Business to the Buddha

Tag: Narendra Modi

  • Gratitude – clap your hands

    A few weeks back I had a chance to meet an Art of Living faculty. During his discussion with us, he said to be grateful. Be grateful to what you have and life will be full of abundance. There were wonderful examples and stories he shared with us. It was fascinating to listen to him. I remembered this discussion on gratitude and Prime Minister Mr. Modi’s suggestions for clapping and applauding many unknown people in healthcare or essential services sector who are selflessly working day in and day out. Show your gratitude – clap your hands.

    Have you ever thought of those who pick up your dustbean everyday morning. The sweeper, the cleaner or for that matter the car washing young man of your society. Many of us may not even know the names of these people whom we pass-by every morning. However, bad is the status of cleaning in Mumbai – compared to Indore, my home town – but it works at its own level of efficiency. Is not it? Should not I be grateful to this cleaning system too? Yes there is room for improvement, yet grateful to the existing levels of cleaning.

    http://business2buddha.com/2015/07/12/gratitude-by-coincidence/

    Gratitude – an example

    Last week, I went for a haircut to a nearby saloon with my father. Since, I was with him, it was nearby and finding parking was difficult I took two wheeler. While returning, my hair were oily, we lived nearby so I took it for granted and did not wear helmet. Murphy’s law kicked in. Police was challaning, I was charged INR 500/- (roughly $70) for not wearing helmet.

    This is another story that I paid the challan outstanding within 15 mins on Mumbai Traffic Police App, ICICI Bank has cut the amount from my account and yet Mumbai Traffic Police App shows the challan is unpaid. On a lighter note a lesson – do not use the app to make challan payment.

    Coming back to the story, I told the police sir I live nearby – literally 300 meters from here, I am coming after a haircut and my hair are oily. So I did not wear the helmet, it is in my dickey. He replied – it is for your safety, you should have worn it. He didnt budge, completed the process. I asked now can I go without helmet it is just 300 meter! He replied what is more important – your head, you and your fathers safety or helmet getting oily? You can go you be a better judge, no one is ahead to cut another challan for you.

    http://business2buddha.com/2018/02/06/driving-in-india/

    I was upset, my father told me he was right. My father always wear helmet (it was even when there was no one wearing it about two decades back). He continued – you should have worn helmet. I made payment on the app instantly and gave it a thought later on. That policeman was not wrong, he was doing his duty, he could have done his job and let me go. However he was kind enough to politely remind me – what is more important “your safety”. This lesson costed me 500 rupees. Though I am rarely that careless, in last 24 years challaned second time. Once for stopping ahead of stop line on signal which where stop-line was barely visible. I felt bad but grateful later on for the policeman – I even wonder if I would see him back in life (I would not want to too :)). Small cautious act can go a long way. In current times it is home quarantine during Coronavirus spread. This small act of individuals can go a long way for the whole society.

    Gratitude – clap your hands – be grateful to the unknown

    Gratitude

    Today is the day when we have to be grateful to the healthcare and essential services professionals. Prime Minister Mr. Modi has said that we have to clap for these people whom we have not seen, not known. They are doing their best to help us fight the biggest challenge our generation is seeing. The graveness of Coronavirus cannot be ignored – especially when there is no known vaccine or medication for that. It is immaterial whether we are sick or healthy, rich or poor, youngster or senior citizen. We must be thankful to these professionals.

    We miss-out on thinking about so many people working on so many things on a daily basis. Some are directly associated with us many are not – be it the local trains of Mumbai or bus or Metro trains services across many cities. If you work in a stockbroking company, you may be taking a local train to the office. Your boss or the owner of the company is not. But to come to work in the owner’s company the employee needs to take the local train. Unknowingly or indirectly the local train driver is adding value to the stockbroking company’s owner. Many a time’s people do not consider this list for gratitude.

    Be grateful

    There is a good amount of research on this – check Harvard articles. Gratitude is a virtue, one must inculcate it. You are alive, be happy about it. Someone told me a couple of days back, you woke up you are fortunate, respect that you have got time and today to live. Especially we must be happy, restrained and grateful at this tough time when the world is facing the pandemic of Coronavirus.

