Why Dell is not perfect

Buying a full-featured personal computer from Dell, fully loaded with hardware to run the compulsorily bundled monstrous bloatware called Vista is no guarantee that Michael Dell's company really cares about your system.

I found that out when Dell refused to help with the installation of a graphics processor card on their brand new E520 PC that costs middle class Indians at least as much as two months' pay. Dell's problem is that the card is not sold by it, and so it will not help, not even on payment. Incidentally, Dell does not provide technical support directly in my city, Chennai, but through a competing PC vendor, Wipro. Interestingly, Dell is building a computer assembling plant at Sriperumbudur, a suburban town about 40 km Southwest of Chennai.

If you look at the flip side, the PC can have any number of external gadgets hooked up that have not been bought from Dell. If something goes wrong with the PC in that situation, Dell will probably have to look into it, because they have sold a "complete cover" warranty to me.

So why not help me get the new Nvidia GE Force 7300 GT card made by PNY in place, and earn the goodwill of a customer who has forked out a lot of money for a full warranty and next business day service?

Should we pay Dell to hear why they cannot help us with our computing needs?

Coke will caution consumers on caffeine in US, but not in foreign markets

We are very aware that US corporates can demonstrate a remarkable disregard for consumer protection outside their home market. Here is Coca Cola announcing that it will put caffeine information on labels of its products in the US, but not abroad.

That is unsurprising, because Coke cannot help itself to local water in the US and has to pay for it, but abroad, it just drills down, extracts water and makes commerce of it.

Here is the official word on it from Coke:

Coca-Cola to put caffeine labels on all US products

Atalanta, Feb 22 (AP) The Coca-Cola Co, the world's
largest beverage maker, said it will put caffeine content
information on the labels of all of its drink products
distributed in the United States that include the ingredient.


The Atlanta-based company yesterday said the plan was
voluntary and part of an industry initiative.


Coca-Cola said it already has included caffeine labelling
on its Full Throttle and Enviga products. It said it will roll
out the new labels on its other brands, starting with cans of
Coca-Cola Classic in May, and expanding to other brands and
packages during the remainder of the year.


The time at which the revised labels reach store shelves
will vary by brand and region as US bottlers use up existing
inventories of packaging, Coca-Cola's North America division
said in a statement.


A spokeswoman said the expanded caffeine labels will
not be placed on Coca-Cola products distributed outside the
United States.


The company said that in 2005 it introduced labelling
that provides consumers with nutrition information for a
standard eight-ounce (226-gram) serving as well as for the
total of a single-serve package.


Coca-Cola also said that it plans to market a new Diet
Coke drink containing vitamins later this year.


The zero-calorie drink, called Diet Coke Plus,
contains niacin, vitamins B6 and B12, magnesium, and zinc. It
is "an innovative product designed to meet the needs of
today's active consumers," said Coca-Cola spokesman Ben
Deutsch. (AP)

Exxon and its campaign of deceit

To those who watch BBC World regularly in India, the slick advertisements of the monstrously successful oil company Exxon Mobil come across as the reassuring statement of a socially conscious corporate.

Nothing could be farther from the truth, as those who have watched the oil lobby know. In fact, Exxon made a fantastic 40 billion dollars last year through ruinous burning of fossil fuels that have further warmed the world.

Here is a press release issued by those committed to exposing such fraud.

