AN OPTIMISTIC OLD MAN

When one is born, he will die. The best rule of this universe is that everything visible is subject to decay under a pre-destined time-frame. As far as man is concerned, despite being aware of this truth, he is afraid of death. In Sanskrit, there is a word known as 'jijivisha' meaning, will to live or you may also coclude that nobody wants to die. In the mythological ‘Yaksha Prashna’ also it is so explicitly mentioned that everyday despite seeing men dying, nobody thinks that his own journey will also someday come to an end. Death, as a matter of fact is achieving fruition, which is unavoidable whether you welcome or despise it. If there is a scheme of things behind this creation, by God or nature itself, there must be a plan of new set replacing the old and so there is always space for the universal cycle going on ad infinitum.
I was in my personal life aware of the old age being round the corner after I celebrated my golden jubilee. I knew that not only the anatomy but even the minute faculties including brain becomes weaker day by day. Bad digestion, faint eyesight, teethless mouth, sleepless nights, sanality, Alzheimer’s disease, nervous system break down and cold treatment from the kith and kin are parts of disturbing old age syndrome. The very idea of landing in an old-home frightened me. What did I do?
The research in advance enabled me to chart out the map of my post retirement life. For that I decided to (1) leave all bad habits like smoking, (2) to arrange sufficient financial back up so that I should not be fo beg before reluctant relatives and, (3) keep fit through a strict regime of healthy food, regular exercise and stressfree life style. Let it be very clear that there is no substitute for income and fitness. Income deficiency reduces a man’s personality to a meaningless state. Niti says: It is better to live in forests surrounded by lions and tigers than to live in his society as a pauper. So, during service period itself one should lay down for upcoming lean period or he should explore the possibility of an alternative job, both for income and engagement. Fitness is, if we quote once again from Sanskrit: shareermadyam khalu dharm sadhanam, body is necessary both for earning and consuming and so it is the root of all righteousness as well.    
Earlier I had read that an old man becomes more greedy (mayavi) and easily irritated. This mental decay is faster and worse when there is none to care for him. But only a couple of days back, I came across a news item which has definitely enthused me at a point of time when I have left behind my platinum jubilee. It says about a recent research in UK which, after a thorough survey has come to a conclusion that older one becomes smarter he turns because he sits on heap of useful experiences. Though this news begets optimism in the aged, but from my side I dare to add that this ‘feel good’ will also come true when the individual is physically fit and financially self-dependent.  

CANCER AND CAP

Since cancer has been spreading fast and engulfing both sexes and all age-groups, the world has launched a hectic search not only for remedies but also drugs and accessories to blunt its painful side effects. One of them is the hair loss for mainly the lady patients. Breast cancer is the commonest form in the ladies. If it is detected early, only either the radio therapy or the chemotherapy may be advised to cure the patient. In the eventuality of late detection, the patient has to undergo triple course of operation followed by RT and CT. Whenever CT is prescribed, the hairfall starts immediately after the first dose and she becomes a complete bald by the third application each being after a gap of 21 days. CT in case of 2nd or 3rd stages is generally given in half a dozen sittings with the approved gap.
The weakness of ladies for long, thick, black and shining hair is known to all so much so that it is not considered less than any ornaments in matters of make up. Therefore, for bald ladies it becomes a very trying situation to move out. Anybody in market will be surprised to see a young and beautiful lady bereft of hairs on head. Since more and more patients are seen these days, you will find them covering the head with scarf. Despite that the inferiority complex in them is visible.
In this backdrop, some caps have been brought in the market in England and USA. The first such cap is known as Penguin Cap. It is like an icebag. It has to be kept on freezing point. Immediately after the CT sitting, the patient puts it on. So that the treatment could be effective, it has to be changed after every half an hour for two hours. It keeps the scalp so cool that the heat effects of CT is compromised and the patient is saved of unwanted hair-loss. It has to be more than one. So the entire package for one patient costs about 600 dollars. The second cap is known as DigniCap. Unlike its first counterpart, it has an inbuilt machine working as a coolant. It is slightly cheaper. The patients are presently not benefiting on a larger scale as it has not received necessary clearance from the monitoring authorities and hence it is not commonly available in market.
The treatment, therefore involving CT requires some more improvement besides safety from baldness. Firstly, being the costliest part of the post-operation treatment, the medicines forming its package has to be made cheaper and secondly less painful. CT spoils the taste in the mouth  of the patients so badly that they lose appetite which makes them weak. The post-operation patient’s body becomes delicate and very prone to infection. Since, till now only risk factors are known and exact cause has not been detected, the medical community has to take this challenge of making cancer treatment cheaper and less painful.    

