Tag: India

Pirates in the Ocean called Democracy

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“A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the people discover they can vote themselves largess out of the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that democracy always collapses over a loose fiscal policy–to be followed by a dictatorship.”  ― Alexander Fraser Tytler (Scottish advocate, judge, writer and historian)

“Government! Three fourths parasitic and the other fourth stupid fumbling.” ― Robert A. Heinlein, Stranger in a Strange Land

“The hardest thing in the world to understand is the income tax.”–Albert Einstein

Hindi Saying: “Dhobi ka kutta, na ghar ka, na ghat ka’” which roughly translates to “Neither here, nor there.”

The political class of this country has to take care of the people at the bottom of the pyramid (at least once in a while) because they form the bulk of the voting population; these people basically sign the politicians’ appointment order to rule the country. The politicians worship the rich men of this country because they generously fund, albeit without much transparency, the political parties. The Tax paying population is actually in no man’s land with nobody to care for them. In fact the maxim for the tax paying population could be: ‘I Pay Taxes Therefore I Am.’ If a history book is to be written about Independent India’s achievement, the tax paying population would be mentioned just in the footnotes: ‘All the achievements of this country were funded by the country’s generous, unsuspecting and helpless tax payers.’ The only reason that we ever matter to the country is because we pay taxes, Period. Our true existence is for politicians to use our tax money to indirectly pay incentives to the poor people to elect them. It’s a good old carrot and stick approach: The politician get the carrot and the taxpayer gets the stick!

The tax payer is the poor soul caught between hell (inflation) and high water (government) that ensure that his or her hard earned money is used lesser and lesser for his or her own well-being with each passing year. The Indian Taxpayers are like the poor oxen used by a farmer to plough his barren land. The farmer (Politician) knows fully well that his land (Indian Economy) has been rendered barren (in bad shape) by his greed (rampant corruption) and nature (global economic situation), yet he expects that by making the oxen (tax payer) work harder (pay more taxes/ forego subsidies) he can get better returns (continued support from the voting population).

The Indian Tax payer is like the bonded slave of Colonial India. We are bonded for life to pay taxes to the government. We have an eternal duty to pay taxes but no right to ensure that the money that we pay as taxes is spent wisely. We pay taxes and travel in potholed roads but our tax money will used to provide free television for the Needy!!! We pay taxes and endure innumerable power cuts every year while our money is used not to build power plants or public schools or hospitals but in some arcane, utopian and symbolic public scheme that ensures the most votes for the politician who announces the scheme.

The first thing that we should be willing to keep open during our travel in this country using our personal vehicles: ‘Our Purse.’ Why should we, the tax payers pay toll duties at every toll booth? We already pay duties (taxes) to the government every month. And shouldn’t that duty (taxes) that we pay be used to build the roads. Shouldn’t the non-taxpayer who uses his own mode of transport be the one who should pay toll duties? In free India, the Indian tax payer is probably paying more duties/ tributes to the Indian Government Machinery than paid by Indians of Colonial India to their British Masters.

By the time we understand what one type of tax actually means and how much it will offset us, the government roles out yet another tax or cess. Income Tax, Professional Tax, Property Tax, Value Added Tax/ Service Tax, Toll Fees, Excise Duties, Entertainment Tax, Fuel Surcharge, Education Cess, Swachh Bharat Cess, etc., the list of assault on the tax payers income is endless. Just like the omnipresent microbes that threaten the physical well-being of individuals, the government imposed taxes and its bad policies threaten the financial well-being of the taxpayer. What is the success rate of various populistic scheme rolled out by the government? Shouldn’t the tax payer have some say in the way his or her money is spent?

What have successive governments done to broaden the tax net? What have successive governments done to catch hold of the tax evaders? What have successive governments done to bring back black money holed up in tax heavens? What have successive governments done to plug the leakages in the public distribution systems? What have successive governments done to roll back various privileges and subsidies being bestowed upon politicians and parliamentarians? The answers is an EMPHATIC NOTHING.

Politicians mask their incompetence by running media campaigns about how a Good Samaritan has to give up his or her LPG subsidy. The LPG subsidy to the taxpayer is just a drop in the ocean of government spending. The LPG subsidy to the tax payer is like ‘a pimple on an ant’s rear’: It is awfully small compared to various other spending by the government.  Lawmakers, ‘Please address the real issues that are setting back this country before you target the tax payer once again.’ I guess not only in kids’ stories but in real life as well, the greedy owner (government) is hell-bent on killing the goose (tax payer) that lays the golden egg (taxes).

Why does someone who makes above 10 lakhs of income have to forego subsidies whereas parliamentarians with crores worth of personal assets enjoy subsidies and privileges of various kind? Why can’t we roll back various tax benefits given to the largest of Indian companies? How about taxing super rich of the country on any money that they have not used in productive, job creating investments (holding idle) for more than a period of, say five years? Well parliamentarians of India, ‘Please lead by example. Please say no to all the privileges that you enjoy.’ Ultimately what is the difference between the pirates of medieval times who used weapons to loot ships in high seas for their own benefit and modern day governments that use the threat of the law to make taxpayers part with their hard earned money which these governments eventually spend as they wish with absolutely zero accountability?

Note: This post has been written for IndiSpire Edition #100: ‘Gas Subsidy has been ended for people with income more than 10 Lac and prices hiked. What is your take on this decision?’

 

A Time of Need and a Time for Greed

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‘The world has enough for everyone’s need, but not enough for everyone’s greed.’ – Mahatma Gandhi

‘Neither a man nor a crowd nor a nation can be trusted to act humanely or to think sanely under the influence of a great fear.’ – Bertrand Russell, Unpopular Essays

As the rains receded on December 3rd, I and my brother in law ventured out to buy essential household items. It was around 11.30 AM and we had to go from one shop to another as there was stock out situation for some of the essential items. I had walk the entire Kottur area in search of Milk and Candles. Not a single candle was available in any of the stores. A solitary vendor was selling milk outside a big vegetable store in Kottur market. But instead of the usual Rs. 40 per liter he was charging Rs. 100 per liter, a full 150% mark-up to the usual price. Most people were buying multiple packets of milk from him and yet after walking a few feet from the shop complained that it was wrong on the part of the vendor to hike the price in that hour of distress.

After an extended period of incessant rains, the prices of some of the vegetables had reached the stratosphere. On this particular day these darlings of every household’s kitchen were not even available at even these extremely inflated prices. Bread and Rice were running out of stock too. A couple of days later as I was standing in line to buy milk at another milk depot, a woman was hoarding about hundreds of packets of milk in her tricycle. When one of the customers asked why the woman was siphoning off milk meant to be distributed through regular channel, she hurled abuses at the customer. The irony was that within a few minutes she was selling the same milk packets in a nearby street with a fat markup.

Though most of us complain about the greediness of opportunistic vendors, we are opportunistic and greedy too. A case in point was a trip a petrol pump on the same day. My brother in law’s two wheeler was almost at the verge of running out of petrol. By this time most petrol pumps were closing down as they had no more petrol or diesel to sell. The unending lines of people outside petrol pumps rivaled the queues outside places of worship on auspicious days. I went along with my nephew to one of the petrol pumps near Royapettah. Among the crowd to my disappointment and chagrin, there were a bunch of guys who had come with multiple 30 to 40 liter cans. Why would anybody need so much petrol or diesel? Clearly they were greedy arbitrageur who was planning to sell the fuel at much higher prices in suburban localities. Even people who were buying for their own use too were buying more than necessary.

Around the same time, another irrational phenomenon was unfolding across the city. There was a run on the banks, no actually there was a run on ATMs. With most of the bank branches in Chennai on leave due to rains, the cash balance in ATMs was already low. The situation was made even worse by a lot of anxious people (foreseeing more rain and bank holiday) each withdrawing up to their daily permissible limit. The anxious withdrawal pattern resulted in most ATMs going out of cash by afternoon that day and as result the entire city was indulging a real life treasure-hunt, running from one ATM to another. Only after bank branches opened the following day and some of the banks started operating mobile ATMs the situation limped back to normalcy.

