Book Review- Drone Warfare: Killing by remote

Wreaking havoc sans the risks

The book ‘Drone Warfare: Killing by remote’ by Medea Benjamin is an excellent work which has very lucidly covered every facet involved with the use of drones or UAVs. The history of combat and warfare has been witness to revolutions which altered the face of the war. The same is happening now with the prolific use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) for not just surveillance but also espionage and real time situation awareness of the scene of action. The same UAVs are today delivering payloads on the perceived enemy and the man flying the machine is sitting in an air-conditioned room oblivious of the vagaries of the war ground.

The use of these pilotless aerial flying machines is deemed to be the new game changers when the real man-to-man war of attrition is seemed to be gradually heading to obsolescence. The valor involved in penetrating the enemies’ territory and conducting missions in the face of the enemy fire might become a story of the yore. But there are issues like collateral damage, human rights violation, and breech of privacy as the mission operations of these pilotless flying machines are going to be multifaceted.

Even if these drones will be operated to knock-off an enemy or a militant, questions which immediately pop up relate to how one could confirm that targets are not civilians? How does a UAV ensure it never launches strikes against people not directly participating in hostilities? And these questions are relevant because of the large number of civilian casualties which get reported from Pakistan and Afghanistan which are the epicenter of most of the UAV missions being operated by the USA and UK.

The entire wiring of the intelligence provider, operator of these machines and the people involved in analyzing the received information has huge gaps. Let’s anticipate that signal intelligence or technical intelligence or human Intelligence received from the ground is precise, even in that case the area of operation remains dynamic which poses a risk to innocent life. Precisely these very reasons have brought the Pakistan Government and USA in a confrontation as the lives lost on ground in Pakistan have created a swell of anti-administration demonstration.

A tall man in a robe could be anybody. Even if the target is found to be right, how could one stop the damage in the periphery. There are umpteen examples like 24 Pakistani soldiers killed, one man knocked out in front of the mosque but the projectiles killing another 16 inside the mosque. Also, there are children, women and animals who if not killed are maimed for life. And they are also left with a psychological scar, something like the post trauma stress disorder, which keeps stirring within them throughout the life. Apart from these issues, there are legal and human rights issues, while we keep the battle field or security and defence requirements at bay.

The book is a thorough research on the kind of missions these drones are performing in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya or Iraq. It touches upon the influence of the manufacturers on the administration whether it is USA, UK or Israel which, as of now, have put these drones into maximum use. The research is not just about the bases within these countries but also those bases in Seychelles, Saudi Arabia, UAE, and Turkey which are buzzing with these machines and their operators and handlers. Back home, as brought out by Medea Benjamin in the book, lobbies are using every means to push the interest of the manufacturers. The companies involved in defence production like Lockheed martin, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, Rafael Advanced Defence Systems Limited have other companies like AeroVironment which specialize in mini drones of the size of Humming Birds or wasp and experimenting with technologies which can switch their role as per the need and mission. Medea has very interestingly detailed the web of means employed to grease the wheels to push the manufacturer’s interests and benefits.

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Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

IIPM’s Management Consulting Arm-Planman Consulting
Professor Arindam Chaudhuri – A Man For The Society….
IIPM: Indian Institute of Planning and Management
IIPM makes business education truly global
Management Guru Arindam Chaudhuri
Rajita Chaudhuri-The New Age Woman

ExecutiveMBA

Payback Time?

With global diplomacy playing its part and an army showing signs of resilience, the Assad regime in Syria seems to be regaining its composure once again, says Saurabh Kumar Shahi

While the world was focussing on the goings on in the Middle East, the Syrian Arab Army under the leadership of President Bashar al-Assad, achieved a major tactical victory this week in its fight against a mishmash of home grown rebels and foreign mercenaries. The Syrian army successfully captured the tactically important town of Qusayr. And by doing so, it has reopened the transport route between Damascus and Lebanon, something which was closed for more than six months now, while denying it as a resupply line for the insurgents in Homs Governate. There are several versions of how the rebels lost the battle and the town and none of them give a definitive story of what actually happened in northSyria this week. However, there appears to be a growing consensus on why they lost it and are poised to lose further.

The single biggest reason that appears to have started turning the tide is that even after months of fighting, the morale of Syrian Arab Army remains very strong and there is no visible cracks in the military itself. This is an extremely important sign. The army has been stretched thin in the initial 14 to 15 months of unrest. It was also stretched because it had failed to concentrate on key areas.


Also, in the initial days the opposition opened several fronts, especially those where training was being provided by Jordan and Turkey. And that is why deployment was stretched to its optimum to stop these leaks. However, this was less affective as the opposition resorted to hit and run tactics that bled the army quite profusely. This strategy has been changed at several fronts. Broadly the new strategy appears to be on these lines.

First, the Syrian Arab Army decided to withdraw from those areas that were not tactically important or are at least less important than others. This was followed by the consolidation of important areas, which gave the army a chance to mount coordinated attack on the opposition strongholds. It has also helped them withdraw and consolidate arms and weapons in their strongholds and stopping them from falling into opposition’ hands, as was the case in the past. This three-pronged strategy has helped the Syrian Arab Army in not only retaining their strongholds from falling into the hands of highly motived and armed rebels but also recapturing some of those territories it has lost in the last few months.

Apart from this there are other aspects that are very visible. The biggest of them is the army's ability to strongly withstand pressure from the opposition. After months of small and big scale defections and desertions, the Syrian Arab Army has now stabalised and have dropped to a trickle. Sources close to TSI say that during the second half of 2012, an average of 400 to 700 soldiers from the army were defecting every month. That figure has now dropped down to 10 to 12 defections every month, which the sources added, are `very manageable.'

Also, unlike 2012, there is little discontent amongst the officers corps - evident in decreasing number of defections while all such occurences are now limited to the level of soldiers and that too in the logistics department.

It is also very interesting to note here that the core of the conscription of the Syrian Arab Army that is still very Sunni in its formation, has remained consolidated to this day and there has been no apparent crack in that support base although the rebels have tried to project the unrest as a Sunni versus Alawite conflict.

Similarly, the minority conscripts as well as the officers, drawn from Christians, Druze and Kurds, have stuck it together displaying solidarity and camraderie. 

While the insurgency continues to retreat slowly but steadily, Russia's maneuvering has been successful in deterring any chance of an outright western intervention which was rated high on the cards at one point of time not too long in the past.

“According to the Geneva plan the United States and Russia will convene a conference with the aim to finding some consensual new Syrian government with each side promising to bring its supported party to the table. For Russia that will be easy to do. The Syrian government has always agreed to such talks and is willing to send a delegation that will discuss the various issues and compromises, where required.

