Time to rationalise...

Criticality of VIP security notwithstanding, nowhere in the world anti-terror special forces are used for VIP protection duties except in india, writes Pathikrit Payne

Meet Anil Kumar (name changed), hailing from a central paramilitary force of India, it was last year when Anil was finally selected to join the elite NSG or National Security Guard on deputation. His eyes had then glowed at the very thought of wearing the black uniform and be part of one of the world’s best anti-terror units. The high rejection rates of 70-75% notwithstanding, Anil scalped through all hurdles to emerge as a toughened commando ready for any eventuality. Yet when 26/11 happened last year, the likes of him were not given the clarion call for duty. It was the chaps from army in NSG who handled it on their own while many like him, in spite of wearing the coveted black uniform, having the same rigours of training, were engaged in roles of VIP protection from the very beginning. As a professional, for him duty is duty but deep inside a few unanswered questions like ‘why are the army chaps never put to VIP protection duty or why men like him are never assigned works in the likes of 26/11 hostage rescue operations, hurts and haunts him. For, he at heart knows there’s nothing that an Army chap in NSG does, which he cannot.

At a time when India’s Defence Minister himself stated in the Parliament that Indian Army faces a shortage of a staggering 11,387 officers, the decision of the Government of India to augment the strength of NSG by 10,904 personnel has put the Army in a quandary. The reason being that the Army which already deputes more than 4,000 of its personnel to NSG and is hard-pressed with its deployments in Rashtriya Rifles in J&K and Assam Rifles in Northeast, would necessarily have to provide the lion’s share of the augmented strength. But if the Government of India can steer clear of the recent controversy over the withdrawal of NSG security to several VVIPs and thus give the Home Ministry the green signal to completely relieve NSG of VIP protection duty, it would give NSG an estimated 2,400 more personnel for anti-terror operations. In fact that is the estimated number of personnel from NSG who are involved in the protection of 20 VVIPs of India. Sources in Home Ministry state that 2,400 is perhaps good enough to take care of 10 Indian cities (without any further addition to the strength of NSG) given the fact that the standard procedure now is to deploy 240 personnel for each critical city. Or else, given the fact that each of the two upcoming hubs in Kolkata and Hyderabad are supposed to have 5,000 NSG personnel, this 2,400 would be good enough to take care of at least half the requirements of any of the two upcoming hubs without any additional recruitments. It would also help in reducing the gestation period that the NSG is expecting it would need to set up the regional hubs and additional centres in Jodhpur and Guwahati.

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Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

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Merits of son or sons of merit?

Congress pushes dynasty candidate; will it work again?

Most of the Congress candidates contesting the Karnataka bypolls are from prominent political families. New talent is prominent by its absence in the five constituencies – Govindarajanagar, Chitapur, Ramnagaram, Kollegala and Channapatna – that are going to elections on August 18.

Of these five, two (Govindarajanagar and Channapatna) went vacant after Congress MLAs joined the BJP, while in Ramnagaram, Kollegal and Chitapur, sitting MLAs got elected to the Lok Sabha.

All three major political parties in the state – the BJP, Congress and JD(S) – will get another opportunity now to prove their mettle. Some senior Congress leaders of the state are confident that this time they have sufficient ammo to corner the BJP which rules the state.

The Congress that had crossed the halfway mark and the JD(S) that had performed poorly are trying their best to improve their tallies. And to that effect, they are banking on dynasty. Some of Congress candidates were born into families that have been in politics for long. Priyank Kharge is the son of Union Minister S Mallikarjuna Kharge; Priya Krishnappa is son of Congress MLA, M Krishnappa and TK Yogeesh is son of former Congress MLA TM Krishnappa. None of them is a fresher or downwardly mobile. This time parties (particularly the Congress) have encouraged only those young leaders who are somebody’s close kin. It seems that the Congress perchance has taken the dynastic route to play it safe; although DK Shiva Kumar, KPCC working president, does say, “We are not for dynastic politics. The candidates who are contesting in the five constituencies are all party workers. We fielded them because they did good work for the party"

Although that claim might be true, it is also true that in today’s Karnataka, nothing counts more than one’s lineage. The entire political philosophy revolves around well-known families; and perhaps because voters over the years have tended to vote for the 'name' rather than the 'work'.

