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WILL POPULATION BE A BOON OR A BANE FOR INDIA?

According to the 2001 Census, India’s population was 102.9 crores. Viewed in a global context, India constitutes 16.9 per cent of world population and 2.4 per cent of the global land area. Currently, India’s population is estimated to be around 111.2 crores.

The population of India grew by 21.6 per cent in the first decade following Independence; the rate rose to 24.8 per cent during the next decade. The growth began declining from the third decade onwards and in between 1991 and 2001; it declined to 21.5 per cent. Despite population growth in India declining steadily over the last two decades, the population size is increasing because of the high proportion of young people in the reproductive age group. The population size will continue to grow for some more time because of the "population momentum" factor. The high population growth rate in some parts of the country is due to the large size of the population in the reproductive age group, higher fertility due to lack of contraception, and high wanted fertility due to the high infant mortality rate (IMR).

According to the report of the Registrar General of India, Technical Group on Population Projections:

(A)The population of India is expected to increase from 1,029 million to 1,400 million during the period 2001-2026-an increase of 36 per cent in 25 years at the rate of 1.2 per cent annually.

(B)The Crude Birth Rate will decline from 24.1 in 2004 to 16.0 during 2021-25 because of the decreasing level of total fertility.

(C)The IMR, reported to be 58 in 2004, is expected to decline to 40 by the end of the period 2021-25.

(D) With declining fertility and increase in life expectancy, the number of older people is expected to more than double, from 71 million in 2001 to 173 million in 2026.

(E)The urban population, which was 28 per cent in 2001, is expected to increase to 38 per cent by 2026.

(F)The total fertility rate (TFR) is expected to decline from three in 2003 to two during 2021-25. The assumption is that the TFR would decline steadily and touch the floor value of 1.8 in some states.

 With this, the weighted TFR is projected to reach the replacement level of 2.1 by 2021-25.

 Population stabilisation is not merely about numbers, it has to be looked at in the context of wider socio-economic development. It does not matter if, in the process, we don’t stabilise by 2045 (as indicated in the National Population Policy (NPP), 2000-it could be achieved by 2050 or 2060. But what is of greater concern is how we approach the issue of population stabilisation. It should be a gender-balanced and rights-based approach rather than a top-down authoritarian approach.

The "two-child norm" can cause immense harm to women’s health in the existing social situation, where the preference for a son is high and the woman’s status is still very low.
One of the important risks includes increase in sex-selective abortion and consequent reduction in the number of girl children.
 
It is being increasingly recognised that social investments help in attaining the goal of slower population growth. Improving access to and equity in quality health care, education and opportunities for women is a matter of human rights. It also empowers women and results in smaller, but healthier families.

Family planning and other population stabilisation programmes should form an integral part of the comprehensive primary health care programmes and need to be based on "community needs assessment".

Micro planning with community needs assessment can help identify and address the local problems through more acceptable strategies.

Women’s health can be better taken care of with such a decentralised approach. The twin issues of gender and equity should be over-arching while implementing the NPP.
In the planning stage itself, certain minimum and practical indicators of quality of care should be incorporated and monitored. The emphasis on complete registration of births, marriages, pregnancies and deaths can inform the planners of the current and the future status of the population and help them review policies at various stages.

India is emerging as a regional-or even global power in not too distant future. The demographic advantage to be derived from the age structure of the population is traced to the fact that India is (and perhaps will remain for some time) one of the youngest countries in the world. The population of India could be its biggest asset, if appropriate policies are formulated and implemented with people’s participation. We can reap the demographic dividend as we stabilise our population over the next 50 years.

WILL CORPORATE INDIA GO GLOBAL?

The intense competition unfolding in India today has ensured the rise of several world-class and soon-to-be-world-class companies. Entrepreneurial ferment is in the air. Yet, there is an under utilised asset that corporate India should recognize-the Indian diaspora.
China has shown the way forward. Its worldwide diaspora numbers about 50 million, compared to India’s approximately 20 million.

Over the last two and half decades, the Chinese government has successfully tapped into the financial, managerial, knowledge and social networks of the overseas Chinese.
This has resulted in mutual gain. In the early 1980s, when Deng Xiaoping’s China first opened up, only Chinese entrepreneurs overseas could compensate for the murkiness of the Chinese corporate environment and chose to invest. During the late 1980s, 70 per cent of foreign direct investment into China came, from this community, especially from the ethnically Chinese locales of Taiwan and the then British colony of Hong Kong. Their catalytic function thus served; today China is a central part of most major corporate boardrooms’ investment maps.

