Victims of Sex Crimes in India - Does Regional Language TV care for them?

Nirbhaya passed away in Singapore on Dec 29 and her body was cremated today in Delhi, but her fight lives on. Millions of us will not forget it and will ensure that what can be done is done to drastically reduce such crimes. Why only reduce? Because statistics show that there are currently an average of 600 rapes a year in Delhi alone. To eliminate them would be a mind-boggling achievement. 

In any case, the goal cannot be to control such crime in metropolitan areas alone. Women in rural areas and small towns suffer a lot, in fact a lot more, because of sex and gender-related crimes: rape and other forms of violence including murder, acid throwing, "honor killings" so-called, Khaps' persecution of women who marry out of caste, denial of inheritance, domestic violence, intimidation, denial of equal wages for equal work, reduced job opportunities, and so on. Socio-economically backward women in urban areas suffer as much as their rural sisters, perhaps more. They and their sisters rarely express themselves in English, so they do not get heard on English language TV channels. 

Regional language TV channels seem to have ignored the revolution taking place in Delhi more or less, denying 90% of Indian women their say. Leaders have failed to recognize that revolutions lack teeth if the masses do not participate in them. I compliment urban youth for taking up leadership roles, but experienced leaders should have strengthened their hands and supplemented them by goading regional language TV channels to come out of their slumber. There should have been gatherings and protests in small towns and rural areas as well. The protest leaders should have taken great care to see that the socio-economically backward women have their voice heard loud and clear. I monitored Kannada and Tamil language channels frequently during the last 72 hours - most of them were running routine movies and entertainment programs most of the time. In contrast, English language TV was spending well over 80% time on the revolution.  

We cannot win if we do not unite. 

Srinivasan Ramani 

The gang-rape victims: Nirbhaya and India

I am quite stunned at the way Nirbhaya’s case reflects the realities of India. The brave woman fought to the best of ability, to survive the grievous injuries inflicted by cruel animals in the garb of humans. There is no doubt that rape deserves the strictest punishment. In cases of gang rape involving death of the victim or life-threatening injuries, I believe that there is justification to consider capital punishment. I would also add custodial rape in this category of heinous of crimes; in fact, put it ahead of the other categories.

However, let us face it; changing of laws alone will not solve the problem. It is not the cardiac arrest or the brain injury alone that kills the injured victim. More often, it is the sepsis that threatens all the organs in the body and causes multi-organ failure. It is my case that we need to worry about the threat of multi-organ failure that the whole country faces.

No change in law will make a corrupt policeman exempt a rape victim from his lust for money. No feudal lord in the form of a powerful politician will voluntarily vote to reduce employing a large percentage of the police force to protect his feudal class. No legal system with its movements frozen by advanced arthritis can jump up and run to settle rape cases expeditiously. No government officer will voluntarily give up tying down as orderlies and menials able young men who ought to be protecting people on our streets.

Running to Singapore for help is also very symbolic.  Our hospitals can no doubt learn about hygiene from their hospitals. I remember sitting in the canteen of a great big Bangalore hospital recently. Specialists were performing the most complex of operations on a patient who had suffered a serious problem, a friend of mine. During the time I had my vada sambhar and a cup of coffee, we saw ten water tankers come in. In fact, while trying to get out of the canteen, I wondered if the tank drivers had a contract from the orthopedic division to create more patients for them right on the hospital premises! It is great to talk of medical tourism bringing wealth to India. But why don’t the politicians gang-raping the country not work once in a while to get piped water to our hospitals?

Singapore is not only for our hospitals. Our law enforcement agencies can also learn a lot about law enforcement and keeping corruption under control. 

It is a great revolution that our youth are crying out for. Let us not trivialize issues by amending a few statutes here and there and forgetting the fundamental problems. Let us have significant changes. Let us hope for national leaders who rise to the occasion and declare what they stand for. The 2014 election is one hope. Will it do us any good? Or will it do for us what the Singapore trip did for Nirbhaya? 

Srinivasan Ramani

The Modern Thuggee

Visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thuggee

The visitor has always been a preferred victim. The thuggee had no hesitation in killing the pilgrims and other road farers of India. Sleeman, a British administrator, put an end to this practice about 170 years back.

But a modern version of this practice continues to this day. Several telecom companies around the world charge as much as fifty times for Internet connectivity to the cell phone of a tourist as they charge a local customer. Sleeman! Where are you, now that we need you again?

Overcharging a tourist makes mockery of maps and navigation services offered over the web. The tourist needs them more than the local residents. I plead with the regulatory agencies of the world to review this robbery. The goodwill a country will generate by not fleecing the tourist over the Internet will more than make up for the revenue loss. Travellers’ associations should launch an agitation against this and suggest boycott of countries indulging in this practice.

Srinivasan Ramani 

The Mayan calendar and the Fiscal Cliff

I offer you a guarantee that the Mayans were wrong and that nothing cataclysmic will occur tomorrow (12/21). They got their event timing wrong by ten days. Actually, what they had in mind was the US fiscal cliff! 

I also guarantee they were wrong about the fiscal cliff! I am sure that common sense will prevail and a compromise will be struck. 

Best wishes for a happy new year! 

Srinivasan Ramani 

Jobs versus productive jobs

I believe that intelligent management of a nation’s economy has to aim at availability of jobs for all. There is hardly any politician who disagrees with this. But what amazes me is that the Indian politician rarely mentions productive jobs. Creating jobs that don’t create goods or services is a fraud on the nation. It merely fuels inflation.

Today I heard a politician saying on TV that she had seen drugstores abroad using scanners through which customers scan the bar codes on the goods they wish to purchase. The customer then pays for the goods swiping his or her credit card and goes off. No one is needed at the counter. Our neta was appalled.

It appears to me that nothing is lost and a lot is gained by using technology and education to automate the mundane tasks in life, ensuring that people do better things in their life. Not a great new idea! Norbert Wiener wrote about it in his book The Human Use of Human Beings in 1950.

