India needs to dismantle Bania-Brahmin caste system for sake of skills.

So long as Hindu society treats white collar Brahmins as the highest caste its impossible to inculcate and build world class blue collar skills among Hindus, direly needed for the economic development. Would you like to become someone who is looked down upon in society?

Government has realized that fast economic development is not possible without inculcating critical skills in the people of India. Economic growth based entirely on the capital has limited leverage on the growth . On the other hand innovations based on skills rather than the capital could have a major catalytic impact on the long term sustainable growth of economy. Skills don't follow the capital, its the other way round.

CK Prahalad & Gary Hemel introduced the concept of Core Competencies into Management literature. Michael Porter,strategy stalwart, advised many governments to persuade them to build a Competitive Advantage for their economies and companies. Though India can invite FDI for various industry but importing skilled managers with innovative creative minds is almost next to impossible due to domestic socio-economic conditions. 

Just imagine that you have a choice to become a doctor or a fashion designer, and the society you live in accords more respect to a doctor, would you prefer the later route? Besides livelihood people work hard to earn respect of society around them. Can you say I bought a Ferrari by selling contraband? People are identified by their profession and skills so skills are important part of what a person is? Isn’t it?

Presence of large number people having knowledge of English language available at low cost provided  competitive advantage to India in the BPO sector for couple of decades. China took few years to scale up their assembly & manufacturing on the basis of manual skills present in the Chinese people. Indians, Hindus particularly, on the other hand don’t seem to have any significant manual skills needed for achieving success in manufacturing space.

Another conundrum prevalent in India is presence of huge number of professionally educated youth that the India Inc find as unemployable due to lack of skills.  Who would believe that some undergraduate colleges in Delhi, don't accept students without almost 100 percent marks. How could students score such high marks? And how the teachers establish the fact that someone deserves 90 percent plus marks? Is it for real or just another mythological tale from an incredible India, the most mysterious country on the face of Earth.

In the real world a genius drops out of formal education system to blaze a trail. Steve jobs didn't like the taste of fruits served to him in college, so he left the formal system to cultivate his own Macintosh Apple.  Naturally why in the world someone with 100 percent marks in 12 the year of education be need to seek admission in some formal college? S/he could pretty much be on her/his own. But in India, innocent young people go around flashing their 'percentage prize' like a designer accessory, simultaneously, pray to god for mercy to help them get admission in a branded college. So the education in India is all about marks alone.

Though more students obtain significantly higher marks today than a decade ago but employers are complaining about poor quality of training & absence of skills in the fresh youth. How could rise in marks be indirectly proportional to skill creation in India? Govt of India has already committed itself to skill creation in India. In this direction, India signed an MOU with the US govt for setting up of community colleges in India during the recent visit of Secretary John kerry. High marks are like Himalayan peaks, very attractive but difficult to scale.

But the deluge of high marks in India is leading to more chaos on the ground than presenting a pretty picture on the canvas of economic development & industrialization of India.The absence of skills in not limited to technical & professional sector alone. India is not producing great quality managers, actors, academicians, writers, administrators and politicians.  So the education system is unable to improve on existing quality and take it to next higher level. How can India become a global power with low quality human resources?

Its time India wakes up and take steps to upgrade the quality of its citizens through formal & non-formal education. Hindus must open their hearts and minds and demolish the caste system once for all and stop that look down upon those who have world class skills. White collar brahmanism is keeping India poor and week.

How stupid, don't you know your great-grand-Dad?

North India is often riled for its penchant for flouting wealth and the family name to influence others while making a point about an individual's power & glory in the society. Don't you know who my father is? Well have you ever heard someone say,"I am not interested to know the name of your father, but do tell me who was your great-grand- father?"A two minute silence may follow.

How many people in the so called tradition bound 'Sanatan' society of India can tell the name of family beyond Dada Dadi & Nana Nani? Almost none may not be able to write a ten sentences long essay on their par-Dadda or par-Daddi ji. Do you think its inconsequential to know mambo jumbo about your family that has no bearing on the present? Come on, how can you swear to god about family values of India and still don't value the memory of your ancestors? Take a walk in any street in India to meet with many a Swamy roaming around to remind you about the Hindu DNA of your ancestors. Jokes apart, a society that forgets its past is condemned to repeat their blunders, So better be careful and take a peep into your past and carefully connect the dots backwards to know your future.

Lets get back to the present moment & dispel the disbelief about your grasp on it. How many can write the story of your parents, where were they born and how they lived before you arrived in their lives and the later period? Many can write an longer essay on cow, than her real mother. Same for the father. Therefore you need to seize the moment and sit down to write a long story of your family that you could leave behind for your great grand children. Facebook will not lead to redemption on this account. Like other SM sites, facebook has a limited life span. Therefore if you are interested to help your great grand kids to know you better then scribble all your memories on a piece of paper for the posterity.

