நேரு: இந்திய வசந்தத்தின் இளவரசன்

-     தி இந்து பி.ஏ. கிருஷ்ணன் :வியாழன், நவம்பர் 14, 2013

நேருவின் உலகப்புகழ் பெற்ற சுயசரிதையைப் படித்த தாகூர், 1936-ம் ஆண்டு நேருவுக்கு ஒரு கடிதம் எழுதினார். அதில் அவர் நேருவை “ரிதுராஜ்” - வசந்தத்தின் இளவரசன் - எனக் குறிப்பிட்டிருந்தார். அவர் எழுதி 11 ஆண்டுகளுக்குப் பின், சுதந்திரம் பிறந்தபோது, இந்து-முஸ்லிம் கலவரங்கள் நாட்டை உலுக்கிக்கொண்டிருந்தன. வசந்தம் வெகுதூரத்தில் இருந்தது. இருள், இதோ கவ்வப்போகிறேன் என்று பயமுறுத்திக்கொண்டிருந்தது. மேற்கத்திய மேதைகள் இந்தியா பல துண்டுகளாக உடைவதற்கு அதிக நாட்கள் எடுக்காது என்று எழுதிக் குவித்தனர்.

அன்று நாட்டை ஆளத் தேவையாக இருந்தது எதிர்கால இந்தியாவைப் பற்றிய நம்பிக்கை. நம்பிக்கையை உண்மையாக்க வேண்டும் என்ற மனவுறுதி, செயல்திறமை, அப்பழுக்கற்ற நாட்டுப்பற்று. இவையெல்லாம் அன்றிருந்த தலைவர்களுக்கு இருந்தது என்பது நாடு செய்த தவப்பயன் என்றுதான் கூற வேண்டும். இருளகன்று வசந்தம் பிறந்தது இவர்களால்தான்.

மக்கள் தலைவர்

தலைவர்கள் மக்களோடு மக்களாக இயங்க வேண்டும் என்பதில் உறுதியாக இருந்தவர்கள், இருவர். ஒருவர் காந்தி. மற்றவர் நேரு. பஞ்சாபி எழுத்தாளர் துக்கல், ஒரு சம்பவத்தைப் பற்றி எழுதுகிறார். தில்லியின் கன்னாட்ப்ளேஸில் இருந்த முஸ்லிம்களின் கடைகளைக் கூட்டம் ஒன்று சூறையாடிக்கொண்டிருந்தது. திடீரென்று காரொன்றிலிருந்து நேரு இறங்கி, கூட்டத்துக்குள் புகுந்து, கண்ணில் பட்ட ஒருவரைக் கன்னத்தில் அறைந்தார். ‘‘என்ன செய்கிறீர்கள்? நீங்கள் எல்லாம் வெட்கப்பட வேண்டும்’’ என்று இரைந்தார். கூட்டம் உடனே கலைந்துவிட்டது. அறை வாங்கியவர், ‘‘என்னைத்தான் நேரு அறைந்தார்” என்று பெருமையோடு சொல்லிக்கொண்டு திரிந்தாராம்.

நேருவின் வீட்டினுள் நுழைய முயன்று, காவல்காரர்களால் தடுக்கப்பட்ட ஒருவர் நேருவுக்கு மிகுந்த கோபத்தோடு கடிதம் எழுதினார். நேருவின் செயலாளரிடமிருந்து பதில் வந்தது: ‘நீங்கள் மன்னிப்பீர்கள் என்று பிரதமர் நம்புகிறார்’.

சில நாட்கள், வேலை முடிந்ததும் இரவுக் காட்சி சினிமாவுக்கு அவர் செல்வாராம், நுழைவுச்சீட்டு பெற்றுக்கொண்டு. ஹைதராபாத் நிஜாமுக்கும் நேருவுக்கும் கடிதப் போக்குவரத்து இருந்தது. கடிதம் ஒன்றில் நேரு எழுதுகிறார் - நிஜாமின் பேரனை அவன் மனதுக்குகந்த, படித்த பெண்ணை மணம்புரிய அனுமதிக்கும்படி! நேருவின் இந்த மானுடம்தான் எல்லோரையும் கவர்ந்தது; அவரை மற்ற தலைவர்களிடமிருந்து வேறுபடுத்திக் காட்டியது.

வலிமைகளின் ஊற்றுக்கண்

இந்தியாவின் வலிமைகள் என்று நாம் கருதுபவை யாவை?

