Rohit Bhat

Karnataka 2013: A last minute analysis of various Exit Polls

2013-05-07T10:08:00.000-07:00

The Karnataka Vidhan Sabha 2013 Elections results will be out by 12pm tomorrow. This is my last effort in predicting the election results. Here I consider the voting percentages as given by various News Channels and prove why their predictions are wrong and also predict the number of seats for each political party assuming the same percentages.

Suvarna News 24/7 with C-Fore:

Suvarna News have been conduction Pre-Poll surveys from December 2012 in three rounds. On Sunday they also did an Exit-Poll(asking random voters to enter the Party they have voted for and put it in a dummy Ballet Box). The results are as follows:

Percentage of Votes (Predicted):

Indian National Congress: 37%

Bharatiya Janata Party: 27%

Janata Dal (Secular): 21%

Karnataka Janata Party: 7%

Badavara Shamikara Raitara Congress: 8%

Number of Seats (Predicted):

Indian National Congress: 109-120

Bharatiya Janata Party: 49-60

Janata Dal (Secular): 31-37

Karnataka Janata Party: 5-8

Badavara Shamikara Raitara Congress: 2-4

My Analysis (Based on this Percentage):

JD(S) is supposed to be a region centric party restricted to Old Mysore region with less or almost nill in other regions. If JD(S) is supposed to get 21% of votes, in that 14-16% will be from Old Mysore region. Old Mysore region has around 70 Vidhan Sabha seats which contribute to 30% (if symmetrically distributed). In this 30%, if JD(S) gets 14-16%, then I'm sure here JD(S) will get seats anywhere between 37-42. Congress with almost same but a little less percentage of 11-14% in this region may end up winning 20-25 seats. BJP may get around 5-8 seats and KJP + Independents may get around 1-3 seats.

Remaining Vote percentage for Congress is 22-26%, BJP 23-24%, JD(S) 6-8% and the change in other petty parties may be negligeable. So, with this percentage of votes remaining, I see a neck and neck fight between Congress and BJP in all other regions of Karnataka with Congress having a slight edge and may get 5-7 seats more than BJP. So only Old Mysore region gives Congress an edge over BJP and hence may get around 20-25 seats more than BJP.

With the above analysis, my Predictions for this vote share are:

Indian National Congress: 92-98

Bharatiya Janata Party: 72-80

Janata Dal (Secular): 38-44

Karnataka Janata Party: 04-08

Badavara Shamikara Raitara Congress: 02-05

Independents: 02-04

TV9 & Headlines Today with C-Voter

Percentage of Votes (Predicted):

Indian National Congress: 37%

Bharatiya Janata Party: 25%

Janata Dal (Secular): 20%

Karnataka Janata Party: 8%

Badavara Shamikara Raitara Congress: 8%

Number of Seats (Predicted):

Indian National Congress: 111-118

Bharatiya Janata Party: 51-59

Janata Dal (Secular): 31-37

Karnataka Janata Party: 9-13

Badavara Shamikara Raitara Congress + Independents: 7-11

My Analysis (Based on this Percentage):

With the same analysis of Percentage as in the above case, my predictions for this vote percentage:

Indian National Congress: 92-100

Bharatiya Janata Party: 70-78

Janata Dal (Secular): 34-40

Karnataka Janata Party: 05-09

Badavara Shamikara Raitara Congress: 02-05

Independents: 02-04

Times Now with with Chanakya

Percentage of Votes (Predicted):

Indian National Congress: 37%

Bharatiya Janata Party: 24%

Janata Dal (Secular): 22%

Karnataka Janata Party + Others: 17%

Number of Seats (Predicted):

Indian National Congress: 132

Bharatiya Janata Party: 38

Janata Dal (Secular): 38

Karnataka Janata Party + Others: 15

My Analysis (Based on this Percentage):

Indian National Congress: 95-105

Bharatiya Janata Party: 60-68

Janata Dal (Secular): 40-46

Karnataka Janata Party + Others: 15-25

Final Predictions (Based on my views):

Indian National Congress:92-99

Bharatiya Janata Party: 69-80

Janata Dal (Secular): 37-44

Karnataka Janata Party: 05-08

Badavara Shamikara Raitara Congress + Independents: 04-09

Thanks for sparing your time in reading this even by knowing that the complete picture would be out by next 12 hours. Your's Sincerely, Rohit Bhat

My take on the "Budget 2012"

2012-03-17T06:56:00.003-07:00

Namoskaar..
Belcome to the rebiew op the Bodget 2012 sobmitted by Pronob da to the Lok-Sobha.
He thanked Shonia G por her bision in preparing the Buddget.

