Booming and Bubbling India-IV

Posted on June 11, 2007 by indra

Economy grows at record 9.4%: Indian economy grew by 9.4% in 2006-07 against 9% in the previous year. Manufacturing grew by 12.3% in 2006-07 against 9.1% in the previous year, while trade, hotels, transport and communication grew by 13% against 10.4%. It means a per capita income of Rs 29,382 a year or Rs 2,448.5 a month. It is the same India that also houses the most number of billionaires in Asia-36, ahead of economic powerhouse Japan, according to Forbes magazine.

FDI piling: India is expected to attract $30 billion of foreign direct investment (FDI) this fiscal year. The FDI gap between India and China is closing at last. FDI per unit of GDP will be around the same very soon, even after ignoring the fact that China uses more liberal definitions of FDI. Moreover, in 2006-07, the $15 billion of FDI that came in was far more than the $4.9 billion of FII investment, thus reducing short-term risks.

Latin America lures Indian IT firms: Mexico, Argentina, Brazil and Costa Rica are the most mature sourcing destinations in South or Central America, and it is Indian vendors that are leading the charge. TCS has operations in 14 countries including major centres in Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Uruguay, employing over 5,000 professionals and catering to more than 150 clients with its revenues of Latin America touching $159 million (around Rs 650 crore) in 2006-07.

Dell designs in India: Dell, the Texas-based computer maker, is soon going to roll out its enterprise server ranges being designed and developed from its India R&D which focuses on enterprise products for global markets. Dell’s India R&D center, established in 2001 primarily for software development, has grown from 100 people to 600 people now, and is also the largest R&D centre for Dell outside the US.

Retail institutes: According to industry estimates, retail alone will throw up 2.2 million jobs by 2011. Presently there are around 50 institutes offering post-graduate courses in the country. At least 50 more institutes are expected to come up in another 2 years with specific retail programmes.

Potential of Rural India: Promotion of rural tourism, wasteland cultivation and enhancing grain productivity can create upto 40 million new jobs and Rs85, 000 crore additional income in the countryside by 2012, a report by CII-McKinsey of 1 June 2007. According to the report, the per capita rural income can be jacked up by 25-30%. The four activities – cultivation of jatropha and pulpwood on the wasteland, improvement in the production of grains, wine and poultry and tourism development – are capable of generating Rs40, 000 crore, Rs20, 000 crore, Rs5, 000 crore and Rs20, 000 crore respectively by 2012.

India’s only trillionaire: A sharp surge in share prices has earned Reliance Industries’ chairman Mukesh Ambani a rare distinction of being the only trillionaire in the country with over Rs1, 00,000 crore of wealth through his shareholdings. Younger brother Anil is also trailing behind closely with close to Rs90, 000 crore of wealth in the stock market.

BSE now worth $1 trillion: The Bombay Stock Exchange’s (BSE) total investor wealth – the market capitalisation or the total market value of all listed shares – has crossed the $1 trillion mark for the first time in history. The market cap today touched Rs 40,69,000 crore, a rise of Rs 46,500 crore from the previous day, and as the rupee closed at a nine-year high of 40.51 to the dollar, the market cap in dollar terms crossed the $1 trillion level. The combined market value of Reliance Industries, ONGC, Bharti Airtel, NTPC and TCS has soared past $210 billion and accounts for more than 20% of the entire $1 trillion wealth of investors across categories.

Coca-Cola plans robust investments: Putting behind the worst ever controversies of pesticide in cola, Coca Cola has a robust investment plan to boost operations in the Indian market.

Vodafone to invest Rs 8,000 cr: British giant Vodafone’s plans to invest one billion pounds (over Rs 8,000 crore) in India this year is nearly one-fifth of its global expenditure, reflecting the importance the world’s largest mobile player attaches to expand in the fastest-growing telecom market.

Hero Honda for $300-350: The world’s biggest two-wheeler maker is planning to build a motorcycle that will sell for Rs 12,500-15,000 and create an all-new class of buyers. At present, the cheapest motorcycles in India cost between Rs 30,000 and Rs 35,000.

Suzlon bags Repower: Wind turbine maker Suzlon Energy has managed to gain control of over 60 per cent of Germany-based REpower’s equity through an agreement with its shareholders, French nuclear energy company Areva and Portugal’s Martifier. Both Areva, which holds 30.17 per cent of REpower’s equity, as well as Martifier, which owns 23.08 per cent, have conceded their voting rights to Suzlon. Suzlon becomes the fourth-largest wind power company in the world.

Tata Steel enters Vietnam: Tata Steel secured the Vietnam government’s approval for floating a joint venture with Vietnam Steel Corporation (VSC) to build a nearly Rs 14,000 crore integrated steel complex in that country. Tata Steel would take a stake of up to 65 per cent in a steel plant venture with Vietnam and a 30 per cent stake in a nearby iron ore mine

TCS buys Brazil’s partner: Country’s top software exporter TCS has acquired the remaining 49 per cent stake in its Brazilian joint venture for USD 33.4 million, giving the company 100 per cent ownership. TCS do Brasil recorded a topline of 66.5 million dollar for the year ended March 31, 2007 and has over 1700 employees. India’s prowess in the BPO space continues to win accolades at the global arena with three Indian companies — Wipro, Bharti Airtel and Bank of India –bagging ‘The Outsourcing Excellence Awards’, dubbed as ‘Oscars of Outsourcing’.

Crompton acquires Microsol: Crompton Greaves, India’s fourth largest electrical equipment maker has agreed to purchase Ireland’s Microsol Holdings and other group companies-its third purchase in Europe in 2 1/2 years and increase access to new markets, taking advantage of India’s low labour costs.

Indian agriculture conglomerate Jain Irrigation Systems is buying 50% of Israel’s Na’an Dan Irrigation at a company valuation of about $35 million..

Tata Tea’s strategical sale: Tata Tea makes profit of $523 million on stake sale. In August last year, Tata Tea purchased 30 per cent equity in US-based Energy Brands Inc for $677 million. With Atlanta-based beverage giant Coca Cola’s decision to acquire Energy Brands, also known as Glaceau, for $4.1 billion in cash, Tata Tea stands to get $1.2 billion for its holding, which it has decided to sell. It’s a neat 77 per cent return in nine months.

