Typos: BEAR WITH US, PLEASE…

Typos: BEAR WITH US, PLEASE…:

Land of the tiger? Yeah ok… Land of the tiger too, but is the Royal Bengal Tiger our largest, most imposing predator? Well, not really… That crown sits not on the head of the tiger. Nay, it isn’t even the regal and mighty Asiatic lion but the massive head of a giant that lumbers his way across the mountain slopes of the high Himalayas, way above the tree line that wears this crown. More than seven feet tall and weighing in at close to 300 kgs, the Himalayan brown bear towers over its other more media friendly predatory rivals. But of all the thousands who flock to the tiger reserves with their shiny new SLRs, and XL camouflage jackets, trussed up in their luxury resort jeeps and SUVs, how many have ever trekked up to the mountains to catch a glimpse of this magnificent monster? In my defence, I must insist that I did go up to Gushaini, the gateway to the Great Himalayan National Park where walks this great beast, but circumstances stopped me from pursuing the tracks of this giant then… But I will go back!...............

 

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COMMON SENSE SIMPLIFIED: GREEN IS THE NEW BLACK!

COMMON SENSE SIMPLIFIED: GREEN IS THE NEW BLACK!: The debate on subsidy on diesel price never seems to reach a consensus. On one hand, diesel subsidies are important to keep food prices and transport prices under check, while on the other hand, this subsidy is being exploited by luxury car owners and owners of commercial hubs. In simple words, tax paid by the aam adami which is meant for societal development is latently being directed as subsidies to industrialists and rich business houses! Thus it becomes far more important for the government to either come up with a differential pricing system or some other model which categorises these two different set of users under two different price bands.......

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Passionate About India: Will the Supreme Court please clearly define the t...

Passionate About India: Will the Supreme Court please clearly define the t...:

This article is not about Shiv Sena bashing, because enough people are doing that; and personally, I can’t imagine how Mumbai could have possibly had a normal day on the streets when two million of its citizens were genuinely mourning the death of the Shiv Sena supremo, Balasaheb Thackeray. In fact, before I get into the main article, let me also first say a few things about the Mumbai bandh and the Balasaheb legacy of absolutist fear. Yes, post his death, the fear factor was surely there... and that was a key reason why, even without a formally announced bandh, there was a total bandh in Mumbai. Yes, I also believe that the rest of Maharashtra should have been more normal. However, it is also a fact that this vexing fear that we are talking about and such quasi-bandhs are not really the monopoly of Shiv Sainiks. Bangalore was at a standstill when Rajkumar died a few years ago; there have been bandhs and equal fear of SP goons in UP, and far more fear, door to door, all over West Bengal about CPM goons; and now the same insidious mantle is steadily being taken up by importunate Trinamool party cadres. In India, hero worship is a culture and the loud existence and fear of suppressive political goons almost a pathetic norm in every corner of the nation. What was however very different about Balasaheb Thackeray was that he was the only leader that we have seen – in the midst of all hypocrites and chameleons – who, as my colleague Sutanu wrote in his blog, was always perspicuously consistent. BJP leaders will agree; they have seen all bigwigs – from Omar Abdullah, Mamata Banerjee, Naveen Patnaik, Prafulla Mahanta, M. Karunanidhi, Chandrababu Naidu, Ram Vilas Paswan to J. Jayalalithaa – change sides from being BJP allies at one time, while Balasaheb, along with the Akali Dal, remained their only constant partners. Thus, his cult following has quite strong reasons, and it’s a fact that the so called secular media has been harsher about the Shiv Sainik goons than about the Samajwadi and so called secular Marxist goons.

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Typos: BRAVEHEARTS AGAINST THE APOCALYPSE

Typos: BRAVEHEARTS AGAINST THE APOCALYPSE:

While the country celebrated the hanging of a villain who murdered innocents, I had mixed feelings about the news of Kasab’s execution. It seemed like it was the right path, the only path in fact, and yet one wondered if there could have been a path more right than this. I don’t have the answer yet and so I leave you with my thoughts from the day when Ajmal Amir Kasab was still a gun-toting specter haunting the streets of Mumbai... a story from four years ago that celebrates and remembers those who stared down death so that many could hang on to life through those four fateful days... Until i find my feelings and the answers.  