In recent years, the US Census Bureau has reported about one million India-born residents in the US, as compared to 1.5 million China born residents. The Chinese community in the US is larger mostly because migration from China to the US began as early as the 1840s; migration from India followed about a century later. But, importantly, migration from India hit its stride in the 1960s and thereafter-precisely when Mao’s China had curtailed migration-so that more Indians than Chinese have found their professional ways into American corner offices and boardrooms today. Indians have thus steadily and very visibly reached upper executive echelons. Silicon Valley venture capitalists and entrepreneurs of Indian origin, responsible for putting the Indian diaspora on the radar, were once senior executives technology firms.

Success has not been limited to information technology, but has spanned sectors like consumer products and aviation. And the Indian community as a whole is wealthy- surveys by the likes of Merrill Lynch point to two hundred thousands millionaire families and median income for people of Indian origin of $60,093 compared to the US median income of $38,885.

Encouragingly, the government has made strides in acknowledging the value of the Indian diaspora. The high-profile Pravasi Bharatiya Divas is now in its fourth year and the India Resurgent Bonds scheme of 1998 is in its eighth year. Networking organizations like TiE (The Indus Entrepreneurs), industry bodies like NASSCOM, and foundations are fostering links with the diaspora. And many students at Harvard-not just those of Indian origin-are increasingly willing to factor India into their career plans. Yet, Indian entrepreneurs and companies can be more systematic in engaging the diaspora so as to claim what I call the diaspora dividend. Companies can tap into the diaspora to source inputs as well as to sell outputs.

On the input side, Bangalore based tech entrepreneurs have already shown that the diaspora can provide capital, talent, networks, advice and mentorship. The same will prove true for tapping into ideas. In the sciences, for example, mutually beneficial relationships between Indian companies on the one hand and overseas Indian scientists on the other can be formed. Multinationals in the developed world are already claiming their share of the dividend by routinely consulting their Indian employees to "figure India out" or to lead their India efforts.

On the output side, companies can sell to the diaspora. Bollywood already does this superbly. So do Indian food manufacturers based out of the UK. ICICI bank targets different segments of the diaspora- from the Gulf, the UK and the US, to Southeast Asia, in ways appropriate to the different compositions of Indian-origin people living in these locations. Moreover, these efforts need not only serve the diaspora. The diaspora can provide a beachhead into a broader market. Packaged chicken tikka masala or samosas, for example, are known enough to find shelf space in grocery stores targeting mainstream consumers.

Much more can be done, by entrepreneurs and policymakers alike. Recent research suggests that diaspora connections most benefit entrepreneurs in smaller cities-those in Delhi and Bangalore already have adequate means of connecting to world markets. Policy makers and networking organisations can help foster such connections.
 
‘Brain circulation’, a term used to refer to roving bands of talent-in this case, circulating between India and the world-shows up as being key to realising the benefits of the diaspora.
Embracing the diaspora is thus a relatively easy way for Indian entrepreneurs and companies to consolidate recent hard-won gains in global awareness. At an enormously buoyant time for India, the diaspora represents willing, available and useful pickings.

WILL THERE BE HEALTH FOR ALL?

The global healthcare industry, worth $4.5 trillion- is the second largest industry today after the agro industry. The world’s third largest employer is the National Health Services of the UK, so one can imagine the potential for employment if the healthcare in India blossoms. Over the years, more than 90 % of the jobs in the healthcare sector have been ideally suited for women, especially from the lower socio- economic strata. The IT industry requires less than 10 people for a turnover of Rs.1crore, while the health care industry will require 200-250 people, typically from lower economic strata, ensuring all-round development.

Nursing is the only profession in which a girl hailing from an earn more than Rs. 1lakh a month by the time she’s 24, by getting a job in a US or European hospital, where there is a dearth of qualified nurses. In fact, in the US, the only industry to have registered growth and added millions of jobs in the last five years.

The policy-makers of India should look at healthcare as an industry that can propel economic growth rather than as a necessary evil. Millions of students graduate from our colleges every year, but our economy does not have jobs for all of them. One of the easiest solutions to the problem of unemployment is to start investing in the healthcare industry. Since nearly 60 per cent of our population lives in villages, the policies, projects, and schemes relating to the healthcare sector must try to impact this segment, so that it is delivered to the whole country. A major policy change that has to be implemented is the role of the government. The government should become a health insurance provider rather than just a healthcare provider.

Today, only 17 per cent of the total cost of health care is borne by the government and patients have to privately finance the rest. Our government spends thousands of crores in building massive hospitals, but not much capital is invested in building a network for insurance. The most laudable recent effort in this direction is the Yeshasvini Health Insurance Scheme, which is functioning in association with the Karnataka State Cooperative Society, in which every villager has to contribute Rs 5 per month to cover his healthcare. The Yeshasvini micro health insurance scheme in Karnataka has ensured that 20 million farmers in the state will now be able to afford healthcare and surgery in good hospitals-and this includes heart surgeries-for as little as Rs 5 a month.

