Kumble nails it

The RCB skipper inputs a key strategic plan that would have done lot of other last-over chokers good in the IPL:

“As it is, whenever we chase, we make it a point not to go into the 20th over. When we are chasing a smallish total, we try and think of the 18th as the last over and when the target is bigger, we aim at finishing the game in the 19th, giving us some sort of a cushion. That message was also sent across as a reminder at the strategic break”

T20 games involve a lot of pressure-cooker situations and nothing can make it worse than taking the game to the last over. By ensuring a six-ball buffer, you effectively negate it out. Exciting? No. Clinical? Yes.

A country gets the government it deserves

Elections 09 ended with a resounding win for the Congress-led UPA. There has been clamour in my (intellectual) neighbourhood, signalling disappointment at BJP’s dismal performance. Few have ‘condemned’ India for another five years with statements on how ‘uninformed’ voters have led the country into a downward spiral. I am thrilled, on the other hand, that the present-BJP is nowhere close to any kind of power at the centre.

My grouse against the BJP run into many dozens. My two cents here:

1. Communalism – A party that blatantly and openly approves of intolerance for other religions can never be broad-based to take the whole country forward. Their existence, and hence, interest will depend on keeping the minorities at bay and suppressed. And, we have already seen with SIMI and IM that no good can come out of suppresison. A frequent line of argument to support BJP has been that the ‘pandering’ of minorities will only empower them and how the ‘islamic’ rate of population growth is a cause for conern. One only has to read the Sachar committee’s recommendations to banish themselves of irrational fears and understand the daily difficulties the minorities work with.

2. Leadership Bankruptcy – Apart from Arun Jaitley, there is not one leader of note in the safforn party who can stitch together two streams of thought, or even worse, articulate anything that is worthy. There is a clear absence of thought leadership in the party, visible throughout the two-month campaign. All their speeches tried to only belittle the previous government with scant mention of plans for their government, sans a few notes on the IT-sector.

3. Urbane-ness – India continues to be a nation of the rural and will be so for the many decades to come. Rural India encounters problems that are vastly different from their urban counterparts, solutions for which have to be now and here. NREGS and the loan-waiver schemes were hallmarks of such solutions. The latter, an economic waterloo and the former, an implementor’s nightmare. Divestment, Mandir and Uniform civil code does not matter to over 70% of the populace. My own (little) experience tells me that caste, and not religion, is much more deeply entrenched in rural India. It really does not matter to a farmer if a temple is built at Ayodhya or not. He is only worried about his upcoming crop and the debts he has to repay. So, is loan-waiver the best way to help him? May be not, but it was a political master-stroke.

4. Image Reality – My dad, a (an erstwhile, hopefully) BJP supporter, liked to go on about the ‘clean’ image his party enjoyed and how it was filled with incorrputible persons. The truth cannot be further than this. ADR’s latest press release summarizes the ground reality – politics in India is universally murky across parties. In fact, if you consider percentage of the total MPs elected, BJP has a much higher percentage of MPs with criminal background than any other political party in the country. In Karnataka alone, the party has been as political as any other, with various defection-engineering schemes executed successfully to tempt legislators from other parties to joining the BJP. The point being BJP is as political, clean and honest (or not) as any other political party in the country. 

Frankly, I am excited about the UPA because of the promise it holds. Cynical, experienced old-hands might balk at my naivette but I see much potential for things to happen with the kind of likely ministers in the cabinet – Tharoor, Jairam Ramesh, Scindia Junior, Pilot Jr., PC and MMS himself. The initial statements on the economy, the cabinet structure and polity sounds encouraging and promising. I only hope the promises are lived up to.

Sa Jie and Pelican Brief

The Pelican Brief

Start-ups and Small Organizatons

I remember reading somewhere that stated one shouldn’t work for a start-up unless a part of the founding team.

It is a golden rule to follow. I would stretch it to include small organizations that have yet to transform into a process-driven structure. The biggest thing going for a small, growing entity is the constant state of excitement and challenges employees get to be a part of. The challenges are enjoyable as long as they have a fair degree of control over tackling them and tapping new opportunities.

