Saturday, December 29, 2012

She was 23

She had just been to see 'Life of Pi'. Immersed herself in magic realism where things often aren't exactly what they appear. Where the gentle bobbing and swaying of a ship on the high seas can turn in minutes into a super-storm that will capsize and sink it. Where a limpid pool on a deserted island hides a malevolent secret.  But also where a defenceless boy shipwrecked in the middle of the ocean manages to make peace, albeit somewhat restive, with a ferocious and frequently starving tiger.She would still have had vivid memories of a fluorescent whale somersaulting in an iridescent arc above a frail lifeboat on a pitch dark night. And of bright hued birds and animals cavorting in a tropical zoo.

A beautiful fantasy that must have lifted her spirits, brought a smile to her young countenance, given her the buoyancy to deal with another difficult week in college and in the oppressive city, turned in a second into a horror so unspeakable, we could not abide it if it were to be ever reported with the full extent of its brutality.

How fragile a dream was her life?




Sunday, December 23, 2012

Incoherent and angry


This post is written in a distraught moment. I came back to the top to write the disclaimer so those who don't want to read incoherent, angry rambling can leave right about now. 


Many of you, like me, may have spent a large part of this weekend riveted to the TV as another gruesome tale plays out on India's national stage. A young girl, younger than many of our kids, is battling for her life after a rape so brutal, it is a wonder she survived at all. It is hard not to take it personally. 

That is where the confusion begins. I am a parent of a young daughter myself. The fearful person within urges even more cocooning, even more restrictions. Conversely, the rational voice is outraged that my child should progressively lose her freedoms because the world around is an ever more dangerous place and most particularly the male gender is now merely a polite euphemism for violently anarchic, sexually repressed, grotesque beast.

I've never said this before so publicly but here is a question for you. Is this ubiquitous sense of siege the inevitable consequence of a more unequal India that economic liberalisation delivered? Being honest is going to be really hard but let me push the point. Even in the current instance, the 'good guy' is the well turned out, mixed-gender JNU set in its activist chic scarves. The intimidating image is a scruffy, all-male mob that has underclass written all over it. Fewer of the first lot, by far, than the second of course thus dialling up the factor of fear. Recall also that all the Saket rape accused are clearly underclass while the young girl is one-of-us, white collar bourgeois. The characterisations are in place. 

Twenty years back, my wife and I lived in a large bungalow desolate and rather remote corner of Secunderabad. Plots were vacant for over 50 metres on three sides (the fourth was a road). My work entailed frequent, extended travel; our first-born was a mere infant and my elderly mother-in-law also stayed with us. I would often be out of touch for days at a time but don't recall any bouts of, or with, anxiety wondering if they were all well while I was away. Today in spite of all the communication tech at hand and real time communications a snap, I would probably ensure round-the-clock security before leaving them in a similar situation. 

As the gradient that separates the economically successful from those still striving becomes steeper the walls that the former are enclosing themselves in are rising ever higher. The motivations of those outside are ever more suspect. On their part, the ones falling behind can see the prosperity on the other side and have an ever diminishing hope of getting on to that high table. While most will simply suffer the inequity silently a few, less accommodating or more desperate, will lash out in the only way they know... with violence. The unescorted young female from the posher class of home is a particular heel of achilles that can be attacked to achieve multiple hideous ends simultaneously. 
Demands for harsher punishment, tougher laws, more policing will dominate the course of proceedings over the next few days and weeks. Some tokenism will follow. It will make no difference, though. We have never had any shortage of laws, only of the political will to enforce them.
In the meanwhile, no time and effort will be expended in going beyond immediate cause to examine if there are underlying dysfunctions that our brave new India is relentlessly spawning. 

What's the point after all? We can't do jack shit about it anyway.

Thursday, July 12, 2012

GAAR? AAAAARGH!

On a regular basis, our business papers bleat about the terrible idea that is GAAR. Apparently GAAR is terrible for FII. (We will note in passing that the two, read in conjunction remind us about an intemperate cartoon feline).

Since I understand little or nothing of matters financial, I had thus far chose to avoid offering any commentary on this, undoubtedly, earth-shaking issue. This morning, however, I actually read such a piece talking about what it was. Turns out that GAAR attempts to ensure that FIIs actually pay tax on profits they realise from the conduct of market transactions in India. It doesn't matter that the tax be paid in India, mind. Even if they pay it in some other jurisdiction, and can prove this, they needn't pay in India. Now FIIs don't like that. Why don't they like it? Because (i) they would have to reveal the provenance of the money they are bringing in and (ii) they would have to reveal the destination of the money going out. Ok, so I'm not getting the technicalities exactly right and so on, but I am looking at it from my own position as a small participant in the financial markets. Here's what happens to me. FIRST my income gets taxed at source. Then I take my post-tax income and invest it in the market. Then, when this punt generates a profit, it gets added back to my income and I pay tax on it yet AGAIN. Unlike these nice FII people who need to be treated with special, super-soft, velvet gloves.

