Demographic Dividends: Fresh Challenges for BJP

As days pass by the challenges for BJP to strike back are getting tougher. Fresh challenges are cropping up as the UPA government is taking newer steps in desirable direction. But that’s indeed a healthy scenario because now the opposition has a higher goal in front of them. Like it’s always more challenging, and satisfying too, to become the first boy in a class of all bright students, it can be a really cherishing coming back to power for the BJP because of the competition from a rejuvenated Congress after the decisive victory in 2009 elections.

Coming to power in the 1990s for BJP against a decaying Congress and coming back to power now against a fresh Congress are not the same thing. Nevertheless, it’s indeed a positive sign. At the end of it the country would be benefitted with a better and stronger opposition and alternative in future. It’s same as that of a fiercely competitive market where the consumer is finally benefitted by the constant improvement of the quality of the products from competing companies.

In the 1990s both the bottom and the middle of the pyramid of Indian population were equally frustrated with the complacence, misgovernance and corruption of successive Congress governments. The emergency, the anti Sikh riots and the Bofors scam were still not things of distant past. The constant and brazen appeasement of the minority community for years by the Congress had also alienated them from the majority class, who by no way were communal. At that point of time BJP came up with fresh hopes for everything better not only for the educated people, but also for the ‘Aam Aadmi’.

Very ironically this very section of the voters turned their back to BJP in the recent election. But the reason is little different. Over the decade the aspirations of the people have changed.

People had already tasted prosperity since the days of NDA rule. Buoyed by the strong wind of the global economic boom the subsequent UPA government had limited chances to stop India’s growth. One had to be really dumb to stop the natural growth and prosperity that India was enjoying out if inertia of the high-speed global economy.

It’s no longer a mystery how Lalu Prasad Yadav turned around the fortunes of Indian Railways. Driven by the initial ground work done by Nitish Kumar, the previous Railway Minister, and the buoyant economy, anyone else also might have turned the Indian Railways around.

The perception of the UPA government being in favour of ‘Aam Aadmi’ was also created without much of effort. The ‘Aam Aadmi’ saw prosperity not because of the fact that the UPA government did something extra ordinary. The natural growth of Indian GDP, in lines with the flourishing world economy, bore the fruits of development for the ‘Aam Aadmi’ too. On top of that a few further gimmicks like loan waiving and the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme added more to the perception. Hence, surprisingly, the anti incumbency wave was quite low against the ruling government.

All this itself had made the task for BJP to come back quite challenging. To add more to the challenge, UPA has started taking some steps that can’t be ruled out as just gimmicks.

The recent induction of Nandan Nilekani into the cabinet as the overall boss of the National ID project is one such act. It’s a very well thought plan.

The UPA government could have inducted any one of the Ambanis, or a Godrej or the Tata or someone else for the same job and still it would have worked out quite well. But no one else, than Nandan Nilekani, is looked upon as an ideal by anyone who is educated and hails from the middle class and who is young – someone who represents, or would be representing, India in the very near future. In Nandan Nilekani’s own words, India’s best asset at this point of time is her ‘demographic dividend’ coming from this huge chunk of educated, urbanized, middle class people. A few years back also this ‘dividend’ was not considered that big a thing either in business of politics.

Nandan Nilekani’s story, along with that of Narayan Murthy’s, is something that anyone with limited means but unlimited vision and ambition and passion can associate with. He comes from a middle class family without any golden connection as is the case with majority of Indians. He achieved everything in life by his sheer credibility and the favourable economic conditions of India – something that majority of Indians would also aspire of. His is an inspiring story that can raise hopes among the majority of Indians – but not the stories of the Tata or an Ambani or a Godrej.

Narayan Murthy has described this event as important as Sam Pitroda’s Telecom Revolution and Swaminathan’s Green Revolution. Inducting someone like Nandan Nilekani into the cabinet is a master stroke that can endear the UPA government to the majority of educated, urban, middle-class Indians, who are going to be the main driving force of our country over the next few decades.

I see this as a fresh challenge to the opposition. BJP has to come up with strategies that will align with the future class that would yield ‘demographic dividend’ to our country. This class no longer would be ‘Aam Aami’ staying in the hinterland of India waiting for a ‘White Tiger’ to become a ‘Slumdog Millionaire’. This class, again in Nandan Nilekani’s own words, would be the one that would change the way politics is looked at and the way our country has been functioning. This class can’t be ignored or crushed. The system has to change as per their aspirations. Anyone who is not aligned with this new system would perish and anyone who goes with them will cherish the fruits of ‘demographic dividends’. So it’s high time that BJP gets aligned with this new ‘White Tiger’.

