The Unused, much misused human resource

About 50 percent of the sanctioned posts lie vacant at various community health centres in the country revealed an Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry (ASSOCHAM) study. An investigation done by a leading national daily by acquiring facts from the concerned departments through RTI shows that there are more than 1.3 lakh vacancies in the police dept. in the country.

These are two of the many examples where numerous posts in the country are lying vacant. Educational institutions lack staffs, libraries don’t have the staff. We do not need any study or research papers to show that vacancies at various places need to be filled. But how many job opening advertisements do we find in the papers. Not many.

Whenever we have to count one of the biggest strengths available in India that makes it conducive for investments (especially foreign investments) it is, here one can get a good lot of educated human resource.

Few years back Hillary Clinton while speaking in the sidelines of a summit said that the good thing about India is, more people could afford a college education.

But what is coming out of it? Are there enough dependable jobs available for the college educated? Outsourcing surely has generated jobs, but is it secure enough? The answer would be no for at least a large number of those who are working in that industry.
Privatization has been advocated by successive governments in the country, thus trying to do away with the socialist strand in our economy. Leaving a large number of people to an insecure job market and future, where you can be hired and fired anytime. The issue for termination not all the time remains, ‘not been able to meet targets’.

So many posts in the govt. offices remain vacant, yet no hiring is done. It is also trying to delve into the contract basis job system.

Are you living in Delhi, wondering why the domestic breeding checkers have not been to your locality yet? Because, they are on a strike, demanding for permanent jobs. They are also hired for the season only.

It’s a pity that the Union Labour Minister Oscar Fernandez chose to speak on such an important topic on death of the CEO of the Italian firm Graziano, who was attacked by a lynch mob of striking factory workers. ‘Hire and fire’ policy of the India Inc. and foreign Incs. present in India needs to be questioned but the timing was not right. It was after all a law and order issue (lack of security presence; even the Italian ambassador had earlier requested for more security cover be given to the company, until the labour issue is resolved) which catapulted into this sad tragedy.

The result of the wrong timing is that hire and fire policy which happens to be a grave issue, as correctly pointed out by the minister, who asked the companies to be “compassionate” towards its employees is not going to be raised again. After all the Prime Minister had to intervene to make the minister apologize for his remarks (which made India Inc. angry).

Track changes

Many of our serials have relied on this trusted plot- our dear character’s rival screwing up the office presentation just before the all important meeting, which could make or mar the hardworking character’s career. But gone are the days when such a thing could happen. Technology has taken that popular plot away from our serial makers. Reason for that is the computer.

Everyone now in the family now knows how to work on the computer, which has now become as indispensable as a refrigerator or TV. Not just the kids but the housewives are also learning to run this device. And while learning the MS OFFICE WORD, every learner comes across the special program (I hope that’s the technical word to describe ‘track changes’) in the tools menu, ‘protect document’. If you mark your document so, no one can mess with your document. Not just this, the maker of the document can also see what kind of changes has been made by the other user, in his/her absence, if the document has been marked 'protected'. one can also give a password to the file while saving, but that won't be fun at all.

Someone must in appreciation of the Microsoft show this plot happening in some serial. Imagine the villain opens the document to destroy the toil of our 'honest fellow' and instead of that sees the computer showing the changes made, though changes are also simultaneously being made. The evil fellow is busted on the spot. What a situation it would be:
A dramatic plot with loud background scores and zooming-in & out camera turned into a comic plot.

The Paradox of our Age

We have bigger houses, but smaller families
more conveyances, but less time;
We have more degrees, but less sense
more knowledge. but less judgment
more experts, but more problems
more medicines but less healthiness.

We've been all the way to the moon and back.
but have trouble crossing the street
to meet the new neighbour.
We have built more computers
to hold more information,
to produce more copies than ever,
but have less communication.
We have become long on quantity,
bit short on quality.
These are times of fast food,
but slow digestion;
tall man, but short character;
steep profits, but shallow relationship.
It is a time when there is much in the window but nothing in the rooms.

- by Rudyard Kipling

I dont feel like commenting much on these lines. but trying to put these lines in the context of the Delhi blasts, only thing that comes up in my head is, why afterall, some people will go for killing inocent people for some ideology of sorts. Are they misunderstood? Is there some communication gap or something? Why churches are being attacked?What ever it may be , any protest or misunderstanding should not grow to an extent that it starts taking the life of innocent people.

