Uncomfortable with oneself? Mobile is the answer

Mobile phones have become the de-facto "time killer" or "boredom killer." People might have to spend 30 seconds inside an elevator yet they will keep on fiddling with their mobile phones, not sure what they check. I guess most of the times its Facebook update, gmail, or sometimes office mails. But many simply keep their fingers on the buttons/phone, just for the sake of it, without actually performing any activity.

This could be a sign of over dependance on technology and an indication about being uncomfortable with oneself. Person who is comfortable with silence, peace, lack of activity, will rarely use mobile phones like many other do. Why can't one put the phone inside pocket and use it when there is a real need?

Consumerism drives most of these phenomenon that easy access to anything will multiply its consumption and usage. Therefore, had it not been for mobile may be the use of Facebook would have been reduced. But now, with internet access in mobile people can keep checking random stuff on the internet. Though people can live the life the way they want, but sometime it becomes amusing to see people just love-struck with their mobile devices. Not sure what long term implications, if any this may have.

If someone wants to reduce this dependance the change has to come from fundamentals. Just avoiding phone will not work. There needs to be a revamp of personality in terms of being comfortable with silence, peace, oneself, lack of activity, etc. In this world something or other will keep on happening, that should not mean that one should keep abreast of all these developments.

However, the change will come only when a person believes that his mobile consumption is becoming an addiction. The realization has to be from inside and not externally forced. Its not far to see mobile detox camps in the future in the line of drug rehabilitation centers. Social network addiction may go the same way.

Book Read - Vedanta Treatise by A Parthasarthy

The author A Parthasarthy is considered to be an authority in the subject of Vedas. I must say I had never heard his name but perhaps that may have been due to the fact that I had never done this kind of reading or attended any of his discourses. I am not sure he is an authority for the rich gullible junta desperate for an answer for their seemingly illusionary miseries stemming more out of boredom and nothing better to do syndrome than actual problems. Anyways I had attended a discourse on the Chapter no. 17 of the Sri Bhagwad Gita in Mumbai, India. Why I purchased the book? I believe that even if one is not inclined or interested in a topic or believe that certain books are against thought process and intellect one should still read them as knowing the other side of the argument is also very important to make a better argument.

So at the onset I must admit that I bought the book because the Swami brought in the concept of “reason” in his discourse on Gita. And as I keep writing in my blogs about the problems I have with people applying reason to those facets of life which are based on faith and belief, I thought this book may be something of an anti thought for me. Hence I bought it and finished it in a reasonable time as I was afraid I may lose the connection or may become bored.

The book turned out to be largely what I had thought. The importance of reason given in Vedanta does not hold most of the times as finally all reason based principles including the Vedanta imply that “when you are pursuing truth or God you cannot just go by reason you must make assumptions have some belief and take that leap of faith”. Therefore as the premise itself weakens the whole subject it becomes redundant to read the book. Still I read it and I must say apart from a few knowledge points about scriptures and some technicalities I did not really gained much.

It seems amusing that Vedantis call the world in which we breathe, we grow and develop experience as “illusionary” whereas the seemingly abstract concept of “Self” “Atman” “Brahman” is put across as the “Reality”. Moreover there is lot of condescension and preemption of argument. Therefore if a seemingly rich guy comes up to Vedantis and tell them that “Sir I am really happy in my life” they would comfortably reply “it’s an illusion that you are happy. You are not happy as you are not connected to your Self, your Atman”. Therefore it becomes a self winning argument that Vendatis would never accept anyone saying he is happy and would put that as an “illusion”.

Now whether people who are materially successful and happy are under illusion or Vedantis who believe in the concept of “Self, Atman, Brahman” are under illusion is difficult to state. However one thing is for sure that there are many more numbers of people who are rich and happy in the so called illusionary and ephemeral world than people who have realized “Self”. But then Vedantis also have a reason for this too. The miniscule number of people connected to their Self is testimony to the fact that how difficult it is to get aligned with the Self, the Atman the eternal Brahman.

So the underlying assumption is that people in this world are not happy, they are foolishly running behind material gains which do not give them anything but pathos and they are mesmerized by the illusion and hence are disconnected from their Self. One major issue I found with the book apart from the fact that it was Vedanta based, which means reason based faith is the fact that it used too many analogies to prove its point. It seems the Swami forgot a fundamental principle that we can disprove something by example but we cannot prove it.

Therefore if we say that if something is thrown up it would come down due to gravitation, we just need one thing which if thrown up does not come down to defy this law. However throwing up thousand of objects and their coming down does not prove that ALL the objects would do that. It would only demonstrate that unless an object which breaks this law is found this law holds good. We can never be sure of the fact that there is no object which does not follow this law.

But then I believe there is no point in finding out issues in the book if one does not believe in the underlying philosophy of the book. I was hoping the book to explain how Vedantis go about the concept of God, but then like the Plato doctrine, the Falsafa doctrine of Islam it also reverts to faith and belief.

Vedanta says not to apply things based on their purported merit, but analyze them yourself before applying. Then as expected it talks about the fact that religion has been merely reduced to mindless rituals and hence left the youth baffled. Reading the book you would realize that the target reader is the youth as it’s bemoaned time and again that how today’s youth is dejected with the ritualistic tendency of religion. The usual teaching which are pervasive in almost all religious literature were perhaps stated at the earliest in Vedas like look inside for happiness, do not run behind materialistic wealth, do not be jealous of people, love each one as if they are you etc.

Vedantis would always attempt to have an upper hand in this argument as I had earlier said that they would never accept anyone as happy in this “materialistic” world. Therefore they would conveniently ridicule people who do not believe in the concept of Self as “ignorant” without realizing that perhaps they are ignorant and have this illusion of “Brahman, Atman, Self” as Reality rather than taking the world which is there as the Reality.

But I indeed gained some browny points which I hope are genuine as I do not want to get a false knowledge of certain facts that we have in Vedanta. Like explanation of Om, explanation of God, three schools of thoughts explaining the relation between the God and the human being. Dwaita means God and Human are two and can never be one, a thought popularized by Manjucharya, Advaita which proclaims oneness of human and God, founded by Adi Sankracharya and Vashista Advaita which was founded by Ramanujacharya.

One more peculiarity I found in Vedanta (I hope this is true) is it’s over reliance on dreams. In a nutshell we can make a statement that had there been no dreams there perhaps would not have been Vedanta. The concept of illusion, the ephemeral nature of world etc are explained just because we dream. So Vedanta attempts to explain many dimensions of our lives based on its theory of Waker Dreamer and Deep Sleeper.

However a larger issue which is more philosophical appeared that Vedanta can actually be applied to be really happy and in a blissful state. Not because it has something amazing to offer but it makes the concept of “Self Atman and Brahman” so elevated that people can just delude themselves without doing much in their lives that they have found the Self which means their Godhood and hence now all is them and they are all. Therefore if someone is succeeding that delusion would make the “Self” getter believe that it’s him who has achieved the success and hence there would not be any jealousy or any attempt for the Self getter to improve his own life. As Self becomes everything pursuit of material things end and hence one can practically do not work.

