The World - A Collection of Thoughts

Book Review: Liar's Poker by Michael Lewis

2012-07-03T01:40:00.000-07:00

Highly recommended for those who want to learn what the heck trading and investment banking at Wall Street is all about. Of course, this book reads more like a well written comedy/parody about Wall Street but Michael Lewis clearly explains how Investment Banks function across the world by talking about his stint at Salomon Brothers.

It was also very interesting to know the history of how Salomon Brothers created the mortgage based financial instruments in the 80s. I was very amused reading this book and comparing it with the fact that this mortgage backed security has been so abused over the years leading to the financial crisis of today in the US economy. Who said there are only smart people in investment banking!?

Book Review: Made in Japan by Akio Morita

2012-07-03T01:34:00.000-07:00

Great story on how Akio Morita orchestrated the growth of the Japanese electronics industry following the death and destruction in World War II. Stories of the small guy taking on the big guys is always interesting to read and this book has a lot of that.

I recommend this book for those interested in understanding how Sony Corporation grew to become what it is today and how Japanese corporations worked their way in the International markets that were highly dominated in a "protected" way by large western firms during the 60s and 70s. This book is certainly inspirational for all the entrepreneurs of the World who want to make it big. It shows how perseverance and the will power to do something different will come a long way towards a firm's success than investor funding will do. From a small factory in a war torn nation, the founders of the company successfully nurtured a dedicated group of workers who formed the core team that made Sony's products. The story of how they came up with the name "Sony" is also an interesting read. The founders wanted a name that would sound more global and generic rather than like a Japanese name.

The fact that Sony is struggling today with the lack of any innovative or competitive products in the marketplace seems to indicate how transformation in any organization where the mantle is passed is subject to the fight between incumbents and the new entrants. A company has to always be nimble and watch out for how the marketplace is evolving. A competitor always comes unannounced and innovation always takes the market by surprise. Amazon's kindle e-reader took off when Sony was still wondering how best to create a better e-reader. When innovation in television display and packaging was accelerating, Sony took a cautious approach that slowed its growth in the market. Every company has a lesson to learn in history, but Sony has definitely sealed a legacy of its own.

Book Review: The Walmart Effect by Charles Fishman

2012-07-03T00:24:00.003-07:00

Charles Fishman has written a mostly unbiased account of Walmart and its influence on its customers, competitors, suppliers, the economy and several players throughout the world. I personally met Charles Fishman when he came with a jar of Vlasic pickles to my Business School. The Charles Fishman that I met that day was a different man than what one would expect to see from the book he had written.

Mr. Fishman talked more about the CFL bulbs that Walmart influenced GE to develop and several of its other sustainability initiatives across the world. These findings were from a trip to Walmart's headquarters that he made after his book became a huge success. He ended up adding additional pages about these in his new updated edition that he promoted over there.

Overall, this book has made Walmart think and act positively in one of the greatest ways an American corporate firm has ever responded to constructive criticism.

Book Review: Ramakrishna- His Life and Sayings by Max Muller

2012-07-03T00:16:00.000-07:00

I recommend this book to anyone who is interested in philosophy. However, I found the initial part of the book to be the most interesting. It is a commentary by one of the then western world's authority on Indian History, Max Muller.

Max Muller talks about the philosophical leanings of ancient India much before foreigners set foot in the country thereby trying to subtly disprove the primitive connotations that several other European historians of that time had attached to India.

He was in particular fascinated by saints like Ramakrishna Paramhamsa and tried to explain through his own "unbiased" approach on the advancements in critical thinking in the country. The sayings of Ramakrishna Paramhamsa are interesting and mixed with examples from daily life so that one can easily understand the deep inner meaning attached to them. Max Muller personally received these sayings from Swami Vivekananda and several other disciples.

For anyone interested in analyzing History differently from what has been fed to us through a not so open educational system, this book serves that need and is part of a series of historical insights that we need to be aware of.

Book Review: Competing for the Future

2012-07-03T00:11:00.000-07:00

This book is all about "core competence", a term coined by the authors (Gary Hamel and C.K. Prahalad) several years before and had become an industry buzz word. I liked the book as it tried to elevate strategy to a different status, a more positive one, in the eyes of companies.

It was however surprising that nothing much has changed the shape and face of what strategy is in companies since the time this book was written. Strategy is still considered a burden in several organizations and consulting firms have taken control and ownership of that function. Strategy in effect has turned out to be a wasteful exercise involving several resources working over time to create nothing for the future.

Hamel and Prahalad come up with a strong viewpoint on how strategy is about what the future could look like from an industry transformation standpoint. This does not take into consideration what you as a company are doing today and how successful or unsuccessful you are today. This foresight is based on core competence and what it can do for a company.

They then recommend that the company needs to evaluate what it should do today to get to that new World in the future. I think that is the single biggest change in mindset that I believe not may companies are willing to adopt even today. Strategy has definitely been about what we can do in the next 3-5 years, given what we have today as a company. A point that the authors raise in their book and try to change.

This is a good read and has obviously been a top seller since a long time. The point that it hasn't changed the industry landscape and strategy's position in general may however make you wonder whether academic dictum really means anything in a corporate world where bureaucracy rules and "change" is always hard to adapt to.

Book Review: The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari by Robin Sharma

2012-07-03T00:04:00.000-07:00

Self help books are scattered around book stores and the internet around the world. These books obviously center around tips, tricks to plain diktat about how one should lead life to be successful at home and in their career.

I personally find most of the books as misleading or in most cases confusing around their objectives. Some of the advice does work but it just seems that the "always works" formula these books recommend don't work.

This book by Robin Sharma can in one way be looked at as just another self help book. However, it does deviate from the other books in a couple of interesting ways. First of all, it is as the name suggests, written as a spiritual fable. It is fiction. Yet, it tries to squeeze out the reality of our existence through a pretty simple story. This, I believe is very hard to pull through and the author did a great job of that.

Second, the book tries to get away from the get rich quickly schemes and so called personal management for greatness theories by emphasizing on some age old principles of human development- mastery of the mind, simplicity and discipline, selfless service to others and the setting of personal, professional and spiritual goals.

A couple of words of wisdom that I liked in the book were- "the quality of your life is determined by the quality of your thoughts", "Never sacrifice happiness for achievement", "By elevating the lives of others, your life reaches its highest dimension" and "Discipline is built by consistently performing small acts of courage".

Book Review: Jesus Lived in India by Holger Kersten

2011-12-10T04:36:00.001-08:00

When a movie promises a lot in its trailers only to disappoint when you watch the real deal, you are left not only with anger but with a certain sense of frustration and deep after-thought that it could have easily been better, only if the movie maker took some obvious points into consideration. Such was the feeling I had when I read the book, Jesus lived in India by Holger Kersten. So much of promise, but yet a disappointment.

This book, contrary to many negative reviews, does not portray Jesus Christ in a negative manner. It does not question his existence, it does not ridicule his teachings, nor does it weaken the power of the Christian world. What it tries to deliver instead is an interesting insight into the history of Jesus Christ's existence especially during the undocumented years of his life as a young man. It takes history in a direction that no other historian or religious authority (obviously!) took before.

In a very sequential description of a set of events, the author shows the strong parallel between the teachings of the Buddha, his disciples and those of Jesus. This unfortunately didn't find favor with many critics of the book, who felt that the greatness of Christianity is lost when compared with other religions of the World, especially the religions of the East, given that the Church and other political establishments of the West carefully herded us people into the belief of superiority of the Christian religion and its privileged followers over the years. The humanizing of colonial misdeeds through the lens of religion is lost when the epitome of it, the Lord himself, is portrayed as a beneficiary of intellectual and spiritual wisdom from the unworthy East.

The author talks about how Jesus might have traveled across the trade corridors of the past that connected the West with the East. Through a series of narratives picked from tales across different countries like Turkey, Afghanistan and so on, the author shows how Jesus, Yesu, Isa and so on were one and the same. This is all convincing evidence that does show how Jesus might have truly walked these lands and been part of the life over there in the past. The author gets to also talk about how Jesus traveled to India, to either gain wisdom or impart wisdom (things get confusing in the author's perspective here) and reached Kashmir, lived there and possibly traveled far and wide within India too. This is all possible except that the stories the author collects to explain Jesus's presence would rather be classified as folk tales that many modern, educated historians will blindly dismiss. The biggest disappointment for me was however that the tales of Jesus in India is ridiculously very limited and the author comes to discussing it only towards the tail end of the book.

So, the rest of the book ended up being a painfully, detail oriented explanation of how the shroud of Turin was indeed that of Jesus Christ and his blood stains were suffered as part of the elaborate punishment that the spiritual leader truly endured. I loved the points the author makes to prove that the critics of the shroud are missing the truth and hence dismissive of Jesus's existence. My frustration came from the fact that enough pages were spent on this topic that the book was turning into a mockery of the title - Jesus lived in India. It could have served a better purpose if it read something like "The Shroud of Turin - the true possession of Jesus Christ".

Just when I lost hope with where the book was taking me towards, the chapter on Jesus's presence in India was taken up. Unfortunately, this is where the after-thought about how things could have been better came up in my mind. A very limited prose on what Jesus might have done in India is hurriedly explained. The topic that I really loved to explore, the tomb of Jesus in Kashmir was abruptly explained and closed with the statement that the government of India did not allow the author to get into the tomb. Couldn't you wait to get there before writing the book!? Maybe not, given that it is the Indian Government and the Kashmiri Administration, both tough and unreachable democratically elected bodies to deal with, that we are talking about here.

But, what could have sealed the deal in Jesus Christ's favor of living in India is killed like a dream that is far fetched from reality. Now, I didn't wish to learn that Jesus lived in India as there were very many saints who lived and thrived in this ancient nation. But, when someone promises the moon, only to deliver a pittance, it makes you feel bad. Having said that, it was indeed interesting to learn something about the teachings of Jesus Christ that is long lost and buried in the stories of the Bible. The goodness of human existence don't have different variations in History or Religion. It is all about the difficult job of being "nice" in life for human beings. Buddhism that tried to refine the corrupted form of Hinduism preached it. So did Jesus and his Christianity that tried to refine the corrupted form of Judaism and other Western practices of that time. We will continue to see very many more "religions" and saints walking among us, trying to save us, and leaving us with a hope that good does exist in a world of evil. Unfortunately, we don't learn from History as we don't know what our History truly is!

Book Review: Fooled by Randomness by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

2011-07-21T03:52:00.000-07:00

Fooled by Randomness was described by Fortune magazine as "one of the smartest books of all time". I have to agree with that and also make sure nobody questions me as to why I agree so, in fear of exposing myself as a fool. For this author has already predicted who I am and what I will be doing in the next few lines reviewing this book. He makes constant mockery of the journalist, the trader, the scientist and the MBA guy and notes that such people are the largest group of people who have read his book and also appreciated it probably because they assumed it was a lesson in intelligence for the other person. He also mentions how people who review this book are only a reflection of their personality and are not providing any intellectual fodder that the author needs to consider as criticism or feedback.

Well, what else can be said? I already know that the author considers me a fool and also will never read these reviews (not that I'm qualified enough to expect him to read it in the first place!) as is only a reflection of my personality. So, what I will do is just author a book review for my own personal satisfaction of having read a brilliant work on a subject as abstract as "randomness".

To start with, this was by far the toughest book I read and tried to understand, often forcing me to re-read chapters or paragraphs I already read a few days before. All again, this is no surprise, as the reason for that was also explained by the author. Unfortunately for me, I belong to a larger sample size of people who were not born to understand the concept of probability and hence may

never will (I will not assume a percentage value of this sample size here lest I expose my lack of statistical depth).

The author, Nassim Nicholas Taleb, has definitely become a favorite of mine. A person I intend to follow closely (his work of course) to get some reprieve from the innumerable "success story" books, meaningless biographies of business tycoons and self-help literature that constantly seem to remind me of something missing in my portfolio while the other person has it because he or she is more assertive, a go-getter, a high profile communicator and endowed with other glib characteristics. The author however warns that this book is not escapism from hard work or an excuse for doing nothing or achieving less.

The dynamics of randomness are such that more or less, that turns out to be the reason someone is firing away in life while the other is fired at work. Mr. Taleb calls these people who re-create their success stories after the fact by attributing it to a certain special skill as the "lucky fool", where luck is defined as the random event that creates an avenue so successful in the present but yet unseen before. The author's focus throughout the book is also on his favorite subject -

probability, with several references to Keynes "Treatise on Probability" as one of the best contributions of the economist.

When I read my History books and the 19th century work of so called intellectual authorities called "European savant" historians who literally recreated India's past, took away its present and permanently dented its future, I couldn't find a way to explain why these historians cannot and should not be treated as authorities on the subject just because of their race or their rational way of evaluating history (Max Muller et. al). This book and the author helped me in finding the answer I was looking for. The cloud of ignorance that these savants suffered from is called "historical determinism". To quote the author in his own words - "When you look at the past, the past will always be deterministic, since only one single observation took place. Our mind will interpret most events not with the preceding ones in mind, but the following ones....Psychologists call this overestimation of what one knew at the time of the event due to subsequent information the hindsight bias, the "I knew it all along" effect".

The author's commentary on yet another arrogance propagated around the World by correlating "developed nation" with "material progress" is also interesting. He explains that "Mathematically, progress means that some new information is better than past information, not that the average of new information will supplant past information". He then brings out the general argument dished out by the fans of the new things in life by showing the changes brought by the arrival of new technologies such as the airplane, autombile, telephone etc. Calling it as middlebrown inference (inference stripped of probabilistic thinking), he says such thinking can lead to people believe that all new technologies and inventions would revolutionize our lives. Banking on the concept of survivorship bias, he indicates that we are only looking at the winners at the cost of the several losers we have ignored. He quotes, "the opportunity cost of missing a new thing like the airplane or automobile is minuscule compared to the toxicity of all the garbage one has to go through to get to these jewels". Likewise, he also talks about how randomness can be ingested into evolution to explain unexplainable results and also highlights the true significance of the Darwinian theory of self selection - it is after all about reproductive fitness and not about survival fitness.

