The Euro

The Euro - Unity in Diversity

As a child of Maastrich Treaty, The Euro was created as a Common single currency of the European Union in 1999 and notes and coins started circulating in 2002.  UK and some other countries did not opt to become part of it then.  Even now UK is outside the currency union.  About 23 countries use Euro as their currency. 

Global Financial Crisis of 2007-2008 saw the Euro zone, where Euro is the official currency, enter into recession creating instability due to unbalanced economic developments among countries.  Some countries like Germany and France were stronger economically and some others were facing problems.  The stress of a more severe recession was threatening break-up of the Euro zone.  Easier said, than done.  The resultant catastrophe would have been monumental, had that happened.  The severity would have been worst worldwide  than Great Depression of 1930s.  Greece, Portugal, Ireland, Italy and Spain were the laggards dragging the others down into the crisis.  Defaults of these governments due to their mounting debts were staring the entire union.  As is always, none was prepared to tighten their belt and adopt austerity in their countries because of political compulsions.  The better managed countries were made to work out bailout packages to redeem crisis ridden governments.   Greece had become a test case of how the EU could deal better with the debt crisis emanating from its bulging debts.   In 2010 the Greek Government debt was downgraded to ‘junk’.  Even now Greece has not come out of the woods though it showed some positive developments in between.  It continues to have the debt burden and is on the verge of or already in a debt trap, if not well attended.   Austerity measures imposed were resented by the mass and led to a change in government which won on the promise of no austerity.  Naturally people would not want to reduce their consumption.  But on assuming office the new government in 2015 also learnt it the hard way that it had to agree to the conditions of the European Central Bank (ECB), International Monetary Fund (IMF) and Euro zone countries, dubbed as Troika, for debt relief and other supports to tide over the crisis.  Portugal and Ireland had the same problem of burgeoning debt with looming defaults.  For Spain it was the housing bubble that triggered the crisis with accompanying artificial and unsustainably high GDP growth rate.   The government’s very high expenditure along with hidden losses and misleading information flow in banking and finance sectors compounded the gravity of the situation.

Problems arising out of handling of economy and its monetary policies by Greece continue to haunt regulators of the currency mechanism, vis-a-vis, economic development of Euro zone.   It has to downsize their expenditure, service their debts and also guide their economy to grow by creating a right environment for economic development.   One country’s economic difficulties will trigger flight of capital and it cannot be isolated or insulated enough not to affect the other performing better off countries as they are constituents of European Union and Euro zone where free flow of capital and labour between them is guaranteed.  Flight of capital will only aggravate the crisis.

Euro zone and India both have similarities.  Of course India is a country with a federal structure consisting of about 25 states and union territories, whereas Euro zone consists of about the same number of countries but unified by a single currency.  Here regional imbalances are in states but in Euro zone the regional imbalances occur in separate countries economically.  Both have the problems of pulls from various quarters with their uniqueness.  Both experience pulls and pressures from within and without and find Unity in Diversity.  The fruits of unity outweighs otherwise extreme option in both cases.  That is the reason why even though the thought of exiting euro currency zone is current in Greece it has not happened so far. 

History has instances where unity was not achieved through diversity.  The erstwhile Soviet Union consisted of 15 republics disintegrated at the end of 1991.  Likewise Yugoslavia also disintegrated in 1991-92.  May be, the unity could not be achieved in these cases because of the type of governments they had which could not be called democratic.

But the latest affirmation for Unity in Diversity came in 2014 in the referendum in which Scots decided to remain with United Kingdom. Better wisdom prevailed.

Fearing 'Missed' Heartbeat?

Fearing 'Missed' Heartbeat?

No way.  Because as technology unfolds, a day may come soon that hearts need not and will not beat in the future.  Is it catastrophe or end of civilisation?  Should one fear missing an heartbeat on seeing a beautiful girl – it would become a thing of the past for world’s first bionic heart that does not beat but circulates blood has already been successfully transplanted into a live and healthy sheep by Australian researchers. Sheep chosen as it is similar in chest size to women and  children. Any artificial organ, particularly heart, runs the risk of wear and tear and declining efficiency.  This new device ‘BiVACOR’ will likely to function 10 years more than the previously designed artificial hearts, it is claimed.  This device has a disk that spins at 2000 rpm to pump blood without a beat, viz., pulse.  It is stated that it uses magnetic levitation technology to keep the components of the units from coming into contact one another and hence no wear and tear.  It is definitely revolutionary and 'path creating'.

