Marriage by barter

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I was reading the Times of India, when I came across a rather curious report. Apparently the Haryana Police stopped the wedding of a 15 year old minor. In a country that contributes to over 40% of the child marriages across the world, that in itself is not newsworthy. Minors do get married in rural towns and where police is informed they step in and make sure the rituals do not take place. Parents are suitably warned by the police, educated and counselled by social activists and life goes on.

The story of this minor was more complex. She was getting married on the same day as her maternal uncle. Her uncle was getting married to her prospective groom's sister. Now that the police had stopped her marriage, they had affectively stopped both weddings. A suitable bride (i.e. not someone below the age of 18) had to be found as her replacement for both the marriages to take place. The problem arose because of acute shortage of women. The uncle could only get married if he could in turn ensure the marriage of his future brother-in-law. Easy enough to solve if you have a niece, so what if she is only 15 years old?

As per the TOI,
"Haryana is reduced to this because of its deeply skewed sex ratio. A state government report admits there are just 822 females for every 1000 men in the 0 to 6 years category. The ratio falls even further in the literate population: 618 females to 1000 males. In some villages in the state, notably Malerna and Duleypur, the sex ratio at birth is 370 and 400 females per 1,000 males respectively".

There are families in this part of rural India that end up using the ancient barter system to ensure that their children don't remain unmarried. A girl and a boy from each side solves this problem nicely. The problem is when they don't have girls of marriageable age, then they make do with the minors in their family.

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No Entry Load on Indian Mutual Funds

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There is some good news for the small time investors in India. SEBI has abolished entry loads in Mutual Funds. Previously, any investment made through a distributor attracted an entry load of 2.25% which was paid as commission to the distributor. If the investment was made directly to the Mutual Fund, it attracted no entry load. By abolishing entry loads, SEBI has acted in favour of small time investors like us because it means we will now be able make our investments at reduced cost.

My understanding is also that distributors and investors can negotiate the amount of commission to be paid for an investment. This commission can be paid separately and directly and does not have to come out the original investment. This will allow the client to evaluate the service provided by the broker. While some of these brokers provide enough information which allows the investors to make informed decisions, others simply collect cheques, fill up forms. Why should both types of brokers make the same kind of commission? The obvious concern from the distributors and brokers is that it is a loss of income for them. The investors will now in many cases not pay any commission or pay a small negotiated amount. As a small time investor it is not really a concern that I share. From my perspective, it's a great move because I get to benefit from it. If I approach a broker from a piece of advice or a recommendation, then it must not be a particular product just because it will give the broker maximum benefits. The recommended product must be good for my investment needs and not the profits the broker makes out of it.

Brokers have also been guilty of 'portfolio churning'. I once met a guy who under advisement of his broker invested in over 40 different mutual funds over a period of 3 years. Every time there was a new fund offer, his broker would call him and convince him to make an investment in the latest schemes. 3 years later this guy had a heavily fragmented and over diversified portfolio while the broker continued to make merry. If he didn't have money to invest, then the broker would advise him to get rid of an underperforming fund (with 40 to choose from, there were plenty of them). Then this guy would sell off an underperforming fund and invest into another new fund. To say that this guy made a loss on his investments because of the greed of his broker is an understatement. It would be interesting to see how much this guy would have actually stood to gain had he invested in the same money under proper advice. This change of policy by SEBI should put to rest such unscrupulous acts by brokers. It ensures that the best chance for the broker to continue to make money is if his clients stay invested in the fund. This way the broker will continue to get a trailing commission from the fund.

I have another concern. Now that mutual funds will not get as much commission for the broker, what will he resort to? There are other investment products in the market that are not regulated by SEBI and which fetch much better commission rates, sometimes ridiculously high. These products are insurance related investments which the financial industry recognizes as ULIPS. ULIPS are essentially investment vehicles that provide insurance as well and equity investments, all bundled into one product. In India, they are extremely expensive and also fetch good money to the broker who convinces his clients to invest in them. ULIPs being part of the insurance industry are regulated by IRDA. SEBI has historically been more investment friendly than IRDA and that doesn't look like it's going to change anytime soon. While SEBI's move may well be a boon for the informed and educated retail investors, it may also drive gullible investors into the arms of gleeful insurance companies, who are more than happy to extract high commission rates and pay some of it to the brokers.

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The Investment Paradox

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Ever wondered what is the most effective way to make investments in equity markets or mutual funds? When I decided that I wanted to create an investment portfolio, I spent a decent amount of time researching on the internet, speaking to people and reading popular investment magazines and books. It would have been foolish to put money on something without actually understanding what it entails, the pitfalls and the rewards, the dos and the don'ts. I had seen markets surge forward and knew of people who made a bundle of money. I had seen the markets tumble to new depths and the same people lost money and it was more than a bundle. What is the best way to invest money in the markets and at the same time protect yourself from the volatility that comes with the territory?

