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.

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

"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