Can Status Quo, ever be the other name for God?

Can Status Quo ever be the other name for God? 

I ask that, as most seem to be following that & with great faith. 

The inherited customs, conventions, protocols, and policies go on & on. 

Status Quo is actually the other name for Devil. 

Decision-making builds character. 

Good decisions, good character. Big decisions, big character. 

There is God in great character & thus so rare.

The capacity to take decisions is now almost lost in our modern world.

Individuals have been replaced with committees for check & balances. In the bargain, what we have achieved is the opposite of the intent. We wanted less of wrong decisions, instead, what we have is - more of no decisions. 

The Brexit referendum waz an outcome of just that, where the learned British parliamentarians left the all-important decision on the ignorant guy on the street.

It seems to me that at the very kernel of all decision making, there is either greed or fear or indifference but seldom any courage of conviction.

Decision-making, esp. for public good is complex & thus esoteric in nature.

One cannot hope to resolve it with a committee. 

Ah committee !

Committee is a "group of people who individually cannot do much, however, collectively decide, that nothing can be done !"

All big public decisions are not only open to be challenged today but are precedence setting & likely to become future citations and reference points. 

So, even when problems are born today, their proposed solutions could have far-reaching consequences in the future. 

Thiz requires that such problem solving decisions be taken by the visionary, who are willing to let go the immediate personal gain for future security of the many. 

It requires for people in high position to be wise, brave & take risks. 

Who that person is, cannot be decided by democracy. 

Enter Narendra Damodardas Modi !

As a student of leaders, the 'DeMo by NaMo' is worthy of affectionate praise. Hiz capacity to take a solo decision, as huge as that & talking directly to the citizens of India via TV during prime time, shows us how tall a leader he is. 

If he had set up a committee, notwithstanding the secrecy issue, the pygmies would have told him all the reasons on why it can't be done. That done, he would be almost bound by their advice & the decision to DeMo would have demised.

For decision, one needs - intent, idea, & implementation.

Nobody can cast a doubt on the giant's intent. 

The idea of demonetization is not hiz, waz in discussions for the last few decades, but none before him had the guts. 

Implementation can be discussed & debated till the cows come home, but the flaws if any, seem small compared to the colossal decision the Modi-man haz taken for a better India.

Bolo Bharat Mata Ki ..... Jai Okay Please 🙌🏼🇮🇳

For this media, "Love all" makes a lousy score to report

When George Bush introduced Dr. Manmohan Singh to his wife Barbara, he purportedly said "Meet Dr. Singh the Prime Minister of India, a country with the highest number of Muslims in the world, but not a single Al Qaeda operative there."

Fast forward to our current times and the world is a different place and how !

An Indian government with Dr. Manmohan Singh as it's head, has been replaced with one that is christened as - the Modi Sarkar. Narendra Modi is known for what he is, but courtesy domestic media, not so much within his own country. And he will surely not need nor get the Al Qaeda referenced introduction & nor would that be fair. Modi is a man of his own, an assertive Indian government is being groomed under his strong leadership.

And of course we also have amongst us the likes of Dr. Zakir Naik, who sell hate soaked in religious bigotry to supposedly over 15 million of his global followers. Some among them are applicants for a job at the ISIS, an organization that not long ago declared the formation of the outlawed caliphate called "Islamic State", just about after the exit of Dr. Manmohan Singh in 2014.

As opposed to the soft & accommodative Dr. Singh, Modi is perceived as a strong man, especially against terrorism. On global forums, he is heard advocating that "Terrorism is the single biggest challenge for the world."

On the other side of the globe we have a Donald Trump that's running for the American presidency with a constant anti 'Islamic-terrorism' rhetoric.  Regrettably Trump's perspective, built around sensationalism, works well. Since today's popular mainstream media has gone topsy-turvy, like tabloids, it chases news that gives it the maximum eye balls and not necessarily relevance. Trump is thus getting far more coverage than Modi, both within America & across the world. He is fast influencing the western nations' value system, which now speaks less of what it is & more of what it is against.

That should not have been the case with India, but unfortunately, she too has succumbed to the media's pandering. The Moditva Doctrine is not common knowledge & so can easily be misunderstood as Trump's echo. The twist in the irony is that Modi was labeled a 'Muslim-hater' by the politically motivated & compromised Indian media & so Modi, the then democratically elected Chief Minister of Gujarat, was denied a visa to enter the US, even without ever being proven guilty in any court of law. It was an abject and an unprecedented travesty of justice, which was largely buried by the Indian media & so bypassed the attention of some of the most educated but yet politically unconscious Indian masses. If elected, Trump wants to allow entry of only non-Muslims into America. So on the face of it, both leaders should be natural allies.

Well they are in fact, diabolically opposite.

For a moment let us accept that Trump is right i.e. less of Muslims equals more of peace. But then India with the largest Muslim population in the world, with their strength of over 200 million in India or almost one in every five Indians, should make this nation the most dangerous place in the world - but it is not. Most attacks on India are from infiltrators from Pakistan, as apparently they cannot find die hard "fidayeen" fighters across the length & width of India. Having said so, we have now seen shoots of home grown Indian Muslims, who have become subscribers to the ISIS ideology. For reasons best known to the media houses, that terrorist organization is regularly introduced to the general population through the media updates of their daily atrocities. The ISIS makes the Al Qaeda that Bush referred to while introducing Dr. Singh, look rather pale.

Notwithstanding, India is still the safest country in the world, at least if we choose to view her through an American lens that for convenience & simplicity conjoins the Muslim community & terrorism into a single hyphenated phenomenon i.e. the "Islamic-terrorism". Considering their vast strength in numbers, even if a chunk of Indian Muslims were truly to be influenced by the terror marketers, at best we would have a disaster on hand & at worst a mayhem.

So even when a giant nation like India is largely peaceful, the question before us should really be - can we then discount the ISIS influenced Muslims, as mere fringe & simply call it an aberration among just a handful of misguided youth?

No. We should not ignore them, no matter how small it's impact today.

All & especially the Muslims themselves, must first accept that there is a problem within their community. The terror attraction is a manifestation of their inability to reform with time & that can happen to persons of any faith, irrespective - if they remain frozen in the past.

For most Muslims, religion even today is not about a personal spiritual experience in solitude, but the faithful are expected to visibly practice the rituals in a manner that makes their religiosity a central life theme. That gets further rekindled at the almost mandatory weekly Friday mosque's mass congregations. As a result, Muslims encounter many modern day requirements that cannot be compatible with their daily mandated religious routines. Being accommodative, would attract scorn from the community peers or make them feel incomplete Muslims. Thus most cannot convince the world at large that they are beyond & larger than their self imposing religion bearing identity. In a fast globalizing world where cultural assimilation is an expectation, interdependence a maturity and gloss & glam a norm, their inflexibility to adapt to the order of the day renders them somewhat unemployable & their school of thought as obsolete.

Not willing to bow out as misfits in the fast paced modern society, some staunch Muslim community leaders have lately been instigating a retaliation, rather than reform. These so called leaders don't seem to resonate with the likes of say Abdul Kalam the former president of India or the Khan trio Bollywood superstars or A R Rehman the master music composer or Bismillah Khan the instrumental music Ustad or Sania Mirza the tennis ace or Azharuddin the cricket captain or IH Latif the ex-air force chief or Ahmedi the ex-justice at Supreme Court - to just name a few of the Muslims, that have negotiated with their personal space to reach great heights & become entire India's favorite. It is not even in their reckoning that this makes India perhaps the most unique country in the world where a minority community has achieved so much & in so many spheres. For them, the heroes to emulate are perhaps foreigners like Osama Bin Laden or even Burhan Wani, a Pakistan declared "martyr".

Some parents too get influenced and so fail to teach their children, that there is solace in societal achievements and not in being a claimant of perpetual victim-hood by it.

At such a delicate time, the ISIS has now confidently raised it's head and is demanding that the faithful to Islam must not wait to be affected in order to retaliate. It wants the Muslim community to become aware & focus on the minutest ideological differences that exist between the Muslims and non-Muslims and eliminate all and any nonconformity, including the neutral or benign.

