Wit Wisdom and Whoop

Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it. Right now, the Indian legacy business/ industry is going through exactly this – Do they take the path less travelled or stay on the same path and wait for a miracle to.   Let us step back and see the reputation of India in matters commerce. From time immemorial there is recorded and accepted information that India was a globally reputed trader, dealing in spices, silk and what-have-you across the globe. While the focus has been on commodities, high volumes, low prices, low margins and being global it is about “managing” the system and people at which we have become adept. Whatever chest-thumping we may do about having advanced technology fact is that in the recorded age India hasn’t been a technology leader. When Dr. Subhash Mukhopadhyay demonstrated the test tube baby in 1978 soon after it was done in Britain, the Indian system mocked him officially and drove him to suicide. It took a brave ethical Dr. Anand Kumar wh...

It was 1996 and Internet, which is so ubiquitous today and literally touching our life every minute of the day, was a novelty, an unknown faceless blackhole that was a wonder to most of us. I remember meeting a senior Infotech guru who showed me something called email and it was so complicated that I wondered why anyone would even want to use it. The state run VSNL, as it was then called had started this thing called internet and for those who were born around that time, I must explain how it worked. It was fascinating. Sure, after reading this you will think of Dinosaurs but that was how it was. Firstly, we used to dial up a number and after hearing a prolonged – Kiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii, Wuiiiiiiiiiiiiii, Keeee, Peeeee and such strange noises we were connected to god knows what. All we saw was a black screen. We the cattle class had what was called a Shell account while the likes of Infosys, TCS and such others had a TCP/IP account. The shell account meant that you didn’t see any grap...

A Zillion words have been written and spoken about the decision of the Modi govt to abrogate Art 370/35A, bifurcate it and downgrade Kashmir to a Union Territory. A Zillion words have been spoken and written about the many historical blunders done after that fateful day in 1947 when Raja Hari Singh signed the instrument of accession to join India, so much so that a new lexicon was coined to describe it – Himalayan Blunder. Let’s look at the situation from a different angle that does not seem to get the desired attention. What’s so special about Art 370, what has it given to the people of Kashmir and what its removal does.   And no this is not about the legalese but the emotions, feelings and matters of the heart seen through the prism of practical politics. Firstly, the India Pakistan partition was done with no other logic than religion – Muslims and non-Muslims broadly called Hindus. Historically even in 1947 the area broadly had 3 distinct demographics, geographie...

It’s easy to be wise after the event. But sometimes some things are so easy to predict that it takes a very high degree of being intellectually blind sighted to not see it. The voter has spoken and how. Congress is decimated, SP/BSP combine got thrashed and opinion makers will give you complex PhD thesis to explain this. Those that had an open mind, could see the writing on the wall as these tweets would show from April 2019. This was not luck, just an OPEN mind. Whether the opposition Congress led UPA had a chance in the first place to return to power is moot but could they have done better is an important question. The answer is yes, only if the opposition and Congress under Rahul Gandhi had strategized well. This election was not about bad strategy in hindsight, it was known as height of foolishness from day one. That no one thought it fit to tell the emperor that he had no clothes on is obvious. That they actually strutted around like peacocks, as if they were dressed lik...

As the nation heads into the election season to elect its representatives in the Lok Sabha the jury is out and divided as to who is better, who will win, who should win and all gloves are off. Journalists who are supposed to be neutral and the 4th pillar of democracy have become 5th columnists whichever viewpoint you look at them from. Some have decided to come out of the closet after having leveraged their position to promote the views of their preferred politics and contesting elections. Yet others are unapologetic about their being cheer leaders of their preferred politics. Never before in the history of this nation was there as much polarisation of political views as in the past 5 years. Never before had there been such involvement of the common every day citizen in politics. Every street corner, every chai and coffee shop, every break in the office meetings, every chance encounter in a park, mall anywhere with friends, even casual conversations with total strangers in public ar...

Disruption: The one thing that Modi can be given full marks for is the disruption that his govt caused to a long established well entrenched ecosystem. Be it throwing out over 1500 high and mighty squatters from their Delhi bungalows, demanding accountability from NGO’s, making ministries and such offices out of bounds for media etc. they stirred up every retired hornets nest. Above all the secrecy and confidentiality that must be maintained in a govt had all but disappeared. It was like a nudist colony and many who hid all facts about themselves felt that govt being nude was cool. Thank god this changed. Now nothing leaks. Bottom line is that life is no longer as before. You can argue, debate, scream and protest but life is disrupted. The famed Lutyens club is finding its foundations being shaken. Some would argue that a new Modi club is taking its place. I say that wherever there is space created something or somebody will fill it. The difference is whether it is exclusive or...