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Friday, April 26, 2013

Letters to the Editor

Opinion builder

I am a regular reader of Business & Economy magazine. Your choice of topics and the research that goes into them is very impressive as is the quality of writing in every issue. The editorial columns are amazing and it gives immense knowledge, which assists me in generating my opinions on current topics in the industry. I especially liked your cover story on on the joint research with Tuck Business School as it offered a detailed case study, which not many publications go into. I also look forward to reading the sector analysis articles as they tend to summarise the past, present and future of the covered sector very precisely. I must say that each and every issue of B&E offers some or other brilliant piece to read. I wish you all the best for your magazine and hope you people continue with such amazing work in future.

Sriwant Wariz,
National Marketing Manager, Fujifilm India

Great analysis

This was the first time I have read Business & Economy. Just after going through the magazine, I decided to write a small appreciation letter and regards to the team for the tremendous and faithful work that they have done. They have done true justice to the covered sectors and the stories are real insiders. The smart charts and intellect analysis of the sectors as well as the corporation were mind blowing. I would say that it has an edge over the other local magazines in the country as it more of an international and world class magazine. I would just like to suggest that you cover news and analysis of international companies in greater detail.

Read more....

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

2012 : DNA National B-School Survey 2012
Ranked 1st in International Exposure (ahead of all the IIMs)
Ranked 6th Overall
Zee Business Best B-School Survey 2012
Prof. Arindam Chaudhuri’s Session at IMA Indore
IIPM IN FINANCIAL TIMES, UK. FEATURE OF THE WEEK
IIPM strong hold on Placement : 10000 Students Placed in last 5 year
IIPM’s Management Consulting Arm-Planman Consulting
Professor Arindam Chaudhuri – A Man For The Society….
IIPM: Indian Institute of Planning and Management
IIPM makes business education truly global
Management Guru Arindam Chaudhuri
Rajita Chaudhuri-The New Age Woman
IIPM B-School Facebook Page
IIPM Global Exposure
IIPM Best B School India
IIPM B-School Detail
IIPM Links
IIPM : The B-School with a Human Face

Wednesday, April 24, 2013

Innovation Ecosystems

Ron Adner, Associate Professor of Business Administration, Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth, Author of the new book The Wide Lens: A New Strategy for Innovation, writes on the role of innovation ecosystems

There is a blind spot that undermines great managers in great organisations even when they identify real customer needs, deliver great products, and beat their competition to market.

Philips Electronics fell victim to this blind spot when it spent a fortune to pioneer high-definition television (HDTV) sets in the mid-1980s. The company’s executives drove a development effort that succeeded in creating numerous breakthroughs in television technology, offering picture quality that customers loved and that the competition, at the time, could not match. Yet, despite sterling execution and rave reviews, Philips’s high-definition TV flopped. Even the most brilliant innovation cannot succeed when its value creation depends on other innovations – in this case the high-definition cameras and transmission standards necessary to make high-definition TV work – that fail to arrive on time. Philips was left with a $2.5 billion write-down and little to show for its pioneering efforts by the time HDTV finally took off 20 years later.

Sony suffered from a similar blind spot, winning a pyrrhic victory as it raced to bring its e-reader to market before its rivals, only to discover that even a great e-reader cannot succeed in a market where customers have no easy access to e-books. And Johnson Controls, which developed a new generation of electrical switches and sensors that could dramatically reduce energy waste in buildings and deliver substantial savings to occupants, discovered that unless and until architects, electricians, and a host of other actors adjusted their own routines and updated their own capabilities, the value of its innovations would never be realised.

In all these cases, smart companies and talented managers invested, implemented, and succeeded in bringing genuinely brilliant innovations to market. But after the innovations launched, they failed. The companies understood how their success depends on meeting the needs of their end customers, delivering great innovation, and beating the competition. But all three fell victim to the innovator’s blind spot: failing to see how their success also depended on partners who themselves would need to innovate and agree to adapt in order for their efforts to succeed.

Welcome to the world of innovation ecosystems – a world in which the success of a value proposition depends on creating an alignment of partners who must work together in order to transform a winning idea to a market success. A world in which failing to expand your focus to include your entire ecosystem will set you up for failure. Avoidable failure.

There is a growing trend to not go it alone. In a 2011 survey of senior executives by the Corporate Executive Board, 67% expected new partnerships, and 49% expected new business models, to be critical drivers of their growth in the upcoming five to ten years.

