Demonetization and Modi

I always wonder if Modi is a philosopher king of Plato or is he a Gorbachev of USSR who is trying to bring perestroika in the form of demonetization. I was not a big Modi fan in the teen years of my life. His Hitler-style of working and communal blemishes on his past always made me skeptical of whether he would be able to lead India in secular and sober sense or not. However, I started listening to his speeches more regularly after he got elected to power. It changed my perception a little bit. The recent step of demonetization has created mixed feelings in my mind.

I love him for his boldness and courage in taking this step. The political-economic-social cost of this step is very huge. He has put his personal reputation at the stake in the process. But on the downside, he has pushed the whole country in an uncertain territory.

He is considered akin to philosopher king of Plato because he has no political dynasty. He is learned and a self-made individual who has learned from the book of life itself. He is above nepotism and corruption. But the analogy is incomplete given the fact that he does show favoritism to his party BJP. His rejection of opposition which is essential for the function of democracy creates doubt in people's mind.

On the other hand, he is seen as Gorbachev of USSR because be could not correctly gauge the kind of preparation which country needs to successfully reap the dividends of the demonetization plan. India will not collapse as a result of this. But a general outcome would be the end of saving culture in the country. Jobs will be lost because businesses would be forced to follow rulebook. However, the new jobs won't be generated immediately. Every new industry and new business have a certain gestation period. The setup and flourishment of the business will take time. Therefore, for the time being, the joblessness will be on the rise. This will create a fertile ground for agitations and unrest.

Amid the dynamics of Plato and Gorbachev, what may eventually come out is a Putin of Russia. In the aftermath of USSR collapse, the country had become a den of oligarchy and corruption. The project of accelerated privatization under Boris Yeltsin had virtually transferred all the political and economic control in the hands of Businessmen like Guinsky and Berezovsky. Just like Adani and Ambani of India, they became the invisible king or the king-makers of Russia. However, when Berezovsky helped Putin's rise to power, little did he know that he is putting nails in his own coffin. As soon as Putin got hold of power, he asked these oligarchs to surrender their shares to the state. He set out fair processes of auction and tender. He meticulously managed his image through the use of media. This led to the revival of Russia and era of Putin.

The same may happen in the contemporary India. Although with an Indian twist to the things. Modi may call for banking nationalization in the light of bad assets. He has already nationalized the total household savings of the country by way of demonetization. He may ask the big NPA holders businesses to surrender their assets to the state and may play an active role in their auctioning process. He will not disturb the big houses of Adani and Ambani but he will pick on the second-rung business class which has huge bad loans and may assign this to the new players. Already Media is polarized heavily in the country.

Anyway, be it a philosopher-king or the Gorbachev or the Putin, Amid all the confusion and chaos of demonetization, India has no other option except Modi. Only he has the guts to go the full length on the issues of Benami reforms and digital economy. The fear is in the process he may end up killing the whole generation of the entrepreneurial class. Plus the lack of innovation on the part of businesses is leading to the stagnation in the job market.

India is standing at an inflection point. It may go either way. Either it can continue with the status quo or it may forcefully tread the path of reforms. Time will tell whether Modi will become Putin or will he remain a Gorbachev.

Why is it necessary to lead?

If you do not lead then you are led. Being led means being manipulated. It means your thoughts are not your own. They are engineered. There are two kinds of leaders. One who empowers their follower. Other is who disempower their subordinates and followers. Every one of us is a leader in some or other role. A father is a leader to his children. A manager is a leader to his team. A politician is a leader to his people. As a teacher, you are a leader to your students.

Nowadays, the first kind of breed has become rare. The first kind of leadership requires generous heart, high sense of competence and security. It requires unique qualities of true mentorship. They lead by example. They lead from the front. Some fine example of such leaders is Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, Dr. Vikram Sarabhai and people like Bill Gates.

The second breed is more ubiquitous. They are found in every nook and corner of our daily lives. Such people believe in manipulation and hegemonic domination. The moment they understand that the subordinate is a strong contender for the position he is holding, they would try every possible means to decimate him. Generally, such decimation occurs in a vicarious fashion by way of shaking his confidence. For example, teacher rebuking his students instead of answering their curious questions. Parents shouting at their children when a child tries to take independent decision. Politician creating hurdles for anyone who poses a threat his position. And a manager attempts to subvert his employee by putting extra workload or giving him lower rating or making him believe that he can't do it.

