Let us look at some references I have tried to gather through my own understanding, evidences to prove the greatness of the work by Amish Tripathi.

“We believe that everything in the world is a carrier of shakti or energy… For anything that you do, you need energy. The energy comes from people, from objects, from Mother Earth itself. You have to ask for that energy respectfully…. I am just a medium of that boundless Natraj energy. Anyone can be the medium….” – Page 76

One has to ask for the energy respectfully and it comes – the condition. One is nothing but a channel of energy hence one should never think to hold it, Let it go on – the fact. Understanding this takes one to the next level of existence. If the reader is truly receptive and sensitive, he or she can feel tremendous gratitude when one goes through this phrase in the book.

“Transactions are threads that when woven together make up a society, its culture. Or in the case of a person, weaves together their character…. Transactions are interactions between two individuals….” – Page 210

Transactions as exchanges of energy. We read it in chemistry, physics, quantum physics, business education and spiritual texts as well. Reiki practitioners understand this basic concept very well. Brought so well in the book at right place when one is immersed in reading the story and suddenly gets exposed to one of the fundamental truths of the universe – everything is a transaction.

“The devas and asuras,… , represent two balancing life forces – duality. … The masculine and the feminine…. They will always exist….” – Page 384

Duality, appears beautifully in the flow of Meluhan Epic. Duality will always exist and has existed from the beginning anyway. Atom is divided into cations and anions – the negatives and the positive. Polar magnetism is built upon it. The combination of these two dualities leads to electromagnetic forces. Heisenberg’s principle converts duality into a scientific equation accepting the fact that nothing is absolute in this world. That’s the overall foundation of materialistic universe. Similarly life energy is represented by two parts. This also brings another fact to our notice – each aspect of duality is equally powerful and important.

“You don’t earn a title after you have done the work. You do your deeds because of and only after you believe that you already are the Mahadev.” – Page 292

True in every context – for leaders, entrepreneurs, fighters and innovators. One needs to first commit to the cause through visualization, self realization and internalization. Leaders own the cause themselves and don’t wait the tasks to be assigned by someone else. The best quote from the book, I feel.

“The moment he became the sun, his calling became higher. He does not exist for himself. He exists for the greater good of everyone.” – Page 231

Expansion of responsibilities through enlargement of aura and consciousness. One does not remain confined by one’s own physical, emotional, mental & spiritual requirements as one moves beyond a certain level. Sun does not live for himself. Leader lives for many. Those who live for their own limited self can never be true leader.

“Har ek hai Mahadev…. Har Har Mahadev” – Page 337

Kalki, the final avatar of Vishnu, is supposed to be enlightenment of many awakened souls after a certain period. That’s when everyone will be realized. Or, everyone will be Mahadev. Shiva has tried to live future in present. That’s how innovations have taken place. Prototypes have to be experimented well in advance. This part is a prototype of a bright future.

“You are required for the most crucial task: To answer that most important question… What is evil?” – Page 387

The most important question for the mankind anyway in the current period – what is evil that’s to be eradicated? People are merely carriers. But where does the real evil exist in the developmental status of human being from present point of view? What’s that which is blocking us from moving ahead? Where are the real blocks? Unless we identify the problem, how can we uproot it? How can we bring and pull the solutions down unless we know where the darkness is? Questions that would start bothering many human beings soon. Questions the current civilizations will be forced to face, very soon if not already.

“There are many realities… What appears as the unshakeable truth, the exact opposite may also be true in another context.” – Page 290

Getting addicted to smoking and getting addicted to non-smoking, both are same essentially – addiction, one simple example. If someone needs negative in order to explain positive, both are same realities from different context. Depends upon which side you see it from! Kuran says believers will rule so does Bible or Gita or many other texts. All are right from their context. Constrained vision may force people of one faith to think and believe as if the rest are on the wrong side. Right are those who see both the sides integrally. Wrong are those who see factions, from either side.

“The mudra or kriyas were technically correct but the bhav was missing….” – Page 72

Bhav – the key aspect of being if one has to excel in whatever one is doing. Are you connected with your profession through bhav? If not, its all mechanical performance. Be where your bhav is. Bring bhav to where you are. Connect your thoughts and actions with your bhav. Only then you can see the real performance, representing Natraj.

