Is India Government believe in Cess & Levy - Where we are heading ?

The Government of India post assuming office chalked out ambitious plan to clean India to change the image of India. The vision of government was very noble and launched the program with fanfare wherein everyone nominated their favorite to be part of it.

Indian Media in order to capture the user base, followed the organized events by the government and flashed images of ministers to local people trying to keep the street to colony clean. The opposition bombarded government and called it as PR activities. In order to generate awareness among the common people government spent heavily through print and digital media by allocating multi million $.

Time moved on and Indian citizen moved on and we all know what happened in Delhi when Local MunicipalCorporation went for Strike and whole Delhi get converted into Garbage Center. We all observed that all politician to local citizen kept talking and blaming each other including popular Indian Media houses but no one initiated collectively to clean the city.

As government spent heavily and in order to fill up cost, Finance ministry came out with fantastic Swachh Bharat Cess wherein there is no Cleanness. To be my utter surprise they started charging the cess attached with service tax and other taxes. If go by the collected tax and projections; finance ministry will be generating $1 Bn in FY17 but we don't see any changes on the ground.

In my point of view,  no one who got nominated by prominent personality is even bothering to go out to the street and observe the situation.

Country faced severe drought and Finance ministry came out with Krishi Kalyan Cess and expecting to garner around $800 Mn per annum.

Finance ministry observed that India is moving fast towards digital and mobile Internet and how to garner additional revenue from it so came out with equalization levy of 6% popularly known as Google tax. With growing digital and mobility business, they will be generating around $400 - $500 mn in tax collection per annum.

Now Raining season is coming and most of the metro cities will be flooded as there is no sewage mechanism and strongly believe that finance ministry will be coming out with Sewage cess.

I appreciate the initiation but it should be reflected on ground. I also do understand that it takes time to change the mindset of people but also believe that  government should not be squeezing common people in such a way that at the end they start thinking that their contribution is going under water. In point of view, The income tax payers should be kept away from above cess but non- paying  income tax citizen should be charged service tax and other cess. Would love to see everyone comment

The Definition Of Good School In India - Dreams Vs Reality

Being one of the most populated countries and major population falls under kids and youngster group; it is important for Indian Parents to be very sensitive about their kid’s education. Indian Students and Professionals are in news across different geographies and leading most prestigious universities, research institute, companies and government sector. It prompt simple queries in everyone mind the followings.

1. Should we think that all that happened because of the unmatched education system in India?
2. How parents manage their kids to excel in their studies?
3. As the fundamental of Indian Students are one of the best but does that come from education system or from the approach and extra effort from Students and Parents combination.

For Kids, there are many so called good schools and the unique selling points of such good schools are the followings:

1. We have Air-conditioned School Building.
2. We have Air-conditioned Transportation system.
3. We engage kids through Extra curriculum activities.
4. Our teachers are well trained to handle kids.
5. We do proper assessment of Kids progress every week or monthly and give the feedback to parents.
6. We are open to feedback's from parents about teacher’s and if our internal assessment panel approve then we take corrective measure.
7. We give lots of homework to kids. When i am talking about kids I am referring to kids till standard 4th.
8. We enable kids to learn things faster through pictorial manner.
9. We teach kids to perform on stage to make them vocal.
10. We are there for parents and kids.
11. Our Kids got 95% in their board.
12. We are very stringent to maintain the discipline and that's why we keep school open even though there are floods, heat waves etc until unless we receive orders from State or central education ministry.

Expectation Vs Reality

Wow, all good points and parents are impressed that they will be sending their kids to one of best school around and kids will be learning fast in competitive Indian environment. Then comes the real shocker for parents and they are.

1. Parents must be liable to pay around $500 to $600 per quarter as tuition fee depending upon the quality of building, building floor specific to private school.
2. Good school categorization is dependent on the increment of tuition fee per annum just like increment in Industry to beat out inflation and increment of salaries.
3. Hiring of teacher's paid in the range of $200 to $ 500 range in case of top quality.
4. Asking parents to buy books and clothes from their designated stores and even with the high prices; quality and standard of both uniforms and books are low.
5. Every alternative day asking kids to bring $2 to $5 stuff for one or the other activities.
6. Giving loads of home work on daily basis and in holidays which include Model creation.
7. Taking kids for the ride which parents come to know through the kids.
8. Parents specifically ask teacher not to be physical with the kids but at the same time to be strict with kids.
9. We believe in Bookish knowledge transfer.
10.  And many more.

Great thought process of School where parents don't have a choice but to follow school instruction as complaints from parents are generally unheard off with an assurance that they will be considered. To be honest, the current schooling system in private segment is following one of the most pathetic mechanisms where the focus is on monetization in the name of building future of kids.