Global auto majors sourcing from India: ArvinMeritor currently sources components worth $80 million from India from about 24 companies. The sourcing value may touch about $500 million over the next few years. Global OEMs like General Motors, Ford, Fiat, DaimlerChrysler, Renault, Volvo, among others have already been sourcing parts from India. The ACMA-McKinsey Vision 2015 document estimates the potential for the Indian auto component industry to be $40-45 billion by 2015. German luxury carmaker BMW will soon open its international purchasing office to cater to its worldwide ancillaries requirement.

ITC trains 10 lakh farmers: ITC Limited has turned teacher to about 10 lakh farmers in states like Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh. Senior scientists from the National Research Centre for Soyabean (Indore) and University of Pant Nagar, as well as post-graduates from other agriculture universities, have been roped in by the company to supervise and demonstrate best agricultural practices to farmers.

Indian economy to surpass Japan: India’s economy will overtake the Japanese economy by 2025 to rank third in the world after the United States and China in terms of purchasing power parity.

Information Click away: For the 25 million Indians living abroad, the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs in association with the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) launched a facilitation centre, which will act as a ‘one-stop-shop’ for addressing all the queries of the Indian Diaspora regarding opportunities available in the country.

Highest French civilian honour for Indian educationist: Bikas Sanyal, who is the director of Maison de l’Inde or India House in Paris, has been honoured by the French government with its highest civilian award, the Legion d’Honneur.

Record power addition this fiscal: As much as 17,000 Mw is slated for commissioning during the year – two and a half times more than the largest addition of 6,850 Mw achieved last year that represents as much as 13 per cent of the current capacity of 132,000 Mw in the country. Will India be able to add 78,000 Mw of capacity over the next five years as promised?

Indian BPO firms in world’s ‘hot growth’ list: Two US-listed Indian outsourcing firms — Cognizant Technology and EXLService — have made it to a list of the world’s 100 “hot growth” companies with significant growth potential.

Engineering outsource: India is poised to become the hub of engineering process outsourcing (EPO) with the size of its EPO market expected to touch $30 billion annually by 2015, according to a strategy paper on “Growth of EPO from India” based on an analysis by consultancy firm AF Ferguson. The estimated demand for EPO to India has grown at 30% to 35% from 2004-06. The global EPO market is poised to grow to $ 110 billion to $140 billion by 2015. Engineering exports from India had touched the $ 26 billion mark in 2006-07.

Protein mapped: Scientists at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) in Bangalore have mapped and modeled an important protein in the parasite that is responsible for the most lethal and common form of malaria. It will help drug researchers make drugs that attack and weaken specific areas on the protein, thereby killing the parasite and its spread.

Wockhardt to set up 30 hospitals by 2012: Mumbai-based Wockhardt Hospitals plans to set up 30 hospitals in the country in five years. Wockhardt is one of the major corporate hospitals groups in the country with over 1500 beds in 10 hospitals in Mumbai, Bangalore, Calcutta, Gujarat and Nagpur According to management sources, the hospitals would cover almost every city of the country. Work on a 400-bed hospital in Bangalore has just begun.

Social engineering: Several companies such as multinationals like McDonald’s and Dell and even domestic firms like Group 4 Securitas have tied up with an Andhra Pradesh-based government organisation Elimination of Rural Poverty (SERP) to source employees from the Naxlite infested districts.

India Inc. performs well: India’s top 25 business houses showed significant growth in terms of sales and profit during 2006-07. Sterlite, notched the fastest growth in sales up at a rate of 78.6%, followed by Ruchi (54.2%). On the other hand, BK Birla group logged a net profit growth of 177.4%, followed by Sterlite (164.6%) and the KK Birla group (120.5%).

India Inc. bullish on ‘clean’ business: As of 24 April, as many as 220 clean development mechanism (CDM) projects from India have been registered under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), for availing certified emission reductions (CERs). According to the latest UNFCCC data, Indian projects accounted for 35 per cent of the registrations, way above China and Brazil..

India is booming all around even after all the annoying news such as Gurjjar rebellion or some greedy advocates selling their conscience for money. And as it seems every one is ready to be sold for a price. But still there is some hope. I read news from Noida itself where an auto driver returns a bag full of cash and jewelry to its owner. Surprisingly, he was from Bihar.

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Booming and Bubbling India-V

Posted on June 10, 2007 by indra

India tops global markets with 26% growth: The Indian equity market has outperformed the markets of both emerging and developed nations for the past three months, growing at 25.87 per cent, according to the Standard and Poor’s May Global Stock Market Review. Accordingto Market analysts, the Indian markets showed good returns on account of improved performance of Indian corporates along with the appreciating rupee, which has led to higher inflows from foreign investors to the Indian economy.

Global generic firms gung ho on Indian buys: Global generic companies such as Merck and Pfizer are scouting for big-ticket Indian acquisitions as huge amounts of money is sitting on the fence ready to fund biotech ventures.

Small buyouts bring big gains: Jain Irrigation Systems bought a 50 per cent stake in Israel’s NaanDan Irrigation Systems a fortnight ago. It will help Jain Irrigation emerge as the world’s largest drip- irrigation company in two years. Standard & Poor’s recently named Jain Irrigation in its global list of 300 mid-sized companies most likely to challenge world’s leading companies. United Phosphorus’ invested Rs 1,000 crore last year to buy five brands and one foreign company, Cerexagri. In the process, the firm became the 11th largest agri-company in the global pecking order from its previous ranking of 17. Last year, Wipro spent over Rs 800 crore on six European and US companies, including Austria’s R&D services boutique NewLogic, New Jersey’s payment processor mPower, and Michigan’s mechanical design services firm Quantech.

Biotech industry touches $2 bn revenue: The biotechnology industry has touched $2-billion mark in revenue for 2006-07 from the $1 billion in 2004-05, and seems to be on the right track to meet its target of $5 billion by 2010. The biopharma sector touched $1.4-billion mark while the bio-services sector reached $250 million. The bio-agri sector crossed the $250-million mark.The industry grew by 30%, with bio-agri scoring the highest growth rate at 50% and largest acreage of nine million. Investments in the Indian biotechnology sector crossed $580 million in 2006-2007.

US-based solar chip-maker to invest $2b in India: The Palo Alto, California-based Signet Solar Inc., founded in 2006 to design and manufacture low-cost thin-film silicon modules that convert solar energy into power, plans to set up three solar photovoltaic manufacturing fab units in India at an investment of over $2 billion (Rs8, 100 crore) spread over the next 10 years.

