The pigs could not keep the bulls at bay as stock markets had a rollicking run today even as the World Health Organisation and countries around the globe, including Singapore, raised the swine flu pandemic alert and began stepping up infection-control measures -- http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/426089/1/.html .

 

The swine tragedy is clearly threatening to assume dangerous proportions, but one European joker tried to regale the world with an insane racist remark. Michael O'Leary, the Ryanair boss, said the airline industry (in the West) need not sweat as the swine flu only affected those in slums in Asia and Mexico -- http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/article6186585.ece#cid=OTC-RSS&attr=797093.

 

The remark came about even as California reported one death, with the number of swine flu cases mounting across Europe, including in England. Racist rascals exist even among the educated! Let's cast aside such vermin living in the ivory tower of the days of yore and focus on keeping the swine flu outside our environs.

 

The markets shrugged off the threat today, giving investors good yields, with an economy on the mend outweighing the risks surrounding the swine flu.

 

 

 

 

And I am not Talking about Equity Analysts!

There was a time when, as a retail investor, I was trading in stocks worth more than a million dollars a month and almost always ending up with contra losses. Not that it was fun to lose money you did not have, but those were times when I had viewed equity analysts as swines the world can be without.

Now, however, the world has become wiser so much so that often when they call for a “sell” on a stock investors push it up. Even when the markets pay heed to them, investors have learnt to profit from the volatility and their wrong guidance.

Well, the swines are now back to haunt the world. They are of a different breed, though – the real swines making people run for their lives! I am talking about the swine flu that is threatening to be worse than the Sars outbreak in North and South-East Asia a few years ago.

Markets generally tend to overreact to news irrespective of whether it is positive or negative. But this time, while they have taken a hit the falls have not been steep. They are obviously too tired of the downward spiral that we were getting used to until the recent spike in stock prices.

The reality is that they lend an unpredictable touch to the scenario, and this is precisely where the risk-reward equation assumes greater significance.

Afterthought: The plural form of “swine” can be either “swine” or “swines”. I chose the latter as it sounds right. English is not a logical language, so there is no harm in letting our discretion drive usage though it does not mean we can defy the rules.  

n  G Joslin Vethakumar

 

Politically and environmentally, Chennai may be a wretched place to live in, no thanks to the gimmicky, corrupt leaders and the filth and squalor you see everywhere. But, in terms of security (and, of course, gastronomically), Chennai is one of the best cities in India.

 

Still, I applaud the decision of Australia to stay away from their scheduled Davis Cup tie in Chennai (May 8-10) despite the strictures this may entail. When the Indian authorities themselves short-sightedly chose to move the IPL to South Africa, thereby sending a fatal message to the world, it will be silly to expect other countries to have more faith in the country. Australia ends up as losers as they will forfeit the tie and face a ban as well from the International Tennis Federation (ITF). But, as they rightly point out, some things are more important than sport.

 

Australia had strong reasons to request the ITF to move the tie out of India -- election results are not going to be out before May 8 and the world has been fed with reports of poll-related violence in many pockets. The ITF did err in sticking to its guns.

 

We will have to wait and see how many countries boycott the 2012 Olympics as London is infested with supporters of terrorism of various hues.

 

But Forsaking Cyanide, Two Rebel Leaders Surrender

Human Rights Violations Move the World but India is Playing Nero with Little Time to Look Beyond Elections

Movement for Tamil Eelam Set to End the Way the Fight for Khalistan Did

Sometimes, when a problem drags on for too long, we lose sight of the issue at stake. This applies to the crisis dogging the Tamils of Sri Lanka for over 25 years. What started off as a legitimate fight against blatant discrimination soon deteriorated into one of terrorism, no thanks to an unyielding government.

Now that the LTTE is on the verge of decimation, the question I have is whether its leader, V Prabhakaran, will just swallow a cyanide pill and save himself the ignominy of being captured by the Sri Lankan forces? Cyanide will possibly be the last nail on the coffin of the LTTE, the group that popularised the deadly pill globally.

Moving Scenes: But even as the LTTE leadership was asserting they would never surrender, two key Tigers are believed to have given themselves up, as per a BBC report here -- http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8012016.stm  

Tragic scenes of wounded and maimed civilians are captured in a moving video at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8009670.stm in what is brilliant coverage on the rapidly developing crisis in the island.

The world is moved, but not India which is too preoccupied with its elections.

The Eelam movement that the LTTE represented can be equated with the fight for Khalistan in India that late prime minister Indira Gandhi tried to quell by letting the armed forces storm the Golden Temple.

It resulted in the death of its leader Bhindranwale, but the issue continued to simmer, with Indira Gandhi paying with her life for that misadventure. There was more bloodshed – more than 3000 lives lost in the aftermath of the assassination in Delhi – before the issue died down. The one reason I can think of is the realization among the community that they were (and are, as the Prime Minister himself is a Sikh) treated fairly in the country.

Second-class citizens: This is not the case in Sri Lanka where post-Independence, the Tamils there were treated as second-class citizens, with weightage given to the Sinhalese in all spheres of life – from education to employment. Human rights violations by the government were also common – it continues to this day as is evident in the massacre of civilians by the army in the push to corner the Tamil Tigers. That is the tragedy in Sri Lanka – catastrophic loss of civilian lives – as the curtains are about to fall on the LTTE.

The Red Cross, the U.S., several Western governments and human rights groups have been periodically raising concerns about the catastrophic developments in Sri Lanka and plight of innocent civilians caught in the crossfire between the Army and the cornered Tigers. But they are handicapped – they can hardly do more. You can slam the LTTE for using civilians as shields, but governments are not expected to behave recklessly and kill innocent people by the thousands

Only India could have made a difference. But, India tried its best to make the plight of the Tamils there worse by joining hands with the Sri Lankan forces in the late 80s in an effort to cripple the LTTE ironically in the name of peace-keeping.