    Be happy today; be grateful for so many known and unknown people and things in your life. Take care and do not forget to Show your gratitude – clap your hands on 22nd March 2020 at 5 PM for 5 minutes.

  • You Need To Believe







    When I hear the phrase “you must believe” the first thing that comes to my mind is “Kung Fu Panda“. I love the movie and here are two videos that come to my mind when I think of “you need to believe”. First is when Master Oogway tells Master Shifu to believe. The other is Po’s father telling him “…there is no secrete ingredient, you must believe the soup is special…” this gives Po an idea what the message of Dragon scroll is.

     

    I reached in a country (continent) where I never thought I will go. I am walking on the streets and meeting people on the other hemisphere, it is no less than a surprise. This makes the title “You need to believe” apt for me today. Believe is a verb for belief, I am slowly making some perspectives that one must accept things and be willing to be amazed with life as it comes. It requires some sort of trust (trust in who is immaterial and can be explore in some future blogs).

    Change in perspective is happening on other dimensions too for me. I was of the type of liberals who hate present Prime minister of India Mr Modi. In my mind it was kind of dislike for him after 2002 to almost until 2015, even though Indian courts have already acquitted him. Slowly, I started feeling, he being the PM of India is a better choice than any other current politician in India.

    On believing some of his steps, I loved demonetization as a decision. In fact I am a step ahead – wish we do away with denominations higher than 100. I know there were execution challenges, however after a lot of planning too in last 70 years we have seen what the results of planned policies resulted in – roads made but do not sustain, money gets allocated but only 5% of the actual amount reaches the needy. What is the need of such planning in those cases?

    We need a kick to start a bike, isnt it? Perhaps some decisions of Mr Narendra Modi are like that. If someone who has the guts and takes decision and makes course correction – we think planning is less but at least some actions are taken. Those who start have the possibility to reach those who do not start cannot go anywhere.

    We need to believe. I live in Mumbai, I have seen stagnation of property prices in there. I am a fence sitter for buying home, after demonetization the prices have come down, not to my expectations though but yes some things have change for better. The artificial inflation is low now. It is possible that growth number at the time of previous government were impacted positively due to such inflation.

    I believe, artificial property price rise and corruption was “Organized loot and legalized plunder” what we saw in Manmohan Singh government of Indian National Congress. It is when CWG, Coal and 2G etc scams happened – that is organized loot and legalized plunder. All the scams were kind of legal activities but organized such that payments were made under the table to those who were in government. I hope former PM Manmohan Singh who presided over these scams will know what a common-man sees as Organized loot and legalized plunder.

    We need to believe things will be better – be it GST or demonetization. Who knows perhaps in 2019 it will be a hung parliament?

    You Need To Believe was last week’s LBC topic where Maria, Ramana uncleji, Ashok and Shackman write. You can see what the other writers of the LBC have to say in their respective blogs.

  • Defining intolerance







    IntoleranceWe have been listening to “intolerance” a lot these days in India. This has become a point of debate on a regular basis I think for last couple of weeks. The consistent point is – India has become intolerant, especially off late when the Narendra Modi led BJP Govt has come in power.

    It’s obvious to have opinions, I too have my views on the same. Before, I scrutinize the subject further – I have been feeling that the intolerant India is more of a figment of few minds who are breaking their bread on this.

    Before, going any further on my analysis I thought to get a definition of intolerance. No doubt I searched on Google (actually dictionary) for meaning of intolerance. Here is a Google screenshot of the definition – “Unwillingness to accept views, beliefs, or behaviour that differs from one’s own.” The definition on Dictionary.com is – “unwillingness or refusal to tolerate or respect persons of a different social group, especially members of a minority group.”

    Based on the above two definition I started scrutinizing current state of affairs. The killing of Mr Kalburgi in Karnataka falls under the definition of intolerance. The Dadri incident happened in UP recently also falls in that category (both the definitions). I had criticized the same earlier – Tolerance. These could be stray incidents, and also how can we make Centre Govt liable and responsible for state level incidents? Especially when these have happened in states where Govts are of opposition parties?

    In recent past I did not see any such incidents that were anything new. We are tolerant to many encroachments by Mandirs, Masjids and organizations affiliated to political parties. We are too insensitive to many things including terrorist attacks to killing of animals or people trying to save them. Surprisingly there was no hue and cry recently when a person (of one community) was killed by a group of people (from another community), who was trying to raise voice against cow slaughter in Karnataka (news link).