The biggest leap of faith for the founders to cross is the art of delegation. Depending on how small or large is the power of delegation, employees will tend to be either inefficiently used or lack direction. This is, in my view, the most difficult and critical leadership skill. It is what separates the great, big organizations from the myriad number of small and medium-sized entities.

Before the founders reach this part of the curve, the tendency is for decisions, strategic and operational, to be taken by a set of individuals, arbitrarily and informally. Without a set process, there is redundancy with the group having to decide on similar points repeatedly. If the organization is lean, this can still be managed. But, once it grows beyond a critical mass, the employees further down the organizational chain leave decisions to higher-ups and/or are left confused on the organizational growth path. This structure also breeds sycophancy of types subtle to the obvious since decision centers are individualized rather than consensus-based.

Contradictions

Two ongoing theatres of conflict in the neighbourhood depict the contradictions the government has to straddle. The government lodged an official protest on the imposition of the Jazia on the Sikhs in Pakistan. The government also claims to be pressurizing the Lankan government to stop attacks on Tamil civilians trapped in LTTE-held territory in Sri Lanka. 

Note the views expressed by the gentleman, also voiced by many others in TN about the role of government in what is essentially a civil war. As a policy, I believe, that citizens present in all democractically elected countries are first and foremost citizens of that country with ethnicity and religion rendered subordinate to citizenship. Therefore, the government of any other country has no business in interfering in the internal matters of another country, be it any outrage against the communities. The Pakistan government, rightly, dismissed misplaced Indian concerns. As a foriegn government, the Indian government can, both in Sri Lanka and Pakistan, should restrict itself to condemning attacks against innocent civilians, instead of selectively picking biased causes.

Taxing private transport

I often use public transport to stop tearing my hair apart navigating Bangalore’s wretched traffic. I believe the crux of Bangalore’s infrastructure woes stem from an uncontrolled surge in ownership of private vehicles, partly due to the poor public transport system and party due to the sudden increase of wealth in the urban middle class. This has imposed a heavy strain on the road system that has led to a slew of short-sighted measures such as one-way lanes, flyovers, under-bridges and widening of roads, often by chopping down trees that serve as lungs of the city.

One of the ways in which some countries, such as Singapore have circumvented the problem is by introducing a punitively high duty (as high as 100%) on purchase of private automobiles. This measure cuts off the problem right at the source by ensuring, maybe a bit autocratically, private vehicles are out of the majority’s reach.

Another way in which this can be done is by by imposing a heavy tax on commercial fuel. The tax, similar to the ownership tax, has to be high enough to deter customers from using their vehicle. While preventing the usage, the measure still provides you with the flexibility of owning and using the car selectively. This data, compiled in Oct 2008, shows that Singapore seems to have imposed a fuel tax too, in addition to the ownership tax. India, as can be seen, has one of the cheapest prices for vehicle fuel, apart the Arab and quasi-Arab (US and Canada) countries. Even more interesting is that fuel price in India is one of the most convoluted figures floating around. It is a complex amalgamation of subsidies and layers of taxes that ensure no one, including the government, I suspect, is sure of the economic impact a paise-rise in fuel price has.

Clearly, subsidies for petrol and diesel have to go to ensure oil companies do not bleed and that they reflect market trends realistically. Secondly, forget subsidies, the government should actually tax fuel sold through all commercial outlets to discourage private transport. Fuel for public transport should be sold only through depot outlets (which already happens). Commercial vehicles too can be provided tax-free fuel but I suspect this will lead to hoarding and black-marketeering.

But, this is easier said than done because it is slightly like bolting the stables after the horses have fled. The automobile industry has grown to mammoth proportions now with a lobby strong enough to affect policies. I doubt if it will go through easily but it must be introduced to solve urban traffic quagmires soon. This will deter private ownership, increase demand for better public transport and automatically improve the existing systems. Solutions of the supply side that include providing better public transport (like the Volvo buses in Bangalore) are prone to be not used as long as customers are not incentivized to switch from existing systems. I think it is criminal that I can choose to drive a four-seater car for a nominal cost, taking up precious road space and contributing to traffic quagmires when there is an alternative available.