Sir V S Naipaul at the Tehelka Goa Think Fest a few months back while in conversation with Tarun Tejpal commented in response to his question regarding the best advice he can provide writers: and the venerable Mr. Naipaul said that it would the best thing for a potential writer to skip university. Thats a radical suggestion from all dimensions. The rationale which VS Naipaul gave that university shapes a person to think in a particular manner. The distinctive style of writing is thus lost which a person is born with, an artistic flair that is not manufactured and is thus a breath of fresh air. Education presents us cognitive frameworks to think, analyse content, data and situations. But the talent cannot be given birth in a creative writing class. It is the raw marble slab which is polished fine in an English literature program.   Education gives us certification, and the time to grow up to be what we are; but these things can be done after high school taking up an apprenticeship  and working up the ranks.  The Citadels of Higher Education are creating non functional beings, unable to think for themselves and hence becoming slaves of the market.

Innovative talent gets lost in the quagmire of structured learning as teachers want us to think in a particular manner. Its the teachers perspective which prevails. As a person shifting from Engineering to Sociology, I have faced the brunt of this treatment. I have miserably done in assignments as i ‘did not meet’ the teachers expectation. Is this grad school all about? Is it about social control and conditioning or about value creation and learning at the end of the day. So much for the oxymoron called ‘inter-disciplinary-learning’.  It takes time, effort and energy to make a domain transition and for cross-pollination of intellectual ideas. Structured learning does not have any room for that, and then these folks expect ‘out of the box thinking and learning’.

I am equally amused, bewildered and frustrated in equal measure. The Iron Towers of High Table Academia are impossible to breach as people need PhD’s and Post Docs to make it even to a reasonable university to teach. The paradigm of publish and perish makes it hard to hire good teachers which ultimately becomes difficult to create a generation of informed citizens as profs are more inclined towards writing papers and not towards teaching. Its a battle for tenure than teaching well at the end of the day. Do not blame them, we all have bills to pay and families to feed.

I have come across high profile managers who are doing good with an undergrad degree in their careers, who teach adjunct in universities and teach better than career academics. Salman Rushdie’s books are taught in post colonial literature PhD level modules in English Literature programs globally, and he himself is a history major from Cambridge and teaches at Emory in the USA. I support the Stanford Prof in Computer Science who quit his tenured post and started a open digital university offering courses. The Un College movement started by Dale Stephens, a Thiel Fellowship recipient offers training which is free and open source, which an average college student in US is raking up debt which they cannot pay back for years after graduating.

I feel as education has under-delivered when it comes to skills really needed in the market, an undergrad degree is equal to a diploma 30 years back. A double masters holder gets offered an entry level job. What the hell is going on? I feel saddened at the state of affairs, truly….

Whenever, the narrative about development is written it is always the rural poor which is focused upon.  The narrative often forgets that there is something as the urban poor which live in the flavellas of Rio to the slums of Dharavi. Slums in global megapolis’es are the economic engines of those regions. These are the areas which serve us. The domestic staff, factory labor and the minimum wage staff all live in urban shanty town’s. The inner cities are the heart of our cities really. Social Enterprises (or simply SE from now on in the article) mostly cater to the rural folks in selling artisan products or bringing skills training. Or the success story of Microfinance in Bangladesh brings credence to the story in circulation. Grameen and BRAC are both case studies in their own right because of their spectacular success. Microfinance is unique not only to the rural poor but also to the urban poor as credit access is limited by lack of identity proof and hence there is no question of credit history in this regard.  Singapore based  Microfinance SE Milaap is reaching poor urban communities in southern India in their quest for better life for the borrowers.

We can see in a Singaporean context that SE’s or Social Enterprises in short can fill up a niche, which is hard to bridge either by corporate s or by the Government. Old School is an educational SE that serves people who dropped out of formal public education early on. Or a World Toilet Organization which spreads the ‘good word’ about sanitation across developing countries globally. In Mumbai, India Ambulance 1298 is providing emergency access to ambulances during the ‘golden hour’, which saves lives. Embrace, a Stanford D School based SE is providing affordable non power based incubators for infants. In the developing world, power cuts are the norm rather than the exception even in urban spaces. As the world is getting more urbanized with China already crossing the psychological threshold of more residents in cities than in the rural areas, SE’s are the way ahead in building sustainable communities, one at a time complimenting local civic governments.

Dear Friend

Its Valentines day yet again!! This is one day that single guys like me post status messages, especially funny ones to heal the   burden of being, well what else but the fact of being single! Its almost been ages for me on this planet, observing the festival of love being celebrated in three different culturally distinctive regions of Asia. From the conservative to the liberal, call it globalization, neo-liberalization or Americanization; V Day is a global metaphor for celebrating the emotion of love, of being wanted, the irresistible feeling of being cherished and to cherish someone special. Whether it is  youth of Meerut (Or any other Tier 3 town) in India calling it ‘Pyaar ka Teohar’ or the festival of love, this day has evolved in to a life of its own divorcing itself from the traditional religious baggage.

