Shashi Tharoor

Governance Delivered – By 140 characters!!!

“EPFO plans to hire social media agency”EPFO

This news bit resembling a 140 character tweet appearing somewhere in a corner in today’s Indian Express caught my attention and set the tone for my this week’s blog post. Has social media in general and Twitter in particular become so important a tool today for delivering Governance? Though our PM Narendra Modi has been in the forefront in using social media as an important medium for direct communication even before he became the PM, it’s only now (may be an year or so) since we started seeing other Ministers on platforms like Facebook and Twitter. Apart from the Ministers themselves, we are now seeing even official accounts of Ministries, Secretaries and other key officials.

It’s a fact that Indian politicians except a few like Shashi Tharoor or Narendra Modi were quite slow in taking to social media. During the UPA rule when Tharoor as a Minister was quite active and visible on Twitter with day today updates of his work, Congress party admonished him to keep a low profile, we were told.  And that time from the opposition, leaders like Venkaiah Naidu took sly digs at Tharoor for his excessive tweeting!

More than 4 years later, the wheel has come a full circle. Naidu has an active Twitter account with more than 220K followers.  And it has now become the norm for the Ministers and other ruling politicians to customarily post updates on their day today activities and accomplishments on their FB page and/or on Twitter. We as citizens who had to depend earlier upon newspapers or TV reports (who in turn relied on press releases/briefings from Ministries) or Full page ads in newspapers released by parties to tom-tom their achievements (by the way this rotten practice continues to this day by all parties) now can get an idea of what is happening by “following” different ministers. Of course one must know to separate “gloats” from “ground reality”!  Apart from this method of feeding information – the game changer has been the emergence of a medium like Twitter to solve people’s problems.

We all now know how our Minister for External Affairs Sushma Swaraj has become a darling of Overseas Indians because she religiously takes actions based on tweets directed at her asking for help. For those who get stuck in unforeseen situations that too in foreign shores, this has become a Godsend to cut across the Embassy security and bureaucratic maze and get the needed attention.  And similarly Suresh Prabhu, the Minister for Railways is another who is prompt in responding to passenger grievances on Twitter. So much so a passenger’s complaint tweeted from one station while he was on a journey got addressed by the time the train reached the next station! Or so we were told.  Routinely we see people tweeting to Nirmala Sitharaman, Minister for Commerce and Industry about various queries on policy matters,… and she makes it a point to respond diligently. In another positive use of social media, few days back Star anchor Rajdeep Sardesai tweeted about the need for a post office in Pithoragarh a small town in the Almora district – a mountainous stretch in Uttarakhand and lo, Ravi Shankar Prasad the concerned Minister obliged with opening of a new Post Office there I believe in 4 days!!! So it didn’t come as a surprise when the Ministers who were ranked high in opinion polls at Modi Sarkar’s 2 year Anniversary were all those who were active on social media. Not just active by their presence but by earnestly attempting to solve governance problems.

Though an active “twitterer” myself, I was initially a sceptic too. Whether the social media influence on public at large is an overrated phenomenon. After all a Facebook or a Twitter as a medium is still considered very urban and elitist and not one that reaches the bottom of the pyramid in a country where the political “fortunes” actually lie and where the IT penetration is a still a Work in slow progress. In fact, many including me were caught by surprise when a not so IT savvy grass root politician like Amit Shah, BJP’s President announced that one of the criteria for candidates for the upcoming UP polls was that they should have social media accounts and must be active on the same with XXXX number of followers! Is it that Modi is “bully pulpitting” the BJP and its leaders to take social media seriously and take advantage of the same???

May be or may not be actually. For the innately smart Indian politician (whether IT savvy or otherwise) it doesn’t get so difficult to grasp the growing utility of social media. There were many politicians in the pre- social media era too who earnestly addressed citizen issues being brought up to them thro petitions, letters, appeals,… However when they addressed those issues, it was only known to that petitioner or complainant concerned. However, in social media, when a Suresh Prabhu addresses a passenger issue promptly and responds on Twitter it reaches many of his followers. Multiple Retweeting then generates a humongous multiplier effect! And finally, if the story gets picked up by main stream media also then it delivers a huge reach – may be to the actual target audience of the Minister😃