Retiring Sourav Ganguly: no, not another GD

It seems like every time the name of this man will be dropped from the squad, every Tom, Dick and Harry would start speculating about his retirement. Recently I saw that one of the channels conducting poll on whether Sourav should call it a day now. This is preposterous. Conducting polls to make someone take retirement and putting a player of Sourav’s stature in a spot position.

We belong to a country where we boast of knowing ways of treating our seniors well. But Sourav Ganguly’s case tells me of something else. We must have known it in the past but TRP and Bytes have made us forget those mannerisms. Electronic media, especially the 24×7 news channels, are pushing the society to be judgmental about every issue. Whether it’s the Arushi-Hemraj murder case or Roger Federer slipping from no.1 spot hence starting to write his career off, until he defends his US Open title; the electronic media just wants to pass judgment on each and every issue and sometimes without doing proper research. Because of this kind of trend, the print media also have to fall into the line to cater to the needs of the audience or reader, to keep their paper going.

Newspaper and news channel, whose job is to give news and not to speculate, have suddenly changed its role. It’s now more into speculations and rumor mongering. In the times of crisis the govt. must take the news channels off- air. As speculation ends, things can function properly. It would avert a disaster for sure. Because for exclusive footage, god knows they can go to any extent, just as they stage manages sting operations.

If the media has run out of issues, why don’t they call it a day? Instead they should not discuss people, their life or career on primetime to fill the slot. What kind of new arguments can they come up with in defense and against the dropping of Sourav from the Irani trophy? The forums have not sounded any different from the last ones, since he was dropped at the behest of the then coach and selector, Greg Chapell and Kiran More respectively. He has been picked up and dropped quite a time and all those discussions haven't come up with any new suggestion. May be Navjot Singh Sidhu have quoted different proverb each time; that would be the only difference.

Don’t the anchor and the producer get tired of this business; certainly the audience does including me. Give the audience and Sourav a break. When he will have to retire he will, but this kind of pressure tactics can make his determination to play grow stronger and inspire him to better his form. So, media must stop speculating and start reporting, for a change.

Is journalism the best profession around?

In his rare public comments, Columbian writer Gabriel Garcia Marquez, on 2 September 2008 in Northern Mexico, hailed journalism as the best profession. Is it so?
Choosing to become a journalist, one is always hounded by one’s friends and relatives, even at interviews, why on earth are you choosing this profession? One needs to give a thought to this question, as it is unlike other profession and usually thought as low paying one involving ‘risks’. But that has not deterred people from selecting this as their career. What is the attraction that has been drawing people to this field, which also is growing at a tremendous rate; is it really the best profession?
Bob Woodward once being asked the same question, has suggested that it is the nature of work that makes this profession the best: “ Everyday is interesting……when things get uninteresting you don’t have to cover them…you get to cover the next interesting thing.”
As a journalist you are covering ‘news’; the term itself makes it clear. Like any other working person, a journalist will also be going to the office, but the nature and content of work is going to be different everyday for him. A reporter covers new things. He will be tracking an old story and will report it only when there is some new development. This close relation to newness is what attracts people to this profession. Probably this is one of the rarest of professions in the world, where you get to passionately follow newness. As Marquez has expressed: “we enjoy it when we find jewel (of a story)…”

Not only this, this profession also allows serving the society and nation to prosper towards a better present and future. A journalist is the ‘prime mover’ of his society. He educates and enlightens the citizens by bringing new information to them. And as Francis Bacon has said, ‘knowledge is power’, thus empowers them. As the fourth estate of a democracy it also keeps check on the functioning of the government, thus ensuring prevalence of democracy.
A journalist enjoys no privileges. His rights are same as that of any ordinary citizen of a country, but he is shouldered with lots of responsibilities which are challenging and exciting at the same time. After all who wouldn’t like to be part of a profession where one gets to serve society, educating it, and also where monotony or boredom or lull never sets in? Isn’t it the best profession to be part of?

Can Obama bring the promised ‘change’?

let's hope for the best.

Unlike any American citizen my concerns were entirely different while listening to Barack Obama at the Democratic Convention, this morning. Over the years, especially under President George Bush’s term in the White House, has convinced me that the United States of America democratically elects the biggest dictator in every four years to rule the world.

In a speech perfectly blended with prose and poetry, Obama scathingly analyzed the policies of the Bush administration in the two terms and also tried to realistically pin-point the agendas he have, which he is terming as ‘change’.