The author also has some good commentary on his big influence in life, Karl Popper, a falsificationist. He goes to explain Popper's lack of confidence in taking Science seriously and looking at justification or verification as the means to proving things as scientific. Mr. Taleb finally concludes with the concept of heuristics and how our brain is set up to use emotions for thinking, thereby forcing us to be less rational in our decision making and actions. While one can study randomness and theorize the need for handling it, our evolution and mental make up prevent us from identifying it.To end it, while admitting that like others, he also is a fool driven by emotions that drive action, he remarks that the difference lies in the fact that he realizes and accepts it rather than adamantly denying that we can be fooled by randomness.

The Telangana Movement in Andhra Pradesh

2011-07-17T23:36:00.000-07:00

A very nice blog on the Telangana Movement and my response to it: http://yemanna.wordpress.com/2011/07/16/telangana-regional-identity-and-the-telugu-language/

Great research work done on getting some facts straight on the language and culture based issues dogging Andhra Pradesh. While I appreciate the great call you have made for all Telugus to be truly united irrespective of their cultural or political roots, I feel driving the need for such unity falls outside the periphery of Lok Satta or any political establishment for that matter. Democracy as a system thrives in an egalitarian system of governance and society. If you go back to the modern roots of democracy based on Roman doctrines for governance or way back into Chanakya's rules of governance in the Arthashastra, you will see that spelled out wide and clear.

However, the irony that several people don't realize is that, this very egalitarianism cannot survive when the divergent forces of diversity tend to pull a politically bonded society in different directions. In other words-race, caste, language, religion etc. are not uniting but only discriminating forces acting against egalitarianism, especially if they are serving a purpose beyond the rudimentary basics they are meant for. While I believe every language (or dialect) has its own beauty and cultural significance that must not only be appreciated but celebrated, if it goes beyond its basic purpose in life- i.e. to communicate in society- it starts creating a 'you vs me' mentality. That is basic human nature. This has been beautifully explained by Dr. JP in the succinct message he shared.

Due to the way we are taught our history in schools and our own reluctance to unlearn what we agreed to accept as kids, we fail to realize the true functioning of democracies. More so, we fail to realize that India as a country is a political creation that began to take shape when the British started mapping out their colonial conquests. The Indian Union of today was an uneasy relationship accepted by Nehru's visionary team after our independence.

In a tremendously diverse nation like India, pursuing these egalitarian ideals of democracy meant that there was a need for some form of standardization (or commonality) to be carved out of India. This took the form of a national language in Hindi which wasn't widely used before, a common macro-cultural identity based on the roots of Hinduism and Islam and so on. Every state in India was also formed with a largely inefficient but standardized format based on language with a common disregard for dialects. No other country in this world (barring China) has this humongous challenge at hand when it was in its process of nation building. While we celebrate the democratic principles of the USA and yearn to be like it one day, we comfortably fail to realize that a country like USA was able to succeed democratically as it was "politically" able to sideline the divergent factors that affected its stability since its creation as a nation - race is still predominantly White, religion is still predominantly Christian, language is still predominantly English. While as a social entity, diversity has been accepted with an open heart (you can build temples and celebrate being a Hindu in the US), as a political entity, the US doesn't deal with the complexities of diversity that uproot egalitarianism and in turn defeat democracy. Changes today are affecting some of them and in those places, you do see friction and a not so progressive form of democracy - Hispanic and African American population and their growing significance, multiple religions like Hinduism and Islam bringing in a different perspective on daily life are some examples of those changes and they are slowly creating points of friction in American society. Coming to China, while the World may reject it as a non-democratic nation, it still had to face the same challenges in its nation building. Luckily for China, it grew out from a uniform central core into vast geographical tracts occupied by other diverse people. The core being Han Chinese are the dominant force in that nation and so is their language (Mandarin) and religion (lack of one under Communism). The outliers consisted of the Tibetans, Uyghurs, Mongols and so on. If you look at the map of China, you will realize that they all form the peripheries of the country and are slowly losing their identity while slowly being integrated into greater China. While several examples can be gleaned out from our past and present, the key point I want to drive is that political governments can never be in the business of promoting extreme diversity as it runs counterproductive to the growth of democracies. Having said that, India is already stretching a lot to accommodate this from a political standpoint and it explains the rather slow and painful progress we afford to make in every step of our growth as a nation. Whether this is good or bad is again an exercise in personal perspective. I personally feel we are painfully slow in growth but vastly mature in our dealings as a country. But my impatient and greedy self that looks at fast results and better changes, sees the country's approach as an impediment.

The reason I digressed to explain non-Telugu related aspects of the World is to help bring a change in our perspective of what democracy (something that Dr. JP is passionate about) and the Lok Satta party should mean. While the current political commitments of the Lok Satta party is towards the state of Andhra Pradesh, its true leanings are towards the promotion of democracy in the Indian Union. We should realize that while coastal Andhra culture and language became the predominant force in Andhra Pradesh much to the loss of identity of the other Telugus, this progression has a logical explanation, very similar to how we are still sitting idle in our homes while corruption and bad politics continue to happen around us. What happened in Andhra Pradesh was what happened to most people pushed as a herd to accept the changes happening around them. British Andhra was the most politically strong entity prior to our independence as that is where Education, the press and other forms of British governance saw their implementation. So did the movie industry and other large industrial establishments that in turn fed political organizations. The Nizam ruled regions of Andhra Pradesh bought their freedom from British interference but at the same time continued with all their past policies which as we see today were not supportive of the diversity of the Telangana people. What happened since our independence were just incremental steps in political adjustments that happened to carve out the identity of a then non-existent state called Andhra Pradesh. As one can imagine, such changes were just influenced by people from places where the capabilities existed. In other words, you can expect a person to file a lawsuit against another person who affected his living only if a judicial system, police, administrative bureaucracy and press exists. If one lived in a country where none or some of them exist, then that person will not even know what to do in such instances. Such was the parallel you could draw between the various factions in Andhra Pradesh. When such changes did happen during the formation of Andhra Pradesh, one particular system of identity was carried forward and the herd followed.

Now there are two pressing questions that need to be answered - the formation of a separate state of Telangana? and recognition and equality for the Telangana people and their unique Telugu diversity? While we can try to be politically correct and neutral in our statements on the first question, the facts are pretty simple. The creation of a separate state of Telangana will help in the creation of yet another democratic structure that will slowly or rapidly adjust itself to a standardization. That political standardization may come in the form a state board of education that teaches the Telangana dialect, a Telangana religion (all may be allowed but one will prevail politically), a Telangana caste and so on. This may still continue to not provide a solution to the Maoist separatists of Telangana and that will continue to be a pain point. Hence, there is nothing wrong in creating a separate state of Telangana provided its purpose is not to promote the diversity of the Telangana people, its literature and culture or create a one-Telugu movement. It will definitely provide state administrative jobs and better land deals for sure to its people. If the Telangana movement is mostly about this (which is not so depending on whom you talk to), then a separate state will definitely provide it.

This takes us to the second question, the question that the original blog was trying to address. What about the recognition and promotion of the diversity and the Telugu heritage of the people of Telangana or the one-Telugu unity? One must realize that when political organizations or governments promote language, literature or culture it is for the purposes of propaganda. They will always contain the truth presented in a way and manner to suit the greater needs of people with a political agenda. Even US textbooks and government literature are littered with trash on the exploits of Columbus, the founding fathers and the native Americans. Only literary works and materials outside of political interference have had the tenacity to show alternative perspectives. These still remain unknown to the blind eyes of meaningless existence that most people proudly lead as their normal lives.

The true dissemination of the literary greatness, cultural richness or linguistic beauty of any region comes from its own people - not from its elected political governments or external promoters. The fact that this blog was still able to access the literary gems of Telangana writers is testimony to the fact that preservation happens from within, not from outside. The Bhagavad Gita was not preserved because we had successive governments promote it over more than 3000 years or because the Indian democracy requires it for taking oath in a court of law. While Sankritized Telugu may not be the true language of the Andhras, it is still a literary art form that also has its place in Telugu history. The ballads of Telangana poets also have their unique place in our lives. Their recognition will however come from one going out of the narrow purview of textbooks (again driven by political governments) and actively pursuing and promoting them on our own. If this is the Telangana Movement, then it doesn't need a KCR or a TDP or a Congress or a bandh or a rasta roko or lost lives to support or grow it. It can come from the several thousand NRI Telangana Telugus who have the capacity to do a lot more today or from any one of us truly interested in propagating diversity in life irrespective of its origins. Governments were not created by us (yes, sad but true) to leave everything to them. They were created to serve us in our daily life while we take care of the rest.

Arundhati Roy's Speech for Kashmir's Independence: Secession or Confusion!?

2011-02-28T21:33:00.000-08:00

Arundhati Roy is one of India’s most recognized writer and a social activist who has taken up several people causes in defiance of large corporate interests and governments. She has been highly critical of the US government policies, the actions of Israel and the decisions of the Indian government over the past several years. Like all intellectual activists who tend to create a controversy by speaking the untold truth in a hard-hitting manner, she had chosen several issues that make unruly governments and sheep-like people-followers very uncomfortable with what she says. After reading through several of her commentaries, essays and speeches, there are several things that are clear about her-
· she is very highly inquisitive about the World,
· has probably spent several hours and energy to gain an alternate perspective to largely accepted truths about the World,
· is very revolutionary and bold in her statements and outlook on life,
· has written a book, the God of Small Things, which was destined to be successful as it encompasses topics that titillate the literary palate of generous Western promoters as it hits right on what they perceive as always-a-winning-formula topics like “Indian Sex”, “Indian women exploitation”, “Indian religious bias” and “Indian caste system”. The caste system being one such word and social definition, created by our British masters, that we have so well hypnotized ourselves with,
· is lucky to have earned a lot of money showered by corporate big-wigs, publishing monopolies and wealthy sponsors of literary awards, the very people she supposedly despises the most, and
· is probably spending her money wisely for social causes and spending her time wisely on meaningful pursuits (which include conferences and meets where she is invited around the world to talk at and I’m guessing something she doesn’t charge for unlike past Presidents and ex-CEOs)
A feminist Indian woman national always deserves the respect and admiration of fellow Indians and the World at large. While India always produced and has seen several of them since ages, the greater part of the “developed” world only sees them rarely, like an oasis in a parched desert. Drawing inspiration myself from several of these people of her kind and related disposition, I am amazed by the power wielded by the intellectual mind.
Having said that, I would however like to divert my attention at this point to one topic that she has repeatedly been very rhetorical about, including the one instance where it probably went too far for the political leadership and the general public, during a conference in India on October, 2010. Taking a very unemotional view on the speech she made that day, I was amazed at how intellectually strong people also tend to suffer time and again from a “truth-based bias” that can force them to build opinions or say things that on introspection never lead to an objective evaluation of reality. Breaking down her speech into the important snippets of wisdom she shared that day, this is what we see.
1. Choice of conference: Arundhati Roy has gained international reputation, thanks to her books, but then a lot due to her fight-the-system campaigns primarily against the regimes in US, Israel and India. She has of course covered other countries in good details too, but the focal point for her international campaigns against the evil of “empires” has been these three countries. Roy has been in the company of some wonderful people like Howard Zinn and in Universities like Harvard to share her viewpoints on several topics.

Looking at all that, the Azaadi conference was a questionable choice, not because it had certain anti-India elements like Geelani, a Maoist leader who supports the killing of innocent people locked into jobs that support government establishments and a range of other speakers who became largely unheard. It was questionable because of two primary reasons:
a. the promotional intent of the conference, which happens with all conferences intent on spreading propaganda, was purely about why Kashmir should not be a part of India, but nothing else towards a discussion on what is the true path forward for all Kashmiris in the future. This was something Ms. Roy impressed upon towards the end of her speech but it didn’t bring any visible change to the rest of the speakers.
b. Whether today’s population in Kashmir, which consists of several unaccounted infiltrators from Pakistan’s NWFP, wants to accept or not, the Hindu minority was a very vital component of Kashmir’s unique culture and legacy. There was no representation from that minority group of Kashmir, thereby making the conference look like a propaganda farce than a forum for a Kashmir solution.

By choosing to become a popular voice of the ‘azaadi’ movement in the conference, Ms.Roy became a poster child for that movement, but at the same time, didn’t come out as a rational, unbiased social activist whose only bias, if at all, should be towards human justice and life.

