The how and when of early retirement

 https://www.deccanherald.com/supplements/dh-education/the-how-and-when-of-early-retirement-1056082.html

Theory of Random Stock Picking

Theory of Random Stock Picking Portfolio Month end Update....as mentioned earlier about the stock picking exercise. I have listed the Diwali picks of some of the leading brokerages in India. I have made a list of those stocks and then used our nursery rhyme Inki Pinki Ponki and selected 10 stocks. Equal investment of 1 lakh has been made in each of these stocks as shown in table.

I will be tracking this portfolio against the benchmark Nifty and hopefully my guess is that this portfolio by next Diwali should beat the Nifty Index...

Note - That this is just a fun exercise and not any attempt to prove anyone or anything right or wrong

The lesson so far - Just sit back and buy the nifty ....offcourse things can change very quickly in the market but for now the mid caps and most large caps are taking it on their chin with the rally restricted to a few of the index heavy weights which are driving the index up north

Democracy on the Road

Democracy on the Road

Ruchir Sharma has been one of pragmatic economic political commentators that one should follow in India considering his experience in this field.

The book is a decent read on the authors journey of tracking elections and elections campaigns across India ranging from the Hindi heartland states to the states in southern India. Some observations include the complex relationship between economic gains and political gains, welfarism and development politics from the time of Rajiv Gandhi to the Modi, anecdotes of various campaigns in UPBihar, Bihar, Tamilnadu, Karnataka, Bengal. The centre state relationship and how federalism has evolved in the last few decades make it worth reading for anyone following Indian politics and election campaigns.

Campaigns stories right from early 90s covering Chandra Babu Naidu, Mayawati to Mamta Di, Jayalalitha, Lalu Yadav etc etc have been covered in good details

What makes democracy thrive and so Much more stronger than in many other parts of the world, what role does caste, cash and candidate selection play in winning or loosing an election, cricket, Godmen, Bollywood and their love for politics, all of these and much more are written in this book.

Project Rainbow

There are hardly any sports books from India that one can read barring a few from cricket. This book particularly interested me as the topic was about professional cycling a sport that is catching up now in India and the fact that there was a book about how British cycling has reached such a dominant spot in the world made it more appealing to read.

Ideally this book is a worth while read for any sports manager or administrator as it highlights the process that British Cycling used to build such impregnable top class team across all formats of professional cycling be it the team pursuits, track cycling or even road races.

The author himself is a professional cyclist and is about this journey as a coach and what it takes to spot, build and nurture world beating team. The importance of discipline in training is some thing the author keeps stressing upon with various examples and outcomes.

The dominance of the a British cycling ever since this program was put in place is evident from the results that British cyclists have won in the various world championship and Olympics starting form the Sydney Olympics of 2000. The Grass root level talent spotting program has yielded some of the biggest names in the cycling world from team Great Britain. A good amount of information on how British Cycling became a professional unit, the races strategies used are the highlights in the book.

The likes of Mark Cavendish, Geraint Thomas, Bradley Wiggins, Chris Froome who are and were the biggest stars in the cycling world and their journey across the major cycling events be the Tour de France, Giro d'Italia etc etc and the work ethics of team Sky make it a worth while read for any sports affectionado.

Book Review - The descent of Air India

My first business chronicle of this year and what makes it interesting is that it is written by an insider who has spent almost 2 decades with the beleaguered airliner.

How Air India from being almost a monopoly with dominant market share and the preferred airlines for anyone flying out of India between the 50s to 80s became the government's biggest liability as we know of it today. What historical reasons helped it become one of the best international airlines under the leadership of JRD Tata.

What factors led to this downfall, how did the airlines cope or rather what did the airlines not do to cope with the opening up of competition post the liberalisation era.

What kind of political intervention or patronage took place at crucial junctures in the organisation, indecisiveness or lack of leadership, apathy from governments starting from the mid 90s and confused bureaucrats without any knowledge of the airline industry , incompetence from Management, frequent leadership change at the senior level, avoidable fleet expansion plans, high handedness of the employee unions, Mis-managed merger with Indian Airlines, a board of directors with hardly any powers to act on tough decisions etc etc are obviously the critical factors that led to the downfall of Air India and are written in full detail in the book.

One gets to know about the dynamics of how a Public sector unit typically works and how decision making happens. A good overview of the airline business in the 90s and early part of 2000.

Book Review - The Cult of the Amateur

A book that is almost a decade old but most of the concerns raised largely remain even to this day and I would say has increased multi fold. With the advent of Web 2.0 , Social media we have seen a unprecedented rise in the no of blogs or YouTube by amateurs on various topics ranging from sociology to Politics. The author has given the downside of this information age where unverified news by amateurs has led to a surge in fake news which eventually shape public opinions on critical topics which should ideally be handled by reputed media houses. It is unfortunate that this phenomenon has led many educated very informed internet users to fall prey to such fake news .

The likes of Wikipedia or YouTube have in one sense made information and self expression universally democratic but at the same time given rise to millions of amateur who are not trained nor are they subject matter experts take the place of trained media professionals. From media to music to news the threat of Web 2.0 with its uncontrolled growth is something the future generations will have to deal with.

A thought provoking book to understand the past and future of information age

From Average Runner to Legend of Ultra Marathons

First book of 2018 and what better than reading about Ultra Marathon legend Scott Jurek.

Strength does not done from physical capacity but comes from an indomitable will ~ Gandhi

Doesn't matter if you are a 5k runner or a want to be Ultra Marathoner this book is a must read. Scot talks about his unlikely journey from being a weekend skiing enthusiast to Ultra Marathon legend. He has included lots of tips on running form and the various plant based diets that he experimented with to help him perform and recover better after each run.