One of the strategies that appealed the most to me was to have a systematic investment plan. The basic premise behind systematic investment plan (SIP) is to allocate a fixed amount of money every month and invest it. Stock markets are cyclical in nature. There will be months when the stocks are trading high and there will months when they are trading low. By investing systematically every month you are effectively averaging out the cost of your investments, reducing your risks in a volatile market and increasing your gains. There are other advantages to consider, you will avoid having to make lump sum investments. When the money is going out of your pocket (or bank) in small amounts, it doesn't hurt. The bottom line is that to think big in investments, start by thinking small.

Now it's time to discuss the paradox. Systematic investments are nothing new. They have been around for many years now and many people have benefitted from it. The odd thing about these investments is that whenever the market falls, people stop their monthly debits. The flow of monies into the funds reduces alarmingly. At the same time people try to liquidate their investments putting redemption pressures on the fund itself. The point that perplexes me so much is that when equities crash, it's precisely the time to continue with the monthly investments because you are buying stocks are much lower valuations.

Take the example of ELSS equity funds in India. March 2008, saw an inflow of 1317 crores in ELSS funds (approx. 263 million dollars @ 50 rupees a dollar). Subsequently the markets crashed like never before. April 2009, saw an inflow of 93 crores (approx. 18 million dollars). What that means is that while the markets crashed more and more people stopped investing in the market. Monthly inflows were not even 10% of when the market was at its highest.

That sounds logical doesn't it? Why invest in equity markets when the value of your investments is going to fall and not grow? Flawed thinking in my opinion.

If you have invested in equities in 2007 and the early part of 2008, then you have purchased them at a higher value (compared to what transpired later on). If you stopped your investments at that time then you have deprived yourself of buying the same equities at a much lower price. Think of it another way, would you buy your favourite brand of jeans if it was on sale for 70% off? So why wouldn't you apply similar thinking to your favourite equity which over a period of time will go back to its original price if not more. Not investing when the markets are down actually makes it very difficult for you to recover investments made when the valuations are high.

The problem I see with most investors is that they think of today or think about the next 6 months which is short sighted when you want to create wealth in an asset class such as equity. In order to be truly profitable when buying equities, I think requires a waiting period of at least 5 years or more. If your investment horizon is much shorter then you should look for alternate asset classes that can give you guaranteed but lower returns.

The last two months have seen an incredible growth in the Indian equity markets. The Sensex jumped from below 8,000 points to over 15,000 since the beginning of March 2009. Guess what, now that the markets are going back up, everyone is investing again. People tend to invest on higher valuations than lower. Strange, don't you think?

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Identities – Part VI – The Politics of Identity

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Identity Politics is an attempt to empower a group of people that have a basic differentiation from the rest based on their race, colour, religion, caste, ethnicity, culture, region, sex, sexual orientation and a multitude of such other identifiers. Many of its practitioners are well intentioned highlighting the plight suffered by their group. For example, there have been multiple feminist movements across the world. These movements often run campaigns on issues like female infanticide, dowry harassment, sexual harassment, domestic violence, equal rights, honour killing etc. Another example is Gay Rights Activists, running campaigns on equal rights for Gays. Highlighting these Identity based issues plays in important role in a civil society that promises to give equal rights to all its members. It is an attempt to address a problem area that confines a particular group to the backwaters of a society.

The problem I have is that Identity based politics can get a lot uglier when the same practitioners look for political representation. I am not talking about feminism, gay rights, environmentalists and various such other groups. I am talking about Identity groups that seek to enter mainstream politics. Groups that cater exclusively to black or white, Christian, Muslim or Hindus, Yadavs or Dalits etc

Let's take a classic example. The British National Party is an exclusive whites-only political party in the United Kingdom. Party membership is limited to "Indigenous Caucasians". One of the objectives of the BNP is to see an all white nation. It wants to send all immigrants back to their home country. What about non-Caucasian people who are now naturalised British citizens or non-Caucasian people who were born in United Kingdom? Well, tough luck if you are one of them. They want to send you back "home" as well, never mind that you don't know of a home outside mother England. The BNP however does not have a problem with white immigrants. Those folks are fine and dandy. Thankfully the British public has so far denied the BNP any representation in the Parliament. They do however manage to win a handful of local council elections. Interestingly, the wards in which they do win are some of the most economically backward wards in the whole of Britain.

Alas, United Kingdom is not the only country that has to deal with far-right winged politics. Germany has National Democratic Party of Germany to contend with. This political setup is very similar to the BNP in its ideology. News about them reached even India when Obama was elected President of the United States. They apparently felt his presidency was the result of "the American alliance of Jews and Negroes". Like UK and Germany, almost every democratic country in the world has to tolerate such divisive and hate based politics.