“The best society is when a person’s caste is decided only by his abilities and karma. Not by any other factor…. All children that are born in Meluha are compulsorily adopted by the empire. To ensure that this is one methodically, a great hospital city Maika was built deep in the south, just north of the Narmada river. All pregnant women have to travel there for their delivery. Only pregnant women are allowed in this city, no body else.” – Page 93

A different version may be implementable perhaps if not the exact one. But it is this which has potential to start a debate on how to address the problem of different potential levels existing in a single society harmoniously. As the current version is ineffective, is there any different way? Innovative concept.

“Some people are predisposed towards certain diseases. When somras enters the body it triggers immediate occurrence of these diseases which when cured never recur. Hence the body remains healthy till death.” – Page 115

Diseases occur before their expected time of appearance. So if I am susceptible to say liver malfunction, when somras is consumed the disease would manifest much earlier over a small period and get healed as well. Pointing to dilution of fate isn’t it? Excellent!

While in the bus at the tarmac in Delhi airport, I thought it was good idea to have a beer with my old friend Rahul from Lucknow who is currently with Railways. He was on a visit and was expected to be back to New Delhi station by 8:30 PM approximately. I thought of spending some time in Connaught Place, the hangout of IIT days. CP is a mess right now as its being renovated. Hardly any place to even walk properly. But few joints are always crowded. Keventers – The milkshake corner in CP, still alive and attracts good crowd. One chocolate milkshake with lots of ice flakes in it! Ummmm so refreshing!

In a nearby music shop, I found Ramayana sung by Mukesh. A rare collection that I was searching for real long time. Proceeded to Ram Chandar & Sons shop for kids and found Kipper the Dog, hindi version! Superb animation and lovely stories and even I also enjoy with my son now! Some more time and KFC fit the schedule perfectly with lots of chicken on my plate. Being a vegetarian by choice, I had to chew the flesh a lot and that’s how I spent one hour in KFC before I got a call from my friend that he is getting back. Metro from CP till New Delhi! Travel in Delhi can be so relaxed. I wish it was there 15 years back!!

Rahul took me to a wine shop in CP where buying wine is itself an experience! Pick up and shop yourself. Much like any popular self-service shopping mall. Similar to the wine malls in western countries. I took a bottle of red wine for myself and my friend preferred the traditional whisky instead of experimenting with something new. Few sips led to debate over Swami RamDev getting into politics – should he or shouldn’t he? Is it a right move or wrong? Is it driven by hunger of power? Or is it an outcome of sincere aspiration to contribute to the nation building? I took the later view. My friend felt it as just another power hungry move. The debate remained inconclusive as I had to catch the night train for Kashipur. To be continued next time!

Got to Kashipur early in the morning. My home is some 12 kms away in a village and there is no direct transport available till 7 AM. As advised by my local friend Ravi, I took a bus for Jaspur and got down at Kunda where Ravi was waiting for me with his old but trusted Suzuki Bike. It was 16^th April and I met my mother at my sweet lovely home after almost one year. She was there for last 4 months living peacefully alone!

Next day, I visited my bank in nearby village Garhinegi and was happy to know that the local branch of Bank of Baroda is now on core banking network! Next time, I would get my account credentials for sure and would feel connected with my village through net always!

Also visited my family friend’s house. Sanjay has got one room constructed as his political office now outside his house. Must be strong influence of the local politician who is known to carry a massive personality around himself. Voting tactics sometimes spoil normal behavior beyond recognition and simple followers fall into trap of ego copying mechanisms. Anyway.

My hometown has lots of business opportunities now. It’s just the environment that I don’t trust else I would have been there long back. Setups of floriculture with strong state support, food processing, nursery, seed processing are aplenty. Some are supported by the tax benefits, some by subsidies and some by the corruption inherent but overall, there are opportunities. I liked the way floriculture and food processing are growing. These are also the growing business domains in the country and must see good growth in coming future.

The gap of quality pre-primary and primary education school was evident everywhere. Race to have schools to make money is there but very few really capable of offering the quality activity based learning model. Lack of resources must be the reason as to get commitment from trained teachers is difficult.

Met an old friend who is among the leading businessmen of the town with one of the leading paper mills in the country. Pawan, owner of Naini Paper Mill, is a shining entrepreneur of Kashipur. He has recently done executive management from IIFT, Delhi and claimed to get really benefited from the course. I also shared my practical insights with him especially regards  organization setup and people dependency in different unknown environments.

