China's concern

After a spate of growth for the past 30 years, China had immense internal migration from the agricultural states to the towns. It is estimated that nearly 250 million farmers had come to industrial towns in hope of a better living. 

China is a country that is predominantly dependent on exports. This January, its exports sunk by 17.5% compared to last year. With the current economic downturn, there have been reports that the unemployment may be at 10%! This means that the newly working age group of youngsters and middle age group people will now be out of jobs, with no income. 

What's important is that this can be wide civil unrests and violence in China. The mob may take to robbery, stealing and other forms to earn their living. 

It is also estimated that the agricultural villages get nearly 30% of their remittances from the people in the towns. Even this now shall vanish. 

China will have to deal with the issue given the seriousness of the crises. Its economic stimulus plan of $586 million that plans to provide 650000 new jobs in the next two years may have to be further increased.

One good sign of the present situation is the rise of entrepreneurism in the country, not only in China but also in France. This situation calls for 'out of the box' thinking that shall be provided by the laws created. 

Phrases to remember

Plan the way (or life) a fire department plans out its work.

Politicizing Culture

The recent incidents of the Mangalore pub and the assaults on the Valentine Day are an alarming signal to the nation.

Youngsters are requiring a means to showcase their love in the open that is not acceptable to some group of people. The tolerance limit for these few people is crossing the limit, such that they enroll in numbers to take action against the lovers. Such acts should definitely be taken under the purview of the law and action should be taken. The Indian Penal Code also has sections which deal with such criminal behavior

How do you define culture: It is the set of values, goals, attitudes, traditions, practices that a group of people share. What we see now that is that it is these set of values that do seem to co-exist in a group belonging to the same community.

In the last month incident at the Mangalore pub, a group of 40 Sri Ram Sena members assaulted the women who had entered the pub in the name of their obscene behavior. The argument they gave was to prevent the Indian women to ‘go astray’. It is surprising that it is happening in the very same country that gave the world Kama Sutra. The question that we face is, is what the Sena did a part of Indian culture. Can someone break the law, assault women publicly in the name of ruining Indian culture and still go handsfree? It is a big irony that the very people are ruining the culture in the name of others.

 

 

Drinking of alcohol amongst younger generations

Drinking alcohol is increasing becoming a nuisance in India. With the pub culture flourishing, many youngsters are taken to it in the name of modernization. They binge till late night, rape women and some others indulge in horrifying accidents on the highways.

A recent study by NIPCCD (National Institute for Public Corporation and Child Development) has shown that school children are increasingly getting prone to consuming alcohol and smoking. A survey of 15000 students from the age of 5-18 years of age showed that 30% of boys and 26% of girls regularly consume alcohol.

Is this good for India?

While it is becoming increasingly clear that alcohol is the main cause for accidents, poor academic records, health related issues and deteriorating conditions at home, it still growing at an alarming rate.

Can and should the government take action?

Well, if the government does bars the production of alcohol in the country, there will be many protests across the country. Everybody shall claim that those who do not want to drink need not drink and all the stuff. So this is not a viable option. If the government does not ban alcohol, what is the step it can take to prevent excessive consumption of alcohol amongst students and elders?

There are lessons to be learnt from other countries.

In a town in Brazil, the murder rates caused by people who drink was reduced by nearly half only by putting the closing time of bars at 11 PM. In the US the increase in the minimum drinking age of students was raised that significantly reduced the number of road accidents. In the UK, pubs have been asked to follow a ‘Code of Practice’ (COP) that discourages binge drinking promotions like ‘ Buy one and get one bottle free’, North Carolina’s (US) law makes it illegal for any shop knowingly selling or giving alcoholic beverages to any person who is already intoxicated.

It is very difficult to take an action of extreme step right at the very front. But steps such as these need to be taken for reduction in the alcohol consumption, especially amongst the future generations.

 

Economic Behavior

Today on my way to the airport to pick up my father, I again encountered a traffic jam. On a stretch of a mere 100m, I ended up wasting nearly 30 min.

Studying at MDI, I just learnt an obvious fact of India: It is in India that individual rationalism leads to collective irrationalism. This reminded me of the Noble laureate John Nash. How true was he when he contradicted the theory of Adam Smith, that was imbibed in everybody since then.  Adam Smith said that a successful group occurs only when all the individuals of the group act in their own interests. John Nash contradicted it by saying that the best result emerges from a group only when the individual members act in the best interests of themselves and the group.

How true in this particular case. But then when this is true why don’t we all follow it. Why don’t we allow and wait for the other person to go and then follow. Why do we always try to cut things short and race the car to any vacuum that is created in the jam.

Well I feel that the answer lies in the people tolerance. Over time, the tolerance power of people is going down. People are just not ready to let the other person go forward. It does not matter to them how much ever time they wait, but they can’t see the other person going before them.

Hence I feel that even if the infrastructure of India improves, even if there were better roads, we would still face the problems of jams. Till we do not the change the way we think, I don’t see a solution to the problem.

The next question arises as why is this so?

Again I feel that it is in India’s education system. Note that all the people who were on that stretch were well to do people with sufficient education. Even then?

Education in India is only defined by competition. How the student is, is judged primarily by the grades of the person, regardless of other attributes. Are marks and grades the only way to judge a candidate. In the recent placements at my college justified the fact. It is in this that all of us only try to outwit and outsmart the other person without having a thought of self. This is not the case with US. There the students decide the college they want to go to and the education they seek. Though grades do play a role, so do many other things.

I feel it is this that needs to be mended in our country and imbibe this learning in our system