OK keeping Sarcasm (or PeeJay) apart, let's get into the main things of this years Budget....

As usual the Budget presented by Pranab da failed consecutively this time too but our Media friends were as usual backing his budget as always by tagging it as "This was the best Budget that could be given under the pressurised circumstances". :P

To start off, all the things required for the "Aam Admi" will be dearer by atleast 3-4% this year. To add to it, the Govt. has increased the customs levied on the Oil and Petroleum Products. This would indirectly rise the prices of all the essential commodities.

What costs more??

Electonic gadgets, Cements and Fertilizers, Household Machines (Washing Machine, Grinder), Automobiles (Cars and Bikes), Cigerrates amd Beedies, Petroleum Products, etc are to be costlier by a minimum of 1.5% to 7%.

Oh. Yeah. Trouble for Women(Gold lovers).Gold is also expected to be dearer by 1.05%. Stay in five star hotel expected to be costlier by 2.5%

What Costs less??

According to what I observed in the news channels the whole day on 16th March, I found only two things to cost less.. The Bycyles and the LED/LCD TVs.

Now to add to the woes of the "Aam Admi", our Pronob da has decreased the interest on PF amount to 8.25% which is a huge blow to the middle class and lower middle class labourers.

The Income tax waiver limit which was expected to be raised to 3 Lakhs per Annum is just brought to the round figure of 2 LPA, i.e a raise of 20k from the previous budget's amount of 1.8LPA. Surprisingly, this year the waiver for women tax payers is same as that of men.

The savings that can be considered for IT waiver is told to be raised from 1 LPA to 2.5 LPA provided the difference amount of 1.5 LPA is from the House loan. But there is no confirmation from the Budget document on this matter. Wait and Watch.

On Friday (16th March), Union Minister Prakash Jaiswal stated "This Budget would help the ""Aam Admi". it would curb inflation and price-rise"..
I don't understand as to whom he was trying to fool out there.. When the customs on Crude Oil and petroleum products are increased how can one expect to "curb inflation and Price-rise"..????
Hope our Minister would do proper homework before commenting on such things..

The Budget has allocated more amount to the sectors where huge scams are possible. Ex: NRHM, NREGA, PSU's development, etc.
The amount allocated for the above categories is raised by 5-10% from the budget of Previous year. Since elections for important states like karnataka, Gujarat are nearing, the Central Govt is eyeing to make more money in order to bribe the voters in those elections..

The estimated fiscal-deficit in the previous budget was 4.3% of GDP but the actual rate is found to be 5.9%, a whooping 1.6% (:-o). This was enough to prove that Budget-2011 failed to the core..
Keeping this in mind, Pranab has estimted this year's fiscal-deficit to be 5.1%. But considering the scams that may happen in the above categories, according to me the fiscal-deficit this year will exceed this figure and reach the figure above 6.1%...

These were all the highlights of my understandings from the Budget 2012. I'm open for all the comments and crtics on my review..

Thank You for sparing your time to go through this article..

Bye Bye.. :)

The Oily Truth

2011-03-01T03:22:00.000-08:00

Hey all.
The legacy of our Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee continues with one more hopeless Budget. Nothing has been done by the Finance Ministry from 2 years to curb price rise. No increase in subsidy for the Petroleum Products (exept Kerosene where direct Monitery subsidy will be given). Ok. This post has got nothing to do with the budget and as the name suggests it is about Petroleum products and mainly about "Complete Deregulation of Petrol Prices".