Read More........ http://prashantobanerji.blogspot.in/2012/11/bravehearts-against-apocalypse.html

COMMON SENSE SIMPLIFIED: IITF IS STILL AN INFANT

COMMON SENSE SIMPLIFIED: IITF IS STILL AN INFANT:

The importance of trade fairs has never been so profound. The recent IITF 2012 opened the gates for budding as well as established enterprises to showcase their products and services that eventually allows them to display and project their services not only to their potential customers but to the entire region at large. The power of trade fairs notwithstanding, it is fascinating to delve into its genesis that dates back to the medieval era in Europe. Since then, its impact has grown from strength to strength through the industrial revolution in Britain and Europe and later in North America. The trade fairs, in fact, became the face of industrial revolution that reflected its vitality and showcased the same to the world.  

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Passionate About India: Lessons on inner-party democracy from the American...

Passionate About India: Lessons on inner-party democracy from the American...:
 Today, India is at a critical juncture with all socio-economic as well as political ills engulfing the nation from almost all possible directions. Starting from a series of bribery scams that are being exposed, to our plummeting ranks in almost all economic indicators – everything corroborates the hope for the rise of a fourth front (considering the third front still exists and is potent) in the form of Arvind Kejriwal’s political debut with India Against Corruption, along with an emerging coterie of social activists, who are gradually morphing the political landscape and are all collectively reshaping the political couture of the nation..... Click here to read more:

The Fascinating World of Marketing: DO YOU HAVE MUSCLES FOR MICROMARKETING?

The Fascinating World of Marketing: DO YOU HAVE MUSCLES FOR MICROMARKETING?:

Bharti Airtel handles around 8 billion calls daily generating humongous amount of data. Based on this it has divided its customers into nearly 100,000 segments to whom it offers customised products based on their usage pattern. Right now it is working to provide at least three services to each customer, to improve stickiness, working on the insight that customers for multiple services tend to stay on longer than single service users. Further, due to call drops it was facing the problem of churn. At nearly 40% it was a huge number. When it analysed the data it found that a customer was most likely to switch to another service provider if six or more calls dropped in a day. So a software was developed that offers customers free SMSes after the sixth call drop.  

Read more............http://kk-srivastava.blogspot.in/2012/11/do-you-have-muscles-for-micromarketing.html

The Fascinating World of Marketing: DO YOU HAVE MUSCLES FOR MICROMARKETING?

The Fascinating World of Marketing: DO YOU HAVE MUSCLES FOR MICROMARKETING?:

Bharti Airtel handles around 8 billion calls daily generating humongous amount of data. Based on this it has divided its customers into nearly 100,000 segments to whom it offers customised products based on their usage pattern. Right now it is working to provide at least three services to each customer, to improve stickiness, working on the insight that customers for multiple services tend to stay on longer than single service users. Further, due to call drops it was facing the problem of churn. At nearly 40% it was a huge number. When it analysed the data it found that a customer was most likely to switch to another service provider if six or more calls dropped in a day. So a software was developed that offers customers free SMSes after the sixth call drop.  

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Business is Marketing: BOOTSTRAP YOUR WAY TO SUCCESS!

Business is Marketing: BOOTSTRAP YOUR WAY TO SUCCESS!:

This little boy used to walk barefoot to school. He used to sit on the floor in the classroom, as he was not allowed to sit on the desk; neither could he enter the temple of his village, for he was considered ‘unclean’ because he belonged to a lower caste. Ashok Khade is today a multi-millionaire who has Arabs as his business partners. A poor cobbler’s son, he had no money. He could barely finish his college and in spite of being a good student, he had to drop out and take up a job as an apprentice draftsman at the Mazagon Dock. His dreams of becoming a doctor were shattered, but he continued to work hard and became the best draftsman in the company. One day, his boss sent him to Germany for work. There, he chanced to see the paychecks of the Germans and was shocked to find how much they made in a month. This motivated him to work harder. 

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Typos: AND BUDDHA CRIED

Typos: AND BUDDHA CRIED:

Sometimes we need a jolt to wake up, to stay good and to be strong. And then we need people to hold us tight through these tests, to remind us of our goodness when the mirror fails to point out any... Here’s a jolt from the vault that helped one find one’s inherent goodness. May both the lessons and the people who hold us tight through these jolts live long and live strong... 