Irrespective of this, the by-election results would have no bearing on the stability of the BS Yeddyurappa government. In the 225-member Assembly, BJP has 114 members, the Congress 73, and independents have six; this apart from the five for which the by-polls are being held. As for the Congress and the JD(S), this is just the time for them to prove that their parties are still relevant in the state. Using dynasty candidates, can Congress impress voters as it did in last UP parliamentary polls? If one goes by the wide diversity of prepoll forecasts and the actual results in the UP elections, one can only say that there is perhaps no foolproof way of knowing the result till, well, the result.

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Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative

Kahaani Ghar-Ghar Ki - "IIPM Press"

At that time, it was the biggest carnival in the nation-bigger even than the Goa carnival which many of us had revelled in. For less important hacks like us, the staid Hotel President at Cuffe Parade was the hideout while the bigger names were staying in the Taj or the Oberoi. We were all on a junket attending the wedding of Anil Ambani with Tina Munim back in 1991; a time when reality shows on Indian television screens were more fantasies than dreams. Like most journalists, we liberally enjoyed the hospitality of Dhirubhai Ambani even as we talked about how he is using money to 'subvert' the system. And like all journalists, we ceaselessly gossipped about the then legendary Bollywood style love affair between Anil Ambani and Tina Munim. For years, journalists used to lay bets on Anil Ambani being able to convince his father Dhirubhai to accept Tina Munim as the daughter-in-law. Even then, the younger sibling Anil was fondly called the 'rebel' with his penchant for fast cars, parties and glib talk. Back then, not many knew much or talked about the elder brother Mukesh Ambani who seemed to be perpetually busy building some petrochemical thing or other in exotic places like Patalganga and Hazira. But you could not stop talking about the confident, brash, articulate, suave and smart Anil Ambani.

Almost two decades later, all those adjectives remain valid when you want to describe Anil Ambani. Even more relevant, valid and poignant is the 'rebel' tag. In the rarefied world of India Inc where pink papers and business magazines glorify industrialists who, in turn, genuflect in front of netas and babus in North, South and myriad other Blocks of Delhi, Anil Ambani has done the unthinkable. He has actually declared war on the government; or at least a Union Cabinet Minister called Murli Deora who used to be a close personal friend of the late Dhirubhai Ambani and is now one of the top notch leaders of Congress. Sure, you can name entrepreneurs and industrialists by the dozen who are unhappy with decisions taken by the powers that be based in Delhi; sure you can listen to the choicest epithets when everything is off the record. But never before has an industrialist-whose own fortune and future-depend on favourable government decisions so openly lambast that very government and accuse it of clear and present prejudice.

For days together, the 'rebel' entrepreneur and sibling took out front page ads-on behalf of his group shareholders-accusing the Union Ministry of Petroleums & Gas of deliberately enriching Mukesh Ambani's companies at the cost of the exchequer and even public sector units like NTPC which happens to be the largest producer of electricity in the country. This is clearly unprecedented and is still something that lobbyists who hover around Delhi are finding difficult to believe and digest. The ads and the media offensive launched by the younger brother have not even spared some family linen from being aired. The Anil Ambani camp accuses the elder brother and his advisors of damaging the image that the father Dhirubhai Ambani had so painfully created over the decades. The word 'trust' is thrown around as carelessly as Congress and BJP politicians use the word 'loyalty'. And both the camps have roped in as many big guns as possible from various political parties to bolster their case. Just think about it: The Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group (ADAG) has interests in financial services, power, infrastructure and telecom–all sectors in which the State still exercises enormous amounts of discretionary power. So what has made the suave rebel take such a risk? What if an infuriated government decides that Anil Ambani has to be taught a lesson when the time comes in the near future to dole out 3G licenses in the telecom sector? What if the Union Power Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde, who is a fellow Congressman of Petroleum Minister Murli Deora, decides that the multi-billion dollar power plants that the ADAG is planning to implement are best left on paper? What if other Congressmen decide that it is best not to funnel any infrastructure projects towards ADAG? Where will that leave Anil Ambani and the eight million shareholders whom he claims to represent?

For Complete IIPM Article, Click on IIPM Article

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative