Tuesday, November 22, 2016

Demonetisation - Some of the Queues shown by news channels seem untrue or Engineered.

Is demonetisation a good step or bad step can only be seen after at least two years. That the measure demanded complete secrecy is also a fact.

Other facts are,  it did put lot of people in lot of inconvenience. May it be traders, farmers, parents having marriage of their children or common man on the street. But it is also a fact that given size of roll out of new Rs 2000 and Rs 500 notes, this inconvenience was a necessary evil that had to be gone through.

Granted that rural areas are the worst sufferers because of sheer fact that logistics involved in getting new currency to those places is phenomenal.

All the above explained and accepted, one fact does not add up. That fact is huge crowds at Bank branches and ATMs at Delhi and Delhi alone. 

For about a week, all bank branches and ATMs across the nation saw huge queues. All the measures being taken have shown results with recalibration of ATMs and increased money supply, particularly true for big cities. Those queues in the cities (at least in Mumbai where I stay) are thinning down with each passing day.

Delhi, if one believes the news channels, seems only exception. For unexplained reasons the queues seem to be either constant or increasing in this city.

Only two possibilities. One, it may be because while all big cities believed in combination of banked and cash dealings, this city dealt with only cash. The other reason could be that these queues are specifically designed to show the length of the queue when TV crew is around or when some politicians visit the bank branch or ATM. These crowds either gather looking at TV crew or politicians or they are created for these specific events.

I am not trying to belittle the misery of people but the queues at Banks and ATMs which have remained unchanged (at least those which are filmed by TV Crews, etc) defy explaination. 

Monday, November 14, 2016

Demonetization of 500/1000 notes and Maslow's Theory of Hierarchy of Needs

It is unusual to start a blog post with a disclaimer but I would do it.

Disclaimer : I personally am in favour of the govt move and have been also sacrificing , may be at lesser extent, as I have decided to wait and watch rather than going and standing in a queue. This blog post is only a satire on current situation for inducing a new thought and a good laugh.

The Blog

India has been a nation with large number of issues and problems. May it be Kashmir, NE, Naxals, Atrocities on Weaker sections, Dowry Deaths and what have you like casteism, nepotism, etc. No one ever believed that there could be a magic wand which a magician would move and over night all these problems that nation faced evaporated. But they were wrong.

After a long wait a magician came to the scene in this nation. A man with Gujarati culture, mannerisms and accent. A man with pepper beard and a man who relentlessly works for hours together. He travelled to four countries, beat the jet lag and very day of return was roaring in parliament.

This magician evaporated (what is evaporated can come back after condensation and it can happen in this case too) all the problems of the nation. He came, he saw and he announced. On 08/11 at the stroke of 8 pm he removed tonnes of Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes from circulation and demonetised them making them merely a promissory note to be encashed only at banks.

With this step he achieved many objectives in one stroke. All these objectives are being debated very hotly by the supporters and the opposers on all the channels, the ones who had TRPs and also the ones who did not have. But the other gains are not being talked. 

First is revenues to TV channel, second is unemployment that got created in Bank note press, Not of India where they have to do overtime, but BNP of Pakistan. They have been made unemployed. The defunct leaders of many parties also were the beneficiaries who suddenly found their voice and most importantly found TV channels who are ready to give them air time.

But the most important gain seems to have been missed out by most. I must admit, there were few creative people who did think about it and created Whatsapp messages and then there were those who forwarded them diligently, obviously without reading it (If I am saddled with messages on Whatsapp then why should I not make other also pay).

The gain is, he has bought time for himself from the critics, genuine and fake, to work for the nation, a task that he seems to love looking at kind of working hours he pulls daily without any break). He resolved all the pressing problems of this nation with one announcement, may be for short time (50 days as he says).

And how did he do it? He seems to be a management expert. He seems to have studied Maslow's Theory of Herchichial of Needs and mastered it.

Maslow's Theory of Herchichy of Need - 

The human mind and brain are complex and have parallel processes running at the same time, thus many different motivations from various levels of Maslow's hierarchy can occur at the same time. Maslow spoke clearly about these levels and their satisfaction in terms such as "relative", "general", and "primarily". Instead of stating that the individual focuses on a certain need at any given time, Maslow stated that a certain need "dominates" the human organism. Thus Maslow acknowledged the likelihood that the different levels of motivation could occur at any time in the human mind, but he focused on identifying the basic types of motivation and the order in which they should be met.

Considering this theory, he realised that the higher level needs of most middle and upper class people have been met. This is resulting in they fulling various problems or if not fuelling, they are fanning various problems. 

Only way to resolve this situation was to bring these people to stop these activities by reduce their level of comfort and making them stuck in to lower level of needs so that they have no time for anything else but only one worry, from where will I get Rs 100 or lesser notes to pay for daily needs (well, I admit, the lower class did suffer but remember, they anyway suffer every day, demonetization or not, so materially things changed only for upper and middle class).

With the level of need having brought down by PM, the higher level of needs (and also their utopian thought of communism, Bharat Tere........, Azadi, Power through barrel of gun, etc) were forgotten. Only worry every citizen has today is, where will I find next bank branch or Bank ATM which has currency in it, Period. No other  thought in whole of India's mind for last six days. 

Has anybody seen such a unanimity of thought in this nation? No Kashmir, No hardline hindutva, no Gau Rakshaks, No "Lal Salam", no JNU, No atrocities on any one, No dictatorship, nothing but only one thought, where to find next bank branch / ATM to find next set of Rs 100 notes.

By one stroke of his announcement, he is united the nation, made it classless, casteless and made the whole nation have simple worry that I mentioned earlier, Bank or ATM having cash in it.

Never ever earlier, except when nation fought war with Pakistan or China, that nation had forgotten all other problem and concentrated only on one problem.

Hats off to the PM and hats off to Maslow who paved the way to this miracle that is happening in India.

PS - I too am one of those millions of Indians who have achieved a unity of thought and I by chance found a Bank of Baroda ATM on Colaba Causeway which was just loaded with Rs100 notes and I said Eureka. I stood in a line of four people (needless to say I was the last but by the time I finished the line was 15 people) and took out 2000 Rs ( as ATM was not modified with new limit of of Rs 2500). Eventually, as per present level of maslow's Theory, I have crossed over to next need to be fulfilled. Long live Maslow