ஜனநாயகம்; மாற்றுக் கொள்கைகளுக்குப் போதிய இடம்தர வேண்டும் என்ற வலுவான நம்பிக்கை; மதச்சார்பின்மை பக்கம் இருப்பதாகக் காட்டிக்கொள்ளாமல் அரசியல் களத்தில் இறங்க முடியாத கட்டாயம்; அடிப்படைக் கட்டமைப்புகள்; அறிவியல் மற்றும் தொழில்நுட்ப நிறுவனங்கள்.

இவையனைத்துக்கும் ஊற்றுக்கண் நேரு

இவற்றை உருவாக்க நேருவுக்கு காங்கிரஸ் கட்சியின் மூத்த தலைவர்களிட மிருந்து ஒத்துழைப்பு கிடைக்கவில்லை என்றுதான் கூற வேண்டும். பல தருணங்களில் அவர் தன்னந்தனியாகச் செயல்பட வேண்டிய கட்டாயம். எழுத்தாளர் ஒருவர் நேருவை ‘கேளிக்கை விடுதியில் பியானோ வாசிக்கும் மேதை’போன்றவர் என்று குறிப்பிட்டார்.

நேருவின் சோஷலிசம்

நேருவை முதலாளித்துவத்தின் தரப்பிலிருந்து விமரிசிப்பவர்கள் பெருகி வருகிறார்கள். நேருவின் கொள்கைகளின் மூலம் அதிகப் பயன் பெற்றவர்கள் இவர்கள்தான். கட்டற்ற சந்தையின் பெருமையைப் பேசும் இவர்கள், நேருவின் வாழ்க்கை வரலாற்றை எழுதிய ஜுடித் ப்ரௌனின் வரிகளைப் படிக்க வேண்டும்:

சமூக, பொருளாதாரச் சீர்திருத்தங் களுக்கான செயல்திட்டங்களை வகுப்பதில் அரசுக்கு மட்டுமே வள ஆதாரங்களும் அதிகாரமும் இருக்கின்றன என்று நம்பியவர் நேரு மட்டும் அல்ல. போன நூற்றாண்டின் நடு ஆண்டுகளில் உலகம் முழுவதுமுள்ள அறிஞர்களின் மத்தியில் நிலவிய கருத்தொற்றுமைகளில் இதுவும் ஒன்று. குறிப்பாக, இரண்டாம் உலகப்போரினால் பேரிழப்புகளை அடைந்த நாடுகளை மறுகட்டமைப்பதிலும், ஏகாதிபத்தியத்திலிருந்து மீண்ட நாடுகளின் வளர்ச்சிக்கு அடித்தளமிடுவதிலும், இந்த வழிமுறையே சரியானது என்று பலரும் எண்ணினர். இந்தியாவிலும் இந்தக் கொள்கையை பலர் ஆதரித்தனர். பெருமுதலாளிகளும்கூட. நாட்டைக் கட்டமைப்பதிலும் தொழில்மயமாக்குவதிலும் அரசு முன்னிற்க வேண்டும் என்று அவர்கள் வலியுறுத்தினர்.

நேரு, சோஷலிஸ்ட்டுகளும் கம்யூனிஸ்ட்டுகளும் இப்பணியில் தன்னுடன் தோளோடு தோள் நிற்பார்கள் என்று எதிர்பார்த்தார். ஜெயப்பிரகாஷ் நாராயண், லோகியா, கிருபளானி போன்ற தலைவர்கள் ஆதரவு தருவார்கள் என்ற அவரது நம்பிக்கை வீணானது. கம்யூனிஸ்ட்டுகள் கனவுலகத்தில் இருந்தனர்.

கட்டமைப்பின் முதலாண்டுகள் வசந்த ஆண்டுகள்; எல்லோருக்கும் இல்லா விட்டாலும் குறிப்பிடத் தக்க அளவில் பலருக்கு. வசந்தத்தின் இளவரசன் நேரு.

மறக்கப்பட்ட சாதனை

நேருவைப் புகழ்பவர்கள்கூட அவரது மகத்தான சாதனை ஒன்றை மறந்துவிடுகிறார்கள். இந்துச் சட்ட விதிகள் மாற்றியமைக்கப்பட்டதில் முக்கியமான பங்கு நேருவுடையது. அம்பேத்கர் அமைச்சராக இருந்தபோது கொண்டுவரப்பட்ட இந்தச் சட்டத்தின் வரைவுக்கு கடும் எதிர்ப்பு இருந்தது. எதிர்ப்பின் பரிமாணங்களை நாம் இன்று நினைத்துக்கூடப் பார்க்க முடியாது. அன்றைய குடியரசுத் தலைவரான ராஜேந்திரப் பிரசாத் சட்டத்துக்கு அனுமதி மறுப்பேன் என்று பயமுறுத்தினார்.