HR DIRECTORS' CONCLAVE

                               

The Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS)  Chamber of Commerce and Industry organized its 1^st Annual HR Directors’ Conclave’15 on March 13, 2015 in the Main Auditorium, Scope Complex. The theme was ‘Building an enabling Eco-system for success of ‘Make In India’ & ;Skilled India’. It was a day-long programme from 0945 to 1800 hrs. The gathering contained mainly industry people dealing with the human resource matters. Important among them were S/Shri Padmashree Dr. Pritam Singh (former Director, MDI, Gurgaon), Ms Saloni Malhotra (Associate Vice president, Paytm), Ms Jayanika Dave (Non Executive Director,Ingersoil Rand India), Navin Coomar (Hon. Advisor, BRICS CCI), Saurabh Nigam (Vice President, (Human Resources – Scrapdeal), Rakesh Seth (Senior Vice President, HR Group, Lloyd Group), Rajiv Bhadauria (Director, Group HR,Jindal Steel and Power) and Col. Prashant Dhingra (Vice President, HR, Citi Cable Network Ltd Zee Network)

They lamented that skill development is not possible without proper training institutions and out of 100 top universities in the world none is an Indian. Some suggested that the industries should have a close contact with universities so that they could spell out their requirements and tell the institutional authorities to include the same in the syllabus. India has skilled labour only in numbers and not qualities. It was pointed out that under the ‘make in India, programme, the country needed 50 crore of skilled workers. For that the hinterland should extend to villages and that is possible only when out of 6 lakh villages there should be one training centre for every two villages. Though it was a gigantic task, the speakers hoped that with commitment, the country can achieve.

Some of the HR experts threw light on other aspects as well. According to them, the employers should understand that only pay package was not enough to instill a sense of belonging in the workforce as they need other facilities as well to lead a reasonably good life style. One of them said that an industry HR leader should remember that he can buy an eight-hour duty schedule and not an 8-hour motivation.  For this objective, involvement of employees in policy making is an essential success mantra. The host had arranged a sumptuous lunch and tea.   

WEST ASIAN HERITAGE IN JEOPARDY

                  From Egypt in west to Afghanistan in east and Turkey in north to Pakistan in south, the entire region is badly disturbed for last more than twenty years even if we leave behind the continuing Arab-Israel enmity since 1948. These upheavals are caused  by religious bitterness like the Sunnis threatening Shias or forcing the incumbent govts to implement Nizam-e-Mustafa in to to. Thus far these uprisings have been religious or political. However, since the chaos started affecting the rich heritages of West Asia, which has been the cradle of civilization, the people concerned with history, archaeology, heritage, art and museums are feeling highly concerned and anguished.
It all started in 2001 when the Talibani militia in Afghanistan destroyed age-old stone statues, known as Bamiyan Buddha of 6th century AD. When these huge statues did not give in easily, most cruelly they procured tanks and blew them off. We have been told by knowledgeable people that Islam does not contain anything approving of this iconoclasm. Of course some stress that the Prophet himself had broken some statues in Mecca. Since the Bamiyan Buddha statues were not properly cared for, some European countries had offered to make available funds for conservation which annoyed the Taliban and they precipitated their revengeful activity. How history can forget that Buddhism prevailed in  Afghanistan as well? Whatever the explanation, Mankind has lost covetable pieces of heritage.
Similar loss was seen in 2002 when Iraq was being bombarded by the Americans to wipe out the Saddam Hussain regime. One of the important setbacks was the desolation of the local national museum. Costly, rather rare artefacts were thrown away on roads making a heyday for the vandals. The museum was so rich in matchless exhibits that the loss was irreparable. Even the super structure of the building suffered huge damages. When the guns became silent, the museum gates were closed to avoid any more theft or vandalism. It is a matter of great relief that after 12 years, the museum with some repairs has been reopened. Saddam Hussain was killed and the American President retired but the losses to the museum cannot be made up.
Of late, some more such instances are coming to notice ever since the notorious ISIS launched its marauding campaigns in Syria and Iraq. Only a couple of days back, news came that the ISIS militants have heavily damaged the world famous museum there at Mosul while trying to maintain their hold on Mosul which came under reprising attacks by the Iraqi govt forces. Additionally we have learnt that ever since the captured oil wells were either taken away from them or burnt, the ISIS is suffering from coffer crunch. So they have started selling out costly artefacts to the European customers against heavy prices. As a matter of fact even the Boko Haram of Nigeria, also facing paucity of funds, has decided to support ISIS for money. In this bloody game of power and money, entire West Asia has been losing fast its rare pieces of heritage which as a matter of fact is a loss to humanity.                              