But the United States itself has a huge problem on hand. It has little leverage over a large disjointed Syrian opposition. How can it then deliver on the promises it made? There are two identified groups the US is interacting with: the Syrian National Coalition (SNC) and the Free Syrian Army through General Idriss. To these groups the US can give or withhold money, equally it can give or withhold arms. But what is the SNC's leverage on ground and who, except the Muslim Brotherhood, does it really represent? And if the U.S. withholds money from them, will Qatar and other sources do the same,” questions noted Middle East expert Bernhard, who has kept a close eye on the Syrian crisis.

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Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

IIPM’s Management Consulting Arm-Planman Consulting
Professor Arindam Chaudhuri – A Man For The Society….
IIPM: Indian Institute of Planning and Management
IIPM makes business education truly global
Management Guru Arindam Chaudhuri
Rajita Chaudhuri-The New Age Woman

ExecutiveMBA

Travel became a travail

It is dangerous for Indian Muslims to travel to Pakistan as tourists as I realised
FIROZ BAKHT AHMED ,SOCIAL COMMENTATOR AND GRAND NEPHEW OF ABUL KALAM  

My honeymoon with Lahore - my dream city, a place of fun and frolic and home to world’s best institutions like Aitchison College and Punjab University, eateries like Salt’n Pepper Village, Food Street and Zaiqa and water parks like, Sozo Water Park, Joy Land Park and Starlet shoes - has ended. During my second — and perhaps last visit there - from June 4 to June 13, I found ourselves: me, wife and our three children at the Sarwar Road Police Station, Lahore Cantonment.

Through these columns, I implore Muslims of India never to venture into Pakistan as tourists since there is no guarantee that they would return unless they are part of some government delegation. Pakistanis loathe Indian Muslims, terming them variously as enslaved and spies. My children who were enthusiastic about visiting Lahore — a city about which famed Urdu writer Kashmiri Lal Zakir had said, “Jinne Lahore nai vekhya/wo te jamiya hi naiee!” (He, who hasn’t seen Lahore/ He isn’t even born!) - are now absolutely Pakistan phobic.

On June 9, day five of our stay in Lahore at about 5 pm, the children wanted a joyride in Joy Land Park. While we were about to enter the park, we were threatened by ISI sleuths in civil dress who had been following us from Wagha. Without our knowledge, they diverted our three-wheeler towards the Sarwar Road Police Station in the Lahore Cantonment.

In the police station, we were told that we had entered a ‘prohibited’ area. My wife said we were tourists and there were no sign posts in any case. But our interrogators had sinister designs and began preparing papers to throw us behind bars.Even if a tourist unknowingly goes to the amusement park, he can land into the hands of ISI rangers. During the grilling, they kept repeating that Pakistani tourists get even worst treatment at the hands of Indian agencies. My consistent denial demeaned me in their eyes.

We were staying at the prestigious 125-year-old Aitchison College from where our passports, visas etc, were hauled in by the police. I was wondering what threat perception we posed, an enthusiastic bunch of tourists consisting of three school going children, me and wife?

The ISI spies had plotted impeccably to snare us - only to be later victimized as Sarabjits and Surjeets for whom neither Pakistan nor India are frankly much concerned. Our arrest documents were written and passports and other papers confiscated. Fortunately, College bursar Col Mehboob, a retired army man, spoke to the police assuring them of our bonafides. Even that was not enough and I had to call the editor of The Nation. It still took us five hours to get out of the dreadful and scandalous clutches of ISI officers after a written apology.

Pakistan, unfortunately, is run by ISI agents and its military. They are suspicious of all Indians. The `soft corner’ for Pakistan, after this treatment has absolutely vanished, particularly against the country’s intelligence apparatus. Bigwigs there are double faced and can do a ‘U’ turn at the drop of a hat, a reason why that country is on the verge of disaster.

At the police station, I could not help but wonder: the El Dorado that Quad-e-Azam Mohammed Ali Jinnah created as a dreamland of Muslims after thousands of sacrifices, is not even a semblance of the dream he had spun. Pakistan’s landscape is dominated by terrorism, corruption, inflation, honour killings and sectarianism - to name just a few burning problems.

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Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

IIPM’s Management Consulting Arm-Planman Consulting
Professor Arindam Chaudhuri – A Man For The Society….
IIPM: Indian Institute of Planning and Management
IIPM makes business education truly global
Management Guru Arindam Chaudhuri
Rajita Chaudhuri-The New Age Woman

ExecutiveMBA

"Taihoku plane crash is the most probable theory"

Anita Bose Pfaff was an infant when she last met her father. She grew up under the burden of being the only bloodline of Subhash Chandra Bose – Netaji – one of India’s most celebrated freedom fighters, who some some scholars believe, could have posed a stiff challenge to Jawaharlal Nehru to become India’s first Prime Minister.  Netaji’s death in the wee hours of World War II remains one of the great unsolved mysteries of modern times. Three probe panels (headed by former INA lieutenant Shah Nawaz Khan, Justice G D Khosla and Justice M K Mukherjee) probed and gave different versions of his death. None was totally satisfactory and answered all questions. The last one, Mukherjee Commission, claimed even though Netaji did not die in that plane accident, he in all probability is no more because of his age. The controversy was reignited when the UPA-I government said it did not accept the findings of Mukherjee Commission. Bose’s daughter Anita Bose Pfaff did not embrace politics though her husband was in active politics in Germany. Instead she preferred academics. Both she and husband Martin, whom she met in Bangalore four decades ago, are ex-professors at the University of Augusburg, Germany. Though Pfaff lives in Europe, she visits India frequently and keeps in touch with the Bose family in Kolkata. Excerpts of an exclusive wide-ranging interview with Kakoli Ray.

What is the first memory of your father?
ABP: I had no first memory as I was only four weeks old when he saw me last. All my memories are second hand.

KR: Was it a photograph on the wall, a book or any other item – how did you relate to your father first time?
ABP: My mother (Emilie Schenkl) kept photographs of my father so I saw him in photos. But beyond that it is difficult to pin it down to a particular time because a child does not relate to the political situation. That was all rather abstract, which did not mean anything. I learnt he was a famous person but as a child that didn’t mean very much. I learnt more from intimate contact with some my father’s family members who lived with us in Vienna later.

KR: When did Bose family members come to Vienna?
ABP: I met my first cousin in 1947. I was about four-and-half when my uncle -- my father’s second brother Sarat Bose – came with his wife and three children to meet us. Two of his children stayed in Vienna somewhat longer, up to eight to ten years, from 1949-50  to 1961-62.

KR: Can you share some of the anecdotes about your father which you heard from your mother?
ABP: I did not hear it from my mother but from conclusions of a grown up woman, I can tell you he was a terrible husband. He was married to a woman but his first and foremost love was something else leaving his wife to play the second or third fiddle. But my mother never criticised or complained. I came to that conclusion later on. When I was a child there were many others who grew up without a father because a number of them were killed in World War-II. So that was not so unusual. Ultimately he led a life which he decided to live. Originally he planned to leave before I was born, which did not happen because the news had leaked out. He had to postpone his departure as leaving early was too dangerous. The difference with others (fathers of other children in school) were they were conscripted in the army. My parents had spent relatively little time together.

