistent with what Krishna had to say to Arjuna in the Bhagawat Gita! I discovered that modern game theory and associated experiments and games seem to validate what Krishna had placed before Arjuna in a nutshell. Clearly, it took thousands of years of management science to validate the Gita (even if unwittingly), much as presend day experiments on the outer reaches of space continue to validate Albert Einstein.



Consider our simple prisoner’s dilemma situation of Chapter 4. ……. If everyone followed the path of the karmayogi stipulated by the Gita, C-C is the only outcome and that leads to the “highest good”…..



That is why we must not ‘defect’; that is why those who do not follow the path of dharma ought to be punished; that is why it is one’s dharma to be provoked by the adharmi and retaliate, and yet show compassion and forgiveness in the conduct of one’s actions, just as the Tit for Tat strategy guides us.



This is what game theory tells us, and this is what the Gita tells us as well. It is just that Gita is simplified and made-easy or ready-to-serve version of actions that the game theory plods through to demonstrate. It is interesting that some sage, aeons ago, thought of the right courses of action for humanity at a large in a variety of situations that can stand the test of proof of present-day tools and techniques, including computer simulations.



My intention in writing this chapter was merely to share my own personal awakening to many aspects of the Gita. What is strange is that we should be witnessing so much of defect-defect behavior in the very land that gave us the Gita. Clearly, while the West, using its cumbersome vehicle of game theory, has covered a lot of ground in collective cooperative behavior, we seem to have made very little headway in that direction, notwithstanding our heritage of the Gita.



(P142-148)



This review won’t be complete if you missed the last two paragraphs in the above quoted text. And any review can’t be replacement for the ultimate joy of reading a book.



The book is not long, the language used is simple, the scientific inquiry (e.g. game theory) is not too complex to understand, and this book deserves to be read by one and all. I highly recommend it to all my readers.

Impact of Corruption on GDP Growth

A PTI report tells that Government of India has lowered its estimate of GDP growth, from around 9% to 8% now. Pranab Mukherjee says this is due to high oil prices and higher rates of interest done to curb inflation. “If oil prices continue to rise, it would be difficult to achieve higher GDP. GDP may come down to 8 per cent from [the projected] 9 per cent,” Mr. Mukherjee said.

But what no one is bothered about is how large scale corruption in government impacts GDP growth of a nation. I had given a thought on this before and I was certain that as corruption increases, GDP growth of the nation should come down. Also, more corrupt people sending money in Swiss and other foreign banks makes the situation worse too. Reviewing the way our current govt was managing the affairs and the highest than ever corruption cases and scandals coming out in the open, I thought this was going to cost us dear. But I didn’t have empirical data to prove my point. Now, thanks to the US researchers, I have something to fall back on. 

Mushfiq Swaleheen of Florida Gulf Coast University has done a research on exactly this topic of how corruption impacts GDP growth. His study is titled “Economic growth with endogenous corruption: an empirical study”. As such his major discovery was that “In deeply corrupt countries such as Congo, incidences of corrupt practices actually enhance economic growth, perhaps by helping companies sidestep onerous rules.” But that is only at the extreme. I understand India doesn’t fit into that set. But going one step ahead, his finding was really hitting for countries like India: 

“For a country with average endemic corruption, a one-standard-deviation increase in corrupt incidences depresses per-capita GDP growth by 0.12 percentage points.”

Now this is exactly what I used to say, and what logically followed too! And now we have the statistics too! No wonder when our GDP figures would come out next year, and if we see a major debacle, our government and economist ministers will blame it on inflation, higher rates, oil prices, etc, and no one will speak about corruption. But we the public, should understand and think it over. After all, this country doesn’t belong to a Sonia Gandhi or a Pranab Mukherjee alone – this country belongs to all of us! And all of us can make a difference by democratic means too! Awareness is the foundation of any democracy.

- Rahul

 

Impact of Corruption on GDP Growth

A PTI report tells that Government of India has lowered its estimate of GDP growth, from around 9% to 8% now. Pranab Mukherjee says this is due to high oil prices and higher rates of interest done to curb inflation. “If oil prices continue to rise, it would be difficult to achieve higher GDP. GDP may come down to 8 per cent from [the projected] 9 per cent,” Mr. Mukherjee said.

But what no one is bothered about is how large scale corruption in government impacts GDP growth of a nation. I had given a thought on this before and I was certain that as corruption increases, GDP growth of the nation should come down. Also, more corrupt people sending money in Swiss and other foreign banks makes the situation worse too. Reviewing the way our current govt was managing the affairs and the highest than ever corruption cases and scandals coming out in the open, I thought this was going to cost us dear. But I didn’t have empirical data to prove my point. Now, thanks to the US researchers, I have something to fall back on. 

Mushfiq Swaleheen of Florida Gulf Coast University has done a research on exactly this topic of how corruption impacts GDP growth. His study is titled “Economic growth with endogenous corruption: an empirical study”. As such his major discovery was that “In deeply corrupt countries such as Congo, incidences of corrupt practices actually enhance economic growth, perhaps by helping companies sidestep onerous rules.” But that is only at the extreme. I understand India doesn’t fit into that set. But going one step ahead, his finding was really hitting for countries like India: 

“For a country with average endemic corruption, a one-standard-deviation increase in corrupt incidences depresses per-capita GDP growth by 0.12 percentage points.”

Now this is exactly what I used to say, and what logically followed too! And now we have the statistics too! No wonder when our GDP figures would come out next year, and if we see a major debacle, our government and economist ministers will blame it on inflation, higher rates, oil prices, etc, and no one will speak about corruption. But we the public, should understand and think it over. After all, this country doesn’t belong to a Sonia Gandhi or a Pranab Mukherjee alone – this country belongs to all of us! And all of us can make a difference by democratic means too! Awareness is the foundation of any democracy.