Such people act as a glass ceiling for our ambitions. They tend to put a lid onto our imaginations and inflict injuries on our can-do attitude. To overcome this transparent yet stifling veneer of subordination, it is necessary to believe in yourself and be your own leader.

Today every successful person we see around ourselves is a leader. Followers are never the achievers. They only remain followers. Only one who has the ability to lead becomes successful. What is the prerequisite to becoming an empowering leader?

First, one should have self-believe to the degree of madness. He must be stubborn and obstinate to a very high degree. Second, one should be fearless. Be it fear of failure or fear of being wrong or fear of being different. Third, one should pursue an idea and should just pursue one idea at a time. Fourth, one should be ignorant of criticism. When a mediocre person aims to become a leader, other mediocre people try their best to stop this attrition from their lot. They try their best to pull him down. In the process, they criticize him or ridicule him or laugh at him or try many other things which can shake the person's confidence. A true leader remains unmoved from any of this. Fifth, leaders are master of the art of living happily in the moment of uncertainty, anxiety, tension and stress. Sixth, leaders should be good in emotional profiling of their followers. Sixth, a leader needs to have a history of failure in some or other walk of life. The taste of failure helps him in becoming more resolute in his goals, enables him to deal with his frustrations and help him in becoming humane.

The absence of any of the above six traits will make him deficient in some or other way. For example, the absence of sixth quality will make him an insecure or mean leader. The absence of fifth quality may turn him aggressive, and angry. This way either he becomes unethical or reclusive in his nature. The absence of fourth may turn him into a joke. He will constantly be in a self-correcting mode.

A big question which arises is whether leadership is an inborn talent or is it a learned behavioral trait? The answer to this is both. Just like every other thing in life, leadership is also a combination of heredity as well as environmental factors. Generally, A true leader is more a product of environment than the inborn skills. After a stage, Leadership is also about human relationships and emotional intelligence. Both of these are learned skills.

Coming to the main topic, why is it necessary to lead? The short answer is if you are not fulfilling your own dream then you are fulfilling someone else's dream. So it is important to pursue your own dream and for this it is important to lead.

Year 2017

Without much ado, I will directly list down the new year's resolution for the year 2017.

1. Without a doubt, the first and foremost is to keep the phone in flight mode when I am studying or working.
2. Paper and pencil writing at least 5 days a week and 5 blog writing every month.
3 Sleeping before 12 o'clock every day.
4. Reading and Revising newspaper at least 6 days in a week.
5. Reading 12 books in the entire year.

This is it. Company, music, exercise, job, technology, teaching, travel and every other shit can comfortably take back seat for first 10 months.

Review: Year 2016

I started the year 2016 with a resolve that I would be reading one book every 15th day. I had committed to myself that I would be blogging on a regular basis. I wanted to keep a check on my fitness level and wanted to engage myself in my general hobbies of music, teaching, and other items in the to-do list. As per the philosophy of SMART principles, I had set following goals.

Finishing one book every two weeks and writing a review for the same.
Writing Daily blogs.
Exercising at least 5 days in a week
Reading newspaper at least 5 days in a week
Learning one new technology every three month
Registering my NGO and company
Starting a book readers club
One fun trip with friends
Writing 3 articles of newspaper grade
Sleeping before 11 in the night at least 5 days a week
Meditate daily
Learn to set realistic goals

In the light of above goals, let me evaluate my performance of the year 2016.

The year began happily. I shifted from Bangalore to Noida. The sister's wedding was scheduled for February. With the grace of god, It went really well. Soon after, I joined the new job in Noida. So the platform was all set for me to take up new things and fulfill all the commitments. But sadly not much happened. I was again trapped in the spiral of Civil Services. It left me with no time to spare. When It comes to UPSC preparation, everything else takes a back seat. The same happened this year.