You would want to elect a candidate based on a development platform, based on election promises that focus on improving our day to day lives. But instead we have to deal with candidates who don't have any focus of development. Their basic premise is to induce mass paranoia among the general public. It's almost like they are thinking – 'Let's scare them so much that development is no longer the most important issue. Let's make them insecure, unsure, hesitant and suspicious. They will have no choice but to vote for us'.

I cannot discuss Identity politics and not discuss India. It is like talking about flying reindeers and not talking about Santa Claus. India is a country with amazing diversity, diversity in its languages, regions, religions and caste permutations. It's the Promised Land for all Identity Politician wannabes. Unlike other countries, Identity politics can actually get you political mileage and the elusive seat of power. Interestingly many of the identity politicians in India are not far-right in their ideology. They are so self-serving that often their ideology is obscured and relatively unimportant in the larger scheme of things.

I list below just three such interesting identity political parties.
Shiv Sena – Can claim to be one of India's first right wing political parties. This politic party was born out of perceived marginalization of Marathi people living in Maharashtra and a strong advocate of a pan-Indian Hindu identity. It was also vehemently anti-Muslim in the 1990s but these days its ire is concentrated on the immigration of North Indians to Bombay (Mumbai)

Bahujan Samaj Party – Stands for the rights of Dalits. The political setup is controlled in an authoritarian manner by Mayawati, U.P's current Chief Minister. Her net worth today runs into hundreds of millions of rupees. She has no ideological leaning worth talking about, having opportunistically aligned with BJP, Congress, SP and the Left during various elections in the last 15 years. It is her ambition to be the next Prime Minister of India. God have mercy on us.

DMK and AIADMK – Both political parties represent the Dravidian movement and have a strong presence in Tamil Nadu. So strong that since 1967 Tamil Nadu seen 16 Chief Ministers - all of whom are either from DMK or AIADMK. The Dravidian movement started out as an anti- Brahmanism, opposition to Hindi and even cessation from India much of which subsided in the 1960s.

The most encouraging factor of the 2009 Indian General Election has been the defeat of many of the identity based political parties. Caste and race permutations failed in this election. For instance, Shiv Sena lost in its stronghold of Bombay, BSP lost seats even in constituencies where the scheduled castes were in a majority. Is our electorate getting wiser? Only time will tell.

Part I - Groups and Affiliation
Part II - Stereotypes
Part III - Ghettos
Part IV - Zeitgeist
Part V - The Fear of Small Numbers

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Identities – Part V – The Fear of Small Numbers

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Part I - Groups and Affiliation
Part II - Stereotypes
Part III - Ghettos
Part IV - Zeitgeist

The title to this blog entry is inspired by a newspaper article I read a few months back on a book written by Arjun Appadurai called Fear of Small Numbers: An Essay on the Geography of Anger. For those of you who want a copy, it can found on any of the regular online book stores, like Amazon. I have never actually read the book, only the review in the newspaper. Still, I found the title of the book in itself is very fascinating. I have found no other book title so compelling in recent times. It made me pause, take a deep breath and contemplate on the meaning and its significance. When you spend time thinking about it, so much unravels. This blog entry is an attempt to pen down those thoughts. Mr. Appadurai apparently explains about globalization and co-relates the global unrest and terrorism to it. While his thoughts are those of a seasoned anthropologist and intellect, mine are from a layman's perspective and they have absolutely nothing to do with globalization.

'The fear of small numbers' makes me wonder why we fear small numbers in the first place. Why is it that minorities are viewed with so much indifference, suspicion and sometimes hate? In certain societies, minorities feel they don't have equal rights to the majority even if in the modern free democratic world we are all supposedly equal in the eyes of the law and we have the same rights granted to us by the constitution. While some minorities feel like second class citizens others feel oppressed and discriminated against, not to mention those hordes of people who lost their lives imply because they were not in the majority. Indo-Fijians constitute over 35% of the population of Fiji, yet their political representation has been scuttled over a series of coups since the 1980s. They represent a classic case of a community that feels at times as if they don't have the same rights as the rest of the country. The African American population and the civil rights movements to restore equal rights are well documented throughout American history. It's hardly surprising that over 90% of African Americans voted this time in Obama's historic election to the White House. This is the very same building where people of Obama's race were not allowed to enter in the early parts of the 19^th century unless they were part of the housekeeping staff. The African Americans are examples of a race that faced discrimination in the form of brutal slavery and blatant unequal rights.