Using ISRO satellite connectivity, Narayana Hrudalaya has treated over 22,000 heart patients in India and some abroad-through telemedicine. This concept is based on the fact that in 99 per cent of the cases of illness, there is no need for surgery. So, unless an operation is required, the doctor does not need to be physically present to treat the patient. Technology as a solution to disease and pain is gaining importance. We have installed hundreds of ECG machines costing Rs 10,000 each, in clinics in the remotest parts of Karnataka-an example of precious life being saved by simple technology that takes advantage of the infrastructure of teleconnectivity.

Ironically, even a century after the first heart surgery, less than 8 per cent of the world’s population can afford it. About 6.5 lakh heart operations are performed worldwide every year, out of which the United States accounts for 5.4 lakh surgeries. It is estimated that India requires over 25 lakh heart operations in a year. However, records show that only about 70,000 heart surgeries are being performed across the country annually.

This gap can be met only if the medical industry in India starts manufacturing products and other requirements for heart surgery. To make this possible, the government should devise policies to promote investment in the sector. The gestation period in the medical industry is particularly long, which makes concessions even more important.
Though India produces a large number of doctors, nurses and medical technicians in the world, the lack of financial support is a major hindrance the healthcare industry faces. With micro health insurance becoming popular, this scenario should change soon.

The Central Government has committed thousands of crores of rupees for rural healthcare, but we have to realise that we train only 26,000 doctors per year. These doctors aspire to become intermediate or super specialists. If we really want to ensure that health care is delivered in rural India alternative medicine like ayurveda and homoeopathy should encouraged. Doctors trained in these alternative branches medicine can at least prescribe antibiotic and put up intravenous drip when a child is unwell in remote corner of the country.

WHICH STATE WILL BE THE MOST PROSPEROUS?

The question pre-supposes that states will continue in their present geographical form and will not be broken up. Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and West Bengal are too large to be governed efficiently.

There are three additional points:
First, regional development is also a function of economic integration with immediate neighbours. This has begun to happen in the South.
Second, India’s future will depend on the Hindi heartland-Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Rajasthan.
Third, road networks are mainstreaming states like Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh. The problem lies in central India and the East.

Per capita income is the most obvious indicator of prosperity, but it is not the only one. Judging on the basis of current trends, Chandigarh will be the richest state of lndia. Delhi, or the National Capital Territory         (NCT), will be next. This is not fair, one might argue. Chandigarh and Delhi are not quite states. And a state like Goa, which will also do well, is small. Among major states, we are talking about Maharashtra, followed by Gujarat. Haryana will follow, pulled up by the NCR factor. Punjab will come next, but will increasingly fall behind.

In the next category will be the southern clutch of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala. However, two states-Rajasthan and Himachal Pradesh-will break away from historical trends. These are the states to watch out for.

The percentage of the population below the poverty line is another indicator of prosperity. In the states mentioned, there will be poverty reduction. But one state, not listed above, will also have a very low ratio of poverty-Jammu & Kashmir.

Prosperity can also mean access to physical or social infrastructure. If one forgets about Chandigarh and Delhi, the best physical infrastructure will be found in Goa, Maharashtra and Punjab, with Gujarat, Haryana, Kerala and Tamil Nadu following. If one talks about roads, Haryana, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh will be the best. In power and sewerage, Gujarat will lead the pack. In terms of social infrastructure, Kerala will still lead, followed by Tamil Nadu.

To restate the obvious, prosperity will be in the North, the West and the South. Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Orissa and Bihar, in that order, are states I wouldn’t want to live in, even a decade or more from now.

INDIA‘S NEXT BIG GROWTH SECTOR

India’s economy has been dramatically changing in the last 15 years, It is now the latest of a long string of Asian countries that have been transformed by a sharp acceleration in growth and development since the mid-20th century, However, India’s growth trajectory has been very different from that of other Asian countries.

The standard Asian “miracle” was all about deploying ever larger amounts of labour and capital in manufacturing and construction, In contrast, India has so far grown by deploying a highly skilled but cheap middle class in the services sector, This has led to a boom in banking, media, software, business process outsourcing, tourism and so on. As a result, the services sector now dominates the Indian economy at 55 per cent of cop, (In comparison, services only account for 35 per cent of China’s GDP).

India’s unique growth path was the result of two historical accidents: First, it already had an educated middle-class in place before economic reforms were introduced; second, the information technology and communications revolutions of the 1990s coincided with India’s economic liberalisation. Unfortunately, the unique services-led growth model has a major constraint-the size of India’s skilled middle class. A figure of 300 million is often quoted in the media, but, in my view, the middle class is still a fraction of this size. This is why the country is currently experiencing one of the sharpest escalations in wages/salaries of skilled workers ever witnessed. Ask any major corporate and you will be told that the biggest constraint to expansion is the availability of skilled workers. In other words, a growth path relying exclusively on the urban middle class is no longer tenable.

