Bank Nationalization in Retrospect

Banks were nationalized by Mrs Indira Gandhi with much fanfare.  It was done with a view to replace the class banking practiced by the then private banks with mass banking.  Currently the term mass banking has been replaced by a more sophisticated one, that is, financial inclusion.  This was a laudable objective indeed and still remains laudable and only marginally fulfilled.  Else, why would there be such hue and cry about financial inclusion after more than 4 decades of bank nationalization?

Looking back, it seems very clear that this was a master stroke by the shrewd political class for helping crony capitalists drain the public exchequer.  All talk about mass banking was merely a facade.  The unfulfilled mass banking agenda is being now carried forward for setting up smaller banks with limited functionality like payment banks etc.

In a recent TV debate on the Mallya debacle, one of the speakers pointed out that it is generally believed that the global banking crisis a few years ago left India untouched.  While governments world over had to pump in huge amounts of money to rescue some of the banks, nothing of the sort had to be done in India.  He went on to say that this is fallacious.  According to him Indian public sector banks face this crisis every year because of large loans being written off and large sacrifices being made for corporate debt restructuring etc.  And they are rescued each year by the government by recapitalizing the banks.  Thus nationalization did not help the agriculturists or the poor common man so much as it helped corporates having good liaison with the politicians to milk the public exchequer.  To be fair it must be said that the banks merely served as a convenient conduit.  But has the conduit too been damaged in the process?  We may have to wait for some more time to find out.

This must be the reason why politicians of all hues, and not merely the leftists who control the trade unions in these banks, have no real interest in privatizing the banks.  Though, it must be said to their credit that they do occasionally make the right kind of noises in this matter.

The massive fraud, which perhaps overshadows all other mega scams thus far, has now been uncovered and the astronomical amounts involved are staring us in the face.  I do not know if the sums involved are giving the government a cold feet too.  Do they still have the capability to recapitalize the banks to the extent required?  Or is the ground being prepared for the depositors to take a haircut?

As a retired person living on his precious savings and interest thereon, the very thought gives me the shivers.

A debate between Zakir Naik and Srisri Ravishankar

Recently while wandering on the net I came across a video which showed a full program featuring a debate between Zakir Naik and Ravishankar.  The duration of the video was a little over two and a half hours.  Though the video was found on YouTube itself, it proclaimed "has been deleted from YouTube" alongside its title.  I watched the entire video with keen interest and mulled over it.  Later I tried to watch the video again, but failed to locate it.  I clicked the history item in the browser and YouTube, but to no avail.  During my repeated searches, I also came across a message on YouTube saying that the content has been removed.  It seems that someone had succeeded in reloading the video and I was lucky enough to watch it before it was removed again.  Fragments from this video are still available, but not the complete video that I had the opportunity to watch.  I feel truly sorry that I cannot give you an URL for watching this video.

I must say that the person entrusted with conducting the debate in an orderly manner did an excellent job.  Zakir Naik (ZN) - I am not prefixing Dr as he does not seem to be in that profession any more - came across as a seasoned speaker and debater.  RaviShankar (RS) - I am not prefixing SriSri as it sounds a bit too pretentious - surprisingly found the time allotted to him a little too long.  He also seemed to be ill at ease and a bit fidgety at times.  Once or twice he interjected too while ZN had the floor, which was perhaps against the format.  He got a bit provoked when ZN pointed out some errors in a book authored by him and admitted having made mistakes. But more about it later.

The speed at which ZN quotes book number, chapter number and verse number from a large number of scriptures from various religions, bears out an amazing memory and considerable breadth of his knowledge.  However he seems to be lacking in depth.  He repeatedly quoted from Vedas and Bhavishya Purana to make a point that the arrival of prophet Muhammad was foretold in these books.  Of course, I cannot recall the exact references that he gave.  He harped on three words, Muhammad, Nrishans and Mlechha, found in the Hindu scriptures.  He said that these pointed towards the prophet.  Mlechchha, according to him, merely meant a foreign origin, and Nrishans meant a Nar (man) worthy of adoration (Shansa being the tail end of Prashansa.)  This ignorance is shocking indeed.  Had he known the true meaning of the two words, he would refrain from using these words for the prophet: for it will be blasphemous to do so.  Nrishansa, as all students of Sanskrit and Hindi know, means merciless and cruel.  Making it out to be a combination of Nar and Shansa is far fetched indeed.  Similarly Mlechchha, though associated with persons of foreign origin in a sense, is a highly derogatory word that means impure or unclean.  The same applies to the word Mahaamad, which ZN takes to be Muhammad.  Mahaamad is a derogatory word that means a conceited person with an overarching ego and insolence.