While coming back, on 19^th, I took JanShatabdi from Kashipur and reached Delhi at around 4 PM. That’s also when I enjoyed the luxury of radio cab to the fullest extent. Booked MeruCab while on train as my mother and I had to meet my Uncle after long gap, then booked it again while going to airport from Patpadganj and finally in Mumbai from airport to home in Navi Mumbai. Excellent service every time. Funny thing was in Delhi railway station as there was hardly any space for Meru driver to park his vehicle and ultimately we had to cough up 50 Rupees to the traffic police for stopping the taxi outside the station on main road. On one aide, entire space is taken up by illegal shops or digging and on other side you can’t even stop the pre-booked taxi even for 2 minutes. Sad story of infrastructure building in India.

The visit was very short but full of plenty of insights especially on entrepreneurship opportunities near my home town. Floriculture, quality primary education, food processing and cottage industry are on my radar now. I hope over next 2-3 years, I would be able to develop some concrete plan in these lines.

One year MBA is the new trend in India but not yet trendy enough. Management courses in India usually tend to be acad oriented. Well, which course is not acad oriented in India? Right from childhood, I have seen the same tendency everywhere. Study, study, study. No one really cares about integral development. Jobs, the only aim. Entrepreneurship? Well only if you are really bad enough not to get a decent job. Losers? be entrepreneur. Winner? get a plum job man!

If you assume that Executive MBA courses are strongly industry oriented and would have strong components of career planning, you are wrong. These courses have yet to evolve to the desired level, across all schools in India. Looks like its time to introduce Activity Based Learning even in management school ensuring development of right side brain as well. Someone listening in primary education? iDiscoveri has a business opportunity here!

Have a look at the recommendations I have compiled based upon the feedbacks from my friends doing executive management courses across many schools in India -

I would like to share how the SVIC got formed starting from myself getting motivated and ending with motivation getting spread to many others virally!

My first brush with social enterprises was during 2006-07 when my wife did a course in Social Enterprise Management at SIES, Nerul, Navi Mumbai. As I had to complete most of the assignments and project work for my wife, I also ended up in learning lots of stuff about contemporary work happening in social arena, work such as micro finance, eChoupal etc.

Post joining IIMC, I read a post in Hindu on Unconvention, a conference on rural innovation to be held in Chennai for 3 days during December 2009. Intuition, thats all guided me to enroll for this event. I knew nothing about the speakers, nothing about rural innovation so far, nothing about incubation cells in IITM or other places! Never really knew that so much was happening. Unconvention changed me unconventionally really, thanks to Paul Basil for organizing such a lovely event. What a wonderful and humble human being he is. Another assurance of goodness originating from the country of gods, Kerala!

Motivated, elevated, innovated, incubated and socialated (!), I was a man with a mission. I decided to initiate something similar in IIMC. Event? Cell? Body? Team? Didnt know. But something was to be done. As usual, I started with top gear. My life-bike doesnt have initial gears so the only way to work for me is to get into 3rd gear at minimum.

Started from conceiving a similar event of 2 days, got that reduced to one day later as I thought the best way to launch SVIC was through an event. Didnt get enough momentum in the campus and then I thought of trying my connection in the IIMC Alumni Kolkata chapter where I had my elder brother (8th batch IIMC) as my godfather! Few dialogue and I got a slot to deliver a presentation in the 2nd week of Feb’10.

Just before the presentation, another event happened in XLRI on inclusive development organized by Prof Madhukar Shukla’s team. Prof MadShu, as he is widely known amongst XLites, is full of contagious energy and enthusiasm. Another event, another round of connection, another dose of motivation for me! Back to campus with another bang.

Created the presentation and delivered to the alumni in Bengal Club. Few arguments, few supporting evidences and we had the mentor from Alumni ready – my brother himself! Only one demand from alumni – you get the entrepreneurs, we commit our support.

Back to campus, on the laptop, logged in to student dashboard and left a small message to PGP to contact me if anyone is interested in launching an enterprise with social objective. 5 responses with two from PGP-2 and three from PGP-1. Two from PGP-1 were Vivekanandan and Winny Patro. Vivek is getting into Butterfly Farming and Winny into Handloom Stores. I would like them to narrate their story in their own language hence not elaborating this much here.