Associated with this issue is that of worker training and productivity. Let me cite a hilarious instance of poor training leading to wasted human effort. Two weeks ago, I was considering the replacement of my swivel chair for use at my computer desk. A nice leather upholstered chair at Rs 25,000 in a shop window attracted me. I would have bought it except for a concern about disposing off my current chair. It is in good shape, except that its polyurethane arm rests have worn out. I hesitated to give it away in its current run-down condition. Then it occurred to me that I could get the company to replace the armrests. After all we do have a tradition in this country of providing for repair of seven year old products, an intelligent use of our vast under-employed workforce. The chair had been bought from a large, nationally well-known manufacturer of office furniture. I called their call center, and was told that a repairman would call and that I would be charged Rs 250 for the visit. I accepted that offer and the man turned up within day or two. He said that he would have to order a set of armrests and that it would cost me Rs 500 or so. Amazing, isn’t it? I paid the 500; he gave me a receipt and used his cell phone to call his office and convey the order. I was deeply impressed, but was told that the stuff would have to come from Mumbai and it would take ten days. I was willing to wait.

Then yesterday, he turned up again with a package in his hands. I brought the chair out into the hall and he took one look at it and gasped. The package in his hands contained only one of the two armrests required. He stared at some work sheet in his hand, a penciled note on which it read “one set armrest”. He picked up his cellphone and called his office again. The product code used had been wrong. He is an intelligent man though he has trouble in coping with the many languages Bangalore requires you to know, including English. So, I paid another Rs 500. He will come again a couple of weeks later.

Well, that is one of the factors that keeps India poor. Why can’t the big company’s field operations be better managed? Why can’t they train their workforce better? With such an ill-trained workforce and such poor management, no good will come out of our “demographic dividend”! 

Srinivasan Ramani 

Revenue of Indian ISPs compared to MVAS Revenue of Cell Phone Services Operators

A Press Release (dated July 2012) from the ISP Association of India, quoting Telecom Regulatory Authority of India indicates the ISP segment revenue as Rs 7,500 Crores per year (approximately US$ 1.4 Bln). Visit
http://www.ispai.in/ispai-view/pressreleaseview.php?pressReleaseId=8

Compare this with the figure of Rs 2 to 3 per month spent by cell phone users on apps as well as games (Visit my blog post
http://obvioustruths.blogspot.in/2012/09/the-reality-of-mobile-value-added.html
This is the nearest estimate I get to Internet related expenditure of cell phone users in India in 2012. The number of cell phone users in India was reported by the Times of India as being 929.37 million in July 2012. Visit
http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2012-07-05/telecom/32550630_1_base-touches-subscriber-base-wireline-segment 
Multiplying the number of users by Revenue per user we find that Indian cell phone users are not paying more than Rs 3600 Crores. This is probably an over-estimate, as the figure of Rs. 2 to 3 mentioned above cover apps as well as games. So, all of this amount may not count as expenditure on mobile Internet.

Srinivasan Ramani
October 20, 2012

Information & the Anti-Corruption Movement in India

If you had asked me two years ago if I expected to find a reduction in corruption in India during my lifetime, I would have said no. The situation had been so bad for so long, and was in fact getting worse. But now, suddenly, so much is happening so fast! 

It has been said that Internet based tools have speeded up political changes in many countries in the recent past. I don’t see much reason to believe that Internet based communication tools have made much difference on the Indian political scene. Of course there have been the famous (:=) remark about “cattle class” travel and the recent one about “mango men in a banana republic”. Most of us have read about them in newspapers or heard about them on TV. I do use Facebook, Twitter and Linked in, but I do not see many Indians using them for political activity.

All this calls for serious research – what is speeding up the anti-corruption ferment in India now? How has it become so rapid - so much so that now I worry about change being managed carefully so that the country does not become worse before it becomes better?

Let me hazard my guess. The major factors have been the arrival of independent TV channels on the scene, followed by a rapid increase in the number of such channels. Add to this Direct-To-Home telecasting and the Right to Information Act! You have enough to start a big change. The TV channels have even woken up our stodgy newspapers and made them significant players in the revolution.

How cozy would it have been for the political class to have stayed with the obedient Doordarshan as the only TV service provider? Did they foresee the current ferment? They have seen a few tsunamis now! But do they realize that the Indian climate change is going to be huge and irreversible? What do they plan to do about it? Will they play a role as agents of change or will they become the victims of change?

Srinivasan Ramani

Aam Janata Party for the Mango People

Mr Robert Vadra might have given a great idea to India Against Corruption - a name that will stick. Let me elaborate on these ideas:

a) Name the party Aam Janata Party

b) Sell (not give away) yellow T-shorts with a green mango logo on the front and back

c) Ask the election commission to give them the mango as a symbol.

There is no better way for the party to identify itself as the party of the common people. I hope that Mr Arvind Kejriwal, Mr Prashant Bhushan, Mr Shanti Bhushan, Mr Manish Sisodia and all their colleagues would consider these suggestions seriously.

Srinivasan Ramani

The high cost of cell phone services in the US

The Online Wall Street Journal (India Edition) carries an article today (Sept 26, 2012) saying that cell phones are eating away the (US) family budget! Visit

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390444083304578018731890309450.html

This article quotes Labour Dept statistics and says that the average household’s annual expenditure on telephone services rose to $1226 in 2011. It carries a small graph showing that expenditures went down during 2007-2011 on vehicle purchases, apparel & services, entertainment and food away from home, while expenditure on telephone services went up over 10% during this period. It discusses the role of smart phones in all this.

I wish to juxtapose this with other information in my previous blog posting:

http://obvioustruths.blogspot.in/2012/09/the-reality-of-mobile-value-added.html

In that posting, I had argued that despite big noises being made over the media, the average Indian cell-phone user spends less than 50 US cents per month on Mobile Value Added Services. Of this, mobile apps and games accounted for less than 10 US cents. The bulk of the 50 cents went into such things as ringtones and SMS-based applications.  