However I must admit that people contributing to Vedanta would have been a bunch of smart guys. They realized this plausible loophole in their argument and hence said that do your action, your obligatory duties but with a sense of “detachment”. Now I would not get into this topic as it is abstract and may actually be an amazing topic in the Vedanta books but as the Swami was summarizing his own understanding in his book he could not have possibly done justice to the whole concept in a few pages.

Overall the book was not much of a value add though I believe it would appeal to its “young target audience” who is reasonably rich, has many materialistic pleasure at its disposal and hence perhaps has become bored of it. And it should appeal to foreigners as well, as most of them it appears are in awe of these kinds of English speaking Swamis and generally take anything from the “mysterious East” as something divine which can give them salvation.

One more scrap . Sufi

Just thought of putting down lines we keep on humming. So here they are .. Quite self explanatory.

"tasbi baati pher na baahu ee tasbi da ki karna hu, jedda saadde naal hisaab nahin karda oddey naal hisaab ke karna hu"

"in waison ne muft ka ilzaam liya tasbi ke he daanon se abas kaam liya, ye naam toh wo jo anginti le kya gin gin ke jo tera naam liya"

"padh padh aalam faazal hoiyan kadi apne aap noo padya nahin, jaa jaa chad da mandarwa seedi kabhi dil apne tu vadya nahin, bulle shah aasmaani ud-deya fadna hei jedda ghar/man which baitha onnu fadya nahin"

"padh padh ilm kitaaban da te naam rakhaayo kaazi, makke gaye te haj kar aaye naam rakhaayo haaji phad shamsheer mujaahidan waali te naam rakhaayo Ghazi Ghulam Farid onu kuch nai kitta jina yaar na kitta raazi"

Reason and Belief …the argument continues

It’s a coincidence that I get to write sequel of a blog so early. In fact I have never written any sequel to any of my entries but could not resist myself writing this one. I had earlier written the blog on reason and belief and coincidentally I attended a discourse on 17^th Chapter of Sri Bhagwad Gita by the well renowned speaker Swami Parthasarthy in Mumbai.

The discourse was nothing much to write about as most of the tenets are quite general and if you are someone who believes in the google punchline of “do no evil” you would not find much content in these discourses. Like in Sufi teachings finally most of the tenets boil down to “look within for happiness, help people, spread happiness, pursuit knowledge etc” and this discourse was nothing much different.

However what struck me in the discourse was an inherent superiority assigned to reason over belief. The Swami talked about blind faith, being tamasik (lethargic), ridiculed vastushastra (not that I am any fan of it), had condescending attitude towards people wearing sacred threads around etc. I believe as he is from the “Vedanta” school of thoughts he has an inherent propensity towards reason. Problem is that people do not realize their trust on reason also come from a belief on reason. The dictum that reason is supreme impacts the lives of Vedantis and hence its obvious that they give it more value. However paradoxically not realizing that there is an inherent dichotomy that there is no reason why they should consider reason to be supreme. Apart from the fact which I had earlier pointed out in my blog that what we understand we appreciate. Reason we understand, so basically what our limited cerebral competence gives us as understandable we take it as reason and things beyond that we do not comprehend. However that does not make those things inferior or worthy of ridicule.

The problem is when we start ridiculing belief of someone as “childish” and have a sarcastic and condescending attitude towards it. I am unable to understand why it is difficult for the Swami to understand that the behavior he is considering childish has belief system of other person behind it. And it becomes all the more difficult to fathom that a person of his caliber, so much learned and giving discourse on how perspective change when we see things from the top and from higher cerebral and philosophical standing, cannot rise above prejudice of seeing this so called “childish” behavior from a colored perspective of blind belief or superstition.

It was very difficult for me to understand that how come learned people like him (and the others) fail to recognize that their faith can be termed as blind and ridiculed equally by the same people whose faith they are disparaging. So when he ridicules other when they follow vastushastra or say tie many sacred red threads around their wrist, the Swami forgets that his faith or belief (which they say is reason driven) of say getting up at 4am as the guna “satva” is very active and should be leveraged to connect to a higher being, can also be ridiculed. In those scenarios people like Swami would again bemoan the ignorance prevalent in the masses which are ridiculing their “scripture driven” lifestyle. Point is any belief can be ridiculed equally and supremacy of one over another cannot be demonstrated by force unless someone following a belief wants to learn more and then rectify those things in his life which he believes are not in synch. But till then should his belief be considered downtrodden and not worthy? It’s a tough one to answer. Finally it boils down to one’s own choice. Like Krishna after 18 chapters of Gita still tells Arjun, this is what it is “now do what you want to do”.

What do we mean by blind belief? I am not sure but it seems that people think blind belief is something not backed by a “reason” or something which appears stupid to a third person. Moreover this argument makes me most uncomfortable as it gives precedence to reason over everything. And this argument wants to analyze everything from the perspective of reason, a perspective I do not subscribe. The argument is whether it’s the problem of the person being considered as “superstitious, blind faith holder” or the person who are thinking him as “superstitious and blind faith holder”. Reading stories about Sufis like Bulle Shah you could realize how badly people of those times treated him and how in the coming generation he was considered a Sufi saint. Therefore reasoning is just a cerebral level of thinking and it may fall short for many people. What Bulle Shah could think his peers thought to be “stupid and crazy”. But once the generations following understood what Bulle Shah was speaking he was deified.

So if a person thinks that changing the position of a table in his home (vastu shastra) would bring him good luck, why can’t the so called intellectuals and apologists of logic consider this to be a reason (if that pleases them). I come from a school of thought that we should not assign superiority to any one of them. We should not analyze belief from the perspective of reason and should not dissect reason using belief.

The Swami also talked about how come people do not understand the real reason of doing a yagna (hawan) or prayer and just do it as a ritual. He also talked about a bank Chairman praying for 3 hours daily and then while in office making the lives of his reportees hell. I failed to understand whats the connect here? It seems the Swami wanted to convey that prayers should be used to seek knowledge, to think good of people etc. But then in his office the person is doing his work (in line with the Bhagwad Gita) and this argument of bank Chairman defies the fact that Gita tells us to do what is our work without thinking about its repercussions.

He also talked about people doing hawan but not imbibing its spirit of doing good to others and living in peace. Though I do understand its better to imbibe the real spirit behind a ritual but then doing the ritual in itself may give peace to people doing it. Hence they may not feel any need to imbibe hawan in its true spirit. Problem is when the Swami thinks that imbibing is the best thing to do and just doing hawan does not suffice. I understand after reading so much scriptures and being so knowledgeable people would like to share their perceived wisdom. However what I am uncomfortable with is when these people tend to ridicule those people who are not performing rituals the way they want. However if someone is an authority of a subject then he must intervene if he finds that the subject is not being followed the way it is.