2. Starting punch-lines: Every speaker intent on riling up their audience or seeking the occasional publicity stunt, start with a punch-line statement and then end with an even more powerful ending statement. These statements are meant to define the personality, message and overall outlook of the speaker. Adolf Hitler did that for the Nazi cause and as even Nazi-hating observers will admit, he was phenomenal at spreading his ideology to his audience. Winston Churchill did that too, although his speeches were mostly well written and well executed prose in the Queen’s English. Now, Arundhati Roy also started with a punch-line. These were the lines that Ms. Roy said (for exact transcript, you can watch her edited videos on YouTube):
“…Kashmir was never an integral part of India. Even the Indian government has accepted in the UN that it’s not an integral part of India…”
Well said, since the truth is that successive Indian governments starting with Nehru struggled with the definition of what is Kashmir for India. While some governments claimed that Kashmir is indeed a part of India, there were others who were not clear in what that meant.
But, here is the biggest disappointment that a person like me who sucks up to words of wisdom from intelligent people suffers from. Yes, Kashmir was not a part of India. It was a “princely” state of the British government that the Indian government got into its “empire” through a divine trick or intervention from the last British viceroy, Lord Mountbatten, and the then ruler, Raja Hari Singh. Yes, Kashmir was not a part of India. But, so are the North West Frontier province, Gilgit and Baluchistan not a part of Pakistan. So are Tibet, Inner Mongolia and other autonomous zones not a part of China. So are Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland not a part of the United Kingdom. So are Hawaii, Alaska and the US pacific settlements not a part of the Unites States. In fact, every so called country of this World has constituent states, local governments, ethnicities or most importantly people, which are not a part of that country or don’t want to be a part of that country. Wouldn’t it have been a great example in intellectual lecturing if Arundhati Roy had taken the pains to explain this simple reality to her audience and to the Indian public in general so that they understand what they are dealing with?
Since she didn’t mention it, now it brings into question the biggest feedback that people had for her speech, why didn’t you mention about Pakistan. Not a word was uttered about Pakistan in her speech. Maybe, she didn’t consider it as important to the agenda at hand. But, by not choosing to utter even a word about Pakistan, she missed out an opportunity to seal the deal for Kashmiri independence. Azad Kashmir or PoK is an occupied area of Kashmir that Pakistan took over right after Independence. Even after several successful wars, the Indians didn’t take it back. But that is a game or political ploy that we can reserve for later discussion. Azad Kashmir may not be having Human Rights reported issues of stone throwing or street protests, but it is everyone’s knowledge that it is a training ground for Islamic militants/terrorists/freedom fighters. Keeping that aside, it is one of the most economically poor states in the nation and has no great reputation for either the presence or treatment of minorities either.
Now, this conference is for the independence of Kashmir. But, why just from evil India? What about from evil Pakistan? What about from evil China? Now, by not asking that, she has proved that she just turned out to be a tool for Syed Geelani’s pro-Pakistan and anti-India banter for Kashmir’s independence. While she toyed with the golden word “justice” a lot of times in her speech, she failed to give enough justice to this very simple argument.
She then goes on with this statement:
“ See in 1947, we were told that India became a sovereign nation and a sovereign democracy, but if you look at what the Indian state did from midnight of 1947 onwards, that colonized country, that country that became a country because of the imagination of its colonizer—the British drew the map of India in 1899—so that country became a colonizing power the moment it became independent, and the Indian state has militarily intervened in Manipur, in Nagaland, in Mizoram, in Kashmir, in Telangana, during the Naxalbari uprising, in Punjab, in Hyderabad, in Goa, in Junagarh.”
Yes, the British indeed cooked up a map of India and in fact created a then non-existent nation called India for their propaganda and colonization purposes. Yes, there was Indian military intervention in the places she mentioned. It began with the iron-hand (aka use of military force if needed) policy of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel to bring the so called defined nation of India back into a single piece. Yes, Goa was militarily occupied. But, it was from the European Portuguese colonists- occupiers who obviously changed the social, religious and cultural landscape of that state over several years, most possibly by force. Without mentioning this and by including it into a laundry list of Indian exploits, she is still telling the truth but preferably telling the truth to suit her purposes. Hyderabad wanted to go with Pakistan. Yes, we would have had a mini Pakistan within the Indian empire serving the needs of the Pakistan Empire in West Pakistan and East Pakistan (later Bangladesh). Yet again, this is another bad example of blatantly listing out colonization pursuits of India by using hard hitting statements. Yes, Punjab was an issue. But, why is Western Punjab in Pakistan not an issue? My problem with her statements is not with the fact that she didn’t mention Pakistan, but with the fact that she didn’t utilize the power of truth to enlighten her audience. When truth is selectively used to serve the publicized or secret needs of a group or person, it is called propaganda. That is what she ended up doing – mere propaganda.
3. Kashmiri Minorities: Now, this conference was definitely portraying how a certain religious minority is being persecuted by the Indian armed forces in Kashmir since 1992. However, Kashmir’s minorities are not Muslims, but Hindus, Sikhs and Christians who have lived there since thousands of years. Again, the select choice of truth leads to a lot of questions on the genuineness of her thoughts. To look at some further statements by Ms. Roy,

“…since 1947, and when you look at who are those people that it (India) has waged war against—the Nagas, the Mizos, the Manipuris, people in Assam, Hyderabad, Kashmir, Punjab—it’s always a minority, the Muslims, the tribals, the Christians, the Dalits, the Adivasis, endless war by an upper caste Hindu state, this is what is the modern history of our country….”

Yes, India can be accused of waging war or containing dissent in the above mentioned places and the affected people were minorities. This unfortunately goes along with the concept of nation building or definition of a country that I talked about before. But, here is the catch. This so called war was waged against every inhabitant of India, by the Indian state and also by external states. Not just selectively against the minorities but against every identity possible. If not, it wouldn’t be possible that 80% of the country live on twenty rupees a day! The army may be a differentiating factor in some of these examples, but keeping the national borders intact is something that every country is fighting internally or externally for. Removing this barrier would mean the non-existence of India or for that matter, any country in this World as these are all mere political entities. While it is an ideal state of affairs, our 1000’s of years of World history tell otherwise.

This war wasn’t also waged by just an upper caste Hindu state. This repeated bashing of the Indian nation that a lot of foreign nationals love to accept and recognize is again mixed in ambiguity. It is not an upper caste but an upper class state. It is not a Hindu state but a vote-bank state. It may not be a true democratic state, but is definitely a political state. Here is why it is a class based and not a caste based state. Again taking Ms. Roy’s statement into consideration, it is not possible that 80% of the country lives in dire poverty because 80% of the population is lower caste. It is because 80% of that population belongs to a lower class in society irrespective of caste. This is a class difference that is bubbling and may burst in a revolution world-wide as NO country in this world is different.

Even Geelani’s much loved Pakistan (Nanga Bhooka Hindustan, Jaan se pyaara Pakistan!) is ruled by an upper class society even though it has draped itself in the green flag of a uniform, egalitarian Islamic nation. There are conflicting statistics on how many upper castes exist in India. This is so because, our country is an upper class, vote-bank based political state. The more you claim sops based on caste, the more you gain in the system. The more you gain, the more you enter the upper echelons of the class system and the more you enter the class system hierarchy, the more unknown become your caste origins. But going even by some questionable estimates, about 65% of upper castes live below the poverty line as defined by UN benchmark as those living under $1/day. These obviously are upper caste Hindus who are waging war against an upper class society consisting also of lower caste, religious minority and ethnic minority controllers of the nation - politicians, statesmen, activists, government officers and businessmen. A similar lower class in other countries of the World is also waging war against its own state that is represented by an upper class minority ruling their state. It is no joke that to become an MLA in a State assembly in India, you need to spend a crore (Rs 1 crore) a day for publicity stunts and for silencing your opponents. This doesn’t come from just being among a group of upper caste Hindu state rulers.

Vara Vara Rao, the Maoist leader who shared the dias with Ms. Roy is an upper caste Hindu Brahmin leader of the naxalites. But, he belongs to the lower class society and his fight, although at times violent, is for the rights of the lower class society. Ms. Roy either ignored this fact or preferred to not get there as it then would derail the strong message that she wanted to send in her hazy definition of India’s modern history. In fact, without getting into personal attacks of any kind, Arundhati Roy can and should be defined as an upper caste “Hindu” leader of the social activist masses. Although born as a Syrian Christian, she later married a Hindu man. Her upbringing was not in a lower caste society, but in fact, in a strong class system of Syrian Christians who are powerful and wealthy in the Kerala community. Her education has also been in India’s premier educational institutions, not something that the average Indian gets access to. In total, her background and upbringing indicate that she was more of an upper caste Hindu and also given her inheritance and work, a person belonging to the upper class society of India. If these communities are harmful, then one should cast doubts on her intentions too. If she is a defining part of modern Indian history, then her legacy and identity is also skewed.

Ms. Roy made some very hard hitting statements too that many people in the media didn’t care to bring up to help show her in a better light.
“…the great debates between Ambedkar and Gandhi and Nehru—they were also real debates and over these last sixty years whatever the Indian state has done, people in this country have argued and debated and deepened the meaning of freedom. We have also lost a lot of ground because we’ve come to a stage today where India a country that once called itself Non Aligned , that once held its head up in pride has today totally lain down prostrate on the floor at the feet of the USA. So we are a slave nation today, our economy is completely—however much the Sensex may be growing, the fact is the reason that the Indian police, the paramilitary and soon perhaps the army will be deployed in the whole of central India is because it’s an extractive colonial economy that’s being foisted on us…”

The above lines have a lot of warnings for the current state of affairs of our country and the rest of the World too. If one is willing to learn, there is a lot of literature and opinions on how a market based capitalist economy slowly intruding and taking over democratic rule of a state will eventually lead to large scale destruction of people, resources and the environment. We are already seeing that in action with the US economy slowly churning into a giant blob that could explode any time. However, these statements are misplaced in this discussion as Ms. Roy’s statements would have been well suited for a “save democracy” conference rather than a “let’s break democratic principles to help certain groups achieve whatever they want” conference that this turned into.

It is not that Ms. Roy never mentioned this altogether, but again, the choice of a conference failed to bring out the real lessons that one was supposed to learn from these statements. Continuing further,

“…I want to believe that this fight is a fight for justice. Not a fight in which you pick and choose your justices—“we want justice but it’s ok if the other chap is squashed.” That’s not right. So I remember when I wrote in 2007, I said the one thing that broke my heart on the streets of Srinagar, was when I heard people say “Nanga Bhooka Hindustan, jaan se pyaara Pakistan.” I said “No. Because the Nanga Bhooka Hindustan is with you. And if you’re fighting for a just society then you must align yourselves with the powerless,” the Indian people here today are people who have spent their lives opposing the Indian state…”

Now, those were the words of wisdom that one should have taken up. But, I am not sure anyone supporting a separate Kashmir state only from India ever got what she said. That is because, there are not many in Kashmir today who are willing to be a part of the Indian masses and work towards true positive democratic change for their betterment and that of the country. What they want is just to get away from India and go to Pakistan. Lack of moral strength and action from successive Indian governments obviously didn’t help with that either.

These statements also bring out the subtle naivety that Ms. Roy exposed in her interpretation of the statement, “Nanga Bhooka Hindustan, jaan se pyaara Pakistan”, and how she then used it for her message of supporting the Nanga Bhooka Hindustanis. But, the problem is, the people shouting those slogans were not talking about the poor of India, they were talking about Indians in a poor way. More than this statement, she should have talked about the more famous slogan that was pushed into the World media and by lobbyists from our “friendly” neighboring countries in other forums to showcase the Indian oppression against the Kashmir cause, “Indian Dogs, Go Back!” By subscribing their lives to Pakistan, these activists are supporting a movement that they believe can help them from getting away from any obligations required towards holding hands with the minorities who were evicted from the valley. Now, this brings us to the other statements she made specifically about minorities,

“…We know today that this word ‘secularism’ that the Indian state flings at us is a hollow word because you can’t kill sixty-eight thousand Kashmiri Muslims and then call yourself a secular state. You cannot allow the massacre of Muslims in Gujarat and call yourself a secular state and yet you can’t then turn around and say that “we are allowed to treat our minorities badly “—…
…
…I think this disturbance is based on a misunderstanding, because I was beginning to talk about justice and in that conversation about justice, I was just about to say that what happened with the Kashmiri pundits is a tragedy, so I don’t know why you all started shouting, I think it’s a tragedy because when we stand here and talk about justice, it is justice for everybody, and those of us who stand here and talk about their being a place for everybody whether there’s a minority whether it’s an ethnic minority or a religious minority or minority in terms of caste, we don’t believe in majoritarianism so that’s why I was talking about the fact that everybody in Kashmir should have a very deep discussion about what kind of society you’re fighting for because Kashmir is a very diverse community and that discussion does not have to come from critics or people who are against azaadi trying to divide this struggle , it has to come from within you so it is not the place of people outside to say “they don’t know what they mean by
azaadi, do they mean Gilgit and Baltistan, what about Jammu? What about Laddakh?” These are debates that people within the state of Jammu and Kashmir are quite capable of having by themselves and I think they understand that. So, to just try and derail things by shouting at people is completely pointless because I think that people, the pundits in Kashmir, all the time I’ve spent in Kashmir, have only heard people say they are welcome back and I know people who live there, who believe that too, so all I want to say is that when we are having these political debates, I feel I have watched and have been listening to and following the recent uprising in Kashmir, the fact that unarmed people, young people armed with stones, women, even children are out on the streets facing down this massive army with guns is something that nobody in the world cannot help but salute…”

Now, here is the real frustration with what she mentioned above. Ms. Roy very confidently states that 68,000 Kashmiri Muslims were killed by Indian forces and hence challenges the claims of a secular state by India. On a similar note, once some riled up people in the audience asked what about Hindus, she had this to offer: “…I know the story of the Kashmiri pundits. I also know that the story that these Panun Kashmir pundits put out is false. However, this does not mean that injustice was not done…., I was just about to say that what happened with the Kashmiri pundits is a tragedy, so I don’t know why you all started shouting…”

Ms. Roy seems to have a very strong number when it comes to number of Kashmiri Muslims killed by Indian forces. But, in checking most media outlets, the 68000 number is that of Kashmiris killed since the problem erupted in 1989. Now, it is fair to agree that a majority of this number was of Kashmiri Muslims. But, that number could have well included the following – officially accounted for Kashmiri Hindus killed by militants in the valley with the help of Muslim sympathizers who provided the names and locations of the Hindus to be targeted, unaccounted for Kashmiri Hindus killed by militants but not added to the books as it took a while for India to militarily get back Kashmir in 1992, Kashmiri Muslim sympathizers of Hindus and Indian government who were targeted and killed by militants from Pakistan bent on creating unrest and innocent Kashmiri Muslims killed in the cross fire of violent riots where the weapons used were not just stones but more deadly tools aimed at causing damage to the Indian armed forces. Now, if the math is really done, the losses are great, tragic and deplorable. But, the reasons for the losses are not as cut and clear as Kashmiri Muslims killed just by Indian armed forces. Now, this is no justification for military excesses, but I want to make a case for the valid presentation of truth and Ms. Roy’s statements don’t do that.

