Sujavna 1:41

Giri at 1730hrs on 27^th November

What is the value of human life in India? All of Indian politicians and most bureaucrats will answer this question with a lie and a straight face – we truly hold life as invaluable, they would aver! And most Indian parents will look at the person posing this question with contempt as they live in a fool’s world that they value their precious childrens’ lives higher than those in other parts of the world. And yet, several incidents that were reported across India, during the week that went by, seem to confirm what most Indians all know deep within themselves – that human life in India is rarely valued for its inherent sake and for the potential that it can aspire to attain. Be it the tragedy of the Doon Express fire or the death of a Mumbai school boy due to a combination of badly-designed and installed billboard on a lamp-post and badly-designed window cross-bars in the school bus that the boy was travelling, (or the long-drawn struggle for criminal justice and fair compensation in cases such as the Uphar cinema case or the Bhopal gas tragedy) Indian society is yet to comprehend that in this particular aspect we are still amongst “barbarians” and have to cross several chasms of legal, educational, economic and political value systems to be considered truly developed.

So are there innovations that can facilitate Indian society to cross these chasms? How about taking a clue from the Responsive Care approach that many chemical giants initiated in early 1980s? Perhaps each large employer (employing say more than 200 people) can initiate a CSR programme, for its employees and their families, that aims to (a) advocate and establish the importance of safety and security, (b) support in adopting insurance products, (c) support in legal and financial assistance to those that need any. The government can allow such companies to avail some tax benefits for expenses incurred in such programmes! Other smaller employers (say those who employ 20 or less) may perhaps need to mandatorily send their employees to a day of interactions with the closest CSR programme of a larger company.

Wishing you a great week ahead.

Sujavna 1:40

Giri at 1000am on 20^th November

As this Sunday morning brings in a sharp chill in the air (in Mumbai this means sub-twenty degree Celcius!), a lot of ideas continue to swirl in my mind – many of them in response to news and events that surfaced during the course of the last 7 days. I am sure an equal number of ideas, if not more, would have occurred to you as you successfully progressed through an eventful week that went by!

So what are the new ideas that entered my mind in the last few days? For starters, I am wondering why certain private sector health providers in India (such as Fortis Hospitals) cannot incorporate a web-based appointments scheduler, on the lines of airlines web-check-in process, wherein pre-registered patients (OPD) can reserve appointments with doctors on the date and time of their preference and pay online for the consultation fee within a couple of hours if their reservation is to be confirmed through an email from the hospital or an SMS from the hospital? This will facilitate greater efficiency and transparency in customer-care processes?

Yet another thought that my mind keeps churning around relates to the continuing absence of a normative culture of written contracts, especially amongst professional services firms such as accountants, lawyers, company secretaries that specify clearly what a customer (especially small corporates, individuals) can expect for the professional fees that will be charged and what standard time frames can be expected for delivery of services and how does one escalate any grievance with top management of the service provider? Much of this is oral and many times the trust factor does not work in favour of the customer. Can professional bodies mandate such minimum standards of service-care for their members?

Hope you are having a great weekend. Wishing you an exciting and useful week ahead.

Sujavna1:39

Giri at 1500 hrs on 14^th November

Firstly apologies for the delay in this posting this edition; this became unavoidable due to time – mismanagement on a project that I had to complete.

Today Indians celebrate the day as Childrens’ Day and I think it is a day when all adults need to introspect on how they can provide and sustain a positive environment of learning as a fun-filled activity for our children. What contemporary innovations have there been that could be replicated and how do we incentivise adoption of innovative teaching programmes?

If I may, there could be a beginning made by our commercial radio channels – how about every first Monday of the month being reserved by our FM radio channels as the day when they hunt the country for the most challenging teaching and learning assignments that resulted in adoption of innovations for success ; the hunt could be fun-filled with songs and music scores and interviews broadcast to encourage sharing of success. The hunt could end in an annual finale of recognition through awards to school managements, teachers and students who participated.

I am sure you have many more such ideas up your sleeves. I am most eager to read them, so please respond to this blog.

Sujavna 1:38

Giri at 11am on 5^th November

Welcome to yet another edition of Sujavna. I hope that you all are enjoying the weekend with your near and dear ones and rejuvenating yourselves to immerse in the exciting opportunities that the next week may have in store.

But I guess not all of us always look forward to the future, especially those who are in the marginalised sections of society and, who, as someone pointed out to me, repeatedly come out as losers in the Russian roulette of life that they need to play, day after day, week after week. I write this with a sense of exasperation after reading about the death of a new born in a hospital in rural India, because the staff used carbolic acid instead of disinfectant on its mother in a pre-C-section administration. And there have been no criminal cases filed against the hospital staff, the hospital administration!

And yet there are always many who look forward to the future, because they have hope that matters do improve and economic gains do lurk around the corner for those enterprising enough to search for the pot and have a go at striking it.

What innovations in our governance structures can ensure we have more and more numbers in the latter group than those of the former? And how do such innovations become well-accepted norms of civil society? I admit I am totally lost on this – in fact I wonder if these are right questions to be asked? Any one amongst you , who has a better framework of questions to ask in this context or indeed any answers to my questions?

Wishing you a great week ahead.