my childhood...

I remember having a really tough time understanding maths when I was young, it was very shameful when my teacher would ridicule me in front of the entire class for not being able to add two numbers correctly. There were other students who had similar trouble like me, but in my case the pangs were multiplied because my father is a mathematics teacher. My elder brother was a brilliant student and as happens in most Indian families, comparison with my brother was inevitable and peer pressure was huge. I remember I had secured 36 rank in the first standard, alas there were only 36 students in the class. In the next grade I stood 35th but then there were only 35 students left in the class cause one student had quit the school (Those were the times when both my brother and I would come first in our classes, the only difference being he would be first from front and I first from behind). After more than twenty years now, I still have the report cards which are a testimony to my individual brilliance :).

The following years were very interesting as I alternated with rise and fall in my rank in the class. My parents were terribly confused and so was I... I always did the same thing but ended up with vastly different results. It was not that I was wonderful at sports either, I was almost pathetic in any form of sports. I usually came last in 100 mtrs or 200 mtrs dash and could never complete any distance greater than 200 mtrs anyway. I used to love long jump as it required the least effort among all other sports and some how I would just cross the qualifying mark, however I never won any prize for any sport in my entire student life. One thing I was really good at was watching cricket, hockey, football etc and I was an expert in encouraging and cheering a team but I was never a participating member of any team. I was extremely introvert and would usually spend time alone making toys (like cars out of cardboard boxes), sketching cartoons and painting (usually scenery of a mountain range and a river, with huts and trees). While things did improve with age and I have changed quite a lot from what I was years ago, I still am very introvert and prefer being alone. My friends and family fret about my unwillingness to go to parties and malls etc but that's the way I am. I do hope to improve on this front though, in the same way as I managed to improve my mathematics skills (I won the Best in Mathematics shield of my Batch in Standard 12 :) ).

Alien in my own country...

Why is everyone against people from Bihar and UP. India is a free and united country, why is then there so much public drama over jobs being taken away by outsiders. We show our displeasure when Americans fret about outsourcing jobs to India but are ready to fight our own country men who come in search of a decent living to prosperous cities. It is really sad to know that people within their own country are being treated like aliens. First it was in Assam where poor North Indian workers were ruthlessly thrashed and some even killed, then the chief minister of Goa says he does not want a train from Bihar as he did not want Beggars in his state. It was then followed by the chief minister of Delhi and now the biggest political drama which is happening in Maharastra, especially Mumbai. People are being beaten up, even killed and crores worth of property damaged. Probably the politicians have found a way to engage the youth, having failed miserably in their promise of providing employment.

I sometime wonder whether it is practical to ask all "outsiders" to learn the local language? The migrants from other states are anyways a tortured lot, everyone starting from government officials, traffic police, auto drivers and vegetable sellers fool and fleece them merrily. Every state where some people are crying hoarse over the issue of Biharis invading their cities know for a fact that most migrants end up doing menial jobs which does not threaten the local population in any way. The poor laborers and workers are the one who bear the brunt of such public display of anger. When I think of reasons for such behavior, I get no plausible answer apart from the one of strengthening vote banks. Having branded BJP as a non secular front, the so called secular parties have found a new method of creating a divide among societies. I sincerely hope the Indian public understand the real motif of these politicians and treat them no better than they deserve.

Having said that I really dread for the day when similar events will start enfolding in Bangalore, for I am an outsider who does not know the local language.

Visit to IIM K

IIM K recently organized a "startup fair" and we were one of the few startups invited. This is definitely a great initiative, the idea is to give students a chance to work with a high energy startup.

We reached Kozhikode at 6 in the morning and decided to walk around the lovely campus. The entire campus is situated on twin hills and the view is just breathtaking. This is probably the only campus among all the IIMs and IITs which looks more like a resort than an educational institute.
At around 10:30am we were ready with our stall and spent most of our time chatting with students and faculty members. It was great to meet and connect with some really enthusiastic people. The highlight of the visit however turned out to be a very unexpected meeting with Prof Sunil Handa. To tell the truth I had no clue who he was until our buddy at IIM K gave us his brief intro. He is a champion of entrepreneurship and advocates one and all to leave up the cushy jobs and to walk on the path of entrepreneurship. He asked us some pretty tough questions and was rather very blunt at our responses ( in other words, according to him we had done all wrong by starting up hungryzone, raising funds for hungryzone was another gruesome error and he was literally shocked to hear that we had 12 members in the hungryzone family). He said, this idea cannot be made into a business of 500 crores, well its true, even I know that hungrzone cannot become a 500 crore business in its current form, but with all due respect Sir, you can only see 1/10th of an ice berg from above, similarly the core of our business is still invisible/ unexplored/ unimplemented. Stay put and we will surely change the way India eats!!

While success is important, in entrepreneurship the experience is more important. People usually learn the most when they fail. I do not intend to strike gold with my first venture (well if I do strike gold, I won’t mind at all) and I am not afraid of failing. Failure would definitely be painful but the learnings I am getting everyday is priceless and cannot be matched or taught even by the IIMs.