Now, let’s take a look at her view on Kashmiri Hindus. Now, this is where the skeptical analysis of truth, which is a must have for an activist like her, comes up. Unfortunately, it is not for her previous number for the Muslims, but is there for the number for Hindus. Her statement about the false information provided by the Panun Kashmiris is largely about that – the sharing of numbers and the losses they incurred. Not about what those losses meant to them. Panun Kashmiris claim that 700,000 Hindus became refugees but official numbers don’t support that claim, thereby casting doubts on the intent of this ethnic Hindu group. But, from a humanitarian standpoint, this is what possibly happened. Kashmiri Hindus were targeted and killed by terrorists trained from across the borders, they were displaced and those who lived in the valley slowly left it. Those who wanted to come back were terrified enough that they will be singled out that they still preferred not to go back there. Some Hindus have taken advantage of the situation by using up government grants, but the rest hurriedly sold all their homes and assets as they didn’t have anyone to support them there. Most Muslims bought Hindu property for dirt cheap prices or occupied them for free and there is no longer a clearly recognized home for the minorities in the valley.

Now, if we need to discount realities just based on the valid claim of numbers, then, based on Ms. Roy’s not so accurate 68,000 number, there could be a dangerous group of people who can interpret the death of Kashmir Muslims as retribution for their sins and their unwillingness to cooperate with the democratic system of nation building as represented by India, but instead choosing to go with the Islamic fundamentalist doctrines of Pakistan and it’s remote control, the ISI. Just looking at these two situations helps us understand how a biased viewpoint shared as hard facts misleads the audience and can potentially lead to serious issues for the future.

Ms. Roy may have called what happened to the Hindus as a tragedy, but “tragedy” is a poor choice of word coming from someone who won a Booker for using exotic English words possibly learnt from schooling in rich Indian Christian institutions. Tragedy is what happens when someone loses their job or their limb or their limb at a job. Genocide or more likely selective mass killings based on religious hatred is what happened to the Kashmiri Hindus and the Muslims. Unfortunately, by trying to make a quick case for only the Kashmiri Muslims and quickly brushing aside the Hindu cause in a half-hearted manner, she has hurt the chances of Kashmiri Muslims getting help even from the unwanted Indian “dogs”, if not the World.

Ms. Roy however also makes a call for adherence to certain democratic principles that can potentially lead to something worthwhile for the Kashmir community. She said, “…everybody in Kashmir should have a very deep discussion about what kind of society you’re fighting for because Kashmir is a very diverse community… These are debates that people within the state of Jammu and Kashmir are quite capable of having by themselves…”

What would have been exceptionally useful would have been a discussion during that conference on how the Kashmiris, inclusive of minorities, can start that unique dialogue and public debate. Instead, the conference went into yet another attempt at bashing the Indian establishment as one speaker after the other chose to do that. Now, it is true that the Pundits are hearing people in the valley say that they are welcome to come back. But, if you talk to the Kashmiri Pundits, you will also hear them say how they were separated out and identified on the streets of Kashmir, sometimes mocked and sometimes made to feel threatened. Complicating this is the fact that Pakistan has no official policy towards stopping AK-47 wielding “freedom-fighters” in crossing a porous border. This means that Hindu minorities going back to the valley can always be woken up in the middle of the night by someone who wants to shower bullets on them! In the same way Ms. Roy said Kashmiris cannot inhale and exhale without their breath going through the barrel of an AK-47, a reference to the Kashmiri Muslims threatened under the Indian military forces.

4. Syed Ali Shah Geelani: Mr. Geelani was definitely the central character in this meeting. Apart from bringing in supporters for the Kashmiri cause, he was also instrumental in bringing in speakers from different segments of the political struggle in India and provided a forum for them to talk. This is amazing as this is the kind of public debate that is missing a lot in our country. However, Mr. Geelani’s speech was completely focused on why Kashmir is not a part of India and why it shouldn’t be a part of India. All is good with that, but why should Kashmir be a part of Pakistan? And why is Azad Kashmir or POK a part of Pakistan? None of these are discussed as the forum was definitely for pushing the dial on what can be done to garner support for a non-violent movement where in as Mr. Geelani mentioned, stones were thrown but no Indian soldier was killed. If kids are brought out and the youth is involved, it becomes an all the more interesting twist as now the onus is on the Indian military to scratch their heads and determine what can be done to prevent stones from hurting their heads. After all, stones were not being thrown to see how far they go they were thrown to bump on some soldier who wasn’t attentive enough to escape the missiles. In an age where bullets can be sprayed in a matter of seconds, we can safely believe that stones don’t cause harm maybe!
Well, the reason Mr. Geelani himself is a point of discussion is because of all the debaters looking for social justice that day, Mr. Geelani was the most misleading of them all. Those who have followed him in other press meets know that he is an open supporter of Kashmir going to Pakistan. He of course, includes the entire state of Jammu & Kashmir in that equation. Now, his speech on independence did not mention Pakistan like it is was a forbidden word that everyone secretly signed to not mention before speaking! He bemoans the fact that we have had 150 dialogues since 1992 on the Kashmir issue and it hasn’t led to anything as India fails to agree with the premise that Kashmir does not belong to India. This is a sad state of affairs as successive Indian governments for that many years have dropped the ball on having meaningful negotiations with the Kashmiri Muslims, but instead chose to have a permanent military presence to stabilize the region.
But, here is where Mr. Geelani comes out as not genuine. He has said in the past that Kashmir should be going to Pakistan as it cannot exist as an independent state even if it wants to! Now when a reporter asked why, he said that India, Pakistan and China, yes China too, were interested in Kashmir that they will just take it up. More like money left on a table. Now, not many people mention China as an interested partner in this mess, although we know that Pakistan took a part of Kashmir and then gave it to China! And yes, China does cut a check to Pakistan to keep things going in Kashmir, the same way the US also cuts a check to keep things going in Afghanistan and India cuts a check to keep things going in Tibet. Now, on the pressing question of why Pakistan; his viewpoint is that Kashmiris have dealt enough with India and don’t trust them anymore. His solution for how he will cut a deal with Pakistan is that Kashmir will remain autonomous and run its own administration but will use Pakistan only for managing security, finance and foreign policy. Well, umm, that is what India did with Kashmir, right!?
Now, what about the minorities? Well, they are welcome to come back to Kashmir. But to what kind of Kashmir will they return? It is not with no known vengeance that minority religious places were attacked or are threatened of being attacked. It is not with no known discrimination that the Kashmiri language takes a back seat with Urdu as the official language forced in all schools in the valley and it is not with no known disparity that the Muslim majority takes the larger share of jobs and seats in educational institutions. While these can be corrected by a very good leadership in independent Kashmir, precedents don’t seem to help. The fact that Mr. Geelani hardly has a clear roadmap and definition for what the independent nation of Kashmir tied in its hip to Pakistan will mean, all the stone throwing protests are merely that, stone throwing in the streets by raising voiced slogans for independence. What about Azad Kashmir or POK? What kind of Kashmir will that be once it is allowed by Pakistan to be integrated into independent Kashmir? An excerpt in Wikipedia says, the 2009 edition of the Freedom in the World (report) by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees rated Jammu and Kashmir to be partly free, while in comparison Pakistan-administered Kashmir was rated to be not free.
The ego of the Indian nation and the emotional temperament of its people will not allow a Kashmir to exist with Pakistan or even independently beyond its current autonomous status if there is no meaningful direction ahead and no meaningful public debates encouraged. Mr. Geelani should be less focused in collecting stones and sharing it with kids who don’t know what Azaadi really means, but more focused on how this debate can be made more meaningful so that his 151st or maybe 160th dialogue with India will lead to true democratic freedom for the Kashmiris, not just Muslims, not just Hindus, but even the Sikhs and Christians in that region.
5. The final closing comments: As I mentioned earlier, while your starting punch-lines define who you are for the audience, the closing comments are the call for action from the audience set up in clear, definitive terms. Here were Ms. Roy’s comments,
“…You’ve got to ask yourself—there’s more to resistance than throwing stones—these things can’t be allowed to happen—”how is the state using people?” The colonial state whether it was the British state in India or whether it’s the Indian state in Kashmir or Nagaland or in Chhattisgarh, they are in the business of creating elites to manage their occupations, so you have to know your enemy and you have to be able to respond in ways where you’re tactical, where you’re intelligent, where you’re political—internationally, locally and in every other way—you have to make your alliances, because otherwise you’ll be like fish swimming furiously around a fish tank bombing the walls and getting tired in the end because those walls are very, very strong. So I’ll just leave with this: Think about justice and don’t pick and choose your injustices. Don’t say that “I want justice but it’s ok if the next guy doesn’t have it, or the next woman doesn’t have it.” Because justice is the keystone to integrity and integrity is the key stone to real resistance.”
While Ms. Roy makes an exceptional case for prudence, substituting actionable next steps with beautiful rhetoric turns the speech into a confusing conundrum of meanings for the audience. She makes a beautiful suggestion for how we should not choose our injustices or care about justice for your own self. Again, a practical answer to that would be if Kashmiri Muslims partnered with minority groups to fight for the injustices done to the minorities and also willingly called out the double standards of not just the Indian nation but of other nations acting on the sly to further their own selfish agendas. Kashmir was always plundered historically since ages. Several military forces tried to occupy that nation during different stages of its history.
The challenge with Kashmir is that revenge or retribution will never work as that is what had happened to the region for thousands of years. Hindus were forcibly converted to Islam by rulers from the West bent on correcting “infidels” through threats of death and destruction. The Sikhs came in with their own agenda. The Muslims were persecuted by suffering in the lower end of a feudal system, the British came in with their divisive agenda, The Hindus were divided in their support for the Muslims, Sheikh Abdullah made things right for Muslims by making things wrong for the Hindus and the Indian government and Pakistan government added to the mix by playing around with their own agendas.
None of these can be used to blame one group, religion or nation against the other. Any deviation from following democratic methods of resolution will always lead to more bloodshed and misery. This is the painful story of that valley. India needs democratic reforms to support the life of its people, occupied or non-occupied. It needs for sure but needs less of intellectual superstar writers blasting nations for their complacency and calling an already battered people to take up giant nations with massive power. You make changes to those nations only through the strong pillars of democracy- reason, reform and truth- unfiltered, unbiased truth. The path forward may be painfully slow, but the wait will be worth it as it doesn’t provide short term band aids but a wholesome treatment for the problem at hand.
To take Ms. Roy’s analogy of a fish in a tank for representing the Kashmiris in India, while a fish shouldn’t keep hitting the walls of a tank as the walls are very strong, the biggest concern for a fish is to not come out of the water or not lose the water in which it is still able to swim. There will always be four walls enclosing a water body, whether it is a fish tank or an ocean. Trying to know your enemy isn’t helpful here if the enemy you consider is the four walls saving the water in which the fishes are still alive. Today it may be the fish tank of India. Tomorrow it may be that of Pakistan or that of China. Or, one day, it would be the ocean of the World. But, your enemies that you need to so intelligently be aware of are the other fishes that may try to eat you within that tank or the toxins that someone from outside puts into that tank. The beauty of peaceful democratic coexistence comes from not drilling a hole in the tank but from figuring a way to enjoy the resources available for you within that tank and making amendments if needed to the rules of existence in that tank. As who knows, the other tanks or ocean you want to so eagerly escape to or create on your own may have more fundamentalist sharks or dictatorial whales that you may not survive even a day in if you don’t have an agenda for how the fishes will live in your tank to begin with. You don’t fight to get a separate tank only to end up being the only fish left in it.

Book Review: The CIA's Secret War in Tibet by Kenneth Conboy

2011-02-21T13:42:00.000-08:00

There are several books written on secret wars and espionage conducted around the World. Most of the books, I believe, represent some element of truth but could also be just among several books that provide an alternate perspective on what happened at a certain place at a certain time. I am not sure under what category this book falls into, but this book surely seems honest in its approach and the presentation of facts. The book, as the name suggests, talks about a secret campaign conducted by the CIA during the cold war to preempt a potential growth of Communist China by taking up the cause of the Tibetan nation. Tibet was occupied by Communist China when the PLA under the leadership of Chairman Mao laid claim to the vast expanse of mostly barren land for strategic, economic and possibly cultural purposes. The rest of the book tells the story of how the Tibetan's organized themselves under the Dalai Lama, used India, Nepal and East Pakistan (Bangladesh) as a base and worked with the CIA to launch secret operations of resistance against the Chinese.

Assuming that this book was allowed to be published, it is probably anyone's guess that these operations were probably not a secret for long and they were probably exposed or identified by the Chinese way back in the 60s or 70s. But, there were still some very insightful perspectives or facts offered that I will summarize in points below for those who are interested in knowing what the book is all about. I found these to be personally educative as it helped me realize how far away we are from the happenings around the World unless we try hard to learn more on our own!