Long distance running is an extremely lonely sport and what drives professionals and amateur athletes to run such long distances ranging from 50 Kms to, 250 kms is something one should experience.

The book has lot of details of some of Scot's most famous races including the deadly Badwater ultra, the run with the Tarahumara Indians in the Copper Canyons, the Western States 100 Mile race, The Hardrock Ultra, UTMB France and the Spartathlon in Greece.

A must read book from one of the sages of long distance running.

Book Review - Aadhaar India's 12 Digit Revolution

Couldn't find a better book to read at a time when Aadhaar and the controversies surrounding it have become a daily affair. Right from data privacy to where Aadhaar can be used are debated and legislations framed on this basis.

Coming to the book it a well researched book by the author and covers the entire period from when the project was conceptualised and the key players and decision makers involved in making this project stand on its feet as of today. The Congress govt under MMS had desperately wanted Aadhaar to succeed at a time when the economy wasn't doing well and cases of corruption against the government had reached an all time high, the mood was of gloom and the state of the Government finances were in a extremely bad shape and the govt had marketed Aadhar as one of the ways to reduce corruption and ensure all benefits reach the intended beneficiaries.

The opposition on the other hand from day one weren't too convinced about this project as there were numerous attempts in the past to create a national registry but no one of them took full shape. In spite of numerous objections the Congress govt implemented Aadhar under the UIDAI and stated the national roll out in 2010.

Once the new government was in place in 2014, the same government that had opposed Aadhar had to now look at things more pragmatically and after consultation with various stake holders including the man behind it Nandan Nilekani the NDA gave Aadhar legal backing with a statutory status and ever since have backed this project.

Points to learn from this book is the kind of parliamentary procedures involved in passing and framing laws, the scale of this huge project and the no of use cases it could handle, the importance of getting the right talent be it from the private sector or within the government itself is critical in deciding the success or failure of a project.

A worthwhile read of you want to know about one of the biggest biometric citizen identification projects in the world which will be case study in the years to come.

The Men in Blue .....

From plain white coloured pants and buttoned shirts to honour the Gentlemen's game to the designer sports wear from the biggest sports apparel manufacturers of the world, this has been the journey of the dress that our Indian cricket team wears on the field.  Ever since the advent of the white ball and day night cricket it is always the colour of the jersey worn by cricketers that spectators from around the worl have got used to identify their favorite teams and players . While it was traditionally yellow for the Aussies, it was always green for Pakistan, black for the Kiwis, Maroon for the Windies and for some reason the Indian team got used to be called the Men in Blue. 

My earliest memory of the Men in Blue was from the 1985 Benson and Hedges trophy in Australia, I vividly recall a tall and lanky Ravi Shastri in his light blue T shirt and blue pants opening the innings and winning the coveted champion of champions title and an Audi car. Over the next few years the light blue was the standard jersey colour until it changed in the 1992 world cup when the team started using the dark blue  jersey , I found it strange that this T shirt also had a red and green strip on it , not really sure of the significance of these two colours. It is quite normal to have the colours of the flag of the country but this combination all though it looked good didnt have any significant reason for it to be present on the T shirt. Over the next few years as the sponsors of Team India changed so did the design of the Tshirt, from simple collared Tees to Tees with buttoned collars to open collared Tees.

The Tri colour was now common on almost all designs after the 1999 world cup which probably was the last Tee with a light blue and yellow combination.As the years passed with improvement in fabric the Tees were now made from the latest synthetic materials which we now call as the Dry Fit Tees.The last couple of years has seen a completely new shade of blue which is quite different from the light and dark blues that have been tried earlier and I find this most appealing, thanks to the efforts of the various hi profile designers who have worked with BCCI to make this not only eye catching but also very trendy. The tri colour also been juxtaposed well with the team name and logo of BCCI. 

It wouldnt be unfair to say that just as the design of the Tees have evolved so has the fortunes of the Indian cricket team over the last 2-3 decades. 

Before questioning Mallya should we also ask why not also question Air India.

This is probably the best time for the aviation industry not only in India but the world over. Almost all well managed Aircraft operators have been making profits thanks to the low crude prices for the last couple of years and the story is no different in India however there is one exception to this and the company that has not been able to become profitable in such benign conditions is the state carrier Air India. It is well known fact that Air India has been a sucker for public funds for many years and every other government has only diverted money into Air India from other key social projects just to keep the Airline floating or rather flying.

What we have witnessed in the last few months in terms of the banks going after Mallya who owes banks a sum of 9000 crs is a welcome step but going by the same logic the banks should have also gone after Air India whose combined debt runs into more than 40000 crs. Why arent the public sector banks taking this step , why arent they held accountable for the huge debt that Air India is sitting on. The close nexus between politics and the Babudom exposes this truth.

Old private air carriers like Jet and even the relatively new ones like Indigo or even Spice jet have figured out what needs to be done to remain profitable but Air India inspite of being present for decades hasnt still got the right mix . Even if Air India is closed down it will not impact the Airline industry in any way as the market share of Air India is only about 15% which can be made good by the private players.A bloated organization like Air India will continue to extract money as we have seen in the past and all the half hearted attempts to make it professional have gone down the drain.Unpaid vendors , pending bills from the Government , improper route planning are ailing problems that have now become legacy problems with the Airline.

In in current form with its networth being wiped off years back no investor will want to touch the company, the only way forward is to write off all the debt and start of on a clean state and make it favorable for private operators to invest in the company. The airline has been around for a while now and has a huge fleet with experienced staff, alliance partners across major routes and also all necessary permissions at major international airports. It is up to the Government on how they will want to capitalize on this while inviting bids from private players. It is high time Government gets out of the business of running airlines if for any strategic reason they might want to still hold a stake it should be limited to about 15-20% and the rest should be offloaded to public or private investors.