So though social media still is very much urban and caters to a very literate and niche audience (considering India’s size) as of now, it is growing at a fast clip in terms of adoption. And more importantly what we see is social media today feeding off the narrative in main stream media routinely. What happens on Twitter gets lapped up and stories developed by many reporters, anchors and columnists for Newspapers, TV News,…

Yes, the obsession with “Trending on Twitter” by News channels and political parties may be completely misplaced. But if a political party gets also obsessed with using a Twitter as a medium to listen to the common man and communicate, it automatically becomes a very effective tool for delivering Governance. Today, it could be a staid EPFO that wants to be on social media. Tomorrow it could be a more staid Ministry of Ganga Rejuvenation😃. By the way, young boys and girls, managing social media has become a very attractive and powerful career option in political capitals!!! (more powerful than the “Personal Secretary” of yore)

P.S: Being very responsive on Twitter to deliver Governance also has its side effects. As Mrs. Swaraj recently found out. Somebody tweeted to her for help regarding problem with his Samsung Refrigerator😃😃 It’s another matter that the astute tweet got huge play and negative WOM for Samsung that I am sure the Tweeter would have got the desired result swiftly!!!

For “Swachh Bharat”, STOP the Cleaning!!!

From the time Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the kickoff of the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan in India on the 15th August this year, India has been on a cleaning overdrive. Routinely we have been seeing ministers, netas wielding the broom and doing a cleaning act. It culminated in the actual launch of this new social awakening campaign by the PM on the 2nd Oct where he himself did a bit of sweeping. Its’ been a while since India actually saw the top leader championing a social campaign which Prof. Pratap Bhanu Mehta and Shashi Tharoor in their articles refer to as the “Bully pulpit” a phrase meaning to drive change top down. Close on the heels of the PM, we saw many ministers, MPs, MLAs, officialdom, volunteers from NGOs, celebrities and general public doing their bit of Shramdhan on the 2nd Oct in cleaning in different parts of the country. So far so good.

bharat

But the moot question is does a country become clean by cleaning alone?

Among the many countries I’ve visited if I have to pick up one country which stood out for its cleanliness it will obviously be Japan. Many who have been to Japan agree to this. Is Japan spic’n span because they have more people to clean and for longer? Or do they put technology to use to ensure cleanliness? May be they do. But the fact is Japanese are extremely particular about cleanliness not just within their homes but in public spaces as well. So what they do is not just cleaning but not creating many opportunities for cleaning. They just don’t litter.  The cleaning up of the football stadium during the FIFA World cup by Japanese fans that too after their team’s exit from the World cup is now part of WhatsApp “forward folklore”. I’m sure most of the litter must have been generated by the Columbian fans!!! From having a small personal ashtray in their pockets to having 4 or 5 waste bins in every nook and corner to separate wastes, cleanliness is one of their two biopolymer strands in their DNA!!!

Contrast that to we Indians, forget DNA, cleanliness need to be searched in our hair strands!!!

I was walking down the stairs after leaving my daughter in a class yesterday. This was when the country was still reeling under the Swachh Bharat mania. A young man must be in his 30’s was standing on the edge of the stairs talking on his mobile phone. As I turned to exit the building, he used all his energy to spit the red juice of the paan he was chewing, on the floor.  I stopped and gave a long stare at him and asked him “Swachh Bharat”??? He started smiling and I felt like slapping him then and there. Now the red remnants of the “paan art” will be cleaned by someone someday. But the stains will remain to remind the world of our dirty etiquette.

For a while, I was of the view that public etiquette is an education thing. After seeing the walls and corners splashed in red in Mumbai, I have concluded that it is not. Day in day out in Mumbai (and indeed in many parts of our country) gentlemen “paint the city red” by spitting after chewing paan in public spaces and wherever they are.  In most walls, the warning sign goading people not to spit is submerged in paan stains.

For us Indians, by and large cleanliness is within the four walls of our homes. Beyond that is not our concern. This is the core issue and the reason behind the pathetic state of our public places.

If Ganga is dirty, it is not for want of cleaning. In the past Governments sanctioned crores of rupees on Ganga cleaning project and I am sure a fraction of it indeed would have been spent on cleaning. But if we don’t stop littering, then this cleaning is of no use. Like Shashi Tharoor in his article says, in the past also they have been different campaigns for a “Clean India” though not necessarily as visible and of this scale as Narendra Modi’s. They have not yielded results for the same reason that people don’t feel the need of a clean surrounding beyond their four private walls whether they are bus stands, temples, railway stations, airports, parks, gardens, schools, hospitals,… ,…

To be realistic, we cannot expect the PM to keep cleaning his surroundings in public every day in public view. And similarly the ministers, babus, NGO workers,.. . Even I heard that once the programme was over in Delhi, it left behind a trail of of water bottles,.. When the optics fade out in a few days, it will be back to the municipality workers to pick up the thread and litter literally.