I also had similar feelings towards people who used to call them Ghazal lovers and used to consider Ghulam Ali or Jagjit Singh as the Ghazal singers to follow. I used to ridicule them or had a condescending attitude towards them but then I relinquished that thought. I used to never touch feet of elderly people under the pretence and stupid argument of “unless it comes from within its not respect”. But then I realized I may not be really respecting those elders but then if they feel good when I prostrate before them or touch their feet while greeting them what prevents me from doing that. Why can’t I do this if that makes them feel good? Therefore we can and should do those things which make others happy (as long as it does not violate our sense of self respect and value system).

That is where I think “to each his own” thought comes into picture. What people think and what makes them happy which could be termed as “ignorance, blissful negligence” etc by the esoteric elite, should be done. Though I am a staunch supporter of being good to people and performing more acts of goodness than plain rituals, I do not force my arguments on others and would consider people also not forcing their belief/reason system on others worth appreciating. Moreover knowledge seeker should be humble and should have communion with the God. I found these to be lacking in the Swami.

Reason and Belief

“What’s the reason for this”? This is perhaps one of the most repeated and often heard questions in the modern world. However when we make this inquiry we forget that the acceptability of the answer for this question depends on the listener’s maturity, thinking level and his perception about the other person. Some listeners may take the answer as reason some may take that as an excuse or fanciful story.

The moot point is that reason in itself is self limiting as it depends on the cognitive and mental abilities of the listener as well as the belief of the listener in that reason. That belief may be driven by the past record of the other person, what kind of impression that person has on others, how serious and committed is he etc. In fact people who are reasonable and believe in reason a lot, also understand its shortcomings especially in those matters where belief and human emotions are involved.

A whole lot of philosophical thoughts be it Falsafa of Islam or the Plato doctrine are based on reason yet they do not generally eulogize its supremacy as they are aware of its shortcomings. Taking the argument ahead we can always ask the reason brigade that if they believe reason is indeed supreme what is the reason for that? So what’s the reason to believe that reason is supreme?

One could be that we can understand reason, well most of the times! Therefore just because we can grasp what is being reasoned which essentially means something which can get into our head is given supremacy over belief which perhaps does not have any “reason” to be followed. Which also means we are hiding our shortcomings of understanding an argument (reason based or belief based) because our mind lacks that grasping ability. One reason may be acceptable to one listener but may not be to another.

So just because we understand something as it emanates from a reason based argument, does that mean something which is belief based becomes peripheral and less important? May be something which is belief as we see, could be an extreme reason for someone else. I think the people who give too much importance to reason forget that belief can itself be a reason (if it pleases them that way). So when someone says “I think when a cat cuts my way it’s inopportune for me” people would term it as superstition. But why can’t we say that as the person believes that cat cutting his way would bring bad luck for him, this belief of the person is a “reason” in itself? We forget that particularity of the reason is also very important. What we term as superstition in case of the cat we forget that for that individual believing cat cutting his way brings bad luck, is a reason. It may not be universally applicable but that does not dilute its importance for that person concerned.

May be because his “reason” of cat cutting his way bringing bad luck is not applicable universally though a “reason” as we know it, generally has universal application. But here we need to differentiate between scientific reason and a generic reason. Therefore when a ball is thrown up it would come down due to gravitational force that is a scientific reason. However a “reason” about how come twins going to same school, living in same locality, having same friend circle turn out to be poles apart is not universal, yet it could not be termed as superstition. Though the apologists of reason would keep on trying giving false research and fanciful retrospective distortion to force fit some data and come out with some reason based argument even for the twins problem.

We would do all kind of scientific studies to prove that placebos work. Placebos are nothing but fake medicines which just make the patient believe that these medicines would cure him. Now without scientific studies this is as good as a so called “superstition” of cat crossing the way bringing bad luck. However now when studies are done which implies “reasons” are given for this placebo effect linking it with some biological process, ability of mind to conceive placebo bringing positive effect etc, the normal reader would understand placebo’s importance. Placebos work in those circumstances where the body can still develop immunity towards a disease and therefore its universality is doubtful. However as no scientific study can be done when cat crosses our way (as the impact is highly individual specific) it is termed as “superstition”.

Therefore again we are hiding and camouflaging shortcomings or grasping ability of our brain in understanding something which is beyond normal comprehension as superstitious or ridiculous.
If someone says “I do not watch this program on TV as I believe this brings me bad luck”. Isn’t this belief reason enough? Just because we believe there is no “reason” for the person to believe that the TV program indeed brings him bad luck we rebuff him as superstitious or term him a fool who believes in these “unreasonable” thoughts. In these extremely politically correct times we tend to support arguments which are mass based which generally implies so called reason based as masses can understand reason (which is nothing but shortcoming of their mind). So if we are not understanding belief system of someone we should accuse the inability of our mind and should not ridicule the person. This would also bring humbleness to our perspective.

I am not supporting any argument on superstition not because I believe in them, but I believe there is nothing what we can or should term as superstition. Superstition of one is belief of other, belief of one is reason for other and reason for other could be superstition for someone else.
Therefore we should be kind of ashamed that we have invented terms to hide the incompetence of our mind in validating those things which are beyond comprehension. Hence if there is an argument which is outside human thought, that is termed as belief (generally unfounded belief) or superstition. The problem lies with understanding of a person and not necessarily the belief system of someone else.

Many of the people who take pride in their reason based attitude do not see a dichotomy between them believing in the God as well as believing in reason. Taking extreme reason would negate the existence of God, but these people overlook this argument most of the times. Even if they believe in God, they would laugh at so called superstition of other people without seeing the argument that their belief in God could be a superstition or an “unreasonable thought” for an atheist. Even for an atheist what’s the reason for not believing in God, it’s nothing but his belief of God’s non existence. Then he would please himself of his atheism by inventing reasons to justify his disinclination towards the God. So it becomes a circular argument where sometimes reason gives rise to belief (like a very good hospital can be believed to provide best services) or a belief can give rise to reason (I believe in cat crossing my way to be a harbinger of misfortune and hence that is the reason for it as well).

The apologists of new thinking would condemn this line of argument saying it promotes superstition and disbelieve in scientific argument. However the purpose of this line of argument is not to promote superstition (as earlier said that I do not believe there is anything called superstition) or destroy belief on scientific truth, the purpose is to communicate that reason is limiting and there are things beyond human comprehension which are belief driven and if the proponents of reason want to find a reason for this belief, then the belief in itself is a reason.

Natural evolution of culture ..or is it?

In the long list of the problems associated with free speech, one is when to reverse the direction of support? And this is not only with freedom of speech but with any other kind of support we give to any cause. Most of the times as long as these so called democratic ideas suit us we are supporting them and one day we realize something wrong is going on however it becomes too late to change anything then.