The realities of so called Good Schools are as follows:

1. Only low single digits of population of India pay income tax and cannot afford to pay such tuition fee. Government should make it mandatory for Private school not to take any tuition fee from those parents who are paying Income tax.
2. School must be aware of the fact that kids are not doing their home work like art work and all but its kid’s parent’s responsibility. What should be the focal point of school to make kids learn not their parents.
3. Why parents are liable to buy books from school designated school.
4. Do anyone will buy that the hired school teacher are capable enough. Why School is reviewing their performance but it should be the wallet review by parents which must be initiated by school.
5. When for each and every activity initiated by School attracts additional payout from parents then for what they are taking tuition fee.
6. If the teacher  are so good then why parents are forced to send their kids for tuition for each and every subjects.
7. If Private schools are so good then why Training Institutes are prospering in India.
8. Why parents are forced to get their kids into mugging of content mode instead of practical based.

I was reading very interesting article on LinkedIn “What makes a good school better?"  And thought of sharing the real scenario with the readers and strongly suggest to all readers to share this article if they believe that they are also facing the same issue. It's always easy to claim on paper but it does not mean it’s always correct and we all educated ones should take a stand to raise our concern to safeguard the mental  trauma which kids go through as well as agony parents go through. If we want to reduce the suicide level, depression among kids; we must force school to change their mindset around monetization to socialism.

I request all parents to give their comments along with location to make the initiative as a voice or message for so called school.

IQ Game for kids

Vocabulary Game for kids 

India Media Companies Should Be Careful In Selling Airtime For Alternative Medicine Advertisement - Why Government Is Sleeping

It's a known fact by now that Indian Media companies are so powerful that they can drive any burning issue into a situation where even governments are enforced to take an action. Many media houses talks about the safety of kids to elder's and latest one is Bread saga an earlier it was Maggi Noodle. All media houses made those findings as breaking news and it was all over media over more than one month. I really appreciate the media inclusion for the betterment and communication with citizens and airing it to rest and many times even government swings into actions.

Here i would like to highlight that post the health ministry ban on multiple medicines given the side effect and end results are very effective and observed it on ground level. In case any user goes to medicine shop even with valid prescription but the advice date expired then medicine shop owner refuses to give medicine irrespective of one's relationship with medicine shop owner.

I would like to highlight that there are many alternative medicine promotion is happening on Indian TV media where known personalities from TV and Bollywood is promoting those product. For an example; using herbal paste will remove all the bone problem. Another one is astrological and on calling those numbers, they try to lure customer base; another one is for cancer; another one is for beauty; another one is for weight loss. More importantly, I was surprised to see the price list of such medicine. I failed to understand what media houses are doing to generate revenue. One side they take up all burning issues for the protection of citizen and on the other side exposing the citizen to unauthenticated or verified product line. I would like to ask who gave such herbal companies the certification to market their product. In a country where more than 25% of citizens are under poverty line, media should be sensitive enough and should compromise their revenue for the sake of their userbase.

If the alternative herbal motivation can help reducing the cost of treatment with guarantee, That i suggest government to close all hospital in india.

It's my personal view and will be happy to see the comment from media houses.

Digital India May Trigger Indian Telecom Sector And Effective Government Communication

In recent weeks, Indian regulators to ministries are coming out with ambitious plan to convert India into Digital India. The broader goal of government is to leverage Smartphone and Feature phone penetration to reach out to 75% Indian population in no time.

The government push also received applauds from Industry to opening new frontier for Telecom Sector. With growing struggle to generate additional revenue from mobile value added services, the new found love by government may trigger Telecom companies to invest in new infrastructure to make it compatible to capture untapped marketing spending generally done by government. It is also expected that new tech brownies is going to come out with many new idea to promote socio and eco related applications, product and services which in turn will help government to reach out to citizen with their services.

It’s a fantastic move by government to offer new lease of service at arm to Telecom sector and at the same time mitigate unwarranted spending on number of welfare services. It is being observed that government were spending multi fold marketing $ to promote to single citizen.

I donot want to be negative about the threats attached through PESTLE and reverse eagle eye approach. Will come back soon with that assessment too. By Tushar Singhal

How Education May Change Tagline In India – Everyone Must Contribute – Tushar Singhal

In India, more than 90% of children get admitted into primary schools but in due course 40% of them opt out due to multiple social thresholds and financial problems. The education system of India in turn supports only 54% children and enables them the ladder to achieve literacy but this 54% comprises of only 34% girls & 54% boys.

The dismal figure exists even after the government is spending 3% of its GDP as well as charging education cess from taxpayers to promote education among households which cannot afford to send their kids to schools. The figure itself raises multiple queries around Indian education system and it’s hierarchy of achieving right to education law passed by law of land. Some of the basic but non avoidable systems are not being taken care off and they are:

• Non availability of basic hygiene.
• Very Low to Non Existent Infrastructure especially in rural India.
• Lack of Qualified Instructors and Non-Availability of funds for Upgrading the Mechanism of Information Transfer To Students.
• The Focus on students is minimal as the Average Teacher :: Student Ratio is around 1:40 and in some of the non developed states it goes as low as 1:80.
• Lack of focus by school authorities to offer indirect intelligence enhancement tools to students to increase their IQ factor.
• Lack of promotions by government authorities to procure latest hardware and software to make students well versed with the same.