While it is understandable that there were long queues at grocery stores, milk vending booths, ATMs and petrol pumps to everyone’s surprise there was queue in wine shops too. And contrary to ATMs and petrol pumps that ran out of stock, these wine shops were fully stocked and was buzzing with so much activity and life that one could have easily mistaken them for an ant colony or a beehive. It is billion dollar puzzle that how in a democratic country there is stock out for essential commodities but wine shops are fully stocked.

No amount of technology can serve as replacement for irrationality of human beings. No amount of rules and processes can check human greed. As I think back on the events that unfolded during the recent rainy spell, I get reminded of a dialogue from a recent movie: ‘By eating even a single mouthful of food after our hunger has been quenched, we are ensuring that another person remains hungry.’ This principle is very apt in situations of natural or man-made calamities like the recent rainy spell.

The Essentials in Life

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What would I consider as luxury? What would I celebrate? What would I classify as a moment of great joy? What would call as a divine blessing? Today, my answers to these questions are completely different from the ones that I had in my mind until a few days ago.

A twenty four hour period of continuous and very heavy rains between December 1 and 2, created an urban deluge that started submerging one locality after another in Chennai. All my family had were just the essentials, the bare minimum to carry on with our day to day activities. And yet, this bare minimum seemed at that moment and even now like ultimate luxuries for which I am very grateful to God.

I do not remember previous instance when there was no power in my house for two days at a stretch. Yet I was grateful that the rain water had collected only in my street and did not enter my apartment complex. The excess water let out from one of Chennai’s reservoirs was causing havoc at localities barely a couple of kilometers from my house. Army and NDRF were using boats and every other possible means to evacuate people from these areas. Though there was no power in my street and the mosquitoes were troubling us, we were safe and had the luxury of a good night’s sleep.

There was no power, no TV, no internet and slowly the mobile battery too ran out. The waterlogging in my street made it nearly impossible to go outside. As a result I spent most of the two days playing and interacting with my daughter. In those two days I should have played and interacted with my daughter more than I would have done in an average fortnight. And my interaction level with my wife, parents and neighbors increased significantly during those two days.

In that time of despair, a bunch of kids in my apartment complex found reason to play and rejoice. When the rain stopped on the third morning and the common area in my apartment complex was dry enough, I and my daughter walked from one gate to another. I also saw my neighbors either interacting with or playing with their kids.

In a city where the weather is hot and humid for most of the year, I wouldn’t have ever dreamed of a day when I would rejoice at the sight of the sun. And yet when the rains stopped and the sun appeared only for a brief period, I expressed my joy by shouting like a child. Thankfully from that moment, though the sun has been playing hide and seek the rains have stopped.

By the third evening, with the power still not back, we left to my eldest sister’s house in another locality. It was still raining at the time of dinner and we were all sick and tired of seeing more than a month of rain breaking one record after another as well exposing the limits of our city’s infrastructure. Though the environment was pale and gloomy, my daughter on seeing her aunts, uncles, grandparents and cousin having dinner with her described, ‘I am very happy. We are all having dinner together.’ I guess she was absolutely right. What mattered was that we were all together and we were safe. Everything else that we counted as the necessities of modern life seemed superficial and redundant. I thank God for providing me this moment/ opportunity to reflect on what is important in life. I hope and pray that the people whose life had been thrown out of gear and traumatized by this monstrous downpour find the courage and help needed to reconstruct their life.

Rains in Chennai

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I do not remember the last time when I saw so many helicopters fly. The incessant rains in December first week left my hometown Chennai as battered like a war-torn city. Unable to cope with unfolding disaster, the state government asked for center’s help which soon dispatched the army, navy, air force, the coast guards to join the NDRF which was already assisting the state government with rescue and relief operations.

Someone photographing the earth from several kilometers high in the sky would have been baffled at the sudden appearance of numerous islands in India’s South East. The railway tracks in the city, the major roads leading to and from the city, the roads linking different localities within the city were all under water. With the airport runway too submerged the geographic isolation of the city was complete. This is probably the first time in several years that train service from the three major railway stations in the city were stopped completely. And for the first time in several years that the airport operation in Chennai came to a grinding halt. And so many people in and around Chennai became aware of the names of all the rivers, canals and lakes in and around the city for the first time in their lives.