Best Thing for a Father on Father's Day & World Music Day - 21st June, 2009

Today was Father's Day and also World Music Day. Many of us are parent and all of us love music. I won't find a more apt moment than today to share this piece of music.

All of us would perhaps like our kids to learn some music. The first time our kids perform at school, the first time they learn something to sing or play, the first time they win any music competition at school - all these are among the most memorable days for us. To capture these moments we take camcorders and cameras with us, upload the recordings in youtube for their grandparents to watch and we keep on telling everyone about them. I just wonder, how this father called Leopold would have felt when his 5-6 years old kid composed this piece of music.

Well, no points for guessing the kid - I haven't heard of any kind other than Mozart to compose at such young age.

I just came across the sound track and notation, recently in web, of this piece, accepted widely as Mozart's first composition. It's enumerated as K.1 and called 'Minuet for Harpsichord'. It was recovered from his elder sister's notebook. His sister Nannerl, then 10/11 years old wrote it down in her notebook when her little borther suddenly started playing something on piano which they were not taught by their father. Though very rarely this piece features in Mozart's best compositions, but for any music loving parent, there can't be a better composition than this one. It would be the dream for any father to have a prodigal child like who can compose such good music at an age of 6. Also there's something in this composition which any kid would like. My 6 years old kid Hrishav, who has just started learning western classical music in keyboards, has been listening to it every now and then ever since I've downloaded it. After all who else, than a kid himself, would know better what kids love?

Happy Father's Day to the fathers and Happy World Music Day to all.

Makes & Breaks in Politics: Analogies with Corporate World

One of the most important concepts in Indian culture and philosophy is that of the role of a creator, savior and destructor. People in India, since ages, have believed that the life cycle of anything, be it a nation, or civilization or a human life, is nothing but three phases of creation, survival and destruction. From the religious point of view also Brahma the creator, Vishnu the savior or protector and Shiva the destructor have been associated with the highest level of divinity. Keeping aside the theological aspects of this concept, it also has a very far reaching implication in almost everything thing – including the corporate world and the politics.

In a span of three decades the creation, growth and the recent debacle of BJP is a very relevant phenomenon in this respect. There have been introspections (or atmamanthan – one of the terms that Vajpayee had made popular even among the Hinglish crowd), review meetings, innumerable columns and writings on the causes of the debacle. Very logically nothing surprising has come out of all these. Most of the things that have been pointed out seem to be known to all. Nevertheless, none of these findings should be ignored with a ‘we-all-knew-this’ attitude like the kids in the class of Christopher Columbus who were all asked to place a boiled egg with shell firmly on a table and Columbus was the only one to break the shell, flatten the bottom and place it firmly on the table.

In Swami Vivekananda’s words ‘education is the manifestation of perfection already in man’. It’s no rocket science or the lack of it that makes someone a success or failure. In most cases debacles happen for reasons that are always known. So all the exercises for reinventing the reasons for any failure is always welcome. It’s also important to study success and failures at various fields and spheres because at the end of the day the reasons for any success or failure have some common things, knowing which just helps us to become more aware, educated and enlightened.

I’d like to analyze the growth and decline of a company which I’ve see from a close distance and draw an analogy to the same for politics. The intention is to infer that growth and decline always follow a particular pattern and the successful corporate and politicians always try to understand the pattern as best as possible.

The nineties saw a large number of technology startups in the San Francisco Bay area, popularly known as the Silicon Valley. The nearby universities at Stanford and Berkeley always provide an uninterrupted supply of talent to the Bay Area. Most technology companies either are head quartered or have important design centers in Bay Area. Intel, HP, Sun, Google all started in Bay Area. One of the technology areas which saw quite a few startups in nineties is called EDA or Electronic Design Automation, which provides CAD (Computer Aided Design) tools for designing semiconductor chips for electronic products. While semiconductor, which includes behemoths like Intel, IBM, Nokia, Motorola, Sony, Samsung and innumerable others, is a huge industry, EDA is very small. Individual revenues of Intel and Nokia are $40b and $50b respectively and the entire EDA industry has revenue of only $4b. That’s why EDA is perhaps one of the most fiercely - often bordering to nasty – competitive industries.