So are we to stay condemned with a dirty India? Certainly not. From that point of view, the PM’s initiative is extremely laudable in creating awareness about cleanliness. This awareness needs to be transformed into an awakening by us citizens by educating our children right from the young age about the need to have clean surroundings wherever they are. I don’t have much hope on the current grown up generation to give up their few minutes of self-pleasure and stop chewing paan and spitting from tomorrow. That will continue. And for that may be the PM’s push to all to spend few hours in cleaning every year may help.

But, what will make India a Swachh Bharat though not in 5/10 years but may be in 20/25 years is when attitudinal shift happens in generations. For that we have to follow as per me the most vital part of the pledge which is “I will neither litter or let others litter” and drill this in our children.

Swachh Bharat is not about cleaning but a clarion call to cease the need for cleaning!!!

After thought: If Swachh Bharat Mission leads up to this type of cleaning no complaints though 🙂 🙂 🙂

cartoon

Cartoon courtesy : Satish Acharya

Do read my another post on Swachh Bharat – Towards Swaasth and Swachh Bharat!!! https://anandkumarrs.wordpress.com/2014/11/16/towards-swaasth-and-swachh-bharat/

April and the IPL Typhoid !!!

Come April and it’s that time of the year when sections of people in India hate Modi. Wait a minute! Before the Modi brigade start trolling me, let me clarify. This is not NaMo the usual object of hate generally but LaMo – Lalit Modi who six years ago created a product called the Indian Premier League (IPL) and shifted permanently the centre of gravity of Cricket economics to India forever.  While IPL has triggered a craze in the country and is attempting to bridge the gap between “Bat & Fad”, there are the following naysayers:

  • Women: Generally speaking in an average Indian home, the remote control is by and large with the woman. I meant the remote control of the TV ‘also’!!!  In between Cartoons/Disneys/Chota Bheems and Ram Kapoors/Jetha Lals/Parvati Bhabhis – it is not very unusual to see the Rajdeeps, Harshas & Barkas getting squeezed and edged out in the normal scheme of things. But come April, men who otherwise don’t get to establish their ‘control’ on the ‘remote’ have their last laugh and for 50 days – IPL takes over the airwaves inside the house. So, no wonder the moment the IPL promo ads start airing, you start hearing sounds of the grinding teeth amidst the “Gilli Gilli” sounds!
  • Film Makers: Since weekends are usually cramped with double headers starting from 4.00 pm in the IPL, the usual crowd in theatres during weekends goes missing. Film makers take a break from releasing their new movies when IPL is on fearing a Box office disaster. Last year a producer who released his movie during IPL was feted with “Bahaduri Ka Puraskar” (Bravery Award) to keep the chin up of the movie fraternity!!
  • Businessmen/Shopkeepers: In the pre-IPL days, weekends were times of heightened business activity as parents throng shops/outlets with children for ‘time-pass’ during vacation time and end up in a shopping spree.  Not any more. They themselves have to keep a TV set in their shops and watch IPL matches to keep them occupied in IPL season. Surprising that our politicians who are against FDI in retail are not against IPL!!!
  • Hotels/Restaurants: This is a no brainer. If people stay indoors – there is certainly an effect on the eateries! Smart cookies started beaming IPL matches in big screens still to get people in. The jury is still out on if this strategy is working.
  • TV Channels other than MAX: It is that part of the year when all the GE TV channels just cool their heels without launching any new big-ticket programmes/Reality Shows,… So the Indian Idols, Big Boss’, Super Singers, KBCs and their ilk all take a break during IPL and return post June.  As far as the news channels are concerned – they board the IPL bandwagon with their own pre and post-match programming.  Something is better than nothing! In other cases, they just have to live with the ignominy of poor TRPs. Just today I saw a tweet from a news caster  which goes thus :

“If blore bats first against hyd at 8pm, gayle wl also take viewers away fm my spl report on blore’s woes ahead of elex n headlines today 😦 “

Guess it’s because of the venomous curse of the above groups that Lalit Modi is sitting in the fringe somewhere in the UK these days tweeting live updates on IPL matches instead of being at the centre of action in India during IPL!!!