Once two entrepreneurs were ready, I immediately started looking for mentors from the faculty. Four of them are willingly providing their support and guidance to the venture formation. Vivek and Winny have also met the alumni representative to explain their models. Thus all connections are in place now.

The event didnt happen but the connections are made. Next year, we may see event also happening if things move as per plan and enthusiasm builds up further. SVIC? Should get formed next year.

Huff Huff! One small milestone achieved!!

Next year, we can expect two enterprises with social objectives coming out form IIMC!

The presentation I shared with the alumni is embedded below.

This was the first TEDx event to be held in Kolkata.

IIMC Alumni Kolkata chapter was also one of the sponsors of the event and provided funds towards rent of the IIMC auditorium.

There were speakers from variety of fields with everyone speaking for a fixed slot of 18 minutes each.

In between, to connect with global aura of TED, following videos were also played (Must Watch) -

1. Ken Robinson – Schools kill creativity
2. Elizabeth Gilbert – On creativity
3. Malcolm Gladwell – On spaghetti sauce

The insights shared by some of the speakers can be summarized as –

Forget and Forgive, if you want to move ahead (Gurbux Singh, Olympics Hockey Player)

Whether in sports or in corporate life, if you want to move ahead successfully, remember to forget and forgive. There are different types of people, some move thru aggressive arguments, some thru motivation and some others thru affection. The result matters and the best way to get the result is to remain focused on the end objective. Forget and forgive what happens in between. That’s the way to channelize your energy.

Entrepreneurs are required in Big Organizations also (Prof Anjan Raichaudhuri)

Large organizations are often against taking entrepreneurial people on board. It is not only against the existential spirit of the organizations but also against the basic foundation on which the large firms are built. Every large firm was small to begin with. Every small firm was built by a passionate entrepreneur. Every large organization needs to grow innovatively in new directions. Thus, every organization has space for entrepreneurs. The space mostly gets ignored due to orthodox thinking of the management.

Cinema can nurture innovation, Television can not (Ashok Viswanathan)

Television or the idiot box is full of repetitiveness where all serials, characters and stories look alike. Cinema is the place in entertainment which allows one to experiment more. Ashok has recently released a movie in which story moves in reverse direction! Ashok is well known for innovation in Indian Cinema.

Microfinance is not just funding. It is enabling others (Olly Donnelly)

We see so many microfinance organizations in India and other emerging economies. It appears to be just another lucrative money making business. Olly disagrees to consider microfinance as just another funding based business. Its much more than that as per her. Her microfinance organization Shivia aims at providing a complete solution to enable poor, needy and potentially entrepreneurial people to stand up on their own. Microfinance is much more than finance.

Health services must have equal standards for all (Dr. Arun Singh)

There can not be double standards in health services. Dr. Arun Singh has been instrumental in establishing state of the art hospitals with facilities for expectant mothers and new born babies in need of special care. When he came to know about electric bulbs being used to keep the babies warm, he experimented with himself sleeping under 4 high wattage lamps for one night, felt the pain due to extreme illumination throughout the night and took a stand there after to ensure single standard care for all kids, whether from poor family or rich. Hospitals in Purulia dist. in West Bengal are live examples of his determination.

Heritage is not just for tourism but also for contemporary living (Ananya Bhattacharya)

Ananya is part of the team that promotes Bauls and Fakirs of eastern India through formation of self help groups. She said that cultural heritage should not be seen only as an attractive tool of tourism. Tourism brings stagnation to art often and may kill the progress the art must go through to stay abreast with the global progress. Heritage thus must be allowed to grow through its real owners from the local areas and should be protected from tourism industry owners.

Rural People have great potential, even in IT (Radha R Basu)

When Radha Basu narrated her positive experiences of creating micro entrepreneurs in the interiors of SundarBan of West Bengal, it became apparent how creative, innovative and entrepreneurial rural people can be. Lack of prolonged formal education is not really an impediment.