Montek. S. Ahluwalia
(Vice-chairman Planning commission)

So, is this the end of the Indian growth story? No, Two completely new factors will drive growth over the next 15 years. First, a primary education revolution is rapidly pushing up literacy rates across the country, Since the mid -1990s, the efforts of the government, NGOs and, more importantly, private schools, have pushed up primary and secondary enrolment rates sharply-an achievement that is rarely recognised. We have witnessed how schools have sprouted in remote places like Arunachal Pradesh. This will boost the basic literacy rate to over 90 per cent by 2020. In turn, this will make it possible, for the first time ever, to mobilise and deploy the bulk of India’s workforce.

Second, the country will go through a demographic revolution as birth rates decline and the share of adults of working age rises in the population, In this, India will be merely following what has already happened in East Asia, Most economists only think about demographic transition in terms of the supply of labour, but the experience of the rest of Asia suggests a simultaneous increase in savings rates, Indeed, we may be already witnessing this phenomenon-the savings rate has increased from 23% of the GDP to 29 % over the last five years. It is more than likely that this will rise to 35-40 % by 2020-not inconceivable, since China currently has a savings rate of 48% of its GDP. The rise in the domestic savings rate implies a large pool of cheap capital that can be used to fund investment on a large scale.

What does all this mean for India’s future growth trajectory?
The simultaneous availability of a large pool of capital and a rapidly expanding (and literate) workforce implies a growth path that is more akin to the standard Asian “miracle” model. As India begins to deploy ever larger amounts of labour and capital, the new growth engines will be relatively low-tech rather than high-tech. In other words, the boom sectors of the next 15 years will be sectors such as construction and manufacturing.
Services too will grow but it will be increasingly driven by the mundane-think “rural beauty parlours”-rather than cutting-edge software and technology.

Whenever we put manufacturing forward as a major source of India’s future growth, critics retort that the country’s infrastructure will simply not allow it. It is true that India’s infrastructure is very poor. However, this is not a unique position-all other countries started out with poor infrastructure. As these countries went through the demographic shift, they used the increase in labour and capital to create the required infrastructure. In my view, it will take active effort to stop this from happening in India too. Note that the construction of infrastructure does not merely allow other sectors to grow; it is a major area of economic activity in its own right.

As India shifts to the Asian trajectory, its position in global trade will change. Today, India does not seriously compete with China as the two countries occupy different spheres- one in services and the other in manufacturing. This will change by 2020. Armed with new infrastructure, India will increasingly compete with China for markets. By then, China’s labour force will be aging and its savings rate will be falling. This will sap its growth engine. This may seem incredible today, but it only repeats a well-established pattern the shift from Japan to Korea/Taiwan and then to China.

What is most attractive about this growth model is that it will affect the bulk of the people rather than the educated few. But, what of the urban middle class? It will continue to grow and prosper, but it will be the result of growth rather than the proximate source. Of course, an Asian miracle in India is not inevitable. Changing demographics and rising literacy have created a one-time opportunity-India needs to reach out and grab it.

WILL INDIA SUFFER FROM AN ENERGY CRUNCH?

An assessment of how India is doing in terms of energy depends very much on how the question is framed. If we are to measure the current state against our past, we seem to be doing well indeed: the Planning Commission estimates that the total primary energy supply increased from 83 million tonne of oil equivalent (mtoe) in 1950-51 to 440 mtoe in 2001-02.

Over this period, commercial energy supply increased even more significantly, from 22 mtoe to about 300 mtoe, while power generation went up from 5 billion Kw-hours to 515 billion Kw-hours.

But we remain woefully constrained in terms of overall energy availability. Per capita energy consumption is a third and per capita electricity consumption a fifth, of the world average. While higher energy and electricity consumption is not an end in itself, availability of adequate and modern forms of energy is generally correlated with human and economic development.

Worse still, the distribution of energy use in the country is highly skewed, with a wide disparity between the energy haves and have-nots. About a third of our total primary energy supply still comes from non-commercial sources (biomass, dung) that are used mostly in a traditional fashion-direct combustion-by an estimated two-thirds of the country’s population (mostly the rural poor) for their energy needs. The only worse performers are the poorer African nations and a few countries in Asia. And over 40 per cent of the households in India still do not have electricity.

In terms of energy supply, we are fortunate to have fairly extensive coal resources. While detailed assessment of reserves is needed, there is a general consensus that coal will be a mainstay of the country’s energy future. But the difficulties in rapid increase in power generation capacity have become apparent in recent years. Oil and gas resources are much more limited, resulting in high dependency on imports (for oil, about 70 per cent of total use). The tightening global oil markets, driven by the United States’ enormous appetite and China’s growing demand, are likely to pose continuing problems for India-our oil consumption and imports saw an annual growth of over 5 per cent and 9 per cent, respectively, between 1990 and 2002.