Exxon in Sheep's Clothing

Oil Giant Lies, Evades in Full-Page Ads Across the Country, Group Says

SANTA MONICA, Calif., Feb. 16 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- In full-page
ads today in the New York Times and Wall Street Journal, ExxonMobil
rewrites history, omits any pledges of actual change and blurs Exxon's long
opposition to action on global warming, said the Foundation for Taxpayer
and Consumer Rights.
"The ad is an obvious attempt to quiet public anger and prevent
government action," said Judy Dugan, research director of the nonprofit,
nonpartisan FTCR. "Exxon is trying to pretend that it is a now a good
global citizen and deny its decades-long dispute of global warming."
FTCR's examination of the ad found:
-- Rewriting history: The ad brags that "for 15 years, our scientists
have been participating directly in the preparation of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports." (The IPCC is the
respected UN body that recently raised new alarms over the "very likely"
human causes of global warming in an extensive report.)
The reality is that ExxonMobil secretly sought -- and got -- help from
the Bush White House in a 2002 attempt to oust the head of the IPPC, Dr.
Robert Watson, and other key scientists on the panel. Exxon memos obtained
by the National Resources Defense Council showed that Exxon's aim was to
replace respected scientists with, as the NRDC put it, "contrarians known
for disagreeing with the prevailing consensus that man-made pollution is
causing global warming."
Read the Exxon memo at: http://www.nrdc.org/media/docs/020403.pdf
-- Verbal acrobatics: Exxon never uses the phrase "global warming,"
which sounds dangerous, substituting "climate change," which could be a
good thing. It uses statistics that minimize what warming is, including
"The earth's climate has warmed about 0.7% in the last century." That seems
slow, of course. There's no mention that the 10 hottest years on record
have occurred since 1990.
-- Omissions: The ad contains no pledge to develop, much less market,
renewable fuels. That's because Exxon doesn't, and won't.
At a March 14, 2006 Senate hearing, Sen. Charles Schumer of New York
pressed Tillerson on Exxon's puny spending, less that one one-hundredth of
one percent of its 2005 profits, on alternative energy research.
Tillerson's response:
MR. TILLERSON: "Well, Senator, I think your question is are we
investing heavily in alternatives and ... --
SEN. SCHUMER: You're not.
MR. TILLERSON: We're not. We are investing in technology, and we are
investing heavily in conventional oil and natural gas, which is the
business we are in. We are not in those other businesses.
(Read the transcript at
http://www.consumerwatchdog.org/energy/rp/6137.pdf )
-- False choices: The ad concludes that the task of business and
government, working together, is "selecting policies that balance economic
growth and human development with the risks of climate change." In other
words, global warming can't be remedied without trashing economic
development.
That's the opposite of the truth, even from a hardheaded economic
perspective.
The global insurance giant Swiss Re warned in a 2005 report that
"Climate change will significantly affect the health of humans and
ecosystems and these impacts will have economic consequences."
"We found that impacts of climate change are likely to lead to
ramifications that overlap in several areas including our health, our
economy and the natural systems on which we depend," said Dr. Paul Epstein,
the study's lead author and associate director of the Center for Health and
the Global Environment at Harvard Medical School. "Analysis of the
potential ripple effects stemming from an unstable climate shows the need
for more sustainable practices to safeguard and insure a healthy future."
Read the story at
http://www.livescience.com/environment/051101_insurance_warming.html

Contact: Judy Dugan, +1-310-392-0522, ext. 305, or cell +1-213 280-0175



SOURCE The Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights

After Ford, its Coke and Chrysler

We heard about the record breaking loss suffered by Ford Motor Company in 2006, which is not such a surprise given the state of the oil-addicted world unable to find a cheap fix.

Now it is the turn of another purveyor of well-packaged junk, Coca Cola. This symbol of poor health and water theft around the world has reported a drop in earnings and an erosion in its share price.

This is the report from Bloomberg: Feb. 14 (Bloomberg) -- Coca-Cola Co., the world's largest soft-drink maker, said fourth-quarter profit fell less than analysts anticipated on increased demand for soda in China and Russia and healthier beverages such as bottled water in Mexico.

Net income declined 22 percent to $678 million, or 29 cents a share after its largest bottler wrote down the value of its North American unit, the Atlanta-based company said today in a statement. Excluding that, Coca-Cola earned 52 cents, topping analysts' estimates by 2 cents.

We must beware the designs of this water raider because it has said its rise in volumes is coming from markets outside the United States. In most of these markets, such as India, Coke simply sucks up groundwater in poorly supervised surroundings and pursues an aggressive advertising campaign using local film stars to sell its stuff.

Even more interesting is the report that Daimler Chrysler is looking for a buyer for its ailing acquisition, the Chrysler division. This American carmaker is to shed some 13,000 jobs, of which 11,000 are part-time workers. Shifts will be cut down in some plants and a profit now looks possible only in 2008. No one knows what the world will look like in that year, as the atmosphere is pumped with more greenhouse gases each minute, steaming up the climate.