ஆர்.எஸ்.எஸ்-காரர்கள் அந்தச் சட்டத்தைக் கடுமையாக எதிர்த்தனர். நேரு, அம்பேத்கர் உருவ பொம்மைகளை தில்லியில் எரித்தனர். சட்டம் கொண்டுவர இயலாததால் அம்பேத்கர் பதவி விலகினார். நேருவால் உறுதியுடன் செயல்பட முடியவில்லை என்று அம்பேத்கர் குற்றம்சாட்டினார். ஆனால், நேரு 1952 தேர்தலின் கொள்கை அறிக்கையில் இந்தச் சட்டங்கள் கொண்டுவர வேண்டிய அவசியத்தை வலியுறுத்தினார். காங்கிரஸ் வெற்றியடைந்ததும் சட்டங்கள் கொண்டுவரப்பட்டன.

முதல்முறையாக, இந்துப் பெண்களுக்குச் சொத்து உரிமை கிடைத்தது; பலதார மணம் தடை செய்யப் பட்டது; விவாகரத்து அனுமதிக்கப்பட்டது; கலப்புத் திருமணம் அனுமதிக்கப்பட்டது.

சீனாவுடன் போர்

நேருவுக்குப் பின்னடைவு ஏற்பட்டதற்கு முக்கியமான காரணம், 1962-ல் நடந்த சீனப் போர்தான். அவர் சீனாவை நம்பிக் கெட்டுப்போனார் என்று குற்றம் சாட்டப்படுகிறது. நட்பு மூலம் காரியத்தைச் சாதித்துவிடலாம் என்று அவர் நினைத்ததன் அடிப்படை, படேலுக்கு அவர் எழுதிய கடிதத்திலிருந்து விளங்குகிறது: நாம் ராணுவத்தைப் பலப்படுத்த முயன்றால் நமது திட்டங்களுக்குச் செலவுசெய்யப் பணம் இருக்காது. பலப்படுத்தினாலும் ராணுவம் நமது விரிந்த எல்லைகளை முழுவதுமாகக் காவல் செய்வது இயலாத காரியம்.

ஆனால், போர் தற்காலிகமானது, நட்புதான் நிலைத்து நிற்கக்கூடியது என்ற எண்ணத்தில் அவர் உறுதியாக இருந்தார். அது தவறு அன்று என்பது இன்று நமக்கு விளங்குகிறது.

தீர்க்கதரிசி

அவரது செயலராகப் பணிபுரிந்த குண்தேவியா, ‘‘கம்யூனிஸ்ட்டுகள் பதவிக்கு வந்தால் எவ்வாறு எதிர்கொள்வது” என்று நேருவிடம் கேட்டார். ‘‘கம்யூனிஸ்ட்டுகள் இந்தியாவில் ஒருபோதும் பதவியைக் கைப்பற்ற முடியாது’’ என்றார் நேரு. குண்தேவியா எழுதுகிறார்:

“நேரு சொன்னார், இந்தியாவுக்கு நேரக் கூடிய மிகப் பெரிய அபாயம் கம்யூனிஸ்ட்டுகள் அல்ல. வலதுசாரி இந்து மதவாதம்.”

SBI sees steepest profit fall in over two years

  

November 14, 2013 Last Updated at 00:57 IST

BS Reporter  |  Mumbai  

Netprofit slumps 35%, but stock gains as pace of bad loan growth slows

The fear of history repeating itself had kept investors on the edge as Arundhati Bhattacharya, the new chairman of State Bank of India, prepared to announce the bank’s maiden earnings under her. There were enough reasons for the nervousness, as new chiefs and poor profitability have become almost a norm for public-sector banks, Bhattacharya’s two predecessors included.

Bhattacharya, too, followed the quarterly-result tradition; she announced on Monday the bank had posted its steepest quarterly profit fall in more than two years, as non-performing loans increased.Net profit slumped 35 per cent to Rs 2,375 crore in the quarter ended September. That undershot analysts’ average expectation of about Rs 2,700 crore. The share of net non-performing loans in total assets rose to 2.91 per cent, from 2.83 per cent in the preceding quarter.

