The Ambani's

The grand spectacle that is the Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) annual shareholder meetings have always been like a big fat Indian wedding. 40^th in the series was no different. Dhirubhai Ambani started in Naroda in 1967 with the philosophy of ‘Think Big, Think Different, Think Fast & Think Ahead’. Thanks to this thinking, RIL has been a beacon of India’s private sector progress since last four decades. 

Dhirubhai’s greatest achievement was that he showed Indians what was possible. With no degree from any exclusive schools and no family capital to bank on, he achieved what the elite sahibs of New Delhi could not- he built a modernistic, profitable, global enterprise in India. What's more, he detached millions of middle class Indians from depending on crony state socialism and brought them to the world of can-do capitalism by convincing them to load up on Reliance stock.

The 40^th meeting of RIL shareholders was celebration of the four decades of success and steady progress. Mukesh Ambani – first born son of Dhirubhai, following in his legendary father’s footsteps went over the company’s performance and gifted JIO to India. It’s not surprising that the company that launched the equity culture in India is disrupting the telecommunication landscape by giving aam aadmi access to an affordable high speed internet…a whole lot of it. 

Among many things, Mukesh shared a video paying homage to his late father. One noticeable element about that 30 minute video was how subtly, in RIL style, Anil Ambani – younger brother of Mukesh, didn’t appear in a single clip. It seemed like Dhirubhai only has one son. It’s true that after the split between the two brothers, Mukesh is scaling new heights every year, on the other hand Anil is selling his entities to pay off his corporate debt.  

So how is it that since 2005, Anil’s personal net worth is depleted to one tenth of Mukesh’s? Does this proves that Mukesh was ‘right’ in asking for the control of the combined RIL entity as a first born son? From this 12 years of separation, one think I can say is that Mukesh creates trends & Anil waits for them. Following 12 years might be different but for now, thanks to Mukesh, a JIO customer is surfing the web at high speed for peanuts. Mukesh, can at last say that he has changed India. And when you are Dhirubhai’s son that is what is expected of you*.   

*Own ‘non-market moving’ stakes in RIL & Anil’s entities.

Happy 70th Independence Day

This independence day I will be celebrating it with my new office colleague. Even though we both are away from our motherland, we both share the same sense of belongingness to our homeland. We both want a nation that is far far away from violence, we want our kids to go to better schools, elders to get better healthcare facilities, youths to get better employment opportunities, families to get better environment to live in. We don’t want our future to be the prisoner of our past. We want religion to bind us together and not be the reason for separation.

This independence day, we both will have our Gulab Jamun…and eat it too, although at different times. My colleague will celebrate on 14^th and me on 15^th!!

India and Pakistan, both will celebrate their 70th Independence Day in next few days. 70 years of hostilities from both governments, 70 years of family separation, 70 years of violence on both sides in the name of nationalism.

This might be an opinion of an aam aadmi, but I think this 70 years has shown that the Two-Nation theory was flawed. The unnatural geographic division based on religious backgrounds has failed. Understood, the situation in British India was hostile but a united India might have been better equipped to deal with those problems. Partition only multiplied the problems by two. Both countries remain crippled by the narratives built around memories of the crimes of partition. But in spite of that, it is important to remember that the division of what is modern day India, Pakistan and even Bangladesh, is chillingly unnatural. Remember, the communities that were divided in 1947 had coexisted for almost a millennium.

This independence day, I wish we celebrate our independence from British and not from each other.

The ‘Jugaado’ Genius – MS Dhoni

                From a small town, thrill seeking cricketer to the trademark calm, Mr. Cool has come a long way. Almost all modern era famous cricketers remind you of others from the past. In Dhoni, I could see no other. There is something about Dhoni’s sixers that advertise power.

                  It was just over the weekend I had watched MS Dhoni’s biopic. I was more stirred by the opening scene set in Wankhede Stadium during the 2011 World Cup final, than I had been by the actual match five years earlier!! In real life, Dhoni is one of the supreme one-day cricketers, a chillingly calm, calculating batsman for whom a run chase is a mathematical equation. It is a game he understands totally, in command of the nuances and strategies, capable and confident of making difficult decisions.

                 In the shorter (ODI) and shortest (T20) format of the game there is no greater genius than him. Street smart does not even begin to describe him. He is galli smart…alley clever…bylane canny. He is the shrewdest, most ingenious man on the ground. In fact English terms don’t do justice to his ingenuity. The right word to describe him is Jugaado. He can drive through a cul-de-sac & can bring democracy in China. Ok I stretched a little, but the fact is he always has a Plan B. And most of the times it works.

                  He smiles, he advises, he shows displeasure, he communicates with umpires, but while his messages are clear, no one could bet on what his thinking is. Dhoni is nothing if not practical. He stumped everyone once again (first being the Test retirement) by his announcement, preventing media speculations & BCCI’s conundrum about his future following Virat Kohli’s successful captainship in Test.

             Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s greatest legacy will be his spirit of a champion, a spirit that believed in carving out victory when defeat seemed imminent. His cool is now legendary, but has there ever been a captain with greater situational awareness than him? I would say, Never!!