The Narendra Modi Government's recent election victories have given it a thumping majority to push forward such reforms and it is time they bite the bullet .

Made in Detroit to Make in Silicon Valley ....

To stay relevant in business means to Innovate and to Innovate means getting the right talent who can envision the future and create it. The iconic Ford Motor company yesterday announced a new CEO even before the current CEO Mark Fields could finish his term. Industry experts see this as a sign of desperation by Ford . The current CEO failed to communicate the strategy for the future and it was time the board decided to look for a change and get in someone who could deliver results sooner.

The automobile industry is going through a big phase of experimentation and a massive churn is likely to happen in the coming few years. The likes of Google, Uber and Tesla have been investing into self driving cars and electric cars. The shift would mean that the current crop of car makers like Ford or the GM, Chrysler can no longer sit back and not worry about the future of their businesses. While it is true that Ford and its likes have started investing into the self driving or electric cars the point that really needs attention is if it is enough? Do they have the right talent to drive these initiatives. On the other hand the current generation of companies who are driving these changes be it Google or Uber or Tesla or the self driving software makers have to an extent succeeded but that does not mean they will find find it easy in the future.It is still early days.

Marketplace is very dynamic and we have seen enough examples of how companies who were giants in their fields were thrown out of business in a few years by much smaller but innovative competitors. We have seen how Kodak was replaced by the digital camera and how the Walkman gave way to the I Pod or how CDs were replaced by the USB drives. All these changes happened in a span of few years. Having said that making cars is not a joke , the sheer no of components that go into making a car and the supply chain that is needed to make it fully functional is something that the traditional car companies have learnt and mastered over the years. Do their nimble footed competitors have what it takes to build factories and assembly lines of the size that a Ford or a General Motors have done throughout the world.

Only time will tell who will be the ultimate winner....

India's vision for mobility - Can India replicate the Telecom revolution for its electric cars.

The NITI Aayog's recommendation to have a deadline of 2032 for all cars to be only electric is surely a welcome sign. On the face of it I am sure it will make most of the people who work in the area of sustainable living give this a thumbs up. The recommendations to the government 

 include lower tax and interest rates on loans to buy these cars. This step will mark a key shift in a market which is the second fastest growing passenger car market for conventional cars in the world.

A similar scenario has happened in India almost a decade and half back when land line phone were still penetrating households in India and tele density was in its growth phase and the mobile revolution took over India. With the opening up of the telecommunications sector and private sector investment pouring in the sector grew phenomenally over the next decade.Call rates fell dramatically and at the end almost every other Indian had a mobile phone connection. The shift from landline phones to mobile phones was a quantum leap. Even before people could own a landline phone the mobile telecom industry was in place to ensure that every citizen could now afford a mobile phone.

Can we expect the same in the case of cars, can the shift from conventional cars to electric cars be replicated in the same way as the telecom revolution,can we avoid the mistake that developed markets in the west made of going through the entire cycle of owing conventional cars and then shifting to Hybrids before finally moving to Electric vehicles? The answer is yes but it comes with its own caveats. There are many steps that should happen for this vision to become a reality in the coming decade. Most important addressable issue is on the cost part of the battery and the charging infrastructure around it. The government must subsidize battery manufacturers to bring the cost of cars on par with regular cars. Enough charging points , standardized batteries for all cars is also something that the NITI Aayog has recommended. Incentivizing electric cars used as Taxi's with lower per kilometer charges is also another welcome step.

The commission had also planned to have a restriction by way of a lottery on the sale of conventional cars, however this does not make sense at this stage in a nascent market like India and will have a negative impact on the entire ecosystem. With limited and pathetic public transport this will be shooting oneself in the foot.

Currently India has only one electric vehicle maker which is the Mahindra group the makers of Reva. Ever since Mahindra has taken over Reva they have consistently been investing in technology to make the car better on all aspects. There has been talks of Tesla the American EV giant also wanting to enter India, the company in its latest press release denied that they will not want to enter India anytime soon as there were some restrictions in terms of percentage of local components sourcing. Any such conditions should be sorted out on a case to case basis and competition should be encouraged to come and invest in India. This will not just ensure that the consumer gets the latest technology but also competition ensures that the best practices in the industry are shared by all manufacturers. In an industry which is still get its feet on the ground this is the need of the hour.

The target to go fully electric by 2032 is a bold one but surely not one that cannot be achieved !!

A genius called George....

Maradona Good...Pele Better....but George Best

For most kids of the 70s and 80s growing up watching football our heroes were the two Latino giants, Pele and Maradona and I was no different. It was only a few years back that I accidentally while changing channels on TV came across this program on a player named George Best. It was for about half an hour and the documentary was about the life what they described as probably the greatest footballer ever and that made me curious to start reading and watching videos about George Best and over a the next few weeks I was also of the same opinion that George was easily one of the best the football world ever saw.

Best was an Irish Born footballer who played professional football for Northern Ireland and made his debut for Manchester United at the age of 17. It is said that the a talent scout when he spotted George at the young age of 15 immediately sent a telegram to the Manchester United coach Matt Busby saying " I think I've found you a genius " and he was right. Pele called him the greatest player in the world. Maradona said that both of them were very much alike when it came to creating magic on the field. Much before the Ronaldos and the Beckhams , George was the first superstar in the world of football.

His remarkable ball control and dribbling skills left the opposition spell bound.When he turned up to play for Manchester United the entire stadium would be on their feet chanting the name of George. Best was also part of the United Trinity at Old Trafford comprising of George Best, Dennis Law and Bobby Charlton. The same United trinity who helped ManU win the first European cup in the year 1968. A statue of the three has been erected outside the Old Trafford to honour them.