Being a non-medical, let me venture out to visualise, though not seriously, the impact of this device on our day to day life.  Whenever one meets a doctor for any consultation, he would sub consciously extends his hand to the doctor, not for a hand shake, but to enable him to feel the pulse.  The medic routinely grips his hand to read the pulse and opens his Sphygmomanometer (difficult for me to even pronounce) for a reading of blood pressure.  These are the two parameters he basically needs to diagnose the status of a patient.

People normally does not like change and that is why age old practices are being followed without deviation or even questioning the necessity of it for the present day.  There are a lot of faculties in educational institutions who continue to teach the subject as they learnt during their college days till the time of their superannuation without updating contemporary developments .  This is the same reason why organisational culture does not change and Mergers and Amalgamations become failures.  Adaptability is the victim.  Doctors are also no exception and imagine a doctor who has not brushed up his repertoire and kept abreast of the developments diagnosing a patient with no heartbeat.   Will the bionic heart change the body temperature – another all important parameter a doctor needs at first.  The all known surgical procedures have to be harmonized to suit the changed circumstance, i.e., without heartbeat or pulse.  The entire medical knowledge will have to be overhauled and approach in all areas concerning physiology has to be re-charted!

If a person is emotionally charged or physically over exerted, there is every possibility that he will get a heart attack or stroke.  Will the position change when this new device is implanted?  The new device will possibly be programmed to take additional load.  That throws up more possibilities.World over it is customary for people to say, "Long Live" or "Bless you", when one sneezes.  It is said that while sneezing the heart stops for a fraction of a second!  In future scenario this good intentioned gesture will become redundant. 
 
The possibilities are endless with a bionic heart sans ‘beats’ in place of one which 'beats'.

From another angle, having a device with no heartbeat and human beings with ever changing emotions, the psychiatrists will also likely to have a field day.

'Din' from 'The DEN' -- CHINA, ‘The GOD’s Father’

China - ‘The GOD’s Father’

China, a communist country, trying to engineer a succession plan to the Dalai Lama is anathema to its professed ideology.  But it is in the process of usurping the right to have a dominant say.  Though on paper it does not interfere in citizens belief or religious practices it tries to determine the reincarnation of the 14^th Dalai Lama.

Tibetan tradition has it that the next Dalai Lama would be found by seeking the previous leader’s reincarnation.   The present 14^th Dalai Lama recently speculated that he will not reincarnate and will not have an afterlife.  It is an intricate process by which the successor is identified and incarnated.  It can take two to three years to complete the process.  According to Wikipedia, the Dalai Lama said he would not be reborn in a country controlled by the People’s Republic of China or any other country which is not free.  This throws up the possibility that the future Dalai Lama could be from any other country where Buddhism is practiced and followed.  The Dalai Lama speculated then that the future Dala Lama could be a woman.  The fact that the present Dalai Lama who exiled himself from Tibet / China and fled to India in 1959 and established a government in exile in India, aggravates unease of the Chinese Government.  That government still functions from Dharmasala, Himachal Predesh, India.  He is still the most reverered and venerated amongst Tibetan Buddhists.

Hence the present speculation that the 14^th Dalai Lama would not reincarnate makes China jittery for they would not have any say in the reincarnation of Dalai Lama or leverage in the affairs of Tibetan Buddhists.  The Chinese government fear losing grip on Tibetan affairs.  Appointing a friendly and pliant Lama who accepts China’s presence, policies and supremacy in Tibet would become impossibility.  China terms this as a betrayal of the succession of Dalai Lamas in Tibetan Buddhism.  The government seems to be bent on managing all aspects of Buddhist affairs in respect of Tibet, including the rituals of succession, to ensure total control of Tibet.

But Dalai Lama by speculating that there would not by reincarnation of himself put all efforts of China’s efforts to naught and in disarray.   Perhaps Dalai Lama does not want a repetition of Chinese government meddling in the affairs of selection of a successor as it did in the case of Panchan Lama in nineties.  The possibility of no reincarnation would make Chinese Government irrelevant.  This insult, the China is unlikely to digest and hence an attempt to run the rituals to identify to the person as incarnate.

Hence we now see the parody of Marxists, atheists by ideology, trying to fix reincarnation and after life in the true spirits of an oldest religion!

'Din' from 'The DEN' - Census 2011 throws up........!

Census 2011 throws up........!

It is reported that pregnant women are gravely underweight in India.  This fact came out while analysing census data.  Majority of Indian girls are anemic and under nutritioned.  The reasons attributed to this dismal level are the prevalent poor sanitation and drug resistant infections.   India ranks even below the world's poorest countries, like, Congo, Zimbabwe and Somalia.  About 42% of Indian mothers are underweight and the figure for sub-Saharan Africa is 16.5%.