Little different from the Congress monopoly in Indian political scene, EDA had a sort of oligopoly dominated by the big brothers Cadence & Synopsys for quite some time. There were many small entities like the regional parties, but none could do anything significant till late nineties when a company named Magma suddenly rose like a sphinx. With barely a few million dollars of revenue in late nineties it attained $250m (1/8^th of total EDA GDP) in 2005. When the semiconductor design houses were getting frustrated with the complacencies of the biggie-duo Cadence & Synopsys, a dashing young Indian entrepreneur, Rajiv Madhavan, still in his twenties, brought in fresh hopes and newer and more efficient ideas for making chips. The big brothers Cadence and Synsys didn’t provide a one-stop-shop and the customers had to buy a suite in pieces and stitch them together. On the contrary Magma came up with a single stitched elegant suite. Most importantly Rajiv exactly understood the problems and the aspirations of his customers - the chip makers.

The result was phenomenal. Apart from Google, not many startups in Bay Area can boast of such a success in so less time. Magma came into being in late nineties and by 2002 it had already become number two in areas of its operation, displacing the big brother Cadence. Magma’s reputation in customer satisfaction became a matter of threat even to the other big brother Synopsys. The entire designer community felt proud to be associated with Magma. In started attracting the best of the talents.

In a few years Rajiv could ‘destruct’ the old hegemony of the big brothers Cadence & Synopsys and ‘create’ a successful company. Rajiv was indeed a great Creator with all the right traits required for ‘creation’. He was aggressive, emotional, passionate, possessive, ruthless and ambitious. The Big Brother Synopsys tried its best to put him down, but he was just unputdownable.

The next logical phase of the business is retention or ‘protection’ of the growth. There’s a startling difference between destruction/creation and protection. It’s no theology, but sheer practical sense, that the protector Vishnu has been given a totally different image than the destructor Shiva. The Protector is much more matured, not emotional, very practical, composed and off course much more benign than the Destructor. The traits required for destruction/creation and protection are as different as playing cricket and singing songs. It’s not necessary that Sachin Tendulkar can also sing like Kishore Kumar. That’s when the problem started with Magma.

Rajiv is an excellent creator but turned out to be a bad protector. He went on with the same aggression, arrogance and emotions with which he’d created the company. He slapped a law suit on the Big Brother Synopsys without much reason and drained huge amount of money for fighting the case. Synopsys kept on dragging the case as long as possible because they knew Magma would bleed heavily with the sky-rocketing legal costs in USA. His views and comments in public became too harsh and arrogant as compared to the relatively soft image of Synopsys. At the same time his lofty claims about some of Magma’s future products didn’t turn out to be fully true in due course. Gradually people started to dislike the very arrogance and aggression in Rajiv that they had liked few years back. In the mean time very silently and humbly Synopsys came up with a really good product that challenged Magma’s superiority in recent times. Gradually people started to prefer the ‘softer’ Synopsys rather than the ‘hard’ Magma. That was also the time when the global slowdown starting taking its toll and Magma went into a whirlwind downfall.

Let’s turn back to the rise and decline of BJP from just two seats in 1984 to close to 200 in 1999 and down to 120 in 2009.The nineties saw the dramatic rise of BJP who could well understand the pulse of the nation. India had been frustrated with the fifty years of misgovernance, corruption and minority appeasement by the Congress. Indians badly needed some fresh outlook, transparency and a cultural nationalism to pump up the declining global position of India. BJP came up with the right mix of aggression, passion and emotion to destroy a fifty year old dynastic misrule and setup the startup of a successful coalition government in the center for the first time. Almost the entire educated middle class aligned themselves with BJP in the nineties.

But when came the turn of protecting the same government it started losing ground because of the same reason why Magma started failing. The same aggression that brought BJP to power became the negative point. The excessive attack on the older Big Brother Congress was not taken in the right way by the same people who’d voted the Congress out a decade ago in favor of BJP.

Like I hope Rajiv matures as a protector, BJP can also overcome the transition from a destructor/creator to a protector. It’s just a maturing phase that will pass by. The same people who had brought BJP into power in nineties might not be the best candidates to play the role of ‘Protector’. There has to be a change of guards. This shouldn’t be seen as an embarrassment or humiliation for the old timers because their contributions and expertise are not being ignored. It’s only that after Sachin’s innings it’s time for Kishore Kumar to sing. Let Sachin not attempt to be Kishore Kumar. Sachin is Sachin and Kishore Kumar is Kishore Kumar. It’s no embarrassment to Sachin that he is not Kishore Kumar. It’s just not his cup of tea.