The title Dalai Lama was given to a monk in the 16th century by a Mongol chieftain Altan Khan. Subsequent descendants kept that title going forward. The current Dalai Lama is the 14th.
Earlier Dalai Lama's had less of a great legacy and didn't last beyond a few years. The 4th Dalai Lama was Altan Khan's great grandson -a shrewd decision made to gain Mongol patronage. The 5th Dalai Lama self declared himself as the Bodhisatva of Compassion- the highest celestial authority.
Tibet was divided into at least three distinct regions with different topographies and related ethnicity. The central part of Tibet was where the Tibetan leadership existed in the past. There were class based differences between Tibetans from these different regions with people in the central region considering themselves superior to the rest.
Chiang Kai Shek laid claim to Tibet by considering it as part of the Chinese Republic. Following a civil war with the communist party and his subsequent retreat to Taiwan, the PRC pursued the agenda of making Tibet a part of the country.
American leaders like the then US ambassador to India, Loy Henderson, were worried about the advancing PLA troops far south into the Himalayan regions.
The CIA based in India created and executed several covert operations to check the strength of the PLA in Tibet.
President Eisenhower began the first of a series of secret US sponsored activities in foreign soil to push the exiled Tibetans towards causing disruption to the PLA.
Prime Minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru, did not openly support exiled Tibetans from going on an all out war with China as part of his appeasement policy with that nation. India was called as the "Dregs of Humanity" by Beijing in 1949.
The CIA conducted several covert operations by working with the Dalai Lama's brothers to recruit exiled Tibetans who escaped to Nepal and India. India allowed the exiled Tibetans to settle in the country with the condition that they don't cause any disruption to Indo-China relationships.
Several CIA operations were conducted from East Pakistan (Bangladesh) before India officially lent support to these operations after the Chines invasion of India's NEFA (North East Frontier Agency).
Most of the CIA led operations in Tibet were small teams of Tibetan's air dropped inside Tibet to conduct covert operations. Most of the Tibetan recruits were captured and killed by the PLA before they made any useful impact to their cause.
Biju Patnaik, ex chief minister of Orissa, was instrumental in the liberation of Indonesia from the Dutch. He also supported the CIA in partnering at a strategic level with the support of Nehru.
Brigadier Uban Singh was instrumental in organizing a strong regiment of Tibetan recruits under the name "Establishment 22". Nehru and the Dalai Lama had also inspected the operations of these forces during a secret review of the regiment.
President John Kennedy was a strong supporter of India and was instrumental in providing support to the country in indirectly allowing the CIA help the Tibetan cause. This support and partnership with India was lost after Kennedy's death. Subsequent governments were leaning more towards Pakistan thereby alienating a strong partnership with India. India on the other hand, pursued a pro-USSR policy for obtaining arms and other economic support.
In the 1962 war with China, the Soviet Union sided with China and dumped India. Indo-US cooperation was much stronger and better at that time, although very few in India knew about it. Anti-US sentiment was politically very active right from the start and continued over the next several decades after India chose to move closer to the Soviets.
The US soon adopted a pro-China policy during the Nixon era. US warships arrived dangerously close to India during the Indo-Pak war for Bangladesh's independence. It was claimed by Henry Kissinger that US would have supported China in case the Chinese attacked India to support Pakistan, following which the Soviets attacked China.
Nepal leaned more towards China in fear of being dominated by India. During the closing years of the Tibetan struggle led by the CIA, Nepal, in support of China, was instrumental in destroying the Tibetan operations on the Nepal-Tibet border.
CIA funding slowly depleted for the Tibetan cause after a $180,000 yearly stipend to the Dalai Lama charity was shut down. Following that, most of the CIA led operations were winding down.
RAW director R.N.Kao later blamed the Americans for the lost Tibetan cause, although Indian support was also not strong enough. He said, "The Tibetans were looking for somebody to hold their finger, and the Americans dropped them like a hot potato."

Book Review: The Lightning And The Sun by Savitri Devi

2011-02-10T10:13:00.000-08:00

It is a well admitted fact that the Nazi regime was cruel and led to mass destruction and anarchy until its end with World War II. Even if we have been trained over the years to listen, read and learn one-sided stories on the Nazi saga with well crafted allied vs axis propaganda in books, movies, speeches, documentaries and our daily lives; the ultimate truth is that there was large scale loss of life and property during the years leading to the World War up until its end in 1945.

There also existed a parallel stream of so called "Nazi sympathizers" too. They were largely unheard of until the internet revolution provided an alternate medium for them to propagate their ideas. Their theories either invite the ire of Nazi regime haters or historians who feel they have already done enough justice to present the reality to the public. To others, they create confusion as the alternate "truth" that they present is sometimes mixed with realities and hard hitting facts that makes you think, thereby making you feel uneasy. The real truth is probably hidden somewhere in between, but the very pursual of that may seem insignificant and unnecessary.

In that light, I consider this book as contributing to the confusing yet delightfully challenging perspective on what could have happened before, during and after the Nazi years in World History. The narrative in this book is even more interesting as it delves into certain spiritual and philosophical aspects of Aryan wisdom and draws a logical map for what that means in the divine scheme of things in life. The author's primary focus in the book is on three types of men who carve themselves out from the rest in the World- Men in time (drawing a parallel with Lightning), Men above time (drawing a parallel with Sun) and Men Against time (a combination of Lightning and Sun). Adolf Hitler is presented as a Man against time, an incarnation of the creator God of ancient mythology. The author also manages to provide examples in Akhnaton (man above time) and Genghis Khan (man in time) to provide glimpses into the other alternatives the World got to see. The Hindu principle espoused in the Bhagavad Gita on detached violence is also taken as the basis for justifying certain unimaginable acts of death and destruction.

While it is hard to just brush aside the not-so straightforward and not-so truthful acts of the allied nations, I do feel the author makes widely accepted assumptions on Aryan legacy based in Nordic, Celtic, Saxon and Germanic roots that I am yet to truly believe in.

The book is worth a read also because it has been written by someone who is not a German and who didn't truly participate in the Nazi cause actively in Europe, although her husband and she worked on Nazi propaganda in India. The author's name can also be misleading as it is a Hindu name -Savitri Devi. The author however was a European with French and Greek roots (no Germanic roots at all) and was married to an Indian, a Hindu, and she believes in calling herself an Aryan Hindu woman. Moreover, she does not really belong to the group of "Nazi sympathizers". She is more of a Nazi fanatic, a passionate believer in an alternate purpose for that movement started by Hitler. Her commentaries however were all authored well after the World War ended, thereby lending voice to a long dead movement.

I would recommend this book only for people who can digest its contents without taking sides and have the capacity to think through things that go against widely hammered down literature on World History over the years.

Book Review: India, A Short Cultural History by HG Rawlinson

2011-02-08T13:35:00.000-08:00

Indians do not know their history. European historians who eventually put Indian history on paper did not get over their biased thought process to bring neutrality in their theories, thoughts and information presented.

HG Rawlinson's book is mostly a compilation of Indian history from other books written in the past. The good thing is that it is presented in a brief, concise manner with mostly a good intent of highlighting the unique cultural history of this nation.

The book presents a historical account that tends to expose a couple of interesting facts about the country's past and present.
- Indian's don't know what their history was as their history books in schools are useless.
- Indian scholars of history largely ape their colonial European masters when it comes to re-rendering India's history. There is no critical thinking associated with questioning the works of Max Muller or other great European historians and their works.
- India did not and still does not have the resources required to restore the historical accuracy of its past. Nobody knows how to build a consistent chronological account of Indian history as they do not know enough about its past. The author brings this out by highlighting the dark ages of Indian history in different intervals in the past where no one knew what happened in this nation.
- India as a nation never existed in the past. It was a vast compilation of culturally rich, socially divergent and racially diverse groups of nations. Different rulers including the Mughals and the British tried to tie it into a single unified nation with only some success.
- The British and other Europeans passively resided in India centuries before they started taking over the political administration of the country during the fall of the Mughal empire.
- And yes, some of the best accounts of Indian history were documented by the Chinese. We shared a lot more in culture and cooperation in the past than in the present.

Book Review: India, What Can It Teach Us? by Max Muller

2011-02-08T12:57:00.000-08:00

Max Muller was a Sanskrit scholar and Orientologist who rose to fame with his translation of the Rig Veda and several other Sanskrit literatures from India. He was part of a small group of Historians who sometimes defined and in other times redefined India's past based on theories that they felt were justified by archaeological or historical evidences. History so well crafted, politically authorized and mass publicized that no other modern historians have been able to break these shackles of preconceived ideas and thoughts to accept anything different about India’s history today.

This book is a series of lectures he gave to Indian Civil Service officers of Colonial Britain at the University of Cambridge, before they were commissioned on administrative assignments in India for 10-20 years. It largely talks about how Britishers’ should not look at India from a biased colonist point of view, but learn from its rich history and heritage dating back to 3000 years or more. Max Muller makes a case for how Sanskrit literature is rich in content and context sometimes surpassing Greek literature that most Europeans are largely appreciative of. He talks about the wisdom espoused in the Rig Veda around concepts such as religion and philosophy thereby attributing cultural richness to the nation.

The author belabors the point that the true India is in the village communities of the country. He talks about how the villages of India have defined the social strata, legal structure and cultural outlook of the nation as compared to its cities and towns that saw years of occupation and plunder from outside nations. The author’s main fascination is however around Sanskrit and Indian philosophy. He talks about Sanskrit as the elder sister of the Indo European languages and urges the civil service officers to learn Sanskrit on their arrival in India. He also laments the bad image created of India by British historians like James Mills and urges these officers to instead seek Indian History from the journals of Colonel William Sleeman, a British officer commissioned to handle thuggery in Indian villages.

Max Muller comes out as a very respectable figure in his brief lectures captured in this book. Whether he made any true impact on the British officers who attended his lecture is doubtful as the intent of British administrators was never meant to shower love on India or Indians. They occupied the nation for economic purposes and maintained their hegemony as long as it mattered for the mother country.

The author generously praises India a lot in this book and probably talks more passionately about the country in some cases when compared with other Indian nationalists of his time. He calls India a "paradise on earth" and a place where the greatest achievement of the human mind under the sky was realized. He however largely talks about these in the context of an India that existed 2000 years before, well before Buddha or Christ, and not the state of the country when it was under British rule.

Max Muller however suffers from using the same convoluted lens that other European historians have used to intuitively capture the history of the East, especially India, primarily based on the Aryan invasion theory. Like other historians of his kind, he comes with a preconceived notion on Aryan history and its origins. He makes glaring assumptions on how Aryans originated somewhere in Europe and their conquests pushed local aborigines (dasyus) further South in the country. This theory based purely on color of the skin of the native inhabitants and misinterpreted lines in the Rig Veda lack any convincing storyline. This mindset in reflected in how his showering of praise for the nation is also intermixed with a call for “sympathy” towards Indians. The other delusion that his work suffers from, like all other European Historians, is to consider "India" as a country in its entirety with a singular cultural or historical identity. This was probably done to provide uniformity in thoughts to its readers and sponsors, mostly rich colonial European administrators. India as a country was a fictitious creation of the Mughal invaders way back, but then even they didn't consider the Southern part of India as part of the Hindustan that they mapped out. India turned out to be a creation of European invaders and trading companies, who cared less about its cultural diversity, if not the ethnic and linguistic history of its inhabitants. It's a shame that this theory was well supported by the free India created in 1947 as it helped serve the federal or union building efforts of the then government. A simple way to look at this anomaly is in seeing what the World would have thought if Asian Historians self proclaiming themselves as experts would pool together the entire European nations and call them as a single country called "Europe" occupied by white inhabitants with a single religion tied to the Christian faith! This was how European authorities or historical savants viewed India as and got away with it.

The author also hurriedly tries to explain the antiquity of Indian literature in the context of the Rig Veda by making a case for how writing the Rig Veda onto paper was not the intent of the ancient Indians, but the goal was to have a select group of people memorize them and pass them over the years. But, he struggles to confidently claim that the Rig Veda shows an advanced culture dating back to 1500BC or even earlier. I believe the tendency for European historians and archaeologists to pick an earthen pot and use flawed carbon dating to confidently attach chronological evidence also forced him to still consider literary evidence as those scribbled on paper, wood or rocks as true beacons of dated history.

Overall, this book is a good read for anyone interested in the works of European orientologists and Indian History. At a bare minimum, this book reflects the historical fact that British colonists did organize a series of lectures to outgoing civil service officers by calling in noted European historians for sharing their perspectives on India. Sometimes, it’s the intent that matters rather than the results. The British government had a good intent in teaching its select cadre of talented people something more about the nation they occupied, although that knowledge, to Max Muller’s disappointment, didn’t percolate well enough to the British public in general.

Recent Developments In Taxation Law Agreements Between India And Switzerland

2011-02-03T10:16:00.000-08:00

Recently, India entered into a revised double taxation avoidance agreement with Switzerland. A debate ensued in the Lok Sabha with leaders such as L.K. Advani asking for clarification on what benefits the agreement will truly provide to India. The terms of the agreement are confusing indeed and there is no clear sense of the benefits that such an agreement will provide to the country. Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee however made it clear that this treaty will not help India in getting back any black money stashed away by Indians in secret bank accounts nor would it expose details of the account holders. According to Mukherjee, Swiss Laws are very strict and the banks don’t give any information of their banking transactions. Moreover, the only information obtained cannot be publicly disclosed and can be used only for taxation purposes. In other words, it is not meant to recover any black money.

According to the influential Swiss Bankers Association, India has roughly about $1.5 trillion of black money deposited in Swiss banks. India has more black money than the rest of the world and is equivalent to one year of India’s GDP. This is a tremendous amount of money that when utilized for the right purposes in India can educate children, fund much needed infrastructure projects and remove the majority of poverty in the nation over the next 15-30 years. Ram Jethmalani has been a recent advocate of the need to retrieve black money deposited by Indians in Swiss Banks. "A staggering $1500 billion Indian money has been stashed away in Swiss banks. If it is retrieved, each Indian family will get Rs 2.5 lakh each. India will have a debt-free budget for 30 years and all our external debt will be wiped out," Jethmalani told a seminar organized by the Telangana Advocates Joint Action Committee, making a case for why regional differences would no longer matter when prosperity exists in the nation.

However, there are certain realities to consider in the background of this agreement, which even if not historical, is a significant step made in the right direction. Given the challenge with Swiss laws and the Indian political, legal and economic establishment, recovery of black money in part or in its entirety is not feasible. Swiss banks are not the only holders of India’s black money. A parallel economy has existed in this country over the past 50 years and inflexible taxation laws have led to Indians stocking large amounts of unaccounted money. This was also fueled by the existence of the License Raj in India until its slow demise in the early 1990s. Several countries including the US and Germany have been pushing Swiss banks for access to their citizen’s accounts for years together through several lawsuits and political pressure. However, all those efforts have only resulted in one success just for the US government. UBS, the second largest Swiss bank, agreed to hand over account details of about 4,450 tax evaders to US authorities out of a total request for account details of 52,000 clients.

