It is the power of perception, silly

We are now well aware of the love that Justice Katju has for Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi. And also how this love spruced up Arun Jaitley's love for Justice Katju.

In his article, Justice Katju persuades 'idiot' Indians to not commit the mistake that the Germans made in 1933, when they elected Adolf Hitler to power. But Justice Katju does not mention why this happened. Germany was humiliated at the end of World War 1. The country was asked to bear the costs of the war and simultaneously was restrained from developing its industrial capacities and power to the fullest potential. This led to economic mismanagement, hyper inflation, joblessness and erosion of  hard-earned personal savings. Amidst all this Hitler's party provided a road map to what Germans of that time perceived as recovery to glory. And Hitler bolstered these perceptions through actions at critical points in time. This strengthened the perception that only the Nazi party can restore Germany's lost glory. The final nail in the coffin was the Great Depression, a product of the great American economic mismanagement. The result: an overwhelming number of unemployed young and old people in a stagnant economy and a political landscape that didn't inspire any hope or confidence.

See some common part? The creation of a perception and backing it up with visible actions. Today the youth of India perceive Modi as a man of action. They want an economy that is fully functional and provides them with jobs. They realise that the only way to achieve progress is through economic development. And he has backed these perceptions with actions. When every Tom, Dick and Harry is looting the country, Modi comes across as a clean person who hasn't indulged in any kind of corruption. His biggest PR coup was in getting Tata Motors' Nano plant to Gujarat in a matter of days. And almost every industrial house has lauded him for his skills in providing an investment friendly atmosphere.

What is the perception about Modi's challenger, Rahul Gandhi? He doesn't seem to have a firm stand on any issue that troubles today's youth. He doesn't appear to take a strong stand against those in his government who are  accused of corruption. His election time speeches haven't inspired the voters in UP, Bihar and Gujarat. He claims to strive for merit but is made Vice President of the Congress party even when he hasn't led the party to a single electoral victory! Majority of the 'youth' he has promoted are sons of erstwhile ministers. His plans on kick starting the economy are not known. He doesn't interact with people through media or social media and always seems to keep away from scrutiny. His own brother-in-law seems to be financially benefiting from Rahul and Sonia Gandhi's position in the centre. To top it, Robert Vadra called us 'idiot Indians' as "mango people in banana republic." In such a scenario, how cam he persuade people to vote for his party?

Oh yes, the riots of Gujarat were a reality and Narendra Modi was at the helm of affairs during those riots. You claim he hasn't been brought to justice. But so is the case with the 1984 anti-Sikh riots of Delhi. Who has been punished for those riots? In fact, the man who said that this is a reaction of very very angry people was made the Prime Minister of the country in just a few weeks of making that statement. Justice Katju, you did appeal to us 'idiot Indians' to not commit the mistake that the Germans committed in 1933. That we should not have a situation where Narendra Modi is at the helm of affairs of our country. Going by your appeal even those at the helm of the Congress should not be brought back to power. But sir, you haven't enlightened us about a possible and credible alternative to Mr. Modi. In such a scenario what are we 'idiots' supposed to do? Hope you do not take us on a ride with this opinion of yours!

The National Rifle Association's PR disaster

This has been a fortnight of PR disasters. After gruesome crimes and horrific incidents in the world's flag-bearers of democracy- the USA and India, the targets of the agitation were involved in huge PR disasters. The government of India and especially the Prime Minister, were committing one PR disaster over another, in their response to the protests and reactions over the horrific gang-rape incident in Delhi.

Across the seas and oceans, the USA was rocked by the mass killings in an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut. As is common (and very necessary), there were huge voices and loud calls in support of enacting laws for regulating the ownership of guns and ammunition across the country. The Americans, who fiercely defend their constitutional guarantees, were bound to be vocal across both sides. First, since the constitutional gives rights to people to own guns, that right needs to be protected. That the guns end up taking lives of others (who are not necessarily the gunman's enemies) is an other matter. The National Rifle Association (NRA), which is an association of gun owners in America, is an extremely powerful body with over four million members. Not only are they an association, they are lobbyists too and powerful ones. They spent more than US$24 million in the 2012 elections towards funding political campaigns of candidates who were favourable to them. But, if they had spent a fraction of that amount on PR management, their  CEO, Wayne LaPierre, would not have ended up in a PR disaster soup.