If you are also addicted to oil, the end of the good life is nigh.

Lalu Prasad boosts railway fortunes, but in-laws try free tripping

Lalu Prasad has now secured the only endorsement that matters in New Delhi on his running of the gargantuan Indian railway network: Sonia Gandhi has said he is doing fine.

Here is the PTI report on it:

Sonia praises Lalu for "new style" to improve Railways

Rae Bareli (UP), Feb 14. (PTI): UPA chairperson and Congress Chief Sonia Gandhi on Tuesday joined the chorus of praise for Railway Minister Lalu Prasad saying he has introduced "new style" to improve the functioning of the Railways.

"Prasad has introduced a new style to improve the Railways functioning. For this everybody is praising him," she said after laying the foundation stone of a Rail Coach factory in her Lok Sabha constituency Rae Bareli in the presence of Prasad and his two deputies - Naranbhai Rathwa and R Velu.

Referring to the UPA Government, Gandhi said she was happy to say that ever since the party-led coalition came to power at the Centre, a new era of economic development has started, which would bring positive changes in the lifestyle of common people across the country.

As far as the Rail Coach Factory here is concerned, the Congress chief said that Railway Minister Prasad is a man of firm commitment and she was fully confident that this project would be fructified soon and provides jobs to youths.

"Lalu Prasad is firm on his words. Whatever he promises, he does it. That is why I hope that this factory will be ready soon and start working and will provide employment to youth here," she said.

Asserting that people gets name for his works, she said similarly, a Government is also remembered for his work.

"I am satisfied that our UPA Government at the Centre was proving to be a Government that works", she said.

But Lalu's in-laws are not really co-operating, it appears. They were caught without proper tickets but to their credit, they did not provide fodder for the media and quickly paid the fines, continuing their journey. The mainstream media is apparently too embarrassed that the in-laws of the illustrious Lalu were caught without proper ticket and so leading newspapers down south have only a single column item in their inside pages.

This is The Hindu's report of the incident from staffer K.Balchand.

Of course, one must conclude with the observation that Lalu Prasad is hopelessly ignorant of how his Railway system is faring in Chennai. To belabour the point to the insensitive Railway bureaucracy, the MRTS system is a ghost line even today because Lalu and his somnolent deputy Velu have no idea what is going on. Perhaps when Lalu has some time left after his MBA lectures, he can visit Chennai and take a ride on the MRTS.

In some stations, if he walks in after dark, he is likely to fall into the ditches and traps that have been left uncovered by the Southern Railway administration, currently headed by General Manager Thomas Varghese.

The China fallacy

As the only more populous country on the planet than their own, China holds great fascination for Indians. Not everyone may agree that China followed the best course of development since opening up its economy to foreign capital, but to many Indian political leaders and their supporters, that nation could do no wrong.

The ruinous effect of an intensive, polluting and industrial development philosophy on China's environment is well documented by international journals, including those with strong socialist leanings such as The Guardian of UK.

Now comes another critique of China's false development from another Leftist intellectual, Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen.

Professor Sen told a Chennai audience at the Voluntary Health Services on February 10, that life expectancy at birth had dramatically improved in the period before the country launched its economic liberalisation programme. After that, the rate of growth had actually reduced.

To quote Professor Sen, "I referred earlier to the extraordinary fact that China managed to achieve astonishing progress in general health and longevity before the economic reforms in 1979 -- a period in which economic growth was in fact rather moderate in comparison with what happened after the reforms. And yet afte the economic reforms, which ushered in a period of sustained growth and super rapid economic expansion in China, unprecedented in the whole world, the progress in life expectancy actually slowed down dramatically."

"To some extent this can be expected since by 1979 China already had quite a high life expectancy at birth, around 68 years, and certainly further expansion becomes more and more difficult as the absolute level of longevity becomes high. But the fact is that China's life expectancy is still relatively moderate in comparison with many other societies in which the progress of longevity expansion has continued to occur at a very high rate."

It is of course natural that Professor Sen spoke about the long catching up that India has to do, even to get to where China is, and not much importance need be attached to the average increase in longevity in India, which has been three times as fast as in China since 1979. He also referred to the earlier commitment that China had shown to public health (something which has been sorely missing in the Indian context despite the visionary policies recommended by Sir Joseph Bhore in 1946).

