Food Parks, a new sunrise industry

During the last budget, our Finance Minister expressed intentions to double the farm income in next 5 years. A great initiative, I thought. Anyway farm incomes would rise given the steadily growing demand and short supply causing food pricing soaring high and being a major driver in inflation. But Govt.’s efforts would surely help the farmers. I was thinking in what all ways farm incomes can see an improvement. I wrote them down here.

·       Higher yield (GM seeds, right use of fertilizers and pesticides, right info)

·       Infrastructure (Water and Power supply, better connectivity to markets)

·       Improved storage (modern warehouses, cold storage etc.)

·       Productivity gains (use of farm equipment, imparting skills to farm labors)

·       Wider market (Reducing export restrictions, futures market)

·       Finance (easy loans and crop insurance)

When you look at those factors, while some of it can be done at individual capacity, most of it needs Govt.’s support like developing infrastructure, removing trade barriers etc. And Govt. has started acting on it. (Link:http://www.thehindu.com/business/Industry/more-cold-chains-food-parks-to-boost-farm-incomes/article8999592.ece)

A food park can help farmers in many ways from providing the right info to sow to connect them with end markets. Strengthening that with right infrastructure would help in every phase of farming. From soil testing to rain forecasts, choosing the right seed to right amount of fertilizer, helping them store the produce to reduce wastage or turn produce into alternate products through food processing and finally helping them to market at the right price. This kind of hand-holding throughout the farming process is necessary to reduce the volatility in supply and in the prices. As more umber of people get out of poverty, their first demand would be increased food consumption. Population is still growing and would need few decades before it tops out. That will also take the food demand high. But the available land does not increase as forest zones are already carved out and all towns and villages are expanding too. Only way out would be to have higher yields with improved methods and facilities. Whole world is noticing this and India needs to lead by example.

India was an agriculture based economy throughout its history. When the human civilization learnt farming, they found that there is no better place than India to grow their food. So large number of migrants settled down here to become part of India. Those farmers financed the kingdoms through taxes. But they remained poor forever. Times are changing. Don’t be surprised if an average farmer’s income matches that of an IT employee in the next ten years. By the way growth in IT parks is seeing saturation but Food Parks are a sunrise industry.

Dear Finance Minister, your wish will come true but it may take little longer than five years. Those looking for long term investments, farm lands should be on your horizon.

Making India flat (reducing economic unevenness): GST will help a lot

In a big country, there will be unevenness in the resources spread. So will be availability of skill sets and wages too. But people migrating helps it reduce the gaps in wages and skill availability. When it comes to materials, good infrastructure and efficient transportation can help reduce the pricing inefficiencies across markets within India. But the earlier tax system, dominated by different outlooks by respective State Govt.’s had made the playing ground unequal especially for manufactured goods. Take the example of manufacturing of a two-wheeler, its assembly plant is in one state but the raw materials, spare parts come from different states. Tyre's, batteries, spark-plug, speedometer, steel to make chassis do come from different states and attract different tax rates. So producing the same two-wheeler may cost different in different states for the same manufacturer. And the final product too will attract different tax rates when it is being sold. These variations would reduce or cease to exist as GST comes into play. States Govt.’s will lose their power to levy more taxes or to promote any segment with less taxes at their will as there will be one tax collected by the central Govt. and states will to have to collect their share from it. But they have not lost their entire power as few major businesses like liquor are kept out of GST. Yet, this is a welcome move in integrating manufacturing and trade in India and making it one platform and one market.

At the surface level, GST is a great tax reform. It reduces pricing variations and thus promotes trade. That is economics. But it will affect social structure over the long term as it will reduce variations in wages too. Now average incomes of those working in West Bengal and Goa vary a lot. Similarly employment levels are not the same in Kashmir and Kerala. That was because trade was unequal in those states and some of it was due to different tax policies adopted by their state Govt’s. As those taxes get scrapped and the benefits of GST begin to spread, those states who lacked advantage would find themselves at the same level playing field with those states who dominated trade before. So both trade gaps and income gaps will begin to reduce across states making India a homogeneous country economically. India needs to remain diverse in cultures but not in incomes. And GST will help promote it.