I could read hardly 7-8 books in the entire year. The notable one being The tipping point by Robert Gladwell, Infinite Justice of Arundhati Roy, India Shashtra by Shashi Tharoor, Emotional Intelligence by Travis Bradberry, Company of the women by Khushwant Singh, The 50 Psychology Classics, and Kashmir in Vajpayee years by A.S. Dulat. Some were left unfinished. The social animal being the notable one in the list. The one under progress is Sapiens by Yuval Noah Hariri. I wanted to read 4 more books but my other commitments, slow speed, and my lazy being held me back.So the task remained incomplete.

Blogging came really well. I was able to make a century of the posts. It felt really good. I wish I can continue the tempo and keep writing on a variety of topics of socio-economic-political importance. But here also, My target was of writing a blog daily. I could hardly do that. So it remained incomplete.

The fitness routine took a blow because of my inability to manage so many things at a time. Somewhere the lethargy had set in and after initial months of consistency, I slipped off the track and did not pursue it with as much vigor with which I should have done it. So it remained incomplete.

As far as the newspaper is considered, I was fairly consistent in current affairs coverage. The insights coverage was regular though it could not reap many dividends. But It was good and somewhat satisfactory.

One place where I miserably failed is in learning a new technology. I had bitter experiences on the job. It served my purpose, though. I learned a lot about organizational politics, negotiations, and skills of identifying good apple from the bad apple.

I was able to register my company. As far as NGO is concerned, The association with Vishwa Ahimsa Sangh flourished to the next level. So performance on this task was satisfactory though the task itself was less important. Though I could not hold on to my schedule. A lot of improvement was desired but It was OK.

The most notable and satisfying achievement of the year was my trip to Kailash Mansarovar. In the heavenly abode of Lord Shiva, I feel so blessed and fortunate to be invited to this serene place in-person. Even now I have all the voice recordings of my journey and I feel the temptation of writing them in my blog. I feel so much empowered and so much calm when I close my eyes and think of those moments when I was standing at the feet of Lord Shiva and was looking at the Kailash mountain with mouth agape. I think that moment would be added to my list of blissful moments which I would choose for my deathbed.

The biggest disappointment of the whole year occurred when I faltered in the prelims examination. This one possibly trumps everything else except the great Kailash. Even today I wonder, why is it that I need to exhaust myself for scoring a victory? Why does it not happen with less effort? Why was I not so motivated and focused in the month of July when I needed it the most? Anyway, whatever is gone is gone. The best way to overcome a failure is to look forward and keep walking.

Overall, a mixed year. Did some wonderful long pending things. Was fortunate to visit the heavenly abode. But when it comes to my dream, the dream was disturbed even before it began properly. Anyways, now is the time to prepare a new vision and new list of things for the year 2017. Hope to do well in this year.

Mein Amir Khan banana chahta hun

Each one of us has grown up watching the success of Sachin Tendulkar, Amir Khan, Dhoni and now Virat Kohli. Their standard of excellence and the artistic level of their competence leaves everyone awestruck. But rarely anyone gives a real thought to what is it like becoming Amir Khan or Virat Kohli? What sort of discipline and attitudinal strength does it call for?

We study for the exams or work on our respective jobs. But in the process, we remain connected with the world. Every now and then, we look at our WhatsApp or facebook to see if anyone has sent some message. Our attention is divided among so many things that oftentimes we are not able to do the justice with the task. On the other hand, just imagine Virat Kohli checking his WhatsApp or Facebook during his practice sessions. I am sure he would never do that. He won't be allowed to do so and even if he is allowed to do so, he must be motivated enough to stay away from such distractions. That's the difference between a common man and a god.

Second such difference is seen in their indifference to the criticism. Big players who are a cynosure of media cameramen know it well that they can be de-floored any day. Therefore, they become too agnostic to such attention and enjoy this media attention without being too sentimental about it. This indifference level reaches only after you invest so much time and effort in your job that reward of becoming a national star looks like a peanut in front of your effort. For people like Amir Khan, I think they have developed the highest level of conviction in what they do. As a result, praise, criticism, success and failure becomes irrelevant. Doing the job in an excellent manner remains their only concern.

