Sujavna 2:54

It is 10am on 30 December 2012
And on this last post during 2012, I add another few ideas for doing things differently.

35. Can we develop and start using hygiene towels or hygiene sprays that can do away with our daily baths. For a city like Mumbai, this would mean a saving of at least 70 million litres of water every day, assuming that one third of its citizens will switch over.

36. Has the time come for developing an all-compassing Global Sports Industry that links up a network of sports academia and research institutions and qualifications, generates and provides employment to millions of sports professionals including athletes, equipment designers and manufacturers, sports medicos, sports infrastructure and sports training outsourcing centres, sports journalists and media commentators?

37. (and this is just an extension of my earlier idea 34) – can we do the same for music album productions?
38. can we have neighbourhood gadget clinics (like we have pet clinics or barber shops), where one could periodically take one’s gadgets such as laptops and mobiles, and get them serviced for gadget continues to provide efficient service to its owner? Such clinics can offer a range of free to premium services at different fee slabs.

39. can more mothers teach and delegate responsibilities to their adolescent sons to cook, wash linen and make beds so that there is more equitable and empathetic shift in gender roles? 

40. And can more fathers teach and inspire their daughters to take up professional careers, that takes them out of the family circle and provides society with greater options to use their skills, while providing women with greater self-respect and financial independence?

I started with a target of 50, and I am happy that I was able to think of 40. Some of them may find acceptance and many may be rejected. (As I am sure a lot of my thoughts on this blog may have found acceptance or rejection). I am happy that this blog has continued in its second year and is poised to go further in its third year in 2013. I wish each of you a very great 2013 with lots of happiness, peace and prosperity and lots of innovative ways of achieving these wonderful values.

Sujavna 2:53

It is 4pm on 23 December 2012.

And I continue to struggle to complete my list of 50 new ways of doing things. But all hope is not lost as yet, since I was able to think of another 11 additions to my earlier lists of 10 and 14:

25. (and this is in the context of the increasing reports of eve-teasing, stalking and molestation of women in India) – can we develop and provide all women with a spray that can instantly turn off sexual desires in men? Perhaps this could even be a powerful stink-perfume or a powerful itch-inducing perfume? So exit pepper sparays enter itch sprays and stink sprays.

26. can all pathological laboratories invest (or perhaps get sponsorships from healthcare companies) in self-help digital kiosks that waiting customers can use to know more about lifestyle diseases, and how to understand the lab reports and what questions they can ask their doctors about treatment and cure? Even pharmacies (retail points for medicines) can offer such kiosk facilities!

27. can all public libraries and public reading rooms be mandated to assign a part of their space for voluntary literacy programmes, voluntary math-literacy programmes and voluntary language coaching programmes so that the impact of such programmes and subsequent use of the libraries are better?

28. can consumer gadget companies such as those selling new-generations of refrigerators, televisions, computers and mobile phones run a free weekend (physical as well as on-line) awareness workshops for consumers on how to understand, choose and use such gadgets efficiently and how to respond when performance problems / incidents are encountered?

29. why can’t companies producing milk and dairy products that use milk-deliver boys to deliver milk satchets daily to millions of customers in cities such as Mumbai, also deliver packaged and safe drinking water (in satchets or bottles) at costs that should be much lower that what is now available in the market in the branded water segment?

30. Public-Private Partnerhips in community policing, based on training and certification provided by police academies and human resources provided by housing societies.

31. Mandating a certain percentage of energy re-chargers of electronic gadgets to use renewable-energy based power-sources (such as solar energy).

32. Review and (doing away) with by the need by various agencies, to collect and store self-attested photocopies of identity documents from customers.

33. Delinking jobs from academic qualifications, except for those jobs in academia and research. Encourage a system of linking jobs with vocational qualifications from professional bodies.

34. Can movie goers take a financial stake in individual movie productions and get fair returns for the funds that they provide, besides getting to enjoy their movies? As an extension, can we have a system of a box-office exchange, where movies are traded for a minimum period of 3 months upto its release (akin to an IPO) and a maximum period of 12 months (going my the term of the longest box-office run).

Hope you are having a great weekend.

Sujavna 2: 50,51, 52

It is 5pm on December 16^th.

And I am continuing to struggle to complete my list of 50 new ways of doing things better. Over the last two weeks, I have struggled to come up with not more than 4 more; perhaps this had to do with my busy travel schedule (if I were to be generous to myself); closer to the truth may be the fat that my lateral thinking capabilities are not as good as I would like to believe. In any case, I list below the four that I have been able to think of.

1.       (and this is an idea that my wife helped me with, and which is already seeing some implementation) – the use of automatic vehicle tracking scanner systems at toll booths across the country and the use of scanned data to for revenue-related and infrastructure-related policy development and implementation.

2.       The development of agriculture export zones (on the lines of software export zones and special (manufacturing) export zones) in the vast hinterlands of India, with technologies that can help grow any food (organically) that is staple in different countries, but where there is limited land and manpower availability.

3.       The rationalisation of tax systems – whereby every cheque and credit card transaction is automatically taxed at 1% (0.5% debited from payer and 0.5% from payee) and every cash withdrawal from bank is automatically taxed at 2% (this higher tax is to discourage cash transactions) on withdrawee. The benefits are self-evident.

4.       Democratic institutions need to be mandated to include 50% of the elected representatives to be under 35 years and to include 50% women.

      Hope you are having a great weekend.