2011

Today is the last day of 2011! Not the most eventful year 2011 was, but I have definitely had quite a few interesting and memorable experiences this year.

The ones that have immediate and top-of-the-mind recall are the following -
1. Manfest 2011
2. IIML Placements
3. My father's bypass surgery
4. Job change

Interestingly, all in the first half of the year. The only thing in the latter half of 2011 which I would always remember is the Anna Hazare movement, because of the impact it had on my mind.

2012 is going to be interesting and eventful, as have been most of the even numbered years in my life so far. I am going to start the year with the 1st guitar class in the music school I've joined. I hope I can play the thing well by the end of 2012 or by the end of the world, whichever comes first. And I also hope to become a better swimmer in 2012. And I will certainly do many many interesting things in 2012!

Blogger app for mobile

Installed the Blogger app for Android just now. Looks pretty cool and easy to use. This post comes through it.

The app has all the features you need for a basic blog post with pictures. The text box for writing your stuff is small when you start writing, but grows as required when you type in text.

Still need to explore it deeper to figure out what's wrong with this thing. So far, everything seems pretty good!

Lokpal Bill

All of a sudden, Anna Hazare and his team seems to have lost the support and sympathy of a lot of people. Here are my views on what’s probably happening.

Common man would not have a goal so specific as having a Lokpal to check on the Governmental bodies. His interests are specific to his view of or touch points with the Government. His concerns are specifically on how he is affected by the practices prevalent in Governmental institutions. Of course, the case may be that a corruption-free government may be the only way some of people’s high priority wants would be met. For example, we all want good and adequate roads, and corruption in the whole public infrastructure space is one big reason why we don’t have them. Therefore, it is indeed good for us that our systems are clean, efficient and transparent. However, how that translates into the clauses of the Lokpal Bill, is beyond anyone of us common people. Therefore, it seems everyone is confused about what’s going on and what should replace what in the bill, and if the bill is really of any use in the first place.

But then, common man in a democracy is not the one who makes laws. He elects representatives who are supposed to be smart and wise enough to come up with the right set of rules, regulations and laws. However, a unique law like the Lokpal, whose sole purpose is to keep those elected representatives in control, cannot be framed by those representatives alone, coz there is a definite conflict of interest there. Then who would do it? That’s where a Civil Society or some such body finds its place. But the way the system is designed, making laws is the sole prerogative of the elected representatives, i.e., parliamentarians. So the civil society has to act as a pressure group. Anna Hazare’s team has been doing exactly that, and in great style until now. Their claim to represent common man is solely based on the crowds they have been able to gather. These crowds, however, bother least about the specific clauses of the bill. They generally want an end to corruption, and want to trust that Anna’s bill would do it, coz trusting the government’s version is difficult because of the conflict of interest, and Anna was able to stand out among the many who have been fighting for Lokpal. This worked till now, because the common man was happy to have someone shouting slogans standing in front, coz in a mob opposing a governmental system, everyone wants a bakra who would willingly stand in front, who is revered as long as he’s getting it right or it’s all just working somehow and is called a fool as soon as he goofs up somewhere. And Anna’s team goofed up in quite a few things through their tactics since the last fast - taking party-specific stand in elections and indulging in anti-campaigning, for example, which was really stupid and unethical. Not that people don’t trust team Anna any more or their tactics have lost appeal. It’s just that it’s not working any more. Also, and most importantly at this stage for the common man, there’s too much confusion on what’s right and what’s wrong for the future of the country. And amidst all this confusion, there arose a question mark on whether team Anna really represents the common man. After all, our parliamentarians, who are elected by masses by actually casting votes, don’t seem to really know or care what the masses want. In that situation, how can someone stand up and claim to be speaking the voice of the common man?

