Consulting in Education Space

This idea came to me while reading the book "Imagining India" by Nandan Nilekani. I was shocked to find that only ~20% of all graduates who pass every year are employable. This essentially means there is a huge opportunity to develop the quality of education. 

In an idealistic world the idea should be to develop the qualiy bottom-up, ie start from school. But by looking at the current situation where India is treated as a young nation compared to the developed economy, we can't afford to let go the opportunities that are coming our way. We need to make more and more people employable. And it has to be imminent. This essentially means the immediate focus should be to develop the quality in Engineering/MBA space and then go top-down. We can't afford to wait till the time government do something. That will probably be a fatalistic approach. 

Well at this moment, we can't afford to have a static curriculum in our system. To keep in pace with current economy, the current curriculum has to be dynamic and more practical in nature. It requires somebody to continuously keep track of recent developments and ensure that the curriculum reflects those changes atleast on a yearly basis. Secondly there has to be more autonomy given to the colleges so that they can choose their curriculum. I am essentially indicating at the idea of setting up a consulting team for educational space who will guide the instituions to design better curriculum year after year.

I am looking for more ideas in this space so that we can take this figure of 20% to atleast 60% in next 3-4 years!!!

Aren't banks opportunistic

If you are going for a new housing loan, you will be charged ~8.5%. But existing housing loan customers continue to pay ~11%. 

I appreciate the fact that banks are trying best to boost the economy by giving housing loans at a cheaper rate. Currently people are holding back to their cash under market apprehension. This hurts the economy. Fundamentally banks are doing a good thing by providing opportunity for movement of cash within the market. I hope this works and make more people to buy houses and there by helping GDP growth. 

But!!! what about the current housing loan holders? Shouldn't bank do something to ensure even such a set of people need to be taken care by the system. If bank lowers the interest rate for existing customers, that will mean customers have more money to spend and hence will help to boost the economy by utilising that money in some other space. Banks will anyway increase the interest rate when economy bounces back. So then why not reduce the interest rate on existing loan!!!

AR Rahman - Redefining Globalization

Truly, AR Rahman proved: "if you have passion for something, it's worth dreaming the best!!!". I heard a lot about him from people. If a person can lock himself up in a room for days to come up with a staisfying score, his dedication is definitely laudable. And there is hardly any possibility of such dedication going waste. 

With Oscar, AR Rahman has redefined the term “Globalisation”, giving Indian Music Industry a much needed impetus. A truly global image is just few miles away for Indian Music Industry. It’s always seen that the 1^st step is usually the toughest one, after that things fall into place. I am quite sure that in no time, we will get to see more Indians winning Oscars and more Indians playing Music for International movies. But one thing will not change soon, ie, People like Rahman, Tendulkar, Lata Mangeshkar will remain as rare breeds for generations to come!!!

All my wishes with Rahman. I am sure Oscar is just a stepping stone for him to achieve more in future!!! Good luck to him!!! 

Parking - Do we need Government Regulation

Yesterday, on 14th Feb, I had been to Metropolitan Mall and figured out that they were charging Rs 100 for parking. I was taken by surprise, but then started thinking is it right to charge exorbitant price for parking? Aren't we taking too much advantage of "free market economy"?

Well I got the following definition about "free market economy" from Wikipedia:

"A free market is a market that is free of government intervention and regulation, besides the minimal function of maintaining the legal system and protecting property rights"

In a free market, the price is primarily determined by demand-supply equilibrium. In the above case, the supply of parking area is limited in a place like Gurgaon. We also have the problem of limited public transport within Gurgaon. This forces people to take their own vehicles and give whatever price charged at parking. In some cases, people take the risk of parking on “Non-Parking Zone”. Well, I won’t put the complete blame on those people. We need to analyze the alternative as well to ensure that neither the parking charges are high, nor people go against the law to park at Non-Parking Zone.

1st Question: Do we have enough public transport in Gurgaon? The answer is NO. 2nd Question: Do we have enough parking facility provided by Government? ( I am sure they are intelligent enough to understand the fact that in the absence of Public Transport, more no of personal vehicles will be on road) Again, the answer is NO. In such a situation, I am a little uncomfortable to apply the concept of Free Economy in the case of infrastructure which is mostly influenced by Government. I think in the above case, parking charges should come under Government Regulation in the absense of sufficient alternative infrastructure.


My 2 cents. I would appreciate your comments on it!!!