Significantly, Professor Sen refers to Kerala as forging ahead of China in the area of health, and achieving a four or five year advantage in life expentancy over China since 1979. It is higher than every province of China (with the obvious exception of urban conglomerates such as Beijing and Shanghai).

Let us remember that Kerala has been one of the exceptional states in the Indian Union with the natural blessing of a verdant, unpolluted, tropical climate. Much of the State except for the Palakkad Pass is skirted by the Western Ghats Mountains and is therefore favoured by nature with plentiful rainfall and vegetation. Is it possible that Kerala's protected natural environment, unsullied by intensive manufacturing-based development is partly responsible for its better health indicators? The literate, health-conscious and politically aware citizenry is of course responsible for the positive outcomes overall.

No MRTS on weekends

It would have been the kind of interesting "view from the sky" ride that one normally pays heavily for in a theme park. From Chintadripet, in the centre of Chennai, to Adyar (Thiruvanmiyur) in the Southeast on the elevated MRTS.

I wanted to ride the MRTS to listen to Nobel laureate Amartya Sen on the subject of "Health and the Society." It would have been a dream to go on the elevated train to the Adyar point just opposite the venue, which was Voluntary Health Services.

Sadly, Dr. Sen's lecture was on a Saturday and for some strange reason, the Mass Rapid Transit System of Chennai does not operate between Thirumayilai (Mylapore) and Thiruvanmiyur during the weekends. What a shame.

Ultimately, I carpooled with a colleague, and a friend joined us. The only achievement we could speak of was the use of one car instead of three.

If the folks at the Indian Railways Fan Club do read this, can they campaign for the unsung MRTS, please?

I imagine that if the Railways were less greedy and more sensible, they would price their MRTS at two rupees flat for a ride, and run trains every five minutes, potentially packed to capacity.

Too bad the Railway Minister Lalu Prasad is getting so much attention for good performance without really doing anything about this train system and the "stiff upper lip" Southern Railway bureaucracy could not care less.

Sold on the Sun

As a seeker of the Sun, that unimaginably powerful nuclear reactor that sustains all life on earth, I believe that the answer to our energy demands comes from the sky.

I found this neat commercial on Youtube, which has a cinematic feel and conveys a vital message in under two minutes with a slick feel to it.

Indians can be among the biggest beneficiaries of solar photovoltaic and thermal power and it is encouraging that the first signs of recognition are there in the area of business. Moserbaer is developing its solar pv unit and if they will distribute their panels and devices adopting the same concept as the VCDs and DVDs, we can all buy panels without burning holes in our pocket.

Here goes the video:

Judgment Day for Wal Mart and some Indian echoes

Everyone knew that the darling of the consuming class in the US, Wal Mart would get its just come-uppance sooner than later for its anti-labour practices.

A US court has allowed female employees to sue it for discrimination. This class action suit, the US media says, is the biggest of its kind in that country's legal history.

Look at the irony of the situation. Wal Mart manages millions of items every hour sourced from around the world in its unquenchable thirst for profits, but it said it could not manage the claims of all its female employees!

The Los Angeles Times website reports that the court made this observation to Wal Mart's claim: "The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Wal-Mart's claim that a class of more than 1.5 million employees — all of Wal-Mart's women workers since 1998 — would be unmanageable."

At home (here in India) Sonia Gandhi has suddenly developed jitters about the Wal Mart - Bharti retailing venture and asked Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to go over its possible impact on small traders closely. Media reports say she is worried that it might displace small retailers with terrible social consequences. I beg to ask, how is it different from the Reliance retailing venture, which is similar in scope and scale?

Incidentally, Reliance retail with the brand Reliance Fresh is an environmental disaster for India. How, you ask. More on that soon...

Acid drinking teens

Attempted suicides using cleaning acid. There are many youths who try it but according to a calculation made by the Government Royapettah Hospital, only one in 200 succeeds.

The others slide down a tunnel of dark misery that few are even aware of. The GRH meeting of Jan 26 has been captured in video and hosted as a full-length streaming programme by kumudam.com

I think it should be shown in all schools, colleges and slums which represent places with high concentrations of vulnerable people. Possibly the government will do that.