Films such as Pyaar Ka Panchnama show the frailties of being in a relationship and all the emotional complexities that a young guy in a relationship goes through.  It is true to a large extent that relationships are hard to maintain. It is a work in progress and takes effort. But if two souls are willing to create magic then the magic is certainly present. And as always the best relationship advice comes from a friend who is perennialy single 🙂 Relationships have power dynamics but start off with the chemistry which is ethereal and magical. Lets celebrate the magic once again on this day.

This is one day where either we feel the sense of relief that our wallets are not being lightened or we want to feel that moment, which is truly priceless, even if the credit card statement for the next month is going to give one a bad financial hangover. Card Shops, Eateries and Coffee Chains make a killing on this day. Cannot find a decent place in a restaurant this evening for sure as love soaked birds would be sharing a wonderful time together. Well this makes me feel even better 😦

The World requires more days of Love, or celebrating, acknowledging the sanctity of love than strife and conflict. How many days in our globalized calender do we remember which glorifies strife. Media channelized new content is predominantly bad news, or gossip which is meaningless. How many days of our lives do we consciously  make a effort to demonstrate an act of kindness. This day is filled with symbolism, and symbolism is per say not bad if the essence behind the razzmatazz and hype is worth it.  Every day is worth living and loving to the full, every second of it. This is what creates the energy to live in the darkness around us. We need nodes like V Day in our lives, to channelize the emotion of love and bring the heart back in the mind-space instead of dry rationality that envelops us.

Most of my V Days since the past few years, are spent at School (Grad School) doing assignments, readings, meetings. In short its a normal day, very normal.  But the buzz around is special, that what makes it a special day. This year too will be no different, as my sing my favorite Adnan Sami Track – Kabhi To Nazr Milao to glory over Green Tea!

Have a Great V Day Friend, even if you are in a relationship with some one, or in a relationship with life itself, such as me:)

How can you know my madness till you become mad with me ?

With Love

Change Thinker

A few days ago while exchanging pleasantries with a friend of mine on Twitter, i had ‘favorited’ his post, and bang the reply came that i had extended the nation of the virtual like from Facebook on to Twitter. Yes, i was taken aback with the extent that Facebook-ization has enveloped my life and the legion of social media addicts. We engage with friends, acquaintances and online pals on a regular basis, and have translated one to one human interaction on the language on online space. The vocabulary of online interactions has exponentially increased certainly, with a dis-like button on You Tube, to express dissatisfaction. May be a kiss (with Valentine’s Day around the corner) and a slap is on the way (a very needed button indeed), with the ‘poke’ already around. We can like a comment, and now a like, does not really mean that we have to like, like it but it is just an acknowledgement that the comment has been well, acknowledged, received and read.

Social Media has about a billion users around the planet, with local languages expanding the reach further. This is changing how we interact in a highly connected, but disconnected generation. We might not know our next door neighbor very well in person, but we chat on Google Talk everyday saying Hi or Salaam. Has our quality of interaction bettered over the years? Or are we doing social media because some friends are on it.  We are chronicling our lives online, every event is being recorded in pictures, tag in to a place or simply status updates. The Cool Factor is certainly contributing to the buzz. We feel good at the end of the day when we get a like or a comment, and even better a meaning one on our thoughts that we have shared. This can even be a conversation initiator in the real world, the next time when we catch up with a friend.

I get to read some of the most amazing stuff posted by my friends on Facebook and Twitter and also the equally absurd content.  We the ‘Like’ -o-philic generation, we get to like stuff miles away from the actual event, share some insanely creative stuff.  Technology is like a kitchen knife, it can cut veggies as well as can be applied to heinous ends. It is the values which matter behind the technology and not the technology itself. Facebook is well on its way to create a lot of wealth for its shareholders through its IPO, well, thats something to ‘like’ about!

I was horrified today morning  by watching an emotionally soaked ad of Vedanta on an Indian News Channel, talking about the rhetoric of development. This is the same organization that has run in to controversy with the tribals in Orissa state in India over mining leases. This has even lead to protests by tribals. Similarly, savvy corporate communication strategists wean over any bad publicity by conning the general public with elegant media campaigns. Corporates have green washed their way through by tying up with non profits in exchange for some loose change in the form of grants. Academics are not untouched too. The Climate Change skepticism is fueled by the lobbies in America, fund research to discredit Climate Change such as the Koch Brothers. Climate Change is a meta phenomena which impacts poor, vulnerable communities from the Maldives to Tuvalu every single day. Media is also driven by advertising moolah, its role is implicit in the contamination of the narrative.

Green washing can help only so far. Sincere efforts are around, but they are few and far in between. The lust for money can lead to intellectual infidelity and professional devaluation. This is not un-natural as there are families to feed and bills to pay, but in such circumstances the moral and ethical entrepreneurs of our society have to brought to audit as well.  Think Tanks and Global NGO’s are driven by vested interests. Capitalist fodder drives them. The developmental narrative is hence not immune too.  Corporate Social Responsibility has a strategic social risk management value, and shared value can indeed be created, but the soul of development seems to be eroded. The MBA-ization of the development sector is impertetive but how much of the donor dollar is actually reaching the intended recipient is a different issue altogether. It seems, that neoliberal agenda rebrands its old wine in new skin every generation, the spirit of capitalism should be relived in its original avatar.