Yet, the SBI stock initially rose more than three per cent before closing 1.34 per cent higher on BSE, as the pace of bad loan growth slowed. In that, the market saw a glimmer of hope. During the July-September quarter of the current financial year, fresh slippages stood at Rs 8,365 crore — down sharply on a sequential basis from Rs 13,766 crore. The bank reported a steady increase in upgrades and cash recovery during the quarter and arrested the sharp pace of growth in NPAs. Investors also took comfort from the fact that SBI had pro-actively increased provisions on stressed assets.

The tone of the new management, however, was cautious, as the banking sector was still grappling with pressure on asset quality.

“There is still more pain in the system and there are no bright signs. The stress is the most in mid-sized companies and larger SMEs (small & medium enterprises). Retail has shown resilience and, in fact, NPA in this sector has come down,” Bhattacharya said in her post-earnings press briefing.

Gross non-performing asset ratio deteriorated 49 basis points from a year earlier to 5.64 per cent, while net bad loan ratio increased 47 basis points to 2.91 per cent at the end of September.

Higher loan loss provisions, which increased 44 per cent year-on-year to Rs 2,645 crore, mainly due to higher regulatory standard provision requirement, dragged profit down. The decline in profit was also due to a 79 per cent increase in standard asset provisioning to Rs 448 crore, coupled with a 106 per cent increase in cost of borrowing (due to a 200-bp hike in marginal standing facility rate to 10.25 per cent in mid-July). Banks had started availing of funds from the MSF window, as the repo window was capped at 0.5 per cent of the banks’ net demand and time liabilities.

The lender has also seen provisioning requirement increasing, by 83 per cent to Rs 1,283 crore, due to superannuation benefits. “Net profits were affected as staff expenses rose. The provisions for wages were 15 per cent higher, pending negotiations; we also set aside amount for pension as LIC increased the mortality rate to 81 years,” said S K Saraf, deputy managing director and chief financial officer of the bank.

Profit on sale of investments was near-flat, at Rs 236 crore, while foreign-exchange earnings declined 53 per cent to Rs 320 crore. Growth in fee income on a year-on-year basis was also nearly flat, while net interest income grew only 11.64 per cent to Rs 12,251 crore.

The bank delivered a surprise on the net interest margin front by reporting 3 basis point rise sequentially to 3.19 per cent. However, the management declined to give any guidance on the margin front.

“We do not want to give guidance on interest margins and turning the tide to report higher profits, as the market is volatile. We will plan (work) for the long term, rather than giving a short-term outlook,” Bhattacharya said. The lender also expects credit growth to moderate to 16-18 per cent for the financial year, from 19 per cent recorded in September.

“SBI’s reported profit after tax was in line with estimates and an improvement in net interest margin was a positive surprise, while lower slippages than the previous quarter and the provisions were in line with expectations. Overall, it was a mixed performance and we retain our positive stance on the company due to reasonable valuations,” said Rikesh Parikh, vice-president (corporate broking), Motilal Oswal Securities.

Analysts said Bhattacharya would be under pressure to tame non-performing loans and reverse the weakening profit growth.

Survey says... our many moods about money

 

Bloomberg :Ben Steverman  THU, NOV 14 2013. 01 02 PM 

The world is awash in meaningless statistics.
 As a personal-finance reporter,
 I sometimes worry I’ll be among the first to drown in them.

Financial firms inundate my peers and me with polls, surveys and studies—some three dozen of the things scurried into my inbox in the past month. Many are of dubious intellectual value. Did you know, for example, that 49% of Charles Schwab and Co. clients say now’s a good time to invest in stocks? Yup. A perfectly ambiguous percentage of Schwab investors—short of a majority yet not a distinct minority—are bullish on equities. With all due respect to the discount brokerage, why should we care?

While an overloaded inbox makes me cranky, there’s some juicy stuff tucked away among the surveys. Many people will answer financial questions from a pollster that, coming from close friends or family, would likely be greeted with, at best, a brisk “None of your business.” The best surveys are a sort of intriguing economic voyeurism, giving us statistical snapshots of our neighbours’ finances and revealing trends.

The key is filtering out the nonsense. One survey in my inbox questioned 150 people—a number more appropriate for the seating capacity of a Denny’s than for a poll sample size.

With all that noted, here are some of the most striking findings from financial pollsters in the past month:

1. Advisers to the wealthy: stop being so generous!

Here’s a window into the private conversations between advisers and their rich clients: According to a US Trust survey of 300 professional advisers to the wealthy, 50% prefer that their clients accumulate at least $500,000 in liquid assets before they start giving to charity. Almost a quarter would like their clients to amass $3 million before parting with some of their wealth.