To be sure, great customer insight and execution remain vital. But they are only necessary – not sufficient – conditions for success. Rather, two distinct risks now take center stage:
? Co-innovation Risk: The extent to which

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2013.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

the success of your innovation depends on the successful commercialisation of other innovations.
? Adoption Chain Risk: The extent to which partners will need to adopt your innovation before end consumers have a chance to assess the full value proposition.

Read more.....

Thursday, April 04, 2013

Reaching out for The Broadband Dream

Over a year has Passed by since The Broadband Spectrum auction, which raised hopes of bringing Internet to The Masses. What’s delaying The Launch of BWA services?

Can Internet penetration in India match the surge in the number of mobile phone subscribers? It’s a far-fetched thought at the moment. Today, every second person in the country owns a mobile phone. At last count, the number of wireless phone subscribers stood at 840 million and tele-density had crossed the 50% mark. According to Voice&Data, approximately 10 million mobile phones were sold in India every month in 2010, while at the same time, an average of 622,000 new users signed up each day to a mobile service; adding 227 million new mobile subscribers in 2010. In contrast, the total number of internet subscribers in India is just 18 million out of which those with a broadband connection make up a paltry 11 million, according to Telecom Regulatory Authority of India. That’s 9 million less broadband connections than what was originally targeted by the government. India was supposed to double its rate of broadband reach to 2% – 20 million broadband connections – by 2010, but missed it by a long shot. In comparison, other Asian nations like China, South Korea and Japan have broadband penetration of 21%, 95% and 75% respectively. According to the latest figures from China’s Internet Network Information Center, the number of internet users in China rose to 457 million at the end of June, 2010, an increase of about 73 million over the past six months. The figures show that the number of broadband users reached 126 million while the internet penetration rate climbed to about 34%. On the other hand, in India, the rate of growth of Internet connections actually fell to just 4.4% during the December quarter, 2010, or 23% compared to the last three months of 2009.

A World Bank study shows that every increase of 10% in broadband penetration can lead to an increase in GDP growth by 1.4%, and can add more than 200 million jobs. Last year, the French government announced a budget of €2.8 billion for broadband penetration. In 2009, when the rest of the world was grappling with recession, the Australian government set aside a specific fund for broadband penetration.

Clearly, internet penetration is very important for the economic growth of a country. However, it has been more than a year since Broadband Wireless Access spectrum was auctioned in India, barely days after the controversial 3G spectrum sales. The BWA auction raised Rs.385.4 billion compared with Rs.677.2 billion for the 3G spectrum. But while 3G services were launched by private operators in December 2010, none of the private operators has rolled out BWA services. Only BSNL, which was given start-up spectrum much earlier than private operators, has launched BWA services in a few circles on WiMax technology.

Read more....

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles

Wednesday, March 06, 2013

“Carrier believes in Sustainable Growth”

Gaurang Pandya, the newly appointed MD of Carrier India, reveals to B&E the strategies that have worked for them in India

B&E: You have been associated with Carrier for long now. How has been the journey so far?

Gaurang Pandya (GP): It’s has been wonderful. In fact, I have gained a lot when it comes to understand the international markets. I was in Singapore and US with Carrier on the financial and business side. I was also involved in lot of programmes in Asia Pacific region and have worked on areas like localisation, signing of JVs with partners apart from various distribution initiatives taken up by the company. The learnings from these experiences have been really helpful as one can now see these activities happening in India as well.

B&E: Carrier has always believed in maintaining a very low profile opposed to its competitors when it comes to promotions? What is the logic behind this strategy?

GP: As we are a part of the US-based United Technologies Corporation (UTC), therefore there are certain set of laws under which we are governed. For instance, it is the US law pertaining to defence, anti-trust regulation of India and anti-competition laws of US, et al, that applies to us. Thus, if you ask us our growth rate for the year we might answer the question in two ways. First, these rates are for internal usage, and second we don’t want to disclose it to the outside world.

Read more.....