Keep on playing around with your idea. You may find business in it! (Pallav Nadhani)

Pallav, the youngest speaker at TEDx, shared how he made a loss on his first commercial deal! He sold a small package to a USA based customer for $15 considering it was good enough money if converted into rupees. He received a cheque, deposited that in his bank and later got to know that instead of some credit, there was an over all debit in his account!! The bank told him that 25$ was the charge for an overseas cheque. That was the first deal however. Since then, by playing around with his strengths, he sells creative packages to his clients to convert their dull data into attractive visual treats. All this through playing around continuously with his ideas at an early stage.

That’s what I could assimilate from the entire day event with lots of thoughts, presentations, videos and discussions.

I hope IIMC would be retained as the permanent venue for TEDx events in future. I also wish to see active participation from the MBA students of IIMC Kolkata in coming days in organizing such events in the campus.

That’s all from me as of now.

Migration has to addressed through Inclusion

It’s been a bipolar world so far for all development proponents. A leader is supposed to take, advocate, support, tread and execute one of the given two paths – socialism or capitalism. All management schools, leading universities, institutions and groups within those institutions are normally found divided by this self-enforced demarcation line placing extremely capable intellectuals against each other. We, people from the normal world, are the ultimate losers.

How long can these two sets of thoughts stay away and opposite to each other? Can they survive without each other? Isn’t there a critical dependency? Are they not feeding each other? Can society exist without money? Can business exist without the society? Capital and society, must exist in harmony. But we have plenty of gaps developed over last century of industrial development leading to lack of accountability and exploitation of natural and human reserves causing huge negative externalities. Distress migration, often mostly internal has on one side increased pressure on developed cities of India and on other side has taken away whatever skilled manpower is available locally.  What’s the solution?

Inclusive development. Inclusive management. Inclusive entrepreneurship. Inclusive business. Not socialism as it has failed to deliver on its own. Socialism needs funds to run itself and sources of funds come from the organization socialism is opposed to. Not a healthy way at all for sustainability. Capitalism is facing opposition and threats everywhere as it’s habitually not aligned to local social needs. The market is far from the production site. Head offices are set up in metros. Locals are never the beneficiaries of the industrial and market development, as initially claimed to be a certain positive side effect in future by the industrialists and one section of economists.

No, we don’t need social enterprises run by social entrepreneurs. We don’t even need 5% CSR. We don’t need charities here. RoI targets may be low. Objective of business may be selective. We need real entrepreneurs running real enterprises with one mission – inclusive development.

We need inclusive entrepreneurs.

We don’t even need institutions promoting rural development. Neither for forest management. Nor for capitalism, investment banking, competitive marketing & strategy and high end consultancy. We need institutions to promote inclusive management. We need advocates of inclusive management in India and all emerging economies.

We need Indian Institutes of Inclusive Management.

(This post is the outcome of an intense discussion held today morning in the PGPEX mess between one of the faculty from IIMC, Kolkata and myself)

The CxOs that participated were –

1. Mr Rajesh Gulati, President, Hero Motors, 21^st Jan 10
2. Mr Sridhar Rathnam, CIO, Tesco, 15^th Feb 10
3. Mr. Viresh Oberoi, MD & CEO, Metal Junction 22^nd Jan 10
4. Mr. C.  Balagopal, M.D, Terumo Penpol Ltd, 24^th Feb 10
5. Mr. Naveen Mathur, Associate Director, Angel Broking, 26^th Feb 10
6. Mr. S. Sivakumar, Chief Executive, Agri Businesses, ITC Ltd, 3^rd March 10
7. Mrs. Leena Srivastava, Executive Director, Teri, 3^rd March 10
8. Mr. S. Parasurampuria, Chief Business Officer, MCX, 5^th March 10
9. Mr. Sarath Naru, Managing Partner, Venture East, 7^th March 10

I had a privilege of  listening to 6 of them only as I could not attend lectures of Mrs. Leena Srivastava and Mr. S Parasarampuria. The lectures were interactive discussions and there was a lot of learning and insights which would be useful for entire batch, not just me, in future I believe.

In this article, I have tried to summarize my learning from the lecture series as under.

• Aspire. Set higher standards, as high as possible

Its very important to set highest goals possible. If the goals are set low, achievements will be even lower.

Mr. Balagopal emphasized upon this a lot during his talk. Same was visible from Mr. Oberai even though objectives were not set at one go but aspiration was there very strong and goals kept on redefined through out their journey of metaljunction success.

