Demonetisation:Bank's dilemma -Half full or Half empty ?

Any other time, bankers would be rejoicing. A windfall of Rs 14 lakh crs of fresh demand deposits, of which Rs 12 lakh crs has already flown in, to accrue within two months ending 31^st December 2016, vaults bulging with cash, and a PM deeply appreciative of their labours, should have seen a spring in the strides of CEO of Indian banks.

But these aren’t normal times. At the stroke of midnight on 8^th November, ‘The Times they are a changing” changed. Overnight bank men became the face of a nation-wide humongous exercise to impound all high denomination notes and replace it with new notes-a gargantuan task considering that India is a hugely cash economy, the largest in the world. 

Never before were bankers, anywhere, tasked to accept, scrutinize, sort, bundle and store so much cash within such a short time, to be precise, 86% of total currency notes in circulation of value Rs15.4 lakh crores in 50 days. And so far, they have done splendidly. In 30 days ending 9^th December over Rs 12 lakh crores has already been counted and turned in bank vaults.

Never before were they required to physically recalibrate over 2 lakh ATMs, many in the remotest corners of the country, because some bright guys into decision-making thought new notes should be as different as chalk from cheese. Besides the design, the length and breadth of the notes too were changed, so ATM cash bins needed physical adjustment.

Never before were they required to stoically and without demur brave the wrath of customers, peeved, angry, abusive, at times aggressively violent protesting abnormal queues and transaction delays at bank counters, ATMs and at being forced to withdraw their own money in driblets, repeatedly over days. 

Never before did they suffer so much disruption at a stretch in their personal and social lives. These days, not for them any work- life balance.

If things work out, and that’s a big IF, as PM assured the nation, in less than a fortnight, the first day of the new year should see bankers breathe easy and, deservedly, feel a sense of déjà vu. They would have accomplished a feat never attempted on such a large scale and in so little a time. The nation should raise a toast to their diligence and devotion to duty.

Mission accomplished. Time to count the chips that came their way from this mammoth assignment. While vaults overflow with cash, more than half the space is taken up by waste paper, of no use to any one-the banned notes. Disposing it will present its own logistical problems and costs. The little free space for usable notes is sparsely populated, creating day to day problems of cash outs at branches and ATMs. More energy is expended now on daily operations than acquiring new business. However, these are niggles that should disappear as dynamic monetary equilibrium kicks in to restore normality. Further, if the currency crunch in any manner promotes a less cash economy, there would be less cash for bankers to count in days to come. And to boot, gains will accrue from share in the electronic transaction fee pie. That is a source that will surely grow with times. Moreover, not all of the cash deposits will be withdrawn, so banks look to a bonanza of stable walk-in demand deposits that enables them to lower interest rates, both on loans and deposits, keeping intact their net interest margins. No good news though for elders subsisting on interest income.

But the picture isn’t too rosy elsewhere. By all accounts GDP growth will slide in the short term. The quantity theory of money says so.

MV=PY 

M money in circulation, v velocity of money (number of times a rupee is used to transact during the year), P avg price level, Y output in quantity

So, V remaining unchanged, and note ban contracting money supply M, as it surely does, PY, that is, GDP must fall. Economists will walk you through many ifs and buts and paint different long term scenarios but all are agreed that GDP growth will shrink in the short term. A cash crunch negatively impacts the whole supply chain with a cascading effect throughout the economy. That’s not good news for banks weighed down by massive stressed assets overload. Currency contraction affects small enterprises the most as these are greased largely by cash. Many wont outlive the crunch. Already, substantial amount of loans to large businesses is red flagged in Bank books, a stressed MSME sector only further exacerbates their NPA woes.

On the other hand, businesses holding banned notes have rushed to put it in their loan accounts. Non-food credit of SCBs has therefore dropped by as much as Rs 65680 crs in the fortnight ended 25^th November, conflating the degrowth Rs 43970 crs in the previous fortnight. The year on year credit growth till 25^th Nov stood at just 6.6% against 9.3% the previous year. While there seem few takers for fresh loans, demand deposits surged by Rs 11366 crs in just the fortnight ending 25^th Nov -a leap of 4% in 14 days ,fuelling a year on year deposit growth of 15.9% against 9.8% the previous year. Booming deposits, falling credit isn’t a rosy picture for any bank. It compels them to squeeze more profits out of treasury operations to compensate drop in interest income. One of the imponderables for banks is how much of the CASA surge will remain. Till a figure is arrived at, they remain saddled with interest bearing deposits with bleak prospects of being loaned out. Bulk of the CASA bulge is in savings accounts carrying interest rate of 4%.

For all their labours to be rewarded banks must hope that demonetisation triggers an economic resurgence, sooner than later. Hopes of unaccounted money held in cash getting extinguished and to that extent strengthening government finances have evaporated with all banned notes expected to be banked. But if IT authorities do a good job of unearthing black money in these deposits tax revenues will get an immediate boost. Further, banks would be praying that the cash crunch ushers in a paradigm shift in the way people pay for goods and services, from cash to cashless enlarging both the number of taxed transactions and the tax base. With more money in its kitty public investments will expand for private capital to follow suit. That’s what banks would most relish.

But the big question is, will global economy wait for India to do the catch up. Fed is already climbing the interest rate curve making US a more attractive destination for fund managers and private capital flows. While our industrial output slackens fell 1.9% in Oct 16, big neighbour, China, is well and truly on the recovery path. Its industrial output grew 6.1% in Oct and 6.2% in Nov. Retail sales too rose,10.8% in Nov. Murmurs against globalisation manifested in Brexit followed by a Trump win is no longer muted. Populism may force more western governments to adopt protectionist measures making exports of manpower, services and goods from emerging economies increasingly difficult. A vibrant Indian economy emerging from the ashes of demonetisation to meet these challenges is, therefore, lost in too much of haze for banks to bank on.

For now demonetisation rides on the shoulders of bankers giving lots of pain but little gain. If economy doesn’t pan out the way government expostulates a job well done will, ironically, leave behind bitter memories.

Demonetisation: Surgical or Furgical ?

More truly, demonetisation is looking for a needle in the haystack and that by any stretch of imagination is not a surgical strike, the principal characteristic of which is precision attack on pre-identified targets . Here every house is a suspect. At the same time, the process of making over and reclaiming one’s own cash savings entails real pain over an extended period. The torment ,therefor,e is anything but ‘furgical’. Lalu Yadav in coining the epithet won ‘rhyming’ points but not much more. Maybe, ‘tragical’ would be a more apt rhyme.

We are now a fortnight into Mr Modi’s fusillade. If the bullets set afire black monies held in withdrawn notes without any significant collateral damage Mr Modi will emerge a global exemplar of a crusader against corruption. Else, the monetary disruption may leave deep disfiguring scalds on the face of our political economy. But we are yet some distance away from the day of  reckoning.