Hexagon to invest Rs 45 cr in R&D: Hexagon Nutrition Pvt Ltd (HNPL), a 100 per cent technical collaboration of its New Zealand-based parent Hexagon Group, is planning to set up a research & development (R&D) centre adjacent to its facility at Dindori, 32 kms from Nashik, at an investment of Rs 45 crore.

Moser Baer starts commercial shipment of cells: Moser Baer Photo Voltaic Limited (MBPV) has commenced commercial shipment of its solar photovoltaic cells. The manufacturing facility has started producing photovoltaic cells at expected level of output with cell efficiency levels up to 15.5%.

India tops global consumer index: Forty per cent of consumers globally considered the next 12 months a good time to buy things, but in India, Hong Kong and Scandinavia.

TCS wins SAP Pinnacle award: Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) has won the SAP Pinnacle Award for providing high- quality products and solutions to customers.
The Indian company was given the award in the field of ‘Industry Solutions Go-To-Market For SAP Adaptive Manufacturing Solutions’.

TCS to hire 5,000 in Mexico: Tata Consultancy Services Ltd plans to hire 5,000 workers in Mexico in the next five years as labour costs climb in its home market because of a rising rupee. http://www.financialexpress.com/latest_full_story.php?content_id=166346

The IT sector would require nearly five lakh professionals in the next five years to cater to the growing needs of this booming industry. Currently, the industry required three lakh professionals, however the number was expected to nearly double with the sector being poised for huge growth.

IT companies into global financial services sector: Indian software product firms I-Flex Solutions Ltd, Nucleus Software Exports Ltd, Infrasoft Technologies Ltd, Polaris Software Labs Ltd, the product arms of top software services houses Infosys Technologies Ltd and Tata Consultancy Services Ltd, and a growing number of small Indian players are beginning to dominate the banking and financial services industry.

President’s Vision: India is now working on its second space vision and will make significant contribution to low cost access to space and missions to the Moon and Mars.

India in ‘Economist’: The longer-term ascendance of India’s middle class, meanwhile, has been charted by the McKinsey Global Institute, which predicts that average incomes will have tripled by 2025, lifting nearly 300m Indians out of poverty and causing the middle class to grow more than tenfold, to 583m.

Indian SMEs Bets Big on Net: Small and midsize businesses (SMBs) in India will spend US$1.2 billion to beef up their Internet infrastructures and enhance their Internet access, according a new AMI-Partners study. Compared to 2006, online spending will jump 33 percent to reach US$300 million this year, of which India’s small businesses–defined as having fewer than 100 employees–will account for the lion’s share of the investment.

India’s Diamond Biz: India has long been the world’s biggest center for processing uncut diamonds imported from African mines, primarily in South Africa, Botswana, Congo, and Angola. It’s a $12 billion industry, and diamond polishing and processing factories in Gujarat and Maharashtra are big employers. India’s diamond industry employs about 3 million in all.

Dabbawallas in NYT: Mumbai residents rely on an intricately organized, labor-intensive operation that puts some automated high-tech systems to shame. It manages to deliver tens of thousands of meals to workplaces all over the city with near-clockwork precision.

FDI in real estate: According to a report by property consultants Jones Lang LaSalle on rising FDI in real estate, an estimated $10 billion foreign investment is expected to enter the Indian real estate sector in the next 12-18 months. http://www.financialexpress.com/latest_full_story.php?content_id=166338

Acquisitions abroad: The Gurgaon-based forging firm, Amtek Auto, has acquired the entire assets of the UK-based J L French’s (Witham), a company engaged in manufacturing high pressure die casting (HPDC) aluminium for automotive application, for an undisclosed sum. Sintex Industries has acquired US-based Wausaukee Composites Inc (WCI), manufacturer of engineered composite components for original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) in an all-cash transaction.

Egg production has increased to 46.2 billion currently from 38.7 billion at the end of the Ninth Plan. India currently ranks fourth in egg production.

UGC targets 15% enrolment: The UGC is ready with its higher education policy to be implemented under the 11th Plan (2007-12) that has the target of bringing another 45-50 lakh students to college between 2007-08 and 2011-12.

Georgia Tech’s intl campus now in Andhra: Atlanta-based Georgia Institute of Technology today signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Andhra Pradesh government for setting up its international campus near Hyderabad. Focusing on systems engineering and research, the Georgia Tech aims to help in meeting the requirements of global corporations having large operations in the country such as IBM through its Indian campus.

Vaccines from Indian labs: The developments on some potentially revolutionary vaccines are taking place in Indian laboratories that are emerging as serious front-runners in the global vaccine race. A recombinant, protein-based malaria vaccine is being developed by the Delhi-based International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology, in collaboration with Bharat Biotech International Ltd.

Cadence to up R&D output from India: India is emerging as the second largest research and development (R&D) centre for Cadence Design Systems, which specialises in electronic design and automation (EDA) tools and services. With a headcount of close to 1,000, Cadence India accounts for 22 per cent of the company’s worldwide R&D strength and 18 per cent of its total staff (5,200).

Piaggio to set up diesel engine unit near Pune: The Italy-based global transportation major, Piaggio & C Spa, will pump in ¤60-65 million over the next two to three years to set up a diesel engine manufacturing facility near Pune. The move comes as a part of the company’s plans to make India a global sourcing hub.

Exports of consumer electronics: Annual export growth in consumer electronics during the past five years is estimated at 27.33%. Colour televisions topped the exports in 2005-06. In value terms, exports increased to $190 million from $93.25 million in 2004-05. Exports of clocks and watches also registered record growth of 143% to become the second-ranking item last year.
http://www.business-standard.com/common/storypage_c_online.php?leftnm=11&bKeyFlag=IN&autono=23972

Delhi Metro reduces pollution: The Delhi Metro helped save 33,000 tonnes of fuel and prevented the creation of over 2,275 tonnes of poisonous gases in the national capital in the past four years,

Exports increasing: NELCAST Ltd, a castings and component manufacturing company catering mainly to commercial vehicle and tractor industries, is increasing its exports from the present 10.2 per cent to almost 30 per cent for the financial year 2007-08.

Nokia India has seen exports from its telecom special economic zone (SEZ) at Sriperumbudur near Chennai reach Rs 1,650 crore in 2006-07, according to figures provided by the Madras Exports Processing Zone.