Having said that, jokes apart – IPL has been a revelation. Inspite of the exit of its creator – Lalit Modi and the tribulations some of the team owners are going through oflate, it’s still proving that the success in the 1st few seasons was not a fluke.  And one must hand it over to Lalit Modi for first creating the product and then demonstrating how to manage the product successfully. I’ve no doubts in my mind that the last few years of IPL basically have been “Copy & Paste” of the formula Modi worked out in the formative years.  Whether it is the format, the auctions, opening and closing ceremonies, outsourced Game organization, telecast, pre and post-game hype and hoopla,… it has “Modi Chaap” even today. What is missing today is the orchestrated PR plugs which Modi had a penchant for.  I remember in the 1st few editions, there were deliberate attempts to keep IPL in the news during the long drawn campaign.  Just when the games start getting into a repetitive monotony (same teams playing against each other “n” number of times) there will emerge some scandalous off the field story which will bring IPL back in the news (Remember Harbhajan slapping Sreesanth in 2008???)

While I started this piece on a lighter vein with an introduction to IPL’s hate groups, on a serious note, its worth looking at IPL’s effects on the economy. I read somewhere that when Brazil wins the World Cup the country’s GDP in that year expands by an additional x % as people revel in the feel good ambience and end up spending a lot of money and a Baby Boom ensues!! I feel when Brazil loses, it also spurs the economy – only that this time it’s just the liquor economy as people keep drinking to drown their sorrow 🙂

Given this connection between sporting success and economy of the country, let’s look at the IPL effect on the economy:

  • The obvious one is its avatar as a “Job Fair”. Look at the opportunity it provides to so many fringe cricketers like the Gonys, Anirudhs,…who may find it hard to break into an Indian team. Then you have the band of ex – cricketers who get the chance to stay in the limelight as coaches/advisors,.. of IPL teams or get employed as experts and commentators on TV and some of them as columnists in newspapers/Web. Suddenly you find Kapil Dev who was the brand ambassador in the opposite camp (ICL) burying all animosity and doing the “Jumping Japak” routine with Sidhu and mouthing expert comments. Apart from that you have so many other indirect jobs – curators, security, catering, transport, bouncers,…,…
  • Then you have the other impact on the economy – Hotels, Airlines, Media, Consumer goods,…

The positive latent effect on the economy is what Shashi Tharoor cited as a main reason for his keenness on a Kochi team in IPL which he attempted to stitch together. Rightly so.

So what if there are a few hatemongers and worrywarts on IPL? Now that the IPL-6 typhoid has set in, let’s contribute to the IPL economy. As Farah Khan exhorts in that cool IPL-6 campaign – Sirf Dekhne Ka Nahi!!!

IPL toon

Now Showing – “Board Exams”

For this time of the year, the temperature in the last few days in Mumbai has been few degrees higher than normal.  One tends to attribute the same to the usual suspect called “Global Warming”.  But I suspect that the higher temperature this time overall is due to the “Exam fever” every house hold is seemingly suffering from – these days!  In India this is the season for the SSC (10th) exam and the “life threatening” HSC (12th) exams now and my best wishes at the outset to all the students who are going through the rigmarole.  Absenteeism in companies is at a high as parents take leave in turns to be with their kids and provide moral support as they prepare for the ‘board’ exams.  Film makers who aspire to be in the 100 Crore club avoid release of their movies in this tense period.  In these highly competitive times, board exam times are becoming “testing” times for the parents, grandparents and the ilk.  

I’m not sure if this aura around ‘Board’ exam is only in India or it is a universal phenomenon. India made a 1st step towards easing the burden on students when Kapil Sibal, the then minister for HRD, made the board exam for 10th standard an optional affair from 2011. I’m not well-informed on how this optional thing works or doesn’t work.   However the tyranny of the board exam continues for 12th Std to this day.

