The Real State of Real Estate

For the last 4 days I've had my 3 slices of bread in the morning cooked on a tawa, instead of a toaster. And showered with cold water because at precisely 7.45 am every morning there is a power cut.

I live in Pondicherry, which is for all practical purposes considered a peaceful UT. However, technically, it falls in the state of Tamil Nadu. So we don't enjoy the same 'special status' when it comes to uninterrupted power supply.

Things hadn't been too bad in the past - bijli went gul only on one occasional day. Now, it's like 'kabhi bhi chali jaati hai'. But unlike Madras, residents here are still in a state of denial. Must be some temporary problem, we're thinking, instead of rushing out to buy inverters.

Meanwhile thousands of square feet of mill land in central Madras is being freed for "redevelopment". But can I ever hope to buy a home that isn't 20 km away from town? Not on my budget.

Only the very rich or the very poor have that luxury. And of course, those whose grandparents came and wisely occupied rent-controlled housing decades ago.

Theoretically, more land and more apartments becoming available should lead to more affordable housing. But trust me, none of those new 'centrally located' houses are going to get on the market for under a crore ($200,000 or so).

Since the land is being parceled out piecemeal, each project will be a lucid, fenced-in recreation of First World living conditions in Third World surroundings.

Mera Ghar, mera fort
In the old days, the likes of Shivaji built fortresses as protection from invaders. Modern day builders are building modern day fortresses to protect us from our fellow countrymen.

As an ad for a project at Nelson Manickam Road promises: "every Chennaiite's-wish-come-true city": Kohinoor city. Going beyond the mere swimming pool and granite platform, this one offers "customisable IKEA kitchen" as well as:

* Site meets US green building code
* Guest parking and guest rooms for visitors
* Holistic spa, premium lifestyle club
* International shopping mall
* Modern centre for performing arts
* International hotel and office plaza
* 3 schools on campus

Throw in an engineering and MBA college and maybe one can go from birth to death without having to step out and face the 'real' Madras city at all!

With the government unable or unwilling to take a holistic view of how to develop neighbourhoods, 'People Like Us' are increasingly opting to live in this highly artificial and insulated manner.

This is the 'Gurgaon' model of development. But is this really progress?

If you simply want a modest home located next to a garden, with wide roads and functional footpaths (without shanties) - all of which you and I pay taxes for - there are very very few options.

If only "let there be light" wasn't just a slogan...

Social entrepreneurship: A big idea

We live in a country with a hell lot of problems but instead of just complaining, at last, there seem to be folks from a cross section of society actually doing something about it and doing it differently.

Venkat Krishnan, for example. He runs Give Foundation which is not an NGO, but more like an 'NGO for NGOs'.

GIVE Foundation is a professionally governed and managed Indian nonprofit organisation dedicated to promote "giving". We help "good" NGOs raise funds and promote greater transparency & accountability in the voluntary sector.

Our mission: To promote efficient and effective giving that provides greater opportunities to the poor in India.

Our vision: A strong "giving" culture where Indians donate 2% of their income every year to give the poor a chance. A vibrant "philanthropy marketplace" to ensure that the most efficient and effective nonprofits get access to the most resources.

The point is, had Venkat tackled the 'let me do something for the less privileged' in a conventional manner he would have started a charity - a school, or hospital, or home for orphans. Which, surely, would have been a good thing. But not as good as what he is doing now. Because 'Give' is conceived in a manner that is delivering far greater impact.

'Give' is an example of 'social entrepreneurship'.

The term 'entrepreneur' generally brings to mind the likes of Bill Gates or Dhirubhai Ambani: individuals with drive, ambition and vision - and enormous bank balances. Entrepreneurship is so firmly associated with the creation of wealth that using it to describe non profit-driven leadership and innovation is initially a little hard to digest.

But as management guru Peter Drucker so rightly puts it, not every new business is entrepreneurial and not every entrepreneurial venture must be in business. He defines an entrepreneur as one who "always searches for change, responds to it and exploits it as an opportunity".