My blog posting had argued that we should not believe that India has suddenly become a nation of Internet users because everyone carries a cell phone.  Important applications such as education and timely information dissemination will need to use services such as SMS for years to come, to cover the population satisfactorily.

Mobile Internet does cost money, even in the US – to the extent that the Wall Street Journal links increase in telecom expenditure to reduced expenditure on food away from home. I only ask that society should give adequate importance to economically productive uses of cell phone services, at least in low-income countries. Smart phones are fun, but for many of us, they have to do their share of work!

Srinivasan Ramani 

The Reality of Mobile Value Added Services in India

Let me show the white flag first! I am techie at heart and I do believe that the mobile Internet has a great future in India. However, I believe that the future should not become the enemy of the present. We have to accept reality and cope with it in suitable ways. Let me come to the point of this article.

Mary Meeker of Kleiner Perkins Caufield Byers made a presentation in May this year. Visit http://www.scribd.com/doc/95259089/KPCB-Internet-Trends-2012

Among the statistics she has presented are the following:

1. India has the third largest number of Internet users (121 Mln) in the world. The number increased during 2008-2011 by 69 Mln to reach the figure of 121 Mln. Compare this growth with the 15 Mln in the USA!
2. India has 39 Mln 3G subscribers, growing at the rate of 841% year on year as against the 115% of China and the 31% of the US.
3. The percentage of Internet traffic carried by cell phones in India has already overtaken the Internet traffic carried by desktops in the country by April 2012.

Some of my friends abroad got quite excited by all this and sent me emails celebrating India’s victory!

I was aware of other statistics which presented a different picture. Visit
http://www.ccaoi.in/UI/links/fwresearch/Mobile%20Conceltation%20paper.pdf

Consultation Paper No 5/2011 put out by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India:

Mobile Value Added Services (MVAS), 21st July, 2011. The key points I take from this paper are:

1. The average revenue per user (ARPU) per month in March 2011 was Rs 100 in the case of GSM users and Rs 66 in the case of CDMA users. This covered revenue from voice services as well as other services.
2. Non-voice revenues were 11% of all mobile revenues, that is Rs 11/month. 60% of this came from SMS revenues, that is, say, Rs 7. Internet related services earned 9% of all MVAS revenues, which is about Rs 1/month per subscriber.
3. Major uses of the SMS services were:
4. Requests for ringtone downloads, seeking information like news, cricket scores, astrological predictions, subscribing to jokes and accessing other such services

You might think that a lot would have changed since May 2011. Another source
http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2012-07-04/news/32537173_1_mobile-vas-market-mvas-arpu
quoting a study by IAMAI-IMRB study, gives some updates. My take from this Economic Times report is:

1. The number of mobile Internet users in India in March 2012 was 48 Mln.
2. The average revenue was Rs 96 per GSM user and Rs 73 per CDMA user.
3. Average user spend on MVAS was 27 per cent of the ARPU, estimated to be roughly Rs 24/month.
4. Of the Rs 24 per month, 27% went into ringtones, 17% into SMS based applications; mobile apps took 10% while games took 8%. So, mobile apps took roughly Rs 2 to 3 per month.
5. The report predicted that ARPU will increase by 5-8% over the coming years.

So, here is the reality: The average Indian user did not spend even 10 U.S. cents per month on mobile apps and games! What does all this mean to us? I believe:

We should not jump to the conclusion that mobile Internet is suddenly going to make a big difference to people in rural areas, who constitute two-thirds of cell phone users.

We should not under-estimate the value of providing SMS based services to the majority of users. They stay away from mobile Internet because they find it difficult to download and install apps, and to use browsers. They are afraid of the cost. Being told that the cost is 10 paise per 10 KB of data transfer does not mean anything to them. To me it translates into Rs 10,000 per Gigabyte! Being told that they would have to pay Rs 98 per month for a 1 GB package (or something like that) is itself frightening to them. That is without their really reading the small print. Anything in excess of 1 GB is usually charged at 10 paise per 10 KB again! It appears that this is a totally counter-productive strategy – charging novice users making a beginning with web-content at hundred times what is obviously a sustainable rate. It is equally counter-productive to threaten novice users with the risk of huge bills if they accidentally end up using more than what is their quota.

What about the cost of SMS? There are student packages that offer them a quota of a hundred outgoing SMSs per day for fifty or sixty rupees a month. That indicates that the real cost of an SMS to the service provider is less than two paise!

These issues have been particularly important to me, as one working in technology for education. Is there any chance that low cost cell-phones in small towns and rural areas could promote school-level learning in some way? I believe that this is possible. An associated post in my other blog http://newstudentresearch.blogspot.in/2012/09/apps-that-make-low-end-cell-phones.html briefly describes one of my efforts in this direction. 

If you are in India, you can try out this simple service that enables to test their knowledge of English comprehension using only SMS messages. Students can voluntarily take a monthly test without any fear of failure from anywhere, at any time. I believe that such voluntary tests can sensitise them to the challenge they are facing. Teachers, family and friends can encourage them to read books beyond textbooks and improve their English. They can discuss questions and help students to learn new words. You can access this service over SMS, if you are in India. Visit http://www.hydrusworld.org/Tests over SMS.html 

You can use an Instant Messaging interface to access the same service if you are on the Internet. Visit http://www.hydrusworld.org/Tests over IM.html

Srinivasan Ramani 

India’s Functioning Anarchy

Most people I meet seem to have little expectation of any good legislation coming out this year. Frequent disruptions of Parliamentary proceedings cause concern. Sashi Tharoor’s article “India’s Functioning Anarchy”, dated Aug. 9, 2011, continues to be very relevant. Visit 

http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/india-s-functioning-anarchy

We, the people of India, have given no clear authority to any party to do what needs to be done one way or another. If we continue to fragment our vote among a couple of dozen parties, we surely deserve what we get. I have no recommendation for whom you should vote. Nor do I recommend that a country of this diversity should be represented by two parties alone.

