Life-my perspective

Hunters' Tavern: Gamification vs Gaming in Recruitment

2013-01-16T19:51:00.001-08:00

Hunters' Tavern: Gamification vs Gaming in Recruitment: I have been speaking to few HR Managers in the last few days about Gaming and Gamification in Recruitment. There is an interesting debate g...

Hunters' Tavern: Announcing PHP developer hunt

2012-11-16T21:50:00.001-08:00

Hunters' Tavern: Announcing PHP developer hunt: We are announcing PHP developer hunt this Sunday. PHP hunt : FirangiBhai and Bluegape are hiring PHP geeks through this hunt. Bluegape ...

Hunters' Tavern: Business Analyst hunt - an analysis

2012-11-14T22:50:00.001-08:00

Hunters' Tavern: Business Analyst hunt - an analysis: We spent a lot of time designing questions for Business Analyst hunt. We hope the questions were tricky and interesting. Most questions w...

Indian cinema - the road ahead

2011-09-07T09:22:00.001-07:00

Recently I watched Mankatha-the 50th ajith (popularly known as thala in South-India) movie. Though the movie was watchable, I couldn't digest the theme of the movie where the villain is shown in positive light. The movie was more about justifying the act of two corrupt police officers.

The people throng the theaters whenever a superstar actor movie releases, (be it a negative theme based movie). It is the responsibility of the directors (and producers) to make movies that produce positive energy in the society. Movies have been influential to the behavior of the people in our society. The release of Rang de basanthi (RDB) was followed by public becoming more about corruption. In a way today's anti corruption strike led by hazare owes a lot to RDB.
But today directors, in the name of exploring new themes are making movies like Mankatha which might influence people to commit crimes.

Looking back at Tamil Cinema history, I would say that, Tamil cinema has evolved a lot technologically, but in terms of story, characterization and picturization the quality has come down.
Just look at the kind of movies that are made today. Most movies have a standard theme where the hero has supernatural abilities, the heroine has no role to play and ya there is an item number.... Come bollywood, the movies there add a few raunchy sex scenes. Where is the cinema industry heading?

60's and 70's was the era of classical movies, where lot of emphasis was given to character. Even our demi-god rajnikanth ACTED in the movie 16 vayathinile. We have seen more classic like Edhiroli, Karnan, Apporva ragangal, avargal, mahakavi kalidas etc...oh ya rajni can act!! :)

80's and 90's was the of age of offbeat theme based movies..we had the best of directors in this age..from KB to maniratnam, P Vasu, Bharathi raja to name a few...:) and they gave us excellent movies...remember anjali? i will shed couple of tears even today if i watch that movie! apart from that we had guna, thever magan, chinna gounder, duet kadalan etc to name a few...this period also coincided with kamal shifting to acting versatile characters and rajni doing more superhero roles..

The quality of movies begin to steadily deteriorate in the 2000's..Even Rajni acted in a hopeless movie - 'baba'..we are still having the steady flow of characterless, emotionless and logic-less movies of actor vijay..
but still i feel tamil cinema industry was fairly much better when compared to bollywood or tollywood..even though vijay's movie was logic-less it never promoted any wrongdoing. he would fight the wrong/evil with the help of his supernatural abilities like jumping from one movint train to another, jumping from 100+ feet in the air without any support system etc. We can forgive vijay for that.

but mankatha has opened the pandora's box. now tamil cinema directors will start making 'A' rated porn movies, they wont mind making movies where wrong doing is justified..we would soon see movies like the dirty picture, dellybelly made in tamil.

This is not good for a society like ours where fans blindly follow what their stars do. I wouldn't be surprised if tomorrow some ajith's fan commits a crime and justifies his crime by pointing fingers at mankatha.

Inspite of this I haven't lost hope. We still have a handful of quality directors like maniratnam, shankar, kamalhasan etc. The rest have to just refocus their views and make films with moral responsibilty.

Book review - the lost symbol by Dan Brown

2011-09-01T00:31:00.000-07:00

Having read all of Dan brown's books I couldn't help but compare the lost symbol with his previous books. As in all his books, the novel happens in short time and there are more then one plot which come together at the climax. From the intriguing angels and demons and da vince code, this book is a little disappointing. nevertheless, for all dan brown's book readers, the lost symbol is an enjoyable read.
This the third brown book involving Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon. This book is set in Washington DC and the roles are derived from freemasonry.

Though the book was not as fast paced as the da vince code, the plot here was more believable and realistic. The main antagonist poses as an atheist and the characters try to convince him to have faith and belief in a supreme power.
The reference to Neotic science is a fun read but brown could have given more details about it. Apart from the interpretation of what Hell might be like when Mal'akh dies, there's no Indiana Jones Holy Grail excitement going on here.

Coming to the plot, the novel starts very well. The buildup about the secret - the Freemasons keep and national security crisis forces the readers to keep one hand on the book!! The buildup to find the lost symbol brings along many new aspects connecting science and spirituality. The plot is good until the climax, where he refers to the bible as the 'the lost symbol'. For someone with brown's caliber we can expect a better ending. It is like brown wrote this book with a movie in mind.

Finally saying that the lost symbol is the bible (for a christian, vedas for hindus, quran for Muslims etc) was diluting all the buildup. There are some more loose ends in the book. Was it the bible that the masons were protecting? it is available everywhere! What about the staircase that is going down the earth? cant langdon figure out that he is actually climbing up the stairs?
Barring these mistakes (in the climax), the lost symbol is a nice read. It is typical brown style book. racy, energetic with lot of puzzles to understand and solve. Also inclusion of Neotic science in the book has made every made question his spirituality.

Finally, if you planning to visit washington, read this book and explore the places mentioned in the book (I will if I visit washington DC :) )
For all brown fans it is a must read!! It is an entertaining novel but definitely not the best of Dan Brown’s work.