Indian newspaper circulation up: Newspaper circulations worldwide rose 2.3 per cent in 2006 with Indian sales increasing most with 12.93 per cent, the World Association of Newspapers (WAN) said in Cape Town.

Maruti achieves 26 pc reduction in energy consumption: Maruti Udyog Ltd (MUL) has brought down overall energy consumption at its Gurgaon facility by as much as 26 per cent per vehicle over the last six years. MUL has also reduced consumption of water and waste generated in car manufacturing,

Ramjas College, New Delhi switches to LCD: The College will have LCD projectors in place of blackboards. The students will now be able to explore online resources, including research papers of foreign universities and latest articles from international journals and magazines in the classroom itself. The college has spent around Rs 3.9 lakh for providing LCD projectors in each of the 26 classrooms. All teachers have also agreed to buy laptops for enhancing the quality of teaching.

A central university in each state and a degree college in each district: The gross enrollment ratio in high education is estimated around 9.1 per cent. The government hopes to raise this ratio to at least 15 per cent by 2012.

Do you agree that India is in boom mode?

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Whirlpool-Massacred Noida-Summer

Posted on June 9, 2007 by indra

Last summer, it was Godrej refrigerator that created havoc. I was stressed as Rajesh with Shephali and Svanik were here in summer, and that too unfortunately straight from California. Godrej service facility in Noida kept me busy for a lot of time that I could have enjoyed with Svanik, and many a times, it made me cry.

This summer we are alone but Whirlpool air conditioner that was keeping my ground floor bed room cool has ditched me, and more so the poor response of the service facility of the company that claim to be world class MNC. The a/c got its gas fill every year for last five years. The repair mechanics of Noida claimed to have discovered that the atmospheric pollution of the city is responsible for this, and the a/cs of all makes are facing the trouble. I don’t have any other means to check it. But with all the three brands – Whirlpool, National, and Hitachi, that I keep, it has been true. Why can’t the a/c manufacturers take care of this defect by improving the design and making that robust for the condition in Noida?

I got first the a/c gas charged as usual. But after few days, when the atmospheric temperature increased, it stopped cooling. I could get the call center number of whirlpool India Ltd in Noida. They visited and declared that the compressor needs replacement. Fortunately for me, it was under warranty for 1+5 years. The engineers promised to replace it and so lifted it on April 21. Since then the a/c is lying with the service center. I have tried all avenues and begged for all solutions including adaptation of another compressor at my cost, but have fail till date. I was surprised today when the man from service center very politely informed that the compressor is original from US. I don’t know if he is right. But that reminded me about the story of quality war going between China and US on food items that I read today in NYT. Perhaps, this is the reason that the automobile industry of US, and for that matter all the other manufacturing sectors are on deathbed.

But all these products are produced today in India. A responsive service is a necessity for growth of these manufactured items. If the products can’t be that robust, at least the service can be of a standard that eliminates the customers’ inconveniences. With some service a/cs with the service centers, the problem could be tackled. But why should they bother till there are customers lining for purchase?

Do these companies expect customers to keep extra a/cs with them to meet the situation that I am in?

Is there any one from whirlpool in my readers, who can help me?

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Desire Vs Super 30

Posted on June 8, 2007 by indra

Just after the young aspirants for entering the prestigious IITs got their results this year last week, a mutiny of a sort started in Patna. I came to know about it through media.

Super 30 has become a global name and has got a lot of publicity, because of its missionary approach. Perhaps, it is also as two of the founders- Shri Abhayanand, the present AGP, Bihar and Anand Kumar who was also invited by IIM-Ahmedabad just in continuity with Laluji and Nitish Kumar, have become legendary and celebrity. I also wrote about it time and again. The best part was the founders taking a holistic care of the aspirants and arranging lodging too in Patna besides coaching them. I wish they had inculcating the good values in the boys also that caused the problem.
Super-30 claimed 28 of its 30 getting selected for IITs. And then perhaps another coaching institutes I-Desire claimed 3 of those 28 from Super-30 as its own students and got them facilitated by the CM. It created a tide of protests first from the founders declaring the closure of its Super-30, and then from the students’ community in Patna. I also appealed to CM to call both the parties and clear out apprehensions; as to me it appeared as silly and damaging for the students. Many wrote emotional letters on Internet sites that smelled with caste bias. I was shocked and pained too.

After many appeals from far and near including some from abroad, the founders are ready to continue with the great affirmative work for the deserving candidates from deprived categories of the rural Bihar that they are doing since last five years. However, I shall like to give some of my own views.

Why should the Supr-30 feel bad if some of its own students get allured to attend some other coaching institue too? This has become a common practice among the students. Out of sheer lack of confidence to get into IITs anyhow, they are resorting to many practices that I feel wrong. I came across a case where the boy left his good school in class XII as it required a minimum attendance for appearing in final examinations, and joined an ordinary school to go to Kota the coaching city for preparing for the IIT entrance examinations. As he has not been selected, he shall be wasting one year more with Kota coaching and try again.

Firstly, why should a coaching be necessary? It was not there at our time, and we were no way disadvantaged. Can’t IITs invent an innovative way of examining the students that can’t be facilitated by coaching centers?

Why can’t IITs depend on the results from the boards as BITS, Pilani does? Is the performance of BITS any way inferior? I feel the coaching institutes are as superfluous as the newly introduced finishing schools for the graduate engineers. It is certainly making many entrepreneurs rich. It is noway adding any creativity among the students that are the basic necessity of a good education.
However back to the main story, why should Super-30 wish to make itself monopolistic? How does it matter if some hundreds of institutes such as Super-30 come up in Patna?

I read reports about I-Desire in both the national dailies of New Delhi. It is a good endeavour if it is correctly report.

Now, IITians help poor crack IIT-JEE
PATNA: A poor waiter in Patna has become a celebrity of sorts after his son cracked the IIT entrance exam this year. The overjoyed man gives full credit to I-Desire – a small group of former IITians in Bihar who coach underprivileged kids and provide them study material.

It appears the institute wishes to emulate Super-30. I don’t find any harm in that.

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Design ‘For the other 90%’

Posted on June 7, 2007 by indra

“The majority of the world’s designers focus all their efforts on developing products and services exclusively for the richest 10% of the world’s customers. Nothing less than a revolution in design is needed to reach the other 90%.”