Even without any effort at retrieval of existing black money, if we can stop the bloodletting by preventing further black money from flowing out, the benefits to the country are significant. Say, a wealthy person deposits Rs. 10 crores in black money (about US $2 million) in a Swiss bank. That money through the banking system will eventually fund and fuel the Swiss economy by providing its local governments and corporations with unprecedented access to investor money. The Indian economy on the other hand is sitting to lose not only that investment potential but also 30% of that amount (at least in taxes) or the equivalent of Rs 3 crore. It is anyone’s guess that such money could be used to fund huge development projects in the country to truly alleviate "materialistic" poverty.

Swiss bank laws support a very strong secrecy pact that in effect prevents anyone not authorized by the account holder from accessing account details. This applies even to governments seeking information on any suspected individuals. The reasoning as one Swiss official put it in a NPR radio interview several months back is to protect the privacy of the account holder and the safety of his assets. This has been evangelized over the years by the Swiss government and still continues to be their selling point. The Swiss laws make a glaring distinction on legal grounds between tax avoidance and tax fraud or evasion. The Swiss government agrees to cooperate willingly on tax fraud issues but not on tax avoidance. Understanding the difference between these largely similar terms is baked in technical language that is difficult to easily comprehend. The challenge that several countries including India face is that there is a lot of evidence needed to build a tax fraud case. That evidence is in turn already hidden in the bank asset details of a citizen under investigation. In other words, to request bank account details of India’s citizens, the government needs to build a case for evidence of tax fraud. However, to make an effective case for tax fraud, you need the bank account details of these citizens. Hence, a never ending loop is created and the ability to generate any viable results in favor of the country requesting bank account information may come only through a miracle of legal maneuvering or political hardballing. This is where the recent amendments to the DTAA with the Swiss government still continue to pose a major challenge to India if it truly wishes to retrieve black money and redirect it for the benefit of its people.

The irony of this situation lies in the fact that except for reasons of tax evasion or fraud, there is no other reason a person from developing nations such as India would stock money in a Swiss bank. India’s large population of the poor and middle class societies may never have visited or even heard of such banks. Even with the globalization of the banking sector in the recent past, Swiss banks don’t dominate the banking landscape of the country, although some American banks do. It is India’s minority network of politicians, bureaucrats, celebrities and other rich members who have the means and maybe the will to utilize these banking services. Populist taxation measures not built on true economic benefits for the nation but at the same time targeting the wealthy also seem to serve as a motivation for this section of the society to preserve its assets in other forms detrimental to the nation’s growth. Also, when it comes to safety of assets, most well established banks provide enough safety measures to protect the assets of its clients that this cannot be the motivating factor for someone seeking to transact with Swiss banks.

So, even though the merits for someone to save assets in a Swiss bank is not convincing enough to term it as a non issue, the means to get to money moving out of the country is not bright either. In the years to come, the hope is that the DTAA and other tax agreement measures are continuously improved so that its true purpose in preventing and redirecting black money to the mothership country is well served. Also to be considered is the ability to build taxation laws that are not complex, not populist and not cumbersome to comply with. In today’s age of globalization, assets move between countries at a very fast pace. The ability for India’s banking infrastructure to effectively participate in this global effort is important to sustain the long term potential of the country to renounce the parallel economy and participate in the country’s growth forward. The amendments to the DTAA may be a misdirected step in one opinion or a small step forward in another opinion, but it takes the collective will of several entities in India to address the root cause of it.

Book Review: Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond

2010-05-09T21:01:00.000-07:00

Well, after a long break where I spent most of my time driving a strategic priority project towards completion at work, I am back to spend time talking about my favorite topics. I have recently experimented with video blogging and this is my first attempt at it.

I read the book "Guns, Germs and Steel" by Jared Diamond several months before but never got a chance to share my viewpoint on it. Now, I have tried to express some of my opinions in the form of a video blog. A lot to work on for me, but at least I have given it a start.

Ethics in Business: Silence is a Sign of Approval!

2009-08-20T06:59:00.000-07:00

In today's world, consumers are constantly bombarded with marketing promotions, gimmicks and subscriptions that companies use as a tool to gain a greater market share and obviously lock in more consumers into their network. While some companies do it the traditional way by sending promotion material either in print or by presenting it on the internet, there are a lot more companies that seem to adopt a shady version of it that I call the "silent parasite".

The "silent parasite" is a tool that companies seem to use to attract an unwilling consumer to their network through some means and then hold on to the consumer forever assuming that he/she has accepted their presence. Mostly the "means" end up being a free offering or subscription that eventually turns out into a trap laid by the company to grow its customer network.

A typical example of this was one that I had faced with the site-freecreditreport.com, way back when it started and before it changed some of its practices later on. When this site initially began, nobody knew who started this site, but it launched a pretty heavy ad campaign to promote the idea that your credit report is for free. When I signed up for the free report, I was led to believe that I was entering credit card details so that my identity could be verified. Without a clear indication of what was in store, I did manage to get my free report and was happy that I didn't have to access the monopolistic ring of the the three leading credit agencies to get a report that talks about my credit worthiness. What I wasn't aware of was that I had also automatically signed myself into being charged a monthly fee to get some regular updates on my credit report because I somehow did not disapprove the idea of being charged in the first place! After a few credit card bills that showed money being siphoned off account, I eventually had to call them up to cancel my "subscription". I soon realized I wasn't alone in this silent approval trickery. Consumers immediately exposed the fact that this site belonged to one of the three large credit agencies-Experian. Also, the fine print that was possibly concealed well enough was also exposed and the site received some flak. Soon, the website was revamped and as you can see the current version today, it not only shows clearly that it is an Experian company but it also has a clearly highlighted "important information" section in the home page that warns that not canceling the free membership within 7 days automatically implies subscription to a monthly fee based program.

This company is not alone in sucking customers through this trick. Several companies often have these clauses showing up in fine print- a practice I think gives businesses a legal option to smartly whip the unsuspecting consumer. How many times do you think consumers get to read fine prints in the first place, and read and understand the Shakespearean language used to explain what the consumer is getting into in the second place? Assuming that the law requires even consumers to be smart enough to look around, identify and understand what they are getting into, the bigger question is how can businesses assume that since a consumer did not say no to something that they imagined the consumer will say "yes" to, the consumer has in effect authorized to part with their money?

Magazine/newspaper companies are also a good example of a place where such practices are common. Don't stop a free subscription and you will automatically be billed from the time the freebie ends. Why this trick works for businesses is because of the nature of human behavior when it is influenced by time and space. This is the fuel to the marketer's promotional instincts that guarantees that a consumer in a large number of cases does not reject something once he is knee deep into it.

To explain this further, we need to understand how people behave. A majority of us are not the kind of people who maintain a strict regimen in life. A life that is filled with a time bound activity of what all needs to be tracked and completed in the future. A good amount of people who are of that kind are mostly those who tend to track and complete activities of prime importance for them. That is where, the marketing programs of businesses seep in through the cracks. Given the growing responsibilities of the average human being, it is becoming largely difficult for them to keep track of every event that they participate in or every action that they have taken in the past, which has a future implication that is strictly time bound. How many times can a consumer remember that before the seventh day from today, she needs to call freecreditreport.com to cancel an automatic subscription that will immediately sign her up for a fee-based subscription??

Companies are smart enough to understand this human dilemma- a general disposition towards laziness when it comes to remembering a particular time in the future to carry out a series of not so familiar non-daily actions to prevent themselves from getting into something that they are not in approval of to begin with. As one can see, none of these "silent approval" programs have an easy way for the consumer to one: pre-cancel a membership/subscription while signing up for something free and two: post-cancel a membership/subscription through the click of a button, the same easy means by which the consumer signed up in the first place. These cancellations are largely done when the consumer ends up calling a 800 number and wait for some time before they end talking with an agent to get rid of the parasite. In my opinion, what companies I believe have realized is the economic benefit that comes with this trivial human nature.

If freecreditreport.com captures 1000 consumers, who do not wish to hold on to their subscriptions to end up paying for it, the company has a computer based time bomb ticking away and waiting for day 7 (0 hours o minutes 0 seconds) to pounce upon them. Assuming that a rare 95% of these consumers called in to cancel their subscription, it leaves the remaining 5% of consumers who are still exposed to this parasite. Given that the monthly subscription is $15, 50 unwilling consumers end up registering $750 into the companies bank account. This is free money for the company that no consumer can claim as lost through any legal means. If this continues for another month, the company pockets $1500 of free money. By scaling up these numbers, one can imagine the kind of free money that a company can make by simply taking advantage of the principle that "silence is a sign of approval"!

Marijuana and Dogs: The Strange Case of Two Michaels

2009-05-10T22:01:00.000-07:00

Two interesting events happened in the American sporting world in the past two years. It involved two famous sportsmen, but it had nothing to do with sports. Michael Vick, a footballer for the Atlanta Falcons, was caught running a dog fighting ring. The uproar was tremendous as public opinion flowed in to protest the ghastly crime committed by the player. The law was also not slow in slapping him with some strong felony charges and he was rightly sent packing to prison.
Until recently, Vick served his prison term, lost his NFL berth, became bankrupt, was not easily forgiven by the law and still struggles to get back to his life. Now, all is well and good in this story. A man deserves to be punished for his crimes, in this case, the death of dogs. Even today, public opinion is largely skewed towards punishing him more by denying him a start to his NFL career. Great media coverage, great legal prosecution, great punishment and a great public reaction.

Now, fast forwarding it to another incident that involved the best swimming sensation the planet has ever seen so far, was another Michael, whose last name Phelps was being associated with everything good that people can think of either in the sporting world, in the business world, the media or the public in general. Michael Phelps was caught smoking Marijuana largely by accident when someone clicked away and shared photos that were probably not meant for public viewing. This is when the big "WHAT!!!?" sparked in my mind. The public protested but it just lasted a few days and seemed more of something done out of embarrassment than anger. The media covered it too. But, they too were caught up with news that was not getting enough attention from the public and to make matters worse even the law. The law did start investigating the matter, but soon enough, "public" opinion emphasized on the fact that this is "just" news and it is "just" drugs. In the words of the Sheriff who investigated the matter - "We had a photo and we had him saying he was sorry for his inappropriate behavior. That behavior could have been going to a party". He never said, 'I smoked marijuana.' He never confessed that". Phelps own statement went this way - "For me, it's all about recognizing that I used bad judgment and it's a mistake I won't make again". Great choice of words for something that Phelps did that nobody knew about! What was he feeling bad about? Nevertheless, people grew tired of the investigation, the law never followed up, Phelps got punished by not being allowed to swim in one of the pools and everyone was happy that the embarrassment didn't last long.
This is where the big question arises - if something that affects dogs could evoke such genuine reaction and swift action, why can't something that can tremendously affect people the world over not get the right response. Although personally there is nothing against Phelps, I fail to understand why Phelps and Vick couldn't end up being on the same side of the fence. One obvious reason why it wasn't that way is because people in general do not understand the number of lives that Marijuana takes in its way as it reaches the hands of a society that still fantasizes its use and struggles to outright criminalize its consumption.
Marijuana comes from several domestic and largely international sources. According to the US DEA, Marijuana is the most widely abused and readily available illicit drug in the USA. About 30% of the US population has used Marijuana sometime in their lives. This could potentially explain the lukewarm reaction to the "Phelps show", but the dangers are not exposed enough. Organized crime groups and cartels run these operations in different countries possibly eliminating a few people before a pound of Marijuana makes its way to US shores. A high quality Marijuana sells for about $6000 per pound. I believe it is safe to assume that on its way to the US, a pound of Marijuana must have eliminated at least one person in a so called "third world" country. No price can be set for life, whether it is a person or an animal. That price is definitely not as low as $6000 or $10000 a pound. If a person consumes a gram of marijuana, he is in effect paying $12 for ecstasy and $0 for one human life. The question becomes who needs to pay for the "free" life that one consumes when smoking this drug. Given that this is designated as a gateway drug to more powerful drugs, the bloodshed on the way is immeasurable but yet more significant. If Vick paid up millions in fines and lost his job for the "life" that he consumed, why couldn't a user of drugs also be responsible for a similar fate?
The war against drugs has been ongoing for several years and there has always been a debate over who the "criminal" is and who needs to be punished for the selling and consumption of drugs. Nevertheless, public reaction and debate are the only triggers that can create laws that protect the weak - a dog or a human being. By remaining silent or worse not even bothering to react, we people have probably exposed our inability to value human life beyond the life of a dog by refusing to think and question the actions around us.

