THE HIGH FIVE !!

       Imagine you gotta kill someone , What would you do ? What weapon would you be using ? Knife , an Iron Rod , Hockey Stick etc etc .. . Now what if you  gotta kill a group of people ? May be some guns ? (Just can't go shooting people with like Max Payne ). Now imagine you gotta kill the whole country ! What would you do ? 

From time immemorial right from Mahabharata to the one in Afghanistan people have been fighting for power. So many battles have been fought , so many people have been killed. Although it took a while, people understood that nothing can be gained that way.Greed is the driving force behind all these ; greed of Duryodhana to the greed of wealth that lead to war of Constantinople to the greed of the nations that colonized others , it's always been greed.

With the recent advances in technology and other industries like manufacturing and telecom and name it whatever you want and the changes in the economic policies of almost nations , the interdependence of one nation over the other has increased. No one nation can say to hell with you to other unless they are dang sure that they are self sufficient though this being a distant dream to any country today.All this is true but the greed still exists , it has increased evermore. 

Given the prevailing geo-political and the economic conditions, the best way to bring down a nation no matter how big or small is to target its economy. Trust me economy today is as good as a religion (see my previous post on this). Once you destroy this religion (read as economy) , that's it !

Just imagine you badly need some money so that you can come out of the mess and when the guy who you think can bail you out gives you money on a condition that you gotta spend the money just as the guy says then what is the use of such a loan or bailout? 

This is what the IMF and WB precisely doing with the countries that have recently joined the Industrial revolution or got freedom recently. How long do they need to dance to the tunes of the so called GOD (read as IMF / WB) ? Enough is enough and thats what the BRIC now BRICS has though and come up with an agenda. BRICS (Brazil , Russia , India , China , Southafrica) though have almost nothing in common at all expect from having a sense of being ostracized from the International economic framework. This agenda is the establishment of a New Development Bank.

The funds of these 5 countries makeup for almost 25% of world's GDP! To establish such a Bank is surely an Herculean task given their problems in dealing with it's own group members.China shares territorial borders with India and Russia. We all know that in the recent past they have been engaged in a war also! Also China is opposing India's nuclear plans of late. Recently there has been a trade gap between China and India.  Russia has its own internals problems in dealing with the US friendly neighbors. On the other hand Brazil is very vigilant when its comes to Argentina. Despite these unfavorable circumstances , these nations have come together for a common goal, the development of the developing economies !

       However there are few important questions for which they need to find the answers. Here are a few of them:

1. Can they come out of US hegemony ?

2. Are they sure that this new Bank is not going to repeat what IMF and WB did?

3. How can they ensure that the regional politics and regional issues not going to impact on the function of the Bank?

4. You think this is going to nail the GOD's coffin?

5. How efficiently they can challenge the Western Liberal Democracies (so called) ?

Despite all these BRICS indeed is a force that is going to drive the developing economies to excel and come out of the mess.

Disclaimer : The views and opinions expressed in this article are solely the view of the author. The author doesn't intend to accuse any financial institution  or nation. Also the author does not hurt the religious or regional sentiments of the people of any geographical region.

Sensible use of social media .

Heyyy ! Awwwww chooo cute !! Ah u luk lik angel ! Wow what a pic where is it taken ? While banging (yeah you read it correctly) they keys of my keyboard , I hardly can see  the words  appearing on the canvas area of the ms word I have just typed in and you better know why (all are underlined red).  Social media, the hottest platform for the people to share and connect. Imagine to share a news if u still had to send a telegram with one guy having to key in the Morse code and then you hope for it to reach ASAP.  With the advent of such a platform (is it really the platform?)  not only communication has become faster but also we are , to an extent losing our space in life. Of course you are free to join or disjoin it anytime you want but the point there is not joining or disjoining it or advocating the use of it.

                Let me digress. When I say is it really the platform, I really mean it.  It’s not only me or you, it all the users of such a social media who acts as platform for the host company on which they can run.  In a way though such a site is, technically is deployed using a server and has an attractive home page and user interface and a mobile app for all the various mobile platform, psychologically it is we who act as the platform on which they run their business.

                Coming back to track, I am not against becoming a member of such a social network, for I wouldn’t have created an account on a social site.  One should always see both the sides of a coin. Of course even the social media has its own pros and cons. Of late people being reactive on social media think is same as being active. God help them ! In my personal opinion it won’t let people be what they are. It forces people to be someone else.  What makes me say this is that many people feel that they are not leading a good life only because they tend to compare their lives with of the others on the social networking sites.
           

                Also , of late social network serves as complaint box . Some indirect communication camouflaged as some quotes ( why don’t you sing kishore da’s dard bhare nagme and upload it on social site?)   Sometimes the posts even go to an extent to compel you to share it and like it even if you don’t want to . Like please share this god’s photo in 7 seconds and share it with 7 people you will have good luck. Boss in that case any Tom Dick and Harry would have gone to a cyber cafe asked the guy to open an account for him and share such umpteen number of photos and get good luck.