They are in fact the echo-in-action, to the hollow war-on-terror cry made by Bush at the UN, who had reportedly thundered "Either you are with us or against us". To some, the ISIS brand of terror appears mesmerizingly attractive and an opportunity to subjugate the world to the puritanical Muslim way.

Now when a population with a particular belief - say, any explosive idea (affinity to the ISIS kind of terrorism being the case here) goes 'unopposed' from a very tiny fraction to about 3% of people, the tipping point may not be far. Studies show that the time taken for a radically different idea to take grip of even just that 3% of the population is very difficult in the beginning i.e. it takes 90 % of the time to reach that threshold number. From there on however, to move to a higher critical mass % of population, it will take only 10 % of the time, after which that idea can no longer be ignored as it would become trend setting. So if it is going to take 9 years to radicalize 3% of the Muslims into motivated terror elements, it will take just 1 year to reach a higher damaging number, after which the entire society would have to deal with them on almost a daily basis.

This should explain where the ISIS itself came about from, so suddenly & out of nowhere. In reality, it is not as sudden as it feels. For years it was simmering in the back burner unnoticed, but after the forced departure of Saddam Hussein, there was a local leadership vacuum & that problem got compounded further by the American bombing. It has now came out in full force to actually form a caliphate of its own.

Thus, even when home grown terror is next to negligible in India, the opposition to the concept of terrorism should be early on i.e. radicalization of the Muslim youth, no matter how significantly insignificant now, should not be allowed to transcend unopposed and definitely not among the young Muslims with impressionable minds.

This is where it gets tricky. We must keep in mind that the approach to opposition of all & any type of terror network must be prompt & yet in an evolved manner, using soft power which involves all the stake holders, especially the peaceful Muslim majority, who have the most at stake. If not done that way, you are no different than the agents of terrorism themselves.

The means to get to the objective are as important as the goal itself.

The acerbic, blunt & direct Trump-ism or the war-on-terror through remote controlled drones, may produce the sounds & sights of halting it but in reality, it is still akin to allowing a poor concept to perpetuate unopposed. The reason is, if anything, bitter criticism of the Muslims by painting them all with the same black brush is playing into the enemy's cards. In fact that only strengthens the resolve of the terror group leaders, who may no more need to distort facts to portray a fake & a supposed grim picture to prospective young Muslims in order to coax them into joining and participating in a 'them-vs-us' mission.

Donald Trump's jibes or the no-hijab law in France are perfect examples of achieving the exact opposite of the intent, by adding nobility to an otherwise heinous ideology. The routine incitement through insults of Muslims & their prophet is alienating & silencing the vast number of Muslim liberals, presumably, also scared of the Muslim radicals. These Muslim liberals are being driven away, who otherwise would have been as good partners as influencer, in positively countering the dark shadow of ISIS on their own youth, that is stealing away their future.

Americanism & the western culture at large with it's overbearing 'my way or the highway' attitude regularly line up battery of university professors on CNN or BBC with fancy titles like "Middle East expert" or "Islamic scholar". These TV regulars severely fail to understand the brewing angst in the post-Saddam Muslim world, when they ridicule & attack the region, it's people & their faith. They fail to capture the fervor which is emanating from a deadly concoction of two extremes, that from of a sense of - super despondency due to social ostracism at hands of modernity on one end & ultimate hope in some make believe Islamic salvation on the other.

So below the surface of it's sophisticated view points that are enveloped in euphemisms and conveyed to the world through its global media footprint, the entire western world is no different - it provokes more than it convinces. The western bravado is in fact giving a helping hand to a mission that otherwise was attempting to defy gravity. It would have easily died under it's own weight, as the call by ISIS for killing all non-believers, including the moderate Muslim families with their women & innocent children in tow, is repugnant to the human senses, irrespective.

One's strength is in knowing one's weakness and avoiding it. Attempting to match madness with insanity is America & it's allies current weakness, but they just don't seem to get it. They are in pursuit of that race to the bottom.

So how does one reverse this crazy war? The solution lies outside the military 

establishment.

If a frail man in a loin cloth could push back an expanding empire with the greatest armory at the time, it was due to his cutting edge insight into the human behavior & applying the same on fellow humans.  The concept has been tested again & again and even successfully imported in America itself, when it manifested & unleashed itself through Dr. Martin Luther King, who won the 'white hearts' for the cause of race equality, using the Gandhian principles of humanism in practice. Nelson Mandela too won over his oppressors, when he "shocked them with compassion."

These innate human endowments are valid across geographies and peoples and are timeless. If ever there was a need to embrace them by world leaders, it is now.

Universality got established, when we take the example of how Modi in India recently made a huge breakthrough to resolve one of the oldest insurgency problem that India faced. In Nagaland he signed a peace accord with the Naga tribes, without redrawing the state's border ( the long demand of the insurgents ). He made a deal that involved creating an institutionalized mechanism that allowed dignity & autonomy for the Naga tribes living across in Manipur. In fact, Modi had announced a few hours before he signed the accord, that some great news will be shared by him. As expected, the Indian media however was not interested in giving it the due coverage, as there is no profit to be made in peace, besides the TRP enhancing Islamic hue was missing.

So when one is so very vulnerable, the odds are so against you, what have you been left with besides attempting to convince the other side, to appeal to his higher moral values & make him drop his arms?

History ignored, who will tell the Americans that in spite of their grand military machinery, they are still weak & helpless? America is supposedly the leader of the global civilized community of nations & so it and it's allies must still - follow all the rules, respect human rights, maintain minimum civilian casualties and yet face full media scrutiny. Breaking the rules, wins it no friends & in fact exposes it's hypocrisy. The Islamic State and it's ambassadors are invisible & spread across the world & are not shackled by such self imposed restrictions. It was bound to be an asymmetrical war from the day it was so thoughtlessly called out by Bush.

The situation since, has got further exasperated by the media, that is relentlessly cooking up stories, by pouring the Arab oil into the fire that prepares the western world's bacon.

As a consequence, today we have a very peculiar situation at play. It's a vicious downward spiral with the following routine :

* Some modernity afflicted Muslims will indulge in a terrible act;

* Irrespective if it is true or not, ISIS will claim that it is it's doing;

* Some leader in the opposition or running for a post will hurl insults at the Muslims in order grab attention;

* The liberal Muslims will be embarrassed & defend with a "Islam is a religion of peace" argument;

* For the sake of law & order, those in office of authority will attempt political correctness & endorse the stand of the liberal Muslims;

* The TRP seeking media will play to the gallery as that earns it the maximum sales i.e. the photos of post attack aftermath will be pasted on front page, the angry reactionary statements by politicians will make for bold headlines, the knee jerk policies will be debated and either under reportage of those suggesting to make calm or condescending undertones of peace makers will make it to the weekend editorials;

* All that will collectively make deeper gashes in the relationship among all the players;

* More jilted Muslims will embrace radicalism;

* The next terror attack will ensue as a consequence & the cycle repeats.

The end result is that "hate-all" creeps in & media like an inert catalyst, will never be a suspect for the exothermic reaction that it actually aids.

All the parties will be the losers, the media being the exception as it shall continue to poke one & pinch other to seek out profit from pain. To add insult to injury, media which peddles misinformation entwined in half truths that are full lies, will claim pretentious nobility. It will skillfully suggest that it is not the creator of the dark picture but merely holding a mirror in front of the society, which is reflecting an attitude gone bad. Anyone that tries to curb the media will be attacked by the naive 'freedom-of-speech' crusaders.

At such a time we have a statesman in our midst, who is also a visionary, in the name & nature of Narendra Modi.

He is a powerful thought leader, not the one to be drawn into a mud slinging matches & ignores the cacophony, including personal attacks. He exhibits great patience & temperance in dealing with such matters. The Moditva Doctrine's approach on what is now being labeled as "The Muslim problem", is yielding dividends & results are note worthy.

The Moditva Doctrine :

A) Be tough on terrorism - He certainly wants a united global response & wants tougher laws to deal with the menace of terrorism. He does not mince words, in fact he has severely criticized the United Nations Security Council after the Brussels attack, for not waking up to the reality. He admonished that "United Nations has a documented definition, consequences & ways to prevent war, but has no structured response on terrorism. If UN does not soon come up with a suitable response, it might risk of becoming irrelevant."