After the mass killings in Connecticut, where most of the victims were young children, many aged less than 12 years, there was an outcry to have stricter gun control. The NRA was expected to say something, not that many expected it to say anything in favour of gun control. But even the NRA's members would not have expected it to be such a huge PR disaster. In a press conference, LaPierre said that the only way to stop gunmen from going on a rampage is handing guns to good people. So, instead of limiting the types of guns available and the number of people those who can own those, LaPierre wants everybody to have them. In the moments of grief, this isn't a welcome statement. It is almost like saying you need to fight more wars to have more peace. This was a pure PR disaster, indicating the mindset of the NRA members. Sure, you are a rifle association, so then why should civil population have access to assault weapons and military grade guns and ammunition? That too, in Wal-Mart, as if it were a weekly purchase of eggs! Nancy Lanza, the mother of the killer (Adam Lanza) in the Connecticut shootings, owned an array of guns in her home, which were accessible to her sons. Now, why did she need so many? If she was a collector of some sort, then shouldn't it be necessary for some regulations that ensure the safety of the weapons and restrict their accessibility?

Sure, your constitution guarantees the right to possess a firearm for self-defense within the home. But, is this the age when you might be attacked by a group of bandits, that you need to possess military grade assault weapons? And if so, why can't you let the police classify your area as such. Certainly, areas that are relatively safe do not need you to possess assault and automatic weapons. But then, for a safe society, all Americans need to accept that they need to adhere to certain restrictions. Will these restrictions guarantee a certainty in safety. Absolutely not, but then adhering to the 2nd amendment's provisions also has not done the same. Wonder how many people who matter would now want to side with LaPierre, after his press conference?

Skyfall

The year 2012 marked fifty years of the James Bond franchise. It had been already fantastic for Bond in 2012, with an appearance in the opening ceremony in the London Olympics as the Queen's escort. That is perhaps a huge tribute to Bond's contribution about "being British" and  it sealed Bond as a cultural characteristic of Britain. Skyfall, too had a grand premiere coinciding with the release date of Dr. No, which also saw the Totals too in attendance.

So, how is Skyfall, when compared to the previous Bond movies? First, it is very rare in Bond movies to not know who the villain is for the first 20-25 minutes. Perhaps, the only time it has happened is in The Spy Who Loved Me. Secondly, this is the first Bond movie in which the villain has no more than a personal agenda. Raoul Silva's sole motive is to avenge the perceived injustices committed by M when she was in Hong Kong with Silva working under her. In all previous Bond movies, the villain had a motive to achieve either a monopoly which would lead to economic benefits or achieve a stage to be in a position for obtaining windfall economic gains. Except, in Thunderball and From Russian with Love, where the villains wanted to establish a new 'perfect' world. In terms of gadgets too, this is not a very typical Bond movie, especially when you have seen the action involving Q's gadgets. It is more along the lines of Dr. No, where Bond is armed with very minimal gadgetry, a Walther PPK and a bag with fifty sovereigns, a knife and an explosive opening case. I cannot recall Bond finishing off the villain with something mundane as a knife in any movies. This is perhaps because of continuation of the reboot, which began with Casino Royale. Of course, with Q coming back, it marks his trademark requests to Bond about returning the equipment in one piece and we all know how Bond treats it. And finally, after fifty whole years, we know the full name of the new M. And Miss Moneypenny's too. If Gareth Mallory continues as M and Eve Moneypenny is allotted screen space in Bond 24, it is the first time M's and Moneypenny's full name would be known to people. All in all, Skfyfall marks some notable departures from previous Bond movies.