All I argue is that, in every election, we should vote to give one of the nation-wide parties a clear majority in Parliament - or at least near majority. This should enable the formation of a stable government. Only such a government can make and implement effective policy. Every thought leader should emphasize the importance of an effective mandate. Every citizen should recognize it and vote accordingly. Otherwise, India will continue to be what it is – a functioning anarchy! There would be little hope for economic and social progress. 

Srinivasan Ramani 

Indians from the North East Should be Welcomed back

Students and working people from the north eastern states have been driven away from their places of work by organized terror. What can we do about this as Indians in places like Bangalore? I have a suggestion. Do you know employers of people from the north east? Do you know educational institutions that have attracted students from the north east? Talk to the employers and to the decision makers in the educational institutions. Tell them that we cannot be blackmailed by terror. Ask them to write letters to their employees and students declaring that we want them back at their places of work. Keep their jobs and seats for them. Welcome them when they return and tell them we are with them. They have a right to live anywhere in India, and we will defend their rights.

Srinivasan Ramani

Anna's party – Can do a Lot with Half a Percent of the Vote

Let us challenge ourselves to think hard. Anna’s movement will be launching a party – but this does not make it any less of a movement. It will be a movement willing to use the danda of elections to achieve limited goals, as and when appropriate. Old political hands are smug – they believe that an anti-corruption movement cannot get enough votes to bother them. They are wrong.

Just imagine that Anna’s movement/party draws up a list of top 60 undesirable “netas”; which of them can be called criminals and/or corrupt elements will have be decided by lawyers, but there is nothing illegal in labeling them undesirable! Suppose the movement tells political parties of these undesirable netas that it will work against all those from this list who are nominated as candidates. The movement may put up candidates to oppose the “undesirable” elements, create mass awareness campaigns in the constituencies, and take all legal measures to mobilize opinion against them. It may even endorse an alternative candidate from another party, if he/she is clean

For this purpose, the movement could list 60 good leaders who it would not oppose if they are nominated. I believe that the movement can influence other parties in this manner. Work can be focused on only sixty constituencies and if half percent of the nation’s vote is garnered in these places, and is used against undesirable elements, there will be an average penalty of a few percent on each undesirable. A few percent can swing an election in a constituency. The fear of this can cleanse the other parties of some of their undesirable elements. I have quoted numbers above only to illustrate the argument. Better estimates can be made as the election draws near.

The main point made here is that you don’t need a lot of votes. Just ensure that they are garnered in selected constituencies to influence key decisions. Anna’s party may not have brawn but it can use brain power to maximize its impact. Anna’s party doesn't need to win; it only has to get undesirable elements defeated by someone or other.

The movement can also benefit from a few donors – celebrities who can gather enough votes to defeat key undesirables. But we need only those celebrities we respect and who belong to the movement.  We do have a few, already! We should starting seeking more!   We need to persuade them that they have to act effectively to achieve what they believe in.

Srinivasan Ramani

Anna’s Political Party – Trust India

I will use a question/answer format to share my thoughts on this topic.

Will not membership in a political party soil us all?
If you believe in democracy and in the Indian constitution, you cannot assume that there will be no clean party ever. We need to trust that India has a future, that there are Indians whom we can trust to lead us.

The problem with existing parties is usually an absence of ideology. The Wikipedia says that an ideology can be thought of as a comprehensive vision, as a way of looking at things. You can also say that it involves the basic beliefs and principles that characterize the party. Many parties exist merely to give power to an individual, or to people having a narrow identity – narrower than that of Indians in general. Some of our parties have lost their ideology, and some stick to their moth-ridden, moribund ideologies. There was a time when Indian nationalism was the driving force of a party. Concern for the downtrodden was the ideology of several parties.  As long as the parties stayed true to these basic ideologies, they were clean.

What has Anna got that other political parties do not have?
He has the vision of a clean India freed from the thieves and crooks who have worked themselves into positions of authority. So, his party could focus on three things. One is that of a modern India effectively governed by the rule of law. Second a party of unselfish persons who act as trustees of the nation. Third and most importantly, that idealism is not foolish. You can live your life without making deals to get ahead, and paying the price for sticking to your principles whenever necessary.

Will such a party survive?

It may not survive as a single party. It may split and give rise to different parties, but the followers may not forget the fundamental ideology. The party may take longer than a banyan tree to grow to be its true self. A great party cannot be ordered for instant delivery, like fast food!

What should the Party do to survive?
Idealism alone does not win wars! Much strategizing is needed. We have to recognize that Members of Parliament are fundamentally representatives of their constituencies. Those who do not have a constituency do not have the primary power. But, who said that idealists cannot serve a community? Take Anna himself. Don’t the people of Ralegan Siddhi recognize him as their leader? Didn’t Baba Amte serve a constituency?

Service to a constituency does not make a person irrelevant to national leadership. We need a few hundred people who have earned the trust of their communities by their own clean life and long period of service to a constituency. They might have run hospitals, educational institutions, or have served people around them in some other way. They may be serving as doctors, teachers, lawyers or social activists.  They may be industrialists who believe that the major beneficiaries of a company’s activities should be the consumers and the employees of the company, in that order. They surely would not have sold their souls to get Govt land allotted for their own benefit, or to amass unearned wealth otherwise. Many of us know popular restaurants that were started by freedom fighters – and have continued to run serving good food at affordable prices over decades. They have avoided becoming five star, because that is not what the founders started them for.

We will need a thousand dedicated idealists to support each one of the constituency leaders. This should be no problem in a country of 120 Crore people.