–Dr. Paul Polak, International Development Enterprises

The other 90% refers to the billions of people living on less than $2 a day.

A billion customers in the world are waiting for a $2 pair of eyeglasses, a $10 solar lantern and $100 house.” Paul Polak told a crowd of inventors recently. Surprisingly, the few offspring of the other 90% when after the necessary training through some affirmative actions of some benevolent join the clan of inventors, they also get themselves engaged in designing for the same 10% class.

Polak is psychiatrist by profession, but presently runs an organization helping poor farmers become entrepreneurs, cater to the globe richest 10%, creating items like wine labels, couture and Maseratis.

As reported in media, Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum housed in Andrew Carnegie ‘s 64-room mansion on Fifth Avenue is exhibiting presently the works of inventors dedicated to ‘the other 90%’.

One of the exhibits is the simplest and yet most elegant design that eases the task in which millions of women and girls all over the world spend many hours every day in the year. Many paintings and sculptures might have depicted it sexy or more sophisticatedly elegant postures. But the work is just fetching water, the basic requirement to live. Balancing heavy jerry cans on the head is back breaking work and sometimes causes crippling injuries. And the inventors have come out with the design of the Q-Drum, a circular jerry can, holds 20 gallons, and rolls smoothly enough for a child to tow it on a rope.

Each object on display in exhibition tells a story. Design ‘for the other 90%’ demonstrates how design can be a dynamic force in saving and transforming lives, at home and around the world. As claimed, “some of these design innovations often support responsible, sustainable economic policy. They help, rather than exploit, poorer economies; minimize environmental impact; increase social inclusion; improve healthcare at all levels; and advance the quality and accessibility of education.”

In another case, Martin Fisher, an engineer from Stanford has founded KickStart, an organization that has helped 230,000 people escape poverty. Its human -powered pumps cost $35 to $95. Pumping water helps a farmer grow grain in the dry season, when it fetches triple the normal price. According to Fisher, customers had skipped meals for weeks to buy a pump and then earned $1,00 the next year selling vegetables.

“Most of the world’s poor are subsistence farmers, so they need a business model that lets them make money in three to six months, which is one growing season.” KickStart works for them Is it not something that requires emulating?

Designers, engineers, students and professors, architects, and social entrepreneurs from all over the globe are devising cost-effective ways to increase access to food and water, energy, education, healthcare, revenue-generating activities, and affordable transportation for those who most need them.

Prof Anil Kumar Gupta of IIM-Ahmedabad and his work on grassroots innovations through National Innovation Foundation is also an endeavour with similar motives. Many of the innovations can change the life of people at the bottom of the pyramids. NDTV-Profit as well as NDTV India used to cover some of these stories.

CK Prahalad his book “The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid: Eradicating Poverty through Profits” proposes the involvement of the big industrialists in the game of alleviating the poverty of the millions and provide them with a cheap way to improve the quality of life. According to him, even big multinational firms can help cut poverty and boost profits at the same time by tapping a huge market of 4 billion low-income consumers in developing countries. “There is a deeply held assumption that the poor will not appreciate high quality or will not accept high technology and they have no need for products and services that are innovative. However, that is not true. The bottom of the pyramid can be a focal point for innovations for the large company too.”

Reliance’s Rs. 770 mobile phone, and $ 100 (our HRD ministry’s $10) laptop of the One-Laptop Per Child Project (OLPC) are endeavour in the same direction. Even Intel’s recent announcement of $200 laptop teaming with Taiwan’s Asustek Computer Inc, the world’s largest maker of motherboards is a step with the similar mission. All these will empower the poor people of the world that are in billions.

I wish and propose that the educational institutes of India participate in the game in big way by involving its students in these projects of ‘designs for 90%’. Why can’t the Indian farmers produce the same quality of fruits? Can some fruit plucking devices reduce the damage on the surface? Can someone devise a safe fruit-polishing machine? Can an Rs 20 filter be provided in each family to provide safe water? Can some cheap means kill the mosquitoes? Can oil from Jatropa plants grown on waste land be directly used in rural equipment? Thousands and thousands of innovations are the national requirements. It will provide India a competitive edge. These innovations must and will come from everyone from all professions from a cook, a janitor, a carpenter, a housewife or a designer from all part of the country. Only this process can make the country developed in real sense.

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India’s Agriculture: From Abundance to Scarcity

Posted on June 7, 2007 by indra

As one with the experiences of the years of food scarcity in India as a kid in 50s and a young man in 60s, I was happy and proud when India became self sufficient about food grains. I was excited, when India started exporting grains, wheat and rice in particular. However, there are inklings of India slipping behind in food security trap. India is fast getting into food importing from food exporting.
The contribution of agriculture to the GDP has declined from 38 per cent in 1975 to around 19 per cent now. But 68 per cent of India’s workforce still depends on agriculture as a means of livelihood. Can the productivity of farming be increased to bring in prosperity? Can a major percentage of the rural population be diverted to some more lucrative non-farming employment? Perhaps the answer still seems to be in negative.

The annual per capita food grain production had declined from a high 207 kg in 1995 to 186 kg last year (a level reached in 1975). And that is the critical concern, though people are shifting to high-end food consumption. But the average annual rate of growth of agriculture in the last five years has been 1.87 per cent, while it was 5-per cent in the mid-1980s.

Even in Punjab, the yield from one hectare has dropped from 4,700 to 4,000 kg a hectare in two decades. And as a result, the country’s wheat production has stagnated at around 70 million tonne. The yield of rice is around 1,900 kg per hectare. Yields of pulses have reached a plateau at around 600 kg per hectare and the total production has not exceeded 15 million tonne, while the demand is around 18 million tones. India imports pulses today in large quantity. In oilseeds, India has doubled its production in the past two decades to 26 million tonnes, but still oils fall short by 3 million tones because of increased consumption.

The incomes of the farmers across the country rose by a measly 0.28 per cent as compared to 4 per cent in other sectors. A recent national sample survey showed that 40 per cent of the farmers want to opt out of their current profession. And over 20,000 farmers commit suicide out of despair over failing crops and high debt every year. Farming is no more a superior engagement, as we knew from our traditional sayings.

Why has the farming lost its ground and luster?