We can go as far back in history as we want to look at how a dominant group over powers a minority. The indigenous Australians, Aboriginals today constitute less that 3% of the population on the land mass that once completely belonged to them. A majority of their culture, customs and languages are today considered endangered. Under the Australian law, children of mixed heritage were forcibly removed from their parents so that they could assimilate into the Australian culture. Their neighbors, the Maoris, suffered a similar fate of cultural and numerical decimation. In many ways, the natives of Australia and New Zealand fared much better than those of Latin and Central America – the Mayans, the Incas and the Aztecs. We can go back to biblical times, the times when the Hebrews were enslaved to the Egyptian Pharaohs and oppressed to such a degree that God sent to them a Prophet who liberated and took them to the Promised Land.

In modern times, there is no such thing as the Promised Land. There is no land free of occupation. The independence of countries like Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania lead to a mass exodus of people of Asian (read Indian) origin from these countries to places like England. Zimbabwean land reforms in the last decade lead to the redistribution of land to the majority population as the government contended that the whites while numbering only a percent of the population held a majority of the land. This redistribution in turn has led the large scale displacement of the population and the collapse of the economy. Many of the displaced white minorities have now migrated to all parts of the world. The average life expectancy of a Zimbabwean is 36 years.

Slavery, cultural annihilation, displacement and racial/religious discrimination aren't the lowest levels we can stoop to. Our humanity is capable of falling off a cliff. We are a species that's capable of Ethnic Cleansing. The slaughter of 6 million Jews in World War II is not the only example in our history. As recently as 1994, saw the genocide of Tutsis by the Hutus majority in Rwanda that saw the death of over a million people. Around the same time, the largest mass murder in Europe since World War II was perpetuated in Bosnia by Bosnian Serb forces against Bosnian Muslims. This happened despite the area being declared a safe zone by the UN and despite UN peacekeeping forces deployed there. Further crimes against humanity were committed across Bosnia, Kosovo and Croatia. In each and every case of genocide in our bloody history, victims were selected, separated, segregated, stripped, raped and brutally killed in unimaginable ways because of one and only one reason – their identity.

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Letter to the Prime Minister

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Dear Dr. Manmohan Singh,

Firstly, many congratulations on securing a historic second 5 year term at the helm. It pleases me greatly as an Indian to see an acclaimed and renowned economist and intellect par excellence as my Prime Minister.

As the stock markets indicted on Monday, 18^th May, it is also an occasion of great optimism that you can now run a government without the Left pulling strings, hampering your every progressive reform. There can be no better opportunity than this to make up for your previous term on economic reforms where frankly you were allowed to do very little. The mandate you have got during this General Election is loud and clear. India has voted for stability during a time when there is global chaos. India has voted for a sitting Prime Minister whose integrity and honesty is beyond doubt. India now needs to see that confidence in you translated into the kind of performance that made you a household name during the early 1990s, i.e. the era of economic liberalization.

There have already been some pleasing reports in the newspapers on government formation and the Cabinet's new members. If they are to be believed, this time round the new government will have a higher representation of young ministers. It is also being mentioned that non-performing ministers from your previous term may not find a berth. It was also pleasing to hear that this time MPs with criminal proceedings against them will not be invited as the bargaining capacity of your allies has reduced significantly. How much of this will materialize will be known soon enough when the Cabinet is announced and all the ministers are sworn in. Nevertheless, the Indian voters can still celebrate the fact that this time you do not even need the support of RJD, LJP, SP and JMM. These parties like the proverbial Shylock and they would have extracted their pound of flesh from you.

As an Indian I have two primary concerns which I hope will get top consideration from your administration.

Fiscal Deficit
India's fiscal deficit is in excess of a mind boggling 45 billion dollars; one of the highest in the world. With revenues falling short of expectations and borrowing higher than expected, it seems this deficit is only getting bigger. It is hoped that your administration addresses this issue and bring down the deficit within the next 2 years. Now the Left parties do not have the same level of influence in Delhi, it is hoped that you can pursue PSU disinvestment aggressively and bring in much needed cash into the government coffers. Also of concern is the liquidity in the market (or the lack it). There are market expectations of the interest rates coming down and I hope these expectations are not without basis.

Security
We live in an increasingly volatile neighborhood. The safety and the well being of ourselves, our families, our local neighborhoods, our cities and of our all our countrymen is of paramount importance. We live during times where our rich diversity is being used against us by vested external and internal forces to drive a wedge between us. The very social fabric of our society is being torn apart. There is an urgent need to implement inclusive and progressive policies, introduce education to the hundreds of millions of our countrymen and to bring the prosperity of a growing economy to the rural population.

I was very disappointed with the Mumbai 26/11 attacks. While I was alarmed and concerned over the attacks, they did not represent my biggest disappointment. I understand that in a country as large and as populated as ours, security checks, intelligence reports and the ability of thwart terrorism is an extremely difficult job. The British Prime Minister once said after the July attacks in London, that if the government raised an alert on every threat perception and gave out information on every threat stopped then the country will come to a complete stand still and pandemonium would ensue. I accept that argument on face value.