Is the gamble well taken?

First, let’s be clear, ‘notebandi’ is not ‘nasbandi’ that will stop ‘procreation’ of black money. Cupidity is intrinsic to human nature and of all  venal crimes, non- payment of taxes is a relatively innocuous infraction that the intrepid and intelligent sportingly indulge in. Successful evasions and avoidances of tax earn bragging points even for a President elect of USA, Mr Donald Trump. Obviously, ‘honourable’ crimes that essentially breed voluminous amounts of black money are of sterner stuff than demonetisation can handle.

Further, till bills for a politician's walk through public life are footed from cash donations received from dubious sources ,generation and supply of black money and corruption will scarce decline.The just concluded USA presidential election was agog with candidate funding for a quid pro quo. India is no different. The International Money Watch Group estimates that BJP alone spent Rs 23000-24000 crs in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, most of it unaccounted. The figure may be disputed but the scale and grandeur of BJP poll ad blitzkrieg lends considerable credence. In fact, all political parties are partners in this crime of corrupt poll funding. The Lok Pal, supposed to cleanse the Augean Stables of corruption in high places, including political corridors, is sadly mortuary bound even before it felt the birth pangs. A pure nation with an impure polity is a contradiction in terms. Therefore, staking political fortunes on the plank of demonetisation as an ‘imandari ka parv’ is ab initio a sour bet. It may cause ripples but will fail to enthuse.

Secondly, fear of stigmatisation and prosecution will lead beholders of illegitimate cash to quietly bury it, nothing will flow into government coffers. Existing money stock will get depleted causing a short-term currency contraction with its concomitant deleterious effects on incomes and productivity. If Mr Modi makes good on his resolve not to replace all the notes turned in, the relative currency shortage will perpetuate. In an economy, with an informal sector greased by cash, accounting for 40% of GDP, the gap may not be bridged by e-money any too soon making liquidity woes endemic.

Thirdly, existing counterfeit notes that supposedly finances terror will be guillotined. By Indian Statistical Institute estimates, 250 of every one million bank note in circulation is fake, that puts the stock value of counterfeits at Rs 400 crs , not a significant sum. Besides, while we recalibrate our ATMs for the new notes, a process that some say may stretch over 3-4 months, the handlers of terror too would be retrofitting their printing presses to churn out fakes of our new notes. Till then, a temporary respite at best.

Fourthly, the ‘whales’ of black money don’t hold it in cash, only the ‘prawns’ do. Therefore, if at all, only the prawns will get caught.

Fifthly, economists could never figure out whether money is the cause or effect of economic conditions; if former, we are inevitably headed for an economic slowdown. Prognosis on offer is heavily hedged for political correctness and couched in astute doublespeak, anything but categorical. The one common refrain ,though, is that the economy will contract in the short term.

Sixthly,is the govt equipped to scrutinise all cash deposits of over Rs 2.5 lacs in accounts ex-post demonetisation? Already, it is supposedly looking, on a monthly basis, into a much narrower field of cash deposits of Rs10 lacs or more per annum in bank accounts. Nothing much has come out of it.

Seems the odds are stacked against. 

Need for calm reflection

If so much is uncertain of outcome, the time to sing hymns and hosannas of triumph and euphoria reminiscent of our surgical strike into Pakistan, or for that matter, even to pronounce demoniac presages ,has not yet come. The aims of demonetisation are indubitably and eminently desirable but it comes with several caveats. Consider these two.

First, the carrot of amnesty dangled for voluntary disclosure of unaccounted assets met with limited success. The ’Black and White’ scheme for foreign assets netted just Rs 4000 crs, a total whitewash, and the ’Fair and Lovely’ scheme for domestic assets found 64275 declarants with Rs 65250 of undeclared assets, a measly Rs 1 crore per head. The big fishes were, clearly, not enthused. Will the ongoing cash purge smoke them out this time around?

Secondly, withdrawal of currency for the purpose of eliminating black money has met with limited success, rather in some countries it led to violent disruptions. BRICS nations are broadly in the same economic boat. So, the 1991 demonetisation of 50/100 rouble note by Mikhail Gorbachev may provide instructive insights. And the one unpalatable lesson is that it drove the last nail in the coffin of a crumbling USSR and the USS left USSR and Gorbachev with just Russia. Burma faced violent student unrest when the military rulers cancelled its currency. In other countries too the experience has been sub-optimal.

Demonetisation a bitter pill

Given the blemished history of demonetisation, one wonders, is it a compelling imperative for an economy flaunted as the one bright spot in an otherwise bleak global scenario? If winter has not set in why the need to administer ‘kadak’ chai to all and sundry? The state has sufficient instruments to prise out ill-gotten wealth and concealed incomes in a pin pointed manner instead of casting its net over all citizens, most of whom are law abiding.

Cash holding per se is not insidious. The poor hold it close to their chest because it is tangible and money in hand literally. Besides,the nation has a large and legitimate parallel cash economy constituted by small businesses contributing 40% of GDP. It is suffering the most. disruption as currency contraction.comes as a huge restraint in its most busy season.- marriages, harvesting of kharif crop and preparatory farm operations for rabi sowing. Much of our economic edifice rests on consumption arising from marriage festivities and farming. The fact that concessions had to be made for both these activities post implementation betrays lack of planning foresight and poor timing.To identify this informal cash economy with circulation of black money does not do justice to the diligence and entrepreneurship of millions of small businesses contributing legitimately to national wealth. Bear in mind that cash in Japan is 20% of GDP ,ours is less than 12%. Cash is not the devil made out to be.

Further, demonetisation icomes against the backdrop of a visible  upturn in manufacturing and farming. Will it not abort this resurgence in economic activity. Likely, most financial wizards say.

Cost benefit equation.

Then. there is the question of cost- benefit. The Centre For Monitoring Indian Economy ,CMIE has pegged the cost of the official 50 day currency disruption at RS 1.28 lakh crores .That's huge. There's a human cost too. More lives have been lost ,unsung, due to demonetisation related causes than at the borders since the Sep surgical strikes , estimates varying from between 25 to 50.

One indisputable benefit from currency contraction is the leg up it gives to electronic payment system.That should result in better tax collections. Also, lower currency circulation reduces currency replacement costs.

Meanwhile, masses line up in long queues to reclaim their legitimately earned money; those not having accounts or more money than the state is willing to exchange out rightly look for jugaad to overcome the handicap. They aren’t complaining, not yet, for they want to believe that Mr Modi is playing Robinhood and that they stand at a crossroad in nation building when, ignoring all personal trials and tribulations, they must tread a path charted by him “In a country’s history, there come moments when every person feels he too should be part of that moment – that, he too should make his contribution to the country’s progress. Such moments come but rarely.” Demonetisation is  thus cloaked in tiranga and administered to the lay as a patriotic pill. Besides the national interest  pitch, we may be seeing the manifestation of an age old weakness of humans living in communities - concealed delight in the misfortune of better off  neighbour..