Dear Indian media, there are others apart from US elections

This post is born out of frustration. About reporting in the Indian web and electronic media. With the US election scheduled in November, everyone was busy reporting on the tiny details of the two candidates. Where Obama spoke, where did Romney have dinner, how their wives felt, etc. Hell, on the last two days, the reporters went into a kind of frenzy, reporting every step the two candidates took, that Obama cried during his final speech and many more. Now, most of the netizens will not be able to point out on the map, any of the cities or towns these two campaigned in. So, why are these elections so important to hog a major portion of the news space in India? Do we have no other newsworthy matters in hand?
Stephen Harper, Canada's prime minister, chose to visit India at perhaps a wrong time. Because our media was not interested in bringing to us what Harper had brought for the country. Our media felt that it is of more importance for Indians to know who the next US president is! So, nothing was in the prime time about Harper's visit to India. Nor was anything reported about his security personnel rejecting Indian measures and shipping in their own security limousines for Harper. Who is going to find out the truth of why this happened? When a visiting dignitary has to bring in his own security vehicles, is he being snobbish or is our government guilty of inadequacy? But of course, this doesn't matter to our media. What is more important news is how Obama cried in his last campaign speech.
Forget this negative part. The Harper government signed a few agreements with the Indian government. Of these, one was setting up a research programme with three Canadian universities and the IITs in the area of clean water technologies. But we know nothing of that! More importantly the two governments signed an agreement where temporary Indian employees working in Canada and temporary Canadian employees working in India and their will not have to contribute towards their social security or pension plans. This allows both, the companies and their employees, to save costs incurred on things whose benefits they wouldn't have ever received. Do we know of this? No, but we do know that Obama cried during his last speech. Doesn't matter if many Indians working on-site have been crying for years on the unjust contributions they have to make to the US social security system, when they are not eligible to receive any benefit from it.
We cheered Obama when he came to India and hailed him to take the nuclear reactor deal forward. But nuclear reactors run on uranium, which will not come from USA, but from Canada as it has one of the largest reserves of uranium. But we do not yet know at what stage is a deal for uranium supply with Canada? And what did Harper's visit achieve in that direction? We will have to read Canadian newspapers for that because our dear media was busy dissecting why Romney lost and Obama won! More importantly Canada wants to sign a free trade agreement with India. What will this agreement cover? What is the Indian government's view about this agreement? No we won't know of that till our media finds time from reporting how democrats and republicans will never reach any agreement because each controls one house of the US government.
Seriously, I am tired of this minute-by-minute updates of all that doesn't matter to our country. How do these affect India? In almost no way. Romney or Obama it doesn't matter to us. They don't do us any favour. While India has been purchasing military equipment from the US firms through its tax payers' money, the same are given to our western neighbours as part of aid to "fight terrorism". And why cheer Obama who has, during his campaign, talked of India only as a job stealer through outsourcing? More importantly, why not cheer Harper, who has given Indian employees on Canada their fair dues?  What I am seriously tired of is the Indian media. They have their own ideologies and iron-cast agendas. They won't budge from that. The nation's interest is secondary. That's why we saw more headline space for Sandy, compared to Nilam. In the web media it appeared as if Nilam had just kissed the Indian coast while Sandy rammed through the USA. New York's preparations where highlighted throughout, but not Tamil Nadu's. And of course, they conveniently missed the fact that the same Sandy had caused far more devastation in poor countries like Haiti and Cuba, which face crop loss too. But alas, they weren't having elections where the state was ruled by an opposing party to the president.

The FDI threat?

The Prime Minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh, finally 'bit the bullet' and announced a slew of economic reform measures. When cornered, even a cat puts up a fight. The government definitely was cornered by a lots of issues. The biggest being fiscal deficits. Now, there may be a big, big controversy and disagreement over how oil companies compute their losses made on sale of diesel, petrol, kerosene and LPG below market prices. But, the point is that these are auditor-approved losses and hence, the government has to compensate for these losses, as they do not allow the oil companies to freely set these. And hence, the government had to raise the price of diesel, as crude price was rising through the summer and almost through the entire year. But, that is not the point of discussion here.

