A load of crap from an idle brainPersonal, Movies, Music, IT, India, Singapore, Politics, Fun

First a trip to smelly and dirty Chennai, then a trip to equally smelly and extremely dirty pilgrim town called Velankanni (with the famous shrine of Mary) and finally to an extremely clean, cold and windy Hyderabad.

Chennai was sweltering hot, i sweated buckets.  Coupled with that the scarcity of water and a city that is used by its citizens as a garbage dump.  You wonder where the municipal workers of the city are?  If at all they are doing the work.  Whether you are the middle of the city or at the outskirts, one thing that defines Chennai is the consistent crappy smell in the air.  The air stinks in Chennai and uniformly so.  Dont know why and how.  This is in addition to the dirt and filth all around.  Wonder which moron decided to name it a metro.

Velankanni was equally dirty.  For a piligrim town with such a potential for tourism, there are hardly any good lodge/hotels.  The only good ones are the dorms run by the church, but they too offer you rooms for the next day only.  And if you are the ones (like me) who just drop into the town with no reservations, hoping to stay at some hotel, be disappointed with the kinds of rooms you get there.  As for the restaurants, stay away if you dont want to come down with some extreme case of food poisoning or diarrhea.

If you have any plans of going to Velankanni, stay at Nagapattinam, a town near Velankanni.  Take a bus in the morning to Velankanni, see around and come back to Nagapattinam.  This was advised by my friends after i did my trip much to my exasperation.

Took a train from Chennai to Hyderabad.  Was travelling by the Indian Railways after more than 11 years and loved the experience.  Reached Hyderabad early morning around 6am on the 14th (our 1st wedding anniversary).   Was amazed at how clean the city of Hyderabad was at 6 in the morning.   Either the roads were swept clean or at some places the cleaners were hard at work.  Kudos to the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) and the people who work for them for keeping the city reasonably clean.

It was drizzling all through and there was a nice cool breeze.  Loved it. Since we were tired, we preferred to rest.  There was not much celebration for the anniversary as all plans were for wifey’s birthday which was 2 days later on the 16th.  Had a get together at home for friends and family for wifey’s birthday.

Later on in the week, went to the new mall in town, GVK-1.  Good place to hang out, but there was something lacking in the place.  I prefer Hyderabad Central or City Center.  Also the mall is pretty new and the shops are only coming up.  Maybe it will be good once it fills up.

Saw the movie New York.  Not bad i thought.  Better than the crap that Yash Raj is famous for churning out. Saw the movie at the new INOX multiplex at GVK-1.  The seating is good and so is the sound system.

Travelled back to Singapore via Chennai again.  From the superb airport of Hyderabad to a garbage can called Chennai Airport is a perfect example of what the private sector can do to our economy while at the same time, the Chennai airport run by the inefficient babus of Airports Authority of India have really screwed it up.

There were no seats at the international departure.  They simply disappeared.  For someone who’se flight is yet to start check-in, they simply have to stand there waiting for the counters to open.  Can you believe that?  What about the elderly and the people who need to rest?  Have the airport authorities ever thought about their comfort?

And the cafe’s selling stuff in Chennai airport are nothing but daylight robbery.  Tea is sold for Rs 30.  A samosa / aloo bonda costs Rs 60.  Whereas you get a good Cafe Coffee Day coffee at the Hyderabad airport for just Rs 15.

I can go on and on about the pathetic situation at Chennai airport, but its a waste of time.  Its a perfect example of why the airport needs to be handed over to a private player so that they can do a better job of the same.  Anyone with doubts can look at Hyderabad, Bangalore, Delhi and Bombay airports and compare them to the ones run by AAI.  There is simply no comparison.

Back at office and a mountain of work stares me in the face.  Time to get going.

Chennai picture courtesy: I’m seeing green ;  Hyderabad tank bund and NTR gardens picture courtesy: Hyderabad

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Shouldn’t these have been done earlier considering the fact that much of the products that originate from China are not only spurious, of inferior quality,  harmful to humans and the security of the nation (especially the cellphones with no IMEI numbers).