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COMMON SENSE SIMPLIFIED: GRAFT THE DRAFT MANIFESTO

COMMON SENSE SIMPLIFIED: GRAFT THE DRAFT MANIFESTO:

Unlike many post-colonial nations, which have descended to dictatorships or sham democracies, India has sustained to a reasonably stable democracy unhindered since independence. However, the success of the very same democracy in India would raise numerous eye brows if benchmarked against the best examples of it. Certain basic deficiencies in the country’s social and political dynamics have never allowed the nation to maintain a free and fair democratic setup.

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Passionate About India: Why BJP can't afford to lose Gadkari!

Passionate About India: Why BJP can't afford to lose Gadkari!:
 

That Congress is digging its own grave is too apparent. That it is a party full of unbelievably corrupt is also something that is established in public perception. And that win-or-lose, Arvind Kejriwal has been the man responsible for giving the maximum dent to Congress’ image in its entire history is also established! However, what is most amusing is how, during this entire fall and fall of Congress in public perception, BJP has remained a mute spectator, gaining nothing out of the whole issue.

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Typos: AN EDEN IN MY BACKYARD

Typos: AN EDEN IN MY BACKYARD:

The dragonfly flapped its transparent iridescent wings with a slow deliberate jerk, like the early swivel of a chopper’s rotator blades before taking off while I zoomed in carefully. Its dark head and bulbous eyes grew bigger and closer in the view finder. As the focus rim turned, the image grew clearer… There she was, holding onto a tall stalk by the bank, basking in the soft warm light of a November morn and then I clicked, and she was gone, buzzing her way along the bank in search of a corner where a man with a camera would not pry into her morning duties.  

Read More......http://prashantobanerji.blogspot.in/2012/11/an-eden-in-my-backyard.html

COMMON SENSE SIMPLIFIED: JOBS APART

COMMON SENSE SIMPLIFIED: JOBS APART:

As against the conventional wisdom of building a service career as a permanent employee, corporates are increasingly rolling out part time jobs and the employees are only too happy to lap it up. It’s developing into a trend that is evolving at the speed of light speed which is benefitting both employers and employees. The informal workers in the organised companies have risen from a moderate 32 per cent in 2000 to a most expansive 68 per cent in 2010. The figure of part-time workers’ growth in 2009 was over 10 per cent and in 2010 the figure settled at 18 per cent! It shows the lucre that goes with the proposition of temporary jobs, a trend that is ever rising in most of the developing countries, according to the World Development Report, a publication wing of World Bank.  

Read More : http://prasoonsmajumdar.blogspot.in/2012/11/jobs-apart.html

Passionate About India: It just takes one Arvind Kejriwal! Sadly, there is...

Passionate About India: It just takes one Arvind Kejriwal! Sadly, there is...:

 Arvind Kejriwal’s series of attacks reminds me of a tale by Hans Christian Andersen, ‘The Emperor’s New Clothes’, where two weavers design a new attire for the emperor that, they tell the emperor, will be only visible to those who are honest and loyal. The emperor subsequently dons the ‘attire’ to test his subjects’ loyalty, much to the amusement of his citizenry. Arvind Kejriwal, like the child who laughed at the emperor and dared to shout that the emperor is actually parading naked, is ripping out the false masks from the faces of many such self-proclaimed political and corporate emperors and has dared to show their real faces to the world.

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Typos: FAITH IN THE FALLEN

Typos: FAITH IN THE FALLEN:

 Today, Armstrong the cyclist, even with his seven titles intact can’t hold a candle to Lance the humanitarian and cancer fighter. The former just doesn’t matter and nor is he half as relevant as the latter. To shun and shame and attempt to destroy the Livestrong movement just because cycling’s governing body suddenly suffered a bout of wakeful action is worse than throwing the baby out with the bath water. The Livestrong band is a symbol of solidarity in our fight against cancer, and it’s a symbol that has been instrumental in raising millions for a cause. There was no cheating there. There was no lie there. So stop tearing that down and if you took it off in shame, put it back on… the world still needs Livestrong.

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