ZN's ignorance could be excused but for the delight he and his followers take in his rattling off references to verses in various scriptures and then presenting their translation with an air of absolute authority.  However what really surprises me is the fact that neither RaviShankar nor anyone from the huge audience pointed out these errors nor did anyone stop ZN from making blasphemous references to the prophet.

Another favorite argument of ZN, one that he presented in this debate too, is that Vedas and Upnishads all say that God is one and formless.  And this is precisely what the Quran teaches. He takes Vedas and Upnishads to be the counterparts of Quran in Hinduism. Then he concludes that we should be worshipping God, the creator, and not the created.  But Hinduism is not restricted to such a single linear strand of thought.  It is more like a container of objects rather than an object itself; maybe a Pandora's box.  It also has in its kitty the Samkhya which maintains that there is no God.   It maintains that there are just multiple Purushas (consciousness principles,) each interacting with Prakriti.  Vedanta chooses not only to combines all these Purushas in one ParamPurusha but also merges the Prakriti with it.  Dualism and non-dualism both exist as valid philosophies and the debate goes on.  For the non-dualists, nothing exists but the God.  There is no distinction between the Creator and the Created.  The Creator, the Creation and the Created are all one.  The differentiation is just Maya and that too is an aspect of the only reality, the Godhead.  So in this container of Hinduism, monotheism, atheism and pantheism, dualism and non-dualism all co-exist and it sees no problem with such co-existence.

Thus any religion on the face of this earth could find parallels in one object or the other in the box called Hinduism.  And yet, any religion that wants to build bridges with Hinduism need not demonstrate any similarities.  Just a willingness to reside in the container is enough.  When you meet someone holding a view that is diagrammatically opposite to yours, don't scowl and growl, just wink and smile.  Yes, I understand and I am sure so do you.  Just accept the diversity and be at ease with it. It is this ability to wink and smile, rather than your belief system, that makes you a Hindu, or Hindustani, if you please.

Having said that, I must add that all is not hunky-dory in this container.  This container also has, for example, the most divisive and discriminatory caste system.  This single anomaly is beating down at the walls of the container to break it down.  There are many others too.  If a confluence of different and differing belief systems inside the container could join hands to cast away the toxic contents in the box, there indeed would be an utopia in this wonderful container.

PS: If you can find the deleted video on the internet, please post the URL as a remark to help other interested readers watch it.

Why Interrogate Bankers Alone?

By now the number of times the name Mallya has been spoken or written must be running into millions.  It is there in the media - print, electronic and social - as well as serious debating platforms like the parliament.

The name appears in conjunction with banks, previous Congress government (CG) and the current BJP government (BG.)  Though I have not carried out a statistical analysis myself, I suspect that if you were to do so, you will find the number of times it is associated with CG or BG exceeds the number of times it is associated with banks.  In the debate in the parliament, charges were traded between Congress and BJP as to who was in power at those points in time when the loan was sanctioned, renewed and finally the borrower allowed to flee.

Neither CG nor BG tried to make a point that banks are autonomous and the government does not try to influence their commercial decisions.  I wonder if this tantamounts to a confession by both of the top two political parties of India.  And if it is so, two questions arise.  Does it seem likely that anyone in IDBI or any other bank could demand a gratification if a directive was received from the party in power?  And the second, why is ED not calling FM officials too for questioning?

Banker friends may like to comment on this.

BSNL's contempt for DND

I have a prepaid mobile number that was ported to BSNL quite some time back.  It was under DND with the earlier operator and I had registered it under DND soon with BSNL too after porting.  As unsolicited messages kept pouring in, I called the BSNL customer care number and complained.  I was told that my number is already under DND and was advised to register it once again.  Since then I have sent the START 0 message two times and each time the response told me that START0 was already active. Just in case you are wondering about the zero, you are allowed to choose from 7 alternatives and of these 0 means stop ALL.