Burning up the future: the climate crisis

This Friday, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is all set to release a massive document detailing the climate crisis that we have unleashed on ourselves, and which is likely to ruin the future of generations to come.

It is of course a pity that India and China, two of the most populous and ambitious countries on the planet today are contributing actively to accelerate the pace at which such disaster will overtake the earth.

Both countries have huge populations that are now discovering prosperity levels that were unknown a century ago. Their newly affluent citizens are being actively wooed by the global automotive industry to sell cheap, low-performing, gas guzzling and unsafe cars and two-wheelers.

Strangely, the Communist parties in India have also got the wrong end of the stick and are calling for reduction in petroleum prices, as a panacea to the problems affecting mobility. This is a warped argument, although there seems to be a hidden agenda to support Indian capitalists who are riding the boom in the automotive sector. It is completely topsy-turvy because mass mobility can never be achieved through personal transportation, and the Communists are seen harping on individual mobility and freedom, which is a conservative, Right-wing approach to the issue, far removed from the traditional precincts of the Left.

The wheel seems to be turning full circle in the land of profligate consumption: America.

Look at what one of their conservative journals has said now, as the world prepares to hear the bad news from the UN.

(From a blog on The Huffington Post)

Even in the conservative American Spectator today, William Tucker made serious mention of some of the causes of this impending catastrophe (probably written before the UN news made the wire). Among a lot of analysis of the president's energy plan, Tucker acknowledged the following:

"In 1976 we burned 500 million tons of coal a year. Today we burn more than a billion. There are 90 more coal plants being built right now. The Department of Energy points out that -- because of various loopholes in the law -- 80 per cent of these plants still use the same old-fashioned dirty technology."
And...

"A carbon tax would truly drive Americans toward conserving gasoline. Everybody agrees it's wasteful to be splurging on SUVs and Hummers, but people will do it as long as gas is $2 a gallon. The real danger is that we're going to start running up against world supply limits, particularly if China and India go car-happy. As long as we've got the carbon excuse, why not start easing into a situation of scarcity with some kind of carbon levy?"

What is happening to the world? Right is Left and Left is Right!
More on this when the UN report is out.

Disappointing suburban CMDA layouts

Despite all the hype about life in the suburbs among sylvan surroundings, lakes, birds and bees, the reality can be very different.

This is what the owners and residents of Jeeva Nagar, a layout not far from the Sri Ramachandran Medical College and Research Institute in Kattupakkam - Mangadu have found.

They have been petitioning the Kancheepuram District Collector and the Mangadu Panchayat, about the abysmal state of civic facilities in their low-lying plots, which become inaccessible at the first hint of rain.

Here is their letter published in The Hindu
today.

Just to make it easier, the text is also reproduced here:

Civic works in Jeeva Nagar

The residents of Jeeva Nagar, a CMDA-approved layout in Kattupakkam just off the fast developing Mount-Poonamallee Road (PPD LO No. 134/2003 and Survey Nos. 558/2B2, 559/2, 561/2 and 562 of Mangadu Village) are awaiting civic works to be undertaken, to overcome problems of severe monsoon flooding, lack of basic roads and street lighting.

The Mangadu Panchayat, which has jurisdiction over the layout, has said that it is considering these development works, and tenders are being processed, which is a commendable step.

We would like to point out that optimal utilisation of the allocation can take place only if the road level in the layout is raised through addition of debris (which is readily available from nearby encroachment demolition work carried out by official agencies in December 2006). This would bring the Jeeva Nagar ground level on par with adjoining Badrimedu ward and AUDCO Nagar.

During 2005 and 2006, Jeeva Nagar remained inaccessible for nearly four months because of flooding, release of sewage from adjacent wards, lack of roads and total darkness at dusk. As a result, house-building activity came to a halt and the panchayat suffered revenue loss.

While thanking the Kancheepuram District Collector and the Mangadu Panchayat for their initiative, we appeal that they make the best use of funds by ensuring at least four feet road height, and provision for laying of drinking water pipelines along all interior streets.