The crooked whose misdeeds foisted this agony on masses, though, do not line up i queues; not one of them figure among the 25 reported dead (some put the toll at over 50) from demonetisation related causes. They don’t lose sleep for ill-gotten wealth is ‘easy come, easy go’. The future will again give them chances to recoup their losses. For the moment, the common man endures all the pain with no gain in sight.. Nobody has explained to him how the measure benefits him.,So nothing to him looks , poor friendly..

Alternatives

The government has stated to the Supreme Court that demonetisation aims to boost electronic payment of goods and services. Eminently laudable objective with the caveat that a cashless economy is a fanciful thought. Even a most electronically connected economy like USA has cash to the tune of 8-10% of its economy. Its highest currency denomination $100 is at the current exchange rate, 3.5 times our highest denomination ,Rs 2000. But undeniably we must move firmly in that direction.

Could this switch over be catalysed without going through the torture of demonetisation? If boosting e-payments is  the predominant motive,I believe Yes,it can be done.One way is to forewarn the nation and give people sufficient time ,say six months, to accept and internalise a regimen where all contracts above a cut off limit would be legally valid only if paid electronically. Both the avowed aims, encouraging e-money and eliminating black money would thus be attained without the damages inflicted by a shock and awe demonetisation. Not death by guillotine (that anyway isn't feasible) but  the slow, yet sure, attenuation and de-fanging of black money through exsanguination.

Between the lines...

As the days pass by, the measure increasingly morphs into a political narrative in economic script. Allegations of treasurers and friends of BJP being forewarned of the move are rife. In evidence is cited the abnormal rise in bank deposits between July and September this year.That the  government is not willing to rebut, adds grist to the rumour mill. If true, it does give an unfair advantage to the party over its political opponents in their financial preparedness for the ensuing polls. But more likely is that it rounds up BJP's armoury of poll battle cries. To Kairana, Bharat Mata Ki Jai, and surgical strike (lost some sting as Pak remains firmly belligerent and unrepentant) has been added an anti-corruption pitch. That is a formidable quartet of goodies to sway voters.

When the history of this period is written, its one abiding remembrance will be of long serpentine queues of puzzled, frazzled and tense, yet mostly disciplined people, lined up before ATMs in enclosures with downed shutters across the length and breadth of the country, hoping against hope that the shutters will lift, and it will, like before, start dispensing cash, and even more importantly, praying that by the time their turn comes it won’t run dry.

Demonetisation Googlies

Muthiah Murlidharan bowled only a DOOSRA, Mr Modi went one ahead, spun a TEESRA. Demonetisation is his third assault on black money. How many demons, if any, will it slay, the jury is still out on that. But the measure is reinforcing what every chronicler of ‘money’ has chorused. ‘A constant in the history of money is that every remedy is reliably a source of new abuse.’ Man’s cupidity is unbounded. This measure to ambush ‘black’ cash too is ending up creating more of it. So, the ‘imandari ka parv’, as Mr Modi describes demonetisation, has so far struck many different strokes.

(i)               Many a hapless traveller stranded with only the trashed notes and staring at starvation was tipped to go to the note-changers for succour who deigned to offer- Rs 400/700 for each proffered Rs 500/1000 note. Good Samaritans too risk-reward their munificence. Doubt if that extra rupee will be reported to the taxman.

(ii)              Petty bank account holders were pleasantly surprised to find their unfancied accounts could earn ‘rent' in addition to interest. They merrily ‘rented’ their accounts for depositing others’ banned notes, the rent rising as high as 25% of the amount routed. Mr Modi’s instrument for financial inclusion, the Jan Dhan accounts are said to have been particularly seduced.

(iii)            The grey market in bullion, for a while, did brisk business, exchanging gold for cancelled notes at premiums ranging from Rs 10000 to 20000 per 10 gms over the official gold rate. One report speaks of 25 tons of gold sold in the first four days of the ban order. Most busy was the grey market in the PM’s own state, Gujarat.

(iv)            Even Gods are making hay; donation boxes in temples overflow with cancelled notes. Defunct notes worth Rs 4.4 million made its way into the temple hundi at Sri Jalakanteswarar temple in Vellore. Ironically, the worthless, untaxed hoard in the donor’s hand now becomes legit tax free. In the God’s earthly realm even impure notes get laundered white. Ganga Maiya too found herself awash with banned notes near Mirzapur.

(v)             But the parsimonious housewife will be unforgiving of Mr Modi. Her instinct for thrift has been sadly abused. She had painstakingly cut corners to squeeze some savings out of the house keep money and stashed it away from the prying eyes of her husband for a rainy day or more likely, a visit to the jeweller. All of it for ease of concealment had lain hoarded in Rs 500/1000 notes. Alas! just when the family needed it most, she found her savings stripped of immediate purchasing power. Not only did she lose control over her savings, she also lost face, and had some explaining to do as to its source. Anyway, the husband had the last laugh.

(vi)            Mr Modi enthused congressmen when he mocked them "those involved in big scams, like 2G and coal scam, now have to stand in queues to exchange Rs. 4,000". Congressmen didn’t know they were so many across the country, the only prominently identifiable congressman standing in a queue was Rahul Gandhi.

(vii)          A day later ,a 96-year-old lady escorted by relatives exchanged annulled notes at Oriental Bank, Ahmedabad under the full glare of camera lenses and TV crews. She was PM, Mr Modi’s mother. 

(viii)         Media was agog with wild rumours. One fancied a Rs 2000 note embedded with NANO GPS chip that terrestrial satellites could locate even deep down to 120 mt. below earth’s surface. At that depth why bury notes when one can extract coal instead at some places.

(ix)            counterThe ‘sanskritization’ of economic footprints begun with the new symbol for the rupee was carried a step forward. The 2000 note for the first time carried numerals in Devanagari script.

(x)             The famed Indian art of jugaad too was brought into play to ease somewhat the leg-aches of those standing in long queues for hours to reclaim their savings. A website ‘book my chotu’ offered to hire out a stand-in for queueing up before bank counters or ATMs . Not many of the proxies ,though, were kids, that is, chotus, but fully able-bodied men out of work.

(xi)            An example of a jugaad that was simplicity personified surfaced in a PSB. An innovative cashier started entering Rs 100 note deposits by people as deposits in Rs 500/1000 note tenders, then made ‘out of court’ swaps with Rs 500/1000 note holders at a discount of 20%. As simple and fool proof a jugaad as can be.