• Get best advice, even if it is unaffordable

Advice must always be welcome whether affordable to execute or not. Whatever be the source, get ready and be receptive. That’s the way to channelize energy from all possible sources. Receptivity to new ideas, suggestions and advice is very important, Final action may be one’s own preference however.

Mr. Balagopal narrated his own experiences on how he always accepted the advices he got from his well-wishers.

• Inefficiency in the system brings business opportunity

Whenever there is any inefficiency in the system, look at how it can be addressed through a sustainable and profitable solution. Every gap may have some business opportunity, creating a win-win situation for all as to one section, it provides the solution and to the other one, it is an opportunity to earn and make living.

Metaljunction and eChoupal are perfect examples of converting long existing inefficiency gaps into win-win business opportunities.

• Real strategy is built in silence

The best form of strategy is silence where no critical action gets publicity. This doesn’t allow the competition to stand up against the business and allows the team to work to materialize its aspirations. Metaljunction strategy has been a silent move for long and before any one could realize, its making revenue in thousands of crores.

• Strategy evolves through execution

Initially, strategy is nothing but a burning desire to succeed. In most of the cases, strategy has evolved through practical experiences and didn’t remain fixed plan of action.

eChoupal went through many incremental changes when it kept on adding stakeholders and solutions into its team and portfolios. Metaljunction was supposed to be another dotcom but went on to become a key player in the metal and coal supply chain. There were strong aspirations but the solution emerged through experiments and execution.

• Strategy needs passion. Passion does matter

It was not calculated moves and preciseness of plan which moved the team and the leadership. It was pure passion of delivering something good through team work which has worked in most of the cases including Angel Broking, Metaljunction, Angel Broking and VentureEast.

• It pays to put all eggs in one basket

Double minded approach doesn’t work for entrepreneurs. At some time, one has to take up the entire challenge, burn the bridges and put all eggs in one basket. That’s then the real person starts moving and gets the solution through extreme desperation.

• All inclusive commercial solution is possible

Businesses are supposed to be win-lose games, someone wins at the expense of someone else. eChoupal has been a win-win all inclusive business platform for all stakeholders so far. Govt., middlemen, farmers, ITC, buyers, suppliers all have been benefitted from the value chain of ITC IBD.

• Agriculture is innovation driven science

Agriculture, if managed properly, can be extremely challenging and stimulating for intellect! Perhaps the lack of growth can be attributed to the way it has been perceived so far – cheap labour driven orthodox, mechanical & social way of making meagre money. Yes, it requires reforms. Still, there are opportunities to bring efficiency to the system through scientific methods, eChoupal is a live example.

• Be a Spiderman, create a web

Ensure through all possible ways that the solution or customer reaches you. Build an entire web, not just a single thread.

• Experiment, when in doubt

Keep on moving. Don’t get stuck in doubts. Solution emerges from experimentations. That’s how Mr. Balagopal kept on moving and today Terumo Penpol is leader in blood bag manufacturing from India.

• Information does matter

Finally, information systems do matter. Efficiency in most of the cases has been achieved through innovative mechanism deployed through IT. eChoupal, Metaljunction, Tesco are perfect examples of enabling innovative business ideas through IT.

Thats all in this summary of the lectures!

The source of these facts was ASER (Assessment Survey Evaluation Research) which provides   Annual Status of Education Report. ASER is set up by Pratham the largest NGO of India providing quality education to underprivileged children.

Pratham has been delivering to the society for last 15 years. ASER has been active since last 5 years. Its activities are funded by one of largest global IT firm.

ASER has very young team of members passionately dedicated to the cause of primary education. The links to details of the team are available here.

Dr. Rukmini Banerji is driving the initiative gradually and persistently across the nation and has also delivered lecture across the borders. One such speech delivered in Paris last year in which Pratham’s work has been described  –

How does ASER work? The team conduct detailed survey of each state through rigorous methodology. One such report on Uttaranchal can be seen here. The reports are truly valuable and have been appreciated by the education minister himself.

One of the themes was “Universal Primary Education” under the larger objective of inclusive growth.  The group had very experienced resources persons, each a significant contributor so far –

1. Ashok Kamath – Chairman, Akshara Foundation
2. Pravin Mahajan – Executive Director, Janarth NGO
3. Ashish Rajpal – MD, idiscoveri and
4. Dr Rukmini Banerji – Director, Pratham

The group had its first meeting on 30^th from 11 AM till evening and delivered a presentation on the next day to entire audience. This post is a summary of the key issues raised and the solutions perceived and proposed during the discussion on primary education and beyond.