Friday, February 08, 2013

Mood of the Nation

An exclusive TSI-CVoter Opinion Poll on politics and governance

Methodology

The Mood of the Nation opinion poll has been carried out with a national representative sample of 8,721 randomly selected respondents. The survey was done with CVoter's specially designed Computer Assisted Telephonic Interviews (CATI) process across 180 Lok Sabha seats. The survey was conducted in April-May 2010. The data received has been weighted to India's Census profile. Margin of error is plus or minus 3%. As part of our Mood of the Nation initiative, CVoter is now keeping weekly track of the pulse of the people and what India’s rural and urban masses are thinking and feeling about local and national governance. This is being facilitated by CVoter's Weekly Omnibus wherein our researchers quiz voters for their perception about the performance of the country’s political leaders. They also keep a tab on the contemporary issues that matter to the masses. We hope that the initiative will not just help voters make their voices heard but will also hopefully serve as a weekly reminder to the nation’s political bosses about the immediate and long-term needs and ambitions of the voters who brought them to power in the first place.

Read more....

Monday, February 04, 2013

Water harvesting is the sole solution for this grave crisis

Water harvesting is the best way of tackling the drinking water crisis. We get sufficient water from rain, but we fail to replenish it. What is needed is good infrastructure and citizens’ resolve. So don’t let rain water go waste.

Experts estimate that rain falling on a house built in a 1,500 sq. feet area can generate enough water to serve a family of six. So collect it and preserve it. In towns where we have fewer open spaces we need boring wells to draw water from the earth’s surface. We can collect water by digging soak pits in our gardens and fields. These recharge the ground water and tube wells. We should also ensure a better garbage management system so that ecological balance is maintained and chemical wastes are deposited safely. Chhattisgarh leads India in water harvesting. Water management is an art and we should learn it. Thousands of litres of water are wasted every day because of overuse. To stop this misuse, we must use buckets in place of bath tubs. While brushing our teeth we must ensure that the tap is not open all the time. To wash our vehicle we must use wet cloth instead of bucketfuls of water. To preserve drinking water NGOs, industrialists and the youth should work together. If we don’t understand the importance of water then the crisis cannot be resolved. Bin pani sab sun (without water, there is nothing).

Water is a lifeline for people. And the crisis is felt mostly in summer. Drinking water has become scarce in big cities and rural India. In the hinterlands the situation is worse as villagers have to trudge miles to get drinking water. And in small towns there are many who wait for hours and hours for water tankers. Besides, there have been reports of water riots. All this has happened because we have failed to preserve rain water.

The crisis is further accentuated by depleting ground water levels. In many areas it has gone from 50 feet to 600 feet. Alarmed by the situation, water authorities are proposing a model legislation to prevent further erosion of the water table. The Central Groundwater Board carried out a survey and found that about 800 areas are in the danger zone. The water level has gone down drastically in Delhi, Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Daman and Diu, Andhra and Tamil Nadu.

Many areas of Haryana, including Narnaul, Samlakha, Karnal and Moga, Sangur, Maha Kalam, Ahmedgarh in Punjab, Surajgarh, Behror and Bhinmal in Rajasthan, Gandhinagar in Gujarat have seen depleted water levels. Water experts say in coastal areas of Gujarat and Tamil Nadu deep drilling of tube wells has led to saline water ingress from the sea destroying prime agricultural land. And sometimes this endangers the only available source of drinking water. In 43 blocks further extraction of ground water has been banned. Several states have been informed about the worsening situation. They have been told to adopt water harvesting as a means to tackle water crisis.

Read more.....

Friday, February 01, 2013

Macro economic environment in a recession

Firms need to take a holistic view of the macro economic environment in a recession

how is the government?
Firms are constantly making decisions about their near future. In developing economies in particular, the value of imports, like a piece of equipment, a computer or new software for example, depends on the exchange rate. If the government has a monetary policy that is dedicated to stabilise its currency and has conservative fiscal policy, firms will have a relatively clear view of the investment horizon. In that case choosing an array of safe assets with an acceptable return is not that risky.

For instance, countries like Argentina have been able to absorb the shock better than its big neighbours like Brazil or some other countries because its monetary policy stabilises the peso (Argentine currency) to the dollar around a predicable market value. It imposes restrictive capital controls and has a conservative fiscal policy to support its stabilisation plan. It is true that its credit market has felt the impact, but it was not well developed before the crisis. So, one can say that the economic activities in Argentina were not significantly affected by the global crisis. Moreover, because the government taxes the country’s agricultural exports, necessities like beef and grains, revenues have remained stable.

In countries where the government has a floating exchange rate regime and where financial capital can flow freely, relative prices tend to behave erratically during a crisis because fear affects the value of currencies, and thus prices, in unexpected magnitudes. In these cases firms may have to consider relocating to more stable economic environments or to invest in safer assets until the crisis subsides to levels at which the future is more predicable.