    The next question is – if it is intolerance; do the minority groups feeling insecurity across India? Perhaps they are feeling as they have been for last so many years. Well, the other apt question could be – how do you define minority? According to census of India 2011 (Population distribution), there were few religions namely; Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Sikh, Jain, Buddhist and 2 options no religion & others, effectively making eight divisions. So, if we divide 100% population by 8 divisions it comes out to be 12.5%. The definition of minority should accordingly be – religious group which has population <=12.5% is minority. According to this definition in 12 States & UTs Muslims are not minority (includes UP), in 8 Christians are not minority, Sikhs in 2 and Buddhists in 1. So, should we ask questions about how other groups (minority) are feeling in these states?

    Also, before anyone concludes that I’m a BJP sympathizer I had been India Against Corruption enthusiast and therefore for many AAP supporter. However, I have kept my abilities to analyze open and have no political affiliation.

    Here are two recent examples and therefore I think this could be termed as intolerance

    China – China bans Ramadan fasting in mainly Muslim region

    Switzerland – Switzerland overwhelmingly votes for burqa ban with £6,500 fine for Muslim women who rebel

    So, I in this post, I tried to define intolerance, made my opinion on the same. Also, since the definition of intolerance had “minority group” in it, I tried defining that too. In the end I gave example of what could be termed as “intolerance”. Certainly that kind of thing has never happened in India since ages. Only remembrance of that historically is when Aurangzeb applied Jazya tax. Read details here – Jazya Wiki and Aurangzeb Jazya tax.

    I posted on twitter

    Penalty of apostasy in Islam is Death! That is intolerance. I do not see any intolerance in India.

    Here is a link of discussion I am having with one of my childhood friends. We studied together, we were in Engineering together.

    https://www.facebook.com/krdpravin/posts/10153691538450149?ref=notif&notif_t=comment_mention

    My point is simple define intolerance first and than ask if India has changed in last so many years or last 2 years?

    My take – India has not become intolerant as discussed by many!

  • Big data – lesson on spirituality







    I was talking to my MD – Dr Vivek Damle. I said, Big data is “relevant information provider” for real time. One cannot rely on old data generated by a person, say in 2010, for marketing strategy (I am writing this blog in 4th Quarter of 2013). The discussion went on a very strange yet lovely tangent, Dr Damle said – “… so big data would take us on the road of spirituality, is it? I mean to say – like suggesting us to live in the present!”

    I was impressed with this thought. So here comes the lesson learnt from spirituality and applied to the Big Data and vice versa.

    Big-dataBig data is all about volume, variety and velocity… so data generate say 2 yrs back is likely to be irrelevant for today’s marketing campaign. In coming days or say months – all analytics would move to the real time e.g. at the moment of truth. Spirituality teaches us this very simple lesson (difficult to apply in real life though) – “live in the present moment”. As Master Oogway says in The Kung Fu Panda – Yesterday Is History, Tomorrow Is a Mystery, but Today Is a Gift. That Is Why It Is Called the Present.

    I was thinking – is technology forcing us today to spiritual concepts? Or unknowingly are we moving towards concepts of spirituality through technology?

    Big data can help identify a persons choices and predict his or her future course of action… but what in case of older data? That data would have lesser significance. Take an example in India, Narendra Modi (PM candidate in India from Opposition Party – BJP) for someone was communal few years back now is a hope, why? because perceptions changed. Vice versa for Dr Man Mohan Singh (PM of India). Old data less relevance. If I talk about my owns example of last month – I was searching for rental apartment, not now. The data I created while searching for a rental apartment last month is irrelevant now. The marketing campaigns will be more real time e.g. the present not based on “Historical” data.

    Earlier in my professional engagement as a marketing analytics consultant, we made a predictive model. The client executed the recommendation more than 8 months later. result – failed. no one wanted to take the blame. That’s what is the case is in a fast moving world.

    Live in the present.

    For Business people – try to be more real-time data based decision makers.

    Image source – http://www.greenbookblog.org/2012/03/21/big-data-opportunity-or-threat-for-market-research/