If you look at where I ended the previous post. Now lot of water has flown under the bridge since then. A series of articles and police actions happened around the same time which were reported in the Indian Express. What is interesting about those articles is one of the statements

“We were asked not to use Deep Freeze. But, surprisingly the software that police have asked us to use, Clink, has this setting of data deletion inbuilt in it. These are double standards by the police.”

- Yogesh More, a cafe owner

What is interesting is that I have had the pleasure/pain of seeing the software in action. Some of the observations I had over period of time are:-

1. The speed of the systems/performance of the systems goes down by half or more than half then this software is installed.

2. There is loss of effective bandwidth as well when using this software.

You could try some of the network monitoring software’s to get an idea as to how much data is exchanged. The classical symptoms of the software is very much in line with the software called ‘Spyware’ the only difference though that most spyware is silent while this one innocuously sits on the desktop watching every move. It very much reminds me of the Chinese Golden Shield/Great Firewall f China thing. Hence I would not be surprised if the software has the function of taking screenshots every few minutes and sending to some repository somewhere or/and capture keystrokes and send that data as well. While text doesn’t take much effort to duplicate making screenshots and making sense of them would be more of a technical challenge. With words it could be some algorithm which would be looking at specific keywords from some database. The software does interest me intellectually but also disgusts the human rights part of me.

The net net result of such a scenario would be that cyber-cafe owners/operators would be forced/have to upgrade their systems and bandwidth to make things work. Another point would be while some customers would blindly go doing things the same way, many like me would also be wary of using services such cafes. Its not that we do something right or wrong, but its not a nice feeling to know people are watching over your shoulder. For e.g. in this cyber cafe most of the customers who do come have work either as in ‘Project work stuff’ (lots of Engineering and varied disciplines colleges around) and PMC tenders work. The Pune Muncipal Corporation (PMC) has gone online and some of the people concerned print the tender documents at their own expense. The printing and browsing business makes for a large percentage of people who visit here. Couple of cyber-cafes down the line I know of people who use the cafe for doing shares/equity speculation/trading work. Now imagine those people, they would not be happy if somehow some of those trades or ideas leaked about or their financial information is leaked somewhere.

An additional expenditure would be in installing Anti-viruses and stuff which again means more expenditure and loss in system performance.

The economics of running cyber-cafes is also interesting as it makes me remember couple of odd summer jobs I had taken in different cyber-cafes while growing up.

1. The first one was in summer 1992 or therabouts. I had been nurtured/spoiled by my association with NIIT Computerdrome which had this voucher system where we paid somewhere from Rs. 6/- to Rs. 10/- per hour depending on the time of the day when outside the market rate was Rs. 100/- . The NIIT Computerdrome experience went for almost a year before taking the summer job in/around 1992. The cyber-cafe was to be a hotspot on Fergusson College Road on the main road itself. It didn’t work as while they did try having a fun theme ‘ they made an underwater theme’ and other stuff they didn’t have much in content and while their prices were similar (maybe 5-7% more than the prevailing rates) they just couldn’t attract people. People thought it would be too much. They also had a gaming section but didn’t either the breath of titles or the hardware to make a community out of it. Net net 2 months and the cafe folded. I also made a notional loss as their cash flows were not good.

Looking back, while the idea was good, it simply was far too ahead of time and lacked in execution of stuff. They didn’t concentrate on making a community nor had ideas about modding and stuff which could have stirred things up. Of course, this is still the case in most of the places but now people have some ideas.

The next summer I went for another cafe job this time though less than 50 meters from my place. This time the guys tried to make it through with rock-bottom pricing. They also did the variation time pricing thing and were upon almost round the clock. Due to low prices they never had any problems with having customers round the clock. I remember people coming at times like 4:30 – 5:00 in the morning to check stuff out as the price were lowest at that point in time. They had close to 20 odd machines. They failed as they had bought the lowest configuration machines and had not figured the costs of having good antivirus and the system performance issues that it brings. It was a policy issue and they were not amenable to the idea of having an antivirus and thus more than half the time the computers were down. The net net result being that they literally fled from the place in the dead of the night as they couldn’t make the rent and whatever credits they had taken from the market. I think couple of police cases were also filed but nothing happened after that. The issues with reinstalling OS and application software also got to the staff as its the most boring job in the world. Again a good idea but failed in the execution of the same.