For the cause of "poor" bribe taker

2011-08-24T09:45:00.000-07:00

All of us criticize the "bribe taker". Let it be the local traffic constable, or any government servant in any government organization. But we never look at what causes them to take bribe. ( I am only trying to justify the position of low level bribe takers in a government organization, many of whom I have come across being "forced bribe takers"). Bribes in lower level of bureaucracy can be best explained by the trickle down effect of corruption!!!

In one of my previous blogs, I had mentioned about the apathy of a traffic police constable and the terrible life he is being forced to live in. In this post, I am trying to extrapolate and generalize this concept, i.e. the plight of any ordinary government employee who earns an average of less then 30,000rs/month.

At this age, cost of everything right from education, to daily rations, travel etc have become so high that the lower class and middle class have found it virtually impossible to bridge the gap between expenditure and income. India has become a living model of how the government policies can be designed in such a way that rich get rich and poor get poorer.

Coming back to the core point of this blog, why does some officer take bribe? Simple, because he has to take it. He cant get decent food, he cant get his kids educated in good schools or colleges and ya he cant provide his family a decent place to live in. In order to bridge this gap between expenditure and income he is forced to take a bribe.

I will like to give the example of a real life incident (that does not involve a government employee). Once I had taken an auto-rickshaw from Chennai CMBT (main bus stand) to my home in chrompet (roughly 20KMs away from CMBT). Over the coarse of journey I had a chat with the auto-driver about how life is getting tough for normal middle class people and what the government did (or does) for making the condition better. He begin telling me about his personal life experiences and how he is fighting to get his three kids educated so that atleast they can have a better life then his. He was forced to give "capitation fees" to get his kids admitted in private schools. Just hearing at his plight made me realize how much of a comfortable life I am living in.
Though this auto-driver (or any auto driver) charged me extra for the ride. This is an indirect form of bribe. But again he is forced to charge me extra. If he had some help from the government, he would have charged me right!

Imagine a situation when cost of petrol is as low as 10rs per liter!!! Ya, it can be a possible if the government brings back all the black money!!, and it makes better use of the gas in KG basin(There is a separate scam involving KG basin and Ambanis, which is set to explode in the next few days). They would be able to provide enough subsidy to the poor people (like the auto-rickshaw driver). Petrol cost is one thing that affects the life of majority of the people in this country. Right from the vegetable vendor, autoricksaw guys to any ordinary citizen of this country.

Why cant the government bring in effective policies to control effective distribution of PDS of foodgrains? Why is the opposition silent on it? The answer is straight forward. All the political parties and its members get their monthly money (read it as 'salary') from this theft!! Why cant the government do something about it? If we had effective PDS, the bribe taker need not take bribe. They need not go to the local ration shop to buy foodgrains at highly inflated rates.

The bribe taker at the lower level is taking money which indirectly reaches the people in the higher level of bureaucracy! And therefore rich get richer and poor get poorer.

Chennai - a tribute to its people

2011-08-22T07:54:00.000-07:00

It was around this time of the year in 2004, I moved to chennai. I always thought I was a north indian and would never fit among chennai people. But things changed as soon as I joined high school, all my fears evaporated. People here are very accommodating. Initially, I had to overcome the pressure due to my average performance in my 10th board exams, and coming to chennai was like blessing in disguise....Chennai helped me to adapt, helped me to perform better academically and ya taught me more the most important lesson in life - " the significance of hard-work" !!

The people of this city give lot of importance to traditions and its values. Almost all my classmates in school would visit the temple daily. It does not mean that they are less fashionable, neither are they averse to modern technology.
Chennai today has got a lot many new hotels with varying cuisine. But people still love to eat idlis in murugan idli shop, panipuri in gangothri, sweets in anandhabhavan and ya ofcourse gheeroast in saravana bhavan! :)
The people of this city are aware of whats happening around them. For example, If you talk to anyone who is supporting anna hazare and his campaign against the corruption, you would realize that Chennai people know what they are protesting against. They are aware of the weak points in the government's version of lokpal and why anna hazare's janlokpal thou being "draconian" is better off.
Many of my northi friends say chennai lacks a night life. And therefore does not qualify as a modern city. They go the extent of saying that chennai is modern village!
But chennai begs to differ. People here do not enjoy night life. Nights are meant for sleeping and chennai people beg to differ from the rest! And this is the beauty of chennai.
People here love what they get. A very hot day does not deter people from going to beach, and come rain people enjoy that too:)
Another important aspect of chennai is "affordable housing". Chennai can today claim to be among the most developed cities in India. But still you can find houses at reasonable rent. You can earn 20K/month, live a good life and still save up half the salary. the same is not possible in bangalore or mumbai!

The temples, the silsarees, the beaches, the shopping malls, the hotels, mahabalipuram, the flower sellers, Tnagar, pongal, diwali....all make chennai what it is!!!And now chennai people have adopted themself to start loving the automobile and IT companies too....

Happy birthday Chennai! May the spirit of Chennai live forever!

The power or social media

2011-08-21T12:28:00.000-07:00

The various social media sites have had a tremendous impact on how news reaches the people in this world. Even till a decade back, a government would survive even if there was a massive disconnect between what he promises and what he delivers. But now there is a vehicle to connect information and people. In recent months we have seen protesters take on the government by organized street rallies, sign online petitions and reach out to more people. Social media sites like twitter and facebook has made information reach people faster and more accurately.

Social media as such by its design promotes democracy! It presents the government and its leaders with challenges, challenges where they have to constantly live upto their promise! There are a couple of instances where I have seen people, ya, ordinary people take up social media to reach out to the needy.

During the recent mumbai blasts (13/7), large number of people not only offered others a free ride home but also provided them with accommodation for the night stay! people used #google docs, #twitter and #facebook to reach out the needy. Injured people who needed blood were able to connect to possible donors and when the phone lines were dead, people used twitter to communicate their safety to their relatives.

