Floating Retail Ideas in the backwaters of Kerala

Nostalgia is the word as I write this piece. My mind meanders to the paddy fields of Neerettupuram, to the narrow kutcha roads where only cycles plied, to our tharavadu on the banks of the Pamba river and to my paternal grandparents (who are no more with us) with whom I spent most of my summer holidays as a kid. The world knows this place (Kuttanad) better as the backwaters of Kerala. More than it's importance as a tourist destination, the intricate system of canals and backwaters in Kerala connect hundreds of villages and is the lifeline of over a million people. Thousands of people commute to work everyday on boats, even today you can't miss seeing farmers transporting their produce to the market on their vallams (Malayalam for boat), political parties use the waterways for campaigns and it is the primary source of irrigation for the predominantly agricultural area.
Was it then surprising that the Kerala State Co-operative Consumers Federation decided to tap into the potential of these internal waterways and take their retail stores to the boat jetties of Kuttanad? The federation has launches catchy bright red and white supermarket boats christened as floating triveni in June 2009. Catch a video on the floating supermarket below:



This is a true bottom of the pyramid venture and is bound to be a roaring success. Most parts of Kuttanad is predominantly rural and has an agrarian population, typically there will be a single town catering to the consumption needs of a number of satellite villages and the villages themselves will have just a few small shops catering to the ration needs of the villagers. Floating Triveni addresses this glaring need of the BOP customer perfectly - here is a product that caters to all your shopping needs, comes to your doorstep and is priced significantly lower than other stores. It's one of those ideas which you look at and say, 'it was so obvious and why didn't anybody think about it before?' - that's the halmark of all simple ideas. A number of FMCGs in India have given lot of thought of the content, packaging and pricing of their products to suite the BOP Indian customer, but very few innovative ideas have sprung up on reaching out to the Indian consumer (we get fixated by the inflated numbers of the great Indian middle class (courtesy Pavan Varma!) that we tend to forget about the billion strong BOP customers of the country!). I can imagine other hard goods jumping into the bandwagon (boat?) soon - like agricultural equipments and fertilisers, but for sure the people of Kuttanad will be thanking the Government for the red and white floating supermarkets now and it will be really interesting to see the numbers of Consumer Fed next quarter as well as the potential clones!!

Why History is boring....

I am disappointed that I was never taught about the history of my own state in school. Blame it on a national syllabus or the bias of the historians - which ever might come out true, I've been the loser! There is a negative societal bias towards history as an academic subject in our country - I wouldn't be wrong to say that not many people make a conscious choice to study history, afterall it's portrayed as boring, unintelligent and insipid. Well, blame it on the methods of teaching and the syllabus and not on the subject alone. We have never been taught the 'why' of history - why do you need to know (I would prefer to use the word 'know' in place of 'learn') 'your' history, we have never been taught to ask any questions about history and most often the history we learn has been disconnected from our immediate surrounding. All of us have a strong innate urge to question, explore and decipher the world around us. That is what makes the study of science and mathematics so fascinating for many. Whatever we study in science helps us directly in understanding the intricacies of the things (natural and synthetic) we see around and equips us with skills to explore and deconstruct them further. This builds an endless fascination of discovery. This is where I believe the teaching of history fails. The study of history is nothing but a journey into deciphering the past, a study of our social, political and economic evolution and fundamental in helping us answer the question of why are we who we are today. Fundamentally, doesn't the social and economic dynamics of our society influence our existence more than any other scientific phenomenon (other than may be biology and medicine)? It is a huge mistake to classify history in a silo and treat it as a separate subject. History can never be understood in it's entirety unless and until we under a host of other subjects like anthropology, archeology, sociology, art symbolism, geography, economics and politics - history is what you get when all these and more amalgamate, it distills into a story of evolution and paves the path to the present. It's a pity that history is not given it's due importance in our country, it's saddening that we are not taught to have an inquisitive mind about our past, to fathom into the times that shaped our today and the men from whom we have been made....May be that's the difference between learning and knowing....

Why scrapping board exams won't work in India

It does look as if the UPA Cabinet is running on steroids - each minister is trying to outsmart the other with radical policy announcements and raking in a national debate every other day. Perhaps the most significant of the proposals has been the suggestion to make class 10 and 12 exams optional. It's a welcome change to have someone like Kapil Sibal heading the Human Resources Development ministry and a number of Mr. Sibal's policy statements are sure to bring in sweeping changes to the educational structure of the country. Though the intention to make the board exams optional is laudatory, I am convinced that it will not serve the purpose of reducing stress on students and parents and more importantly will not radically change the educational system of the country. Below is an interview of Mr. Sibal on the same topic by Barkha Dutt:



Here is why I think Mr. Sibal's well intented and ambitious idea will not work:

> Stress to the students and parents is not caused by the examinations per se. Examinations are just a vehicle that externalises the deeply embedded culture of social expectations and a uni-dimensional system of measuring the capability and worth of an individual.
> In the Indian social context - 'success', 'accomplishment', 'achievement' and to a large degreee the 'perceived social worth' of a student is primarily measured by the single factor of marks. As these social perceptions greatly affect the morale and esteem of an individual, the inner need to score high on the single parameter (marks) that defines these perceptions will naturally be very high.
> As George Orwell said "All animals are born equal. Some are more equal than others". I do not think that every individual is endowed with the same cerebral abilities and there will surely be people strewn all over the scale of measurement from top to bottom. This is not going to be altered by making the board examinations optional and surely this will come to glaring light for the single national examination that Mr. Sibal is proposing. So in effect, all that Mr. Sibal's proposal will do is to transfer the stress and trauma from the board examinations to the single national examination that he is mooting. We need to tweak our social perception to accept the fact that people will be differently endowed and not to treat failing in an examination as a social stigma.
> My basic argument is that what we need is a multi-dimensional scale of measuring the performance of a student. Currently, the socially and academically accepted parameter for success and achievement is solely marks - which puts extreme pressure on students to do well only on this single measure. But, if the society and more importantly colleges change the measurement of success and accomplishment to a broader array of parameters, the importance on examinations will naturally die away. For example, if colleges and society measured success solely on the dancing ability of students and if admissions were based solely (this word is emphasised because that is what we do right now, base admissions solely on the basis of marks and it does sound ridiculous with this example isnt it?) on how well they did on a national dancing examination(!), who would ever care how well a student did in science or mathematics or history? Parents would be spending a fortune on getting dance tuitions and the same stress and trauma would be present days before the dance examination. Every society has certain parameters for the measurement of social perceptions like success and altering these parameters will alter the way these perceptions are measured.
> The bane of our educational system is this uni-dimensional measurement of the accomplishment of a student. This kills all initiative and efforts to build a more balanced learning experience, because what is rewarded is non-creative linear learning. For example, even the premier colleges of India will give admission to a person who has scored 97% in his board exams, over a person who has scored 90% but has an excellent track record of extra-curricular achievements - on what basis do you say that the former student is more qualified than the latter to study in the institute? Marks are rarely a fore-bearer of success in life and it's high time we shed this uni-dimensional focus on a single parameter of measuring achievement and success.
> Mr. Sibal would do well to introduce a more balanced system of measuring the success and achievement of a student - by considering the quality of extra curricular activities, participation in inter-school competitions, depth of creative expression of the student, organisational abilities displayed, social service, evidence of research, letters of recommendation etc. This will surely revolutionise the way achievement and success is perceived in our society and surely lessen the importance and stress created by examinations.
> I will also appeal to Mr. Sibal to make teaching an attractive career option (or even a compulsory one for students from premier government colleges in line with the policy for MBBS students having to serve a rural term). It is my firm belief that the reason for the dwindling quality of education in the country is primarily due to the lack of creative and inspirational teachers at the school and most importantly at the college level. We have all grown up listening to the wonderful Indian tradition of a guru-shishya relationship, where the guru was seen next to God. This respect to the guru was not born out of him being in that position, but due to the immense knowledge, humility and concern the Guru possessed. Unfortunately, with teaching being seen as the last resort of an unemployed man and being 'branded' as an un-exciting, monotonous and stagnant profession - creative, inspirational and committed teachers are a rarity in this country. Without a change to the quality of teaching in the country, any radical policy announcement by the respected Union HRD minister will fail to reach the last thatched government school in one of the thousands of villages in the country.

P.S.: I wonder sometimes why governments do not take a systemic view and address the actual problem rather than trying to roll out piecemeal solutions that just dress the wound. Stories like that of Dr. Abraham George and of the Super 30 IIT training institute in Patna clearly show that what we desperately need is an upliftment in the quality of education through better teachers, better access to schools and a more balanced measurement of the success, accomplishments and abilities of students.

A Dialogue with Time

I wrote this piece around five years ago during the final year in college. Towards the end of my college days, an acute guilt that I had taken 'time' for granted and an existential dilemna gripped me - this is what followed....

A Dialogue with Time

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Time: That’s it, time’s up.

Me: He,He….you thought I was surprised?

Time: Hmm,thought you would plead for an extension.

Me: At last, got you!

Time: Not actually, who would want to finish off their college life? That’s when you feel there’s excess of me and never give a damn to who I am.

Me: Hey, true man! So you’re offended? Even I am pretty sad I treated you this way, that’s why I am looking to move on.

Time: So that’s it? You’re fed up with life at college and want a break?

Me: Now that’s reading something which was not there at all! C’mon, the break is inevitable. You thought I was not realistic enough to understand that sadly no tangible associations are permanent?

Time: Aha, so your relationship with your family and even your closest friends is temporary?

Me: Yes, temporary depends on the time scale you are talking about. At a long enough time scale, every association is temporary. You should know better.

Time: No. My job is to run and keep on running, not to stop and think.

Me: To exist without having to think is a virtue. Choices arise when you start contemplating and you are pushed in to a complex process of decision making where you are never sure of your move. Lucky guy! You don’t have to do it. It’s a bigger virtue to know your duty and be on it.

Time: Interesting, so what if I thought one fine day that I am tired with all the running and want to be something else….let’s say a season?