For example when vulgarity entered reality TV the pseudo intellectuals and like minded buffoons gave “there is a demand there is a supply” kind of ridiculous arguments. Then when Jane Goody’s death was supposed to be telecasted live, the same guys had cold feet and clamored that it’s gross and disgusting. Now being a human being we are bound to support those ideas we believe in and oppose those which we do not. However things are never that easy as once you take a position it becomes a trap of escalating commitment. So if a lip locking couple is manhandled by some people the “educated class” like us, come forward bemoaning the “cultural and moral policing”.

Now as culture and moral are not written down anywhere and evolve based on the social needs, it’s very easy to play with them. However in this argument of natural cultural evolution (or may be decadence) we forget that a particular custom or subtlety or cultural aspect in a society evolved because when it was evolving it was not opposed.

A profound example is the development of religious beliefs across the globe in Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Buddhism etc. We would find how much important the inherent belief of the King of those times played in evolution or destruction of some ideas in these religions in a given region. Therefore these Kings intervened when certain sects like say Sufism in Islam or Methodist in Christianity or Hadism in Judaism were evolving and suppressed these ideas and they never caught public imagination in the way they might have had, had the King not intervened.

The argument above is to make a case that saying culture evolves naturally and in itself, is not entirely correct. You would see kissing couples at Bandra Banstand in Mumbai (India), Carter Road in Mumbai and many other places and it has been broadly accepted. However if these couples start kissing in trains what are the co-passengers supposed to do? Should they keep silent or report the matter to law? If they do nothing then next time the couple may be having sex in the local train and then what would you do? You never intervened when they were kissing near Bandstand and it got accepted as “Mumbai Culture” and now what, when they are kissing in the train? Again if there is no intervention it would become “Mumbai Culture”. Arguing whether any kind of culture is good or bad is not the issue here. Issue is development of a so called culture more often than not is dependant on inaction of the general public.

Now if you are traveling in a train and do not approve of this kissing and public display of affection would you take the trouble in reporting this to police or taking matter in your hand? 99% of people would simply move on to their work as they have other things to look after. And this tacit acceptance is taken as “public acceptance” and no one attempts to understand that it is due to “compliance or acquiesce by force or apathy” and not by choice. In these circumstances if some other organization takes matter in its hand and handles the matter well without violence should that be condemned?

Tomorrow if you do not believe in some idea then you would want the same organizations to take matter in their hands as yourself cannot take protest to the intended people. When a 13 year old boy became father in UK, UK media and people were shocked out of their consciousness. However they have to blame themselves as when moral decay was creeping into their society they chose to remain silent under the garb of “new age evolution”. But where do we draw a line between evolution and a complete lack of any sense of right or wrong? Now the argument could be “what is right and what is wrong”?

Problem comes when we tend to answer these questions of right and wrong and quibble around the niceties of a civilized argument rather than doing anything. I am sure many so called moral policing instances would have had significant mass support, may be tacitly. A typical example would be development of authoritarian regimes. As long as the dictator is doing things which we approve of his approval rating sour, but then one day the tide turns.

So how to decide which social development needs to be opposed at mass level? The foremost question is who should decide what to oppose and what not? One thing for sure is the law and the Government. If these agencies believe in opposing or supporting something that idea generally develops or is nipped the way these agencies want. But the question is what about the idea of general public? How should the general public, say one person convey his or her acceptance or rejection of an idea.

Being a democracy ideal condition would be those ideas should prevail which have acceptance (tacit or explicit) of the larger pubic. But the issue is the one stated above that general public hardly cares for any idea apart from perhaps something which is developing in their immediate vicinity.

So how to generate a broader consensus over certain issue which is really important. Now there are certain issues which are of national importance (like say reservation, nuclear deal etc) which are generally raised and resolved in the parliament. However the problem is with those issues which are very local in nature or those issues which are indeed national but perhaps could not be taken in the parliament unless a critical mass of support is there (for example opposing vulgarity on reality TV like Shweta Tiwari bathing almost naked in some Sony TV’s reality show).

In these cases how a single individual register his opinion to those social institutions which matter. May be first of all that person should have that kind of illuminated drive which forces her out of the slumber so that she can act. So feeling reprehensive about a development is one thing but getting a drive to register a formal legal protest (say by a PIL etc) is an altogether different issue. This kind of activism needs serious drive and is different than drawing room criticism of some television program.

Right Decision, the illusion continues ….

The title of this blog does not represent the broad nature of what has been written here. Primarily it’s a diatribe which many other people have already done, numerous times earlier. The article is basically about demonstrating the talent of human beings in displaying wisdom in hindsight. Therefore when we say it was a good decision or it was a bad decision we do not realize that there is nothing called good or bad decision. It’s just that the given situation and circumstances of a person makes him feel that if he had taken some other decision earlier, he would have been possibly in a different state. Therefore it’s more of a speculation rather than certainty about the present condition if some other decision was taken in the past. Hence if someone is happy he would think “if I had taken some other decision I might have been unhappy now and hence would have repented that decision”. At the same time if someone is unhappy about the current state of affairs he would have thought “if I had taken other decision I would have been better off”. However whether these persons would have been better off or worse off in current situation if they had taken a different decision in past is a matter of speculation. The good thing about history is we can write anything about it as it cannot come back to defend itself. Therefore we may go on saying anything about any decision as it would never come telling us “had you done this you would have been better”. It’s all delusion which inebriates us and we assume that we would have had different current situation than what is actually present.

However extending this logic may be dangerous as people may take this explanation as an excuse of not doing any due diligence or ignoring some hard facts available to them while making a decision. At the same time it does not mean that current negative hard facts about something definitely imply bad future for it or current good facts necessarily imply good future. Hence things become unexplainable and to a large degree random and imprecise. However we should not abuse this argument and start doing things which are seen as absurd from current perspective under the premise that as future is unknown no one can foretell the future outcome of whatever actions/decisions we are taking right now. Therefore it may become good excuse for incompetence and complacency. It could also derail and put in danger the “planning” and “strategy” development.