Srinivasan Ramani 

Anna’s Anti-Corruption Politics, Social Networking and Secret Societies

Anna’s anti-corruption movement is facing difficult decisions. Can they form a political party and get any closer to their objective of reduced corruption in India? There have been many skeptical remarks by public commentators. I would like to remind them about parties like the Alliance '90/The Greens in Germany, which won 10.7% of the votes and 68 out of 622 seats in the Bundestag in 2009. Visit

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alliance_'90/The_Greens

A focus on the environment is one of the major characteristics of this party. If concern for the environment can get 10% of the seats in the Bundestag, I do not see why an anti-corruption movement cannot get 10% of the seats in the Indian Parliament. Clearly, however, it is not a cakewalk to create such a party.  Much strategizing would be needed. The movement should recognize its limitations and focus on specific constituencies where it can win and on specific public figures who can get votes. The movement would also need to exert its influence not by fighting on its own, but supporting clean leaders from other parties and working against corrupt leaders. They should not choose the most corrupt to fight, but the ones who are most vulnerable in the electoral field. You need to win! Choose an enemy you can defeat! Altruism needs to be supported by good strategizing.

As we all know, the hatred for corruption is widespread in India and one political party alone cannot be the solution. Is there room for secret societies in this field? I believe there is, particularly in view of the vastly lowered effort required to do social networking using the cell phone and computer based devices. Why a secret society? Most people against corruption do not do anything about it – for fear that they will lose their jobs, will be thrown out of college, will be targeted by the baddies, etc. A secret society will protect whistle blowers. It will not expose them. It will let the “deep throats” communicate with the effective actors who will do what needs to be done.

Every corrupt person has a hundred people around him knowing what he does. No RTO’s office employee can do underhand business without a hundred people knowing it. No college can run a back-money factory without hundreds of students and their parents knowing it. Fraud is best sniffed out by people who have the knowledge. Take the case of the big share market scam of the nineties. I remember the role of some employees of the State Bank of India who saw a share-broker make frequent visits to the bank’s headquarters in a flashy Toyota Lexus and sniffed something fishy. Visit

http://flame.org.in/knowledgecenter/scam.aspx and

http://www.scribd.com/doc/29354503/case-study-Harshad-Mehta

for information on the scam.

Somehow, information got to a veteran columnist, Sucheta Dalal, who wrote an article about what was going on and blew the scam sky high! Who decided to inform Sucheta Dalal, how was she chosen as the best person to act?

Put yourself in the shoes of an office employee, working in an office where everyone knows what is going on. There are at least a few people who are disgusted with it, but everyone is scared of the baddies, particularly the bosses who may be getting a good share of the loot! You don’t know someone who will strike out like Sucheta Dalal and succeed. I have a few suggestions for you:

You need a secret society so that you can belong to it and work with others who think like you without being exposed. But it need not be a single society, it needs no central HQ, it doesn’t need a central leader. All you need to do is to believe that there are few altruistic people like you who will not let this country go to the dogs. Believe that you, along with them, and their other contacts can achieve your goal. All of you don’t need to meet together. Everyone you think belongs to this group does not need know the others. If some of them interact with each other without your knowing it, so be it. Get to know a journalist, a few students who are willing to act, and a big talker who seems to know everything going on in the office. If you trust them, share some of your information with them selectively. If one of them tells you something, you do not necessarily have to let on that someone else had told you the same thing earlier. Let information go around, someone with the opportunity and the capability will act on it. There will be a hundred centres in the movement and hundreds of actors.

You need to have two important beliefs. One, we need to act collectively. Two, cursing and condemning is not action. Trust me, there are lots of Sucheta Dalals. As the movement grows, more and more of them will do what needs to be done.

The media have become powerful, and they usually ensure quick justice. A crook cannot spend his lifetime happily, filing appeals, delaying the progress of cases and getting bail every time. Media are not the only solution; there may be a few honest and competent vigilance officers; there may be a few honest and competent cops. There may even be a few honest and competent netas!

Srinivasan Ramani 

Train Accident near Nellore

This morning we received news that a compartment of the Delhi – Chennai Tamil Nadu Express caught fire and nearly forty passengers were burnt alive. This raises serious concerns. The immediate questions are: 

• ·       Are there fire detectors in trains? If passengers are deep asleep at 4:20 AM, and a fire breaks out, how do they find out that before it is too late? How are the driver and guard to find out?
• ·       Why are compartments carrying such combustible materials? Is the foam used in cushions the cause, or is there too much wood?
• ·       Are there adequate fire extinguishers in compartments?

India is getting ready to send a spacecraft to Mars. Why can’t we first learn to send trains safely from Delhi to Chennai?

Are the politicians the cause of the mess railways are in?  Are they treating railways as a vote-bank, playing their populist games, ignoring rail safety and the abominable conditions under which millions travel every day? Are they denying railways officers adequate autonomy to run a public service instead of having to beg their masters constantly for adequate budgets?

If we can import various items from abroad, why can’t we encourage Indian private industry to invest and manufacture quality equipment in India? Why is the Japanese private sector ok, but not the Indian private sector?

Srinivasan Ramani 

Is a computer failure better than a hydraulic failure on an aircraft?

The media reported today that an Air India Airbus 319 made an emergency landing in Pakistan. Visit

http://www.ndtv.com/article/cheat-sheet/relieved-air-india-passengers-back-in-delhi-after-emergency-landing-in-pak-top-10-facts-240992

The first reports said that three hydraulic systems had failed simultaneously. Later reports said that actually wrong information had been given by the computers to the pilot; the hydraulic systems were OK, but the pilot got a misleading warning. He had no choice but to make an emergency landing. How can such a thing happen? Computer systems on modern aircraft are supposed to be protected against failure by redundancy. Multiple computers built by different manufactures and running different software systems are installed on each aircraft. This is supposed to prevent a problem being created by a failure in a single computer. The probability of multiple, independent computers making the same mistake simultaneously is calculated to be negligible. Some information on this topic can be found in the article:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airbus_A320_family

The references in the article cited above give more information. 

Coming back to India, a speedy investigation should be carried out by the Government of India and the findings made public. There is hope that this will take place; there is a site describing in some detail aircraft accidents over the years in India:

http://dgca.nic.in/accident/content.htm

I would feel happier if complete documents revealing the findings of such investigations are made available over the Web.

In any case, best of luck to you and to me when we take the next flight! I would be taking one soon! 