George had everything going for him at such an young age he had fame , money and anything else that he wanted. Women and fast cars were now his constant companions of the field. Addicted to drinking almost everyday , the high life of work hard party hard had now started to take a toll on this phenomenally talented youngster from Belfast. George could neither give up football nor the late night drinking and partying.The long hair like the hippies, the side burns made women droll over him and at some stage George was as popular as any of the Rockstars of those days the Beatles or the Rolling Stone. His prime came at a time when youngsters were still hoping to play for their country or a club like ManU and his decline also came at time when other youngsters in the club were hitting their prime. Unable to manage all this and work with the new players who came into the team George quit ManU at a age of 27 , he did play for 10 more years after that but was never the Best again. Success had become his biggest enemy , the same success that he could not handle had let him down.

Alcoholism took over his life and eventually he died due to liver complications in the year 2005.His life was glorious and his end was tragic. His final words from his hospital bed were:"Don't die like me." George will not be remembered for how he walked into oblivion and died but will be remembered for the way he played this beautiful game , at a time when football players were treated like any other players George attained the status of Football's first Superstar.

Journey from " Trespassers will be Recruited to Pink Slips " the story of Indian IT.

The last few days have seen IT services majors from India announcing major lay offs anywhere from a 1000 upto 10000 to be shown the pink slip in the coming few months. The major reason they attribute is restrictions on H1B visas in their biggest market the United States. Some of them even announced that would hire local staff from the United states which in many ways would align with what President Trump wanted to do to get back jobs to America. The IT services scene in India was anyway getting way too competitive with pressure from other low cost countries who could do the same job at a lower cost and now we have the H1B problem to live with. Was this expected ? I would say yes ,anyone who understands business cycles will agree that no country in the world will be able to maintain its competitive edge forever and in today's globalized world with constant pressure on corporations to cut cost these cycles tend to be even more shorter.

The IT boom which started in India somewhere in the mid 90S primarily grew as a cost arbitrage business model to provide IT services to the biggest corporations in the US. The TATAs were amongst the first to start this global delivery model which was also replicated by other IT biggies like Wipro, HCL, Infosys and many other mid tier companies. A shot in the arm came in the form of the Y2K problem and the industry did what it took to ensure that the majority of the work outsourced was done from India. Most companies used the Y2K boom to prove their worth and get a bigger slice of the IT services pie. A lot of investment was done to aquire staff, new demand for office space was growing briskly across all major IT hubs of Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad and Noida. NASSCOM had predicted a revenue of 50 billion by 2008 was pretty much on track. To add to it we also had the BPO and the call center industry contributing to job creation and in turn demand for other services created by these employees. Everything was on a roll, campus recruitment which was once limited to only the Tier 1 cities was business as usual in almost every engineering college across the country. It had reached a point where some people joked that IT companies that visited campuses with a tagline of " Trespassers will be recruited ".

Promotions, onsite opportunities,developer forums to attend were common jargon for most IT professionals. Would the party last forever was a question most people never asked or never bothered to reflect on. Youngsters just out of college with a job on hand were the envy of the outside world.The consumption boom that got created was very obvious in the unplanned way that cities like Bengaluru, Chennai, Gurugram etc etc grew. This obviously put a lot of pressure on the physical infrastructure of these places.

While all of this was happening very few gave a thought on what next, am I really skilled enough to handle the uncertain ways of the job market. It was not as if Trump created this problem. In any industry that believes in the principles of free market it is common to expect jobs to move to places where it the cheapest with reasonable quality. Some of East European countries saw this as an opportunity and started competing with Indian firms and the market got a lot more competitive. The famed global delivery model was cracking and if anyone smart enough would have noticed it when we saw major India IT companies reporting lower margins and slower year on year growth. The writing was getting clear , pull up your socks now.

Is it the end of IT , I am certain that it is an overstatement but yes it may surely be the end of the cost arbitrage model that we were offering. There is still enough of opportunities to grow. Technology is such a dynamic changing phenomenon that it is impossible to say that it is the end . With never technologies coming in, the advent of social media, big data, mobile technology and huge domestic market to cater to Indian firms still have a lot of it going their way. Will the managements of these firms re-engineer their business model and cater to the new demands, will they motivate their employees to reskill themselves , will they position themselves to the corporations in west as partners who offer value rather than just vendors....if the answer is Yes then we have nothing to worry about till the turn of the next business cycle.

What next in the fight against black money

The fight against back money is a long drawn battle and each step will progressively help if not in totally eliminating black money but at least reducing the avenues that generate black money. By black money our definition in this case is money on which tax is not paid.

There are many steps taken so far like appointment of Special Investigation Team , Voluntary Disclosure of income scheme and the latest being demonetization. All of them may not have yielded the desired outcomes but have in a sense indicated the positive bias of the government to take decisions instead of leaving things as status quo. The next steps needed to further curb generation of black money should be more radical.

First and foremost the government must consider doing is to legalize betting. It is common knowledge that be it cricket betting or football betting or even betting on outcomes of certain events the amount of money that changes hands in cash runs into a few thousand crores. Countries like UK have legalized betting for a long time now and have established legal bookmakers who take bets on various sporting encounters , football being the most popular one. A similar system can be implemented here in India as well. Once betting is legalized it not only brings back a lot of this unaccounted cash into the system but also helps the government in collecting tax from betting operators. A case to support this horse race betting which is legal and is prevalent for a long time. If the numbers are to be noted the Karnataka government earns about 150-200 crores annually from the horse racing authorities in Bengaluru. With the popularity of cricket I am sure the money flowing into legal betting channels will be much more and so will the tax collected and all of this will not only add to the kitty of the government but will also remove the hassles for punters to bet with some shady unknown operators.