What baffled me during the Mumbai 26/11 attack was our response time and our ability to stop an ongoing terror. We watched in amazement for 48 hours as our country was held at random by less than a dozen terrorists. It felt incredible that so much time was taken to mobilize our commandos. Crisis Management, co-ordination and response time was woefully lacking that day. I hope during your tenure, steps will be taken to address these anomalies in our security.

I look forward to a safer and brighter India, to a better tomorrow. This General Election holds great promise for us and in turn it has given me great hope.

Yours sincerely,
M Shariff

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Identity Complex

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What better place to rant than your own blog. I was just reading an article in the Times on the Indian Peace Keeping Force. It was an interesting article and it details the problems India faced in Sri Lanka during the time the forces were deployed there [1987-1990] with the objective of ending the ensuing civil war. The relevance of the article was that just a couple of days the Sri Lankan army informed the media about the death of LTTE leader Prabhakaran. Now I don't particularly have a problem with the analysis. It was nice and succinct. What ticked me off was the title "India's Vietnam".

Why is it that we cannot see ourselves and introspect without comparing ourselves to other? In the past few months I have seen similar headlines and somehow I feel resentful when I see such headlines.

India's 9/11 – In reference to the September 11 attack on the World Trade Center. Both were acts of terrorism but forgive me if I think of it as India's 26/11 and not as India's 9/11.

India's Josef Fritzl - In reference to a father being questioned by the police for raping his daughter. Now Josef Fritzl is surely not the first father to commit such unspeakable crimes, neither is the Indian the first such low life scum in India. The headline is a pitiful attempt to draw out the viewer or the reader's attention.

There are far too many issues with the Indian media these days. The satellite era has seen the emergence of many news channels each one competing for the viewer's attention. As a result, they have resorted to sensationalizing issues to hold on the view's attention. The quality of the print media has also gone down steadily. Some of our most circulated newspapers are no better than tabloids.

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BJP’s strategy post 2009 elections.

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The 2009 General Elections have concluded and the results are out. The Congress along with its allies has 262 seats, marginally short of a simple majority. In a country that has followed coalition politics for two decades that's as close to a mandate as you are going to get. Dr. Manmohan Singh became the first Prime Minister after Panditji to be reelected after completing a 5 year term. This is an extraordinary achievement for a man who in his own words is a politician by accident. The country has voted for stability and for continuity during a time when everyone feared a fractured verdict and post election horse trading. BJP in the meanwhile are despondent. They fared even worse than they did in the 2004 election when they lost power. In what was supposed to be a photo-finish the Congress led UPA ended with over a 100 seats more than the BJP lead NDA. The BJP's seat count was reduced by nearly 20 MPs.

This almost certainly means the end of the career of L.K Advani. By the time the next General Elections are held in 2014 he will be 85 years old. It would be unreasonable for anyone to expect him to be the party's Prime Ministerial candidate 5 years from now. It will be unreasonable to expect an increasingly young electorate to identity with him. After all, should he win in 2014 and last the full term, he will be in his 90s. Indications are that he wants to step down as the Leader of the Opposition. That should affectively bring curtains to the Vajpayee-Advani era in BJP's history. Where does the BJP go from here? Who among their next generation will be the face of the BJP? More crucially will the BJP further dilute their ideology in an attempt to appeal to a larger vote base or will they harden their stance, their core Hindutva beliefs and strengthen their current vote base?

The answers to these questions will start emerging in the months to come. To start with, if L.K Advani does not reconsider his decision to stand down as Leader of Opposition, then the BJP will need to fill that position with someone else. The current favorites will be Shushma Swaraj, Murli Manohar Joshi or even Rajnath Singh. Will Narendra Modi take centre stage? More importantly, will he be allowed to? Narendra Modi was one of the main campaigners of the BJP in this General Election. It's clear that his shrill rhetoric and personal attacks on his opponents does not resonate with the public outside Gujarat. It is also apparent that outside of Gujarat, he has not been able to translate his popularity into votes for the BJP. It is the state of Karnataka and not Gujarat that has sent most number of the BJP MPs to the Lok Sabha. The bottom line for Mr. Modi is that his state does not send substantially large number of MPs to the Lok Sabha and the myth of his nationwide appeal seems busted, at least for now. Given those permutations, it would be fascinating to see if the central leadership in the BJP gives Modi any elbow space and if Modi himself will risk relocating to Delhi.

Within the minority community, a suspicion lingers on that communal tension simmer when the BJP remains in opposition for long. Now that they are forced to wait another 5 years, the biggest fear of the minorities is that BJP might look to replicate its Gujarat model elsewhere across India. The consolation is that last time a saffron Delhi watched as mute spectators while Gujarat burnt. This time the hope remains that Delhi will react faster if such a situation arises.