Overall land under food grain cultivation has remained static at 120 million hectares, rather it is dropping further steadily. In the past decade or so, there has been a major diversion of land meant for wheat and rice cultivation into commercial crops such as oilseeds and cotton. Further, as per one estimate, 7.5 lakh hectare of agricultural land are being diverted to other uses for urbanization and industrialization such as real estates, roads, SEZs, industrial parks every year. A revitalization process for wasteland available in plenty in the country is necessary, but it has not yet started in a big way.

Fragmented holdings: As estimated, 78% of the farming population owns only 32% of the land. Even 15 years ago, over 60 per cent of the rural households owned less than one hectare. The average size of holdings declined from 2.63 hectare in 1960-61 to 1.06 in 2002-03. As per one estimate, the average landholding is only 0.37 hectare today. Farming is increasingly becoming an unviable activity. Is it not a high time for a change in policy in favour of consolidating the land holdings for genuine farmers? Why can’t the land ceiling acts of the states be modified or dropped?

Public investment in agriculture as a percentage of GDP has dropped from 3 per cent to around 1.7 per cent. Irrigation didn’t get the desired priority. In India, 47 million hectares (Mha) of irrigated land produces 56% of food grains, while the rain-dependent 95 Mha land yields just 44%. Another estimate indicates that only 40% of the sown area of 142.8 million hectares having assured irrigation. Even 60 years after Independence, 60 per cent of the farmlands are still dependent on good monsoons for reasonable crop productions

Between 1981 and 1991 the annual growth of land being brought under irrigation was 2.27 per cent. But between 1991 and 2004, that figure dropped to 1.15 per cent. In real terms, between 1985 and 1995, 14-lakh hectare were brought under irrigation. But between 1995 and 2005 that figure fell to 6.85-lakh hectare.

Strangely for the 10th Plan, while the target of spending Rs 90,000 crore towards investment in irrigation was met, the potential added was only half of the stated figure of 16 million hectare.
The performance of the government has been dismal. According to the ministry of water resources, 388 irrigation projects spread all over the country still remain incomplete: 340 were started before 1992, and 40 before 1974. Till 2003, Rs 78,449.63 crore had already been spent on them, and an additional Rs 89,872.72 crore was additionally needed to complete. Had these projects been completed on time, over 20 Mha of land would have come under irrigation. However, only about 7 Mha worth of irrigation facility has actually been created. Why can’t an effective central government agency such as NHAI be created for irrigation projects? Why can’t private companies be involved? Why can’t some accountability be built into the system? Who will ensure the timely completion of 240 new irrigation projects proposed?

Over 58% of irrigation is from groundwater using an estimated 6.5 million diesel pumps and 11 million electric pumps. Costly diesel required makes farming virtually unviable for small farmers. Wherever the pumps are on electric power, that is either free or wrongly tapped, the farmers are overusing and wasting it. Groundwater tables have dropped rapidly. Over 15% blocks in the country are now groundwater deficient. Surprisingly, Punjab has lower land productivity despite intensive use of largely subsidized water and fertilisers. While Moga’s fertiliser consumption was 243 tonnes per ha in 2005-06, Wayanad in Kerala used 49 tonnes per ha, Chatra in Jharkhand only 67 tonnes per ha and Tuensang in Nagaland just 0.07 tonnes per ha.

A recent report of the Punjab Farmers Commission found that the water table had reached the critical depth of more than 10 meter in as much as 85 per cent areas in central Punjab. And now the Punjab Government is shifting at least one million hectare under paddy to other less water-consuming crops. In Karnataka, ground water levels are depleting at an alarming rate of 70 cm a year. Noone for certain can say anything about the finance minister’s pet projects of the renovations of the thousands of heritage water bodies of the country.

In other countries, the farmers can realize one-third of the market prices of the commodities. Indian farmers manage to get only one-fifth of the prices, as the balance goes to financially strong middlemen. May be the contract farming can be the answer.

Poor financing policy has slowed mechanization. Unfortunately, the financial institutes and banks have never been farmer-friendly. The National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development’s (Nabard) guidelines for financing of farm machinery requires farmers to offer not only the underlying asset (tractor) but also land as collateral security. Moreover, this land pertains to a minimum holding of eight acres, that too “perennially irrigated”. Given that this kind of land nowadays fetches no less than Rs 5 lakh, it means pledging an asset worth Rs 40 lakh for a loan of Rs 1-3 lakh. This is one reason that tractor sales have been stuck at around 2.5 lakh.

And the way out:

Contract farming may be one way to improve the earning of farmers as it may exclude the intermediaries who grab the maximum advantages. In contract farming, the farmer provides a commitment to deliver a specific quantity of a commodity at quality standards agreed upon by the purchaser. The sponsor on its part pledges to support the farmer’s crop with all possible inputs and to purchase the commodity. The Government also plans to set a target of involving 10 per cent of the farmers in contract farming in the next four years. However, a simple and transparent dispute resolution mechanism must come out for safeguarding unscrupulous ones.

The decline of wheat is largely attributed to an “ageing” wheat variety which has been in use since mid-’90s. The scientists must come out with some new breakthoughs with some high yielding varieties. As reported, a new high-yielding variety of pulse is being introduced.

Can the PM’s mega Rs 25,000-crore assistance plan to states give a push to agricultural productivity? Can the resolution to boost the growth rate of the sector to 4 per cent be realized? I suggest few steps:
1.Ministries need restructuring. Water resources, fertilizers, agricultural universities and laboratories, extension centers, and rural development must get integrated under one ministry.

2.Agricultural universities and laboratories must move to farmers both physically and digitally, and make a breakthrough with some real high yielding seeds.

3.Panchayats must be made responsible for the building and maintenance of waterbodies, canals, and check bunds.

4.Holdings for the real farmers must be allowed to increase up to at least 50 acres.

5.All retailers in organized sector must buy straight from the farmers under transparent contract system offering the best price, as perhaps ITC is doing that.

6.With fast improvement of rural connectivity, the entrepreneurs must move the manufacturing to the rural homes as much as possible.

7.Agriculture and farming must remain attractive enough to keep the younger generation of the farmer family attached to it.

8.Financial institutes must not treat farmers with suspicion, and provide credit with some practical and flexible product design.

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Latest Trends in Machining in ‘My Writings’

Posted on June 5, 2007 by indra

Today, it has only one document on ‘Latest Trends in Machining’ practices. Machining and manufacturing has been my life-long interest. At one particular time, I refused to take over a higher position in hierarchy and responsibility to be nearer with machining in my professional career.