Here's the interesting bit

While the term is relatively new, social entrepreneurs have always been around. Florence Nightingale, Mahatma Gandhi, Vinoba Bhave are vivid examples. The problem, says David Bornstein, author of How To Change The World, is that historically we have looked at such individuals as humanitarians or saints.

"Great social entrepreneurs are not the geniuses of society," argues Bornstein. "They are not the best educated or the richest or the most talented. Rather, they tend to be the people who are the most strongly motivated in a particular area..." People who have done remarkable things, he says, didn't begin with the knowledge and capacity to run a large organisation. They acquired it along the way, step by step.

It's the same as in business. The great entrepreneurs aren't necessarily the best educated or 'most talented'. They are the ones who are most motivated, the ones who don't just think but focus on implementation.

Yahoo male

Yahoo launched a new campaign to promote "Yahoo India Mail" featuring Malaika Arora Khan in 2005. A leading daily gushed : "This is the first time that a leading internet company in India has shot with a Bollywood personality for an internet campaign".

Model and vejaay, yes. But Bollywood personality?? Malaika, as far as I can remember, has appeared in one item number on top of a train.

The company elaborates: "We were looking for a vibrant, regal, fashionable, easily recognisable youth icon and someone the youth of the country could easily identify and connect with."

Someone who'd charge less than Rani Mukherjee or Shahrukh Khan, I guess. But the basic question is: can a celeb add any value to a brand like Yahoo mail?

I have a google account, am more than reasonably happy with it and too lazy to shift elsewhere. But if I had to open a new one today I would probably opt again for google because I perceive it as better, faster and 'cooler'.

So sure, yahoo feels the heat. It's much lower on the 'gotta have' scale than it used to be a while ago. But I don't think having Malaika to greet every user who wished to sign up for a new id did the trick. (no kidding - that was part of the deal!)

Note the manner in which the company's communication tom-tomed Malaika and mentioned the tech bits just by-the-way. Like yeh Indian userlog na, kaafi dumb hain.

"The company perhaps hoped to put the heat on hotmail with its own online hottie and yes, Khan brought with her larger storage space, greater attachment capacity and advanced spam control. If you still needed more Malaika, you could actually have her... on your mobile phone as well. Yup, Malaika themes, wallpapers, screen-savers, video clips and even Malaika games!

Exclamation marks kis liye bhai. Are Malaika games and wallpapers the ultimate in excitement? But wait, there's more...

"Malaika's expression in the advertisement was able to convey the key product feature and its utility to a celebrity like her."

Well, I haven't seen the ad on TV but sure hope the expression was an improvement on the Pizza Hut ad - where Malaika's 'expression' conveyed the impression of a large marble stuck in her mouth.

I may be completely wrong. Maybe all the research and deliberation yahoo had done was right and there were thousands of starved young men out there (the kind who post ads on dating sites like:"hi i m jayes and i like to make friendship with girls!") who appreciated this campaign and signed up in large numbers.

Yahoo not so long ago was the undisputed king in terms of brand recall and prominence on the net. This dominance came under threat with the runaway success of Google. Gmail is superior to Yahoo in my opinion not just for the enormous space but also for the nifty features that continue to get added to their service as it is in beta.

I suppose many are deserting its service for Gmail and it could fade away into the sunset as an also-ran.

Malaika Arora symbolised glamour. Her appeal was used to garner attention to Yahoo Mail. That is all.. no more analysis required.. Whether or not Yahoo succeeded was another matter. Personally i believe Gmail has  grabbed the cake..

Does anyone need invitations to open a gmail account ?

But my personal view is that while celeb endorsements may work for a soft drink or a clothing company (if at all they do work!) they do nothing for a brand like mail providers except cheapen it.

But full marks to Malaika's publicist. If anything, the yahoo campaign put her on a far higher pedestal than she actually occupied!