The present uprising of the people of India against corruption and the inefficiency of the government in tackling corruption has also been vastly helped by social media sites. People were able to communicate about fasting sites to large number of people. My own parents took part in a candle light march in marina beach after coming to know about it via a twitter! such has been the reach...

Even in corporate level, social media sites have come to their rescue during difficult times. Most of us would have seen the youtube video showing two disgruntled employees contaminating the food they were about to deliver..it become a rage then..It was a nightmarish week for the company. dominos fired back via youtube and twitter...they uploaded their own video what they were doing to fix the situation..this way they could connect directly to their customers..dominos were able to come out unscathed from this potentially catastrophic event..such is the power of social media..

spencers plaza - a trip back in memory lane

2011-08-20T08:35:00.000-07:00

Spencers plaza the past

Spencers plaza is one the largest shopping malls in south asia. Situated in the heart of chennai, this shopping malls has a collection of top foreign brands as well as indian brands. With centralized A/C this place used to be the most important hang-out spots in chennai.
It is (was) one stop shopping mall in chennai where People from all classes (rich, middle and poor) can buy something and everything. With Satyam cinemas close by, most people would follow up a movie in satyam cinemas with a visit to Spencers..

Spencers was a hanging spot for me right from high-school days. If we decided to hang out, the first place that comes to our mind was spencers plaza. It had a little for everyone.
When it comes to food, It was an one stop place where we can taste variety of cuisine.Right from the pani-puri shop located at the entrance of the food court, to pizza corner that used to follow that and the cookie man; spencers would be able to feed people from all walks of life.

We had the historic Landmark book shop. It was a one stop place for latest books, music cds,kids-toys, movie cds etc...
In Spencers we also used to get a variety of gadgets ranging from Chinese gadgets like music stereos to FM players to the latest sony cameras and latest leather footwear..

After a little bit of google search I found out that Spencers plaza has its own history..read this, an article in hindu newspaper about the history of spencers. Spencers plaza was Chennai's first departmental store in 1895. In 1984, a fire broke out and it was reconstructed subsequently as spencers plaza.

Spencers plaza the present

Today I visited spencers with many of my old friends. I was totally shocked to find spencers plaza empty. All the shops from third floor have been removed! ya, the place that had food court is gone!
The whole of the third floor has been converted to a parkng space! There is no landmark, no cookie shop too...:( The new food court opened in the third phase, second floor has only a handful of eateries! With hardly 10 people in the food court, the whole place looked deserted!

I am really saddened to see the current state of affairs in spencers;, that too in a city like chennai, where people give lot of importance to historic things. Spencers had long been the heartbeat in chennai and now it is reduced to nothing more then a museum. I hope spencers plaza fights through this period of uncertainty and reclaims its position of the best shopping plaza in chennai!!

Annagiri- the new phenomena part2: middle class

2011-08-19T21:10:00.000-07:00

It is a fairly straight forward question..why is the middle class supporting anna hazare? why are people from different religion, caste etc come together to support anna hazare? The reason is fairly simple... outburst of frustration caused mainly due to the virtual absence of any governing body in the country..
Indian middle class is the largest contributors to the Tax paid to the government. They do not have an option of not paying taxes, it is directly cut from their salary...and in return what do they get? even basic amenities like clean and hygienic water, smooth roads, public transportation are not provided by the government...I am not against the government using tax-payers money for the benefit of the poor, but at-least provide the middle class with these basic amenities..ya, you lay roads every year, but come one rain, the roads are all gone..what is left is stone and soil..and we have to face the agony of travelling in poor roads all winter...there is also the added hazard of stagnant water and its related diseases. But the government is not bothered about all this..
The poor have been poor all their life. The government policies are aimed at short term benefits. be it NREGA or any other scheme, they are meant to provide the villagers some form of employment. The money they earn is only sufficient for rozha khana...And in effect the poor are dependent on the government all their life..

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There is another aspect of the Indian youth that I would like to highlight here..

why this sudden momentum? were things fine 5 years ago? was there no large scale corruption before? remember JP Narayanan + Indira Gandhi + Corruption = Emergency..?? remember Bofers..Corruption has been a phenomenon throughout 60 odd years of independence....2G, CWG etc are just additions to the list...
The answer lies in the IT revolution...till a decade back, middle class indians are mainly employed in government firms like railways, incometax, PSUs, banks etc..that is the educated people of this country were mainly dependent of the government for its salary..but the last 10-12 years have seen large number of education youth work in private industries...
anna hazare is just a phenomenon that people could connect with..the people of this country do not only want to fight corruption or black money etc.. The people also want better infrastructure, better roads, better transportation, better healthcare facilities etc..It is a fight for their basic rights...
Dont be surprised if you see more such anna hazare's and protest in the future...

Annagiri- the new phenomena

2011-08-17T02:33:00.000-07:00

I have been following the annahazare protest and its the buildup for the past two days. And definitely it is not anymore an anna fast! Just look at the crowds that have come out on the streets in different parts of the country, it is clear that the people of this country are frustrated with the no-action policy of the government.