Let me remind you. We are talking about institutional investors here, not direct investors. These are NOT people who are building factories, setting up universities or research laboratories, bringing in new technologies, strengthening our roads, dams, ports or power stations. They are gamblers playing short term punts in the Indian markets. If they think the Rupee is going to harden against the dollar, they will happily buy Indian paper and exit it as soon as it delivers their profit benchmark. If they think Indian equities are going to take a hammering, they will not hesitate to sell short and cover as the markets tank. They are not putting money into the ground, which having gone in, takes a few years to start producing an yield, and what is more, is nearly impossible to liquidate and exit. They are putting money into electronic roulette wheels called NSE, BSE, NCDEX and so on where the cosmetic indicators called stock and commodity indices live. And this money is fungible. If it doesn't like the bed it is sleeping in, it simply goes and finds a nicer one. On the other side of the street. Or the other side of the planet.

And apparently, the only reason why the nice folks at FinMin are so keen to see these delicate darlings smile is because they help keep us nifty and sensexy.

Right then. Here's my rant. My money at least isn't hot money. I don't have the option of upping and picking up my stakes from the table and then storming out in a huff.Everyone knows where my money came from. There are no participatory notes behind which I can hide.

And that fully honest money is treated systematically worse than money that something called an MAD or BSM or KVM illicitly shuffles out of India and then shuffles back in wearing the impenetrable mask of an FII?

How is that a fair tax system? And how come no tax-compliant Indian has any problem with their  being treated systematically worse than dirty, volatile, foreign speculators?

And finally, can we please understand that their is nothing investment-like in FII money? Call it what it is. A gambler's stash.

Thursday, July 5, 2012

Broadcasting and Brand Management

A young man who currently works in one of the Big Three television networks dropped by for some career advice last week. After graduating from business school he has spent almost five years at the job, the first two in Ad Sales and the next three in Marketing. He feels like he is beginning to stagnate and has raised the issue with his boss. Boss suggests that he move back into Ad Sales.

What would you advise him?

If he planned to be in the broadcast industry for the long haul, say the next decade, I suggested that he stay in Marketing. If it was just the next two or three however, he was likely better off shifting back to Ad Sales.

Seems cryptic? Hang on, we should soon see why.

Marketing’s role at most Indian broadcasters only comes in when all aspects of the channel, show or event have already been finalized. All that remains is to build awareness of the impending launch to try and ensure the quickest possible pace of sampling among viewers. Talented creative agency is called in and briefed. Wit, emotion, action and drama are poured in and out pops a striking, often award winning, campaign. All that remains to be done is splashing out a large sum on a media plan and the job is done.

If you learned your Marketing at one of the putative Universities of the discipline, P&G or Unilever or one of the beverage majors for instance, you would expect to lead, not follow the process and centre every decision at each stage on the consumer. It would probably offend you to be treated merely as a deliverer of advertising and media campaigns. Given the circumstances, you would want to shift closer to either the Content or the Ad Sales side of the business, where the action really was.

Things are going to start changing. As soon as July 1, 2012 actually.

For as long as we’ve had C&S TV in India, going on 20 years now, the biggest impediment in its expansion has been limited bandwidth due to analog delivery. With capacity of less than 70 channels delivered at indifferent resolution and scratchy audio, the biggest challenge before a channel is to get distribution at whatever cost. Once this hurdle has been negotiated, it enters a relatively limited range of options available in any given genre. The rest depends on casting as wide a content net as possible. Almost every channel tries to be all things to all viewers.

Mandatory digitization arrives in the big metros on July 1. In a fell swoop, channel choice is set to grow three-fold or more. Costs of distribution should fall rather sharply, removing a significant entry barrier and opening doors for many more content providers. Inevitably, the days of every channel wanting to be ‘One size fits all’ must give way to specific consumer needs driving product design. International channels already show this precision in proposition and content. Comedy Central makes no bones about what it stands for and will stay close to the promise. Fox has a whole portfolio of well-designed channels that identify and then single mindedly go after a tightly defined benefit.

