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Mahindra Shubh Laabh Services (MSSL). Yes, this is the initiative under which the Mahindra & Mahindra group is exploring growth opportunities in the fresh produce supply chain space. This would be joint venture with a foreign supply chain heavyweight. MSSL is already supplying fresh produce to global retailers like Carrefour and Tesco, Albert Heijn and Sainsburry’s and may consider a cash-and-carry JV with one of the players, sources said. MSSL is positioning itself as a back-end supply-chain partner for organized retail, sources said. It currently supplies fresh produce to retailers like Subhiksha, Reliance and others.

The CEO of MSSL Vikram Puri said: “We are considering the supply aggregation space for organised retail. We will offer a bouquet of supply-chain services and are developing capabilities for strong supply chain, logistics support and the infrastructure to back a successful retail venture.” The company, MSSL currently procures fruits and vegetables from Himachal, Punjab, Maharashtra, & Madhya Pradesh for both the domestic and export market. It has tied up with farmers for procurement. Some farmer groups have formed grower societies to sell to MSSL.

In an area of 70,000 acres, with over 9000 farmers, the company provides farm services. There are some which provide fruit and vegetables for domestic sales and exports. MSSL was set up six years ago with a primary focus on the rural space and is aggressively scaling up its presence at the farm gate. The company is also upping investments to scale up its presence in more categories in agri-produce, company officials said.

Contract logistics, corporate employee transportation services and meeting of transportation requirements of the specified projects for the other companies as well is looked after by another group company Mahindra Logistics. The company was reported to be in talks with international players. Mahindra Gesco Developers, the real estate development arm of the Mahindra Group, is currently focused on residential projects and integrated infrastructure development in SEZs.

Mahindra Intertrade is the company that would operate under the group. In a recent announcement the Mahindra group has  revealed that they have the plans to venture  in to lifestyle retailing by setting up stores. It has been given the licence to distribute children’s apparel toys and furnishings of companies such as Walt Disney, Mattel, Lego and Woolworth’s Ladybird. Company officials are also beefing up its contract farming of citrus, pomegranates, mangoes, bananas, grapes, onions, potatoes, carrots which constitute about 50% of the total fruits and vegetables production in the country.

As far as reproductive behaviour and sexuality is concerned, science has lot to say about the moral and ethical issues apparently involved. In the animal world, for instance, the idea of what is “normal” and what is not is so frequently breached that it makes mockery of human mores. Cloning - as in the many instances of virgin birth where no males are needed - is common among many species of lizards, fish and some amphibians. Gender determination is not fixed from birth either; there are reptiles whose sex is decided only by the incubation temperature. Others can switch from male to female and back again easily during their lifetimes and, often, even depending on behavioral cues coming from their social group. The scientific notion underlying such “unnatural” activity is that animals will do anything to make sure their kind is propagated through progeny into future generations. Genetically speaking, that is the only obvious and overarching consideration and, here, human beings are no exception.

A mother’s love for her baby is actually hardwired into her brain’s circuitry and she can, in general, behave in no other way than she does. In fact, researchers have found that the same wiring exists in all adults’ nervous systems too.

Imaging scans indicate that when grownups are shown even random pictures of infants who are not related to them, a part of their brain responsible for facial recognition and behavioral reaction, lights up almost instantaneously, leaving no time for thought processes to mediate. It just means there is no conscious control over such instinctive traits, and biologists say the immediacy of this kind of bonding is necessary for lineages to continue.

This could very well be the explanation for things like sacrifice, altruism and even love but, unfortunately, where science has consistently failed to derive a material substrate to a huge range of observed behaviour among humans is in their profession of a divine relationship. It’s far more difficult to drum up a survival value for the existence of a spiritual bonding between an individual and his or her perception of a personal God without stretching the bounds of credibility. And that is exactly the reason why a higher grade of ideals and values has managed to develop within most of humanity than can be explained by animal behaviour, innate programming or brain scans.