KR: How much time?
ABP: About five years. They used to correspond as that generation was very good at writing letters. The time spent together was not very long. There was work and a lot of travel. But not very much of what we call normal family life.

KR: Did they travel or stay at home?
ABP: Since my father’s health was not all that good, they went to some spa now and then. The longest time they spent together was in Rome.

KR: Do you remember the Taihoku plane accident (in which Netaji was killed) ?
ABP: No, I was too young. I was only two-and-half years old when that happened. I only heard details from my mother when I was 8.

KR: His death continues to be a mystery and returns to the news every now and then. Recently the Allahabad High Court has asked UP government to probe the mysterious Gumnami baba.
ABP:There are some bizarre tales. The story about Gumnami baba is one of them. Justice Mukherjee who investigated my father’s death, examined many of these bizarre stories but came to  the  conclusion that they were not true. Its also strange how rumours start. Somebody starts speculating, others pick up and in the end something absolutely nonsensical comes up. For example I heard a story in Kolkata this time that I will return with my father’s ashes and will hold a press conference on January 23. This is total nonsense.

KR: Do you believe the findings on the Taihoku plane accident?
ABP: It is a fairly consistent story though not one hundred per cent consistent. If  you ask people you will get identical versions from everybody on plane. It sounds quite plausible. Other stories are speculative and unsubstantiated.

KR: Are there any particular missing pieces of puzzle in the crash report?
ABP: I have not investigated it myself. The Mukherjee Commission came to the conclusion that he did not die in that plane accident (It concluded that the accident story was concocted by the Japanese army and Bose’s comrade Habibur Rahman to create a smokescreen for his escape. The Mukherjee Commission could not find any conclusive and convincing evidence of what happened there. For example, the death certificate is not available. The doctor who was alive till a few years ago did not know what happened to it. Naturally he won’t keep the death certificate. By the end of World War II, and even though Japanese were particular in documenting things, they would not necessarily do that few days after the end of such a major war and ten days after the bombardment of Nagasaki and Hiroshima. It sounds to  me quite plausible and in fact it might be suspicious if they were safekeeping documents under the circumstances. While getting out of that area they probably decided which document to take and what to destroy. It seems plausible that Japanese won’t necessarily have such documentation under such circumstances. By and large that seems to be the most consistent account. There were sufficient number of eye witnesses. The children of people who died in that crash also gave corroborating statements.

KR: Did you speak to Col Habibur Rahman? He was the only Indian who accompanied Bose on that famous 90-day submarine journey from Europe to Japan and was with Bose even in the plane. He survived the reported crash and deposed before the Shah Nawaz Committee.
ABP: Unfortunately not. He was in Pakistan when I was in India first and I never visited Pakistan. My mother wanted me to meet him but I was not staying that long (in India) and it was complicated to get permissions to visit Pakistan.

Read more....

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

IIPM’s Management Consulting Arm-Planman Consulting
Professor Arindam Chaudhuri – A Man For The Society….
IIPM: Indian Institute of Planning and Management
IIPM makes business education truly global
Management Guru Arindam Chaudhuri
Rajita Chaudhuri-The New Age Woman

ExecutiveMBA

How to serve the unbanked!

We need new banking systems that work for the poor

The last time that licences were given out for setting up private banks in India was way back in 2004. The Reserve Bank of India, vide its guidelines on February 22, 2013, has once again got the ball rolling on the issue of allowing entry of private banks into the Rs.73 trillion banking sector. It is hoped that more banks in the country would lead to the government achieving its target of providing access to financial services for the entire bankable population. With 720 million potential users still remaining outside the banking framework, there is a huge gap that the banking industry could help to bridge.

But deepening of financial inclusion requires providing access to services and credit to a large number of highly dispersed and often remotely located individuals and agents. This raises transaction costs significantly, which if passed on to clients in the form of higher interest rates would price banks operating in rural areas out of the market. The billion rupee question is: Will the new bank entrants be willing to run the gauntlet and serve the objectives of financial inclusion even at the cost of taking a hit to their bottom line?

As private banks cannot justify on commercial grounds the business model that allows them to deal with the triple whammy of low savings balances, small transaction sizes and a large number of customers, they will typically pull back their physical presence in rural areas to discourage the custom of poor. But to ensure that the objective of financial inclusion is met, it is essential that poor people are ensured of low-cost ways of transacting. The ability to undertake remote transactions is therefore a key element of financial accessibility.

To achieve universal banking access, new banking systems are needed that work for the poor and yet are commercially sustainable. Will the new licensees be able to meet these requirements?

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Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

2012 : DNA National B-School Survey 2012
Ranked 1st in International Exposure (ahead of all the IIMs)
Ranked 6th Overall
Zee Business Best B-School Survey 2012
Prof. Arindam Chaudhuri’s Session at IMA Indore
IIPM IN FINANCIAL TIMES, UK. FEATURE OF THE WEEK
IIPM strong hold on Placement : 10000 Students Placed in last 5 year

BBA Management Education

If Amazon took six years to break even, so will they. [Will they?]

E-commerce’s fight against brick-and-mortar format is public enough. Especially with the rise in count of web-shoppers in India, dotcom outlets are fast becoming common nouns. But there is much left to overcome before they start making money By Bachan Thakur

The last two decades have seen a transformation in the Indian retail landscape. From mom-and-pop stores to supermarkets and malls to online buying; the change has been radical.

A busy lifestyle and the convenience that online space provides, is leading Indians to shop with their fingers. But, online shopping is still in its infancy in India. There are barriers that prevent it from becoming popular faster than it actually is. Questions regarding credibility of merchants, doubts over quality of goods, security regarding online payment gateways, and mostly the culture-based attitude of our cash-oriented society are only a few. But all this has not deterred a host of e-commerce players in India, like Flipkart, Jabong, Myntra, Indiatimes, Snapdeal, Homeshop18, Yebhi and others, from wooing the Indian customer with world-class services and products.

No surprise then that these players are investing heavily on product differentiation, technology, customer service and advertising. That these players want themselves to get heard and seen is good news.

In recent months, players like Jabong, Groupon, Snapdeal, Myntra and eBay have particularly become loud about who they are and what they have to offer. A recent market report by eMarketer shows that online advertisement spending in India has grown from $0.25 billion in 2010 to $0.48 billion in 2012. Online portals are thus working hard to build brand recall. Be it online marketing through social media sites like Facebook and Twitter or improving visibility on offline vehicles like TV, Print and Radio, these e-tailers are investing big bucks in promoting themselves.