By this standard, most of those now giving to charity would keep their wallets shut. According to the Chronicle of Philanthropy, Americans of all income levels give away about 4.7% of their earnings each year. Those making $50,000 to $100,000 donate the greatest share of their income.

A companion survey found high-net-worth clients are far more inclined to be generous than their advisers—a result undermined by the fact that US Trust polled only those wealthy who were already “actively engaged in charitable giving.”

2. Cash-hungry muggers should focus on men

Muggers looking for good old-fashioned cash should choose their targets carefully: A Visa survey shows that two-thirds of Americans carry less than $50 in their wallets, and 40% carry less than $20. Men are four times more likely than women to carry more than $100 in cash.

3. Surveys ignore the biggest retirement roadblocks

A study sponsored by Principal Financial Group asked financial advisers what holds back workers from adequately preparing for retirement. The most commonly mentioned constraints: “not saving enough” (cited by 74%), “not starting to save early enough” (70%) and “living beyond their means” (69%).

Fair enough, but let me suggest two constraints the study overlooked. First: not earning enough. The US Census Bureau says the inflation-adjusted median household income last year was $51,017. That’s dropped 9% since 1999.

Second: not having access to a retirement plan at work. Under a study titled “Access, Participation Strong in Employer-Provided Retirement Plans,” mutual fund trade group Investment Company Institute revealed a statistic that contradicted its own headline. Just 50% of workers age 21 to 64 have access to a 401(k) or other workplace retirement plan. That rate, the lowest on record, hasn’t budged since 2009 and is 10 points lower than in 2000.

4. Bosses win no points for ‘fun’— and no, you can’t work from home

They earn more than us. They get to tell us what to do all day. But we still like our bosses. According to Kronos Inc., 69% of employees think their managers set a good example. When asked to choose between a boss who invests in professional development and one who makes the workplace “fun,” 61% of respondents decided against fun. The fictional antics of Michael Scott from NBC’s “The Office” may be having an effect here.

If your boss is being a pain about working from home or providing other forms of workplace flexibility, you’re not alone. A survey by human resources nonprofit WorldatWork found fewer companies offering most forms of workplace flexibility. In 2010, 57% of employers offered employees the option of condensing workweeks into fewer than five days, compared with just 43% this year.

5. Pessimism can be highly selective

Given the economic trauma of recent years, I’m not surprised when people are gloomy. I am surprised when people think everyone but themselves is in for a bad time. That trend is most obvious among the wealthy, who are benefiting most from rising stock and real estate prices. In a PNC survey of affluent investors, a majority were optimistic about the performance of the stock market, the real estate market and their investment portfolios in the next six months. Yet somehow only 32% were upbeat on the US economy.

6. Returned-to-nesters aren’t budging— or reproducing

A majority of consumers, 51%, told LearnVest and Chase that they feel “it’s too expensive to raise a child today,” and 37% said they’d delayed having children because of financial concerns.

To explore one such worry, Securian Financial Group surveyed 700 young adults still living with their parents. Just 10% pay rent, and 91% said they have no deadline for moving out. In their defense, 82% said they help with chores. I wonder what a survey of their parents would reveal.

7. Middle-class bills may trump Turkeys

While the wealthy tend to be optimistic about their ability to make money in the market now, dozens of surveys highlight how many middle-class Americans are weighed down by bills and stagnant wages. In a Wells Fargo and Co. poll of the middle class, 59% said “paying monthly bills” is their top financial concern—up from 37% two years ago. Both paying those bills and saving is “not possible” for 42%, while the poll found more than half of those in their 50s despair that they’ll “never be able to retire.”

Two studies encapsulate this tale of diverging attitudes: A Discover Financial Services survey found shoppers plan to spend an average of $1,014 during the holidays, up 20% from last year. Yet a relatively small group of high-end consumers drive much of holiday spending. Thus, a study of middle-class military families by First Command Financial Services also found 62% are cutting back on Thanksgiving spending and travel.

8. The ostrich investing approach lives

Sometimes people admit to opinions that are, according to the vast majority of experts, foolish. Almost every retirement plan and pension puts workers’ retirement assets in stocks to some degree, and a Federated Investor survey of advisers found 92% are confident that equities “will provide a solid result for clients.” Nevertheless, just 24% of middle-class Americans are confident in stocks as an investment for retirement, according to Wells Fargo.