The second radical move to curb black money generation is to ensure that all agriculturists also start filling their returns. The NITI Ayog has suggested that they will want the government to start taxing all farmers but considering the current situation and the state of our farmers most of whom are marginal this does not seem to be a viable option. It should not come as a surprise that many people have misused this loophole of zero tax on farm income and hence have used to convert the money generated from other means into white money by showing it as farm income. It is a known problem and nothing has been done to stop this, a small but radical step to change this is to make it mandatory for all farmers to file their income tax returns. At least by this measure the tax authorities can question these so called farmers on their source of funds.

Will the government bite the bullet and take these radical steps is something only time can tell ....

What ails Indian Football

The headlines read that twiterratti celebrates Indian football teams FIFA ranking reaching a 21 year high of being in the top 100 among all FIFA nations. Something to cheer about? Yes, considering that at one point we were ranked somewhere below 130 and many times lower than countries which many of us wouldn't have even heard of.

What ails Indian football, why is that we are so lowly ranked in the world. We have some of the largest fan bases in the world. The English Premier League or the Bundesliga or the Copa America has probably more crazy fans in India than in their own home counties. I can see almost every pub or lounge bar on the weekend playing live matches of the EPL with crowds of youngsters throwing comments and strategies on what Paul Pogba should do next or why Vincent Kompany is the best Manchester City has had in a long while or why Jose Mourinho can never become the next Sir Alex Fergusson. The same exuberance is displayed once in four years when the FIFA world cup is held. All though India would have failed to qualify to the finals much before the elimination round the interest shown by Indian football fans in tracking the performances of other teams is simply amazing.

After all this one would certainly expect a country with such a vibrant football support base to be atleast highly ranked in Asia but is not the case. To add to it the Indian soccer league between teams named after regions and cities of India has bought a lot of interest to the game. But a point is what is that ails Indian football while we can claim glory in cricket even though not many countries play cricket as compared to football and we are quite successful when it comes to hockey why is our performance is below par in football. The answer could lie in the fact that how many of us actually play football, how many of us would encourage our children to take up this game on serious level. Professional football is a muscular sport requiring extreme levels of training and fitness coupled with a disciplined training regime, do we have enough staff to coach the new generation of players. Baring a few States like Kerala, Goa, West Bengal and North East India most of the other states hardly have any talent to showcase.

Probably the answer to the question 'What ails Indian Football?' is we just don't need a few players from handful of states to play the game, the game will grow when all of us get out of the house onto the field and start playing it in our own little way and not just watch it on television.

Who Took my Red Beacon Away

I recall reading an article a few years back of a politician who said that the biggest kick one gets by becoming an elected representative was the power that accompanies the post . The power to walk your way through a queue in a temple or bypass voters waiting in a queue on election day or having a separate entry at airports or having the top cops salute you as you get out of your car or just having a government car with  red beacon on top of it. Yes a read beacon which when switched on in traffic makes everyone on the road to move and give you way, a red beacon which ensures that the traffic cops shout at anyone on the road that obstructs your way and send a signal that a VIP is on his way.

The move my the union governments and a few state governments to have red beacons removed on all government vehicles is certainly a welcome step in the right direction. For decades many from the political and bureaucratic class had misused these privileges which we had unknowingly acknowledged as their right. A privilege which on many occasions was abused to a point which left a bad taste amongst the millions of honest tax payers of our country. In a hierarchical society like ours such rules are pretty common, these rules are not only discriminative but are outdated and should have removed long back. Except for the Prime Minister,President and the Chief Justice of India I feel no one should be given this privilege. Now that the order has been passed many from the political class who have been pampered for years will find it uncomfortable for a while and will resist this change giving the usual excuse of time wasted in traffic jams which in the process leads to loss of productive time forgetting that the  common man faces these issues on a daily basis. They will try to persuade and seek exemptions from the authorities on theirs should be treated as a special cases and they should be allowed to use the red beacon. They will seek workarounds and possibly ask for a convoy or some may even start using a green or blue beacon by suggesting that the law states only a red beacon is not allowed. 

It is up to the authorities to strictly resist any temptation and fearlessly do their duty as such small steps will slowly add up in changing the culture of politics in India. Such small steps will go a long way in sending the message that the common man is frustrated and angry with the abuse of power and privileges by the political and bureaucratic class that he has now lost his patience.

The main question however remains is who will blink first the implementing authorities or the Neta.

Book Review - Panama Fever

A thrilling tale of exploration, conquest, glory, money, politics and medicine.What amazed me most about the book is the amount of information the author has collected from multiple sources while putting together this epic story in the form of a book. The smallest of incidents that happened more than a century back are all well documented and archived in multiple sources. The book is about the epic story of building one of the greatest engineering marvels of the modern era the Panama canal. For centuries kings,business leaders and explorers were constantly looking at ways to connect this small passage across the Isthmus of Panama which in turn would connect the Atlantic Ocean with the Pacific
and whoever controlled this canal would get enough power and influence over global trade and in turn a control on the fate of nations.The effort was literally back breaking and took almost 35 years before it was finally commissioned in the year 1914.

The French initially led the effort to build the Canal in the year 1881 and the man incharge was the Ferdinand De Lesseps the same genius who had build the Suez canal
a few years back. The ambitious project took America and Europe by storm and drew everyone's attention including engineers, drafstmen,diggers, machinists all
wanted to be a part of this project and take advantage of the high wages and in turn be amongst the men who were part of his high profile project. Politicians and businessmen from Europe and America were constantly involved in high stakes diplomacy and in deciding the path to be taken, the technology to be used, the funding plan and where to get cheap labor from. While most of the administrative and engineering jobs were led by the French the construction jobs were invariably from close by West Indian colony of Jamaica.

Unfortunately the French effort to build the canal didnt last for long and after about 14 years they had to give up due to many reasons the most important being cost overruns and thousands of deaths of workmen in the tropical climate of Panama due to Yellow fever , Malaria and Typhoid. Thousands of people lost their lives due to these diseases and many returned to their countries never to come back to work in these horrific condition.