Srinivasan Ramani 

Are there any rules about ministers receiving gifts?

There have been several Disproportionate Assets (DA) cases against ministers and ex-ministers in India. A recent court ruling in regard to a DA case against Ms. Mayawati has attracted a lot of attention. Visit 

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/SC-scraps-assets-case-against-Mayawati/articleshow/14724722.cms

In the past in many (DA) cases, the accused have argued that the millions of rupees they have amassed have come from donations by members of their party. I am not concerned about individual cases – the courts will deal with them; my concern is with the law. Are there any laws regarding acceptance of gifts by ministers, similar to the Conduct Rules for Government employees?

The US Senate rules are quite clear in this regard. Visit http://www.ethics.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/gifts

I quote from the same:
“No Member, officer, or employee shall knowingly accept a gift except as provided by the Gifts Rule.

A Member, officer, or employee may accept a gift, other than cash or cash equivalent, having a value of less than $50, provided that the source of the gift is not a registered lobbyist, foreign agent, or private entity that retains or employs such individuals. The cumulative value of gifts that may be accepted from any one source in a calendar year must be less than $100. Generally, gifts having a value of less than $10 do not count toward the annual limit”.

There is no exception for gifts from party members. This makes sense, because anyone can find a party member who can be used as a conduit to pay a minister. Indian legislatures should consider enacting effective conduct rules for their members, in the interests of their own credibility. A minister is as much a public servant as any government officer. Why can’t ministers be covered by the same conduct rules as government employees? In fact, ministers have a lot more authority than government employees and should, therefore, be well above suspicion. Large amounts received as gifts by a minister should be presumed to be illegal gratification irrespective of where they come from, even if they come as small amounts aggregating to a disproportionate amount.

What about party funds, particularly because they are exempted from Income Tax? That is another matter requiring serious discussion. Why should they not be audited by auditors appointed by the Election Commission and the audit reports published? The anti-corruption movement (http://www.indiaagainstcorruption.org/index1.html ) should consider and comment on these issues.

Srinivasan Ramani

Modern techniques to verify documents communicated online

The question of verifying a handwritten signature has become the subject of a national debate in India. Visit

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics/nation/pranab-mukherjees-letter-quitting-kolkata-institute-fabricated-bjp/articleshow/14653088.cms  and

http://www.dnaindia.com/india/report_congress-calls-bjp-s-letter-charge-against-pranab-mukherjee-scandalous_1710631

The question concerns a resignation letter sent by Mr. Pranab Mukherjee, a candidate for election as President of India, to the Indian Statistical Institute (ISI) in Kolkata. The resignation is from the post of Chairman, ISI. Under Indian law, a candidate for the President’s position should not be holding such a post on the day of nomination. The leading opposition party, BJP, and another candidate Mr. P A Sangma, have questioned if the signature on the resignation letter is a genuine one.

On reading this, my thoughts went back to my blog posting dated Saturday, March 11, 2006, titled “Is handwriting really accurate in identifying people”? This had appeared in my blog http://www.newstudentresearch.blogspot.in/

Let us go beyond the signature that has received a lot of media attention now. Ensuring the verifiability of signatures and their time and date is of great importance to any economy. We cannot burden courts by having them spend days on end listening to arguments on such questions.

Handwritten signatures are no solution to this problem except credible witnesses testify to the signing and handing over of the document to the recipient. (Of course, you cannot ask that this procedure should be adopted for resignation letters!) My blog post mentioned above discussed the unreliability of handwriting recognition. It quoted a judgment of the US Supreme Court which referred to a paper authored by an expert, which gives the results of a study showing experts make errors in approximately 7% of their judgments and non-experts err approximately thirty eight percent of the time!

Sophisticated technology is in use in India by the Income Tax Dept and all banks for online verification. When a bank pays you interest on a term deposit, it has to meet a legal requirement – to deduct a specified percentage of the amount due to you and pay it to the account of the Income Tax Dept, registering the payment with the National Securities Depository (NSDL) Ltd. NSDL is an information technology service provider with a specialization in security for online transactions.

Yesterday I went to my bank to ask for a certificate stating the amount deducted from me and transferred to the Income Tax Dept. The bank officer who handled this request explained to me that they can no longer issue such a certificate themselves. Instead, they have to download the statement form NSDL, which keeps track of all income tax payments registered with it.

Technically, NSDL could introduce in future a system to address the problems of registering and time-stamping documents. Anyone sending an online communication through this system to someone else could have the transmission registered online with NSDL. The sending party would identify himself to NSDL through one or more passwords or a digital signature. The recipient would be identified by the email address given to NSDL to forward the communication. All NSDL would need to do is to send both the sender and recipient a copy of the communication digitally signed by itself. This would serve as an authentication of the message to the recipient and as a receipt to the sender. It is a trivial matter to verify a digital signature with the right software at any time, now or in the future. NSDL does not need to store the communication for future verification at all, as the technology verifies the document if either of the transacting parties produces a machine-readable copy.

I hope that the current high profile dispute would trigger an implementation of a national communication registry. It would contribute an improvement to the velocity of business in India, earn its own costs and turn in a handsome profit!

Srinivasan Ramani 

Healthcare Legislation is Relevant to the Whole World

The decision of the US Supreme Court to uphold Affordable Healthcare Legislation is of great interest to the whole world, not merely to the US. Visit

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/supreme-court-to-rule-thursday-on-health-care-law/2012/06/28/gJQAarRm8V_story.html

Insurance is a good idea for evening out the burden of unpredictable health costs. Life strikes some people very hard and insurance, in principle, can spread the burden over the whole adult population and make life bearable for the poor souls who get hit by diseases that necessitate major expenses. But how does one ensure that the health insurance industry is properly regulated? How does one prevent excesses in healthcare costs being imposed by hospitals and doctors? Can one do all this without excessive bureaucracy?