S. Ramkumar,

President

Jeeva Nagar Owner's And Residents Welfare Association

Kattupakkam.

These residents also maintain a blog to highlight their issues and have put up a slideshow on the post-monsoon situation.

Royapettah Hospital: They attempted suicide with cleaning acid...

Republic Day 2007 was celebrated by a group of patients who survived a suicide attempt (they tried to kill themselves by drinking concentrated cleaning acid) at the Government Royapettah Hospital in Chennai.

There were patients from Bengal, Andhra Pradesh, Madurai and other places. Some have recovered sufficiently after surgery by Dr. S.M.Chandramohan and his team, to be able to eat routinely. Normally, the upper gut is rendered useless after consuming acid and it is impossible for these patients to eat normally. Surgery has worked a miracle for them.

Some of them spoke out on their experiences and rued their moment of weakness when they tried to commit suicide with acid. Now, their families are left with the searing pain of caring for someone who has been severely crippled; in the worst cases, people who cannot eat and must be fed with some nutrients directly into the system.



Dr. Chandramohan paid glowing tribute to all medical teams who had assisted in making the hospital's work a big success. Certificates were distributed to the departments of anaesthesiology, oncology, pathology, medical gastroenterology, intensive care, orthopaedics, ENT, nursing, radiology and others.

The Health Secretary Mr. V.K.Subburaj was there, and so was the Director of Medical Education (in-charge). There was some talk of expanding GRH, and putting up new buildings. For the thousands of people who depend on this suburban hospital that is located in a congested part of the city, good facilities will not come a day too early.

But then, they live in a country that is increasingly veering away from the ideal of free, universal healthcare access with high quality standards...

Expect Ford to step on the gas in India

Ford, the iconic American car company that symbolised consumer utopia by mass manufacturing vehicles for the common man early in the 20th century has hit another massive speed breaker with a fourth quarter loss of 5.8 billion dollars and an annual loss of 12.7 billion dollars for 2006 (reports Reuters).

This is, according to the agency, the worst year in the 103-year history of the company. Last year, heavy job cuts sounded the alarm that Ford is running out of fuel (as the auto industry generally is bound to be in the developed world).

The question that should interest us Indians is the response from loss-ridden international automakers to the emerging scenario of global warming, costlier fuel and supply lines that are linked to the vagaries of geopolitics and the general unsustainability of motorisation in the developing world, of which China and India are the prime examples.

It is fairly certain that the losing carmakers will compete more aggressively in the developing markets; price cuts, cheaper (and unsafe) models, petrol/diesel guzzlers, higher emission engines and a tacit campaign against public transport are all being witnessed even today; we will see more of it.

The positive feature is that the frenzy of car sales has a GLOBAL climate impact, which is likely to send more Katrinas hammering the US coastline, as much as the typhoons in South East Asia and the seemingly unending monsoon downpour in Mumbai, all of these being very lethal weather phenomena.

If Indians are concerned about the future of the planet, and, that of their children, they should persuade the Manmohan-Chidambaram-Ahluwalia caucus against encouraging fuel-guzzlers from hitting Indian roads, whether they are from loss-ridden Ford, Chevrolet, Skoda, Hyundai, Suzuki, Toyota, Mercedes, Tata...

We need cheaper, modern buses that are rolled out on Indian roads by the tens of thousands each month. Why, if cars can be imported and sold (to supplement domestic manufacture), why not buses? And trains? and trams?

If the automakers are going to try to press the pedal further, we may have nowhere to run for cover.

Let us remember what Andre Gorz said long ago. It is simply impossible for everyone to want to buy a part of the beach, because that would give each person a few inches of beachfront; that cannot be used by the owner in any practical way. Ditto for the car. If all of us had a car each, none of us would be able to use them!

New autorickshaw rates in Chennai

Two items of great interest to the middle class that are in today's papers are a cut in roaming tariffs for mobile phones, and the impending introduction of newly regulated fares for autorickshaws in Chennai (from January 26).

There is of course a great deal of cynicism among the city residents that this is another attempt at window dressing by authorities who are not serious about regulating the autorickshaw sector.

The Hindu today carries a report giving all the numbers which will take down complaints against illegal demands made by autorickshaw drivers.

