United States’ finely tuned images of ‘land of opportunity’, ‘land of the free’ and ‘home of the brave’ – all have in recent time received a major jolt with protestors pouring in from all over the country in thousands. It is probably the biggest protest since anti-Vietnam-war demonstrations in the 70s! Finally their police are finding it tough to control their own people. This time they are failing to smoke them out, because the enemy lies in every other house. I wrote about the coming end of capitalism – the way we know it – in 2008 itself as an aftermath of the latest recession that has hit the world due to its blind belief in free market profiteering and was surprised why (despite people around the world, from countries in the Middle East to a laid back country like India, showing a tendency to come out on the streets to press for their rights) people in the western world were delaying coming out in the streets to press for what was their right – the right to stable and dignified living. But finally the streets in the western world are slowly starting to look like streets of Egypt, with thousands out on the streets, protesting against the shameless profiteering of the Wall Street – the symbol of capitalism at its greediest best. It is a movement of the working class – which forms overwhelming majority of the American population – being deprived, ignored and cheated by the greedy corporations, which forms the top one per cent of the population. The growing protests that have spread its tentacles all across the nation indicate a serious problem in the financial districts of the American cities. The conservatism that has put unchecked and deep crony capitalism to almost heavenly pedestal is the root cause for such economic injustice, which has literally forced thousands to come out on the streets to protest. No wonder, the gradual transition of American capitalism to crony capitalism is a result of inherent shortcomings that the financial system and capitalism on the whole has been experiencing since decades.

For the last 30 years, the United States is suffering from erosion of jobs and corporate big shots renouncing the values and spirit that once made America as great as it is perceived today because of short term profits – a classic case of uncontrolled deregulation practised in this crony capitalist system. This system has made a class of minuscule super rich even richer, driven by the Wall Street, but has marginalised the vast majority who faced the albatross of dead end jobs, lay-offs, lack of future and other destruction of the very tenets of any functional democracy!

One of the reasons that led to this out-cry is irresponsible lending by the banks and very high consumer debt. It has eroded the purchasing power of the common man. Lack of consumer demand is halting new investments and preventing new job creation. Obama’s steps to steer the economy to safer ground – mortgage refinancing, healthcare overhaul, student’s loan minimisation programmes – have not seen any breakthrough so far. The reasons are Republican’s opposition and consequent blocking of government’s intervention in the economy.

The Gini coefficient (that measures the income divide in a country) of the US is at par with that of undeveloped countries of Africa like Uganda. In 2010, the top 20 per cent of all Americans owned 49.4 per cent of the nation’s income. The top one per cent of all Americans owned 40 per cent of the total wealth of the US and 24 per cent of all income – most importantly an increase by 31 per cent in the last four decades. Moreover, in these four decades the income of wealthy Americans have increased by 300 per cent while that of middle class has increased by merely 20 per cent and that of lower strata by merely five per cent – thus increasing the Gini coefficient from 39.7 in 1967 to 46.0 in 2005. A report by IMF titled ‘Leveraging Inequality’ published back in December 2010 concluded that ‘long periods of unequal incomes spur borrowing from the rich, increasing the risk of major economic crises’ in the way it did during the Great Depression of 1929 and the Great Recession of 2007. This income gap kept many poor Americans away from schools and proper medical facilities, eventually affecting their productivity and income per se. The executives at the Wall Street enjoyed hefty pay packages and impressive compensation while others had to struggle for a decent salary. Studies show that in 2004 the top 25 highest paid hedge fund managers on Wall Street collectively earned more than the combined income of all of the CEOs from the top 500 large-cap American companies. The employment rate still lingers around 9.1 per cent with 4.5 million people still unemployed, which is at a historically high!

More than 6,000 protestors gathered on October 15, 2011 at Times Square and around 100 were arrested after the protest went violent. The protests have just been gathering steam. Chicago police also arrested more than 150 protestors. Similar phenomena was seen in London too and the police had to debar people from entering Paternoster Square (London Stock Exchange). The protests have crossed the domestic borders and reached almost all the continents of the world. Recently protestors were found displaying their anger outside Reserve Bank of Australia. Similarly, protest rallies have graduated into violent riots in Rome and other European nations and more than 100 protestors were arrested. People also got violent in Japan, Hong Kong and Korea.      Read More....

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My first brush with Tagore was when I was in the 5th class, when I was supposed to recite one of Tagore’s poems at one of our local Durga Puja ceremonies. I didn’t like the idea at all. But my father was insistent. I looked at the poem and wanted to run away. It looked too long – four odd pages... But my father knew what he was doing and I had no choice. The poem was about "the hero". About a young boy’s journey with his mother and how he saves her from villains... “Think as if we are travelling together mother... to a land far away – a strange and dangerous land... You are going in a palanquin and I am trotting on a horse next to you...” It filled inside me a sense of aspiration and dream and heroism... Because a line later, when the mother gets a little frightened, the boy says, “Mother, do not be afraid... Because I am there...”

Nothing could have been more inspirational. For days, I used to visualize that poem inside my mind and imagine that I was taking care of my mother. And during those moments that I recited that poem, I became a braver boy.

Time passed and by then, my father had developed inside me a very clear sense of what to do with studies and what not to. I oft en repeat this, and will do it again in the future I believe. He instructed me to master the subjects of Mathematics and English and not to worry about the remaining subjects – provided I read as many books as possible. I did exactly that! Fortunately, my interest in Mathematics developed and I became good with the subject, while also reading expansively – I always read everything around... but Tagore’s books still never made it to my list. I remember that the books of Tagore would be there in my bookshelves, staring at me and scaring me. They were thick and looked endless; and to top it, they had too much poetry. But I was inspired. Inspired enough to sit and use my mathematics to calculate the number of pages Tagore wrote daily on an average, given the years he lived vs the number of pages he wrote. That’s how mathematics met Tagore in my life. And later, I was going to be more awestruck at this great man’s genius.

Very soon my father, scared that I was not reading enough of Tagore, made me participate again in poetry competitions – and there I was again, standing, reciting Tagore’s poems and finding depth and meaning in life. One of Tagore’s poems, ‘The Question’ – which, I remember, won me a third prize during one such recitation – left questions in my mind which still haunt. “Bhagaban tumi juge juge doot, pathiecho bare bare, ei dayaheen shanshare... tara bole gelo...” [“God you sent messengers of greatness life after life in this unforgiving earth, they said forgive all sins. They told us to love, and to remove all malice from our hearts”]. The poem ended with the words, “Those who poison your air and blot out the sun, do you really forgive them? Do you really spread love to them too?”

That’s a question that haunts me till this day when it comes to forgiving the worst souls – something that my father does in his life, and insists I should too. As time passed, I started taking a liking to Tagore’s works, though selectively. So while his “where the mind is without fear and the head is held high” and “Jodi tor dak shune keu na aashe, tobe ekla chalo re” [if no one listens to your call, walk it alone]” inspired considerably. I still continued resisting his novels and songs. I was scared to read his stories because they had too much pathos. They invariably would bring tears and leave me sad for days.     Read More....

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.

IIPM B-School Detail
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