I have been rare individual in one respect that even while working on shop floor or in managerial assignment, I kept on writing. It started with writing an educational series for the supervisors in that automobile firm where I started working. I could get that published through Tata McGraw Hill, New Delhi.

I did publish another book named ‘Mr. Supervisor as Mr. Manager’ through a lesser known local publisher to satisfy my ego. I have also circulated two very important documentations on manufacturing- one on gear manufacturing that must have been procured by each and every gear manufacturing company, and the other on automobile manufacturing. I could not do much marketing for the later one. However, I shall try to put tI don’t know if you have noticed it or not. The blog is having a new icon ‘<a href="http://www.drishtikona.comhis on my site under 'My Writings' for the benefits of those who are or will be working in automobile manufacturing companies. It is all because of the insistence of Anand and Shannon.

Automobile Manufacturing will contain subjects such as engine components manufacturing, sheet metal stamping, body welding, painting, and vehicle assembly and testing. I wrote this, as I didn't find any book where all these subjects were available in one place. I am sure there must be one available today. However, the readers may recommend their friends in machining and manufacturing sector or in engineering colleges to read them. I shall also love to get some comments and suggestions that may help me to improve upon the content.

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Bihar: Some News, My Views

Posted on June 1, 2007 by indra

1.For nearly five weeks, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar didn’t attend his office at Patna Secretariat due to his wife’s illness and her subsequent death on May 14. The bureaucrats ran the government as the Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi had been also on a two-week Australia, Singapore trip to study their tax structure.

While all the people are sympathetic with the premature death of Nitish’s wife, the news that no one was heading the government during this period is disturbing and presents a case of lack of management organization and a system. Nitish Kumar must have a protocol of seniority among his cabinet members so that in absence of the CM and his deputy, a cabinet member automatically becomes the acting presiding officer of the cabinet and takes all the routine decisions. I wish Nitish Kumar or for that every head of any institution must build the discipline in its organization.

2.Twenty-eight of the 30 students of ‘Super 30’, the most innovative and exemplary coaching institute in Bihar have passed the highly competitive Indian Institute of Technology-Joint Entrance Examination (IIT-JEE) this year. Anand Kumar, director of Super 30, reactions was equally interesting, “We were sure of positive results as we teach them to eat, sleep, walk and talk only IIT.” It speaks highly of the focused and dedicated skill building that reminds one of the famous Dronacharya and the way he trained Arjuna in archery to aim at the bull’s eye and nothing else. Interestingly, Bihar’s Additional Director-General of Police Abhyanand, still teaches physics at the institute. It must be giving the desired break from the fatiguing police work chasing criminals and kidnappers of Bihar.

As reported, Super 30 is only five years old. Its success can serve as a model for other such institutes across India, but more so it must make some more Anand Kumar grow in the state and the country who can take up the task for the deprived class for preparing for the highest ranked and the most sought after examination of the country. Why is it not happening? It is matter of concern. But Anand Kumar must expand too. Bihar requires more of them with a new IIT coming in Bihar. Interestingly, early this year, Norika Fujiwara, a former Japanese beauty queen and actress, made a documentary film on Super 30 for its innovative and successful attempt to send poor children to India’s top engineering colleges.

3.Manish Kumar of Gyan Niketan, Patna secured 99.4 per cent marks in Class-X examination of the CBSE. I was happily amazed to know that Kishore Kunal, IPS, is the founder of Gyan Niketan too. Some more students of Gyan Niketan such as Prashant Suman got 98.4 per cent while Robin Raj 98.2 per cent. If I am not mistaken Kishore Kunal also runs the institutions such as Mahavir Mandir and Mahavir Hospital too.

I wish Kunal could have concentrated in setting up schools of the same standard in every district head quarters of the state, as Bihar needs them in hundreds. And I still plead that all the schools in Bihar should switch over to CBSE to bring a uniformity and to downsize the number of employees in the Board. But can Gyan Niketan come up with a mission that makes its students passing class XII compete in IIT entrance examination without any coaching that is costly and unnecessarily additional load for the students?

4.Nobel laureate Amartya Sen will head a panel that will oversee the opening of an international university in Nalanda in Bihar, and its first meeting will be held in Singapore in July. Other members of the panel are Sugata Bose, a grand nephew of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, who teaches at Harvard University in the US, Singapore Foreign Minister George Yeo and a minister each from China and Japan. All three countries are expected to fund the university. After the Singapore meeting, three more meetings will held in China, Japan and Bihar. The state government had begun acquiring 500 acres of land for the university. The proposed university will be fully residential, like the ancient Nalanda seat of learning. In the first phase of the project, seven schools with 46 foreign faculty members and over 400 Indian academics would be established. The university will impart courses in science, philosophy and spiritualism along with other subjects. A renowned international scholar will be its chancellor.

I wonder why the name of India is not in the participating countries of the meet and in providing the fund. Why can’t the new IIT proposed for Bihar is one in the institutions in the proposed university? Why can’t the participating country establish an institution each in specific field of arts, science, or technology that be its showpiece and internationally the best? The project must aim at setting up a global village for eminent people who wish to live in vicinity of a great educational university? May be the professors teaching there may decide to live there forever.

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Innovating India

Posted on May 31, 2007 by indra

For quite sometime Anand suggested and is trying to put all my papers and books that I have written on my website http://www.drishtikon.com. He has already put my last book, ‘Latest trends in Machining’ that is now freely accessible for all working in engineering industry and who is interested to know the latest about machining technology.

I wanted to find out if I can scan my articles published in different journals from its reprints and convert into a format that can be edited, updated, and put into pdf and on website. One day I discussed the problem with my nephew Prakash, who is a student of IT in a private college in Vadodara. He had some solution that I did not know. However, I was surprised to know about the innovations that are coming from our young friends in different colleges.