The government on Wednesday put quality restrictions on mobile phones, dairy products and toys in a measure aimed mainly to block their imports from China and which may trigger another round of wrangling at the WTO between two of Asia’s biggest economies.

The Directorate-General of Foreign Trade said mobile handsets without the IMEI (International Mobile Equipment Identity) number, which helps authorities to track the sale and use of the phones, cannot be imported from now on. An estimated eight lakh such phones come into the country every month from China. These are unbranded and cost a lot less than the branded variety.

Security agencies had raised concern over the use of these phones, many of which, they said, were being used by terrorists to set off bombs and communicate among themselves. Since these sets do not have the 15-digit IMEI number, or cloned numbers, the authorities find it difficult to track the sale or usage. Approximately 30 million such phones are in use at present.

The DGFT also banned till January 2010 the import of toys that do not meet international safety standards and norms. This move too will hit imports of toys mainly from China and several other countries. India had blocked import of toys from China in January on health grounds, after concerns over their safety were raised in developed markets. But the restriction was eased later after Beijing questioned the restrictions on the ground that New Delhi did not put such curbs on toys from other countries.

More than a dozen countries in Asia and Africa had also banned milk and dairy product imports from China, while several others had recalled the products suspected to be contaminated. India, world’s largest milk producer, does not import milk products from China. The ban is being seen as a preventive measure.

Meanwhile, the government has asked its missions in the African region to step up vigil against bootlegged drugs being sent to those markets with fake `Made in India’ tag. The commerce department last week lodged a complaint with the Chinese embassy here and the Indian embassy in Beijing and sought action against the impostors.

The Indian action comes after Nigeria’s pharma regulator reported the detention of a large consignment of fake drugs for treating malaria. The consignment carried `Made in India’ labels but was produced in China. A laboratory test of a recent consignment of anti-malaria drugs Maloxine and Amalar tablets proved these were fake. Had the drugs flowed into the market, about 642,000 lives would have been affected.

/Newslink/

Hope the ban stays long enough.

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With  the help of the great guys at Just host, i managed to migrate over all the data from my wordpress blog to this new domain. There are a few duplicates here and there and also the blogroll hasnt been updated.  Am in the process of fixing up all the small niggles.

Your advise, words of encouragement, criticism is very much appreciated as i start off this new journey.  Plan to write more on my investments, politics, economy, integrate all my pictures and much much more.  More importantly, i plan to segregate all of them well so that someone looking for information on this blog doesnt need to crack his head.

Thanks for dropping by. Much appreciated.

Above picture source: Biblesociety

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It might be too early to make such a declaration, but a lot of pointers indicate that such an unthinkable thing has already started.  Has the Great American Dream that the Indian families so fondly cherished started to grind to a halt? Or is it just a temporary pause?

Remember those days when the H1-B visa quota was reduced from 150,000 to 65,000 and the furore it created during the Bush regime.  Even Bill Gates slammed the US govt for such a myopic decision of not wanting to get in as many people from developing countries such as India into the USA.

A few years ago, when the H1-B visa window opened, it was filled up within a matter of few hours.  This year, the window has been open for 7 weeks already and still 20,000 vacancies still exist.  What happened?

Owing to sluggish US economy, the H-1B visa programme, once the most sought after among Indian professionals, still has nearly 20,000 slots vacant, seven weeks after the American authorities started receiving applications for the fiscal 2010 beginning October this year.

The US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) yesterday said it has so far received approximately 45,500 H-1B petitions against the Congressionally-mandated cap of 65,000.

This is in contrast to the previous years when USCIS had to resort to computerised draw of lots as it used to receive petitions outnumbering the cap several times within the first few days of opening the scheme.

The USCIS said it has received about 20,000 petitions for the advanced degrees category. However, it would continue to accept advanced degree petitions since experience has shown that not all applications received are approvable, the USCIS said in a statement.