So the fight is on – differentiate, impress buyers and get cash flow positive. But that is where the problem lies. E-tailers in India haven’t still learnt the trick of making money from this much-hyped virtual shop business. A 2012 Technopak Report confirms this. The frenzy to attain a critical mass of consumers through whom they can start to make money is leading to consumer acquisition through heavy discounting (even lower than costs) and mass media advertising, resulting in very high customer acquisition costs (about Rs.1,000 to Rs.1,400 per customer as per various industry executives). Thus, to differentiate and gain consumer loyalty, e-tailers are fighting it out on the pricing front.

As such, the e-commerce business in India is increasingly become a game where the last man standing may turn out to be the biggest loser! Little wonder that this space has already witnessed consolidations. According to data compiled by Microsoft’s India Accelerator Programme, of the 379 technology product start-ups launched until October 2012, 193 were e-commerce firms, and 87 of these – including Shopveg.in, Taggle.com and Letsbuy.com – have ceased to exist. Letsbuy.com was bought by Flipkart in February 2012, while Myntra acquired Exclusively.in. Online retailers like Lensstreet.com and Dealivore.com also saw closures in 2012.

In due course of time, strategic shifts will take place in the e-commerce space, and more smaller and non-serious players will get wiped out, leaving behind clear leaders. As per Rajesh Nahar, CEO and Founder, Cbazaar.com, “E-commerce businesses in India should have a very smart balance in planning organic and inorganic growth of customer acquisition and revenue. The moment a company tries to accelerate inorganic growth by acquiring customers at a high cost and offering products at discounted rates, it will get very hard for it to get into the profitable zone.”

The Indian e-tailing story has also appeared very promising to investors. These investments have enabled players to grow and scale up quickly. Investment in the online retail space exceeded $500 million in 2011. But failure rates of e-tailers is disheartening.

To stay alive in the business, e-tailers have already started tweaking their business models. One example is Flipkart. It started in 2007 as an online books retailer, but has today extended its portfolio to media (games, music and movies), mobile phones (and accessories), personal care products, home appliances, watches, belts, bags, luggage and toys. Unlike two years back when all you would have heard of in the name of Snapdeal was discount coupons for various services, today, 95% of its offering basket is filled with products!

Limited availability of brands in Tier-I and II locations is driving consumers to shop online. And e-tailers are paying attention. One of them is Jabong. The company has put in place 55,000 special packaging units (as on January 2013) to ensure the shortest possible time of delivery. At present, the company offers same-day delivery only across metros. In 2013, tier II cities would enjoy the facility. And by 2015, expect the company to replicate the same across tier III towns. Says Manu Jain, MD, Jabong.com, “In 2013, we will ensure that we follow the same day delivery concept in tier II cities as well.”

E-tailers are experimenting with new methods to engage end-consumers. Trends like cash-on-delivery (COD), replacement of goods if found unsuitable, delivery-post-trial et al are on a rise. States Sharat Dhall, President, Yatra.com, “We have invested aggressively in consumer-friendly processes...” This fight against brick-and-mortar has become loud already. But the traditional retail format is not going anywhere soon. Think of the challenges that online companies face. India has over 6500 e-commerce companies and most of them are struggling with problems relating to payment options, logistics, infrastructure and consumer service. An e-tailer can tempt a consumer once, but if the erosion of trust starts from the very delivery stage, that brand can expect little in the name of word-of-mouth marketing.

Read more....

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

2012 : DNA National B-School Survey 2012
Ranked 1st in International Exposure (ahead of all the IIMs)
Ranked 6th Overall
Zee Business Best B-School Survey 2012
Prof. Arindam Chaudhuri’s Session at IMA Indore
IIPM IN FINANCIAL TIMES, UK. FEATURE OF THE WEEK
IIPM strong hold on Placement : 10000 Students Placed in last 5 year

BBA Management Education

Blank prescriptions!

There exists a huge shortage of doctors in rural areas

Every other day, a new government offers a building to open a private hospital – Max, Apollo, Fortis are just some of players to name a few. Many think that the emergence of private hospitals will fast replace the poor government health-care infrastructure and help improve the overall health care of the country. But statistics are not in support of that. India’s shattered health-care system proved again that it has yet to go far to claim it is shining. A few facts will remove the myths. 42% of the children are malnourished in India, which is worse than even the Sub Saharan Africa figure of 28%. Shockingly, even though the economy grew 50% over the period of 2001-06, the rate of malnourishment declined by only 1%. 1.72 million children die every year before reaching the age of one year. India has now the 3rd highest number of HIV patients in the world.

Indian hospitals have a poor infrastructure and are severely ill-equipped with poor technology. Indian doctors do not have access to modern technology for the health care system. Moreover, the doctor to patient ratio is abysmally low. India has one doctor against 1,953 people. The total number of registered doctors in the country is only 5.5 lakh against such a massive population. There are many reasons for that too. Firstly, limitation of medical seats is hindering the supply of doctors in good volumes. Secondly, there is a massive migration of Indian doctors abroad. While the cost of reform may seem high, the cost of non-reform, if one goes by the World Health Organization’s calculation, would be higher. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that India’s GDP could be pulled back by 5% by 2015 and the country would suffer this economic loss due to the deaths caused by the various diseases.

Healthcare expenditure remains barely above 1%, which should reach 2.5% as is the case with the developed nations. Even though India has planned to invest $86 billion (Rs 3.7 lakh crore) over the next 15 years, with past experience, it is quite possible that India would not be able to reach the present hospital bed density levels like Brazil, China and the current world average. In a 2008 study focusing on the Ujjain district, researchers found that about 61% (almost 1.1 million people) of that district’s population live in rural areas, served by only 39 professionally qualified doctors.

Read more.....

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

2012 : DNA National B-School Survey 2012
Ranked 1st in International Exposure (ahead of all the IIMs)
Ranked 6th Overall
Zee Business Best B-School Survey 2012
Prof. Arindam Chaudhuri’s Session at IMA Indore
IIPM IN FINANCIAL TIMES, UK. FEATURE OF THE WEEK
IIPM strong hold on Placement : 10000 Students Placed in last 5 year

BBA Management Education

Book Review: Our Moon Has Blood Clots

The agony of deracination

Our Moon Has Blood Clots by journalist Rahul Pandita is not a mere personal memoir that begins when he, as a 14-year-old, was forced to leave Srinagar amid shrill cries for azadi the Kashmir Valley. It revives the memories of Rahul and thousands of Kashmiri Pandits of the good life they had in the Valley, of how they built it and  how suddenly they were evicted from their own homes and turned into refugees in their own country, and how they suffered in exile. It also tells us how they continue to suffer in exile.