The photos that were being relayed across the globe of the devastation would have made everyone question, ‘Is this India’s fourth largest metropolitan city?’, ‘Is this the city whose name used to synonymous with South India until a few years ago?’, ‘Is this the same city that was so strategic to the British in India that it became the only Indian city that was bombed by the Germans in World War I?’ Every locality in the city was affected by the rains. Electricity and Telecommunication were completely cut-off. Instead of resembling a major metropolis, Chennai resembled a series of islands in distress and people were just castaway in their own homes.

The rainfall received in the month of November is the highest in nearly a hundred years. The rainfall received on December 1, is the second highest rainfall in day in the past one hundred years. In addition to Chennai, four other northern districts (Kancheepuram, Thiruvallur, Cuddalore and Villupuram) and the Union Territory of Pondicherry had to bear the brunt of the cloud’s fury. The endless streams of clouds resembled the unstoppable army of Anubis from ‘The Mummy II’: These streams of cloud unleased hell on Tamil Nadu’s northern districts and crippled normal life.

Nature became a neutralizing agent that made the young and the old, the rich and the poor, the well-connected and the not-so well-connected all equal in that moment of misery. While we cannot do much about the vagaries of nature, one should not forget the fact much of Chennai’s present problem is actually man-made. The steady disappearance of lakes and ground level tanks, the encroachment of canals and rivers, reckless urbanization, greed of the residents for cheaper real estate, toothless civil administration that that did not stand firm in instances where it should have been are all the pieces in the not-so difficult to understand puzzle that shamefully managed to convert the fourth largest city in India into a ‘DISASTER ZONE.’

Voting is both a right and a responsibility

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‘With great power comes great responsibility.’ – Uncle Ben in Spiderman

‘Caveat Emptor (Let the buyer beware)’ – Ancient Maxim

For every public role that a man or woman would play there is a qualification. If we want to be doctor we have to undergo schooling, then enroll in medical school as an MBBS student. All along the away at every important milestone we have to appear for qualifying examination and then clear it to move to the next level and receive the qualification/ degree. The same applies for other professions like Engineer, Auditor or Lawyer, etc.

However for one of the most important public roles, that of being a CITIZEN of the country, there is no training or qualifying exam in our country. As a democracy, everyone above the age of 18 years has the right to vote. The problem is that people are willing to treat their power to VOTE as a RIGHT and an ENTITLEMENT but forget that the power to vote is equally a RESPONSIBILITY too. Are we exercising that responsibility well? Are electing the right candidates to represent us? Definitely not. We pass on the blame for all of our nation’s maladies on to our politicians but we are part of the problem too. In fact the problems starts with us. Our political class is nothing but symptoms of deep rooted problems in our society.

Every one of us dreams of India becoming a great nation; but we are personally not willing to incur the small but numerous everyday costs that would collectively enable this dream to become a reality. Some of the guidelines to be followed in choosing our representatives include (but not limited to):

  1. We need to make informed choices and choose our representatives based on weighing the pros and cons of his governance record
  2. We should never choose a candidate because he represents the party we support (if the candidate does not merit being elected)
  3. We should not blindly support a party because historically our family elders have voted for that party
  4. We should not cast our vote for someone just because he or she is related to the leader whom we like

We blame that there are not many good candidates contesting in elections. But can we tell the difference between a good candidate and bad candidate? Do we know what information to use to arrive at that decision? Do we know where to look for that information? Do we understand the consequences of sending the wrong candidates to represent us? When the government doles out freebies, what are the other important projects that are being shelved? Where is the government borrowing from and who will pay the principal and interest for these borrowings? What would ensure in long term social progression? Where does India as a whole and individual states within India stand on each and every one of the parameters of Human Development Index? What’s the progress been over the years on these parameters? The answer to all these questions would be an EMPHATIC NO.

The only way to ensure this situation changes for the better is to have systematic qualification exam for voters or voters who are due to be eligible to vote. Going forward, the Election Commission of India, instead of adding anyone above the age of 18 (based on the proof of Indian Citizenship) to the voters’ list, should also conduct a qualification exam to assess if they are aware of the rights and responsibilities of a voting citizen. People who do not clear the exam should be denied a voter’s ID card and a place in the voter’s list. Since the cut-off age for being eligible to vote in India is 18 years, the age around which most kids finish their higher secondary schooling, we can have a subject for 11th and 12th standards across all school boards that deal with various aspects of the rights and responsibilities of a voting citizen. The curriculum for this subject should be handled by a constitutional body like the Election Commission of India. For people who are not fortunate enough to be part of the schooling system, the Election Commission of India should have an independent certification process.