The second, which we would all agree with is the aspect of foods getting destroyed due to lack of adequate storage and distribution infrastructure. Hence, an artificial inflation, when harvest quantities at farms are not drastically short. The government, on its part, failed to erect cold storage facilities, store houses and a flexible policy on farm harvest procurements. For decades, the wholesalers in the agriculture produce market committees (APMCs) have ruled the roost and enjoyed a monopoly in procuring farm produce. The monopoly extended to labour that could be used to load and unload the produce. The farmer was forced to pay for labour to unload his produce. He couldn't get cheaper labour of his own to do the work. These two monopolies- the wholesalers and the APMC labourers- have never worked in favour of the farmers. What more, they are such a strong political force, that very few have dared to take them on. These people have never invested or enabled anybody to invest in infrastructure that will prevent loss of food products between the farm and the fork. The government's monopoly too, has hurt the cause. We keep on hearing about how grains are rotting in granaries and not effectively reaching those who need them. But, will FDI solve this particular problem? I do not think so.

A set of people who would be affected by entry of Wal-Mart, etc. are the kirana shop owners and people whom they employ. But, they have been weathering the heat from players like Big Bazaar, Reliance Fresh, More, etc. Why would they suddenly wilt if Wal-Mart arrives on the scene? As I have said in a previous post, big retail shops tend to sell products in large packaging. E.g. a toothpaste of 200 gm., or three soap-bars together. But, when a city like Mumbai has more than 50% of its population living in slums, are they going to buy from the big retailers? Mind you, many of them are not poor in the perceived sense, but just that they can barely make their ends meet. Most of them, have a monthly credit with the local kirana store. And they buy stuff in small packages. A bar of soap, half-a-kilo of sugar at a time, etc. FDI in retail, if implemented as seen in North America and Europe, is not going to help these marginal families.

A bigger issue that should be of worry to many, is the accounting practices of many of the wholesalers and kirana store owners. Never, do we get a receipt, with its sales tax and VAT numbers. Most of the sales accounting is done on a piece of newsprint quality paper. So, many of us, of the salaried class, whose income taxes are routinely cut even before we get to see our pay-check should be definitely worried if these kirana stores are paying the taxes that are due. Will the big-box retailers be honest enough to pay their taxes? May be not 100%, but compliance would be way better than the kirana stores. If you haven't noticed, do check the receipts you get from stores like Big Bazaar, D'Mart, etc. They do carry a CST/BST number and VAT registration number and the sales do get recorded into their accounting system. Kirana stores have, for long, not modernised their business practices. If they do not, then they would definitely lose business to the big-box retailers, whether Indian or foreign.

Finally, is the government in a looking-London-talking-Tokyo mode? There was a time when the unions of employees of leading national banks went on strike, refusing computerisation in banks. They feared that this would lead to job losses. They pressurised the banks into agreeing on a fixed pace of computerisation, which was so slow that banks would never have achieved computerisation in a reasonable time-frame. To get over this, the government allowed private banks into the market. These had completely new labour, free from the union tactics of nationalised banks' employees. They introduced a slew of computerisation and digitisation in their working, which made banking easy. People flocked to them in large numbers. This scenario made the unions of public banks realise that if their branches are not computerised fast enough, they would any way lose business and customers. And after two decades of allowing private banks, government banks are still competing and flourishing, only because their employees chose to adapt. Similarly, is the government forcing the wholesalers and kirana owners into modernising their business practices through another way? Ghee seedhi ungali se nahi nikal raha, to ungali tedhi karni hi padati hai.

Finally, is FDI in retail going to benefit anybody? It is definitely a double-edged sword. Consumers may get better quality stuff at cheaper rates. Producers may get better deals. But all depends on how honestly is the policy implemented and how honestly is the implementation tracked to achieve its stated goals.