Blame it on the … Chindians!!

Highly opinionated! That’s what I am.

One of those opinions being – The west is too obsessed with itself, and knows too little about the rest of the world. What they think they know, is surprisingly inaccurate and misinformed.

Only to prove this point, the western media and the officials of Public or Private Service keep going on and on and on about how China and India are responsible for all the ills that the world is facing today.

On the Commodity pricing front – They keep going on about how the fast increasing demands of foodgrains and energy fuels is igniting the price of commodities all over. Of course, some bit of it is our contribution, but… but… but…

a) I am sure speculators and all these traders on energy and commodity exchannges have a HUGE part to play

b) Actually, per capita consumption of foodgrains is HARDLY going up in India, even in comparison to the US. Especially if they consider how much they are now converting into biofuel etc. Some big names, who keep passing the buck to Chindia like the man known as Bush, just love leading the public down false paths. Obviously he has all the information and all the data… but of course the American people like to hear that someone else is responsible for all the so-called misery.

On the energy and fuels front, of course there is growth in India, but does anyone BOTHER to check what is the per-capita consumption in the west and what it is in India. If not that, have they checked what is the TOTAL consumption of western economies or America as compared to India???

On the global warming and emissions front – has anyone checked what is the total emissions of the US against the total emissions of India? Forget per capita, that thing is not even worth mentioning. Every leader is convinced that the environment cannot be helped unless the “fastest growing” economies come on-board, but has anyone thought how much emissions can be controlled if the US emissions went down by 5% or 10%?

The west has been polluting and developing at this pace for the last 50 years. They are enjoying the living standards and the economic conditions for which the price has already been paid. Now they should be the ones making up for it. Give these new economies a chance to flower.

I would sincerely advise these leaders to stop misleading their vote-banks and take some hard decisions. Of course no one likes to say/hear the truth, but blaming it all on Chindia will not help. Even the most logical person will neither expect the Chindians to keep living like the scum of the planet and nor will the Chindians pay the price for all the havoc the west has wreaked on the planet. We will drive gas-guzzling SUVs too and we will eat junk food and becomes obscenely fat like American kids too. If you’re hurt that the government subsidizes gas prices, then you should read the fine print and know that they tax us back and make gas still MORE EXPENSIVE than it is in the US.

Stop crying babies! The real growth and transfer of power is yet to come.

Decoupling and all that!

Over the past few months, there has been a lot of talk about decoupling in the worlds economic markets and how Europe or China or India are not going to be affected as much when the US goes down.  And now, as the whole world catches a cold, there are more comments of how that is not true. To me, both of these versions are flawed. It is obvious that it is neither black nor white. Anyone in the world can not claim to be not affected when the US economy goes down, but, what we can definitely say is that businesses are on the whole far more “insured” today as compared to 10 years ago. On the one hand, every market in the world will swing wildly when the biggest FIIs start pulling money out of investments, but on the other hand companies (especially in India) will still march onwards to stellar growth and results. It is the panic of the domestic investor that is causing them to lose money. I’ll write more on that in another post, but basically my point is:

a) Decoupling is true, and more so for India than most others, in the sense that we are not so export-dependent as China. The biggest companies in the sensex will go on doing amazing business and keep growing in spite of what happens in the US. Of course there are some export oriented segments or US oriented companies which might suffer in the process. The fact that stock prices have gone down does not mean that the companies have just become unprofitable, or not-so-profitable or anything else. Its just a case of demand and supply of the shares – it’ll change again soon enough.

b) Decoupling is NOT true in the financial or equity markets. Today money flows almost freely from one country to another. But of course we are going to see a fall in Indian equities if the institutional investors are all pulling out money. Moreover, this decoupling will never happen and more in my next post.