Major dilemma

When Major Devashish Chakravorty, Lt. Cdr. T Balaji and Flt. Lt. Nilesh Gupta move around the sprawling campus of Indian Institute of Management (IIM A), it's no secret mission they are carrying out, reports TOI.

All three are ex-defence services officers now studying for their management degrees. A sad but interesting statistic which clearly highlights the growing unattractiveness of 'careers for life' in general and careers in the defence forces in particular.

Says the army guy: "I joined the Army for a life of adventure and valour. That was a stage when I wanted physical challenges in life. Now I seek mental challenges". Which, he specifies are: a career in investment banking or consulting.

It will be interesting to see what kind of placement he gets. 13 years of experience - that too in the army - is an unusual kind of profile. Even for a lateral recruit.

Of course, a lot depends on how well he performs academically. I would think he should not find the 'pressure' too much, having been through much worse at NDA and he must be pretty motivated, that's for sure!

The navy chap is an electronics engineer who joined the forces out of fascination for the uniform, the sea and the thrill of life in the forces. But he was on a short service commission.

The air force fellow is the most candid: "It was a feeling of accomplishment to be in the IAF, but gradually I began feeling the monotony and wanted a change".

Monotony? Well, if you look at the issue dispassionately, clearly we haven't had a real 'war' since 1971. Kargil was an undeclared war, but one where the Air Force wasn't allowed to cross the LOC and bomb out the enemy camps.

So all they do really is keep training, staying fully prepared and alert for a war that never happens. Now this is necessary in the national interest - but not an exciting thing for the talented individuals serving in the forces.

No, thank you
When I was in school, several of my classmates had an army-navy background. A fair number of the boys were quite gung-ho on joining the NDA/ IMA and I know for sure at least 3 did so.

Today, it's rare to find such enthusiasm among officer's children. One such offspring declared to me," Only the duffers among us try for defence services ..."

Slight exaggeration perhaps but yes, the smarter ones aren't waiting 13 years to realise they want "mental challenges". They're trying for MBAs or studying abroad from the start.

As Vice Admiral S C S Bangara, former commandant of the NDA candidly admitted to rediff.com in an interview

It is a fact none of the crème of our youth opts for the military... We have middle class and below, and more so in the lower middle class families coming into the NDA. But is it unique to India? No, my answer is it is not unique to India. This is the global trend.

At a recent Passing Out Parade at NDA it was observed that a significant % of the graduating class were children of jawans and JCOs. For them, becoming an officer is the ultimate in 'upward mobility'.

As they say, one man's punishment posting is another's dream job. So even as the dream sours for some, it glows brightly in the hearts of some others...

Qualitatively speaking
The decline in interest among 'elite youth' is often attributed to the fact that other professions pay more. But that's too simplistic. Those who've experienced the privileges of an army/ navy lifestyle know the 'quality of life' is great. In fact it's the kind of quality money cannot buy. Says the Vice Admiral:

I have a son in the corporate world who at a young age has reached a fairly senior position. He does not have the same quality of life despite his income being higher than that of a young officer in the armed forces.

But the general feeling is you aren't 'going somewhere'. Most do join the forces with a great deal of josh but it quickly wears off.

There is frustration with the hierarchy, the lack of modernisation, the politics. The constant relocations to small and boring cantonment towns. And an additional, often overlooked problem: the fact that your spouse will never be able to have a proper career.

If it were easier to leave the forces, I suspect many more would actually do so. Meanwhile, the army/ navy/ air force need to figure out how to deal with a whole new mindset. One that aspires for 'more' than previous generations.
 
There is frustration with the hierarchy, the lack of modernisation, the politics.

Hierarchy and politics are not uncommon even in huge, efficient and highly profitable Corporations. And, here we are talking about a system where, for every small thing you need to get permission from the "babu." I am sure even the mighty Superpower has such issues to handle.