   

AKBAR'S LIBERALISM

                            

                                                                  -Bageshwar  Jha

Whenever we talk about the Mughal rule in India, some unpleasant issues including Zazia and forcible conversion into Islam figure prominently. In this respect Aurangzeb is singled out for large scale outrages. From Babar to Bahadurshah Zafar, there were seven main Muslim emperors. Out of them, Akbar, famous as Mughal the Great, is recorded in history as the most liberal. Did we ever care to go into the reasons which shaped him to be so? Nobody becomes I liberal overnight. There must be a number of factors including tradition and training to impart an individual a liberal personality.

There were several factors which stopped Akbar having a one-sided picture of life  and propelling him to see the world from other angles also. He, as such developed tolerant enough to know the views of others as well.   His father, Humayun was an orthodox Sunni Muslim. On the other hand, his mother, Hamida Banu was the daughter of a Persian Shia, God-fearing Maulvi, famous for his liberal outlook. He was equally dear to both Shia and Sunnis in his circle. Similarly Akbar’s early tutor Abdul Latif was also did not have  stern religious attitude and was being loved by his neighbours. His liberal religious temperament left a permanent impression on his royal disciple. To add further in the list, his guardian in course of his minority,  Bairam Khan was also a Persian Shia. To cap these all, Akbar was born in the house of a Hindu, Rana Virsal of Amarkot, who was a close friend of Humayun.

When he became the emperor, he built an assembly hall known as ibadatkhana inside the Fathehpur-Sikri Fort in which almost every evening the Muslim scholars discussed about Islam. But all the times these scholars, trying to dominate the course of deliberations, bitterly fought among themselves which annoyed the king and made him sad. Then he started calling the scholars of Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism etc. and encouraged them to express their religious views. This opened his eyes and  he decided to launch a new religion, known as Din-e-Ilahi containing high gospels of all religions. It was strongly opposed by the orthodox Muslim clerics and hence this experiment could not attract public. But Akbar continued to give vent to his soft attitude towards different religions. It influenced his personal life as well. He had three wives – Hindu, Muslim and Christian.

If the above brief account is taken into consideration, nobody would have any doubt in treating Akbar as the most liberal Muslim ruler.    

BUDGETS OF PRABHU AND JAITLEY

                                               

                                                                                      - Bageshwar  Jha

The usual annual fanfare of  budgeting exercise came and  passed off with foreknown bouquets from the ruling combine and brick-bats from the opposition.  While the NDA leaders showered praises on the FM for his balanced and futuristic budget, the opposition benches gave a blanket verdict of it being a ‘bakbas’. One ex-FM, Sh Dinesh Trivedi did not call it a budget  at all and rated it as an idea only. Did not he lose his ministry for flawed budgeting?  However, the impartial analysts found them aking a break from the populist measures of the regimes in the past.

When the Railway budget is due, the only inquisitiveness in the public is to know about the passenger fare. If it is down, which is the rarest of the rare, the budget is good. If it is otherway round, the Rail Minister is called worthless. In case the status quo has been maintained, the commuters take a sigh of relief. Similarly, with regard to the general budget, whether he is a salaried man or a businessman, the only enquiry is about the slab and rate of the Income Tax. If the tax-free slab has gone up, the FM is treated as a magician. The question arises, have these budgets only these angles? Who cares for the economy of the country, international pressures beyond our control, requirements of national security and economic developments?

The impartial financial analysts are of the opinion that both the ministers have, to a large scale avoided toearn cheap popularity and have taken into consideration a growth oriented  road-map of 7-10 years. Since some states are on the threshold of elections, both the ministers maintained  the existing passenger fares and IT slabs intact so that the people at large were not annoyed. Whereas Prabhu has concentrated on fulfilling the commitments of previous dispensation and modernizing the service with better facilities, Jaitley worked out to fetch 8% growth and lead it to double digit in near future. Without giving relaxation in IT, he has allowed the salaried class to invest more to minimize IT cut.

Both the budgets were followed by an upsurge in share markets which is a welcome trend. After all the share market players have their fingers on the nerves of the national economy. The Govt has emphatically committed to perform. They need a reasonable timeframe.