The statistics of primary education in India reflect the gaps as under –

Ashok Kamath moderated the first round of discussion and identified 3 subcategories for further discussion –

1. Strengthening the government system
2. Quality issues (Technology / Innovation / Pedagogy)
3. Inclusive strategies and delivery system

Pravin Mahajan addressed INCLUSION and spoke about the work his organization Janarth is doing to provide education to the excluded children of migratory labor workers in western and southern India. He said, “Cost of education is less than cost of ignorance”. Exclusion can be categorized under 2 major types –

- By societal design

• Physically or mentally challenged children
• Children with learning disabilities
• Girls due to various reasons such as early marriage, poor sanitation, lack of transportation, household work, labour work, lack of schools nearby etc

- By force

• Labour migration
• Poverty

It was also found that inclusion has not been uniform across the country and there are different levels of maturity even within inclusion category. The group came up with following suggestions as solutions –

1. Counselling with parents (different in each context) such as to celebrate small achievements of disabled children or not to neglect education of children as far as possible
2. Increase in schools for special children and also in teachers for special kids
3. Bring school close to children (Janarth Model)

Janarth has established a simple model to reach the excluded children. They have mobile schools on motorcycles with a kit containing 3 Ls – Library, Laboratory and Laptop.

Ashish Rajpal took up the QUALITY issues as difficult words, too much theory, lack of involvement, high drop-out, resistance to change the methodology, mindset of teachers etc. He further summed up these issues in two core problems –

1. Poor design of curriculum and
2. Poor or ineffective delivery and teaching methods

He quoted his own work being delivered through iDiscoveri and gave an example how teaching can be made interesting for kids as well as teachers. He brought the teaching problem to one issue – can the assigned lecture be delivered by the teacher? If yes, it doesn’t matter what the qualification of the teacher is.

iDiscoveri has designed xSeed as the complete solution to make teaching creative and interesting. As per Ashish, through xSeed, they not only train the teachers but also ensure that the teaching is delivered in the way it is expected with tools necessary. So far they have chosen 4 subjects – Maths, English, Social Science and Science for KG-08 standards. Within last 4 years, they have covered 250 schools in India and recently Govt of Bhutan has also adopted xSeed methodology in its primary schools.

Dr Rukmini touched upon the GOVT SYSTEM related issues and informed the team members about huge funds available through Sarv Sikhsha Abhiyan under GoI schemes. She also brought out the fact that in terms of performance, govt schools are not really lagging much behind the pvt schools. She narrated the work being done by her organization in Maharashtra through Bal-Wadis and how the demand continuously pulled her to expand the work slowly but steadily.

Ashok Kamath also talked about initiatives taken up by Akshara Foundation to strengthen the systems. Akshara has been very innovative. It has collected statistical information about certain schools in Bangalore  and mapped that to the online google-maps thus making the final information available online to all users.

One of the solutions expressed was to have low cost chain of primary schools from private sector as it was felt that govt has its own limitations in providing professionally run educational services. Another solution was to utilize the funds available through PPP based programs driven by either NGOs or social enterprises.

The discussion was attended by following participants – Diwakar Kaushik, Zala, Ritesh, Rakesh, Pritika, Soumi, Romil Sood, B Ganesh, Sangita, Akanksha, Nitesh, Shubhashish, Sakshi, Mr B Rajendiran, Pulkesh, Vijay Gautam, Gaurav, Rakesh, Arvind, Kornica, Kumari, Aditi and Abhishek.

Ideally mobile commerce process should be exactly the same as a normal transaction with following components -

1. Bargaining & Negotiation
2. Proposal
3. Acceptance or rejection
4. Direct money transfer

The current process of m-commerce or even e-commerce is not like that. The onus of correct transfer with with the sender where as in normal cheque based transaction the risk is with the receiver. In m-commerce, there is no negotiation and the feel of real market based transaction is not there.

An acceptable version will be one in which bargaining, acceptance or rejection are local action enabled through bluetooth and money transfer with authorization is encrypted external action routed via the bank.