These protests makes me ask a simple question? Is it only corruption that this protest is about? Is it only the fight to gain our democratic rights that the protest is about? It is definitely much larger then that...Looking at the way the government has responded to the various scams that have been committed in the last two decades, people's anger has been growing!! Let it be 2G, CWG, Adarsh or the yet to come out Krishna-Godavari gas scam the government's response is to save the guilty.
People are frustrated with politicians in general. The politicians are looting people in all levels. It starts from captation fees that we have to pay for our kids to get admitted in pre-schools to get a seat. Ya in chennai the captatition fees for prekg varies is 40K-120K. And guess what many politicians, film-stars have started their own schools. If we do not want to pay any such illegal bribes we need to get our kids admitted to government schools. All of us know the quality of education we have in these government schools.
the next level is in college..May it be medicine, engineering, arts, science etc, most of the private colleges are owned directly or indirectly by politicians. My cousin scored 1138/1200 and 199/200 in PCB and still couldn't land a seat in any medical college in tamil nadu. In SRCC, Delhi this year the cut off was 300/300..ya, a phenomenal 100%..Till two years back we had 6IITs, 7IIMs, 17 NITs..now this number has doubled..but a little bit scanning the net, you will realize most of these new colleges do not even have a campus....what can people do? how can a common middle class family bear such fees...this is why people are forced to take bribes..
a traffic policeman in chennai has to stand in hot sun all day 365 days a year..and how much do they get paid..a paltry 25K/Month..how can he get his son/daughter educated? It does not make sense..he is forced to take bribe to pay the bribe and fees....I am not justifying this traffic police, but what other way does he have?
Today If some IAS officer wants to maintain law and order in his/her constituency, he has to directly confront the local politicians....for anyone who is following what is happening in madurai, tamilnadu for the last 5 years he will understand what I am trying to say here..

The way forward is much more then lokpal..the whole political class needs to change...I am not a great fan of rahul gandhi, but still I would like to see him take up leadership roles in the present government..the next step would be to ruthlessly punish the corrupted culprits...scams like 2G, CWG etc needs to be investigated by fast track courts and the guilty should be punished asap...even the scams of the past like bofers scam should be investigated..thou this may lead to some top names go behind bars, but ya this will also bring back faith in the political class...here in the present opposition needs to wake up..they cant continue playing politics with the issue of lokpal..they should have their views made public...

Perhaps in the interest of democracy things should change as soon as possible..

I would like to finish with the argument that it is no more about anna hazare..but it is about the people of india adopting annagiri....jai hind...mera bharat mahan...

FDI, an intro

2011-05-08T09:41:00.000-07:00

I have been reading quite a about stocks, FDI etc in the last month.
Here is a small intro on Foreign Direct Investment(FDI).

The world has come of age after globalization. People with money are exploring new coutries with large market and exploitable workforce.
In todays world, FDI is very essential for the growth of the economy. Coutries like India, China etc are competing with each other for FDIs. Infact many policies are framed by developing coutries to attract more FDI

Definition
To put it crudely, FDI is the investment made in businesses outside the investors economy. A parent foreign enterprise teams up with a foreign affliate, which together form a multinational cooperation. FDI is permitted through joint ventures, technical collaborations etc. For example, Bharthi (ya, the airtel company) and Wal mart have teamup to form Bharti Walmart Pvt. Ltd. and have already opened up stores across india.
The advantage with FDI is that it is non-debt creating and non-volatile. The returns depend on the performance of the projects.
FDI is not allowed in all sectors. Generally most countries wouldn't prefer to have FDI for Arms, Nuclear energy and other sensitive sectors.

An Introduction to Mutual funds.

2011-04-22T09:23:00.000-07:00

My interest in mutual funds started right from my college days. I could never participate in d discussions wid my friends when ths topic came..this led me to learn about mutual funds.

What is mutual funds?

Its an investment collected from a pool of investors. The money collected from investors are invested in diversified tradings to minimize 'risk'. It is a financial intercessor that allows investors to pool their money for a predetermined investment objective.

How does it help?
Generally the middle class is very risk averse when it comes to investing in stocks. This is due to the inherent fear of markets crashing and therefore loosing out all the money. Its very obvious that every boom is followed by a 'crash'. When 'overpriced' stocks in market 'correct' their value it leads to fall.therefore people may lose their investment.
this is where mutual funds come into play. An AMC (Asset Management Company) pools money from investors and invests them on behalf of the investors..This money is invested in various asset classes like equity, bonds, debentures, government securities etc.

Key aspects of Mutual Funds

The most important aspect of safety in mutual funds is 'diversification'. The money invested by investors in invested across different types of investment. When one investment goes down, another might come up. This reduces risk considerably..

The advantage here for the investor is that he/she need not invest a large amount of money. They also can invest on a monthly basis. Even a small amount that is invested is diversified in various forms of investment and as a result, there is more safety.

Types of mutual funds and risks associated with it.

Equity fund: Since the returns are directly related to the performance of the company it is a 'high risk' mutual fund investment. But again if we invest in trusted firms like TCS, Hindustan motors etc, the risk is much lower.

Diversified funds: Invests in companies spread across sectors. Risk is less as if one sector fails others are still productive.

Tax Saver fund: Offers tax benefits.

Gilt fund: safety is my priority if i were to invest here. Primarily government funds.

Sector fund: Investing in equity shares in a particular industry.

Hedge fund: very high risk funds that adopts highly speculative trading strategies. Though very risky, if the company performs well you will hit the jackpot! :)

Debt/Income fund: Investment in bonds, debentures, government secutities etc. Provides regular income. Less risky.

Balanced fund: a balance in both equities as well as fixed income based investments. main aim here is to have a stable income as well as capatilizing on high returs (but risky) equities.

Liquid fund: as the name suggests, it aims to provide easy liquidity. investment is generally done short term.

Nowdays all banks have mutual funds departmnet, therefore it would be a good idea to split your savings between mutual funds and recurring deposits. This will ensure higher value for your savings.. :)

I am back :)

2010-12-31T07:44:00.000-08:00

Its been a while since i wrote my last blog..i have been preparing for various mba exams in india and as a result dint find much time:(
but in this same time period, many changes has happened in indians. with larger then life scams i am not really sure what is there in stock for india in the future.