The demonetisation measure is hailed as bold and innovative. But are these any less so? Time is not up, as we go along I am sure more creative strokes will be struck against Modi’s TEESRA. 

Today NDTV,tomorrow WHO ?

Let me begin this piece with an obituary picked up from an article by Ashok Mahadevan in Reader’s Digest (date changed).

O’CRACY,D.E.M., beloved husband of T.Ruth, loving father of L.I.Bertie, brother of Faith, Hope and Justicia, died on November,9

It was meant to draw the attention of world at large to the prevailing stifling smog of dread and distrust hovering heavily over a nation suffocating under Emergency. To hoodwink censors the text was morphed and, says the writer, surreptitiously inserted in TOI. Today, I have chosen to reproduce it as nothing better describes the depth of my dismay, distress and deep anguish at I & B ministry’s punitive direction to NDTV to be off air on 9^th November and as because the freedom to overtly rebel and bewail assaults on right to expression and information still exists. Tomorrow, maybe not. Already, a debate has germinated whether questioning or doubting state action or failing to be supportive of it is sedition qualifying for quarantine in Pakistan, or in the least, to be pointed out and stigmatised as anti-national. No less than Mr Kiren Rijiju, an Hon. Minister of State adds mite to this debate by defining what does not constitute right culture at Home;

“We should stop this habit of raising doubt, questioning the authorities and the police. This is not good culture”.

So, there is a present and imminent danger of such thoughts mainstreaming. Having breathed the malodorous air of Emergency, even a whiff of censorship in any form, be it dress, food, the choice of slogans, access to information, or religious practices, raises hackles and makes one cry wolf. The Hon minister more than ruffles feathers, in fact, strikes at the very roots of democracy- right to question. I see not a whiff but a gale of authoritarianism and thought policing reminiscent of Joseph Goebbels’s infamous Ministry of People’s Enlightenment and Propaganda aiming for ‘Gleichschaltung’, achievement of uniformity. The world has moved more than 30 years past 1984., and here we have a state still striving to suppress ‘deviant’ views.

Before Mr Rijiju’s proselytising zeal for true culture ensnares us all into re-defining democracy, it may be worthwhile to bear in mind how USA’s founding fathers of democracy conceptualised the term.

“The duty of a patriot is to protect the country from its government”, Thomas Paine

“It is the first duty of every citizen to question its government “, Benjamin Franklin

Though the Americans have done well for themselves living by this understanding of the term, the current ruling elite in our country have turned a page different  from them or reading some other book.

And what a rotten day to sound ‘quietus’ - 9/11.Granted 9/11 occurred on 11^th Sep but the ban on 9^th Nov is too numerologically close to invoking dark memories of 9/11. If an important edifice of global democracy -twin towers of World Trade Centre was obliterated on the American and 9/11 and Democracy served its heaviest blow since Pearl Harbour. .Is GOI’s intending something similar on Indian 9/11,an equally grievous blow to Indian democracy ?

The unease with the ban arises primarily from what it shows up in bold relief- covert building up of a paradigm of non-acceptable forms of information seeking, expression and speech in public discourse, social interactions and media projections. Information on security operations,surgical strikes, excesses committed by security forces, violations of human rights by armed forces, or pointing out lapses in policing of army camps in JK that lead to its repeated breaches by terrorists, is now deemed prejudicial to national security. Security is truly a daintier damsel in distress in peace times than she was in war. Today a touch and she stumbles. Caricaturing and lampooning are non-approved expressions, more so, if it relates to prominent political personages from the establishment. Chorusing of Bharat Mata ki Jai is sought to be made mandatory. 

An ‘Outlook’ editor gets the sack for an expose on RSS. P. Chidambaran’s interview is spiked by NDTV because it asked questions of surgical strikes.  Reporters of ‘Scroll’, an online magazine get jailed in MP for raising inconvenient questions about anti- Naxal operations by forces. Such instances have multiplied alarmingly. 

That channels will discuss to eternity a shoe flung at Rahul Gandhi, interviewing and focussing on the ‘hero’, but not find time to debate alleged fake encounter killings of SIMI fugitives of Bhopal jail or the mysterious disappearance of a student at JNU can’t all be incidental. It stinks of an unholy nexus between the media and the state, the durban feasting with the thief. The fourth estate has voluntarily entered a self- imposed regimen of doing the bidding of the state under editorial prodding of its owners whose sympathies unabashedly lie with the ruling elite.One fears the Nazi dictum of who controls expression controls the people being actualized.

Why then should a need arise to single out NDTV for ‘treatment’. Let’s defer this question for a while. First why the ban is rotten. GOI has powers under Sec 20 of  Cable Television Networks Regulation Act 1995, to prohibit transmission of any channel in the interest of security. And as Venkiah Naidu says, GOI took TV channels off air 21 times during UPA regime. Right, yet I see three gaping holes in state’s justification. 

First, competitive sinning is not NDA’s popular mandate. People voted this government for change ,not perpetuation. So ‘me too’ is poor politics. Secondly, those UPA instances relate to broadcast of adult content, easily spotted. On the hand, NDTV case is a first-of-its-kind penalty for what essentially is, in the subjective judgment of GOI, prejudicial to security of the nation. What is porn is porn indisputably; the ideological predilections of a regime decide whether it goes on screen or not. But what is prejudicial to security is a subjective assessment in the absence of actual harm or damage hence pregnant with alluring possibilities for abuse for partisan ends. The state should not be the sole arbiter of subjective judgements in matters relating to a the fourth pillar of democracy. Precisely for this reason there exists a state recognised self-regulatory body, Broadcast Editors Association, duly constituted under the relevant government guidelines, for oversight of visual media. TV does not have a statutory regulator like the Press Council of India for print, hence the Editors Guild fills in. For reasons, best known to it, the state ignored it. That’s what makes the order bad and capricious.

 Lastly, government failed to rebut NDTV assertion that "its coverage was sober, and did not carry any information that had not been covered by the rest of the media and was not in the public domain”. Another channel ‘News Times Assam’ too is ordered off the air on the same date for a footage that some other channels also aired. Discriminate brandishing of state power is ominous for democracy. Putting all together it is crystal clear that the order smacks of malafidy and arbitrariness with the intent to put nooses on 'errant' channels.

Now the why NDTV. NDTV (Hindi) is the one channel that has held alternate viewpoints on several policies and events, at times embarrassing the government and its ministers. One can find no other reason for government picking on NDTV while condoning others for identical infraction. Obviously i t is being arm twisted to toe the government line and no other. Dissonace with official views is no reason to snuff it out a news channel. If democracy can’t live with dissent, debate and ambiguity what will ? Intolerance is not only bad governance in a functioning democracy ,it is suicidal for the social fabric of a pluralistic nation.

