Revival and Reversal - Two resolutions

So I had my much needed cuppa of tea, my 5th cup from the morning. The cuppa, I say, is because the cup is a china-clay mug and not a tequila shot. So the tea is equivalent to, at the least, two full chai cuttings and some more. It was the usual busy morning promising a full onslaught of dull meetings at sleepy afternoon hours. 

All of a sudden, out of nowhere, my mind wanders towards the thought of visiting the laboratory for routine health checkup in the hospital building located right next to my office. As mundane and inappropriate it might be on a busy weekday, the idea to get a health check-up done was a great rationale to break from the regimen that we call popularly as 'work'.

So, i undergo all the basic and advanced health check-up routines that are offered by the hospital as a 'package', an entity using which most hospitals these days amass prosperity by wielding people's adversity.

'The reports will be ready in a few hours', I was told. After enjoying this momentary delightful break from work, reality seeped through my mind and I got back to work again. Along the way, the pensive(i call it as pensive, you may want to read it as foody) person in me, thought about aadhi-potoba-mag-vithoba (which is the Marathi equivalent of I-TRY-TO-FIND-(GOOD)FOOD-IN-EVERY-SITUATION)and the subsequent resumption of work as the best possible way to ensure uninterrupted work later in the afternoon.

Well, it did work that way as per my appreciable plan, only the work was interrupted frequently by a few random species called as 'bullocks' that wear horse tack blinkers provided by their EMI-plucking home loan banks. These bullocks, popularly known in corporate world as 'colleagues', are nobler-than-thou tea connoisseurs and are experts in the-subtle-art-to-flag-you-for-another-tea-break.

Amidst all this, if you get some time out, you only hope to get enough time to somehow try to hold up your fort and just about accomplish as much work that can make you breathe just alright.

And then, while I was engaged with a great discussion about some work issue and its resolution with a talented bullock (ok, he is a great colleague), I get a buzz on my phone from an unknown number. 

'Your-blood-sugar-is-480. How-many-years-are-you-diabetic? This-is-an-emergency-situation. Please-visit-our-hospital-emergency-department-NOOOWWWW." - I heard from the other side. I couldn't really figure out if it was an automated voice speaking or an actual human speaking in the robotic style. I figured out it was indeed a person and not just a voice when that person on the other end of the phone sensed my now-dry-throat and said the following -'Don't worry. Just visit the hospital NOW.'

I am diabetic from now on, until the time I am able to reverse the condition. 

I will reverse the condition, I am confident. I would like to post regular updates here to make notes and thus recollect, reread and remember my journey towards the reversal process.

I have been thinking about this activity over and over. I have been thinking about reviving this blog. I have been thinking why I have remain passionless about this blog for the last couple of years. 

Now all is all. I have decided to make a day-by-day entry; it could be a short indite or a minor update. It should be anything silly.

So, this day has been good. I made varan (Maharashtrian version of dal tadka) and steamed some rice. I go to the Shiv Temple every weekend. so i did that today too. 

Nothing much significant is going on these days. I have been watching this amazing series by ABP News called 'Pradhanmantri'. The show is hosted by film director Shekhar Kapur and is a climactic compendium that starts with the 1947 freedom eve and reaches up to the present day political scenario of India. Like many of his works, you can see Shekhar has done a great job to show the minutest of all the details. 


P.S.: You can ignore Shekhar's accent. 

Huh... Finally the week long wait that started on 26th November is over. This watch that I wear is showing me a wrong date. Probably, it's time I should change its batteries. Ohh.. let me see.. it is a solar battery one. How can it behave like this then? And it's CASIO. My fx-991-MS has been loyal to me since the last 8 years.

This piece is something that becomes a bohany for my new (customary) new year resolution (yes! I am at it again). I have resolved to write on worldly topics like ECONOMICS, TRADE & POLITICS. NO! Not because it is all meaningful and all. But, because it is easy. Throw in a few articles, a few verbs & nouns like Global, sustainability, market, fiscal, its deficit, etc. and there you are.. ready with a really really creative piece of what-ever-you-like-to-call-it.

Ok, now get a bit serious. And read.

Economy at the point of Inflection

The word ‘Economy’ has been delineated a million times since eons & our economists, undeterred with what the consequences their ‘stately’ statements can cause & affect the lives of a billion citizens, continue to plunge themselves in the ‘economic’ hot water. We are living in the times when the economic order is as volatile as it ever can be, if not more.