In 2010, UPA-II had taken a move to partially deregulate the Petrol price throughout the nation. This led to hikes in Petrol rates frequently from then on. Currently the average petrol rate per litre in India is around Rs.62/-. If the government deregulate the Price of Petroleum products completely, then the rate of petrol would reach a national average of Rs.77. Now I guess many of you would have wondered that this author is crazy and wants to pay more for Petrol. But the fact is that unknowingly we are paying Rs.110 or so per litre of Petrol. This excess of Rs.48/litre of petrol is being paid from the taxes we pay. The Rs.48 excess money is used as follows :

1. Rs.15 goes to the company to meet the actual rate of Rs.77/litre.
2. Rs.20 is reqd. to pay up the wages of the employees, electricity bills,etc for the office setup for this purpose.
3. Rs.3 is eaten up by the employees for personal requirements.
4. The remaining amount of Rs.10 is eaten away by our Netas.

So, instead of payin Rs.77, we are paying up Rs.110, an excess of Rs.33/-. From the stats it is found that the percapita consumption of petrol is 1 litre per day. So each of us lose Rs.33 per day without serving any purpose.

Rs.33 for one year would be 33 x 365 = Rs.12045 percapita per annum.

This means that the maximum level for Income Tax exemption may be raised from current 1.8Lakhs to a min. of 2.5 Lakhs per annum. The 1st slab may be rasied from 5 lakhs to 5.5 Lakhs per annum. For rural non-tax paying people, The National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) can be extended from 100 days to 200 days. There by increasing their annual income to Rs.20,000 p.a. For Urban non tax paying people,better facilities can be provided in ESI hospitals and a new category of below 1 Lakh p.a can be formed and even these people can be given access to Fair Price Shops. The remaining amount can be utilised in increasing the no. of Govt. Malls like Janatha Bazars which may increase the employment opportunity of Urban Youth.

Earlier in 2000-01, BJP-JD(U) wanted to completely deregulate the petrol prices, but since it was opposed by Jayalalitha and many others present in the ruling NDA coalition, this reveolutionary idea was dropped. The INC was opposing this from the beginning but deregulised partially to swallow the money of Aam Admi. The partial deregulation has worsened the situation. It makes us pay more money and also doesn't curtail the amount alloted by the Govt from the taxes collected. So, it is a double blow on the Aam Admi. The Netas are now swallowing money from both the ends. Hope that if NDA returns to power after the next general elections, the first thing they would do is to deregulate the Petrol Prices.
Thanks for the read,
Yours' Sincerely,
Rohit Bhat
ECE, PESIT,
Bangalore

Budget 2010

2010-02-26T11:49:00.000-08:00

Petrol, TV's, AC's, Cement, Gold, Silver, Tobbaco products and what not; the current year's budget hiked excise duties on all these commodities. On the other hand, the Income-Tax percentage has been brought down.

Income Tax: Income up to Rs.1.6 lakh per year exempt from income tax; up to Rs.5 lakh to be taxed at 10 percent; income of Rs.5-8 lakh to be taxed at 20 percent and income above Rs.8 lakh to be taxed at 30 percent.
"The proposal to reduce the tax slab will benefit 60 percent of all tax payers," said Mukherjee.

Petrol: Petrol would cost more by Rs 2.71 a litre while diesel would be hiked by Rs 2.55 a litre from Friday night. Jet fuel would be costlier by up to Rs 1500 per kilolitre.
"The customs duty was withdrawn when the prices of the petroleum crude reached as high as $122 per barrel. When it is much softer, there is no reason to continue the same concession" , said Mukherjee.
But this statement cannot be validated, because when Petrol price in US was $140/barrel, the petrol price in India was around Rs.60 per litre and when it reached $40/barrel, the rate per litre was brought down only by Rs.10 per litre. So is not fair on the part of FM to hike petrol rates. This lead to mass Boycott of Loksabha by Opposition members.

Cement: The subsidy on Cement is brought down which will lead to huge raise in Cement rates. So new house purchasers and builders have to shed more money inorder to build their dream palaces. Meanwhile, as an eyewash, the interests on loan amount for loans upto Rs.20Lakhs has been reduced by 1% which wont be of much benefit to the "Middle Class" or the "Cattle Class".