Certain points which he made, the American people are in strict need of, especially creating jobs in America for the people living there instead of allowing companies to outsource jobs and at the same time getting tax benefits. Democrats in this session of the run-up to the elections have raised concerns about gender equality and quality college education. Being a father of two daughters himself, Obama vowed to ensure equal wages for women, creating better opportunities for quality education, not allowing privatization of social security and tax cuts.

The last two points needs to be noted by our economic policy makers which need to be implemented in the Indian context as well. Better get it done before the Americans do it and set an example.

When he moved on to criticize the Republican policy about giving benefits to those who already have the surplus and hope that prosperity trickles down the social order, it simply brought the thought back that human misery, its causes, is similar and universal. Isn’t it the common belief in India as well that our government too functions in this manner? Obama didn’t stop there, he went on to explain it briefly that the policy basically means that ‘you are on your own’. Isn’t it was the situation in India as suggested by the news reports on 27th August 2008 or when the inflation figures rises northwards every Friday or when there is some terrorist attack?

But what struck me as most worthy of all, was his pledging to decrease America’s dependence on oil from the middle-east. Definitely Obama has hit the nail on the head. If he wins the election and gets this vision of his rolling then half the problems round the globe would be over. Another war like that of Iraq based on false premises could be avoided in future. There would be no silly diplomatic games played by big countries, especially the USA for oil’s sake.

However, so far Obama’s speeches and those made in support of his candidature has been more messiah like, though steeped in idealism, sounds convincing. He definitely has delivered some of the best speeches of the present times. And on the 45th anniversary of Martin Luther king jr.’s ‘I have a dream speech’, as the first African-American Democratic Presidential nominee, Obama has already made history and his speech though steeped in high prose, sounding idealistic wasn’t blind to the reality.

Come this November, the world would get to know whether his speeches have been able to convince America or not, that he is the best man for the White House. And good news is that so far he seems immune to the dictator bug.

27th August 2008 nine o’clock news: most shocking ever

Today’s nine O’ clock news was the saddest things that I have ever seen, except the post-9/11 days. It seemed as if a chaos like situation from pandemonium has suddenly hijacked our nation. Law and order, peace, natural harmony, suddenly has gone missing. And both god and the government have forgotten about its subjects.

So many unnatural stories were reported today, but the reaction, both verbal and physical was nowhere to be found from the people vested with the duty and power to protect us. Neither god nor the government was answering the prayers of the hostages in Jammu or flood affected people in Bihar or the people affected by communal violence in Orissa.

The violence in Jammu and Kashmir is refusing to die down. For more than two months now the state has been in news because of the protests because of the Amarnath land Transfer issue. And for few days the Kashmir valley is trying to cope up with the curfew imposed there. And midst of all these, one also gets to hear ceasefire violations and militants trying to cross the Line of Control. Political parties try to do nothing other than playing electoral politics as the elections are inching closer. When will the normalcy return in the ‘Paradise on earth’? One after another problem is gripping the state but the government and the respective agencies aren’t even able to figure out even produce a gimmick of peace.

It’s not been long, the state of Gujarat has not yet recovered, and another terror attack takes place. Three militants cross the line of control holds 7 people hostage including women and children in a home in Jammu. It took almost 17-hrs for the security forces to gun down the terrorists.

Bihar’s ‘river of sorrow’ Kosi has again changed its course flooding several districts. Over thousands are stranded in submerged houses without food or water, with hope of being rescued. The chief minister has announced for complete evacuation but with the resources available with the administration at the ground zero is telling that such a task is a Herculean one, as the officials are falling short of rescue boats.

Meanwhile a communal clash is in progress Orissa, where Christians are being targeted after a local Hindu leader was killed. Christians there are fleeing to the Phulbani Hills to take refuge.

Why are the concerned authorities not being able to take steps to curb the violence or the problems at stage? Why things are allowed to spiral out of control? Aren’t we alert enough? Probably the militants were right when they mockingly called our Intelligence Bureau, ‘Ignorance Bureau’. It seems like the people in the country are living on the mercy of the god, who is also not been kind these days. Probably the authorities are thinking people will get used to living to this as they have with bad roads, without regular water supplies, irritatingly irregular long power-cuts.

Few days back one editor mentioned in his column that whining is our national obsession. After the situation around us is not at all rosy or perfect. And if you stop making the authorities know that you are not satisfied with the present circumstances then even the ‘late reactions’ that one is getting in form of some compensations from the authorities will also vanish.