As a result, a good understanding of the country’s macroeconomic policy may prove to be important during the process of analysis and planning because successful planning depends in part on the ability of the managers to read the future. And forecasting is more an art than a science. The analyst pieces together different parts of the puzzle to construct a tapestry about the future. The process requires not only formal knowledge of particular production processes, consume behaviour, the characteristics of the markets for the various inputs including labour, fiscal impact on the firm and various other issues, but it also needs to have an open mind to find new niches and to be willing to withstand the storm under an umbrella of falling margins while imagining new ways to allocate the existing assets in the less predicable environment that looms ahead in the next few months of this year.

Read more....

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.

2012 : DNA National B-School Survey 2012
Ranked 1st in International Exposure (ahead of all the IIMs)
Ranked 6th Overall
Zee Business Best B-School Survey 2012
Prof. Arindam Chaudhuri’s Session at IMA Indore
IIPM IN FINANCIAL TIMES, UK. FEATURE OF THE WEEK
IIPM strong hold on Placement : 10000 Students Placed in last 5 year
IIPM’s Management Consulting Arm-Planman Consulting
Professor Arindam Chaudhuri – A Man For The Society….
IIPM: Indian Institute of Planning and Management
IIPM makes business education truly global
Management Guru Arindam Chaudhuri
Rajita Chaudhuri-The New Age Woman
IIPM B-School Facebook Page
IIPM Global Exposure
IIPM Best B School India
IIPM B-School Detail
IIPM Links
IIPM : The B-School with a Human Face
IIPM – FLP (Flexi Learning Program)

Monday, January 28, 2013

One day become India’s answer to WalMart?

Can Shoppers Stop do it? Does Shoppers Stop have it within them to fight the slowdown and one day become India’s answer to WalMart? angshuman paul investigates...

Think about it... For decades, the only option for a godforsaken departmental store that Indians ever had was the nightmare of a shopping excuse called Super Bazaar! And if you’re one of the teeming wastrel dozens who had their penny-wise romantic interludes in the generation spanning Kendriya Bhandar, none the better. Come 1991, and Nagesh became the Salvador Dali of shopping, romanticising the art for Indians in a way they felt was alien, yet enslavingly addictive. If the ‘91 inaugural Andheri store started in an upstreet Linking Road in Mumbai smoked the intent, the Ansal’s Plaza outlet in New Delhi went the full figurative blast. From one store in 1991 to 36 in 2009 (and 51 CrossWords, 3 HyperCity Marts), Nagesh, and Shoppers Stop, had arrived! But like I said, till the last year.

The numb’ers

For eighteen straight years, Nagesh has intently focused on growing Shoppers Stop’s geographical reach. And the impact has been frivolously brilliant, especially in terms of revenues. Look at just the last five years. From Rs.3,448 million turnover in FY 03-04, Shoppers Stop jumped 27% to Rs.4,411 million in FY 04-05. The next year was brilliantly more fantastic. A super growth of 42% made revenues shoot up to Rs.6,228 million in FY 05-06. With Rs.8,123 million in FY 06-07 (30%) and Rs.10,799 million in FY 07-08 (32%), Nagesh commandingly was traversing the upper crust. But both MD Nagesh and CEO Govind knew the warning signs were already there. With three quarters of this year giving Rs.9,606.6 million turnover, replicating last year’s growth might not be possible at all; though all indications are that they will surely beat last year’s revenue figures.

It’s quite ironical then that the year in which Shoppers Stop has reached the historical high grandstand of its revenues, is the same year that has perchance been the worst for it during the past decade. Even before the start of the year, the last quarter of the previous year had given them Rs.25.6 million loss (net after taxes). If that looked only trite figurative or bookish, the next quarter made its intentions clear. A mammoth Rs.256 million loss. The third quarter of the year ending September 2008 was the movie 300 in action; a bloodbath of Rs.496.7 million loss. Fourth quarter ending December 2008 gave another loss of Rs.32.6 million.

Read more.....

Monday, January 14, 2013

learning valuable lessons for its future

infosys has been definitely hit by the global slowdown, but it is also learning valuable lessons for its future, say virat bahri & arun roy of B&E

Part of that was thanks to the fact that the Lehmann debacle happened in the second half of the year. Moreover, the company managed a lot by means of cost cutting. Variable components of salaries were increased. Their reliance on repeat customers also came to their rescue. Also, rupee depreciation over the year was a welcome breather.