Let me make few suggestion about how to go about this arduous task. To begin with ask your father mother to narrate their story to you, Record it. This may take more couple of sittings depending upon the journey s/he have been through. Once your have a draft story then make a plan to visit the locations associated with their past with the intent to take pics of school, university, house & jail where ever they have spent sometime. Try meet as many people as possible to dig out the other version of the incidents narrated by your parents. Such inquest may lead to better understanding of your loved ones. Finally, sit down wearing an editor's hat to create a collage that gives a near true picture of the life of your father or mother. Don't worry about the grammar so long as you paint the story in an interesting manner. 

Finally you could give no bigger gift to your parents than their own story, in form of a book, which they had forgotten in the struggle to make life better for you. Its good to know your great grand dad, and better to write the story of your mother father for the sake of their great grand kids. Some tradition excite all of us always. 

Republic of Animals !

Animals and humans share this universe but humans alone make fun of animals. Scorn, I would say, ridicule too. Have you ever seen any animal laughing at a human? Will that be behaving like us? Humans find it difficult to share things easily with its own species & almost impossible with others depending upon degree of unfamiliarity. Most animal species happily share most of the available bounty with their ilk and others. We humans extensively use animal metaphors to describe our fellow humans. The most common animal metaphor used is perhaps that of dog, cat & lion. Most of us think of themselves as a Lion and others as dogs? Let's see what's popular animal metaphors are there from the animal kingdom. Let me warn you that since its humans who run the show of civilization & creation of languages concepts etc therefore animals are still said to have been living in a kingdom and not in a republic with adult franchise.

Most countries want to become a world power more in military sense than economic. And therefore military has remained a major national asset of the nationalist people. Honey Badger reminds me of the elitist navy seals of USA or other professional killing machines part of military worldwide. Who won’t like the sweet badge of honour for killing in cold blood for enlightened-self-interest? 

Donkey has long been symbol of poor hard working classes who could never get out of the rut of feeding, sleeping, breeding revolving on the axis of relentless back braking hard labor. India is home to world’s largest population of poor people. Large numbers of people are willing to work on assurance of food alone without nay wages. You won’t be surprised that our Hindu nationalist politicians have long discovered that India is shining. The ‘secular’ politicians find India as incredible. Well India surely is an incredible country where vast majority conducts their life according to movement of planets in Sky.

Monkey is generally portrayed as an animal that resemble human race a lot depending upon its various species which is endowed with ability to learn or copy human behavior. You may have herd of folk tale of ‘Monkey & Cap Seller’ in which the trader uses Monkey’s behavior to get back his stolen merchandise from him. Well moral of the story is that those who copy for living would not win the game. A nation that discourages original thinking and promotes conformity by imitating, reengineering, technology, processes and concepts from others cannot become a world leader. It’s illogical to except that a blind follower to become leader, who will he follow?  Regimented society based on group dynamics than individual recognition has no future. It would soon be dead as a dodo.

Dogs are domesticated for their unconditional loyalty. Horse is said to be most loyal among all the animals. Can you recall a famous person who is known as Dog of X-country? Not pejoratively of course. Many people are called Lion of so & so place. Punjab my homeland has a fetish for the sobriquet of Lion of Punjab. CM of Gujarat also is called Lion of Gujarat.  United Kingdom is well known for having cats as pets. Cats are add charm to life by their presence but are not known for their loyalty.

Modern corporate media is like cats, it has no value except to add some color to the business of life & governance in a country. Media no longer resent any editorial control direct or indirect as long as it has healthy bottomline like that of a feline. Gone are the days when a book or story in media could affect amendments to constitution or force parliaments to enact new laws. These days’ cats keep playing around the house without disturbing anyone except those who are looking at them. 

Pray or else

Pray or else.....Fear should be made a criminal offence. No one should be allowed to be afraid, fear any one or any thing. It is the fear that makes the life meaningless. India had long been governed by the powerful people and institution that live by fear. Belief in God has also been linked to fear. Pray or else..? 


Let us stop being afraid of our Gods and instead love them if you like. Ask them to make things better for us Indians or leave us to our own devices. In order to progress and live happily we need to stand up and face. I been travelling 240 kms every day four days week to work. I did not die in a car crash, so why be afraid.


Old civilizations world over used to revere the Sun god. But if we examine it closely we would find that countries around the equator have not been blessed with prosperity  by the Sun god with the exception of middle east. On the contrary countries away from equator are rich, powerful & happier. Lets resolve to banish our fears.

Corruption & India

TI has ranked India at 87^th place in survey of 178 countries, almost near the middle of the pile. So in a way we are well placed as we don’t seem to be alone on an island. I often wonder why we are a corrupt country. How could a country with national tag line of ‘Satyamev Jayte’(Truth shall prevail) could happen to be corrupt? Should we not estimate the economic & social impact of corruption on us? Can we develop despite corruption amidst us and become developed country?