- Rahul

 

Why Lakshmi and Ganesha are worshipped together?

A friend asked: “Why do we worship Goddess Lakshmi and Lord Ganesha together on a Diwali night?” Or for that matter, on any other day. I understood that in her opinion there was absolutely no reason why Goddess of wealth, Lakshmi couldn’t be worshipped alone as a single deity. She also wanted to know if Lakshmi and Ganesha were anyhow ‘related’. My explanation was as follows:

First of all we should understand that all different gods and goddesses in Hinduism are different aspects of the same God. Goddess Lakshmi is the Goddess of all wealth, money and richness. Lord Ganesha is considered God of wisdom, intelligence, success and prosperity. Ganesha is considered extremely intelligent: we remember the legend how when asked to make a round of this world, he just made a circle of his parents saying what he did was equivalent to what was asked; while his brother Kartikeya actually went and made rounds of the world and came back. (Btw, doesn’t this episode prove that people in ancient India knew that earth was round and if one starts from a point, one would reach the same place after one rotation?) Symbolism of Ganesha also proves how he represents wisdom. Ganesha is also considered remover of all obstacles on the righteous path, and hence he is worshipped at the beginning of any auspicious work like opening a new factory, entering a new house, or before starting on any great work. Now see his characteristics along with those of Goddess Lakshmi. What is wealth without prosperity? What is money without the wisdom to use it properly? Will all the material gains in the world be permanent without intelligence? Also, can anyone achieve any great affluence without removing the obstacles on the path? Qualities of Ganesha are so complementary, if I use the term, to those of Goddess Lakshmi, that our custom requires us to worship both of them together. This also reminds us that we don’t have to aim only for material wealth but also have to aim for prudence and wisdom.

Also, in Hinduism, there is no excessive focus on necessity of being poor to reach God. In Hinduism we aim for prosperity and wealth along with intelligence and wisdom – thus maintaining a very fine balance between both material and spiritual needs.

What a wonderful idea to worship Lakshmi and Ganesha together! Isn’t it so?

Note: Many times, Lakshmi, Ganesha and Saraswati (Goddess of learning) are worshipped together, again highlighting symbolically why Lakshmi (wealth) alone is not our aim. Also, in most images or sculptures, Lakshmi is placed on the right hand side of Ganesha, as in Hindus there is a custom that husband sits right of wife, and this particular gesture is to mark that there is no such relationship between the two deities. Often Lakshmi and Ganesh are worshipped by the merchant community and they mark the puja place with written words “Shubh-Laabh” (Prosperous Gain) – which again points out that we only aim for gain/profits which are prosperous and righteous.

- Rahul

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“Aapki Ladki…”

Within a month after weddings in India, some kind of feedback flows from sasural to mayake. These feedbacks can come as one-offs or can come regularly. Some in-laws follow this custom almost religiously with utmost sincerely. Not that the bride’s parents don’t know these facts about their own daughter, but the in-laws consider it their duty to let them know the minute details of her ‘performance’. Perhaps it is part of their relationship building! These feedbacks can be of a variety of types - constructive, sarcastic, funny, little, naïve, grave and what not. “The new bahu sleeps till 10 o’ clock in the morning.” “She forgot adding salt in sabji”, or “added salt in tea”. “She didn’t touch the feet of that Pappu ke chacha ki chachi”, “nor did she entertain Tinku ki bhanji ki baby”. These little gestures perhaps give a lot of revealment about her coming days and since the bahu is the future bearer of the vansh, each of her mistakes are analysed with a great detail. Of the only positive feedback for any bahu I know, that I remember, was this:

She was our tenant’s daughter. When she got married and spent 3-4 days at her in-law’s house in another town, once her husband’s grandfather saw her and called her near to him and asked with a smile, “Where is your home young lady?” Now what she should have replied? She could have told the name of the city where she lived; her father’s place. Or shown some education by mentioning India, or earth, or flaunted about all the cities she had lived in so far? But as soon as the question was asked, there came her reply: she mentioned the name of the city where her in-laws lived! The old man was so much impressed by her answer, that he made it a point to tell about her smartness to one and all. And then this positive feedback also flowed back to her parent’s place! They obviously shared it with all family and friends too.

A girl in India is burdened with the responsibility of maintaining two families – her parent’s as well as her in-laws’. She can’t run away from either of these. Of course such responsibility has got both advantages and disadvantages, but this is also one thing which makes women worthy of worship in the culture of the land. The trap is that there are so many expectations from her, that if she doesn’t cope up with any side, she loses the appreciation. But women in India also earn most of their abilities, qualities, strengths and appreciations by getting deep into the gamut of responsibilities… This small episode with the young bride tells a lot about the expectations from daughter-in-laws, our family structures, thinking and the way to go…

- Rahul

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The Exam: For Psychology Enthusiasts

During MBA, our communications teacher had shown us a movie called “12 Angry Men”. We were asked to observe and analyse the communication skills and patterns of all the major characters in the movie and later submit a report. It was a good learning and we enjoyed doing it. Some days back I watched a movie “The Exam”, which I found more interesting than the former. I think any student of psychology should not miss this one flick. The story rotates around a bunch of guys and girls, all from different ethnic backgrounds, left in a room to find answer for a question which apparently didn’t exist! They end up fighting, even attempting to kill each other! How the plot leads to that moment, and how different characters behave all through the movie, is clearly a delight to observe and explore…

So if you are interested in psychology, do try to find “The Exam”! You are sure to finish the movie with lots of foods for thoughts and many discoveries too…

- Rahul