In order to solve the above problems, Government promoted private sectors to open School and Colleges to increase the literacy at all levels but it backfired as private sectors always look to open such centers in locations which carry capital benefits and this forced me to believe that creating a few more schools or allowing hundreds of colleges and private universities to mushroom is not going to solve the crisis of education in India. Education system in India is failing because of more intrinsic reasons.

The core issue of Indian education system lies in teaching methodologies and missing link of knowledge transfer at every level as opposed to teaching skills. The difference between Indian education system compared with that of developed countries revolves around memorizing vs practical based learning wherein developed countries focus on the latter part.

In any scenario, if the government and also the citizen of India would like to have a better future then Indian education system must be overhauled from root with major focus on achieving end product instead of announcing programs and subsidy.

It’s always easy for everyone to raise questions but what exactly being citizens of India are we doing for our potential future as well as generation? Here are some of the recommendations I am proposing which I am following as well in order to contribute towards my homeland

• Funding one child’s education in one’s neighborhood such as the driver’s, maid’s or anyone’s kid. In India, there are 43 million taxpayers and if even 50% of the taxpayers opt for the same then more than 20 Mn children will get education and in future will turn out to be major contributors. The individual opting for such activities can be promoted with tax breaks.
• There are more than 7.5 Mn SMB/SME in India and they should come forward and fund 10 students’ education and in turn get tax breaks from government. It will simply put more than 70 plus million children back to school.
• It is being observed that many Indians are opting for gadget exchange program to buy new gadgets. It is advisable that one should also try to gift the same to children who need the same to increase awareness about new technologies.
• Its widely known that many NGOs are involved which get government funds to increase benefits of education in remote rural India but it must be tagged with commitment vs. delivery model.
• It is also advisable that Public school students must be allowed to access Private school labs and other infrastructure which inturn will convert Indian education system into Common schooling with no disparity among masses and classes.
• And many more suggestions can be given but I believe that if all of us start taking the first step then the major change will come automatically.

Although India has already shown its skills in ITIL sector but it must adopt the changing environment around the world in order to be competitive and for that all of us must focus towards giving the right approach to society. One can earn millions but satisfaction really comes when one does something which brings cheers on many faces. Just imagine if we can make one kid successful it is going to bring happiness and prosperity to the whole family. The initiative is not only going to improve the literacy but also bring out millions of Indians out of poverty. This is the time to make the move. So together let’s begin.

Why Indian Education System and Student Struggle

In recent years India experience huge surge in Educational Institution. The dynamics changed post the surge in India IT supremacy and that led to many opportunistic investor to open college under the pretext of Trust or NGO. It enabled them to get the land allocation as well as other approval from the respective local and central authority in No time. The huge compensation package offered these days by IT firms attracted young generation to opt for technical college.

The phenomenal growth infact turned as trap for young aspiring student who wants to excel in their life. It offered Educational Organization to offer quick entry to those professionals at very high entry fee. The entry of students in such non recognized college acts as beginning of struggle in their professional life. These aspirants parents in many cases sells all their properties in a visualization that their son/daughters are getting right set of mentoring, knowledge transfer and inturn would act as backbone in future.

I must admit over here that not all colleges are bad but it is also true that majority of them donot adhere the vision of skill set enhancement instead of that focus on monetary part of it. For each activity there are additional cost attached and in that scenario a simple points pops up in my mind that – why they are taking thousands of INR per semester fee from students.

In contrast, the level of knowledge transfer barring top notch college is in dire situation. The lecturers are not well versed with the latest technologies making news, research activities, and industrial requirement. It is really interesting that on raising such points the answer comes really funny that we are overloaded to number of lecturers, needs to complete syllabus and last resort is even more surprising and that is “ We are not allowed by the college management”.

I would like to ask few queries from Indian Students and those are as follows

1. Do anyone knows what is the mechanism of “ Problem Based Learning”
2. Do anyone knows the mechanism of problem statement process.
3. Do anyone knows what all big companies are doing and why they are successful.
4. What was the reason that you took one or another stream.
5. Are you happy with the current knowledge transfer skillset in your college.
6. Do you get constant update by your Professor regarding ongoing activities in regulatory environments.
7. Do anyone of you ever been told during skillset development that how one should prepare their professional life.
8. How many of you been trained during studies in presentation, communications and team management.

I can go on and on and list 1000 of queries as I also went through these problems 25 years back when I was student. It is surprising that the situation remains the same.

The above negligence by the educational institution act as malware in their knowledge set which keeps on denting young professional throughout their professional life. In India, the recent downturn clearly demonstrated the Good AC fitting Educational Institution is nothing but a movie theatre and when Student comes out in professional arena they realize that their education period was nothing but virtual world. Still it’s not too late and Educational Institution should adopt proactive approach in hiring Industry veterans also to transfer real world based learning program supported with cutting edge innovation knowledge transfer. For students, they should focus on in learning new technologies, focuses on Industry trend they want to move in, presentation and communications skill. Without above, the new generation of students will face stiff challenge to prosper in professional life. I also would like to thank Mr.Sagar Gupta for his contribution in accumulating information w.r.t student’s pain points.