Quo Vadis?

Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory is something that stuck with me from my MBA needs. We learnt this as part of Organizational Behaviour and how motivation revolved around people finding themselves at different level of needs and so the motivation strategies should be aligned with the level the person is in currently.  If the theory is new to you I will lay it out in simple terms. Man begins with physiological needs, physiological means basic needs to survive like air, water, food, shelter, clothes and reproduction. When a man is not having food to eat will a movie ticket that cannot be sold enthuse him? If you see the image once man achieves his need in one level, he strives to move ahead to the next level. This ascent is natural and ends at the fifth level when man achieves what is called self-actualization where he will be in nirvana and will renounce everything around him. Few achieve stage five, many are content with one of the lower levels and this is normal. What is abnorma...

Train journeys can be very interesting and much has been written about train encounters, movies are made when the lead pair falls in love in the train journey and so much more. I have not been in a train in ages getting used to flying for business trips and when possible taking the car, it was due to a combination of factors that I found myself in the Rock Fort Express in the First Ac compartment yesterday. After the pleasant surprise seeing the new rake that was spic and span with working fittings I settled down to the journey. The compartment was quite busy with a few men in the coloured dhotis which indicated that we had the three major parties of the present Assembly represented. My co-passenger a distinguished gentleman was greeted by a few and I tried to blend into the surroundings and make myself as unobtrusive as possible in the small confines of the coupe. Suddenly a young man in jeans and tee spotted my co-passenger and told his dad who came into our coupe. The visit...

(Image Courtesy Google images article ) When the Prime Minister  threw that googly to the billions on unsuspecting people on November 8 th I was as puzzled as many others but since we live in a highly polarized country where the crazed fanatics bully every other point of view other than their own I kept my peace. Today after Chennai was left shaken but not stirred by the cyclone Vardah I think it is time to speak out against the way this demonitization has been done. One of the four metros in the country from a highly developed and progressive state is now on its knees not because of the cyclone but what its after effects combined with this bitter pill called demonitization has done. Since the floods of last year the citizens of Chennai have discovered that they are a better people and they care for each other. They are also resilient to face up to what has been thrown at them. Vardah left behind a trail of destruction that included uprooted trees, fallen cables (pow...

The second anniversary celebration of the NDA government is puzzling for the scope and scale for the following reasons: -           Two years appears too early to celebrate as it is less than half the term but it may not be a bad thing if the scale was not so big -           If the government has done its job and I will concede that they have, why make a big song and dance about it? Was not the mandate given for them to do the job? Having done it why are they feeling so happy about it? -        Is the government celebrating to hide the fact that they have not done enough? When actions speak louder, should not the actions of the two years suffice? Why go on an overdrive with a Bollywood star to draw the crowds? -           Is the government feeling unsure whether it is on the right path and is using this me...

The dust has settled after the elections to the state government; history has been made with the threat of incumbency given a trampling by Amma; memes have been made to celebrate, drown sorrows or ridicule; but the big question on the minds of many is “Now What?” The more the numbers of the voting patterns are studied the more the story emerges that beyond the 40% or so who wanted the same government another nearly 40% was willing to go to the deep sea and there remains the balance 20% who want change. There is a small percentage of voters in this 20% who did not want any of the current options, which apart from being a symbolic act matters little to either the results or the poll chances of the candidates. To those who kept saying that NOTA would have made the difference in the polling: pause and understand that he / she did not want to vote for anyone and instead of letting the vote get misused or go unused he / she has said “I am not voting for you” The apathy of Chennai...

Home Alone has crossed 25 years and the cute little kid who still makes you smile is now close to middle age. Of the many memorable and silly scenes in the movie including the mandatory mushy climax there is one scene where Kevin conquers his fear of the basement and the radiator. You will recall his initial reaction to the radiator in the basement where he will make a hasty exit and hide under his bed; his fear will consume him till he takes charge and conquers his fear by saying “Shut up”. Now let is shift to the sedition, defamation and many other cases that are piling up in our courts usually by people in power. Whether it is a simple folk singer or a college student, ordinary people have managed to throw the fear into people causing laughable knee jerk reactions. Government machinery including well qualified and competent officers spend their time doing things that will make them wince otherwise. Freedom of expression or public criticism will lead to defamation adding ...