Over 258 pages, the book records over how hundreds of people were tortured and killed and how about 3,50,000 Kashmiri Pandits were uprooted during the last three decades. Pandita, who is the author of the bestselling Hello, Bastar: the Untold Story of India’s Maoist Movement and co-author of the critically acclaimed The Absent State, narrates how Kashmiri Pandits were at the receiving end of the atrocities of 14th-century Sikander Butshikan, the 18th-century Afghan Durranis, the 1947 Qabuli Raid. This, in a way, gives the rader the sense that exile was virtually pre-ordained for the Kashmiri Pandits.

Pandita presents a deeply personal, powerful and unforgettable story of Kashmiri Pandits by narrating his own sufferings and tragedy that equally fell on the community. More gripping and moving is the massacre of 23 people in Wandhama, Ganderbhal district. Vinod Dhar, who, as a  14-year old, was the sole witness to this cold-blooded butchery of his near and dear ones, currently works in the State Secretariat. Dhar realises how this one particular incident in his life has left a psychological scar on him.

Pandita, who has reported extensively from war zones in India and elsewhere, tries to establish that the madness of Islamic fundamentalists against Kashmiri Pandits enjoyed popular support and complicity of ordinary Kashmiri Muslims. “Killings of the Hindu minority,” Pandita writes, “had turned into an orgy; a kind of blood lust. By April 1990, the mask was completely off. It was not only the armed terrorist who took pride in such killings – the common man on the streets participated in some of these heinous murders as well.” This is the central theme. The author shows how Pandits became a target of a brutal ethnic cleansing. He points to the case of telecom engineer BK Ganjoo, who was shot dead in his attic by militants after a neighbour directed them to his hiding place.

Similarly, he sees a trend in how the leading actors showed callous disregard to the plight of the Pandits while the organs of the state were aiding and abetting locals in usurping their properties. For instance, 12 days after leading lawyer and Kashmiri Pandit leader Tika Lal Taploo was killed by militants in September 1989, the then Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah performed a small piece of classical dance along with Yamini Krishnamurthy during a cultural function at the Martand temple. Later, the CM assured that militancy would end soon.

In the backdrop of a multi-party delegation visiting Kashmir, a veteran communist leader Reshi Dev, who was a Kashmiri Pandit, appraised CPM leader Harikishan Singh Surjeet and asked him to raise his voice against the brutality that had been unleashed against the Pandit community.  ‘Aisee baatien chaleti rehti hein (such things keep on happening)’ he shot back.

The tide soon turned against India with a series of bomb blasts against symbols of Indianness - India Coffee House, Punjab National Bank, Press Trust of India.

Moulded by numerous narratives, incidents of anti-Hindu feelings experienced as a teenager and shabby treatment meted out as a refugee in Jammu, Pandita also takes on the Indian intellectual class that has refused to acknowledge the suffering of the Pandits and how the Indian media, who see the brutalization of Kashmiris at the hands of the Indian state, has failed to see how the same people also victimized another people (read Kashmiri Pandits).

Read more.....

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

2012 : DNA National B-School Survey 2012
Ranked 1st in International Exposure (ahead of all the IIMs)
Ranked 6th Overall
Zee Business Best B-School Survey 2012
Prof. Arindam Chaudhuri’s Session at IMA Indore
IIPM IN FINANCIAL TIMES, UK. FEATURE OF THE WEEK
IIPM strong hold on Placement : 10000 Students Placed in last 5 year

BBA Management Education

When Mobiles Crack crime

Parimal Peeyush and K.S Narayanan report how the police and criminals play hide and seek with cell phones.
Ever since the mobile phone revolution swept across India, cops and sleuths have found the ubiquitous handset and the mobile towers to be a very handy tool in solving crimes of all types.This has been borne out by the manner in which the cops claim to have solved the two recent sensational cases involving liquor baron Ponty Chaddha and real estate tycoon cum erstwhile BSP leader Deepak Bharadwaj. Rapid advances in technology have turned an ordinary mobile phone into a potent tool not only for criminals, but also for law enforcement agencies.

The advent of technology in the past two decades has seen the world, including India, take a giant leap in the way that people communicate and share information. The Information, communication and technology revolution has seen mobile phones evolve from being a mere replacement to desk phones to a sophisticated modus operandi for criminals. Law enforcement agencies, as a result, are today faced with this persistent challenge of keeping pace with technology in order to check crime and maintain law and order.

Take the case of the Bharadwaj murder as an instance. Call records have helped the police establish how the murder plan was hatched and also revealed key conspirators. An analysis of the call detail records of the alleged conspirators in the Bhardwaj murder case point to a plan where the assailants tried to wipe off every trace of their movements. The conspirators communicated only through SMSes and would switch off their phones before heading out to meet either at a parking lot or outside a school in Vasant Kunj, next to the lawyer's residence, to avoid their locations from being tracked, police sources said. Each person in the chain of conspirators was looking out for himself and this precisely was the reason why lawyer Baljeet Singh Sehrawat recorded his conversations with Bhardwaj's younger son Nitesh Bharadwaj, who is the main accused in the case. Sources further revealed how Nitesh, Sehrawat and Swami Pratibhanand exchanged 45 calls till five days before the incident, beginning January 2012. Later, they changed their phones and SIM cards to prevent police from tracking the IMEI number.

Lets look at another high profile case that grabbed headlines in the recent past. Investigators looking into call records of Ponty Chadha and his brother to build the exact sequence of events that led to his and brother Hardeep Chadha's murders revealed that Hardeep had a close relationship with at least two ministers in the Sheila Dikshit cabinet. These ministers - Delhi's Urban Development Minister Arvinder Singh Lovely and power minister Haroon Yusuf - are said to have been in close contact with Hardeep. Lovely reportedly talked to Hardeep and exchanged text messages almost every day. Interestingly, between November 1 and November 17, the day the brothers fought bitterly leading to the final fatal shootout, Lovely and Hardeep talked to each other 59 times.

There is an endless list of how tracking mobile records and surveillance have helped investigators uncover hidden motives and establish crime.

In fact, the first action of the police investigating an unseen crime is to seek phone records from the telecom service provider. The service providers are mandated under law to provide access of call records to law enforcement agencies as and when required. There is a strict protocol that is followed which includes a request being sent by the law enforcement agency to the service provider after it is approved and signed by the Home Secretary. In a conversation with TSI, S N Shrivastava, Special Commissioner of Police, Special Cell, Delhi Police said, “The use of these technical tools is subject to its misuse. The mandate (to facilitate surveillance and tracking) that was given to the mobile service providers was that cell phones were being used for crime.  Mobiles have become a powerful medium of communication between criminals.” He said that when a technology could be misused for destabilising law and order, any society had the right to keep such checks and balances in place. “Any surveillance or tapping that is done is under a law that is approved by Parliament. There are norms laid out that enlist the purposes for which surveillance can be done. These include national security, maintaining national integrity, public order and prevention of crime,” he added.