The topics to be covered should include (but not limited to): a brief overview the constitution of India, the electoral process, the powers of the Supreme Court of India, Lok Adalat system, The Right to Information Act, sources to look for unbiased information on the back ground information of contesting candidates, etc. In addition, we should it make it mandatory for people to read the following books or similar books that deal with topics covered in these books:

  1. Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media by Noam Chomsky and Edward Herman
  2. Basic Economics: A Citizen’s Guide to the Economy by Thomas Sowell
  3. Games Indians Play by V. Raghunathan (this book provides the Indian Context very well)
  4. Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces that Shape Our Decisions by Dan Ariely

Note: The above list is only indicative and not an exhaustive one. There can be other relevant topics and books as well. Also there might be books that deal with the Indian context better.

People might question why limit this exercise only to new voters. The costs, logistics and politics of doing this for existing voters are enormous to overcome. Over four or five iterations of this exercise, we will have significant number of voters who would have come through this filtering process. If you don’t believe, keep in mind that the number of first time voters in the 2014 National Elections was around 12 crores!!! In four iterations, at an average of 10 crore new voters per iteration, we can bring in 40 crore voters through this process, a voting block significant enough make a positive change. It is well known in social sciences circle that the minority influence can in fact bring about social change, so making a start which is directionally correct is more important. Also starting with the younger population provides the added advantage that the young are not as much influenced by the social prejudices prevalent in our society and will be more open to change. We can also hope that the awareness created by the process of implementing this new system would have a positive influence on existing voters as well. We should also create incentives for voters to put into use, the knowledge obtained through this system.

There will always be loopholes and we might not be able to create a completely foolproof system. However at this point in time we need to only worry about whether we are moving in the right direction. We should bear in mind that social as well as political change is a slow and evolutionary process and we should be patient enough to give this new system the right amount of time to flourish. Some people might ask why not a qualification system for contesting candidates as well. It is a much more difficult idea to implement. Also as more and more candidates with cleaner and better governance records get elected, political parties themselves will see the merit in fielding right candidates. After all, aren’t Indian political parties’ masters at playing vote bank politics?

How a working professional in her med-twenties continues to remain a 14 year old school girl in social media

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http://https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5wO3jO-NPX8

http://https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhlUVdbU9Lk

Yesterday (November 4, 2014) as I was going through my LinkedIn page looking for updates from my connections, I came across a post that was liked by one of my connections. It read “Remya Jose a 14 year old girl from India invented this pedal operated washing machine. It requires no electricity and using it also gives you exercise. She won a national award for this.” Without even thinking further, I too pressed the like button (The post had around 1900 likes at that time). But the update did not have any working link to take me to a website/ newspaper article featuring Remya’s story. So I went to Google to look for newspaper coverage of Remya’s innovation. I got a list of links featuring Remya’s story; the one that interested me was Google Book’s link to “India: Land of a Billion Entrepreneurs by Upendra Kachru.’ I checked the details of the book to figure out that the book has been published in 2011. On seeing this publication year I get the natural suspicion that Remya’s story is 3 years old. Or is it just three years old story?

I started reading through the page that featured Remya’s story. Almost the entire page 46 chronicles Remya’s innovation. But one sentence towards the end of the page caught my attention: “Her innovation was featured in Oulook magazine in 2005.” Oh My God! This story is nine years old. Remya, who is by now in her mid-twenties still continues to remain a 14 year old school girl in our social media. I was curious about what happened to Remya and what happened to her innovation. I was also curious to figure out why a story which is probably nine years old is currently making rounds in LinkedIn and other social media sites. As I could not remember seeing any pedal operated washing machines in stores, I decided look on the World Wide Web to figure out what had actually happened.