Young innovators in many a academic institution across India are full of ideas and are also incubating, creating new technology platforms, and coming up with real-world solutions. In most of cases, it is happening as a bunch of enthusiastic and motivated batch mates share a common passion for creating cutting-edge software platforms that can make a difference to mankind.
The India leg of the ‘Imagine Cup’ provides the opportunity and the challenge. This year approximately 12,000 students from over a 1,000 colleges participated for the India leg of the Imagine Cup. The number of innovators is increasing every year. Some of the achievements are as follows:

1.Batch mates Deepak Jagdish, Vasundhara Kantroo, and Avi Mehta, known in group as Team Blue Leaf, are final-year B.Tech students at Dhirubhai Ambani Institute for Information and Communication Technology, Ahmedabad. The trio are making waves for ‘Recog’, their unique innovation, which has won them first prize at a national level competition recently. Recog is a software platform that integrates handwritten notes, textbook pages, newspaper cuttings and other printed media. It identifies the context of the content and tries to find meaning in it. The trio are now going to Seoul to take on innovators from around the globe at the Imagine Cup, world’s premier student technology competition, where more than 1,00,000 students from nearly every country in the world will compete with their innovations.

2.Vaibhav Rastogi, Anand Mohan, Shailendra Sason and Patel Alkesh Maganbhai-the four BTech batchmates from IIIT Allahabad, have created ‘Aabha’ a multilingual document summariser. It’s a software which when given a document, automatically prepares its summary. In their words, ”our system can summarise documents in English, Hindi, Urdu, Gujarati and Telugu. Moreover, the design is so modular and generic that given a few linguistic modules, it will work for most languages”. That’s not all, the foursome have quite a few innovations to their credit. For example, they have created a multilingual chat and conferencing module which facilities multilingual chatting, conferencing, PowerPoint presentation sharing et al.

3.Pranav and Shivanand Thakur from the Army Institute of Technology, Pune and IGNOU Lucknow have created ‘Educational Content Identification and Grabbing System’ (ECIGS). Software that minimises search options on the Net and increases efficiency in finding relevant and useful content.

4.Roshan Sumbaly and his friends from BITS Pilani, Goa created, ‘eduGRID’. It’s aimed at solving the problem of ‘low student: teacher ratio’ in educational institutions. “Gone are the days when a teacher used to give personal attention to every student. Students can use our software to learn themselves. It answers queries in an interactive and conversational fashion (speech as well as text). Indeed it can’t be a ‘replacement’ for a teacher, but yes, it can be a ‘substitute’ when a teacher is not around.”

Many of these youngsters from India are also making a mark globally now. Indian teams have featured twice in the global top three in the last five years of Imagine Cup. In 2003, students from the Vivekanand Education Society’s Institute of Technology, Mumbai, won the second prize globally for their solution Sanjeevani aimed at the healthcare industry.

However, India lacks the ecosystem that exists in countries like US and Israel to nurture innovators. ‘More VC firms must provide seed capital for the good innovators. Some educational institutions such as IITs, IIMs are having the incubation fund for the prospective entrepreneurs.

India will have to go miles and miles to make its presence felt among the developed nations. And the idea of innovations must spread in all sectors of activities of services, manufacturing as well as agriculture.

Ideas come fast and fade off faster, so what’s needed is a place where these innovations can be nurtured and allowed to grow. India needs to set up incubation centres across the country.

CII, big IT companies, banks and even MNCs such as Microsoft are also taking the initiative and providing the incentives and other opportunities to the young innovators.

Remember, all the four groups mentioned in the story are from institutions other than IITs. It gives a hope that India can reach a respectable position in the field of innovations that cam make it compete and win.

It will be interesting to mention a recent survey about innovation- friendliness of India. An Economist Intelligence Unit survey finds that though India’s environment is slightly more conducive for innovation than China’s, over the next five years, the latter may not only narrow this gap, but also surpass India on overall outcomes by spending far more on R&D. The gap is huge: $6 billion last year in India against $136 billion in China.

Can India maintain its lead even with lesser spending in R&D, as the spending does not have a direct relation with the quality of innovations?

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Leaders Must Drop Caste-based Perks

Posted on May 31, 2007 by indra

The whole of Rajasthan is burning. More than a dozen protesters have lost life. The state all over is under siege. Jaipur Highway is under army. Trains are moving through Rajasthan. And for what a silly reason! Gurjjar community wants it to be designated as Schedules Tribes. But why do they want that? It is because that gives certain advantages in government jobs.

Our constitution makers incorporated reservations for the scheduled castes and schedules tribes in employment. However, that was only for just 15 years. But our politicians have gone on extending and perpetuating that till date. And then came the reservations recommended by Mandal Commission and incorporated by VP Singh, the great. With Congress coming in power in 2004, the floodgates of divisive politics opened with reservation for OBC in the institutions of higher learning initiated by disgruntled Arjun Singh. Meira Kumar pushed for the reservations in private sectors. And the Gurjjar protests in last few days are the manifestations of the mistakes committed by the crooks in society. A 80 year old army man is behind this uprising. It becomes difficulty to digest these news.

How can Gurjjars be schedule tribes? Neither their look, nor social status supports the demand. I can’t even imagine that my friend Sirohi or neighbour Baddhana are from schedule tribes. I don’t find them anyway inferior to the so-called upper castes in look, IQ, or social status. Many questions are becoming pertinent. Has Indian society changed so radically that a community, at present categorised as OBC, would willingly opt to move down the social hierarchy in return of prospective material benefits? In Haryana, Jats have been demanding OBC status, although they rank higher in the caste ladder. And Jats in Rajasthan have already succeeded to get into OBC category. How can it be different for different states? How can the caste leaders decide it? If at all, it must have been done by dharmacharyas and must be done on countrywide basis. In my childhood, I did remember some castes trying to put on sacred threads and getting into business of conducting the rituals to prove that its belongs to the highest caste. Today, perhaps, the same caste is ready to get coverted into schedule caste, if officially done and if all the benefits are made available.

It is high time that all politicians decide to leave back this way of winning election. It is also high time that the so-called Dharmacharya or Sankaracharya denounce the caste system in Hindus. It is also high time for the educated and intellectuals in all the communities to drop the mention of castes all together. It is not going to serve any purpose of the nation. It will only divide the country and its people to a limit from where it will be impossible to return and evolve as a nation. The nomenclatures evolved over the ages are totally outdated and out of place in this twenty-first century with globalisation moving so fast.

It reminds one of the well-to-do people getting them enlisted into refugee list in the post independent period. As I understand a similar thing is happening to get into BPL list. It can stop only if every benefit comes on basis of merit, and if the government stops giving doles and subsidies. The government and the community leaders must empower every citizen of the country to live a respectful life instead of making them beggars.

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