That toughness is "directed at Muslims", is a figment of a perverts imagination & supported by the media. That has in fact been the oppostion's narrative all along, who are pandering to the "vote-bank politics" of appeasement to the Muslims on one hand and selling fear of "RSS controlled BJP" on the other. In an interview, when a foreign journalist asked Modi about his "Muslim bashing" speeches, he replied "Have you heard them, or have you just heard about them?" He further added "I am in the public eye for over 40 years. I have written on a host of subjects & have given innumerable interviews & perhaps delivered more speeches than any other Indian leader. Kindly, research & then make your opinion."

Modi was painted as a Muslim-hater, but the reality is that according to the UPA commissioned Sachar Committee to evaluate the well being of the Muslims across India, the Muslims prospered the most in State of Gujarat under the leadership of Modi, when he was the chief minister there.

B) Define terrorism - Modi is going about doing his job tactfully, appealing to the vast Muslim majority in the most subtle manner. He fully realizes that the issue must be dealt with utmost care as it is an emotive issue. To draw an analogy, we are trying to diffuse a high intensity time bomb and one wrong move could be crippling.

He has been saying the same thing as Trump and is yet so very opposite. Far from propagating a false notion that "All terrorists are Muslims", Modi was the first global leader to clearly delineate religion from terror. At his maiden G20 summit, without ever using the words "Islamic-terrorism", he called out for a need to go to war with those who are "against humanity" & that he has been repeating at every possible opportunity. He has removed hypocrisy from the hyper Islamophobia hype. His definition will make all accountable, not just the Muslims.

C) Engagement of the Muslims - He is seriously attempting to bring back the vast majority of disengaged Muslims for peace, back into the center fold. As a symbol of significance, he even addressed the Sufi forum at the Vigyan Bhavan in the capital & reminded the Muslims, that of the "99 names of Allah - none stood for violence." He took special efforts to remind the Muslims who they are and frankly that should shame most of the current crop of Muslim leaders. He touched upon their history as he reminisced about the entry of the Muslims into the Indian sub-continent, which was peaceful and is as ancient as the first millennium BC, when he presented a gold-plated replica of the Cheraman Juma Masjid from that era, to King Salman Of Saudi Arabia.

After all, the right way to engage the Muslim youth is to first show respect for their community at large. It is definitely less for the others and more for the Muslim elders themselves to stop their young from being wrongly influenced and securing their own future. One can only face one's future with confidence if he or she is first made to realize & shoulder the responsibility of continuing a peaceful, prosperous & purposeful past.

The Results of the Moditva Doctrine are note worthy both domestically and internationally. Modi is well recognized in the political circle for his freshness & boldness but the sold out Indian media seldom highlights the same in that manner.

To give a few examples, not withstanding the years of status quo on Pakistan, at the very start, Modi demonstrated that he is a non-conformist & risked inviting Nawaz Sharif for his swearing-in ceremony & later visited him unannounced.

On the domestic front, Zafar Sareshwala who once took Modi to the International Court of Justice for the 2002 riots in Gujarat, is now his greatest goodwill ambassador among the Muslim community. One of India's most prominent journalist M J Akbar was so impressed with Modi, that he joined the BJP & is now a spokesman for the party. Asifa Khan of Gujarat, who formerly worked for the All India Mahila Congress, is now the BJP's face in Gujarat & elsewhere, especially in the electronic media & Hindi TV channels.

World over the Indian diasporas of Muslim faith greet him warmly.

Modi was recently awarded the highest civilian award by Saudi Arabia, the epicenter of Islam. That makes him the first Indian leader to be conferred such an honor but sadly, the media forgot to showcase us that.

It may not be out of context to mention that the social liberals in India don't seem to understand the gravity of the situation at hand & are living in a fools paradise. They get fooled by the local media, that delivers news that is less insightful & instead more communally incite-full. They are using the liberals to push even the politically neutrals to the right of center. That done, media is laughing all the way to the bank, with the polarization of the society getting firmed up. It plays cheerleader to these so-called liberals, who are more than eager to hog the limelight by offering them a voice, often out of context. The liberals sadly get taken & join the manufactured pseudo "intolerance debate". They import Americanism & conveniently fail to understand the Indian secularism, where the law typically does not keep an arms length from all faiths but attempts to make a handshake with all. Thus, the liberals unnecessarily front issues such as the beef ban, while not even seconding the issue in favor of uniform civil code & triple talaq tragedy or speaking up against the irresponsible statements of the Hindu fringe, while keeping mum against the Muslim mainstream leaders out of fear; are examples of their irresponsibility.  They challenge ghar-wapsi but turn the other way when those following tribal religions, who lived next to Hindus for centuries, get converted en masse by NGOs financed by foreign money. As a result, many of the Hindus who are relatively indifferent to the religious preferences of their own or others in day to day matters, get infuriated and turn right wingers.

For a peaceful society one needs to understand the following 1) That faith is a fact beyond the reach of proof or reasoning, 2) That the security of any minority is in the goodwill of the majority, 3) That the civility of the majority is in its ability to accommodate the minority & 4) That media's freedom is a right but it's responsibility towards the national integrity is paramount.

Media however has failed the Indian state, it is time that it's freedom is curbed. If "Jaan" in Hindi means both life & information, then : Media to hai jaan ka dushman, hai hai !

Believe it or not, for a sustainable solution, in India at least - it should be Modi & Muslims vs. the media.

Go ahead and get 'tip-sy' !

Once upon a time... some school-days friends and yours truly went to this high-nosed, snob-end restaurant.

For starters, the first beer was served warm. I ignored it as it reluctantly sat on my table. It got annoyed & turned a bit cold on me... thankfully!

The waiter who took our order couldn’t recall who among us was vegetarian, non-vegetarian, or somewhere in-between - a gravy-tarian.

We inadvertently ordered more ‘uppams’ than we could ever eat-ems. He didn’t admonish us or tell us as he wasn’t trained to do so.

For the ender, the Bill finally arrived. It was actually a disguised Bush... and it made a huge deficit in our personal economy.

The “service charge” an euphemism for tips on it, is a trap. As the saying goes, “An innocent and his money are soon parted.”

Tips should be dispensed voluntarily by the king-ish customer, but it was extortion-ingly included in the invoice. That hurt my inner voice as much as it hurt my already diminishing regality :-(

Mustering courage, confidence, and conscience, I still proposed a 5% monetary tip... breaking away from my rather principled life stance of ‘better to reward the deserving, rather than help the needy.’ I would have actually liked to reward this guy with some advice on hospitality instead, which he so deserved. But I also know that waiters are paid less in lieu of the tips they receive.

That 5% was promptly deemed by my very own sons-of-a-batch school friends as either me being global-financial-crises stricken, or me having turned into a miser.

Did I say I know that waiters are paid less in lieu of tips?  

Yes.

The story behind the story:

I had discovered a university within a university.

The first paid job I ever did in my life was that of a part-time waiter.

I got an opportunity to work at a fine-dine restaurant called “Barons” at the University of Houston Hilton Hotel. It usually attracted high net-worth customers — corporate folks or parents of students visiting the university campus. That experience taught me more about business than perhaps any business school could have.

That exposure during my formative years helped me many years later in leading my company. There should be no growing-up without doing a job, no matter how menial or trivial. In strange ways, it unknowingly gives us an experience that benefits us many years later.

One of the key things I learned then was that I had to adjust and accommodate between the customer - the obvious target, the kitchen - the factory, and the bus boys - the support staff who clean and re-set the table once the customer leaves.

How different is it today for anyone at the helm?

At the time, the minimum wage in Houston, Texas was USD 4.35 per hour. But since it was assumed that customers would voluntarily tip servers, they could be paid less. The assumption was that gratuity would compensate for the shortfall.

So, for the job as a waiter, I earned USD 2.01/hr. Compressed between, or rather stretched apart by, the moods and tantrums of the chef (earning USD 9/hr), the bus boys (earning USD 4.35/hr), and the demanding customers - wealth usually brings its conjoined twin, arrogance. 

I used to feel my job wasn’t worth it. Well, it wasn’t, at least not in the beginning. But eventually it grew on me and became enriching.