                One more funny thing that people have come up with. Share things like what does your birth date reveal? Had it been true then how easier it would have been to understand women ! (wow I wish it was real ). What’s your ex’s name starts with ? Boss why on the face of the earth would I want to broadcast it to the whole world ? Check out this app to know when and how will you die ? Is the site playing God with such freaking apps? What were you in previous birth? What the hell has that got to do with what I am now. Plan what you want to do in this life.

                So many malicious links have been discovered, still people don’t know where to draw the line. And posting where and with whom you are hanging out. It’s good to a certain extent but one should know where to draw the line. You just can’t post your hangout details with your boyfriend / girlfriend. If you are not concerned about your privacy at least be concerned about theirs.

                I again say that , I am not  against joining a social site,  but what I do advocate here is the disciplined used of the social networking site.

                

Disclaimer : The views /opinions expressed in this post are the personal views / opinions of the author. The author doesn't intend to discriminate defame any social networking site.

Is Economy the new Religion?

Ever since the big bang has ever happened, if there is one thing that has stood the test of time, then; in my personal opinion ; it is Religion. Yes, it needs no proof to prove this, just look back at the history. Be it any religion for that matter. One may say that there are so many religions that have perished. Agreed. But if you look at it and just introspect and ask yourselves what made it perish? It’s again another religion.

What basically constitute a religion? It’s nothing but an organized collection of belief system. Any economy is basically the same. It’s nothing but the sheer faith / belief of people in the economy that runs it. Some people have faith in Keynesian economics, where as the other have faith in Freemen Economic theory. There are however who have faith in Communism. It is very much debatable so as to which is better and I will tell you it’s not going to end. Let’s consider dollar it’s the sheer faith in the dollar that has made it the benchmark currency for any trade. As Indians also we are too much worried about the dollar and rupee comparison.

            See the belief the eurozone countries have in Euro and the rest of the world in Dollar.  The governments of the developing countries have sheer faith in the IMF and World Bank and thus act as per their terms. After the rejection of the initial plan for the bailout, the Cypriot government finally came out with another plan to recover from the financial crisis. This plan involved levy on the depositors. So it’s not just that you say abra ka dabra! And you get money. You cannot just create money out of thin air!. If there is something that can create money then its debt.

                It is observable that how a devotee doesn’t want to hurt his / her god, similarly the governments don’t want to hurt their god (the investors) even though it hurts its population. It’s faith in the consumerism that fetches the major chunk of GDP to some governments and faith in their economy that even though the debt to GDP ratio is over a hundred percent they are able to sustain that.

Disclaimer : The views expressed in this article are the personal views of the author , and has no intention to hurt any religious sentiments or ridicule any economic theory or any currency or any financial organization

Can Cyprus flu infect India ?

Cyprus has reached the heights of its fiscal imprudence. What’s going on there is indeed alarming. Imagine the public debt to be at par with the GDP of a nation. Or let me put it this way you are earning the same amount of money you need to repay someone or may be what if your monthly EMI is as same as your salary considering salary to be your only source of income ?

            Cyprus is the new not so proud member of the eurozone to apply for a bailout (Read as beg!).  Every nation on the face of the earth begs. But what’s so big deal with Cyprus? They don’t have the resources to repay if someone is going to bailout. Of course the IMF and some members of the eurozone have come up with a great plan! What’s the plan?

            Before actually talking about the plan let me tell you something. We all pay taxes! I know how it feels to pay tax at the financial year end.  In India we pay tax on what we earn yeah Income Tax! And we in India do live on our savings unlike in the Dreamland where the nations GDP is driven by consumerism (of some people if you know what place am referring to) where people don’t even know what savings mean. GDP is the market value of the final goods and services produced in a country. And GDP per capita is the indicator of standard of living!  So today you have money and you buy what about tomorrow? I will talk about standard of living in subsequent post. But for now let’s stick on to this. Tomorrow when you don’t have a penny on you then you got to sell what you have; as simple as it is. 

Let’s come back to tax. Currently Government pays interest for your deposits in the banks (at least in India). What if the government, tomorrow says, boy if you want to deposit your money you have to pay some amount of tax! That’s what IMF and some eurozone countries’ plan is. The Cyprus parliament however rejected this bill. But what’s the plan B? Let’s not talk about it since it’s their prerogative.

Let’s talk about if it really affects India. If it does then how and when? Basically for a nations’ public debt to be at par with the GDP the necessary and sufficient condition is that you borrow more than you can repay.  What leads someone to borrow so much? It’s indeed a food for thought.  Speaking in a microeconomic scale let’s see why someone borrows.

1.      You are really in need of that commodity.

2.      You need to just flaunt it.

The former condition is good, provided you can repay what you borrow considering the ROI that you can fetch out of that commodity. But the later is bad; this type of economic condition is driven by sheer consumerism. Consumerism is good to an extent but once you reach the ultimatum, it’s bad. Consumerist approach is indeed important to improve the standard of living but how much?