Chemical Fertilisers: Chemical fertilizer rates has also shooted up as the govt. will reduce the subsidy by huge margin. This leads to huge loss for "Desh ki kisano". Again here as an eyewash, the loan rates for Farmers has been reduced by 2%. A farmmer may have a max. loan of 3 Lakhs. So reducing by 2%, his Interests may reduce max. by 6000 per annum. But Hike in Fertilizers will lead farmers to incure more loss than the amount subsidised for their loans. Another eye-wash here is increasing the time of debt repayment by 6 months in the view of drought and floods which hardly matters.

Electronic Goods,Large Cars and SUVs and Tobbaco Products: Huge custom duties are likely to be levied on all Electronic Goods and Tobbaco products. This highly effects Aam Aadmi.Taxes on large cars and SUVs increased 2 percent to 22 percent. Since the electronic goods are bought more by IT sector people and also the Cigarrates and other tobbaco products are largely used by the same IT masses, the cutdown in I-Tax rates would componsate to the amount spent for all these required stuffs. The 20% increase in taxes of large cars is highly a blunder. This deprives "Executive Class People" and "Higher Middle Class People" to buy those cars at comparitively low rates as before.
This budget is of no use to Aam Aadmi and Kisans of the nation. The only better thing done is bringing down I-Tax rates. Rest of it was full of junk.
On the contrary the main issue of Price Rise was not at all discussed in the Budget. The increase in Petrol rates will lead to further increse in price of essential commodities. The Opposition is right in boycotting the session for the hike in Petroleum product rates.
Thanks for your valuable time.
Rohit Bhat,
ECE, PESIT,
Bengaluru

State needs Urdu, not Sanskrit varsity

2010-01-25T22:41:00.000-08:00

JD(S) leader MC Nannaiah in the legislative council, demanded that the state Govt. should setup an Urdu Varsity rather than a proposed Sanskrit Varsity.
He said that there was more need of an urdu varsity than a Sanskrit varsity in the state. Thousands of students study in Urdu medium but there has been no option to study in Sanskrit medium.
The issue came up as a debate when Congress leader Nyamagouda urged the ruling Govt. to setup a PU college and a Degree college offering a course in Urdu medium in Bagalkot and Bijapur. But the Education Minister Vishweshwara Hegde Kageri said that for those students who study in Urdu medium, the ample Job opportunities would be less.
Reacting to Ministers statement, Former Opposition leader of State Council Ugrappa said when the Govt. was ready to setup a Sanskrit UV then why not offer Degree courses in Urdu medium.
Nannaiah, joining Ugrappa said that Urdu UV would have a major role to play than a Sanskrit UV. Kageri ended the debate stating that the issue would be discussed with all the members of the assembly and then finally the decision would be taken.
Source: Deccan Herald,
23rd Jan 2010
Personal Comment: This act by Congress along with some members of JD(S) proves how secular they are. When >75% of the population of the state are Hindus, they need more Urdu varsities(colleges) than a Sanskrit varsity which would be of great help for many platform-less scholars to do their research work on various Sanskrit works. This act of pseudo-secular Congress must be highly condemned. Vote-bank politics still prevail in the country only due to these kinds of controversies created by the people of Pseudo-Secular party.
So people of Sovereign Democratic India please think about this issue and many similar issues before electing anyone to power.
Thank You for spending your valuable time on reading this blog.
Rohit Bhat,
ECE, PESIT,
Bengaluru

My First Blog

2009-11-10T09:58:00.000-08:00

After more than an year of using blogger.com to follow others blogs,etc, I'm now willing to blog for the first time. I was thinking and thinking and thinking about what my first blog should be about. Then I got an idea on the topic of my first blog. This blog is exclusively dedicated to "Vivekananda Balaka Sangha" of Sri Ramakrishna Math, Bull Temple Road, Bengaluru.

Sri Ramakrishna Math

Sri Ramakrishna Math previously was called as Sri Ramakrishna Ashrama was established in the year 1904 in a rented building by Srimat Swami Ramkrishnanadaji Maharaj( one of the 16 direct disciples of Sri Ramkrishna Paramahamsa). In 1909, the monastery was shifted to the centre by the Government of Mysore. Swami Brahmananda, the then President of the Ramakrishna Order, inaugurated the Math building in January 1909.