Looking forward, the major challenges for the Indian energy sector are three fold:

(A)We need to enhance national energy availability and energy security. Our policies have mainly focused on increasing energy supply.
Demand-side management has received little or no serious attention. There is enormous scope for managing the demand and increasing energy efficiency across the board. While the energy intensity of our economy-energy used per unit of the GDP (in purchasing-power-parity terms)-has improved over the years, it is still 25 per cent greater than that of Japan.

On the power front, the best way to contribute to energy security is to make sure that the country’s coal resources are fully assessed and then extracted and used efficiently.
Advanced renewables and nuclear power have potential in principle and technologies such as wind power have made enormous strides in recent years, but these options still have a long way to go before they make a significant contribution. On the hydrocarbon front, measures to reduce petroleum use in transport will have benefits for energy security, in addition to easing our balance of payments and reducing pollution.

(B) We need to reduce the inequities in energy availability across populations, especially in rural areas. Enhancing the supply of clean and modern energy services to the poor will result in health benefits, relieve women and children from the tedium of collecting fuelwood, and open up opportunities for socioeconomic development. Improved cookstoves or fuels such as kerosene and LPG can playa significant role here. The use of renewable technologies such as biomass gasifiers and solar photovoltaics can help bring electricity to remote areas. The creation and financing of sustainable business models to supply energy services to rural consumers is a challenge.

(C) We need to reduce the social and environmental disruptions associated with the energy sector. Our rush to increase energy supplies has led to unacceptable insults to communities and the environment, be it in the case of coal mining, the siting of thermal, hydro and other power projects, or the disposal of waste. It is critical to explore innovative models for management of highly-contested social and environmental issues associated with energy projects.

The problem of global climate change has enormous implications for the energy sector. Options such as biomass-based energy technologies and energy-efficiency measures, which have immediate benefits, should be implemented and the institutional first steps needed to develop a low-carbon energy sector should be provided.

Meeting these challenges will not be trivial. It will require moving away from the piecemeal approach to energy policy that has been our hallmark-here, one hopes, the Planning Commission’s recent Integrated Energy Policy will help. It will require developing capacity for systematic and detailed data collection and policy analysis, greater transparency in policy making, and openness to public participation. And most of all, it will require examining critically our past and existing efforts, learning from our mistakes, and developing better policies that go beyond simplistic supply-side, subsidy-driven, or market-centered approaches that are treated as panaceas to our energy problems.

This video defines India culture and diversity for me. I have been in USA for 10 years now but I still remember when I saw this the first time. It brings back the old memories and it’s good to know that India has the same values now also.

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Yuvraj Singh smashed Stuart Broad to become the first player to hit 6 sixes in an over for Twenty 20 match. Yuvraj scored 58 of 16 balls with seven sixes and 3 boundaries.

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Mahatma Gandhi saw only one film in his life, Vijay Bhatt’s Ram Rajya, and he thought even that was a waste of time. But it was not only Gandhi with this view. The Indian Government saw no place for films and other entertainment in its task of nation-building. Entertainment could give people wrong ideas and lead to chaos, the government felt.

Thus, for the government, entertainment posed both a moral and a political problem. The answer was strict state control over radio and television, and no subsidies for cinema.
Today entertainment has become a profitable industry. Economics has trumped morality. But if we consider the future of entertainment, the political questions remain, even if we do not agree with Gandhi or the Indian government.

What form should entertainment take in India? Where is the chaos feared by the government? Or is it too soon to tell?

The Indian government justified its monopoly over the airwaves by assuming that only it could have a vision of the common good, and could bridge the class differences in society. It feared that private businesses would simply cater to the rich and ignore the majority. It turned out that government monopoly was ineffective. After all, it is difficult for bureaucrats to legislate over culture.

All India Radio and Doordarshan enjoyed captive audiences with no domestic competition, but it was film songs and feature films that audiences responded to. Though refused government support, Hindi cinema created an audience for itself.
In the process, it came to define, along with regional cinema, the contours of mass entertainment in India.

The end of government monopoly came about more than a decade ago. It has been replaced by scores of private channels, both in radio and TV. The avenues of communication have multiplied through satellite, cable, Internet and cell phones that can download streaming video. For private enterprises, the scope to fulfill the promise of an independent media is staggering. However, cinema and celebrity culture saturates the media environment. We have "breaking news" about Soha Ali Khan’s new wardrobe, and wire flashes about Salman Khan’s latest dust-up. Entertainment has become news, and news is judged by entertainment value.
                                                     
Rather than an expansion, we witness a narrowing of topics and a duplication of themes. The information revolution seems to have created a hall of mirrors, endlessly reflecting the same images. No one can pretend that the aspirations for a free and autonomous media have been fulfilled.

The justification provided for the focus on film stars and celebrities is that the media is "giving the people what they want". But it is the media owners and managers who decide the focus. And the absence of variety points to the lack of imagination in media programming. Perhaps the future will belong to those who respond more imaginatively to the diversity of Indian audiences.