That’s down from 30% in 2011—even as the stock market is way up. Will improving financial literacy help? Not if Americans don’t want to listen to industry experts and reporters like me. 

A majority of middle-class Americans—51%—say, “I have little interest in learning more about investing.” Well then. 

 

Empower Yourself :The First Step to Being Powerful

HBR :by Nilofer Merchant  |   9:00 AM November 8,2013

 I am such a big failure. I can’t believe that I’ve made this mistake and it’s cost me months and months of time.  I might never recover…What an idiot to not see that one coming.” On and on, he went. In distress, my colleague was clearly suffering because of a recent fiasco.

Seeking counsel, he had come to me supposedly to problem solve. But all he could focus on was how this incident made him a failure. I got frustrated listening to him. Not at his words, but at how vicious he was being to himself. In the end, my advice was not as cogent and articulate as I had intended — I used a popular vernacular term for bovine droppings — but I stand by it.

Talking to yourself like you are worthless is not helpful. Yes, mistakes  mean you might be in hot water, or that there is a lesson to learn. But there is a huge cost to telling your story in such a limiting way. You give away your power. When you define your “I” as what I call a “weak I” you have lost your ability to effect change.

Sometimes it’s less important to know how to learn specific things, than how growth itself works. You cannot change anything unless first you believe in your ability to drive change. That’s what lets you start to engage ideas, problem solve, enlist others, and focus your energy. In other words, to have an impact, you need to think of yourself with a “strong I”, not a “weak I.”

Most of us talk to ourselves in ways we’d never talk to anyone else. More than likely, you are unkind to yourself when you’ve had a failure. You expect yourself to “get it right” — every single time. More often than not, you hold yourself responsible for the whole of the failure. You believe you should have seen it coming. As if somehow you can actually control everything. But, let me ask you – would you speak to someone else this way? Would you talk to them in an unforgiving, demanding, and invalidating way? Likely not. Were you to say it to someone else, you would almost see him or her shrivel up from the inside. A label given to another person can transform a person’s sense of self and their ability to contribute and create. So can a label you give to yourself.

This is a not about self-help, though it might help you. This is an opportunity to talk about the role of narrative power, through the form of “weak I” and “strong I,” and how it affects our entire economy.

Talent of all sorts is valuable to an organization only when people feel free to bring their differences to work. But all too often, difference is not seen, nor valued. Instead, our difference makes us unseen. I myself fell for this, when someone powerful told me “as a brown woman, the likelihood of you being seen in the world is next to nothing.” I wrote about that experience in a piece on cultural bias. But what I didn’t share then is how much it formed a new weaker narrative in my mind. The “you’ll never been seen” narrative changed my power from a “strong I” to a “weak I” because of the societal group I belonged to. I was a mess for many months. When I didn’t get the role I wanted on a particular board of directors, I thought to myself, “Yes, there! That’s proof that he’s right!” And I started to step back, to stop trying, to deny my own creativity. I had so easily adopted his frame of the world, as my own. It was disempowering, and debilitating.

When I share this personally awkward story in public, I do it to point out a truth about unlocking our economy. New ideas and sources of innovation are abundant. Right, in fact, in front of us — and often hidden in plain sight.

The problem is when those who do not see (the ideas right in front of them, but different than what they expect), believe this means the unseen is not actually there. The argument goes – for example– if there were strong women leaders, OF COURSE we’d see them, maybe even put them on our board. We can’t see them so, of course, they must not exist. (As Claire Cain Miller pointed out of Twitter’s all-male board, this is ridiculous.) Or, when Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos list of favorite books includes only books written by men, some folks online posit that women must not have written important works. To which one might want to look up circular logic.

The debate that often arises when the topic of not-seeing comes up is this:  Maybe the people — those not being seen  — haven’t not done enough, accomplished enough, or tried hard enough. And unfortunately, this “not enough” narrative plays to some fears on the part of the people not being seen. Me, included. I convince myself that this is something I can control with an action plan. It’s just a matter of jumping a higher hurdle. The thinking goes… once that is done, then I  will finally be seen.

But that puts the power of your being seen in someone else’s hands, doesn’t it?

What if the first step in being seen is learning to see ourselves? What if, in our desire to fit in and be seen, we have forgotten how first to belong to ourselves? The more you believe in yourself, the less you need others to do it for you. This doesn’t mean that I deny the role of structural power or cultural power that limit many from being unseen. To make all power about the individual is to privatize power, and to imply that if an entire group of people is unseen, or less seen, that it’s somehow “their fault.” (I’m reminded of the term for bovine droppings, again!)