And an additional, often overlooked problem: the fact that your spouse will never be able to have a proper career.

I have only one data point for this and it suggests the exact opposite of this. A friend from Defence has to move to newer location almost every 2 yrs. But his spouse has keenly pursued her career. May be, because she was open to explore multiple career options, she didn't had to face too many tough problems.

Watch 911 by Michael Moore, which makes passing reference to this issue. Even in US, there are no takers for career in Defence.

A challenge as grave as the actual threat posed by our thorny neighbour...

Mujhe rang de

Replacing the staid stripes with sequins, banal checks with brocade patches and formal suits with fun shirts, men are adding more colour to their lives, believes India Today.

IT asked half a dozen young men who work in the metro's and each of them gasped," I wouldn't be caught dead in that". That being the floral print pink shirt worn by a particular model in glossy mags and journo's.

And I get the feeling not many guys would disagree.

Thing is, every media vehicle worth its salt is desperately searching for trends. But there's a difference between 'trend' and 'trendy' - as trend spotter Irma Zandl so rightly points out:

Trend vs Trendy:
Why it's important to understand the difference.

A trend is driven by demographics, lifestyle, technology -­ it moves forward steadily and relentlessly. It provides the foundation for building businesses and new brands/categories.

Trendy phenomenon ­ or fads - often seem to spring up overnight, burn intensely and then die out just as rapidly e.g. scooters, swing dancing, gin martinis. "Trendy" looks good but generally does not fit into the pattern of people's lives.

Flowery pink shirts do not fit into the pattern of men's lives and hence, in my opinion, need to be classified as 'trendy' - for p3 and wannabe p3 people. "Our niche market is the rich daddy-kid and the yuppie," says the MD of Tuscan Verve. Point taken - a market exists. But why does the writer have to make sweeping statements like:

"Checks and pinstripes are bowing out to colours, frill and funk. Men's wardrobes are resembling women's, with embroidered collars, patchwork pieces and retro prints."

Really? Checks and pinstripes bowing out to embroidery? Flamboyant shirts are going to be lounge wear or club wear - not replace standard business clothing or Friday dressing. Even for rich daddy-kids and yuppies. I mean, who will take a male CEO in a pink paisley shirt seriously??

The article, predictably, concentrates only on the tiny designer wear market (declaring breathlessly: Rohit Bal's floral and polka dotted applique shirts are 'flying off the shelves'). Except for a brief mention to Provogue - a relatively mass brand.

But yes, there is actually a trend hidden away in the focus on trendy.

Men do want to go beyond blue and grey - they want to look good. But except for a tiny fraction of a fraction they do not identify themselves as 'metrosexuals'. They want to look like guys, not girls.

So when pink has to be added to the wardrobe, brands like Arrow are the ones which will do the trick. The normally staid company has become a lot more adventurous of late. It's introduced colours like bright pink and lime green pinstripes (and it looks quite decent!).

Allen Solly - the Friday dressing people - have lots of colour in their store. But it's all checks and stripes, in novel and interesting design and colour combinations.

Will they introduce paisley prints and embroidery? I think not. Yes, Indian men are now more style conscious and willing to experiment. But like I said, the experimentation will be within certain bounds of masculinity.
We don't get the stuff that sells everywhere else in the world (even though we make a large part of it), most of the stuff I have seen at the shops run by Indian designers seems like its been put together using bed-sheets. The quality of even expensive brands in India such as Benetton is not worth the money we pay for them. The styles and fits we get in India are really bad and they make us look bad. Searching for good clothes is like looking for a needle in a haystack ( i am talking about men's clothes). But, we Indians are also obsessed with brand-name, no matter how ugly the clothes, people still wear it to show it off.

Wearing pink is not unmanly, depends on the shade and what exactly you are wearing. Wearing colors isnt about being metrosexual, its just about what looks good on you, if you have a darker complexion going in for bright colors (especially pink) might not be the best idea. Yeah but the guy in the picture looks bad, looks like India today really skimped out - paying for a decent looking model, could have just used a bust. But the right jewellery on men isn't good.