I have been acting against my parents wishes by not going for a masters in US or Europe. There used to be a feeling in me that I have to be among the set of people who should stay back in India and do something for it, its people. But now I have my doubts. It is worth staying in this country? Could I or people like me really do anything?Will this system allow me to do anything? Or should i pack my bags and leave this country for a more peaceful life and thereby keep my parents happy. I see my parents, both government employees, the difficulties they have faced in their jobplace and tend to agree to what they say. i.e. leave this country.

I seriously hope, the government and opposition both at the national level as well as state level mend their ways and bring in the necessary reforms..

India vs China

2010-09-04T11:31:00.000-07:00

Can India ever overtake china? can India ever feel all of its billion population? can India make nalanda university an MIT?

Before answering any of these I would like to highlight some of the factors i have considered for comparison!!

Infrastructure!!
Some of the buildings/railway networks that china has built over the years made the world stand up and notice. For example let us take the Tibet-china superfast express ( Qinghai Tibet Train aka the Lhasa Express), In certain parts in this networ, the tracks have been laid over ICE. ya I mean actual ICE!!! It works fine in winter, but summer?? chinese government, keep the ICE in the full length of the railway network frozon! This is the first of its kind, hundreds of kms of ICE kept frozon for almost 4-5 months every year!! Another example I am giving here is the the new buses chinese are planning to introduce by the end of 2011. The buses will be running like trams, 20-22ft above the ground, the two legs of the train being in the two ends of the road!!ya!! and cars can will run underneath this!! this sounds like some scene in James bond movie to me!! But chinese will do this as early as 2011.
Where India stands in comparison? roads that are literally washed away by the first monsoon, power shortage even in major cities like mumbai, bangalore, kolkotta, chennai, hydrabad etc (I am purposely not including Delhi here!! CWG effect :( ), In most of these cities metros are being built right now, there will be atleast a 1000 cases in the court for staying the construction of the metro!! 90% of the railway network in India were laid by the Britishers in 1920s!! post independence, all the expansion work of the rail network was stopped!! Can we boast of any engineering marvel in India?? and for heavens sake please dont tell Taj mahal or any other monument!!

Corruption!!

the punishment that china gives to corrupt officials is death!! India, years in court!! most of the politicians in India would be having accounts in Swiss bank!! They have cini-houses, tv channels etc!!most of the police fellows in India are corrupt!! I need not give any more information on this, we have living examples like the bhopal gas tragedy, boffors scam etc which have stood the test of time, and has not punished a single officer!!

Politics
This has been the only setback in India, most of you may argue that chinese setup may not stand the test of time, but Indian democratic setup will outperform all our competitors on a long run!! my only question is 'really??'

Despite all these, and all our politicians, Myself, being a patriotic citizen of India, believe that there is a way forward, India has the likes of tatas, birlas ambanis and agarwals(vedeanta). I beg the indian government not to bring in politics in between to make these people consider other countries as thier possible future destinations. With three major avoidable incidents in the last decade(Singur and the most recent one of Orissa and Cairn Energy). We have got the best private workforce in the world. These workforce will take India to the next level, perhaps India can be a better country if it becomes a capitalist economy.

India may never overtake china, but India can always try to follow the chinese model. Many of its policies can be studied and implemented in our system. Instead of spending crores in research, India can start adopting some of these strategies and apply in our economy.
The rest can be left to the Indians!! they will take better care :)

The true face of Nehru

2010-08-25T09:22:00.000-07:00

Offlate there are lot of political issues that is bothering me as an Indian. Perhaps the most painful one is the kashmir issue. So I wanted to do some background check on why and how did this problem arise!!
In 1946, i.e. before india got independence, congress wanted to elect a president for its party. At that time, there were 16 states in India, out of which 13 states voted for Sardar Vallabhai patel. But gandhi wanted Nehru to be the congress leader for some reason. Patel being a true patriot and a staunch follower of gandhi request of him not being the first prime minister. Now here I am not sure why gandhi did this. Instead Nehru was made the president of congress then. This i would say was the darkest phase of any congress government.
Then once India got independence, nehru was automatically made the first prime minister of India.
Why patel should have been a the first prime minister??? Patel as home minister Patel merged all parts of India under federal control but Jammu and Kashmir was left out because of Nehru.
When the British mission proposed 2 plans 4 transfer of power, there ware considerable opposition within the Congress to both. The plan of 16May 1946 proposed a loose federation wid extensive provincial autonomy, and the 'grouping' of provinces based on religious-majority. The plan of 16 June 1946 proposed the partition of India on religious lines, with over 600 princely states free to choose between independence or accession to either dominion. The League approved both plans, while the Congress flatly rejected the 16 June proposal. Gandhi criticized the 16 May proposal as being inherently divisive, but Patel, realizing that rejecting the proposal would mean that only the League would be invited to form a government, lobbied the Congress Working Committee hard to give its assent to the 16 May proposal. Patel engaged the British envoys Sir Stafford Cripps and Lord Pethick-Lawrence and obtained an assurance that the "grouping" clause would not be given practical force, Patel convinced Nehru, Rajendra Prasad and Rajagopalachari to accept the plan!!
There is one famous incident that happened during this merger of states. At that time the nizam of hydrabad wanted to an independent state. So when negotiations were going on, Nizam threatened patel with the lives of over 2million hindus staying in hydrabad. In reply, patelji coolly said, 'Its ok if you dont merge with India, but I am worried about the crores of muslims who live in other parts of India. If hydrabad doesn't merge with India, I dont guarantee any of their lives!!' This was the statement by the home minister!!
Why was kashmir left alone?
We had Nehru as our prime minister then!!! Nehru was a Kashmiri and he thought he was better suited to handle the Kashmir issue. He thus took the ill fated step of dealing with this problem himself and did not allow the IRON MAN, Patel, the home minister to deal witd it. Kashmir was a complicated issue and nehru was not smart enough to deal with it.
The Maharaja of Kashmir Hari Singh, who decided he wanted to remain independent. It is difficult to imagine why Nehru did not move decisively at that time.