Coming back to where I’d started – let’s understand that we not only need a Shiva, but also a Vishnu. That’s what runs a business, and that’s what runs politics!!

The “For Aam Aadmi” image of Congress

There’s no denying that fact that the image of Congress being a pro ‘Aam Aadmi’ party did lot towards winning decisively in 2009 LS elections. It’s totally a different thing all together whether the steps that the UPA government had taken in the past five years were really the best possible ones. Nevertheless, on the basis of all these the perception that Congress has worked towards the overall development of bottom of the pyramid has been already been created.

It’s now the task of the opposition, lead by BJP, to make sure that the populist steps, that UPA has taken in the past five years and will take in future, don’t put a long term dent in the financial health of our country. But again doing so is a double edged sword. Saying anything against the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme or waiving of loans would directly hit popularity. There’s lots of credence in making people understand that any step with very short term populist outlook would be very detrimental to the same people for whom the schemes are being created.

Let’s take the example of the NREGS. Yes, it did give some economic security to around 45 million households amidst a global slowdown. But couldn’t something else be done that would have had even greater impact? Already there have been enough talks about the futility (1, 2, 3) of the work against which the employment has been provided. In many cases the sort of work done is comparable to what is said of the US about what they did to come out of the great depression of the thirties – one group digging up a hole and another filling it back. In stead of that the government could have launched many useful infrastructure projects and provided employment. The Golden Quadrilateral project has been almost stalled. A lot of employment could have been generated had all the incomplete roads were completed on time.

There’s no doubt that loan waiver scheme for the farmers was just an eye wash. In reality only the rich farmers were benefited. Majority of the poor farmers, who take money from the local money lenders, are still not benefited at all by this and they are the ones who continue to commit suicide throughout our country. In stead of waiving the loans, which anyway doesn’t impact majority of the farmers, the government can think of something like micro finance which can have much greater reach and impact.

Things like RTI and fixed terms for civil servants are indeed very good steps in instilling hopes in people. The RTI was a great success. A large number of PILs were filed in the past few years just because more and more information were available to the common people. These steps are simple to implement and can’t be criticized easily. BJP should come up with more such steps and propose them in the parliament.

It’s written in the wall that you can’t win any election any more unless you have the confidence of the bottom of the pyramid. But that doesn’t mean that you have to become populist in an unviable manner. That’s where BJP has to play a great role – that is to serve the “Aam Aadmi” in a much more efficient way than what Congress is perceived to be doing or have done.

Urgent appeal for millions affected by Cyclone AILA in West Bengal

To donate in India - http://www.eurekachild.org/donate/wbcyclone-ind.php
To donate from Overseas - http://www.eurekachild.org/donate/wbcyclone-ab.php
To donate in US - https://secure.aidindia.org/aidadmin/donate/current/Donate.jsp?p=Cyclone%20Aila%20Relief%20Fund

 

To provide relief materials please contact -
Shayan      +91-9883395449
Debolina   +91-9836922336
Prithviraj +91-9830481370

 

You can find the reports/updates/requirements at -
http://www.eurekachild.org/wbcyclone/
http://aidindia.org/main/content/category/36/281/407/

As of Wednesday, 27 May 2009, more than 200 people are reported dead and an estimated 3 million displaced from their homes by Cyclone Aila that made landfall in eastern India on Sunday, May 25.

Please visit AID's site for regular updates from the ground. Rs. 10 Lakhs (Rs 1 million) has already been approved for Baikanthapur Tarun Sangha (BTS) working in the Sundarban region to provide food, water and temporary shelter to the affected.

According to the Press Trust of India (PTI), 13 districts in the state of West Bengal have been hit. However, the islands in the ecologically diverse Sunderbans delta have borne the brunt of the cyclone.

Those displaced are suffering acutely due to lack of food and clean water. "There is water everywhere. We could reach aid to only 10 percent of the affected population. We could not even airdrop food packets because of the flooding," Kanti Ganguly, West Bengal state minister for Sundarbans, told Reuters, as quoted in the Washington Post.

This is an hour we all must come together and show our wholehearted support for the cyclone victims. It is critical that the immediate needs such as food, clean water and medicine are provided to those affected.

AID is a volunteer movement, and a registered non-profit charitable organization. All donations are tax exempted under 80G of the Income Tax Act, 1961 and receipts will be issued. For online donation please click here.