Me: Ha! Ha! Now this is the problem with not thinking at all!

Time: Now what did I say to make you laugh?

Me: You never understood that ‘you’ can not change from what ‘you’ are ? ‘Time’ and ‘Season’ as entities are diametrically opposite in their existence.

Time: Trying to teach me who I am?

Me: Well, all of us love to lecture, even when we know that it is of no avail!

Time: I know who I am.

Me: Is it, then let me hear it.

Time: I am the one you humans race against, not realizing that I will outrun you always. You perish, still I move on, on and on forever.

Me: There is a big difference between who you are and who you think you are. The road to the purpose of your existence becomes clearer when both of them converge. And my dear friend, for you the gap is as far apart as the poles.

Time: So are you telling me that I am not what I think I am?

Me: I don’t want to be conclusive. What I want to tell you is that who I think you are is very different from who you think you are. That may help you get to who you really are

Time: Well, well….now do I really need to stop and think who I really am? Can’t I move on with who I think I am ?

Me: Yours is a completely different case! But for us to do that is a tragic offence. Essentially because your thought is only as good as the next one. And the process of evolving your thoughts is greatly dependant on your external environment and internal aspirations. You build a chimera and try to convince yourself that it is the reality. Sadly, you can drag your life on (even without realizing that you are dragging it on) till the very end, living in that ivory tower.

Time: So how does that matter as long as people move on in their lives?

Me: How does it matter living your life through shutting your eyes to someone and later realizing that the one you spurned was the one you loved and the one you loved was never the one for you? All you can do is sit down and rue about the lost ‘experience’ and hope life had a rewind button.

Time: Go on….

Me: It’s all about the experience. Only when you go through something will you realize its true flavour. Notions, prejudices and prejudgements often colour a picture of a hitherto un-experience reality. Sadly, we hold on to that canvas and cling to our present ‘secure’ realities refusing to change. Fear of the uncertain is primal.

But think of shedding your fears, treading the uncertain path and moving towards the experience of understanding who you really are. The ivory tower will come crashing down to the sweet chime of your inner realization. You will be born anew, look at things in new light, redefine yourself, your goals and make choices that really matter to you.
Freedom. That is when you experience real Freedom. Freedom leads to liberation and empowerment. People talk of inner peace and realization, for me they follow once you understand who you really are.
The value of both the experiences, being who you really are and who you think you are is completely different and it’s tragic if people miss to experience what really matters.

Scripting the future of the country: Abraham George and the Shanthi Bhavan School

"All who have meditated on the art of governing mankind have been convinced that the fate of empires depends on the education of youth."
-Aristotle.

Behold the man who acts over the man who speaks, for words die down by the tick of the clock while an act leaves a mark, a smile, a legacy, a change....My ear aches hearing the incoherent rhetoric and the superficial palliatives greased by electoral politics, dishing out the great dream of social engineering, equality and upliftment. This is an enterprise that has worked it's way for the last 60 years, having nothing to claim other than 400 million Indians loitering the slums, feasting on garbage and burning out hungry and begging. This is when people like Abraham George stand out as a beacon of inspiration and hope. Dr. George runs a school called Shanthi Bhavan for the economically challenged section of the society near Bangalore. Well there may not be anything new or radical in this, for our country is littered with institutions of charity for the downtrodden. But what makes Shanthi Bhavan truly remarkable is that it is a world class institution, comparable to any elite school in the country - it offers the excellent ICSE/ISC syllabus, has a close knit group of around 20 students per class, is completely residential and spends close to Rs. 60,000/- per student each year. Dr. George's vision is not just to provide education to these underprivileged kids, but to provide the very best education and mould them to be on par with the best in the country. At a time when education has been commoditised, when 'international' schools charge lakhs of rupees as fees and caputation fees, when the divide in the quality of education between the haves and the have nots is increasing by the day - I salute Dr. George's visionary initiative to provide the very best education to kids who may not have even seen a thatched government school. Here is a compilation on the school by Thomas Friedman:



What is most exciting is the fact that all students in it's first ICSE batch passed with first class - a feat some of the other very well established ICSE schools have not been able to emulate. This just goes on to show the glitter of human potential, there is nothing more satisfying in this world than seeing an individual blossom and reach his/her true potential and I am sure Dr. George felt that when he looked up at the results of his students!

P.S.: I am deeply compelled to compare the above initiative with NREGA programme of the UPA government. While the NREGA has been hailed as one of the most pathbreaking social empowerment programs since independance, I truly believe that an initiative to provide education to the masses like Dr. George's is more fundamental and valuable to the country than an initiative like NREGA. NREGA feeds the hungry man, but education teaches him to fish and will keep him well fed all his life. Bimal Jalan makes a wonderful argument in his book 'India's Politics' why governments don't pursue programmes with long term social impact. He argues that in India's fragmented polity, the government is lured to adopt initiatives that show immediate results and can be encashed in the ensuing elections. NREGA gives employment for 100 days and the effects of that is for everyone to see, while educating a child is a long drawn out process and by the time the results bloom, the party might be down in the dumps!! I can't but agree to Mr. Jalan more here!!