As a server, I was actually just a messenger between what happens in front of the kitchen door and behind it. And yet I was expected to be the smiling face of the restaurant and maintain customer relationships so that they keep coming back. At first I thought it would be easy. Then I thought it was unfair. But much later, I realized how heavy that responsibility was, and that it was actually a fantastic opportunity.

I must explain that as a postman of sorts, a waiter often gets undeserved beatings from customers. The insipid cuisine created by the chef, or a missing fork by the careless bus boy, was not the waiter’s fault. But it was nevertheless always vented on him or her. A waiter has no authority, read luxury, to explain whose fault it is. He or she is simply expected to resolve the issue with a smile and a sorry to the customer.

‘Customer is the king’ was an axiom there. It was always perceived as the waiter’s fault. So as the visible face of the organization, I was expected to mollify the mood of His or Her Highness.

With the requirement to handle hard cash and credit card transactions, I was expected to be even more responsible than the chef or bus boy.

When the pressure was too much, I was expected to assist the chef by fetching condiments from the back-room shelf or even slicing lemons, etc.

Then, on selected days, I was to be a backup for usher-cum-cashier i.e., when the assigned person (earning USD 12.00/hr) had to suddenly rush to the restroom to fix his necktie, or take a small break to quickly comb his hair, just so that he or she looked impeccably presentable.

To add insult to injury, I even had to clean up if some kid knocked over daddy’s precious beer mug. I slowly learned to do that while smiling at the child’s mom, just to reassure the lady that the apple of her eye was still as adorable.

To add injury to insult, at times I was also expected to assist the bus boy, technically my junior in status and my assistant in clearing or joining tables if a huge party of unexpected guests showed up. Ouch!

And don’t forget, for all this I got paid a measly USD 2.01, i.e., below minimum wage, but still legal for waiters in the US, because waiters were expected, not guaranteed, to get tips. Frankly, that expectation may come from the government, but I knew that in the real world, I somehow had to ‘win’ the tips and earn my bread, even as I served it.

Not knowing the daily take-home, but keeping that challenge of somehow winning-the-tips in mind, I kept the job.

After about a year-plus of service, I slowly learned to move away from bearing the burden with a grin, to serving with a genuine smile. Some days I made just a little over USD 2.01/hr, and some days even USD 10/hr. But on most days, I called it a victory at USD 6.0.

Since the law of diminishing returns strikes fast with fast money, slowly even the tip factor began to diminish. I then ‘evolved’ to love my job, because it gave me an opportunity to be in my own element. Each new customer was a chance to meet a new person - be they good, bad, ugly, or mad. The everyday suspense and surprises in the earnings, and the learnings from ‘my’ customers, were a given.

I began to feel lucky. Each customer who came in meant more work for the chef and the bus boy. For me, it was a chance to serve, learn, and earn.

So I learned that good days and bad days are only in the mind, and shouldn’t be the only thing that determines the fate of my mood. Asserting mental stability in the face of various vagaries of life was important. It meant I had to engage with all three entities - the chef, the bus boy, and the customer. No matter which side of the kitchen door you’re on, status or hierarchy don’t count much. What counts is that they all should like you and smile back at you. Sure, any job can be tough or mundane, but why not make it challenging and interesting!

The tips eventually became a by-product, just one of the many reassuring indicators on my control panel.

The chef feeling ‘my’ pressure each time a customer was in a hurry, every bus boy wanting to be assigned to work ‘under’ me, and regular customers asking the usher to seat them in the section allocated to me; that was far more rewarding.

Some customers even shared an experience, a personal tragedy, an incident, or a joke with the ‘small’ person, a mere waiter. I was sometimes touched by what they shared, and sometimes I know I touched them. Dignity of labor does go a long way.

I realized through experience that people with high status are also emotional humans. And so am I. So we can connect, irrespective.

To rule the world, one must serve it!

Yes, go ahead and get ‘tip-sy’ i.e., don’t forget to tip those waiters, for they too give us tips, even as they serve!

World economy is not moving, needs a bit of de-oiling !

Economists are rattled as price has dropped from over USD 100 to below half that price for a barrel of Brent crude oil, in such a short time. The ponder is, where will it go from here?

Some may recall that the beautiful Columbian singer Shakira had sung a wonderful number during the 2010 FIFA world cup, the song was captioned Waka Waka. If she was to sing a theme song for the oil sector now, and trust me the industry can do with a bit of glamour, she would surely be chanting VUCA VUCA, instead of Waka Waka.

VUCA is an acronym for Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity & Ambiguity !

The global churns have elevated, if I may, VUCA ( which has it's origins in the military ) to describe a difficult war strategy, to our peace time commercial world. It is used to describe the inability to cope with or predict almost anything in the context of global business & more so in the oil sector.

The past RBI Governor Dr. Y V Reddy had once said that "In India it is not only difficult to predict the future but it is also difficult to predict the past". That's because our data collection methods were always questionable then. However in the global context, in fact tables have turned & today India is at least seen somewhat as a stabilizing factor. On the other hand, the world outside of India has become difficult to predict, even in the present !

So did it all fall from the sky?

It is Einstein who once said that "The only reason for time, is so that everything doesn't happen at once".

It surely looks like it's all fallen out of place together, but in my humble opinion, the imbroglio was building up.

For the sudden drop in demand for oil & many other commodities, I am not referring to or addressing to the suspects like - the 8 year business cycle, the fuel efficient cars that have been entering the market, the soon to flow sanctions free Iranian oil or the challenge posed by the American Shale producers. Sure, they do add to the pain but I am going to list out the intangibles that have been silently building up that have led us here, to the sorry situation at hand.

The 5 factors that are undoing the global order are: 

A) De-globalization - It is said that before the global financial crises of 2008, oil was traded 30 times before reaching it's destination & price of oil which had reached it's peak then, was predicted to even cross USD 200 a barrel.

Since 2008, the world had never truly recovered. Data by CRISIL shows that trade used to grow at a speed, twice as fast as the GDP i.e. we had a frenzy economic activity and that dropped drastically vs. GDP in 2009 i.e. just after the infamous Lehman Brothers moment. Trade growth rose again briefly in 2010 due to the combined efforts by the leaders of G20 nations & yet again fell in 2011 to just match that of the GDP growth. Since then trade growth has retarded to just about keeping pace with GDP, from earlier being twice that of GDP.

It may be interpreted as the desire by most nations, not withstanding the promises made at the G20, to slowly shift inwards or sourcing more domestically to perhaps protect local jobs through imposition of both tariff & non-tariff trade barriers on imports. Also the losses in stock markets in that era may have led to a consumption behavior which was more need based & less speculative.

B)  Financial jugglery - Much of innovation had since last few years moved away from science & engineering & into finance. 

To keep up growth at any cost, practice of artificially low interest rates was followed by unbridled money printing as a reaction to the the financial crises. That had to bring in long term volatility. Today when the American Fed talks of increasing the the rates, it automatically infuses fear of money being sucked out from the global monetary system. Further, the US dollar also gets stronger & making it that much more difficult for say low margin oil producers to get finance. On the other side of the world, export dependant emerging economies have been engaged in competitive devaluations in currency, adding to the trust deficit.

On another level, country allocation are becoming less important & thus portfolio investments directed towards the BRICS nations lost interest in favour of huge unlisted companies or 'Unicorns'. Also disruptive technologies like the "FANG" or Facebook, Amazon, Netflix and Google took the shine away from the conventional industry !

C) Unprecedented wear & tear in democracy - All time high partisan politics among the democratic nations is not only slowing down even the most basic progress & reforms, but polarization across the aisles is leading to an unprecedented acrimony between political parties. The same haz been undermining the expected decorum in both national & international posturing & public discourse haz been finding new lows, hurting investor confidence that much more.

Of interest to those in the oil sector, so while out of sanctions Iran may soon be adding to the oil glut, 47 senators from the Republican party wrote an open letter last year to the Iranian leadership, that should they win, they might abrogate the deal made by the current Democratic party led US government & reverse the time clock.

Unable to demonstrate maturity through unity in the nation's functioning or policy making, the burden remains on respective governments to do growth spending, as even cash rich foreign & private sector investors remains weary. As if that was not enough, world over there is an anti-incumbency fever & so to retain power, populist trends have risen and financially prudent ones have taken a back seat, adding to the already stressed debt situation.