Dissent is the highest form of patriotism, Thomas Jefferson rightly said. Uniformity of thought -my way or the highway, is anathema to democracy. It follows that state must enable citizens to do its patriotic duty of creating various shades of opinion based on unimpeded access to all sources of information including media channels. The state has no inherent right to paint the nation only in black and white, it must allow for shades of grey. As citizens, we too need to be reminded that eternal vigilance is the price we must pay for preserving our individual liberties. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse, and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality. I agree, Mr Desmond Tutu

These words of Pastor, Martin Niemoller resonate with me as I see its increasing relevance in the present state of the nation.

First they came for the Jews and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for the Communists and I did not speak out because I was not a Communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for me and there was no one left to speak out for me.

who are the 'martyrs' ?

A democracy, by definition, is liberal in thought and deed. And India is among the very few former colonies that steadfastly and exuberantly has been a vibrant one for the last 70 years or so. Naturally, ’conferring’ martyrdom comes easy, more so, when it is liberally buttered with nationalistic fervour for political dividends. Soldiers killed in cross border fire; or terrorist attacks on army camps; or Siachen landslides; or OROP suicide; or in Naxal attacks; or a cop garroted by undertrials in Bhopal jail, all such tragic deaths, depending on newsiness or capacity for milking partisan gains, are opportunities for thrusting martyrdom on the slain.

Soldiering or copping is an occupation like any other, only one with heightened life risks. In peace times, the risk abates. Still, in the performance of duties some, inevitably, do get killed by inimical forces. its an occupational hazard .We feel the loss and grieve with the victim families.

Does their death in harness automatically confer martyrdom, merely because the victim is a soldier or a cop? I may sound irreverent or profane or in the current mood of the nation, seditious. But do ponder. What should one say of the truck driver who carries a daily life risk on road, and many times more of them die every day in road accidents. Is he less exalted or beholden of an inferior genre of life risk ? Whether a cop or a soldier or a truck driver, all voluntarily choose the risk-reward inhering their jobs.

So, do we call them martyrs or reserve the term for one put to death for not renouncing his faith, or one persecuted for adhering to a principle or a cause. The Dictionary unequivocally says, the latter. Yet, across the political spectrum one sees a competitive race to glorify soldiers, cops losing their lives in course of discharge of duties as martyr. Like never before.

In earlier times, we paid our respects and homage, solaced the mourning families and endeavoured to provide good lives to the families they left behind. Things have changed indeed. Suddenly slain security men have become handles for political posturing and whipping up jingoistic hysteria. The nation has fallen into the trap of worshipping form and ignoring content. That an ex-service man had to commit suicide, for whatever reasons, setting aside the issue of his mental state deemed questionable by V K Singh, is proof enough.

Let us not debase true martyrs by a politically expedient reading of martyrdom. The rightful claimants are the few who lay down their lives for noble causes. Slain security personnel deserve our heartfelt homage, empathy and a befitting financial package, may be even handholding, to enable their families to walk through life with their head held high. But martyrdom, only with due circumspection.

Proverbially yours

PROVERBIALLY,YOURS

History only tells ‘His_Story’- of kings and wars; of peoples and their cultures; of tyrannies and democracies; of liberals and bigots; of good and bad nations but never the story of oneness of mankind . That insight one fruitfully gains by an analytical study of folklores, aphorisms, truisms and proverbs sourced from different climes. Whatever the times or the skies they in different guises speak in one voice – the similitude of human fears, cravings and struggles for existence.

Take proverbs. Chambers defines a proverb as ‘a pithy, practical, popular saying expressive of certain, more or less, general conviction”. Not just a wise saying or a  striking aphorism, but a concatenation of wit, wisdom, popular acclaim and use at the time
 it was first coined, an expression of life’s lesson drawn from long  experience, one that is widely believed in and has morphed into a truism. 

Forewarned is forearmed; fast bind, fast find; a tethered sheep soon starves;भैंस के आगे बीन बजाना,are all distillates  of cumulative human experiences that became commonsensical enough to serve as eternal guides of human conduct.

As one flits across the skies and epochs ,geography and culture drapes proverbs in fascinating peculiarities of phraseology, symbolism and characterisation.However, the embedded truth is identical .Indians say “चले न जाने अँगना टेढ़ा” to mean “a bad carpenter quarrels with his tools”. These similarities transcending language and culture is what history misses out in writing ‘His_Story’

So, when men start living on Mars, the proverbial truths will still be aglow but lighted by different fires, or to put it  prosaically, by phrases and vocab that we use today .What will it be? Let’s do some crystal-ball gazing. Join in, who knows you may hit gold and 
coin one for human Martians to quote. I can't  resist putting Trump on top of the list for its sheer topicality,

1. When arses are around ,can Donald be far behind ? 

2. He who shares his password has nothing left to share.

3. We talked Mars, they talked moon.

4. Smart possessed is smart dressed . 

5. Knowledge is Google. 

6. Power is a microchip 

7. Citizens die ,Netizens survive  

8. Truth is just a photoshop away

9. A tweet a day keeps gloom away

10. If you aren't ahead ,you are as good as dead

11. All's well when likes swell 

12. With a hook you can fish, without one you can phish.

13. A harvest of Ideas  is worth more than gold 

14. Never step on toes of customers, they have long memories

15. Insult and abuse are politician’s ruse 

Life has metamorphosed in myriad ways.To capture its ebbs and flows in admixtures of “humour, truism, twaddle and common sense” is great intellectual fun. Go ahead and toggle your grey cells ,proverbially ! Till then adieu.

The shrinking rupee of elders

 The shrinking rupee of elders 

Monetary Policy Committee,India’s  financial newbie, issued its inaugural Repo Rate ‘stamp’ at a discount of 0.25%.Banks can now borrow from RBI at 6.25%. Means cheaper loans and that always makes FICCI rub its hands in glee. And FM finally has his way with RBI as  Urjit  Patel delivers. All hunky dory ,save in one corner-the elders .For them the fine print is too black and gloomy.

Let's see why. First,the rate cut is prefaced by paring of interest rates on all small savings ,understandably, to facilitate  easier transmission of the widely expected RBI rate cut by banks. And secondly, RBI upped its inflation target .Together ,it delivered a double whammy to elders.

As repo and small savings rates are now reset quarterly,it is more than likely that these two set of rates will move in tandem and arguably,downwards. Among all the multitudinous factors that impel private investment ,FM feels interest rate is  prime. Mr Rajan thought otherwise and had to make way for Urjit Patel. In a nutshell ,FM and RBI ,in the foreseeable future,will manipulate interest rate downwards to kickstart private investment,an elephant hitherto impervious to all enticements.