I hope that leading university departments of public health around the world give these questions adequate attention. Such departments in the US will no doubt have their primary focus on the US context. However, some researchers should suggest answers to these questions at a more global level; they should, at the least, stimulate a worldwide debate on this topic. It is not clear if a UN body such as the WHO can do anything about these questions.  Let us ask http://twitter.com/#!/who

People in many countries live on per capita GDPs at the level of a small fraction of the US per capita GDP. Giving them satisfactory healthcare is not easy. Neither the individual nor the state can bear the huge costs of modern healthcare. Researchers have to investigate this immense challenge and provide some answers. Ultimately we can do only what we can do! No more! We have to apply our mind to the issue of what we can do if we come up with the best possible ideas.

Srinivasan Ramani

R. E. Bedford, Professor Emeritus, IIT Bombay

Professor Bedford made a big impact on my life, because he had those qualities that great teachers have. He was a professor and a gentleman! From him I learnt that a teacher is one who does not merely impart some knowledge and skills; a real teacher goes beyond that, serving as a role model inspiring his students.

I had specialized in heavy current engineering for my university degree in electrical engineering. Over the next fifty years, a lot of work on alternative sources of energy would be done by people with such a background; it is an exciting area for research.

However, when I applied for admission as an M Tech student at IIT Bombay, my heart was in computers. I turned up for the admission test, but a stern official would not let me take the paper meant for the candidates applying for work in electronics. So, I took the one meant for heavy current engineers and managed to get to the selection committee for an interview. Prof Bedford was, I think, the Chairman of the Committee. He greeted me with his characteristic good humour, saying "We hear that you don't want to work with us!" I described the ruling the official had given. "So, what do you want us to do?" he asked. I said that I would like to be interviewed in the area of interest to the Committee. Subsequently, if they thought I merited some consideration, they could perhaps pass me on to the other Committee with a recommendation. Luckily, I passed the hurdle of the first interview. Prof Bedford personally took me to the other Committee and said something like "This chap doesn't want to work with us! See if you want him to work with you". Despite the light-hearted remark, he had somehow conveyed that I deserved a second interview in his opinion.

Prof Isaac and Prof Pradhan were in this other Committee. After another interview, they selected me. I had come out of old-fashioned educational institutions where rigid hierarchy prevailed. That an IIT could be flexible enough to admit for an M Tech in electronics a bloke who had taken only one paper in that subject was amazing to me. Inter-disciplinary barriers had been worse than caste barriers, but they did not exist in the mind of IIT professors; at least in the minds of some of them! I suddenly saw how IIT's differed from the institutions left over from the Jurassic period!

Bedford and Isaac belonged to the new breed of academics, who treated students as humans and interpreted rules without forcing narrow minded interpretations into them. This modern approach to academic decision-making went a lot further. Later, I graduated from the IIT Bombay and went on to work at a reputed research institute pioneering in the computer field. What about working for a PhD? IITs had no rules to enable even researchers working in the same city to enrol for a PhD. Should institutional barriers be water tight and exclude collaboration and sharing of ideas beyond the walls of the institution? Bedford and Isaac worked with other like-minded professors to get the senate to approve "external registration". I became a student at IITB again and completed my PhD work under the joint supervision of Prof R Narasimhan and Prof Isaac.

I have served as a professor later in life, and hope that I have given my students in some small measure the same support and encouragement I had received from Prof Bedford. His passing away on Monday, June 25, was a major blow to all of us whose lives had been influenced by him.

Srinivasan Ramani
June 28, 2012

More on the bore-well that killed a baby girl in Manesar

India Today has commented on the case I had discussed on this blog on June 24, 2012, and has also commented on the need to be prepared to meet mass-scale disasters such as earth-quakes. Visit

http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/draw-the-right-lessons-from-mahi-tragic-death/1/202448.html

This item also reports on the role of Sohrab Khan, a local well-digger, who eventually got her body out of the well. This does not in any way detract from the credit that should go to the army personnel who worked night and day to dig an 80 foot parallel well to enable access to the bore-well.

The question about preparedness to cope with mass disasters is this: with whom does the responsibility lie? I would vote for the Chief Secretary of the State and the Secretary to Govt who supervises the fire department. They are well-educated, trained government officers who ought to be trained in disaster-management as well. Every mass disaster should be reviewed by a judicial commission, and if unpreparedness or incompetence is established, the officers concerned should have their jobs terminated.

A soft state is one which does not assign clear responsibilities and does not punish negligence and incompetence.

Srinivasan Ramani

Sakunthala did not know what they did to her

Sakunthala (name changed) works as a housemaid, cleaning vessels and sweeping floors in three or four homes. She has a husband who drinks frequently and beats her, and a teen age daughter. She had to go to a big hospital recently for pain in the abdomen. They told her that an operation was necessary. From what she told us, we could guess that there was going to be the removal of a fibroid. We visited her in the hospital a few days after the operation and were happy to hear that she was recovering well. We asked her if the doctors had removed her uterus, as they often do when they remove fibroids in women nearing the end of the child-bearing age. She did not know, and was surprised to her that such things were done. Her daughter was near her, and we asked the girl if she could ask the ward nurse to give her the case sheet so we could find out. Then we realized with a jolt that we were asking for things beyond patients’ rights in a hospital that provided free treatment to those not able to pay for it.

The staff nurse came charging down the aisle and told us that case sheets are not for patients to read! We were sufficiently humble, and said that all we wanted to know was if there had been the total removal of the uterus, and if there had been a test for any possible cancer. The nurse did not know, but had a quick method of finding out. She asked the daughter if “they” had given a plastic bag to be carried to a building which she pointed out, to be deposited there. This had not happened. The nurse declared that if there had been any need for testing for cancer they would surely have given a plastic bag to the patient’s relatives to be carried to the other building. Removal of the uterus? Yes, of course! She was sure that would have been done.

We were disturbed by this during the following days. Why did they treat patients the way veterinary doctors treat animals? No need to talk to them and tell them about what was being done to them? If we had seen the case sheet or other information sheet meant for the patient’s information, would it have been in a form readable by the patient? Would it have been in the local language Sakunthala could read, or in English which she cannot read, or in squiggles?