ದಾಹ ತೀರಿಸೇ ಮಹಾದಾಯಿ

ಅಂಕಿ-ಅಂಶಗಳು

	ಕರ್ನಾಟಕ	ಗೋವಾ
ಮಹಾದಾಯಿ ನದಿ ಉಗಮ	ಭೀಮಗಢ,  ಕರ್ನಾಟಕ
ಉದ್ದ (ಕಿ.ಮೀ)	29	52
ನೀರು ಸಂಗ್ರಹ (ಟಿ.ಎಂ.ಸಿ)	44	176
ಸಮುದ್ರಕ್ಕೆ ಹರಿದು ಹೋಗುತ್ತಿರುವ ನೀರು (ಟಿ.ಎಂ.ಸಿ)		200
ಕಳಸಾ-ಬಂಡೂರಿ ಕುಡಿಯುವ ನೀರು ಯೋಜನೆ (ಟಿ.ಎಂ.ಸಿ)	7.56
ಅವಶ್ಯಕತೆ (ಕರ್ನಾಟಕದಲ್ಲಿ ಸಂಗ್ರಹಗೊಂಡಿದ್ದು ಕರ್ನಾಟಕದ ಉಪಯೋಗಕ್ಕೆ)	17%

(Data Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandovi_River)

ಇದೆಯೇ ಪರಿಸರಕ್ಕೆ ಹಾನಿ?

ಸಮುದ್ರಕ್ಕೆ ಹರಿದು ಹೋಗುತ್ತಿರುವ ನೀರು 200 ಟಿ.ಎಂ.ಸಿ. ಯಲ್ಲಿ ಕುಡಿಯುವ ನೀರಿಗಾಗಿ ಬಳಕೆಯಾಗುವ ಪ್ರಮಾಣ ಕೇವಲ 7.56 ಟಿ.ಎಂ.ಸಿ. ಮಾತ್ರ. ನಾಲ್ಕು ಪ್ರತಿಶತ (೪%) ನೀರು, ಸಮುದ್ರಕ್ಕೆ ಕಡಿಮೆ ಹರಿದು ಹೋದರೆ ಪರಿಸರಕ್ಕೆ ಯಾವ ಹಾನಿಯಾದೀತು?

ಹಾಗಾದರೆ ಯಾರಿದಕ್ಕೇ ಅಡ್ಡಿ?

ನೆರೆ ರಾಜ್ಯದ ಸಾಮಾನ್ಯ ಜನತೆ ಕುಡಿಯುವ ನೀರಿನ ಯೋಜನೆಗೆ ಪ್ರತಿರೋಧ ನಡೆಸರು. ಆದರೆ ಅವರ ಜೊತೆ ಸರಿಯಾದ ರೀತಿಯ ಮಾಹಿತಿ ಸಂಹವನೆಯ ಅವಶ್ಯಕತೆ ಇದೆ.  ಎಲ್ಲಕಿಂತ ಮುಖ್ಯವಾಗಿ ಅಲ್ಲಿಯ ರಾಜಕಾರಣಿಗಳಿಗೆ, ನಾವು ಕೇಳುತ್ತಿರುವುದು ಸಹಾಯ ಅಲ್ಲ ಬದಲಿಗೆ ಅದು ನಮ್ಮ ಹಕ್ಕು ಎನ್ನುವ ಸಂದೇಶ ತಲುಪಬೇಕು.

ಅದು ಯಾರ ಕರ್ತವ್ಯ?

ಅದು ನಮ್ಮ ನಾಯಕರು, ನಮ್ಮ ಜನ ಪ್ರತಿನಿಧಿಗಳು ಮಾಡಬೇಕಾದ ಕೆಲಸ.

Himalayan Calling

How did the pull begin?

It was couple of years ago when on vacation with family at Mussorie, I saw the signboard showing Gangotri to be at 100+ kms. From the top of the hotel where we had stayed, Himalayan mountain ranges looked enchanting. I thought I should go there sometime. A year before that natural disaster had struck Kedarnath. And a year later, rains seemed to bring more harm but they did damage at the other end of hill ranges, in Kashmir. After one more year, I had to scrap the plan to visit Char Dham due to heavy rain forecast. It did rain heavily. But the videos I had watched of those regions had created a calling in me. I was prepared mentally fully and just waiting for the opportunistic moment. And it came this year.

Not a good start

A flight from Bangalore to Delhi, then another flight to Dehradun landed us in Uttarakhand swiftly. But when we were at Delhi Airport, there was the news of heavy rain and the road to Badarinath being blocked. And a whatsapp image sent by my wife showed a newspaper article of cloud burst killing twenty in the route we are supposed to travel. But there was no looking back as we had already arrived close to where we wanted to go. We had to wait for couple of hours in Dehradun to board a cab. Our journey on wheels began but we had to return from two of the routes to where we started due to a land slide causing traffic jam in one and a stream overflowing the bridge on another route. Third route took us out of Dehradun and by the afternoon, we were stopped by a massive landslide on the way to Yamunotri. An earth mover was doing a heroic act to clear the way which took more than four hours. Not a good start but I thought tomorrow is a new day. And Gods smiled at us.