D) It's increasingly becoming a leaderless rudderless world - Over the last decade what we have seen is a financially bruised, war fatigued & morally drained America on one side & on the other side we saw a China - a supposed new rising leader, but with no followers. China began posturing aggressively with each of its so many neighbors it shares it's border with.

Notwithstanding the trade agreements, financial aids or sanctions that are arising more out of political compulsions rather than needs, even institutions like the United Nations, the IMF & the World Bank are being undermined. Thus today it is not only a multipolar world out there, but also a multiple opinionated world, with no acceptable leadership to set the tone right. 

Just note the unfolding of super complex relationships emanating from animosities or alliances in & among the different players like the Syrian Govt, the Shias, the Sunnis, the Kurds, the Saudis, the Arab league, Iran, Israel, Turkey, Russia, America, the Al Qaeda & now the ISIS - it would make any soap opera look pale. Most of the players are warring in hot or cold against or amongst each other with interests in & around the oil rich regions of the planet.

Even to the severest critics, all the chaos, at some level should make the OPEC unity of the past, appear more as an institution that waz made for stability rather than one that arose out of greed for petro-dollars. 

E) Last & the loudest is the free (mis)information age - it was JFK who once said that "The greater the knowledge we have, more our ignorance unfolds". He was referring to the space, but it seems, we are spaced out right here on planet earth. A recent PEW survey of leaders, on the 'Top 10 global trends' revealed that misinformation was among them & it is indeed a worrying trend. We will be entering our 5th year when about a 3rd of the rich nation youth now gets more information from the www that they tend to live in, rather than say from their parents, teachers, uncles & aunts.

Our opinions are becoming adulterated & popular trend driven & these then become pressure points on those that attempt to govern. It is said that if there is anything true about India, it's opposite is equally true. The same can be said about future market & pricing on oil, gas, refining & petrochemicals. All one needs to do, is to go on the web & the person will find plenty of editorials & opinions with adequate data points & seeming facts to predict that by the end of the year, oil will be at USD 20 a barrel on one side and USD 100 a barrel on the other side. 

The problems are not going to run away & definitely not in oil industry. In fact there is worry expressed by some, that just like the financial crises that had it's origins in sub prime real estate finance, the problems in the oil & gas industry could once again spill over into the financial sector.

To understand the pulse of the oil producing nations, just note that today the oil is trading at around USD 35 a barrel. A Rystad industry report says that the approximate break even for countries like Kuwait is USD 10, Saudi Arabia is USD 15, Iraq is at USD 20 & Iran at USD 25. Norway at USD 37 is on the edge. Russia & Venezuela are at around USD 50 are troubled & Nigeria which waz a rising star, has fallen as it needs USD 70 to stay buoyant.

The Indian economy is oil import dependant and so will benefit.

The Modi government's policy seems to be standing on 4 stable pillars 1) Make In India, 2) Invest in infrastructure, 3) Reduce subsidy or leaks in the system & 4) keep it clean. The savings in oil imports due to better roads & elimination of long transport vehicle queues due to GST at octroi collection booths or interstate check posts, will surely help some of that. The government haz already targeted to cut the oil import bill by 10% over the next few years. With the latest HELP or 'Hydrocarbon exploration licencing policy' on incentivising the exploration sector aggressively & in parallel raising the bar from BS4 to BS6 for emission norms, shows the government’s deep commitment, as much towards our energy search, as the environment.

Global oil & gas companies have all given a downward revision in investment & the mega players are likely to undershoot their capex by 15% but in India, ONGC has gone in the opposite direction which gives us a harbinger of things to come. In the short turn expect more brown field investments, shift towards down stream - those that can process high value Naphtha lighter products should gain. Refineries in Singapore & India's RIL with favorable Nelson Complexity Index are already benefiting immensely. LNG & so also regassification investments will rise. However in the long term, grass root plants will also come up.

Einstein had once philosophized that "A perfection of our means & confusion of ends seems to characterize our age" & on a global scale, that seems very much relevant today, with India being the exception.

In conclusion, far from making our's the best world, we have made it into a problematic PEST i.e. the Political, Economical, Social & Technological variables that are thrown up due to the global vagaries, makes it difficult for one to know what information is reliably valuable & what is just trendily in vogue. India being the saving grace.

Having said so, the wise man had admonished us against jumping to conclusions & instead had advised "Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted" !

It's time to stop worrying about tomorrow. Shri Einstein also gave us a clue on how to deal with our future & like an Indian spiritual guru, had recommended "Don't think of the future - it comes soon enough."

Que Sera Sera !

Softies - get the hard truth right !

Beware - the ISIS knows it's enemy well !

Sadly the world's & in particular India's "Softies" ie the Left Liberals who feed the popular media, do not. 

Btw, the softies bestow the rather appealing to senses title of 'Moderates' - upon themselves. They would like you to believe that they are rationalists & balanced.

Sure they were balanced in a yesterday's world, but in view of the changing ground realities, rationality's center of gravity has shifted. Instead of recalibrating their position, the moderates are now living in the past & asserting a fool's equanimity in the present.

Recently an order was issued by the ISIS that the fighters must kill their parents esp. if they do not endorse their proclaimed caliphate & its mission.

To put meaning behind the madness, a militant man among them actually demonstrated it in public by killing his own hapless mother in full view of the hundreds of people gathered outside a post office in the Syrian city of Raqqa. That should have been repugnant to the senses of the so called moderates & woken them from their sweet dream world.

For any mother, her child is the most precious and would like to keep it away from harm's way. That very ideology - of preservation & nurture, which is fundamental to the society, is deemed harmful by the ISIS creed. They seem to know only too well who their enemy is - all who peddle the concept of a status quo society, including their own kith & kin, flesh & blood, unless of course they fall in line, else they simply fall.

In the meantime, the civilized world is found twiddling it's thumb on how to address them !

http://m.timesofindia.com/world/middle-east/ISIS-vs-Daesh-vs-ISIL-vs-Islamic-State-What-do-the-names-mean-and-why-are-there-so-many/articleshow/50070566.cms

It is time we all wake up to the reality that the enemy is motivated and fighting an asymmetrical ideological war, which will eventually get our children  ( if not us ), unless we mend our ways.

Let me explain :

* At the very core of military strategy is a belief that - self preservation is instinctive & so the enemy would like to kill you but save himself. Well, here the enemy does not mind being a suicide bombers. 

* The other assumption is that if you have not harmed him - why should he want to harm you? Understand, your mind is too soaked in sound sensibilities to even comprehend his clarity of thought, which in this instance is crystal clear - either you are with them or against them (neutral folks including). That is their defining call.

* Somebody else will take care of the 'war on terror', it's not in my backyard. You thought the same when the Kashmir problem started over 2 decades ago, didn't you? To quote Shashi Tharoor 'The fires in the Afghani caves eventually melted steel structures in New York'. These are indeed problems without passports.

And hello, all that happened before the disruptive advent of affordable omnipresent communication devices and consequently, the death of distance. They are already here on our soil & in our www world that we now live in & recruiting volunteers, drawn by their mesmerizing mayhem.

If a long journey begins with the first step; this one is miles ahead and advancing rapidly.

In a management class of young aspirants, if Vision, Mission & Goal setting is to be taught, that organization is a worthy case study.

Now I know with gratefulness that God has made us kind. But I also know that the kind God has not made us stupid.

While we may not possess the temperament to kill the wretched sons of mother killers, should we not at least ring fence ourselves in self-defense against those who believe that their peace resides at the knife's edge?  

Recently the Gujarat Terrorism & Organized Crime Act was once again struck down by the President of India much to the glee of the doves. Earlier it was introduced by the then CM Narendra Modi and it was deemed as an attempt at saffronization. 

We all know what happened to the NDA introduced Prevention Of Terrorism Act or POTA - it was killed by the so-called United Progressive Alliance saying it was anti-minority.

Really? 

Speaking realistically, it was pro-appeasement!

It is time that the softies get a grip on the ground realities and they be more 'right', if I may, and as correct, to support stringent anti-terror laws.

Not done, irrespective of one's faith, the only color that we all will eventually witnesses is a red one - that of blood on the streets below & a black ISIS flag with Arabic letters fluttering above.