However thinking from a broad perspective if we take this argument of “unknowability” of future before hand then the predominant work of top management in an organization (which is primarily fuzzy strategy based) would appear to be of no consequence and hence the top management would lose the importance it generally has in an organization. Therefore the larger question is can this argument be inflated to make top management irrelevant? I think it may not. This is due to the reason that the final success or failure of a decision is different than the actual decision. The success or failure depends on execution, external factors and lots of unknown and random factors. For example a financial product distribution house may decide to open a branch in Gujarat, but whether that branch does well or not is a different issue. At the same time for that branch to do well or not, it has to exist and hence the decision of opening has to be taken. Therefore that decision of opening the branch is actually different than its success or failure which is determined by various factors. Though this explanation can also be abused as any decision can be taken (either by taking current facts into account or just going by plane hunch) and then when the intended outcome is not achieved, “execution” could always be blamed (though most of time execution is the real culprit but separating execution with the decision which has to be executed is almost impossible. On hindsight execution can always be blamed). We confuse the decision with the outcome and that is where the problem begins. However as I have said earlier it may be improper to extend this argument to a level where people can use that for hiding their incompetence or making stupid decisions (decisions which appear stupid from current perspective, as future perspective is unknown). Therefore perhaps what Keynes had said “When I see facts I change my opinion, what do you do Sir?” makes a lot of sense in these scenarios where the management may have some hard facts in front of it which it cannot simply ignore. Though in the future when the decision of the management would be analyzed about whether the actions/decisions taken were “good” or “bad” (which I have earlier argued is indeed misplaced), the analyzer would at least give benefit of doubt to the management that it actually took care of the hard facts presented at that point of time. That does not anyway means that these hard facts are relevant to the future state of the company (which cannot be seen as of now). However they are important from the perspective of not ignoring hard facts and hence not doing things in unplanned and casual way.

This again brings us back to the same argument that how could we right now tell that if we do something casually, without planning or we do something with lots of planning and care, taking all facts into account, which route to the future would be better. Perhaps it’s just the human psychology to please itself that it took care of the hard facts and took a decision based on “serious deliberations, discussions and analysis”. Our mind does not pardon us for doing things in haphazard manner without any planning, though the outcome of these haphazard actions could be better as compared to the planned actions (better when we evaluate the future in hindsight as currently the future condition is unknown). May be taking a planned, fact based, analysis based decision prevents us from getting scathed by attacks if something go wrong in future due to our decision (again this is impossible to know whether what so called wrong had happened is actually due to our actions or due to a complex maze of interconnected events which may have been irrelevant or vague while we were making that decision).

Therefore like many arguments this also falls under the realms of human psyche. Its our inherent and natural appetite to please ourselves of our “decision taking abilities” using tons of data (which may be irrelevant), analysis etc which has ingrained so much over the years that it comes naturally to us and we have started believing that these analysis actually matter (they may or may not).

However sometimes from the current situation and hard facts some forecasting may be done for future which may actually come true. Now it would depend on which camp you are to believe whether the future which turned out to be the way it was forecasted was actually due to the planning and decisions taken earlier or you believe that many uncorrelated, undefined and nebulous factors interacted with each other to create a future which somehow matched the one which was forecasted. Therefore there is never one camp which would win in the scenario where future events or data actually turns out to be similar to what had been forecasted. However human tendency would generally rate higher that camp which would claim that it had forecasted the future and it actually turned out to be what they had projected.

Deferred Tax Conundrum

My understanding of Deferred Taxes after reading literature and annual reports

“We would see an entry “Provision for Taxes” in almost all the P&L account of companies. This heading would generally have Subheads like “Current Taxes”, “Fringe Benefit Taxes”, “Wealth Taxes”, “Deferred Taxes (Either Asset or Liability). Now this either Asset or Liability is confusing and let me explain what I understand. While calculating the profit after tax, we REDUCE ALL these provisions from the “Income BEFORE taxes/Profit (Loss) BEFORE taxes. Now if an entry is a Deferred Tax ASSET, then it should INCREASE the profit after tax. Which is another way of saying that it should INCREASE the profit(loss)/income BEFORE tax as well. Therefore as we are REDUCING these provisions, for this Deferred Entry to INCREASE PAT and hence be termed as a Deferred Tax ASSET it should have a NEGATIVE sign in front of it so that when it is REDUCED from PBT it in a way gets ADDED to the PBT and hence increase PAT. Let me explain it using some numbers.

See here that the Deferred Tax has a NEGATIVE value (-9005000), therefore when ALL the provisions are REDUCED/SUBTRACTED from PBT (259,092,856) to derive PAT, the Deferred Tax being NEGATIVE gets ADDED to PBT and hence it INCREASES the value of PAT. Therefore the REDUCTION process of Provision effectively becomes

259092856 – 66195845 – 4887171 – (-9005000) , which is same as

259092856 – 66195845 – 4887171 + 9005000 = 197014840.

Therefore as the Deferred Tax value gets ADDED to the PBT (in a way) we conclude it’s a Deferred Tax ASSET. Or vice versa, if we see a P&L entry of Taxation Provision having a NEGATIVE value for Deferred Tax Entry (without saying whether its an ASSET or a LIABILITY) we can say that as the Deferred Tax value given has a NEGATIVE sign, its an ASSET and NOT a LIABILITY.

Had the Deferred Tax value being 9005000 (and not -9005000) we would have calculated the PAT as

259092856 – 66195845 – 4887171 – 9005000 = 179,004,840 (less than 197014840)

In this case the Deferred Tax value (9005000) is REDUCED from PBT and the final PAT value comes out to be 179,004,840, which is less than the PAT value we found when the Deferred Tax value was -9005000. Therefore we would have called that 9005000 value as a Deferred Tax LIABILITY, as it reduced our PAT.

the marketing jugglery

I generally refrain from commenting on any marketing hype or horrible media in our country because I believe; in the end they are doing their business and have to earn money to survive. A marketer’s critical work is to hype out self made trends and then make people believe that something like that is really happening. But then that is their job and I think what they are doing is not unethical either. No problems from my side.

Two advertisements off late have attracted whatever little attention span I have for them. One of Nivea promoting the whitening cream for boys and other Parachute advt in which the new chick on the block Deepika Padukone talks about doing “Champi”.

The advt are so contrasting in the message they want to deliver and the concept they are relying on. Nivea brand is associated with men’s product. Now to get into the facial products it’s trying to expand by conveying a message which goes against the general perception of a handsome man “Tall and Dark”. Dark color was ingrained in men’s handsomeness, but now to increase the market and make more money Nivea decided to turn the logic head on. Well we can always argue that this “Tall Dark and Handsome” was arbitrary and has nothing to do with handsomeness of a man and Nivea is an innovator when it challenges the unproven hypothesis.

And if you happen to ask Nivea guys about this advt which is against the accepted notions they would say with a straight face “Oh we found many men using women’s creams. Therefore we thought we have a market to serve”. This is what I was talking about when I said that marketing would make people believe that they are launching the product because a demand exists. This is because marketing led demand inducement is still not taken very well by the people.

I am not saying that demand for men’s cream does not exist. What I am trying to convey is that the demand would be minuscule and hence Nivea has to increase it manifold by advertisements and all sorts of gimmicks. By this it would be successful in inducing foolish consumers in trying a product which they would not really need.

In the parachute advt Deepika is trying to get a forgotten concept “Champi”, a concept which is not considered to be “cool” back to the mainstream. And why is she doing that, because Parachute finds itself to be a brand which is associated with the older generation. Therefore to get back into the grooves it’s trying to get an so called old fashioned concept to core. In another advt she would be promoting a “chip chip” less oil and may be advising not to use oil at all.