After a decade or so the effort was again revived and this time the Americans took the lead and were backed by the US Government itself. Extremely committed and highly decorated Engineers were now sent to Panama to get the work back on track. In spite of poor living conditions in the humid tropical climate and racial discrimination against the West Indian black workforce the project managed to go on as per schedule. At the later part the US army was also involved in the construction work. Eventually after 10 year from the time the Americans started the work and more than 20000 people loosing their lives due to diseases and accidents in the site the canal was finally commissioned in the year 1914.

The story shows how a small strip of land in a small Central american country suddenly changed the world and made it smaller and launched the era of American Engineering dominance. The Americas were separated by the canal but the world of global trade just became one.

Book Review - The Ocean of Churn

This book covers much more than what the title suggests, all though a lot of research has gone into building the narrative at times the sequence of events and timeliness get a bit confusing for a novice reader on history. Nevertheless a good read to know more about various civilisations that ruled the world, maritime and trade history of the world, the colonial era and the impact of the industrial revolution in trade.

Aspects of formation of continents and land masses , the life of Man in the ice age to the bronze age and finally the iron age are covered well in the first few chapters.

The role of the Indian Ocean in facilitating trade between Europe empires and south East Asian powers including the Greek, roman and later on the turks is something which many of us wouldn't be aware of. The Arab merchants who frequently visited India and how they set up their trading bases in south India and later on Yemen, Oman and Africa are worth knowing. Not many of us would be aware that India also contributed immensely to global trade and would see merchants from mainland India travel as far as Kenya, Oman, East Africa, Iran, Iraq in search of new business opportunities. No wonder that even to this day we can find of people of Indian origin in many of these independent countries.

The south Indian empire of Cholas had a big role to play when it came to exploit trading opportunities in south East Asia and they used their military conquest to spread their empire upto Indonesia which was then followed by business expansion by private merchants.

The post mid 15th century started the new era of European intervention to control trade in the Indian Ocean right from mainland China to south East Asia and upto East Africa. The Arabs who had dominated this route were not very comfortable with this and how all the colonial powers including the British, French, Dutch etc used trading as an opportunity to slowly grow their empire is explained in detail. The major wars, treaties between the colonial powers and the native powers in India, south East Asia and sequence of events that lead to their domination and eventual decline post world war two are aptly examined in depth.

The Indian Ocean trade routes have shaped history and will continue to remain the most important trading route in the world as it touches Asia, Africa and Europe partly and with the growing influence of China and India it will only get bigger .

A good read to know history and the little facts that somewhere are lost in this information age.

Book Review - Veerappan Chasing the Brigand

There was something mysterious about why it took so many years and so many lives to capture Veerappan. Afterall he was once a small time bandit who was into poaching of elephants and later became one of the most wanted fugitives in India. Once you finish the book you will understand the complexities that were involved in bringing this operation to a successful end.

The book written by Vijay Kumar(IPS) Head of Special Task Force Tamilnadu who one of the chief architects behind the final operation " Operation Coccon" that eliminated Veerappan gives a very detailed account of what happened in the numerous encounters conducted by STF in both Karnataka and Tamilnadu. The saga of more than 15 years saw Veerapan become the most wanted bandit in India.

A lot of details of the encounters, strategies used by the STF make it a gripping read, the various tactics used by the police and counter tactics used by Veerappan to hoodwink the police give the reader an idea of what goes on in the minds of the police and the various challenges faced in a complex terrain like the MM Hills from where Veerappan operated. The kidnapping of Dr Rajkumar and sequence of events that followed are explained in detailed, the complex network of police informers and how they are cultivated is something most of us wouldnt be aware of and is worth appreciating the hard work put in the both the police from KA and TN.

Meticulously researched with lot of examples on some ground rules that police us while conducting operations, counter insurgency operations, examples from other countries prove that the author knows the subject well.

Someone wanting to read a thriller should read this book.

Book Review - Out of my Comfort Zone

Steve 'Tugga' Waugh or Iceman Steve as he was popularly known never had the talent of a Tendulkar or the Charisma of Shane Warne nor was he intimidating on the field like McGrath nor was he as flamboyant as Jayasuriya but if you look into what he has achieved in his nearly 20 years of cricket you will easily acknowledge Steve as one of the greatest to have played the game, his sheer grit, discipline and never say die attitude is something cricket fans will speak for generations. This book is quite detailed I would say really detailed and is spread over 700 pages but still worth a look for anybody having interest not only in cricket but in general about sports leadership and management.

The initial parts of the book is from Steve’s younger days in school and local school cricket which I was not very interested in, the interesting part starts from his journey into the Australian team lead by Alan Border , his initial failures and successes , rapport he shared with some of his senior team mates from New South Wales and how they helped him gel into the national team , various anecdotes from his cricketing tours in the Subcontinent , the Ashes and the West Indies make it interesting to read.

I can only imagine what it means to win the Ashes for the Aussies or the English only after reading this book, the intensity in which the Ashes are played seem to be much more than a typical India VS Pakistan match. Many epic test matches and incidents over the 80S , 90s and 00S take you back down memory lane, most notable amongst them are the 1986 Chennai test against India which ended in a tie, the 1995 Trinidad and Tobago test against the windies and the famous face off he had with Ambrose, the Eden Gardens test against India which saw the heroic innings from VVS and Dravid, the 2003 Adelaide test which again saw VVS and Dravid get the better of the Aussies and the infamous incident involving McGrath and Sarwan.