I guess such kind of funky clothes are for people related to the fashion, movie and entertainment industry in general, where people have to do things to catch everybody's attention and get noticed. And there is a huge market out there for such clothes, since a lot of people today are mesmerized by the entertainment field and want to join it.

And its obvious and understood that the business class and the regular job doing variety, will not go in for such clothes.

Besides, not to forget, such clothes, if designed by fashion designers like Rohit Bal and other huge brands, do cost a bomb. So there, its anyways out of reach for the common junta.

It's like guys may have started wearing beads - but they're NOT going to adopt dangling earrings. At least, I hope, not in my lifetime...

Asking for it

"Can you cook?"
"Can you dance or sing?"

These, reports TOI, are some of the 'unrelated' questions asked in recent admission interviews to institutes like NID, CEPT and Nirma - in order to test the candidate's character and personality.

"The questions are not meant to throw students off guard but guage their understanding, common sense and aptitude. With coaching classes available now, it is difficult to know the calibre and true worth of students," says Akhil Saxena, NID activity chairman for education.

I would tend to agree. The perfectly programmed and pantomimed answers to all the 'usual questions' often leave little scope to differentiate one student from the next.

IIM interviews have always been a little more edgy and asked these 'unrelated' questions. One of the IIM Calcutta interview, which was held in the commanding Hindustan Lever boardroom, asked things like:

* Can you recall a few lines from Lincoln's Gettysburg Address
* Who painted the mural next to the library in TIFR
* What was the O Henry short story 'The Last Leaf' about?

Of course, these questions were not entirely unrelated.

All this info was listed on one of the candidates form, which lay before them. Luckily he could answer everything - although he messed up some of the routine questions (guess coaching wasn't as sophisticated back then).

But he must have done alright coz they sent him an admit letter.

As far as 'unrelated' goes, asking a physics graduate the principle behind the working of the ceiling fan may sound irrelevant to his or her aptitude for management. But what the panel is really checking for is how well you know your basics. Are you a thinker, or a mugger?

Believe it or not, many people cannot answer such simple questions because they have passed exams with flying colours through ratta. And they cannot 'think through' or connect the theory with the practical. Which definitely does not bode well for a future career in management! Or any other field, for that matter.

The other quality which gets tested in the process is integrity. If you say "I speak 5 languages" but are unable to actually do so, you will probably be dead meat. The only thing worse than not being able to answer is faking it. How can they tell?

Well, years of experience give these panels the intuition that Malcolm Gladwell described so wonderfully in 'Blink'.

Still, you might argue the 'cooking' is going a bit too far. I'm sure that's just one of the many they ask - and you won't be automatically flunked for saying you have never touched a stirring spoon.

It happens to be highlighted simply because it makes a good headline. But NID has given the following - valid - explanation: "Considering that students are overprotected by their parents, we want to see if they can do things independently."

No its not about selection procedures, for they can never be perfect. And those who get there are not far better than many of those who don't. Callibre and talent can not be judged. Under the current circumstances probably you can't do much.

The flip side is, there are snobs on both sides. I am not saying all are like that, but there are those who have made it and do not wish to understand and think about everyone who hasn't can be worthwhile. And there are those who haven't and hate those who have.

Now this whole thing of judging and grading callibre (in fact grading human beings) leads to this.

The problem?

The problem really is that we have not developed a society where everyone would be respected for whatever he/she is doing, whatever little he/she is doing.

That sounds more like an ideal, an ideal that losers talk about for the winners are too much into the illusion of what they think they have won. And that brings a stagnation. Things never change.

And its not just about India, that's how it is all around the world.

I as a kid had my own Ideas of scientific work being more "worthwhile" and "respectable". Today I find they don't do much. I mean what they do is not very different nor is that very difficult or complex. Anyone can think out of the box if one really wishes and at the same time a sweeper does work as mundane and as creative and has opportunities to do things better.