 “There is a proper protocol in place when law enforcement agencies request operators to monitor somebody. Each request comes to a nodal officer that every operator designates for each circuit. The nodal officer then informs a close group of people who then provide the interface. This comes to our switching centre where the LEAs are already connected. So, whenever we get any request, all we do is route the information. The service provider does not get involved in overhearing, encrypting and decrypting,” Rajan Mathews, Director General of the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) told TSI.

While call records and mobile surveillance have come in handy during investigations, there is also a flip side to it. It is not just the police that are getting smarter; with the advent of technology, there have been several instances where law breakers have managed to outsmart law keepers. Even in the case of the Bharadwaj murder, sources reveal that the prime accused Nitesh never communicated with Pratibhanand directly.  Instead, he was in touch with Sehrawat who in turn was in touch with Swami Pratibhanand. Nitesh and Sehrawat spoke only through SMSes and would plan the spot and time for the next meeting. All this was done with the intention of evading investigators.

Speaking to this magazine, Prakash Singh, a former Director General of Police, Uttar Pradesh, says that state at the forefront of tracking mobile calls to crack crime. “Many criminal gangs who unleashed terror in their neighbourhoods were eliminated by tracking mobiles. Technology is so sophisticated that one gets to know the exact location of a mobile, he says. However, Singh also cautions that criminals are invariably one step ahead of law enforcement agencies. “The police have to constantly upgrade their technology, coordination and intelligence to make arrest and breakthroughs. It is a useful tool. Nevertheless challenges continue to surmount,” he added. Dinesh Bhatt, a former senior police official currently serving as a member of the Uttarakhand Public Service Commission also believes that keeping abreast with technology is a big challenge. “But the new crop of police officials are doing a wonderful job,” he says, adding, “the young lot that we have today are well-versed with the use of complicated technologies and are committed to cracking crime with its help. It is all about adapting and implementing,” Bhatt says.

But today, checking crime by tracking mobiles is also becoming increasingly difficult. Assistant Commissioner of Police at Delhi Police's Special Cell Manish Chandra says that all criminals today know that the police uses telephone records and locations to nab them. “When a criminal knows how he is going to be caught, he will obviously take precautions for not getting caught. The basic aim is to evade arrest. Moreover, when a criminal is caught and sent to jail, he gets all the training that is required on how not to get caught,” says Chandra. The time spent in jail helps him understand the errors that he could make and once he is out, he is bound never to make those mistakes. “Criminals who are today getting caught with the use of mobile technology are either first timers or with a really low IQ,” Chandra added.

Things, however, were not so difficult earlier. There was a phase when technology was moving ahead and nabbing criminals with the help of telephones. “As on date, you take my word, you cannot catch a criminal only with the use of telephone records,” says Chandra, adding that the most essential and fundamental factor is human intelligence. It could be used later to establish a crime or conspiracy or motive. We are going to see an increase in the reliance upon human intelligence to catch criminals, he says. It can be source-based or through undercover operations of infiltration by the police. “In the past 8 to 10 years, the focus on human intelligence had taken a back seat. We found a tool in mobile technology where we could track, intercept and crack cases sitting in one place. Now, the criminals have overtaken us. More reliance needs to be put upon human intelligence,” Chandra emphasises.

The use of mobile surveillance or tracking during investigation, however, is not new. In fact, it has existed ever since mobile phones arrived in India. For the record, it was a condition for granting telecom licenses in 1995. There is a clear mandate that if a law enforcement agency requests interception of a particular subscriber, the service provider has to comply. Requests are made under the Indian Telegraph Act, 1911. Tracking of suspects has become a normal procedure in the course of investigation today. Be it crime, financial frauds such as the Nigerian 419 scam or tracking of terror outfits and their supporters, mobile tracking is common and has existed since as early as 1995 when the first tranche of telecom licences were given out in India. Since then, the police in various cities have been at it. This, say experts, has given criminals all the more reason to give mobiles a slip.

According to a senior official, all Pakistan-based militant outfits active in Kashmir have switched over from mobile phones and satellite phones, which are easy to track. Now, it is the Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) call that is coming very handy for ISI agents and terrorists operating from Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK). The mushrooming of unregistered VoIP or Internet telephony is becoming a huge security problem as the origin of the caller and time of call cannot be ascertained immediately. Central security agencies have been pressing Department of Telecom (DoT) to ask service providers to come up with a solution for which several rounds of meetings have taken place between the, the DoT and the National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO). However, no quick fix solution has been found to block unregistered VoIPs operating from outside the country's borders.

Read more.....

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

2012 : DNA National B-School Survey 2012
Ranked 1st in International Exposure (ahead of all the IIMs)
Ranked 6th Overall
Zee Business Best B-School Survey 2012
Prof. Arindam Chaudhuri’s Session at IMA Indore
IIPM IN FINANCIAL TIMES, UK. FEATURE OF THE WEEK
IIPM strong hold on Placement : 10000 Students Placed in last 5 year

BBA Management Education

Sean Penn to 20th Century Fox

Early-1999, shortly after the release of Terrence Malick's The Thin Red Line, in which he starred, Sean Penn approached 20th Century Fox and asked for a private jet to take him to a screening of the movie in Houston. Much to his dismay, the studio refused on grounds of cost and company policy. Infuriated by the rejection, Penn wrote the following letter to the studio in response. It was very quickly leaked to the press.


January 6, 1999


To whom it may or may not concern at 20th Century Fox, et al.


The purpose of this scratchpad communique may well be as much to amuse you or inform you. Clearly, its less than humble writer has found grounds for amusement in its content.

In my continuing effort to support our shared entity, "The Thin Red Line," I have yet again run into another of the endless bureaucratic hurdles that your company relentlessly plants in my path. As a result of Terry Malick's invitation, I made plans to join Terry in supporting the film's screening, and ultimately its profile in Houston. As I have two movies, two children and (as each woman is at least two people) two wives presently in distribution, my schedule is rather hectic. I therefore requested that Mr. Murdoch's gigantic corporation might be so generous (with the money they've earned exploiting the pain and suffering of myself and my peers in their tabloids) as to supply me with a private jet to travel to Houston.
The response was a clear NO.

Two things were cited: 1) The $40,000 cost. 2) Policy. As to number 1, we at my tiny little San Francisco office went ahead and priced the cost of such a jet ourselves. In fact, it came to $16,000, which we had offered would be divided by two, as Fine Line Pictures had already committed to pay half (I would do an interview on behalf of "Hurlyburly" while I was there). Next we priced the commercial fare somewhere in the area of $2,000. The final cost differential to Mr. Murdoch's pool-heating expenses: A WHOPPING $6,000, which, against the price cut I offered in my deal to act in this movie, seemed equivalent to the fair market price of one hair on Mr. Rupert Murdoch's formidable ass. Next comes policy, the number 2 reason cited us in denial of our request. Evidently this is a word prized by Mr. Murdoch's company as I ran into it before when Mr. Malick requested that I be given an opportunity to view a videotape of the movie prior to his locking the print. I think we all know what a shameful little dance went on there, with wasted time, wasted money in the name of a policy. Has anyone at 20th Century Fox considered that it might not be my policy to do 7-figure favors for multi-national corporate interests as I did when I took the salary you paid me on "The Thin Red Line"?