Yes, it is hard to silence that inner critic — especially if outer critics are also chiming in. If you can’t silence it, make peace with it. I have a standing appointment with fear, where I listen to it and make a plan based on what I learn. In return, fear has learned manners and keeps quiet until our next appointment, thus allowing me to get to work.

You can’t ask other people to make a “weak I” go away. Only you can live your life. And only you have lived the life you’ve lived thus far, only you can have the dreams you choose to have. By asking someone else to validate that, you are not only giving away your power, you asking someone to validate something that they can’t possibly understand. Each of us is standing in a spot only we are standing in; it’s a function of our history and our vision. Until you own this spot – your onlyness — in the world, you will never stand in your power. Without it, you will never fully own your “strong I”. Until you celebrate who you already are, you will always be hustling your way to worthiness, as notable researcher and storyteller Brene Brown would say. She defines hustling as the need to please, perfect, pretend, and to prove your worth. All this is an effort to show the world what you think it wants, not what’s really happening because you don’t believe that your experience, your reality is already good enough.

Professor Amy Cuddy of Harvard knew of research that powerful people have powerful body language—taking up more physical space–and thus appearing more confident to others. She proved that the reverse is also true: just doing powerful poses can actually create the feeling of power. Similarly, I’d argue that by doing the work you’re called to do and by owning your difference, you own your narrative power – and owning it is what lets you create the future.

You do not need to “be seen” before pursuing your ideas. Enjoy yourself. Work. Create. Add value. Do what you can, consider everything an experiment to be held lightly, and then see what it leads to. Trust that in the doing, you are learning and growing, and being powerful. While it is quite possible you will be left “unseen” by some of society, at least you’ll see yourself. In this way, power stretches to become dignity.

Own your story, and you own your life, Justine Musk recently wrote.
 Talk to yourself as a friend, not an enemy.
 And remember, you cannot change anything unless you first see your own self as powerful enough to act. 

The way we talk of ourselves and to ourselves grants power – narrative power — to what happens next. 

Farewell to Cricket's Little Master

India's Sachin Tendulkar, pictured in the first Test against West Indies on Nov. 8, will start his final international match Thursday. Demotix/Press Association

Today  for more than a billion people, the world as they know it effectively comes to an end. The second Test match between India and the West Indies that begins on Thursday in, inevitably, Mumbai, will be the last international appearance of one Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar. You might have heard of him.

For so many people—essentially, anyone more than a couple of years younger than him—Tendulkar more or less is cricket. He has been the game's most recognizable figure for two decades, its biggest star and very frequently its finest batsman. His retirement removes a constant from cricket—the game's purest source of technically perfect batting pleasure, a source none of us really believed in our heart of hearts would ever go away.

As well as appearing in a record number of matches—Mumbai will be his 200th Test—Tendulkar holds more or less every batting record in the game: 15,000-plus Test runs, 18,000-plus One-Day International runs, 51 Test centuries, 49 ODI centuries—you name it. Those figures will almost certainly never be surpassed, simply because of the sheer unlikelihood of a player breaking into an international side aged 16, staying in it until the age of 40, and spending almost all of the intervening period at the very top of his game.

But it isn't his statistical record, or even his perfectly compact, spare, balanced, faultlessly complete batting technique that makes it unlikely that there will ever be another cricketing figure of comparable stature. Tendulkar's career coincided with the game's period of money-driven hyper-expansion, particularly in India; he was both the poster child for cricket's incredible growth phase and a link with its antediluvian era, someone who had been an international cricketer for 14 years before the first domestic Twenty20 match was even played.

The joy of Tendulkar is that he doesn't seem to have changed much between 1989 and 2013. He still unites the game's constituency in admiration, and he still exudes the same sense of soft-spoken integrity—in a quarter-century at the top of the game, he has attracted only the mildest controversy, and only very rarely. He has never even really said anything that you could quote back critically at him.

The endless rolling hoopla around his retirement—to which this article is a modest contribution—like the yearlong feeding frenzy around his hundredth international hundred two years ago, can get a bit deafening, but then that devotion is precisely what makes Tendulkar unique. As he was about to walk out to bat following the dismissal of Murali Vijay in the first game of the two-match West Indies series, the crowd at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata provided possibly the most extreme version of the extraordinary roar that always greets the fall of the second Indian wicket in home Tests—one of the very few cases ever of a crowd habitually cheering one of its own team's wickets, whoever it is that's out.