Third such difference is seen in the form of the desire to push yourself and specialize. They do not chase multiple rabbits and completely focus on one task. Most of us end up doing n number of things simultaneously and eventually fall in the mediocrity bracket. For these champions of their field, their hobby is same as their job. In a way, they are a specialist in their field who may not be even knowing ABCD of other fields. Becoming Virat Kohli or Amir is not impossible. It may be little difficult but one can always become like them.

In the software domain, what Amir does is can be compared with a role of product manager. Firstly, one should read and gets hands-on information on a range of products. Once we have that, we need to invest ourselves completely in a product. We need to work very very hard on building the right team. The team may take months and years to form but let it be. Just like Amir screens nearly 5000 girls for a role in her movie, similarly, a product manager also needs to invest in the team formation. The product manager needs to completely immerse himself in the product, thinking about every possible use-case and every single click scenario. This and only this submission to deeper details and product features will yield us the desirable product.

Politics compulsion of demonetization

The deadline of 50 days is fast approaching. The government and opposition are busy in making claims and counter claims on the success and failure of the scheme of demonetization. PM Modi is still aggressive about the program of change in the country. He is adamant on the future course of action which involves Benami transactions and land registrations. Whether he would be able to do this successfully is something to ponder upon.

Firstly, I must admit that despite being a limited liberal and anti-rightist, I admire PM Modi fo taking such a bold step. We go to shopping and even while buying a pair of undies, we vacillate and dilly dally. But he took such a hard decision for the entire nation. This is an example of courage and leadership skills. It requires an immense level of self-confidence and mental resilience to bear loads of criticism and ridicule which might come your way. Hats off and ashtanga pranam to such conviction. With this move, Modi has become a larger than life figure.

Some people have compared this to Indira Gandhi's emergency era. To an extent these analyst are right. Those who have read the literature of that era and those who have lived in that era can tell you that Emergency sustained itself for two years because largely people accepted it. People loved the discipline. People loved the strict enforcement of law and order. It was only later that people realized the kind of damage it had done to our democratic political system.

The same is the case now. People are accepting demonetization as it is wrapped in the cover of the fight against black money, corruption, and nationalism. It calls for sacrifice in the national interest. Masses are feeling involved in a social economic project of this grand scale and therefore dutifully standing in the queues before ATM. But people has a limit of patience. They would not hesitate from retaliating in the situation does not become normal in time to come. Their best possible response would come through election ballot. When the collective beep of Indian masses will sounds the bugle of defeat for BJP.

The project of demonetization has become a sort of bone in the neck of BJP's fight against corruption. Now a situation has come where the only option is to swallow the whole bone with a cry of pain. Rolling back or ducking away is not an option for BJP. Somewhere at this point, it seems as if demonetization is becoming a political failure as BJP is running short of options. It may become an economic success in time to come due to it's thrust on the cashless economy and increased tax revenues but that will take time.

The agenda of Benami transaction would be very difficult to implement. We do not have enough tax officers who can actually go through the records and do all the tax analysis. Even the loophole of turning black to white money past-demonetization has not fallen on the net of tax officer. It is like, in the pursuit of getting milk of milk and water of water, the government is trying to catch the thief's underwear rather than the actual thief. The lakhs of crores of money was turned from black to white but the government is only able to capture some kg of gold or some chunk of new currencies in its raid. It requires a large amount of workforce to actually scrutinize all the accounts and catch the black money.

Even for Benami transaction act, I am keeping my fingers crossed given the state of affair in India. People who are the biggest accumulator of wealth the bureaucrats, the politicians, the taxmen, and the policemen are the one who has to implement this. The only victim of this whole scheme would be the middle-class businessmen. One who took risks and worked hard to earn all this. Obviously, he did engage in a little bit of corruption but that was the norm of the day. It was about his survival. It was not his wish or greed.

A moot question to ask is then what is the alternative? Frankly, I do not have any direct answer. The big mistake has already been made when demonetization was launched without proper preparation or supporting reforms. Now people are only a moot spectator. It's like a situation of the year 1942. The country is in the God's hand. I hope political class act with prudence and does not try to antagonize the situation further but that would be so anti of their own existence.