Steve has also shared some memorable moments in the book, insights into Australian Cricket culture, the loneliness of being a captain, the highs and lows associated with the success and failures of your team, winning the prestigious Laureus award , playing the Ashes, the Frank Worrell Trophy ( version of Ashes aginst the Windies), his association with Udayan a NGO based out of Kolkatta and his love for India ( initially it was love to hate ), his first meeting with Mother Teresa , the bribing and match fixing controversies that rocked the cricketing world which involved senior layers from India, Pakistan , Australia and South Africa. The resurrection of Australian cricket under John Buchanan and Waugh himself is something worth going through, it offers lots of life lessons, be it on team play, strategy, planning fitness and discipline something that the previous generation of Aussie cricketers had not taken very seriously.

Some nice little superstitions which cricketers follow, Steve himself had this red handkerchief which he always carried with him while playing right from the days he started playing for Australia in mid 80s till the day he retired, he was so particular about it that in one of Ashes tour in England he had forgotten it back home and was going through a rough patch on the field, he immediately asked for this hankie to be couriered to him to England.

Steve hasn’t been very generous in his praise about other cricketers especially non Australians but the few that he has praised include our own Maestro Sachin ( for his talent and cricketing mind) , Dravid for his professionalism and perseverance( btw the foreword to this book has been written by Dravid and both of them have huge respect for each other ), Sehwag for his dare devil style of playing , Wasim Akram for his sheer bowling ability, Hansie Cronje, Ambrose, Walsh, Alan Donald ,Waqar, Imran, Muralidaharan and Lara .

BTW a quick fact Waugh made his test debut against India and also played his last test against India maybe that’s why his special love for India.

If you want to know the life story of an inspiring sportsman and what it takes to become one, do read this book.

Book Review - The Marwaris From Jagat Seth to the Birlas

Very few books have been written on Indian Business history but these series of books edited by Gurucharan Das make up for it. The book primarily deals with what factors have led to make the Marwaris extremely successful businessmen not only in India but also outside of India.

A good amount of information about where these Marwari businessmen came from, how they migrated across different parts of India and set up businesses is covered in the book. A lot of comparison between the family firms set up by Marwaris and the Jewish family firms (mainly into money lending) is presented, the manner in which these small firms scaled up from money lending to becoming leading Industrialists in pre and post-independence Era is explained in detail. Marwari is a generic term which refers to the business community who were predominantly from the Marwar region in Western Rajasthan, they were typically Agarwals or Jains. It is interesting to note that most of these Marwari firms were not only into money lending to the peasants but also the preferred business partner for the smaller kings and also the East India Company when the British came into India to set up their trading business in India.

Most of the Marwaris migrated towards the Eastern part of India and set up their trading firms in and around Calcutta, Assam and to an extent Bihar also, while some of them ventured towards Bombay but it was usually the Parsee and the Gujarathi businessmen who dominated the trading empires in Bombay.
Over the period of 19th century many of these family firms had graduated from just money lending, to private banks to becoming dealers for various multinational products from Europe and this set the stage for the MNCs to enter India post-Independence.

The reader get a good overall picture of what fundamental traits the Marwaris have to make them so successful in the field of business. The most important of them being a good accounting method (Parta as it is called), ability to allocate capital in the most efficient and productive way and form a good network within their own community to help each other in times of distress. What initially started of just Opium and cotton textiles trading over the years has now seen Marwari firms into various industries be it old economy or the new age business. As the fundamentals of business management haven’t changed much the family firms have changed and adapted to the new paradigms of business.
Case in example is of the Birla group which has been extensively covered by the Author and also taken input from the book Business Maharajas by business historians Swati Piramal. The challenges faced in today’s complex business world be it about succession planning, corporate culture etc etc is something the new generation of Marwari firms have to deal with. The GD Birla group seems to have got their act together by appointing professionals to run the company but the family still monitors it on a regular basis and also involved in key decisions, something that other first generation non business group will have to learn from.

A good book for anyone interested in knowing Indian Business history and the rise of Marwari businesses in particular.

Book Review - Tigers of the Snow

Anybody interested in the history of mountaineering in the Himalayas should read this book, the author Jonathan Neale has done lot of ground research, conducted interviews with former climbers mostly from Europe and off course last but not the least the Sherpas. The book is written to present to the readers an unbiased account of what happened in the early years of climbing the various peaks in the Himalayan range between the 1920s and 50s. There is enough literature which have written about the experiences of the climbers from Europe and America but nothing has been written from the perspective of the Sherpas who are the most important people in any expedition. The book attempts to give the Sherpas also called as the “Tigers of the Snow”their due share of credit which has mostly been eluding them for a long time.

The early part of the 1920s saw many expeditions led by various European nations all of them trying to conquer the big peaks in the Himalayan range which were mainly the Everest , K2, Kanchenjunga, Annapurna and Nanga Parbhat. A good amount of information of the Sherpas ( Tibetans who migrated into Nepal and India) and their life style and what made them the people of choice to assist and ferry goods in expeditions are given in details. Most of the expeditions preferred these mountain men as they were physically suited to this altitude more than the others, their strength and Iron will to survive in high altitudes was something that made them the first choice compared to any other clans who were also ready to do the job of a porter (ferrying goods from camp to camp along the mountain). Needless to say in spite of their huge contribution to the expedition they were still treated like second grade citizens, the Europeans particularly the Germans and the Brits. Things however started to change somewhere in the mid 30s after a series of setback to many expeditions most important among them was the expeditions to Nanga Parbat ( the naked mountain , the ninth highest peak in the world and considered more deadly to climb then the Everest) .

The Germans after many attempts to scale Nanga Parbat planned another one in 1934 with almost 20 Sherpas as part of the troop , things looked comfortable but as the days progressed the captain of the troop realized there were running out of time and money , there was tremendous pressure way back at home with Adolf Hitler personally monitoring the progress of this expedition, there was some sort of political rivalry between the British and Germans in who would scale the peaks in the Himalayas first and make their country proud, in this whole rush a series of fatal mistake by the captain led to death of all but three from the troop of about 30 people which included German climbers supported by the Sherpas.