Both the experiences give a good idea for case studies as to how thin a knife edge these people operate. I am talking of places where oligopoly happens not where there is a monopoly in giving net services.

Update 28/09/10 :- There have been few interesting as well distressing articles which have appeared in the newspapers. The latest development is the doubling of rates which would happen from October 1.

Now from what I know most of the Sim card sellers get something between Rs. 10-15 per Sim card sale. How are they supposed to physically verify the documents? If you look at the ‘Banks unwilling to sell pension scheme to poor, says regulator ‘ Economic Times article. Now when institutions like banks which have huge reach and economic clout are unable to reach people, then how are the poor mobile connection seller is supposed to physically verify that the papers in order when he doesn’t have either the know-how or the technical reach that banks have. I chatted with couple of mobile connection sellers near my place, most of them while educated are not aware of how to distinguish between real and fake documents. I do not even know how they can do it. Even if one takes at the 1000 odd cybercafes there must be 100000 odd mobile connection sellers . The only way out I see from the state’s perspective is the UID thing but that again has privacy issues. What I am worried about is the ‘function-creep’ which gets inbuilt in the system and the misuse of cards like that. For the poor it is a powerful thing as it would make them eligible for lot of things as its hoped, lot of government services and all but for the middle-class I am not so sure. Although I don’t have any significant wealth that anybody should think of going through the pains of having my identity but it would make a difference for many others. Also UID would have to prove to skeptics (like me) that it really works and the give and take is really worth it.

As a side note, its been 7 years since I gave my ration card for new when they said the middle class would get white ration cards, till date didn’t get any. Went 4-5 times but still to no avail. Back of my mind, there is a thought that somebody might be claiming ration in my family’s name but nothing I can do about it. Even applications are buried in a file. Now in such a scenario if the UID would help in getting even the white ration card or knowing the status of my ration card that would be something useful.

If one looks at the whole scenario the State is just following what the Americans are doing. I can visualize 100s of different ways in which messages could be passed from one to the other without the govt. knowing. The Wikileaks site gives some ideas as well as sites relating to cryptography, PGP being another example . Again from an intellectual perspective it would be an interesting exercise but suffice to say the State does have to get it act together without causing as less a grief to the public as possible. Anti-social elements,terrorists and governments world over have been becoming very sophisticated in their attacks. The recent reports of the Stuxnet worm and it being possibly a state engineered worm I think our cyber defence and cyber crime have to be 10 steps ahead. The procedures they are following are pathetic at the best, they really need to get their act up. With the hope that some sanity comes in the system and there are better, transparent methods of a fine balance of security and civil rights. If some of the regressive ideas such as physical verification of mobile connections are enforced then the growth of mobile connections would come down to the hindu rate of growth rather than the explosive rates of growth as seen today.

What was interesting in that wiretap story and which somehow is the following bit of info.

Several privacy and technology advocates argued that requiring interception capabilities would create holes that would inevitably be exploited by hackers.

Steven M Bellovin, a Columbia University computer science professor, pointed to an episode in Greece: In 2005, it was discovered that hackers had taken advantage of a legally mandated wiretap function to spy on top officials’ phones, including the prime minister’s.

“I think it’s a disaster waiting to happen,” he said. “If they start building in all these back doors, they will be exploited.”

Susan Landau, a Radcliffe Institute of Advanced Study fellow and former Sun Microsystems engineer, argued that the proposal would raise costly impediments to innovation by small startups.

“Every engineer who is developing the wiretap system is an engineer who is not building in greater security, more features, or getting the product out faster,” she said.

What is really pathetic that unlike other democratic countries there isn’t any privacy advocacy organizations in India or there doesn’t seem to be.

So signing off and hoping better ideas and sense prevails.