Changing face of Indian Cinema

I am not a bug movie buff. My worldview in the field of Cinema is limited but I have been observing the changes in the cinema in last few years. The recent release of Dangal prompted me to write down some of those thoughts and observations.

Let me begin by paying my tribute to Amir Khan. He is a true idol. Since the days of Andaz Apna Apna and Jo Jeeta Wohi Sikandar, I have followed his movies and acting. The only bad movie which I can recall is Mela. Otherwise, be it Sarfarosh or Ghajni, or Mangal Pandey, I have liked his performances. But these are not the movies which have made him an idol of the so many young hearts. His life changing movies like Lagaan, Three idiot and now Dangal are the one which makes him and out and out superstar leaving far behind other khans and also the Kumars and the Kapoors and other who's who of Bollywood. He is like Tom Hanks of Bollywood.

His movies are not just loved for his acting and screenplay. Rather they are admired for carrying a strong social message. For example, through Dangal, he has sent a very special and strong message of women empowerment in the land of Jats which famous for foeticide and gender discrimination. It displayed the power of conviction and action. I salute Mahavir Phogat for showing the kind of courage for which Jats are known. As for Amir khan, he deserves a separate blog describing everyone's desire of "Mein bhi Amir Khan banana chahta hun".

Now coming to the larger topic of changing face of Indian Cinema, one can see it along four dimensions. One is the kind of songs. Second is the lasting impression of movies. Third is the use of technology and grandness scale and the fourth is the parallel evolution of substantive cinema.

When I hear the songs of the current era, they fit on my tongue very quickly. The sound lingers for almost day or two. Some like Aashiqui 2 songs may go on for the entire week. But eventually, as soon as a new movie comes, the previous one fade away. The songs percolate in thoughts for not because of their meaning but because of the soundtrack. The loud beat, the Drum, and heavy guitar combination fill the ears but it falls short of filling the heart. This is in contrast to the old songs which used to be very deep, meaningful and emotional. Nowadays the culture of Item girl dance and DJ has taken away the soul of songs and only the Hungama has left.

The other domain is the lasting impression of movies. Nowadays, barring few Amir Khan movies or theme based cinema, movies have become a fast moving consumer good. The first three days decides whether a movie will continue beyond 10 days or not. Earlier movies like DDLG and Hum Aapke Hai Kaun used to last in the cinema hall for almost an entire year or two. DDLG even made the record of ten years on the same screen. Even the previous era movies like Sholay and Deewar were considered classics of Indian cinema. Now it seems that barring one or two in a year, the film industry is stopped producing classics. Every Friday is scheduled for a new movie release. The previous one goes out and a new one comes in. Another related point is the grandness of the revenues. The hundred crore club has become the new benchmark for a hit or flop film.

The third area is the use of technology. It is very heartening to see that Indian cine industry is fast catching up with the global trend of technological advances. The vigorous use of technology in Babubali was a watershed moment in Indian cinema. Earlier animation and effects were limited in their use. But the new-age action films and the 21st century cinema shows the changing trend. Even the budgets of the movies have gone beyond twenty-thirty crore. Sometimes if a film is a Sanjay Leela Bhansali's epic or Karan Johar's family drama then even a single set may cost this much.

The fourth area is the rise of substantive less known YouTube-driven parallel cinema. It is an umbrella category for all kind of meaningful short films, documentaries, and low-budget acting based cinema. For example, the recent Marathi movie Sairat was one that belongs to this category. Similarly, short films like chutney or movie based on women empowerment or communal outrage send a strong message to the society. These short movies are not well marketed and use the platform of Youtube for their promotion. They are the bread and butter for lesser known actors who do cinema for the love of cinema itself and not for the fame and money. Possibly this was the kind of cinema which has given rise to Irfan Khan and Nawazzuddin Siddiqui.

I may not be able to quote many examples in this. The reason being my limited knowledge of the Indian Cinema but from a layman's perspective, I can speak about the changes which my confused segmented fragmented and divided generation is witnessing. One thing is still remaining that is my thoughts of "how to become Aamir Khan"?