It will be fascinating if the internal findings of political parties become public information. Public posturing of all political parties rarely reflects their internal assessments. What would the BJP attribute to its failure? Is their core constituency shrinking? Do more and more urban and rural voters disagree with the politics of divide and hate? Should the BJP adopt an inclusive model or should continue to concentrate on their core Hindu voters? M.J Akbar in the Times of India made a very interesting observation. He said India is not a secular country because that's how the Indian Muslims want it. It's a secular country because that's how the Indian Hindus want it. A large majority of the Hindus in this country do not believe in an exclusive model of politics. This election has also given resounding thumbs down to identity politics. The Hindus and the Muslims of this country, the Brahmins and the Dalits, the North and the South Indians, all of them want the politics want to be based on development and not on identity.

The BJP should be able to recognize this model themselves. Nitish Kumar, their ally in Bihar has had a spectacular victory. His governance since 2005 has been both progressive and inclusive. So successful was he that he has singlehandedly decimated Lalu's RJD and Paswan's LJP. For the first time in Bihar, the politics of development trumped over the politics of identity. The Yadavs, the Jats, the Muslims and the backward classes all voted for Nitish Kumar. That's a big lesson for all political parties to learn from. There are now state governments that are coming back to power on the basis of pro-incumbency. That includes BJP states like Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh. That includes Congress states like Delhi and Andhra Pradesh.

The million dollar question is which way will the BJP go? Will they practice a more inclusive brand of politics? Will they succumb to the pressures of an ideology that sees the primacy of one community and culture in what is essentially a multi-cultural society?

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Identities – Part IV – Zeitgeist

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Part I - Groups and Affiliation
Part II - Stereotypes
Part III - Ghettos

My history teacher in high school had a very unique way to teach. It's probably on the reasons I enjoy history as a subject and why I am intrigued so much by socio-political issues. She once wrote down ZEITGEIST on the board and asked us to spend some time finding out what it meant. There were brownie points up for grabs. The only hint she was prepared to give was that it was not an English word. Now this was a pre-internet era where personal computers were just coming in. Only one of my classmates had a computer at home and he was the envy of the whole class. Google was almost a decade away. Our history book for the term, our curriculum and indeed those of our seniors contained no reference to Zeitgeist. What the heck did it mean anyway? And what was its relevance to our subject.

Zeitgeist as I was taught that year is a German word and refers to the way a group of people think, believe and behave during a specific time period. During the preceding or subsequent era people would have felt differently. Wikipedia defines Zeitgeist as - the intellectual, cultural, ethical and political climate, ambience and morals of an era and also notes that Zeitgeist can only be observed for past events. In the previous week while studying World War II, the general consensus in our class was OK Hitler was this total nutcase; a gifted orator and all that but a nutcase nonetheless. He was responsible for the death of millions of people. The only fault of this people was that they had a different identity, they were Jewish, an identity that Hitler hated and he wanted to establish this pure Aryan race. OK Point accepted. But what about the rest of the Germany? Why did they go along? Can you bend an entire nation to do your bidding? Was there no one who felt they were doing any wrong? Yes, we had heard of the Gestapo and yes we knew how humiliated the Germans would have felt during the Treaty of Versailles. We learnt all of it but we could not reconcile to the idea of an entire nation being unable to stop the lunacies of one man. A society contains a variety of people; it contains its intellectual class, its artists, a judiciary, military and policing arm, a representation of people from all sections of society. That variety acts like a fail-safe mechanism. It protects a society and keeps it in line. In the Nazi era however, the fail-safe mechanism did not trigger. How else can one man manage alter the ideological beliefs of an entire nation? Zeitgeist was our teacher's way at offering an explanation. She said Hitler was able to influence the "spirit" of the "times". Zeit is time and Geist is spirit. He was able to channel the resent of the Germans into what he was convinced would become world dominance.

You just have to look behind in the past to see the number of ironies life throws back at us. Somehow we never learn from history. The Jewish community was persecuted for centuries in Europe culminating with the horrific events of World War II. They carved out a nation in the heart of the Middle East and today scores of Palestinians have become victims of a Ghettoized society, forced to live in refugee camps by the very group of people who were themselves victims and survivors of Ghettoism. How can the Jews, a group of people persecuted in the past, have no empathy towards another group? How can they disfranchise and displace the Palestinians and consign them to decades of misery. The irony is that if there is any community that should have understood the plight of the Palestinians, it should have been the Jews. No Arab can even come close to understanding it but a persecuted Jew should be able to understand, because his forefathers have faced much worse, because he has walked down that road before, and he knows the miseries that lie ahead.