Let’s start at the very beginning circa pre-1992. I remember as a young teenager going in holidays to Bombay (as it then called) with family and friends. My cousins and friends used to sneak out to enjoy the night-life of mumbai and hang out at the local nightclubs and bars to see and be part of the action therein. Of course, I was the youngest person in the group. The biggest crime for us that we committed were dancing, looking at girls/women, attempting to flirt with women twice our age and underage drinking. I was the only underage boy/guy/teen. It was really an innocent time as there was no worry about anything. Even if we used to take locals or Taxis late at night we didn’t have to worry about anything. Of course, the underage drinking may be legal issue, the flirting may be more of a moral grey area but can live with it. Then the 1992 blasts happened and like millions of others the feeling of creepiness, looking over the shoulder came and the enthusiasm to visit Bombay dimmed for sometime. Cut to January 2010 and the German Bakery Blast (One of my fav. haunts from 3-5 years back to let my hair down and socialize) happened. While if it had been a week before I could have very well been one of the more injured or a causality. So while I do feel happy, I also saddened for the loss. I don’t know still confused about what to feel. Anyways, last week, some of the main accused for the German Bakery blast were found in an unknown city called Udgir, somewhere near Latur (known for the earthquake which happened there few years ago) Maharashtra. The accused perpetrators used a cybercafe as a cover called ‘Global Net cafe’ and perhaps for communications as well. Of course, all of which should come out in due investigation. I also have to say ‘alleged’ as all that has to be proved in the court of law.

With this development, the Pune Crime Branch Cyber Cell started booking unlicensed cyber cafe owners and Operators. While that is a step perhaps in the right direction, one of new alleged instructions is to take scans of all individuals identity proof who come/frequent cybercafes. On one hand I have questions for the Cybercafe owners as to why they haven’t got themselves licensed, as a freelancer and entrepreneur can very well understand some of the issues/hassles involved therein. But this post is not about that.

Even from a technical perspective, I can also understand the cyber cafe owners insistence on using ‘Deep Freeze’. For those who don’t know the software it simply deletes the profile and clears all temporary files so the next session the computer runs smoothly. Also many people know that Windows XP memory management during a session leaves a lot to be desired. If an applications takes memory from the OS after the application is done and over with, the memory is not given back to the OS with the result that during a session the computer becomes more and more slow with the net result being that one has to go next session to get the best performance. Also Deep Freeze is used so no viruses can enter the system or if they do, the next session is from scratch so it would not happen. Some of these issues and many more compelled me to switch to GNU/Linux. The other problem is most of the cybercafes are also a one-man, two man operation and they lack the technical skills and motivations to maintain the machines as they would in a corporate environment. The basic business model is to have low-cost machines, good bandwidth, electricity, light for the princely price of Rs. 20/- per hour. Most of their target audience are either students or people coming to print and file PMC tenders and things like that. Most of the students are those who are studying in the nearby Engineering and Commerce colleges.

It is rumored that in Windows 7 they have completely revamped the memory management function but upgrading to that at this point of time would entail lot of extra expenditure which would make cybercafe charges prohibitive and they would not have the 80% people, customers they have as of today thereby killing an important commercial and social service.

From the law and order perspective, I am as non-plussed and stumped as perhaps they are how to keep the service running while keeping an eye on potential terrorists and other anti-social elements in check. If they don’t take any action, the general populace (including me) would react that the police doesn’t do anything to protect us from such things. Another counter-argument could be made as the civil rights issue played in China and Russia . While the law/big brother is on the move the intentions and clarifications are in order. After all, we are supposed to be living in a democracy the last time I checked.

Lastly, I am a small fly in the grander scheme of things. I have put up a short e-mail addressed to the Pune City Police as shown below. The only thing which I have omitted from the mail are my personal contact details.

Resp. Sir/Madame,
I have been using the services of ‘Prism net cafe’ for the past six months or so. Since my desktop broke down. On 16th September, 2010 Pune Newsline carried a news item detailing how many unlicensed cybercafes are running in the city. http://www.indianexpress.com/news/police-chief-talks-tough-heat-on-unlicensed-cyber-cafes/682257/ . Yesterday evening i.e. the 17th of September, 2010 i went to the above-mentioned cybercafe. They asked to have a scan of the identity proof. While I gave the relevant details and they were duly scanned. While I do understand and appreciate the work being done by the Pune Cyber Cell targeting terrorist/anti-social elements at large I am also concerned with the possibility of misuse of such information by unscrupulous individuals working in and around Cybercafes. I am sure you are aware of how common individuals/people’s names and cell numbers are harvested routinely and sold for spamming/cold calling etc. While most of these are a nuisance rather than anything else, getting access to scanned identity information could have more issues. Possibility of cases of identity theft (couple or more which have already happened in India) may see a rise. how does Pune Police hope to secure the common public from such issues? While I have played out the State’s predicament as well in my blog post http://wp.me/po8ay-1Y alongwith a copy of this letter I would appreciate a reply on the same. I have few poignant questions on the matter mentioned above as well :-

1. What if any new conditions are being made by Pune police for identity proof ? I looked for answers on the Pune Police website http://www.punepolice.gov.in/message_com.html and was none the wiser.