Bottom line is...our policies collide. Good luck with the picture.

P.S. I know you guys don't remember what the inside of a commercial airline terminal looks like, but if you send me a picture of your jets, I'll send you a picture of the door at the Red Carpet Room. Wish I could've been in Houston. It's a beautiful movie and I'd like to have helped spread the word.

Read more....

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

IIPM’s Management Consulting Arm-Planman Consulting
Professor Arindam Chaudhuri – A Man For The Society….
IIPM: Indian Institute of Planning and Management
IIPM makes business education truly global
Management Guru Arindam Chaudhuri
Rajita Chaudhuri-The New Age Woman

ExecutiveMBA

Tashkent Ahoy!

With a potent mixture of new and old, the city of Tashkent has something or the other to offer to travellers of every budget and taste, says Saurabh Kumar Shahi

There is a flurry of images that the word Tashkent evokes inside the minds of every Indian: 1965 Indo-Pak War, the Tashkent Agreement, the sad demise of Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri and the image of his body being flown back to New Delhi. That was 1965. After that there is nothing much to recall.

But while we were busy doing what we do, some tectonic changes occurred. The Soviet Union dismantled and Uzbekistan emerged as an independent nation with Tashkent as its capital. The 90s saw developments at breakneck speed as the newly independent nation was inspired to gift itself a city worthy of being a national capital. Tashkent changed, and changed for good.

First the essentials. Uzbekistan Airways runs direct flights between Delhi and Tashkent, as well as Amritsar and Tashkent. Being a relatively new airline, Uzbekistan Airways boasts of some sparkling new carriers, a mixture of Boeing, Airbus and Ilyushin, in its fleet. The flight from Delhi takes a little over two hours and the ticket prices are affordable. The Uzbekistan Embassy in New Delhi will be eager to provide you with visa and other travel related documents provided you are going there as a tourist. Individual travelers face little problem unlike some of the famous tourist destinations nearby. In fact, the liberal visa regime has seen sudden spike in number of Indian tourists who are flocking to Uzbekistan these days.

While in Tashkent, the only hurdle that you might face will be at the Customs. The law requires you to declare every penny that you are carrying inside the country. You have to sign a declaration form that has a counterfoil and keep a stamped copy with yourself. This copy needs to be returned when you leave the country. Also, once inside Uzbekistan, tourists staying for more than three days need to get registered with the bureau. If you are staying in a hotel, the onus lies on the hotel to do it for you. Once done, you are set to explore the queen of Central Asia.

Tashkent is a well-laid out city with broad boulevards and even broader squares. Taxis are affordable but motorbikes are a strict no no. City buses are in plenty with widespread routes. But the best option to see the city around is through city's well laid metro network. A mixture of Soviet era and modern routes, the metro can be used to visit almost all the areas of new city and the downtown and a few areas in the old city as well. And, like its counterpart in Moscow, the metro stations are in themselves a delight to see. Adorned with murals and engravings, and a design reflecting Soviet era aesthetics, each metro station represents a unique theme. But as much as you feel like doing it, it is strictly prohibited to click the pictures of metro stations. The security inside the network is unprecedented and tourists are advised to keep their travel documents handy.

You can cover some sections of the city on foot. In fact, if you divide the city between the old and the new part, you can actually cover each part on foot. The city has mild and pleasant summers and bitterly cold winters with the mercury dipping way below zero. The best time to visit the city is from April to September. As there is little or no humidity, the walks are pleasant and does not exhaust you beyond a point.

There are two squares that define the new part of the city and it is in between these two that many of the attractions are situated. The city's biggest square is Mustaqillik or Independence Square and  it serves as the nerve center of the Uzbek government. Spread over an area of 30 acres by the side of the magnificent buildings of Government Secretariat and Oliy Majlis, the square draws substantial crowds at both daytime and evening.

Adorned with green zones and fountains the square is overlooked by the Arch of Independence. Nearby is the Monument to Independence and Humanism. There is a pedestal with a bronze replica of the earth on its top. On this bronze sphere, the territories of Uzbekistan are engraved. Prior to 1991, this pedestal had the statue of Lenin adorning it. Below is a statue of a seated mother with a child in her lap symbolising the new nation.
On its right is the Monument of Courage, build to commemorate the courage of the people who suffered the 1966 earthquake that almost flattened the city.

Further right is the World War II memorial dedicated to the fallen Uzbek soldiers. The monument consists of a flame and sad woman and a building with two corridors with the names of fallen written on it. The design is distinctly Japanese as it was constructed by the Japanese POWs. You can also catch a show in the adjoining Turkestan theatre which is well known for its aesthetics and acoustics.

The square is linked to another famous square, Amir Temur Square, through a boulevard locally known as Broadway. The city boasts of street artists and painters, who display and sell their original artworks. There are many shopping centers, boutiques and cafes around and spending an evening here is highly recommended. You can also catch street performers in the late evening. Also,  this is the place where you can pick some good souvenirs and Soviet era antiques. You also have the Palace of Symposiums and National Library of Uzbekistan nearby.

Read more....

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

2012 : DNA National B-School Survey 2012
Ranked 1st in International Exposure (ahead of all the IIMs)
Ranked 6th Overall
Zee Business Best B-School Survey 2012
Prof. Arindam Chaudhuri’s Session at IMA Indore
IIPM IN FINANCIAL TIMES, UK. FEATURE OF THE WEEK
IIPM strong hold on Placement : 10000 Students Placed in last 5 year

BBA Management Education

Manufacturing defects

Focus should not be only on service but manufacturing as well

The economies that focused on strengthening their manufacturing sector, post World War II, have prospered and became global economic super-power to reckon. However, in India, the manufacturing sector has been a laggard compared to the fast and racy service sector. As a result, the service sector’s contribution to the economy is 56.4 per cent compared to manufacturing sector’s 26.4 per cent. Only some patches of growth trajectory experienced by the manufacturing sector even if impressive and optimistic is never enough to catch up with the service sector in terms of employment generation and human capital exploiter.

