Well Can't

argue with Sukumar on this one!

Some excerpts

The message I got from the note was: “Don’t like the draft guidelines? Don’t blame me. You know whom to blame.”

 

Should such information

be published in news articles?

Sources say Jindal has given inputs about the Lashkar-e-Toiba's sleeper cells in the country to the police, based on which, police teams will be carrying out raids across Maharashtra. Police say Jindal used a different name in each incident he was involved in and has been questioned about all terror attacks that took place in the past six to seven years.

I am appaled.

A great piece

A bold piece on the state of our country by Bibek Debroy (via TGS)

Excerpts

 When the history of the Indian economy is written twenty years down the line, we will look back at the 2004 to 2014 decade as one that was just as damaging as mid-1960s to mid-1970s, if not worse, because the world has changed.  As was the case during that earlier decade, contrary views are not encouraged and are marginalized.  Advisers, bureaucrats and economists flow along with the tide.  That’s partly because views of many people are malleable.  That’s a requisite trait for survival.  

A sensible piece on the IIT exam issue

by Sandipan Deb here

The idea of including Board Exams is not a bad idea. However, the means in which it is incorporated needs to be considered. The weigtage should not have a part in direct admission to IIT. In its current form, it is used as a cutoff test; it is a good idea. however, the weigthage of 50% is still too high. Probably 25% is a more reasonable number. The wightage should be so as to encourage a complete education among IIT aspirants. However, the weightage should not be so high that you remove the deserving students during the cut off itself. It should eliminate people who have no apetite for a complete education. If some students who are good in math, physics and chemistry and suck at english and other languages they need to make sure they study them too. I dont think it is a bad thing. Again, the weigthage should ensure that people with low marks in math, physics and chemistry dont get an advantage just because they do well in langauges; because these students dont stand a chance in the Main JEE paper and are wasting the spots for deserving candidates. Thats my 2 cents!

Life

You think you have figured it out and know what you want. Well, hard luck son, it never is that easy!

A succinct summary

of what happenned wrong since 2004 in a very well written piece by Raghuram Rajan here

Some excerpts

In the years after the BJP’s loss, with a few notable exceptions, India’s political class decided that traditional populism was a surer route to re-election. This perception also accorded well with the median (typically poor) voter’s low expectation of government in India—seeing it as a source of sporadic handouts rather than of reliable public services. 

For a few years, the momentum created by previous reforms, together with strong global growth, carried India forward. Politicians saw little need to vote for further reforms, especially those that would upset powerful vested interests. The lurch towards populism was strengthened when the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance concluded that a rural employment-guarantee scheme and a populist farm loan waiver aided its victory in the 2009 election. 

But, while politicians spent the growth dividend on poorly targeted giveaways such as subsidized petrol and cooking gas, the need for further reform only increased. For example, industrialization requires a transparent system for acquiring land from farmers and tribal people, which in turn presupposes much better land-ownership records than India has.

Some good words as the day begins

Some nice words from Michael Lewis (Link via tgs) ... do read it in full!

This isn’t just false humility. It’s false humility with a point. My case illustrates how success is always rationalized. People really don’t like to hear success explained away as luck — especially successful people. As they age, and succeed, people feel their success was somehow inevitable. They don’t want to acknowledge the role played by accident in their lives. There is a reason for this: the world does not want to acknowledge it either. 

Life’s outcomes, while not entirely random, have a huge amount of luck baked into them. Above all, recognize that if you have had success, you have also had luck — and with  luck comes obligation. You owe a debt, and not just to your Gods. You owe a debt to the unlucky. 

you are the lucky few. Lucky in your parents, lucky in your country, lucky that a place like Princeton exists that can take in lucky people, introduce them to other lucky people, and increase their chances of becoming even luckier. Lucky that you live in the richest society the world has ever seen, in a time when no one actually expects you to sacrifice your interests to anything. 

All of you have been faced with the extra cookie. All of you will be faced with many more of them. In time you will find it easy to assume that you deserve the extra cookie. For all I know, you may. But you’ll be happier, and the world will be better off, if you at least pretend that you don’t. 

Never forget: In the nation’s service. In the service of all nations.

 

 

 

So true

is all we can say!

The political lesson that can be learned from the celebrated rise and ignominious fall of Dr Manmohan Singh is that India cannot be led by prime ministers who are prime ministers by appointment. Sonia Gandhi must accept that her experiment in enjoying political power without a modicum of accountability may have worked the first time but has failed miserably this time around. And, India is paying the price.

 

Full piece here