2. If a scanned picture of an individual along with relevant details are taken how is the police going to stop/save us from any possible misuse of our identity/information ?

3. If instructions have been issued/given to scan pictures for id proof, aren’t they supposed to display those instructions on the display board.

The above mentioned cybercafe is located off J.M.Road near Mamta Sweets. If people want to forward the mail to other socially relevant groups, please do so minus my contact no.

A concerned citizen

Like others I could have also turned a blind eye, in fact was very much tempted, but it is saddening and worrisome at the same time. Of course, in my specific case, I have the resources to buy a lappy and/or a desktop and relieve myself of such stress (That’s the idea, waiting to some specific hardware to hit the market before I commit myself to a new machine) but scores of individuals who may be not as lucky as I am. With all government and social resources moving online and being the best way to get things done, accessing Net and not using services of a cybercafe are not an option. One more thing to keep in mind is the next 3 months where a multitude of festivals are happening. It is supposed to be a time of joy but now also carefulness

So just my 2 paise.

Update 28/09/10 :- I made a part 2 of the same post.

This post tries to share some examples of how trust is being eroded in Banking. Specially with the new aspect of Financial inclusion which is being banded about.

First of all, its not as I do not trust the banks as I have heard of some stories/incidents as well which also do inspire that banks do also have some good people as well. Of course, the incidents are from a different time but still they matter. Let me share one of those incidents with you.

One of my uncle’s on my mother’s side was a branch manager in one of Old Delhi’s busiest Punjab National Bank branch. The incident is about 50 years ago but is still relevant in today’s time.This was before Punjab National Bank was nationalized.

There was a rumor that spread at that time. The rumor was that, there was some wrong-doing in the branch and hence the branch had become bankrupt.

The rumor spread like wildfire and within half an hour there were long queues till the end of the street, almost couple of kms. long.

The moment my uncle (on mother’s side) reached the branch and he came to know of the situation, he called other branches within the city and asked them to bring cash (as usually branches had cash tied up in longer term loans and norms such as Capital Adequacy Ratio while were aggressive as per today’s standards but still weren’t good enough in cases if issues like this happened.

The next thing he called a branch employee crisis meeting and asked all the branch employees to not panic and co-operate at this needy hour. He asked them to do overtime and offered them lunch and dinner either on office expenses or to ask them to send messages to home to bring lunch and dinner to the branch. Next, he announced that the branch will be open till 21:00 hours.

He also made sure that some of the more experienced employees also had a break of couple of hours so they could sleep and be fresh as they had to tally the accounts later at night when the branch will be closed to public.

One has to remember that these were times when there was no automation of any kind so only the bank employees knew their customers and one couldn’t use people from other branches (as can be done today) .

At 21:00 hours he still saw the queues were as big as in the morning or possibly longer and while he closed for the day, he announced that the branch would be also open on Saturday, which is normally a holiday. He then called up branches beyond the city too, going as far as Agra to get funds to pay people.

The next day, again the same pattern was repeated, both for the employees and the public were paid their money back. Again, at the end of the day it was seen that queues were still there and announced that the branch would be open on Sunday.

Again Sunday, the same pattern repeated itself. My uncle gave confidence to his employees and the payment was done to people.

On Monday onwards, people started coming back and depositing money back into the system. By Wednesday, he was able to send back all the money the branch had borrowed from other branches of the same bank.

While later there was an inquiry, it was found that it was nothing more than a baseless rumor and all was well.

Cut to 2010 and have seen various issues in today’s banking environment.

1. The first experience I had directly was with Indian Overseas Bank. A nationalized bank . I had gone to make a Fixed Deposit in the bank. The deposit slip I was given to credit the amount to the bank had neither a control number and neither was there any date column. I have seen some banks which have control number on their deposit slips while some banks don’t .

Trying to find any information on the (that if RBI site is not user-friendly.