The FDA Should Ban Foreign Clinical Studies of Drugs

2009-03-15T17:00:00.000-07:00

Among several relatively unknown activities that lead to exploitation of the innocents, foreign clinical studies or drug trials is one such act carried out by giant multinational pharmaceutical firms. The big name pharmaceutical firms in the US and UK depend on conducting clinical trials in nations such as India and other poor countries to reduce their overall drug development costs by about 40-60%. By 2010, it is assumed that the total spend on outsourcing clinical trials to India is to exceed $2Billion. Having seen how doctors and hospitals behave in a country like India, it is pretty certain how the ignorant (it doesn't matter whether you are poor or rich) can be taken undue advantage of to satisfy the needs of these companies.
Doctors and Hospitals in India have less at stake when it comes to safe recommendation and regulation of medication for patients. In a World that wakes up and sleeps to the music of money, the only stick that holds greed at bay is confirmation to strict legal regulations. Without a strong legal base in a country, the law remains powerless when it comes to monitoring the greedy acts of companies. When a doctor prescribes a "special" medicine to an ignorant patient on the behest of a pharmaceutical firm working to test those drugs, there is nothing within the legal rights of the patient to stop such acts. India has a lot of laws that prescribe the right conduct of such trials and these companies make sure that these legal edicts are safely followed on paper. Unfortunately, in countries where issues do not even reach the doors of the law for justice to be served, the end result is the lack of any law in the first place. India and several other materialistically poor nations suffer from this incurable disease. I have personally observed how daunting an experience it is talking with doctors and hospital/clinic staff who literally have a free ride in not only recommending any number of medications they like without fear of being legally sued, but also have the audacity to scold or threaten patients if things are not to their liking. Several of these doctors are constantly approached by medical representatives, who act as a sales front for the pharmaceutical firms. Sometimes, in the guise of an informed consent, they literally dump new medications or slow-moving medications to unwary patients. One can only imagine how it would look like for the largely poorer or ignorant sections that constitutes about 70% of the Indian population.
In all this melee hides a silent and often ignorant sleeping giant - the FDA. The FDA authorizes foreign clinical studies as long as it abides by the regulations set by the host country (where the trial is conducted mostly in secrecy) or to other ethical principles under the Declaration of Helsinki (which I believe is no longer relevant), whichever protects human rights better. This unfortunately is a mere fallacy that has no practical meaning whatsoever. All the profit making pharmaceutical firms in the World look forward to the FDA as the gate keeper who opens them to the mecca of blockbuster drug sales - the USA. The US is one of the largest consumers of prescription drugs and one of the most profitable markets for any drug company. Fortunately, this country has the FDA to hopefully regulate the kind of drugs brought out into the market and its long term use and existence. Also, a network of well organized lawyers later ensure that these firms are selling what they promise they cure or else slap them with multi-million dollar law suits that usually work in favor of the "cheated" patient. Unfortunately, the FDA is not thinking in clear terms when it comes to how these companies work to meet the requirements of their strong codes of conduct.
The FDA does not have the resources nor a nationalistic purpose to clearly monitor the often obscure methods employed by these large drug companies in conducting their trials in remote areas of Asia or Africa. The FDA has to answer the US government and its citizens and that is all it is driven by as a daily mantra for ensuring that quality foods and drugs enter the US. In such a state of affairs, the FDA should be morally more inclined to not accept any foreign clinical trials unless it has it own people closely monitoring that process. In fact, to take it a step further, it is completely wrong on the part of the FDA to allow such foreign tests on human guinea pigs when it as an agency does not have the power to dictate how other countries should regulate the action of drug companies in their soil. The guiding principle of "informed consent" as a signature on a blank check for legally authorizing companies to conduct tests on people is an entirely weak argument when it is easily realized that poor people hardly have the power or the knowledge to understand their rights in the first place. It is very unfortunate that this greedy act that largely benefits profit seeking multinational drug companies is allowed to continue in the name of giving healthy, "well tested" drugs to the "developed" nations of the world.
After all, these well tested and safe drugs are either heavily expensive or never reach the poor countries that largely test it. It is usually the cheap ripoffs or generics that are either affordable or available to large sections of the population in countries such as India. To make matters worse, in the name of protecting so called patents, the large drug companies have used the WTO to force countries like India from reverse-engineering these drugs to create cheaper alternatives. So now, not only do people in India test themselves with these drugs but never get to use them if they really need it.

The Ethics of Swiss Bank Secrecy Laws

2009-02-19T21:52:00.000-08:00

Recently, the Swiss Bank firm UBS was directed by the US Justice department to give access to some of its customers who "used" the Swiss Bank secrecy laws in hiding billions of assets, thereby evading taxes. This was followed by another lawsuit filed by the US in Miami asking for bank information on 52000 US customers who could have potentially stashed away billions of dollars from the eyes of the IRS.
This is however nothing new for US lawmakers. In the 80s, during the height of the Wall Street insider trading days, Swiss bank accounts in safe havens like the Caribbean Islands served as popular destinations for hiding millions of dollars swindled by greedy Wall Street traders. The SEC during its investigations struggled hard in accessing the details of these account holders as the banks were unwilling to cooperate. Although, they eventually succeeded in arm twisting some banks to comply, we never know how many got unnoticed.
Swiss bank laws support a very strong secrecy pact that in effect prevents anyone not authorized by the account holder, from accessing account details. This applies even to governments seeking information on any suspected individuals. The reasoning as one Swiss official put it in a NPR radio interview is to protect the privacy of the account holder and the safety of his assets. This has been evangelized over the years by the Swiss government and still continues to be their selling point. However, I think this is one among the many bad aspects of nations that can deviate from ethics as long as money flows into their pockets. Unfortunately, Switzerland is considered as one among the most "developed" nations in this world while they have virtually created a scheme to attract "bad" money from greedy people around the world.
There is enough information in the internet talking about the kind of people that Swiss banks attract. On the contrary, Swiss banks have also come up with how clean their customers are and the controversy around their practices. Swiss banks have come a long way in better monitoring their operations and the background of their customers. Unfortunately, this only came about after all the pressure generated by other nations in exposing their banking practices over the past 40 years.
Unfortunately, the banks have not realized the ethics of their practices from a human perspective. When Swiss laws do not act immediately on tax avoidance but only on tax fraud issues, this just becomes a greedy game of money laundering. For example, if a celebrity client from a "developing" nation deposits $10 MM in a Swiss bank account, he could possibly be doing it without the knowledge of the local government's tax department. There could be no other reason why someone would put huge sums of money into a foreign bank. The argument that these banks provide a greater return cannot be true as they are mostly comparable to other banks in the world. "Secrecy" in maintaining a bank account is desirable only when you don't want a greater authority to know what you are doing with your money or from where you are getting it. Any other kind of privacy or secrecy is provided even by a rural bank in a struggling "developing" nation.
By making a glaring distinction on legal grounds between tax avoidance and tax fraud, this country had been largely benefiting itself and rapidly growing it's economy by attracting money from abroad. Although proponents of capitalism have legally and morally justified human greed, they have not figured a way to identify the limits of ethical behavior. If a celebrity in India deposits 10 crores in Indian currency (which is easy for them to earn in a year), an equivalent of $2MM dollars is being deposited in a Swiss bank. That money through the banking system will eventually reach Wall Street or fund bonds offered by a Swiss global corporation. The Indian government on the other hand is sitting to lose 30% of that amount (given the high tax rate the government charges due to its inability to raise money through other resources) or the equivalent of $600K, which in Indian currency is a respectable sum. Less than 5% of the country pays taxes in the first place. Even with an insensible government in place, $600K can be used to fund huge infrastructure projects in the country to truly alleviate "materialistic" poverty. Swiss bank accounts are hardly opened by a middle class person in any "developing" nation. I don't even believe any ordinary person will go out of the way to deposit a few 1000 dollars in such banks. By having countries act like safe havens for rich tax evaders (or avoiders), these banks are severly violating the ethics of human behavior that would be so well expected from a nation that belongs to a World group that recommends how other countries should run their lives. It is time Swiss banks stop this so called secrecy pratice and actually promote a more open banking system that benefits the entire World in moving forward.

Book Review: Autobiography of a Yogi - A Story of Mysticism and Spirituality

2009-01-25T17:51:00.000-08:00

Reading through the pages of the book "Autobiography of a Yogi" by Swami Paramahansa Yogananda is like a magical journey through times past, present and uknown! A journey that describes the pursuit of a yogi towards God realization and the adventure he embarks upon in a mystical India that is relatively diminishing over time.
The yogi's tale is a very engaging account of how the science of Kriya yoga was initiated by a God saint "Babaji" (and originally by Lord Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita) and passed on to his mortal disciples who in turn carried on the tradition of passing this art to the following generations, in turn becoming masters in their own right.
The biggest challenge with anything that the human senses cannot easily perceive becomes unscientific as per the modern world. Walking along this trend, it is very difficult to ascertain the "truth" or "reality" of the various superhuman and God-like saints Swami Yogananda talks about. Nevertheless, it is very comforting to know that there have always been people on this earth renouncing materialistic gains and seeking unison with their spiritual self.
The book as such however meanders into areas that makes one doubt the seriousness of the Kriya yoga initiative. The Self Realization Fellowship (SRF) founded by the Yogi in the US is described in grand details- materialistic acquisition of property the exotic locations of the Pacific West. Sometimes, the book seems more like a sales pitch for Christians to join the SRF. However, I liked the subtle references to Christ's sayings in the Bible, the yogi's interpretation of them, and how all spiritual teachings were meant to be the same for the entire people of the World.
No matter what mistakes a skeptical human mind can come up with, there were unique perceptions of the yogi on some topics that were a delight to read. He laments on how the true form and value of education embedded in the ancient guru-shishya form is lost in today's world. Education by rote has become the order of the day and there is no genuine pursuit of knowledge and wisdom. His comments on India's misinterpreted history and true wealth (spiritual superiority) also delves into how misguided Historians created an Aryan invasion "theory" to discredit its unique past.
The yogi also studies the power of human beings in achieving superhuman capabilities for non-materialistic purposes. His explanation of some of the abilities of yogis to materialize objects out of thin air is fascinating. The base theory that objects are made of atoms, packed into matter and emanating energy is used as a basis for explaining how certain highly trained yogis (who control prana) could recreate the same objects from thin air by rearranging those atoms. He also delves into the Law of Miracles by explaining how certain yogis can materialize themselves in different places at the same time and as and when they wanted.
Quoting straight from the book, "Einstein proved that energy in any particle of matter is equal to its mass or weight multiplied by the square of the velocity of light. The release of atomic energies is brought through annihilation of these material particles. The velocity of light is 186000 miles/sec. Only a material body whose mass is infinite can equal the velocity of light! Great yogis achieve materialization and de-materialization by utilizing this concept of light to manifest themselves in any form they want - their mass is infinite." All this has supposedly been explained in the acient texts of the vedas. According to the yogi, "The Law of Miracles is operable by any man who has realized that the essence of creation is light"!
Yogi Paramhansa Yogananda has indeed opened up a new insight into a forgotten history and lost cause. I'm not sure how the Self Realization Foundation is truly working today to help people use Kriya yoga (never explained anywhere in detail) as a path to human upliftment, but the yogi's biography is worth knowing about. It is definitely delightful to read the life account of people who came and left the Earth with a unique purpose in mind.

There are No Developed Nations in the World

2008-09-28T19:41:00.000-07:00

The moment you start to ask questions about things happening around you, the more interesting the results you get to see. Having lived in three different countries, I've had the good fortune to understand similar events from several perspectives to develop a viewpoint. One of the things that I find interesting is to understand why certain countries have "developed" while others are still "developing". My interest was however in understanding people and their behavior as it is attributed to those two words.

When I read news articles and commentaries that use the term developed nations, I find it fascinating to understand how different people have their own take on how they interpret their nations and their qualification for being "developed" or "undeveloped". In that mess, I fail to understand what the true meaning of a developed nation is? I personally believe that only a foolish person could have come up with such a biased view of the world in the first place. What has been developed in your nation that has not been developed in another nation?

If it is about industrialization, then yes, certain countries are surely developed. But, the larger interpretation of people in general is that developed nations have developed ideals, developed thoughts, developed behavior and a developed strength and perspective on worldly matters. This somehow has given many nations the license to decide on what are sane and truthful decisions in the world. This is where things fall apart. I haven't seen a single case of a so called "developed nation" being all of this except for being industrialized. I have however seen many of these developed nations do senseless, childish and undeveloped actions that in no way qualifies them to be developed as human beings.

Assuming industrialization happened sometime in the 18th century, it is pretty difficult to understand how building an assembly of cars, rapid mining of natural resources or doing anything with iron and steel has made people truly advanced. Materialistically yes, intellectually maybe, but as a good human being, no way! The First World War, a bunch of European nations that fought among each other, was precisely a large scale event to remember because industrialized production of stuff that can kill humans faster and better were developed. The Second World War, fought again by the same old people not happy with the human capability to produce mass destruction, was another industrialized opportunity to build something quicker to eliminate something quicker. Unfortunately, my views are blinded by the fact that I'm ignoring a very basic characteristic of a human being - to be greedy and gluttonous in life.

After those historic events came the most childish prank, a reflection of human underdevelopment and the inability to grow beyond basic animal instincts for territorial greatness - the Cold War. Two nations fought a proxy war, generated lies, masked truth and most important of all, brought money into the orbit of war games. The result was a massive wastage of the human intellect in interpreting the science behind the atom to create a nuclear arms race in the world. A developed mind would have pursued peace as the world's most powerful weapon for human development instead of a stockpile of disastrous toys. After that, there hasn't been anything worthwhile to mention when it comes to developed nations. If humans have consistently done something in the world, it has been the ability to fight against one another.

A developed country should represent people with a developed mindset. Nothing apart from wisdom through knowledge can help a person achieve this status. It is the ability to act and think beyond an animal that makes a human being a developed person. Instilling a sense of fear among others by acts of intimidation or killing may make you powerful, but degrades a human being to levels below that of an ordinary animal. After all, even an animal kills only to satisfy its hunger, not for creating a status symbol. The capability to apply wisdom and restraint in your ability to deal with people around you is what takes you closer to being a developed human being. Sharing that profound capability to control your mind and the monkey that tries to uproot it, among other people creates a developed nation.

However, there is definitely an argument that is to the contrary. "Developed" nations are not messy, unclean and troublesome to live in as compared to other "undeveloped" nations. Hence, there has to be something profoundly great about the people of these nations that the undeveloped people in other countries lack. Even I had that notion in my mind, until I lived and observed for long enough in a developed nation. The answer merely goes back to a basic characteristic of a human being. When people get what they want to lead a life (food and shelter) they become happy. When a group of people become happy due to the ability to have these basic needs satisfied at an individual level, they become peaceful socially. When socially peaceful people live in a nation, they tend to do well to others within their group. When any of these benefits are threatened or uprooted, human beings behave badly. Sometimes, this comes at the cost of denying someone else the same comforts of life.