Son - be an unabashed admirer of America, but always remain truly in romance with India

Son,

You are going to the same college where your grandfather had studied. I am proud that you are also going to the University of Michigan !

I am reminded of my day, when I left on a journey for America to purse my education.

As I look back, I feel that at some level, nothing has changed and yet at another, everything has.

I read a joke recently : A Cuban, Russian, American & an Indian met on the upper deck of a ship. As expected, they begin to show-off.

The Cuban threw his expensive Cigar after just one puff & when Q'ed said "No problem, plenty of cigars in my country"!

Not to be out done, the Russian threw his expensive Vodka after just one sip & when Q'ed said "No problem, plenty of Vodka in my country" !

The American could not think of anything to boast about & so is at a loss, saying "Plenty of Indians in my country" ...he pushed out the Indian  ;-)

Plenty of Indians !

There are Indians all over USA & today, far from being thrown out, they have actually climbed up the ladder & are now into the main stream life in America - from senators to corporate honchos to hotel owners to Hollywood stars !

In my times, we had none of that. In fact the place where I went for my freshmen year, in Iowa - I was the first Indian there. An inquisitive lady who had never seen an Indian before had Q'ed me if - I was a white guy with a great tan or a black guy with straight hair !  

What has not changed though, is that I too, as an Indian teenager, had aspired to live a life like that of those "cool Americans". Sporting Nike shoes, sipping Coco Cola, playing video games, chewing Wrigley gum, dancing at the disco to pop music and off course visiting Disneyland & Hollywood ..all had taken a grip over my teenaged imagination. It was that soft power of America that attracted us to it & continues to do so even in your generation.

For India's sake, besides textbook & classroom education, that's what I want you to discover when there - how does one attract, so much & for so long ! What’s their secret sauce?

One Dr. Nye at Harvard defines soft power of a nation ( can be any entity ) as the intangibles that attracts others to it & in fact it's ability to even alter others’ behavior.

I would guess a teenager wanting to abandon his or her style of dressing and wear torn or patched American jeans, eat American food, listen to American music or even alter his or her accent to adopt an American one - just to assert a supposed superiority, are examples of soft power.

Sticks & carrots are the other ways. One can be coerced or incentivized to change, but soft power is the cheapest method & is as effective in the long term.

Dr. Nye observes what makes the soft power of a nation, it happens when :

1) It's dominant culture is aligned to the global majority's trends - democracy, pursuit of open global trade, fair judiciary, woman's empowerment, pluralism, etc are examples.

2) It's grand culture is effectively communicated - is not opaque

3) It shows results - uplifting of its citizens

Armies of the world cannot stop an idea, whose time has come. I believe India's time has come & when in USA, I want you to be an ambassador of India. When people ask you about India, I would like you to think of some of the things that matter - that are so Indian.

In an international college like University of Michigan, where students will come from all over the world, just like the Russian, Cuban, American & Indian that met on the upper decks in my joke above & began to boast - such a session of bragging is inevitable. Search for greatness of your nation & do communicate that effectively.

In fact, ask them how do they define greatness? Our past MP & former ambassador at the UN Mr.Shashi Tharoor in his book 'Pax Indica' gives us a clue. If they say that the parameters of measurement are :

Population - we are largest in the world. 
GDP size - we are 3rd largest in the world in PPP terms.

GDP growth - ours is among the highest in the world.

Army - we have the 4th largest.

Nuclear Arsenal or missile programs - we are in the top five. 

Space program - we are in the exclusive club.

IT, cell phones & knowledge sourcing or TV channels - we are # 1

But those are tangibles. As Einstein once said - all that counts, cannot be counted and all that can be counted, need not count.

Our intangible soft power is, in spite of having so many cultures, regional languages, religions & sects that pull us in all directions, we are still able to work as a united country & thus we have often punched above our natural economic might. If we have not done so even higher, it is because we do not effectively communicate our largeness to the world. We remained a tiger, but an elusive one - not seen by the world.

Consider the foll, we are also the wise elephant :

• After independence, we did not hold any grudge against the British. We decided to make peace with our past & moved on & today we enjoy good trading ties with them. And as a reactivate measure to our neighbor Pakistan, that also became independent in parallel, we gladly did not become a Hindu nation, when they became the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. Even today, that nation pretty much defines itself as all things 'opposite of India'. We define ourselves for what we truly are & that is 'soverign, secular, democratic republic'. We are very accommodative & it is said that when George Bush Jr. introduced our former PM Manmohan Singh to his wife, he said "Mr. Singh comes from a land which is still free of Al-Qaeda, even when India has over 150 Million Muslims".

• Israel is a friend of India and helps us enormously in agriculture & military technology. Yet when they abuse the Palestine, we openly vote at UN against Israel. This, is in spite of the fact that many Muslim nations wish ill against India wrt the Kashmir issue. We go only by merit of the case. Speaking of Israel, ours is the only country where there is no case or history of anti-Semitism.

• Before you were born, the world was divided between the USSR & America. One had to define themselves as to which side were they aligned in the warring giants' "cold war". We remained neutral & as a leader of sorts of the non alignment movement, we sought security from the Soviet and business from USA. It is only after Pakistan attacked us & simultaneously embraced USA, we were compelled to show a mild shift towards the Soviets. Nevertheless, we remained very sovereign in most of our post independence adaptations, so while our politicians went to Moscow, our business community went to New York!

• Unlike Pakistan, we largely remained a self-reliant ( non-dependant ) and thus no sanctions will ever work on India. The same has come to be tested in the past; when we exploded our nuclear devices at Pokhran, the Americans were quick to impose sanctions on us. Soon they realized that they had more to lose than India & unilaterally removed the imposed sanctions on India. Amazing then became astounding, when even without our signing the nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty, we still got the Americans on board & their nuclear suppliers group to accept our nuclear program and eventually work with us. Even a right wing president like Bush Jr had to sign the nuclear deal with us. We on our own, asserted & declared that our program was for self defense only & we adopted the "No First Use" doctrine.

• That too was severely tested. Even when provoked by Pakistan in what later was known as the "Kargil misadventure" by Pakistan - we remained maturely restrained and postured defensively only, pushing them out of our occupied territory. FYI, Kargil war was choreographed by their military chief Musharraf as Indian PM Vajpayee waz engaging with their PM Nawaz Sharif for friendship & same was not digestible to the military establishment of Pakistan. Post Kargil, in a coup, Musharraf deposed Nawaz Sharif & took over. Musharraf later was still invited to visit India at the "Agra Summit", offering him a 2nd chance to redeem himself. Peace is in our psyche.

• In the American led "coalition army" against Iraq called "Operation Desert Storm" the world's powerful nations fought against Iraq. India showed independent foreign policy and did not join that but instead boldly pushed for talks. It remained out of the entanglement as Iraq had been a friend that had supported India on Kashmir. Today Iraq is in shambles as an out come of that war & American economy badly bruised.

• We did not ever annex or attack any nation. Bhutan is a landlocked tiny Himalayan kingdom in our neighborhood & very dependant on India. We could have easily absorbed it by force at any time. PM Modi, in fact made it the first nation to visit after his coming to power, to pledge even more support to it. In fact, we have stood by it at all times, including recently, when China showed aggression in it’s Doklam region.

• It is Sikkim that on its own become part of India in the 70s, as it was afraid that Nepal or China may swallow it. Such a volunteerism has almost never happened. And when the monks of Tibet faced a Chinese threat, they saw India as a natural refuge. We support them for the cause of spirituality even when there is no political or economic mileage. It is a gesture that is enshrined only in kindness. After takeover of Afghanistan by the Taliban, our assistance to Afghan refugees in the past & recent gesture of assistance in rebuilding that ravaged nation is also not out of any imminent economic considerations.

• Even recently, in our vote at the WTO, we found ourselves opposing almost the entire world's view on need for food security. Well, we know that for our tragedy, we must adopt only our own strategy. Not withstanding the the wise words dispensed by those seated at the head table, we asserted & prevailed to have the right to stockpile food, as a back-up to a possible failed monsoon. Alas, Ethiopia once learned through drought & famine that surely the kind world does wake up to help, but not before she become completely helpless. On the other hand, only strength respects strength & so even after the unpopular vote by us, there is a huge India centric investment rush !