I have few questions in this regard :-

a. Has RBI laid down any rules and specs. for deposit slips for banks to follow ?

b. If there are norms and specs,does it include having a control number and a date column?

c. If yes, what punishment can RBI do if the bank is not following the rule,convention,specs. ?

d. If no, then why aren’t such specs. in place ?

e. In fact, trying to find if there is a PIO (Public Information Officer) posted in Pune, where I could find the above details doesn’t seem to be one in Pune. (Please refer page 33 of the RTI pdf published therein. )

f. In fact the pdf is also silent if what is to be done if there is no PIO posted in the city itself.

g. Why hasn’t the RBI ombudsman updated the other branches of IOB which are in Pune? The RBI ombudsman shows only 3 branches when there are clearly 19 branches as shown in IOB site itself? Try finding the Shaniwar Peth branch details on the complaint form . I used the B.O. office as mumbai and selected IOB from bank name which I don’t know is the right one or not. Also no idea what B.O. stands for ?

I should mention herein that in 2009 IOB took over Shree Suvarna Sahakari Bank whose branch link I have linked above. The bank is around 1 year in operation.

RBI needs to work on their site to make it more user-friendly.

2. The second one which I saw was of a street vendor who sells Dabeli and makes a living of it. The poor guy had opened an account with a co-operative bank called ‘Dharmveer Sambhaji Urban Co-Operative bank‘ which is based somewhere in the outskirts of the city. Every evening or every second evening a business correspondent of the bank with a hand-held pass-book printer comes in the evening and collects the cash. At that time I looked and the business correspondent made an illegible entry in the pass-book. As I am regular customer of him, I asked to see the pass-book, I saw that none of the entries had been entered by the pass-book printer and all were by hand. I advised to get the account checked once in a while by going to the bank branch and making sure the amounts tallied and keeping his own account by hand as well. Whether he does it or not, I was very disappointed to see the same happening.

There is financial illiteracy on the dabeli guy’s end which the bank business correspondent might be using to his advantage.

3. One of the more interesting start-ups has been Eko bank. Now while it seems to be interesting start-up as can be seen in TOI’s Crest coverage there is a caveat there too. One does not know how secure or insecure the system is. Something similar talked about here or here.

All in all, while there are some things to look forward to as new technology comes in, some transparency is also needed in the way banks work. These above examples show that banks are still not in step with customer’s expectations.

An update (12/05/2010) :- I sent the mail to moneylife magazine as I knew Sucheta Dalal (from reputation as well as had met her once couple of years ago. ) She promptly sent the mail to Mr Kaza Sudhakar,
Chief General Manager, Customer Services Department, Reserve Bank of India. While I am yet to hear from him on e-mail she also made an event on the same on 15th of May at 305, 3rd floor, Hind Service Industries Premises, off Veer Savarkar Marg, Shivaji Park, Dadar, Mumbai 400028 (turn left from Chaitya Bhumi, 3rd building on the left).

Moneylife conducts events from time to time on various topics. The idea behind the events is to improve financial literacy among the people. While I’ll not be able to go due to cost-benefit analysis not working out to go there but still it feels cool that one might have been one of the last nails in the coffin (as in figure of speech) which might have resulted in the event being held.

There had been lot of news about Khaps and their ways as given in the article

Don’t mess with us, threatens khap mahapanchayat

A massive gathering of 20 khap panchayats (caste councils) from Haryana, Delhi, Rajasthan and western Uttar Pradesh on Tuesday reasserted the validity of diktats to “keep society in order”.
The meeting demanded that the Hindu Marriage Act be amended to prohibit marriage within the same gotra (patrilineal lineage), and passed a resolution against intra-village marriages.
The meeting was called in the backdrop of a Karnal court sentencing to death five members of a family for killing a young couple, who belonged to the same gotra. The couple was killed a few days from their May 18, 2007, marriage by the girl’s family members who objected to what they said was an incestuous relationship.

This is just part of the article which was published in DNA paper on 14th April, 2010

There was an interesting letter which was published on the 15th of April 2010

Look at heritage

This is with reference to the story ‘Don’t mess with us’, threatens khap mahapanchayat (DNA, April 14). A defiant assembly of 36 khap panchayats from Haryana, parts of Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Delhi demanded that the Hindu Marriage Act be amended to ban marriages in the same gotra (clan). But do these ‘cultured’ upholders of the so-called Bharatiya sanskriti know that ancient India never made bones about endogamy? The word gotragaman (sex in the clan; gaman as in sexual intercourse) was prevalent in the Vedic era and Mahabharat has 26 direct/indirect references to sexual relationships among the same family members.