Ever since Sri Ramakrishna temple in the Math has became source of inspiration for devotees. This temple contains the holy relics of Sri Ramakrishna. The relics and the daily congregration of devotees make this place vibrant with divinity. The outer view of the prayer hall of the Math is shown in the picture.

This Math was sanctified by Sri Sarada Devi. She stayed here for three days in March 1911. She also sanctified the little hillock at the back of the Math building by sitting there in meditation. The pic. of the hillock is the one shown here. When the Holy Mother (Sri Sarada) sat on this hillock for meditation, Sri Ramakrishnanadaji took the devine blessings of the mother and dedicated the three slokas of Devisthuti starting from "ಸರ್ವಮಂಗಳ ಮಾಂಗಲ್ಯೇ ಶಿವೇಸರ್ವಾಥಸಾಧಿಕೆ" to the Holy Mother.

Another valuable possesion of the Math is a Holy stone bench which was sanctified by Sri Swami Vivekanandaji when he had visited Bangalore way back in 1892, but the pic. of this holy bench is unfortunately unavailable right now but this bench is exibited in the Math premises.

Now coming to the main part of the story, rather the main part of the blog, i.e Vivekananda Balaka Sangha.

Vivekanada Balaka Sangha

Vivekanada Balaka Sangha was started in the year 1953 by Srimat Swami Yathiswaranandaji Maharaj. This Vivekananda Balaka Sangha(VBS) aims at overall development of the members of the Sangha. This Sangha is meant only for boys. Any school going boy of 4th Standard to 10th standard can join the Sangha. All VBS members meet every Sunday at sharp 7am in the morning and go upto 12pm.

The first session begins with Chanting of the holy "Vishnu Sahasranama" and "Lalitha Sahasranama". The next session is "The Arathi" to the Holy Trinity ( Sri Ramkrishna, Sri Sarada Devi and Sri Swami Vivekananda). After this session all the members are directed to the open auditorium and a physical trainer will guide them to do exercises and Yoga. After this session, as the members would be tired by this time, Sri Ramakrishna Math provides delicious food prepared in the Math to the members of the Sangha.

After breakfast, all the members indulge in cleaning the VBS hall and other important places in the Math premises. This session is followed by a lecture session where a professional talker/ orater is invited to handle classes on topics varying anywhere from Moral Values to Spiritual to Science Topics. This session will sometimes be followed by a library session, where the members read books present in the Library that is exclusively meant for the members of VBS. The picture below is that of VBS members deeply lost in reading the books presnet in VBS library.

Books of various topics ranging from History, Science, Economics, Literature, etc are available in this library.

During the summer vacation, the VBS conducts an annual summer camp called "Vasantha Vihara". This camp is condusted in 2 or 3 batches every year. First batch is for primary school boys (4th-7th Standard), second is for High School Boys(Members of Sangha) and the last batch is for High school boys who are Non-members of the sangha. The schedule of this Vasantha Vihara is very rigrous. Students have to be highly energetic to attend this camp. The camp includes a mixture of all the activities which are required for the overall development of the student members. This mainly consists of Vedic Chanting, Yogasana, Lectures, Games, Vedio Show (pertaining to Moral and Spiritual Values and also topics pertaining to Science and Technology).

I joined the VBS after my Class-VII. From the I became a regular member in VBS and started attending the Vasantha Vihara and got indulged in the various activities conducted by the VBS and Sri Ramakrishna Math. Presently I'm a volunteer of BookStall here in the Math. After joining VBS my life has changed tremendously. I have learnt many things from this Sangha which I wouldn't have done without the influence of the Sangha. I have also encouraged many of my friends to join the Sangha which they did and then they also now realize that their way of life wouldn't have been better without the influence of the Sangha.

The uniqueness of the Sangha is that the activities of the Sangha which goes on are all organised by those members of Sangha who are all in contact with the Sangha for more than 10-20 years. This uniqueness is found rarely elsewhere.

It is because of this Sangha I was able to attain the level at where I am right now. So this is a great oppurtunity for me to thank all the senoir members of the Sangha(atleast through my first Blog) for facilitating me to join the Sangha and hence make my way of life better.

I hereby thank everyone for your valuable time spent in reading "My First Blog".

Thank You,

Rohit Bhat,

ECE, PESIT.