I got yet another Pappu joke from another fan of the current government.  The attempt to look invincible by projecting a weaker adversary is laughable at best for the effort and not the joke. Make no mistakes that I am a Rahul Gandhi fan, in case you still wondered about Pappu; I am not anybody’s fan, not least a politician. For all his faults that have been loudly proclaimed by many I would like to give him credit for being someone who tried and who is taking the difficult option. It would have been easy to live with the silver spoon he is born with and have a good time but it calls for a certain degree of character to get into the world of politics and to step into the frontline and fight an election campaign. What are the odds stacked against RG? Many in my opinion:- -          A party of geriatrics who refuse to let go -          The bright sparks who struggle to come up - ...

The responses to the conviction and sentencing of the former CM range from tragic to the absurd. Tragic were the lives lost either due to suicide or due to heart attacks; absurd are the various protests, unrests and damage to public properties, fasts and now forced closure of schools. A court has found an accused guilty of corruption and has awarded punishment that while eyebrow raising has its own merits with inflation among other things but instead of appealing against the verdict these senseless acts by a few are making a mockery of one of the pillars of our democracy that is the judiciary. I am still confused on the stance of these people are they claiming that their leader is not corrupt and the judge has made an error despite all the evidence to the contrary or are they feeling that corruption should not be punished selectively? My personal take is that this punishment is little too much a little too late. The case was filed on the earlier version who in her arrogance an...

Driving past the Stella Maris College while always pleasant is even better these days. The beauties outside the campus make you slow down for a second look and are potential traffic hazards. A thing of beauty always warrants a second look and when you have so many of them in one place you can be forgiven if you stop and stare. You move on feeling extremely annoyed and angry with this government for whitewashing the walls of the YMCA and other public buildings. Improper use or lack of grammar annoyed me no end. These days grammar has been reinvented along with the language being spoken. Among the many Tamizh dialects is Tanglish a forced marriage of Tamizh and English which has become the language most commonly used and understood by the common man in Chennai. Earlier we used to “fying” everything to make the English cousin of a Tamizh word, remember “suttufying” which sounds like shooting but means looting. The latest Idea ad in Tamizh, rather Tanglish is Poo Soothing! Looks lik...

The security detail provided to some people who fall under various categories seems to be a cruel joke. A joke because the public are subjected to great hardships while the public servant is protected from potential threats which history would tell you never happened. It is simply incomprehensible that so much on man, machinery and time is spent on safeguarding one person without realistically assessing the risk that is attributed to this person. I have been one of many who have groaned, fumed and vented ire on a Very Very Important Person rushing around in a huge convoy of vehicles while Very Very ordinary persons like me are barricaded away or forced to make detours. It is even more disheartening to know that I have contributed to this gross waste of public money by paying my taxes on time. After all death is inevitable for all, what is the point of denying this? I do not have statistics but the number of VVIP dying from external causes read it as terrorist attack or a...

One movie I enjoy watching during its many reruns on one of the many movie channels on cable is The Distinguished Gentleman starring Eddie Murphy.   We have now ceased to get shocked by mammoth scams that have raped the country by various politicians and have resigned to the fact that politics and scams are like conjoined twins in our country. This movie tells us that we are not alone. Even in the US of A this happens and even there the people have resigned themselves to the inevitability of it all. In case you have not seen the movie, a synopsis of the same from Wikipedia “A Florida con man named Thomas Jefferson Johnson uses the passing of the longtime Congressman from his district, Jeff Johnson (who died of a heart attack while having sex with his secretary), to get elected to Congress, where the money flows from lobbyists. Removing his first name and shortening his middle name he calls himself "Jeff" Johnson. He then manages to get on the ballot b...