Pakistan was then encouraging the tribal warriors from the North West to attack Kashmir. The raiders made an advance into the province. Gilgit was taken over and the Maharajas troops were all annihilated. Still Nehru did not wake up(sleeping in the mountain with?? ) and waited on the advice of Mountbatten, for the instrument of accession duly signed by the Kashmir ruler. It cannot be understood what kept Nehru from ordering the Indian Army into Kashmir at this critical juncture, when the raiders were advancing into the valley.
The tribal's reached Baramulla and occupied it. They soon however continued their advance on Srinagar. Still Nehru dutifully waited for the instrument of accession. How nice it would have been if Nehru had followed the dictum 'offense is the best form of defense 'and sent in the Indian army when the tribal's had just begun their advance into Kashmir. But being naive and having no idea of the politics of power he just waited and waited. The Pakistan aided tribal's reached Srinagar and that's the time the Maharaja panicked and signed the instrument of accession. In hind sight history will judge Nehru for his biggest blunder here. His failure to react to a fluid military situation and excessive reliance on the advice of Mountbatten resulted in vast tracts of the valley being occupied by the raiders and irretrievably lost forever. It was only when Srinagar airfield was almost occupied that the green signal was given to the Indian army to move in.

Nehru however was an intellectual and had no stomach for any prolonged war. The Army pushed the raiders back and in about 6 months of fighting cleared the valley of the invaders who were aided and abetted by the Pakistan army. The Indian general staff then made plans to advance into western Kashmir, but Nehru again committed a fatal blunder. He stemmed the tide of the Indian army and agreed for a cease fire and reference to the United Nations. It's difficult to understand what prompted Nehru to do this. Perhaps the facts will come out later, but there is no doubt that he was greatly influenced by Lord Mount batten and his family.

The blunders of Nehru did not cease there, but he made another commitment that was to hang around the neck of subsequent Indian governments that followed. He promised a plebiscite in the valley at a suitable time .In a state where religion is the by word and the two nation theory accepted by the Hindu and Muslim leaders, a plebiscite can never go in India's favor.

Nehru thus laid d seeds of a perpetual conflict. I always wish that the clock can be put back and Nehru had intervened when the raiders had just entered the valley. Perhaps his mind did not accept that power politics is all about military power. Rosy ideas and philosophy cannot replace the power of a nation which rests on military might. He blundered and tied the Indian nation to a perpetual problem in Kashmir. In hind sight his listening to the advice of Mountbatten and waiting for the instrument of accession to be signed, his acceptance of a cease fire and reference to the United Nations coupled with the offer of a plebiscite, will show him forever as a man who never understood the game of power politics. History may judge Nehru harshly for these blunders.
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This is what the nehrus and gandhis have done to India!! There are some unanswered questions that questions how mahatma was gandhi actually? like for example, why did gandhi want nehru to be congress president even though 13 of the 16 states voted for patel? Why dint gandhi intervene when nehru was playing around with kashmir? Was gandhi competeting for attention with patel? As someone truely said, patel was the true mahatma of India.

Thanks to wiki!! I got most part of this story from there

The GAM days

2010-08-14T21:22:00.000-07:00

I had joined SANDI in the first week of June. Though i was very tired or organizing events and wanted a break, GAM was too big to be ignored. I saw another opportunity to learn new ways to organize events.
So the day i landed up in bangalore, thanks to Ankit Shah ( my batchmate in NITT), i got in touch with organizers of GAM. From then on it was mere application of what i learned in Pragyan. Soon Mradul joined me :).
GAM was very different from Pragyan or Festember or Nittfest. Here most of the work was outsourced, we were involved only with generating ideas, it was a difficult model for me to work in, i was used to do lot of work in my college, but here we did only quality work, I am waiting for the day when Pragyan will also be able to adopt this model :)
Rajan, Ganapathy, Madhur, Mrinal, Vibhu, Mahesh etc reminded me the like of Anand, kaushik, greg and co, the people who were my role models in my college. These people have been very active in keeping the NITT flag flying!!
I wanted some sort of reunion with my guys from college, perhaps GAM was a place where all of us can work one last time with each other. Shyam Ram and Vijaykumar also joined the OC team of GAM. But then we badly missed abhi, sura, raggit, venky, pambu and nami :(. They would have added up to all the fun we had in GAM.

Second year in NITT

2010-07-30T10:07:00.000-07:00

its been due for few days now. Finally got some time to write this.