A little bit of background on Remya and her story: Remya’s family hails from Keezhattur Village in Malappuram district of Kerala, India. In 2002/ 2003 timeframe when Remya was a fourteen year old school student she developed the ‘pedal operated washing machine.’ The tough family circumstances under which Remya designed and developed the pedal operated washing machine (with the help of her father and other well-wishers) is truly inspiring. The benefits of the washing machine are it does not require electricity and cycling would help the person to stay fit. Remya’s innovation was found out by SRISTI (Honey Bee Network), a non-governmental organization set up to strengthen the creativity of grassroots inventors, innovators and ecopreneurs. Eventually through National Innovation Foundation (NIF), Remya’s work got coverage in Outlook magazine, Discovery channel and NDTV. In 2003, with support from NIF, she acquired the national patent for her machine. In 2005 she won the award for the best innovation among 25,000 entries at the NIF’s Third National Grassroots Technological Innovations and Traditional Knowledge competition. The 2005 article in Outlook goes on to state that, “if the washing machine patent is accepted, she hopes she will have enough funds to pursue an electronics engineering degree in a reputed college.”

So far so good. I was still not coming across articles about whether Remya was able to successfully commercialize her innovation. As I kept searching, I ran into a blog post by Rahul Brown on ‘India’s National Innovation Foundation and Honeybee Network’, dated May 23 2008. Rahul Brown states that though NIF helped Remya patent her intellectual property, the redesigned washing machine by NIF went on to cost Rs. 3,000 compared to the original Rs. 1,500 for Remya’s initial design thus making it unattractive against low end electric washing machines available in India at that time. Also NIF’s licensing agreement with Remya introduced another layer of cost into the final price of the washing machine. Rahul goes on to argue that NIF’s processes might in a way be detrimental to the wide spread commercialization of the very grass-root innovations that they are trying to promote. By Rahul’s account, looks like the ‘Pedal Operated Washing Machine’ did not have huge commercial success.

So what happened to the young innovator Remya Jose? Remya eventually went on to be an engineering graduate. An April 16, 2010 article from India Today provides a very grim picture. Quoted from India Today, ‘Though she received much acclaim for her invention, there weren’t many takers for it as it wasn’t considered commercially viable. She has gone to the UAE now with her uncle to look for a job. Showing the bundle of certificates and prizes Jose has won during her student days for various innovations, her father Joseph laments; “What’s the use of all this if she cannot find a decent job in her country?” India needs to answer this disappointed father.’ I felt very sad on reading this: Is this a story of a teenage innovator whose hopes were dashed?

I continued my search on the web to find out what Remya is currently doing. I landed on Remya Jose’s page on INKtalks where she is listed as a fellow and serial innovator (hurray!!!). The page stated that, ‘Remya works at National Innovation Foundation, Ahmedabad, and is responsible for many other innovations.’ I checked NIF’s site but could not find Remya’s profile as an employee, though I was able to see details of her innovation. I once again started searching on the internet on where Remya is currently working and landed on this LinkedIn profile of Remya Jose. Remya works in UAE as a project coordinator with Petrofac. The profile does not list her roots from Kerala, India (School or College). So, is this Remya Jose of that I was looking for? I could not figure out from the photograph. I am assuming this is our teenage innovator based on these three facts from the LinkedIn profile page: 1. Remya is working in UAE (her father said she went to UAE to look for jobs), 2. Between 2010 and 2012, a stint with National Innovation Foundation (NIF) as research engineer (INKtalks profile stated that she worked with NIF) and 3. Most important of all, a mention about her ‘Washing Cum Exercise Machine’ on the profile page.

I am not sure whether to be happy that Remya is working in a reputed company abroad or be sad about the fact that a young innovator from India who could have gone on to become a successful entrepreneur in India itself, is working in another country. So much has happened in Remya’s life and to her innovation (listen to what she wants to become and what her father wanted to do with the money from commercializing this product) since 2005 when her story stated appearing in Indian media and yet only in November 2014, a lot of Urban Indians (through social media) are feeling happy about a 14 year old girl who invented a pedal operated washing machine and won a national award for it. Incidentally the washing machine on this Facebook page is slightly different from the one featured on NIF Page. And so, the young innovator from Kerala who is currently working as Project Coordinator in UAE still continues to remain (in our social media) a 14 year old girl who invented this pedal operated washing machine.