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Identities – Part III - Ghettos

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Part I and Part II of the Identities series

It's hard to talk about Identity groups and not mention Ghettos. Although the origin of this term takes us back some 500 years, it's only the last century that the term has gained prominence when talking about social groups. In 1516, Jews in Venice were forced to stay in area called the 'Venetian Ghetto'. The same area, within which the Jews lived in, also contained iron foundries used for cooling slag. Slag in Venetian is "gheta". I read about Ghettos in history lessons about World War II for the first time. A majority group (Germans) rounded up a minority group (Jewish people) and forced them to live in a restricted neighborhood. This as we learnt in school was not the final destination. From here, they were sent to concentration camps.

The Ghettos of the Second World War were neighborhoods, districts even, where people of a community were segregated and forced to live. Seventy years later, the creation of modern day ghettos has not always been by force of law. Ghettos today are created primarily because of socio-economic reasons. You have black neighborhoods and white neighborhoods in America. You have Muslim neighborhood in India. While one Ghetto has been formed because of the color of your skin, another Ghetto has been created because of the God you chose to worship. But race and religion are not alone when it comes to Ghettos. You have Chinatowns, Irish, Italian, Hispanic, Caribbean and many other nationalities that formed their own neighborhoods across urban America.

I lived in London for over 4 years. If there is any city in the world that can boast of having a true multi-national population then it must be dear old London. You can't strictly call them Ghettos but they represent broad groups of nationalities, races and religions; living across London in bunches. Wembly has a high population of Gujratis. East Ham has a high population of Tamilians. Southall has a large population of Punjabis. Imagine my surprise when the train stops in Southall station and I am greeted with a signboard that says SOUTHALL in three different languages English, Hindi and Urdu. Most Australians, South Africans and Kiwis living in London would be residing in West or South London. Brick Lane is thickly populated by Bangladeshis. Euston is another place with a lot of Bangladeshis. I was told that a few decades earlier Brick Lane was dominated by Jewish people. Today a large number of them can be found in North London. Ilford has a high Punjabi and Pakistani crowd. Where do the actual British people live? Well, they live all over the place but there are areas in and around London which have your average British population like Romford for example. Most of my work colleagues however preferred the quite life on the countryside and commuted long distances to work. I wonder if the term white flight is applicable here. According to Wikipedia - White flight is a term for the demographic trend in which white people move away from suburbs or urban neighborhoods that are becoming racially desegregated to white suburbs.

So why does the average Bangladeshi arriving in London (or Bengali for that matter) prefer to stay near Brick Lane. You could say that safety and familiarity play a role here. You could say that things like access to local food, language, music and culture play an influential role here. You could say that being surrounded by people of your own community fosters a feeling of home away from home. Since none of these conditions actually are a consequence of socio-economic pressures, it hard to call them Ghettos. The closest I can call them is "Ghetto like".

I have never strictly seen a black neighborhood. I have seen black dominated areas in London without really seeing the problems faced in such neighborhoods. What I have seen is Muslim neighborhoods in India living in abject poverty, epitomized by their narrow lanes, illegally constructed houses sticking wall to wall, in which an overcrowded and often illiterate population attempts to survive and beat the odds of life on a daily basis. One such example of a ghetto is the Sabarmati River in Ahmadabad that divides the city into two distinct parts. The division is not just geographical. It also divides the increasingly affluent Hindus on the West and the economically marginalized Muslims on the East side. This is equally true of other neighborhoods across India that houses the Dalit populations or any other socio-economically backward group. A village in the backdrop of rural India still living with the burden of a caste driven society has a segregated population of 'untouchables' living in one portion of the village.

One of challenges that a society faces and in my opinion often fails in; is to integrate all sections of society as it moves forward. One of India's biggest problems is that sections of our societies are divided not just on a single identity but in multiples. A progress that fails to include everybody is not really a progress. It's a recipe for disaster. What will happen to a society in which one section moves forward at the cost of another? Why does social unrest surprise us anymore? Can a society afford to marginalize some of its constituents? Social, economic and political tensions are direct fallouts of Ghettoized societies.

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Identities – Part II – Stereotypes

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Part I of the Identities series

Stereotyping of an identity occurs when we come in contact with an individual or a group of people belonging to one particular identity. Our perception of the identity is drawn from the experience we have had with one or more such people. Often it is not even our own experience but the experience of someone else that we know of, perhaps of someone who belongs to our own group. Regardless of whether these experiences are exaggerated, real or imagined, they represent a generalization of an identity. If the member of a particular group happened to be good or bad, it doesn't mean that everyone from his community is good or bad. The perception of an identity however lingers long in our mind and it makes us biased for or against it.

Stereotyping can be applied to any identity group. Think of any identity group and your impression of it. Here are some examples below of statements that I have heard in the past.

Women can't drive.

India is a land of snake and elephants.

Don't be such a Jew.

When I see a group of black people on the road, I normally cross over to the other side.

Lawyers are liars and manipulators that cannot be trusted.