This situation has resulted in a higher child mortality rate.  One can perceive that though cultural practices make the mother to eat the reminder after feeding all in the family, it is economic backwardness that dominates the majority of the households.

On the other hand it is also reported from the census data that in Tamil Nadu more than 70 lakh people in the age group of 20-80 are unmarried.  Of these 71% of them are males and the remaining are females.  Amidst them are people who never seriously considered getting married despite the pressure from the families to get married.  The unmarried in Tamil Nadu account for nearly 10% of the population.  The number of unmarried has jumped 13 times since the previous census in 2001.   One of the reasons attributed to this is the financial constraint.  Family commitments to support the siblings and parents alongwith the extension in the family through marriage has been a deterrent.  There seems to be no urban rural divide in the composition.  In all the southern states of India, the percentage of unmarried to that of total population is in the range of 8% to 10%.

The above two scenarios have a common link that both are the result of economic backwardness.  This is despite the fact that India had grown considerably during the last two decades after opening up of the economy.  It is a fact that the per capita income has increased, the average standard of living improved, the GDP has grown, is the fastest growing among the BRIC countries and the Indian Economy has become one among the top ten biggest economies of the world.  The development is skewed.  It is also a fact that all these improvements have not percolated down and the disparity between APL and BPL has not narrowed down so far.   If this is not addressed early, the feeling of discontent will gather momentum and a clash of classes may become a distinct possibility. 

Incidentally it is pertinent to recall that on March 8, 1917, Russia’s February Revolution began in St, Petersburg.  It was called  ‘February revolution’ as the Gregorian calendar was not adopted by Russia then and the earlier calendar that was in vogue in Russia then lagged behind 12 days. 

'Din' from 'The DEN' - Big Budget 2015

'Din' from The DEN - Big Budget 2015

Much anticipated Budget has come out, sans fireworks.  May be because PM Modi had lighted the gun powder directed at the main opposition the previous day itself in the course of his motion of thanks to the President in Lok Sabha.  Cameras were often focused across on the crest fallen faces in the live telecast proceedings of the House on 27^th February 2015. This has resulted in maintaining of decorum by all in the House, barring one stray retort from a leader.

As it should be, Budget is a policy document of the Government that explains how it intends to achieve its objectives in course of time.  In India, we are used not to hear policy statements and directions, but of the give-a-ways like freebies or waivers and cash distributions from the government.  Rob Peter to pay Paul. Only figures interest people.  Individuals judge the budget and categorize it as good or bad depending on the extent to which they are  affected with.  Seldom one finds a dispassionate assessment.  After all, everybody has an ax to grind!

The atmosphere is good to the Government given the fact that oil price is ruling at a very comfortable level  resulting in lesser foreign exchange outflow and reduced burden of subsidies.  Major part of pruning the deficit has been taken care of automatically by the fall in oil price.  The benefit of international oil price reduction was not fully passed on to the consumer so far.  That made the job easier coupled with moderating inflation.  The Government achieved the deficit target.  When one is given a concession it is difficult to withdraw later.  It becomes a right without obligations.  An opportunity to reduce subsidy was lost and even an effort at that is not seen in the budget.

Budget being a policy document, without going into the bolts and nuts,  envisions a path that would lead to sustained progress.  There are positive announcement for boosting sectors like, Education, Defence, Agri. and Tourism.  Visa on arrival for 150 countries is targeted towards a gold mine.

A good chunk goes to welfare schemes to take care of the neglected.

Gold monetisation is another step to release static gold in the form of unproductive holdings for economic investments.

Abolition of wealth tax is compensated by taxing rich through a 2% surcharge.

Across the board increase of Service tax and  Swachh Bharath Cess would increase the incidence overall and generate a sizable revenue to the government.

Gradual reduction of marginal Corporate IT rates by 5% over a period ensures more residual income for ploughing back, whilst  Individuals are taken care of by the promise that base limits of taxation would be gradually increased in due course commensurate to the buoyancy of the revenue collection.  Overall the promises are prospective to the tax payer.  However middle class individuals did not get a respite though some crumps are offered through increased deductions / allowances. The fact remains that the disposable income has not increased.

Steps to deal with Black Money in overseas and in India are welcome and should be effective with deterring punishments.

On the whole there have been no give-a-ways coupled with increase in the burden of tax.  The proposed investments in the industries and welfare measures should ensure upliftment in the years to come. With the hope of lesser leakages in the implementation, the intentions must be realised to mitigate the immediate pain.

The  direction of the budget is good and we await with crossed fingers for that to happen.  The market sentiment also seems to be good with the increases in NIFTY and Sensex on the budget day. This augured well.

Awaiting a kindle to add one, so long.