The Indian economy is undergoing a state of rapid fluctuations from being, on the one hand, the second most prosperity capable economy to, on the other hand, being an eternal potential threat (the one it always has been since the dawn of this century) and following its principle to remain just that, ever, and as always.  The economy has been, as is the case with the world economy, forced into the vicious circle, or the chakravyuh, of demand fluctuations caused by the uncertainty in the US market and the gloomy Euro security. The question is whether we keep sulking about these uncertainty issues or dunk the economy in the cleaning solution containing the first traces of prosperity since independence. I think the latter looks to be a good option, though it is true that we haven’t really tried our level best towards this new prosperity order; or we haven’t really shed our birthright inertial indianness towards solving problems.

The vicious circle I mentioned about is the demand-supply-policy circle. Policies change as per the demand-supply pattern. Unprecedentedly. The Indian Rupee has completed its first annual loss since 2008. The 1.78 trillion dollar elephant is struggling to achieve a growth rate of 7.6%. The borrowing is expected to go to 4.7 trillion rupees. In such times, it is essential to embark upon a new change, a revolution, a movement to elevate India from the seeming abyss that the current world order is.

By announcing subsidies, the government thinks it elevates the infliction caused by inflation & poor revenues to the government. That is where the government is failing miserably. The US and, because of the US, the entire world is bearing the burden of high fiscal deficit. When the demand exceeds supply, the prices of commodities go up. The RBI will then raise the interest rates to curb the inflation. The money in circulation will be less then. Thus, the demand for commodities will go down. As such, the economy shall shrink, which isn’t a good sign. From viewpoint of the business people, in such circumstances, they will ask for less money and curb their instincts of expanding their businesses. This is a multiplier effect leading to further economic slowdown. Again the government revenues fall. To recover the lost ground (and from the election point of view), the government will declare subsidies. This leads to greater governmental expenses. To make those expenses, the government borrows. It has to pay interests on the borrowed sum, leading to more deficits.

The most favored option to bail out the economy from the deficits is by printing more currency. So, more money is available with the citizens to spend. A large chunk of the money is stashed into the bank lockers or is used to buy gold. The cash, liquid in system, is quite less then. There will be high inflation due to more money with the people, leading to high food prices. There will be more hunger. The government will go for issuing more subsidies. This process goes on and on.

The solution to the economic turmoil is to understand where the problem lies. Curbing the demand is not the way to bail out the economy. It will only lead to the slowdown of it. Rather, increasing the supplies via development, technology diffusion & training of personnel is the way about prosperity.

Recent CII 10^th Manufacturing Summit 2011 propagated exactly this. The National Manufacturing Policy, designed with the backing of DIPP & NMCC, has strong credentials to support this. It aims at increasing the supplies & overall industrial output by multifold numbers. Accelerated development, industrial growth, employment to 100 million people by 2022 & increase in the contribution of manufacturing to GDP from 16% to 25% by 2022 are some of the points the NMP stresses on. The idea of creation of National Investment & Manufacturing Zones (NIMZ) is encouraging as well. Creation of vocational training & education opportunities will help increase the supplies needed to cater the ever increasing demand. Service & manufacturing sectors show strong potential to create a lot of growth opportunities in India. The support of the oil pricing strategies, defense sector & energy management will hold the key.

The Indian economy is at the point of inflection. Foreign investment in the form of FDI & FII and Goods & Services Tax (GST) can take the economy to a high level of flourish. It is not just we, the Indians, but the whole Asia and the world, which remain poised to what the course of the game shall be in the coming future.

LATER.

Ta-da..

HI ALL!

It's been months. But, I'll be back soon! Just a week's time!

And my stay at Mumbai comes to an end in a short while. I am surprised that I am keen to go back and resume with academics in Nasik. Quite unnatural really. In a way, I feel I am missing my course and friends. Having said that, I know you don't make real thick friends in a span of a mere two months.

Mumbai was so particularly pathetic and nice, just as it ever is. Traffic jams, randomness in honking, humidity, packed local trains, smelly armpits and chameli ka tel ladened heads, pan stains all over, insane amount of spitting and that too on your head or foot if your back luck is terrific real bad on one such occasion ( this has happened to me once). Mumbai has a fair share of illnesses, caused by its very own people.