Muslims are fanatical or Muslims are fundamentalists.

Now India is not really a country full of snake and elephants. I have lived more than two decades in India and I don't usually bump into either species. I have met women who drive very competently, thank you very much.

I had never actually heard the expression "Don't be such a Jew" in India though. I first heard it when I working in England. One evening I was in the company of a few friends, a British Asian, a Caucasian male and a Jewish colleague. The conversation was light hearted and my white friend blurted out, "Don't be such a Jew". I had an expression of puzzlement and my Jewish friend was visibility irritated but said nothing. My friend proceeded to apologize and said "Sorry, I didn't realize that you were also there". So would it have been OK to say it if there were no Jewish people around? Well, that was certainly the insinuation. While writing this particular piece, I googled anti Semitic expressions and came up with interesting results. "Eat like a Jew" (manger en en juif) is a French expression and it implies that you are eating alone. "jodenfooi" is a 'Jewish tip' in Holland which means tight fisted. These are expressions that have become part of our linguistic repertoire.

The accusation that Muslims are fanatical is quite common in the decade we live with. 9/11 did not create this perception; it merely cemented it in our living memory. There are over 1.2 billion Muslims in the world, an overwhelming majority of who don't even live in the Middle East or Pakistan where much of the fundamentalism originates from. Even within the Middle East and Pakistan the larger population is peace loving and in tune with this world. Muslim fundamentalism was a political creation to counter the growing influence of the Soviet Union in Central Asia in the 1980s. Yet the rest of the Muslim world is saddled with a perception that all of us are medieval in nature.

A man should be judged by who he is and not by the generalization of his identity. Sadly, all of us are guilty at some level of practicing stereotyping. Even Governments around the world follow it. It's called racial profiling. Stereotyping does more harm than good. It leads to disenchantment, it leads to resentment, in its severity, it leads to hate crimes.

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Identities – Part I – Groups and Affiliations

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No man is an island they say. Man has always been part of a pack. There is a sense of comfort, of safety, of belonging and of security being part of a pack. Birds of a feather do flock together after all. Being over 6 billion of us on this planet, there are bound to be an endless number of packs and each such pack assumes an identity of its own. Across the world, we identify ourselves on the basis of our color, race, sex, religion, caste, creed, region, country, language, social standing, monetary worth, education and an assortment of such identifiers. All of us belong to multiple identities. It defines us and makes us who we are for the better and unfortunately for the worse.

When we as human beings segregate ourselves in multiple complex groups we set ourselves up for an Us Vs Them Syndrome. Depending on the nature of the identity group this could be harmless or it could be brutal. Typically the more important the identity the more lethal it could be. The very social fabric of society is threatened when opposing identities clash.

Take India as an example, a country where we were taught about India's unique diversity and its unity despite the existence of multiple complex groups. Tamils and Kannadigas spill blood over river water, tensions on communal lines between Hindus and Muslims is bad enough, now Hindu and Christian issues have started to emerge. The Meenas and the Gujjars clashed in Rajasthan last year over reservation. The Telengana guys want a state carved out of Andhra Pradesh, the Gorkhas are not far being asking for Gorkhaland to be carved out of West Bengal. The Maharastrian Vs North Indian debate rages on in Mumbai making it an important election agenda for regional parties. Then there is the displacement of Kashmiri Pandits and the illegal migration of Bangaldeshis into India. The gulf between the rich and the poor only seems to get wider. The middle class in India is growing into a huge population with disposable income levels on the rise. At the same time, India's heart lies in its poor villages, with a majority of population staying there. You can take any number of large identity groups and you will see associated issues. The list can be exhaustingly long. With our fixation to cricketing stars, India by and large gives a step motherly treatment to its other sport stars and athletes. For a long period doctors and engineers were considered to be the only profession that parents wanted their kids to pursue. Sexual harassment, dowry cases, honor killing, infanticides are all issues that women as a group deal with.

Our ancestors were no exception to identity groups. They gained and lost through their various affiliations. They lived in a society where their social standing was determined by which house they had the fortune or misfortune of being born in. Life would be a lot easier if you were born to a Brahmin or a Kshatriya family instead of a Shudra. The migration to the subcontinent by the Aryan tribes saw the Dravidians being pushed south. India saw migrating social groups, either as invaders or conquerors and if you take the example of the colonial British, then even as traders. Somehow they all managed to co-exist for centuries, ruled successively by one dominant social group or the other. There are times when I think maybe our ancestors where better off because they knew a secret, a secret they perhaps didn't share with us. They have shown high levels of tolerance to each other, learnt to co-exist and even assimilate one another's rituals and habits. There seems to be a common ground somewhere despite all the problems.

However in today's world, tolerance is a word that is fast becoming obsolete. It has no relevance. There is no middle ground. It's our way or the highway.

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