• Prime Minister Modi travelled to Washington & Moscow, to Tehran & Riyadh, to Jerusalem & Ramallah – all warring each other in hot or cold, but warmly welcomed him to an open armed embrace, making Modi the most unique leader in the world. He could do that because even when some call India a "soft state" & others "politically un-savvy" one for not taking the sides for immediate national gains; to me India represents a country that is truly sovereign, one that decides for itself, very independently & for the long term. Further, even when India has achieved much in terms of hard strength, it regularly finds itself on the side of humanity & fairness without fear or favor.

Christopher Columbus had come searching for India but had instead discovered America. Like your grand father who also studied in America, I too, enamored by the American soft power, went to look for America ... but instead from far away, discovered India ! 

 It is only after going there, I realized what India meant to me.

When I went there, the things that I took for granted here, became very dear - the masala chai & masaledar nashta - how I missed them. From long distance, I started to appreciate India - it's warm climate & people. Don't get me wrong, America was comfortable - like a great 5 star hotel, but it was not home.

I recall vividly, I used to phone India & in the background I would hear the street vendor lady screaming "Bolo limbu, methi, palak, bhajiii...iiiye". I had once actually told my mom to keep the phone receiver facing the window for better clarity. The sounds coming in from the window was music to me. America had become a standardized super market, my India is a wonderfully chaotic bubbling bazaar ! 

It is said that education must be rooted in ones culture but wedded to one's growth. This country has nourished your roots, do not forget them as you pursue higher education to secure your future growth. As you spread your branches, do note that in the long run - deeper the roots, sweeter will be the fruits. While there, you will be America's student but remain a soldier of India.

Son - be an unabashed admirer of America, but always remain truly in romance with India.

All the very best.

Love

Dadzi Pop

Of facts, fiction, frogz & fun !

@ Home

Before I had gone soft spoken in voice, I recall it had gotten hoarse & that's when my tale had begun. 

I recall vividly, my wife had given me that look & said in that all too infamous old wives' tone "You're not like before".

Oh-o now what? - I had thought.

I had raced my mind to figure out my next old husbands' move. As a response, should I put on that 'Hey, what  are you talking about?' child-like innocent look OR should I just confess?

Well, eventually I'll anyway be found out- I recall I had concluded.

I had decided to own up.

Boys aspire to look like their dads but that day, I had reversed the order, just to borrow my sons innocent looking face.

I had taken a deep breath, shut my eyes & opened my mouth to tell it all with a : "Ahm...actually....er...you know...I umm ...no honey I umn". Hen pecked that I was, I had found myself completely speechless.

Before my 2nd attempt, my son had interjected "Yes dad you are not like before - your voice sounds like a croaking frog" !

FROG? I had pondered with an inverted-u-smile.

Phew, anyway topic had got changed .....or had it?

Anyway, I had lived to tell a another tale. 

---

@ Work

You all well knew that slowly my voice had gone from croaking like a frog, to that sound of a teenaged tadpole.

And so since over a month, each of you had been escaping my screaming & shouting - no matter how much indiscipline you had put on display.

As if that was not enough, I had been further troubled by the fact that when some of you came to my office & I spoke softly to you, you also had respond back to me softly.

Why?

I had wondered if you were also having a problem with your vocal chords or was mine a contagious disease or to add insult to injury - you were making fun of me by imitating me. To add ouch to my agony, when I was in excruciating pain & couldn't even speak softly, I was compelled to just whisper. The response I had got was a soft counter whisper - forcing me to ask "What...what?". 

I had suspected that maybe I also had an ear problem.

When I used to write on a note pad, your answers were also in writing - just because your handwriting is better than mine eh?

Anyway, I had lived to tell a another tale.

---

@ Doctor's

I had gone for a check-up & had told the doc my problem in a very faint voice. He, in an equally whispery soft voice had responded back "You can't speak?". 

No kidding! I remember, I was fuming at being made fun of by this so called noble profession guy.

Sensing that I was getting upset, my wife had taken over and she had explained my 'case of the disappearing voice'. I think he looked a wee bit extra delighted as she had narrated the events.

The doctor had eventually understood that I was a patient loosing patience.

Finally, he had began his business with his standard operating procedure.

"Any history of blood pressure or diabetes or heart problem?" he had asked without any emotions of sympathy. I recall I had shook my head into a no-no-no, as I had remembered Akbar, Chandragupta Maurya & Mrs. Sita Kumar my history teacher in school.

Then after the expected "aye, ee, ii, oo, uu, ... ahhh" that the doctor had made me do with my tongue completely out ( pls try it right now - it's fun ) he had looked at the nurse from Kerela and used big big medical words. I knew about these nurses from south of India, I was told they believe that - doing service to mankind is doing service to God. I had indeed felt safe as she had nodded an Indian nod ( shaking head side to side-wala ). But then the Doc had looked at me and uttered the the great grandfather of big words that made me feel unsafe - "We need to do a nasolaryngo-scopy on you".

I had also nodded without any understanding, resembling that nurse and turning instantly Hindu, as they have 86 lakh ( +/- 10% ) Gods & I had prayed to all of them at once. I waz as half scared as half excited :

Scared as that grandpa of a big word had just confirmed to me that - invoice to recover a lost voice, would be huge  :-(

The exciting part was, maybe once this 'Go Larry's-nose go' thing was done, we could put that in our company profile, in the 'Management Leadership' section under my name as a qualification passed :-)

He had then asked me to lie down on the couch & had dropped a few drops into my nose. I recall well that I was tickled & spooked - "Problem is in my throat sir, not nose" I had said loudly, almost. The doctor had got startled at the sudden awaking of my voice and had shhhh-ed me into a silence. After a few seconds, I had felt that I was not breathing at all and was bewildered as to how I was still alive?

To confirm, I had asked.

The Doc had ignored me; the kind God's nurse had explained that he had just administered local anesthesia & as the drops trickled down my nose and reached my throat, they left behind a trail of numbness. Dumbness I had thought - at least he should inform me before doing this to me. Indian Doc that he was, his eloquence was in his stern silence.

Anyway, he had then pulled out a tube camera to insert into my left nostril.

I remember, I had posed.

He had slowly pushed it in, much to my horror ( though I was not embarrassed, there were no road blocks ) and slowly the tube must have reached my voice box, deep in my throat. After about 20 second he had removed the tube and watched the movie that he had recorded ... sans any popcorn.

At least he had finally found his voice again "Ahhh" he had exclaimed. Not fair, I thought ... he had taken a short cut to good luck, as he had skipped the other vowels that he had made me utter.

"There is a problem" the pleased Doc had said. He then had explained to me at length without big words but had still managed to scare me "Imagine a two door window. To shut it tight, we must close both the doors. However in monsoon, sometimes we experience that the wood gets swollen and then the window does not shut but remains ajar. Same has happened to your vocal chords that act like the two doors of a window; one of them is swollen for some reason". 

I had reasoned myself to never keep my mouth open in any future monsoons.

He had said that he could laser-cut my swelling and fit it all back to size. I was scared of operations, so I had asked him if he knew of any alternative methods. 

Bewildered the Doc had asked "Like what"?

My turn. I had happily dispensed advise to the doctor "You know no cutting fitting, why not do like just how those tantric fellows do - they make the patient chant some chants & its sorted"

"Chant" the angry Doc had said in a loud voice ( much to my jealousy ) & had continued "No tantric, the only trick - is to shut up ... & be that way as much as possible" as he had walked out of the room.

I had promised myself to never see him again. Well destiny had other plans for me. 

Nevertheless, I had left from there. ..quietly of course.

Anyway, I had lived to tell a another tale.

---

@ Being silenced

During that frustratingly quiet period of no talking, by chance, I met myself a bit more intimately. I had actually realized what it was to be a handicap - sure makes me a more sensitive person now.

When in a group, I am regularly that guy that rants at the top of hiz voice, seeking and soaking in disproportionate attention.

But due to my forced silence, I had actually begun to wait for an accidental eye contact with someone to signal my message, as I was being ignored in a group. Alternatively, I would take advantage of that sudden and unplanned momentary hush that tends to just happen every once in a while between humans in conversation. That pregnant pause, that occurs between talks for no apparent reason, would make a 'normal' persons feel a bit awkward, but to me, it was 'my moment' to grab & whisper out a short message in between.