My first year in Nitt was nothing less then a rajnikant movie, second year proved to be even more challenging to me. From the day when i entered Nitt my only aim was to make sure that every soul in NITT knows me by name, I dont know whether it was good or bad, but i wanted to be like that.
I had gone for trip to badrinath and kedarnath so i joined college a week late. I started my second year with very high hopes. I had opted for chemical engineering perhaps thinking that, it will be more practical then Mechanical and Instrumentation Engineering. Only now did i realise that chemical was a very boring course and to make things worse we dint get the best of facultites in Nitt to teach us. :( My frustration with chemical engineering led me to quit as the class rep. I wanted to be as away as possible from the dept :(
But this opened up a new challenge for me. I wanted to do something different in college. I dint want to end up being yet another studnet passing out of Nitt!! Thanks to the boring chemical engineering my focus shifted to extra curricular activities in my college.
I had worked for Nittfest '07 ( intra collegiete cultural festival of NITT) in my first year. I had befriended many seniors in that process. The likes of Anand, Kaushik, JK, Patwa etc were role models to me. They were the perfectionist in my college. These were the people because of which Nitt life was not boring. I enjoyed their company and made sure that i spent as much time with them as possible.
Also before i forget, i would also like to mention about my days in Diamond hostel. I was staying in room number 50!! second floor in diamond. For everyone who stayed in diamond second floor, i am sure it would have been the best years of their collge life. For me, it was a big difference. My close group of friends, abhi, shyam, pam, ram, kums, dawals. sura, venky, puna, sab etc all lived in second floor (pls note that there were only 5 rooms in second floor and three huge balconies!!). This is where my group formed. I will forever be indebted to diamond!!
It was a year of learning different things for me. I had quit studies. Thanks to likes of rachit and sab, i would pass in my exams. My focus shifted to organizing fests in college. Together our group become THE organizing in our batch. My second year was probably the second fasted year in my life( fasted being my final year).
Festember 08 was a sort of eye opener for me. Till then i really dint understand the amount of effort that goes behind organizing a fest. That too in a government college like Nitt where the faculties are against anything new. There were so many teams, subteams etc. There were so many meeting happening in differnt places of the campus. No one person can keep track of whats happening. With a budget that runs into few millions, this was an event of very high standerds!! I am sure Just understanding how fests like festember, pragyan etc work will surely make any big organization learn a lesson or two about management!!
It was time for me to dream big. I consulted many seniors, many friends, faculties i knew etc and finally i stood for the election for the post of VP of students union of NITT. My good friends helped me make an election agenda, we printed posters, spoke to different people etc. All this was new to me. But i liked it. I along with my friends went door to door, spoke to all the people in my batch. We dint know many ppl's names, but we would speak to them as thou we were friends for years!!
I would both like to thank and apologies to my organizing team friends. Thou we worked as a group, all the time there was any work the senior would call me. If he wanted to thank us, he would call me. I would try my best to make sure that the credit goes to the right guy but many a time it never would. But my friends never complained!! I dont know why, i felt bad many a times but these things were unavoidable!! again sorry abhi shyam dawals pam kums venky and co!!
Soon the day of election came. We were desperate. we dint want only to win, we wanted to win by a big margin!! the election started at 5 in the evening. I would like to pay tribute to my friends here, you knw why. here is the reason. The election was held in SJB. A good 200-300mts from both beryl and jade. There were many lazy people who dint wantt come for voting. My frinds would go room by room, cycle them to the election arena and drop them back!!!! ya, people these people did this!! There was no compulsion for them to do this. I did not ask them to do it, but they DID!!!
The election got over and it was the time of counting. I had won!! it was a movement of joy for all of us. Abhi and shyam were in pragyan marketing interview then!! pam dawals were waiting for me outside SJB. they were the first people i talked to!!
This is where it all begins!!

I will be back with my blog about my third and fourth year in the very near future.
Sorry i couldn't include pics.

CFD, what is the potential!!!

2010-07-08T19:41:00.001-07:00

Applications of CFD

CFD is the abbreviation of computational fluid dynamics. A google search of CFD and you will realise that it is nothing but a tool which combines Maths and Physics, and applies it to solve engineering problems. It has found large scale applications in various fields like Aerospace engg, Mechanical Engineering, Chemical Engineering etc. In 1900's, man used life sized pilot plants to design planes, choppers, cars, manufacturing units etc. Just imagine how much money would have been invested/wasted in doing that. Also this is not a very efficient method as the data has to be extrapolated to get the data for real life sized models (which is not very reliable).

With CFD, all these problems are solved. CFD is a tool by which you can simulate literally any living/non-living entity in the whole universe. Right from the Space Aircraft to the satellites to the cars that run on the road to the reactors that forms the core of chemical engineering plants, CFD has been successfully used in all these fields.
Here, in this post I would like to list out some very very interesting uses of CFD (this list does not include the regular uses of CFD).

Modeling Commercial Aquaculture Systems:

Many factors influence marine aquaculture: tidal fluctuations, water temperature, food concentration and stocking density, among others. Success in this industry depends on balancing what you can control with what you can’t, and putting years of experience behind day-to-day decisions. Nowadays CFD is used to help identify productive sites and plan management strategies, especially considering sustainability: computer modeling targeted to aquaculture.
(Source: www.flow3d.com)

SPACE Rentry capsule
Flying at Mach Number near 5 ( 1 Mach - Ratio of speed of vehicle and Speed of sound in the same physical conditions), it near impossible to replicate the same physical conditions in a pilot plant. CFD has been an very effective tool to solve this problem. All space organizations in the world like NASA, European space Research, National Space organization, Japan(JAXA) etc have used this tool to design their spacecraft.
(Source: www.sandi.co.in, will be up soon)

Needle-Free Drug Injections
A novel, needle-less, powdered drug delivery system is currently being developed. It makes use of biolistics technology, where tiny particles are injected through cell walls by a high-powered gun. The technology provides a unique capability; it effectively delivers vaccines in micro-particle form through the skin, into an epidermal layer.

Space Shuttles
Man has not even explored moon, but most of the organizations like NASA, JAXA etc are already in the process of designing space shuttles that can fly at an speed of Mach 5(that's roughly 1500m/s!!!). Imagine all these can be done sitting right in front of a computer.
Fuel Cells, Civil Engineering, Nanotechnology, Motor Design etc.

Applications of CFD are growing by the day. Hope this blog was informative enough. If you want any information feel free to contact me.

Cheers,

Shanky

P.S. The best part of this blog is, research in most of the uses of CFD listed here happens in my lab. I am lucky enough to get an opportunity to simulate Space Reentry capsules, Space Shuttles etc. :D :D

Also if you are interested in knowing more about this software do contact me at shankar.ganapathy@sandi.co.in

Where India fails

2010-06-26T01:13:00.000-07:00

people say "by 2020 India is going to be the second largest economy after china!!" How many of you agree?? I certainly do not agree with it.

Where India fails?
1. India is predominantly the back office of all the major companies in the world!! ya, India is the IT hub of the world!! but for how many more years? The world prefers India cause labour force is cheaphere!! but now chinese people have started speaking English and the IT industry is moving towards countries like china, africa, Vietnam etc.