I have vivid memories of my tryst with board exams which started with the 10th way back in 1983. In our predominantly Hindu – Brahmin school in Trichy (by name E.R.Higher Secondary School), the hall tickets were handed over after a puja at the temple. On the appointed day, all the students and respective teachers of the 10th class were taken to the temple for the Puja. My neighbour and friend who used to be in a Catholic school said that in their school, the hall tickets were handed over after a prayer at the church. So I concluded that all religions took board exams seriously and board exams by nature were secular!  By the time I came to 12th there was no need to take the walk to the temple for collecting the hall ticket. The school by then made strides and collected enough funds to build a small temple within the school premises itself.  To take care of the Saivite and Vaishnavite sensibilities or rather their academic aspirations, the temple was built with 2 presiding deities – Ganesh and Hanuman. 

In a neighbourhood Ganesh Temple the priest – an old pious man would give us specially worshipped ‘vibhudhi’ individually to each of us to be applied just before we open the question paper.  During exam time, he reminded us kids not to forget to collect the same before the exam begins and we did so religiously.  As quaint as it may seem, the lines to collect this ‘vibhudhi’ from him were quite long during board exam times with even non regulars to the temple queuing up.  That the old man was carrying out this practice without expecting any monetary consideration is in stark contrast to the materialistic world of today.

As soon as the 11th exams were over, the preparation for 12th started.  The idea was to start early and complete the portions by Dec. In preparation for the 12th board exam in April, the classes get over by Dec and the next 3 months one is at home to prepare for the final kill. I must admit here that though the board exam fever was running high, we were quite relaxed and taking it easy.  So much so that we didn’t resist watching the entire “Benson & Hedges World Championship of Cricket” which took place in March 1985 in Australia.  Following the World Cup win in 1983, India continued its winning stretch in One Dayers beating Pakistan in the finals in this tournament.   Watching almost all the matches live on TV with mates that too at a friend’s place and rooting for India bring back unforgettable memories. Ravi Shastri became a (to borrow today’s vocab) “hash tag” overnight after being crowned as “Champion of Champions” in that tournament and ‘Audi’ got into the lexicon of the Indian youth.   Looking back I realize that this tournament provided for a much needed break in between our continuous study routine and acted as a stress buster.

While one starts getting into the trappings of the board exams – the refrain all around is “prepare well for this one last time, get good marks and you are set for life”!!!  But the truth is far from it. The competitive rat race of life continues post the board exams as well.  Only that you start getting used to it!!! The jury is still out on whether academic excellence matters at the end of the day and is the passport to success. As somebody said, academic excellence may well provide you the “Passport” but you still need the “Visa”!!!

It is nobody’s case that there is no need for an assessment in the form of an exam. It’s just that a complete focus on one final exam puts so much pressure and one bad day in office or rather the exam hall can put paid to an aspirant’s career hopes in today’s system. A movement to a continuous and regular assessment is the way forward.  Can our pragmatic and hardworking minister Shashi Tharoor ring in a change ???

On a Sunday as I am writing this post, my six year old daughter is quite engrossed in the movie “3 Idiots” for the “N+1”th time.  As the main protagonist Aamir Khan launches his diatribe on the present education system which gives so much weightage to marks and marks alone, I’m not sure if she realizes what’s in store for her. I hope by the time she is in her 10th, the so called ‘board’ exams have lived their lives and have been consigned to history.  The selfish thought being we as parents will be freed of the ‘board’ Exam fever!!!

Let me close this piece now as I have to rush my daughter to the dance class for well ………. an exam 🙂 🙂 🙂

Postscript: If people who are in Twitter are “Tweeples”, people who suffer from Exams are “Examples” 😦 😦 😦

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Blame it on “India Shining”!!!

Indians or should I say Middle Class Indians were ushered into the new year of 2004 with a feel good factor spread by the “India Shining” campaign launched by the then ruling front – the National Democratic Alliance ( NDA ) or rather its anchor constituent the Bharatiya Janata Party ( BJP ).  The reasoning was quite simple.  The NDA, whose term was to end in Oct 2004, thought that the time was ripe to call in early elections to cash in on the overall positive political climate.  (It is said that the then PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee was not keen on this move and felt that there was still work to be done but eventually had to give in to the more vocal party strategists).  The economy was booming, stocks markets were on a high, state election results were favourable, external affairs particularly relations with Pakistan was stable and more than everything the principal opposition the Congress was in a dilapidated state – reasons enough for this early calling of elections.   So, if I remember correct from Jan in that year onwards for a few months we were inundated with the “India Shining” campaign across all media.