Thanks to the support of the community AID has helped support relief and rehabilitation work following natural and human-made disasters, in various parts of India, including Tamil Nadu, Bihar, Orissa, West Bengal, Chhattisgarh and Assam. We worked with the flood relief in Bihar in 2008 and with the Tsunami relief effort since 2004.

Right now AID is actively working with several partner organizations in West Bengal for relief and rehabilitation of the survivors. It is committed ensure that the funds get dispatched at the earliest.

We hope you will help us maximize the support we can provide as quickly as possible. The need is dire and we all must act with the greatest possible urgency to rush aid and relief to those affected.

For further information on Cyclone Aila, please visit the following links:

AID INDIA Relief Work: http://aidindia.org/main/content/category/36/281/407/

Does Educated Young India Get Attracted towards Educational Qualification of Candidates?

Now that enough introspection and analysis have been done, it’s time for BJP to take corrective actions and work effectively towards improving the confidence of the people. It might not be possible to come up with a single antibiotic for all the headache, stomach pain and body ache at the same time. And by any chance if someone comes up with any such single-shot-solution that will surely be another grave mistake to apply it. Corrective measures are meant to be staggered and modified from time to time in order to account for all possible feedbacks. Faster the feedback mechanism, faster would be the settling time for the corrective measures.

 

Failures are the pillars of success. It’s good to fail and learn. That way the arrogance and the adamance of the success can be controlled to a great extent. But at the same time success shouldn’t be looked down. It’s always a good think to find out what all factors lead to a success. In the context of the recent election it’s not a bad thing to identify some aspects that might have helped the Congress to win more seats than BJP.

 

One of the aspects, as pointed out several times, is indeed the projection of youth by the Congress. Besides that there’s also one important thing that people may be overlooking. Doesn’t the election throw some light on the hypothesis that the educational background of candidates might have played a greater role than any other election in the past?

 

It’s not that highly educated people never took part in election in the past. Also education is not just measured by some professional degrees - otherwise Rabindranath Tagore can’t be considered educated at all. But that can be taken as an exception. As a general rule qualification is indeed a good measure of education and learning. Going by that standard this election did have some highly qualified people and most of them have won decisively.

 

Starting from Manmohan Singh (Cambridge), Jayaram Ramesh (IIT), Prithviraj Chauhan (BITS Pilani), Shashi Tharoor (UN) to S M Krishna, Kapil Sibal and many others there have been a platter of technical expertise from various domains ranging from engineering, to economics to law and International Relations. Most of these people are from Congress.

 

To top all these there are also a few personalities like Montek Singh and Shyam Pitrada, who are not directly associated with politics but are no less involved with the Congress machinery.

 

For the millions of first time voters, most of whom are not illiterates, such credentials might have played a great role in creating a perception that Congress is better ‘qualified’ to run the government. Such a perception may or may not be true always, but at the end of the end it’s this perception that might have turned the wheels in favour of Congress.

 

Even though a rational person may be against dynastic politics but still the suaveness and external polish of many second generation (and fourth generation in one case) young politicians did tilt the public sentiments in favour of dynasty because the alternative in many cases were just no match for the sophistication of the heirs of the chairs.

 

Does that mean that more educated the youth of India would be more and more they would prefer the sophistication and suaveness and polish rather than a rustic down to earth true worker? It might be too premature to come to any conclusion like this.

 

Whatever be the case even the most techno savvy person would prefer a half naked Gandhi, devoid of any popular perception of sophistication, against the impeccably dressed and eloquent and suave Jinnah.

 

So when there is indeed some basis for the hypothesis that qualification of candidates may have helped Congress this time, but at the same time it’s not the only criteria for winnability. People did see ground work also apart from qualification. That’s why Captain Gopinath could get only 18000 votes in perhaps the most techno savvy and hi-tech constituency of India – that’s Bangalore South – against BJP’s Ananth Kumar, who defeated not only Gopinath but also another US returned and educated young turk from Congress.

 

I’d like to conclude by saying that a safe bet is to field candidates with really good educational background and also strong track record of developmental services.

 

Mamata Banerjee won’t have won so much this time had she not had Derek O’Brian, one of the most popular personalities among the elite Calcuttans, a well educated and popular singer – Kabir Suman – who had revolutionized modern Bengali songs some two decades ago, a very successful doctor like Kakali Ghosh Dastidar and few others from corporate sectors also – most of whom had fought and won this election. Mamata played a very safe game this time by attracting the elite and highly educated people from various spectrum of society.