            Now though the financial condition of Cyprus doesn’t affect India directly, it doesn’t prompt us from giving it a thought and wake up. Thanks to the globalization that the financial condition of one nation or group of nations (EU) impacts the rest of the nations. So if tomorrow EU or US’ economy wobbles then am sure it’s going to affect us. I may even be wrong in saying that it may affect us, but considering the fact that the Global financial system is behaving so anomalously, I say that it may impact India.

            Sometimes it makes me think on what basis one can say that we won’t see the same condition in India in the near future. The banks have been shut down nationwide in Cyprus. Imagine if the same happening in India.

            One solution that I see in my personal opinion is that we need to cut down unnecessary imports. And implementing strict import duties on the unnecessary commodities. Also we can strengthen the manufacturing sector thereby providing the quality goods which are produced indigenously .Which also helps in reducing the unemployment problem and helps us to move towards the export based economy.

            More the pace with which we move towards becoming an export based economy; the Capital deficit tends to get normalized i.e. you don’t spend more than what you can earn!

                        So the mantra is save first, spend next!

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article are the views of the author and are completely unbiased. The author doesn't intend to hurt the sentiments of any nation.

Programming and Girls !

Commonly I have seen the articles that bring out the difference between girls and beer , girls and programming languages etc.. But this post has been written after keen observation of girls and their behaviour with their respective (yeah ! you read it right) boyfriends. This post does not intend to hurt the sentiments of the Gang of Girls but just a satire (Its not a all a revenge to the articles / images girls posts to make fun of guys ).

This post brings out the similarities  between the girls and the programming languages . Few of my observations have been listed below:

1. Girls are like NULL pointers, you should never follow them , for chaos and madness await you at its end !

2. Their anger is like sleeping threads , you never know when a spurious wakeup can happen.

3. They are masters of type casting , you can't typecast your lies and present it.

4. You ignore their warnings and you are sure of getting the runtime error.

5. They are like the observer model with a twist , they notify the changes (read as your wrong doings) only during a fight.

6. Girls are highly case sensitve !

7. Their requests are always asynchronous and blocking , they won't let you do any other thing until you complete that request and you can never predict when you get a request.

To Be Continued...

Whats Happening ??

This was written at the time when my inbox was overflowing with the messages regarding the date 12/12/12 amidst of the chaos of India losing pathetically and then the Boxing Association issue and to top all that the big market (read as wal mart ) scam in India.

Once it so happened that , I opened my twitter account to check the tweets and suddenly , the words "What's Happening ?" in the tweet space caught my eye and then all this came up to my mind. So here it goes ...

Number of messages in my cell do dwell,

When I check, it's all about twelve twelve twelve.

This day everyone has got something to sell,

To doctors ,the dame do compel.

Astrologer makes you dance to his tune,

Buy selling you the story of fortune.

Couples deciding to get into knot soon,

I wonder if the world tomorrow, is going to doom ?

And in what name 

Are they playing a game,

Putting at stake ,the nations name and fame

And to the loss , give excuses that's lame.

Some try to bring in a big big mart,

Which shall in ways will rip apart,

Those, who thrive on their pushcart,

And fools call , this move smart.

Day and night, athlete does toil,

To get name and fame to the thy soil,

With a faux process, they create a turmoil,

In the oil of shame , now they boil.

More or Less

It had been quite sometime since I had an amazing weekend. This one is going to be cherished for some good long time to come. The reason , not being that I did something great or something great happened , rather so simple , for I did keep myself away from all the things that I would normally be using viz. laptop , mobile , pen drives , hard disk , watch etc. 

       I dont intend to say that I am a techie or something but the point here is that the these things though very much essential, always keep reminding us how fast is the life that we are living and these things make us feel that  life is so complicated though it is not , I would call them "pseudo-complicators" ( I know such a word doesn't exist but just that is what I feel these things are !). 

      I must admit that I really did get nostalgic , felt the same freedom that I used to have a couple of years ago and yes I did not call up friends and decide to meet , I just knocked their doors and Voila ! they were avaliabe :) Just the same as I would do a couple of years ago (Rather a decade to be precise). I was thinking how beautiful it was when our lives were not surrounded by these "pseuco-complicators". 

We have all things we need,

Don't have things that we want.

Crazy thoughts grow like weed,

Things still continue to haunt.

We were happy when, things We had 'ere less,

We thought We'd be more happy when We have things more.

In this process , We have run into a mess,

Can't stich the things that We have tore.

We didnt have a phone ,yet we used to meet,

The friends with whom We would play.

Now though We own a phone so neat,

Not even a Hi , to them We would say.

We used to walk down the lane,

Where we used to play day long.

To go out now, is a bane,

Don't wanna walk even a furlong.

It doesn't matter what you have,

What matters is what you do.

The only way out to salve

Is to start the things all anew.