I believe, the tendency for corruption springs from some element of human behavior, and the economic and social context. A holistic solution to corruption should involve strong inputs from psychologists, sociologists and economists. Not just political scientists and legal experts. And not necessarily the common man. I am not sure whether the current drafts can claim to be so thoroughly analyzed. May be we should pilot 2-3 versions of the Lokpal Bill in different States and understand the pros and cons before we do a National rollout. Why don’t we do that? We have so many States, and so much scope for trial and experimentation. Why do we have to draft/pass a bill just by debate, without doing a trial run and without collecting real data to prove its effectiveness?

Note: Use of masculine gender for common man is just for the sake of simplicity, and it refers to both males and females.

Passion

Let me attempt to present my views on the question I raised in my previous article.

I was trying in my mind to define Passion, and was easily lured into defining obsession instead. But soon realized that there ought to be a difference between the two. Without getting into the trap of referring dictionaries, let me choose what I mean by passion. I would define passion as a highly intense positive feeling or emotion for an activity, which can drive a person to dedicate all his/her energies into doing it in the best possible manner and which results in happiness of the order for which one can willingly choose to die.

Such true and genuine passions are rare, mainly because our upbringing tries to make of us individuals who can handle, to an extent, most of the basic stuff required for living in this world, and anyone who does one thing to an extreme degree, ignoring everything else, is seen as an abnormal being who must be penalized for his/her behavior. So, first and foremost, this belief must change, along with the development of institutions and systems that allow an individual to focus on his passion, and have the rest taken care of. The industrial revolution was a small step towards that, and consequently, we have had more people in the west, choosing and working in fields they strongly feel for, than in the east, where countries like India have had professions decided by castes which have been largely hereditary for the past 1000 years.

That explains the various perks and facilities most companies provide to their employees in their workplaces. And the company that gets it right, can get the best out of its employees, provided its employees are also doing the work they are passionate about. For example, I heard a few years back that google ensures there's food within 8 feet from each of its employees! Not sure whether that's true, but it certainly is one such perk. And google certainly used to hire extremely talented guys those days.

However, ensuring job-fit is not what a company's HR department or Talent Managers or Technical/non-Technical managers can do best. Job-fit not only means that the company gets the best out of an individual, but also that the individual enjoys doing the job, so much that he applies his mind and creativity to do it better and then, is motivated to get to the next level in that stream. Most well-educated individuals are equally capable of doing most kinds of jobs efficiently. And they can prove their skill well if their abilities are put to test. And I don't think the world really has many jobs so complex that an average human being can't do well enough with a little training. Given all this, I believe it is always only in the hands of the individual to choose his work in his/her area of passion. The world can only offer him the environment where he/she can pursue his/her passion in the best possible way, but can never ensure that he gets the work that he does best and also enjoys doing.

Which brings us to the next element of the puzzle of passion - Choice. Besides the context of our birth, our choices largely define what we experience in life. Our upbringing and education should therefore jointly involve the right elements to give us a strong belief that we should fearlessly and rationally choose what we want to and when we want to. Of course, they should also impart the values which would govern the nature of those choices and ensure that they are not harmful to the world.

So to summarize - our institutions, social setup and systems should be such that they take care of everything else if an individual wants to do one thing alone; and our upbringing and education should make us strong enough to make our choices and stand by them.

There has to be a lot more, and I would therefore like to invite your views. Please comment.

India lacks competent mathematicians: PM

On second thoughts, I feel India lacks competent anybody in any field. We don't traditionally have a culture which promotes passion for any area. So while we develop capabilities, we don't develop competencies that are world class, although our education system does great job in imparting what is sought. If there is passion, one would never have dearth of resources, support or prospects.

So, how can we create an ecosystem that promotes passion in individuals for their areas of interest? What fundamental changes do we need to make in our society, institutions, beliefs and values?

Cricketers, stop complaning of fatigue...