Part of second paragraph adopted from Mike Selvey’s column in The Guardian (Dec 20^th 2014)

My Fellow Countrymen

                My fellow countrymen, I urge you today not as a non-resident Indian but as a common man of my motherland. We as a nation have faced gravest of challenges since our independence. From poverty, to illiteracy, from socialism to corruption, one decade after the other we have seen our dream of prosperous India fading away. And yet we keep on hoping. Hoping for an India that gives equal opportunity to all, for an India were justice is equal for all, for an India without any corruption.

                This is one of the rare occasions in independent India were benefits of a policy are going to be visible to the common man. Abolishing the 500-1000 bills can right many wrongs for our country. But some pain has to be shared. The intentions of this policy are very clear; it is for the national good. I don’t belong to any political party, but I am aligned to a leader who works for the betterment of our nation.

                Through all the chaos that is our history, through all of the pain and suffering, through all of our times, there is one thing that has always kept us going and that is our hope, our hope for believing in the future of India.

                This is a very rare occasion where the dreams of an entire nation are focused not on a politician or a leader but on the ‘patience’ of a common man.

America got Trumped by Americans!!

                 “So what now?” is the question on everyone’s mind? Including Donald Trump.

                48% of Americans decided to make one of the most polarizing figures in recent history to be there 45^th President. You are right Mr. Obama, Sun did rise today, but for some the warmth might not be the same as yesterday. What happened on the night of Nov 8^th 2016 in America, says a lot about the 48% Americans. It says that it’s totally fair to trade nebulous promises of economic success for racism, sexism, and xenophobia. I am no economic or social expert, but would love to see how the rust belt will get their jobs back and why will Mexico pay for building the wall.

                Last night was hard, and I certainly didn’t sleep much. But I like almost all working class Americans are at work this morning and we need to do the best we can to address the issues deep within our society that led us here. The idea of ‘America’ can’t be lost because of one election cycle. Remember: There was no perfect time in American history. America is a work in progress. This great democracy always had problems and hardworking Americans have always been working towards fixing them.

                There are many Americans across the United States who woke up this morning and are apprehensive because of their skin color, gender, religion, or sexual orientation. They might feel that their political voice is lost. I will urge to those Americans, please don’t give up, for America needs you more now, than ever before.

This time its different – 2016 US Presidential Elections

                

                It took almost 80 weeks & over a billion dollars for America to arrive on the ‘2016 Election Tuesday’. The world’s greatest democracy is going to exercise their right to vote in the 58^th quadrennial Presidential elections. 146 million will be lining up in the polling booths or sending in their choices via mail.

            These elections have been anything but cordial. Election is all about presenting different ideas and perspective so they tend to be heated, but this one went to the extreme. These are my fifth US elections that I am following and it has been definitely unlike the previous four.

·      The level of anxiety among ordinary people is palpable. For some reason almost the whole voting population of US is aware of everything that both the candidates have said or believe in; And strangely everyone whom I have spoken to have extreme views about the one that they dislike. Some dislike the ‘two faced’ Hilary while the rest don’t trust Trump’s ‘right leaning’ views.

·     Another jarring thing about these elections is the ‘outside’ influence. This would be the first time when news networks in America are mentioning Kremlin with US election night. There has been convincing proof of Russia being involved in STEALING (not leaking) internal materials to damage one candidate.

·        Not to mention the involvement of the Federal Bureau of investigation - An unprecedented bungling of public handling of the (legitimate) Clinton email investigation by Director Comey.

·       Finally the ‘slowness’ of the traditional media to learn about candidate’s inaccurate statements and how to handle candidates during national debates that are supposed to be focusing on their future policies and strategies. Instead the three debates became a slugfest of personal attacks.

                

     These elections almost became a ‘reality TV drama’. I strongly believe in the democratic institution and hope that after all of this United States of America will begin to heal starting Nov. 9^th. But one thing is for sure (& this is very unfortunate) 2016 US Presidential elections will go down in history as the one were in people voted for the candidate they ‘disliked’ less !!

Kashmir Conundrum

         It’s been almost ten days since the Uri attack. I wanted to wait so I can get over my impromptu patriotic emotion. Needless to say, first thing that crosses mind after repeated attacks is to enter Pakistan, guns blazing. But that won’t bring an end to this decades old crisis. Pakistan is almost a failed state and I won’t be surprised that these attacks are the brainchild of fundamentalist groups that don’t align with Islamabad. But just as during the partition, India needs to act like a responsible, elder brother. We are at the cusp of becoming an economic & political powerhouse and we shouldn’t let this issue derail our hard earned progress.

So what needs to be done? We can’t just be sitting ducks for the next attack.

To tell you the truth, I am not sure. But I know this…

      * We need to accept the fact that Kashmir is a ‘problem’. We can’t just keep stashing the social, economic & political issues under the article 370 blanket. Kashmir is not like other 28 states.

·       * We need to recognize that India is still one of the poorest countries in the world, we still struggle to provide adequate food, decent shelter, basic healthcare and enough clothes to almost one third of our population and we are spending an enormous portion of our meager resources on military confrontation.

                

      And so, on behalf of frustrated Indians, Pakistanis & unlucky Kashmiris, this is my appeal to all the ‘so-called’ foreign policy experts, local & foreign, figure out something before it’s too late.

Enough blood has been shed to shame the human race!!