India is known to be deeply religious society, so could be trace the role of religion in fighting or promoting culture? The western society has begun to blame the Church for problems faced by the society, could we do the same? There is nothing new about it as Mahavir, Budh & Nanak did express such a view.  Why can’t the social & religious leaders launch a crusade against corruption? Would that be not a better temple for our pantheon of Gods in India that fighting over size of the temple?

One yoga teaching swami has become very popular of late. His success has been engineered by a vested interest group that want to promote yoga for the their social race genda than anything else. Some two decades ago Doordarshan ( Govt. owned TV Channel in India)had done so to another yoga guru who was close to the then prime minister. Swami Ramdev talks about fighting corruption, why can’t he start a micro finance venture and save millions of Indians from falling sick? Most of the MFIs are in the direct control of influential people including parliamentarians & politicians.

Corruption erodes the quality from a system. It has eroded away India’s potential to compete globally. We have become chalta hai jagaroo country. Look at our companies, most of them survive on borrowed or copied ideas, products & processes. Some of our visionary industry leaders after independence had influenced the politicians to protect them from competition so that they could survive. Look at any sector and tell where we have leadership? How could we have victory without going through the competition? Copying an idea is a form of pure corruption and most of so called Indian products like Cinema, auto, and chemicals etc are based on borrowed ideas. India needs original ideas to become a better country.

We grow up listening to chants of India being a land of culture, saints and family values. Our rivers have been given the status of God/Goddesses but no one thinks twice before polluting them. If our rivers are polluted & revered at the same time, do we take it as a sign of our way of life? Such unimaginable ambivalence? If you ask an average middleclass guy about such issues they would blame it on the lower strata of society. Indians of all economic class lack civic sense. They would not think twice to spit out from a moving vehicle or defecate at any public place. I have, you must have too, seen people bathing in rivers & other water sources that not suitable for human consumption just to please Gods. How could the Gods like unclean people?

Our social structure is based on group dynamics with family as the unit. So a large family has greater influence over the smaller one. You may find it natural? But these results in destruction of individual talent at the hands of might of family number? Our ancients text Mahabharta portrays the struggle between two families, depicting the defeat of the bigger size family and projecting individuals as Heroic. Could we learn some lessons from there and cap the corruption at the source? 

Love Thy India !

India is your country too but I am not sure if you are in love with it. Moreover there are other countries that I admire like Japan, Germany, China and USA.  I am also attracted to the people living across the border in Pakistan as they look, talk, eat, and behave more like me than those living in various other parts of India. Such thoughts are very confusing. Must I not love my own country only? Are we not duty bound to love our country? But can you love be conditional? There are several issues that need clarity before i fall in love with my India and I am listing them below in a random order.

We Indians consume buffalo milk but do not give it similar status at par with the cow? Can’t we be accused of apartheid as both the animals are useful to us but cow gets better status, is that something to with cow's color of skin? Or it could it be due to discrimination based on family system as the Ox has been used more in the cultivation over the bull? Animal lovers & Maneka Gandhi why don't you give equal status to both animals as per the merit of utility to human race.

Our democratic institutions are so robust that even when criminals manage to get elected to the parliament and state assemblies no one takes it as a threat to the just functioning of our democracy. It is possible to get elected in India even when the highest court has passed a guilty verdict on you. On the national highways you would come across several cavalcades of ministers, bureaucrats and other VIPs forcing the people into inconvenience with their deafening sound of blaring hooters and blinding flood of high beam lights. They would not follow any traffic laws that they routinely themselves approve in the august houses of parliament. Therefore once you become somebody than nobody can touch you. This freedom is possible in India alone.

Advani ji has been travelling in a luxuriously fitted truck all over India to awaken ‘Hindutva’ amongst Hindus but he chose to call it a Rath, and himself a Rathyatri. Rath is an ancient long forgotten primitive mode of transport that has no use in the modern times. There are lots of leaders and religious Swamis who could speak for eternity on what a rich and great country India was once but they would not do anything to take it forward. Ritual and symbolism dominates India and that has more value than real and practical wisdom.

There are hordes of popular swamis who claim to cure any diseases with yoga & mantra. You look at them and find that most of them are suffering from some disease themselves.  Swamis are more popular in India than scientist, doctors & professors.

Our PM generally talks about the need for creating new infrastructure for promoting higher education in India. He has never talked about the requirement of building more religious places, Deras and Satsangs. We have more properties devoted to religious/ spiritual activities than that are for education. Why can’t the government takeover such places for national development? No political party can dare say that howsoever logical this argument may be.

When will the most of Indians start respecting some rules and laws? Most Indians would not mind doing an unlawful activity provided when no one watches them. We flout every red light signal on the road as if we are driving in Pakistan and we must not follow their laws here.

When those VIPs & Swamis are treated as equals to other citizens like us we sure would start falling in love with it. How do we expect an average Indian to fall in love with India when they give it more than they take from it?