I am sure the consumers will buy both the arguments. That reminds me of a few notes I had written in the Kotler’s marketing book when I was doing my post graduation in management. Those notes were “if the people are so gullible and idiots to buy these preposterous marketing arguments, then they deserve to get fooled by these advertisements”.

Therefore whereas Nivea wants to break preconceived notions and is going against the accepted principles, Parachute is trying to bring back a concept which was omnipresent earlier but has been forgotten off late. I am also confident that these products like that of Nivea have a short life span and would go off shelf soon. The consumer finally is not that fool, apart from those who have excessive money to throw away. They may have tremendous growth phase earlier but their longer growth rate is susceptible.

Being a management graduate myself I however must congratulate the marketing campaign of both the products as they would be successful in inducing demand for their product where none may have existed.

Perspectives, Context and Benchmarks

Perspectives, Context and Benchmarks

Wanted to write about this topic for long. These three words may appear to be disconnected, however I believe they have quite a bit in common. Whenever we appreciate something or dislike something there is an unsaid benchmark we tend to compare it with. For example if someone says Jagjit Singh is a good ghazal singer he would be benchmarking him against Indian awful singers like Pankaj Udhas. However when we see Mehdi Saheb, then we realize where does Jagjit Singh and singers like Ghulam Ali stand. However this is my perspective. From someone else’ perspective I am sure they would have different reasons to give for liking or disliking Jagjit Singh, or say any food or any culture etc.

Whenever we read a book we tend to agree with it provided the author writes something which is in consonance with our predisposition towards the idea presented in the book. It appears enticing but is very tough to judge or read a book without any biases. We all are prisoners of our prejudices and biases which have impacted our upbringing and social context.

When we tend to compare two things we tend to forget the difference in context we are talking about. This mistake is most common in courses on leadership in management institutes. The students are asked to compare two leaders without giving a thought that comparing across time periods, across different socio-economic and geographical settings is impossible. However management minds are trained to perform comparison even when it has only academic value (if at all).

From Indian’s perspective Bhagat Singh was a hero but from British perspective he was a state criminal. From our perspective so called Mujahidin’s in Kashmir are terrorists but from their perspective they are messenger of God and fighting a holy war. Therefore finally most of the debate boils down to who holds the upper hand. For example saying that Greek was the older civilization which worked consciously towards making a nation and state is flawed as history belongs to the victorious and the arguments are preserved which are heavily biased towards something more popular.

We must never forget which context we are talking about. If we understand the context most of the futile debates which we see in our society won’t even exist. However most of the times the deeper we get into something be it music, management, literature etc we tend to become closer to philosophy. Perhaps that’s why philosophy is the ultimate form of human emancipation and learning. Most of the big authors talking about business strategy or some other mantra tend to give too much of philosophy in their books which appear to be ridiculous to the readers. From the reader’s perspective this philosophical thought is not tangible and hence it is not valued. However once these readers themselves have sufficient reading behind them they also tend to become philosophical.

Questions which appear inane once like “What do you want to do with your life” “What does happiness means” etc become the most important questions to address. That may be a reason why we see so many billionaires starting some social initiatives or some fund helping cause of the poor. For them that seems to be giving back to society and going nearer to the unseen power which is known as the God Almighty.

The problem arises when people tend to pass value judgments on others without fully understanding the contexts and the perspectives. That’s why so much of social tension is caused.

When we see poor homeless people we want to help, but when it appears that the person on the street is “happy” what should we do and how should we do? But the bigger question would be should we do something. We can see (again through our perspective) that the person is not living in a condition which is apt for a human life. But then we say that from our benchmarks. If his family is not getting three meals, or is not getting decent income or not getting medical attention we tend to analyze it based on our own benchmarks and standards. May be if these people had written the constitution they may not have made “right to food” as the fundamental right because from their perspective “regular food” is a luxury and cannot be a right per se.

This issues has always intrigued me and I have hopelessly tried to answer it. When we say “Every child should be a child and should be taken care of etc etc” what do we actually mean? And who gave us the so called “educated class” to jargonize and presume so many things that whatever we are thinking is indeed correct. I believe the answer would be that someone has to take the initiatives. If no initiatives or nothing new was said or done the humanity would still be living in the cages. However was living in cages a worse option than what we have today? The problem in answering these arguments would be that we would answer them based on our current benchmarks. We could say “see we would not have been able to talk to many people apart from close clan (under the influence of communication technology these days”, we would have said “we would have felt so much of heat, would have been eating uncooked food etc (under the benchmarks of eating cooked food these days, having AC etc.”) .

The fundamental issue is that all these answers are made from current benchmarks and hence can never be used to answer those days when these things never existed. Was the world a worse place before car, mobile, computer etc came?

Expanding music boundaries, Nusrat, Purist and the Dilemma

I was watching one video of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan singing in his usual unique and captivating style but could not resist seeing the shabby stage and facilities he was singing in. There were those cheap decorations on the wall, bad acoustics and sound systems. I had heard this debate where people say that Nusrat has made such a class of Sufi music "cheap". This kind of music was supposed to be for those people who really like, understand and admire it. It was not made to be heard in a paan or barber shop (figuratively speaking). However Nusrat (like Jagjit Singh in India for Ghazals) popularized the Sufi music to masses. This quest lead him towards west where the people would not understand what he was singing but based on the way it was sung, the clapping of chorus, the ragas, the rustic harmonium, tabla etc made them dance on this music. This gave Nusrat world wide recognition as well as money. Now he could sing in the Wembleys or Royal Concert Hall. However this also impacted in dilution of the following of real music appreciators of Sufi music. Sufi music became a fad which everybody wants to "do" now. However had Nusrat not expanded his musical boundaries he would have met the same fate like many other slatwarts who died penurious death due to want of money. At the same time this expansion introduced the West to a large degree about a different kind of music which surpasses any kind of music (apart from Mehdi Hasan's Ghazal singing). Therefore in a way it was a good initiative in terms of financial and recognition sense. Nusrat would have been singing in the same shabby PTV shows or those pathetic gatherings of rich people from from Lahore. Hence I believe once some phenomenon or concept expands beyond its natural habitat its bound to get diluted in terms of its quality, following, target segment etc. However this expansion may invariably be needed if that phenonmenon has to surpass the boundation of time.

Why english movies have this?

Despite the fact that however good or bad an English movie is, there appears to be common scene in all of them for particular scenarios. If there are two police or investigating agencies they would always be in the loggerheads. FBI would be screwing around LAPD or NYPD etc and would treat them condescendingly. If there is FBI and some other country's police (like Rush Hour 2) then also FBI would treat them badly and would always say "get the hell out of our way".