For the fiscal 2010, the USCIS started receiving H-1B petitions from April 1. In the first five working days, it received 42,000 H-1B petitions. In the month and half since then, USCIS has received juts 3,500 more H-1B petitions, indicating the slump in demand for H-1B work visas.

This is mainly attributed to the current economic crisis, high unemployment rate in the US and also partly to anti-H-1B sentiment prevailing in America at present.

Source

Agree that Obama has stopped giving tax breaks to companies that ship jobs outside the US, but then why the reluctance of the Indians to go to the US now?

A recent survey showed that almost 86% of Indian students in the US believe that better days lie ahead for India.  A lot of them favour a return back to India inspite of the salary cut they might have to take.  I know a few friends who have left it all and moved back.  I read the blog of one such person who writes about his experiences in India post his move back from the US.

Have we reached the end of the brain-drain that was so endemic in the 80s and 90s?  Only time will tell.

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Double Standards

While the Indian government, political leaders and businessmen have no qualms berating Obama for setting up protectionist barriers towards American companies that ship jobs abroad. The same can’t be said about these same Indian politicians who deny the basic education, jobs to people who are not of a certain caste, religion etc. The caste based reservations have caused havoc in the way seats are assigned for professional courses and jobs. Its one place where the Government of India balantly discriminates against its own citizens just because they are born in some other caste. But they will go hammer and tongs at the American government for doing something to protect the jobs for its own citizens.

At least the American government doesnt discriminate against its own people as the Indian government does. In terms of transparency, the Indian economy is ranked 123 in the Economic Freedom World rankings whereas the USA is ranked 6th.  That just goes to show how protectionist the Indian government and its economy is. What then gives the politicians the moral authority to rail against Obama and his team for trying to deny tax breaks to companies that ship jobs overseas? Obama is elected by Americans. He is responsible for their well being. The Indian politician also claims that the protectionist measure he espouses is for the well being of Indians.  Then why the double standards?

Isnt it time we set our own house in order before throwing stones at others?

Greed

A few years ago there used to be 3 airlines that flew between Singapore and Hyderabad.  They were Silkair (a subsidiary of Singapore Airlines), Indian Airlines and Air India.  Both Indian Airlines and Air India merged to become one entity.  As the passenger load factor between the 2 cities increased, the greedy Singapore Airlines (SQ) replaced Silkair with SQ and jacked up prices (from approx SG$ 600 to approx SG$1070).

Mysteriously, Air India also stopped flying between the 2 cities citing rationalising of routes leaving travellers at the mercy of the high priced SQ.  I quit using SQ and stared flying by Tiger Airways to Chennai and took the domestic Kingfisher Airlines.  In spite of the round trip, it saved me more than SG$500 (approx 15,000 rupees) per trip.

As the recession set in, people started flying less.  It started to tell on the SQ passenger load factor.  They started to fly almost empty.  Slowly SQ reduced its frequency between the 2 cities to just 3 trips a week.  And, now they have announced that once again SQ will be replaced by Silkair and that it will fly between the two cities 5 times a week starting June 15th.

The excessive greed of Singapore Airlines in wanting to make as much money from the paying public with its ridiculous pricing has made sure that it has lost many customers.  I for one, have sworn never to fly SQ again.  I also advise all my friends and relatives to avoid it as much as possible. Not only on this sector, but everywhere. I advise them to fly Thai, Malaysian, Sri Lankan, Emirates, Cathay Pacific….. anything, except SQ.

The only way we, as the paying public can bring all these high flying business establishments who try to screw us with their peak pricing and monopolistic business practices is to hit them where it hurts them the most.  At their pockets.

I did. And am happy to see SQ lose business and now start to fly its low fare subsidiary, Silkair between Singapore and Hyderabad.  Hope at least now SQ will realise that greed does pay in the short run, but over a long period they will only lose business and alienate their customers forever.

Hope this recession teaches all the businesses some valuable lessons.

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