The messages that I continue to get are messages whose senders' names are prefixed with BP, BT, AD, DM, MD, IM, BW, VK, BH, MM, BZ, DZ etc.  Occasionally there is a broadcast flash giving a number and enquiring whether I would be interested in friendship.

As normal channels for voicing my complaint had been tried out, I wrote to the Ministry for Communication and IT.  They promptly forwarded my complaint to CMD of BSNL and also DOT for immediate resolution.  As nothing happened for a week, I wrote to all the three parties again - MCIT, BSNL and DOT.  MCIT has again promptly forwarded it to the other two parties who are yet to wake up.  I have also written to TRAI in the matter today.

If you too have a BSNL number, I would like to know whether this suffering is universal for DND lovers or peculiar to my case.  If it is universal, how do we seek rectification?  I may add that DND is working wonderfully on my Airtel number.  It is surprising to find that private players are more ethical / rule-compliant than a public sector counterpart.

TTI advertising on IRCTC

Well that TTI isn't Travelling Ticket Inspector; it is Trick That Idiot.

This style of advertising on the net must have a nice academic name.  Unfortunately I am unaware of it so I am using the non-pedantic TTI.

As you know, we love apps, we love music and we love books.  And we love them even more when they can be had for free.  Our search for such freeware often takes us to sites that employ TTI.  So, they will give you a download link for the stuff you are looking for. But it will not be so prominently displayed as another big Download button that will download something very different from what you are looking for.  And because of this visual design, you are more likely to click on this button instead of the one that you intend to.  Now it doesn't take a great marketing guru to figure out that this other Download button must have been placed there by someone who has paid for it.  It is paid TTI advertising.  Similarly some websites, notably the Readers Digest site, present content in the form of slide shows.  When a slide is presented you will find back and forward arrows for navigating the show.  Alongside other and more prominent arrows will be placed prominently on the screen.  These are TTIs that will take you not to the next or previous slide, but somewhere where the paying advertiser wants you to go.  I am sure you have experienced this TTI yourself and I would be happy to know what name you have given to them.

You may not mind being tricked when you are looking for something for free.  After all, the fellow maintaining the website has to seek revenue from somewhere.  But it does come as a nasty surprise when such TTI is embedded on an e-commerce website like IRCTC where the visitor is paying for what he wants from the site.  Let me narrate to you what happened today morning.

Someone approached me for online booking of train tickets from Mumbai to Lucknow in the sleeper class for her journey 120 days later.  She was very insistent that I sign into the website before 8 am so that I can initiate the booking as soon as the clock strikes eight.  Each second counted.  I was ready with the train and the class selected at 7:59 am.  However there was no link to book.  Then I noticed this huge "Book a seat" button and clicked it.  It took me to Bla-Bla car website.  I thought this was IRCTC's way of keeping you amused till 8:00 when the booking will open.  So I kept closing the popped up ad and clicking on the said button.  By the time I noticed that a row in which availability and booking link were displayed, had appeared on the screen, I was late by those few critical seconds.  I also think that I was under the impression that the same button which opened BlaBlaCar ad will open the booking form at eight.  By the time I noticed the actual booking link, all berths (449) had been taken and RAC had started!

Of course, I have learnt the lesson now.  But the question, dear reader, is whether it is fair for IRCTC to go for this TTI style advertising?

Holy Cow

“Milk Comes from a Grieving Mother” ~ leaflet by Peaceful Prairie Sanctuary

In terms of the airlines menu categories, we are a family of lacto-ovo-vegetarians: Ovo is only occasional.  We love cows, relish dairy products and find the thought of eating beef rather sickening.  My son is planning to go vegan and do away with the prefix lacto-ovo.  He feels that cows are the most exploited animals.  We milk them thereby starving, at least partially, their calves and we also slaughter them when they go dry: He lives in USA where beef is staple.  Most of the calves also end up at the slaughter house.  He feels that he wont be a party to this sinful treatment if he gives up dairy products.

I have spent part of my childhood in a village.  I have seen cows being treated with love and care.  Male calves too were taken good care of.  They were castrated and they powered the agriculture at that time.  A cow or a bull was fed and taken care of till the end of its life.  Once it died, the body was taken away by people who specialized in removing the skin and bones for various commercial purposes.