And when there is a bomb scare or some other scare why always they have to cry their heart out "out out, now" or "everybody clear the room right now" "go go go". Its so irritating to see these scenes in almost every second English movie. And then they would speak strange English "There would be no quite room no more" rather than "There would not be quite room anymore". I mean does not two no would make one yes? If we say "I would not do no more" does not this essentially means I would actually do more? May be these are cultural subtleties and how the English is spoken. Anyways Americans have this illusion and desperation of showing "American English" which in any case is no language, to be different than British English. Be the word called honour written as honor or colour written as color. Anyways none of my business.

Why one festival is more sexy than other?

I was seeing a movie named "Jhankar Beats". The movie was pretty decent and "young". However I saw they showed one girl (hindu) going to Church every Sunday. Now I am not against going Church or Mosque but it appears Church is a more glamorous place to speak about and show in a movie than say a Temple for a young lady. At the same time when the movie makers have to show a "traditional" heroine they would show her going to the Temple.

Is their a glamorization of certain religious principles? I could see students in colleges going out to buy cakes during Xmas, though none of them would be a Christian. I am not saying that celebrating XMas by Hindu is wrong, the point is why only Xmas and not Eid, which falls few days before Xmas. Again I believe the answer is Xmas is a more glamorous festival than Eid.

So what are we celebrating the festival for? To really celebrate it or just to be the part of this bottom less pit of enjoyment. How come certain festivals or days (like Valentine etc) became more "sexy" than some other days. I think the inherent inclination towards "having fun" and getting out of the usual drag of life is one factor and the marketers have also done a commendable work making money out of these festivals.

Every now and then we would have some days to boost sales of mall stores be it cards, apparels, food items etc. As human beings always are fun seeking its very easy to delude them and induce them into something which they may not at all want. This is one critical job of marketing. It may be termed as unethical however there is nothing really unethical about this practice. Thats the job of a marketer, to induce people, create demand and then fulfill it.

One more angle to these festivities is that how come Christian festival became bigger than a Muslim festival in terms of celebration by common people. Even I bought a cake last time to be cut in my room with few of my friends. What makes one festival more sexy and appealing over the others to a majority Hindu public despite the fact that both festivals belong to minority community. If at all we can celebrate all festivals in right spirit (a utopian argument) we would have lots of brotherhood in the country than the fickle consumerism.

Life in a Metro: The Movie

Writing after a long time. I generally do not comment on movies and books but then I could not resist myself after seeing "Life in a Metro". It’s such a safe bet to make movies like "Life in a Metro". No research, no story just figment of imagination. Show whatever you want under the camouflage of "oh yaa this is a true metro story, these days you can see this happening in society etc etc".

Did someone come to tell the story writer or the director about his or her story that he made into a movie. They just want to cash in the predisposition of people about metro city's life being bitchy, cut throat, sleazy, girls willing to get laid for promotion, boys performing all stratagems to get a better career, no one having good married life. Just want to ask these guys is life so bad !!!

What are they trying to show? What is the motive behind making the film? Well I must admit the movie is well made but the premise on which it is based is flawed. Its simply an unnecessary castle made by the filmmakers about something which he might not have ever seen or felt in metro cities. The viewer acceptance is a matter of research here. The simple explanation is that when you see a movie you say "Oh man this might be happening to someone" and take it as true. And then there would be these news articles by our "respected" jholachaap journalist writing columns for money about "When you see these kind of movies you would certainly say Oh I know someone like that, Oh this is so much close to my life, blah blah blah blah" .. Bullshit.

Anyway the movie was decent but the point the director was trying to convey was flawed and unrealistic as far as I am concern.

Ghazal and Sufi Music

I was reading some post on net and got the shock of my life. Where while describing the God of Ghazals Janaab Mehdi Hasan Saheb the person wrote that "Mehdi Hasan is as great an artist as Nusrat and Madam Noor Jahan" .. How the heck can someone compare the legends of legends mehdi saheb with these two artists. I agree the other two are also great in their own regards but no where and I repeat absolutely no where near to Fankaar-e-Aazam Mehdi Saheb. When I thought about it a bit more and talked to few of my friends in London I could realize that Nusrat is much more a popular artist outside Pakistan than Mehdi Saheb. I think the reason is pretty simple to decipher. Sufi music even if you do not understand the lyrics( high dose of high class urdu and Panjabi) can be appreciated by people just based on its music. Moreover it is more tappy and catchy than Ghazals. To appreciate Ghazals you need to be a music lover from the core of your heart. Especially you need to be like a data miner who finds hidden data trends. Similarly to appreciate high quality Ghazals that of people like Mehdi Saheb or Beghum Akhtar a strong liking of poetry and lyrics is of utmost importance. To understand and appreciate Ghazals you need patience as it not a rock music to give you high. At the same time need the knowledge of urdu to some extent. Remember poetry is lost in translation hence even if you try to decipher the Ghazal in Hindi or English it looses meaning. Like saying Jo Koo-e-yaar se nikale toh Soo-e-daar chale ... you need to appreciate inherently without translating that "Come out of house of my beloved and then go to the gallows" this simply does not make any impact. Any how this is not my diatribe against Nusrat saheb but I really do not appreciate people comparing Mehdi saheb to any one else. He is just one of his kind no one in past no in future can surpass him.

NGO's farcical "Social Activism"

At the onset let me clarify that I am all for those NGO who do credible work, and I know there are many out there. But then these sincere NGO seems to have attracted lot of attraction and now we are seeing a whole NGO industry out there wanting to grab its piece of share. Recently one NGO (probably GreenPeace) came to our office (obviously they wanted our money). I could see that the representatives they had were probably college or school students who were in need of some quick bucks. Unfortunately one of school going kind guy stopped me and tried to explain me what does NGO does. I could see how improper his prep talk was as he hardly had any facts right. Then he proudly said "Sir we did not allowed French ship Clemenaceau to reach India as it had high level of some toxic substance". I said "well it was not "some" but asbestos, Moreover the ship journey got derailed due to Egypt's intervention and not India's". Then I asked him "did you ever talked to the poor laborers at Alang(Gujrat) who were actually going to dismantle the ship and earn their bread. He candidly said "No sir we didn't". Well I was not shocked as I know the people who are really going to be affected are hardly taken into consideration when the more enlightened breed of NGOs talk in their favour in New Delhi while staying in Five Star hotels. Then I drew a parallel of it with my own life. Few days back I was trying to get a cycle rickshaw to reach my home. Then I saw few rickshaws standing near by. I chose the one which had the oldest driver. While on the rickshaw I said I would have never sat on this rickshaw few days back (before this GreenPeace incident had taken place), but now after this GreenPeace incident I will surely sit here. I must say I did not used to sit on rickshaws having old drivers respecting their age and health. Then I said to myself "hang on, what are you doing? aren't you doing the same thing which the GreenPeace guys did. You yourself decided what is good for the old rickshaw guy and never bothered to consider that he is plying rickshaw to earn money and to get two meals for his family. In my misplaced beinignity I was depriving him and his family that bread. In a way my ridiculous social empathy was actually a curse on these people. Then on I decided that people who want to earn money with all the legal means by their side needs to be supported, and I threw my preposterous social inclinations in a cold basket.