Mumbaikars are blessed with a lot of things a mumbaikar can't really forget or possibly stay without.
They could be as follows:
Cutting chai, Band stand, kanda bhajiya or a vada pav and samosas, corn bhutta, bhurum maska & bun maska in the railway canteen or an Iranian restaurant, a football game in the rains, cricket on a concrete pitch with a wet rubber ball, radio stations for housewives, idliwallah on Sundays, a nice little doze on the hall sofa with your head on a cozy pillow and a comfy kambal (Solapuri chaddar) to cover you while it rains outside, double omlette with ketchup and some bread, maggi and that too a double pack, a romantic book and preferably of Nicholas Sparks, a repeat telecast of yesterday's Wimbledon game, a miscellany of cultures, communities and thereby ideas, Kanga league on Shivaji Park, Azad and Cross Maidan, a front seat with a front window on the upper deck of a double decker. And there are many more I can't actually recall or may be haven't experienced.

You can enjoy all these things else where too. But for a mumbaikar staying outside Mumbai for varied reasons, he can't really feel, any where else than Mumbai,  the Mumbai spunk that is a constituent in all the above mentions.

I may have been a bit indulgent on what I feel about Mumbai. But then that is exactly what Mumbai does to me.

GOOD BYE Mumbai for a short while. I will be back there on the 1st of September. Ganesh Chaturthi.
Ganesh Chaturthi, the brass band entry of Ganesh Idols and the dancing, the gulaal, the ukadiche modak, the patrolling by the police, the visarjan at the chaupati. Ganeshotsav in Mumbai is complete awesomeness.

LATER.

MUMBAI BLUES

I got back to my home after about a month. Sister and my brother-in-law had arrived earlier. They were surprised to see me at the door with my heavy baggage and all. A small light joke on them, coming from my mother.

The dinner was, as usual, spot on. The delicacies cooked by my Mother T were Waran-bhat-aamti-bhaaji-poli-koshimbir. And to add some spunk to the already smashing treat was the serving of a huge bowl of   refrigerated aamras made from the home made palp of the Devgad hapus mangoes. To hell with the possibility of loss in nutrients and all, due to storage of foodstuff for long. Anything that is served on my plate by my mother and then that which goes in my Brobdingnagian and equally insatiable stomach cannot be ill-nutrient.

So all was well by then. My mother T had just finished asking me, the 928933th time, if my roomies smoked or fuddled. My father discussed with me about the Djokovic-Nadal final. He is a Federer fan. So, like most of the Federer fans, he had turned into a Djokovic fan, by default, that Sunday. My brother-in-law and I had a brief but pertinent discussion on the sex ratio of my MBA class. We also discussed films. I told them that Bal Gandharva was the only meaningful and worthy film I had been to, since in Nasik.

And my sister, construing that  the topic diverted to films, out of sheer and characteristic enthusiasm, told me about the death of notable actor Rasika Joshi. It shocks you, such news, at least for a second, especially when  the dead person seems real fit and fine the last time you saw the person on a chat show or in a movie. A few are destined to die young. Few achieve a lot in their small time period on earth, as if they almost tacitly know they have a short period. Example in such case is not restricted to Rasika Joshi. Dewang Mehta, Malcolm Marshall, Divya Bharati, all belong to that category.

Whoever out of those Junoon guys wrote these below two lines was spot on..

Kya bashar ki bisat  

Aaj hai kal nahin.

(Mortal's presence is so fickle

 Here one moment and gone the next.)

While I mention this, I know a part of me is sad for the death of some respected person. 

While I wonder if i should ever blog about it even. And in turn, spread the sadness. I intent not to, though. 

Chod meri khata 

Tu to pagal nahin

(Leave my follies 

 as you are not mad like me.)  

And I don't even want to talk about those fucksome blasts. 

LATER.

I AM VERY MUCH ALIVE ON THIS BLOG

It is that time on the earth when everything is meant to be a real crooked affair. It is the time on the earth when you can’t really act straight to a particular situation and if you happen to act straight, I bet you’ll lose upon a lot of opportunities. It is a time when every goddam thing is meant to be real unfair.

Haven’t blogged in a while, but promise a better job at it in future. The last time I blogged, blogspot.com had this REDIFF-STYLED-HTML-THINGY getup. This new scenario looks slick.

Well... LATER..