It's funny these cricketers talk about fatigue. They don't even play every day. A 3-hour match twice a week, is hardly something anyone should complain about. And it's sports. They must enjoy it. Okay, that's not the right thing to say perhaps, coz enjoying a job is never possible! However, all jobs, even the ones involving heavier physical labor, are daily jobs. And most factories in India work 6 days a week, in spite of the fact that their corporate offices in big cities work only 5. And needless to say, the earning of a factory worker, as a proportion to that of a cricketer of the Indian team, is a such a small number, that it will round to zero if you consider only a couple of decimal places.

And these 30-40 year oldies don't stop playing, yet go and hurt themselves in all places. And all that despite cricket being such a dull and slow game, where a player, on an average, just stands/sits and watches for 80% of the game. Okay, I may not be accurate with that percentage, but most of the time is indeed spent just watching. It's that odd dive or ball in some odd moment that causes all the trouble for our uncles on field. And I guess that's because of not being too active the remaining time, which in some way slows down reflexes and response time. And we Indians are only good at such sports, where we have enough time to idle around, introspect, scratch at places, spit, fart and occasionally run. No wonder we have no history of any sort in football.

Who's the Culprit? DOCOMO or Android or HTC ?

Who has cheated me? I am not able to figure out.

Tata DOCOMO is my mobile service provider and I am currently using their 299 Rental Roam Free Plan. Under this plan I have 100 MB of data transfer free every month. I have been using this plan for 3 months now, and my data usage has always been below 100 MB per month, and between 2 and 8 MB per day.

An unexpected, abnormal, unpleasant and unusual thing happened day before yesterday (17^th Sept), and which I came to know of yesterday. DOCOMO reports that in a single day, my mobile sent/received 317 MB of data. And the unbilled amount on my mobile number shot up by Rs.4000. And since the credit limit allowed to my number is only Rs.1300, my outgoing calls were blocked. And blocked without a notice/warning. I called up customer service and asked them to unblock my outgoing calls, and they did in a few hours, although they first said I must pay the huge unbilled amount above my credit limit.

Neither the blocking made sense to me nor the unblocking.

Later when I came to know from my online account with DOCOMO about the humungous data transfer that happened on 17^th Sept from my number, I called up their customer care to tell them that it was total non-sense. The response I got was even more frustrating. They said they couldn’t check the details of what happened, coz the details did not show up in their view of my information. And that they could not take any complaint in that regard, coz, well, they could not take any complaint in that regard. That was ridiculous. And then, when I asked them to connect me to whoever would be the right person to talk about such things, they simply said there was no one. They asked me to wait until my next bill would be generated, on October 7^th, and then they would look into the issues with the bill. Finally, after a lot of yelling, I got an email ID where I could report the problem. I sent an email yesterday evening.

I found that the data transfer was high yesterday (18^th Sept) too, in spite of the fact that the mobile was out of service for more than half of the day. But it was indeed active for the rest of the day. Today I called them up again, and begged, that if they did not fix the problem at this stage, the bill would go on shooting up. And I can’t go on paying money till October 7^th – the next bill generation date, when each day my internet usage is Rs.3000-4000. The response I got – again the same email address. He promised a reply within 24 hours after I mail them. It is already 22 hours since I mailed. No reply so far.

Now here’s why I am not able to figure out what the actual problem is.

Android: Does not have an OOTB tool to monitor the data transfer. I could not find the details of even the total data transfer since I started using the phone. I can install an app now, but I have no way of checking whether my mobile did actually indulge in so much data exchange on 17^th Sept.

HTC: Common sense says I should only blame my OS for this and not the device. But I found that some HTC users did face this kind of huge data exchange on occasions. So is my HTC the culprit?

DOCOMO: Was there any error or mixup in DOCOMO’s records? DOCOMO will hopefully check and get back to me.

Let’s see what happens. Meanwhile, I am no more using mobile internet. And have not yet paid them any money. Waiting for them to block my outgoing calls again…

What an A$$!

An ad by Flying Machine has given Indian social activists something to kill time with…

I personally don’t find anything offensive in this ad. It just acknowledges the fact that certain things contribute to human sexiness, and we all want to look sexy. And now I feel it is actually a waste of time even to talk about it, coz Indians also have all moved on and above and beyond these small and unimportant non-issues. We just don’t care.