India next hot spot for Billionaires after America

We’ve all read about how the wealthiest in India are setting higher and higher standards everyday. To put it in perspective, as per this report as well in the economic times, there are 36 billionaires in India as per Forbes, and India has the second highest number of billionaires in the world after the United States. The feat is brilliant, considering how huge an economy Japan is. Some doomsayers will say that this exactly is the irony and pain of India, that the rich are super rich… and even a mammoth economy like Japan is better spread, but I’m not one of those. I try to look at the positive side of the story. India has 3 members in the 20 richest in the world as well. Higher than any other country except the US once again. Wow! At least we could call India the land of opportunity now. The big thing about Americans, if you notice in the smallest nuances of their dialogues etc. is that they think everything is so great and so exceptional about their country. Most other citizens are so busy criticizing what is wrong in our systems.

Through all this, one thing that does make me sad is the slow demise of the Birla clan (relatively speaking). I studied in Birla institutes for my schooling as well as my Engineering, and it always made me sad, even in my childhood, as I saw other groups grow and become bigger than the Birlas. The article above in the ET also states that when Forbes actually started the rankings, the Birla’s were the only one on the list with a net worth of almost$2 billion (imagine that in 1987) … but I have to say they did precious little in the wonder years that India has seen since then. What were they thinking? Perhaps that all the hue and cry was for nothing, and that India would continue the way it had in the last 40 years before then?

The thing that confuses me a little – As far as I remember, Slim should be on top of the list!

Incredible India – Government of India takes to youtube for Tourism Promotion

🙂 The good feeling again… when you see the government and its arms do something constructive. I can’t help but think though that there would be a private contractor behind this as well. Imagine… we’re so stuck with inactive/lethargic governance that I refuse to believe someone in the tourism ministry or someplace took the initiative to get this campaign to youtube. Of course, this has been one of the big successes of the government of India in the recent past – the Incredible India campaign.

Of course, being a dutiful Indian, it has to feature on my blog as well. I’m wondering how many people on slow connections would have the patience to watch them…

Dunno how many of them are official videos and how many from other sources… but it’s all good!

A fable from the Himalayas

This is a short film by Nitin Das (IIM Calcutta, http://www.filmkaar.com). Got the link on the e-group with a message from Nitin saying – The enchanted land is dissappearing fast. Could you please spread this film to your friends. In the fight against Global warming, no effort is too small.

Watching the video is a small motivation to do our bit. I’m feeling good about the water harvesting we do… and thinking maybe some of the parking space at home can give way to a tree!

Corrupt Mumbai Police Officers & Bank Managers

I’m not really sure about the facts of the case mentioned below, but it seems like this man has been harassed so bad by the Mumbai police that he is determined to get his dues back. Obviously I support him (hope there is no fraud within the story), and I can do my bit by raising awareness for such issues through my very limited efforts. The link is provided below, and by clicking “next” at the bottom of each page you can go through a number of letters he has written to the senior cops.

I wonder if there is more information and if it finally got resolved… I guess it is ongoing as per the site he has developed.

Corrupt Mumbai Police Officers & Bank Managers

Blogging has become quite a strong tool all over the world to influence decisions and for the public to raise their voice. We should do the same in India. It’s definitely not going to be up to people like me as

a) I’m not such a great writer

b) I’m not even residing in India (maybe it makes a difference, maybe not)

So lets pull up our socks and contribute a little bit back to the world and make it a better place… for you and for me and the entire human race (heal the world – michael jackson)

Global Warming awareness

I’ve always wanted to put up a lot of images from all over the web on my blog. Again, my ineptness at handling html etc. had me by my @#$%^ as far as this initiative was concerned. Now, once again I have wordpress to my rescue and here is the first of such images to come on my blog. I am sure this is going to be a good affair 😉

The human hand isn’t always creative.
Sometimes it destroys… The polar ice caps are melting. We can all do something to slow down global warming. It’s in our hand to save the planet.

Advertising Agency: TBWA, Athens, Greece
Creative Director: Vangelis Vrouvas
Art Director/Copywriter: Renato Tatas
Photographer: Yiannis Chatziantoniou
Published: May 2007