 

This indeed is a good thing to think about for BJP. One of the major reasons for the unparalleled popularity of Atal Behari Vajpayee among the youth of 90s is off course his literary sense and poetic style of oratory. People used to wait for Vajpayee to speak because every time they expected some new expression and new words hitherto unheard to most vernacular unaware English educated youth. The educated people used to get attracted to his diction of words and impeccable knowledge of literature and language – something a rarity in politics. By the same logic the next generation youth of the 2000s getting attracted to Cambridge, Harvard, United Nations and IIT may not be a fluke.

COULD THIS BE THE SOLUTION TO THE Global Financial Crisis?

Money !

It is August. In a small town on the South Coast of France, holiday season is in full swing, but it is raining so there is not too much business happening. Everyone is heavily in debt. Luckily, a rich Russian tourist arrives in the foyer of the small local hotel. He asks for a room and puts a Euro100 note on the reception counter, takes a key and
goes to inspect the room located up the stairs on the third floor.

The hotel owner takes the banknote in hurry and rushes to his meat supplier to whom he owes E100.

The butcher takes the money and races to his wholesale supplier to pay his debt.

The wholesaler rushes to the farmer to pay E100 for pigs he purchased some time ago.

The farmer triumphantly gives the E100 note to a local prostitute who gave him her services on credit.

The prostitute goes quickly to the hotel, as she owed the hotel for her hourly room use to entertain clients.

At that moment, the rich Russian is coming down to reception and informs the hotel owner that the proposed room is unsatisfactory and takes his E100 back and departs.

There was no profit or income. But everyone no longer has any debt and the small town people look optimistically towards their future.

COULD THIS BE THE SOLUTION TO THE Global Financial Crisis?

The Strength of Bharat - the Base of India’s Pyramid

The 2009 Lok Sabha elections have brought out many things in the light. Among many others it has also converted a hypothesis into law – If you have to survive you can’t be niche any longer – you’ve to be just very common.  The power is no longer at the top of the pyramid – but at its base.

When I started my career in semiconductors in mid nineties we used to strive to work in the most advanced and niche areas for creating chips which would go into some of the fanciest electronic gadgets. For obvious reasons US used to be the most desirable place to work because that was the centre of all research and development.

Since then most companies producing electronic products have invested heavily in technology to produce things which are no doubt fancy and hi-tech, but not always useful. But then people had money and could afford buying umpteen number of useless things. Even till recently people used to change mobile phones once in every few months. It’s not that they all really needed new phones so frequently. But they can’t be blamed. The electronics industry used to create such hype around the useless gizmos that the innocent consumers would think that their lives would be really useless if they didn’t have one of those useless things.

This vicious circle of demand and supply of things, that can’t be ever called value-for-money products and in most cases too useless, stayed for almost fifteen years when suddenly no one had any money to buy them anymore. People moved away from luxuries of replacing phones every few months to cost effective and value-for-money products.

For the first time people understood the futility of seeing a movie in the small screen of a phone. Not only such an act is unergonomic and poses serious threats to health but also the experience is a debacle compared to even watching the cheapest television. 

That’s when the entire electronic industry faced the biggest ever slow-down.

The story is same for most other industries. When the going was easy people never thought of investing in useful value for money things. Most of the products were always out of reach of the Aam Aadmi and were targeted only for the niche and rich people – the ones that constitute the pinnacle of the pyramid. When the going became tough since last year the only available consumer market was the base of the pyramid – which was deprived of useful things all these years. Then suddenly the focus shifted from niche to simple and common things. Intel is thinking of $100 notebooks with wireless broadband, sales of mobiles are restricted only to the low end categories, FMCG companies are coming up with even smaller sachets of their products primarily for rural markets – the whole industry is euphoric about the prospects of Bharat rather than India.

The age of niche products seems to have come to a temporary halt.

No longer I’m proud of working on the latest technologies to produce hi-tech gizmos for the sale in upmarket malls in Europe or US – because they are no longer in demand there. Rather I should work on simple things that can be sold in a Reliance Outlet in India’s hinterland.