Coming to the bigger picture, Where India lacks?? Inventing our own technology!! We do have Reliance petrochemicals, Tata cars, Tata power etc, the list is long!! but how many of you people know that all the technologies they use are bought from the west!! L&T makes buildings super-fast, but all the technology they use is bought from the west.
If the tats, ambanies, birla take a small part of their fortune and invest in R&D, most of the technologies can be procured for less then half the prize. I have already lost hope with the indian government.

What India needs today to save itself is more entrepreneurs!! India should start inventing technology. All these IT and BPO jobs are not going to stay here for long.
Unless we manufacture our technology, things will get costlier with time and there will surely be a day when only the rich in this country have access to basic amenities!!

Jago Bharat!! Come out of the dream that India is in a boom phase. It is all media hyped!!

how i ended up at Sandi.

2010-06-21T10:46:00.001-07:00

A short intro about my company. Check out www.sandi.co.in . This is an aerospace consultancy company. Started by Prof Balakrishnan and Dr. Nikhil Shinde of IISc, Bangalore, this is one of the fastest developing aerospace consultancy companies in the world. Started under the SID program this is an MIT and government of India funded company.
It all started for me at the end of second year. Like every other student in NIT Trichy i was also looking to get an summer intern in some IIT. I dint know the existence of IISc then. I had mailed couple of profs in IITkgp and IITd and got projects there. While i was deciding on where to go after my semester exams, my friend Sabharish (known to everyone as sab) gave me a call and asked me to join him at IISc banglore. After a quick google search in my mobile, I realise that IISc is the premier institute of research in India. I quickly said a 'yes' to my friend.
Only later did i come to know that our proj was in Aerospace Engg dept. Though initially i regretted my decision to go to IISc, later on only did i realize that this was the best decisioni have made in my academic life :) :D What started off as a project in my second year eventually become an intern in my third year summer vacation. I had earned my first salary then :) :)
In my third year my prof had already started the company. He had shown an inclination towards making me an employee in his company( Though he never made it clear then).
In my eighth sem when i had totally forgotten about IISc, i got a telephone call from my prof and he offered me a position in his company. It was a matter of great pride for me. Before that i had sat for many companies in my campus interviews, sadly i never cleared any interview round( though for the record sake i had cleared the Written and GD rounds of almost every company i sat for).
College life getting over is the saddest thing in my life so far. Though I was home sick I couldn't stay at home, i was already missing my friends. I wanted to go for job at the earliest.
I joined sandi on June 1st and thankfully i like my job. The best part about my job is the freedom I get here. There is no official timing for me to report at office and i get to do some quality work too :) :). Being a start-up company i can choose what area i want to work on :) This is the best possible way for my mind to come out of NITT.

My first blog_ first year in NITT

2010-06-21T09:32:00.001-07:00

I always wanted to write a blog, and finally got time to write one. My first blog is dedicated to NITT: what it has given to me and how it has changed my life.
I was always a outgoing person, wanted to make new friends. In school though i was more concerned about my academics. Coming to NIT Trichy changed my life. It added a totally new dimension to my life.
I still remember the day- july 16th 2006. I had packed my luggage and was leaving chennai to join college. I was waiting for my dad to accompany me, when he said "son, you have grown up now, you have to manage yourself now so you leave to college by yourself". I was standing there shocked!! dint know what to do, but ya from then i had to take care of myself. I will always thank my dad for this one movement :D.
Then enters NITT, the most amazing thing that happened to me. I was walking towards Agate hostel( first year hostel in NITT). I was alone :( , dint know anyone. I was shocked there were some students(soon to become my friends :D ) waiting outside agate hostel with their parents. I dint know what to do, I was not prepared for this. But soon I gained courage and went to my room. Sridhar (fondly known as dhadi, was sitting there in my room with his parents). I had not made any arrangements, I had to buy a bucket, bed etc. Dhadis father came to my rescue. He took me in his car to the shopping complex and i bought all the things i wanted.
This was nothing compared to what awaited me the next day. I entered my class at 825( thought I was early but the class was already full, lol it happened only in the first day at NITT :D ) People were talking to each other. Thambis from TRS coaching center(popular IIT coaching center in Chennai) had already formed a group. Northis were with their state-mates. I was all alone :(. I wanted to get noticed, I wanted to make friends(i had made it a point to myself in my first day in college that all my batchmates should be my friends at the end of four years).
It was the second day in college. Sheeba madam( lol she is more of my friend then a faculy:) ) asked who is the class rep. As soon as she realized that the class rep was not yet selected/elected she asked for an election. Gaining some courage i raised my hand( actually i wanted the people of 'I' Section to know my name :) ) . To my amazement no one else raised their hand. I was shocked!! I dint want to be class rep and there i was, the class rep of 'I' Section. What happened after that was history. I quickly made friends with my class. That one minute of madness helped me a lot. I gained confidence, made lots of friends.
For what I am now ,credit should go to every member of 'I' Section. When there was mass bunk everyone, including the topper would not go to class. We got the best set of faculties, they were very flexible :). No one knows this, but i wanted to tell this now. For what i was as a classrep in first year, lor of credit goes to four people : Anirudh( fondly known as ragha), Ramshankar (dawals), Dhivya and Abhinav( abhi). Ragha was my roommate, the best part about him was he would always help me judging the profs who teach us. He would tell me whether the profs were cool or not. Abhi was doing the same thing. Dawals was also a psedo class rep. He would help me out in everything, right from collecting assignments, to convincing my classmates not to attend class. Dhivya would take care of all the girls in the class.
I had to best time in my first year during section dhamaka and I section class trip to athisayam theme park, Madurai. There are many incidents from my first year that i would have like to include but I guess this is enough for one blog.