However, the wide eyed analysts are staring at the stunning performance of the manufacturing sector that jump started from December last year delivering the highest growth rate in previous 6 months. The HSBC India Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ India (PMI) – a production measure – is ever increasing peaking in December with an impressive 54.7 points, if anything, is an indicator of rising demand and frantic purchasing. However, in spite of this high gliding manufacturing run, the employment creation bottleneck persists as it used to be. The primary reason for that is high worker to fixed capital ratio or in simple parlance capital intensive industries that has become the preferred choice for both promoters as well as the consumers. A twin and opposite development of capital intensive export products have more than doubled from 25 per cent in 1993 to 54 per cent in 2010 on one hand, and labor intensive products, which has 30 per cent share has exactly halved during the same period to 15 per cent (based on the estimate by Indira Gandhi Institute of Developmental Research). As a result, despite some erratic and sometimes notable growth in the sector the employment growth has plummeted from 2.61 per cent in 1993-94 to 1.02 per cent in 2009-10.

In contrast, the service sector is expanding in leaps and bounds producing nothing short of an eye-popping contrast! In fourth quarter of FY 2011-12 when industry sector was growing at 1.9 per cent, the service sector was striding miles ahead at 7.9 per cent. Consequently, the top 3 employment generators in India for 2012 have all come from service sector viz. Healthcare, Hospitality and IT/ITES. This paradigm is the cornerstone for even engineers from top institutes opting for service when they should be engaging themselves for manufacturing sector, for which they are trained. The fees for IIT students was a huge subsidy delivery even till the last year, when it was pegged at Rs.50,000 a year, a subsidy of Rs, 1 lakh per student per year. And where are the returns of this investment, meant to train the students as functions of manufacturing sector boost, going to? Either to the foreign shore to bolster their own industry or to IT or banking sector for which engineers are not trained in IIT at the first place! But at last the government has realized the vain nature of the fund flow and decided to off-load the subsidy burden for the IIT students. The other government engineering colleges too pins to be on the same trail and it requires some extraordinary policy measures from the HRD ministry to reverse the trend.

Read more.....

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

IIPM’s Management Consulting Arm-Planman Consulting
Professor Arindam Chaudhuri – A Man For The Society….
IIPM: Indian Institute of Planning and Management
IIPM makes business education truly global
Management Guru Arindam Chaudhuri
Rajita Chaudhuri-The New Age Woman

ExecutiveMBA

In the big league again

Indian hockey, once a powerhouse of the world game, has been looking down the barrel for decades now. However, with the advent of Hero Hockey India League (HHIL), fans have begun to see a sliver of hope.

The tournament, which features some of the world's finest players and is due to wrap up on February 10, is being telecast in 83 territories worldwide. It has put Indian hockey back in the global big league.

According to ESPN, the official broadcaster of HIL, a comprehensive line-up of global syndication partners are showcasing the first edition of the league in these many territories. Some leading names in the world of sports broadcasting like Fox Sports from Australia, Sky Sports from New Zealand, Ten Sports in Pakistan and southeast Asia and MENA region are covering HHIL live in the territories.

According to Aloke Malik, managing director, ESPN Software India, “These partnerships reinforce our commitment to set new benchmarks in the distribution of Hero Hockey India League. We look forward to working closely with all our partners and serve hockey fans all over the world with some mouth-watering high quality content.”

If Indian hockey is reemerging, the top bosses of Indian hockey will certainly love to take the credit. Dr Narinder Batra, chairman, Hero Hockey India League, said, “We are delighted to have a strong and committed broadcast partner. It is great to know that the first edition of the league can be seen by hockey fans across the world. We are confident that the popularity of the league and the game of hockey per se will greatly benefit from these international distribution tie-ups.”

Successes of HHIL
l HHIL’s broadcast in India, at the end of Week 2, has been seen by 2.27 crore hockey fans, way more than the full tournament reach of UEFA Euro 2012, which stood at 2.04 crore.

l HHIL’s reach is almost four times that of the Men’s Hockey Champions Trophy, which had a full tournament reach of 58 lakh. l HHIL’s reach is considerably higher than that of World Series Hockey, which stood at 1.24 crore individuals at the end of Week 2. l Even on the digital front, HHIL has achieved considerable success. HHIL's Facebook page has attracted more than 410,000 fans, making it the world’s largest field hockey Facebook page. l On Twitter, HHIL has trended multiple times not just in India but also in countries like the US.

HIL began with a bang. In its first week, close to 1.5 crore people watched the league. At 1.46 crore, HIL was 1.7 times UEFA Euro 2012's reach for the first six matches.

It garnered 24 times the average weekly reach of I-league. Within the first week, HIL overtook the tournament reach of the recently concluded 2012 Men's Hockey Champions Trophy. The first week TV viewership was more than double of what World Series Hockey could deliver in the first week last year. The figures released by the official broadcaster back the claims it made before HIL began.

HIL has the sanction of the international body, International Hockey Federation (FIH). To make it a global league, players from 11 countries are rubbing shoulders with each other. The league marks a giant leap for Indian hockey.

Indian fans saw a new avatar of Indian hockey when the inaugural match was played between Delhi Waveriders and Jaypee Punjab Warriors at National Stadium, Delhi.

HIL, a five-team franchise-based league, could in the long run revive a slowly decaying Indian hockey. After India missed a berth in the 2008 Beijing Olympics and then finished at the bottom in London last year, hockey administrators in this country were at their tether's end.

But gradually, over the last couple of tournaments, the young and enigmatic Sardar Singh is showing glimpses of India's past prowess and with a new professional league now in place the game could see a dramatic turnaround.

Unlike the rival World Series Hockey, 120 hockey players – including the best from India and the world – are participating in HIL. In an auction that was held along the lines to the Indian Premier League, India captain Sardar fetched the highest price. He was grabbed by Delhi for USD 78,000. India vice-captain and ace drag-flicker VR Raghunath was bought by Uttar Pradesh for USD 76,000, Australian star Jamie Dwyer went to Punjab for USD 60,000, Fuertse was taken by Ranchi for USD 75,500 and Nooijer was sold to Uttar Pradesh Wizards for USD 66,000.

The tournament – 34 matches spread over 28 days – has already given a huge opportunity to many young players from India and abroad but the organisers will have to increase the pool of players and improve overall standards.

In a cricket-crazy country, the HIL TV ratings have been extremely encouraging. When eight years ago the Premier Hockey League was started, no one would have imagined that one day an Indian hockey league would hit the headlines worldwide.

The best thing for the league is that players like Sandeep Singh and Tushar Khandker, who were dumped from the Indian team, are proving their mettle.

Read more....

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

2012 : DNA National B-School Survey 2012
Ranked 1st in International Exposure (ahead of all the IIMs)
Ranked 6th Overall
Zee Business Best B-School Survey 2012
Prof. Arindam Chaudhuri’s Session at IMA Indore
IIPM IN FINANCIAL TIMES, UK. FEATURE OF THE WEEK
IIPM strong hold on Placement : 10000 Students Placed in last 5 year

BBA Management Education