I have seen how, when a known scientist sends a paper for a publication to a referred journal of repute, it gets approved and how a little known research worker sending an account of the same work gets his copy back.

Are we really recognising work? Are we really recognising callibre and talent?

And then we have all the disillusioned "winners" and "losers".

We may be recognising and grooming some but we are not doing enough and those who think we are doing great need to really take a closer look at how things are.

We have grown up doing things for recognition and not for doing whats needs to be done. We have all grown up studying to make money. We have all grown up confusing recognition as success. We have never done things for the right reasons, and always done them for the attributes.

Its the same with our gods, its the same with our relationships, its the same with our love(s). Attributes decide. With the level of the entrance going down south, the students entering arent exactly meritous (is that even a word?) but mostly ratta people who ratta-ed well in grade 12 and in the coaching who were 'crackus' in most forms of things they did, are disappearing, and no one seems to realise that but the students stuck in the transisiton phase of IITs.

There were students who had loads of applied knowledge, but did not have the grades to show it. They have gr8 grades, most 8s and 9s but not the applied knowledge to prove that they are 'IIT-stuff' and the only 'non-worthy' students getting into IIT, thru the DASA feature, where NRI's sent their kids on dollar fees has been scraped, so not much of a cash flow exists now. I presume, soon there will be a time, when IIT will be a college living only on its name, coz the politics in this country is only reducing the level of the exam for the sake of keeping the kursi intact.

Through B school interviews and after that, the students feel that it is very much meant to put the student off guard...! And why not? A friend of mine was asked the following sequence of questions at the IIM B interview.
1) Are you a Bengali. Yes
2) Are you from Presidency College Kolkata. Yes
3) Are you a communist, aren't you? ...

Hearsay is that a bihari marwari guy was asked on his face what is his going rate on the dowry market.
In his interview, he was asked about 10 questions in a row on sports, and then, on the Jesse Owens/ Luz Long incident at the 1936 olympic, questioned on Hitler.....

Saw the trend? You are put on the edge. Put in the deep end of the ocean. Attacked at what you ARE, (be it your religion, be it popular misconceptions about your associative groups, or be it your raison-d-etre, which is quizzing) and then they see whether you swim or sink.

IMHO, for business, among other things, you need strong people, who can hold their own when off guard. So they are checking the right things. Sometimes it is alright and as for the ones who fake it and make it to the top institutes, they are good enough to fake it and make it in life. That too is fair, I guess.

Thus, cooking is fair. Dance or sing, is fair. Nothing is unrelated.

"Sadly, it's only a few institutes of great repute which can undertake such subjective interviews. Because in the general scheme of things it would most likely be 'hijacked' ie used to give backdoor entry to the less deserving-but-willing-to-pay ... "

Great repute? ha ha! Stanford is of great repute. Just look at the kinda ppl admitted there. Akshata Murthy (Narayan Murthys daughter), Mukesh Ambani ... i am not saying that they are dumb, but its abundantly clear that they are in Stanford bcoz they have shit load of money. Did i mention that Narayan Murthy is on the advisory board of Stanford? Its not hard to imagine what kinda advice he wud be giving them. I guess the next stop for Rohan from Cornell (yeah Narayan's a trustee there as well!) is going to be Stanford. Yeah!

So i think its a good think that in case of CAT atleast you have to have a 99+ percentile to get a call from IIMs. Then maybe all the flithy rich may try their contacts to get their kids in. But getting a 99+ wud be the most difficult thing then.

Except for the 2003 CAT leak , IIMs have done a good job so far (as in the leaks havent been publicised!)

Bottomline: Sadly, only a few institutes of great repute can undertake such subjective interviews. Because in the general scheme of things it would most likely be 'hijacked' ie used to give backdoor entry to the-less-deserving-but-willing-to-pay ...