And make no mistake. This is the direction where all of Indian television is headed; the era of the Marketing led broadcasting business.    

Thursday, March 8, 2012

Fashion victimhood a la Apple

Late last night, by Indian Standard Time, Tim Cook stepped on to a stage in San Francisco to announce the arrival of the New iPad. With Retina Display, Quad Core Processor, iSight camera (5 megapixels, no less), two utterly novel colours (BLACK and WHITE, get?) apart from the Classic Silver, Clairvoyance, Levitation, 12 Side Impact Airbags (oh, okay, some of these will only be activated once we give you iOS 6.0 as a free upgrade from the AppStore), the shiny new device was enough to get the social media all atwitter at that ungodly hour. You'd think people would have more interesting things to do at 1 a.m. than staring at eerily glowing monitors, but there you have it.

Soon after, it can be safely assumed, a lot of these insomniacs would have started plotting their fastest path to acquiring their own new thingy. After all, they would be saying to themselves, timing is critical. Next 3 or 4 weeks and flipping open the smart cover on their new WHITE iPad 3 and there would be audible gasps from the admiring and envious in the Boardroom or Airline lounge. Any later than that and the thing would become so ubiquitous, the whole cache would have evaporated.

Even as they were thus planning, they would have little or no consciousness of their older tablet devices. Or of the little they had discovered of its capabilities. Reading, and sometimes responding to email, browsing the web, posting to their soc med pages, watching YouTube and TED video, and shooting violent birds out of catapults at cherubic pigs...this would probably be a fairly comprehensive enumeration of their usage pattern.

A year back, a friend walked in on me as I was busy fooling around with my then still new ipad 2. Having recently received his own as a birthday present, and not having done much with it yet, he was rather keen to know what it could really do. Replace his lappie perhaps? After running through features, tricks and some must have apps, he was reassured that it was more than a really expensive paper weight and I'm sure he must have become a regular user. I would be surprised, very pleasantly of course, if he has discovered too many more uses for the device than those I left him with that morning.

Forget the iPad for a moment. Notwithstanding how many features our lappies, or mobiles, or televisions, music systems, air conditioners - heck or anything else at all, actually come preloaded with, how many do we actually use? Have you ever used the 'Sleep' function in your AC? Did you even know your AC had a 'Sleep' function?

I like to believe I'm immune to the allurements of marketeers, (don't we all?), and don't readily get inveigled into profligacy. Regrettably, these intentions come seriously unhinged with Apple devices, most particularly the iPads. Long before I had fully discovered what the original was capable of (this post is being typed on it, as it happens), I had to, just had to, get me the shiny, slim iPad 2. Having done little with either in the period since, except read email, browse the Web, consume and post to the social media, view YouTube and TED video (yup, tha typical user was, you guessed it, me) and watch my daughter play 'Angry Birds' and 'Cut the Rope', and at the risk of ridicule, using the iPad 2 as a video camera at her School Sports Day, I am already on the slippery slope that will lead to acquiring the latest hatchling from the Cupertino farm.

Why is that?

Apple has pulled off incredible mass hypnosis, that's why. With its monomaniacal committment to a Minimalist, almost ascetic design philosophy, mirrored rather self consciously in the uniforms sported by Jobs or Cook, Apple becomes the standard bearer for defiant, almost rebellious individualism. The visual vocabulary of the legendary 1984 Macintosh television commercial comtinues to echo newly three decades on. What makes it strange, of course, is that with a billion iDevices sold around the planet, it is utterly mainstream. Hardly the javelin thrower that will destroy the Big Brother who is watching you, it has quietly segued into Big Brother. Who will think nothing of slipping in a few lines of code deep, deep in its innards that will be watching your every move. What's more, it seems to have an impenetrable, Teflon- make that Kevlar- hide. All criticism simply ricochets off, Chinese child labour, despotic management styles, hidden tracking or whatever else.

Makes you despair how gullible we are.

p.s. Anyone coming back from the US in the next few weeks, can I ask you to carry a small parcel for me please? ;)

Monday, January 16, 2012

From the Half Marathon finish line – A salute to all the supporters!