Yamunotri

Next day morning, we began the 6 km up hill trek to Yamunotri. What a place Yamuna has chosen to begin her journey. After walking up around 4 kms, I had to slow down my pace and take frequent rests to catch up with breathing needs. It almost took two hours for us to reach the temple from base. A bath at Suraj Kund helped to let go of all the physical tireness and made us pleasant again. It has been said in the religious texts that visit to this temple will make one get rid of fear of death. I thought otherwise. Anyone scared of death would not be willing to come here. Everything from nature’s cooperation to driver’s carefulness to your physical strength should fall in place to make this happen. But it is worth the effort. In the wild danger lies the uncommon beauty as we call it ‘Rudra Ramaneeya’. After getting down the hills, we stayed at Barkot, a sleepy town. And the views from our hotel room appeared like a heaven unfolding in front of us. Floating white clouds had covered the green mountains. Such a clean atmosphere!

Gangotri

Not much hardship was needed to reach Gangotri as the vehicles can close to the temple. We dropped the baggage into the room, took a towel, walked towards the river bank to take a dip in Bhagirathi River. Water was really cold, probably less than 10 degree C. A quick dip in that ice cold water refreshed me. Cold water bath though looks difficult in the beginning, become bearable as the body adjusts and we begin to notice its magical power of putting one into a good mood. Changing into new clothes, we entered the temple and we were othe only visitors during those late afternoon hours. Then we went for shopping, there are numerous small shops along the street selling idols, pooja materials etc. Our taxi driver was a learned fellow and he had a guru living in Gangotri. Along with him we went on to meet Swami Sundaranand. A mountaineer turned yogi, Swami Sundaranand is already in his nineties, did not talk much. Photos of his in the ashram gave us an idea of what he was like fifty years ago. As we returned to room, sleep was waiting to take control on our bodies.

Kedarnath

Journey from Gangotri to Phata helipad took almost whole day. Stuffed with Aloo Paraatha for breakfast on the way, it was long journey for us. And to give company, Lata Mangeshkar was singing melodious songs for us through car audio. As we reached the helipad, it was getting dark. We booked the tickets for helicopter ride, took a room in the same campus and ordered food in nearby canteen. I slept so well that I did not know how the night had passed. In the morning next day, though we were ready early in the morning, we had to wait for our turn. When it came, I got seat next to pilot in the helicopter. Before getting in I was instructed not to pull any instruments or distract the pilot. It was just eight minutes ride through the beautiful valley. I could see the long walkway but I was mesmerized with the setting of beautiful hills. I remembered reading how Himalayan mountains got formed as Indian sub-continent hit Asian plate. Those formations were in front of my eyes. Reading provides with the information but witnessing it through senses like touch, feel and climb is a different experience. Again in this temple too, visitors were not too numerous. We had a good darshan as there was no hurry to move out quickly. Coming outside, I started noticing the set-up. The temple has tall Mountains in the backdrop which are snow claded in the top. Those glaciers melt down to become the rivers Mandakini and Saraswati. They both meet near by temple and travel downwards. The whole atmosphere is cool and calm. Here one has to put no efforts to meditate as there are no obstructions and the set-up is encouraging. After taking a look at the surroundings, I felt like real god lies in that setting of nature. This experience would have led Pandava’s to build the temple (if Mahabharata had happened) and Adi Shankara to revive it.

The journey downward began on the horse. It was not a comfortable experience so we decided to get down of horse and rather walk down. Three to four hours of walk took us to Gaurikund. We got into cab again to move towards our next destination. Chopta, a village where stayed during night, is said to be one of places of interest to tourists. When he had reached there, it was completely dark and we hardly could see what lied few feet away from us. So we decided to retire for the day. I looked at my pedometer, it was showing past 20k steps. I had never walked this much before. Next day morning, as we were short on time, we decided to move forward rather than exploring Chopta.

Badarinath

It was late afternoon when we had arrived at Badarinath. Found a room near to temple, unpacked our luggage to pick towels to take bath in hot water kund. Water was steaming hot, we had to mix it with cold water in a bucket to take bath. Next we headed to darshan. In all the temples we had visited, this is where we could find sizeable number of travelers. After darshan, we sat along with the group of people listening to bhajan. Two hours passed like minutes. It was time to shut temple, we came out and headed to a restaurant. Our journey was coming to an end. Our Char Dham darshan got over though it started with lots of uncertainties.