Coming back to the chance encounter with Prof Sunil Handa, it wasn’t really an eye opener, as we are already doing what he urges others to do but it indeed was an honor to meet a seasoned entrepreneur and champion advocate of entrepreneurship. I do hope that more and more people follow his advice and become employers instead of employees. The rest of the day was spent meeting few old buddies from my IIT days and some enthusiastic candidates. I am already looking forward to such festivals in other top B Schools.

My Startup

Well as the heading suggests, I am running a fledgling business or rather I am trying to run a fledgling business. I don't quite remember when I got the idea of becoming an entrepreneur; probably the seeds were sown since my childhood or may be from my IIT days or probably after my 3 failed attempts at CAT.

Anyway, the fact is, it all started in January 2006 (convincing myself, doing market research, learning technologies and talking to people), we launched the first version of hungrybangalore in July 2006 and after 2 years of slogging, panting and then slogging again we are still up and running. Does this mean we are doing well? Well, not really if revenue is what defines success... but all of us do enjoy working for hungryzone (that’s what it is called now).

From being a part time affair to a full time one, things have changed a lot like my friends now think of me differently, I have enriched my technical mind with some practical stuff, I feel more confident now of myself etc etc but few things have not changed much, my parents still regret my not going to US and my brother still regrets my not getting through CAT. I don't usually care what others say about me (unless it is good :) ) but as far as I am concerned I feel satisfied that I took this path, even if the venture fails, I am sure this experience will do wonders to wisdom :). I am definitely financially much poorer than my batch mates but as far as satisfaction is concerned I do score a century :)

OBC reservation? nemesis or boon

I am not a supporter of reservations of seats based on cast, I had also participated in the nationwide protests against reservations when our dear, stupid, sycophant, opportunist Arjun Singh had proposed the reservations. When the issue was taken up by Supreme Court, like everyone I expected some rational decision, something practical but alas that was not to be...
The elite judges at the country's highest court wrote hundreds of pages, disregarded various facts and concluded that 27% reservations in government funded central education institutions was necessary.

Considering the state of affairs now, it would not be surprising if the following happened:
1. Reservation in private sector jobs.
2. Reservation of seats in public transport (like railways and buses)
3. Reservation of products of companies (for example: out of every 100 nokia N series phone 27 would be reserved for OBCs)
4. Reservation of roads (27% of the roads in the city would be used only by OBCs)
5. Reservation of food at restaurants (27% of burgers at McDonalds will be served only to OBCs)

Am I being insane? I don't think so, though the ideas sound ridiculous, believe me nothing is really impossible.
While I firmly believe that some action is required to elevate the conditions of SC/STs and OBCs, I have no doubt in my mind that reservations are not the solutions. The exclusion of creamy layer is just a farce as it is not a difficult task to bribe a lawyer and get a false income affidavit or for that matter a false caste certificate.
The solution to this bane is not by reserving seats in premier institutes and stigmatizing a candidate to be an OBC or an SC/ST but by improving the system of education at the primary level, this however is easier said than done. Its not that the government does not run programs to improve the state of education, but due to various reasons mostly attributed to the hypocrite politicians and the corrupt government Babus, the condition never improves. Even if we were to accept reservations in engineering colleges, I simply fail to understand how one even thinks of having reservations in Medical colleges. Will the same Arjun Singh be ready to be treated by a doctor who studied on a seat won by reservation?

Hunger pangs...

Few years ago India was facing a unique problem of excess, well it’s hard to believe but the government had excess of food grains which they had no place to stock. Just few years down the line there is still a problem but of the opposite nature, our food stocks are lying below the critical levels.

The reasons for this are plenty and most of them can be attributed to… yup you guessed it right the policies of the government and the negligence of our dear Union Minister of Agriculture.

1. The government has fixed the price of wheat, rice and other staple grains. The rising costs of sowing, labor and harvesting makes cultivation of staple food unprofitable for the farmers. The end result: Farmers are switching to cash crops.

2. Due to low margins farmers are unable to purchase good quality seeds and this result in lower yields per acre and yet lower profits. India produces half the amount of rice produced by China per acre and 1/3^rd of the amount produced by America.

3. The most important factor to effect agriculture policies in India is of course due to our Union Agriculture minister’s interest in cricket. It’s a known fact that his ministries meetings are held in Cricket Club of India in Mumbai!

4. Another problem crippling our food stocks is the illegal sale of food stocks to countries like Bangladesh and Nepal.

5. The fickle weather adds to the woes of already burdened farmers. For example the unwarranted march rains in Karnataka have led to a loss of more than 500 crores.

Most farmers find it untenable to till their lands due to the above mentioned factors. They are forced to grow cash crops if irrigation is available or sell of their lands to SEZs or do the unthinkable (suicide) if no other option is available. Will the BCCI chief sit up and take stock of the situation before its too late…?