Going forward, the scenario of government snipping small savings rates ,anticipating repo rate cuts ,that in turn setting  in train across the board slide in deposit rates ,will be repeatedly played out. That's what an elder stares at today-a regimen of progressively dipping interest rates giving diminishing returns on his fixed savings and rising expenses including the most inelastic of it all - medical expenses. And there is no insurance against loss of income. A forward interest rate cover in the retail market is yet to be conceived and even if one had existed it would have come at  an additional cost. The dread of difficult times for elders is truly real. 

Lest I seem alarmist here are some facts: 

Scheme     PPF.  MIS. KVP SBI(5yr).Senior.Inflation  PPF(Real)

                                                                                                                                                         

Q3FY16.    8.0.     7.7     7.7   7.25        8.5          6.0       2.0

Q3FY15.    8.7      8.4    8.7   7.25        9.3         5.88     2.82

Q3FY14.    8.8      8.4    8.7   8.75        9.2         6.37     2.43

The last column factors in inflation for illustrative purposes. It clearly shows the lower trajectory of real interest rates in some of the popular saving avenues of elders.For schemes other than PPF, the return gets further reduced by the applied tax rate. 

To put things in perspective, consider medical insurance. That's one investment no elder can avoid.A senior citizen stepping into his 66th year will find his medical insurance premium payable to New India Insurance Co jump from ₹3850 per lac to ₹4250. Against a real income of 2% derived from PPF deposit, his medi-insurance premium would rise more than 10%.He will need to clip some expenses to rebalance his budget .There are other nibbles too into his static income. For instance,interest on small savings is now compounded annually,not half yearly. Senior citizen savings 

scheme has no compounding at all though it pays interest quarterly.

Secondly, RBI  revised upwards its inflation target to 5.3% for 2017 and 4.5 % for 2018 from 5% and 4% respectively. A higher inflation paring purchasing capacity of a declining interest income  is a none too edifying spectre .On top of it is the irreversible attenuation of traditional support systems of 

family and progenies for its elders .With any loss of income his financial insecurities get magnified.

Behind these financial changes is an ideological shift permeating the administration- edging away from a social economy to a market economy, the natural corollary of it is a market determined interest rate notwithstanding any social imperatives. Accordingly, now interest rates on small savings have been linked to yields on g-secs of comparable maturity with a small mark-up ,100 basis points for Senior Citizen and 25 basis points each for Monthly Interest Scheme ,KVP ,PPF.  Though government promised in Feb 2016 to insulate Senior Citizen Savings Scheme from this formulaic determination,it eventually dropped this scheme in the same basket as other small savings schemes.

Besides tracking their own health,state now requires them to chart the bond market as well, the one market most elders never bonded with even in their prime. By all means too onerous a task. Bond markets are known to move by more parameters than just the repo rate and Inflation. One expert 

opines, “70% of the variation (in bond interest rates) is caused by a variety of factors (other than repo and inflation)– each stepping in and out in short phases”. Even exchange rate fluctuations and Fed taper send domestic markets in a tizzy .Living in a globalised,interdependent world impliesanything ,anywhere  affects all things.

Even if the 10 cr strong body of senior citizens guesstimate interest rates ,what then ? May be ,forewarned they will cut corners early enough to prevent dipping into their principal savings. On an unsupplemented ,non-expansive saving even cutting corners is too much of an ask. In the twilight years ,re-employment or self employment (except perhaps the eminently satisfying sinecure of tending young grand children) is not really an option.Thus most elders survive just on income from existing savings.

So as the nation continues with its experimentation with a market centric political economy two issues will occupy centre stage.Interest rates will be market determined. Further, ideological orientation will constrain the state from doling out much to unproductive labourers (in a market economy,doles and subsidies are reckoned povertarian and sinful) .Yet I venture to ask ,should the returns on savings of  elders be buffeted by market tides? Should his survival  depend on the vagaries of market or be insulated 

from it ? That’s the fundamental poser. 

 I believe protecting the purchasing value of his income is enjoined upon the state, a constitutional obligation to protect  the right to life of citizens including its elders. As markets only protect producers and entrepreneurs,the state should not trust its market to take care of elders.The least it can do is not to diminish what the elders already have- the income from their savings accumulated in the times when they sold their labour's to the nation.

Therefore,  to check progressive immiseration of  senior citizen,government should consider the following suggestions ,in the least .

  

1. The  Senior Citizen Savings Scheme needs to be god-fathered by the state to make it the mainstay of its benefactions for elders’ financial security. And the best way to do it is to  index interest rate to Consumer Price Index so as to give a real return of 5%.

2. Senior citizen need to be exempted from penalties for premature withdrawal for all schemes.They are the ones most likely to be confronted with unforeseen expenditures at most unpredictable times. Mind you, the penalties are not insubstantial -1.5% of the balance in senior citizen 

scheme, 1% reduction in interest rate on all deposits in PPF. Some banks still charge a penalty of 1% on premature FD encashment under some conditions.

3. The 50 basis point differential interest on bank deposits which senior citizens once enjoyed , has whittled down to just 25 basis points. Instead of moving down, it should move up.

HOW ARE YOU SIRJI ?

Kaise hain SirJi ?

The moment our eyes locked,his face lit up.He is my neighbour,a few houses down the road. With a toothy grin suffusing his broad countenance and body irradiating friendly warmth,he queried,

“Kaise hain SirJi ?”

As far as I can remember ,our road side encounters have been this way only - eye contact, broad smile ,this very same conversation opener followed by ‘politically’ incorrect neighbourly chit chat.

Only of late he has taken to adding  Ji to Sir . Sometimes  it is spoken as one word Sirji ,at most other times he lays equal emphasis on Sir and Ji with a moment’s interval in between, Sir-Ji .All depends on the level of cheeriness in his mood.I was comfy with just the ‘Sir’ for it was adequately deferential .So there wasn’t really any pressing need to suffix  Ji . In the days of the Raj,the reverential response used to be ‘Ji Huzoor’,and now  more commonly heard in government portals is ‘Ji Sir’.Either way  Ji is a prefix and it means ‘yes’,no more.Therefore a Ji suffixed SirJi can only invest double honours. Whatever,adding ‘regards’ tonnage to an addressee as unassuming and as humble as I,was undeserved. Maybe,in a polite way it recognised a newly acquired status -senior citizen.Blessed be he for a  ‘freebie’ honorifical , SirJi.

However I have other weightier reasons to squirm at SirJi and one such touches   divinity itself. If Lord Ganesh, in common parlance ,is  GaneshJi ,do humans qualify for the ‘twice over’ reverence, SirJi ? Even Mishraji, Vijayji... may incur God’s malevolence. Humans shouldn't claim communion with Gods.  