Next day morning we got up up quite early, again we took bath in kund, went into temple and spent couple of hours there. I had found peace in sitting idle near to Adi Shankar’s idol in the temple premises. We got back to room, checked out from room and informed our cab driver to drop us at Rishikesh.

Rishikesh, Haridwar and B2B

On the return journey, at Devprayag, we got down to take some pictures of two rivers – Bhagirathi and Alakananda meeting to become Ganga. Had we time I wished we would have spent some time in this place. We reached Rishikesh during twilight hours. We had climbed down from all those tall mountains which had fascinatingly attracted me. Rishikesh appeared dull and lacked all the soul comforting things which the hills offered. After visiting Jhula’s, I bought few books authored by Sivananda, a yogi who lived and built a big ashram in Rishikesh.

Next day we had arrived in Haridwar. We went to Har ki Paudi, took dip in Ganga and waited till evening to watch picturesque Ganga Aarti. Indian civilization has grown up on the banks of Ganga, though people were scattered over time, they never forgot motherly Ganga. Go to any corner of India, you would find a girl named Ganga. When people offer pooja any water source (including wells), they call it Ganga Puja. Such is the influence of Ganga. Many Hindus believe it is sacred to offer last riots at the banks of Ganga, this was the place they were born and it is Ganga they want to merge with.

Taking overnight bus to Delhi and then by early morning flight we were back in Bangalore.

Aftermath

The days we were in Char Dham was like life’s excitement at the peak. Now the normal life looks so predictable and unexciting. It is like after you count lakh rupees, counting thousand rupees does not seem exciting. But the memory has become rich. My eyes had seen the most beautiful places of this world. My mind had understood what it means by calm and serenity. My body had learnt to cope with physical stress and cold environments. I may go there again but before that I need to do what I learnt there, to walk more, to take cold baths and to meditate.

Idea of India

What is India? Is it a geographical boundary? Does not it include the sky above this land? How about mountains and rivers? Or is it about people living here? Or is it about their culture? That is the question Nehru posed to common people before India had gained independence. About twenty years before him, Mahatma Gandhi had asked this question to himself and the idea of India was born. He got two more supporting personalities in Nehru and Patel who were equally committed to the idea of India. They struggled throughout their lives to realize their dream.

Today we are educated enough to say India is not just a geography or people alone but the culmination of all of it and the evolution of a civilization. But few decades ago before India’s independence, someone had to take the initiative to feed this idea of India into the people who were ruled by foreigners. That job was done by the trio – Gandhi, Nehru and Patel, who traveled all over India tirelessly and waited long enough until their idea was sold and created a momentum to prepare India to rule herself.

Long before them, couple of thousand years ago, foundation of was India was laid out and reinforced by many people ranging from Buddha to Emperor Ashoka, Gupta to Mughal kingdoms, Adi Shankara to Swami Vivekananda. There was no dearth of patriotic personalities in the history of India. But the idea of modern India had to be revolutionized and it was well done by Gandhi, Nehru and Patel. I don’t credit success to only these three people but there were lots of others who were fiercely loyal to idea of India like Bhagat Singh and Subhash Chandra Bose. But the protagonists or the successors chosen by history were Gandhi, Nehru and Patel. Two of them did not live long enough to see what they fought for. It was just Nehru who emerged as sole successor of every single freedom fighter’s struggle and ruled independent India long enough to hold the record which is not broken yet. All decisions Nehru and his colleague and mentor took and the compromises they had to agree to were necessary for the welfare of India. Without these three people, the idea of India would have been void. If you think Nehru’s socialism was bad for India, think again. If Govt. did not have a greater control, many of us who studied in Govt. schools would not have had access to education in case Nehru had preferred privatization over socialism. I don’t say we can’t criticize Nehru’s actions but before we do that we need to get back to those times and think how much of India’s population had access to education and entrepreneurship. Hope you get the reasoning behind making India a socialist country for few decades.

I strongly believe that Gandhi, Nehru and Patel were committed to idea of India than the ideology of a political party they belonged to. If Nehru was alive and in power today, he would have defined the foreign relationships of India like no one else of his contemporaries would have done. Similarly, if Patel was in the the helm, he would have been more efficient than today’s Modi.

Identifying these historic personalities with political ideologies and seeing them in wrong shadows would be a grave mistake. It is like ridiculing your own birth which is equivalent to doubting foundation of modern India. Hope we overcome that and celebrate the success of making of India.