1991, when India was in the verge of bankruptcy was when we were introduced to “Reforms” – both Economic and Structural.  While credit must be given to the architects of the Reforms 1.0 – Dr. Narasimha Rao, Dr. Manmohan Singh and their team, it is also not a secret that many of the items in that Reforms 1.0 were mandated by the IMF.  In the period of 1999 – 2004 during the NDA regime, we saw what I would call as Reforms 2.0.  Independent India for the 1st time had a full time minister for Disinvestment (Arun Shourie) who spiritedly fought his detractors to disinvest and unlock value in many of the Public Sector Units (PSUs) including the likes of Maruti Udyog, IPCL, VSNL,.. Petroleum Minister Ram Naik ventured into the now very sensitive area of dismantling the Administered Price Mechanism for Petrol whereby price of petrol will be decided by market forces rather than by the ministry. It was also the time when the Telecom read as Mobile revolution was slowly sweeping the hinterlands of the country.  With the benefit of hindsight one can say that from governance point of view the NDA regime didn’t do a bad job and if one realizes that it was also a cobbled up opportunistic alliance with its own compulsions, Vajpayee did manage to do a great job.

To the shock of all pundits, NDA lost and UPA came to power.  It was easy for all to blame NDA’s “India Shining” campaign for the defeat.  However there was a larger issue – far reaching conclusions were arrived by the stake holders. Some of them were – ‘India Shining campaign’ is a metaphor for reforms.  So that means if people rejected “India Shining” campaign, they rejected Reforms. Period. The political conclusion across the board was that the NDA was defeated because of the misleading “India Shining” campaign where the aam admi felt that he was not benefitted by the NDA rule while somebody else has.  The fact of the matter is NDA lost not because of their “India Shining” campaign or the reforms which they pursued but in spite of them.  While they swept the Hindi belt except Delhi, they lost the 2 important states in the South – AP and TN.  AP because Chandrababu Naidu in his obsession with the IT and the chatter class hype was completely oblivious of the strides Y.S.Rajasekhar Reddy (YSR) was making with his “Padyatra’ in the interiors of AP.  In TN, BJP made the strategic error of listening to wrong advisors and allied with Jayalalitha and let DMK go off their alliance.  These 3 states were enough to upset the electoral arithmetic.

This made the political class in both sides of the divide to firm up that reforms were never benefitting the poor.   Since then reforms in India is not a 7 letter word but a four letter one for the entire political class whether the ruling front or the opposition.

The immediate fallout was that UPA –I with the Left supporting them outside decided to “Spend” for growth rather than “Invest” for growth.  The govt. itself had a very limited reform agenda and even that was opposed by the Left.

One thought that in UPA-II without the Left and with a renewed mandate, the PM and his party-the Congress would be in a firmer wicket to push through reforms. However in UPA-II we see the spectre of Mamata who is blocking any supposedly reform initiative of the beleaguered government.  The Left is having a last laugh today because Mamata is espousing what all they believe in and in that in a much more effective way!  While Dr. Manmohan Singh risked his govt. while taking on the Left on the issue of the Civil Nuclear deal with the US during UPA-I, there is nothing of that steely nerve seen in pushing through reforms now.

And on the other side the situation is worse.   The BJP still smarting under that defeat in 2004 opposes the same reforms which they introduced in their time whether it is the GST or FDI in retail or even dismantling the APM completely.  Today while in the opposition it is clear that they are paying lip service to reforms!

I am glad that there is serious debate in the country regarding reforms today. However the political leadership across the board is not on board the Reforms bus. Under the scenario we need articulate political leaders to drive home the economical and therefore the political advantages of Reforms to their party men.  Recently I saw Dr. Shashi Tharoor using the online medium to build consensus on reforms which should be commended. Similarly Yashwant Sinha though doesn’t speak well of the reforms in the parliament has been vocally articulating the need for reforms in his columns.  Let more of this tribe emerge!

In spite of all this if “Reforms” still remains a bad word – blame it on that “India Shining”!

While on this, this piece from The Economist is a relevant read :

http://www.economist.com/node/21556576?fsrc=nlw|hig|6-7-2012|2049894|73958874|AP

P.S: In a recent article in the Economic times, N.K.Singh, Ex Finance Secretary and now Rajyasabha MP wrote, “When I walked into the room of finance minister Manmohan Singh shortly after June 21, 1991, to congratulate him, he told me that “we will change India”.

Dr. Singh – India is waiting to see that change you promised Sir!