5:45 a.m. January 15, 2012. Sankranti and Pongal festivities for millions and the special annual celebration of the Mumbai Marathon for a few thousand enthusiasts who gather at VT and Mahim Causeway to kick off on their event of choice: the 42 and 21 km runs, respectively.
It’s a cool morning. The weather app on my berry says 21oC. Humidity is at the 50%ish mark. Weather is going to be a friend today. For some reason only they know, the organisers want every runner to go through three metal detector gates. Hmm. Long distance runner terrorists.
Anyway, we run the silly gauntlet and soon enough we are in the vast holding area at the far end of which is the starting gate. I hear more than one crib about how there’s nearly a kilometre we will run even before getting started. What did we expect? Squeeze 5000 people into a single starting row?
6:15 and we are off. A loud shout ripples its way through the crowd as the run begins. By the time I cross the gate, it is nearly 6:24 though, having been at the back end of the crowd. Some film stars that I can’t recognise are benevolently waving at the runners from their machan like perch at the left of the gate but the klieg lights are pointed at the runners and all we see are starry, unrecognisable silhouettes.
The first stage of the run, just over 5 kilometres, gets us across the Bandra Worli Sealink. While you will never notice it in a moving car, the drive up to the midpoint of the bridge is a steady uphill and already the challenge of running against the gradient is starting to separate the well trained from the less so. I see people dropping to a walk and wonder what their plan might be to deal with the 20+ km that lie before them. It is dark and cool and the breeze, if there’s any at all, is Northerly so it only pushes us on and soon we are below the soaring arches. Look up and there’s a beautiful Moon in her second quarter almost exactly atop the arches, almost like a golden beacon illuminating the path for the runners as they pass below. As we hit the gentle downhill towards Worli, there is a stretch where the path broadens out and leaves a space on the far left that affords some distance from the running throng. India’s male, being of an incontinent constitution, can't pass up the chance to add his salty effluvia to the sea below and a hundred sprinklers spring out of their restraints as soon as they are a vaguely decent distance away. I hear many female voices loudly complaining “It just isn’t fair”. I can offer little defence, ladies, beyond acknowledging that as a gender, we are evidently of coarser stock than you. Forgive us our uncouthness.
As we curve on to the Worli Seaface, the Eastern sky begins to assume a pale orange-pink complexion. Dawn is breaking over the city. While I never run with music pumping into the ears through wee white buds, the inner Winamp is playing the mellow strains of the Beatles’ “Here comes the Sun, it’s all right”. This is also about the time when the first of the full Marathoners start passing us heading in the opposite direction. I salute them as they go. Having never done a distance longer than 21 km, I can only applaud the will that powers these bravehearts to overcome a challenge just vastly bigger. No, 42 is not just twice as hard. Walk up a floor. Then the next. And the next. Is the 3rd floor as easy as the 1st was? See the point?
And though it is still only about 7 a.m. the enthusiasm of Mumbaikars’ support for the runners has already started bringing them out in long lines strung along the footpaths and road embankments, clapping and cheering us all on. We cross the first timing gate just before getting on to Annie Besant Road near the Old Passport Office and turn right to head towards Worli Naka. Almost a third of the run- 7 km, is over and the wind and weather are still acquitting themselves very honourably insofar as helping us with the run is concerned. Cool, dry and tailwind. SASMIRA having been passed on the right and Doordarshan Tower on the left, we are soon at Worli Naka where we turn right again to get back to the Seaface. The 8 km mark passes and my left foot needs some attending to as the toes are getting somewhat squeezed. I stop and sit and start to unfasten the shoe. Almost immediately, a runner pulls up to check if I need any help. I thank him and gratefully decline. He is off again. The fellowship of running is a beautiful thing!
We curve left and the Worli Dairy heaves into view. By now the sky is quite well lit but the Sun is still straining to get over the horizon. The fishermen’s colony marks the end of the Seaface and we dogleg left to head toward Mela Restaurant (or whatever it is called this week). Just before we turn back on to Annie Besant Road, I spot Vilas Kalgutkar. He has to be the Mumbai Media & Communications Fraternity’s favourite photographer. Everybody knows him. He has captured everyone, in candid shot or in pose, on his camera. His self-effacing, mild demeanour cannot hide the talent and meticulousness that he brings to the discipline. I wave at him, give him an opportunity to get the shot he wants (oh, the vanity) and run on.
The cutest sight on today’s run is waiting for us a few yards further just shy of the Atria Mall: a group of five or six street kids who constitute a mini cheering squad. The Sun is starting to come up behind them and they are already there to add their spirit to the run. I am running today for Child Rights & You (www.cry.org) and the kids are a stark reminder of why we need to do all we can to ensure a childhood for every child. Fate dealt them a rotten hand but couldn’t steal the indefatigable ebullience of childhood.