The importance of Bharat is clearly seen in the outcome of recent elections. Even though faulty at many places, still the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme of the UPA government did manage to give the 700 million strong rural Bharat some amount of buying capacity. When the economy went into a whirlwind downfall throughout the world one of the very few markets with purchasing power was indeed India’s Bharat. Perhaps that’s the only reason why our GDP growth didn’t turn negative. The rural economy kept the wheels of India’s economy moving. When my purchasing power was shrinking with every month Bharat was buying 15 million mobile phones every month.

The impact of the recent slowdown was not felt in a significant way in Bharat. That’s surely one of the main reasons why the UPA didn’t feel the heat of anti incumbency. None of the poll predictions could assess the strength of Bharat - the base of India’s pyramid - in such a strong way. Not only is the Bharat driving the economy of our country, but also has proved to be a decisive element in India’s democracy.

There’s no doubt that BJP failed to tap the potential of Bharat. The issue of security or inflation or economic breakdown didn’t have much relevance to Bharat. It was only the India that was bothered with all those!!

It’s the writing in the wall – take care of Bharat.... India is Bharat.

Humble India Prefers Humble people

Since last week there has been several analysis of the disappointing performance of BJP in 2009 election. Most analyses do harp on a few common points like (1) the excessive use in BJP campaigns of the strong vs. weak PM issue which seemed to have reached the level of personal attacks on a person who is perceived as  Mr Good by ‘Aam Aadmi’ (2) lack of youth power which was exploited very rightfully by Congress through Rahul & Priyanka Gandhi (3) total failure in creating an all inclusive and the easily-understood  so called ‘secular’ image among all sections (4) total failure in retaining the educated middle class people who were instrumental in bringing BJP at the helm of power a decade back (5) total failure to utilize the media in its favour (6) the negativity of the entire episode of Varun Gandhi’s speech and the recent cultural policing by some right wing elements perceived to be affiliated to BJP and (7) the internal feud within BJP.

There should be several other reasons off course. But no one is speaking of one aspect which I feel played a major role in the declining vote share of BJP.

India and Indian culture has a lot of respect and regard for humility. Perhaps one of the most distinguishing and differentiating factors that has become an identification for Indians since ages is humility. Indians have been always seen as very modest people. Aggression was never a part of the character for most Indians.

History has more regards for a humble and benign Asoka than anyone else. The next personality who comes close to the reputation and stature of Asoka’s is perhaps Akbar, again a much more benign and humble personality than most other rulers in recent times. Gandhi’s more than a life image and popularity is also perhaps due to the fact that he was seen more as a benign seer than an aggressive politician. It’s not that Tagore was a seer in reality, but the image that remained in most of the Indians’ mind is that of a bearded sage that suits the persona of a Gurudev. People tend not to see at all the aggressive side of Tagore. 

With the exception of perhaps Guru Govind Singh, most of the personalities who have attained a more than life stature in India in all ages starting from Buddha till Gandhi have been – or at least perceived to be - devoid of any aggression. That’s not just a coincidence. I feel that’s a part of our culture and we’ve to respect that.

The very fact that the entire campaigning of BJP was based on the idea of a strong leader against a ‘weak’ Manmohan Singh didn’t go well with the Indians who always prefer soft and humble people. Pointing out blatantly over and over that Manmohan Singh is weak did make the Indians think about the point. At one side they have a soft spoken person who never showed aggression in any form and on the other side there’s someone strong and aggressive. I think the Indians did exactly what they have been doing for ever – prefer a soft person. It’s a common perception that soft people are also very humble. Aggression is always associated with adamance and lack of humility. That’s why they felt very comfortable with Manmohan Singh.

Not only did Advani and Modi’s image speak of aggression, but in general the BJP leaders are perceived to be less polite when they speak. This was very apparent in many of the debates in media. Might be they were always asked uncomfortable questions by a biased media, still their body language and the message couldn’t be seen as very humble or polite. Compared to that Rahul Gandhi’s master strokes of humility, or at least the publicised or orchestrated forms of humility, did gel very well with the culture of India. It’s interesting to see that even the youth of India prefers humility. It’s another story that the so called humility that has impressed the Indians can also be totally a fake.

BJP should take this lesson very seriously. It can be argued that in nineties the rise of BJP was also based on an aggressive Hindutva agenda. But that was more of a cultural nationalism rather than just aggression. Also at the centre was the benign Atal Behari Vajpayee.  This time neither is any nationalism nor a benign face. So it’s time to go back to the drawing board to chalk out the plans for creating a soft and humble image of BJP.