In a world where 'survival of the fittest' is a mantra, it must be heart wrenching for some, to be just a mute spectators.

Anyway, I had lived to tell a another tale.
 

---

@ The dead of the night

Well, I had then learned of a freak advantage in that indisposed state.

In agony & unable to take it any longer, I had gone to the same doctor's late one night. Surprisingly, hiz wife saw me from the window, I had inquired in the softest of voice "Is the doctor home?"

She it seems had taken me a wee bit too seriously. She excitedly looked around to see if any of the neighbors were watching. On confirmation that none were, in a hush hush voice had replied with a mischief in one eye & a wink in the other, as if to beckon me invitingly inside her abode & said with a smile "No he is not" !

Just then, the doctor had returned home ....damn.

Anyway, I had lived to tell a another tale.

---

 @ God knows where

I came, I saw & they put me to sleep.

I was in a timeless zone. However, I could still see them all peering over me. They were examining me. They would touch me but I could not feel them.

Some looking at me in awe and some thought me to be awful. Some nervous, some pretending to not be and yet some genuinely interested. Some were fearful of me. However, I felt no glee nor glum, no emotions at all. Just then someone got out a dissection blade. 

I woke up, I saw and I came to my senses.

Anyway, I had lived to tell a another tale.

---

@ Being me again

What? ...I was not a frog in a bio lab being examined by students ! I am a patient just operated upon for my vocal chord nodules. My general anesthesia had just worn off.

I could still see them all peering over me, they were doctors; including my favorite one !

It was 15th Nov 2014. The operation had gone off well, thank you.

I had instantly realized that I shall soon be able to speak normally once again i.e. humanly ... until my darling gives me that next dose, in that old wives' tone & makes me speechless again !

Bolo Bharat Mata Ki Jai Indeed !

It is said that - 'If there is anything ever true about India, its opposite is also true'. Thus, India with it's vagaries and complexities & over the years bloated bureaucracy, is a very difficult country to govern. Yet within just 18 months under Narendra Modi, things have changed for the better. 

India is supposed to be a thriving democracy & yet like in a monarchy, most of the political parties that operate here are like family owned private limited enterprises. On assuming power, one of the 1^st thing that Mr. Modi had done or rather undone was, he disallowed for more than one family member from holding a position of power in his government.

Before I give my assessment on Mr. Modi, it would be appropriate for me to tell you a bit on the kind of world that we live in.

The 5 things that are undoing the global order & society at large are: 

1) De-globalization i.e. due to the global recession, once again the self-centric trade agreements, imposition of non-tariff barriers and political & ideological alignments among nations is undermining institutions like WTO, UN & even the relatively newly formed G20.

2) Partisan political stalemate & acrimony is preventing even basic progress in many Democratic nations. 

3) Innovation in finance & monetary policy like Quantitative Easing in developed nations & artificially kept low interest rates, brings with it an expected long term volatility in the markets. 

4) China is slowly becoming a leader with no followers, rise of the ISIS brand of terrorism & it's asymmetrical ways of war and the American political fatigue gives no real direction to the community of nations. 

5) Last & the loudest - aggressive media, including social media today allows fastest distribution of misinformation & wrong influence and so compounds some of the above issues even more. Media, supposedly the 4^th pillar of Democracy is severely compromised. Today it no longer reports, it takes sides. Let us understand this, it has transmuted into a profit making business, hence doesn’t deserve nobility. The "No news is good news" axiom was never more appropriate, than now.

Now coming back to Mr. Modi, for his supporters, I think - Mr. Modi is more of a metaphor for 'change' than a person.

As a student of leaders, I can say with conviction that Mr. Modi has made himself the national agenda, an entire government has been personified & rechristened after him i.e. now dubbed as Modi Sarkar. He still attracts the Indian diaspora crowds in different corners of the world, inspiring & energizing them to not only receive him with an unprecedented pomp & also spontaneously erupting into a ‘Modi-Modi’ chant in chorus.

All this, even when he belongs to the "lowest pedigree" i.e. is a politician vs. being a star in the field of sports, cinema or music. Mr. Modi is a rock star !

Suddenly India has arrived on the world stage & now every world leader is found to be accommodating to Mr. Modi's agenda !

His rise is half the story, where he started from, gives the true picture & I am not even talking of the fact that he is the son of road-side tea seller.

His vilification by the Indian media, including by reputed international & otherwise sanguine sounding magazines like The Economist, who did not endorse him - had an unprecedented impact. They painted Mr. Modi as an Islamophobic individual & that even influenced the mighty America - who wrongly banned an elected representative, untried in any court, the Chief Minister of an important state of India from entering into America ( for the record, Mr. Modi is now found cent percent innocent ). The national & regional parties that were traditionally opposed to each other, had singled him out & had launched a united front against this man.

Today the Modi-man is on the top of the world & screaming - Bharat Mata Ki Jai.

As if being led by the conductor of an orchestra - the rating agencies, the IMF & World Bank are all echoing his words in unison. They are viewing India as an upward moving nation. Obama penned a note on the Modi-man, in the world famous TIME magazine.

Till 2008, 114 nations were growing at a rate of 5% plus, today less than a one handful are. With such strong head winds, India turning around as a country with the highest large-nation growth rate, is a miracle in itself.

GDP growth which was retarding for last 5 years & is now moving in the opposite direction - inflation is tamed, including on non-oil dependent items; fiscal deficit is brought under control; forex reserves have risen to an all time high & balance of payment situation is comfortable; unlike most currencies that have tumbled against the American dollar, the Indian rupee has relatively held ground; natural assets are being sold through auction in the most transparent manner & are fetching higher than expected revenue; there is direct transfer of cash to the account of the qualified poor; e-Governance is finally taking shape to reduce procedures, hurdles & middle men; and among other things, corruption as a national menace, has been dealt with a severe blow !

There is an expectation from the Modi-fied government & managing that can be a deemed 'problem of the plenty'. However, contrast that with the fact that, till recently, most felt that they must attempt to grow in spite of & not because of the government.

It is sad that the media is focusing more of what is yet to be done, rather than the wonderful work in progress. The focus of the media is also so naive.

Are the foreign trips' duration important or what he achieved in those trips more important?  Besides huge FDI investment line up, MOUs for unfettered uranium supply, technology to make fighter planes & nuclear reactor in India are just some of the achievements that Mr. Modi made. In fact, he has done more than what any expert commentator had predicted before the trip & still remains absolutely unpredictable - his suddenly landing in Pakistan to wish the PM there on his birthday, being the latest coup.

The media accuses Mr. Modi of being a one-man-band who chokes his ministers. In the UPAs scam era, we had so many self-appointed PMs that called their own shots in contempt of the PMO and the real PM himself was one remote controlled mute spectator. Now when I listen to the likes of say, Rajnath Singh, Arun Jaitley, Suresh Prabhu, Venkaiah Naidu, Piyush Goyal, Smriti Irani, Ravi Shankar Prasad, etc, they talk of Mr. Modi with so much reverence - I wonder on the media's motive. 

While business balance sheets were already too stressed from past era's permission pains & delays & so many projects are stalled. Banks are not in a position to lend them more due to past defaults. Here too, the government is trying to resolve the issues. Mr. Modi's handicap is that he does not have the numbers in the Rajya Sabha to pass bills & Congress has fallen so low, that it has nothing to lose. It has coalesced with former enemies to block the most essential GST & Land Acquisition bills, both required for new jobs to go on the ground & foreign investments to go off the ground. The same too shall be resolved as such unity among opposition members for a poor cause seldom lasts.

Finally, contrary to the RaGa-baba's claim & backed by media created perception that it's a "suit boot ki sarkar"; the cash rich business houses, are learning to go through the slow but sure due diligence process by this regime, as under table "speed money" is becoming worthless.

Have faith, be patient - India under Mr. Modi will do you proud. Not one or two years, Modi Sarkar is working for the next decade.

BTW, not withstanding the media's adulterated agenda, Mr. Modi is still among the most popular world leaders and according to a recent survey, he enjoys over 70 % popular rating within India.

Bolo Bharat Mata Ki Jai Indeed !