His disappointing 10 in India's only innings of the Eden Gardens game, which the home side won by an innings and 51 runs, ended when he was trapped LBW playing back to off-spinner Shane Shillingford, the sort of dismissal that has crept into his game in the past couple of years. The ball, in fairness, looked to be going over the top of the stumps, but India's refusal to use the Decision Review System meant Tendulkar couldn't refer it upstairs.

Ultimately, his latter-day drop in form will be forgotten; a couple of years don't mean much in the context of a 24-year career so magnificent. There is also no reason to assume that he held on so long for reasons for personal vanity—why would he, when he has nothing left to prove? Much like Ricky Ponting of Australia, he was the last and greatest man standing among a generation of great batsmen, and didn't want to leave a vacuum: Rahul Dravid's , VVS Laxman's and Sourav Ganguly's were big shoes to fill. He's been successful in that, meaning that in retirement, the hole he leaves as a player isn't too huge, something that would have been thought impossible even just a couple of years ago.

Heading the generation of new talent hoping to replace those greats is Virat Kohli, increasingly talked about as the Little Master's likeliest successor—although admittedly that sets the bar unrealistically high. Cheteshwar Pujara and Shikar Dhawan are both richly promising, an adjective that has also been over-applied for years to Rohit Sharma, who suggested that he might finally be ready to step into the big time, after years of shortchanging his own outrageous talent, with a characteristically graceful debut 177 at Eden Gardens. None of these young batsmen, though, has played more than 20 Test matches, underlining how important to the team it was that Tendulkar carried on playing longer than he might perhaps have wanted to.

Naturally, the other of the two teams actually playing in the current series, the West Indies, has pretty much disappeared from view. That's particularly a shame for the man who sits eighth on the all-time Test run-scoring list that's headed by Tendulkar: Shivnarine Chanderpaul. For him, the Mumbai game is also a landmark: his 150th Test. Where Tendulkar has 15,847 career Test runs at an average of 53.71, Chanderpaul has 10,897 at 51.89. Where Tendulkar been a member of several generations of the Indian team, sometimes taking his place at the heart of a great batting lineup, sometimes apparently carrying it entirely on his slight shoulders, Chanderpaul has been a quite remarkable rock for the West Indies during one of the most challenging periods in the team's history.

And where Tendulkar has done it all with a technique that appears to have been machine-tooled to perfection with diamond drills by white-coated boffins in a Zurich laboratory, Chanderpaul has done it with a technique apparently constructed from the bits they shaved off, powered by a profoundly pragmatic open-chested sideways lurch across the crease as the ball is delivered that would have most old-school coaches reaching feebly for the smelling salts.

At 39 years old, Chanderpaul soldiers on, but not for much longer—another great on the verge of retirement. For the West Indies, he will be irreplaceable. 

The difference with Tendulkar is that he will be irreplaceable for every cricket fan; a tiny man who leaves the most massive of holes, he is cricket's greatest ever superstar.

By 

RICHARD LORD

Nov. 12, 2013 1:38 p.m. ET

The Spirit of Thiruvalluvar : அமிழ்தினும் ஆற்ற இனிதேதம் மக்கள் சிறுகை அளாவிய கூழ்

திருக்குறள் 

அறத்துப்பால்

இல்லறவியல் 

அதிகாரம் 7

மக்கட்பேறு

குறள்  : 64

அமிழ்தினும் ஆற்ற இனிதேதம் மக்கள்
சிறுகை அளாவிய கூழ் 

மு.வ : தம்முடைய மக்களின் சிறு கைகளால் அளாவப்பெற்ற உணவு, 

பெற்றோர்க்கு அமிழ்தத்தை விட மிக்க இனிமை உடையதாகும்.

The rice in which the little hand of their children

 has dabbled will be far sweeter (to the parent) than ambrosia.

• திருக்குறளில் உள்ள மொத்த எழுத்துக்கள்- 42,194

Bullish Novermber : Go ahead and find places no one has ever been

Bullish Novermber :
 Go ahead and find  places no one has ever been.

HAPPY CHILDRENS DAY !

Listen to the desires of your children.

 Encourage them and then give them the autonomy

 to make their own decision. - Denis Waitley

They are the future... 

They are the  hope for a brighter tomorrow... 

They are the symbols of promise... 

 HAPPY CHILDRENS DAY !

If you are little grownup

Have a day of Chilhood Memories