Kunti’s fascination for her half-son Sahdev was so flagrant and embarrassing that her son Yudhishthir and Bhishma had to admonish her (5th stanza, 4th canto, Aranya Parv). The Sanskrit poets of ancient India never condemned incest or gotra-based marriages or liaisons. The legendary Sanskrit scholar Monier Williams, who died a Hindu, studied almost all the old Sanskrit texts and concluded that there were more than 700 instances of mother marrying her own son or having sex with him, innumerable cases of father ravaging his own daughter or brother-sisters having a swell (pun intended) time together! The point is when such self-proclaimed custodians talk of vansh, gotra, parivar and desh, do they ever bother to have a look at their own history and heritage?
—Sumit Paul, via email

There was an extended article on the same subject on 18th April,2010. The short of all this, while for sometime I rued the fact that I wasn’t born into the Ambani family, I am happy that I was not born into a Jat family.

There were quite a few mainstream channels which were showing the Rainbow gathering which was being held in Rajaji National Park. You can see some of the results here and one of the news reports here.

Most of the mainstream media channels had been projecting the Rainbow gatherings and the Warriors as foreigners camping in an protected wildlife park, drinking, playing loud music and being nude.

Now while I don’t debate the fact that they are foreigners what I do object is the narrowest sense in which the media has been projecting them. The India I know stands for multi-culturism and liberty which has been missing. I would try to give a broader perspective as I know the culture quite a bit.

1. Nudity :- This is the most controversial one which is being shown. It shows lot of narrow-mindedness and a strict narrow view of our own ‘hinduism’ . If they are ‘bad’ so why don’t we equate the same to Naga Babas about whom we (the Indian public) are both scared and revere. Some of which are the benevolent Digambaras and the more exotic ones.

Another interesting point is some of our best known printers internationally have been those who painted nudes. For e.g. F.N. Souza

2. Drinking and/or Drugs :- Both of these are used in countless spiritual practices. The main thing to know though that usually as a rule even if they use drugs they use ‘natural drugs’ rather than chemical ones. Mushrooms and other sorts of hallucinogens for altering consciousness but all from nature. There is a long list of incidents and practices of the same in Hindu spirituality so wouldn’t waste time in giving links.

3. Loud music :- Again as a rule people usually sing, have a djembe (African drum) or didgeridoo (long pipe) or any other exotic musical instrument . To whatever little or much I have interacted with them I have never seen them use electronic music during the gathering. After the gathering winds down and people are in the city its a different deal altogether.

There are other pieces of the puzzle which should have also been expressed if the mainstream media was concerned about them. The Rainbow warriors are not environmental destructors but environmental protectors. They are more civic minded and try to lead as much a low carbon use life as possible. They were one of the first people to protest at the Nevada Test Site and have been parts of many green movements . They have also known to partner with Greenpeace and in fact quite of the original leaders of Greenpeace had been part of Rainbow . This book “EU enlargement and the environment: institutional change and environmental Policy in Central and Western Europe” by By JoAnn Carmin, Stacy D. VanDeveer is the latest book which shares a bit of their involvement . A slightly older reference book on the same subject would be “Environment and transition in the Czech republic” .

This is not to say they are without issues. Just like any anarchist group they have their own group dynamics which plays out in each gathering but they are far far off from ‘disturbing’ people as was being portrayed in popular mainstream media.

I wish we could respect and celebrate the differences and diversity rather than be controlling.

The last I know on the subject were they were forcibly evicted from the grounds. It would have been interesting to know if they would have done the same if the Sadhus would have been there doing the same thing .

Here is some info. on the Gatherings and a slightly more commercial twist to things. Please do note that there is a difference between the two communities as far as structure and some philosophies go.

Till later!

The Supreme Court of India made a progressive statement about Live-in relationships. A three member bench gave this statement/opinion

“When two adult people want to live together what is the offence. Does it amount to an offence? Living together is not an offence. It cannot be an offence,”

Of course there was huge hue and cry on this statement by almost all the religious scholars, the left and the right-wing parties. Now while some thoughts on the emotional side of the issue I would take a little later but it is significant to know the background.