Shivasagar Estate having been crossed, we are now past the 12th kilometre and on to the sweeping crescent at Haji Ali. Random diversion:  Did you know that this is causeway that actually connects islands of the Mumbai Archipelago and it was originally called Hornby Vellard after William Hornby, a Governor of Bombay for the East India Company, back in 1782?
The dome of the Haji Ali Dargah and the shikhar of the Mahalaxmi Temple just beyond it are beautifully illuminated in the early morning light. We run past the Race Course and the Haji Ali corssroads and the demon climb on to Peddar Road stares us in the face. Supporters are now out in near endless lines and several ministering angels are handing out Glucose biscuits to provide a boost of nourishment to the tiring runners. I pick a biscuit off a 4 or 5 year old who barely comes to my mid thigh. She has been hustled out of bed early on Sunday morning but is gamely joining the celebrations. The Asian Heart Institute has a tent near the Chhagan Mitha Petrol Pump that many gravitate toward  to get a quick spritz of muscle relaxant on their thighs or shins or calves or ankles or whatever else that has started to declare mutiny against the incessant pavement pounding. Remember that we are nearly at the 2 hour mark by now and many of the best amateur runners will already have crossed the finish line at VT even as mere mortals like us are plodding up the slope.
I abandon all pretence of running and switch to a walk. No point in burning out the scant reserves of stamina all in a blaze of heroic glory only to crash and burn at the top, would you agree? We crest just past Jaslok and across the road from Sterling Apartments, a motley group of 30-something ladies are making quite a lusty commotion with their police whistles. I can't help but turn to them and acknowledge my deep gratitude for being whistled at by young ladies. Adds fuel to their fire and I have cheery wolf whistles at my back as I start the run downhill to the Kemps Corner Bridge. The Sun has surely come up by now but the uninterrupted row of buildings at Peddar and Hughes (to be pronounced Huges, if you are a Mumbaikar) Roads ensure it doesn’t hassle the runners. Slight dogleg right on to Babulnath Temple Road and then the hairpin left puts us on the sweeping curve of Chowpatty and Marine Drive. We are down to the last 5 kilometres but at this stage it seems tougher than the 16 that have been accounted for. Also, the shade afforded by buildings will now last only ‘til Wilson College and then the Sun will be out to do his thing.
Every few hundred metres there’s an entertainment stage with people singing and dancing. Even the stout defenders of our seas, the Indian Navy has its band belting out a Belafonte set. I pass just as an old favourite, Jamaican Farewell is being reprised. The mind drifts back to parties of a gentler past. And while it is so engrossed, another few hundred metres melt away. The flagging spirits of runners all around me are now counting off hundred of metres and that isn’t a bad thing because it also speaks of the clenched-teeth determination to get the job done.
We take the left at Veer Nariman Road and the crowd keeps getting thicker. Also in evidence are many half Marathoners who, having finished the run are now making their way back home. Just as we turn at Flora Fountain and have less that a kilometre to go, loud sirens atop a pilot vehicle group signal the imminent arrival of the Elite Group finishers. They kicked off at 7:15. It is now about 9:25 and they have already put 41+ kilometres behind them. I stop and get on to the median to watch these perfectly toned and immaculately tuned bodies gallop past showing not the slightest strain from their massive exertions. I’ve said this before and I will repeat myself. I feel like a smoke-chugging, rattling banger of a 1980s Premier Padmini being effortlessly overtaken by a fleet of Pagani Zondas and Lamborghini Aventadors. It is a beautiful sight. If there’s nothing else that will convince you to come out and cheer the runners, think about what you are missing. The perfect human body in perfect, rhythmic motion.
Khadi Gramodyog and we are at the final 500 metres mark. The legs that have thus far held up, with only minor complaints, seem to figure out that there’s not a lot left to go and promptly decide to throw in the towel. The higher authority sitting in the brain is having a tough time keeping its recalcitrant members in order and a battle ensues. 100 metres and it seems the legs will have their way with a cramp abruptly starting to spring up in the left thigh. More gritting of teeth and a few groans, mostly drowned out by the noisome crowd and the finish gate has been reached. And crossed. The Standard Chartered Mumbai Marathon 2012 has been bested. Oh, ok, not bested, just gooded then?
All that remains to be said is it wouldn’t have been possible without your support. Really. It became a troth as soon as the first supporter committed to my cause (which happens to be Aai, my mother) and those cannot be lightly broken. Can they?
Thank you all, ever so much!  

Manoj’s Constitution Day 26 November 2023

A few years ago, Rename Sarkar took a perfectly serviceable 'National Law Day' and rechristened it 'Constitution Day'. No, d...