A Kanhaiyajee or  Ramjee is fine;it couldn’t be otherwise for obvious reasons.Such innately  ‘honorified’ Indians are not alone in the comity of nations.Koreans too impregnate their names with Ji. As many as 80% Korean names have Ji or a play upon it like chee, gi, je, jee, chi as a suffix or prefix .Ji Ho and Ji Hu are common names for boys, Ji woo and Ji yoo for girls. Ji in Korean means wealth and wealth in itself confers honorific . No need to add a further Ji. We though have a problem, a ‘Ramjee  jee’ address sounds queer.

Still the Ji sambodhan is commonplace and giving way to the still more weightier SirJi .Across arterial roads inside any cluster of coaching centres a typical archway adorning these roads is more than likely to have banners with a beaming girl chanting “main toh Physics padhoogi Arjun SirJi se hein” (I will learn Physics only from Arjun SirJi). Sooner than later, Ji will fall into disuse and SirJi 

will enter the Oxford lexicon.

SirJi is obviously an etymological evolution,a product of cross pollination between Anglo- Indian notions of respectful title.As with progenies born of genetic hybridisation the product is more robust and virile .It will be little surprise if SirJi dons the mantle of accepted honorific across all Indian linguistic zones.Good if it does,it gels wonderfully with our syncretic culture,synthesising the  colonial legacy of ‘Sir’ with  Indianness of Ji.

My friend ,though,disagrees. On a first name calling basis otherwise, in a foul mood he is prone to switch to  SirJi; ’aap galat hai SirJi ,or ‘choodiye SirJi’, ‘jaane dijiye SirJi’,(you are wrong, SirJi ,leave it SirJi  ,let it go SirJi).I suppose in his mathematical world two positives a negative make, not the other way round. For him, SirJi is a term of disparagement than endearment. 
  

 Regardless of his reservations,the hyphenation Sir-Ji is dripping  in reverence .But hold on ,it would be a grave error to presume that 

other permutations with Ji would be adulatory too.For instance,take 

Dear and Ji. Mr Ashok chaudhary, HRD minister, Bihar, burnt his fingers when he tweeted to ‘Dear Smt Smriti Irani Ji’,  HRD 

Minister at Centre.She turned crimson,how dare a state minister ‘Dear’ her ? Officialese notwithstanding, it was deemed a frontal assault on womanhood .The ‘victim’ ,Smriti Irani ,promptly took her plaint to FB with a longish outpouring of injured feminism.The 

upshot of the FB diarrhoea–only the husband had ‘Dear’ calling rights, other must use forms of “Undeared” address. Some doubting Thomas’s still question why Dear and Ji are  antithetical and gender sensitive.

Was all the huff and puff really needed? Without the brouhaha over 

feminism Mr Chaudhry would have been fully scuppered had Smt 
Irani chosen the right line. The offending word wasn't Dear it was Ji. Mr Chaudhary had no business pointing a Ji ,a pole arm, an armour ,at a fair damsel who only later was to be in distress. In the good old days of Ming dynasty the pole arm – a pole with a pointed spearhead and a dagger embedded on one side, killed many in 

battles.

But the word ji also connotes love or dread depending on how far you have travelled in conjugal life. ‘Ai Ji ‘ is a uniquely Indian stratagem deployed by wives to draw attention of husbands to 

themselves especially  in rural parts of North India where  it is not customary for a wife to call the husband by name.A year or two into marriage the husband’s heart goes aflutter when wife utters those magical words ‘Ai Ji. A decade later,the heart sinks at the beckon from the dread of losing money or expending physical labour .

Nevertheless, we,Indian,love Ji .Even biscuits are venerated with Ji,say,Parle G and Reliance doesn't forget to prefix Ji in the name of its latest offering ,JIO. Ji is our very heart and mind ,literally .We have even dedicated a popular song from Bollywood blockbuster ‘Ram Lakhan’ to  Ji

“Ai ji ,O ji ,Lo ji, Suno ji
mai hun man mauji,
karta hun mai jo,
tum bhi karo ji ,
one two ka four….”

CLASS WAR WITH THE STRAP

Blame this unholy ,irreverent piece on Late Vinod Mehta. May his soul RIP. In an  unfortunate confluence,Teachers Day has fallen on the very day I am stuck at page 12 of Mr Mehta’s memoir “Lucknow Boy”. As he relates of getting caned on the bum for his umpteen school capers , in empathy I can feel my bum swell to redness and sting.

Decades ago,Mr Mehta,a day scholar,could scoot home and let parents sort out his transgressions with Father Superior, but poor me ? Stuck at 6000 ft above sea level ,500ft higher up the nearest town ,Kurseong, and a climb up  along a 2 Kms long  winding  road from the highway below ,there was no escape from the leather strap for a boarder. The School Dispensary,of course,was there .It offered anti inflammatory balms, pain killers and a Sister Irene to poke and prod you into guilt confession and provide the solace “ it will do you good”. You left her care wondering whether she meant the balm or the punishment .

Still,school life wasn't all that difficult if you reconciled with the stick and the leather strap  as  a part of the teacher’s armoury as much as his erudition. Even parents endorsed felt “it will do you good”.I resided in that twilight zone ,neither brilliant nor a dud. Believe me, that's the most comfortable zone to be in for a boarder.You, succinctly put, are left alone to your devices. So lesser swooshes  of the dreaded stick on palms and fewer whacks from lashes of  the leather strap on bare bum.

However my bum was most vulnerable to the leather strap  in English Literature class. And so it happened .It gave me the mortification of five lashes of the strap on my bare bum.This being the first and the only occasion,the mental scar remains indelibly etched. Also it planted a lasting dislike for two things –‘The Merchant of Venice’ and Synagogues.

On that inglorious day it was my turn to read the following lines ;

The Merchant Of Venice, Act Three ,Scene I

Shylock to Tubal

 “Go ,Tubal,and meet me at our synagogue; go,good Tubal; at our synagogue,Tubal”

In retrospect, many things went wrong.In those early days of transition from a vernacular school to an English medium my diction was heavily accented by Bhojpuriased Hindi .It tended to be as Bassanio says of  Graciano “ too wild, too rude and bold of voice”. Further the tonal inflexions of Shakespearean verse, charming as it is, always confounded me. Ignoring  commas ,semi colons and regardless of modulation of voice at appropriate places,I read out loud and clear in one quick get away lest  Shylock extract his pound of flesh from me.

I got away from Shylock alright, but not the class.Instead of applause for my racy  rendition it broke into a wide chortle. Brother Conners ,the class teacher, gave the class an all encompassing severe cold stare and immediately pin drop silence ensued.