I think that’s how the corporate world also works. An aggressive person may rise to the top, but a popular manager is he who is soft and humble. It’s true that at times you do need a strong and decisive person with lot of aggression, but then it’s very unlikely that he or she would be popular.

Democracy might not guarantee the best – but then that’s the way it is. A party or a leader has to be popular and if that requires taking a particular stand, that’s what any they should do to get to power. 

It’s not the end of the day

The verdict of 2009 LS elections is out. All of us, who consider ourselves Friends of BJP, are really disappointed, as are all BJP and NDA leaders.  Though we all were hoping against all hopes that NDA might come to power, but I believe there was always an uncertainty about the final outcome. I’m sure that most of us were disappointed but not shocked or surprised with the outcome. Yes, the numbers of NDA could have been better, but there was lot of odds against BJP or NDA to come to power. Keeping aside the disappointed I think there’s something that we all should feel great about – that’s the air of change and awareness among the voters that have swept this election at many places; and it’s this awareness that’s a very positive sign for all of us.

I’m a Bengali by birth and officially a Bangalorean. Ever since my childhood I, along with million others born in Bengal since the seventies, knew that there’s only one party and that’s the Left. In both assembly and LS elections the results were very predictable – Left used to win a sweeping majority in both places. The Congress and later the Trinamool Congres (and perhaps BJP to a very small extent very recently) have been mere minorities in opposition for almost 35 years. I’ve always hoped to see a day, sometime during my life time, when the scenario would change. But then I knew it very well that perhaps me becoming a billionaire is more feasible thing than Left becoming a minority party in Bengal. Especially the last LS elections made it more clear that the Left is becoming stronger and stronger day by day. Everyone started to accept the reality that they have born and will die seeing the same Left ruling them forever.

This year’s LS has been a stupendous surprise when Left has got just half the seats as that of the Trinamool-Congress combine. That’s a change that couldn’t happen for almost 35 years. That’s a change that was induced by the growing awareness among the common people. It’s a trend that we all should be proud of. At last the day has come when common man has grown up to understand what is what and call spade a spade. He is no longer a blind person. He can see what’s happening around him. He can understand what’s better for him. He can choose what’s better for him. He is for a CHANGE.

This very awareness among the voters is something that can change the political scenario of India going ahead. It’s true that BJP has failed to get majority, but as long they stand for development and prosperity there’s a hope sometime in future.

I’m sure BJP will now introspect about what went wrong this time. But at the same time they should be more convinced that the day is not far when they can come to power with a sweeping majority. All they have to do is create more and more success stories at the state levels and use that to create more awareness among the common people across India about what’s good for them and the country.  Thus election has perhaps shown that it’s the beginning of a Prabuddha Bharat or Awakened India that Swami Vivekananda had conceived of some hundred years back.  From now onwards India will vote only for development and betterment.

Shekhar Gupta of Indian Express has pointed out one more striking thing about this election which is really very interesting for BJP. This is the first election that BJP has fought without Atal Behari Vajpayee.

There’s no doubt that the personality and the image of Vajpayeeji is something that attracts all section of people irrespective of their political or social affiliations. Perhaps after the Gandhis in Indian politics, Vajpajeeji has the mesmerizing and greater than life personality that endears masses of illiterate or lowly literate millions of people of India. The presence of Vajpayee in the BJP had the impact perhaps similar to that of Nehru or Indira Gandhi in the early days of the rule of the Gandhis in India. The first election that Congress fought without the Gandhis after the death of Rajiv Gandhi was a debacle. But compared to that the performance of BJP as a party in this election, first time without Vajpayee, can’t be treated as a debacle. That reinstils the conviction that BJP is not a party dependent on a single person.

Though the impact of the any particular person can’t be ignored, but still the very fact that BJP has passed the litmus test of fighting an election without their most acceptable and popular face is indeed a good thing.

Winnability directly from the association of any particular family or person is always a risky thing in democracy. Even dictatorship fails if it depends too much on a single person.  What will happen to Cuba after Castro is indeed a matter of concern. Nazi Germany collapsed just in moments without Hitler.

Apart from BJP and the Left parties, no other party in India is based on any particular ideology. Most parties derive their existence from singular personalities. Congress is also no exception to that.  So by construction BJP always has an edge over any other party in a democratic setup.

It’s time to introspect and find out what went wrong. It’s not just a mere word of consolation that “failures are pillars of success”. Lot of lessons are learnt in each failure. I’m sure BJP will rectify the past mistakes and come up stronger in the next election.