All those who watch films or TV learn to desire what they see, to dream of what they might have and to curse those who thwart their wishes. This does not make for a passive or unimaginative population. People are learning to assert themselves. This is the real consequence of the information revolution. Celebrities are only a vehicle for mass-level desires for expression. Is there any doubt that these desires will be subversive, and challenge the status quo? Lower classes will aspire for the status of upper classes and upper class standards-upper caste values-will be challenged.

The irony is that the media look westwards, as if Bollywood will follow Hollywood, and globalisation will come from outside. But in India, globalisation has led to the explosive growth of the domestic market. Marketers had not anticipated this.

Celebrity culture is a stop-gap solution to the problem of anticipating the real demands of a growing domestic audience. The monoculture of today’s media formulae must respect their audiences, and nurture the diversity of their needs and interests. We cannot pretend that all the traditional values can stay the same, even as the world is changing at high speed. Remember, that was why we sought an end to government control of the airwaves.

There are few female directors in any cinema, so India’s number, though small, is significant, with notable directors including Tanuja Chandra, Kalpana Lajmi, Vijaya Mehta, Sai Paranjpe, Aruna Raje, Aparna Sen and, recently, Chitra Palekar. Yet when we come to those Indian film-makers known to mainstream western audiences, Shekhar Kapur is alone in the company of Gurinder Chadha, Deepa Mehta and Mira Nair.
  
Chadha and Nair’s films are mainstream movies in the West and their box office returns are comparable to films of other (mostly male) directors. Yet can they be said to be Indian exports? Chadha, who migrated to the UK from East Africa, is certainly part of the British cinema and we regard her, as we believe she does herself, as a British Asian filmmaker, even if she makes films in India.

 Nair, brought up in Delhi but Harvard-educated, also lives in several places (New York and Uganda in addition to India). However, a deeply Indian sensibility underpins their work, in particular their warm and wonderful depictions of family life. Chadha is at her best when dealing with diasporas, whether Bend it Like Beckham or the much-neglected What’s Cooking?, while Nair’s depiction of street children and wealthy Delhiites are her most memorable. There are two striking features.
 
Why, even when it comes to female directors, is it once again Punjabi culture which exports so well to the West? Second, why is it when people talk of an Indian" crossover film" or making a Hollywood film, do they not notice that there are Indian women doing it already? Are women film directors still invisible?

Mogambo khush hua. In this age of manifest evil, it is difficult to convey the shiver that went down every spine when Amrish Puri uttered those immortal words in 1987’s Mr. India. After Amjad Khan’s Gabbar Singh, Mogambo is probably Indian cinema’s most memorable evil man. And deservedly so.

The one-time employee of the Ministry of Labour, who cut his teeth on the theatre of Satyadev Dubey (he would be the “safe guy” who would drop all the heroines home in his motorcycle with a side car), became a must-have for every film in search of a villain. It could be the maniacal Kali worshipper in Steven Spielberg’s kitschy Temple of Doom in 1984 or the authoritarian father in Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge in 1995.

The 72-year-old actor was seen little of late; a comment on cinema as much as society, where ends can triumph over means and what is villainous is debatable. Brother of actor Madan Puri, another celebrated villain. Puri’s trademark hat and deep baritone marked him out as a character. But unlike other screen villains, he infused so much dignity to evil that the person was never confused with the part.

Subhash Ghai, who worked with him often in a 25-year career, remembers how he was upset when Puri could not keep his date with him for the first schedule of Kisna. It was only later that he found out that Puri, who would always stand up and be counted for the film industry, had blood cancer. “But even then the will to live and the will to work was very strong,” he says. Govind Nihalani, whose association with Puri goes back to when he was lighting director and Puri the lead actor, recalls how he would stride across the stage, tall and imposing. “He was like my elder brother,” says Nihalani. He will miss him. So will Indian cinema.

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The smiles that were missing during Greg’s (former Indian coach Greg Chappell) era are back. Extreme euphoria can be a manifestation of an inferiority complex. Now that we have won a Test series in England, and celebrated enough, it is time to look ahead and not just gloat over an achievement whose true significance only the future can tell.

We have some really tough Test series ahead, the one against Pakistan at home and then Australia in Australia. Both, especially the one in Australia, will test us to the extreme. If we withstand the onslaught of pressure and match a team which combines outstanding skill and the confidence of losing rarely, then we can say this Indian team is a world-beating side.

The manner in which India played the last two Tests, does suggest that the severe loss of confidence and faith in their own ability that Greg Chappell’s methods had installed in the players is a story of -the past now. The smile that Chappell had managed to wipe off Indian faces is back and the so-called “divisive” seniors have not only played a major role in this win but also seem to be jelling well with the juniors.