Arjun Singh and the Quota Conundrum

Well it seems that age got better of Arjun Singh and he has become insane (not that he had any sense anyway). Not that he wants to be another VP Singh but he must have been feeling sidelined on getting a trivial ministry and his falling support in the high command. On his last birth day Sonia Gandhi virtually advised him to leave politics and go hiding when she said that "X" years is too long a time in politics and people achieve whatever they want to do till then.
That probably rang alarms in Arjun's head. His feet in the coffin he just tried to become a cynosure by doing something which will irritate his party member and if he does not become famous he will at least become infamous. I doubt any one in the Congress would have liked this Quota juggernaut the way it has shaped. Students across the country are facing merciless policemen and their lathis. It seems that Mr Arjun Singh himself might not have thought that things will go such a long and disgusting way. He just wanted some quick publicity and a reckoning at the dead end of his career so that when he dies there is someone to remember him.
But now the coins have fallen on the wrong place. His head is on the burner and these protests have taken a Frankenstein form which will be very difficult to contain.

India mirroring the USA ??

The recent gruesome killing of Indian engineer Suryanarayana by the Taliban throws a malicious light on peripherals which have never been discussed. More and more I am seeing India having the same strenuous relations with her neighbour like the USA has across the world. The Indo US nuclear deal was a nail in the incubating coffin as the Islamist world derogated India from a "neutral" to a USA inclined country.

Well this does not mean that we pursue our foreign polices keeping in mind these mindless Islamist states but then we cannot deny that the Iran stubbornness has somewhere a link towards the Indo US nuclear deal. Agreed that India has a better nuclear track record unlike countries like Pakistan but then just because Iran has a hardliner at the helm does not mean they are maniacs. For the US it was a US puppy till the Shah was ruling and as soon as Ayotollah Khomenei came the country suddenly became anti US !! The flawed policies of USA towards many of these countries like Iran Iraq Palestine etc. have made the world an unsafe place. The whole world is paying dear for the ridiculous US foreign policies.

These are the people who made Taliban who is now out to destroy its master. These are the people who tried to bully around the whole Latin America and now we see a definite anti US Governments in almost all the major countries. Similarly the Indian subcontinent is heading towards the anti India direction. We have strained relation with Pakistan, Bangladesh Srilanka and Nepal. We are accused of hegemony by these nations. Our wish wash reactions on Nepal monarchy have alienated us further from the common people there.

Self Censoring... Are you kidding !!!

Well that was the first reaction I had when I heard a so called intellectual whose credentials were nothing more than that he was a celebrity. As has already been said years ago "Free lunch is yet to be invented" same goes for self censorship.

People simply try to push the boundary of the ecosystem they are in. When the system revolts back then they come to know that they have crossed the boundaries or else they continue in their disgusting manner. Then there was one more "intellectual" who said "let us rate the Indian Hindi Movies and let the people decide what to see and what to avoid". That made me laugh my hats off. It was so much similar to one of the Scott Adams Dilbert strip. In the strip Dilbert tells Dogbert that he feels guilty about working for a company which makes doughnuts which have thousands of calories. Dogbert says that you do not force anyone to eat it, you simply make them irresistible.

Here also in the rating system we are not "forcing" anyone to see our movies but by giving them XXX rating we are making them irresistible. One more thing in one of the Dilbert strip was when Dogbert says human beings are fun searching parasites and will do any thing for it. Whether that is in their favour or not, does not really matter to them. On the same line people will go to watch this XXX rated movies knowing that it might not be too well for their moral health. But people making these kinds of movies have mastered the art of "Human being is attracted towards forbidden". So once you XXX rate them you are essentially making them forbidden and hence more attractive for the buyers. Its simple voyeuristic economy and a shame.

Moreover the logic of "let the people decide" is a frivolous one. If people were so intelligent and honest we would not see so many crimes taking place. People would know what to do and what not to do. So we would not have any legal laws then. Let the rapist decide whether raping is correct or not. Gosh!! gimme a break will you.

One more issue is "who decides what is wrong and what is right in media". Now by this logic no limits can be put on anything. Anyone can happily say I am making a porn movie, who decides its right or wrong. In ancient time it was the king and his court which used to decide. Similarly in modern world someone needs to take initiative to decide what is wrong and what is right, inside a legal system. The problem is when moral decline creeps into the system we silently acquiesce to it and want "someone" to take matter in his hand. People appreciated what is shown in the movie Rang De Basanti. That the youth take control in their own hands for justice. Now again who decides whether they did right or wrong. Going by the public opinion they seem to have done right but as per law they were criminals. Similarly when Shiv Sena tries to protest the celebration of Valentines Day all the jhola chaap journalist who are pseudo apologists of "freedom of expression" jump the bandwagon saying who decides whether celebrating Valentines Day is right or wrong. I am not endorsing what Shiv Sena does what I am trying to explain is that "who decides" does not always work. Someone has to take the initiative and wrath of the public opinion. Remember if all objections to something are addressed that thing can never be implemented.

Indian eGovernance initiatives

The recent letter send by the National Knowledge Commission to the Prime Minister Dr. Singh, says that India should go the Open Source Software way to effectively implement the eGovernance initiatives. It is very clear that the panel wanted to minimize the cost of implementation and also wanted to have an open standard so that the proprietary software are kept at bay. Though the intentions are correct but it seems that this might not be the best of an idea to implement at this time. Why I am saying this is because Open Source Softwares have various problems in support issues. The education level and the technical comfort of the normal Indian is not unknown to anyone. In these circumstances the ideal solution would be to have solutions from some vendors who then can be held accountable for their systems. But at the same time there is a big problem in this approach also. Which is that once the Government staff bents towards eGovernance then in near future when we would definitely like to go for Open Office Documents it would be very tough to migrate whole systems towards it. Not only the training costs but also the transition costs for the SW would be prohibitively high. The recent Massachusetts incident in which Microsoft Office 12 OpenXML format was rejected by the panel and they went for Open Document Format and PDF gives a clear indication of where the world is heading. Moreover the Open Document Format being based on the OpenOffice.org's XML formats makes the work easier. The Government records needs to be maintained for several decades. The tax transaction records, land dealings and many other critical documents needs to be stored for very long time. By the time they are required in near future the reading application would have gone so many changes that it would be impossible to read it. But then it is also not guaranteed that even if we use Open Office Document format the versions in future would be backward compatible with an application which is 50 years old. It seems that we are getting into the mess of reinventing the wheel and that too for a shorter period. Here is where the pioneering words of legendary Adobe Chairman Dr. John Warnock come into picture that you can never replace the physical paper. The digital paper should try to be a subordinate of the master paper and should not pursuit a quixotic dream of replacing it. We need to reduce our dependence on physical paper but we should be aware that physical paper might exist till the world lasts.