The challenge for Infosys would come now, in FY 2009-10. Recovery for the sector is expected to begin only by FY 2010-11. Understandably, the company has a relatively flat outlook for the current fiscal; with revenue projected to be in the range of Rs.214.16-217.47 billion and EPS to decline by 8.6-9.2% yoy. For Q1, 2008 -09, the company has reported a decline in revenues (in dollar terms) by 2.9% yoy to $1.12 billion. They did, however, manage a modest increase in net income after tax by 1.6% yoy to $313 million.

Meanwhile, the company seems to be getting aggressive with respect to diversifying its client base. Harit Shah, IT Analyst, Angel Broking, feels that the reliance on repeat business is not an issue per se; rather it is the fact that the company has clients like British Telecom (BT), which contribute a great deal to its revenues. Now when BT starts cutting IT spends the way it has over the past several quarters, Infosys obviously gets impacted. The company has added 27 clients in Q1 itself. Recent wins include Bancolombia and T-Mobile, UK.

Diversification in geographical spread and vertical presence is another challenge that the company wishes to take up. The problem here, again, as per Harit, is that emerging economies like India would take at least 4-5 years to contribute significantly to Infosys revenues. The same is true for verticals like retail, health care, transportation, et al. Investing in them will help, but one must not expect miracles.

Read more.....

Tuesday, December 04, 2012

Why Ms.Tymoshenko’s no Jap!

Ukraine wins its gas war with Russia; and a lady masterminds it all

She fights like a Japanese, she shouts like a Japanese, she walks like a Japanese, even has a name resounding of the rising sun, but Ms. Yulia Tymoshenko, the Prime Minister of Ukraine, for all her film actress drop dead looks, knows when to call a spade a spade and Putin a jack of the behind! Taking sole credit for forcing Putin to beat a bumbling retreat in resolving the Russia-Ukraine gas crisis on January 19, 2009, Yulia showed how a mix of long term planning, strategic manoeuvres and slapstick humour is enough to put a brash bunch of slipshod ill-dressed truants [read, the Putin platoon] in their place for a long time to come.

The background first. Recently, Russia again stopped its gas supply to Europe, accusing Ukraine of illegally leaking gas out of its continental gas pipeline, which is the primary transit for gas supplies to a major part of Europe [25% of Europe’s and 80% of Ukraine’s gas supplies are from Russia], ergo forcing European countries to immediately get involved. Amusingly, the reason Putin played his master move was not at all economic, but political.

Since Ukraine’s Orange Revolution four years back – when Viktor Yushchenko, the revolution leader, led mass civic protests to become the President – Russia has stopped its gas supply four times to Ukraine to force bickering between its pro-western leaders so that the infighting leads finally to a pro-Russian bench coming to power. Truly, Yushchenko’s approval ratings have fallen dramatically from 60% to around 5%; and his open fights against Prime Minister Yulia have never been worse. But Putin hadn’t bargained for the scorned Yulia. Not only did she force Yushchenko to display a united front with her during this crisis, but she also ensured there was no gas shortage in Ukraine! How? Some observers claim she masterminded the gas leakage from Russian supplies to build up massive Ukrainian gas reserves.

Read more......

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri

and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.

Friday, November 30, 2012

ASSEMBLY ELECTIONS: INSIDE CONFLICTS

For the upcoming assembly elections, parties face a tough time

That’s why BJP has already announced Prof. Vijay Kumar Malhotra as their candidate for CM. On the third side, BSP supremo, Mayawati has made Brahm Singh Bidhuri as the new state president and has entrusted the responsibilty of make election strategies on the shoulders of Nasimuddin Siddiqui.

Every leader wants more and more of his people to get tickets. And for the same all parties are facing trouble. They have to face opposition as well as unhappy people within the party. It makes them weak and that’s what is happening now. If candidates are selected on the basis of ability and performance, many names would get cut. A dilemma each party faces.

Read more......

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.

Tuesday, November 27, 2012

On the highway to perdition...

Allowing insurance companies to park investors’ money in VC funds will jeopardise their future

A healthy tan is the first sign of skin cancer. Who so ever has said this must have an experience of the sort. However, the brains at Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (IRDA) are yet to realise the fact. But, never mind, very soon they are going to get their share of experience. Without any doubt (which will be horrifying) not only for IRDA and insurance companies, but also for the poor investors, who knock doors of the insurers to safeguard their future. And, interestingly, all these will happen only because of the desire to earn a little more.