“My dear boy ,the letters  ‘ue’ at the end are silent, not to be pronounced, so read synagogue as 

 synagog Right, now  read it again.”  said Br Connors

This time I got the first one right,  my tongue failed me at the second one,  again synagogue. Br Connors glared at me menacingly. And the class waited  in silent anticipation.

“Out of the class .Repeat it till you get it correctly. Then come back and read  those lines again.”

How I wished someone lent me his tongue instead of his ears ! After repeated iteration in the corridor outside the class, I thought I got it right. Rev Br let me in and as sure as  the earth and the sky,this time it was synagog at both places. But what the Hell.  Br Conners was all fire and brimstone.

“Are you making fun of me? Why ‘syna’  instead of ‘sina’ now. You said it right before leaving the class. One last chance . Now Read it right ,else..”

The threat was too ominous in my present nervy state.I flunked again-culprit the word synagogue.There was no redemption now;you had it ,said the mind.

“Come here . Go to Principal’s office and get the strap . And be quick”

Trudging those hundred yards or so from classroom to Principal’s office to fetch your own instrument of torture is punishment enough.Legs feel weak , time crawls along with the legs and the mind agonises  infinitely more than the likely physical pain from impending lashes.The clerk delivered the dreaded strap much like Br Roh handed out chocolates in his tuck shop .A few gave knowing looks of commiseration,save for an ageless lady,I forget the name,with an eternal grizzle. She evoked visions of the seamstress in  the French Revolution keeping daily count of nobles put under the guillotine. And walking back  the worn out overused leather strap seemed to weigh a ton.

The actual punishment,by contrast,was anti-climatic.I pulled down my pants, down came the strap -whack,whack,whack,whack,whack,winced each time and it's over. No tears , big boy don't cry.Evening went to Sister Irene in the Dispensary. She didn't recognise me for I wasn't a frequent visitor.The balm was handed over,confession made in return for the solace  “it will do you good”

Books make me happy !

For one resettling after a hiatus of two and a half years ,the fast paced changes in cityscape and culture of towns is stark. So it was, when I homed in to bat out my  second innings in Patna. The town
had a heartening spring in its stride, building more of everything 
and promising even more.

But the bookaholic  in  me is  crestfallen.Forced into quiescence  by 

worldly   cares of raising a family and  the money for it, retirement 

offered it a carte blanche to limitless book reading .As Harold Bloom said, “ Reading well is one of the great pleasures that solitude can afford you”.  Sadly , Patnaites may flay my skin for saying it, the one unmistakable ‘non-change’ is the continued apathy of townsfolk towards reading non-syllabus books, that is  fiction ,non-fiction,in fact anything (excluding porn,of course) other than text books, guides, guess papers or religious texts.

As the ‘malice’ man,Kushwant Singh said,"the ultimate litmus test

test of a town’s sophistication is the number of bookshops it has  , the kind of books they stock ,and the customers they draw” . How 
does Patna measure up on this yardstick ? With malice to none ,I venture to say, little has changed  in its elegance or savour- vivre   . Lets see where do I get the courage to make this assertion;

1. No national booksellers chain has set up shop. And we have a goodly number of such supply chains. While Germany has ten,India has thirteen bookseller chains,to name a few –Crossword, 

Landmark, Odyssey, Quadrangle, Oxford Book Store, Higgins 

Bothams, and Reliance Books.

2. Existing booksellers  have not added any significant additional floor area for general books ,that is, non ‘prescription’ books and religious books ( the latter I include as it may wriggle its way as text books).The few that existed since ages, Books- en -Amee ,Tricel, Readers Corner and, of course ,AH Wheeler still hold fort. A few smaller ones may have opened shop here and there without significantly adding to availability.

3. This lack of supply is particularly galling looking to the size of town literates. Of the population of 16.84 lacs, literates count to 12.35 lacs. A  little less than 50% of literates are in the book reading  age, 13-35 years. This figure does not include the thousands flocking from all over the state to its mushrooming coaching centres/institutes ,mentors,subject-wise   tutorial classes for engineering,medical, management admission tests or various job exams. New national institutes-IIT ,NIT,BIT, Chanakya Law College ,Chandragupta Management Institutes now dot Patna’s skyline, all of them with hordes in the potential book readers’ age.

4.Public libraries still number just four.No Book Clubs, save a  fledgling one run by Books-en-Amee  ,I am told. Booksellers thus 
need fear no competition from libraries and book clubs.

5.The growth rate of literate youth is greater than population  growth rate.
  

6. The annual fortnightly Patna Book Fair attracts just 7 lac visitors and sales of ₹7 crores though book stalls exceed 400. Sales come almost entirely from textbooks and help books with  some biographies, dictionaries, vernacular classics thrown in .

Thus a huge potential market for quality books lies untapped .Besides parents and learning centres, publishers and booksellers too need to spread book reading habits. While “reading maketh a full man’, for them it maketh moolah .Their dictum should be stock more, give monetary incentives, say, discounts, organise book festivals in their stores, in schools, colleges ,institutes, libraries, and public places ,for often supply creates demands.UNESCO marks 23rd April as World Book Day triggering a week long celebration of books and book reading in 100 countries across the world,an excellent opportunity to aggressively market good books. The town 
needs more visibility for good literature. There is absolutely no reason why a sprawling Kankarbagh with over 50 meshed colonies should have no dedicated  bookstore for quality fiction and non-fiction books.

If not English are they reading Hindi literature, Hindi being the townfolk’s lingua franca ? No ,says the circumstantial evidence. My neighbourhood bookstore stocks Hindi classics too but sells only guides,help books and mags. Are they buying and reading online? No proof . If anything the youth are spending all their spare and in- between times on texting messages,mobi chats on what's app, the social media or before the idiot box. That makes  them better connected and more aware but well read ? Uuump....

Certainly the youth of Patna are fully aware of  the virtues of good reads so beautifully recounted in Francis Bacon’s classic essays ‘of 
studies ‘. Our grandmas and mommies knew it and derived immense pleasure in story telling from books to put children to sleep. Alas! that's a dying tradition. Abjuring ‘page turners’ , youth now turn to phablets or TV to drop dead to bed .And parents allow POGO to lull kids into stupor rather than read them to sleep. I do still take a book to bed and sleep well. E-reading  or TV actually keeps one  unhealthily awake.

Regrettably,reading as a hobby is asphixiating. Though much of time spent in travelling can be profitably utilised for reading, for the young that's more time to be active on mobiles.  I only  , infrequently,  see a  millennial carrying a fiction in hand or even reading mags for time pass in public places or on trains.

Have the town’s youth given up on a potent instrument of personality development,  book reading, to becomes pedagogues rather than learned ,equanimous citizens? I leave it to the reader to ruminate over the issue and sign off with these golden thoughts

“Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested” : Francis Bacon

  

" Good friends, good books, and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life " MARK TWAIN