The mobile roaming tariffs are more likely to get implemented, although one is never sure how the cellcos are cheating customers on billing.

Who cheated whom? The Global Trust Bank scam

I have been a victim of the arbitrary and completely opaque takeover of the Global Trust Bank by the Oriental Bank of Commerce, under the directions of the Finance Ministry and the RBI.

As a long-standing depositor who lost Rs. 16,000 in two five-year term deposits, I believe both the RBI and Mr. P.Chidambaram, our extremely suave and highly educated but entirely unsuitable, arrogant and unethical Minister have a lot to answer for. What we need is an honest and communicative Minister in this job, not someone who thinks 99 per cent of Indians don't deserve an answer to questions about their money, which he appropriates to various accounts everyday. You don't need a Harvard education to do that. Many semi-literates are doing that everyday in different walks of life.

I would like to know, for instance, how it was decided that the contractual obligations of GTB with depositors will not be transferred to OBC, when it was assuming all its assets and liabilities. We have no idea what assets GTB possessed, particularly real estate. Mr. Chidambaram has not told us that. We are simply told that all rates and charges will apply on OBC terms from the date of takeover.

Meanwhile, I found this post raising some questions about the GTB-OBC forced marriage.

Advertising medical cures and public health

Health Minister Anbumani Ramadoss has said it for the third time in a year and half that he proposes to amend the Drugs and Magic Remedies Act, 1954 with the aim of banning advertisements about treatment processes.

It is a matter of wonder why he is unable to implement what he said in 2005, though a full year has passed. He said it again in 2006, and now he has said it again in 2007. What is so pressing about advertisements, that is not about a host of other ills that are sapping the health of the average Indian?

We are living with air pollution beyond imagination (India has 5 of the world's most polluted cities, the World Bank says, and New Delhi is still the most polluted in the WHOLE WORLD). Why is Dr. Ramadoss happy to live in Delhi with such polluted air, but feels so strongly about advertisements, which are of course completely unethical and I hold no brief for the greedy corporate dispensers of health.

Water is another sadly neglected area which is yet to catch the concerned gaze of our Union and State Governments and Dr. Ramadoss. Only people who can buy bottled water are safe in India. Why not do something about municipal water supplies, so that people can drink safe water. After all, that is a much more fundamental driver of public health than getting a few tertiary hospitals to stop advertising? You can actually stop sending people to hospitals looking for cures!

Are these things not important because our political worthies see no 'returns' from such national scale actions?

A break in the forests

What a feeling it is to be away from the swirling madness that is urban India! Away from the IT and technoparks, the discussions on gated communities, the land grab mafias and the worst specimens of Homo sapiens...

Just got back after a fantastic four days during pongal at Nagarahole National Park, which is not far from Mysore. It is closest to the small town of Hunsur.



I had the unique experience of observing the brilliant faunal diversity of the land in the company of Dr. K. Ullas Karanth, the renowned wildlife biologist of the Wildlife Conservation Society who specialises in scientific study of tigers, and the very talented film-maker Shekar Dattatri.

A piece on the whole question of studying tigers, the ecological concerns and the future of conservation is to appear in The Hindu soon... Also look out for pictures from the trip!

Meanwhile, I spotted this post on conservation from a fellow blogger.

"Muni" invites Chennai audience to be part of film

Here is a still from the audio release of "Muni" held against the backdrop of a giant statue created for the film in suburban Nandambakkam.




Many look forward to the venture because Rajkiran is in it. It is interesting that the statue, the kind of which is (or rather was) a common sight in the Tamil countryside as Ayyanar, features prominently in this film.

Saran and a host of others were there at the audio release, where the filmmakers also offered lunch to those who came.

Thirumazhisai in Chennai to have NRI city

I learn that tomorrow's The Hindu Property Plus will have a big advertisement for a gated community in Thirumazhisai, a suburb off Poonamallee and Sriperumbudur.

Apparently, this town which is famous for Thirumazhisai "Alwar" and many temples of antiquity, has been chosen because it is proximal to the emerging automotive and IT hardware belt.

The second advertisement is for Alliance Bougainvillea, about which I have posted several times.