Today's nations are merely reflections of this trend. The British lived happily when they got what they wanted even if it was at the expense of some other person's lost resources and freedom. Today, when they see that comfort being shaken by other people coming to share it, they have complained. When Americans lost jobs to outsiders, the comfort zone was shaken and they have complained. Ludicrous immigration laws, trade barriers and several other biased human strategies are reflections of that behavior. In all these there has never been the case where people pursued greatness beyond basic human greed to achieve the true status of a developed person or a nation.

Past civilizations in

India

China

Egypt

Iraq

and the African continent had a structure that closely resembled a true developed nation. A nation where greed or its manifestation in the form of money was not what people yearned for to achieve human greatness! History unfortunately is only a collection of half-truths. So, with only a certain possibility, we can say that there were developed nations in the past, but for certain, there are no developed nations today, and given our downward spiral, there will be no developed nations tomorrow.

Why do we build a Discounted Cash Flow (DCF) Model

2008-09-13T13:32:00.000-07:00

Must Read Book on Valuation

There is a lot of literature on the web explaining the importance of a DCF model and how to build one. However, as I recently realized, not many companies are focused or care enough to build an effective cash flow model to evaluate an investment. The fact that these are large corporations borrowing heavily from Wall Street makes it a matter of concern.

The fast pace of decision making in a demanding high growth technology based world has forced companies to bank on experience and/or gut feeling to make an investment. Although, this is in effect not a bad way to run a business in a highly competitive industry such as e-commerce for example, there is still what I call a "responsibility" towards adding more reasoning for strategic investments. The main reason being that the money that a company spends on its investments or excesses is actually money borrowed from investors who are expecting a return on their investment. Greedy- yes, but so is the way capitalism works.

So, when a company decides to make use of the money, they got to have a better reason as to what returns that will produce. This should go above and beyond rosy statements on what this strategy means for the company. The only way this can be done is by adding the language of finance to a strategy. This is where the discounted cash flow analysis comes into the picture. There are several other ways in which a financial analysis of an investment can be made to judge if it is sound in its fundamentals. One can look at top line or bottom line numbers and still feel comfortable about what they are getting into. The big winner among them however has been the DCF approach. Simply speaking, it goes a step further from just a limited accounting analysis and does what can be the best theoretical approach to determining a discount rate (cost of capital).

When I did my MBA, I had a hard time understanding these concepts as I was a slow convert to the field of finance. It was not until I joined my company post my MBA that I started exploring these concepts in detail. Anyways, in short, the DCF does some pretty simple and basic steps to arrive at what is called as a "Free Cash Flow" - as the term suggests, it is cash that is available for the company after it has factored for all costs related to an investment.

Starting with the sales an investment generates, we get to the EBITDA, do a small manipulation with the DA portion (Depreciation and Amortization) by including it for tax purposes and removing it for cash flow purposes, and adjust for working capital and other capital gains. In effect, once all these are meticulously done, we get to what is called as an "incremental free cash flow". This figure is what makes a DCF model better than just a simple accounting practice of arriving at the Net Income. Cash Flow is a much realistic estimate of what the company truly has in its hands after generating the required money for an investment. If the FCF is negative for a prolonged period of time, it in effect indicates that something may be wrong with the investment. Now, once the company has say $10,000,000 of cash, it now has an obligation to its investors that it needs to fulfill. Ideally speaking, it has more of a direct obligation to pay for its leveraged debt than for its equity, but in a ideal scenario, equity investors or share holders do expect some money for the shares they hold in the company.

So, there is where the discount rate comes into the picture. The discount rate is applied by using compounding on the FCF over the number of years that the investment is expected to produce sound returns. Compouding is simply used as laws of greediness dictate that money earned today is used to make more money tomorrow. So, the interest will also be invested to generate more money. The discount rate as such is also called as the "cost of capital" - the reason being that the capital (money) that a company gets has a corresponding cost (investor return) attached to it that the company needs to pay out. DCF model relies on what is called as the WACC (Weighted Average Cost of Capital) to arrive at this discount rate.

The WACC is a weighted average as it uses the D/E ratio to arrive at what portion of the discount rate (or investor return) is attributed to the debt holders and the share holders. The laws of capital markets dictate that the debt holder has the first right towards returns and then comes the share holder (provided there is anything left to give them). The debt portion is for a very funny (or greedy) reason tax deductible. Hence, it is dealt with in a different manner. The equity part of the discount rate is determined using what is called as the CAPM. A Nobel prize winning concept, it is fairly simple to understand but complicated to derive. Nevertheless, it looks into the performance of the company in the market to determine what returns the company can provide. CAPM has its own set of limitations as does the DCF model or any other financial analysis for that matter. No matter what, the discount rate or WACC eventually is applied on the FCF to determine what remains in terms of cash for the company after paying for all its obligations.

DCF model can be manipulated to suit the needs of the person building the model. This is where subjectivity in assumptions, a lack of conviction on part of the person building the model, the desire for glory on part of management to prove that their decisions are always right comes into the picture. These human interventions can in turn affect the "truth" of the model. Many people in the place I've worked claim these to be the reasons why there is no point in wasting time building such complicated mechanisms. In other words, it is a safe way to put ones inhibitions and fears on the backburner, for who wants to embarrass themselves by working on tough financial models. After all, nobody is truly judged for performance based on what they do to run a business, it is the money they generate that matters.

Then comes the NPV to make quick decision based on the DCF analysis. NPV or Net Present Value is just a way of deriving the "time value of money" of the entire investment. By bringing all the money a company makes to year 0 (starting year of investment) and subtracting it from the initial capital investment for a project, a number shows up that indicates what is the prevent value of all the money a company makes in the future on that project. The number has to be positive as if it isn't, it indicates that the investment made is not generating the required returns.

This is the DCF in short. The reason why it is important to have belief in the model and make a sincere attempt at using it is to make a relatively better objective evaluation of an investment. If greed and glory are overcome, a bad investment or negative NPV will be readily defended by a financial analyst to prevent the company from making the investment. Unfortunately, it also needs a strong commitment on the part of the largely ignored and demoralized financial analyst to face the outcome of his/her recommendation. After all, life is not fair. The DCF model may have said something but the fickle minded consumers who eventually utilize the benefits of an investment may think otherwise. The company may not make the $10,000,000 that they desired to make and the DCF analysis is to be blamed!

Book Review: Greed and Glory on Wall Street - Kids on the Loose!

2008-08-10T12:35:00.000-07:00

I recently completed reading "Greed and Glory on Wall Street" by Ken Auletta. Set in the 80s, this book has already been reviewed by many over the years. Although decades old, this book is still an interesting read, especially the final chapter that talks about lost glory and the changing face of capitalism. It is interesting to note that, given the new fate of Lehman Brothers, it doesn't surprise one that Investment Banks have been a symbol of "desperate greed" since ages. Desperate since experts put the blame on a changing society and growing complexity in capitalism as the reasons for such greed.

The author is definitely impartial in analyzing happenings that led to the then collapse of Lehman Brothers in 1984. However, throughout the narrative, there definitely was a sense that the truth is still hidden somewhere in between. After all, the people who interviewed must have planned out a strategy for keeping their names intact. Anyways, it’s exciting to understand how the job of "raising money" can be so convoluted in reality. The fact that it’s just a bunch of gluttonous individuals managing that process for an entire nation (or world depending on how one sees it), makes it all the more shocking. The mess in Ken Auletta's version of Lehman Brothers is just one such example. A bunch of fighting kids with a singular motive to get rich quickly, empowered by a system that promotes easy handling of money, led by a management that believes only in making money, can only be nothing but a perfect recipe for disaster. It's interesting to note that when people in Main Street don't get a hold of how they are getting rich, they obviously can't raise their voices against what self-proclaimed "bracket" firms in Wall Street bulging with money are up to.

This book never gives a clear picture of who the culprit was in orchestrating the demise of Lehman Brothers. In fact, I felt there was none. Pete Peterson, the Chairman, did his best to keep up his reputation as a proud investment banker. Money and fame go hand in hand, and he embraced it dearly. Lew Glucksman also did his part to keep up with his desire to mint money out of selling bonds. While one believed in prestige from corporate finance, the other believed in sales & trading. Nevertheless, both dealt with a board and a bunch of partners, who when combined together, were nothing more than a bunch of kids boosting capitalism and their bank accounts with unimaginable chunks of money.

Just when I was adjusting myself to the end result that Lew Glucksman, was brought down by a board that just wanted to keep its money safe, I read the book "Liar's Poker" by Michael Lewis. That further changed my perspective on Wall Street banking and what could have truly happened to Lehman Brothers. In short, I would put it as nothing but changing market forces killing the super strong bond market growth in the mid 80s. It eventually led to severe losses for all firms that made boat loads of money creating and selling bonds, led to Lew's team losing their shirt and of course Lehman, its pants.

In a capitalist world where the rules are meant to be broken, super bright men (unfortunately women didn't have a recognizable place at that time) with IQs that help them understand how a home loan can be transformed into a completely unknown package of securitized bonds, keep changing the rules of the game. When governing bodies are slow to react (which I feel will always be the case in the fast paced world of Wall Street), a kid who can handle or break a bunch of telephones while buying and selling financial instruments will always call the shots. A 23 year old college graduate will guide the fate of an investment made by a large insurance firm through money sucked from a "not-meant-to-be-understood" health insurance premium it has been charging drug-dependent citizens stuffed with one-a-day pills for a new syndrome defined and marketed by a big pharmaceutical company trading in Wall Street to feed multi-billion dollar blockbuster drug research and become a profitable company.

I never realized money was so easy to get as long as you have a fool that you can take a ride for. The investors in the 80s obviously fell in that bracket. The investors of today may be different, and a bit more diverse (or global as some people describe today), but when they deal with Wall Street, they cannot get a better deal. After all, you make money by taking away someone else’s. Of course, Wall Street gives investors the money they desire. It's just that as the dollar moves from one hand to the other, a few pennies slip through a small hole in the pocket. The less you feel bad about orchestrating it, the happier you feel buying large mansions in overpriced locations and smoking large chunks of expensive cigars with the arrogant belief that you are the smartest guy on the planet.

The Logistical Challenge to e-Commerce Growth

2008-06-18T10:24:00.000-07:00

Question: What does not excite a consumer to purchase a product at an online retailer instead of at a physical retail store?

Answer: Several reasons. Starting with the idea that consumers still prefer to view/feel the products they buy to technical challenges such as fear of fraud in using credit card for payments. Most of these and other challenges have been tacked by online retailers through better pricing, greater assortment, ease of researching and ordering products and the move towards safer financial transactions.

Given this new world that has evolved over the past 3-4 years, the bigger question is how else online retailers can grow their clout in a largely changing world. According to an emarketer analyst, US retail e-commerce sales will reach $146B in 2008, up 14.3% from the previous year. However, the growth rates of online sales will steadily decline over the years. The indication in the report is that the online retail channel is maturing.

I feel that apart from several other important challenges that e-retail needs to tackle, there is one reason why customers tend to purchase offline than go online. It is the time taken to deliver the product as a function of the cost incurred to receive the product. This I believe is the biggest logistical challenge that e-retailers should find an answer for.

Question: So, how bad is it?
Answer: I tried to answer this question by doing some research on the net and came across a very good article that talks exactly about the challenge I was talking about. In an article in cnnmoney.com titled "Consumers say no to high shipping fees", it shows that about 43% of consumers abandon a shopping cart citing high shipping fees as a reason. It also indicates that when consumers compare online and offline prices, savings is realized in the shipping fees.

Question: So, what are online retailers doing to tackle this issue?

Answer: Many online retailers such as Amazon.com are using programs such as "Super Saver" shipping and "Amazon Prime" to tackle this challenge. Wal-Mart also came up with an answer through the Site-to-Store program. Having personally studied and worked on changes to the Site-to-Store program while working at Walmart.com, I have experienced the growth potential of such cross-channel initiatives, although I feel that the program could have been well thought out and executed better in some areas. But yes, I do feel that multi-channel retailers have greater scope for innovation in tacking this challenge than pure play online retailers. The reason being that, they can offer a different shipping mechanism as compared to a standard ship-to-home option to the consumer.

Question: How can we define this challenge?

Answer: I feel that like every economic or statistical model, it can be mathematically defined by an equation.

Loosely defined, the equation could look like:
Consumer's online purchase decision = fn(time to deliver, cost to deliver, price, availability)

There is a strong correlation between the "time to deliver" and the "cost to deliver" variables due to the challenge posed by the carrier companies that retailers use for shipping products. As is obvious, carrier companies attach a cost directly to the speed of delivery of the package, which either the retailer has to absorb or pass on to the consumer. In the future, online retailers may consider this as a single large strategic challenge that they need to effectively confront.

Question: How can an online retailer work on this challenge?
Answer: This is obviously a tough question to answer, especially for a pure play online retailer. Store retailers with an online component can still gain efficiencies by introducing multi-channel options like store pickup and online divisions leveraging the partnerships built with carriers by the store network.
Pure play online retailers such as Amazon can still leverage scale of operations for better deals with carriers. However, it still turns out to be an expensive affair given the rising costs of gas and the inability for carriers to effectively mitigate them. But, I believe there is a solution.

The solution lies in what Wal-Mart has done with its suppliers over the years and continues to do today with its sustainability initiatives. Partnering with carriers to remove costs out of the system will be the way to go. Easier said than done given that Carriers like UPS and Fedex already have exceptional processes in place to squeeze costs out of the system. But there is scope for more efficiencies in the process if retailers can use historical analysis to predict ways in which consumers place their orders and the shipping methods they employ. If this is shared in advance with their carrier partners, the carriers in turn can plan their trips to the retailer's distribution centers and network the trips to the consumers location. To be continued in a later post...