After having watched India’s world cup campaign, where the players were so insecure that even an innocent glance could be interpreted as a sinister plot being hatched to overthrow the captain-coach combine, England has come as a breath of fresh air. No wonder then that most of the players feel free “to be” without the fear of being accused of being disruptive.

Dravid can now afford to relax and not worry about “threats” to his captaincy. The “enemies” are now “friends” and it is to be hoped that it remains so for some time to come. What, though, should now be of some concern to Dravid is his batting form. The perfectionist that he is, Dravid must be almost embarrassed by the batting display he put up in the final innings of the Oval Test.

The master of technique, and the team man to the core, was struggling to put bat to the ball, at a time when India required quick runs to justify his decision not to enforce a follow-on.

The follow-on debate will go on and on, but after having decided to bat again, India needed to score quick runs so that instead of the 110 overs they gave themselves in which to bowl out England, they could have done with at least 15 to 20 more overs.

No doubt, the 11 for 3 score line did hamper them to go after the bowling but once Sourav Ganguly had through his aggression managed to calm Indian nerves, Dravid should have stepped on the pedal.

It is here the Indian captain will realise that it is not always easy to be both — captain as well as a batsman. The pressure gets to the best and hopefully, one big score soon will help Dravid to deal with these twin responsibilities with greater ease.

In that crucial partnership, when Ganguly was threading the ball through the off side cordon with masterly ease, the thought that “thank god, I am not the captain of the team anymore” must have crossed him mind. As we move ahead and face the twin challenges from Pakistan and Australia, it would be better for all of us to accept the fact that Sachin Tendulkar is no more the destructive batsman that he was once. He is, as Ian Chappell put it, “a functional Test batsman” and as long as he remains that, we should let him be.

This over the top screaming when he scores and even when he fails, does no good to him and more importantly to the team. Let us for the time being savour the talent of men like Wasim Jaffer, Dinesh Karthik, MS Dhoni, Zaheer Khan and RP Singh.

Let us not forget that we have someone of the ability of Yuvraj Singh sitting in the dressing room and let us raise a toast to the FAB Four, not to forget Anil Kumble. Mercifully the future did not turn out to be as bleak as it appeared on that muggy March in Trinidad when India was knocked out of the World cup.

A World Tourism Organisation study reports that India is the seventh largest country in the world with a population of 1,095 million, which accounts for 16.7 per cent of the world population. There are reportedly over 28 million passport holders in India and 25 million non-resident Indians living in 110 countries abroad, which constitute the largest segment of overseas population of any country.

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), which is committed to combating human trafficking globally estimates that about two million migrants cross international borders without authorization every year. According to an Interpol study - Project Marco Polo, India is one of the countries accounting for the largest number of illegal immigrants coming to Western Europe. No doubt, UNODC is commissioning a full-fledged study on the nature and extent of illegal migration from Punjab to Europe.

A multi-million dollar racket in which $20,000-30,000 are charged by unscrupulous agents to send gullible Punjabis abroad continues unabated. There is no dearth of candidates willing to spend Rs 10 to 25 lakh to reach Europe or America via the illegal route. Three startling examples as follows reveal it all.

In 1996, in the Malta Boat tragedy; 289 South Asians, Including 170 Indians from Punjab, found a watery grave in the Ionian Sea in their treacherous voyage of illegal immigration to Europe. UNODC recently quoted the Indian American Centre for Political Awareness in the US to inform that 73 men from Punjab who were duped by employment agents landed in a gurdwara in Tehran after a 1,500-mile journey on foot.  Some were so badly frostbitten that their toes had to be amputated. A recent media report highlighted that on June 24 this year, the Delhi Police arrested one Bhupinder Singh with fake visas and passports. Upon questioning, it transpired that he was on his way to Punjab for delivering 300 fake travel documents, including 25 forged passports, 114 fake Visas of Schengen countries, which included seven each of UK, Slovenia, Malaysia and Switzerland, 12 of Korea,  three each of Japan and Mexico, 25 of US and nine of Senegal were seized by the police.

Why is illegal migration preferred to the right way? What prompts adoption of the wrong path? Who aids and abets it? Why is it repeated unflinchingly without abandon?
Why do horror stories not deter fellow countrymen? Why do not the mindsets of rural folk change? Why the illegal ventures? Why the law cannot stop them? Why is the path of migrating the legal way not followed?
Where is the law and is it enforced, if it exits in the first place? What then do the police and the enforcement agencies in the government set-up do? Are human carriers and agents of human trafficking proliferating by the day and by the hour? What needs to be done now?
The dire need of the day seems to be in launching a "Pilot Project Punjab" to do away with this cancerous problem, which seems to be spreading its venom in every segment of society. On March 23, the British High Commission launched a successful outreach campaign in 146 villages in Punjab by beginning in Chandigarh. The Italian Embassy has floated its campaign against illegal migration from Chandigarh on August 11. There is an emergent necessity of setting up a comprehensive action plan by creating an inter-disciplinary group in Punjab for cohesive approach to set up ‘Pilot Project Punjab’ as an innovative step to be first in the country to do so. A publicity awareness programme, cross-country linkages with NGOs and mass mobilization of information backed by an effective investigation team is required in the State. The lucky ones who returned must narrate their horror stories for the benefit of others to tell them about the other illegal immigrants who had frozen to death, were killed by smugglers or have disappeared because they live in captivity as illegal aliens abroad. Those who survived must tell their brothers that illegal migration is wrong.