As per the fresh investment guidelines announced by the insurance regulator, life insurance companies are now allowed to invest in Venture Capital (VC) Funds. IRDA has allowed life insurers to invest 3% of their total investible corpus or 10% of the total size of the fund, whichever is lower, in VC funds. For general insurers, the limit is 5% of their investment assets or 10% of the fund size, whichever is lower, thus providing the insurers another asset class to invest. Prashant Sharma, Vice President - Investments, Max New York Life Insurance avers, “This is a high risk; high reward asset class and the policyholders who have the risk appetite can opt for it.” But don’t you think this is going to jeopardise the safety of investors’ money? Certainly, this has left many in dilemma about the feasibility of such investments.

Read more.....

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.

The Pampas are drying again!

With bond buyback Argentina raises fears of another economic collapse

Dry winds are all over the Pampas once again! And interestingly it’s the same that swept away most of it in 2001. Remember the $95 billion default (largest by any country) by the Argentinean government on its bonds that led to the devastating financial collapse! The reminiscences of it still sends shivers down the spines of many! Well, the same doubts are growing over Argentina’s creditworthiness, yet again!

Though the Argentinean government is already into its third week of a debt buyback programme (has bought back $430 million worth of its 2008 and 2009 bonds) to bolster investor confidence, but it hasn’t been of much help. “Bond buyback by government has boosted some investors’ confidence. But still a lot more needs to be done to restore Argentina’s lost credibility,” P. B. Henry, Professor at Stanford University and an expert of Argentinean issues tells B&E. Certainly at 50% (an estimated $140 billion) of GDP (market exchange rate), Argentina’s public debt is still large.

Read more......

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.

Friday, November 23, 2012

Stoned over sex

Gay pride surfaces on the streets of India and around the world...

“We are humans and are born like everyone else, but have feelings contrary to what is acceptable to the society. I am a guy and I love a guy, which means that people hate me and consider me to be different and weaker than others,” says Mayank, a front runner at the gay parade held in Delhi. On 29th June, 2008, Delhi, Kolkata and Bangalore played hosts to India’s first gay pride parades that drew a huge number of people. Holding placards with slogans like, ‘As good as you’, ‘Hindu-Muslim, Sikh-Isai, hetro-homo bhai bhai,’ the gathering marched peacefully through the streets, and was successful in making the Indian gays, bisexuals and transgenders surface and express their individuality.

Commemorating the Stonewall riots of 1969, which occurred in New York and kick-started the modern gay rights movement, homosexuals around the world came out on the roads holding high their rainbow-coloured flags. Like every year, parades were held in several countries and like India, Bulgaria and Czech Republic too held these parades for the first time ever. Though unlike India, those who assembled at Sofia and Brno were given a rather hostile reception. In Bulgaria; stones and gas-bombs were thrown at people attending the parade, while in Brno, right-wing extremists attacked the people with tear gas even before the march began! “I feel sorry to hear of such incidents where people do not respect people and cannot give heed to others’ feelings. I feel sorry for people who cannot accept us. At times we feel that we do not wish to be a part of this heartless society,” reacts Sachin, who had also participated at the parade.

“Hum honge kamyab ek din...” was the song on the lips of the people at the parade, and it showed the high spirits and firm belief of the activists that they would get their rights. All they want is that they should be recognised as a part of the society and people should not hurt their sentiments by mocking at them.

Read more......

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.

Thursday, November 22, 2012

Mom, can I have a ministry too?

Is portfolio shuffling a born trait or can it be learnt? B&E’s deep review

A few months ago, a research done by the most prestigious Yale University revealed that Indian politicians are extraordinarily intelligent. Well, we should mention they prove to be equally intelligent as ‘fund’ (or should we say, ‘post’) managers to have learnt how to arrange ministerial portfolios to minimise political risk.

Some months ago, when UPA coalition partner, DMK leader Karunanidhi, called back Minister of Communications and IT, Dayanidhi Maran, who was replaced by another party loyalist and Environment Minister A. Raja without any stated specific reasons, even the Prime Minister had no say on it. And Minister of State for Home, S.Rogupathy, another loyal DMK leader, was brought to the Environment Ministry. Similarly, in the era of the NDA government, Suresh Prabhu, who was the then Power Minister, was also forced to leave the Ministry and was replaced by another party leader Anant Geete, a protege of Shiv Sena Chief Raj Thakeray.

Read more........

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.