Entries Tagged as 'jlt !!!'

The Man in the Arena!!

There is a famous quote from the Speech by Theodore Roosevelt, given in Paris in 1910. The quote goes something like this

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

And after reading this… I question myself…am I one of the souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

The Supreme Court and the Govt. of India!!

Whilst the job of the so called Govt of India is to look after its citizens, the objective seems to be shifting more towards scoring high on profit and growth numbers.

India has a huge population which lives below the poverty line who endure great pains just to have two square meals a day. India also has a good number of people who fall in the categories of HNW Individuals, Upper class, Upper-middle class and lower middle class….of we can go on in dividing the demography of the country into various classes!! But basically it falls into two broad categories, people who pay taxes and are able to earn a decent living and people who are not able to do that.

The Govt. of India uses the tax money mainly to give provide for the politicians, either by salary which keeps on going high every year or by the various innovative methods of corruption these politicians come up with. Whatever little that remains, is used for the development of the country.

Some of the money mentioned is used to buy grains and other edible material from the farmers and give them at a concessional rate to the poor people. Well, at the first look it sure is a novel idea and act up as a balancing act.

But what happens when, the bought food is not sold to the poor but rots in the store of the country? The food prices for the people who can afford rises because a portion of the supply is removed and the poor are still left hungry.

Our spineless judiciary did take note of this and rightly directed the Govt of India to give them away for free to the poor.

What does our famed PM respond to this, that it will remove the incentive from the farmers to produce.

My question here is, will it ?? I believe the farmers will be interested in the money we give them in exchange of the grain and not what we do with the grain? So if the Govt of India is really worried about the incentive to farmers then it should give them a higher price for their goods. AND not create an artificial hike in the price by removing the supply, in the name of providing for the poor.

The whole fiasco just outlines how we are being duped by our so called Govt. of India!!

We as in both, the people who can afford and pay taxes and the people who cannot afford  two square meals a day!!

I know…

… I know… But don’t worry, I will be regular soon… I think !!

The Corporation called Government of India!!

I have been thinking about the recently concluded Spectrum auction that was held recently in India. The thoughts have been from different angles, some from technical points, some from business points and few from conceptual points.

The recently concluded so called 3G auction raked in huge chunks of money for the government. But is it really good for us? Ofcourse, the huge spectrum costs, along with the huge costs to roll out the network infrastructure will be passed on to the end customers, that would be us.

India, for long has had the lowest Telecom rates in the world. Many attribute it to the competition brought in by the government policies. Well I think it is not that straight forward.

The competition part is true, but it is not because of good government policies, partly yes but thats not the whole story. It also because the spectrum was sold at an exceptionally cheap price.  The new companies rolled out networks charged the user at around 50% of the calling charges of the already set in players, mainly to capture market share. Smaller companies which can survive on lesser margins started the price war. The end product, cheaper call rates for the users. In the meantime the hue and cry is over the media that Government of India licensed the spectrum at dead cheap price, and inturn lost a lot of money.

But then,

When did the Government of India became a Corporation?

Cheaper prices translate to cheaper call rates to user, which allows them to have bigger purchasing power in other places. So, the general public does benefit out of it and moreover, they get to decide how to spend it. This is instead of passing that money to GoI and then ends up in pockets of Politicians and other corruption black holes, which suck in money with no accountability.

I would prefer the present outcome of 2G spectrum. And moreover, I am quite skeptical how affordable the 3G technology would translate to us, compared even to the Broadband Wireless also known as 4G. I am quite hopeful, that we will have better rates in calls and broadband connection in the 4G spectrum.

Yes, the senior Ambani brother may have pulled out the Ace on everyone else and he may jump start the 4G revolution.

With all these thoughts, I have started to see the general Public of India as different from the Government of India, and I have begin to believe that our interest do not necessarily align. Govt. of India now seems just like any other corporation in the world, and one which does not have a very good management. Whats worse , it has tremendous power for its disposal.

Caffiene and Blogs!!

Finally…after weeks of trying…I have finally given up. I hope only  temporarily. On my way back from lunch, I grabbed the half litre, caffeine filled coffee to my desk. Yes, my tryst to increase the quantity of blood in my caffeine system has taken a set back. Only because I wanted to concentrate more on my web surfing and usual LBDN instead of pretending to be awake while sleeping.

Is it related to me not posting more blogs here. Ofcourse,  blogging has been a good way of LBDN, but I hope it is not because of this reason. My brains ability to churn out thoughts has somehow reduced inspite of having few people who continuously pester me to post. Yes, the word ‘pester’ has be used!!! I think is more to do with the tools of the new social media, posting of one liners, also known as micro-blogging. As some of the connected people would have noticed that, when I was deprived of the Internet, I had resorted to these mediums to let go of my mental rants in few characters. Mostly on Twitter and few times on Facebook. My habit of Micro-blogging has left me feeling comfortable with unpursued thoughts. And now, I am able to churn out decent posts, reading which I can relate myself.

Although I have posted sub-quality posts many times in the past, I have refrained from them a lot more. And unlike some of the other blogs I read, I do not want  to post just for the sake of posting, and hence, I the huge gaps. Yes, like everyone else, I also suffer from mental black holes. Which suck every thought thrown to them and refuse to let out anything worthwhile. Infact, even crap is not coming to me know. So, I have resorted to being blank rather then type posts which are like…ummm… this one in nature!!! :)

Having said that, I will continue diluting blood in my body and end this here.

I hope I will no longer pretend to be awake while sleeping!!!