The government machinery in Punjab now needs an awakening to improve the plight of people who have an innate desire or urge to migrate. They do not know where to go, how to go, when to go and through whom to go. If the foreign missions and Embassies in India are now doing an outreach by coming to Chandigarh the government must take advantage of it. The Canadians have a Consulate in Chandigarh. The German Embassy is the first Schengen country to open its VFS office in Chandigarh on August 4. The British High Commission and the Italian Embassy have educative campaigns in place. VFS, through its offices, offers all facilities in Chandigarh and Delhi for obtaining visas to most countries.

Would it not be in place if an agency or the department of the government takes upon itself the task of disseminating information about channels of legal migration, processing and forwarding their applications and arranging employment through Indian Embassies abroad in countries which attract maximum migration? This alternative channel can replace the risky path shown by dubious agents for exorbitant sums of money extracted by selling land, mortgaging property; taking loans or disposing of assets. The need of the hour is to create a set-up officially to take advantage of the changing climate offered by foreign missions who now offer the right and legal options.

Beginning a business is never simple. Making an out-of-the box idea to work is an even bigger challenge. It all started out with an idea. A vague concept that many a business stalwart would cock their eyebrows at. In a country where business has traditionally originated in match-box-sized family workstations and grown into hereditary goldmines, the out-of-the-box, fledgling enterprise has gradually burrowed its way to the surface. “Innovative enterprises have always existed in the developed markets, they now need to be given an Indian structure,” says a CEO, of an organisation which mentors budding entrepreneurs and has about 50 start-ups, across Mumbai, under its wing.

Veterinary Assistant and an MBA believe that having a unique selling proposition was “the strongest point” of their new start-up. However, a signboard that read Poodle manicures and Labrador haircut initially met with many a raised eyebrow. “It’s not like we opened up and had people streaming in. There were days when we would have just one to two clients,” she reveals. Five years on, the entrepreneurs have seen business at Tailwaggers triple. And bouquets have now replaced the initial brickbats. “We even have customers sending us flowers as recognition for giving their dog a good haircut”.

However, no matter how uncanny the idea, it’s “the clarity of thought” that is the differentiator. When 34-yearold marketing executive Bhavna Jasra stumbled upon a unique concept of freezing life’s milestones, she knew she had hit upon a goldmine. “I knew that in India, the strong family ties and fondness for festivities would help the concept catch on,” says Jasra.

Jasra’s company, First Impressions, moulds special memories for its clients by framing impressions of hands and feet in gold, silver, bronze and even pearl. Although it was a first of its kind in the country, business growth was gradual in the first year. However, it was Jasra’s confidence in her product that kept the cash registers ringing, “It’s important to be focused and tailor your strategies to a definite target group,” she says. Five years on, her business has doubled with the client list boasting the likes of Sachin Tendulkar, Haseena Jethmalani and the who’s who of Bollywood.

One year ago, British Chartered Accountant Christopher Way and hotelier Krishna Pujari kicked their jobs to start a city based tour company. However, the Reality Tours itinerary was nothing like the run-of-the-mill tour services. Their publicity pamphlets promised to acquaint tourists with the country’s biggest small-scale business hub - Dharavi.

But getting tourists to hop aboard a tour of what is, touted, as the city’s largest slum was not easy. “People fear being mugged when they pass through the area. What they don’t know is that it is one of the biggest enterprises. There are 10,000 businesses in the 432-acre stretch,” says Pujari. From standing on street corners with pamphlets to having just two tourists willing to venture out, the duo has seen it all.

One year down the line, the tour has gained popularity among overseas travellers.

“We are now looking to start tours across Maharashtra and explore more untapped locations,” says Way.

Pujari and Way’s start-up may have encountered apprehensive clients, but when Nirupam Hiremath started marketing her Kids on Wheels concept in 2004, she encountered many a closed door. Today when she watches mothers wheel their unyielding toddlers in brightly coloured, car-shaped trolleys across the Inorbit Mall, Malad, she knows that the initial struggle has paid off. “I spent almost one year trying to convince people of my idea. They all felt that their malls were not big enough to necessitate the facility,” she says. An absence of prior experience in the area also worked against this stay-at home mother.

However, a year-and-a half after starting her first shop, Hiremath is determined to expand across the city. “Nothing ventured, nothing gained,” she says confidently.