Another “interesting” event that happened is the Sania-Shoaib & Ayesha triangle . The story in short was that a woman, Ayesha, around 40 years of age claimed that a certain Shoaib Malik was married to her.Incidentally,Shoaib Malik is the Captain of Pakistan in Cricket. He also made some statements in the mainstream media few years ago on the same topic while later he started claiming he married somebody else. Later on though, he divorced Ayesha and is marrying Sania Mirza, the tennis star from India today.

Now while there are rumors of how much he paid her for divorce and stuff that is not the real deal. The real deal was that Ayesha went through quite a bit of ordeal through the whole thing. Her relatives and people who knew her didn’t ever know whether she was telling the truth or lying when Shoaib started claiming otherwise.

Now for the emotional and public trial she went through, if she was in a live-in relationship it would have been so much easier. In this as she was married, she couldn’t get out of that relationship and get on her life unless he divorces her. In a live-in this would have been saved.

Emotionally, whether it is marriage or live-in when the other person leaves you, many a person (without being gender specific) take a long long time to move on. This is based on many of my friends experiences.

I hope everybody has a long,happy, harmonious and peaceful life.

I read this article and became incensed quite a bit. Some of the statements there are just not true.

To what extent is human activity responsible for changing climate?
In the 1900s, the climate warmed and cooled. The sun, changes in the earth’s orbit, continental drift caused it. It’s plausible that climate change in 20th century was natural. It’s also plausible that the changes were caused by humans. Carbon dioxide (CO2) has increased by 35% over the last 150 years. However, it’s (contribution) is only minute compared to natural causes. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is 90-99% sure that the cause of 20th century warming is human activity. Many, including me, disagree. We believe causes are natural.

So things like Australia’s Red Dust Storm were a normal course of things. Also the Ozone Hole has been is a natural thing and not anything that humans did . Even the UK’s Met office has a climate change page page.

So what is Copenhagen all about then?
Oh it’s a political event. Development is a must for which we need cheap energy. Schemes to control CO2 will make energy expensive. Emission cuts make energy very expensive, which only the rich can afford. You know, total emissions of CO2 have gone up in US, EU. In 1997, during the Kyoto Protocol, they promised to reduce emission by 5%. But emission is only going up. They have no intention of reducing it.

Copenhagen is a very bad idea. Another bad idea is solar energy. It will only survive due to subsidies from the governments. In Rajasthan and desert areas, solar energy makes sense. But not everywhere.

I beg to differ. In the recent past Oil has been fluctuating, the last trading of Oil was on Friday at $81 per barrel . If a barrel is around 158-159 litres it comes to roughly to Rs. 23/24 per litre. Add to that cost of transportation, conversion from crude oil to petrol and it is much more. An idea of the subsidy that Oil companies have can be read from this press report.

The other saddening part was the Nuclear Liability Bill which I am horrified to learn is even being thought about. I do hope it doesn’t get passed.

Just to be back on the track, the percentage of Indians living in villages is 72.2% according to the wikipedia page on the subject. Of that 60-70% of the villages don’t have electricity . Most of these villages are in remote areas and hence it makes sense to use solar there. So NDTV has been doing something in this regard last year. This year too, they have done that they are saying they would light 155 villages alongwith TERI .

While I have complete respect for the effort, the only issue is there is no real-time updation of stats as to number of villages and names of villages. Instead of using Google maps I would have liked them to use Openstreetmap for the layer. One can always color-code each year as to the village they went and stuff like that. That would have made lots of difference.

That’s all for now

I had been a member of “Osho Commune” from 1997 – 2002/3 . Till that time there were many times I used to come out to the bakery to hang with friends and other members. I was a teenager/young adult at that time. I remember ’97-’98 and especially during festival times (of Osho Comune) and Saturdays there used to be a festival atmosphere within the Bakery as well.

Many of us used to hang out and party till 0:00 – 1:00 hours having a djembe, guitars and some songs on our lips. The bakery used to have good business and everybody used to have a great time. Specially from August-September onwards till February. I remember coming for a quick chai/ginger-lemon thing early in the morning before going to dynamic meditation as well.

I also witnessed many people going through cathartic episodes while in my visits to the bakery. One of those episodes stands out . This was a late night (around 22:00 – 22:30 hours) and a very beautiful german lady/sanyasin feeling very lonely and some emotional issues freaked out. She wanted to be friends with anybody. She was little bit drunk and was obviously going through something.

The beauty was nobody either tried to act fresh or say anything. They let her be. After sometime some of her friends or countrymen came and took her. The German bakery boys were nice towards her and helped with her baggage.

That episode stood out as the hour was late and still people were decent, helping and somehow understood her situation or could atleast have an idea about what she might be going through.

Although I have been to many parts of India, this is something which I haven’t experienced it elsewhere.

There have been times when I forgot/lost my luggage and came back and had been lucky to claim my baggage from the bakery. There had been times when I have been unlucky as well but still it was a nice place.

I hope to go to the place this week-end and hopefully put a rose somewhere around there. I’m sure people have done something similar. Hope it gets back on its feet as quick as possible. Looking forward to tasting again the ginger-lemon-honey and banana pie of the place

I’m sure everybody has heard the Shiv Sena, MNS and Congress view points. There has been no other voices being heard, least of all the common man. So here’s a common man’s visualization of things.

I come from a middle class Baniya (moneylender) family based in Pune. I was born and bought up in Pune and reside there. I reside in the Shivaji Nagar where there is a mixture of Maharashtrians as well as people from other states as well.

Now from what I know the Maharashtrian caste system is basically about Brahmins, Khastriyas and Marathas. There may be many more castes and sub-castes but this is what I know of . Most of the Brahminic Maharashtrians, the young generation are some sort of professionals, IT and other fields and most of them do their living in States and other parts of the globe. Which leaves the Kshatriyas and Marathas to fend alongwith the migrant population (if one has to call them that) .

Even then I see many of my friends and associates who belong to different parts of India having more of hunger then others. If I have to talk about people from Bihar and other North-Indian states almost all the sweet shops are from people of Rajasthani origin (apart from Chitale Bandhu Mithaewale) and almost all pani puri stalls are from Bihari originated people. Even in driving Rikshaws most of the people are from outside the state. This is also evident in other states such as this article . What has been not known is the kind of wages and stuff. If those statistics were also given and rise of population that would have made for more fascinating reading.

Now for the other point which Shiv Sena says specifically about Mukesh Ambani, about not spending money on Mumbai. Any businessman/entreprenur knows he would spend money where there is good returns, good law and order, makes sense and incentives by State Government. The reality prices in Mumbai and density of people make it also a harrowing time. Also do people remember Mukesh Ambani’s issues when he was starting with Seawind

What all this has done would make businesses go away from Mumbai rather than make investments in infrastructure. What happens if Mukesh Ambani and his associates decide to move to Gujarat, how much loss to the exchequer (in taxes) and how much loss to the image of Mumbai/Bombay. And if one prominent businessman starts to move out what stops others from following suit. I’m sure Anil Ambani may have also thought to voice his concerns but as his stakes are high (Mumbai metro being made by Reliance Infratel) he would choose to look the other way.

These are things and thoughts our esteemed politicans choose to ignore and not think of. For them ‘Independant Maharashtra’ is the idea. Really a sad state of affairs.

Few months back, I had talked about Choices but these choices can only be made when there is information about the candidates and their developmental plans for the city. The voter percentage in the city has been told to be around 40% just like the last time around and which has been attributed as an Urban phenomenon.

While some of the reasons given in that page are there, but there are many more. 6 months back when the elections were held, on couple of days of eve of elections there was a televised interview of the all the candidates who were there from the Pune region . Except for Mr. Arun Bhatia nobody had a comprehensive plan for Pune development and issues. He was the only one who was able to give straight answers while the others of various political hues were engaged in mud-slinging one over other.

This time around, the same thing has been there. There is no way for a registered voter like me to access information about the candidates, what they think of the city, how are they going to improve the public transport and most important of all which candidates are there from which party and what is their background and what are their ideals/plans for the city.

If these details are not there, I cannot make those choices. I would also like to blame the media for not informing enough. I have subscribed to all the newspapers in rotation Indian Express, Times of India, Sakaal and currently DNA India and fail to get proper information. We do not want newspapers for ads, we are paying to get information and education.

Also same is the case on the Net too. I don’t know of any site which has all the details of all the candidates so one can cross-examine the background and what they are promising and how their promises have been so far .

Something similar perhaps to a consumer durable comparison site.

It may seem cheap but this I see the only way for me to take an active part in deciding the future of my country.

Update: Found somebody who is tracking it