Similar setbacks happened in the expeditions to K2, Kanchenjunga and Everest leaving the Sherpa community with not just loss of lives but also confidence and the fact they were not treated as equals when it came to sharing equipment, sharing tents and compensation for the job done added insult to the injury. Things slowly started to change for the good with the Sherpas taking more control of the happenings during the expedition, they were more proactive in giving warning signs, setting up tents and handling the Logistics during the climb. Initially this probably led to lot of friction especially amongst some of the European climbers but it slowly started to change and quite of few of them started getting the recognition they deserved.

A good amount of details about high altitude, the need for acclimatization, the finer details and technicalities of mountaineering, frostbites and its dangers and avalanches are covered and make you nervous about how these people did what they did about 80-90 years back, numerous lives were lost because of high altitude sickness, frostbites but that never stopped people from trying again year after year until the summit was finally conquered.

Surprisingly all major peaks were conquered between 1953-1956 including the most feared of them the Nanga Parbat and the mighty Everest .A good amount of information that went into the conquest of Everest in the 1953 is given, the planning that went into it, the thought process of the captain of the expedition John Hunt and his strategy for the final assault are worth knowing, as per plan the captain had made two teams the first was of two Englishmen and the second was as Edmund Hillary the New Zealander and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay , Hunt being an Englishman wanted someone from England to reach the summit first and make this event coincide with the coronation of Queen Elizabeth which was to happen in the coming week but somehow due to bad weather they couldn’t carry on and the chance to ascent was now given to Hillary and Tenzing.

Finally On that event full day of May 29th 1953 the two men scaled the mighty Everest and stood and could see into Tibet, they shook hands, Tenzing hugged Hillary and they patted each other. The mighty Everest had taken many lives but was finally conquered, both of them took pictures with their Ice Axes and flags of Britain, Nepal, India and the United Nations. When they came down everybody asked which of the two men on the rope had first got to the Summit, Tenzing and Hillary agreed between them not to answer this question, It dint matter , they said, they had done it together and the fact remains that Hillary wouldn’t be there without Tenzing and Tenzing wouldn't be there without Hillary.

Book Review - Infinite Vision

Book Review - Infinite Vision
How Aravind became the world's greatest business case for compassion
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I had heard a lot about Aravind Eye Care Hospital (Madurai) but never knew about what their contribution to Eye care in India and the world was until I saw this book and decided to buy and read it.

The authors have done a fantastic job to not only introduce us to the now very popular Aravind model of Eye care ( Low cost , high volume and high value model) but also described in detail of how this whole model evolved over a period of more than 3 decades.

The model which its founder Dr Govindappa Venkataswamy started ( in the late 70s in Madurai) works on the main principles of Integrating innovation with empathy, business principles with service and outer transformation with inner change. At a time of his life after retiring from active Govt service Dr V ( as he was popularly known in the medical circles) decided to start of this 11 bed eye care nursing home in Madurai , the underlying spirit of service was at the core of this project. Realizing that this low cost model for the poor would not take him to far to achieve his mission of curing avoidable blindness, Dr V then used the cross subsidy model where in patients who want to pay can pay an amount their choice , patients who could pay market rates paid it and poor patients who could not afford it were treated free . This model has succeeded and survived for the last many decades and is still going strong at Aravind Eye care till this date.

The whole philosophy of this venture was to reach out to maximum no of poor people and cure avoidable blindness (cataract) and not to turn away anyone who cannot afford treatment. Dr V and his team ( many of whom were his family members ) have successfully used assembly line operation methods even in hospital management which has helped them provide affordable eye care at a fraction of the cost compared to other hospitals in India and the west. A laser like focus on cost, standardized processes, metrics and feedback have helped Aravind to cut cost of an typical cataract surgery and also hugely impacted productivity , a typical doctor at Aravind does about 2000 cataract surgeries a year while the national average is about 400.

The spotlight on Aravind and how it has managed to scale this socially committed business operation to multiple cities across Tamilnadu and build the largest eye care hospital chain is worth understanding.

Dr V who had been influenced a lot by Sri Aurobindo ( hospital named after him Aravind is another name for Aurobindo ) his constant questioning about life and its purpose and all his teaching seem to be the corner stone while this organization was being built.

To get some statistics Aravind in all its centers put together see 7500 patients daily, does about 900 eye surgeries daily ( cataract glaucoma etc etc) 5-6 out reach camps in village are done daily , 500-600 tele-medicine cases daily, 7000 Intraocular lenses produced at their lens manufacturing facility daily.

Aravind’s journey from an eye care hospital to a manufcaturer of Intraocular lenses to Ophthalmology medicines and a few Ophthalmology equipment and opening of Aravind Training institute ( trains doctors and other hospitals to help them learn and implement Aravind model in their country ) is well documented . Aravind till this day trains doctors, nurses and support staff from various countries in Africa and Asia, they learn about the Aravind model and how to replicate the same back home.

All this has bought them a lot of praise some of which are the Padma Shri for its founder Dr Govindappa Venkataswamy numerous awards and grants from leading social impact funds and organizations like Acumen, Skool, Schwab and Gates Foundation. Innumerable no of business schools have included this case study in their MBA programs including the most famous of them Harvard.

Succession planning, scalability model like in any organization is a challenge and Aravind is no different, what started of as business based on compassion today's stands at the crossroads with the new generation facing the dilemma of the road ahead. With increasing competition w and growing materialism the generation now at the helm face this challenge on how to retain the founding principles when this institute was started.

An excellent read, not only to understand the challenges faced in delivery of low cost eye care but also understand and reflect upon why businesses need to be more compassionate in their outlook.