Modi fasts!

Modi fasts. Now speaks in Hindi. Now claims sadbhavna. Now claims religious tolerance. But I can't help seeing him like a crook coz his face is like that. Generally eyes don't lie. And Modi's eyes are those a criminal. But in a rare case, it could just be a physical characteristic, without any character level correlation.

But the progress in Gujarat that I've heard of from common people like me, is too much to ignore. Modi indeed seems to be a man of vikas, besides other things.

Given how Indian politicians act and behave, Modi seems like the better kind. He doesn't talk too much to Media. And whatever he does is somewhat more logical and to-the-point as compared to other politicians' nonsensical blabber. That may be because he's not a lawyer, like most other top politicians in the country.

Now, he may have instigated riots, and done nothing to stop them. And that is the only negative point against him, and a big one. So big, that I chose to ignore all the good things that my Gujarati friends have been telling me past 10 years about him. Not sure how much he's responsible, and how big and bad his role in the riots was. But now, I feel I can also take a stand of not having a negative opinion about the guy without any evidence and until I see any strong evidence.

With criminals all over the political class, Modi seems relatively okay now. But if he has really done a thing like causing or aggravating religious riots, he is unforgivable, and should be punished, as and when we manage to gather evidence he can't bail himself out of. Till then, let him have his chance of driving progress of the country.

Going on...

Although I came out of the accident with only a few minor scratches, I did end up with pain in hands and legs. However, it took 24 hours for the pain to show up at a significant level, which still wasn't very intense. I took advantage of the excuse and skipped swimming for two consecutive mornings. There is still some pain in the joints. I hope it won't be there when I'll wake up tomorrow morning.

The accident tore my shirt and a little bit of my bag. My clothes and bag protected me well. I didn't wear a helmet, and thankfully my head was left untouched. My bike is having a tough time these days. Last sunday I had its servicing done, along with a few costly replacements which had been long overdue. Then the accident led to a few more costly repairs. And today I found it dead in the office-parking with a tyre-puncture. Let's hope everything else is fine.

My mom slipped on wet floor today and had a bad bruise on her hand, which had to be sutured. The sutures will be removed in a week or so.

Crazy things happening out here...

Nahi Lagi :P

I had a small accident last night. I was very lucky - didn't get hurt anywhere except for minor scratches, both the mirrors of my bike are intact, and there is hardly any new screw up in me or my bike! Although my clothes and bag got messed up, I won't complain. But I am upset with the rainy slippery road and the guy who abruptly got himself and his bike into the narrow space in front of me on the road and made his way fast through the traffic, and made me apply my breaks, slip and lose control.

Thanks a lot to the guy who lifted my fallen bike as I came to it walking from 20m away where I ended up after a smooth slide on the road. Thanks also to Ashish Masson who saw me in mess from a distance and came to help me figure out what was going on and accompanied me to my home.

And lastly, thanks my kismet. The effect of shani is not so strong afterall :P

Posted via m.livejournal.com.

Back...

It's been a long time since I've made a real post on this blog. Of course there have been a few twitter feeds now and then, but those were accidental. As most posts on most blogs say, I will try to be more regular with posting on this blog now :)

A quick update - my dad had a bypass surgery in march and has recovered well, i've resigned from suzlon and will be out it on 31st May, the world seems to be going as planned towards its end in 2012, am still a happy bachelor...

I tried to play a bit with the theme of this blog, and changing it deleted the looong list of books that I had read. I wish I had preserved that list somewhere, coz now I don't remember what books I've read :(. What a waste!

My last week in Suzlon has so far been one of the most heavily loaded weeks I've had here. I hope I'll have a memorable farewell party at the end of it!

Chalo then, see you again. Do visit this blog more often now, and read whatever I write. And please comment, and all your dreams will come true. Thanks!