In those days the cows were milked but not to the last drop.  Some was left behind for the calf too.  Such milk could be considered fit for drinking by vegetarians.  But these days dairy has turned into an industry.  The industry treats cows as merely milk producing automatons and there are few ethical considerations, if any.  It is not a gentle industry.

Further, bulls are no longer needed as draft animals.  Religious cow owners let go of the calves and these turn into stray cattle.  Only a few are needed for reproduction.  The rest must be getting caught and ending up in slaughter houses.  The religious owner likes to think that he has not partaken of the sin as he didn't sell the calf for money.  The dairies, of course, are not bothered by these considerations.

Our cities are riddled with small scale illegal dairies.  The male calves born in these dairies turn into stray bulls that are a menace to the citizens.  Most of these dairies have no qualms about driving away the dry cows who roam the streets feeding on the garbage at the dumps.

With industrialization of dairy, male calves getting discarded and old cows and bulls being left to fend for themselves, it seems that our love for this animal is not reflected in the treatment meted out to them.

Perhaps the only conscientious way out of this guilt is to follow in the footsteps of vegans and give up diary products altogether.  This, of course, will not improve the fate of the poor animal.  But then, we can have the consolation of having nothing to do with the treatment meted out to it.

If this topic interests you and you have read this post up to this point you may also like reading this article: To-be-a-feminist-is-to-be-a-vegan.

How do you feel in the matter?

Support for the IronMan!

In his historical campaign, Mr. Modi projected himself as an Ironman with a legendary chest who will bulldoze all problems into magnificent solutions in one tenth of the time in which these were created.  There was much chest thumping amongst the followers who firmly believed that the panacea lied in Modi's victory.  Even fence-sitters like me were inclined to be charitable towards that belief.

In less than two years the tone and tenor of the discourse has changed.  The Ironman is being portrayed as a victim who deserves our fullest support because the whole world is conspiring against him.  There are posts in the social media suggesting that USA, UN Human Rights Commission, and Saudi Arabia are all after Mr. Modi.  It makes you wonder how could it be so after Mr. Modi's great thrust on international diplomacy, befriending Barack so as to be on first name terms with him and a most eloquent speech at the UN against terrorism.  And if you express your doubts on the social media the diehard fans howl at you.

Mr. Modi's Nepal initiative has failed miserably.  Fans say it is so because we cannot match the financial muscle power of China that has pumped in huge money to win Nepal over.  I don't claim any expertise in international affairs, but I do wonder why couldn't the billion dollar given to Mongolia, a little known country, have gone the Nepal way if this is the case?

Now the daal controversy is being blamed on traders who owe allegiance to Congress.  PM wanted India to be free from Congress. He knows for sure all the scandals that caused the public outrage that led to PMs victory.  With that knowledge and the fact of being in power, it should have been the easiest of the things to put Congress on the back foot by initiating action against it instead of preaching against politics of revenge.  Occasional noises are made about inquiry into Vadra's land deals and the National Herald case but it peters out quickly.  Any investigation into scams involving trillions of rupees are kept so carefully hidden that the public may be justified in thinking that all is forgiven and forgotten.  How is it that a party that has so much against it and is out of power is able to arm twist you through its cohorts without any fear of retaliation?  And then your supporters make big noise about bearing with the government in the distant hope of an golden era that seems to be getting more distant by the day.  Also how is it that the government machinery firmly controlled by you couldn't see the crisis coming and the game that the cohorts were playing?

Again, the current wave of protests against rising intolerance in the country is blamed on Congress and intellectuals who are all indebted to Congress.  It is as if Yogis, Sadhvis and BJP loudmouths are not to blame in the matter at all.  Or if they are, the Ironman is a victim of its own party and organization and we must show more understanding towards him.  As Arun Jaitley has said PM is the biggest victim of intolerance himself.

This call for more understanding and support is in stark contrast with the image projected for our PM whose mere presence in the seat of power was supposed to forcefully dispel all the gloom.  His own supporters are now portraying him as a hapless victim who needs greater support to be just able to withstand all the pressure being mounted on him from domestic and international spheres.

As a member of the voting public, I feel that our salvation lies in becoming more and more ruthlessly demanding and not in being compassionate towards the political class.  Is that unfair?