Ours is a city in which the street names cannot be read by a high percentage of the people because the local government considers it politically unwise to display street names in any language other than the state’s official language. But when it comes to giving information to the patient? If you can’t read English and do not recognize medical abbreviations, you are treated like the veterinary doctor’s patients!

I guess that we ought to be happy that India gives some form of medical care to every one, whether they can pay for it or not, irrespective of what the care is worth! There are well developed economies in the world that do not wish to provide universal health care. Our citizens are better off, in a manner of speaking! But can we improve our practices? Can hospitals treat patients not as a burden but as their customers? After all, it is the people’s money that the hospital runs on, not on anyone’s inheritance! Shouldn’t hospitals have a patient’s charter and enforce it?

S. Ramani

National Disasters

India has been patiently waiting for 80-odd hours for news of the 5-year old Mahi who fell into a bore-well which had been dug without permission from any authority overseeing building codes. Visit

http://indiatoday.intoday.in/video/gurgaon-rescuers-reach-5-year-old-girl-mahi-who-fell-into-a-borewell-after-80-hours/1/202142.html

Lodged at the bottom of a 70 foot well, her life has been endangered by lack of oxygen. There have been spirited debates on television about the lack of coordination in the rescue effort. I hope that the child will come out alive out of this horrible experience, thanks to the brave men of the Indian army who have risked their own lives in the effort to rescue her.

What does the nation have to learn from this “accident”? TV anchors have yelled at the authorities who had turned a blind eye to a bore-well being dug in close proximity to a residential building. The callous builders have left the well uncapped, knowing that it is a death-trap for children going near it. I think of the general disregard for the law in the construction industry. This is not isolated as road accidents claim tens of thousands of lives every year due to disregard for traffic rules. Non-implementation of traffic rules is something India has accepted without any protest. Yesterday I travelled a hundred kilometers on a toll road after sunset and passed well over a hundred trucks. Very few had red lights on at the back. School buses regularly crush children while reversing, because the drivers are unfit to be trusted with any vehicle – none of them has any difficulty in buying a driver’s license.

Coming back to lax implementation of building codes – an astute commentator on TV said “If there is an earthquake in Delhi tomorrow, hundreds of thousands will die”. What agency can deal with ten thousand buildings collapsing at one stroke? How will the hospitals cope with the event? The situation looks bleak for many cities and towns in India. The majority of buildings have violated building codes one way or another. They are death-traps as surely as uncapped bore-wells are.

Corruption is not confined to the politicians and high level bureaucrat. It is rampant in every city administration. Mahi’s plight should wake up the nation to this peril. I hope it does.

I will conclude by referring to the Wikipedia which says that the word bureaucrat is one of the toughest words to spell. Tongue in cheek, it suggests using the abbreviation “crat”!

Focus on e-Content for Education, particularly in Indian Languages

1.   I will focus on one topic that is going to be very important for India over the next ten years and beyond.  

2.   I am talking about e-books or books in the digital form, particularly those in Indian languages. What is special about them, as compared to traditional books? The effort required to create the manuscript is the same in the two cases. But, there are two major differences:

a.   The cost of production is zero. Once the first copy is ready, it costs practically nothing to produce the later copies. Low cost tablets will be available widely, and every educational institution would be capable of providing WiFi access to the Web. Every tablet would be able to carry hundreds of e–books, if not thousands. 

b.   e-books in Indian languages are very few. The tools for putting manuscripts into e-book are not available. Standards have not been evolved for e-book formats.

3.   There are plenty of writers in various fields in India, and academics who can decide what books are most badly needed and are likely to be widely used. But, let us not under-estimate the significance of the technologists who need to show how we should face e-book revolution that is staring us in the face, and is going to have a greater impact on India than even the green revolution.

4.   Inexpensive computing devices are coming up rapidly – starting with tablets. There will be a whole variety of them, manufactured by various manufacturers. I am excited by the low-end book readers – I bought a Kindle Touch for about Rs 5,000, using an impressive e-ink display that allows me to change font size as needed to read under different conditions. It is small, very light, is quite rugged, and has a battery life of over a month!
 

5.   All I want to take from the tablet discussion is that there will be millions of them in students’ hands sooner or later. This will require content in Indian languages – thousands of e-books, with millions of copies needed in the case of each one of them. The content will cost a lot more than the tablets will.
     

6.   I believe that there are over 70,000 public libraries in India, over a hundred and fifty thousand high school libraries, and over 30,000 college libraries. For the moment, consider the cost of acquiring copies of ten thousand modern books for each of these libraries. This will cost Rs 25,000 Crores. Now consider that you may need copies of about 20 books a year for each of the millions of tablets Indian students will acquire. There has been a lot of discussion about making tablet hardware inexpensive, but none about producing e-content in Indian languages.

7.   We need lots of ideas to deal with problems like this. I will discuss just one. Imagine a project which encourages those who write useful, good quality books for use in libraries. Let this project select 100 such books in any of the languages of interest to India including English, and give national awards with a cash payment Rs 200,000 each to the selected writers. This will cost Rs 2 Crores per year. Those whose books are not selected for the award will retain the commercial interest to their creations and will be free to take them to any commercial publisher. The awardees, on the other hand, will be expected to transfer all rights to the Govt of India, except the copyright in its non-commercial form. This will ensure their name as the author, along with a short bio, to be retained in every copy to be distributed. I would propose that that these books be made free to download all over the world. Books in most Indian languages will be of significant value only in India, but those in English may be very attractive in many other countries. This will enhance the visibility and prestige of Indian authors.  What about those who prefer printed copies? The project can authorize any and every publisher to print and sell copies of the books.

8.   Let me come back to the technical issues in creating e-content. We need to sort them out before we plan any major content creation project. What are the essential requirements? How much flexibility should we give to implementers and e-book creators? How important is it that the lowest cost devices should be able to benefit from e-content produced Govt funds?

      S. Ramani