Like Mother, Like Son: This misadventure this time It led to the assassination of Indira Gandhi’s son Rajiv Gandhi by the LTTE in 1991. Hundreds of Indian soldiers were killed in what came to be known as India’s Vietnam.

India cannot emerge as a superpower if it is not going to look beyond India. It does not have to be a big brother to its neighbours, but it has to intervene where it warrants to enforce peace even if it meant deviating from its policy of non-alignment.

We did give shelter to the Tibetan spiritual leader Dalai Lama, which ensured there was no thaw in our relationship with China. As the world’s largest democracy, we could have done more in Myanmar where opposition leader Suu Kyi was prevented by the military junta from assuming power after winning the elections in 1990 and where she is still under detention.

But then India has been having its own troubles in the form of Islamic terrorism and rampant poverty amid plenty. Without setting its own house in order, the world is not going to listen to India!

n  G Joslin Vethakumar

If the first three matches at this year's IPL are any indication, veteran stars who are often derided and dismissed as oldies may put to shade the likes of Dhoni and Gambhir.. Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid and Anil Kumble stole the show by helping their teams (Mumbai and Bangalore) subdue Chennai Superkings and Rajasthan Royals, last year's runners-up and winners respectively.

 

But then anything can happen in 20/20 and it can be puerile to rush to conclusions based on just one match. It is nonetheless a dream start for the trio. They have nothing to lose, and this confidence should help them stack up well.

 

  

This should have appeared on April 8, when my dad turned 80. I could neither make it to Chennai to celebrate the occasion with him nor come up with this post the same day. Blame it on pressures at work!

 

I tried to cheat the system by exploring ways to change the date within the MSN Spaces portal. But users have no such flexibility!

 

The numbers (8 and 80) are special particularly for the Chinese for whom "8" represents prosperity. Add "80" to it, then the picture gets extra special. If it was "88" it will have become unbeatable. The hype aside, I cannot escape this moment of truth -- I am approaching 50 and I wonder if I will be able to assert that I will age with grace, going by my dad's example. But then he is from a generation when surfing simply meant a day at the beach, not time spent idly in front of the computer.

 

Entertainment to him during his growing-up years was playing his favourite games (volleyball, for instance), not staying glued to the television, which had not entered the Indian home then. He has been through the quiet joys of the past (clean air, pure food, family bond -- though he was the only child to his parents -- and so forth) and is now witness to the technological advances redefining the way we live, work, learn and play (to steal Cisco's vision :-)). But that does not mean leaving all the good things behind -- being good-natured, kind-hearted and honourable.

 

That said, daddy, here's wishing you many, many more years of joy and great health.  Though with a quiet demanour, he has had varied interests -- from sport to art. He had the ability to deftly sketch people with just a few quick strokes and in seconds. Reproduced below are a few of his sketches as well as some photographs from the past (he is in all of the snaps, wearing a tie in a couple of them). You can see me as well as a kid with my dad and grandparents in the top-right picture.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It is pushing ahead with its iN2015 vision

But its NGNBN Contract Award May Raise Eyebrows

Singapore is a country that apes and is aped. I am not saying this in any pejorative sense as I see nothing wrong in playing copycat even if this is construed as an attempt to cover my base :-). But it is not fully smitten by the copycat syndrome. In other words, it does not do that blindly but with its own brand – something that Microsoft does through what it calls an “embrace and extend” strategy.

In aping, Singapore has leveraged the successful business model of the West while at the same time making sure progress is not impaired by uncontrolled freedom of expression, communalism and crime.

It is another matter that the U.S. and the developed West now have to grapple with their own success stories that have turned sour, with their “if you cannot make it, fake it” approach having ended up crippling the global economy.

Singapore’s Huge Successes: On the positive side, tiny Singapore has scored big on multiple fronts – government-led investments that have armed it with huge cash reserves, focus on innovation and manufacturing, top-notch education that matches the best in the world and a visionary push on areas of the future such as biotechnology/biomedicine as is evident in the setting up of Biopolis as early as in 2001.

All of Singapore’s neighbours have been busy replicating the country’s business and governance models. Even mighty China treats Singapore with respect, while embracing the investment strategies that the lion city was so successful with.

Maths and IT: Singapore has consistently been viewed as the world’s best in mathematics (combining visual thinking and mental strategies to solve problems) and the country’s curriculum has won praise from U.S. educationists. What is more, many States in the U.S., including California, have begun using Singapore maths books in their schools.

And how can one forget, Singapore’s trailblazing forays into the world of information technology – from its successful plan to transform Singapore into an Intelligent Island by 2000 to its current vision of iN2015 – a global, connected city powered by infocomm aimed at changing the way people live, work, learn and play through ultra-high-speed broadband connectivity. This is an aping of the vision of Cisco Systems itself.

Next-Generation Network for High-Speed Broadband: A final step in this iN2015 mission was completed on Friday (April 2) when the award for running the OpCo (Operating Company) for Singapore’s Next-Generational National Broadband Network was announced. The winner – StarHub the country’s number-two telco.

The evaluation process was spread over three years, attracting the world’s top telcos, including British Telecom, NTT, Deutsche Telecom and Hong Kong Broadband. But all of them dropped out midway, suspecting that Singapore may end up favouring a local player. This is exactly what happened, with Canada’s Axia Netmedia having been the only foreign player in the fray. It does appear that those who gave up ended up being wise!

--G Joslin Vethakumar